I just got back from a late-afternoon walk, something I’m trying to do now that winter has released its grasp from “North of the Wall.” At a recent physical, the doctor told me that I am in moderate shape, but I need more physical activity; unsurprisingly, hours spent in front of a television, monitor, or even a good book do very little for the physique. So I found a nicely-sidewalked road running back behind my townhouse and have been spending at least half an hour each Sunday walking it down to a certain point and back.
Along the way, I just kind of let my mind wander, mostly because my iPod can’t hold a charge, but also because I hope doing so will let my brain unwind, and maybe even have a creative idea or two. Nothing overly structured, mind you, just some light brainstorming, or thinking about some work or another I’ve been enjoying of late.
Several times now, I’ve found my thoughts drawn to small patches of woods that stretch off one direction or another from the road I’m following. These are large patches of wilderness, mind you; I doubt you could go far enough in any direction to become lost, out of sight or sound of civilization. Still, they’re little patches of thick trees, bushes, and the like that haven’t been forcibly smoothed over for progress.
I first noticed them because I was re-reading Lord of the Rings, and my mind came upon the thought that almost all of the places Frodo journeys through would be untamed, trackless wilds. Not only that, but he and Sam journeyed over a thousand miles in this fashion, and repeatedly came upon areas where they weren’t really sure how to proceed.
It would be like me deciding to travel from here to Dallas, on foot and occasional horseback, without any help, other than the guidance of a few people who knew some of the areas. Also, I had to use Google maps to find a city that was a comparable distance away. I thought California to begin with, but that’s another extra thousand miles.
An extra thousand miles that, as it stands, people in recent history have crossed in a fashion very similar to what I just described. From 1804-1806, the Lewis and Clark expedition was tasked with travelling from St. Louis to the west and back, while also exploring, learning, and documenting what they found. This was at a time when people still thought there could be a “northwest passage” waterway that would allow for direct sea travel from the Atlantic to the Pacific.
With the technology we have these days – GPS on handheld devices, 3D-modeled satellite maps, etc. – it’s difficult to imagine a time when people thought such things possible, even though it was a scant two-hundred ten years ago. I know there are still trackless, uncharted parts of the world, but they are fewer every year. On a tangential note, while watching a Batman film today, I realized that the secret road way leading into the bat-cave would no longer be feasible; someone would spot it on Google maps, and then “POW!” teenagers are taking selfies there.
Without these places left to explore, our imaginations have turned to the sky, to “the final frontier” as it has been put on more than one occasion. Star Trek, as it was originally conceived, tapped into that same kind of explorer spirit; the Enterprise travelled countless light-years from Earth, into completely uncharted space, so that the crew could visit unknown worlds. I’m trying to fathom the concept of stepping onto a world that I have no information about, with nothing already there to help me get a sense of direction, bearing, or orientation; I can’t really make that conception work, to be honest.
Probably the closest I have ever gotten in my life is video games, especially ones where you are expected to explore an open-ended game world; things like Metroid, Zelda, Final Fantasy, and the like spring to mind from the past, while new additions like Dark Souls and The Elder Scrolls have carried on the tradition. I always like reading about people who are going through old things and find graph paper with maps of Zebes drawn on it, or scribbled notes about what directions to take and commands to use from a text-based adventure.
Sadly, player accessibility has started to cheat us out of these experiences, and the internet provides instant relief even when the game may not. Yes, Skyrim is an amazing open-ended world, and it can be fun to just set off in a direction for adventure. But almost all of the quests give you a location marker to go by, and fast-travel allows you to zip back and forth between places you have already been.
Dark Souls helps mend this a little, by having almost no sort of mission structure or hand-holding in terms of location marker; Hell, there’s not even an in-game map you can use. Still, if you get frustrated, there are entire websites – most accessible from a data-enabled phone – devoted to helping guide you through Lordran, complete with descriptions, screenshots, and digital maps of each area.
I’m not trying to decry anyone else for wanting to make things easier; I personally have never managed to beat Dark Souls largely because there is so little guidance; yet in my lifetime I have beaten games that offer as little or less guidance, and done it simply by learning the game, or making my own notes and hand-drawn maps; a lot of game used to have both lined and blank pages in the back of the manual intended for that very purpose!
I’ve done a bit of wandering in my life, though admittedly almost always within civilization. When I moved away from home, I traveled 800+ down roads I had never seen, with just some hand-written direction to go by; I arrived in a brand new city, to move into a house I had never visited. I have travelled to Europe on several occasions, once to spend three months livings – albeit with people I knew – in a completely different city, in a country thousands of miles from home.
Probably my favorite thing I’ve done was during that trip, when on my own I took a train, and then a bus to get to Paris, where I spent several days just walking around. I plotted my own course from Sacré Cœur, down to the Arc de Triomphe, and then past the Louvre to Notre Dame. I read maps, talked to people, stayed fed and safe, and even navigated the metro without getting injured, robbed, or hurt worse than some sore feet.
Each time I walk by the woods on the road during my Sunday walks, part of me wants to tramp down into them just for the Hell of it. I might get scratched, bitten, and dirty; people would most assuredly wonder what I was doing if they saw me; yet part of me really feels it would do me good in the long run. If my hope is that my mind might become unburdened by these little strolls, the first thing to do might be drop some of my reservations and expectations. After all, it is supposed to be a dangerous business, going out your door.
It’s been nearly two months since Hideo Kojima let the world get a taste of Metal Gear Solid V with the “prequel” entitled Ground Zeroes; the full game, The Phantom Pain, does not yet have a solid release window. According to Kojima, the intention of Ground Zeroes is to introduce players to the new mechanics involved in the larger game, so that the transition isn’t as jarring. There was also a lot more involved – a misleading trailer from a non-existent company overseen by a fake president who was just Kojima in a wig – but we’ll put a pin in that for now.
The short version, pun intended, is that news broke a few weeks before Ground Zeroes’ release that it was exceptionally brief. As in “one ninety-minute main mission and a few side objectives” brief; the resulting Internet rage actually caused publisher Konami to drop the price on most editions by $10. Even worse, a player in possession of an early copy of the game reported he had beaten the core mission in just 10 minutes. Suddenly, the new $30 price still seemed gratuitous to the community… of players who had not yet played the game for themselves.
I apologize, because this is a bit extraneous, but here’s the thing: I paid $50 for Zone of the Enders on PlayStation 2 the day it came out, and it turned out to be a three-hour semi-interaction anime about giant robots. Now that I think about it, the first Z.O.E. was basically “Ground Zeroes” for the far more engaging (and longer) Z.O.E. The Second Runner, which may be my all-time favorite PS2 game. That being said, I never really regretted the purchase, because it included a demo for Metal Gear Solid 2; a demo that could be completed in around five minutes once you knew the layout.
I knew the layout very, very well by the time I was done with that demo, which I played frequently right up until the day MGS 2 was released. Much like Ground Zeroes, this demo was the first taste of MGS on an entirely new console generation, with all new mechanics to get familiar with; I can’t tell you how many guards I tranquilized and then dropped over things just to see how far they could fall before the game decided it was a fatal distance.
Keeping that in mind, I have been more than pleased with what Ground Zeroes beings to the table; the main mission offers just enough story to draw you in, the new mechanics on display completely revitalize certain aspects of MGS, and the optional missions are far more worthwhile than any of the reviews indicated. Sure, if you go in expecting a full MGS game, the result would be disappointing; I’ve paid more money for less entertainment, though, and anyone who keeps track of gaming in general – and MGS in particular – has no business claiming they were caught off-guard by the final product.
