What kind of game situates the first NPC vendor so that talking to him means standing with your back to the edge of a fatal cliff, at which point a menu pops up in which the analog stick still moves your character instead of changing the menu selection, so that when you pull down on the stick to select the next menu item, your character neatly steps off the edge of the cliff and dies?
Dark Souls. That’s what kind of game. Remember kids, when you’re in a menu screen, use the d-pad.
After the jump, something else I wish I’d known when I started playing Continue reading →
Gears of War is one of my favorite franchises. And one of my favorite things about it is a specific part of the story. But to talk about that would be to talk about spoilers.
So, after the jump, spoilers ahoy! Continue reading →
The first game of Horde mode was pretty confusing. There’s quite a few day-glow green command areas littered throughout the map and a new window on the right side full of icons that are greyed out. On top of the new window is a timer set at 30 seconds, waiting to begin its countdown. I wander around the map, Checkout, for a bit before I grasp what’s going on. This would be the round that seals me in to playing countless hours of Gears 3. Horde is a good time.
For the horde, after the jump! Continue reading →
The first thing I tried after the co-op campaign mode was Beast mode. I knew Horde mode was going to be good and I’ve played the multiplayer in the beta, so Beast is the only unknown. From all the early information it sounded like Versus mode in Left 4 Dead, and that roused my interest. I had my full entourage with me, so we decided to try it out four player. I’m not sure if that helped or not but the results were… mixed.
After the jump, we put the Bea in Beast mode… I guess Continue reading →
The time is finally at hand. I have my copy of Gears of War 3 installed on my shiny, new Gears themed console. My wife Sarah has been wanting her own 360 so she can wreak havoc on Pinball FX2, so it’s the perfect time to replace my current system and get a new 360 slim. I spend the first hour or so transferring my profile and content to my new 360, so I’m pretty ready to kill some Locust scum by the time all is said and done. I fire up the game and hear that familiar sound as the Epic Games logo page appears on the screen. It’s on! Wait, a patch notice. Gah! At least this is the 360 and the patches take about 15 seconds. OK, there we go. It’s on.
After the jump, Donkey Kong… that’s how much it’s on. Continue reading →
I’m all like:
And Tom’s all:
Tomorrow: a more word-oriented entry
Okay, so I took a look at your computer. I don’t know why it’s doing that, but now it doesn’t have a battery anymore. Sorry, but I need the battery, even though I already have seven of them, including this one expensive laptop battery that I’m afraid to sell, because maybe I’ll need it later. That’s how I feel about most of this stuff. I mean, seriously, you should see all this stuff I’m carrying around. Oleander. Can you believe it? I’m carrying around oleander.
Also, I’m going to need to take a look at any phones, copiers, and cash registers you may have around here. Especially cash registers. And do you happen to have any duct tape I can borrow? What about wire or nails?
In the 19th century, as Christianity spread through Asia, the term “rice Christian” emerged to describe people who converted just so they could get rice and other handouts from the missionaries. Rice Christians give lip service to religion for the material and social benefits. In Dead Island, you might say I’m a fruit Christian. I constantly visit the church in Moresby to take advantage of its plentiful stocks of respawning fruit. It’s a great place to nosh up your health, and the fruit is much better for you than the energy drinks littering the beach resort. Those things are probably full of high fructose corn syrup.
Sometimes, I’m also a mace Christian (pcitured). Sister Helen hands out some pretty nifty weaponry. I’m disappointed that developer Techland didn’t take the opportunity to make the mace a named unique item. Rod of God has a nice ring to it, wouldn’t you say? Later in the game, I will be a machete Christian.
And while we’re passing out new categories of Christians, I’d like to point out that distinctive type of Christian known as the videogame Christian. For instance, Sister Helen in Dead Island, Sister Miriam Godwinson in Alpha Centauri, and Father Grigori in Half-Life 2. You know what sets them apart from actual Christians? They never talk about Christ. They never once mention the name Jesus. They are characters written by game developers who play it safe, I presume to avoid offending anyone. It’s actually a common facet of popular entertainment. I recently watched the fun but awful Priest, in which a Blade Runner world surrounded by vampire-infested Western-esque wastelands is ruled by Christians who never once mention Christ.
It strikes me as silly to make a character Christian, and then limit him or her to safely bland talk about a generic universalist God. Every Christian I’ve ever met is happy to talk about Christ. Since when do fictional Christians have to dance around the founder of their religion? I mean, for Pete’s sake, if Danish cartoonists can draw pictures of Mohammed, can’t Father Grigori let loose with the occasional “the power of Christ compels you”?
Witness the power of this fully repaired and operational purple sickle!
By the way, that guy can still attack. I can tell you from first-hand experience that zombie headbutts hurt.
There’s a particular genre of book, military history book specifically, called the “unit history”. It may have a desultory title like “The History of the 1st Infantry Division in World War II” or a slightly jazzier name like “The Big Red One: Crusade in Europe”. It’s usually a catalog of where a unit was on each day of a campaign, what it did, and a lot of name-checking and shout-outs to people who served in that unit, along with photos and other memorabilia. It’s both a historical and personal record, meant to preserve the unit’s memory and standing, and take due (or undue) credit along the way.
There isn’t anything inherently wrong with this, except that as an outsider I don’t have any attachment to any particular military organization or unit, so there’s nothing to grab my attention. I’m not a “fan” of any tank division in the same way that I am a fan of — for example — the Detroit Red Wings. I generally find this kind of stuff boring, despite my interest in military history. Someone once gave me, as a gift, a copy of Comrades to the End: The 4th SS Panzergrenadier Regiment “Der Fuhrer” 1938-1945. I’m not sure what kind of comment that is on him or me, and I probably shouldn’t think about it too much. It’s on my bookshelf somewhere, but I don’t particularly care what a bunch of Nazis did on, say, 14 October 1943, or any day before or after that, unless they died, in which case I’m good with the outcome.
So it’s weird that I just spent thirty bucks plus shipping on a copy of Messerschmitt Bf-110 Bombsights Over England: Erprobungsgruppe 210 in the Battle of Britain.
After the jump, eat your heart out, Detroit Red Wings Continue reading →
Also, Svetlana, can you please move a little to your left before I accept the quest?
I think at some point in this series I promised you some role-playing. Strategy role-playing, to be exact. Not by me, of course, because I don’t do that kind of stuff. But from a game design perspective, you can’t help but appreciate the possibilities. Because the best games tell the best stories, the chance to tell a good one shouldn’t be missed. From a strategy role-playing perspective, what could be a better story than what I’m about to show you?
Find out after the jump Continue reading →
During the Civil War — bear with me — battles often happened by accident. That’s just how it worked back then. Two armies would maneuver around, chasing each other, or feeling their way around the land, trying to find advantageous ground. Eventually, they’d tangle up a flank, or stumble onto arriving enemy reinforcements, or get caught flat footed crossing a river. Skirmishes blossomed into full-blown encounters that gave birth to unplanned Civil War battlegrounds. We don’t often think of battles as surprises, but that’s often what they were.
After the jump, why I thought of this as I plunged to my death in Dead Island Continue reading →
Everyone knows that strategic games with tactical battle engines are better than strategic games without them. Any game which tries to abstract out combat in the name of tighter, more thematic game design is eventually going to get crushed by complaints from gamers who want to fight out the battles turn by turn, or for truly advanced players, in real time. You know it, I know it, and the American people know it. So why do developers keep missing the boat? It’s so cute that you think I am about to give you the answer. I would never be that straightforward. Maybe I just don’t know.
After the jump, there are known unknowns, where we know what we don’t know Continue reading →
