Tonight is a good night to celebrate. Ending 2008, what I would call one of the most disappointing years in gaming that I can remember.
It started right off in January. Two of my favorite franchises, Burnout and Devil May Cry, were getting the next-gen treatemnt with Burnout Paradise and Devil May Cry 4. They both garnered a good amount of hype and were looking to start 2008 on the right foot. Burnout Paradise turned out to be a bit too experimental (though I applaud them for trying something new) with the open world concept. Forcing you to rely on your microscopic mini-map and arrow indicators during a high-octane race was a horrible idea; the game used to just be about blazing down a linear path and trashing all that's in your way. In Paradise I was too focused on optimizing my route to the goal to think about actually enjoying the game. Add in annoyances like a lack of a "restart race" button and the lack of the much-loved Crash mode, as well as same-screen multiplayer, and the result was a package that was original and pretty, but just not that great.
Devil May Cry 4 was also a terrible letdown. Coming off from the stellar 3rd installment that got me into the series, DMC4 had definitely had some expectations to fill. What came out was a lackluster and uninspired entry to the series. Simplified mechanics trashed the complex and customizable weapon swapping and combat style systems for a simple grabbing mechanic, where you can grapple enemies from afar and slice them up. The combos in general felt less technical and more button mashing. The simplified controles and downgraded difficulty leads to what I would call "casual-i-fying" the series.
My hope was renewed in the prospect of the extremely hyped Smash Brothers Brawl. Daily updates on its website was a great hype device, but began to slowly make clear a sad truth - there really isn't much new in Brawl. While Melee was a milestone upgrade from 64 (crisp graphics, a ton of new mechanics and moveset expansion, trophy collecting and a roster that over doubled in size), Brawl only offered a few upgrades, none of which were that interesting. The fleshed out adventure mode turned out to be nothing more than some shallow platforming stages and decent boss fights, along with nonsensical cinematics (YOU try crafting a story with 35 characters that can't speak a word, and keeping it somewhat sensical). The only game mechanic changes (other than more subtle ones like weaker gravity) is in the form of final smashes which were only handed out through an item. Instead of creating an overdrive bar that charges when the character hits / gets hit, they leave it to the random spawns / locations of items to determine when someone can get a game-breaking attack. They can be somewhat fun in casual matches but anyone decently competitive turns them off entirely. The only real upgrade was adding in some new characters, but their appeal wore off relatively quickly, even the surprise appearances from non-Nintendo Sonic and Snake. And don't get me started on the absolutely terrible online support.
The next victim was possibly the biggest letdown of 08 to me, which was GTA4. While it was certainly met with critical success, I just didn't see it personally. The graphics were amazing, the city felt alive, the story was well presented and the new aim / cover mechanics worked great most of the time. The problem was that none of those things are really what GTA is about. The reason I used to spend hours on end in the lands of Vice City and the other PS2 entries was the sheer amount of fun things there were to do. There were hospital and firefighting minigames with gameplay rewards if completed, properties I could buy with missions attached to them, jetpacking around, torching people with flamethrwers or beheading them with katanas, finding hidden packages that gave you awesome upgrades with every 10 collected, just to name a few. You can do none of that in GTA4. While they do still have vigilante missions and hidden packages (well, pigeons this time) they have no tangible reward other than some achievement points. The exciting minigames of GTA4 include activities like watching fake television, browsing their fake internet, and playing virtual pool or darts with one of your virtual friends. Sure, taking them out enough give you some perks, but the entire affair felt tedious and repetitive. The weapon selection was as bare bones as possible with nothing interesting or fun to use. The cars have a realistic feel to them which makes extreme maneuvering a much more difficult affair (and less fun) affair. Money was entirely useless past the first 5th of the game since you never lose your weapons (unless you're bad enough to actually get arrested), so there's no real risk in stocking up on expensive weapons anymore, as well as no property to buy. Pestering the cops isn't even that fun anymore; in past games you could play cat and mouse with them for a while before they really took you seriously, but in 4 by the time you're starting to really have fun you'll hit 6 stars and get trampled by army men soon after (don't expect tanks though, since they removed those too). It just felt like GTA plus realism, minus the soul of the franchise. It felt empty, cold, and uninteresting outside of the main plot.
The next big release was Rock Band 2 in the fall. Now here's a hard thing to screw up; the game got rave reviews last year and pretty much perfected plastic band gameplay already. Instead of keeping to that and upgrading some aspects, they managed to change nearly nothing and actually remove some aspects of the original. Namely I speak of the game keeping track of your star ratings in individual songs; the fact that it no longer does was a glaring and absurd oversight in my eyes. As I just said nothing was really added to the game (other than songs, obviously). The world tour mode was the same as last year's mode, with a few gimmicks like managers you can hire and some more clothes for your virtual rock star. The solo tours were completely removed. There's still no way to do band vs band online play, just 1 vs 1. The battle of the bands mode past the first couple of weeks is just a glorified ad to buy more songs so you can play their setlist challenges that you upload to leaderboards that are forgotten about a week later. Promised modes like jukebox mode and a special mode for a person playing vocals and an instrument simultanously never made the cut. Songs with no vocals can't be played unless you exit the game, take out the vocals player, and go back in the game, just to play that song. The instruments were upgraded but most people didn't need more plastic guitars or drums in the first place. A lot of this is nitpicking but I expect a sequel to have something new or interesting. The only saving grace is being able to transfer 55 of the original game's songs into this one. But overall, collosal letdown on the whole.
Guitar Hero: World Tour had a chance to innovate on Rock Band's formula but fell flat on its head. Their take on the RB interface was a jumbled mess and key components like saving other players and unison bonuses were completely absent. Vocals were horribly done with a painfully strict pitch window and nonsensical combo system. The shared star power system is horribly done and leads to people hogging SP and making SP activations only last for a few seconds at a time. The solo / band tour modes are extremely drab and linear "play pre-done setlists to advance" experiences that were not compelling at all. Their biggest chance to step-up from Rock Band, the music creator, was a flop as well. It gives you no creative expression in making the actual chart (notes are pre-deterined based on the sounds used, and SP placement is 100% random), vocals arn't allowed at all, and the guitar / bass / drums are just terrible sounding midi samples. The only songs worth looking into are random mario / zelda / final fantasy songs redone and insane random solos designed for those crazy people that can 5 star Dragonforce songs. No matter what the song, the result was always a bit jarring for the ears.
A few other letdowns rounded out the year. Fable II, like its predecessor, was supremely overhyped by Peter Molyneux and underwhelmed, with game-breaking glitches to top off the mediocre experience. GTA 4's downloadable expansion got delayed until '09. The blockbuster hits for the Wii this holiday season composed of Animal Crossing, which may as well be a port of the DS version with some new furniture and a couple of gimmicks, Mario Kart Wii, which turned out to be nothing new other than the trick system, gimmicky controls and a gimped battle mode, and Wii Fit, which I just have no words for. Nintendo still doesn't care about finding any solution to its storage problem on the Wii. Playstation 3's Home was a floundering mess and, while still in beta, is already widely considered a failure. And Xbox 360's are still Red Ringing (though less so these days).
I mean, 2008 wasn't a complete failure. Brawl and Rock Band 2, while not really innovating much, remained fun as hell to play. The 360 got an interface overhaul that sent it from having the weakest OS this generation, to the best one. Games like LittleBigPlanet and indie gem Braid gave me faith that original titles can still fare well in the giant pool of sequels that we see these days. Perhaps I'm jaded because all the titles that really did well this year were in the genre I despise most - 1st / 3rd person shooters. Resistence 2, Gears 2, Fallout 3 (please don't try to tell me that this game is an RPG, if anything it's a shooter with some light RPG aspects and an overhyped targeting system), Left 4 Dead, and MGS4 just off the top of my head. I really get worried that in a few years I'll be able to just use the [shooter series' name] [number] format for every popular game released.
Here's hoping that 2009 will have a few less shooters, a few more risks, and some truly worthy AAA titles. To all those that read (and write for) TSG, Happy New Years!
Wednesday, December 31, 2008
Thursday, December 11, 2008
6 Reasons Why I Sold My Wii
Enough is enough, Nintendo. After the sub-par performance of the Gamecube I was really hoping you would deliver something to make me believe in you again. At first it seemed like you pulled it off - the Wii looked like an amazing innovative package full of quality games and groundbreaking motion sensitivity. Well, after bringing you to my dorm this year only to turn you on about 1 or 2 times for the semester, I sold you. And I couldn't be happier. Here's a list of reasons why the Wii has failed, in my eyes.
1) Nintendo has abandoned the seasoned gamer
I refuse to stereotype myself as a "hardcore gamer," but I've played enough games to be pretty well versed in them. Back when the Wii came out we were promised plenty of challenging games from established franchises. Out of all of them the only ones worth playing to me were Mario Galaxy and Brawl. Metroid Prime 3, while equipped with the best implementation of the Wii controller I've ever seen, completely Halo-fied itself and lost what it was originally about, exploring an open world as a lone bounty hunter. Zelda was a complete joke difficulty-wise, both for combat and puzzles. Mario Kart is pretty much like every other Mario Kart, but with bike / stunts / wiimote gimmicks.
