Joe Q. Gamer

Peripherals Accumulate: Killing The Earth With Awesome Plastic Crap and Happy Meal Toys For Man Children

2010-01-03T02:55:00.000-08:00

As a longtime fan of fighting games, I have more than a few arcade sticks. That's an understatement, actually: I have a ~~ridiculous~~ perfectly sane number of arcade sticks. In fact, I have more arcade sticks than I have actual consoles! An intervention from family and friends can't be far off, but I figure I can get out of that by tricking them into a Street Fighter match wherein the loser has to fuck off. Smart money is on me winning, in case you were curious.

I have two sticks for the Dreamcast, one for the Wii on the assumption that, one day, an actual fighting game will be released for it and I won't have wasted my time and money on the Goddamn thing, a custom stick that works on PS3, 360, and PC, an extra stick each for the PS3 and 360, and one for the Saturn. While at Best Buy today, I had to stop myself from buying a Tekken 6 wireless stick bundle just so I could have the arcade stick contained therein. I mean, I hate Tekken. It has too many kangaroos and ursine belligerents to be taken seriously by modern man. And also: Tekken should be played on a Playstation pad: it's the one fighting game that probably SHOULDN'T come bundled with a stick.

The reason I have so many arcade sticks, other than their obvious aesthetic value and the sexual appeal they add to my already incredible person, is that fighting games are designed to be played on a stick. The roots of all fighting games post-Street Fighter II lie in the arcade, with their six button layouts and handy dandy digital inputs. Playing many fighting games without one is an exercise in frustration, so if you want to be competitive, you need a stick. If you want other people to be able to play with you on the same level, then of course you need two sticks. And if you want to play games on more than one system....

So while at least some of this stuff is necessary, my life has far more plastic and rubber garbage in it than is probably worth it. I have two sets of Rock Band drums, three plastic guitars, two shady USB microphones designed specifically for games, a DDR dance pad lurks in my closet somewhere, all sorts of USB cameras and their associated bits, two headsets, fucking plastic maracas for the love of God, charging stations, all kinds of add-ons for the Wii remote... Jesus Christ. Do I really NEED all of this stuff?

The answer is probably 'no', but in this hobby, related detrius adds up fast. Collectors Editions and Limited Editions of many games come with the equivalent of happy meal toys, and they all have their own special space on various shelves and other level surfaces. I am the shameful owner of a wall scroll for Castlevania Symphony of the Night, but that was a gift and in no way reflects on my status as a virile and potent non-manbaby adult. That's a promise. A framed poster with all the characters from the Street Fighter Alpha series adorns my wall, which only further illustrates my maturity and advanced social status.

Sane and rational readers might be asking themselves: why? For the love of God, WHY does all this shit exist? What purpose does it serve, except to illustrate the consumer idiocy of a nation of Godless morons with too much disposable income and not enough work to do? That's a fair minded question, gentle reader, and I salute you for it. The answer to your question is simple: gaming companies like money.

You see, the costs related to a happy meal toy are insignificant when you consider how much extra they can charge for it. I bought the limited edition of Street Fighter IV, which cost twenty dollars more than the regular proletariat edition, and for my extra money I was rewarded with a shitty anime movie produced by slave labor in Korea and an even worse statuette of Ryu, the series lead. You can imagine how little these things added individually to the cost of production: the twenty dollars extra they charged me was more than likely pure, unadulterated profit.

Likewise the plastic instruments that come with games such as Rock Band and Guitar Hero. Mass production of these things takes place in China on the cheap, and Activision and MTV Games reap huge profit margin rewards from their single use accessories. Making it even sweeter is the yearly upgrade to newer, slightly less tacky peripherals. They know that gamers will pay for them, and pay for them they do: not just in hard earned money, but in self-respect and mating opportunities. If you think about it though, who really needs sex and self respect when you can five star "Cult of Personality" in expert mode on drums, guitar, AND bass? Not THIS stud muffin.

Looking around at my sad collection of future landfill residents, It occurs to me that no other medium has this level of byproduct associated with it. Music has its t-shirts and posters sure, but I don't know anyone with a five inch statuette of Lady Gaga on their desk. Indeed, Music peripherals come primarily in the Gold and Platinum record variety, which trumps plastic crap any day of the week, Sanwa buttons or not. Movies have a similar association with cardboard and poorly fitted cotton blends, with an added category called " DVD bonus features"(If you thought the profit margin on plastic shit was hot, wait until you get a load of "DVD bonus features"!). There are merchandising tie-ins with fast food restaurants and toy companies to be certain, but one not only has to seek them out and buy them separately, but they usually serve a purpose, be it allowing a child to pretend to be their favorite vapid action hero, or as something you can drink juice out of. Try drinking juice out of a plastic guitar: I can tell you from experience that it simply doesn't work.

With arcade sticks and plastic maracas, you at least have the excuse that, in order to play their related games properly, you need them. Not so with statuettes, art books, soundtracks you'll never listen to, tacky boxes, stuffed animals, and strategy guides that are a waste of money within two days of the games release: GameFAQs is actually worth something in that regard. Gaming companies have been taking things to a whole new level these last couple of years, too: Modern Warfare 2 had a version of the game that came with night vision goggles. The collectors edition of Fallout 3 came in a lunchbox, and included a Pip the Fallout Boy bobble head. Arkham Asylum included a plastic replica Batarang in their deluxe version. GTA4's limited edition came in a fucking footlocker for NO reason at all, and the upcoming God of War III boasts a version of the game that comes in a huge plastic box that looks like it was designed by a third year art student with H.R. Giger pretensions. It just doesn't seem to end: millions of tons of wasted plastic, all of it doomed to one day lie in a pile of compost. It's madness.

I, for one, am done with plastic crap. I have enough of it. We as gamers need to vote against this trend with our wallets, and not just to save resources and our own mating options, but to show the world that gaming is just as mature a medium as movies, television and music. These companies think of us as children, and if we ever want our hobby to grow up in the eyes of the majority, we need to take the initiative and show them that their games should sell not based on possible future value or nifty bonus items, but on their quality. The alternative is one day running out of petrochemicals not because of inefficient internal combustion engines or bloated military spending, but because they needed a five inch statuette for the latest blockbuster game release. I don't know about you, but I'd rather the resultant panic and economic collapse be caused by the traditional bad guys in the military industrial complex, and not a collection of neck bearded, wall scroll owning man children. We have enough to be embarrassed about.

Yet Another List: Top Ten Games Of 2009: Low Hanging Fruit Is Oh So Sweet

2009-12-30T01:06:00.000-08:00

The continuation of my series about stories in games is still in the works, and will be appearing as I manage to parse my thoughts enough to put them down for posterity without guilt or shame. You can correctly assume by reading between the lines of the above statement that I can't follow any sort of schedule, including one I've set for myself. Congratulations! Not to be outdone on the sarcastic entitled internet asshole front, I've done a bit of logical deduction on my own and have come to a startling conclusion: your mother. Simple, elegant, and altogether true. Sherlock Holmes would applaud.
Now that you've been properly 'owned', we can continue with what looks suspiciously like another game of the year list. Don't be fooled. I'm not standing in the crowd of gaming journalists eager to hand out trophies and accolades in order to draw controversy, which is like page view gold or something. I'm different for two simple reasons.

1) I'm not a journalist. I'm a smarmy enthusiast with too much time on his hands.

2) your mother.

Still, your mother or not, we have the list issue to deal with. I've allowed my love of categorization to take over my hands and mind yet again this year, with the usual results. These games are organized from my fifth favorite to my 'Game of the Year'. That probably doesn't merit capital letters, but fuck it. The delete key is all the way over there. It's not that bigg a deal. Two letter "g's" isn't that big a deal either, if you think about it: english is a screwed up language anyway. Why not two "g's"? Your mother.

5) Uncharted 2: Among Thieves. This game is weird. The controls are sort of 'meh', it kills you in many unfair, didn't see that coming kinds of ways, and lasts about two hours too long. These are serious problems, but the presentation and dialogue are so well done that it transcends its mechanics to become one of the best overall experiences you can have pushing buttons not to die.

Maybe it's the insane level of detail the characters and the world they inhabit have. In one section, you walk at a snail's pace through a peaceful Tibetan village, following someone to meet the village elder. There is no action, very little dialogue, and no way to explore. That kind of shit drives me nuts in most games, but watching children play soccer while their mothers gossip is somehow interesting to me in Uncharted. The fact that the entire rest of the game is one ridiculous set piece after another doesn't hurt: a little down time in the Himalayas might even be welcome after a firefight ON a collapsing building. Uncharted 2 is a perfect example of just how far excellent graphics and art design will take an otherwise average game. That is to say, to number five.

4) Demon's Souls: I've stated before on this very blog that games that are designed to be brutally difficult and punishing quickly earn a place on the pile of games I'll probably never touch again. In an age where more games come out in a week than I can possibly play all year, why inflict that kind of pain on myself? Just to make a hypocrite of me again, From Software designed "Demon's Souls"; not just an assault on proper grammar, but a declaration of outright war on the ego of anyone who thinks of themselves as a hardcore gamer.

It's almost impossible to describe Demon's Souls properly in the little space I can afford to give it, but to summarize quickly, it's an action RPG with some interesting online mechanics and a brutally unforgiving difficulty curve. Combat is slow and purposeful; hitting your enemies without leaving yourself open to attack takes patience and strategy. Speaking of enemies, any one of the normal, joe-shmoe enemies that litter the levels are a serious threat to your character, unlike the cannon-fodder style enemies typically found in this type of game. The bosses are brutal, the power ups are rare, and dying is all too common. In short, this game is hard in a way that most modern games would never dare to be.

I gave a lot of thought to why I like Demon's Souls so much. Is it more because of its iconoclastic approach to design, rather than my actual enjoyment of it? Do I like it precisely because it's so different than anything else I've played his year, or does it stand on its own terms? In the end it doesn't matter: I had a lot of fun with Demon's Souls, and even though I can't recommend it to everyone, I'll be the first in line to buy the sequel.

3) Flower: This game deserves a spot on the list for many reasons, but the most important to me is that my girlfriend loves it and plays it on her own time.

Beyond being something non-gamers can enjoy, Flower represents something new and interesting in professional games development: non-arcade based gameplay. Flying around collecting flowers is your goal, but the game doesn't make it something to stress out about, even when things take a turn for the dark near the end. You can play the game to advance the minimalist plot, or just sort of fly around. It's rare that a game is this relaxing for me, and even though I beat it in an evening, I find myself booting it up every now and again to take the edge off a hard day. I hope we'll see more games like this in the coming year.

