Ok, it's been a fair while since I last posted, sorry if that's bothered anyone. Thing is, I do get a lot of ideas for blog posts, but then I get to writing and can't find enough to put on screen. So, here's some stuff that sounded much longer in my head than they would have been:
1) Movie tie-in games can only stop sucking if they are based on movies that are based on something else, like a comic or a book. At least then there is a wider subject matter to delve into to make up the gameplay hours; games based on original movies only have the plot of teh film to go on, and 2 hours of audio-visual media doesn't translate into 15+ hours of interactive. Mad props to (most of) the Harry Potter games for making a good effort at this. Shame on the Batman Begins tie-in for not even trying.
2) Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines is a great game, and stands up well even after 7 years. The folks who use their own time and expertise to patch the damn thing just so it works for other people need to be given a job by someone, if they haven't already. Seriously, the massive bugs were the one thing that held this game back, and they are all but gone now. You have no reason not to buy this game, it's on Steam for cheap.
3) On the other side, Spellforce is a good game that has not aged well. The graphics are sketchy, the voice acting is lame, and it re-uses too many character models. However, the mechanics are really good, especially for its time - I'm surprised that not as many games have tried to copy it. Still, it's tough playing through it now given that it looks like a duck's arse. However, it's damn cheap right now, download it if your into RTSs.
4) I am not 100% sure it is worth buying the other two Deus Ex games for the sake of the latest one. I didn't have the computer or money for the first game, Invisible War passed me by, and now Human Revolution is this huge thing that everyone is playing and I've been completely left out. This is not me moping over not being with the in-crowd, I'm just lamenting the fact that yet another current-event game is slipping past because I wasn't on-the-ball enough to get in there when everyone else did. If it turns out that you don't need to have played the first game to understand the third one, I will be very happy :)
5) I'm don't know how I feel about stealth games. See, I think the application of stealth in a combat situation is awesome, and it makes for very impressive action sequences in films. However, I'm not an incredibly stealthy person, and I tend to f**k up the sneaky bits in a lot of games (it's the reason I never got past the first dungeon in Zelda: The Wind Waker) due to a clumsy attitude towards hiding and a nervous disposition in the face of danger. However, it seems that many stealth games have heeded to call of klutzes like me, and have made it possible to be all sneaky-like and not worry about getting caught - in the sense that when you do get caught, you won't immediately die a horrible death or get captured. Games like Splinter Cell: Conviction, Assassin's Creed and Batman: Arkham Asylum seem to represent a "stealth-made-easy" herd of action games.
As overjoyed as I am to be able to be a sneaky as anyone is a game, it does make me wonder if any of the challenge has been taken any from the real stealth aficionados, the master burglars of Thief, the silent assassins - no disguises required - of Hitman (another game I like) and the commando captains of Metal Gear Solid; how do they feel about the quick-cover systems and new-found character survivability?
Am I just riding a gravy train to Easytown that disrupts their service to the Land of True Skill? Makes me wonder...
Well, that was therapeutic, glad to those thoughts out of my mind and out there. I do like that having no clear format to this blog means I don't have to deliver any minimum amount of work on any given topic...good God I'm spoilt.
Comments if ya got 'em :)
Wednesday, 31 August 2011
Tuesday, 5 July 2011
Quick Question
Hey, quick question for anyone who reads this...who reads this?
Specifically, do I have any willing regular (well, my version of regular) readers who genuinely like reading what I have to say on all this stuff? Because I really only 'advertise' this blog through Facebook and Twitter, most of the people who know about it are friends of mine. The inevitable paranoid idea that develops from that is that nearly everyone who looks at this blog is a friend of mine who politely clicks the links on their feed out of friendly duty. Which is really nice, but it makes the whole exercise seem a little futile if no-one really cares.
Or it would, if my blog stats didn't regularly show readers from outside the UK, meaning that there exist people who do either stumble onto this blog and/or come back out of real interest. Which is cool. Plus, I don't think I would have got to 500 views on sympathy alone.
So, wherever you are, if you read this blog out of real interest, either regularly or just whenever, please post a comment so I know I'm not doing this for nothing :)
Thanks a lot, guys.
Specifically, do I have any willing regular (well, my version of regular) readers who genuinely like reading what I have to say on all this stuff? Because I really only 'advertise' this blog through Facebook and Twitter, most of the people who know about it are friends of mine. The inevitable paranoid idea that develops from that is that nearly everyone who looks at this blog is a friend of mine who politely clicks the links on their feed out of friendly duty. Which is really nice, but it makes the whole exercise seem a little futile if no-one really cares.
Or it would, if my blog stats didn't regularly show readers from outside the UK, meaning that there exist people who do either stumble onto this blog and/or come back out of real interest. Which is cool. Plus, I don't think I would have got to 500 views on sympathy alone.
So, wherever you are, if you read this blog out of real interest, either regularly or just whenever, please post a comment so I know I'm not doing this for nothing :)
Thanks a lot, guys.
Saturday, 25 June 2011
Recognising Innovation - Gunsmithing
I saw something in a comment thread today, and it made me a little bit cross. Not cross in a reply-to-the-comment sort of way, just in a blog-that-the-guy-will-never-read sort of way.
As most gamers are want to do, I frequent The Escapist during my jaunts into the Internet. One of the videos in there was the reveal trailer for the Gunsmith mode which will be included in Ghost Recon: Future Soldier. If you haven't seen this then I suggest you look up this trailer and the E3 demonstration. To say it made me excited about how the Kinect can be used for things beyond dancing games would be an understatement. I was practically foaming at the mouth, and I've never even played a Ghost Recon game (the image of someone who has watching this trailer then collapsing in frantic ecstasy comes to mind, which dampens the experience somewhat).
The comment thread contained an entry which described the Gunsmith mode as "a gimmick". I had initially mixed feelings about this, which have gradually moved closer to the negative. For those who don't know and didn't go to Google when I suggested it, Gunsmith will be the bit of Future Soldier where the player can customise their weapons, down to the smallest component - from barrels to gas parts. The controls are really cool-looking as I see it: the game uses a Kinect to allow the player to disassemble weapons, view and switch out parts, and test the weapon on a shooting range using hand signals and voice commands. From the look of demos it amounts to the level of the computer from Star Trek - you can even ask the game to optimise your weapon for a particular purpose e.g. long range, damage output etc. The use of technology looks damn impressive and if it works out then it'll set a new standard for controls in a shooter.
And then some jackass calls it a gimmick. This sort of language is starting to grate on me a little. Yes, there are some features to game which are just gimmicks, tacked-on extras to make a game look original with minimal effort. For example, the gimmick to Madworld was the fact that it was a violent adult game on the Wii (if it had been on any other console, it would have slipped way under the radar). However, some new and different game features are genuinely going for innovation, but get thrown in with the turkeys, and it gets on my wick.
It seems to be that many will only accept a game as at all original if it's damn near 100% new. Take Little Big Planet, for example. That game was applauded for being new, and rightly so; it was unlike anything on the market at that time. It's player-created-content focus was fresh and original.
Future Soldier isn't going that far (only so much you can do with a sequel), but I think that the developers deserve praise for really trying here. It's unfair for people to write Gunsmith off as a gimmick at this stage, especially considering the precedent for mistakes that word has: the motion controls in the Wii were called a gimmick way back when, but it ended up starting the biggest revolution in gaming hardware since the DualShock (which I imagine received similar jeers prior to its release).
I'll of course withhold full judgement until release day, but if Gunsmith works out well then the guys at Ubisoft should get major kudos. It's a sad fact that contemporary games show such a lack of creative vision, we should have more appreciation for when someone actually puts the effort in. The Kinect has such potential as a piece of hardware, and it's been squandered for the most part by developers (by the look of the current range of titles, you'd be forgiven for thinking the Kinect was a dance-mat). Ubisoft are trying to put it to good use (as are others, it should be pointed out - the coming year or so will really show us whether or not the Kinect can be used properly), so I say cut 'em some slack you guys. Innovation looks to be on their minds, and innovation is our watchword. Recognise it when it's there.
Now, if the game does turn out to be a samey shooter and that Gunsmith is in fact a useless tack-on, then fair play to you. Just do me a favour and save if for the release. I like to live in hope for the future.
Comments down below :)
Ghost Recon: Future Soldier is the property of Ubisoft.
As most gamers are want to do, I frequent The Escapist during my jaunts into the Internet. One of the videos in there was the reveal trailer for the Gunsmith mode which will be included in Ghost Recon: Future Soldier. If you haven't seen this then I suggest you look up this trailer and the E3 demonstration. To say it made me excited about how the Kinect can be used for things beyond dancing games would be an understatement. I was practically foaming at the mouth, and I've never even played a Ghost Recon game (the image of someone who has watching this trailer then collapsing in frantic ecstasy comes to mind, which dampens the experience somewhat).
The comment thread contained an entry which described the Gunsmith mode as "a gimmick". I had initially mixed feelings about this, which have gradually moved closer to the negative. For those who don't know and didn't go to Google when I suggested it, Gunsmith will be the bit of Future Soldier where the player can customise their weapons, down to the smallest component - from barrels to gas parts. The controls are really cool-looking as I see it: the game uses a Kinect to allow the player to disassemble weapons, view and switch out parts, and test the weapon on a shooting range using hand signals and voice commands. From the look of demos it amounts to the level of the computer from Star Trek - you can even ask the game to optimise your weapon for a particular purpose e.g. long range, damage output etc. The use of technology looks damn impressive and if it works out then it'll set a new standard for controls in a shooter.
And then some jackass calls it a gimmick. This sort of language is starting to grate on me a little. Yes, there are some features to game which are just gimmicks, tacked-on extras to make a game look original with minimal effort. For example, the gimmick to Madworld was the fact that it was a violent adult game on the Wii (if it had been on any other console, it would have slipped way under the radar). However, some new and different game features are genuinely going for innovation, but get thrown in with the turkeys, and it gets on my wick.
It seems to be that many will only accept a game as at all original if it's damn near 100% new. Take Little Big Planet, for example. That game was applauded for being new, and rightly so; it was unlike anything on the market at that time. It's player-created-content focus was fresh and original.
Future Soldier isn't going that far (only so much you can do with a sequel), but I think that the developers deserve praise for really trying here. It's unfair for people to write Gunsmith off as a gimmick at this stage, especially considering the precedent for mistakes that word has: the motion controls in the Wii were called a gimmick way back when, but it ended up starting the biggest revolution in gaming hardware since the DualShock (which I imagine received similar jeers prior to its release).
I'll of course withhold full judgement until release day, but if Gunsmith works out well then the guys at Ubisoft should get major kudos. It's a sad fact that contemporary games show such a lack of creative vision, we should have more appreciation for when someone actually puts the effort in. The Kinect has such potential as a piece of hardware, and it's been squandered for the most part by developers (by the look of the current range of titles, you'd be forgiven for thinking the Kinect was a dance-mat). Ubisoft are trying to put it to good use (as are others, it should be pointed out - the coming year or so will really show us whether or not the Kinect can be used properly), so I say cut 'em some slack you guys. Innovation looks to be on their minds, and innovation is our watchword. Recognise it when it's there.
Now, if the game does turn out to be a samey shooter and that Gunsmith is in fact a useless tack-on, then fair play to you. Just do me a favour and save if for the release. I like to live in hope for the future.
Comments down below :)
Ghost Recon: Future Soldier is the property of Ubisoft.
Friday, 10 June 2011
Duke Nukem Forever Review
Wow, first proper review of a full video game :)
Ok, we've waited 15 years for this, I'll cut to the chase: Good but not great. C+ to B-, depending on how you like your shooters (and games in general), and how much nostalgia you have for the Duke series in particular.
Having been born in the early 90s and not really getting into gaming until at least 2000 [that's right: the world has been anticipating this game longer than I have been gaming], Duke Nukem did not form any part of my formative years, and therefore has no place in my nostalgia. I'd like to think that makes me a lot more impartial but, while I have played a Duke game, I won't see this through the lens of someone who has been really waiting for this. Whether that's an advantage or a handicap I'll let you decide, but it did worry me that I might not "get" it as much as I otherwise would.
Not so, however. The game is pretty open and broad in terms of what there is to get: the narrative is simple [aliens invade, you kill the aliens], the jokes are mostly pop/gamer culture references and anything that refers to the Duke Nukem games is pretty easy to understand, just like the games themselves I'd wager. The gameplay is just as simple, but not quite what I was expecting. Given it's pedigree, I expected this to be a basic run-and-gun shooter throughout, with all the originality carried by the jokes - yes, the humour is there and it's good, including (Spoiler Alert) a chuckle-worthy send up of Christian Bale's notorious rant - I was pleasantly surprised with the other things to do. The shooting sections are broken up at intervals with driving, platforming and even a bit of light puzzle solving. It got me thinking of all the best shooters of today, particularly Call of Duty and it's ilk: they're good fun, but all you do is kill things in those games. Duke Nukem Forever, while not nearly the smartest game on the market does provide challenges other than aiming, moving and ducking for cover.
The game world is used particularly well for this. The world itself is fun to look at and listen to, with things to see, people to talk to and buttons to push. While this isn't the first game to do this by a long shot, DNF actively encourages exploration of this world with rewards in the form of boosts to your health bar, just for playing slots/benching pressing/admiring yourself in the mirror. The fun doesn't stop at shooting the baddies, which is nice to see in a generation where only still it seem pure platformers and RPGs encourage that kind of messing around, and it doesn't need a massive sandbox to do it.
The tone follows much in the footsteps of it's predecessors in being a very boy's-own tale of heroism, without being at all serious. The developers have recognised the status of Duke Nukem as a character, and play on that well in the game. The events take place in a world that admires the hero for real in the way that his real-life fans admire him ironically. Duke has always been a caricature, a combination of boyhood fantasies, the traditional ideal man and even the American Dream parodied to hell; a completely non-introspective chauvinistic action-man. In this game, however, it goes up a level: Duke has taken all of that, and made something of it. He has the admiration of billions, all the money he could want, women dropping to their knees at his feet. Hell, the game starts with him receiving favours from twins in a huge house filled with statues of himself. He is lionised, in this world, for qualities that in real-life would get him branded a jerk and a lowlife - and that's just funny! It's the level of fame he has in the gamer world, come to life. Practically everything the NPC cast has to say is along the lines of "Thank God you're here!" or "You are the most awesomest thing EVER!" Duke comes back with a pure-90's one-liner, and the game moves on, never losing the feeling that you are God's gift to mankind.
The game isn't without faults, of course. The graphics aren't the best thing going: the textures are occasionally bland and flat, and objects appear blurry at short distances (I had the graphics set on Ultra; the game ran well, but it didn't look as good as that might sound). While enemies vary reasonably well (the fact that they're pigs mostly excuses the no-more-than-adequate AI), the things you kill them with don't. Out of the half-a-dozen-ish weapons I saw, I regularly used only half of them. The particularly special weapons (including a Freeze Gun) are fun at first as a novelty, but were nearly always so badly designed that I dropped them almost instantly.
Still, I can honestly say I have had fun with Duke Nukem Forever. It was a good laugh, and there was always something interesting going on. Whether I was shooting, jumping or getting shrunk to the size of an action figure, I always felt like an action hero. While no-where near perfect, and very little to justify all those years in development, I can't deny that I enjoyed myself, which is no less than I asked for. I'd recommend it to those who like a good varied game without much narrative weight. Can't say how well it would go down with an old-school Duke Nukem enthusiast - depends on how hard you're holding onto those rose-tinted specs I suppose.