This would all be forgivable if Nintendo started to up the quality. It's understandable to make mostly subpar games with new hardware. Alas, there is nothing. Nintendo promised a new big hit for veteran gamers at E3 this year, and what did we get?
A new...Animal Crossing...seriously? Not only is this game aimed for non-gamers, but it's virtually a port of the DS version, with a few new furniture items, and a "city" section which is just a bunch of shops lined up for you. And there's just nothing else, take a look at the upcoming releases for the Wii if you don't believe me. http://www.gamefaqs.com/console/wii/releases.html
So if that's true, how the hell is Nintendo rocking this generation in terms of sales? Well, to my next point...
2) Nintendo now caters exclusively to children and soccer moms
Remember their other big announcement for E3? Wii Fit. Not a game, a fitness application. Nintendo went from having a sub-division for the non-gamer to being their exclusive market. They stopped making technically brilliant games and stepped down to shallow experiences like Wii Sports and Wii Play. Sure, these excursions were fun for a little while with the right crowd, but they got stale fast. I went to the Nintendo store a while back to get some kirby plushies with my girlfriend; we saw that they were holding a massive event for a new game. A few years ago this would undoubtedly be for the next big Zelda or Mario or Pokemon game. Instead we found...Wii Carnival Games. Seriously?
Nintendo is not dumb. They are in fact brilliant. They discovered just how untapped the 4-10 and 40+ demographic is with video games. They figured out that by producing tons of low quality games and hyping them to death with motion gimmicks, people will buy them in troves. They no longer need massive development teams to put together masterpieces like Ocarina of Time or Mario Galaxy - they just need to find the next real-life activity to simulate with Wiimote gestures, whether it be golf, cooking, or raising babies.
2a) Third parties figured out the same thing
Third parties, almost absent entirely in the Gamecube era, came rushing back to Nintendo when they realized they can do cheap cash ins with awesome games like Dogz and Catz. Barely any developer wants to make a serious port to the Wii due to inferior hardware and the lack of their demographic. Why would they, when they can put in half as much money on a cash-in and make twice the profit?
3) The Wiimote does NOT work as promised
When the Wii remote was announced everyone touted it as the revolutionary control device to change games as we know it. Hell, even I did. Wii Sports did a good job of creating the illusion that it actually follows your arm movements as they said, but as games came out it became more and more obvious how off the controller is from their original vision.
First, the movement is NOT one to one, not even close. Besides the gyroscope / accelerometer (which can only detect relative movement) the main way for the remote to work is to position itself with the Wii's sensor bar. What this means is, your pointing is always limited by how your orientation works relative to the bar. The result is that you're very rarely ever projecting your cursor the way you point it. Everything is relative to the sensor bar. Countless times I had to flail the remote around to re-orient the sensor and get a bearing of where it is. Slight movements of the remote shot my cursor across the screen in a flash. One of my original dreams of the Wii, to have an entire genre of awesome light gun games, cannot happen due to this. All attempts at a light gun game are forced to show a cursor on screen, since the player cannot actually aim, fire, and hit accurately. They can only move their remote relative to where their cursor already is on screen.
The other gestures are just as inaccurate. Some of the best Wiimote interactions were the ones that didn't try too hard to be 1 to 1 - like flicking the remote in Metroid as a grapple beam or shaking the remote for a spin attack in Zelda. They don't actually care how hard you flick or fast you turn, just the fact that you did it. In essence, it's a button press remapped to a gesture. And it really feels like a gimmick more often than not. Relying too much on how the remote moves, like in Red Steel's sword fighting, result in a control nightmare.
(A note on the Motion Plus add-on - it shows promise. But I'm sure it'll be wasted on more casual games anyway)
4) The online experience is abysmal
This doesn't really need much explanation. The best thing Nintendo has done here is make it free (though future games may have fees attached to them for online play). The rest is just terrible. Instead of having one uniform ID that you choose, you're forced to have a different 12-16 digit code randomly assigned to you for each online game you know. You can't send friend requests either - both sides have to tediously enter those numbers to play that specific game. If you don't like friend codes, then enjoy the completely paltry random matchups, which include no names, no communication, no way to friend a person after a match, and nearly no options for customizing a match (Brawl is always a 2 minute 4 player fight on a random map with medium items), as well as no real ranking system. There is no community to speak of other than drab ideas like the "Everybody Votes" channel and a Mii fashion show. After giving up on Brawl's online I only used it for occasional firmware updates.
5) The market is ripe for selling
The Wii continues into another Christmas season with completely absurd levels of demand and Nintendo failing to produce enough, resulting in shortages everywhere. The result? People will give an arm and a leg for a Wii. I got rid of my Wii in a trade for a person's PS3 with a controller and game - that's right, I gave him nothing but a Wii and what it shipped with, and I got a system worth $150 more AND a game. Maybe he was dumb, but that's just an example of the demand this system mongers. If you're like me and haven't touched your Wii in months, now's the best time to sell.
And finally..
6) The Wii is a threat to the future of the video games industry
Okay, I'm going a bit out on a limb here, but hear me through. Nintendo is shunning seasoned gamers while obtaining a massive following from the casual audience. Game quality is rapidly dropping while sales continue to improve. Microsoft and Sony, while initially reluctant, feel obliged to compete with Nintendo's dominance over the casual market. Microsoft recently released avatars for their system, which are really just Miis in higher resolution. They have a storm of casual games coming out as well.
While it would be a different article for me to write, it is also my opinion that 2008 was a disappointing year for games. One thing in particular that bothered me is how easy / casual games are becoming. Games like Fable 2 and Prince of Persia no longer even punish you for dying; they are instead like a continuous movie that never ends in a game over. While this can be argued as video games evolving to a greater level of visceral entertainment, I really believe they are just becoming movies where you occasionally press buttons.
Put these two together, and I come up with two very scary outcomes for the future:
1 - The death of hardcore video games. It's simple math really. "Hardcore" games are getting easier and easier, while casual games are becoming larger and larger. The inevitable intersect is video games becoming, more often than not, simple interactive experiences. They are no longer about gaining skills and dexterity and knowledge in the context of the game world,but linear experiences that unfold the same way every time, and just need simple user interaction to move them along. The only exceptions would be more and more "applications" like Wii Fit, which barely even qualify as a game in the first place.
2 - The next video game crash. To those who think the casual gamers of today will be the hardcores of tomorrow: I disagree. A 40 year old playing Wii Tennis will be content playing Wii Tennis; I can't see him popping in a disc of Gears of War or Mass Effect. What this means is the market will continue to inflate with casual games and people will continue to buy into them. But one magical day they will wake up and grow tired of flinging the remote around like a baseball bat or tennis racket. They'll want to *gasp* do the real activity instead. The Wii carnival games were cool for a while, but they can never replace a real carnival's atmosphere. Wii Fit was nifty, but going to the gym is really the more effective way to go. The hype will die, and casual gaming will fall apart in a flash. Nintendo will scramble to meet sales expectations and fail, and Microsoft / Sony will abandon their casual ventures back to what's left of the softened "hardcore" games, which will satisfy fewer and fewer of the seasoned gamers. We'd much stick to the old school NES through PS2 days of quality games anyway. In short ,the industry would collapse.
By selling my Wii, I am completing my statement that I refuse to support Nintendo's endeavor into the casual market. I only have my DS left which has a flash card anyway, so they won't get a penny more out of me. I gave them one last chance, and they have failed even more miserably than last time in my eyes.
1) Nintendo has abandoned the seasoned gamer
I refuse to stereotype myself as a "hardcore gamer," but I've played enough games to be pretty well versed in them. Back when the Wii came out we were promised plenty of challenging games from established franchises. Out of all of them the only ones worth playing to me were Mario Galaxy and Brawl. Metroid Prime 3, while equipped with the best implementation of the Wii controller I've ever seen, completely Halo-fied itself and lost what it was originally about, exploring an open world as a lone bounty hunter. Zelda was a complete joke difficulty-wise, both for combat and puzzles. Mario Kart is pretty much like every other Mario Kart, but with bike / stunts / wiimote gimmicks.
This would all be forgivable if Nintendo started to up the quality. It's understandable to make mostly subpar games with new hardware. Alas, there is nothing. Nintendo promised a new big hit for veteran gamers at E3 this year, and what did we get?
A new...Animal Crossing...seriously? Not only is this game aimed for non-gamers, but it's virtually a port of the DS version, with a few new furniture items, and a "city" section which is just a bunch of shops lined up for you. And there's just nothing else, take a look at the upcoming releases for the Wii if you don't believe me. http://www.gamefaqs.com/console/wii/releases.html
So if that's true, how the hell is Nintendo rocking this generation in terms of sales? Well, to my next point...