2) Retro Game Challenge: The lone portable game on the list this year, RGC is a clever collection of brand new "eight bit games" that were created specifically to evoke hard line nostalgia in folks who, like me, grew up on the Nintendo Entertainment System. Each game is designed to remind you just a little bit of classic games such as Xevious, Mega Man, and RC Pro Am, but stand as interesting and fun experiences all on their own: I would have happily paid thirty dollars for some of these twenty years ago.

Each game is playable just as it is. That is to say, as a classic style eight bit game. The real genius is unlocking more games by completing challenges within the games, such as getting a certain score or reaching a certain level. Fake magazines with cheat codes and previews of games you'll unlock later add a superb meta game angle to everything. So basically, this game rocks. I usually eschew experiences designed to take savage advantage of my overly vulnerable nostalgia gland, but the cleverness and uniqueness of RGC was too much for me to ignore. This lived in my DS for months.

1) Street Fighter IV: Smack yourself in the head if you didn't see this one coming.

I love fighting games, and Street Fighter IV is an excellent example of the genre, but it earns the number one spot for reasons that lie outside the actual game itself. I've been heavily involved with the tournament scene for Street Fighter IV, which has made me new friends, introduced me to other games, and basically enhanced my life significantly over the last ten months. That's the most important thing about fighting games to me: the wonderful community around them.

As a game, Street Fighter IV is no slouch either. While certain characters have far better match ups over all when compared to others (such as Sagat), the balance is very well designed. The addition of the Focus Attack is my favorite new mechanic in fighting games ever: it's easy to learn at a basic level, but the depths of its uses are still being explored. Cancel out of a whiffed move to avoid being punished, absorb projectiles to build Ultra meter, punish jump ins and overly aggressive opponents, pressure someone in the corner, bait throws or wake up Ultras... It's an awesome system.

The online is serviceable, and it's a pain in the ass to be forced to unlock all the characters, but the game deserves respect for bringing the fighting game genre back from near death. No matter how you feel about the game itself, it's added a LOT of new blood to the scene, and that should be saluted. Well done, Capcom: here's hoping Super Street Fighter IV is just as good.

Stories in Games Part 1: Or, Bioshock is Chutes and Ladders, not Requiem For A Dream

2009-10-16T00:58:00.000-07:00

[Editor's Note: I've been working on this article a while now. Excuse my tardiness. I've been thinking a lot about stories in games lately. To be more precise, I played through Heavenly Sword and had a serious disconnect between the gameplay (which was basically filler) and the story (which was excellent). That lead to this article, which is tentatively a three or four part EPIC, discussing video games as a storytelling medium, past present and future. Of course, I'll sporadically make fun of Sonic the Hedgehog just so you'll know you're still reading Joe Q. Gamer.

This is sort of an introduction, an immense and baroque thesis, and I'm aware that I'm leaving a lot of obvious holes in my arguments. Rest assured that I'll be addressing them in upcoming installments.

It's gotten to the point where I really should just say "fuck it" and write a book. In fact, I might do that anyway. Until then, though, you get my rambling for free. Ain't the internet grand. ]

Everything that we call 'media' -Books, films, plays, and even comics- exist solely to impart a story. Anyone who's read Sartre, Aristophanes, Dostoevsky, or Faulkner knows that storytelling can be more than simple distraction; it can teach. Properly told, a story imparts a moral. Expertly told, a story can change the reader's perception of the world. Authors and directors of traditional media have always understood this, and the best of them strive to impart their personal ideas and beliefs on to their chosen canvas, be it on film, a stage, or the written word. Now, I admit that the continued careers of Danielle Steele, that "Twilight" woman, and Michael Bay seem to contradict my point here, but even a trashy romance novel or summer blockbuster has at it's core just a little bit of the good 'Ol Joseph Campbell. They may be shit, but they're shit with a story.
Games, on the other hand, are different. Games originated as simple tests of reflexes and skill. Pong and Space War do not compare to "Nausea" or "The Grapes of Wrath"... Or even Transformers 2. Grand Theft Auto is a pale, ugly shadow of The Godfather. Final Fantasy XVLLFM is not Tolkien or Borges. The truth of the matter is that traditionally, games are their mechanics first, and their stories second, and they have little to do with traditional media in that regard. You play a game: you experience a film, play, or book. As such, games barely resemble traditional media in the method by which you interact with them. In fact, they most closely resemble card and board games, activities where what you do is more important than what you take in. This fundamental difference in purpose and interaction is often ignored by the pundits arguing for the cultural importance of video games, and it's something that the industry is just now starting to overcome. Are they overcoming it? Yes. But it's slow going.

(Wait, wait wait.... I can smell the defenders of Final Fantasy and it's ilk opening up their email accounts to send me hateful words. I can hear herds of World of Warcraft fans rustling in the dark, sending me witty rebuttals. Do yourselves a favor, and stop. I don't care, and you shouldn't care. Go back to hanging wall scrolls and reading fan fiction. We're both happier that way).

Considering that we now have games like Bioshock and Mass Effect, you could argue that my point is ultimately meaningless. Regardless of the origin of games, developers are injecting their creations with the same infusion of ideas and beliefs as film, novels, and plays. "Moral choice" is one of the hottest industry buzzwords, and game reviewers raise or lower their scores in relation to a game's story. You COULD make that argument... But you'd be wrong. Games have made great strides towards legitimacy in the story telling department, but they have a long way to go, for one simple reason: games still need to be FUN.

Consider films such as Hotel Rwanda and Shindler's List. No one sane considers these movies to be fun experiences. They hurt to watch. They remind us that not everything in the human condition is sunlight and roses. Indeed: that's the point. Orwell and Huxley warn of dangerous trends in human behavior in their books, forcing the reader to confront ideas they hold dear and judge them in a harsher light. Their purpose isn't to entertain, or amuse, or distract. Their purpose is to teach.

Let's put it another way so I don't have to deal with a mountain of hate mail from Sonic the Hedgehog devotees. Consider how much fun it would be to play through "Requiem For A Dream: The Game". (Consider also that the publisher would probably demand that the developer put in quick time events during the "ass to ass" section of the final level, and that you'd be forced to replay it fifty times in order to memorize the sequence. DLC would include a replacement arm for that guy from "Party of Five" for subsequent play throughs, and you'd unlock a custom needle and cooking spoon item for your Xbox Live avatar if you ruined more than five personal relationships during any given level. I don't even want to think about multiplayer, but you know it would be in there. It would probably be called "Smack Down". And the whole shebang would be published by Activision).

Developers both independent and big league are coming up with interesting ways to bridge the gap between storytelling and mechanics and deal with the 'fun' problem. Bioshock uses it's environment to tell a story in ways that even film hasn't equaled. Silent Hill plays with your mind in interesting and media-specific ways. Pathologic, which we're going to come back to quite a bit during the course of this series, bends and breaks so many rules that it's hard to classify it as a 'game', exactly: it's more of a forty hour mind fuck followed by three minutes of extreme satisfaction that happens on your computer. These kinds of games are still a rarity though: most games opt for explosions and player empowerment, and use the story only as a device to logically string the levels together. Is that bad? No. But it isn't Shakespeare, and games have a long way to go before they can hang with the Bard.

In the next installment we discuss why some genres of games are better at telling stories than others, and speculate on how mechanics themselves can tell a story. I can literally smell your excitement.

Controls And Gaming: Or, I Hate The Universal Remote More Than Analog Sticks

2009-06-04T00:30:00.000-07:00

My gaming set up is pretty simple, as far as it goes. I have everything running directly into my TV, a 37 inch LCD, which outputs audio into my surround sound system via an optical cable. That's a PS3, a Wii, an Xbox 360, as well as component cables for the PSP. Nothing fancy here. My video capture card complicates things a tiny bit, but that's nothing that most people have to deal with. I'm dumb enough to write about games, so it's a headache I've brought upon myself.

My brother and his boyfriend, on the other hand, have elected to set up their entertainment center to cause physical and emotional pain to anyone who attempts to operate it. The receiver hooks into their TV, but nothing else makes any sense. Watching cable is right out. Getting the audio to work while playing on the PS3 is improbable. I'm not even sure that their 360 is even hooked up, though there's a setting for it on the receiver. Christian claims that, if I were some form of vertebrate with frontal lobes, preferably of the mammalian persuasion, I should have no problem at all figuring out how to get it to work. My position is that he's a fucking liar, and some kind of sadist to boot. Try as I might, I can't figure out any other way to explain his attachment to the ultimate expression of the entertainment center's complete ambiguity: the Universal Remote.

I realize that I'm bordering on horrible stand up routines here. Relax. As always, my grousing serves a purpose, though MY sadism requires you to slog through my walls of text to ferret it out. Don't like it? Staple your hand to your desk and I'll get to the point.

Done? Good. No, wait... Do two more. I had a bad day.

Despite the obstacle that the evil fucking remote presents to my using the communal consoles and television, I endure it. I endure it because, Goddamn it, I want to watch TV or play a game. The complexity of operating the equipment is certainly a hurdle, but eventually my frantic button mashing will yield some positive result (blind luck and limited button combinations contribute heavily on this front). If I want to play Flower or Street Fighter in the living room, I will make the system work. The only variable is the amount of profanity from day to day.

I'm not alone in constantly overcoming weird new technological hurdles. In fact, we're dipping right back into traditional stand up tropes again. How many times can you recall either yourself or someone you know telling a story about trying to get a stubborn printer to work, or trying to show an older relative how to check their Email? How about wrapping your head around your first cell phone, or digital camera? Human ingenuity in the face of technology is almost a universal constant... provided that the end result is desired enough.

So. Video games.

When Nintendo trotted out the Wii for the first time, they stressed that they were trying to simplify gaming for everyone. The Wii-mote, clever nomenclature aside, mimics both the form and basic function of something that everyone is familiar with: a television remote.
Everyone laughed at them, and now that they've pretty much dominated the entire industry in less than three years, it seems that everyone is jumping on the motion control band wagon. Xbox has their Natal camera thing revealed at E3, and Sony has their wand devices, also of E3 vintage.
A lot of people have talked about 'simplifying' gaming to seduce non-gamers and 'casual' gamers into the gaming consumer fold. Ubisoft, for example, made the jumping and climbing in their Assassin's Creed and Prince of Persia games so simple that it's created a minor backlash among the hardcore crowd. Peter Molyneux ranted at length about 'one button combat' during the pre-release hype cycle for Fable II. In my opinion, they're missing the forest for the trees.