At time of writing, I haven't quite finished the game [damn near, though], but I will be getting it done within the next couple of days (got some things going in the meantime) and if my opinions change at that point then there will certainly be a post script underneath.
Duke Nukem Forever is the property of 2K Games, and was developed by 3D Realms and Gearbox
Ok, we've waited 15 years for this, I'll cut to the chase: Good but not great. C+ to B-, depending on how you like your shooters (and games in general), and how much nostalgia you have for the Duke series in particular.
Having been born in the early 90s and not really getting into gaming until at least 2000 [that's right: the world has been anticipating this game longer than I have been gaming], Duke Nukem did not form any part of my formative years, and therefore has no place in my nostalgia. I'd like to think that makes me a lot more impartial but, while I have played a Duke game, I won't see this through the lens of someone who has been really waiting for this. Whether that's an advantage or a handicap I'll let you decide, but it did worry me that I might not "get" it as much as I otherwise would.
Not so, however. The game is pretty open and broad in terms of what there is to get: the narrative is simple [aliens invade, you kill the aliens], the jokes are mostly pop/gamer culture references and anything that refers to the Duke Nukem games is pretty easy to understand, just like the games themselves I'd wager. The gameplay is just as simple, but not quite what I was expecting. Given it's pedigree, I expected this to be a basic run-and-gun shooter throughout, with all the originality carried by the jokes - yes, the humour is there and it's good, including (Spoiler Alert) a chuckle-worthy send up of Christian Bale's notorious rant - I was pleasantly surprised with the other things to do. The shooting sections are broken up at intervals with driving, platforming and even a bit of light puzzle solving. It got me thinking of all the best shooters of today, particularly Call of Duty and it's ilk: they're good fun, but all you do is kill things in those games. Duke Nukem Forever, while not nearly the smartest game on the market does provide challenges other than aiming, moving and ducking for cover.
The game world is used particularly well for this. The world itself is fun to look at and listen to, with things to see, people to talk to and buttons to push. While this isn't the first game to do this by a long shot, DNF actively encourages exploration of this world with rewards in the form of boosts to your health bar, just for playing slots/benching pressing/admiring yourself in the mirror. The fun doesn't stop at shooting the baddies, which is nice to see in a generation where only still it seem pure platformers and RPGs encourage that kind of messing around, and it doesn't need a massive sandbox to do it.
The tone follows much in the footsteps of it's predecessors in being a very boy's-own tale of heroism, without being at all serious. The developers have recognised the status of Duke Nukem as a character, and play on that well in the game. The events take place in a world that admires the hero for real in the way that his real-life fans admire him ironically. Duke has always been a caricature, a combination of boyhood fantasies, the traditional ideal man and even the American Dream parodied to hell; a completely non-introspective chauvinistic action-man. In this game, however, it goes up a level: Duke has taken all of that, and made something of it. He has the admiration of billions, all the money he could want, women dropping to their knees at his feet. Hell, the game starts with him receiving favours from twins in a huge house filled with statues of himself. He is lionised, in this world, for qualities that in real-life would get him branded a jerk and a lowlife - and that's just funny! It's the level of fame he has in the gamer world, come to life. Practically everything the NPC cast has to say is along the lines of "Thank God you're here!" or "You are the most awesomest thing EVER!" Duke comes back with a pure-90's one-liner, and the game moves on, never losing the feeling that you are God's gift to mankind.
The game isn't without faults, of course. The graphics aren't the best thing going: the textures are occasionally bland and flat, and objects appear blurry at short distances (I had the graphics set on Ultra; the game ran well, but it didn't look as good as that might sound). While enemies vary reasonably well (the fact that they're pigs mostly excuses the no-more-than-adequate AI), the things you kill them with don't. Out of the half-a-dozen-ish weapons I saw, I regularly used only half of them. The particularly special weapons (including a Freeze Gun) are fun at first as a novelty, but were nearly always so badly designed that I dropped them almost instantly.
Still, I can honestly say I have had fun with Duke Nukem Forever. It was a good laugh, and there was always something interesting going on. Whether I was shooting, jumping or getting shrunk to the size of an action figure, I always felt like an action hero. While no-where near perfect, and very little to justify all those years in development, I can't deny that I enjoyed myself, which is no less than I asked for. I'd recommend it to those who like a good varied game without much narrative weight. Can't say how well it would go down with an old-school Duke Nukem enthusiast - depends on how hard you're holding onto those rose-tinted specs I suppose.
At time of writing, I haven't quite finished the game [damn near, though], but I will be getting it done within the next couple of days (got some things going in the meantime) and if my opinions change at that point then there will certainly be a post script underneath.
Duke Nukem Forever is the property of 2K Games, and was developed by 3D Realms and Gearbox
Monday, 6 June 2011
SWars-gasm
This...is...the single greatest cutscene in the history of mankind. It is also the greatest thing to be made in the name of Star Wars. I am so damn impressed and excited, and I was already impressed with and excited by this game.
Watch this! DO EET: http://www.swtor.com/media/trailers/return
The game is Star Wars: The Old Republic. For the uninitiated (though if you've more than a passing interest in games, you won't be), that's the Star Wars Massively Multiplayer Online RPG being developed by Bioware. It's been in the works a while now, and while I've not kept myself 100% abreast of every detail, I do like to watch the trailers, which include such beauties as Deceived and Hope. They are animated masterpieces, and easily top most action scenes from the films. This new one, entitled "Return" is not just any trailer. It's the opening cinematic to game itself...and and what a f***ing opening!
First, we have a smuggler with a cowboy hat and duster coat. This guy just waltzes onscreen and manages to be the coolest, most dashing rogue since Han Solo himself set the bar for cool, dashing rogues. Two of other characters, the female Jedi and the Trooper are easily recognisable from Hope. There's a swift attack from the Sith (the Jedi Master wasting no time deducing what's going on, nice to see the Jedi on the ball) and it all kicks off.
The next bit will be what I point to when I say that EVERYONE will want to play the Smuggler class upon release. This dude just eats and breathes cool. Sure, that Trooper is badass here and in his previous appearance (the guy goes at a Sith with a knife - that just screams "don't mess"), but it's a little overshadowed by the gunslinger; the Browncoats will be all over that.
The last part is the greatest lightsaber battle ever. The first part is awesome all by itself, and it could have ended there, but then...TRIPLE SABER ACTION!!! God damn, that's just hot. I don't think words can do it justice, you really have to see this for yourself, guys. There's a bit of dogfighting, which is pretty nice, but it doesn't carry on too long; time is the difference between an epic climax and just jumping the shark. This trailer gets the right one.
I have to say, I always thought that if any MMO would persuade me to fork over the dosh it would be The Old Republic, but now I am just too excited. I hope this remains the open cinematic for the final game, because this would provide the perfect mood for any session of Star Wars goodness. My only lament is that we must wait a few more months for it...
Star Wars: The Old Republic is the property of Lucasarts, developed by Bioware
Watch this! DO EET: http://www.swtor.com/media/trailers/return
The game is Star Wars: The Old Republic. For the uninitiated (though if you've more than a passing interest in games, you won't be), that's the Star Wars Massively Multiplayer Online RPG being developed by Bioware. It's been in the works a while now, and while I've not kept myself 100% abreast of every detail, I do like to watch the trailers, which include such beauties as Deceived and Hope. They are animated masterpieces, and easily top most action scenes from the films. This new one, entitled "Return" is not just any trailer. It's the opening cinematic to game itself...and and what a f***ing opening!
First, we have a smuggler with a cowboy hat and duster coat. This guy just waltzes onscreen and manages to be the coolest, most dashing rogue since Han Solo himself set the bar for cool, dashing rogues. Two of other characters, the female Jedi and the Trooper are easily recognisable from Hope. There's a swift attack from the Sith (the Jedi Master wasting no time deducing what's going on, nice to see the Jedi on the ball) and it all kicks off.
The next bit will be what I point to when I say that EVERYONE will want to play the Smuggler class upon release. This dude just eats and breathes cool. Sure, that Trooper is badass here and in his previous appearance (the guy goes at a Sith with a knife - that just screams "don't mess"), but it's a little overshadowed by the gunslinger; the Browncoats will be all over that.
The last part is the greatest lightsaber battle ever. The first part is awesome all by itself, and it could have ended there, but then...TRIPLE SABER ACTION!!! God damn, that's just hot. I don't think words can do it justice, you really have to see this for yourself, guys. There's a bit of dogfighting, which is pretty nice, but it doesn't carry on too long; time is the difference between an epic climax and just jumping the shark. This trailer gets the right one.
I have to say, I always thought that if any MMO would persuade me to fork over the dosh it would be The Old Republic, but now I am just too excited. I hope this remains the open cinematic for the final game, because this would provide the perfect mood for any session of Star Wars goodness. My only lament is that we must wait a few more months for it...
Star Wars: The Old Republic is the property of Lucasarts, developed by Bioware
Monday, 30 May 2011
Alice Combat Trailer
Ok, the 14th of June release date for Alice: Madness Returns is nearly here, barely more than a fortnight away. I've had my eye on this since the very beginning of this blog, and while I continue to use it as a mild bashing post, I really want to hold out hope for it. I just watched the recent trailer showcasing the combat in more detail. Here it is on The Escapist: http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/view/trailers/3318-Alice-Madness-Returns-Combat
My thoughts? This looks awfully generic in terms of mechanics. You hit them with swift attacks or heavy attacks, use the odd ranged attack, there appears to be form of "rage mode" involved...to be honest, folks, I've seen this too much before. Even the bosses have really obvious weaknesses: hit him while he's doing an attack to stun him and get more hits in? Goodness me, where do they get this from? For a fun example of these sorts of mechanics, see the Lord of the Rings movie games. There were great little hack n' slashers, before we saw too much of this sort of thing.
I have said before that we may have hit a bit of a wall with mechanics design the sense that only serious technological improvement will make more involved and original possible, so that could forgive the slightly boring looking fights...but I think I'll withhold that level of judgement for now.
I will point out that the aesthetic design is still fantastic. I could take any screenshot here and frame it - and I would. The bad guys and environments are gorgeous in their own unique way. Even the interface fits nicely with the rest of the screen, although I'm not sure whether the wrought-iron things at the edges are part of the game or just there for the trailer.
I do want this game to be good, and I don't doubt that Alice will shine as a beacon of great artistic and narrative design...but I want them to surprise me with the gameplay first. Otherwise it's gonna be average at best.
Comments down below :)
Alice: Madness Returns belongs to American McGee and EA. Trailer found on the Escapist.
My thoughts? This looks awfully generic in terms of mechanics. You hit them with swift attacks or heavy attacks, use the odd ranged attack, there appears to be form of "rage mode" involved...to be honest, folks, I've seen this too much before. Even the bosses have really obvious weaknesses: hit him while he's doing an attack to stun him and get more hits in? Goodness me, where do they get this from? For a fun example of these sorts of mechanics, see the Lord of the Rings movie games. There were great little hack n' slashers, before we saw too much of this sort of thing.
I have said before that we may have hit a bit of a wall with mechanics design the sense that only serious technological improvement will make more involved and original possible, so that could forgive the slightly boring looking fights...but I think I'll withhold that level of judgement for now.
I will point out that the aesthetic design is still fantastic. I could take any screenshot here and frame it - and I would. The bad guys and environments are gorgeous in their own unique way. Even the interface fits nicely with the rest of the screen, although I'm not sure whether the wrought-iron things at the edges are part of the game or just there for the trailer.
I do want this game to be good, and I don't doubt that Alice will shine as a beacon of great artistic and narrative design...but I want them to surprise me with the gameplay first. Otherwise it's gonna be average at best.
Comments down below :)
Alice: Madness Returns belongs to American McGee and EA. Trailer found on the Escapist.
Friday, 20 May 2011
Thinking about Portals
I've played Portal 2 recently. Long story short, I enjoyed it a lot. The gameplay was as unique as the first, the puzzles offered just the right amount of challenge - not too easy, not rage quit material - and the narrative was immersive and interesting, with great characters and witty dialogue (I always find it funny that one of the most important game franchises right now is essentially a comedy). It was a bit short, but that really just meant it wasn't over-long. All round, it was a good time.
However, it did make me think back to my original opinions on the first game. That was good too, which was of course surprising for something that was basically tagged onto two more important games in the Orange Box. In fact, I'd say one of the reasons I played Portal was because it came with Team Fortress 2 (same reason I played Half Life 2 at all, no not to completion). It's the other reason that worries me: because I had to.
In nearly all things, particularly the media, there are certain things that crop up that you can't ignore. They are there, like it or loath it, and if you don't watch/read/play, then you are officially BEHIND THE TIMES. I played Portal for a similar reason to why I dragged my self through the DVD of Twilight (rest assured, I didn't go back for New Moon): if I hadn't, I wouldn't have had a handle on something important in modern media. Yes, I said it, Twilight is important, if only in the sense that you need to have engaged in it in some way to get where the rest of the world is at.
It's the same with Portal (and many other games, I should add, but I don't want to develop too big a tangent here). Portal was and still is a big thing, everyone knows it, and even if you don't work in the games industry (and I hope to one day) if you have even a passing interest in games then you need to know what Portal is. I went into playing it knowing this, and I have to say it's what egged me on. If I didn't do this, I wouldn't be able to keep a handle on the state of my industry.
Does that strike anyone else as odd? I've always maintained that if something you want to do ever becomes something you only have to do, you should stop doing it. If a hobby becomes a joyless commitment, you should get out. And sure, I enjoyed the experience, but at the end of the day I was playing Portal because I felt I had to. Surely that's not how you approach a game?
I came into Portal 2 with a similar mindset. "Play this, finish it, because everyone one your course will have done so, and that makes it important." Damn, that's just cynical, to the point at which I'm thankful the game was as (really) good as it turned out, otherwise I might have spent the rest of the week in a state of misanthropic sulking, which isn't good when you're running a Friday D&D game.
I could point to the over-hype from the Portal fandom as a cause for this attitude (jeez guys, it's good but it ain't "the perfect game"), but that would be the easy way. Plus, it would mark it as a problem, when really it's kind of how it works in commercial media. If you want to work in any industry, then damn it, you have to make the effort to keep up. I'm just hoping it doesn't take the fun out of it one day.
What about you? Have you ever felt that keeping up with your professional interests was taking the fun out of it? Comment, by all means :)
Portal, Portal 2, Half Life 2, Team Fortress 2 and The Orange Box are the property of Valve. Twilight and New Moon belong to Stephanie Meyer.
However, it did make me think back to my original opinions on the first game. That was good too, which was of course surprising for something that was basically tagged onto two more important games in the Orange Box. In fact, I'd say one of the reasons I played Portal was because it came with Team Fortress 2 (same reason I played Half Life 2 at all, no not to completion). It's the other reason that worries me: because I had to.
In nearly all things, particularly the media, there are certain things that crop up that you can't ignore. They are there, like it or loath it, and if you don't watch/read/play, then you are officially BEHIND THE TIMES. I played Portal for a similar reason to why I dragged my self through the DVD of Twilight (rest assured, I didn't go back for New Moon): if I hadn't, I wouldn't have had a handle on something important in modern media. Yes, I said it, Twilight is important, if only in the sense that you need to have engaged in it in some way to get where the rest of the world is at.