2) Nintendo now caters exclusively to children and soccer moms
Remember their other big announcement for E3? Wii Fit. Not a game, a fitness application. Nintendo went from having a sub-division for the non-gamer to being their exclusive market. They stopped making technically brilliant games and stepped down to shallow experiences like Wii Sports and Wii Play. Sure, these excursions were fun for a little while with the right crowd, but they got stale fast. I went to the Nintendo store a while back to get some kirby plushies with my girlfriend; we saw that they were holding a massive event for a new game. A few years ago this would undoubtedly be for the next big Zelda or Mario or Pokemon game. Instead we found...Wii Carnival Games. Seriously?
Nintendo is not dumb. They are in fact brilliant. They discovered just how untapped the 4-10 and 40+ demographic is with video games. They figured out that by producing tons of low quality games and hyping them to death with motion gimmicks, people will buy them in troves. They no longer need massive development teams to put together masterpieces like Ocarina of Time or Mario Galaxy - they just need to find the next real-life activity to simulate with Wiimote gestures, whether it be golf, cooking, or raising babies.
2a) Third parties figured out the same thing
Third parties, almost absent entirely in the Gamecube era, came rushing back to Nintendo when they realized they can do cheap cash ins with awesome games like Dogz and Catz. Barely any developer wants to make a serious port to the Wii due to inferior hardware and the lack of their demographic. Why would they, when they can put in half as much money on a cash-in and make twice the profit?
3) The Wiimote does NOT work as promised
When the Wii remote was announced everyone touted it as the revolutionary control device to change games as we know it. Hell, even I did. Wii Sports did a good job of creating the illusion that it actually follows your arm movements as they said, but as games came out it became more and more obvious how off the controller is from their original vision.
First, the movement is NOT one to one, not even close. Besides the gyroscope / accelerometer (which can only detect relative movement) the main way for the remote to work is to position itself with the Wii's sensor bar. What this means is, your pointing is always limited by how your orientation works relative to the bar. The result is that you're very rarely ever projecting your cursor the way you point it. Everything is relative to the sensor bar. Countless times I had to flail the remote around to re-orient the sensor and get a bearing of where it is. Slight movements of the remote shot my cursor across the screen in a flash. One of my original dreams of the Wii, to have an entire genre of awesome light gun games, cannot happen due to this. All attempts at a light gun game are forced to show a cursor on screen, since the player cannot actually aim, fire, and hit accurately. They can only move their remote relative to where their cursor already is on screen.
The other gestures are just as inaccurate. Some of the best Wiimote interactions were the ones that didn't try too hard to be 1 to 1 - like flicking the remote in Metroid as a grapple beam or shaking the remote for a spin attack in Zelda. They don't actually care how hard you flick or fast you turn, just the fact that you did it. In essence, it's a button press remapped to a gesture. And it really feels like a gimmick more often than not. Relying too much on how the remote moves, like in Red Steel's sword fighting, result in a control nightmare.
(A note on the Motion Plus add-on - it shows promise. But I'm sure it'll be wasted on more casual games anyway)
4) The online experience is abysmal
This doesn't really need much explanation. The best thing Nintendo has done here is make it free (though future games may have fees attached to them for online play). The rest is just terrible. Instead of having one uniform ID that you choose, you're forced to have a different 12-16 digit code randomly assigned to you for each online game you know. You can't send friend requests either - both sides have to tediously enter those numbers to play that specific game. If you don't like friend codes, then enjoy the completely paltry random matchups, which include no names, no communication, no way to friend a person after a match, and nearly no options for customizing a match (Brawl is always a 2 minute 4 player fight on a random map with medium items), as well as no real ranking system. There is no community to speak of other than drab ideas like the "Everybody Votes" channel and a Mii fashion show. After giving up on Brawl's online I only used it for occasional firmware updates.
5) The market is ripe for selling
The Wii continues into another Christmas season with completely absurd levels of demand and Nintendo failing to produce enough, resulting in shortages everywhere. The result? People will give an arm and a leg for a Wii. I got rid of my Wii in a trade for a person's PS3 with a controller and game - that's right, I gave him nothing but a Wii and what it shipped with, and I got a system worth $150 more AND a game. Maybe he was dumb, but that's just an example of the demand this system mongers. If you're like me and haven't touched your Wii in months, now's the best time to sell.
And finally..
6) The Wii is a threat to the future of the video games industry
Okay, I'm going a bit out on a limb here, but hear me through. Nintendo is shunning seasoned gamers while obtaining a massive following from the casual audience. Game quality is rapidly dropping while sales continue to improve. Microsoft and Sony, while initially reluctant, feel obliged to compete with Nintendo's dominance over the casual market. Microsoft recently released avatars for their system, which are really just Miis in higher resolution. They have a storm of casual games coming out as well.
While it would be a different article for me to write, it is also my opinion that 2008 was a disappointing year for games. One thing in particular that bothered me is how easy / casual games are becoming. Games like Fable 2 and Prince of Persia no longer even punish you for dying; they are instead like a continuous movie that never ends in a game over. While this can be argued as video games evolving to a greater level of visceral entertainment, I really believe they are just becoming movies where you occasionally press buttons.
Put these two together, and I come up with two very scary outcomes for the future:
1 - The death of hardcore video games. It's simple math really. "Hardcore" games are getting easier and easier, while casual games are becoming larger and larger. The inevitable intersect is video games becoming, more often than not, simple interactive experiences. They are no longer about gaining skills and dexterity and knowledge in the context of the game world,but linear experiences that unfold the same way every time, and just need simple user interaction to move them along. The only exceptions would be more and more "applications" like Wii Fit, which barely even qualify as a game in the first place.
2 - The next video game crash. To those who think the casual gamers of today will be the hardcores of tomorrow: I disagree. A 40 year old playing Wii Tennis will be content playing Wii Tennis; I can't see him popping in a disc of Gears of War or Mass Effect. What this means is the market will continue to inflate with casual games and people will continue to buy into them. But one magical day they will wake up and grow tired of flinging the remote around like a baseball bat or tennis racket. They'll want to *gasp* do the real activity instead. The Wii carnival games were cool for a while, but they can never replace a real carnival's atmosphere. Wii Fit was nifty, but going to the gym is really the more effective way to go. The hype will die, and casual gaming will fall apart in a flash. Nintendo will scramble to meet sales expectations and fail, and Microsoft / Sony will abandon their casual ventures back to what's left of the softened "hardcore" games, which will satisfy fewer and fewer of the seasoned gamers. We'd much stick to the old school NES through PS2 days of quality games anyway. In short ,the industry would collapse.
By selling my Wii, I am completing my statement that I refuse to support Nintendo's endeavor into the casual market. I only have my DS left which has a flash card anyway, so they won't get a penny more out of me. I gave them one last chance, and they have failed even more miserably than last time in my eyes.
Saturday, November 22, 2008
Review: Fable 2
(Note: I realized I write really, really long reviews. I'm going to try to include a one paragraph "summary" under the quick fix so you can get the gist of what I'm saying without reading the whole review. In this case it's just copy-pasting the last paragraph)
Review: Fable 2
Score: 7.7
Quick Fix:
++ Great art direction and good musical score
++ Most of the role playing aspects are well done, as are choices with consequence
+ Combat is enjoyable, even if it's easy
+ Great and intuitive control scheme
+ Some of the moral dilemmas in the game are actually pretty good
-- Glitches galore! Some of which can be game breaking
-- The endgame does not feel balanced at all and becomes pretty meaningless
- Load screens are somewhat frequent and very long
- Most of the optional quests are rudimentary, easy, and not very interesting
- The game is extremely easy, do not play if you're looking for a challenge
- Spell selection system is a mess
- Economy system is terrible, gold feels worthless
- Abrupt ending is a bit unsatisfying
Summary: I really wanted to love Fable 2. I wanted to give it a high 8 or low 9, praise it for its fantastic theme and role playing elements, as well as combat that proves that games don't have to be difficult to be fun. If the game ended at the mid-way point it very well could have been that way. Not to say that the game is too long; it's more that it felt like everything became unbalanced, broken and meaningless toward the end. I went from being engaged in the story and my character to just wanting to get to the end as fast as I could. The final line is the game needed some more time in testing - to both fix the myriad of bugs and make sure the second half of the game plays as well as the first half did. Here's hoping that Fable 3 will patch up the mistakes of 2, as 2 has done for 1.
--------------
I finally finished Fable 2 last night, so I figure it's a good time to post a review. Fable 2 is marketed as Microsoft's big action RPG, its Zelda of sorts. While the first Fable was relatively disappointing and did not fulfill the big promises it made, Fable 2 is said to have atoned for the mistakes of the first while expanding the experience as a whole. Does it deliver?
Well, yes and no. It makes up for a lot of the mistakes of the first by filling in a lot of the gaps where the original failed, but at the same time, has a lot of problems of its own. Let's start with the good: Fable 2 is gorgeous. I don't mean cutting-edge graphics gorgeous, but art direction gorgeous. The towns have a life of their own, day and night and the seasons all work well. Everything sounds great too, from the musical score to the excellent voice acting all around. Fable 2 feels and looks like a high budget from all angles. The pre-rendered cutscenes, which are few and far between, are usually brief but beautiful and do a great job of fleshing out key moments in your hero's tale.