Consider that fucking universal remote. It's not only Christian that owns one. It's becoming ubiquitous: something that nearly everyone with a decent entertainment system has. It's obtuse and illogical in design, and requires huge reserves of patience and emotional fortitude to program. It has something like fifty buttons. How many buttons does an Xbox controller have? How many on a PSP? Contrast that with how complex and arcane Microsoft Vista is to operate properly. Contrast that with the number of F keys and shift functions on any given keyboard. Try and wrap your head around the World of Warcraft HUD without tutorials or experience... Something that a pretty substantial number of people who would never play Street Fighter do every day.

So, to summarize, the problem isn't complexity of controls. In my opinion, it's the games themselves that are to blame.

In an earlier post, I'd posited that the focus on violence is the reason why many people choose not to play 'hardcore' games. That's one reason; or more accurately, it's a symptom. People are capable of conquering any hurdle that technology can throw at them if they want to badly enough. What game publishers haven't realized yet is that they haven't provided a good enough reason for most folks to pick up a dual analog controller, or even a Wii-mote. For non-gamers, and even some 'casual' gamers, the reward isn't worth the effort.

We're getting there, though. The 'Milo' demonstration by Peter Molyneux during the 360 press conference shows that someone out there gets it. Google it. Wrap your head around how different and ground breaking that project is. There's no violence. No online mulitplayer. No arcane lobbies or 'losing'. Just a boy, and your relationship with him. Genius. Nintendo sold the DS into homes with one single game: Nintendogs. A similar concept, and one that turned the DS from an underpowered experiment into a powerhouse of a platform. A platform holder's wet dream.

It's an exciting time. Games are finally growing out of their arcade, high score focus, winners and losers roots. I for one can't wait. I have no doubt that the kinds of games that I love today will still be around (people like me will still buy them forever), but it's time that developers and publishers looked beyond the latest sequel of an already established shooter and started thinking about how to create software that anyone can play and enjoy. Never mind the controls: people will learn them if you make it worth their while. Focus on making them WANT to learn, and everything will fall into place.

Gaming Time: Or, All Work And No Play Means More Street Fighter

2009-05-29T00:42:00.001-07:00

Astute readers will no doubt note the (nearly!) two month span of time between my last post and the one that you're currently staring at. I blame three things. Gainful employment in a terrible recession, maintaining a rapidly crumbling home with duct tape and spackle, and a rare case of genuine spring fever. Take it up with them.

It isn't just Joe. Q. Gamer that's suffered from my desperate lack of free time. Friends gnash their teeth in frustration, unable to connect with me in any more meaningful way than the occasional text message. No less than two editors have a tab open in their browsers dedicated to emailing me, requesting projects that are beginning to redefine the word 'overdue'. My cat misses me. So it isn't just my blog. As a result of all this goddamn time sink malarkey, I haven't had much time to actively game lately. I feel like a high schooler returning to class after a lengthy case of mono: everyone is ahead of me all of a sudden, and I'm not sure how to catch up. I mean, what the hell is Plants Vs. Zombies? Do I really need to play Bionic Commando? There's yet another batch of New Fallout 3 DLC to get through? Sunny isn't dating Mike anymore, and Mr. Johnson the science teacher blew up the chemistry wing? Where the Hell was I?

(Lucky for me, then, that gaming culture is even less focused on important long term stuff than any given high school. I figure in six months no one will even remember what happened while I was on my reluctant sabbatical, and I can get back to the business of making insightful comments about shit no one cares about with a clear conscience.)

The only real gaming time I've been able to get in is with Street Fighter IV, which seems to have stolen away my heart completely. I've never in my life spent so much time with any one game: between the PS3 and 360 versions, I have more than two hundred and fifty hours logged since the game launched in late February. Truly, incontrovertible evidence of a pathetically wasted life, but never mind that right now. I'm busy, and as usual, I don't have time for shame. Instead, consider how hard that game must have grabbed me if I've managed to fit that kind of playtime into my hellish schedule. More to the point, consider how and why.

The best thing about fighting games (or any game where you aren't stuck dealing with a prolonged and narrative-dense plot) is how perfectly it fits into anyone's schedule. I can play for ten minutes or five hours and get the same kind of satisfaction from the experience. God, I wish more games could do that. In order to play through Fallout 3 or Valkyria Chronicles, I had to put meaty chunks of uninterrupted time aside: these are not games that reward a prolonged absence. On the other hand, Portal, that old standby, is three hours of pure gaming bliss, but is cleverly divided into quick and easy chapters, each with it's own defined arc. Perfect for the person on the go, or who needs to go soon because his girlfriend is getting impatient.

"What about portable gaming?" I hear you ask. I own a DSi and PSP, and use them frequently, but sometimes you want to be sitting on a couch with an arcade stick in your hands. I have a big ass TV for a reason, after all. I can't surrender to something with a resolution of 250 by 250 as easily as I can my 37 inch LCD at home: the world intrudes on me, even with headphones. It isn't something I'm immersing myself in. It's merely something I'm doing to pass the time.

That spells trouble for a gent without disposable time. And there isn't anything to be done about it. I'm simply stuck whupping fools online with Blanka and Vega: my homiez, down for life. Word. And after all, there are worse fates. I could have ended up maining Sagat.

More updates as I can get to them. Next time, I think we're discussing controls and the myths regarding their complexity, and how it relates to the divide between those who game and those who do not. Exciting!

How to get 'casual' players into 'hardcore' games. Or, stop shooting me so much.

2009-03-12T01:34:00.000-07:00

One thing that always amazes me is how big time publishers can be so out of the loop.

I often wonder whether game publishers forget that their triple A products are not yet ubiquitous pop culture staples in the minds of the world at large. Sure, games make more money than movies or music, but they're also significantly more expensive at retail. Halo 3 was on the cover of Time magazine, but that's one game: how many movies or TV shows have graced the cover of Time? More than one, that's for sure. You can sell a hell of a lot more copies of Bejeweled or Tetris, or even any given DVD release of a popular movie, than you can Gears of War, and that isn't likely to change anytime soon. Publishers need to realize that if they want to reach a wider market than their traditional audience of 'core' gamers, then they need to change how their products are perceived by the world at large. Because, as it stands, many of the ways in which their games are produced and structured are instrumental in keeping triple A games in the province of the hardcore, and the hardcore alone.

What ways? What do I mean? Well, lucky for you that I'm here, huh? Hey publishers, there are a few things you should keep in mind for your next executive brainstorming session, and I'm just grumpy enough to lay it out for you now. So without further delay, Four reasons why your triple A games are selling worse than any given Wii or DS shovelware title. Pay attention.

1) The most common vehicle for player interaction in triple A game releases is violence. This one is easy. Try and imagine your Grandmother playing Counterstrike, Left 4 Dead, Grand Theft Auto 4, or Fallout 3. It isn't going to happen. In fact, I'd bet money that you couldn't get your parents, or even some of your friends to touch those games. Those games, like horror movies and superhero comic books, present themselves as intimidating and visceral experiences, and are therefore a niche product. You don't really interact in a meaningful way with anything, and you don't build a relationship with your character and the world he/she inhabits. Instead, you shoot stuff. Alternately, you might blow it up. Violence has it's place, and I personally think that the games listed above are excellent(except for GTA4, which is the single most overrated game I've ever played), but their presentation automatically narrows the audience they're going to be able to reach. In fact, other than Nintendo first party titles and Little Big Planet, I'm hard pressed to think of a triple A console game that doesn't use violence as the primary vehicle for player interaction. If gaming outside of the Sims, avatar-based social networking clients and puzzle games is ever going to reach the mainstream audience that publishers so desperately want to reach, then they need to find new ways of allowing players to interact with the world they're gaming in.

2) World and character design in most games is juvenile and unsophisticated. I'm sure there are now a legion of people emailing me with screeds about the incredible design of such and such a game, or how totally awesome the guns are in Call of Duty, but I'm speaking broadly. Many games have elements that are cohesive and attractive, but there's usually something in there that reveals a shocking lack of depth.

Take Assassin's Creed for example. The world is incredible: a very faithful recreation of the middle east in the time of the crusades. NPC costumes are very close to period perfect, and the environments are too. Then, you have your character, a secret assassin, and the rest of his secret assassin brotherhood, who are all dressed up in identical secret assassin superhero costumes. Hey Altair, just a heads up: you might want to maybe change into something less conspicuous, although it doesn't really matter. If a guard gets suspicious that a guy dressed like he's been sprung from the pages of Justice League America might be up to something, you can put his suspicions to rest by walking slowly and praying. I guess folks were a lot dumber in the past.

Another relevant example is Gears of War, where everyone looks like they've been popping anabolic steroids and ugly pills instead of daily vitamins. Or we could look at Japanese games with their belts and zippers and ridiculously upsized weaponry. If you like, we could discuss how cliched the designs in Oblivion are. I could go on all day. That isn't to say that everything needs to look 'real' or 'unique', or that fanciful or exaggerated design can't be mainstream. What it does need, though, is to look and sound believable and cohesive.

While we in the hardcore gaming community are able to take that kind of stuff in stride, focusing instead on how good the mechanics might be, casual folks are going to judge a triple A game based on how they've traditionally experienced media they're more familiar with: a unified and believable visual world. People who aren't traditionally gamers are used to interacting with their media visually and aurally. If a developer can nail that aspect, like Infinity Ward did with Call of Duty 4, then getting someone to try the game is that much easier.

3) Competitive multiplayer has an insurmountable barrier to entry. Have you logged on to Halo 3 or Call of Duty 4 lately? Or better yet, Counterstrike? Quake 3? Super Street Fighter II Turbo HD Remix? Burnout? Gears of War? If so, is your sense of self-worth intact? Did you get called 'fag'? How about 'bitch'? I bet that, unless you're a hardcore gamer, you had a terrible time and will never touch the game again. In fact, I'd bet that your entire view of competitive gaming is tarnished. I'd bet that you'd probably stop buying those games and invest in some LCD football devices. Not really conductive to broadening the market for gaming, huh?

This particular point is tricky, because it ties heavily into the point about violence being the primary vehicle of player interaction. Nearly all triple A games that have a primary focus on multiplayer use violence as their benchmark for success, and that attracts a certain kind of player. Specifically, douchebags and adolescent males. Grandma does not want to get 'pwned' by a douchebag or adolescent male. She wants to chat over Uno or Scrabble. I'm just saying.