It's the same with Portal (and many other games, I should add, but I don't want to develop too big a tangent here). Portal was and still is a big thing, everyone knows it, and even if you don't work in the games industry (and I hope to one day) if you have even a passing interest in games then you need to know what Portal is. I went into playing it knowing this, and I have to say it's what egged me on. If I didn't do this, I wouldn't be able to keep a handle on the state of my industry.
Does that strike anyone else as odd? I've always maintained that if something you want to do ever becomes something you only have to do, you should stop doing it. If a hobby becomes a joyless commitment, you should get out. And sure, I enjoyed the experience, but at the end of the day I was playing Portal because I felt I had to. Surely that's not how you approach a game?
I came into Portal 2 with a similar mindset. "Play this, finish it, because everyone one your course will have done so, and that makes it important." Damn, that's just cynical, to the point at which I'm thankful the game was as (really) good as it turned out, otherwise I might have spent the rest of the week in a state of misanthropic sulking, which isn't good when you're running a Friday D&D game.
I could point to the over-hype from the Portal fandom as a cause for this attitude (jeez guys, it's good but it ain't "the perfect game"), but that would be the easy way. Plus, it would mark it as a problem, when really it's kind of how it works in commercial media. If you want to work in any industry, then damn it, you have to make the effort to keep up. I'm just hoping it doesn't take the fun out of it one day.
What about you? Have you ever felt that keeping up with your professional interests was taking the fun out of it? Comment, by all means :)
Portal, Portal 2, Half Life 2, Team Fortress 2 and The Orange Box are the property of Valve. Twilight and New Moon belong to Stephanie Meyer.
Monday, 2 May 2011
Snippets
I occasionally come across things I'd like to write about, but can't find enough to say (unless it's 1am and I feel like rambling; see the previous post). Here's some stuff that has crossed my mind recently:
1) Max Payne 3 needs to be released. I've been replaying the first two, and they were just too damn cool. A really good demonstration of a narrative-focused game that doesn't skimp on the mechanics (Quantic Dream take note). I will point out that Max's gravelly voice, while suited to the character's personality and the style of the game, didn't fit the face until the 2nd game. First time around he looked like John Leguizamo should have been voicing him. I had so much fun diving around and shooting bad guys, while the rich characters and wonderful environments ("wonderful" used here in an odd sense, I realise) helped make the gameplay matter more, rather than the gameplay just providing an alternative to turning the pages of the novel the creators really wanted to write. Yeah, I didn't think much of Heavy Rain.
2) I now dislike Valve a little bit. They forced Troika to release Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines on the same day as Half-Life 2 just because they wanted to have their game out first. Jerks. They killed Troika and the game's sales as far as I'm concerned. Y'know, if you ignore the crippling bugs in the original build of the game. Thank god for the unofficial patch.
3) I really want the world to shut up about Minecraft. Yes, I can see that it's an interesting game, very innovative, I certainly admire Notch for his daring and design work. No, I do not want to pay money for it. Why? Because if I'm going to spend that sheer amount of time in a game, I want more to show for it than a building that does nothing and isn't real. The only project that I really like is that computer someone built in the game, because that shows some expertise and it DOES something. If I wanted a model of the Enterprise, I'd buy one. Why am I so cross about this? Every time I hear about Minecraft or get into a conversation about Minecraft, I keep getting the impression that if I don't love it, I'm somehow wrong in an objective sense. I don't like that because it of course isn't objective. The idea of being dropped into a game with nought but the tools and mechanics and left alone to do what you want is a worthy one to explore, and if that sounds like your cup of tea then fine, more power to you. Go play it. I, however, don't have fun like that. I like a purpose to a game beyond "doing whatever", that's why I hate The Sims. I'll stick to my games that some kind of narrative purpose, and the rest if the gaming world (so it seems) can f@*£ off and play Minecraft.
4) DC Adventures (or Mutants & Masterminds 3rd Edition if you like) looks like a really good game upon reading. If you like role-playing and superheroes, go look for it. If I get a chance to run some of it, I'll let you know how it plays.
5) D&D Heroes of Shadow is also a good book, should appease that player who wants to be evil. I mean, he still can't be, but he can pretend to be. Give him a fringe haircut and let him mope away about how much the world hates him and his magic sword.
Yeah, that's my little bites of opinion there. Comments down below, I imagine someone might just disagree with something :)
1) Max Payne 3 needs to be released. I've been replaying the first two, and they were just too damn cool. A really good demonstration of a narrative-focused game that doesn't skimp on the mechanics (Quantic Dream take note). I will point out that Max's gravelly voice, while suited to the character's personality and the style of the game, didn't fit the face until the 2nd game. First time around he looked like John Leguizamo should have been voicing him. I had so much fun diving around and shooting bad guys, while the rich characters and wonderful environments ("wonderful" used here in an odd sense, I realise) helped make the gameplay matter more, rather than the gameplay just providing an alternative to turning the pages of the novel the creators really wanted to write. Yeah, I didn't think much of Heavy Rain.
2) I now dislike Valve a little bit. They forced Troika to release Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines on the same day as Half-Life 2 just because they wanted to have their game out first. Jerks. They killed Troika and the game's sales as far as I'm concerned. Y'know, if you ignore the crippling bugs in the original build of the game. Thank god for the unofficial patch.
3) I really want the world to shut up about Minecraft. Yes, I can see that it's an interesting game, very innovative, I certainly admire Notch for his daring and design work. No, I do not want to pay money for it. Why? Because if I'm going to spend that sheer amount of time in a game, I want more to show for it than a building that does nothing and isn't real. The only project that I really like is that computer someone built in the game, because that shows some expertise and it DOES something. If I wanted a model of the Enterprise, I'd buy one. Why am I so cross about this? Every time I hear about Minecraft or get into a conversation about Minecraft, I keep getting the impression that if I don't love it, I'm somehow wrong in an objective sense. I don't like that because it of course isn't objective. The idea of being dropped into a game with nought but the tools and mechanics and left alone to do what you want is a worthy one to explore, and if that sounds like your cup of tea then fine, more power to you. Go play it. I, however, don't have fun like that. I like a purpose to a game beyond "doing whatever", that's why I hate The Sims. I'll stick to my games that some kind of narrative purpose, and the rest if the gaming world (so it seems) can f@*£ off and play Minecraft.
4) DC Adventures (or Mutants & Masterminds 3rd Edition if you like) looks like a really good game upon reading. If you like role-playing and superheroes, go look for it. If I get a chance to run some of it, I'll let you know how it plays.
5) D&D Heroes of Shadow is also a good book, should appease that player who wants to be evil. I mean, he still can't be, but he can pretend to be. Give him a fringe haircut and let him mope away about how much the world hates him and his magic sword.
Yeah, that's my little bites of opinion there. Comments down below, I imagine someone might just disagree with something :)
Sunday, 1 May 2011
A Disturbing Lack of Faith
I have come back from a really good session of Star Wars Saga Edition. It was the first session of a new campaign set about 1500 years before the films. The premise? All of the characters were Sith or employed by the Sith.
This made me think of something a reader (laydoth) said back when I wrote about the Black Crusade announcement a while back. In short, he said that playing inherently evil characters could exacerbate any PvP friction in a group; having a party wanting to kill each other does happen, even in a heroic game like Star Wars. Could having evil PCs make the game fall apart? Well...no. This is an account of the playing style of one particular player.
This was the guy who pulled a knife on an angry Wookie and publicly insulted a prominent Jedi master. While I admire the balls it takes to just do stuff in an RPG (I see no better motivation, really), it does often put his characters at odds with the rest of the party. Put simply, out of character we're laughing, in character we're facepalming. At least we could stop him from killing everyone in the room by reminding him of his character's assumed heroic nature, as per the themes of the game. Now his guy is acknowledged as being evil, I did fear we'd lose him to shooting all the NPCs and stealing their stuff, teabagging the corpses as he went.
Not so it seemed. Sure, he did pull a gun on one of the other PCs when he realised he was being paid way too low (the price of Intelligence 9, I afraid), but he also stuck with us even when offered a better job. He didn't just kill everyone, rather he thought about whether or not that would have been best for the group first, as you do when making a decision as to whether or not you should instigate something you can't stop.
If this proves anything, it's that role-players aren't always the violent animals their play style makes them seem. Their characters might bitch and moan at each other, and maybe use one another as meat shields, but none are out to get the rest killed just 'for the lulz'. Role-players are competent enough to consider actions before their characters take them, instead of just doing silly stuff and claiming it was "in character", even when they have every legitimate excuse to. I think Yahtzee Croshaw said it best when he said that "being a dick in a game is only fun when the game doesn't want you to be a dick; being a dick in a dick-simulator is just going along with it".*
So, I think a re-evaluation is in order: Black Crusade might be fine, folks won't be stupid when they can be. If Fantasy Flight make a heroically-themed 40k game, that's when the trouble will start.
This made me think of something a reader (laydoth) said back when I wrote about the Black Crusade announcement a while back. In short, he said that playing inherently evil characters could exacerbate any PvP friction in a group; having a party wanting to kill each other does happen, even in a heroic game like Star Wars. Could having evil PCs make the game fall apart? Well...no. This is an account of the playing style of one particular player.
This was the guy who pulled a knife on an angry Wookie and publicly insulted a prominent Jedi master. While I admire the balls it takes to just do stuff in an RPG (I see no better motivation, really), it does often put his characters at odds with the rest of the party. Put simply, out of character we're laughing, in character we're facepalming. At least we could stop him from killing everyone in the room by reminding him of his character's assumed heroic nature, as per the themes of the game. Now his guy is acknowledged as being evil, I did fear we'd lose him to shooting all the NPCs and stealing their stuff, teabagging the corpses as he went.
Not so it seemed. Sure, he did pull a gun on one of the other PCs when he realised he was being paid way too low (the price of Intelligence 9, I afraid), but he also stuck with us even when offered a better job. He didn't just kill everyone, rather he thought about whether or not that would have been best for the group first, as you do when making a decision as to whether or not you should instigate something you can't stop.
If this proves anything, it's that role-players aren't always the violent animals their play style makes them seem. Their characters might bitch and moan at each other, and maybe use one another as meat shields, but none are out to get the rest killed just 'for the lulz'. Role-players are competent enough to consider actions before their characters take them, instead of just doing silly stuff and claiming it was "in character", even when they have every legitimate excuse to. I think Yahtzee Croshaw said it best when he said that "being a dick in a game is only fun when the game doesn't want you to be a dick; being a dick in a dick-simulator is just going along with it".*
So, I think a re-evaluation is in order: Black Crusade might be fine, folks won't be stupid when they can be. If Fantasy Flight make a heroically-themed 40k game, that's when the trouble will start.
Sunday, 24 April 2011
Guilty Pleasures
I was going to do a bit on the new gameplay footage released for Duke Nukem Forever (source: The Escapist). But, while watching it, something more intriguing came to mind.
During the video (if you watch it, you'll see it yourself), a quote from Xbox Official Magazine is shown: "A guilty pleasure worth waiting for." This got me thinking about what is usually meant by "guilty pleasure". The Urban Dictionary defines is it as "Something that you shouldn't like, but like anyway." That is to say, a thing normally considered to be of low quality that is still enjoyed, even though it shouldn't be. It usually refers to sweets, drugs , or bad movies.
Whatever prediction OXM is making about how DNF (rolling out the acronyms here) is going to turn out on release, I got to wondering whether a game could become a proper guilty pleasure. I mean, let's look at that in other media a second. A "guilty pleasure" movie is usually poorly made: the script might be bad, the actors could be phoning it in hard, the sets might just be awful, but you like it anyway. For me, I'd say Judge Dredd (1995) fits in there. It's cheesy and silly, but fun. Books (corny spoofs or silly fantasy novels maybe) can do the same, I'm sure. But what about games? As I've said, to be a guilty pleasure it generally has to be poorly made but fun, but poorly made games are rarely fun. Even if you can think of one or two (and I'm sure you can) how many are the sort of thing you would feel bad admitting to liking? There's unlikely to be so much consensus of the game's awfulness for that; you can still be ok enjoying it.
One game did sort of spring to mind when I had a think about this was the Fable series. Any of you who have read other bits of this blog will know of my thoughts on the third of these games (check here if you haven't), but the other two do fit a bit more, the second one in particular. Fable 2 was, sad to sad, a rather flawed game. The story was a tad lame in places, the pacing was off a bit (unless you kept only to the main quests, in which case it was just too short), and there was very little challenge for anything other than a casual gamer. A lot of promises unfulfilled, as only Mr Molyneux can non-deliver. Yet, I found myself truly entertained, taking it all the way through to the end and coming back for more every so often. And yes, I did feel a bit uneasy telling certain friends that I enjoyed Fable 2.
Does this mean that Fable 2 was my guilty pleasure? A bad game I could enjoy, something so wrong yet so right? Sounds like it.
I think the way gaming fits into the "guilty pleasure" thing isn't always about specific games; maybe it's much broader than that. Rather than certain games being considered bad-yet-good, occasionally it can get attached to genres. Imagine telling your action-gamer friends that you liked [Job X] Simulator 2011? Sure, it's not embarrassing per se, but it can be a bit odd admitting to enjoying something that should be boring. Even broader than that, gaming as a hobby could be considered a guilty pleasure. Less and less every day, mind, but for demographics not readily associated with gaming (eg women over 30), identifying yourself as a gamer could generate that "wrong but right" feeling as well.
I think I'm just rambling out stuff now, but one should wonder: in a medium where the skill with which something is made is intrinsic to it's entertainment factor, and mistakes in development are usually just annoying rather than funny, could the traditional idea of the guilty pleasure exist? From the look of this entry, it might look like I think I have the answer, but I'm not 100% sure...and I'm not the only guy on the Internet :)
Comments below, please.
During the video (if you watch it, you'll see it yourself), a quote from Xbox Official Magazine is shown: "A guilty pleasure worth waiting for." This got me thinking about what is usually meant by "guilty pleasure". The Urban Dictionary defines is it as "Something that you shouldn't like, but like anyway." That is to say, a thing normally considered to be of low quality that is still enjoyed, even though it shouldn't be. It usually refers to sweets, drugs , or bad movies.
Whatever prediction OXM is making about how DNF (rolling out the acronyms here) is going to turn out on release, I got to wondering whether a game could become a proper guilty pleasure. I mean, let's look at that in other media a second. A "guilty pleasure" movie is usually poorly made: the script might be bad, the actors could be phoning it in hard, the sets might just be awful, but you like it anyway. For me, I'd say Judge Dredd (1995) fits in there. It's cheesy and silly, but fun. Books (corny spoofs or silly fantasy novels maybe) can do the same, I'm sure. But what about games? As I've said, to be a guilty pleasure it generally has to be poorly made but fun, but poorly made games are rarely fun. Even if you can think of one or two (and I'm sure you can) how many are the sort of thing you would feel bad admitting to liking? There's unlikely to be so much consensus of the game's awfulness for that; you can still be ok enjoying it.