What I really, really like about Fable 2 (as well as the original, but less so) is it puts the "RP" back in RPG. A lot of RPGs today seem to only be called RPGs because it involves hit point meters and alternating between swordplay and magic attacks. They rarely feel like you're playing any active role in the plot other than advancing the linear story by talking to key characters and blowing up the occasional boss.
Throughout Fable 2 I really felt like a part of the game world. A lot of games give you options like clothing choices, but it never means anything in the scope of the actual game. Fable 2 often succeeds in the idea of consequences. If you wear attractive clothing, women in the game will remark on how handsome you look, while if you don't take care of yourself and become fat, people will turn heads. If you eat meat vegetarians will look down on you. If you rent out some houses and raise the rent, people will think of you as a miser and react accordingly.
It works on the larger scale too. There are several key decisions you can make in the game that affect the game world as a whole. A simple good-or-evil decision you make during the childhood portion of a game affects the entire town's well-being when you come back as an adult. If you were good the economy prospers and the shop keepers give you a discount, but if you were evil the town becomes run down with bandits and you can get offers to assassinate key gang leaders for cash. Some of the decisions even break the fourth wall: One of the toughest decisions I had to make was between sparing the life of a friend you made (netting you a ton of positive alignment points) or losing some valuable experience points you worked hard to get throughout the game.
All the standard things are here too: customizable clothes, tattoos, hair, getting married and having kids, fat / slim appearance. Clothes and hair can be dyed as well which is a nice touch. I got a pretty sweet black mage gig going down by the end of the game (hat included). If you missed out on the concept of "morphing" in Fable 1, then I'll mention it's in this game too and it's pretty neat. Your character basically morphs based on key decisions you make in the game. If you put a lot of points into your physique (primarily to increase melee damage) you become buff, while increasing your shooting abilities makes you taller. Investing into a lot of spells gives you these cool glowing blue veins at your neck. Being good gives you a halo, being evil gives you dark eyes and even some horns. It's a neat thing to see how different heroes turn out by the end of the game. The end of the game even shows you a brief retrospect of how your hero looked at different points in the game, which is cool to actually see him grow like that.
The RP part is definitely the strength of Fable 2. The weakness, unfortunately, is in the third letter of the acronym, G for game. There are a lot of little and big annoyances here. The load screens, while not too frequent, are very long and almost unacceptable for a game this generation (this is a lot better if you have the HDD space to install it). While the main quests were pretty good in general, the optional quests felt extremely straightforward, usually kill-those-dudes or collect-x-of-item-y affairs ,sometimes with minor moral choices attached. The world was touted to be massive and free roaming, but generally felt very linear, with only the occasional slight detour to find a treasure or key. Your dog makes this even easier, as getting anywhere near a treasure prompts him to bark and guide you the rest of the way, taking a lot out of the exploration element.
A major show-stopper here is the absurd amount of glitches in the game. To get an idea of the amount of glitches, just check the Fable 2 forums at GameFAQs - the main sticky in the forum is one outlining the major game breaking glitches and how to avoid them. If you need more of an example than simply search "glitch" in the forum and see how many pages come up (I got 26, and that's at 50 topics a page!). I experienced a couple of glitches myself; for some reason, they all seemed centered around my wife. For one, there just seems no way for the "have sex" option to appear when I want to have a baby with her. She even tells me how much she wants it, but I follow the prompts exactly and it only gives me the normal "sleep" option. The other glitch is with my second wife, who at some random point in time apparently went mute on me. She doesn't talk to me besides the occasional comment, doesn't react to my gestures, won't sleep with me, or really do much of anything. I do everything to make her happy and give her a good share of money, but she is pretty much a vegetable that walks around. It's really appalling to me that a game with this kind of budget gets out with so many bugs.
The best part of the gameplay, thankfully, is the combat, which turns out to be very enjoyable. While having only one button for shooting, one for melee and one for magic may sound limiting, the game manages to do a lot with it. With your sword you can button mash if you want, but can also block, time your swings to increase speed, hold the button down to charge a flourish attack, and even counter your enemy. With shooting you can either fire a quick shot, zoom in to increase damage, or sub-target enemy body parts to slow them down or kill them outright. Magic has 8 spells that get stronger as you invest more points in them. The cool part is besides basic swinging and gunning, all aspects of melee and ranged are unlocked by investing experience into the right abilities. It really feels like your character is growing because of this, and you'll have some difficult decisions in how to spend experience. Being able to quickly shift between the three combat styles and the lack of ammo or mana gives the player a ton of freedom in how to fight.
A minor downside about combat is the spell selection system is pretty bad. There are 5 levels of strength with magic, and you can put a different spell into each level. When you charge magic the spell you cast depends on what level you release the button at. So if you charge all the way to 5 you'll use whatever spell you put in the 5 slot, but if you release at 4 you use the spell in the 4 slot. This falls apart when you want to quickly change what spell to use. The only way to change a spell is to hold down a different trigger entirely and then use the dpad to select the correct level and spell to use, all in the middle of combat. You can also pause the game and re-organize spells but this really breaks up the action. Why they couldn't just map an active spell to the dpad and then charge that with B is beyond me.
Just don't go in expecting combat with Devil May Cry or Ninja Gaiden levels of difficulty. Not only is the game pretty easy from start to finish, but it is actually impossible to really die. When you run out of health instead of re-doing the fight scene or getting pushed out of your game, your character simply jumps back to life in 5 seconds. The only losses are uncollected experience orbs and the gain of a scar on your body, which never goes away. I thought the lack of death bothering you would be a bad thing since it removed any threat of combat.
I was actually wrong. I still found myself fighting for my life, for my character's scar-less look. If you're the kind of gamer that wants to be punished more harshly for failing in combat, this probably isn't the game for you. It also turns out the death system never bothered me because I never actually died. Anywhere after early in the game you'll have a ridiculous amount of potions (both from buying them cheap and finding them) and they all restore a ton of health instantly, with no restrictions. Anytime I got near death in combat I simply tapped the potion button and everything was okay.
This brings me to what I think is my biggest problem with Fable 2. The game starts off great, and it continues to be great for about the first half. Things feel balanced; my character's funds were limited so I couldn't buy great equipment and health potions, the combat was pretty challenging with said limitations, and my character was steadily growing in skill set. After the midway point, things started to spiral out of control.
For one thing, the economy system blows. When you're poor in the beginning the best way to make money is to take up a part-time job, which of course involves a minigame. Whether it's chopping wood or serving beers, it's always a timing minigame that gets extremely boring after about a minute. It's really the only decent way to make money - questing and stealing both result in tiny amounts of money that could be made in minutes of a doing a job. Rank up in the minigame a couple of times and you'll have enough money to last you most of the game right there. Everything in the game is dirt cheap except for some of the higher level melee and ranged weapons.
The real way to invest your money is buying shops or renting out houses. These are large up-front investments that seem to pay for themselves over time - balanced enough. But by the end of the game I was raking in thousands of gold every 5 minutes. The payout continues even while the game is off - I came back after a few days once and my bank account doubled and then some. High class weapons became pocket change and the only thing worth buying was even more property, which of course perpetuated the cycle further. So to summarize, tedious in the beginning, broken at the end.
The combat also falls apart toward the end. In particular if you choose to invest in spells, the later level damage spells are simply ridiculous. Here's my late-game four step guide to every battle:
1 - Cast Slow Time spell as enemies appear
2 - Move to a safe location as enemies stumble to you in slow-mo
3 - Charge and cast level 5 Shock (enemies still in slow-mo)
4 - Anything that isn't flat out killed can be swept up with some sword strikes
Honestly, after I had those two spells I could not find one group of enemies that could even put more than a dent in me. I ended up avoiding the combination to keep combat from being a complete snore-fest.
After a while the game just felt didn't feel as interesting. My character was already pimped out the way I wanted and my abilities were mostly developed; late-game experience mostly goes toward simple tweaks in the damage you deal instead of interesting additions to your moveset. Combat became a drag and money became a joke. The final quests were barely interesting and the ending felt abrupt. It pretty much throws a plot twist in your face, and goes right to the credits. It felt like an entire arc of the story was left out, which makes me wonder if we'll be nickel-and-dimed for expansion DLC content that continues where the story leaves you stranded. The only interesting part is a really tough final choice you have to make.
I really wanted to love Fable 2. I wanted to give it a high 8 or low 9, praise it for its fantastic theme, role playing elements, and combat that proves that games don't have to be difficult to be fun. If the game ended at the mid-way point it very well could have been that way. Not to say that the game is too long; it's more that it felt like everything became unbalanced, broken and meaningless toward the end. I went from being engaged in the story and my character to just wanting to get to the end as fast as I could. The final line is the game needed some more time in testing - to both fix the myriad of bugs and make sure the second half of the game plays as well as the first half did. Here's hoping that Fable 3 will patch up the mistakes of 2, as 2 has done for 1.
