What Happened To Scores in Games

I know I have been doing a lot of game reviews lately on the site, but this time I would like to talk about a design decision that I think is something that has subtly changed in games over the last 5-10 years.

High Scores in games...

Looking back over my game collection, this is one thing that has gradually been removed from games as time has progressed. I think a large part of this is the gamer points and trophy system that the new consoles have provided players. Now it is not so much about high scores, it is about number of gamer points and trophies that you have collected. We have turned into a society of completion gamers, trying to achieve a 100% goal everytime, instead of the society of competitive gamers that we once were, striving for a higher and higher score.

I believe the root cause of this is that the arcade environment is no longer a common meeting place for gamers, where people can come together in a dark, slightly smelly room, and compete head to head for a coveted place on a high score list. To see ones initials displayed in technicolor glory for the world to see on a publicly displayed system was once a grand achievement.

On one hand I think it could be argued that this has improved the design of games and has taught us that not every game needs to be about competition against others, that co-op missions and single player campaigns can provide better entertainment value. However, with the number of multiplayer deathmatch shooter games out there, Call of Duty Modern Warfare 2 being the most recent in the long chain of these to come to market, that the level of competition is still there. I noticed that even though the game had been out for only 3 weeks, there were those that had been playing the multiplayer aspect of that game for  a total play time of 15 days. That would require you to play for almost every waking minute given an eight hour sleeping cycle each night.

The thing is, games like CoD MW2 still have a point system. Characters have a kill count and a death count. Also, CoD has added a leveling system to multiplayer that allow people to rank against each other. Thus I argue that games like these still require scoring, even if the score is no longer arbitrary. Also by providing these scores available to everyone who owns the game, we still see the display of personal prowess and skill to the greater public. It could almost be said that non-arbitrary point systems, such as experience or leveling has improved game design in a competitive sense.

I think there is still a place for arbitrary scoring though in the game space, the place I see this is with social networking games, or games that provide interfaces for score display to communities such as Facebook and Twitter. Games such as Canabalt and Bejeweled can be used as good examples of this. Bejeweled displaying scores of those in Bejeweled Blitz group being able to compare scores directly on Facebook, or Canabalt, with its option to post your high score (or low score if the case may be) to Twitter directly after dying.

Being that for the most part, I am a single player game type of gamer, I find myself being left out of these situations for the most part. The competition is not a driving factor for me, and as a result I tend to measure completion of games by their storylines. On the other hand, games such as racing games and platformers, I would actually appreciate a score. Regardless of the fact that I am not playing against anyone, I think that by having a score, I am in essence playing against myself. That competition keeps a game more enjoyable for longer. While playing Guitar Hero, the only reason I kept playing that game was because I could physically see myself getting better by the amount of points I would receive for a given song or the percentage I could complete before losing decreasing as I learned the patterns. The same holds true for my self admitting addiction to Dance Dance Revolution when I worked in an arcade for a while. By breaking my previous high score, I am in essence beating a game again that although it has not changed as far as story line or character development, has become more challenging.

Another method that could be said scores game progress is collectables. In platformers especially this holds true. Games such as the Sly Cooper series, or Ratchet and Clank, Jax and Daxter, even Assassin's Creed, has a system in place for tracking your completion progress throughout the game via collectables. Any game that says you have collected 50/100 , whether it be gems, flags, bobble heads, what have you, is indicating a score. This score is the percentage of the game you have completed. Granted, with the new trophy system/achievement system on the modern consoles, these tend to correlate with awards for 100% collection in modern games, but the in game mechanic itself provides the challenge that a player would normally associate with achieving a higher score. 

Overall, I must say that I believe that scores in games are not gone, they have just evolved. We may have become a society of completionists, and in some cases non-completionists when it comes to not having the patience to collect everything in a game, but is this really a bad thing? I would argue that perhaps not. The high score in a game may only be 100%, but 100% still feels good.

Hands On - Bayonetta : PS3 : Platinum Games

For another demo post, I hit up Bayonetta on the PS3. I saw previews for this game about 8 months ago I think, when the first trailer was posted on the Playstation Network. Being a fan of the original Devil May Cry and hearing that Hideki Kamyia was directing the game, I thought I would check it out. I have to say that I was a bit taken aback by the original trailer. With Bayonetta's outlandish one liners and the speed at which her clothes come off, I thought I was looking at a game with the maturity level of a 7th grader.

Then the demo came out, as well as a few articles that I read in Game Informer and on various review sites. Reviews looked promising and in game screen shots looked really nice.

The first demo that I got to see was actually on a friends XBox 360, which I don't know if it is different than the PS3 version, but it included a fighting sequence that I did not see on the PS3. The scene was of Bayonetta jumping from crumbling block to crumbling block of a very large building as it was falling from a cliff that never seemed to end. All meanwhile fighting a hoard of angel like monsters that never seemed to stop coming. That demo was a bit challenging to follow and left me with a bit of a bad taste in my mouth. I had heard that the game was going to be designed to be extremely difficult, and that demo definitely gave me that impression, not so much from the difficulty of the fights, but just the shear amount of stuff that was going on in the scene.

It was quite cinematic however and transitions from jumping  from one block to the next was well executed in my opinion. It felt fluid and the camera never seemed to get in the way, which is a primary complaint that I tend to have with cinematic transitions like that. The cinematic feel alone would not have given me enough reason to pick up this title, but when I saw the demo was available for the PS3 on the Playstation Network, I decided to give it another chance.

So this is where I think the demos are different, the PS3 version never gives you a scene where you fight while falling down a cliff. Also, on the XBox 360 version, although I didn't play it, I didn't see the tutorial portion that was provided at the beginning of the PS3 version. The levels that were provided beyond the tutorial on the PS3, included a train sequence, followed by fighting some enemies within a futuristic train station. These lead to a boss fight with a large angel like beast with the head of a statue. This fight was entertaining and had some interesting button pressing sequences to avoid being obliterated. Once you survive this, another video sequence plays that shows a bit of Bayonetta's past. Once again, cinematography is good, and Bayonetta talks a bit more during this sequence leading me to hope that her character isn't as shallow as you are first led to believe. Post cut scene leaves you to fight another witch in a head to head fight that shows off the ability to perform "witch walk" which basically lets you walk on walls.

What I saw from the demo, the game was not as challenging as I had originally believed. I was able to beat the demo without dying once, something I was not expecting to be able to accomplish. Controls in standard fights felt comfortable if not a bit repetitive. There are some things about the controls I do like quite a bit. Rotating the analog stick and performing an attack makes Bayonetta pull her guns and fire in an aimed barrage that looks nice and the transformations of her limbs look very clean when this is going on. It feels very organic and realistic (other than the fact she is shooting guns with her feet). I am not a fan of the witch walk ability as this felt cumbersome to cancel when you have to press R3 to release the walk, but only while you are in mid jump. Transitioning from one wall to the next is as simple as running, but trying to transition to the floor is not allowed unless you perform this jump + press R3 action. This was very confusing at first, even provided with the popup instructions on performing the move.

Overall, I am a bit on the fence as to whether or not this game will be worth a purchase. I may have to rent this one for a night to give it a go. Given how short the original Devil May Cry was (I have not played the others so I can say anything for them), if this is anything like it, it may be too short to warrant anything more than a rental (maybe two rentals?)

Hands On - Dante's Inferno : PS3 : Visceral

I got a chance to check out the Dante's Inferno demo, available now from the Playstation Network. I must say, at first I was skeptical for Dante's Inferno, read my "First Look" article for my reasonings as to why. They mostly revolved around my reasonable fear that Dante's Inferno was going to just be a God of War rip off.

I was wrong.

The game is amazingly cinematic. Granted that God of War is similar in its cinematic feel, Dante's goes over the top in cinematography to bring a level of suspense that I do not think any of the God of War games has been able to approach. Levels are constantly shifting and becoming more and more chaotic. In the demo, you play in a church on the approach to the gates of hell. This church is basically crumbling into a giant pit of fire and brimstone, one wrong step or wait to long and you're toast.