One game did sort of spring to mind when I had a think about this was the Fable series. Any of you who have read other bits of this blog will know of my thoughts on the third of these games (check here if you haven't), but the other two do fit a bit more, the second one in particular. Fable 2 was, sad to sad, a rather flawed game. The story was a tad lame in places, the pacing was off a bit (unless you kept only to the main quests, in which case it was just too short), and there was very little challenge for anything other than a casual gamer. A lot of promises unfulfilled, as only Mr Molyneux can non-deliver. Yet, I found myself truly entertained, taking it all the way through to the end and coming back for more every so often. And yes, I did feel a bit uneasy telling certain friends that I enjoyed Fable 2.
Does this mean that Fable 2 was my guilty pleasure? A bad game I could enjoy, something so wrong yet so right? Sounds like it.
I think the way gaming fits into the "guilty pleasure" thing isn't always about specific games; maybe it's much broader than that. Rather than certain games being considered bad-yet-good, occasionally it can get attached to genres. Imagine telling your action-gamer friends that you liked [Job X] Simulator 2011? Sure, it's not embarrassing per se, but it can be a bit odd admitting to enjoying something that should be boring. Even broader than that, gaming as a hobby could be considered a guilty pleasure. Less and less every day, mind, but for demographics not readily associated with gaming (eg women over 30), identifying yourself as a gamer could generate that "wrong but right" feeling as well.
I think I'm just rambling out stuff now, but one should wonder: in a medium where the skill with which something is made is intrinsic to it's entertainment factor, and mistakes in development are usually just annoying rather than funny, could the traditional idea of the guilty pleasure exist? From the look of this entry, it might look like I think I have the answer, but I'm not 100% sure...and I'm not the only guy on the Internet :)
Comments below, please.
Thursday, 14 April 2011
Couple o' New Trailers: Space Marine and Dead Rising 2
Here's a couple of trailers I've looked at today. I got these from The Escapist.
The first is the latest from Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine
Ok, well, I can't say this makes me more excited about this new offering from Relic. After all, I've never been worried that they'll mess this up, given how well they've worked with the 40k IP in the past (Dawn of War, anyone?), and that still stands. My opinion has always been that they know what they're doing, let them get on with it. That looks to be correct here. The setting looks wonderful, the character designs are authentic right down to the colours, sounds and details; even the plot sounds suitably epic for a Space Marine campaign (Orks capturing a Titan? Damn straight we're sending in the Astartes!).
One thing that does worry me, as I'm sure it does many others, is that the game focuses around one Marine. For those who don't know, a large part of the Space Marines' flavour within the Warhammer universe is that they work together, as a unit and as an army. It's a whole brotherhood thing. While we've seen hints at teh supporting cast, the player character does seem to be going lone wolf on this one, which seems to go the wrong way. I'm willing to go along with the justification for now that he's a Captain, and therefore perfectly capable of taking on a small horde of Orks alone, I think that Relic will have to come up with a good reason for this in the narrative. The whole "I'm not playing by the rules" hero schtick won't cut it with the Ultramarines, given they wrote the rules.
Other than that, it looks really good, but not totally awe-inspiring yet. I'm hoping for a demo this year. I don't even mind that the Campaign Lead looks like a nervous 8-year-old.
Next, Dead Rising 2: Off The Record:
Is there a point to this, people? I haven't played Dead Rising 2, but I loved the first one, and I can tell you...Frank West was not my favourite character. Not by a long shot. While most of the narrative was poorly written and the cast badly portrayed, I could get by them. Frank just rubbed me the wrong way, and the fact that he resembled a waxwork Neanderthal didn't help. Heck, he's even worse now, what the hell is wrong with you, Capcom? He doesn't have to be handsome, but we do have to look at the screen here.
Back to my point: Why? Why is a remake being made with this guy in it? Why are they ducking out of continuity issues by making it just a "what if?" scenario? Are these the most question marks I've ever used in such quick succession?
According to Eurogamer, this is being labelled a "fan's version" of Dead Rising 2. I am tempted to go ask a friend of mine who happens to be a big fan if this is what he wanted, but it's obvious that the majority (or, more likely, a loud minority) has spoken. Instead of a (I assume) more charismatic hero with a good reason to go risk his life battling a zombie horde like Chuck Greene, what the folks really want is a selfish reporter who is willing to watch people die, and to kill people, just to get a few pictures. Fair play, if that's what is wanted, more power to Capcom.
What strikes me as odd though is why this is being marketed at a spin-off to the second game. I mean, we've been told its got a whole new story, plus it's being played with a different character, and it's being made as a new game rather than DLC. You know what sound's like? A sequel. Call it Dead Rising 3, I reckon.
Either that, or it's clearly not going to be all it's cracked up to be.
Comments please.
The first is the latest from Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine
Ok, well, I can't say this makes me more excited about this new offering from Relic. After all, I've never been worried that they'll mess this up, given how well they've worked with the 40k IP in the past (Dawn of War, anyone?), and that still stands. My opinion has always been that they know what they're doing, let them get on with it. That looks to be correct here. The setting looks wonderful, the character designs are authentic right down to the colours, sounds and details; even the plot sounds suitably epic for a Space Marine campaign (Orks capturing a Titan? Damn straight we're sending in the Astartes!).
One thing that does worry me, as I'm sure it does many others, is that the game focuses around one Marine. For those who don't know, a large part of the Space Marines' flavour within the Warhammer universe is that they work together, as a unit and as an army. It's a whole brotherhood thing. While we've seen hints at teh supporting cast, the player character does seem to be going lone wolf on this one, which seems to go the wrong way. I'm willing to go along with the justification for now that he's a Captain, and therefore perfectly capable of taking on a small horde of Orks alone, I think that Relic will have to come up with a good reason for this in the narrative. The whole "I'm not playing by the rules" hero schtick won't cut it with the Ultramarines, given they wrote the rules.
Other than that, it looks really good, but not totally awe-inspiring yet. I'm hoping for a demo this year. I don't even mind that the Campaign Lead looks like a nervous 8-year-old.
Next, Dead Rising 2: Off The Record:
Is there a point to this, people? I haven't played Dead Rising 2, but I loved the first one, and I can tell you...Frank West was not my favourite character. Not by a long shot. While most of the narrative was poorly written and the cast badly portrayed, I could get by them. Frank just rubbed me the wrong way, and the fact that he resembled a waxwork Neanderthal didn't help. Heck, he's even worse now, what the hell is wrong with you, Capcom? He doesn't have to be handsome, but we do have to look at the screen here.
Back to my point: Why? Why is a remake being made with this guy in it? Why are they ducking out of continuity issues by making it just a "what if?" scenario? Are these the most question marks I've ever used in such quick succession?
According to Eurogamer, this is being labelled a "fan's version" of Dead Rising 2. I am tempted to go ask a friend of mine who happens to be a big fan if this is what he wanted, but it's obvious that the majority (or, more likely, a loud minority) has spoken. Instead of a (I assume) more charismatic hero with a good reason to go risk his life battling a zombie horde like Chuck Greene, what the folks really want is a selfish reporter who is willing to watch people die, and to kill people, just to get a few pictures. Fair play, if that's what is wanted, more power to Capcom.
What strikes me as odd though is why this is being marketed at a spin-off to the second game. I mean, we've been told its got a whole new story, plus it's being played with a different character, and it's being made as a new game rather than DLC. You know what sound's like? A sequel. Call it Dead Rising 3, I reckon.
Either that, or it's clearly not going to be all it's cracked up to be.
Comments please.
Wednesday, 6 April 2011
Bring on the Big Bads
I've had a on-off relationship with table-top warming for the last 6 years. And when I say wargaming, I do exclusively mean Warhammer Fantasy/40,000. It's not that I don't like other wargames, it's just that they seem to deal exclusively in metal models, and I can't stand painting metal. There has to be an unwritten trust between a man and his metal model that the latter will not fall apart at any given moment, seriously annoying the former.
When I'm into it, I'll be all over it, using up large amounts of my money (disposable or otherwise) buying little plastic men so I can pretend to command them to kill other plastic men which I pretend are dying. When I'm not into it, I will miss months of development in what have become rapidly changing product lines. It's for this reason that I signed up for the Games Workshop mailing list, so I could actually have some idea as to what the hell is going on while my obsession gland is diverting me towards something else (usually just as useless and just as demanding on my finances, like LARPing).
Like many companies that specialise in hobby games, GW is in the habit of revamping sections of its product lines with new rules and models, as a means of increasing sales. That makes sense, and I'm all for it. Consumers like shiny new things, so you give it to them. However, the trend for these updates seems to be "mostly the same, a few redesigns on some familiar models and a REALLY BIG NEW THING!!!"
Case in point: a new rulebook for the Tomb Kings (basically an army of mummies and Egyptian mythology-inspired monsters) army is out on pre-order. With it come some new Tomb Guard models, and something that looks like a guy riding a snake. These look pretty standard. Then there's this:
WTF is that?! I know what it is, because I looked it up. It's a Necrosphinx. This is the big, bad thing that's going to be sitting across the table from any fool who challenges a Tomb Kings player from now on. It's been happening with nearly all updates in the last 3 months. The Orcs got a Giant Spider, the Skaven (ratmen) got all this nonsense, and even the Grey Knights, a futuristic army of crusading soldiers not know for their monsters, get this Dreadknight. I mean, look at it. It's a giant robot with a friggin' hammer!
And yet, I do think that this is the best part of the wargaming hobby. In every army in every fantasy or sci-fi war, there's always the really big stuff that stands way above the rank and file. Remember that massive battering ram from Return of the King? The AT-ATs from Star Wars? These things are iconic; we not only notice them, we remember of them with that "woah, did you see that?" awe that befits these styles of media. Sure, these products are really suppose to be that got-to-have-them centrepieces of every army of that type (if you don't have one then it's not a real army), but that doesn't matter to me.
Big fantasy battles are really just backgrounds to those few titans in their own epic struggles, so I welcome the big bads onto the table top. Besides, they've been part of the hobby for longer than I know, it's only now they look so damn crazy.
Comments down below :)
When I'm into it, I'll be all over it, using up large amounts of my money (disposable or otherwise) buying little plastic men so I can pretend to command them to kill other plastic men which I pretend are dying. When I'm not into it, I will miss months of development in what have become rapidly changing product lines. It's for this reason that I signed up for the Games Workshop mailing list, so I could actually have some idea as to what the hell is going on while my obsession gland is diverting me towards something else (usually just as useless and just as demanding on my finances, like LARPing).
Like many companies that specialise in hobby games, GW is in the habit of revamping sections of its product lines with new rules and models, as a means of increasing sales. That makes sense, and I'm all for it. Consumers like shiny new things, so you give it to them. However, the trend for these updates seems to be "mostly the same, a few redesigns on some familiar models and a REALLY BIG NEW THING!!!"
Case in point: a new rulebook for the Tomb Kings (basically an army of mummies and Egyptian mythology-inspired monsters) army is out on pre-order. With it come some new Tomb Guard models, and something that looks like a guy riding a snake. These look pretty standard. Then there's this:
WTF is that?! I know what it is, because I looked it up. It's a Necrosphinx. This is the big, bad thing that's going to be sitting across the table from any fool who challenges a Tomb Kings player from now on. It's been happening with nearly all updates in the last 3 months. The Orcs got a Giant Spider, the Skaven (ratmen) got all this nonsense, and even the Grey Knights, a futuristic army of crusading soldiers not know for their monsters, get this Dreadknight. I mean, look at it. It's a giant robot with a friggin' hammer!
And yet, I do think that this is the best part of the wargaming hobby. In every army in every fantasy or sci-fi war, there's always the really big stuff that stands way above the rank and file. Remember that massive battering ram from Return of the King? The AT-ATs from Star Wars? These things are iconic; we not only notice them, we remember of them with that "woah, did you see that?" awe that befits these styles of media. Sure, these products are really suppose to be that got-to-have-them centrepieces of every army of that type (if you don't have one then it's not a real army), but that doesn't matter to me.
Big fantasy battles are really just backgrounds to those few titans in their own epic struggles, so I welcome the big bads onto the table top. Besides, they've been part of the hobby for longer than I know, it's only now they look so damn crazy.
Comments down below :)
Monday, 4 April 2011
If It Ain't Broke...
I've been playing a bit of Lord of the Rings Online this weekend. I might have done a critique of that, but a couple of thoughts hit me while playing:
1) "Hey, this is kind of like World of Warcraft!" Not original, since most MMOs are like WoW. But that brought me onto...
2) "Do MMOs seem to copy WoW because WoW just happens to have cracked MMO gameplay?"
It's no secret (in fact it's the lament of many gamers) that the AAA games industry lacks innovation right now, at least compared to earlier times. Many games just seem to be rehashes of popular titles with different wallpaper, and it's a source of frustration seeing a lot of talent go to waste on rip-offs and copies when new ideas could be nurtured with the right effort and money. Of course, money is too much to risk these days on experimental ideas that don't guarantee profit, not when we already know what sells.
I'm not going to waste any more time on discussing innovation as a thing now. Better minds than I have far more to say on that. What I wanted to talk about was a rather plausible (and almost justifiable) reason for the seeming lack of new ideas in the medium.
We've pretty much cracked it right now. Think of a genre of games, and I bet you can think of one game that pretty much worked out how best to "do" that genre, and is now copied to death. MMOs, as pointed out, have WoW. Fighting games got Street Fighter. Action games have God of War. Shooters seem to get a new one every so often: Doom, Quake, Halo, Call of Duty right now. It does make sense that when making a game, if someone else has made a game (or games, as I'd say a lot of RTSs are amalgams of tried-and-true mechanics) that does want you want really well, you'd want to take something from that and try to shape it in your image a little. Take God of War, for example. You want to make an action game, but Sony basically got hack n' slash awesome down ages ago. You could try to go in a totally different direction that, yes, could bring about a new age of innovation (that's how these aforementioned game began), but you also risk falling flat on your face if your bold experiment fails.So, the option to take more than a bit from God of War sounds more tempting.
I'm not going to say that innovation in gaming doesn't need a sound kick in the arse, because it does. I'm just putting in the point that we shouldn't dismiss the reasoning that someone else has cracked it as a poor excuse; because until the medium undergoes a really big development (I imagine it'll be when someone figures out how to utilise motion controls properly), it's the truth. We've got games more-or-less sorted for now. Don't be so hard on the developers.
Unless it's a truly shameless rip-off, in which case don't buy their shit.
PS: I draw an exception at puzzle games. They have a lot more room to innovate, seeing as there isn't a right way to make a puzzle.
1) "Hey, this is kind of like World of Warcraft!" Not original, since most MMOs are like WoW. But that brought me onto...
2) "Do MMOs seem to copy WoW because WoW just happens to have cracked MMO gameplay?"
It's no secret (in fact it's the lament of many gamers) that the AAA games industry lacks innovation right now, at least compared to earlier times. Many games just seem to be rehashes of popular titles with different wallpaper, and it's a source of frustration seeing a lot of talent go to waste on rip-offs and copies when new ideas could be nurtured with the right effort and money. Of course, money is too much to risk these days on experimental ideas that don't guarantee profit, not when we already know what sells.
I'm not going to waste any more time on discussing innovation as a thing now. Better minds than I have far more to say on that. What I wanted to talk about was a rather plausible (and almost justifiable) reason for the seeming lack of new ideas in the medium.