Overall Score - 7.7
(PS - sorry for the lack of images. I'm lazy. Game screens / videos are pretty abundant on the web if you want to see the game in action)
Review: Fable 2
Score: 7.7
Quick Fix:
++ Great art direction and good musical score
++ Most of the role playing aspects are well done, as are choices with consequence
+ Combat is enjoyable, even if it's easy
+ Great and intuitive control scheme
+ Some of the moral dilemmas in the game are actually pretty good
-- Glitches galore! Some of which can be game breaking
-- The endgame does not feel balanced at all and becomes pretty meaningless
- Load screens are somewhat frequent and very long
- Most of the optional quests are rudimentary, easy, and not very interesting
- The game is extremely easy, do not play if you're looking for a challenge
- Spell selection system is a mess
- Economy system is terrible, gold feels worthless
- Abrupt ending is a bit unsatisfying
Summary: I really wanted to love Fable 2. I wanted to give it a high 8 or low 9, praise it for its fantastic theme and role playing elements, as well as combat that proves that games don't have to be difficult to be fun. If the game ended at the mid-way point it very well could have been that way. Not to say that the game is too long; it's more that it felt like everything became unbalanced, broken and meaningless toward the end. I went from being engaged in the story and my character to just wanting to get to the end as fast as I could. The final line is the game needed some more time in testing - to both fix the myriad of bugs and make sure the second half of the game plays as well as the first half did. Here's hoping that Fable 3 will patch up the mistakes of 2, as 2 has done for 1.
--------------
I finally finished Fable 2 last night, so I figure it's a good time to post a review. Fable 2 is marketed as Microsoft's big action RPG, its Zelda of sorts. While the first Fable was relatively disappointing and did not fulfill the big promises it made, Fable 2 is said to have atoned for the mistakes of the first while expanding the experience as a whole. Does it deliver?
Well, yes and no. It makes up for a lot of the mistakes of the first by filling in a lot of the gaps where the original failed, but at the same time, has a lot of problems of its own. Let's start with the good: Fable 2 is gorgeous. I don't mean cutting-edge graphics gorgeous, but art direction gorgeous. The towns have a life of their own, day and night and the seasons all work well. Everything sounds great too, from the musical score to the excellent voice acting all around. Fable 2 feels and looks like a high budget from all angles. The pre-rendered cutscenes, which are few and far between, are usually brief but beautiful and do a great job of fleshing out key moments in your hero's tale.
What I really, really like about Fable 2 (as well as the original, but less so) is it puts the "RP" back in RPG. A lot of RPGs today seem to only be called RPGs because it involves hit point meters and alternating between swordplay and magic attacks. They rarely feel like you're playing any active role in the plot other than advancing the linear story by talking to key characters and blowing up the occasional boss.
Throughout Fable 2 I really felt like a part of the game world. A lot of games give you options like clothing choices, but it never means anything in the scope of the actual game. Fable 2 often succeeds in the idea of consequences. If you wear attractive clothing, women in the game will remark on how handsome you look, while if you don't take care of yourself and become fat, people will turn heads. If you eat meat vegetarians will look down on you. If you rent out some houses and raise the rent, people will think of you as a miser and react accordingly.
It works on the larger scale too. There are several key decisions you can make in the game that affect the game world as a whole. A simple good-or-evil decision you make during the childhood portion of a game affects the entire town's well-being when you come back as an adult. If you were good the economy prospers and the shop keepers give you a discount, but if you were evil the town becomes run down with bandits and you can get offers to assassinate key gang leaders for cash. Some of the decisions even break the fourth wall: One of the toughest decisions I had to make was between sparing the life of a friend you made (netting you a ton of positive alignment points) or losing some valuable experience points you worked hard to get throughout the game.
All the standard things are here too: customizable clothes, tattoos, hair, getting married and having kids, fat / slim appearance. Clothes and hair can be dyed as well which is a nice touch. I got a pretty sweet black mage gig going down by the end of the game (hat included). If you missed out on the concept of "morphing" in Fable 1, then I'll mention it's in this game too and it's pretty neat. Your character basically morphs based on key decisions you make in the game. If you put a lot of points into your physique (primarily to increase melee damage) you become buff, while increasing your shooting abilities makes you taller. Investing into a lot of spells gives you these cool glowing blue veins at your neck. Being good gives you a halo, being evil gives you dark eyes and even some horns. It's a neat thing to see how different heroes turn out by the end of the game. The end of the game even shows you a brief retrospect of how your hero looked at different points in the game, which is cool to actually see him grow like that.
The RP part is definitely the strength of Fable 2. The weakness, unfortunately, is in the third letter of the acronym, G for game. There are a lot of little and big annoyances here. The load screens, while not too frequent, are very long and almost unacceptable for a game this generation (this is a lot better if you have the HDD space to install it). While the main quests were pretty good in general, the optional quests felt extremely straightforward, usually kill-those-dudes or collect-x-of-item-y affairs ,sometimes with minor moral choices attached. The world was touted to be massive and free roaming, but generally felt very linear, with only the occasional slight detour to find a treasure or key. Your dog makes this even easier, as getting anywhere near a treasure prompts him to bark and guide you the rest of the way, taking a lot out of the exploration element.
A major show-stopper here is the absurd amount of glitches in the game. To get an idea of the amount of glitches, just check the Fable 2 forums at GameFAQs - the main sticky in the forum is one outlining the major game breaking glitches and how to avoid them. If you need more of an example than simply search "glitch" in the forum and see how many pages come up (I got 26, and that's at 50 topics a page!). I experienced a couple of glitches myself; for some reason, they all seemed centered around my wife. For one, there just seems no way for the "have sex" option to appear when I want to have a baby with her. She even tells me how much she wants it, but I follow the prompts exactly and it only gives me the normal "sleep" option. The other glitch is with my second wife, who at some random point in time apparently went mute on me. She doesn't talk to me besides the occasional comment, doesn't react to my gestures, won't sleep with me, or really do much of anything. I do everything to make her happy and give her a good share of money, but she is pretty much a vegetable that walks around. It's really appalling to me that a game with this kind of budget gets out with so many bugs.
The best part of the gameplay, thankfully, is the combat, which turns out to be very enjoyable. While having only one button for shooting, one for melee and one for magic may sound limiting, the game manages to do a lot with it. With your sword you can button mash if you want, but can also block, time your swings to increase speed, hold the button down to charge a flourish attack, and even counter your enemy. With shooting you can either fire a quick shot, zoom in to increase damage, or sub-target enemy body parts to slow them down or kill them outright. Magic has 8 spells that get stronger as you invest more points in them. The cool part is besides basic swinging and gunning, all aspects of melee and ranged are unlocked by investing experience into the right abilities. It really feels like your character is growing because of this, and you'll have some difficult decisions in how to spend experience. Being able to quickly shift between the three combat styles and the lack of ammo or mana gives the player a ton of freedom in how to fight.
A minor downside about combat is the spell selection system is pretty bad. There are 5 levels of strength with magic, and you can put a different spell into each level. When you charge magic the spell you cast depends on what level you release the button at. So if you charge all the way to 5 you'll use whatever spell you put in the 5 slot, but if you release at 4 you use the spell in the 4 slot. This falls apart when you want to quickly change what spell to use. The only way to change a spell is to hold down a different trigger entirely and then use the dpad to select the correct level and spell to use, all in the middle of combat. You can also pause the game and re-organize spells but this really breaks up the action. Why they couldn't just map an active spell to the dpad and then charge that with B is beyond me.
Just don't go in expecting combat with Devil May Cry or Ninja Gaiden levels of difficulty. Not only is the game pretty easy from start to finish, but it is actually impossible to really die. When you run out of health instead of re-doing the fight scene or getting pushed out of your game, your character simply jumps back to life in 5 seconds. The only losses are uncollected experience orbs and the gain of a scar on your body, which never goes away. I thought the lack of death bothering you would be a bad thing since it removed any threat of combat.
I was actually wrong. I still found myself fighting for my life, for my character's scar-less look. If you're the kind of gamer that wants to be punished more harshly for failing in combat, this probably isn't the game for you. It also turns out the death system never bothered me because I never actually died. Anywhere after early in the game you'll have a ridiculous amount of potions (both from buying them cheap and finding them) and they all restore a ton of health instantly, with no restrictions. Anytime I got near death in combat I simply tapped the potion button and everything was okay.
This brings me to what I think is my biggest problem with Fable 2. The game starts off great, and it continues to be great for about the first half. Things feel balanced; my character's funds were limited so I couldn't buy great equipment and health potions, the combat was pretty challenging with said limitations, and my character was steadily growing in skill set. After the midway point, things started to spiral out of control.
For one thing, the economy system blows. When you're poor in the beginning the best way to make money is to take up a part-time job, which of course involves a minigame. Whether it's chopping wood or serving beers, it's always a timing minigame that gets extremely boring after about a minute. It's really the only decent way to make money - questing and stealing both result in tiny amounts of money that could be made in minutes of a doing a job. Rank up in the minigame a couple of times and you'll have enough money to last you most of the game right there. Everything in the game is dirt cheap except for some of the higher level melee and ranged weapons.