The thing that has me really excited in Dante's Inferno is the choices you can make between good and evil. When destroying enemies, if you grab them you have the choice of "Punish" or "Absolve", doing either will gain you experience points, however whether for good or evil is the question. Now, leveling up the good through absolving allows you to level up your cross attacks. Cross attacks are ranged attacks using the power of holy light. Punishing the undead will allow you to level your scythe abilities for the scythe you take (forcefully I might add) from the grim reaper at the beginning of the demo.

The premise of the game (at least as far as the demo explains) is that you play Dante, a crusader who is returning from Jerusalem after taking part in the atrocities that take place there. However the difference is that you should have never had the chance to return home. After being stabbed in the back, the Grim Reaper comes to take you to hell. Dante wants no part of this, so instead decides to kick the Grim Reapers ass and take his weapon. After some painful self mutilation where Dante sows a moving piece of flesh to his chest (which they don't discuss much of in the demo, but my hope is that they will explain that part in the main game), he arrives home to find his lover murdered. After releasing her spirit from her half naked corpse, her fully naked soul is ripped from Dante by some dark spirit with her message "I must go, I promised." Thus we begin our play through of the standard level that we hope to experience in the main game.

Mechanics for the game are enjoyable, easy to use, and quite graphic. I am looking forward to seeing the higher level attacks that can be performed by Dante. Enemies are not simply for killing either apparently, as the end of the level shows the ability to mount a giant minotaur looking demon, controlling it to stomp, smash, eat and scorch the other various smaller enemies around it. In true God of War style, mounting the beast involves a series of timed button presses, of which I did not fail to meet the first time. Either I am getting better at these types of sequences, or the timing is not that strict. We shall see if this changes in the actual game.

I was surprised as to how much nudity there is in the game. This will definitely not be a game you let your kids play or even watch. I am hoping that with the creative level design I have seen thus far, that the remaining game will continue to bring the level of dramatic flare that they have shown thus far. I am also hoping that the game will provide a level of horror that I have not seen since Silent Hill and the early days of Resident Evil. I am guessing in that department I will be out of luck, however, as stated, there will be no shortage of gratuitous digital nudity.

I have definitely changed my opinion of Dante's Inferno after getting some hands on play time with the game. I am looking forward to its release. I am hoping that the game will have enough content to keep me busy for a while to make it worth the money. I don't think I will be waiting a year for the price to drop on this one. As a result it is going to be pricy, so a short game would be disappointing.

Game Review - Mirror's Edge : PS3 : Dice

It's been a while since I posted, I have been super busy. Actually by super busy I mean I have been working and playing video games. I have not been on my computer much as a result. I have quite a bit of material for reviews now though so I should be able to catch up on my posts in the next week or so.

The first game I would like to review is Mirror's Edge. I picked up Mirror's Edge at Walmart for twenty bucks. A good deal in my opinion, I really do love Walmart's discount bins.  Mirror's Edge was released on  November 14th, 2008. The game is a first person shooter type game with a twist, instead of your standard military guy carrying lots of guns, blasting away anything that moves. Mirror's Edge you play the role of Faith, an appropriate name given that she is a "Runner", or a person who is an avid parkour messenger. For those who are not familiar with this sport, it involves jumping from roof top to roof top and performing death defying stunts. There are many times in the game where it feels like you just have to take a leap of faith and thus why I believe Dice chose that name for the character. Dice has definitely done a good job with Mirror's Edge in simulating the parkour experience. The gameplay experience of running and jumping and climbing twenty stories high is an adrenalin building experience definitely worth twenty bucks. 

The Good:

As I first mentioned, the parkour engine is extremely well done in my opinion. Mechanics controlling Faith's climbing, running and jumping are easy to pick up and are surprisingly versatile. Once you get used to the control scheme, making Faith do what you want is mostly just point and press with the majority of your moves being done via the R1 and R2 buttons. 

The environment is also well executed for the genera of the title. It is great to see a game that takes a different direction in the first person genera other than dark dingy dungeons and desert cities. The world of Mirror's Edge is a clean sparkling city that well suits its dark underlying story of betrayal. Clean rooftops which are mostly white except for the occasional red or yellow which is designed to guide you through the level towards where your next objective is. This is what Dice has labeled as "Runner Vision" and is only available in the easy and normal difficulty settings. This is useful to get used to the levels as the game is extremely difficult on the first run through. Some would say that this difficulty that requires you to attempt the same section of a level 10 to 20 times before being successful as a deficiency in the level design or pacing of the levels, however in Mirror's Edge it is very satisfying when you are finally able to perform some jump or defeat some set of enemy challenges that the designers have placed in your path after about 45 minutes of attempting it. Generally deaths in the game I found did not feel cheap as some deaths in difficult games can. 

I think that one of the reasons for the difficulty of the game is that Mirror's Edge, although could be placed in the first person shooter genera due to its inclusion of guns, is really not your typical shooter. Your character does not carry weapons standard, and the only weapons that you can get are those that you take from your enemies. The use of the weapons also have a debilitating effect on Faith's ability to run or jump, which given her size as a eurasian female, makes a reasonable amount of sense. 

Story in the game was quite enjoyable in my opinion, if not a bit predictable. The cut scenes art style was interesting, done in a 2d vector art style. I actually think that those were done in 3d with cell shading to make them look cartooned. 

Finally, I also think that the music that they chose was very modern and appropriate, and it provided a great ambience to the setting. I am actually considering buying the soundtrack if I can find it. 

The Bad:

For everything in Mirror's Edge that I thought they did well, I think there is equally something that they could have improved. For starters, the mechanic of taking weapons away from the enemy is a bit rough around the edges to say the least. The time given when the weapon turns red in which you can attempt to take their weapon is a bit to short in my opinion. You can however slow down time but if you grab to early, it is basically lights out for Faith. 

It was brought to my attention by a friend of mine that was playing my copy of Mirror's Edge right after I beat it myself, that sometimes when you miss grabbing someone's weapon, if you mash the triangle button (the one used to grab), about half the time Faith will take the weapon anyways. It is usually really amusing to see this happen as it messes up the "smooth" animation change from a swing to a grab. 

The fighting engine in general seems a bit rough around the edges in my opinion. I did like the fact that weapons were not Faith's primary skill, but it seems that sometimes it was just impossible to not fight people. I think that the level designs should have given more options to avoid fighting as this seems like a primary feature of the game, almost an ethical choice that sometimes is unavoidable. 

I would have liked to see the levels that didn't have enemies be a part of the original game instead of downloadable content. It seems a bit ridiculous that you would need to spend additional money to remove content from levels. In this age of micro-transactions in games, it does not surprise me that a company such as Dice, backed by big time publisher EA would go this route to make additional sales from the game.  I still feel that this is a disservice to the fans and consumers and that if they had provided truly additional content, then it would have been worth the money.

Predictability in the story line was also a bit of a let down for me. I enjoyed the world that the developers constructed, but I felt that plot twists were a bit telegraphed and that left them a bit anticlimactic. I would love to see a sequel to this title as I felt the end was also quite anticlimactic and felt too much like a cliff hanger without trying to be one. A lack of a wrap up to the "lose ends" in the conspiracy left me feeling like the game should not have ended the way it did.  As of the time of this writing, it is the case that EA has announced the future development of a sequel to the title. 

Overall:

In overall, for a while i was not sure if I liked Mirror's Edge. I did immediately enjoy the mechanics of the parkour, but was unsure of the fighting in the game as well as the quickly ramped difficulty level. However, once I started getting past areas that I found extremely difficult, the satisfaction of beating it was, in my opinion, worth the effort. On a second play through of some of the levels, I felt that the game was much easier since I knew the right paths and the right methods of getting through the obstacles. I was also much better at the fighting. I think this improved my impression of the title as a whole. I think once you are familiar with all the levels, it might even be possible to complete a run through of the title in about 2-3 hours. It would be interesting to see what the fastest speed run of this title is. 