The experience opens with a Kojima-standard cutscene, which introduces players to some of the characters, shows off the layout of the Guantanamo-inspired outpost, and establishes what Big Boss is doing there. The scene is rendered with the in-game engine, and I am not exaggerating when I say that this is THE single best-looking video game I have ever seen, and probably the best digitally-generated world on top of that.
Imagine Pixar decided to make a movie about black ops tactical infiltration set in a US prison camp in 1975, at midnight in the middle of a rainstorm. Now make that movie an interactive experience, add slightly more violence than Pixar usually goes for, throw in torture and implications of rape, and you have Ground Zeroes. I say this as a compliment to all aspects of the game, by the way, as I have no doubt the minds at Pixar could tell an unbelievably engrossing story like this one if they were so inclined.
Big Boss finds himself at this ambiguously-administrated facility in order to rescue two members of his private military corporation Soldiers Without Borders. If that sounds too routine for Metal Gear, these two prisoners happen to both be child soldiers; a thirteen-year-old boy named Chico, and a twenty-something girl named Paz. I realize “twenty-something” may not register with some people as “child soldier,” but past games have revealed that Paz was trained to be an espionage agent from her childhood.
The mission open with Boss – now voiced and motion-rendered by Kiefer Sutherland instead of David Hayter, for better or worse – on the outskirts of the camp. Players are tasked with gathering intel to discover where the two captives are held, locating them, and then getting each to one of several rendezvous points for extraction via helicopter. In keeping with the more open-world design for MGS V, there are from more routes and infiltration options than its mostly linear predecessors.
The first thing that jumped out at me was the new lighting engine on display, and not just in a superficial capacity; instead of clearly defined areas of “light” to avoid and “dark” to hide in, every light source give off realistic rays that merge, overlap, and shift dynamically as you move through the base. Lights can be switched off, shot out, or even used to temporarily blind guards; all of these things can also attract attention, though, and so should be used sparingly.
The artificial intelligence on display is ground-breaking, both for the Metal Gear series and stealth games in general. While guards still have general routes, the A-to-B-to-A patrols are a thing of the past. Guards will wander off for a smoke, get distracted, interact with one another, and even doze off or succumb to coughing fits. They also have much more realistic reactions to odd sights or sounds: Move too quickly and loudly past a guard, and he will search the area with his flashlight after reporting to HQ; get spotted dead-to-rights by someone working a spotlight, though, and the base is going into full alert.
At least, it probably is, unless you take advantage of the new “reflex” system when you get spotted. In past MGS games, the level of a guards awareness was indicated by punctuation marks over their head; the red exclamation point – and accompanying music sting – from the first MGS has long been a staple of gaming culture. Later games introduced the ability to shoot the mark and daze the guard, or take him out before he could yell, radio, or fire to alert others.
In Ground Zeroes, getting spotted no longer comes with an assault from grammatical symbols, but time does slow down as the camera swings toward the source of the danger. If you can stun, silence, or kill the source of the alert, the base HQ won’t immediately be alerted to your presence. Of course, if the guard had previously reported unusual activity, or was tasked with reporting in at certain intervals, or was supposed to show up to help transport a prisoner ten minutes after you took him out, HQ may eventually catch on and send someone to investigate.
These mechanics are important because they go far beyond simply making the player work harder to get in and out undetected. As stated earlier, this is an open-ended game, and there is very little hand-holding with regards to the location of the prisoners, let alone the best way to rescue and extract each of them. The map on your facetiously named “iDroid” is exceptionally accurate, but doesn’t just point out objectives. Like in MGS 3, the Soliton radar from chronologically later games hasn’t been invented yet, and players must use their binoculars to mark guards, and keep track of surroundings with Boss’s ability to focus his senses when not moving. The binoculars also have a directional microphone, which can be used to eavesdrop on conversations, or just marvel at the sound design.
I managed to get Chico extracted without real issue, but getting to Paz was a much different story; Chico tells you she’s been tortured to death, and gives you a rather disturbing cassette tape as evidence. Master Miller, who has been your radio contact for the mission, advises Boss that even if Paz is dead, her body needs to be recovered. The tape proves useful in this regard, as Chico left it recording when he was taken to see her body, and you can follow the audio cues to track her location in the base.
The clues provide enough information to follow the trail to the base’s administrative and utility buildings, but from there it’s up to the player to either hunt through the area or interrogate soldiers for the exact location. I opted for the former, because I had no detections or alerts yet, and it proved to be an undoing of sorts. I was actually in exactly the right place, but got spotted, and so reloaded a checkpoint. Unfortunately, checkpoints take you back to a pre-determined place on the map, and reset other assets as well; I ended up inside the base, but in a complete different area, and with several guards in different positions than before.
The end result was that I spent the next half-hour carefully picking my way through the most heavily-guarded locations I had yet encountered, only to end up where I started the mission. Once I pieced together what had happened, and actually started using the map correctly, I was able to navigate back to the right place. Reloading the checkpoint turned out to be a moot point, because I managed to alert every last guard in the base as we tried to make our escape.
Paz isn’t dead, turns out, but needs to be carried to a safe rendezvous with the chopper. She is badly injured, physically and mentally, to the point where moving too quickly causes her to cry out in pain; she also sometimes lets out bursts of fear or confusion, which can alert guards to your presence. Regardless of what you do, they eventually discover she is missing, and sound the alarm. I made things worse by misunderstanding an order to “go ahead and call it the chopper,” thinking Miller meant to call it in at our current location. It was immediately shot down, time and again, until I realized he meant to call it to a safe location where it could be waiting for a quick exit.
The scenes that follow your escape can’t be described here, not with any real impact, and I wouldn’t spoil them anyway. Suffice to say I cannot wait for The Phantom Pain, whenever that might arrive. Overall, doing the main mission for the first time took me maybe two hours, and I ended up with an understandably crappy rating. Finishing the main mission unlocks five side missions – six, actually, now that each console-exclusive mission has been made available for free on all platforms – all of which take place at the same base, but alter the circumstances significantly.
I tried several of these missions the first week I had the game, and then put Ground Zeroes to the side as other things came to the forefront. During this time, Wildgrube managed to procure a copy of the MGS HD Collection on 360, and on my advice tried starting MGS 3. He hated it, and not without reason; stealth gameplay has come a long way since 2004, and the controls had been originally optimized for the PS2. Thankfully, he managed to get a copy of Ground Zeroes for himself thereafter, and loved every second of it, to the point where he actually dug in and played the side missions with enthusiasm. Talking to him got me back into it, and I am happier for it.
Most of the reviews passed off these missions as retreads of the main event, just with different time-of-day lighting effects and some tweaks to objectives and infiltration methods. While a couple of the missions do have a “get in, do this, get out” theme, the variety is far and away more worthwhile than I expected. The changes to time of day make an enormous difference, as sneaking in broad daylight becomes an exercise in patience and awareness far beyond the nighttime missions. These side objectives also give the team to show off even more of the open-ended nature of the game.
One of the side missions tasks you with disabling at least three anti-air emplacements so that an aerial attack on the base can be executed. The emplacements are marked from the start, and fairly easy to locate with your binoculars; finding explosives to eliminate them is your true task, and once again involves careful observation, exploration, and even interrogation. My personal favorite side mission eschews stealth completely, and tasks Boss with using a high-powered rifle to provide covering fire for an intelligence asset trying to make his escape from the base.