The real way to invest your money is buying shops or renting out houses. These are large up-front investments that seem to pay for themselves over time - balanced enough. But by the end of the game I was raking in thousands of gold every 5 minutes. The payout continues even while the game is off - I came back after a few days once and my bank account doubled and then some. High class weapons became pocket change and the only thing worth buying was even more property, which of course perpetuated the cycle further. So to summarize, tedious in the beginning, broken at the end.
The combat also falls apart toward the end. In particular if you choose to invest in spells, the later level damage spells are simply ridiculous. Here's my late-game four step guide to every battle:
1 - Cast Slow Time spell as enemies appear
2 - Move to a safe location as enemies stumble to you in slow-mo
3 - Charge and cast level 5 Shock (enemies still in slow-mo)
4 - Anything that isn't flat out killed can be swept up with some sword strikes
Honestly, after I had those two spells I could not find one group of enemies that could even put more than a dent in me. I ended up avoiding the combination to keep combat from being a complete snore-fest.
After a while the game just felt didn't feel as interesting. My character was already pimped out the way I wanted and my abilities were mostly developed; late-game experience mostly goes toward simple tweaks in the damage you deal instead of interesting additions to your moveset. Combat became a drag and money became a joke. The final quests were barely interesting and the ending felt abrupt. It pretty much throws a plot twist in your face, and goes right to the credits. It felt like an entire arc of the story was left out, which makes me wonder if we'll be nickel-and-dimed for expansion DLC content that continues where the story leaves you stranded. The only interesting part is a really tough final choice you have to make.
I really wanted to love Fable 2. I wanted to give it a high 8 or low 9, praise it for its fantastic theme, role playing elements, and combat that proves that games don't have to be difficult to be fun. If the game ended at the mid-way point it very well could have been that way. Not to say that the game is too long; it's more that it felt like everything became unbalanced, broken and meaningless toward the end. I went from being engaged in the story and my character to just wanting to get to the end as fast as I could. The final line is the game needed some more time in testing - to both fix the myriad of bugs and make sure the second half of the game plays as well as the first half did. Here's hoping that Fable 3 will patch up the mistakes of 2, as 2 has done for 1.
Overall Score - 7.7
(PS - sorry for the lack of images. I'm lazy. Game screens / videos are pretty abundant on the web if you want to see the game in action)
Thursday, October 30, 2008
What Happened to Platformers?
I had a sad, sad revelation last night. It came after playing the new Banjo-Kazooie demo freshly released on Xbox LIVE. You see, back in the N64 days Banjo was a platformer, an action-adventure game. But Rare decided to turn my beloved franchise into a action-racing hybrid. Instead of exploring and collecting while acquiring new abilities to further explore other worlds, you build vehicles to explore and complete missions. Instead of learning new abilities you find new parts which help you find new areas. An interesting idea in theory, but the execution was horrible. Controls were clunky and objectives boiled down to brain-dead racing challenges, time trials and awkward goals (nudge the soccer ball into the goal while trying to shoot enemies with horrible aim controls). The only redeeming point of the game is the only thing Rare can apparently do right these days, which is graphics and music.
The music in particular was a throwback to the old Banjo games and almost seemed to tease a "you wish it were like this" kind of message, making me want to play the old games again. It really made me wonder - what the hell happened to the platforming genre? It used to constitute a virtual majority of video games and also a majority of the good ones. If you think back to the NES and SNES days, most games had you jumping around and navigating toward your ultimate goal lurking somewhere off screen to the right. The only obstacles in your way were spikes, pits, enemies, and sometimes lava. They were a dime a dozen and people didn't seem to ever get sick of them.
As games evolved to the 3d era the platforming genre had to evolve too. Having an extra dimension gave developers a lot more places to hide things, and so shiny objects they hid. Games like Mario 64 proved how well the transition worked; while there were still some hard jumps to be had and bosses to fight, a lot of the game revolved around exploring the confounding 3d environments and searching every nook and cranny for those 120 stars and the 8 red coins in each world.
Everyone picked up on how fun this can be, and the genre had another explosive growth. Spyro had you running and gliding for gems as a fire breathing dragon, Gex had you searching for TV remotes as a smack-talking gecko, and Donkey Kong 64 had you searching for every kind of collectible under the sun...it had over 3000 individual items to collect! Of course my beloved Banjo-Kazooie also appeared; it blended beautifully crafted worlds with a move-learning system that had your characters constantly expanding their ways of getting around. In the beginning you could only run, jump, glide and attack. By the end of the game you were dive bombing, talon trotting, egg throwing, and full-blown flying your way through levels. Later levels forced you to use the abilities while previous levels often had secrets that could be found with using all of your powers. It was a great system that made you explore, think, find things, and retroactively explore some more. I was in love.
In the last generation platformers became a bit more scarce. There were some great gems but they often were more combat oriented; examples include Ratchet and Clank as well as Jak and Daxster series. Mario had a less-than-stellar followup to 64 with Sunshine, but it was still a solid game. Other games, like the underground hit Psychonauts, still focused on jumping and collecting things.
When you get to this generation, however, counting the number of good 3d platformers is pretty easy. The answer is one - Mario Galaxy. That's it. There are a number of good 2d platformers out, the spotlight of course going to LittleBigPlanet...but seriously, what happened to the 3d platformers? I feel like the genre became forgotten overnight, replaced by the myriad of FPS / TPS games we see these days. And why this has happened completely puzzles me - Galaxy proved that the genre is not only still viable, but can be successful both critically and fiscally.
It's the kind of genre that can appeal to old and young, to both hardcore and casual. Make the main game tame with some difficult parts and then put some ridiculously hard challenges to tackle for the sought-after 100% completion. Give me some creative, innovative mechanics and some huge worlds sprawling with collectibles and hidden nooks and crannies to explore. Give me an ability system, a light but entertaining combat system maybe, and a nice story to boot. It's a pretty simple formula that's universally appealing enough to make any game that executes it well successful.
The future just looks so bleak for the genre. All I have to look forward to is Mirror's Edge, which looks promising. But I'd love to see some more platforming games come out. I don't want the genre to die - it's one of my favorite ones. I frankly don't understand why it's been such a rarity these days. What do you all think?
The music in particular was a throwback to the old Banjo games and almost seemed to tease a "you wish it were like this" kind of message, making me want to play the old games again. It really made me wonder - what the hell happened to the platforming genre? It used to constitute a virtual majority of video games and also a majority of the good ones. If you think back to the NES and SNES days, most games had you jumping around and navigating toward your ultimate goal lurking somewhere off screen to the right. The only obstacles in your way were spikes, pits, enemies, and sometimes lava. They were a dime a dozen and people didn't seem to ever get sick of them.
As games evolved to the 3d era the platforming genre had to evolve too. Having an extra dimension gave developers a lot more places to hide things, and so shiny objects they hid. Games like Mario 64 proved how well the transition worked; while there were still some hard jumps to be had and bosses to fight, a lot of the game revolved around exploring the confounding 3d environments and searching every nook and cranny for those 120 stars and the 8 red coins in each world.
Everyone picked up on how fun this can be, and the genre had another explosive growth. Spyro had you running and gliding for gems as a fire breathing dragon, Gex had you searching for TV remotes as a smack-talking gecko, and Donkey Kong 64 had you searching for every kind of collectible under the sun...it had over 3000 individual items to collect! Of course my beloved Banjo-Kazooie also appeared; it blended beautifully crafted worlds with a move-learning system that had your characters constantly expanding their ways of getting around. In the beginning you could only run, jump, glide and attack. By the end of the game you were dive bombing, talon trotting, egg throwing, and full-blown flying your way through levels. Later levels forced you to use the abilities while previous levels often had secrets that could be found with using all of your powers. It was a great system that made you explore, think, find things, and retroactively explore some more. I was in love.
In the last generation platformers became a bit more scarce. There were some great gems but they often were more combat oriented; examples include Ratchet and Clank as well as Jak and Daxster series. Mario had a less-than-stellar followup to 64 with Sunshine, but it was still a solid game. Other games, like the underground hit Psychonauts, still focused on jumping and collecting things.
When you get to this generation, however, counting the number of good 3d platformers is pretty easy. The answer is one - Mario Galaxy. That's it. There are a number of good 2d platformers out, the spotlight of course going to LittleBigPlanet...but seriously, what happened to the 3d platformers? I feel like the genre became forgotten overnight, replaced by the myriad of FPS / TPS games we see these days. And why this has happened completely puzzles me - Galaxy proved that the genre is not only still viable, but can be successful both critically and fiscally.
It's the kind of genre that can appeal to old and young, to both hardcore and casual. Make the main game tame with some difficult parts and then put some ridiculously hard challenges to tackle for the sought-after 100% completion. Give me some creative, innovative mechanics and some huge worlds sprawling with collectibles and hidden nooks and crannies to explore. Give me an ability system, a light but entertaining combat system maybe, and a nice story to boot. It's a pretty simple formula that's universally appealing enough to make any game that executes it well successful.