There's a reason that games without the heavy focus on violence and aggressive multiplayer, like World of Warcraft and online poker, have attracted more people than any given triple A console release: they're non-threatening. World of Warcraft has a particular focus on social interaction and cooperation, while online poker is both readily identifiable and popular outside of games. Experienced players and newbies alike can interact and have fun without constantly being reminded of how comparatively unskilled and bitch-like they are.

Steps have already been taken in this direction: Gears of War, Left 4 Dead, and Resistance 2 have a heavy cooperative element built into them, which has proven to be both popular and a strong factor in sales and reception with gamers of all stripes. Of course, that isn't to say that Halo 3 and COD4 have no place in games of the future: that would be ridiculous and blindingly stupid for me to say. Rather, there needs to be a viable and easy to understand alternative to the deathmatch-style games that currently dominate the market: there's a place for that style of game, and they continue to sell well, but it can't be the only kind of multiplayer. If gaming is to evolve into a genuine force in popular media, publishers should continue to move in the direction of co-op gameplay and place more importance on matching up players of equal skill in their games... And maybe tone down the violence, too.

4.) Interaction with gaming worlds is often too sophisticated for short term enjoyment. Little Big Planet is awesome, and so is Flower. Both of these games allege to be simple, easy games that even your mother can play. They are liars.

Developers forget that 'casual' gamers are not versed in the language of gaming in the third dimension: most developers are hardcore gamers, after all. The more complicated you make your interface and controls, the fewer people will be interested in playing your game. That's a pretty simple equation, but it's one that developers often forget. Little Big Planet appears to be a simple 2D platformer at a glance, but the methods for interacting with it's world are deceptively complicated and taxing. There are separate buttons for each of your arms, the D pad controls your face, and there are three separate 'planes' that your Sackboy can switch in and out of. That's a lot to remember for someone new to gaming, and that's before we get to the insanity that is the level creator. Even most hardcore folks stay the Hell out of there.

Now, I don't think that casual gamers are too dumb to play complicated games. That's a pretty ignorant belief. What they are is intimidated by the world they're being asked to play in. World of Warcraft has done it right: it ramps up the difficulty and complexity of its gameplay at the right level for people unused to playing such a game. It gradually introduces its more complex elements, and allows people to discover them at their own pace. Anyone is capable of understanding complex controls and interfaces, but you have to give them a reason to learn them, and you have to allow players time to do so without feeling threatened or stupid.

Just a few thoughts.

Now... I'm going to go play some Street Fighter. I never said I didn't like competitive unsophisticated violence, after all.

Street Fighter IV: Fighting Games Casual? Or, Capcom Lies To Everyone

2009-02-22T00:23:00.001-08:00

Street Fighter IV is here.

I could probably just leave it at that, because anyone who reads gaming blogs can probably fill in the rest for themselves. I obviously won't though, because... Well, I don't have a reason. Pure, unmitigated verbosity, I guess. It's a trait of mine.

The hype machine has been churning overtime on this game for quite some time now. Websites, magazines, and blogs have been covering the release non-stop. Capcom, the developer and publisher of the game, has already sold two million copies in less than two weeks. The hardcore fighting game crowd seems to have embraced the game wholeheartedly, with very little in the way of reservation. Online battles are easy to get. Trash is talked, strategies are learned, and character tiers are being debated.

I don't think it'll last long, though.

A little background, just so we're clear. Capcom has been promising that Street Fighter IV will appeal to both the casual AND hardcore crowd. They've been marketing the shit out of it, up to and including several prime time television spots and an extremely shady tie in movie. Interviews with Ono, the producer at Capcom, have promised that even non-fighting game fans will find something in Street Fighter IV that they can play and enjoy. The marketing seems to have worked: people who haven't picked up a fighting game since the original Street Fighter II are buying the game and playing it online (They're all playing Ken or Sagat, but we'll get to that later).

So what's the problem? Fighting games are in the spotlight again for the first time in years, some of the new players will develop a long-term love of the genre thus adding some desperately needed new blood into the community, and online matches are plentiful. That doesn't seem like a bad thing, but my problem isn't with the here and now. My problem is with the future. Namely, what happens when all the hype dies away and people wake up to the realities of playing a fighting game against people who've been constantly immersed in them for well over a decade? What happens when people realize that a casual fighting game is an oxymoron? What happens when they're tired of being repeatedly raped online by people they don't even know?

I'll tell you what will happen. After losing to a Blanka MK cross up combo into EX Roll into Ultra for the fiftieth time, they'll put that shit on the shelf and never touch it again. They'll go back to Call of Duty, Halo, or Gears of War, and that will be that.

"So fucking what" is the expected response from any given fighting game nut, and I tend to agree. If you can't handle the heat and so on. Losing all by itself isn't a bad thing as long as you learn from it, and let me tell you: I'm like a fucking Rhodes scholar over here. That only applies if you have a genuine desire to learn the system and improve, though: it takes a long time to understand all the ins and outs of any given fighting game. More time than many owners of Street Fighter IV are willing to invest. It's a strange situation that anyone with an interest in gaming culture should take a closer look at, because nowhere else is the dichotomy between 'casual' and 'hardcore' gamers so painfully clear.

First, let's just dispel the myth that Street Fighter IV is in any way 'casual'. In many respects, it's the most technically demanding Street Fighter game yet released. Throws are mapped to a two button press input, a la Street Fighter III. There are not one, but TWO 'super meters', which can be used in a variety of ways. There are 'focus attacks', which are mapped to another two button input and have several important uses. Combos through canceling have an incredibly tight and no-nonsense input requirement: one frame in most cases. That's 1/60th of a second. The simplified control scheme that HD Remix introduced has been removed, returning to the old school system(although simplified controls do exist for a select few special moves). You can dash forward or backwards, you can power up certain special moves to go through hyper armor(what the hell is that!? I hear you ask, but never mind that for now), you can choose to quick stand after being knocked down, and you can kara-throw. That's a short and incomplete list of the technical aspects of Street Fighter IV's fighting engine.

Are you with me? Where the fuck is the 'casual' in that?

I play online quite a bit. There are two different 'pools' of players that you can choose to play with: 'Ranked' and 'Player'. I play in 'Player' matches, because all the people still in 'Ranked' are lying, lagging, disconnecting shits who think that 'battle points' are actually some form of legal tender (We'll get back to them in a moment). Playing online is a bizarre situation, because the online community for Street Fighter IV is a wild mix of experts, lying cheating whores, and players brand new to the game. The mix isn't exactly an even spread, either. The vast majority are of the 'lying cheating whores' and 'brand new' variety, and they both play either Ken or Sagat exclusively.

Let's take a look at an average Player Match. A sort of play-by-play.

So here we are, in the pre-game lobby. I can see my opponent's name, connection strength, and whichever 'title' and 'icon' he may have decorated his name with(these are items that can be unlocked by doing certain things in the game. Sort of digital bling). Every new match is a complete and utter crap shoot, and it represents a strange moral quandary. I'm playing the game to win, but the person I'm facing might be brand new to the genre. He or she might just need a bit of encouragement in order to genuinely embrace the game and eventually become good enough to join the community proper. Of course, I'm not just going to throw a match. I experience a weird moment of metal discord, which immediately vanishes when the person hits ready, takes us to the character select screen, selects Ken and just spams fierce shoryuken all day, every day. My goal is clear at that point. Kill them. Kill them so hard that they pick Sagat.

A quick digression: I understand the 'Ken' dilemma, which has become something of an onus for genuine Ken players in the fighting games community. Many new players pick Ken out of familiarity: everyone knows how to throw a fireball or mash out a dragon punch. Most of the other characters have different and more complicated controls that require charge times, odd directional inputs, or split second timing. Not so with Ken. When I started out playing Street Fighter, he was my 'go to' guy, but the number of new Ken players online is truly absurd: five out of six matches will be against Ken. They're usually not very good. Being called a 'Ken player' is almost, but not quite, an insult to some folks. It's a quandary.

Getting back to the match. Ken players don't have a deep understanding of the game they're playing. They're in strange waters, and they don't know about the crocodiles that lurk there. The match starts, and I start working. They scream in rage when I pull a cross up on them. "I was blocking!!!" Yes, but you weren't blocking high. They hurl their controller when they get thrown for the fifth time after a whiffed dragon punch. "Throws are cheap!" No, they're not. You just need to use them yourself. They rend their garments when they finally get to use their Ultra, and fail to land it because they were an entire screen away. "These Ultras are useless!!" No, they're not. You just broadcast like CNN. Two rounds, two victories, and we're back at the pre-fight lobby.

About three quarters of the time, I get booted from the room at this point. If I don't, they usually pick Sagat or Zangief(top tier characters with no bad match ups), and still lose. If they don't pull their ethernet cord from their console(actually a pretty big problem, we'll talk about that in a minute), or quit to the desktop in the middle of the match, I definitely get booted now. There's nothing satisfying about any of this. It's just the way it goes.

Casual folks just want to play and have fun. They want close matches with a lot of exciting back and forth. They want showy visuals. Winning as many matches as they lose is nice. They are playing the wrong game with the wrong people, and as we get farther from the date of release, it's only going to get worse. There is a significant minority of people who are playing online who are very very good at fighting games, and anyone who plays against those guys is not going to have a good time. They're going to be humiliated, and that doesn't exactly encourage replay.

Let's pretend that our new Ken player decides that he wants to play 'ranked' instead. The crocodiles in THAT water are a far more evil and cunning variety. If they thought 'player' matches were bad, they're in for a rude surprise. Ken is about to come head to head with that most wily and accursed of God's creations: The Wild Internet Disconnector.

Capcom decided that instead of a win/loss ratio determining ranking on the leader board, they would go with a new system: battle points. You earn battle points by defeating opponents, and you earn more battle points depending on the difference between your total and your opponent's total. Not bad in theory -you never see a 'loss' percentage unless you go looking for it- but just like Karl Marx, Capcom forgot one very important detail: people are assholes, and they want to think that they're better than you.

Let's pretend for a minute that I've been off my game, or I'm drunk, or I'm sleeping or something, and the Ken player wins a match. As I see that final dragon punch take me out, I shake my head, hit 'ready', and get back in the game. I take my losses if I earn them. It's only fair if I expect people to do the same for me. In 'ranked' matches, that doesn't happen. People on 'ranked' take their 'battle points' very seriously indeed, and would much rather pull their internet than lose any of their precious Digital Penis Enhancement Currency. They refuse to lose. They drop to the desktop, or yank their cord, if they think a loss is even a remote possibility.