While I have greatly enjoyed my time with the game, especially after Erich renewed my interest, I can say flat-out that this is not an experience for everyone. I can even admit that, if I were not the MGS fan I am then the price-to-play ratio would be ghastly. If you’re interested in seeing what changes have been made to the formula, or haven’t ever gotten into the series, I might suggest borrowing a copy from a friend. I won’t make the mistake of broadly suggesting this to Splinter Cell fans, for the same reason I wouldn’t suggest watching The French Connection just because someone says they like 24.
Overall, I’m very glad I picked up Ground Zeroes, and further pleased that it helped sway someone new to the Metal Gear Solid team. I will be very interested to see whether or not this section is included with The Phantom Pain, or if Kojima goes through with having them be two separate-yet-connected titles. My favorite MGS title is still Snake Eater, and the chance to once again play as Big Boss excites me to no end. The Phantom Pain is purportedly ambitious almost to a fault, but even if Kojima “only” gives us a standard-length Metal Gear game using this engine, the series will still stand head-and-shoulders above everything else.
Last week, Lucasfilm released a statement regarding the Star Wars Expanded Universe. The basic gist of the statement is that all EU materials are officially non-canonical; only the six Star Wars films and the Clone Wars animated show are considered irrevocable canon moving forward. New entries into the series, such as the upcoming Rebels series and Episode VII, will therefore have the freedom to incorporate EU elements, but are not beholden to them.
I fell in love with Star Wars at an early age, and that only grew when the Special Editions were released in theaters. I grew up reading novels, comics, and various “Essential Guides,” in the Expanded Universe; I played an untold number of video games, the Star Wars card game, and even got passingly familiar with the pen-and-paper RPG. I was 12 when Episode I came out, and saw it twice on release day; I actually even thought it was pretty good, at the time.
I guess the expectation, then, would be for me to rail against “The Man” for deciding to invalidate all of those stories, characters, adventures, and cool new spaceships. The fact of the matter is, though, that all this statement did was reinforce was has always been policy regarding the EU. Lucasfilm tried to keep all EU stories consistent with one another, and nothing released under the imprint was ever allowed to openly contradict the films. However, the films were the only official canon, and the prequels overrode numerous things that had been established in EU stories during the ‘90s.
The simple fact of the matter is that trying to create new, post-Jedi stories for the upcoming films that don’t step on the toes of the EU would be logistically impossible. More than that, the writers would be confining themselves for the sake of a handful of good stories, and a whole lot of nonsense. I love the Timothy Zahn books, as does every Star Wars EU fan; if the new films were being made ten years ago, I would even hope the new trilogy might be based on those works.
Most of the EU, though, is moderately well-written, at best, and some of those novels are just bad; the same holds true for the video games as well. I will admit that most of the comics and graphic novels released by Dark Horse over the years are pretty fantastic, with only a few really poor entries. Regardless, these new films need to be able to entertain all audiences, and have the freedom to explore new storylines. Trying to keep the EU canonical would almost guarantee alienation of regular moviegoers, and require characters like Emperor Palpatine’s three-eyed son to be taken into consideration.
I guess I can’t get worked up because this announcement doesn’t go back and erase all the enjoyment the Expanded Universe has brought fans over the years: I still have a crush on Mara Jade; I still know the Outrider is the only ship cooler than the Falcon; I still got to be an elite test-pilot for the TIE defender; I still won’t ever believe Boba Fett died in the Pit of Carkoon. “A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away…” is more than just the opening crawl from those films for me; it’s an invitation to go to that galaxy, to close my eyes and see a dozen different versions of the trench run rushing up to meet me.
I don’t know if these new films are going to be good, but I’m hopeful; I don’t feel as altruistic toward Rebels, based on my dislike of The Clone Wars, but I wouldn’t mind being surprised. I respect this statement, especially given that George didn’t feel the EU was worth addressing in a similar manner prior to the prequels. Plus, since the new films have “full access to the rich content,” there’s still hope to see a big-screen version of Admiral Thrawn.
Leading up to the release of The Elder Scrolls Online, Bethesda has put together a series of cinematic trailers that rival a lot of Hollywood films for production value and sheer amount of fantasy-epic awesomeness. The trailers follow a trio of warriors – one from each of the game’s “alliances” – as they get caught up in the greater events affecting Tamriel. The trailers are a blast to watch, and I’ve linked them below.
Pretty fantastic, right? As fans of The Elder scrolls know, the denizens of Tamriel spend most of their time trying to murder each other, at least when not dealing with fire mountains, Oblivion gates, and reincarnated dragons. The new MMO looks to capture that feeling of strife and struggle amidst grand events; this time around Molag Bal, “Daedric Prince of domination and enslavement,” is working to merge Oblivion with the physical world of Nirn.
I greatly enjoyed the trailers, and would gladly watch a full-length feature, or maybe a series of webisodes, about the “three champions” and their eventual fates. What these videos don’t do, however, is give a genuine representation of The Elder Scrolls Online; I played a few hours of the ESO beta, and can attest that the gameplay is, as expected, about as far from these scenes as the Summerset Isle from Solstheim. To be fair to Bethesda, they aren’t the first game company to do this, nor will they be the last; the most prominent of the bunch is probably Blizzard, whose cinematic wonders for World of Warcraft are a far cry from the point-and-click reality. Hell, at least Elder Scrolls games let you aim your shots!
The problem with a marketing campaign of this nature, however, is that it’s not 2004 anymore; people know what to expect from an MMO, and doubly so from an Elder Scrolls game. I’m not saying MMOs can’t have engaging action – Tera and Guild Wars 2 have certainly altered the landscape in that regard – but I doubt many people are expecting an Uncharted-style action / platforming sequence like we see that rogue pull off. Everyone who’s even a casual gamer has probably played Oblivion or Skyrim in the past decade, and knows that area-specific damage and destructible environments aren’t a part of the proceedings.
The other problem is that even if these trailers do reach people out-of-touch enough to buy an MMO and expect action like this, those people certainly aren’t going to keep paying the monthly subscription fee once the truth outs. Nearly everyone in the industry has already questioned how long parent company ZeniMax can keep the game going on a paid basis; I know that every last person I would play this game with, on PC or console, lost interest the second the fee was announced. Even a strong initial showing for a subscriber model can trail off, as microtransactions and tiered payment systems continue to dominate the industry.
BioWare is one of the leading role-playing developers in the industry right now, and the difference between brand recognition of Star Wars and Elder Scrolls is night and day. The Old Republic got off to what was considered a pretty good start, sales and subscriptions wise; yet it eventually succumbed to a free-to-play model, and still has trouble generating interest from players. I love Star Wars and BioWare; I could go sign up and start playing it right now, and yet it’s not going to happen.
I know that a lot of companies have money earmarked for marketing, but I really can’t help but wonder if the time and funds put into these trailers is going to pay out in the end. The Elder Scrolls Online is currently an unknown quantity, for sure; MMOs are difficult to review, and the early months don’t necessarily reflect how the game will perform over time. If it didn’t have a fee, I’d probably be getting it when it launches for the One; as it stands, I just hope Bethesda doesn’t waste any more time before getting to Fallout 4.
Update: Min-Liang Tan, the CEO of high-end gaming tech giant Razer, has responded to Notch’s tweet: “Perhaps we can help out. Will be in touch.” This year’s CES saw Razer reveal multiple devices that hint toward a possible entry by the company into the realm of virtual reality.