The future just looks so bleak for the genre. All I have to look forward to is Mirror's Edge, which looks promising. But I'd love to see some more platforming games come out. I don't want the genre to die - it's one of my favorite ones. I frankly don't understand why it's been such a rarity these days. What do you all think?
Wednesday, October 15, 2008
Metroid SR-388
In lieu of Rich's pick for his Top 52 this week, I was reminded of this amazing Metroid fan game in the works. The game, Metroid SR-388, is shaping up to be one of the most well done fan tributes I've ever seen. This is no remake or re-imagining of the 2-d metroids...it's an entirely new game. New story,new maps, new powerups and moves, new bosses, new music, etc. For a fan game the production values are really high - the graphics and sound look and sound very authentic. While it has no definite release date right now, this is one game I'm going to keep a very close eye on until its release.
Sunday, September 21, 2008
Review: Metal Gear Solid 4
Review: Metal Gear Solid 4
Score: 8.2
-------
Quick Fix
+++ Astonishing level of graphics, sound and presentation
++ Lots of options for both stealth and action gameplay
+ Unique and challenging boss battles
+ Two of the most intense and well crafted on-rails sequences in the history of games
+ Once the controls are mastered they prove to be very well done
+ Powerful and satisfying end to the MGS series
-- Too many cutscenes, not enough gameplay
-- Design of the game seems to favor gunning down everyone over being stealthy
-- The later three "Acts" seemed watered down in terms of gameplay
- Frequent and annoying load screens, and install times for each Act
- Controls have a bit of a learning curve
- Absurd level of fan service can alienate a non-MGS hardcore
--------
Metal Gear Solid 4 is the final chapter in the story of Solid Snake. Snake's got a lot of expectations on his shoulders - people are touting MGS4 as the flagship exclusive title for the Playstation 3 and the one that will put it over and beyond the Xbox 360. It has been hyped since before the console was even released with numerous trailers showcasing its groundbreaking presentation values and teasing at vital story points. But does it live up to the hype?
It depends on what you expect out of the game.
Snake's final chapter starts off with his monologue about how "war has changed" with his stealthy entrance into a battlefield in the Middle East. From the beginning it is obvious just how spectacular the game's production values are. Everything from the textures to the motion capture to the realistic movement of cloth showcases an astonishing level of realism. There are moments where a character looks Snake in the eyes and I could almost swear I was looking at a real person. The level of realism brings about a powerful sense of immersion in the game.
What breaks this level of immersion, however, is what happens right when the opening scene of the game ends. After Snake finishes his monologue and gets off the truck he snuck onto, the game displays your health bar and finally gives me command of Snake. I'm more than excited to start after that 15 minute cutscene prepped me on my objectives and all that was at stake. I walk around to get a feel of the controls and crawl under a truck to progress...and watch as the screen fades into another cutscene. The 10 minute cutscene to 2 minutes of gameplay to another cutscene cycle happens numerous times in the first act, which just proved to be frustrating. Not only are cutscenes long, but they are frequent do a nice job of cutting up gameplay and taking you out of the experience. I don't mind a long cutscene after an intense firefight to help me relax and prepare for the next sequence, but a lot of times simply walking half-way toward your next checkpoint will cue the next cutscene. I had a number of "why can't I do that?" moments as I watched Snake tactically take out guards in a cutscene, where I was playing just a moment ago.
Another way the game removed me from the experience is the frequent load screens. Before and after each aforementioned cutscene there is usually a loading screen, which can take anywhere from 5 to 15 seconds to complete. Perhaps I've been spoiled by no-loading games like Grand Theft Auto 4 and Burnout Paradise, but it still felt like it jarred me out of the moment for a few seconds. What worsens these load screens are the mandatory installs. Now the Playstation 3 is notorious for forcing the user to install parts of the game when you first play - that's annoying enough as is. But MGS4 prompts an install screen on EVERY ACT. These install screens can range from 3 minutes to 15. Since pretty much every act ends on a large cliffhanger, having to deal with a long wait screen to see what happens next can be painful.
The loads screens particularly took me out of the experience during one of the best parts of the game. An on-rails type shooter sequence, two in fact, that are executed just about flawlessly. They felt like chase sequences right out of a movie - intense, well choreographed, and down-to-the-wire. During one sequence the player must protect himself while protecting another car while shooting down both land and air-bombing enemies - it was just fantastic. But again, after every minute or so of gameplay the game would fade into another 10 second load screen, which just hurt the experience.
These sequences worked so well in part thanks to the new control system. While it takes a bit of getting used to (in particular with close-quarters-combat), once broken in the system works fluently. Aiming felt accurate and easy to target with, especially with the semi-auto-targeting system.
As for the gameplay, I felt that it could really be a mixed bag. The game still gives you a lot of options for being stealthy, a staple of the MGS series. You can hide in barrels, throw playboy magazines to distract enemies, play dead, or just tranq the guys before they spot you. Snake's new OctoCamo system allows him to blend in with whatever he's pressed against by merely standing still for a few seconds. While this system is a great overhaul from MGS3's camo system, where you had to shift through menus every time you wanted to blend in with your surroundings, I felt it made things a bit too easy. Whenever I was in danger I could just lay down, blend in with the ground, get a 85% camo index, and the enemies would never see me unless they literally walked into me. And if they got too close, I could just pop them before they could radio in reinforcements.
The stealth options weren't the main problem I had - it was really the numerous options when you get in a firefight. Early on in the game you meet an arms dealer named Drebin, who gives you laundered guns and ammo in exchange for points. The problem here is you can access his shop ANYWHERE after you meet him - you simply pause the game and select his shop. Running low on ammo? Pause the game, buy 600 bullets, unpause, problem solved. Suppressor wearing out? You can buy some from him too. Need a sniper rifle to handle some far off enemies? Voila, 3 seconds later a sniper rifle appears in your hands.
What complicates the problem further is how you get points - you get them in exchange for enemies' weapons. In other words, the game pretty much rewards you for wonton enemy killing - you keep their ammo and sell their guns for points, which you can use to up your own arsenal. Kill enough enemies and Snake becomes a virtual Fort Knox and an unstoppable war machine - Drebin stocks everything from shotguns to grenade launchers to claymore mines. In past MGS games you had to be stealthy to preserve ammo and save it for tricky spots, but in MGS4 you're pretty much encouraged to kill all you want. You get no bonus for being stealthy except for a low amount of bonus points at the end of each act.
I was really discouraged by this system - it really killed the stealth aspect of the game for me. A simple remedy could have been Drebin only having a limited stock of items, or only being able to call him when not in a firefight, or having to rendezvous with him at an obscure part of the map to get supplied; any of these options would make the system less broken. It was not well thought out and pretty much allows the game to become a complete third person shooter if the player desires.
While the gameplay was strong in the first two acts, everything seemed much more watered down afterwards. Act three mostly consisted of one stealth sequence while stalking a person for far too long to be enjoyable,followed by a rail shooting sequence, followed by a boss fight. Act four had little gameplay and was the most massive piece of fan service I've ever seen (I will come back to this in a minute). Act five was literally two boss fights and a walking sequence. The first two acts were pretty large and had some interesting gameplay elements, such as befriending certain militia squads by helping them take out other squads. You could also get disguises to look like a squad to get their favor even easier.
One thing all the acts share in common are the amazing boss battles. While perhaps not the strongest set in the MGS series, these battles are well thought out and can be intense. In one fight the boss disguises himself as parts of the environment and, if you can't find him fast enough, will lunge at you viciously. It was one of the few moments in a game where I was legitimately a bit frightened. Several of the fights involve more than just gunning down the boss; it takes a bit of thought to figure out their weaknesses and defeat them proper. If you've played a MGS game you know there's at least one battle involving the giant Metal Gear mechs, and all I'll say is the one in this game is by far my favorite in the series.
What bothered me about the game a bit is the absurd level of fan service evident in it. While I'm a diehard MGS fan, the game proved to be self-aware and referenced itself and the 3 games before it too much for even me. In the first conversations in the game characters bring up plot points they seem to assume you know from the previous games. It made sense to me but I could see it really running circles around someone new to the series. By the end of the game things are explained well for the most part. This isn't before Act 4, however, which is the most over-done piece of fanservice I've ever seen. The entire area is modeled after a place visited before (I won't spoil it). Everything from the conversations to what I call "nostalgia triggers" - parts of the area that force Snake into a flashback narrative by simply stepping near it - is just going way too far. I feel that this excessive amount of self-reference would really alienate or confuse someone new to the series.
All that being said, this is definitely not a game for everyone. If you can't stand constant interruptions for cutscenes, loading screens, and install sequences, this game could very well drive you mad even with skipping the cutscenes. If you can look beyond the flaws, however, you can see that MGS4 is one of the best produced games this generation and is a gem in its own right. I recommend this completely to anyone who's played the first three - this game is pretty much custom tailored for just you. If you're new to the series get ready to be confused a little by the storyline, but give it time, it'll make sense by the end. The end in itself is a powerful and emotional ending that does the series the justice it deserves. I recommend playing the previous 3 games first to enjoy the ending to the fullest. I really want to say MGS4 is an amazing game, but I can only say that it is an amazing game in certain respects. There are just some crushing gameplay problems I had that prevent me from giving it the highest recommendation. If you have a PS3 or are a MGS fan, this is one experience you should at least give a try.