Let's pretend that our Ken player has done well for himself and is just about to win a match in 'ranked' after a series of humiliating losses. He gleefully watches his final dragon punch ineffably connect, and just before the "You Win!" payoff, the result of hard work and painful learning... He get's a 'connection lost' message. No battle points. No win. Our Ken player realizes that his options in 'ranked' are either to lose, or to not win. He takes the disc out, breaks it, and puts Call of Duty back in. And that's the end of that.

Street Fighter IV is not a casual game. It is serious business for serious folks.

I'm sure than in six months, online games will be harder to come by, and the average level of skill amongst those who are left will increase. The number of new members of fighting game forums will drop significantly, and many of the recent members will abandon their accounts. If there's a Street Fighter V, it'll sell well, but not quite as well as Street Fighter IV. The community will go back to being a small online niche of hardcore technicians, and the fighting game renaissance of the early twenty first century will have come to a close. We'll be back where we started.

So much for 'casual' fighting games.

Why The Hell Do I To This To Myself? Or, Post Holiday Gaming Apocalypse

2009-01-10T00:14:00.000-08:00

Thank fucking God. The holidays are over. My savings account survives another year: scarred, wounded, but not defeated. Victoria.

The holidays are a financial apocalypse for me, and every year it only gets worse. On top of gifts for loved ones and friends, I end up spending way too much of what I choose to call 'disposable income' on all the triple A games that an irrational and confused games industry hoards for months and months, ignoring the obvious fact that, hey, people play games in June too, before gleefully releasing them in a frantic stampede in the months of November and December. That I continue to obediently buy them all raises the possibility that I too and irrational and confused, but let's not discuss that right now. I need all the credibility I can muster.

After the dust settled on my annual financial doomsday this year, I ended up with a soul-crushing stack of new games. I felt their quiet insistence that I play them as I put them away on the shelf, untouched shrink wrap tormenting me. Free time is at a premium for me, always: when would I get a chance to play the games I had been given or purchased? When would I be able to validate both my idiot compulsions and the good intentions of friends and family? Compounding the issue is my addiction to Super Street Fighter II Turbo HD Remix and Persona 4: both time sinks of incredible density and power. Even when I have the time to play, those two games are always my first and second choice.

This year? Much sooner than usual. For once, the games industry has done me a solid(albeit accidentally). There is literally nothing coming out that I want until Street Fighter 4 in February. That is nearly unprecedented, and leaves me almost two months to play catch up and knock out some of my back log. All of which is very handy, because I had begun to experience what I like to call 'collector's depression'. Anyone who seriously plays and collects games knows what I mean, but we'll define it just in case anyone rational ever reads this.

'Collectors Depression: If a collection of games grows at a faster pace than a collector can play those games, then eventually playing the games stops being fun and becomes a job, leading to that collector temporarily abandoning the hobby and taking up knitting, crochet, or religion'.

So thanks, Games Industry. You've coincidentally helped in keeping me out of fashion, for which you deserve a medal; especially considering my taste in clothes and questionable manual dexterity. I'm already a man of the cloth, so obviously you weren't much help in the past, but hey. It's the holidays, and I am a reverend for some reason. All is forgiven. We'll move on so no one thinks too hard about this paragraph, and the ugly truths contained within.

The games residing in my immediate backlog are, in no order, Folklore, Lair, Far Cry 2, Gradius Collection, Siren: New Translation, and Suikoden. It's not as bad as some years, but still a mighty and powerful stack of software to wade through. Interestingly, I realized as I was putting them away that none of the games I mentioned are new at all. In fact, Suikoden is a download for the PS3. I have no real desire to play Resistance 2 or Gears of War 2, the huge platform exclusive shooters for the PS3 and 360 respectively, and I'd already bought and fell in love with Little Big Planet long before the Christmas season. Prince of Persia? No thanks. I've already beaten Fallout 3. Tomb Raider? No, sir. Legendary? Are you kidding?

The powers that be have granted me a respite, and I intend to use it. Collecting games is fun and sometimes profitable, but often leads to a 'less gaming, more collecting' mindset that I intend to avoid. One of my new years resolutions is to not buy any game until Street Fighter comes out: that gives me a month and a half to cleanse my backlog and shore up the holiday related bills in preparation for next year's assault on my money. Why would I do this? Why alter years of habit and subject myself to Lair on purpose? Because I realized something else over the holidays as I was talking to my friend Randy at work. This guy never has more than three or four games at a time. He buys them, plays them, sells them, and buys some more: lean and mean gaming at it's finest. His philosophy? Games are for playing first, collecting second. He told me, "I've beaten every game I've played, unless it was so bad that even achievements couldn't make me continue". A quick glance at his gamer score affirms this mighty declaration. I was impressed, because I have nearly five hundred games for more than fifteen systems, and I've beaten probably a quarter of them. That doesn't seem like a very good ratio. I figure I've got some catching up to do.

So. What did I realize with the able assistance of Randy? Resolution number two: play the stupid goddamn things. I didn't get into this hobby because I love having all my free space taken up by plastic and cardboard. I got into it because I love to play video games. I should spend more time doing that, instead of adding yet more crap to the collection.

I'll start with Lair, because it's the shortest game on the stack. We'll see how dedicated to this premise I really am when someone invites me to play Street Fighter.

Playing Super Street Fighter II Turbo HD Remix Online: Or How I Learned To Stop Worying And Love Being Beaten

2008-12-26T01:35:00.000-08:00

I usually avoid playing games online. I do this for three reasons. First, I suck at competitive shooters and fighting games(though I love them so!), and if I'm going to lose to someone, then I want to be able to punch them in the gut until they learn not to toy with my emotions like that. Second, if I want to be called an impressive list of racial epithets by a twelve year old in a trailer smoking a joint, I'll go to any number of trailer parks I know of. Or Idaho. The third reason is more complex, and we'll get to it in a minute. The point is, I have seldom ventured into online gaming, and I've often gone on record as a genuine 'hater'. Lately though, all my usual gaming friends are busy with school, work, kids, and the usual 'non-gaming crap' that gets in the way of productive free time, and I've been in a fighting game mood. I was up against the wall. I had no choice.

So it was with great trepidation and more than a little shame that I bought Super Street Fighter II Turbo HD Remix, plugged in my fighting stick, and plunged headfirst into the world of competitive fighting games online. Now that I've played the game against some truly excellent folk, and have seen firsthand just how deep and rewarding that learning a system can be by being repeatedly brutalized by people I don't know, I think I finally understand what I've been missing all this time; not just in fighting games, but in competitive gaming in general.

I thought I was going to do pretty well when I first loaded the game. I've been a devotee of fighting games for nearly a decade now, but I made one fatal mistake: I never took them seriously. They were games to play with friends on the couch to while away a few hours in between having incredible sex with beautiful strangers and fighting crime in my pajamas, or something to play between meatier, more story-oriented games. A sort of digital palate cleanser if you will: a binary sorbet. I willingly reduced the entire genre to a sort of high-level casual game, which I'm sure completely kills whatever hardcore credibility I had with a certain segment of the gaming population. They're probably pulling out their list of racial epithets as we speak. I'm not particularly worried about it because not only am I having incredible sex right now, but I'm doing so in my pajamas, if you catch my drift. In any case, pajamas and sex have nothing to do with winning games online, which I learned to my initial shock and horror. In fact, it could be argued that pajamas and sex are actually detrimental to winning online games, but that's an entirely different post.

Street Fighter II is actually a religion for some people, and if the community at large is any indication, then genuine tax-exempt status can't be far away. Ever since it's release into arcades in the early nineties, it's been a pillar of the gaming community, something that many games have borrowed from. It founded the current fighting game genre as it stands all on it's own, and countless imitators rushed into the arcades in it's wake did nothing to diminish it's impact or popularity. It's one of those rare games that even non-gamers are aware of, like Super Mario Bros., Doom, and Pac-Man. There were many iterations of Street Fighter II released over the years in between the original arcade game(1991) and the true Street Fighter III(1997); tiny, tiny incremental adjustments to a system that became more and more complex with each release. The final version of Street Fighter II, Super Street Fighter II Turbo, is still considered one of the finest and most balanced fighting games ever made by the fighting games community, and they're still playing it fervently today. HD Remix is a high-definition remake of that game, and the same group of fanatical players have embraced it enthusiastically, making it one of the best selling and most popular download titles ever released. That's fourteen years of devotion to a game. I probably should have seen my beatings coming, in retrospect.

The game launched and I chose to play a 'friendly quick match', which was only half true in that I lost in less than thirty seconds. "An error", I said to myself. "An aberration. Let's try that again". I chose to play another round. I lost again. And again. I lost fifteen matches in a row. Fifteen. And then I lost another twenty. And then another ten in 'ranked' matches. And for some reason, I didn't give up. In fact, I loved every minute of it.

Because you see, as I listened to the in-game announcer say "You Lose!!" for the fiftieth(but not final!) time, I realized that by playing the game casually I had stunted my skills badly. There's a reason that fighting game devotees lament the death of the arcade, or more accurately the arcade scene, in the US; the surest way to improve at something competitive is to play people better than you. Anything else is just 'casual fun'. Which I'm pretty sure is against their religion or something, considering the humiliations I've endured lately. But despite the setbacks, something interesting happened: instead of giving up and playing something else, I actually felt my resolve harden. And when I finally won a two out of three match it felt like I'd conquered Asia. Naked. With only a rock. It felt almost as good as incredible sex with beautiful strangers, in pajamas or out. And lemme tell you folks: that's a pretty good feeling.

I bought the game on the PS3, because the 360 D-pad is completely worthless and I already owned a stick for Sony's current-gen console. For Christmas, I received a stick for my 360, and I bought the game again. Yeah. I'm hooked, and with Street Fighter IV coming out in February, I don't see an end in sight. I've gotten a taste of victory, and I want more.

Which brings us to the third reason I always avoided playing games online. It might be reductive and overly Freudian, but as I was getting stomped for the umpteenth time, I realized that I've always thought of games as 'something I can beat'. Life is full of bullshit that you can't control, no matter who you are or what you do. You can't control the economy, or what professor you end up with for a difficult class, or even whether your car will start in the morning. Games were always something that I knew I could bend to my will: after all, games are far simpler systems than the complex and ineffable webs that govern everything from our government down to our relationships with our friends, lovers and co-workers. I might have to fire someone today, or I might have forgotten a paper was due this week, or a good friend might be getting divorced and needs somewhere to stay and someone to lean on, but I can rock the ever-loving shit out of Fallout 3. It's an artificial constant. Like everyone else, I hate losing. Only now, I'm seeing it's long term value. If you don't lose, you don't learn. And if you don't learn, you don't improve. And then all you are is a coward.

