Aftermath : Resistance

My experience with Resistance: Fall of Man only lasted about thirty minutes before I put the controller down with little desire to pick it up again. The interesting thing is I don't think there was anything particularly wrong with the game. I was more put off by the shooter controls on the PS3.

Perhaps it's because I'm too familiar with the 360 controller, but the PS3 controller just felt awkward in a shooter. I couldn't really put my finger on it, but something about the analog sticks felt off... either their position or feel. Also, for some reason PS3 developers keep wanting to put the fire buttons on L1/R1 instead of the more trigger-like L2/R2.

The lack of a useful cover system threw me for a loop as well. Console shooters aren't required to have a cover system to be good (see CoD4), but without airtight controls, the gameplay experience without cover felt rather lackluster to me. The minute to minute experience felt like wrestling the avatar into the position I wanted rather than moving through a battlefield.

I might have been able to slog through the weak tactile experience if the fiction carrot was tempting enough... but the seemingly flat retrospective into an alternate history where aliens invade in the WWII era didn't really do it for me. I know narrative is rarely a strong point for a shooter, but there have been enough that do it well (or at least better) that it's hard to get pulled in by a relatively weak delivery of fiction.

While the game certainly shows off the graphical capabilities of the PS3, it unfortunately highlights the strong foundation that the 360 has in the shooter market. And when you're making a console that appeals to the core gamer, that genre is not the one in which you want to take second place.

Full of Stars

Just over a week ago I was attending Blizzcon in the dimly lit and well refrigerated Anaheim Convention Center. It was a pretty good time for some obvious reasons, namely playing Starcraft 2, Diablo 3, and Wrath. However, it was awesome thanks to the unexpected joy of watching some professional Starcraft matches.

I knew the SC progaming scene was out there (in South Korea), but it wasn't something I ever sought out. Turns out Starcraft is a way more exciting spectator sport than it sounds. The game those guys play is not the same Starcraft I remember playing. It's also amazing that a decade old game actually holds up so well. Long story short, I came home from Blizzcon eager to see more.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, it's not a straightforward task to find English-commented matches. Luckily, I stumbled upon GOMTV, which broadcasts matches from it's sponsored tournaments in English. Needless to say, that's consumed some of my time this past week.

Embarassing? Maybe. Awesome? Definitely.

Achievement Unlocked: Welcome to your Doom

I'm trying to write more, so I'll start hitting this with smaller stuff like this:

Adding achievements to WoW is like lacing a cigarette with heroin. Even more clever, intentional or not, is the fact that the new system doesn't seem to be fully retroactive. Thus, things I've already done must be done again in order to unlock the achievements.

I already know I have a problem when it comes to XBL achievements, so I fully expect to be running around old dungeons and zones just to get those last few precious points... which mean absolutely nothing. Well played, Blizzard.

Age of Conan : Impressions

I don't know what it was that drew me to seek out AoC. Perhaps it was the generally positive response that it has been receiving. Maybe I just wanted to see for myself if it had a chance of making a dent in WoW's death grip on the MMO market. Regardless, trying to find the damn game became a quest itself. I started by hitting half a dozen stores to discover all were sold out. Interestingly, I was never the only person in the store looking for the game. Combined with the news that AoC was quickly approaching the half million mark, I figured something must be going right in this game.

So, one week of store inventory watching and a four hour install and patch session later I'm finally sitting in front of the game. I like the two-tier concept for the character generation. The top level is standard "pick your parts from presets" chargen. But, you can go one level deeper and get sliders for your face and body. Granted that still suffers from the same problems we've seen in the likes of Oblivion or Mass Effect... that being it's really hard to make something look good. I like the concept at least.

After playing for a bit, the game really doesn't strike me as an MMO (as many others have already noted). It's not great if you want to jump right onto the grief-train with all your buddies, but I found it kind of refreshing to see them at least try to make a game experience in an MMO that goes beyond mindless grinding or following raid orders in vent. It falls a little flat thanks to its preoccupation with its M rating. The dialogue options tend to be offensive with little reason, and everyone seems to be a thief, murderer, or whore. So it's a "game for boys" as a friend put it. Fine, at least they're in the right market.

The gameplay is actually growing on me. On the surface it seems like more of the same MMO button mashing... but the attack directions and combo system really make it more engaging than the click and wait auto-shoot WoW sometimes degrades into. Also, the soft(er) targeting system really works for the feel. You can hit multiple things with your standard swings based on positioning. It's such a small thing but it's huge for the experience. Pro-tip: don't hit your attack keys when running by a city guard. Turns out they don't take kindly to being stabbed in face, even if you really didn't mean it.