Overal Score: 8.2
Credits: Gametrailers.com for opening, IGN.com for images.
Score: 8.2
-------
Quick Fix
+++ Astonishing level of graphics, sound and presentation
++ Lots of options for both stealth and action gameplay
+ Unique and challenging boss battles
+ Two of the most intense and well crafted on-rails sequences in the history of games
+ Once the controls are mastered they prove to be very well done
+ Powerful and satisfying end to the MGS series
-- Too many cutscenes, not enough gameplay
-- Design of the game seems to favor gunning down everyone over being stealthy
-- The later three "Acts" seemed watered down in terms of gameplay
- Frequent and annoying load screens, and install times for each Act
- Controls have a bit of a learning curve
- Absurd level of fan service can alienate a non-MGS hardcore
--------
Metal Gear Solid 4 is the final chapter in the story of Solid Snake. Snake's got a lot of expectations on his shoulders - people are touting MGS4 as the flagship exclusive title for the Playstation 3 and the one that will put it over and beyond the Xbox 360. It has been hyped since before the console was even released with numerous trailers showcasing its groundbreaking presentation values and teasing at vital story points. But does it live up to the hype?
It depends on what you expect out of the game.
Snake's final chapter starts off with his monologue about how "war has changed" with his stealthy entrance into a battlefield in the Middle East. From the beginning it is obvious just how spectacular the game's production values are. Everything from the textures to the motion capture to the realistic movement of cloth showcases an astonishing level of realism. There are moments where a character looks Snake in the eyes and I could almost swear I was looking at a real person. The level of realism brings about a powerful sense of immersion in the game.
What breaks this level of immersion, however, is what happens right when the opening scene of the game ends. After Snake finishes his monologue and gets off the truck he snuck onto, the game displays your health bar and finally gives me command of Snake. I'm more than excited to start after that 15 minute cutscene prepped me on my objectives and all that was at stake. I walk around to get a feel of the controls and crawl under a truck to progress...and watch as the screen fades into another cutscene. The 10 minute cutscene to 2 minutes of gameplay to another cutscene cycle happens numerous times in the first act, which just proved to be frustrating. Not only are cutscenes long, but they are frequent do a nice job of cutting up gameplay and taking you out of the experience. I don't mind a long cutscene after an intense firefight to help me relax and prepare for the next sequence, but a lot of times simply walking half-way toward your next checkpoint will cue the next cutscene. I had a number of "why can't I do that?" moments as I watched Snake tactically take out guards in a cutscene, where I was playing just a moment ago.
Another way the game removed me from the experience is the frequent load screens. Before and after each aforementioned cutscene there is usually a loading screen, which can take anywhere from 5 to 15 seconds to complete. Perhaps I've been spoiled by no-loading games like Grand Theft Auto 4 and Burnout Paradise, but it still felt like it jarred me out of the moment for a few seconds. What worsens these load screens are the mandatory installs. Now the Playstation 3 is notorious for forcing the user to install parts of the game when you first play - that's annoying enough as is. But MGS4 prompts an install screen on EVERY ACT. These install screens can range from 3 minutes to 15. Since pretty much every act ends on a large cliffhanger, having to deal with a long wait screen to see what happens next can be painful.
The loads screens particularly took me out of the experience during one of the best parts of the game. An on-rails type shooter sequence, two in fact, that are executed just about flawlessly. They felt like chase sequences right out of a movie - intense, well choreographed, and down-to-the-wire. During one sequence the player must protect himself while protecting another car while shooting down both land and air-bombing enemies - it was just fantastic. But again, after every minute or so of gameplay the game would fade into another 10 second load screen, which just hurt the experience.
These sequences worked so well in part thanks to the new control system. While it takes a bit of getting used to (in particular with close-quarters-combat), once broken in the system works fluently. Aiming felt accurate and easy to target with, especially with the semi-auto-targeting system.
As for the gameplay, I felt that it could really be a mixed bag. The game still gives you a lot of options for being stealthy, a staple of the MGS series. You can hide in barrels, throw playboy magazines to distract enemies, play dead, or just tranq the guys before they spot you. Snake's new OctoCamo system allows him to blend in with whatever he's pressed against by merely standing still for a few seconds. While this system is a great overhaul from MGS3's camo system, where you had to shift through menus every time you wanted to blend in with your surroundings, I felt it made things a bit too easy. Whenever I was in danger I could just lay down, blend in with the ground, get a 85% camo index, and the enemies would never see me unless they literally walked into me. And if they got too close, I could just pop them before they could radio in reinforcements.
The stealth options weren't the main problem I had - it was really the numerous options when you get in a firefight. Early on in the game you meet an arms dealer named Drebin, who gives you laundered guns and ammo in exchange for points. The problem here is you can access his shop ANYWHERE after you meet him - you simply pause the game and select his shop. Running low on ammo? Pause the game, buy 600 bullets, unpause, problem solved. Suppressor wearing out? You can buy some from him too. Need a sniper rifle to handle some far off enemies? Voila, 3 seconds later a sniper rifle appears in your hands.
What complicates the problem further is how you get points - you get them in exchange for enemies' weapons. In other words, the game pretty much rewards you for wonton enemy killing - you keep their ammo and sell their guns for points, which you can use to up your own arsenal. Kill enough enemies and Snake becomes a virtual Fort Knox and an unstoppable war machine - Drebin stocks everything from shotguns to grenade launchers to claymore mines. In past MGS games you had to be stealthy to preserve ammo and save it for tricky spots, but in MGS4 you're pretty much encouraged to kill all you want. You get no bonus for being stealthy except for a low amount of bonus points at the end of each act.
I was really discouraged by this system - it really killed the stealth aspect of the game for me. A simple remedy could have been Drebin only having a limited stock of items, or only being able to call him when not in a firefight, or having to rendezvous with him at an obscure part of the map to get supplied; any of these options would make the system less broken. It was not well thought out and pretty much allows the game to become a complete third person shooter if the player desires.
While the gameplay was strong in the first two acts, everything seemed much more watered down afterwards. Act three mostly consisted of one stealth sequence while stalking a person for far too long to be enjoyable,followed by a rail shooting sequence, followed by a boss fight. Act four had little gameplay and was the most massive piece of fan service I've ever seen (I will come back to this in a minute). Act five was literally two boss fights and a walking sequence. The first two acts were pretty large and had some interesting gameplay elements, such as befriending certain militia squads by helping them take out other squads. You could also get disguises to look like a squad to get their favor even easier.
One thing all the acts share in common are the amazing boss battles. While perhaps not the strongest set in the MGS series, these battles are well thought out and can be intense. In one fight the boss disguises himself as parts of the environment and, if you can't find him fast enough, will lunge at you viciously. It was one of the few moments in a game where I was legitimately a bit frightened. Several of the fights involve more than just gunning down the boss; it takes a bit of thought to figure out their weaknesses and defeat them proper. If you've played a MGS game you know there's at least one battle involving the giant Metal Gear mechs, and all I'll say is the one in this game is by far my favorite in the series.
What bothered me about the game a bit is the absurd level of fan service evident in it. While I'm a diehard MGS fan, the game proved to be self-aware and referenced itself and the 3 games before it too much for even me. In the first conversations in the game characters bring up plot points they seem to assume you know from the previous games. It made sense to me but I could see it really running circles around someone new to the series. By the end of the game things are explained well for the most part. This isn't before Act 4, however, which is the most over-done piece of fanservice I've ever seen. The entire area is modeled after a place visited before (I won't spoil it). Everything from the conversations to what I call "nostalgia triggers" - parts of the area that force Snake into a flashback narrative by simply stepping near it - is just going way too far. I feel that this excessive amount of self-reference would really alienate or confuse someone new to the series.
All that being said, this is definitely not a game for everyone. If you can't stand constant interruptions for cutscenes, loading screens, and install sequences, this game could very well drive you mad even with skipping the cutscenes. If you can look beyond the flaws, however, you can see that MGS4 is one of the best produced games this generation and is a gem in its own right. I recommend this completely to anyone who's played the first three - this game is pretty much custom tailored for just you. If you're new to the series get ready to be confused a little by the storyline, but give it time, it'll make sense by the end. The end in itself is a powerful and emotional ending that does the series the justice it deserves. I recommend playing the previous 3 games first to enjoy the ending to the fullest. I really want to say MGS4 is an amazing game, but I can only say that it is an amazing game in certain respects. There are just some crushing gameplay problems I had that prevent me from giving it the highest recommendation. If you have a PS3 or are a MGS fan, this is one experience you should at least give a try.
Overal Score: 8.2
Credits: Gametrailers.com for opening, IGN.com for images.
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