We've pretty much cracked it right now. Think of a genre of games, and I bet you can think of one game that pretty much worked out how best to "do" that genre, and is now copied to death. MMOs, as pointed out, have WoW. Fighting games got Street Fighter. Action games have God of War. Shooters seem to get a new one every so often: Doom, Quake, Halo, Call of Duty right now. It does make sense that when making a game, if someone else has made a game (or games, as I'd say a lot of RTSs are amalgams of tried-and-true mechanics) that does want you want really well, you'd want to take something from that and try to shape it in your image a little. Take God of War, for example. You want to make an action game, but Sony basically got hack n' slash awesome down ages ago. You could try to go in a totally different direction that, yes, could bring about a new age of innovation (that's how these aforementioned game began), but you also risk falling flat on your face if your bold experiment fails.So, the option to take more than a bit from God of War sounds more tempting.
I'm not going to say that innovation in gaming doesn't need a sound kick in the arse, because it does. I'm just putting in the point that we shouldn't dismiss the reasoning that someone else has cracked it as a poor excuse; because until the medium undergoes a really big development (I imagine it'll be when someone figures out how to utilise motion controls properly), it's the truth. We've got games more-or-less sorted for now. Don't be so hard on the developers.
Unless it's a truly shameless rip-off, in which case don't buy their shit.
PS: I draw an exception at puzzle games. They have a lot more room to innovate, seeing as there isn't a right way to make a puzzle.
Wednesday, 23 March 2011
Chronicles of Arax Review
Or: "Dungeon Crawling for Recluses"
I was going to write a review of one of the Gothic games, having just bought them off Steam super cheap-like. However, I found playing the first one too fiddly early on (couldn't work out how to talk to the first NPC you have to meet, maybe I'm not ready for a game made when innovation meant "be different even if it breaks the game"), so I've decided to give my two cents on a little RPG I found for free: Chronicles of Arax.
The basic premise is that only 1 player is involved in the adventure, which comes in the form of a 'choose your own adventure' style dungeon crawl. You are given a pre-generated character at the start (no character generation might sound odd, but this game has been made to be more of a time killer than an evening filler), and fight through encounters randomly rolled from a table. When you need to do something, you roll a dice depending on the relevant stat (abilities are measured in dice rather than numbers: you might have a Strength of d6 and a Reflexes on d8) and try to get a particular number or higher. In fights, you roll Fighting Skill and see who gets the highest. It's really one of the simplest games to play I've ever come across.
Treasure is easily worked out too. Each encounter lists exactly what you get for killing the baddies; sometimes you have to roll on a table for the more exotic magical items (the table in the core book is small, but it turns into a massive d100 table in one of the expansions). Simple and standard.
I went through the adventure in the core book with my brother (I rolled for the monsters), and we found it to be really fun. The encounters are varied within a theme (orcs mostly), so it all fit together despite the random element. The items were well distributed so it didn't get too easy, and the skill challenges are difficult enough that you'll fail sometimes but not often.
I'd had a go at it by myself before and, well...this where solo stuff falls down: it just felt like a lot of dice rolling, and only dice rolling. Anyone who plays RPGs knows that it's all about the social interaction and shared experience between the group. There's none of that in a solo game, where you just have a book and some dice and hopefully enough patience to slog through before RSI sets in.
And once you slog through...that's really it. There's no guidelines for writing Quests and no monster stats outside of the encounters where the monsters themselves appear. There's only three Quests published right now, so once you're done with them, you're done for good, unless you fancy replaying them with another character type (of which again there are only three), which doesn't sound too inviting to me. In fact, unless the developer, Crystal Star, brings more Quests out, the lovely abilities characters can gain may be wasted.
My final gripe with this game is the way the character types are balanced. They aren't. The character given in the core book, The Adventurer, has a fighting chance of getting through a Quest if you're lucky and the monster aren't. The other two however, which come individually in expansions, are way overpowered. The Battle Wizard might have a hard time with his first quest, but after he levels up and gets some spells he's gonna blast his way through. The final character, the grandly named Knight of the Steel Fist will just zoom through the encounters easy as pie, simply because he starts with plate armour and a really high armour and Fight Skill stat. Even if the bad guy hits him, he's unlikely to damage him; and even if damage is dealt, the Knight has so many wounds it doesn't matter. Put simply, the character types aren't so much classes as badly made difficulty modes.
I much as all that annoys me, I'm tempted to let it slide for now. It's only a recent release, and RPGs do tend to need a bit of tweaking and errata before they get really good. I can't deny I had a good time playing it as well, it just bothers me that I had to find another person to enjoy a so-called "solo adventure game".
If you're up for a old-school dungeon-crawling time killer on a slow day, pick up Chronicles of Arax. It's free for the core rules and the expansions are only $1 each. Just don't expect to be able to take it too far for the time being.
Chronicles of Arax was created by Crystal Star Games.
The game can be found for free on DriveThruRPG.com
Saturday, 12 March 2011
Multiplayer Ramble
I haven't posted anything in a fair while, due to lack of having played or seen anything interesting in games for some time (or at least, anything I can think of a lot to write about). I've been thinking about multiplayer gaming though; I tend to have a love/hate relationship with muiltiplayer. While I do find the social side of gaming fun, I sometimes dislike having to interact with others during play. I think it has something to do with that fact that while I am of course an avid and enthusiastic gamer, I'm just not very good at games sometimes. The ratio of games I've completed to games I own is rather low, and I often end up playing at lower dificulty settings because I find it hard stepping up to the challenge (not that I don't like a challenge, but there's a limit).
The inherent fact of multiplayer is that, well...people can see me fail. I like my failures to remain a secret, so when I've got several people (some of which I may actually know) watching me suck at the game, it's a bit of a downer.
Let it be known: I do like co-op. The thing that attracts me to things like D&D, and which prompted my short spell as a World of Warcraft player, is that it involves peaceful and friendly co-ordiantion between yourself and your mates. My favourite example of this recently: Magicka. I was going to write a full post on this game, but it doesn't work with my new laptop (something about integrated graphics cards), so that went out the window. Quick run-down: Magicka is an RPG that puts you in the role of a wizard, and has you using and combining different elemental spells to combat enemies. There' a big emphasis on experimenting with the different types of spells: eg the Fire spell sprays fire in a short arc, but you can combine it with the Arcane beam spell to make a Fire Beam. The system for selecting spells is a little fiddly for the PC; I found myself continuously staring at the little diagram in the corner before pressing the buttons, by which time I was usually dead. I've been told that it gets easier as you go on, but still no points for intuitiveness.
Anyways, I had a go on the co-op with some guys at university. It's really fun, and it adds more to the game than just more people. When firing beam spells, you can combine beams at a point to make an even bigger beam (think the main gun on the Death Star). I would say that it's a game that really emphasises the term "co-operation", more so than many other games. I had a really good time of it, as we were working together rather than competing.
PvP, on the other hand, can largely take a hike in most games as far as I care. I've been playing some Call of Duty: Black Ops with my little brother today. It's a good game, but like nearly all multiplayer shooters, it strikes me as rather...repetitive. You pretty much do the same thing over and over again until you win or lose. I'm sure any CoD conniseur will tell me why I'm wrong here, but it felt even more grindy than your average MMO; I felt this was due to the lack of a context or story, which is really what a game that has you doing the same thing (shoot people) repeatedly kind of needs to keep me interested. I had the same issue with Counter Strike years ago, and that didn't even have the good grace to offer a decent singleplayer experience,
Wait, what's that I see coming oover the horizon? Dear me, it's an exception!
Anyone who knows me will probably know of my love for Team Fortress 2, a game that has received just praise over the years, and a great community. Yet it's a game I should hate: there's no singleplayer, it's entirely PVP, and there's absolutely no context for the fictional conflict between RED and BLU. But I can't help but feeling that TF2 has miraculously transcended the need for these things. The classes are characterful, the maps are fun and cartoony, and it even stops me from feeling bad about being sucky by making the deaths so damn comical (there' your head, there's your arms, and waaaay over there are your legs); the little message telling me that I nearly got a new personal record on kills is always a nice pat on the back too.
So, to summarise: I don't like multiplayer unless it's co-op...or TF2...ok, Assassin's Creed can come in too...and maybe PVP is ok if it's in splitscreen...
Huh, maybe I just don't like military shooters.
Comment's down below :)
The inherent fact of multiplayer is that, well...people can see me fail. I like my failures to remain a secret, so when I've got several people (some of which I may actually know) watching me suck at the game, it's a bit of a downer.
Let it be known: I do like co-op. The thing that attracts me to things like D&D, and which prompted my short spell as a World of Warcraft player, is that it involves peaceful and friendly co-ordiantion between yourself and your mates. My favourite example of this recently: Magicka. I was going to write a full post on this game, but it doesn't work with my new laptop (something about integrated graphics cards), so that went out the window. Quick run-down: Magicka is an RPG that puts you in the role of a wizard, and has you using and combining different elemental spells to combat enemies. There' a big emphasis on experimenting with the different types of spells: eg the Fire spell sprays fire in a short arc, but you can combine it with the Arcane beam spell to make a Fire Beam. The system for selecting spells is a little fiddly for the PC; I found myself continuously staring at the little diagram in the corner before pressing the buttons, by which time I was usually dead. I've been told that it gets easier as you go on, but still no points for intuitiveness.
Anyways, I had a go on the co-op with some guys at university. It's really fun, and it adds more to the game than just more people. When firing beam spells, you can combine beams at a point to make an even bigger beam (think the main gun on the Death Star). I would say that it's a game that really emphasises the term "co-operation", more so than many other games. I had a really good time of it, as we were working together rather than competing.
PvP, on the other hand, can largely take a hike in most games as far as I care. I've been playing some Call of Duty: Black Ops with my little brother today. It's a good game, but like nearly all multiplayer shooters, it strikes me as rather...repetitive. You pretty much do the same thing over and over again until you win or lose. I'm sure any CoD conniseur will tell me why I'm wrong here, but it felt even more grindy than your average MMO; I felt this was due to the lack of a context or story, which is really what a game that has you doing the same thing (shoot people) repeatedly kind of needs to keep me interested. I had the same issue with Counter Strike years ago, and that didn't even have the good grace to offer a decent singleplayer experience,
Wait, what's that I see coming oover the horizon? Dear me, it's an exception!
Anyone who knows me will probably know of my love for Team Fortress 2, a game that has received just praise over the years, and a great community. Yet it's a game I should hate: there's no singleplayer, it's entirely PVP, and there's absolutely no context for the fictional conflict between RED and BLU. But I can't help but feeling that TF2 has miraculously transcended the need for these things. The classes are characterful, the maps are fun and cartoony, and it even stops me from feeling bad about being sucky by making the deaths so damn comical (there' your head, there's your arms, and waaaay over there are your legs); the little message telling me that I nearly got a new personal record on kills is always a nice pat on the back too.
So, to summarise: I don't like multiplayer unless it's co-op...or TF2...ok, Assassin's Creed can come in too...and maybe PVP is ok if it's in splitscreen...
Huh, maybe I just don't like military shooters.
Comment's down below :)
Monday, 7 March 2011
Alice: Madness Returns gameplay demo opinions
Here's a gameplay demo in two parts for Alice: Madness Returns that was showcased at GDC recently (video from IGN's YouTube channel):
What do I think? First off...wow. This game is just gorgeous. The level looks beautiful, the characters, objects and even the GUI look like something I'd frame on my wall (if there's an art book with a limited edition of this game, I'll buy it). The life bar, represented as a string of red roses, smacks nicely of Zelda-style heart containers, which is a nice touch. The baddies are suitably eccentric, and even Alice herself is styled in a traditional-yet-unique way that I'm sure will put her top-10-best-looking-character lists for years to come.
However...
...the game doesn't shock or surprise me in terms of mechanics. Granted, this is based solely on visual analysis of the game in action, and a short section at that, but isn't that all anyone has to go on at this point? I've been worried that it would turn out to be a generic action-platformer, and from this first look alone it seems to have lived down to that. The platform section is almost the most basic gameplay I've seen in years: jumping between level floating platforms. Oh wait, sorry, the platforms are invisible. No, wait again, you can see them if you press a button to go small for a bit, plus they are clearly pointed out by the collectibles sitting on them...erm....
The combat looks nice though. I stress LOOKS. Again, the graphics are bleeding fabulous, the enemies look menacing and the weapons used (I like that hobby horse club a lot) have a great audio-visual character to them. Let's face it though, it seems to play like so many other action games. The weapons seems to operate on a one-button mechanic, which is a good idea for fast-paced combat, but it strikes me as just a light melee/heavy melee/ light ranged/heavy ranged attack system that has been around for donkey's years. The lock on system has been seen before, as has blocking things while locked on.
I'm not saying that the combat is BAD, not at all; it seems to use tried and tested systems that work. This game, in short, works. But only in the sense of there being bare minimum involved. In fact, there seems to be a lot missing that we've come to take for granted in hack n' slashers: where are the finishing moves, the over-the-top quicktime events? It seems that in a quest to avoid being branded "Like God of War but..." it's ended up as "Like God of War but without..." and I have to say I was hoping for more. My worry is that American McGee and the folks at Spicy Horse are being really restricted by EA, which would be a real shame.
I really want to be proven wrong as more of this game is shown. There's a lot of potential seemingly going to waste, and the fact that only a small snippet of the game is demoed is what allows me the hope that there will be something great, just over the horizon. The game will have to PLAY as good as it LOOKS, and if it happens...then we'll have a masterpiece on our hands. I've got my fingers crossed...
Think I'm wrong? Comments down below.
Alice - Madness Returns is the property of American McGee and EA.
What do I think? First off...wow. This game is just gorgeous. The level looks beautiful, the characters, objects and even the GUI look like something I'd frame on my wall (if there's an art book with a limited edition of this game, I'll buy it). The life bar, represented as a string of red roses, smacks nicely of Zelda-style heart containers, which is a nice touch. The baddies are suitably eccentric, and even Alice herself is styled in a traditional-yet-unique way that I'm sure will put her top-10-best-looking-character lists for years to come.
However...
...the game doesn't shock or surprise me in terms of mechanics. Granted, this is based solely on visual analysis of the game in action, and a short section at that, but isn't that all anyone has to go on at this point? I've been worried that it would turn out to be a generic action-platformer, and from this first look alone it seems to have lived down to that. The platform section is almost the most basic gameplay I've seen in years: jumping between level floating platforms. Oh wait, sorry, the platforms are invisible. No, wait again, you can see them if you press a button to go small for a bit, plus they are clearly pointed out by the collectibles sitting on them...erm....
The combat looks nice though. I stress LOOKS. Again, the graphics are bleeding fabulous, the enemies look menacing and the weapons used (I like that hobby horse club a lot) have a great audio-visual character to them. Let's face it though, it seems to play like so many other action games. The weapons seems to operate on a one-button mechanic, which is a good idea for fast-paced combat, but it strikes me as just a light melee/heavy melee/ light ranged/heavy ranged attack system that has been around for donkey's years. The lock on system has been seen before, as has blocking things while locked on.
I'm not saying that the combat is BAD, not at all; it seems to use tried and tested systems that work. This game, in short, works. But only in the sense of there being bare minimum involved. In fact, there seems to be a lot missing that we've come to take for granted in hack n' slashers: where are the finishing moves, the over-the-top quicktime events? It seems that in a quest to avoid being branded "Like God of War but..." it's ended up as "Like God of War but without..." and I have to say I was hoping for more. My worry is that American McGee and the folks at Spicy Horse are being really restricted by EA, which would be a real shame.