Overall, I think I would have to give this game a favorable review, not perfect by any means, but for the twenty bucks I paid for it, well worth its value. I would say that the replay value is also high, which I think helps the games review in my opinion. I will probably play the sequel when it comes out, and I hope that they are able to improve on the game without corrupting its original vision with feature creep.

I Am On The Rumpus - Episode 18

I am on last weeks "What's the Rumpus" podcast! Check it out. Humorously entitled, "A whole lot of meat in my mouth...". I assure you it means nothing dirty (get your mind out of the gutter).

Some of the topics covered: VR chair, iphone costumes, software patents, PSPGo, Hardees burgers... all right!

Game Review - Dead Space Extraction : Visceral Games : Wii

Last night, I rented Dead Space Extraction for the Wii. I was not expecting TOO much from a rail shooter for the Wii. In fact, I was not expecting much out of a Wii title in general.

Dead Space Extraction is a prequel to one of my favorite games ever, Dead Space, which came out last year for the XBox 360, PS3 and PC. It takes place prior to the events of the first game on the Ishimura, a planet cracker class space barge, set out to extract a large chunk of Ageis VII. During extraction on the planet, Engineers found what is known as a "Marker", a large stone with mystical powers which start to affect the planet side team psychologically. A group of religious fanatics known as Unitologists believe it to be a holy relic which will bring about an age of enlightenment. So, even though everyone knows that the Marker is making them crazy, these Unitologists force the crew to extract the Marker from its resting place and bring it into the planet side station, eventually carting it up to the Ishimura.

Needless to say, everyone on the planet side goes crazy and starts killing themselves and others. The original Dead Space game covers the events of a rescue crew of the ship Kellion and their attempts to help those on the Ishimura. Extraction covers the events leading up to the Kellion's arrival, from the moment the Marker is extracted from the ground, to the moment the Kellion attempts to make radio broadcast to board the Ishimura.

The Good:

So, Extraction was released on the Wii, and many people were concerned that the Wii could not provide the graphics of the original game; as a result the title would suffer. I must say that from the minute I started playing, I was amazed at how well the Visceral team has been able to optimize the Wii graphics engine to render the environment of Dead Space. It felt like I was in the same environments when the game re-visits areas of the ship that you visit in the original. Granted, if both areas were placed side by side, you would see a major difference in texture qualities, dynamic lighting, and overall cleanness and detail in the environments. However as an homage to the original on an inferior system, it does alright.

Game play of Extraction was interesting, and surprisingly fun. I played through the game with some friends while drinking some beers, and the game provided enough challenge at even the easiest of game difficulties to allow a slightly intoxicated person to have a good time, but not feel like he/she were getting ripped off by cheesy deaths. Harder difficulties required much better motor skills and forced us to be more on our game as far as quick reloads and ammunition management were concerned.

Ammunition in the game does not come cheap, there were many times where my partner and I were out of ammo. Reduced to using the Rivet Gun to kill most monsters and to closely watch our stasis meters to avoid being hit by enemies. Also, I have to mention that it is amazing how well they recreated the weapons from the first game, from the Ripper, to the Line Gun. Each was wonderfully adapted to the Wii controls, using the tilted "gangster" style shooting to enable secondary fire. Weapon swapping was instantaneous which made picking the right weapon for the right monster quick and painless. Weapon swapping is handled by moving the analog control on the nun-chuck controller in one of the four primary directions.

Collecting items in Extraction is actually an enjoyable experience, especially in co-op play. Health is shared between players, making it not a competition but more of a relief when your partner picks up a Large Health Pack when you are low on health. Ammunition is not shared in Extraction, which I would not expect it to be, but weapon pickups and weapon upgrades are, allowing both you and your partner to gain more fire power and strength together.

Finally, I think that even though this was a prequel, something I usually dread in video game plot lines, Visceral did a wonderful job telling a story that, although is known, was still a bit vague in the minds of the original game's players. Most of the characters were new, while some were characters from the original whom played key parts in the story of the first game. Visceral, I believe, did a great job in incorporating known events, viewed from a different perspective. The events on Aegis VII were horrific and terrifying, and something that was not covered much in the first game. This game provides a great look at those events, from the moment the Marker is extracted, to the crashed ship leaving the shuttle bay, an event that was covered in the animated graphic novel series which was released at the time of the original title. Other events, are unique to this games play experience, some environments that you never see in the original are portrayed with great detail, such as the sewers of the Ishimura, and some of the areas on planet Aegis VII which you do not get to spend much time in during the original game.

The Bad:

So that brings us to what I didn't like about the game. Keep in mind that I am a bit jaded, I have played MANY survival horror games as well as arcade rail shooter games which, I think makes me a bit critical when it comes to what I think makes a good scary game. 

Shaky Cam, there were many times where I felt like I was on a really really bumpy roller coaster. The camera moved far too much in some areas, reasonably since the game is set in a first person perspective and the character you are playing as is frantically searching around for some noise or looking at some sort of rubble debris. However, sometimes it felt like it was only to allow us as the players to pick up some item that we were only given about 1/10th of a second to pickup. Parts of the shaky cam areas that I disliked the most were when you are crawling around in the maintenance tunnels of the Ishimura. These times it felt like you were tumbling really fast for no reason and it was quite disorienting. 

Target Cursors in the game were far too big and far to bright. The environment of Dead Space is dark, the creatures textures are dark reds, and there are many many shadows that envelop corners of the scenes. Having large bright cursors tended to make seeing what it was I was shooting very difficult. This is probably my number one complaint about the game. Sometimes I felt like i was just shooting in the general direction of the creature and if i blew off limbs, well then I got lucky. 

While playing, collecting weapons from the first game is nostalgic, seeing as most are from the original game. However, one weapon in particular was my favorite from the original, the Ripper. A gun that used telekinesis to hold a spinning saw blade in mid air so that it could be used to hack apart necromorphs. Originally an all around enjoyable experience. Yet, in Extraction, this weapon, although still one of my favorites, was annoyingly buggy. Even when the only thing between my saw blade and a necromorph was processed digital air, the blade would still stay out of reach of the necromorph; wasting precious necromorphic slaughter time.

Not, enough boss fights was another issue. The game is only 10 chapters long, and not every level has a boss fight. Sometimes boss fights are really really good and sometimes they suck, and sometimes they are the only reason to play a game. None of these were true for Extraction. At best the few boss fights that there are, are mildly enjoyable, others are too simple but still alright.The boss fights of Extraction do not hold up to the original Dead Space, such as the Zero-G battle with the large plant-like creature in the Original game. In this fight, you could run around the outside ring of the hull while avoiding tentacles and shooting at big orange bulbous alien parts. Something like that would have been somewhat feasible in Extraction, and would have lent itself to a better end of level event in my opinion.

Finally, being on rails, it really pulled much of the "Horror" out of the title for me. Granted, the game still has its moments, where things pop out at you and scare the crap out of you, some sequences even remind me of the classic horror game Eternal Darkness, for the Gamecube (expect a replay review of that coming soon). Since the marker makes people hallucinate, visions of things that are not there, or things that are but not as they appear, makes for a great scare or mind bending feeling. Yet, overall, this game was not nearly as scary as the original Dead Space. It is hard to place a specific reason for this, I think perhaps being on rails it makes it feel more like a ride at Disney Land, riding a cam through a haunted house.  Perhaps too, that since you do not have to control your characters movements, it is simply not as challenging as when having to avoid large numbers of space zombies while attempting to shoot at them in a third person perspective, as a result, much of the suspense is lost.