Original Story
In a shocking announcement, Facebook has revealed that they will acquire Oculus VR – the company behind the ambition “Oculus Rift” virtual-reality headset – at the price of $400 million in cash, and 23.1 million shares of Facebook stock (valued at approximately $1.6 billion). The deal is set to close in the second quarter of this year.
The leadership at Oculus has posted a statement on the company website: “At first glance, it might not seem obvious why Oculus is partnering with Facebook, a company focused on connecting people, investing in internet access for the world and pushing an open computing platform. But when you consider it more carefully, we’re culturally aligned with a focus on innovating and hiring the best and brightest; we believe communication drives new platforms; we want to contribute to a more open, connected world; and we both see virtual reality as the next step.”
“Mobile is the platform of today, and now we’re also getting ready for the platforms of tomorrow,” says Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg. “Oculus has the chance to create the most social platform ever, and change the way we work, play and communicate.”
“After games, we’re going to make Oculus a platform for many other experiences. Imagine enjoying a court side seat at a game, studying in a classroom of students and teachers all over the world or consulting with a doctor face-to-face — just by putting on goggles in your home.”
“This partnership is one of the most important moments for virtual reality: it gives us the best shot at truly changing the world,” the Oculus team says. “It opens doors to new opportunities and partnerships, reduces risk on the manufacturing and work capital side, allows us to publish more made-for-VR content, and lets us focus on what we do best: solving hard engineering challenges and delivering the future of VR.”
The deal has already claimed one casualty, as Notch, the mind behind Minecraft, took to Twitter and his blog to announce that he will no longer be developing a version of the game for Oculus Rift. The Minecraft phenomenon sprang from very humble origins – though some claim Notch takes more credit than he deserves – and the creator doesn’t feel this new deal is good news for indie development.
“Facebook is not a company of grass-roots tech enthusiasts. Facebook is not a game tech company. Facebook has a history of caring about building user numbers, and nothing but building user numbers.”
Oculus Rift has garnered massive attention over the past year, as gamers have wondered what it would be like to experience games like Mirror’s Edge, Portal, Skyrim and more using the unique VR headset. Time will tell if this deal helps bring virtual reality one step closer to home, or reduces it to just another Candy Crush Saga accessory.
Yesterday, for the first time in years, I took an entire day off doing one single thing: Playing a video game. With the exception of breaks for meals, doing some laundry between matches, and reading a chapter of The Fellowship of the Ring before bed, I didn’t do anything yesterday other than play Titanfall. In the interest of full disclosure, the event actually began at around 8:30 Tuesday night, since my entire team had the day off on Wednesday. That means a solid 24 hours was mostly dedicated to playing Titanfall.
This is going to be one of the easiest reviews I’ve ever written, because Titanfall can be boiled down to a single question: Do you have a core group of friends you play online shooters with? If the answer is “yes,” you don’t really need the review, as I assume you’re already playing Titanfall. If the answer is “no,” and you’re wondering if Titanfall is worth it solo, I’m afraid I have some bad news: It’s not worth it solo.
By “solo,” I mean playing the game solely with an interest in the story being offered, without worrying about being “good” at the game from a multiplayer perspective. For starters, there is ZERO in the way of a single-player experience. This is SOCOM and MAG taken to the next level; yes, there is a campaign, but you literally play through nine of the game’s fifteen maps with some audio and special intro scenes thrown in for good measure. There are other players playing with you, on each side of the story, and to keep things fair it doesn’t matter whether you win or lose each match.
I knew going in that I wouldn’t care about the story, which is good, because it’s delivered in three of the least efficient manners imaginable in a game like this:
1) Audio that plays in the match lobbies.
2) Scenes that happen at the beginning and end of each match.
3) Audio and picture-in-picture video that plays during the match.
So basically, they try to tell you the story while you are talking with your team or party about the last match, figuring out your loadouts, talking about the match that just finished, or worst of all, while you are PLAYING THE GAME. I don’t know about you, but in a fast-paced FPS featuring giant robots and jetpacks, I am devoting less-than-zero attention to watching the little video at the top corner of my screen.
The game randomly picks which side you play as – IMC or Militia – when you begin a campaign, and automatically puts you on the other side when you start your next run. You can’t select individual missions until you’ve beaten both campaigns, which you’ll need to do to unlock all three titan cores. This can be a little frustrating if you’re playing with a party where everyone is at a different part of the game, but we found ways around it until all of us had completed each mission from both sides.
The side you’re on affects what audio, intro, and in-game story bits you see and hear, but the matches themselves have almost no impact on the story. For instance, one match involves the Militia trying to overload some reactors while the IMC defends them it a hardpoint domination game type. Even if the IMC wins by a landslide, the story finds a way to still have the reactors detonate. This also leads to weird situations when a match is close, where your pilots’ COs alternate radio chatter between “we’re crushing them” and “our forces are being decimated.”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JtbKyM263tE
To be as honest as possible, I refrained from doing any research for these next paragraphs, which is the best story synopsis I can give based on having played the campaign from both sides twice: The games takes place far into space, on the “Fringe,” and focuses on a war between the IMC and the Militia. The IMC has decided to start using AI-controlled soldiers called sentinels. The Militia is losing badly, until the IMC ends up attacking a colony where an old, presumed-dead war hero is living. He joins the Militia, and together they stage a series of attacks on IMC bases.
Along the way, you’ll play missions with objectives like stealing data from a crashed IMC ship, taking over anti-ship guns to attack a dry-docked IMC ship, and bringing down towers around an IMC base to allow the giant, vicious life-forms that live on the planet to attack. There are also at least three missions where I can’t remember who’s doing what, to whom, or why.
This culminates in an attack on some kind of base on a world directly next to a star, in which the war hero sacrifices himself, and an IMC commander defects to the Militia, and control of the IMC is granted to Skynet… sorry, “Spyglass,” and a heavily-accented sociopath is a dick to everyone. There are some vague shots of spaceships, and some radio chatter from the corresponding sides. Then, for some reason, the game doesn’t end; there is a final mission where the Militia attacks the sentinel manufacturing facility, and the game essentially gives you another set of vague shots of spaceships and radio chatter.
If my recollection seems very pro-Militia, it’s because the game doesn’t even try to blur the lines about who the heroes of the game are. The very first mission involves a Militia raid on a fueling facility; if you’re the IMC, you have to stop them, despite the fact that there are numerous civilian ships with the fleet. If you “win,” the heavily-accented psychopath remarks that “Today’s civilians are tomorrow’s militia.” The very next mission starts with sentinels slaughtering civilians, and that same asshole remarking that it’s not a good enough test of their capabilities.
The characterin this picture could be named Tits McGee for all I know.
All that to say this: I don’t remember a single character name, meaningful moment, or piece of non-cliché dialogue, and I played this through four times. So when I say that the game isn’t worth it for the solo experience, that’s what I mean. Nothing this game provides is worth it outside of the core experience of playing the game. If you think you can play the game online, but without a team or core group, then it might be worth it to keep reading.
Now that you’ve made it to this point, forget the last four paragraphs and read this: Titanfall is the single best multiplayer experience since Bad Company 2, in my opinion. It is the culmination of a lineage going back to CoD 4: Modern Warfare, and is actually made by many of the same people. It borrows and learns from Battlefield, Halo, Call of Duty, Counter-Strike, Team Fortress, and a half-dozen other pedigree franchises.