I really want to be proven wrong as more of this game is shown. There's a lot of potential seemingly going to waste, and the fact that only a small snippet of the game is demoed is what allows me the hope that there will be something great, just over the horizon. The game will have to PLAY as good as it LOOKS, and if it happens...then we'll have a masterpiece on our hands. I've got my fingers crossed...
Think I'm wrong? Comments down below.
Alice - Madness Returns is the property of American McGee and EA.
Friday, 4 March 2011
Dragon Age RPG review
After ages of having it in my possession, I finally got to run a game of the Dragon Age tabletop game. And it's pretty damn good.
It's only got the first set out (of an eventual four, so Green Ronin tells us), so naturally it's quite rules-lite at the moment. It only covers the first 5 levels of character advancement, and the Talents (more on them in a sec) only have a couple of ranks in them, but what's there makes for a fun little swords-and-sorcery game that doesn't even require intimate knowledge of its video game cousin to play.
The game's core mechanic involves the rolling of 3 six sided dice ("3D6" to the gamers) and adding one of 8 core Abilities (Strength, Constitution, Communication, etc) as appropriate, and trying to get a high enough total to succeed at the given task. Extra skill comes from Ability Focuses, which give a +2 bonus to the roll in that specific situation. For example, your character might have a Dexterity score of 2, and an Focus in Stealth (written as Dexterity 2 (Stealth) ); they would add 2 to a roll for a task involving agility and quickness, but in situations requiring a talent for hiding and sneaking, they'd add a total of 4.
A less prominent aspect of the game, but one that still gets a use, is the Talents mechanic. These are little skills that offer benefits to different tasks, such as bonuses, re-rolls or negating of penalties. They have multiple ranks that increase in benefit as the character levels up, but so far they only have the Novice and Journeyman ranks detailed (one assumes that there'll be more in future sets if they get released), and cover a wide range from medical skills to combat proficiencies.
Just like in the video game, you pick your class from Warrior, Rogue and Mage, each being the archetypal fantasy character. You also have a background, which determines what race and character you can be, as well as offering some extra numeric benefits. There some familiar ones from Origins (City and Dalish elves as well as mages both Circle and Apostate), as well as new ones like the the Fereldan Freeman and the Surface Dwarf (that being the only kind of dwarf you could play in this game world).
The game specifies that when you roll your dice, you designate one as the Dragon Die, normally by having it a different colour to the others. The Dragon Die usually shows your degree of success (1 being just succeeded, 6 meaning it was a breeze), but it can do other things as we'll see later.
That's it. Even combat scenarios are resolved this way, using standard Ability checks with Focuses available for weapon types. However, combat does have one more in-depth feature, which makes it more interesting: Stunts.
Stunts happen when you hit an enemy in combat and get two dice with the same score. When this occurs, your character receives Stunt Points to spend on nifty effects, like extra damage, knocking the baddie prone, or even getting a second attack. The Stunt Points you get are equal to the number on the Dragon Die (remember that?), so when you see two 3s and a 6 on the red die, you know your enemy's in for a beating.
Character generation is pretty swift and easy, and uses a simple to follow step-by-step method. I managed to get a party of 3 generated in about 40 minutes with players who had never even looked at the game before, and they caught onto the game-play pretty quick too. What I can definitely say about this game is that it's small enough to be picked up by anyone.
Problem is, that smallness means there's not a lot of room to explore the game on any terms. You are really just stuck with a small amount of stuff, and while a new gamer would find that good to get on with and not overwhelming, someone a little braver might find themselves restricted. There isn't a lot of support for the game, as it hasn't gone very far into the product line (hopefully the inevitable publicity from Dragon Age II will push it back into gear); GMs don't have a plot of published monsters and adventure-making tools at their disposal, which is made worse by the fact that the rewards system for encounters is far too abstract in advising how much XP you should give the party: it just says to award them some based on how difficult they found it, when XP is used in most otehr game as a tool for decided the encounter's difficulty. Hmm..
The game world gazetter is good enough to get you started, but a bit more in-depth information would have been nice for those not into the video game (and this is coming from someone who hardly ever reads the fluff).
Long story short: if you like the Dragon Age video game series, get the tabletop game. If you like swords and sorcery, get this game. Just don't make it your main game in your group, keep it for one-offs or in-between your main game. There's enough for that, but too little for anything else.
Comments down below :)
Wednesday, 2 March 2011
Why Fable 3 Falls Flat
Tonight, I missed what could have been a really good Pendragon RPG session out of sheer idiocy on my part. I won't voice an opinion on Pendragon as a game, as I've only played 2-3 times; all I'll say is that my mum made gammon for tea, so I'm not quite as sorry as I otherwise would have been.
Out of need for something to post, I'm gonna voice a concern I had with a game I very nearly loved: Fable 3. Now, I know a lot of people dislike the Fable series, and I see why to be honest: it's always been rather flawed, plus Peter Molyneux's fixation on the (rather stupid) task of selling an RPG to the casual crowd has meant that there has been less and less challenge within the games as they have been released - the third game really has no significant penalty for dying, so what's the point?
However, I've generally been able to forgive that because there was always some intangible quality to the games that would make me come back to them time and again; I found the game world, the characters and the narrative to be rich and engaging. So, my judgement of Fable has always been "flawed but enjoyable".
So, naturally, I got down to Fable 3 and began my adventures as an exiled revolutionary with gusto. Yay, swords. Yay, sorcery. Yay, pseudo-Pratchett humour. All fun. Then I got to the bit where you become king...and it all went horribly wrong.
This all happens after a section of the game where you fight a horrid demon-thing made of darkness and sludge, which has almost wiped out a nearby country. It's rather dark and atmospheric, and more than a little bit scary in places. Upon becoming king, I was told that the only reason that the previous ruler was being so tyrannical was so he could build an army because the big demon-thing is headed your way. At this point, I would have called the revolution off and chalked it up as a misunderstanding. Sadly, the game doesn't give you this option, you've gotta go through the next bit...
You are given rule of the country, which involves 1) deciding what to do with the kingdom's infrastructure in the wake of the revolution and 2) trying to gather as much gold as possible to fund the military action against the monster that your brother already had going before you wrecked the place.
You are given a series of choices when rebuilding the country. This will involve one of your allies asking you for something (build a school, help a country join your kingdom, etc) that you promised them in exchange for their allegiance, while Stephen Fry - well, the character with his voice - explains that this will cost too much money. Which it will. The game will clearly illustrate to you that to fulfill your promise to your ally is the "good" option, while going against them for money is the "evil" choice. All the while with the knowledge that any money spent building house isn't being spent on the soldiers to save the people living in them.
This is pretty broken already, right? Damned if you do, damned if you don't, right? No way to structure a game's mechanics. But it gets worse. In the loading screens for this section of the game, there's a report as to how much money you currently have, and the projected civilian casualties. You start with 400,000 gold in the royal treasury, and you have to have 6,000,000 gold at the end of the game year if I remember correctly; the projected casualties are tied to this. After I about an hour of playing through this section, the treasury was about 600,000 gold in debt, and the loading screen was telling me that every last man, woman and child in Albion was going to die. That, folks, was my reward for building schools in workhouses and helping small countries get out of poverty. I would have tried to save money without looking like a tyrant, but unfortunately there's no button for "Sorry, love, but a while a education is indeed important for our nation's future, it won't do much good if the children are dead before they reach 6 years old."
The worst part is that "projected casualties" bit in the loading screen. Because it's a number. With that one little feature, Lionhead, a company I respected until then, turned an already poorly constructed moral choice mechanic into a numbers game. Or, if you will, a PUZZLE. You know what one of the defining characteristics of a puzzle is? That is has a RIGHT answer and a WRONG answer. You know, like morality doesn't? I think there's a bit where you can go on a quest to get some valuable treasure, but by that time I'd given up. Wasn't fun no more.
I've been told that the best way to solve this puzzle is to spend the earlier sections of the game buying up property and saving money so you can add it to the treasury. That makes sense but...how was I supposed to figure that out? I had no idea that that part of the game was coming, and I've never really bothered with the properties in the Fable games. So, the only way to win the game properly is to have played it through already? That's just plain stupid. I could play through again and buy stuff up as I go, but honestly - is it worth it?
Like Ann Hathaway walking in front of a lorry, it started out looking great, but ended in a horrific mess.
Comments down below :)
PS: I know I'm not the first person to moan about Fable 3, but like I said, I needed to post something...
**The main section of this post contains spoilers on Fable 3. You have been warned.**
Out of need for something to post, I'm gonna voice a concern I had with a game I very nearly loved: Fable 3. Now, I know a lot of people dislike the Fable series, and I see why to be honest: it's always been rather flawed, plus Peter Molyneux's fixation on the (rather stupid) task of selling an RPG to the casual crowd has meant that there has been less and less challenge within the games as they have been released - the third game really has no significant penalty for dying, so what's the point?
However, I've generally been able to forgive that because there was always some intangible quality to the games that would make me come back to them time and again; I found the game world, the characters and the narrative to be rich and engaging. So, my judgement of Fable has always been "flawed but enjoyable".
So, naturally, I got down to Fable 3 and began my adventures as an exiled revolutionary with gusto. Yay, swords. Yay, sorcery. Yay, pseudo-Pratchett humour. All fun. Then I got to the bit where you become king...and it all went horribly wrong.
This all happens after a section of the game where you fight a horrid demon-thing made of darkness and sludge, which has almost wiped out a nearby country. It's rather dark and atmospheric, and more than a little bit scary in places. Upon becoming king, I was told that the only reason that the previous ruler was being so tyrannical was so he could build an army because the big demon-thing is headed your way. At this point, I would have called the revolution off and chalked it up as a misunderstanding. Sadly, the game doesn't give you this option, you've gotta go through the next bit...
You are given rule of the country, which involves 1) deciding what to do with the kingdom's infrastructure in the wake of the revolution and 2) trying to gather as much gold as possible to fund the military action against the monster that your brother already had going before you wrecked the place.
You are given a series of choices when rebuilding the country. This will involve one of your allies asking you for something (build a school, help a country join your kingdom, etc) that you promised them in exchange for their allegiance, while Stephen Fry - well, the character with his voice - explains that this will cost too much money. Which it will. The game will clearly illustrate to you that to fulfill your promise to your ally is the "good" option, while going against them for money is the "evil" choice. All the while with the knowledge that any money spent building house isn't being spent on the soldiers to save the people living in them.
This is pretty broken already, right? Damned if you do, damned if you don't, right? No way to structure a game's mechanics. But it gets worse. In the loading screens for this section of the game, there's a report as to how much money you currently have, and the projected civilian casualties. You start with 400,000 gold in the royal treasury, and you have to have 6,000,000 gold at the end of the game year if I remember correctly; the projected casualties are tied to this. After I about an hour of playing through this section, the treasury was about 600,000 gold in debt, and the loading screen was telling me that every last man, woman and child in Albion was going to die. That, folks, was my reward for building schools in workhouses and helping small countries get out of poverty. I would have tried to save money without looking like a tyrant, but unfortunately there's no button for "Sorry, love, but a while a education is indeed important for our nation's future, it won't do much good if the children are dead before they reach 6 years old."
The worst part is that "projected casualties" bit in the loading screen. Because it's a number. With that one little feature, Lionhead, a company I respected until then, turned an already poorly constructed moral choice mechanic into a numbers game. Or, if you will, a PUZZLE. You know what one of the defining characteristics of a puzzle is? That is has a RIGHT answer and a WRONG answer. You know, like morality doesn't? I think there's a bit where you can go on a quest to get some valuable treasure, but by that time I'd given up. Wasn't fun no more.
I've been told that the best way to solve this puzzle is to spend the earlier sections of the game buying up property and saving money so you can add it to the treasury. That makes sense but...how was I supposed to figure that out? I had no idea that that part of the game was coming, and I've never really bothered with the properties in the Fable games. So, the only way to win the game properly is to have played it through already? That's just plain stupid. I could play through again and buy stuff up as I go, but honestly - is it worth it?
Like Ann Hathaway walking in front of a lorry, it started out looking great, but ended in a horrific mess.
Comments down below :)
PS: I know I'm not the first person to moan about Fable 3, but like I said, I needed to post something...
Monday, 28 February 2011
Gods and Galaxies: My weekend in gaming
I had a good Sunday of gaming fun. Went into town to play some Warhammer, then went up to a guy's house for our regular RPG sessions. First up was character generation for our upcoming Scion campaign.
Scion is a really interesting game I find. For those who don't know, it's a tabletop RPG where the characters are the offspring of classical deities from various "real" pantheons, such as the Roman/Greek gods, the Voodoo Loa, The Norse gods, etc. The stories it has in mind are of the grand epics told in the days when those gods were worshipped: slaying demons, roaming the globe, ancient magical artefacts and other some awesomeness. According to some of my classicist friends, it's basically an RPG of American Gods and the Percy Jackson series (ie books I haven't read. Oh well).
It's from White Wolf, and so uses a system similar to it's World of Darkness games: roll a number of dice equal to a Attribute + a Skill, then count up the number of successes (dice of a certain number or higher), the more being the better. The difference here is that this game will 1) have you rolling much more dice than usual and 2) you get automatic successes from your character's Epic Attributes (part of the various arrays of godlike powers you get as a Scion). This, combined with the extra spells and power granted by your divine parent means you will be doing some epic superhero stuff right out of the gate (flinging cars around, inciting whole crowds to riot, jumping chasms, you name it).If you're into those kinds of stories, ancient mythology, or superhero type gaming, I wholeheartedly recommend Scion.
The first session was really for character generation, although we got some role-play in to do our characters' 'visitations', our first meetings with our godly parents, which was fun. The GM also got us on the adventure hook (something in Crete....oooh), so that'll be fun methinks.
The second part of the evening was the regular Star Wars Saga Edition game, which I've already mentioned I've recently started running. Some re-jigging of the PCs stats by one of the players so that the party was far less broken (though the brokenness had originally been somewhat accidental) meant that I could give the party an actual challenge during combat *gasp*. After interrogating a Force-user they'd captured during the previous session (players never fail to surprise me), they had to repel some boarders in the form of two baddie Force-users and a big ol' droid. The droid lasted about as long as I thought it would (that is to say, the longest), and even the Force-users did their part now I'd actually figured out how to use Force powers properly. I've actually got something in mind for the rest of the plot now, as opposed to basically ad-libbing it for 3 weeks, which is a big step forward.
I'd do a little review on Saga Edition as a game, but it's been out of print for about 3 years now so there'd hardly be a point. To put it in a sentence: go find Star Wars Saga Edition if you like Star Wars and know the rules to D&D fairly well (it's a d20 game).
And that was my weekend in gaming :)
I might make a regular thing out of reporting on these games, it's good for reflection and heck, someone might read it XD.
Scion is the property of White Wolf.
Star Wars is the property of Lucasfilm. Saga Edition was created by Wizards of the Coast.
Warhammer is the property of Games Workshop.