Overall:

In the end, I did enjoy playing Dead Space Extraction, it was also one of the few games that I have beaten in a single evening. The other, most recently, was Umbrella Chronicles, another rail horror title for the Wii. Overall, it took about 5 1/2 hours to beat the game on its easiest setting, we only died twice. Based on what we played of the hardest difficulty, the game would not last much longer and only due to more frequent deaths. I have to say it was a fun rental, due to the ability of having two players play at once, yet I could never recommend that someone buy this game at its $50 dollar price tag. The game play is not captivating enough to warrant too many multiple re-plays, and if you feel like you want to play it again, a couple dollar rental fee is much better than $50/number of times you run through the game per play. 

If you have played the original Dead Space, I do recommend that if you have a Wii, that you take the 5 1/2 hours, buy some brews (if your of age that is), and spend an evening with the lights dimmed low, the sound system turned up, and a friend or two to go out and blast some necromorphs with. I think you will be fairly happy you did.  

Harshness of Old Game Reviews

I have been reading many reviews as of late, especially since I have started reviewing more games for this blog. I suppose it is just a means of trying to improve my writing based on styles of other professionals in that space. Its not like I'm trying to do it for a living, my job is a programmer through and through. However, I do like to read good reviews, and I love to play video games, thus this site.

My problem is with reviews of older games. Especially ones from gen 2 and 3 of video game systems. You know, NES, Genesis, Super Nintendo... I have noticed that games reviewed from these genres are overly harsh if they are reviewed anytime since 2000 and on.

#1 reason for this, poor graphics... DUDE! These games were made in the late 80's to early 90's, give these guys a break. I think a review should be subjective based on the system/era that it is being reviewed for. Castlevania for the NES is not going to compare to Castlevania for the NDS... its just not going to happen. Applications like Photoshop were not as good or didn't even exist back then. I'm sure many of these games were either done using raw pixel manipulation or using applications like MS Paint. Also, most of the guys doing art back then were not artists, most of them were programmers, nerdy computer scientists that loved making video games.

#2 Nostalgic impression over hyping actual game play mechanics. Many people are deathly attached to the feeling a game gave them when they played them the first time when they were a kid. Now going back and playing these older games, many people are like "WOW, that game was not very good. The jumping is choppy, movement is sluggish, and oh man, the screen flickered on me while I was playing it."

I think people need to keep in mind that these systems were not that fast, and people putting effort into optimizing their game for the system did a good job most of the time. Granted, compared to other games of the same genera, if the game was slow then say it was slow. I'm just saying, do not compare that systems frame rates/control responsiveness to today's games. Remember that nostalgic feeling you had as a kid and put yourself back into the same mind set you had back then. I think this is great advice for anyone playing an older game of their childhood, I think you will be less disappointed by your child hood favorites if you do this.

#3 Do not review a game less harshly because of the effects of #1 and #2. I know this seems counter-intuitive to the general sense of my article, but I see this a lot too. Just because you love a game, and you realize that the hardware is older, game play mechanics were not as refined due to iterations of a franchise and genera, do not let this affect your review. Again, keep in mind the era that you are reviewing for. Do not give Zelda: A Link to the Past a 10 out of 10 just because it is your favorite game of all time, be critical of things such as game play mechanics, color schemes (which i think were sometimes poorly picked for this title), and sound, just keep them relative to the space in which they should be reviewed.

Look at things like Game Informers Then and Now sections and see how games rated back in the day they were created compared to where they are now. I think most of the time Game Informer does a decent job of reviewing older titles, but they are even a bit overly harsh or under critical at times. Realize how far games have come from then till now, it is actually quite amazing how far the industry has progressed in a mere 25 years.

The reason I bring this up is that many reviewers fall into these pitfalls, myself included at times. Yet as a gaming fan, and one who has not played EVERY good old game out there, I do read reviews to try and judge where to spend my precious gaming hours, and I would hate to miss a great older game that I have never experienced before, simply because I was turned off by some reviewer who thought that Need For Speed Hot Pursuit should be like Need For Speed Shift in terms of quality of AI, handling performance of vehicles, music quality, and visual representation of cars/levels. Now if you said that it didn't hold a flame to Grand Turismo as far as realism of the vehicles, yet it held a nice charm when it came to car customization and simply had fun game play experience, not to mention the El Nino (which was an awesome video game car imho), then I would respect that and would find a review of this nature a bit more informative.

Now on the other hand, I totally think that past games can be used as reference in a new games review. If your new iteration of a franchise sucks compared to your past successes, that's a problem. Games are suppose to get better with each iteration, if they don't, do not ruin your franchise with some crap. Shame on the developers for allowing your publisher to push you into running your franchise name through the mud just so they can line their pockets with money that is garnered by your fans loyalty (I'm looking at you Will Wright/EA).

Why I WIll Never Buy a PSPGo

See all these lovely UMD cases? 29 Games and 4 video disks. Since The PSPGo was announced, it was believed that Sony would be handling the conversion of UMD to digital downloads through some sort of program where game-owners would be shipping in their old UMDs in exchange for a ticket for a digital download through the Playstation store. However, recently it was announced that at release data, this program would not be offered and anyone who owns a UMD would have to re-purchase their beloved PSP games if they wanted to play them on their new players.

Now, I don't know about you, but I don't have boat loads of money (especially in this economy) to go out and drop a few hundred dollars on a new hardware system without some sort of trade in compensation from my old hardware. Thus, it would be un-economical for me to keep my old fat PSP1000 just so I can play all my old games without having to pay for them again.

UMDs aside, there is a whole slew of other reasons I would never purchase the PSPGo.

Reason 1: It looks like a third graders cell phone that can not make calls unless on WiFi using Skype. Not that I don't like skype functionality, I really do. Yet, if you are going to make it out of cheap cell phone plastic and give it the slide open look that a sidekick has, then let it make phone calls. Sony claims that this is going to compete with the IPhone market... Well, let me tell you what, my IPhone can also make phone calls and surf the web on 3G networks. Which brings me to reason 2.

Reason 2: No 3G support. If this device is suppose to re-revolutionize mobile gaming, then you better have 3G support because what if I am walking around the city and I just NEED to get my God of War fix, then I do not want to have to walk around for 20 minutes to find an unprotected WiFi router to hop onto so I can download my game. I would really rather just turn it on, download it quick, and start playing. No 3G support? Well, I guess I'll just go buy a new app for my IPhone. Sorry Sony!

Reason 3: SDK for PSPMini apps should have been made more accessible. Apple did the right thing when it introduced its app developer program. Anyone with a mac can make applications for the IPhone. I took a brief look at the requirements to make a PSPMini application... It seemed like you basically need to be a full time game developer, with an office, and an LLC behind your name before Sony will let you touch the SDK. Not a smart move Sony, look at the numbers of IPhone applications that Apple is making bank off of that were made by indy game/application developers in their bedrooms.

Reason 4: No touch screen. The phone, I mean PSPGo, has a beautiful big screen on the front of the device. However, this screen is practically useless when the device is closed. Another big downfall of an already failing system. My biggest complaint about this though is that with the device closed, the screen is basically useless in this state. Maybe they should have had the screen fold in to protect it instead of being exposed to the elements and my scratchy jean pockets. Would this have made the PSPGo too much like the Nintendo DS? At least my Nintendo DS screen is protected when I'm not using it.

Reason 5: Old operating system and an old processor. I would have liked to see the PSPGo have a faster processor in it than what they put in. I'm sure that it wouldn't have been much more expensive to speed up the OS, maybe even add some more ram so my web browser doesn't crash on me every other page like the older PSP systems are known to do. In this age we have a more diversified web with applications that are rapidly growing in complexity. The system needs to be able to support more hardware intensive operations. I just feel that this hardware is not going to be able to keep up for much more than a year, and perhaps its time has already passed.