As a moderate FPS veteran of multiple console generations, nothing in the game feels out-of-place, unnatural, or difficult to grasp. There’s a twenty-minute training simulator at the very beginning that gives you the basics, but moves along nicely to keep it from getting boring. There are a few mechanics, such as wall-hanging – hold left-trigger while on a wall – that I didn’t know about until they popped up on a loading screen tip. It also seems like you can switch pilot loadouts at any time without a respawn, or maybe in it’s just in certain circumstances; I really don’t know. These oversights in the tutroial are minor at best.
Basically, you spend all of your time either as a pilot or piloting a titan; playing as a pilot is like Call of Duty with jetpacks and parkour, and piloting a titan will feel familiar to anyone who has ever played another game with mechs. There are different weapons, perks, explosives, and whatnot available on both sides, and pretty much any play style can be rewarding if utilized correctly. I will say this, though: Moving around on the ground, half-crouched any checking corners is going to get you murdered.
The game is a symphony of mobility, and the most effective players are going to be the ones who can learn how to think in three dimensions, more than any other game on the market. In hardpoint domination, for instance, most areas can be accessed from any side, from above, and potentially from below. While titans can’t jump, players seem to be quickly adapting to the idea that you can call a titan in and then keep moving around outside of it.
This is accomplished by the game’s impressive auto-titan AI system for the mechs, which can be set to either guard a location or follow you as best they can. More than once I’ve left my titan to guard an area and then run off elsewhere. There are limits – stay gone for too long or go too far and your titan will shut down until you climb aboard again – but the game obviously encourages this play-style. In fact, a later perk allows your titan to be more accurate and efficient while in auto-titan mode.
The game also rewards people who can manage multiple loadouts as necessary. I tend to find two loadouts, tops, that I excel at and stick with them. In Titanfall, though, I actually have all six loadouts ready at any given time, and switch freely between tactics. The same goes for titan loadouts; what may work well if I’m piloting manually in an attrition game doesn’t necessarily perform well in guard mode during a capture the flag.
The only mechanic that the game really fails at explaining is “burn cards,” though we all pieced them together fairly quickly. Basically, these are one-time use bonuses that last from when you use them until you die and respawn. You have a maximum of three slots, and cards can be set in each slot from your deck between matches. Once in a match, they can be activated from the loadout menu. Some will kick in instantly, others not until your next spawn, and you can only have one active at a time.
The effects they offer include upgraded perks, enhanced weapons, extra XP, or even instant-access to a titan; normally, titans have a “build timer” that can be reduced by scoring points in various ways. There is a twenty-five card limit to your deck, so it’s worthwhile to use and even discard cards frequently. Early on I tried to keep cards for “that one special occasion,” but quickly found this wasn’t worth the space, as I just never used those cards.
Interestingly enough, I’ve already written a fair amount more than I intended to, or even really thought possible. To be honest, though, I don’t really think I’ve offered much insight; I’m ok with that, because again, there’s no insight to offer. Odds are anyone with even a passing interest in this game already owns it, especially if they have friends they game with. I’m sure there are a handful of FPS enthusiasts out there who won’t mind picking it up and playing with strangers; if so, more power to them, because this is a Hell of a game.
As multiplayer-driven experiences like Call of Duty and Battlefield have grown bloated in recent years, I’ve stood by and sneered. I don’t have anything against a great multiplayer experience, but all I saw was the same game coming out ad-infinitum. If you had told me I would willingly pay $60 for a game that was online-only, and featured a lackluster campaign I would only grind through to get unlocks, I would not have been pleasant in response. As it stands – or, in this case, falls – I’m going to wrap up the review here, “because Titanfall.”
I downloaded Titanfall directly from the Xbox One marketplace. It was my first time ever getting a launch of this magnitude digitally, and I have no complaints thus far. It is also [amazon_link id=”B00DB9JYFY” target=”_blank” container=”” container_class=”” ]available on PC, and will be released for the Xbox 360 on March 25.[/amazon_link]
When Dishonored was released in October 2012, it hit gaming like a revelation, a breath of fresh air for gamers used to wading through the sequels and spin-offs that usually accompany the final years of a console generation. August, thankfully, had seen Sleeping Dogs revitalize the sandbox/action/crime genre, and Dishonored followed suit for first-person games, eschewing convention and breaking classifications.
It was a masterful work of contradictions, with open levels that invited exploration and examination in first-person, equal opportunities for nail-biting stealth and all-out carnage, a story that blended intrigue and betrayals with just enough of the supernatural, and a moral choice system that made you work to find solutions beyond simple murder.
The game received high praise from critics, players and other developers, but there was a sect of gaming where it was seen as more of a continuation of tradition than something brand new. This sect, myself included, used a single word when trying to describe what Dishonored had tapped into: “Thief.”
Originally released in November 1998, Thief: The Dark Project was received in a similar fashion to its later spiritual successor, and it is possible the praise it garnered was even higher at the time. PC games had been growing steadily more ambitious for years: Half-Life came out a mere three weeks before Thief, System Shock 2 followed a year later, and Deus Ex arrived six months after that.
Where Thief excelled was open-ended levels that not only encouraged, but demanded that players use cunning, critical thinking, and a variety of tools and skills to navigate to the objective. If you’ve played Dishonored, you get the general idea, except Thief’s ambition and execution preceded it by fourteen years. I can still remember playing the original, and being absolutely enthralled by things like rope, water, and moss arrows.
Thief II: The Metal Age came out in February 2000, and was even more beloved than the original; to this day, most Thief fans still point to it as the high-point of the series. The core concepts remained the same, but the story was deeper, darker, and held more legitimate consequences for those involved. The third installment, Thief: Deadly Shadows, added the element of The City as a hub between missions, where players could buy and sell goods, or take on side quests and odd jobs. Deadly Shadows was the only previous Thief to appear on consoles.
After Deadly Shadows in 2004, Garrett and crew disappeared into the darkness; the studio that developed Deadly Shadows closed soon after, and the series passed into gaming memory. It wasn’t until 2009 that Eidos Montreal revealed they were working on “Thi4f;” the studio had only been around since 2007, and their only other project at the time was Deus Ex: Human Revolution. It saddens me to say that as of March 4, 2014 twenty-seven people were laid off from the studio. Keep reading, though, and that decision may seem in the company’s best interests.
Photo courtesy rubberchickengames.com
Over the development cycle, the game that was released two weeks ago simply as Thief went through numerous changes; for instance, the “4” was dropped because the game was no longer a sequel, in addition to the fact that “Thi4f” is a stupid name. The developers toyed with numerous ideas, and games like Assassin’s Creed, BioShock, Splinter Cell, and even Dishonored impacted the final product. The extended development cycle also lead to the game being developed for two different console generations, as well as PC.
The end result is a new title that takes place several hundred years after the original games. The protagonist, still named Garrett, is potentially a descendent of the previous character; other characters share similar naming connections, and clues / references can be found throughout the game to The City’s past. The game opens with Garrett and his sometimes partner Erin trying to steal a rare, supposedly supernatural item from the baron who rules this time period. Things go horribly wrong, Garrett is presumed dead, and a year passes during which a strange plague starts to take hold in the city.
I’m going to stop there. Have you played Dishonored? Then you’ve played a much more compelling version of this story, which is mostly nonsensical garbage. It jumps all over the place, characters come and go seemingly at random, and things just kind of happen without resolution. There are supernatural forces, secret orders, conspiracies, civil unrest, family secrets, and the like all just kind of shoved in there; Garrett see-saws between reluctant hero, anti-hero, hero, and asshole mid-conversation. The final cutscene literally confused me so badly I looked it up and watched it multiple times, and it still makes no damn sense. At this point, I’m going to briefly deal with the “why” of this issue, as I think it may be of some importance.