Of course, that isn't going to stop me from putting a serious hurt on my friend this weekend. He says he used to play Street Fighter II on the Super Nintendo, and he says he used to be 'pretty good'. He says he thinks he played 'the white guy'. He wants to play me in order to 'show me who's boss'.

Hey, I've taken my beatings. I think it's only fair that I pay it back.

Don't judge me.

I will now succumb to the lure of lists....Or, the top ten games of 2008 and what they mean to me

2008-11-27T02:13:00.000-08:00

It has, my friends, been a pretty good year for gaming.

By what standard? Well, quite frankly, by any standard. Consider, for example, the holiday release lists for 1973 and compare them with the lists for 2008. Note the lack of compelling, triple 'A' games. Ruminate on the absence of quality downloadable content. Ponder the poor showing of Nintendo, Sony and Microsoft at retail, and the corresponding lack of up-to-the-minute media coverage. The only good thing about gaming in 1973 was there were no fanboys peeing on each other in GameFAQ forums, on account of GameFAQs not being in existence yet... You know, 1973 was a pretty good year too, come to think of it.

Now that we've determined that 2008 is a year in gaming worth noting, we should consider just how the releases we've been gifted with this year stack up in relation to each other. We do this annually. We do this annually because we are gamers, and if you take 'NU' out of 'annually', you'll have yourself a word that perfectly describes how deeply and obsessively we dissect and analyze everything about our hobby; we take our games and franchises very seriously. Seriously enough to buy a game we already have three copies of ten years later just because it's been re-released on a different platform. Seriously enough to threaten any idiot who doesn't appreciate the finer nuances of the alleged plot of Xenosaga with forced castration if he doesn't just shut up and admit it was incredible. We take this hobby seriously enough, if truth were told, to add yet another 'top ten list' to the ever growing morass of stupid crap on the internet.

I admit that I have a 'list problem'. I am at one with the protagonist of the delightful Nick Hornsby novel 'High Fidelity': I love to classify and order things. I am full of 'top five' and 'top ten ever' lists. I examine things in relation to each other as naturally and readily as your average Naruto fan can say the word 'jitsu', or hang an anime wall scroll. And so, with all that in mind, we come to the meat of this despicable little screed.

My Top Ten Video Games of 2008 are listed below, from tenth to first. After the game I've provided my personal reasons for it's inclusion on this list, as well as some insight as to why I think that the game might be important in the future. I've done my best to span the entire year's releases, and have even gone so far as to include (gasp!) downloadable games. Something else that you should bear in mind is that I've included only games that I've actually played myself. Therefore, Fallout 3 and Fable II(among others) are notably absent. I've allowed remakes(...Well, one, anyway) because, you know... It came out in 2008.

And away we go!

10) Persona 3: FES edition. I fell in love with this game at the title screen. It's that music.
You might have heard this game referred to as 'that game where emo kids shoot themselves in the head to summon helpful demons'. If that doesn't grab you, I don't know what to tell you. Persona 3 is a terrific spin off of Atlus' incredibly prolific Shin Megami Tensei series of Japanese role playing games. You play a kid who joins a group of gifted psychic youngsters who attend high school during the day(including taking tests and joining sports and drama clubs) while fighting evil and saving the world at night. The FES edition is a special re-release that includes the original 100 hour game as well as a thirty to forty hour epilogue game. The plot is interesting and far more adult than your average JRPG, the dialogue and combat are sharp, and the music is hot in a weaboo, J-Pop kind of way.

I think Persona 3 is important overall because it shows that one of the most stagnant and cliched genres in gaming, the Japanese role playing game, can transcend genre stereotypes and reach a smarter, more grown up audience. As someone who's been tired of the rehash bullshit that SquareEnix has been dishing up for years, Persona 3 is a gentle reminder that it isn't the genre that's become stagnant: it's the people who are making games in that genre. We could argue about how recursive that argument is, but lets not. Instead, let us move on to:

9) Super Street Fighter II Turbo HD Remix I'm a fan of fighting games, and a fan of Street Fighter above all others except Virtua Fighter. The game that first sparked my love of whupping my friends digitally was, of course, Street Fighter II, and the finest installment of Street Fighter II is...(deep breath)... Super Street Fighter II Turbo. This is (intake breath) Super Street Fighter II Turbo (...exhale breath), only rebalanced by tournament champion and game designer Dave Sirlin and lavished with a full set of 1080p high definition graphics. It's a labor of love, and it shows.

I think we should examine how well games like Soul Calibur IV and Street Fighter IV have done critically and commercially this year: is there a resurgence in fighting game popularity at long last? The evidence certainly points in that direction. If so, it will mark the resurrection of a genre that has become more and more exclusive and niche in the minds of regular folk, and that's pretty important in my opinion. Especially if I can then whup them digitally.

8) Burnout: Paradise How would you like to crash into things as hard as you can and not be punished? In fact, how would you like to be encouraged to do so? How would you like to casually destroy municipal property, smash oncoming traffic out of your way like a righteous automobile GOD, and be jabbered at by an ass named Atomica during the entire experience? You would? Then I have the game for YOU, good sir or madam.

Burnout is great, and I believe that as we get farther and farther into the current generation of games, the impact Burnout Paradise will have on balancing and design will be undeniable. There is little to no penalty for crashing(read: losing). You decide how you want to advance the game and upgrade your 'license'(read: win). There are tons of secrets and hidden areas. The game has been updated, and upgraded regularly, for free, with all kinds of new and exciting content. You can buy the game outright for download on the PS3, which is something I expected would have caused a bigger stir. And most importantly, this game made arcade racing fun for me again.

7) God of War: Chains of Olympus I love my PSP, but lets face it: there just aren't a huge number of exclusive 'must play' games available for it. So imagine my excitement and surprise when I played God of War and found myself as hooked as I'd been when playing the two PS2 installments. The combat grabs you by the impressive chin squirrel beard and doesn't let go until the final cinematic. I've never sat on a toilet for an hour before because I didn't want to stop playing a game. I'm going to name my first hemorrhoid 'Kratos' to mark the occasion.

If anything, God of War PSP shows that the PSP is, in the right hands, a truly excellent platform for gaming. You just have to adapt to the limitations of the hardware.

6) Ninja Gaiden II This game basically points out to the world that I am an idiot. Only a genuine, bonafide moron would pay sixty US dollars for the privilege of getting his ass kicked by anime ninja and demon stereotypes over and over and over while a buxom CIA agent dressed like a five dollar whore blabbers meaningless tripe into his surround sound system until he gets so pissed off that he shuts his 360 off and refuses to play a game for three days in a sullen childish sulk... Much less claim to enjoy it later. Dumbass.

Under certain circumstances, I really get into the challenge that a good action game can provide. Ninja Gaiden II has a depth in mechanics that games like God of War and Devil May Cry, good as they are, simply don't have. When I finally ace a level in Ninja Gaiden, I feel like I earned it. That's a nostalgic feeling for me(under certain circumstances). When I lose in Ninja Gaiden, it feels like I lost because I screwed up. That's an entirely different kind of frustration than getting screwed by the game itself(GTA, I'm calling you out).

5) Castlevania: Order of Ecclesia I wrote a whole blog dedicated to this game, so I don't think I need to say much more about it. It's very good, and it's had permanent residence in my DS ever since it came out. It'll probably still be there six months from now. Let's move along.

4) Condemned 2: Bloodshot Some games place you gently into a new world and quietly urge you to explore it's lens flare laden forests and glades. Some games require you to explore their lushly rendered cities and candlelit dungeons. Some games smash you in the face with a two by four studded with nails while screaming "Fuck you!!" as loud as it can while you scramble through the muck of a twisted and shadowy alley gasping and crying like a little girl. Condemned is squarely in the last category.

Few games have an atmosphere as noxious and repulsive as Condemned 2, and believe it or not, that's a good thing. As ugly and repugnant as it is, it draws you in so completely that you'll be dodging and swinging in time with your character on screen. After one particularly disturbing boss fight, I found that I had been clenching my teeth so hard that my jaw actually hurt. I loved it.

In addition, the first person melee combat has yet to be equaled. It's intuitive and works perfectly. The 'execution moves' are, perhaps, a bit much even for a hardened horror vet, but the sensation of fighting off a horde of loud, hostile, dangerous creeps using only your fists(or maybe a pipe if the fancy takes you) is something that other first person games should pay close attention to.

3) Dead Space Anyone who loves science fiction horror is basically going to be right at home with this one. Combine the best control elements of Resident Evil 4 and Gears of War with the atmosphere and plot of Aliens, Solaris and John Carpenter's The Thing? Sold! It's like the design document read, "How to get sixty dollars out of Geoff's wallet the easy way". I have no proof that it says something else, so I have no choice but to assume that EA has evil psychic gnomes working for them. Admit it; it makes sense. How else can you explain the fact that Madden sells 3 million copies every year? It sure as Hell isn't the bugs, arcane interface, or being insulted by twelve year old trailer trash while playing online, that's for sure.

Back to good games, like Dead Space. Seldom do you see a level of polish this high on a game. Everything looks and feels perfect. The set pieces, like a mile-long engine or an enormous, million ton enemy are jaw dropping. The sound design is spot on. The HUD, or lack thereof, is nothing short of brilliant. The dialogue is well acted and surprisingly engaging. Basically, it's the best twelve hours of whacking sentient cancer gunk you'll ever have. And surprisingly, it comes from EA, whose reputation in regards to excellent new first party IP is somewhat in question. Actually, EA has been kicking ass this year. Dead Space, Mirror's Edge, Bad Company... Good on you, EA. I'll make you a deal; you keep knocking out the bad ass original games, and I won't call the SEC to complain about the psychic gnomes.

2) Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots I've been gaga for the Metal Gear Solid series since the original Solid incarnation for Playstation. The Metal Gear series has sold me every console on which it has appeared. I somehow own no less than three copies of Metal Gear Solid 3, and I will own two copies of Metal Gear Solid 4 when the inevitable greatest hits version hits shelves sometime next year. Actually, I'm as bad with Metal Gear Solid as I am with Castlevania. That being said, even with all the hype surrounding it and the cosmic mess that was the story of Metal Gear Solid 2, which Metal Gear Solid 4 is the direct sequel of, I was supremely satisfied with the end of Solid Snake's adventures. In fact, I rank the overall Metal Gear Solid 4 experience as one of the finest and most cherished gaming experiences I've had in my long gaming career.

To appreciate the game, you must view it in the proper context. The entire game is a love letter to it's fans. Sure, the new stuff like buying weapons and ammo on the go and the westernized control scheme are evolutions, especially compared to the controls of MGS 2 or the original release of 3, but the core of the game is designed to cater to those of us who have been along for the ride the entire time. There's a satisfying conclusion for every character in the series, and the ending was so perfect and touching in my estimation that I shed a tear. I'm sensitive like that. Don't judge me.

Yes, the cut scenes are long and sometimes poorly directed. Yes, chapter three is an abomination unto the Lord and should never have been allowed to exist. Yes, Snake has an iPod. None of it matters. Snake has had his swan song, and it's one that will ring in my ears for a long time to come. Call me fanboy; I don't care. I'll see you on GameFAQs, and my aim is better than yours.

1) Little Big Planet On the weekend that Little Big Planet came out, I spent every waking minute for two days in front of the television playing four player co-op with my brothers and my oldest younger brothers' boyfriend(...which is actually more annoying to read than Super Street Fighter II Turbo HD Remix. I apologize). Four of us, all adults with jobs and social lives and everything, laughing and yelling like ten year olds, having the time of our lives. There's something almost primal in the execution and style of Little Big Planet. You run left to right. You collect stuff. You jump and swing. It can either bring you back to your childhood gaming roots, or introduce you to the joy of gaming for the very first time. It's accessible. It's incredibly cute. It's clever. And if you muck around with the packed in level editor, it can be surprisingly deep.

The level editor is nothing short of a revelation: it's simultaneously the most complex goddamn thing I've ever messed with and the simplest and most intuitive thing I've ever made a giant flaming penis with. It's almost a game in and of itself: making weird crap and just seeing what it's capable of doing. It also provides the biggest draw the game has for me; an unlimited, never ending supply of new levels to play, provided by other gamers.

That's the single coolest thing about Little Big Planet, and the single most important thing I've seen this year: accessible user created content. Of course level editors have been around ever since Marathon and Doom in the early nineties, but Little Big Planet makes level creation seem easy and within the reach of even casual gamers.

I almost wish I'd made it my top twenty games, actually. I didn't get to praise Valkyria Chronicles, or Left 4 Dead, or Bionic Command Rearmed, or Rez HD, or... you know what, I'm going to stop. My fanboy is hanging out, and I'm trying to cultivate an illusion of 'coolness'. Can't have 'coolness' with a fanboy flopping around like so much male stripper sausage. No need to thank me for that image. I know you appreciate it, and that's all the thanks I need.

I think I'm going to fire up the 'Ol entertainment center and actually play some of those games I've mentioned now. I have four days off, something nearly unheard of, and I'm going to take shameless advantage of it.

Happy Thanksgiving, and remember to play some games this weekend.

Franchise Fatigue... Or, Castlevania and Where It's Going.

2008-10-30T01:20:00.001-07:00

I am an unapologetic Castlevania nerd. To the core, sons and daughters. To illustrate just how far I've gone into the realm of fanatical fanboy territory, I own a Castlevania T-shirt and have been known to actually wear it in public. Sometimes. Seriously. Send help.

I'm not usually one for fanatical devotion to anything related to a specific 'brand' in media. It's unhealthy. It clouds judgment and leads to idiot behavior, like any other kind of fanaticism. A relevant example would be the Nintendo and Sony fanboys who lurk on GameFAQs and other gaming related message boards. Go ahead and try to reason with them. Pick a subject guaranteed to cause them to crawl out of their anime wall-scroll and manga collections to respond. Like, "The PS3 has fallen behind in gaming mind-share". Point out objective facts and try to appeal to them using rational, logical thought. Go ahead. I'll wait. Be polite and thorough with your thesis. Point out your neutrality in the overall discussion. Do not post pictures of retards crossing the finish line or LOLcats. Rise above it.

See how well that works?

I have no room to speak. I've recently discovered that I'm that guy when it comes to Konami's signature Dracula-slaying platformer. I loved Portrait of Ruin, arguably the least interesting and most formulaic of the DS series entries and, to my shame, I'm going to buy the controversial new Castlevania fighting game when it's released on Wii later this year. I can't help it. It's like a cult, or a narcotic. I just cant say "NO" to the Castlevania. I know. I feel sorry for me. too. I'm hanging my head in shame right now. In my Castlevania shirt, no less.

Why Castlevania, you ask? A healthy part of it is pure, unadulterated nostalgia. The first game I got seriously hooked on for NES was Castlevania; the same is true for Playstation(the indefatigable Symphony of the Night). Part of it is comfort. The formula(s) for any given Castlevania game haven't changed since the eighties and nineties. I know exactly what I'm getting when I pop in a new Castlevania game. Part of it, and this is going to sound weird but hear me out, is how disposable the experience is. I can steal twenty minutes of play time on the DS or PSP on lunch break or between classes: I've played the series so thoroughly that even new games are almost rote by association. It's low impact gaming, and it's relaxing. It doesn't change the amount of sheer enjoyment I can squeeze out of them, but it does illustrate the amount of monkey-level conditioning that I've allowed the Castlevania development guys(helmed by the infamous IGA)to subject me to.

(A quick interjection: adult readers? Let's play a drinking game. Every time I type 'Castlevania', you take a drink. For example, I will now type 'Castlevania'. When you read the word 'Castlevania', you will then take a drink. Ready? Castlevania. You can take a drink now, because I typed 'Castlevania'. Get it? Anyone who can finish reading this post without throwing up or passing out gets an anime wall scroll. Castlevania.)

Let's pause a minute so you can re-read the post so far, just so we're clear on what the issues are. Remember to take your drinks.

Still with me? Let us, then, continue, gentle reader.

Bearing all that in mind, it's no surprise then that I bought the newest game for DS last week, the stupidly titled 'Order of Ecclesia'. On the surface, it's the same game they've been releasing since the Playstation one era. It's got the signature open-world roaming. It's got leveling and item grinding. It's got the same enemies and backgrounds they've been using since the GBA days. The same items populate the stores(once you open them up). You can still back dash and (eventually) double-jump. So basically, I thought 'here we go again! Glee!', and set to the task of whacking Dracula for the ten-thousanth time. An hour later, I realized I was playing something much more ambitious than any Castlevania game since Symphony of the Night. I died a lot. I struggled to wrap my head around the new weapons system, dubbed the "glyph system", and the custom combos you can create with it. I noted how far up the difficulty had been ramped. I meditated on how you don't start off in Dracula's castle(cleverly named 'Castlevania'). I balked at the map screen, not seen since Castlevania II: Simon's Quest on NES. While all the usual stuff you find in a Castlevania game is present and accounted for, it's cleverly rearranged. There are things in the game for which I have no reference at all. It's an honest to God attempt to move the series in a new direction.

It irrationally pissed me off.

I shut the game off, frustrated, and took a long look at how I approached the Castlevania series as a fan. I thought about how static and cookie-cutter the series was, and thought harder about all the posts I'd written defending that on various gaming forums. I might have posted a picture of a retard crossing a finish line. I might even have done that wearing my Castlevania T-shirt. I discovered I was one of 'those people', like on GameFAQs. I was wearing a Castlevania T-shirt, and I was suddenly struck with how ridiculous that was.

(A quick digression: did I mention that if Castlevania is in italics, you have to drink double? Well, you do. So there. Bottoms up champ.)

I went back to Order of Ecclesia determined to play the game without prejudice. I applied myself to learning the new systems. I adjusted my expectations in regards to difficulty. I'm really enjoying it. In fact, it might be my favorite of the portable entries. I might even buy a T-shirt.

In an industry that thrives on milking recognizable brands, it's refreshing to see a franchise that's usually so formulaic try and stretch it's boundaries, albeit slowly. Or, at least it should be. Maybe if we gamers were more open to experimenting in our legacy gaming franchises, we'd see more innovation and less rehashes than we do now. Keep that in mind when next year's Madden is a rhythm-action dating sim.

Castlevania Castlevania Castlevania Castlevania Castlevania.

And Now, In This Corner... Mainstream Media Vs. Gaming. Fight!

2008-10-03T23:26:00.000-07:00

Let's not talk about Jack Thompson. Enough is enough. He's had his time in the sun, and if we're lucky, he's been discredited so thoroughly that we no longer have to see his face on television or on Digg. He was a dangerous man in his early days, when the specter of GTA-inspired violence and porn rock threatened the purity of the nations youth, but his time has passed. Another attention whore crucified on his own self-righteous rhetoric.

Let's talk, instead, about the relationship between the media and that most savage beast, the Hardcore Gamer.

I'm always interested in how popular media covers games(Lately, the tide has been turning toward a more even keeled approach, but historically games and gaming culture have gotten the greasy end of the stick). Even more interesting to yours truly is how gamers themselves respond to the attention. I've noticed that more and more, the focus of mainstream media's gaming coverage is the business side of things: how much money is being made and spent, lines of faithful gamers waiting to buy the newest games and consoles on release day, World of Warcraft of course, and how much more money games are making than Hollywood. That's all well and good, but it ignores a legacy of slander and misinformation that's left scars on the psyche of gaming culture. And without sounding too melodramatic, those scars may take a long time to heal.

Earlier this year, a trailer for Resident Evil 5 was called out for presenting itself in a racist light. Gamers exploded in a storm of self-righteous rage, accusing those reporting the story of having an anti-gaming bias. Forums blew the Hell up. Enthusiast sites talked about it endlessly. Capcom, the makers of the game, responded with a press release and with interviews, denying that their game was racist. Those of us in the hardcore gaming scene thought it was the end of the world.

When the dust settled though, the joke was on us. None of the usual detractors had bothered to show up; not even Jack. We, ourselves, had created a veritable tempest in a teapot, and the few intelligent, well-spoken folk in the press who were trying to open an honest to goodness dialogue about the subject had been entirely drowned out by the waves.