Sony... If you ever read this, take my words into consideration. Quit alienating your customers. They are the only reason you're still in business. There are many of us that are very loyal to the brand, but loyalty only is granted through a continuous relationship of trust and understanding. I am starting to lose faith in your products, and I can not bring myself to buy a new PSP under these circumstances. Wake up!

Game Review - Legendary : PS3 : Spark

Overview:

Legendary is a FPS (First Person Shooter) developed by Spark and published by Gamecock. This title is based on the Pandora's Box mythos which describes a box that was created by the Greek god Zeus for the created woman Pandora as a plague upon the earth. The game describes this box as not actually a Greek mythological object, but a real life tool that has been fought over throughout the course of history as it contains powers that can make kings or destroy civilizations.

The game enters with a secret order called the Black Order hiring your character, Charles Deckard to open the box known as Pandora's Box. Now knowing the legend behind Pandora's Box, something tells me no amount of money in the world would get me to open that box. Regardless, this guy apparently has some major debt to pay off because he actually opens the box. Enter crazy numbers of mythical creatures including werewolves, minotaurs, griffins, golems, a huge kraken (which was a boss fight) and these really annoying faeries.

Now, once Deckard opens the box, a magical signet is impaled into his hand allowing him to suck up a magical life energy from these creatures and using it for not a whole lot other than to heal himself and to power EMP and other similar devices.

The Bad:

The reason I picked this game up was that it was fairly cheap from a used game store, and I like mythical creatures and what better way to show my love of mythical creatures than to fire thousands of rounds of digital ammunition into them? So, I was very disappointed when I found out that much of the game was centered around fighting the Black Order and not fighting awesome critters. Not to say that you do not fight a bunch of mythical beasts, but much of the time it feels like werewolves are being thrown at you just so you have some way of recovering health, since this magical energy is generally not just laying around. There are moments where fighting the creatures is enjoyable, such as the first fight with the griffin and the first fight with the minotaur, however, many of these creature fights feel like you are just suppose to blast a couple hundred rounds of ammo in the creatures general direction until they die, while dodging like crazy in hopes of not being eaten. There really was no good strategy for fighting beyond that and as stated before, the signet isn't much good for fighting any of the really challenging creatures, other than the extra health bar it provides.

Some of the other downfalls of the game were related to actual game play mechanics. Jumping felt like an after thought. You jump too quick and the height is too short. It feels like they decided that they needed jumping for one or two levels based on their design and instead of making sure the rest of the levels couldn't be jump broken, they just decided to make the distance/height of the jump so small that it was impossible to jump except for the few exceptions that it is required.

Also, in some parts of the game, the models when hiding behind things, appear to be providing a clear line of sight on the enemy, however, when firing you still hit the object you are hiding behind. I am aware that this is a common issue in games that result from the model's collision model being less detailed than the in game rendered model for computational reasons, yet in this title it just felt like it was really an problem and at times a hinderance. In fact, sometimes it felt like I was standing next to a fairly primitively shaped object and would still have the problem of firing around the object. The most amusing thing is that the AI apparently had trouble with this too, as it is notoriously bad at throwing grenades and would end up killing itself in the process. This made me laugh more times than I can count.

Other minor things included: door sizes being too small in areas, making it frustratingly difficult to traverse in some locations. Also, some levels were laid out very challenging, with check points too far apart in my opinion. I hate having to spend 15 minutes to get to right before the next check point, only to have 4-6 werewolves back me in a corner where the controls start acting up making it so I can not move.  Not to say that I do not like challenging games, but there were at least 3-4 spots in this game where I just felt ripped off by the game as if it were denying me my justly deserved checkpoint.

The Good: 

Some positives of the game; I thought the voice acting was decent... not the best I've ever heard, but no Resident Evil 1 for the Playstation by any means. Also, cut scenes, although couldn't be skipped, were entertaining and the between chapter art work was fairly nice. All hand painted and well narrated. There was also one part of the first "chapter" that I really liked, where the faeries move around an EMP device that you are suppose to charge. I thought that part was well executed and I give that script writer props and I hope he got a raise for that.

 I also really enjoyed the ending.

***SPOILER ALERT***

Not for its cheesy way it kills the bad guy, but because of the way that it didn't meet my expectations of being a Bioshock rip-off. I was totally expecting the game to take the overly used twist of "The guys you are working for are really the bad guys and they have just been playing you this whole time you poor defenseless player! Oh wait, your not defenseless, lets go kick their ass!". No, it didn't take that twist (well not entirely), instead Deckard becomes friends with the animals after busting out of the Councils jail where he is imprisoned for study of his signet after destroying the original box. However, none of this part is playable, instead they just choose to wrap up the story nicely in cinematic form. I do give them credit for this as it is not done as often as was my expected ending to a good vs. evil vs. monsters game ending is.

***END SPOILER ALERT***

Overall, I enjoyed playing the game, it was a nice 3 day experience for me. It doesn't win any awards in my book, and the game play did feel a little lacking. I would rather have seen them rip-off Bioshock and provide some sort of mini game while hacking door locks instead of just having me wait 20 seconds in a room with no dangers, just cause they want to add some extra button press usage. However, story line was decent, acting wasn't "terrible" and the art and animation of the creatures (especially the Griffins) were well done. I would say that I would give this game a 55 out of 100, or about 5 out of 10 stars, or an C to a C+, depending on your scale. Either way, I would recommend this game if you're bored, have nothing else that you really want to play, or do not have much money in these hard economic times to buy a good game, but still want to play video games instead of finding a real job. (Thats right you heard me you bum, get off my couch and get a real job!)

Google SideWiki and Gaming

I have recently heard about this new tool that Google is coming out with called SideWiki. Basically what this does is allow Google toolbar users to add wiki like elements to a side bar on web pages that they visit. These are then visible to everyone who uses SideWiki that visit a web page.

My interest is to see what people do with this tool in the arena of altered reality gaming. We have seen this in the past with, for example, the Nine Inch Nails site when Trent Reznor was preparing to release the Year Zero album. The series of sites had unique and hidden context that could only be discovered by closely inspecting the sites.

The concept is interesting, not really what I would call a game, but could conceivably be turned into one. Such as the legendary Majestic from EA back in 2001. That game had a great concept and a real story line. What I imagine for the Google SideWiki is something more like your standard pen and paper RPG, where perhaps one group of people create a plot line based on a series of sites that the other group of people playing must discover/navigate to collect all of the clues to solve some sort of web mystery. Perhaps a secret web site that they could log into and find out if they were the first to figure out all the clues. The best part is that if you found a clue, you could in theory, alter the SideWiki to throw others off of the trail if they weren't smart enough to look at the history.

I think it is an interesting idea and one that maybe other might find interesting as well. The thought makes me think of geo-cacheing, something I find fascinating but would never personally partake in. I hope someone takes this idea and runs with it.

Ogre3D updates Licensing

Ogre3D, the open source 3D graphics engine by Torus Knot Software Ltd had decided to change their licensing from their current LGPL licensing to the MIT Licensing. This is really exciting as this new licensing that they will be using in their up and comming release 1.7 is less restrictive by not requiring developers who use the free open source engine to release any base source code changes.

The reasoning behind this is to provide more incentive to get commercial and non-commercial to use and extend the Ogre engine in their projects. I am personally hoping that this does push the Ogre engine a bit more towards the mainstream game development scene. I hope that more companies will consider using this flexable and free engine in their development model. I think that using Open Source software in mainstream development will help to reduce the large cost of game developent and allow developers more time and money to be more flexable and creative in the types of games that they are creating. By allowing them to keep their proprietary custom code private, I feel that this will encourage them to use the engine more freely.

A Few Site Changes - Games I Own List

Added a few changes to the site today. I added a list of PS3 Games that I own. I will try to keep this current as I acquire more titles. Sorry, I don't own an XBox, and I don't really plan on getting one since almost every title that I want to play is either on PS3 or computer.