Scion is a really interesting game I find. For those who don't know, it's a tabletop RPG where the characters are the offspring of classical deities from various "real" pantheons, such as the Roman/Greek gods, the Voodoo Loa, The Norse gods, etc. The stories it has in mind are of the grand epics told in the days when those gods were worshipped: slaying demons, roaming the globe, ancient magical artefacts and other some awesomeness. According to some of my classicist friends, it's basically an RPG of American Gods and the Percy Jackson series (ie books I haven't read. Oh well).
It's from White Wolf, and so uses a system similar to it's World of Darkness games: roll a number of dice equal to a Attribute + a Skill, then count up the number of successes (dice of a certain number or higher), the more being the better. The difference here is that this game will 1) have you rolling much more dice than usual and 2) you get automatic successes from your character's Epic Attributes (part of the various arrays of godlike powers you get as a Scion). This, combined with the extra spells and power granted by your divine parent means you will be doing some epic superhero stuff right out of the gate (flinging cars around, inciting whole crowds to riot, jumping chasms, you name it).If you're into those kinds of stories, ancient mythology, or superhero type gaming, I wholeheartedly recommend Scion.
The first session was really for character generation, although we got some role-play in to do our characters' 'visitations', our first meetings with our godly parents, which was fun. The GM also got us on the adventure hook (something in Crete....oooh), so that'll be fun methinks.
The second part of the evening was the regular Star Wars Saga Edition game, which I've already mentioned I've recently started running. Some re-jigging of the PCs stats by one of the players so that the party was far less broken (though the brokenness had originally been somewhat accidental) meant that I could give the party an actual challenge during combat *gasp*. After interrogating a Force-user they'd captured during the previous session (players never fail to surprise me), they had to repel some boarders in the form of two baddie Force-users and a big ol' droid. The droid lasted about as long as I thought it would (that is to say, the longest), and even the Force-users did their part now I'd actually figured out how to use Force powers properly. I've actually got something in mind for the rest of the plot now, as opposed to basically ad-libbing it for 3 weeks, which is a big step forward.
I'd do a little review on Saga Edition as a game, but it's been out of print for about 3 years now so there'd hardly be a point. To put it in a sentence: go find Star Wars Saga Edition if you like Star Wars and know the rules to D&D fairly well (it's a d20 game).
And that was my weekend in gaming :)
I might make a regular thing out of reporting on these games, it's good for reflection and heck, someone might read it XD.
Scion is the property of White Wolf.
Star Wars is the property of Lucasfilm. Saga Edition was created by Wizards of the Coast.
Warhammer is the property of Games Workshop.
Saturday, 26 February 2011
Total War: Shogun 2 - demo
Like I'm sure many of you, I was blown away by the trailers for Total War: Shogun 2. Not only did they look great, the fact that the battle footage clips were in-game recordings was even better. Now a demo is out, so I took a dive in to see if the game behind the pretty pictures lives up to the hype.
Playing this game was a tad weird for me, as I hadn't played a Total War game since Rome. I looked at Medieval 2, (having found the first one to be fantastic) without ever actually playing it, and Empire and Napoleon completely passed me by. But I've got to say, even after so long, it felt comfortable as ever playing through the missions on offer in the demo for Shogun 2.
The demo consists of a skirmish mode and a tutorial, which I went for. You are quickly but comfortably introduced to all the mechanics within 2-3 hours of play, including the battles.
First, the campaign mode. The interface is a lot more streamlined than I remember, with units and buildings able to be queued up easily without wandering through menus and such. The colour scheme and art style is lovely, and you can really be drawn into the campaign by the map alone. A feature I really liked is the Arts system. Arts are little talents that can be picked up along two trees: the Arts of War and Arts of Chi. The trees, and the Arts within them, provide a variety of different bonuses, units and abilities, and you can pursue researching them in any order. Research is automatic as well: you don't have to select an Art to begin researching it. After an Art is researched, the game will inform you which one it will research next, which is useful in case that's not the one you want.
The demo tutorial also lets you try out the battle mode, which is just plain fun. Units are controlled with the tried and tested leftclick-select-rightclick-order system. You order units into formation by drag-and-drop, or group them together (damn useful for two-pronged attacks) and give them one of several flavourful formations depending on how you want to use them (Cavalry-based defence, missile attack , etc). During multi-player (so the game says, I didn't get to use that, but it's in one of the tutorial siege battles) the matches use capture points to represent key areas and buildings on the map, from shrines to gatehouses to the tenshu, which when captured will win you the game.
Total War has a tradition of being a thinker's RTS, and it doesn't let up here, even in a demo. The scenarios forced me to work out how to use the terrain to my advantage, and split second timing and advanced tactics (two things I could never get quite right) were key to winning the day (I managed). However, the game does it's beat to not get in the way of your clever warmongering, helping you get there with the controls and interface, which remains clear and concise in the battle mode.
Wow...that was a lot to say about a demo. The demo hints at a lot more, including naval battles (which I couldn't try) and many more agents and units to throw around (ninja are fun on and off the battlefield). I thoroughly recommend that all gamers, especially fans of the series, RTS games or Japanese military history, to give this demo a go before March 15th when the game is released.
Comment down below :)
Total War: Shogun 2 and the Total War franchise are the property of The Creative Assembly.
Playing this game was a tad weird for me, as I hadn't played a Total War game since Rome. I looked at Medieval 2, (having found the first one to be fantastic) without ever actually playing it, and Empire and Napoleon completely passed me by. But I've got to say, even after so long, it felt comfortable as ever playing through the missions on offer in the demo for Shogun 2.
The demo consists of a skirmish mode and a tutorial, which I went for. You are quickly but comfortably introduced to all the mechanics within 2-3 hours of play, including the battles.
First, the campaign mode. The interface is a lot more streamlined than I remember, with units and buildings able to be queued up easily without wandering through menus and such. The colour scheme and art style is lovely, and you can really be drawn into the campaign by the map alone. A feature I really liked is the Arts system. Arts are little talents that can be picked up along two trees: the Arts of War and Arts of Chi. The trees, and the Arts within them, provide a variety of different bonuses, units and abilities, and you can pursue researching them in any order. Research is automatic as well: you don't have to select an Art to begin researching it. After an Art is researched, the game will inform you which one it will research next, which is useful in case that's not the one you want.
The demo tutorial also lets you try out the battle mode, which is just plain fun. Units are controlled with the tried and tested leftclick-select-rightclick-order system. You order units into formation by drag-and-drop, or group them together (damn useful for two-pronged attacks) and give them one of several flavourful formations depending on how you want to use them (Cavalry-based defence, missile attack , etc). During multi-player (so the game says, I didn't get to use that, but it's in one of the tutorial siege battles) the matches use capture points to represent key areas and buildings on the map, from shrines to gatehouses to the tenshu, which when captured will win you the game.
Total War has a tradition of being a thinker's RTS, and it doesn't let up here, even in a demo. The scenarios forced me to work out how to use the terrain to my advantage, and split second timing and advanced tactics (two things I could never get quite right) were key to winning the day (I managed). However, the game does it's beat to not get in the way of your clever warmongering, helping you get there with the controls and interface, which remains clear and concise in the battle mode.
Wow...that was a lot to say about a demo. The demo hints at a lot more, including naval battles (which I couldn't try) and many more agents and units to throw around (ninja are fun on and off the battlefield). I thoroughly recommend that all gamers, especially fans of the series, RTS games or Japanese military history, to give this demo a go before March 15th when the game is released.
Comment down below :)
Total War: Shogun 2 and the Total War franchise are the property of The Creative Assembly.
Bonus Post: Writing a Saga is hard...
I've been running a Star Wars Roleplaying Game campaign over the last couple of weeks, and so far it's been fun. There have been some good fights (I do so like RP combat), great little moments of roleplaying - one PC managed to stall an enemy attack by asking for their accounts, yay for bureaucracy - and the whole group seems to be enjoying themselves.
However, planning the damn thing has been one of the most taxing metal exercises I've put myself up to. I decided to run the campaign at level 10, because I thought it would be fun to have super-powered characters playing. That's become the hindering factor, however, because two of the group know this game FAR better than I. They've managed to create the most stupidly broken characters I've seen in a d20 game; one of them is a Jedi who fights defensively all the time, so I can't bloody hit him, and even if I do he just slaps my bad guys back for more than they gave; and a face-man-type character who can literally talk his way out of harm, even robbing actions from the bad guys and giving them to the party.
On paper, these sound like the best things ever. However, it means I've had to go to pains to ramp up the difficulty level of the combat encounters just so they don't cakewalk their way through. As a crazy rabbit* once said, "Frustration!"
Got one encounter down, gotta actually get the plot written...it's gonna be a long night....
Star Wars is the property of Lucasfilm
The Star Wars Roleplaying Game: Saga Edition was created by Wizards of the Coast, though no longer in print.
*Max from Sam and Max
PS: The demo for Total War: Shogun 2 is currently downloading from Steam, so I'll probably have post up for that by the end of the night :)
However, planning the damn thing has been one of the most taxing metal exercises I've put myself up to. I decided to run the campaign at level 10, because I thought it would be fun to have super-powered characters playing. That's become the hindering factor, however, because two of the group know this game FAR better than I. They've managed to create the most stupidly broken characters I've seen in a d20 game; one of them is a Jedi who fights defensively all the time, so I can't bloody hit him, and even if I do he just slaps my bad guys back for more than they gave; and a face-man-type character who can literally talk his way out of harm, even robbing actions from the bad guys and giving them to the party.
On paper, these sound like the best things ever. However, it means I've had to go to pains to ramp up the difficulty level of the combat encounters just so they don't cakewalk their way through. As a crazy rabbit* once said, "Frustration!"
Got one encounter down, gotta actually get the plot written...it's gonna be a long night....
Star Wars is the property of Lucasfilm
The Star Wars Roleplaying Game: Saga Edition was created by Wizards of the Coast, though no longer in print.
*Max from Sam and Max
PS: The demo for Total War: Shogun 2 is currently downloading from Steam, so I'll probably have post up for that by the end of the night :)
Do look at this!
Here's a link to a blog my friend writes on. It's good fun to read (and watch, for they have videos :O ).
Give them a look:
Friday, 25 February 2011
Welcome to the Black Crusade
Have a look at this first: http://tinyurl.com/5u7pclx
Nice way to pander to your audience, FF Games. ;)
Honestly, I've no idea how much demand this game has had. All I know is that in most of the RP sessions I've been in, there's been a decidedly PvP sentiment going on. It takes a seriously common cause to make your PCs not want to kill each other, or at least think twice before leaving each other behind in a minefield. I've genuinly had to tell the party cleric, "No, for the third time, you CANNOT side with the evil dragon, you are the good guys."
So...I don't know whether Fantasy Flight's newest Warhammer 40,000 shaped offering, Black Crusade, will be either the cure or simply the therapy for this RPG trope. The fact that the party will consist of people fighting under the same banner (the good ol' Eight Point Star), and yet will still want to murder each other and wear the entrails for armour (hell, I'd give them a couple of points for it) will be difficult to plan for; that's right fellow GMs, we may have to...*shudder*...improvise.
I think every 40k Role Player will have either tried playing Chaos or considered it, or at the very least begged the GM for it. I'm wondering how they would represent Chaos influence; I mean, Corruption points are out the window, as are the means to gather them (unless you want players killing at will as the only way of gathering power). There will have to be some factor to kerb the more overt aspects of Chaos worship (unless you're a Khornate, in which case go nuts), and I'm looking forward to see how they handle that.
The announcement has only just come today, but I'm a big fan of the 40K Role Play range so far; the rules work for me and they've covered some good gameplay themes, from horror and intrigue to open warfare to galactic exploration. This looks like a good way to show the darker side to a universe that's already almost pitch black.
Warhammer 40,000 is the property of Games Workshop Ltd
Black Crusade and Warhammer 40,000 Roleplay created by Fantasy Flight games
Also, apologies to any non-40k enthusiasts who got lost in there. I'll get back to something a little more mainstream later.
Comments down below please :)
Nice way to pander to your audience, FF Games. ;)
Honestly, I've no idea how much demand this game has had. All I know is that in most of the RP sessions I've been in, there's been a decidedly PvP sentiment going on. It takes a seriously common cause to make your PCs not want to kill each other, or at least think twice before leaving each other behind in a minefield. I've genuinly had to tell the party cleric, "No, for the third time, you CANNOT side with the evil dragon, you are the good guys."
So...I don't know whether Fantasy Flight's newest Warhammer 40,000 shaped offering, Black Crusade, will be either the cure or simply the therapy for this RPG trope. The fact that the party will consist of people fighting under the same banner (the good ol' Eight Point Star), and yet will still want to murder each other and wear the entrails for armour (hell, I'd give them a couple of points for it) will be difficult to plan for; that's right fellow GMs, we may have to...*shudder*...improvise.
I think every 40k Role Player will have either tried playing Chaos or considered it, or at the very least begged the GM for it. I'm wondering how they would represent Chaos influence; I mean, Corruption points are out the window, as are the means to gather them (unless you want players killing at will as the only way of gathering power). There will have to be some factor to kerb the more overt aspects of Chaos worship (unless you're a Khornate, in which case go nuts), and I'm looking forward to see how they handle that.
The announcement has only just come today, but I'm a big fan of the 40K Role Play range so far; the rules work for me and they've covered some good gameplay themes, from horror and intrigue to open warfare to galactic exploration. This looks like a good way to show the darker side to a universe that's already almost pitch black.
Warhammer 40,000 is the property of Games Workshop Ltd
Black Crusade and Warhammer 40,000 Roleplay created by Fantasy Flight games
Also, apologies to any non-40k enthusiasts who got lost in there. I'll get back to something a little more mainstream later.
Comments down below please :)
Dragon Age 2 Demo impressions
Yeah, everyone who cares will have played this by now, but still here's my two cents on the demo for Dragon Age 2.
First thing I noticed were the fight mechanics (being that the very first bit is a big fight with a feckload of Darkspawn): they're so much faster and streamlined. The issue one can have with turn-based fight mechanics, such as those used by every Bioware game except for Mass Effect, is that it can slow down the action with taht pause between attacks. However, what DA2 does is keep the interval between the damage infliction (you can see a character's DPS rating in the pause menu), but there is almost no space between animations, meaning you have a proper-looking battle going on, which is far more dynamic and exciting.
The interface is a lot more strealined, with the icons made msaller (though still clear) and the character portraits and life bars sitting neatly in the bottom left corner. Everything is easy to find without being in the way.
The demo gives you a taste of the levelling system. Most of the stats are handled by 6 core attributes, which affect all other stats on a one-to-one basis, meaning that every point you put in will make a difference. Powers and abilities come from a set of talent trees which correspond to different specialties within your class. You can pick powers from any of these trees to mix-and-match, making for a nice level of customisation.
A word on gore: lots. Where in the first game you would cut a baddie up, now you're likely you chop him in half at the waist, which is quite satisfying. Oddly, the blood splash on PCs is toned down from childishly over the top to, well, not so much. There's a bit, but no longer so much splatter that it's distracting during conversations. Basically, the blood is in the fights, not out of it.
So, Dragon Age 2: it looks to be an improvement over an already great game. Obviously it'll take the a play of the full thing to show us how good it is, but that's what the 11th of March is for .
Think I'm wrong in here? Tell me why!
Dragon Age 2 is the property of EA and Bioware.