N'Gai Croal of Newsweek was a sane and intelligent voice in the midst of all the hyperbole and vitriol. He wrote an excellent article that illustrated better than any other why the trailer was controversial. In a nutshell, He suggested not that the game was racist, but that the imagery presented in the trailer had some serious psychological and historical baggage attached to it. As an african american, he couldn't help but be affected by the image of a huge white guy shooting up a crowd of black africans. It didn't help that the trailer was devoid of context; to those who were not already familiar with the series, it would be even more jarring. Whether or not the development team had intended for the viewer to interpret the trailer in that manner was irrelevant. the imagery would speak for itself.

It was a well-reasoned and insightful argument, but it went unheard amongst the furious typing of ten thousand angry gamers telling the internet just how insane people were for condemning yet another innocent video game for a crime it didn't commit. To the gamers, it was Hot Coffee and Manhunt 2 all over again. Reason didn't factor into it; we were under attack, and we responded with ridicule, rhetoric, and empty threats. It was embarrassing.

Just as Mr. Croal highlighted how he was conditioned to react to the imagery present in the offending trailer in a certain way, so did gamers illustrate how they had been conditioned to react when they perceived their hobby to be under attack. And the resulting picture disturbed me greatly.

New media has always come under attack by those who didn't understand it. When Stravinsky premiered his Rite of Spring, it was uniformly panned by critics and actually started a bonafide riot. A book on the corrupting influence of comic books in the fifties actually contributed to a congressional hearing on morality and ethics in the medium. Midnight Cowboy was slapped with an 'X' rating in the time of it's theatrical release, though the movie barely rates a PG-13 in modern times. I mean, compare Midnight Cowboy to Saw. Which one was rated 'X' again?

And that right there is the answer to our problem: familiarity eventually breeds understanding.

Also contempt. But that's for a different post.

People like Jack Thompson, Joe Lieberman, and all the other people crusading for the regulation of games are simply repeating history. It should be noted that the Rite of Spring is now considered a masterpiece, and that your mom probably does aerobics to Prince and Guns N' Roses. For every reporter who writes a condescending article on video games, there's an N'Gai Croal or Jon Davison trying to educate and inform an ignorant population about what games actually are. For every Cooper Lawrence, a Leigh Alexander. We should remember that we have friends, too, and that as gaming grows to be more and more integrated into popular culture, the outcry and controversies will eventually be replaced by a calmer dialogue, just as it always has in the past. This too shall pass, and when it does, we'll all be able to laugh about it over a game of Halo 6 or Guitar Hero 315 Remix. It's practically in the cards.

We gamers should remember that the next time someone points out something controversial in a video game. If gaming is going to grow up to be a relevant part of our culture, there will sometimes be criticism and slander. Film and literature aren't exempt from that; why should video games be?

Media is subjective. Scars only heal if you learn to stop picking at them. Meaningful discussion sometimes comes from the most surprising places. The mainstream media has cautiously started to embrace the idea that, hey, video games... There might be something to them. We should try and view that as the tentative first steps toward something greater.

How Difficult Games Ruined and Enriched My Life. Or, How many controllers have YOU broken?

2008-10-02T01:04:00.001-07:00

I'll answer my own question first, so I can speak with a clear conscience: two. My first broken controller was for the NES. I broke it playing Castlevania, and I was twelve years old. I didn't screw around, either; after yet another humiliating death at the hands of Frankenstein, I stormed out of the room, got a twenty pound weight from my dad's weight bench, stormed back to the den, and threw that sumbitch at the offending piece of hardware, which died a quick, agonizing and inglorious death. At that point in my life, I had never felt so satisfied. In my juvenile and offended mind, righteous justice had been served. Score one for organic life.

The second controller was about a year ago. It was a SIXAXIS controller for the PS3, I broke it playing Call of Duty 4 single player, and I was twenty seven. I had been trying to clear the infamous TV station level for nearly an hour, and even though I could see how to advance, infinitely spawning enemies kept killing me just as I'd finally manage to approach their spawn point. "Just one more time", I promised myself, and reloaded my save. I died within a minute. I didn't screw around then, either: I launched that controller through the wall at top speed, inadvertently reloading my save and making lifelong enemies with my neighbors. My girlfriend was mortified. At that point in my life, and to this day, I've never been more annoyed with myself. Score one for cold, indifferent technology.

(Adding insult to injury, while retrieving the controller from the hole in the wall, those goddamn terrorists killed me again. Score TWO for cold, indifferent technology.)

I did eventually clear the TV station, but only after a long period of postponement. I had other things to do. Work, school, and all the other stuff that adults are forced into to pay their way through life are now more important than pretending to be a soldier. My real life responsibilities came to call, and I had no interest in spending more of my life being angry. My free time is too precious for that. I'd rather play a few rounds of Virtua Fighter 5 on the sofa with my friends than be shamefully slaughtered by computer controlled terrorists over and over again.

So. When does a game become so difficult and infuriating that it drives me into a situation where I actually choose to interact with other humans in order to beat them silly(virtually) on my couch, as opposed to shooting terrorists solo in an unnamed middle-eastern location in order to further the cause of freedom(also virtually)? When does it cross that invisible, blurry line that separates 'frustrating' from merely 'challenging'? There's no easy answer that fits everyone(an experience will always differ from person to person), but I think I understand how I personally react to difficulty in games. If I'm not being consistently rewarded for playing the game, then I give up and move on to something else.

That seems simple, or even self-evident, but it's more art than science. I can lose in a Street Fighter 3 or Virtua Fighter match because I know that I'm being rewarded with a deeper understanding of how the game works every time I hit the mat. Over time, my mastery of the game increases, which manifests in beating the A.I. consistently and making my friends on the couch break more of my controllers. Other games offer more immediate rewards; experience points, unlockable characters, or loot. Some rewards are more intangible; the atmosphere of Silent Hill and Shadow of the Colossus, the exploration of Oblivion, or the 'wow' factor of how good Metal Gear Solid 4 looks on my HDTV. There's a feeling of equal pay(reward) for equal time(...um..time), and it might be the single most important factor in deciding whether or not I'll continue to play a game.

Guys like Criterion get it. In Burnout: Paradise, I choose how I want to advance. Alternately, I can choose NOT to advance, and it's still fun and rewarding. If I crash or fail an event, there's no 'Game Over' and a kick to the title screen. I'm not being punished for learning the ropes. I honestly think that games like Call of Duty 4 single player and Ninja Gaiden are going to die out as gaming becomes more and more mainstream; casual players don't have a history with arcade or 8 bit games that insulates them from being frustrated with something that seems like it hates them personally. They'll move on, and so, eventually, will the developers.

That isn't to say that all games should be objectively easy, either. Don't get reductive; that's MY job. What developers will do is figure out ways to cater to both crowds, without something as crude(and historically uneven) as a difficulty setting. What could that be? I encourage the reader to check out the scaling difficulty in Sin Episodes, or the TrueSkill mechanic on Xbox Live for a good idea.

I've paid my dues. I did finally beat Frankenstein in Castlevania. I can still play through Einhander without a continue, and I walk tall in Ninja Gaiden. Xbox or NES. You pick. I've decided that I'll never again break a controller in anger. It's not worth my time.

Plus, I figure this post scores a point on cold, unfeeling technology. That makes us even.

My car better start tomorrow.

Gamers, gaming culture, and the 'origin of the species'(in this case, a gaming blog).

2008-09-29T02:20:00.001-07:00

OK. Here we go.

Video games are a bonafide, unquestioned cultural phenomenon. The sheer volume of websites, videos, and... yes, I know... blogs that deal with games and gaming is astronomical. Games have surpassed music and movies in revenue generated over the last two years. Triple A titles are covered in Time, Newsweek and the New York Times. There are art exhibitions that use gaming icons as part of their nomenclature. Business professionals relax by grinding on World of Warcraft, clearing gems in Bejeweled and bowling in Wii Sports. Video games have, in other words, officially arrived as part of our popular culture.

You already know that? I know you already know that. Everyone knows that stuff. Why am I wasting your time, then? There's a reason, I promise. I've been told that the first post is always hardest. It sets the tone for everything that comes afterwards. It's more for me than it is for you. I'll get there. Just give me a few paragraphs.

I've always been a 'hardcore gamer'. Like many hardcore gamers, I spend what's probably a disproportionate amount of my free time searching the internet for news, rumors and speculation about my favorite hobby; more time than I actually spend gaming if I were honest. I'm a member of no less than seven gaming forums and websites. I lurk on four or five others. I regularly read Gamasutra and other gaming business websites that are targeted toward the development community. I seize upon any mention of gaming in more mainstream media like a barnacle on a ship's hull; more evidence that my personal interests have relevance to the world at large. I listen to a bevy of gaming related podcasts. I visit Penny Arcade three times a week. And I'm not alone.

Like other sub cultures in other media, hardcore gamers are a finicky, difficult to please group of people. We can be hard for folks on the outside of gaming culture to deal with. We nit pick, make snap judgments, and turn on the very companies that actively court our attention. We bewilder and ridicule anyone who isn't a member of our little club. We're spoiled. We're widely believed to be social outcasts and deviants by popular media. And lately, the term 'hardcore gamer' has begun to be used disparagingly by the gaming industry and gaming journalism community. It's no wonder, they say, that the 'casual gamer' is the new focus for the development community. They bitch less. And sometimes they're right.

See? I can admit that. Make note of my obvious emotional maturity; I'll probably blow that perspective at a later date and we can all reminisce about when I admitted I'm part of a group that's known to be overly sensitive and insular . "Remember that post when Geoff admitted he was a whining, judgmental swine? He was right." I'm glad we've gotten off to such a good start.

I decided to start this blog because I noticed a niche that hadn't been filled yet. There are hundreds of websites devoted to covering games in a professional capacity, bringing previews, reviews and gaming news to hungry fans. There are thousands of excellent blogs and websites by gaming journalists and developers. There are even more 'fan sites'; websites lovingly created and maintained by devotees of certain games and genres of games. Then there are the sites and forums for collectors and modders. What I didn't find was someone writing about the dynamic that exists between those groups; the warp and weave of the gaming culture as a whole. That, good readers, is my goal. To provide whoever reads this blog with refreshingly frank, fascinating insight into what an average gamer thinks about the cultural zeitgeist that is playing and living video games.

I'll try to make it both fun and enlightening for everyone. In the coming weeks and months I'll be covering fan sites, gaming music, how design impacts the average gamer, and more. It's not just for you, either. I love the people and places that make up the wild west of gaming culture. I want to learn and explore it for myself. Sharing with anyone who cares to read is just icing on the cake.

There. It's over. That wasn't so bad was it?