If you also own one of these titles for PS3, and you feel like playing some multiplayer, you can get a hold of me on the Play Station Network at DKGameStudios. Or just drop me a line at my email address (or a comment here) letting me know your user name and I'll add you to my friends list.

Happy Gaming!

Tool Review - Redmine : Project Management Software

Review time again, this time I will be reviewing a utility that I have used on a couple of projects that I have worked on. It is a great utility for managing your personal/independent projects and project teams. The software is called Redmine. You can find it here at http://www.redmine.org/.

The Redmine web server allows you to create projects and add employees to the project. Each employee can be given different rolls on the project providing customization over the project development process and data representation to individual users. The software is very flexible, allowing for the creation of custom work flows and project specific milestones. Gaunt chart features are available project leaders for use in tracking individual tasks as well as entire milestones or projects.


Wiki features are also provided, allowing for streamline design documentation functionality. This is really handy when it comes to group development, documentation can be updated effortlessly while team members are updating status. The Redmine application also supports integrating with SVN servers and files can be browsed directly from the Redmine site. You can even use the revision numbers as links in the wiki pages.


Built in bug tracking software also provides a centralized bug tracking system and task assignment functionality for project managers, these bugs and tasks are easily linked to milestones, where progress of individual tasks attribute towards milestone percentages.


The system is easy to use and is fully customizable since it is built on Ruby and the full source is provided for your individual customization. I recommend anyone who is looking to start up a project for themselves and their friends, Independent game developers who can not afford to spend a lot of money on bug tracking and project management suites, or anyone who would like to be a bit more organized about their development practices. The best demonstration of the system is to simply go to the Redmine site as they use their own software to manage their external face of their project. I have found this software tremendously useful and I hope by spreading the word, others will too.

The Origins of DK

So about once every month or so, I get the same question. "What does DK stand for? Does it mean Donkey Kong? You know that's not very original..." So I want to set the story straight.

It doesn't stand for Donkey Kong, plain and simple. I am a bit more original than that (at least I think so) and would never, ever, ever, use a name from a character in a game as the title in my blog.

What it does stand for is Dranco Karanth. I'm sure you are all saying to yourself, "Who?". Let me explain.

When I was about 10 years old, I used to play this game called Legend of Kesmai. Google it if you are unfamiliar with what it is. It was an awesome MMORPG around the time of Ultima Online. The servers were originally hosted on GameStorm before the company went toes up. Anyways, Dranco Karanth was my first character ever in an MMORPG, in this case he was basically a warrior priest (they called them "Thaums" for short, I can't for the life of me remember why). Anyways, as the years progressed and I started playing D&D, the character changed from a priest to a red mage and he picked up some back story. A few more years later and I designed my first "World" around him and his friends and even wrote the beginnings of a book that some day I hope to finish. He has always been in my head and in my heart and is my biggest inspiration for making games and designing worlds. The DK identifier is a simplification and unfortunately holds a general connotation with a big furry monkey from Nintendo and that is unfortunate, but who would want to visit a blog called Dranco Karanth Game Studios???

That's all I have on that matter, if you don't care for it I'm sorry, but it is something special to me and well, frankly, this is my blog so tough :).

Philosophy of Software Test

I have been a test software engineer professionally for three years (going on four). I have done everything from writing automated GUI control test scripts in visual basic to embedded test systems engineering in c for a wind river operating system running Ada with c interfaces. I know that software test is important for any application. I have seen product fail test evaluation that would have gone to the customer otherwise.

Unfortunately not everyone has the same opinion that I do on the matter. Some feel that test software is wasted code, providing no economic gain in the long term of the project. These people tend to be the ones who write the checks for your project so usually you have to do some serious convincing to get them on board. Once you do, you still need to have a good method of approaching your test system otherwise you will be wasting money, a lot of money.

Here I will try to lay out some basic principles and guidelines to follow when writing test code for any project.

Step 1: Determine your systems primary method of outputting debug information
Many applications use the standard console window as their primary source of debug output. I do not recommend this, the reason being that once you have 100+ modules that you are trying to integrate and test, the debug information spewing to your console will be unreadable.

A better solution is to output all of your debug to a common log file for your system. I will elaborate more as to why only one log versus one for each module in a bit.

Step 2: Design your Test Strategy Early
This is probably the biggest problem for people. They know what type of software they want to write, so they go for it. Then approximately 50 - 70% of the way through development, they realize that their system is poorly designed and half of their code doesn't work. The reason for this is that generally people do not take into consideration that it generally takes a while to get a system into a testable state. By the time you have gotten to this point, so much of your code could be wrong and not true to the original design of the system. Trust me on this one, I have worked on major projects that have gone astray from their original design. No matter how well it functions after that, you are always bending your own rules to get stuff to work right. This rule bending is painful and costly, sometimes whole portions of the system need to be redesigned to accommodate some minor tweak made to fix an issue that resulted in a poorly structured architecture/test combination.

The key to success is to decide on how you are going to systematically test each component (software or hardware) before integrating it into the entire system. This is called a functional test or unit driven test, depending on what camp you come from. The idea here is that each module has a set of tests that test out its basic functions as they would be used in the actual system. Now, I do not mean to say that you need to write a whole platform to test the module, that would defeat the purpose of testing. What I mean is that you create a harness to place your module in that exercises the functions input and output to verify that your internal algorithms function appropriately. It is probably a good idea if this is a centralized module that will allow you to turn on and off specific modules for test so that way as you incorporate more modules in your system, they are not only easy to add, they can be tested together within the same test structure.

An example of this is a custom dictionary. Say your custom dictionary is going to be used by two separate modules within the system. For example a means of passing data between two separate threads. Now, if you write your dictionary to have a set of tests that test each of its functions by supplying artificial data for each of its fringe cases, then you can be confident that the Dictionary itself is functional. Now, once you start implementing the worker threads that are going to access this dictionary, you will obviously want to test each of their functions (including the function to write or read data from the dictionary) in a similar manner as you did the dictionary in the first place. This all seems to check out, all is going well. Now once we start integrating, we see a problem. For some reason we are getting corrupt data from one module in the other module. We can't just run our tests because they only prove out their individual components. However, if we design our system in such a way that a fully tested module can be used to write data to the dictionary and just the test that is used to test the dictionaries read function can be used to verify the dictionary, you have now eliminated one third of the potential problem area of the system. The same can then be done against the other module.

This type of approach will help you narrow down the possible problem areas of your system. A useful strategy that I have implemented in the past for checking for memory leaks within a data structure, was to create a separate test module that simply queried my memory manager to print out its allocation table. I then set up this test module to run between integration components and modules self tests. This provided me a way to quickly identify whether a section of the system was using more memory than was previously expected. It was also useful because it tested out the functions of my memory manager as well as the memory managers integration with the other components in the system.


Step 3: Let your Architects/Designers Identify your tests
The reason for this one is that unit testing should be done before any system code is written, and who else better knows what data will be required for input and output of your functions than your Architects.

Step 4: Identify WHAT to test and HOW MUCH to test it
Of course, if you are the architect, then this section is for you.

This is actually a tricky question. Many times your test team will want to test every component and module in the system. In a perfect world, this would be the case all the time. However, in the real world, cost and schedule demand that you use agile practices and identify key areas of testing. If you were to test everything, writing the test code would take more time than writing the actual code. Performing modular testing is a part of the agile development practice because it allows you to release stable code and integrate new features into your software quicker with less bugs, yet it still requires too much time generally to perform modular testing on all components in the system. The trick is to rely on your foundation classes.

API's such as the .net framework and the Apple OS are expected to be stable. They perform their own unit testing and provide their APIs to test developers to work with and exercise before they release them to the general public. By utilizing their work, you alleviate having to write most of your own data structures, and as a result save both development time and test development and execution time. Many companies seem to not want to rely on these APIs from what I have experienced. I am not sure as to the reason for this, but if faced with the dilemma of either using a pre-built table class or to roll your own, think twice about rolling your own. When you are writing software for yourself or for your company, its not about academics, its about money, its about maintainability, and its about rapid stable development.