First thing I noticed were the fight mechanics (being that the very first bit is a big fight with a feckload of Darkspawn): they're so much faster and streamlined. The issue one can have with turn-based fight mechanics, such as those used by every Bioware game except for Mass Effect, is that it can slow down the action with taht pause between attacks. However, what DA2 does is keep the interval between the damage infliction (you can see a character's DPS rating in the pause menu), but there is almost no space between animations, meaning you have a proper-looking battle going on, which is far more dynamic and exciting.
The interface is a lot more strealined, with the icons made msaller (though still clear) and the character portraits and life bars sitting neatly in the bottom left corner. Everything is easy to find without being in the way.
The demo gives you a taste of the levelling system. Most of the stats are handled by 6 core attributes, which affect all other stats on a one-to-one basis, meaning that every point you put in will make a difference. Powers and abilities come from a set of talent trees which correspond to different specialties within your class. You can pick powers from any of these trees to mix-and-match, making for a nice level of customisation.
A word on gore: lots. Where in the first game you would cut a baddie up, now you're likely you chop him in half at the waist, which is quite satisfying. Oddly, the blood splash on PCs is toned down from childishly over the top to, well, not so much. There's a bit, but no longer so much splatter that it's distracting during conversations. Basically, the blood is in the fights, not out of it.
So, Dragon Age 2: it looks to be an improvement over an already great game. Obviously it'll take the a play of the full thing to show us how good it is, but that's what the 11th of March is for .
Think I'm wrong in here? Tell me why!
Dragon Age 2 is the property of EA and Bioware.
Thursday, 24 February 2011
We Dare...WTF?
I've just been on Kotaku, and they've reported on a new game, We Dare, being made by Ubisoft for the Wii and PS3.
For the story go here, see the trailer, read the article, then come back: http://tinyurl.com/6z6epo7
What the hell? Talk about niche market, Ubisoft! Who buys a Wii for that? Who plays a Wii for that? Are you honestly expecting this to be the reaction to this game. You know Wii games aren't played like on TV, it's a far more subtle affair, not the waving around and overacting you think we're into. Unless you're drunk...like the players of We Dare would likely be...I think I see the reasoning.
I think it takes a lot more than a themed Wii game to get friends...or anyone...shagging. Not to mention the fact that, well...I know this may just be the sterotype, but people who enjoy uninhibited recreational sex and people who enjoy games, whether casually or as a hobby, generally don't create that big an overlap on the old Venn Diagram.
Maybe I'm wrong, it might sell. Not got high hopes though. Just expectations. That it won't.
Think I'm wrong? Tell me why.
We Dare doesn't seem to have a site yet.
We Dare is the property of Ubisoft.
Kotaku is the property of Kotaku.
For the story go here, see the trailer, read the article, then come back: http://tinyurl.com/6z6epo7
What the hell? Talk about niche market, Ubisoft! Who buys a Wii for that? Who plays a Wii for that? Are you honestly expecting this to be the reaction to this game. You know Wii games aren't played like on TV, it's a far more subtle affair, not the waving around and overacting you think we're into. Unless you're drunk...like the players of We Dare would likely be...I think I see the reasoning.
I think it takes a lot more than a themed Wii game to get friends...or anyone...shagging. Not to mention the fact that, well...I know this may just be the sterotype, but people who enjoy uninhibited recreational sex and people who enjoy games, whether casually or as a hobby, generally don't create that big an overlap on the old Venn Diagram.
Maybe I'm wrong, it might sell. Not got high hopes though. Just expectations. That it won't.
Think I'm wrong? Tell me why.
We Dare doesn't seem to have a site yet.
We Dare is the property of Ubisoft.
Kotaku is the property of Kotaku.
Red Dead...Something?
I've recently been playing Red Dead Redemption: Undead Nightmare. First off the bat: it's friggin' awesome! I do love a good zombie shoot, and there's no loss of it here. Hell, it's the first thing you do. There is that staple of the zombie genre: less ammo than usual, but thankfully Rockstar had the good sense to make it not much of a hindrance.
"There are no shopkeepers", as the game points out early on, which means you can't actually buy ammunition, so you have to rip it off of corpses or get it from ammo drops in the towns you free from zombies. You'll stock up quickly without much effort - so much for the Apocalypse - and proceed onto murder after gleeful murder of the local walking dead.
This is made even more simple by the Deadeye feature (I'm assuming this was in the original Red Dead Redemption, I haven't played it), which slows the world down to a crawl (think the opening titles of Zombieland), allowing the pefect headshot. This means that if you're carrying, say, 50 bullets...that's 50 dead zombies, right there. Go save the world.
Here's the fatal flaw to this game, one tiny thing that niggles me: the name. Seriously, they couldn't have been more imaginative? Undead Nightmare sound's like a good B-movie, and it IS a DLC rather than a sequal, but I would have appreciated a little more effort.
Here's my idea, a better title for a great game: Red Dead Reanimation! I like it, it fits nicely with the titles of the other games.
What do you think? If I'm wrong, tell me why.
Comment please, either way.
Red Dead Redemption and Red Dead Redemption: Undead Nightmare are the property of Rockstar Games
"There are no shopkeepers", as the game points out early on, which means you can't actually buy ammunition, so you have to rip it off of corpses or get it from ammo drops in the towns you free from zombies. You'll stock up quickly without much effort - so much for the Apocalypse - and proceed onto murder after gleeful murder of the local walking dead.
This is made even more simple by the Deadeye feature (I'm assuming this was in the original Red Dead Redemption, I haven't played it), which slows the world down to a crawl (think the opening titles of Zombieland), allowing the pefect headshot. This means that if you're carrying, say, 50 bullets...that's 50 dead zombies, right there. Go save the world.
Here's the fatal flaw to this game, one tiny thing that niggles me: the name. Seriously, they couldn't have been more imaginative? Undead Nightmare sound's like a good B-movie, and it IS a DLC rather than a sequal, but I would have appreciated a little more effort.
Here's my idea, a better title for a great game: Red Dead Reanimation! I like it, it fits nicely with the titles of the other games.
What do you think? If I'm wrong, tell me why.
Comment please, either way.
Red Dead Redemption and Red Dead Redemption: Undead Nightmare are the property of Rockstar Games
Alice: Madness Returns - trailer thoughts
Alice: Madness Returns is a sequel to American MgGee’s Alice, a dark action adventure game from 2000 based upon Alice in Wonderland. It got good reviews, but I have to say that I never got round to playing it as I was only just getting into gaming at the time and I was way too young for it.
There are currently 3 trailers out for Alice 2. Trailer 1 is a short and sweet affair: it opens to a swinging key with a voice counting down from 3, then fades to show a girl, obviously our Alice, sitting in a room that has human arms hanging from the ceiling...well, no one goes to Wonderland looking for subtlety. She’s looking down, and the voice asks her to tell us of Wonderland. The camera zooms to her face, she opens her mouth...and lots of blood and teeth come spilling out. Nice, guys. Well, this is definitely Alice 2, no doubt about that. Not much else to go on in terms of game content, but it was an early teaser, so that’s ok.
Onto trailer 2 then: it shows Alice walking through a town square, then pause to look at a little diorama of the Mad Hatter’s tea party. She sees two ghosts in the glass, turns around, but they’re not there. The diorama then lights on fire (so you know it’s awesome), then tentacles (yes, frickin’ tentacles) come out of the case and drag Alice through the fire and through the back of the diorama case. Now, I dunno about you guys, but I’ve seen the Internet; I see a young girl in a skirt, tentacles and aggressive non-consensual grabbing. This may not be Japan, but the connotations are still funny. Still a good trailer, a little more hinting at the story/enemies, but still too early to make assumptions.
Trailer 3 is a MUCH grander affair. Alice is seen walking through a lovely Wonderland scene, and encounters the Caterpillar (still hasn’t kicked the hooka habit, poor guy needs a good ol’ intervention). The oversized stoned grub then flap some butterfly wings and rears up menacingly, while the scene around Alice burns in a spontaneous volcanic eruption. The scene transitions to the Mad Hatter’s table, where the old crowd are gathered: he then screams “Attack!”, and sics a giant teapot-cyclops-thing on her (genuinely the weirdest thing I have seen in a trailer). Alice then proceeds to stab the attacking table furniture in the eye with a knife – the Vorpal Blade, so I’m told (I’m damn sure that 1) that thing was a sword, fucking anticlimactic, and 2) Alice didn’t have that in the book, but what do I know) – and the trailer fades out with the girl’s face, grinning ear to ear with blood all over her. Ho-lee shit, people.
So far, the trailers don’t say anything about the actual gameplay, but it can be assumed that it will be similar to the original. I didn’t play the original, so that would be a bit lost on me if not for the helpful information on the website for the game, which is linked at the bottom of this entry. The game will boast it says, upgradeable melee weapons including the Vorpal Knife thing; intuitive and rewarding puzzles; and being able to explore Wonderland and meet all the weird and wonderful people therein...and likely beat them with Vorpal sticks.
There are some screenshots out, but no gameplay vids have been released yet, which suggests the game is well into development yet not so far in as to be able to prove anything, but that’s ok. American McGee has a good track record, and the first was supposed to be really good.
The game looks to be attempting to innovate on platform action gaming and good for it. What I’m worried about is this notion of making the Wonderland universe darker. I mean, it was a good idea for a first game, but I do wonder if the sequel is symptomatic of either the renewal of the property by Tim Burton, or this whole idea of making childish things darker so the grow-ups can enjoy it without feeling guilty.
And if it’s that, I say: making something darker does not make it more “mature”, no matter what the ESRB rating says. I mean, have you seen Splatterhouse? If you want to enjoy Wonderland, you are allowed to do it in its original guise as a children’s story. Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland was about an innocent little girl having a good time meeting strange new people in a weird and wonderful place. Do you really have to add all the blood to make it acceptable for your age group? You see this in several adaptations: when X-Men got the film treatment, they took all the colour out of the costumes, because the grown-up geeks considered themselves too old and respectable for their heroes to wear spandex.
I shouldn’t really throw that at American McGee though, I think he’s definitely trying to do something different artistically; the whole thing about making stuff darker needlessly bugs me.
So, predictions: Alice – Madness Returns looks to be an interesting game that should shift on the shelves, and will likely be great aesthetically. I’m not sure what to expect of the gameplay, as there’s little to go on. My gut instinct would have me think cynically, that it’ll be just another hack n’ slash platformer, but I’d like to hope for enough innovation to make it memorable. The trailers aren’t brilliantly put together, and the third one felt a little disjointed on first viewing, so I’ve not been grabbed as much as I otherwise would have. But I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t curious, so I’ll keep an eye on it.
Alice - Madness Returns website: http://www.ea.com/alice
American McGee's website: http://www.americanmcgee.com/
The trailers are there. Watch them, make your judgements and please feel free to come back here and tell me what you think. If I'm wrong, tell me why. If you'd like me to look at anything else, please say so.
Alice: Madness Returns and American McGee's Alice are the property of EA and American McGee.
There are currently 3 trailers out for Alice 2. Trailer 1 is a short and sweet affair: it opens to a swinging key with a voice counting down from 3, then fades to show a girl, obviously our Alice, sitting in a room that has human arms hanging from the ceiling...well, no one goes to Wonderland looking for subtlety. She’s looking down, and the voice asks her to tell us of Wonderland. The camera zooms to her face, she opens her mouth...and lots of blood and teeth come spilling out. Nice, guys. Well, this is definitely Alice 2, no doubt about that. Not much else to go on in terms of game content, but it was an early teaser, so that’s ok.
Onto trailer 2 then: it shows Alice walking through a town square, then pause to look at a little diorama of the Mad Hatter’s tea party. She sees two ghosts in the glass, turns around, but they’re not there. The diorama then lights on fire (so you know it’s awesome), then tentacles (yes, frickin’ tentacles) come out of the case and drag Alice through the fire and through the back of the diorama case. Now, I dunno about you guys, but I’ve seen the Internet; I see a young girl in a skirt, tentacles and aggressive non-consensual grabbing. This may not be Japan, but the connotations are still funny. Still a good trailer, a little more hinting at the story/enemies, but still too early to make assumptions.
Trailer 3 is a MUCH grander affair. Alice is seen walking through a lovely Wonderland scene, and encounters the Caterpillar (still hasn’t kicked the hooka habit, poor guy needs a good ol’ intervention). The oversized stoned grub then flap some butterfly wings and rears up menacingly, while the scene around Alice burns in a spontaneous volcanic eruption. The scene transitions to the Mad Hatter’s table, where the old crowd are gathered: he then screams “Attack!”, and sics a giant teapot-cyclops-thing on her (genuinely the weirdest thing I have seen in a trailer). Alice then proceeds to stab the attacking table furniture in the eye with a knife – the Vorpal Blade, so I’m told (I’m damn sure that 1) that thing was a sword, fucking anticlimactic, and 2) Alice didn’t have that in the book, but what do I know) – and the trailer fades out with the girl’s face, grinning ear to ear with blood all over her. Ho-lee shit, people.
So far, the trailers don’t say anything about the actual gameplay, but it can be assumed that it will be similar to the original. I didn’t play the original, so that would be a bit lost on me if not for the helpful information on the website for the game, which is linked at the bottom of this entry. The game will boast it says, upgradeable melee weapons including the Vorpal Knife thing; intuitive and rewarding puzzles; and being able to explore Wonderland and meet all the weird and wonderful people therein...and likely beat them with Vorpal sticks.
There are some screenshots out, but no gameplay vids have been released yet, which suggests the game is well into development yet not so far in as to be able to prove anything, but that’s ok. American McGee has a good track record, and the first was supposed to be really good.
The game looks to be attempting to innovate on platform action gaming and good for it. What I’m worried about is this notion of making the Wonderland universe darker. I mean, it was a good idea for a first game, but I do wonder if the sequel is symptomatic of either the renewal of the property by Tim Burton, or this whole idea of making childish things darker so the grow-ups can enjoy it without feeling guilty.
And if it’s that, I say: making something darker does not make it more “mature”, no matter what the ESRB rating says. I mean, have you seen Splatterhouse? If you want to enjoy Wonderland, you are allowed to do it in its original guise as a children’s story. Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland was about an innocent little girl having a good time meeting strange new people in a weird and wonderful place. Do you really have to add all the blood to make it acceptable for your age group? You see this in several adaptations: when X-Men got the film treatment, they took all the colour out of the costumes, because the grown-up geeks considered themselves too old and respectable for their heroes to wear spandex.
I shouldn’t really throw that at American McGee though, I think he’s definitely trying to do something different artistically; the whole thing about making stuff darker needlessly bugs me.
So, predictions: Alice – Madness Returns looks to be an interesting game that should shift on the shelves, and will likely be great aesthetically. I’m not sure what to expect of the gameplay, as there’s little to go on. My gut instinct would have me think cynically, that it’ll be just another hack n’ slash platformer, but I’d like to hope for enough innovation to make it memorable. The trailers aren’t brilliantly put together, and the third one felt a little disjointed on first viewing, so I’ve not been grabbed as much as I otherwise would have. But I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t curious, so I’ll keep an eye on it.
Alice - Madness Returns website: http://www.ea.com/alice
American McGee's website: http://www.americanmcgee.com/
The trailers are there. Watch them, make your judgements and please feel free to come back here and tell me what you think. If I'm wrong, tell me why. If you'd like me to look at anything else, please say so.
Alice: Madness Returns and American McGee's Alice are the property of EA and American McGee.
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