The story is told, like in most game of this ilk, through a mix of in-game events, scenes rendered with the game’s engine, and a few CGI cutscenes; interestingly, these are not the same CGI used in the trailers, which is far superior. These moderate-production bits are scattered seemingly at random throughout the game, and somehow don’t ever seem to really mesh with the rest of the events. Oddly enough, they also aren’t as sharp-looking as the scenes rendered using the in-game engine, which makes their inclusion questionable.
My half-baked theory is that these scenes were produced, probably at considerable cost, earlier in the game’s development. As time wore on, the story and concepts changed, but these few videos represented too big an investment to simply throw away. As a result, the developers found themselves obligated to try and bend the story in ways to keep these scenes viable. I know how that sounds, but trust me, if you play the game all the way through it will seem a lot more grounded.
The other massive blow to presentation, content notwithstanding, is unfortunately the game-rendered scenes as well; they have better lighting, character detail, and animation, but also have one major flaw. In these scenes, as reported across all platforms, and verified by myself and Erich on PC and Xbox One, the audio and animation are so badly out-of-sync they become almost unwatchable. Not just characters’ lips and voices, either, but the sound and video for entire scenes alternate lagging behind or jumping ahead of one another to a jarring degree.
This is a real shame in some of the game’s better scenes, when I would have genuinely enjoyed being able to just take in the dialogue and atmosphere. One character in particular, Basso, is extremely well-realized; he’s Garrett’s handler, job contact, fence, and sometimes friend, and their conversations are the high-point of the game. The low-point is undoubtedly Erin, who’s basically a Hot Topic cashier dropped into a Thief game with her diary as her script. The story’s biggest drawback is that they expect the player to give a shit about her, which I never once managed to do.
You couldn’t be blamed at this point for wondering why I took the time to keep playing this game, let alone beat it in just under a week, and so I’d better offer an explanation. Without too much run-around, I found the gameplay to be genuinely engaging, if not necessarily fresh or innovative. Running around, hiding in shadows, using tools and trick arrows to move through the levels was fun; seeing the glint of some trinket and knowing immediately that I was going to risk getting caught just to nab it only lost its luster toward the end.
The game is set up with The City as a hub, with your base in the giant clock tower near the center, and a shop to buy supplies and upgrades just a few rooftops over. Navigating is a mixture of fun and frustration, as well-designed paths sometimes end abruptly, or force you to go around seemingly benign obstacles. The game doesn’t have a “jump” button, and instead gives you a context-sensitive “action” button that either works perfectly or fails inexplicably at the worst possible moments.
The City is not seamless, but instead there are two types of “loading” screens you can encounter, one which requires you to jimmy open a window with a crowbar, and one which has you lift a fallen beam out of the way in crawlspaces. Of course, not all windows and crawlspaces are load screens – some just lead to small rooms with collectible loot – and so moving around the hub isn’t as smooth as it could be.
Starting each mission usually requires you to go chat with various characters around the city and progress the story, and then head for a certain spot on the map. As the story progresses, certain things about the map may shift and change, and what was once a clear path may suddenly be blocked or more heavily guarded. The game shines at these moments, forcing you to carefully be on the lookout for grates you can slip through, traps you can disarm, or objects you can shoot with blunt arrows and make a new path.
Each mission takes place in its own self-contained level, and while you still have multiple paths to choose from, they don’t feel as open-ended on approach. The most frustrating moments are when the game intentionally sends you into a heavily-guarded area only to have Garrett encounter a locked door or barred gate, at which point some new means of approach becomes clear. Each level comes with its own various collectibles and unique pieces of loot, as well as dozens of little trinkets to nab along the way, or documents to collect that deepen the story or offer clues to your objective.
These items are often hidden in locations you need to be actively searching for, or that you need to listen to conversations around you to become aware of. Often you’ll need to follow a guard or civilian and slip in unnoticed after they unlock a door or activate a switch. There is a serviceable lock-pick mechanic in the game, and sometimes you’ll need to have purchased the wrench or wire-cutter tool to access a certain area. I found myself seeking out the chances in earlier levels to explore for secrets, but by the last mission I was more concerned with getting to the next objective, especially since spare cash was in no short supply by that point.
Each mission grades you on your performance with one of three monikers: Ghost, Opportunist, or Predator. Predator if self-explanatory, and given if takedowns and murders were your style; Ghost is awarded for making as little an impact as possible, never even giving guards a reason to be alarmed. I got Opportunist on almost every level, meaning I was willing to use the environment, traps, and distractions to my advantage to get past guards. I still managed to make it through the entire game without getting spotted or killing someone, and the only takedowns I had were those mandated by the game at certain points.
The meta-game to this mechanic is that the optional objective for each mission changes depending on what your play style was. For example, a Ghost might have needed to pickpocket six guards, an Opportunist to disarm five traps, or a Predator to get five kills with fire arrows. Completing the corresponding objective nets you extra gold. I got about half of these just by playing the level, but was frustrated that the game only gives explanations of these mechanics in one place: Loading screen tips. Apparently, you can keep track of these objectives from a menu, but I didn’t find that until the second-to-last mission.
I will give the developers credit for at least trying to reward varied play styles. To be honest, I can’t imagine playing the game in an aggressive fashion, because the combat system, even when using arrows, simply isn’t geared toward direct confrontation. Many reviews complained that the melee “combat” is nothing more than a system of dodging and weak attacks with your blackjack, but my response there is simply “You’re playing a game called Thief; why the Hell are you in combat?” True, this leads to a lot of reloading saves if you get spotted, but since that’s the same way I played Dishonored, it didn’t bother me that much.
The game does have some flawed and ill-advised mechanics. There are occasional bits of third-person platforming, and in addition to looking really silly, it’s not always clear where you should be going. The map is useless for anything other than getting your general bearings, which is frustrating when you climb up three stories and use a precious rope arrow only to discover a room with some generic loot instead of a way forward through the mission. There are “loud” surfaces like broken glass and water in some places, as well as dogs or birds that can make noise and bring guards; I never seemed to get a handle on when and why any of these things attracted attention, even after repeated trips through the same area.
Garrett can do something called a “swoop,” where he dashes quickly across a short space in any direction; sometimes I could do this past four guards in front of a torch and never be spotted, but then try and do it past a single enemy in total darkness and immediately alert him. Combined with the occasional failure of the contextual action button, and the unpredictable nature of what does and doesn’t constitute being “in the shadows,” this probably led to more reloaded saves than anything else in the game.
The other so-so mechanic is Garrett’s supernatural ability to “focus,” highlighting people and objects of interest, which can be upgraded so that you move more quietly, deal more damage, pick locks faster, etc. while it’s active. On the difficult level I played through on, it didn’t regenerate automatically, and had to be replenished by finding and consuming poppies in the world. Thing is, even when empty, I could still hit the button and everything of interest would flash with a blue glow that slowly faded. I actually found myself preferring this method, and would intentionally drain my focus meter anytime the game refilled it.
There are a few missions that contain environmental hazards or run-for-your life scenarios, usually involving scripted events of guards spotting you or something catching on fire. The best of these is also the worst, as it involves what should be a breakneck race to get out of a burning, collapsing structure. Instead, what happened was that the scripted events to open a new path, or the ever-cursed action button, wouldn’t work properly, and I’d find myself falling to my death or burning alive before reloading a save.