Also, it is unfortunate, but anytime your company runs into either a budget or schedule crunch, test will be the first thing to go. Manager's priorities lie with meeting their deadlines, not making sure the product is 100% quality assured. This is even more the case when it comes to writing test software to test out hardware. Generally, a computer engineer designing a board for some device will perform a flying probe or a functional board test to verify that their module works (similar to my description of the unit driven testing of software above). As a result, if you can not finish your testing in time for the product release, more than likely the computer engineer/manager will determine that the functional board test was sufficient to satisfy that the product is working... This is wrong. The reasoning behind why it is wrong is the same reasoning behind why it is possible for a module to test out 100% on a unit driven test, but fail once it is integrated into the rest of the software system. It is impossible to fully understand how two devices are going to behave together prior to actually hooking them up and making them communicate with each other.

Step 5: Debug Information - Better Information is Better Information
As I stated before, you really should centralize your debug data. It makes it much faster when sorting through your runtime output than if it was in individual files for each module. I know this seems counter intuitive, but realize that text editors, along with processors and ram, has improved over the years and searching a text file is no longer a computationally heavy task. Well, this is assuming you don't have a hundred megs of output, which may happen at times but most of the time it won't.

Now what I mean by Better Information is Better Information is that more information is not usually proportional to the quality of information that is being output. Sometimes having too much information is more detrimental than having too little. On the other hand, having too little information can also mask your problem. The best bet is to determine early a format for your debug output. This will allow you to quickly identify the major components of the debug output messages. My preferred format is:

[module debug information is coming from]:[message (error, recovery, status)], [message specific data], [expected results], [actual results] [optional time stamp].

This format is uniform and quickly identifiable. For example if you have a player class that checks collision and you wanted to identify during runtime if you collided with other objects in the scene, it might look like this.

"Player: Error, Collision encountered with [object] at (x, y, z), Collision flag = true, [object] Type should not be collidable." 

Now here we can see that there was an Error thrown by our error manager framework. It was output to the log, and it contains all the data we need to see what is going on. It appears that the problem lies in the Players collision function (at least at first glance) and that the [objects] collision type was not set to collidable. If this is not the case, the only other possibility is that the [objects] collision mode read function is not passing data correctly back to the player class for some reason, either the player is overriding the data it receives, or it is corrupt for some reason when it gets there. I think this is personally much better than something that looks like this:

t: 0

Player: (x, y, z)

Object: (x2,y2,z2)

t: 1

Player: (x, y, z)

Object: (x2,y2,z2)

t: 2

Player: (x, y, z)

Object: (x2,y2,z2)

t: 3

Player: (x, y, z)

Object: (x2,y2,z2)

Collision: (x, y, z)

Or even worse, no data at all. The difference here is that we are only reporting on a failure or critical status in the better version. This helps cull data that is unimportant to us, making finding what we are looking for much easier.

I could continue to talk about this topic all day, however this post is getting a bit large so I will cut this session short for now. I will probably be adding additional little discussions about testing philosophy here as that is what I do for a living. I am starting to implement a new game idea and I will be implementing some of these things in that title. I will share my experience doing so here. If you have any comments on this, I am always willing to be persuaded to better methods, so don't feel shy about telling me you think I am wrong. I hope this has helped some of you identify your weaknesses in your testing strategies. Remember, its O.K. to be OCD when it comes to software perfection.

Game Review - Final Fantasy Dissidia : PSP : SquareEnix

It's finally here! Final Fantasy Dissidia for PSP. I feel like such a fanboy, Monday night I stood in line at GameStop waiting till midnight on a work night, for my copy just so could get the special GameStop exclusive collectors edition slip cases. Got to love some pretty cardboard that makes you do stupid things.

Here is a picture of the packaging with the slip cases:

As you can see, the game case comes with a reversible case sleeve. One side depicting the Heros of the Final Fantasy franchise, the other depicting the villains. I really think this game is a real great fan service on the part of SquareEnix. They have really done an impressive job on the packaging. The thing I noticed most was the lack of focus on Cloud or Sephiroth in both the game and the packaging. I think that SquareEnix is really committed to all of their great characters in this title and that is apparent by not giving any of them more cover space than then rest. 

The game is beautiful. It actually surprised me there was no flashy intro video. I was actually scared at first when all I got was an in-game clip of the Warrior of the Light at the beginning. Not the best graphics, on par really for the PSP in-game graphics and pretty much what I expected for dialog sequences in a SquareEnix game. But for a first video, the first sample of the sweet sweet amazing experience I have come to expect and love about the Final Fantasy franchise? Well, I was not let down. After the first little prologue tutorial, you are brought to the ACTUAL main interface for the game, with options like "Story Mode" "Arcade Mode" and "Dual Colosseum". Selecting story mode, I was blown away. A fully rendered clip that I was hoping for appeared. Some of you may have seen this video before release as I think this was one of the videos (or at least clips from it) that was released at an earlier showing by SquareEnix to promote the title. Regardless, it brought some tears to my eyes believe it or not. To see all of my favorite characters brought together in a single title, I was excited, but to see them in full rendering together for the first time ever in the 20 years that the franchise has been in production. That I believe is a true fan service to a dedicated community.  It was about 2-3 minutes long and was spectacularly action packed. The best part was not a single time in the clip did Cloud and Sephiroth cross swords. In fact, I am not sure, but I don't think any of the matching heros/villains attack each other in the video (intentional? hmmmm...). 

For actual game play, I am happy to say I really am enjoying it so far. I have not had TOO much time to play the game, as I am still in Grand Rapids at my home office, on a tight schedule on the current project I am working on. This is my last week here and I am having to put in the over time to get our release done in time. This saddens me of course as I would love to just sit here all day and get through a few of the individual characters story lines. Yes, story lines, plural. There are 10 hero story lines to complete (I am assuming that there will be 10 villain story lines to complete as well once all 10 hero story lines are completed. Ok maybe I'm just hoping) and I am on the first one as of right now. 

I was originally concerned about SquareEnix making a "Fighting" game about Final Fantasy. I am not disappointed though, on the contrary, I am very pleased. It really feels like an action game mixed with the RPG elements that make Final Fantasy what it is. Nothing is really lost in the translation, and in fact it feels very much like Final Fantasy XII in a one on one sort of setting. The board concept is interesting, and I am still trying to get used to the DP system that is used for determining bonuses for the level. 

The game definitely does not lack for all the small little systems that are built into each state of the game. Every screen it seems is loaded with all of these little components or mechanics that use the common set of stats from your characters base stats to the number of battles you have partaken in. An achievements list in the game is loaded with stuff to beat, numbers to push for. It's almost like each time you play the game you can strive for different goals, minimizing turns used, completing as many battles in a calendar day as you can, or trying to get every item in every map. Speaking of calendars, this is my favorite mechanic so far. The game actually uses the day of the week to determine special bonuses and effects that change the way the game is played. This is a great concept, modify difficulty and rewards based on the day of the week. Even more interesting is that the player gets to choose one day during the week that is their "Special Day" where bonuses are increased. This is asked when you make your profile as to what day you play the most. This day is marked in the calendar in game as a special day when you are in the mognet area of the main menu. Another of the great mechanics is the chocobo walk. In the customize menu, a screen is displayed with a chocobo either sleeping, walking, or flying. As you progress through battles, the chocobo will move along the scene. The more battles you fight, the farther he gets. Depending on your difficulty path, that distance changes. If he reaches the end, you get a special item. For the hardest difficulty, it takes 60 battles to reach the target, the kicker is that these battles must be performed in a single 24 hour period, or the chocobo will go back to sleep at the beginning of the path (Fun Fun). Other bonuses are awarded based on other things the chocobo can find along the path. This really adds a little more variability to the game and is really ingenious.