So, AoC is decent and I'm having fun with it. Have the stars finally aligned for someone to take down WoW? Unlikely, but Conan stands in a good position to make a dent in WoW's absurd market share... and some competition is always better than none.

Sporetastic

For those who may not keep up on the day to day of the game industry, the big news of yesterday was Spore's release date: September 7th, 2008.

Gonna be a busy handful of months for me!

Stretch Goals

I really need to steer this blog back towards gaming related things. Out of ten entries only one really touches on the subject that certainly makes up more than 10% of what I do. Following on the heels of my thoughts about longevity of television series, it makes sense to touch on some similar issues in the gamespace.

The obvious connection is really a problem for the entertainment industry as a whole, that being the overabundance of sequels and remakes. Let's be honest, gaming seems to be all about franchising... at least that what the publishers seem to be thinking (GTA4, Halo3, Madden382, etc). I for one happen to enjoy it when a developer takes a proven game and refines it or experiments with it. On the other hand, mindlessly churning out revisions doesn't grow the space of games much at all.

The other issue facing games is the content explosion. Games are constantly under pressure to be bigger (in size) and better (in visuals). RPGs and MMOs are the first to suffer as they require ridiculously massive worlds to be considered decent. Even the staple of games, the FPS, feels the need to expand its world. Usually this is all well-intentioned... an effort to make the games feel more realistic. The end result? We have games featuring endless hours worth of gameplay as though that's always a good thing.

I'm notorious for not finishing games... which immediately excludes me from the core gamer category. You know the type... the ones pulling their hair out to get 100% completion. They won't stop until their satisfied that they have truly completed (or defeated) the game. This type of gamer tends be be extraordinarily patient as such a feat is rarely fun as it requires much repetition of gameplay that already ceases being engaging or fun. Perhaps I'm in the minority here, but I can't help but feel like a good chunk of this superfluous content is targeting this niche of core gamers.

This begs the question, is all that content developers spend time and effort to create really getting played? It seems to me that the average gamer has to be pretty seriously compelled to sit through 40 hours of gameplay that hasn't changed since hour 5. Usually that motivation comes from story, or sometimes clever reward structures, or rarely gameplay that is purely fun by itself. Is our time really best spent on making these massive games?

I've become intrigued by the notion of episodic game content (currently most notable in Sam & Max and perhaps Half-Life 2 to a lesser degree). It seems to have the advantage of breaking the content into more playable chunks and also builds in some breather time to keep the gameplay from going stale in one sitting. Interestingly, it could also lead us right back to the same issue we have with television series: knowing when to quit.

Retirement

It's happening. The addiction is all but a fuzzy memory and that empty void has been filled by many other things. That's right... I'm officially departing the World of Warcraft.

It seems silly to make such a post. It reminds me of a certain retirement announcement made by a friend quitting the drug that was DDR. I'll admit, that bit of writing makes a whole lot more sense to me now. It's a relatively big deal when you take your leave from an activity that you not only did for years, but also formed friendships because of it. The new social dynamic of some games is a very intriguing and powerful force. There comes a point where it's not really about the game anymore... it's about the community that surrounds it. With the notable exception of DDR, there hasn't been a game that I've played for such a long period of time (nearly 2.5 years). It's no coincidence that both involved strong social components.

I began as one of the many nay-sayers who scoffed at the likes of Ultima Online and Everquest. Besides, the mere thought of paying a monthly fee to keep playing a game was absolutely absurd. My friends slowly chipped away at those objections... damn Evercrackheads. I believe that the only reason I finally consented to play was because it was Warcraft, a series I enjoyed greatly. I figured it would be an interesting diversion for a few months and that would be the end of it. I couldn't have been more wrong.

Release day was incredibly exciting as the hype had taken complete control of me by that point. Not even the very scary 40-something at Best Buy who was appalled that I wasn't getting the collector's edition for the free pet panda/zergling/diablo could bring me down from that high. As cheesy as it sounds, the first login was jaw dropping. I had never experienced a game that even compared up to that point. Mind you, I was no stranger to the basic concepts of the game, having spent some time with D&D and various MUDs... so the gameplay was nothing spectacular. The world, the environment, the experience of being surrounded by other players... that was completely new and different.

Honestly, I don't think the gameplay is the real beauty of the game. Sure, it's fairly solid mechanics... but they get old fast. I actually spent most of my time playing solo in that game. Besides the occasional small group run (of 5 friends), my first character's rise to 60 was an individual effort. By the time I was done, the mechanics of the game were pretty much played out in my mind. Playing a different class might be entertaining for a dozen levels or so, but the gameplay is really just more of the same.