Photo courtesy gamehdw.com
The missions can be played back through, but the method of doing so makes so little sense it baffles me. Upon completing the game, you’re told that you can replay missions and try to get all the collectibles. Being a gamer, I assumed this would either be done from a menu, or some sort of journal / display case in the clock tower, where there are journals and display cases for all of the collectibles. No such luck, and the map wasn’t helping, either. In the end, I went online to discover that you have to find the original mission start point in The City to replay a mission. Start points which, despite the fact that Garrett has already been there, don’t appear on the map in-game.
This knowledge of how to replay missions is apparently hidden in a loading screen tip as well, along with this bit of info: Basso can offer you side-mission that require you to steal unique loot from various places around the city. I had read reviews that talked about side-missions, but never encountered the ability to start one, and the game doesn’t give you that information freely. In fact, the game doesn’t really make it clear that you can go to various shops or talk to other characters between missions; after each mission, it drops you back in the clock tower with an objective indicator, and you’re off to have a story-driven conversation or two before the next chapter begins.
I think, in the end, that cycle may be a fitting analogy for this game as a whole: Pointed in one direction and told to go, sometimes without context, while other possibilities get bypassed unknowingly. I don’t think it’s nearly as bad as other reviewers say, and I found the game to be enjoyable and enticing during the campaign. I honestly don’t know if I’ll go back for side-missions or extra unique loot, though I might play any extra content or full expansions that may come along.
If you were wondering why I said I was “saddened” about the layoffs at the studio mentioned earlier, beyond people losing their jobs being sad, look no further than Deus Ex: Human Revolution. I think my words here – long development, uncertain mechanics, unfocused story – could have applied directly to it, as well, when it was released. The developers in that case got a second chance with the “director’s cut” version that came out last year, and was widely seen as being superior to the original product. This is also the studio that brought us the Tomb Raider reboot, which saw the updated “definitive edition” come out recently, albeit a different team within the studio.
I feel like Thief could be easily upgraded from a mediocre experience to a good, at times great experience if given a similar chance to be expanded, polished, and sent back out again. In the long run, though, that’s no excuse for releasing a title with obvious flaws, lackluster design, and broken mechanics. The cutscene sound and audio issues alone should have raised some flags, though its likely publisher Square Enix would not have brokered further delays. As it stands, Thief is the tarnished silver knock-off to its successors, as opposed to the platinum tribute of craftsmanship apparent in Dishonored.
I played Thief on PC. It is also available on [amazon_link id=”B00CYNTHA0″ target=”_blank” container=”” container_class=”” ]360, One, PS3, PS4.[/amazon_link]
…as performed by the “Wiener Chorus” from the recent trilogy of South Park episodes. I dare you to watch the entire thing. More than that, though, you should definitely watch these three episodes: Black Friday, A Song of Ass and Fire, Titties and Dragons. The episodes are phenomenal, but are best experienced if you’re already familiar with Game of Thrones. They’re on Hulu Plus, and available for &*#^ing free on www.southparkstudios.com, along with the nearly every episode of the show.
I made it to the seven minute mark myself. I was subconciously grinding my teeth by that point.
Before I reveal my choice for Game of the Year 2013, I’d like to take a moment and discuss the concept of “GOTY” selections. Awards and accolades seem almost inherent to the human experience; no matter the context, we have this ingrained desire to elevate one thing over others like it. We hold award events for everything from costumes to dogs to homemade flying machines and beyond.
In the entertainment world, this has taken the form of industry-wide events; from the Oscars to the Grammys to the MTV Video Music Awards, we take entertainment and try to qualify it. Some of these events are given more credibility than others, like an Oscar being “worth more” than a Golden Globe, and everyone seems to have their favorite program. Hell, the Razzies are an “award” event for the things people think sucked!
In the gaming industry, the Spike Video Game Awards has probably become the most public event, but their winners tend to be taken with a grain of salt by the large majority of gamers, developers, and even publishers. In gaming, there’s almost a Pokémon approach to GOTY awards; since almost every major publication makes a selection, the objective “winner” seems to be the one who catches ‘em all, so to speak.
Personally, I pay a lot of attention to the Game Developers Choice Awards, because I’m interested in what the people who make games consider to be the “best” every year. The selections from GDCA tend to highlight innovation and excellence in design more than profitability, though to describe some of the picks as “pretentious” wouldn’t be too far off base.
Personally, I think that GOTY awards have lost a lot of potency, though it’s possible they hold weight with investors that I’m overlooking, much like winning an Oscar can help boost an actor or director in terms of studio interest. The biggest direct result of the awards in recent years has been the advent of “Game of the Year” editions that include extra content, although plenty of titles have come around to this idea without needing a GOTY moniker. Of course, companies can go a little overboard when touting these accolades on a new edition…
2013 was an interesting year for my gaming habit; whereas recent previous years were overflowing with titles, this year seemed light on releases. The holiday console launch saw the usual field thinned a bit, as developers and publishers pushed titles back into the next few years. This was also the Year of the PC for me, and the creation of the Stargate SG-X saw a lot of my gaming time go into PC games from recent years that I wanted to experience.
To be 100% honest, picking anything other than[amazon_link id=”B00GXHISJE” target=”_blank” container=”” container_class=”” ] Fallout 3[/amazon_link] as my “Game of the Year” for 2013 is a lie, since no other game pulled me in like returning to the Capitol Wasteland with mods and non-existent loading times. Picking a game from 2008 was deemed “questionable,” though, despite the fact that Matt Lees over at Video Gamer has picked Dark Souls as his GOTY three years running.
All joking aside, 2013 had standout titles, and even a few unbelievably excellent pieces of gaming scattered about. For my part, I tried to pick experiences that made me think “I’m glad I play games. It’s a shame other people miss out on this stuff.” To that end, I think I’ve been rather successful.
Trey’s GOTY 2013: Thomas Was Alone
First and foremost, all credit goes to Beth for convincing me to play this game. We picked it up during the Steam sale this past summer, and it might have gotten lost amongst all of the other indie gems if she hadn’t played it first and insisted – on a daily basis – that I get around to playing it.
I’ve made a bad habit this year of falling into the “PC Master Race” mindset. As time goes by, however, I realize that the true power of a PC isn’t rendering individual hairs inside an enemy’s nose, but the accessibility to perfect little nuggets of gaming that can be played on even basic machines.
Rather than rehash my review, I’d like to focus on the exact reason this game tops the list: Surprise factor. Everyone I have talked to about this game has been astounded at how profoundly involving it is, at how effectively the elements come together and draw you in.
Please, please play this game. Don’t even tell me if you do; it’s not necessarily a water-cooler game. Do it because you’ll be a more content, slightly more complete person afterward.
First Runner-Up: The Swapper
I talked about The Swapper in my Halloween editorial, and my one-word reason for it is: Atmosphere. It’s amazing how threatened I constantly felt in a game where the only characters are you, your clones, and sentient rocks. There were moments when I legitimately did not want to proceed, gripped by dread of the sheer emptiness around me.
The game is also a visual marvel, as every asset is actually a real-world set, model, or miniature blended together with stop-motion and a rendering algorithm. The result is a world that in extraordinarily detailed, even down to the minutiae, without needing a $1500 rig to run it.