Finally, as a design point, I think it is great that they have drawn on all of the old art work from the last 20 years of gaming. Each help menu uses different images, character portraits, character images, and item portraits straight out of the original games. All of the characters from the series are there. I saw a picture of Steiner already, and he told me how to equip weapons. This really helps fill out the games feel in my opinion, as well as I think alleviate some of the complaints that I know have been going around about not including one character or another as a playable character. 

Of course, all artwork in the pictures above belong to SquareEnix (God bless). I take no credit except for the "Wonderful" pictures to show off the sweet artwork on the cases. Sorry for the quality, I took them with my IPhone in my Hotel room which is not all that well lit. 

If you have the game and are looking for people to play online with, drop me an email at crsteinb@gmail.com. I don't really know anyone else with a PSP that has the game, so I would definitely be willing to try out the multiplayer with someone. If you don't have the game... WHAT ARE YOU WAITING FOR??? Go go buy it now!

Dante's Inferno - First Impressions

I perused the EA site today after listening to one of the podcasts that have been done by EA and Visceral. They had mentioned that they were working on the Dante's Inferno title, and the thought of making a game based on that old literature intrigues me. I think it is a fascinating concept and setting for the type of game that they are making. Looking at the game play footage, I have no doubt that the title will be fun to play.

The game play, reminiscent of God of War or Heavenly Sword, looks to be fast pace and action packed. However, my concern is that like the other two titles mentioned, it will be a button smashing game with no real strategy to the attacks. Although, the attacks may look nice and pretty, these types of games tend to bore me after a while, and usually end up causing me some hand cramping. I generally prefer a little more strategy in my combat, titles such as Hitman, Mad World, or The Mark of Kri. All of these titles did more than just provide a button mashing kill fest. However the game did provide a brutal feel that I think that many new games are going for. The difference is that even though the brutality of these titles were present, it wasn't mindless killing (well, its pretty mindless in Mad World, however the fighting system led more to some quick thinking to perform the brutal kill you were going for that would provide you with more points).

Hitman and Mark of Kri relied more on assassination, the silent kill, to complete the mission. These allowed you to avoid the all out frenzy of being detected, and rewarding you as such for doing so. The interesting thing is that these titles also still allowed you to experience the frenzy of many on one combat, and did not really punish you if you wanted to run through the mission and be detected by everyone. I think that Assassins Creed tried to have this mix, but I felt as I played it that it was not very good at allowing you to do the stealth kills as well as I would have originally expected. At times it felt clunky and what would seem like an obvious kill would go unnoticed, where as a well planned and executed kill sometimes set off alarms.

I am hoping that Dante's Inferno will have a good balance of the brutal combo kill, button smashing, and the strategic areas where more skill and finesse is required. I am realizing that game developers, with their multimillion dollar budgets, have a need and desire to appease a wider audience of gamers, and providing "easy to understand" control schemes goes a long way to doing this, and by uncomplicating the combat system also pushes a game into more hands. I just feel as if players who wish to learn complex combat systems and strive for perfection in their gaming are being ignored due to them being in a much smaller demographic. I mean, where are games like the old Tenchu?

Developer Podcasts

I've recently bought an IPhone, and I was never exposed to the podcast community until I was forced into using ITunes (not that its not a good piece of software, sometimes I just have some disagreements with it :) ). Since I have been browsing the ITunes store I have discovered the beauty of the podcast as a means for me to listen to something different than the 2 cds I have ripped on my phone, or the pandora app that I use on a nearly daily basis.

The biggest thing that I am geeked about (and surprisingly so) is the couple of game company podcasts that are out there for listeners. EA is the big one that I have been listening to. They only have 5 episodes out as of right now, but the interviews that they have done have been very interesting, especially to someone like me who works in a corporate atmosphere (at GE Aviation) and has an interest in getting into the gaming industry. I can relate to the corporate day to day that these people have to deal with, and yet it is fascinating to hear about the inner workings of a large publisher and its sub-derivative developers such as Visceral.

I wish that other larger developers, such as Capcom, Atlus, or SquareEnix would do this as well. I would be a devoted listener of any of these three major companies if they were to do a podcast of this nature. I would really like to hear more from coders and level designers on these podcasts to hear what they go through on a day to day basis, working with 3rd party engines or building their own. I think there is also some room for growth in these areas when dealing with play testing a game and how bug tracking and feature planning are handled in the development cycle. I think that interviews like these could help independent game developers, and aspiring corporate game developers learn techniques and behaviors and strategies that can not be learned in a academic setting with professors who have never been in the fast pace industry.

I would also like to see some podcasts be created that follow speaker sessions at some of these larger conferences. I am aware that there are feeds that are broadcasted at events like the Apple conference and some of the coverage of E3, but there are many of these conferences such as siggraph and GDC, that I feel do not receive enough outreach to the public. Obviously a podcast could never replace actually going to one of these conferences, as I have been to a few conferences and the experience was always breathtaking. However, due to the cost of travel and the cost of admission, it would be nice if some of the speakers were covered in a publicly accessible forum.

I recommend anyone who is interested, check out the EA podcast, they are interesting to listen to and much more interesting than any political talk radio that you are going to get listening to the real radio.

Art - New Logo

For the Anime Rename File Utility, I decided it would be nice to make a little piece of art for the about window. Nothing too fancy. But, I wanted something related to the use of the application. I decided to learn a little more about Photoshop as a result and got a little more familiar with the pen tool.

Here is my attempt at a logo:



I think it turned out decent. Much better job than I have done in the past. I think I am getting a bit better at using the tool. I don't know if I like the text so much but perhaps this is just a first draft. Later revisions may be popping up. I may also decide to go with this art style in the future for a game idea that I am starting to brew in my brain. We shall see :)

Download - PC : Anime File Rename Utility

Hello All, It has been a while. GE has been keeping me busy in Grand Rapids this last month and I have been working some major overtime on my current project at work. Thus leaves me little time to work on my side projects (as usual). To top it off I bought an IPhone and that has been a bit distracting in its own right (reviews to come).

Anyways, I did take this weekend to write some software to rename files for TV shows (specifically Anime series). Now of course I can not condone piracy, it is illegal and it is wrong. However, there are many Anime series that have become available on the web via sites such as Anime Take (pronounced "Ta-ke") which follow DMCA policies very closely. I have noticed that many of these are done by release groups that tend to "tag" their files in a very ugly manor. As a result, I have decided to take it upon myself to write a file rename utility that will parse all of the garbage out of the names of files and order them by numbers.

This may be useful for other reasons as well. Picture files perhaps. It is not limited to only Anime, but it was my source of inspiration. The software does not in any way shape or form allow illegal downloading of shows, so please do not ask me where to get illegal Anime. This software is provided free "as is" and if you have any suggestions for improving the software, let me know and I will consider updating it for that purpose.

You can download the installer for Windows PC here.



The software is very simple, once it is installed by running the setup installer. Open the application and click "Browse". Navigate to your folder with the series in it and press ok. This will populate the path field and display all of the files in the folder. The application attempts to use the first file name to deduce what the expected series name is. If this is not what you would like to name it, change the name in the "Series Name" field before doing a rename. The "Numbers in Name" field is used so that series that have numbers in their name like "Super 7 Ninja Magic Yea!" (name totally made up btw :), you can put a 1 in that box and the application will know to skip over the first numeral character in the file name before trying to deduce what episode it is. You can use the "Rebuild Name" button to have the application "guess" the series name after a change to the number field.

You can use the preview button before doing an actual rename to see what the paths for the files will be changed to. These replace the entries in the file list box on the left. Finally, "Rename" actually performs the rename of the files.

Drop me a line if you are having problems with anything.
Later!