The real reason I kept playing after hitting the level cap was the people. Group play was so much more enjoyable than anything else in that game. I managed to get a second character up to 60 simply because I wanted to play with a person who started the game a few months later than I did (and who I may or may not have personally corrupted... bwahaha). The end game content is all about grouping... a blessing because I loved it and a curse because you start needing more and more people to keep playing. It got to the point where I just wouldn't really play unless there was a group going on.

At the pinnacle, I was going with groups of 20 people into areas and we just had and all around good time. Then that pesky expansion came along and ruined everything. Don't get me wrong... a lot of good came out of the Burning Crusade. In fact, I think it was a step in the right direction. However, I do believe it's the reason I lost all interest in the game. It threw me back into the single-player game that I had abandoned many months prior. Not to mention that the sudden change turned the entire social dynamic on its head.

Sticking it out would have landed me back in the larger group content I came to love... but my will to play was already drained. At that point, I was the last remaining active player of my friends who started with me. Most of my personal friends and many of my in-game friends had already taken their leave from the game. That's not to say that I didn't like the remaining folks... quite the opposite was true. It just wasn't the same... and it never would be.

Well, it was a fun couple of years in Wowland... now it's time to catch up on all the games I missed, read a good book or two, and start working in the real world.

Levels of Difficulty

Now that I'm without my school-provided 360, I've shifted all of my gaming focus over to my DS. I've gotten to play with quite a few DS experiences thanks to the wonderful service that is GameFly. Seriously, the service is a must have for any gamer who wants to get through a wide variety of titles without having the shell out $30 - $60 per game. It's perfect for me as I try to catch up on everything I missed thanks to school and World of Warcraft.

Anyway, the last four DS games I've played are interesting because the way in which they are difficult varies considerably. I would break down difficulty here into two core components: knowledge and execution. You have to figure out what to do and then actually do it. How each game dealt with this really affected the way in which I reacted to each game.

Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney
I actually have a hard time calling this a game. It's much more like the true adventure games of old (think LucasArts), and feels like interactive fiction. As expected all of the difficulty in this game lies in the knowledge portion. You have to figure out the correct action given clues... and believe me they're not always that obvious. Execution is a trivial as pushing a button or shouting Objection! All the fun comes from thinking, not acting. The focus is on reasoning, story, and presentation... and it delivers pretty well. I love adventure games and couldn't put the thing down. However, the classic two flaws are still there: there is zero replay value, and you run the risk of getting absolutely stuck. Can't figure out your current set of clues? Tough.

Elite Beat Agents
This is a pretty straightforward rhythm game that makes great (and exclusive) use of the touch screen. This one is on the opposite end of the spectrum from Phoenix Wright. As with most rhythm games, it's all about execution. The knowledge of what to do is handled with a few minutes of tutorial and then it's just practice to improve your skills at the game. It can get pretty hard, but you just know it's a matter of time before you get that song down. The interaction itself is usually fun enough to offset any frustration that would result from repetitive failures (typical for rhythm games). This one was so much fun I ended up keeping it.

Trauma Center: Under the Knife
This one wins the big disappointment award. The mechanics, the interactions, the play... it's all great. The game is just too damn hard. I'll be the first to admit that I'm pretty bad at games, but this one was so frustrating I didn't even want to stick it out until the end. The problem seems to be that once you know how to beat the level, you feel like you should be able to execute. EBA is good because you feel like you make continual improvement even if you fail. However, in Trauma Center you can keep failing at the same spot because it's just really hard... and it's not that you have to do anything different or learn anything new... you just have to do it faster. Doing something for the sake of speed doesn't strike me as engaging enough by itself.

Castlevania: Portrait of Ruin
Plenty of people recommended this title to me, and with good reason... it is a fun and hard game. Granted, this is my first Castlevania game so maybe I'm just unfamiliar with what to expect. It has a great mix of the two elements of difficulty... there's no one way to beat things. You can play to your strengths as a player and usually find a way to execute on them. There's lots of trying out different methods on things, and good feedback on when you should be trying something else. There is still a considerable amount of skill required to get through the game (especially on bosses). When I find myself facing bosses, I end up trying a method... dying... refining my method (and dying) several times until I'm sure it can work... then it's a matter of practice to get the job done. I thought dying would be more frustrating, but for some reason it's not really that bothersome. I'll admit that I'm starting to suffer from player fatigue, but I'm also not the core gamer that this style of game seems to target. The fact that I put up with it as long as I did speaks volumes for the strength of the design.

It's been interesting to look at how these games dealt with their challenges and difficulties. If you put too much on the knowledge side and you risk making your player feel dumb because they can't figure out how to proceed. Put too much on the execution and you make the action incredibly frustrating. The answer is staring the player in the face but there's nothing they can do about it because they suck at your gameplay. I'm not sure which feeling is worse, but obviously both should be avoided. As always, it comes down to balance and your target audience.