Photo courtesy digitaltrends.com
Second Runner-Up: [amazon_link id=”B003O6EB70″ target=”_blank” container=”” container_class=”” ]BioShock Infinite[/amazon_link]
There it is! I’m sure anyone who even perused my gratuitously loving review of Infinite is wondering why it’s not at the top of this list. I have an answer for you: It isn’t a surprise that Infinite is unbelievably good. Its pedigree demanded nothing else. The first BioShock changed the expectations for the most recent gaming generation, and became synonymous with what Triple-A gaming is capable of.
That being said, this game is just about flawless; it blends addictive, rewarding, challenging gameplay with storytelling that is genuinely affecting across the emotional scale. It is a masterpiece, a labor of love from Ken Levine and his team. I acquired it on PC during a recent Amazon sale, booted it up just to see how it runs, and ended up three hours into the game.
Honorable Mention: [amazon_link id=”B0050SWUTQ” target=”_blank” container=”” container_class=”” ]Dead Space 3[/amazon_link]
Few games this year drew as much ire as Dead Space 3; between microtransactions, the increased action elements, and the inclusion of co-op, it was the focus of many poor reviews. For some, it stood for everything “wrong” with EA in recent years. I personally loved it, both in single player and in co-op, and feel it was wrongfully maligned. Also, Necromorphs are terrifying, period.
Fun. Raw, unmitigated, completely explicit and immature fun. You can read Erich’s thoughts on how much fun, or you could just go play it. Preferably in co-op, which is the best reason I’ve found in years as to why friends are a good thing. Go ahead, though, don’t play it. I won’t care, because I’ll be riding a velociraptor while listening to “Walk the Dinosaur.”
I wanted to do something in honor of the tenth anniversary of the Battlestar Galactica reboot, other than drink heavily as I consider that the series began a full decade ago, when I was still young and full of hope. I’ve toyed with the idea of watching back through the series and doing an episode-by-episode breakdown; sometimes this has been a solo venture, other times I’ve enlisted others, but each attempt has crumbled before a single word is ever typed.
Instead, what I bring you now is a show that got my attention specifically because someone referred to it as “Battlestar Galactica the Animated Series,” Space Battleship Yamato 2199. Quick history lesson: This show itself is a reboot of the original Space Battleship Yamato, which aired beginning in 1974, and involves a crew of misfit prodigals who, under the leadership of a seasoned military commander who commands exceptional loyalty and respect, must travel far into unknown space to seek a planet that may not even exist.
Sound familiar? Of course it does, and anyone with even a rudimentary knowledge of both shows can tell you that the 1978 Battlestar Galactica might not even exist without Yamato, which saw success in the U.S. under the title Star Blazers. While the shows share as many differences as they do similarities, anyone who is a fan of one – and doesn’t have some sort of disdain for animated or older shows, respectively – will probably find enough to like in the other to warrant watching.
Space Battleship Yamato 2199 begins with an engagement by the Earth fleet at the outskirts of the solar system against ships from the planet Garmillas. The Earth forces are completely overwhelmed by the attackers, with only a single ship surviving, but we quickly discover they were a decoy for a secret operation. While the Garmillans were distracted, a ship carrying an ambassador and technology from the planet Iscandar arrived on Mars.
The ambassador doesn’t survive, but the technology allows Earth to complete work on the Wave Motion Engine, finally giving humanity the ability to travel at faster-than-light speeds. Earth has been ravaged by targeted meteor strikes intended to turn the planet into a suitable home for Garmillans; the only hope lies in trying to reach Iscandar and retrieve even more advanced tech that can restore Earth.
This task falls to the crew of the Yamato, a ship built in secret that can use the Wave Motion core for propulsion, defense, and even offense. The Garmillans figure this out, and launch an attack directly at Earth that kills some of the intended Yamato crew, and forces the ship to depart early with some new recruits. The rest of the show involves the Yamato’s journey across the Milky Way and beyond, the struggles of her crew, and even takes time to establish more about the Garmillans and their perspective.
The Yamato is crewed by Juzo Okita (Adama), a brilliant but aging commander with his own reasons for accepting a mission he may never come back from; his XO Shiro Sanada, also the ship’s science officer (Tigh + Baltar); the ship’s young tactical officer Susumu Kodai (Apollo) and navigation officer Daisuke Shima (Gaeta); a hot-headed young female pilot prodigy named Akira Yamamoto (Starbuck); and the regular assortment of engineers, pilots, officers, and staff that fans of the genre have come to expect, most in archetypes you can readily recognize.
There are also the military and political leaders of the Garmillan Empire, which is so blunt in its Nazi imagery that I’m not sure “imagery” is even the right word. The plot weaves through the various intrigues of those surrounding leader Aberdt Dessler, as they try to use the Yamato as a piece in their games. We learn that Earth is just of passing interest to the empire, which spans most of the Large Magellanic Cloud beyond our galaxy; an empire which is experiencing a rebellion that the Yamato is unknowingly becoming a symbol for as it defeats Garmillan forces in battle.
Over these twenty-six episodes, the Yamato encounters standard fair for space adventures: ambushes, strange planets, mutiny, dangerous interstellar phenomena, secret enemy weapons, etc. With a few rare exceptions, each episode wraps up all major arcs before the credits roll, sometimes to its detriment; I can think of a few episodes that could have benefited from the added attention – and tension – of playing out over forty-five minutes instead of twenty-two. There are also a few plot arcs, especially those involving some of the intrigue on Garmillas, which just never go anywhere.
For instance, there is a brief storyline concerning how the initial encounter between the Earth and Garmillan forces years before actually played out, with characters on both sides having to accept that the “enemy” may have been incorrectly portrayed. Over the course of a few episodes, those characters develop in small ways, but the larger scope never changes from “Earth good, Garmillas bad.” More than once, the show dabbles in displaying Garmillan characters as sympathetic, only to then kill them off with little regard.
On the note of killing characters off, my largest complaint about the show – and the place where it differs most from its contemporaries and predecessor – is that “sacrifice” is not a word in its vocabulary. With less than a handful of named human character deaths, the show tells a tale about humanity can overcome all obstacles without having to give up anything. What’s worse, the show dabbles in near-death to build tension, but after a while I just stopped believing that anyone was going to actually die.
There are plenty of battles for these immortal crew members to fight, though, and that’s one area where Space Battleship Yamato 2199 keeps true to its course. The animation quality is unmatched, blending modern techniques with hints of the original’s style. Characters are easily recognizable, the ship designs are original and believable, and various battles play out with appropriate flash and substance. The ship engagements are especially well-done, with genuine emphasis on giving the impression of naval combat being played out in three-dimensional (and four-dimensional) space.
I’m watching various episodes of the new Battlestar Galactica as I watch this review, and in doing so I have to admit that Space Battleship Yamato 2199 is similar in spirit, but lacking in execution compared to BSG. I am genuinely interested in tracking down and watching the original Yamato / Star Blazers now, as the little bit of research I have done in writing this article points to a show that better manages some of the storytelling shortcomings I have mentioned in its successor.
I don’t know that I will ever own Space Battleship Yamato 2199, but I will certainly own a replica of the ship, which will sit proudly next to my replica of the Galactica. If you can track the show down on a streaming service, or with fan-made subtitles online, I would highly recommend it. If that seems like too much work, though, then I can say with some certainty that this title probably isn’t for you.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k5RJBhgdhCI
Regardless, [amazon_link id=”B0036EH3UC” target=”_blank” container=”” container_class=”” ]Battlestar Galactica runs less than $100 on Amazon[/amazon_link], and is available in its entirety on Netflix. Even after ten years, this show is unapproachable by nearly all contenders, and remains my pick for the best sci-fi television ever broadcast.
