While talking to someone recently about real time strategy games, I was trying to explain the distinct appeal of Company of Heroes as opposed to Starcraft II. They’re both excellent games, they both look fantastic, and they both reward skilled gameplay. But they’re hugely different in an important way.
Starcraft II is designed as an e-sport. It rewards skill above all else. It’s based on the placement of a sentry shield, the crucial seconds spent moving drones between resources, and the timing of a chronoboost. It’s a gorgeous game, to be sure, but it was built primarily for its long and arguably infinite learning curve.
Company of Heroes is a war movie game to end all war movie games, and it captures the feel of World War II action as well as any shooter. You can’t help but be awed by the destructible terrain, the animation, the voice acting, the explosions, and the spectacle of it all. It requires skill, to be sure, but it’s one of those rare RTSs that lives in your gut more than your head.
This idea of a skill vs. spectacle is a spectrum. I can’t think of any RTS that doesn’t appeal to both skill and spectacle. It’s just that some lean one way or the other.
After the jump…wait, did you paste the wrong text into this entry? Continue reading →
Stalker Call of Pripyat is a gorgeous game. All the graphical elements are top-notch, but of particular note is the art direction, which evokes an incredibly bleak environment and still manages to be mysterious and beautiful at the same time. Sure, the grass sort of appears around you as you walk, and some of the objects in the world are a little chunky, but overall the game is totally gorgeous. Most importantly, it does a fantastic job of placing you in the blasted, worn out world of the Zone, making it feel lived in and picked over and rusted and real. It’s a gorgeous game.
After the jump, something may or may not happen Continue reading →
Dissidia 012 [duodecim] Final Fantasy is the sequel to Dissidia Final Fantasy. That might be a little hard to figure out at first glance, because generally, a 1 is not followed by a 012. The title refers to something that makes (some) sense in the story, but it’s yet another entry in a long line of confusing Square Enix game names. It’s also not the last time you’ll be forced to make sense of numbers in this excellent fighting game.
After the jump, why two life bars are better than one Continue reading →
I’ve been having a fantastic time with this dark and immersive and scary and imaginative and weird game. And then I fall down a funny rabbit hole. After the last play session, I did more writing about the game than playing the game. I enjoy engaging with the game is a creative and reflective way. I was also, I admit, thinking about how much people might like to read what I wrote. My game diary was gonna be good! And sexy! And funny! Fun to do, and it was going to get me accolades and possibly women? Man gaming is wonderful.
After the jump, gaming isn’t wonderful Continue reading →
Nothing! Twenty four hours of absolute diddly squat! Not even a seagull to break the monotony — we’re too far from shore! This time command really screwed the pooch in sending us all the way out here. There is nothing useful floating out here at all.
After the jump, a twist ending Continue reading →
If I had a million dollars, I’d buy a Dodge Viper. Just because. I’m not sure what that says about me and I’m not sure I want to know. But I tell you this by way of explaining that when I’m playing a racing game, I’m driven (ha ha) to pick up a Viper as soon as I can. I am fueled (ha ha) by crazy dreams of being able to actually make any headway with it. Which never happens. For me, the Dodge Viper is an excellent vehicle for accelerating quickly into the nearest wall and, depending on the damage model, crunching up that big beautiful hood.
Surely there’s some practical use for this gorgeous car, right?
After the jump, the Viper is good for only one thing Continue reading →
After looting the bodies of a camp full of bandits, I had a lot of ammo and other goodies. But after getting seriously sidetracked by other quests on my way home, I end up back at the trader camp and find I have next to no ammo for any of my effective weapons.
After the jump, my superpower is the ability to solve ammo woes Continue reading →
After we surface, I see a sizable plume of smoke in the distance, more than can be justified by even a large ship. Seems like I hit something sensitive that may be worth investigating further — but after dark. If it ever gets dark in this blasted land of sun, anyway. I’ll just keep plodding along here submerged, since I can also see that escort a bit too starboard as well. A quick check on batteries and CO2 level tells me we’ll be fine for a while; the action against the convoy and subsequent evasion were surprisingly swift. Shifting those external torpedoes will just have to wait.
After the jump: “oops”, or what happens when you forget your XO Continue reading →
I hate the Lotus Exige S. It’s small, whiny, twitchy, unreliable, full of energy, but not solid enough to really harness that energy. It’s like an overpowered slot car that’s jumped its slot, or an annoying yipping dog hopped up on meth, or a rollerskate with a V8 engine. It feels so bantamweight. It slides when I don’t want it to. I cringe when I approach gravel. Are these loose stones going to throw this tiny skirling thing off the track? It looks like a faux sports car some rich daddy’s girl would drive.
So why am I driving it over and over and over?
After the jump, the thin finish line between love and hate Continue reading →
In Stalker: Call of Pripyat you play a stalker, of course. Stalkers hunt through the Zone for artifacts, revenge, weird critters, and more. But not women. There are no women in the whole game. Maybe that’s why everyone is so grim and angry. You do a fair amount of talking and information gathering, but it’s primarily a first-person-shooter. There are some role-playing elements. You don’t have stats like agility, but you do get tired from running too long. You find better armor and weapons while playing, and need to get them repaired. You talk to lots of masked men with guns and shoot many, many more.
After the jump: reloading. It’s not just for your guns. Continue reading →
On my way north to intercept the other convoy I run across a strange sight in the night — a fully lit up ship. Having operated near territory at war where all ships are running without lights, I take a moment to remind myself that the Gibraltar Strait services many, many nationalities and ports, and some of them might not even be at war with us. Bugger. Time to run some drills!
After the break, I lose half of my torpedoes. Continue reading →
Welcome to Stalker: Call of Pripyat. The game opens in a field after a long and badly dubbed intro. There I am, staring out at a wooded plain. There’s nothing around. Just…woods.
Up pop five objectives, but I haven’t been trained to use identify or set them yet. Having played many modern AAA games, I’m used to a short tutorial on the game systems, so I sit there for several seconds, hoping some friendly guy will come over and take pity on this sad, stupid man who’s just appeared and explain what the hell is going on. I’m not sure if it’s an eastern European thing (the developers are Ukranian, I think), but this game just drops you in, and leaves the systems up to you. Welcome to the Zone, stalker!
After the jump, splashing around in the deep end Continue reading →
While I’m out there hustling (well, as much as hustling is possible at 1/3 speed) through the middle of Bay of Biscay, let’s talk some terminology. Things like crash dives, ballast blowing, silent running and torpedo impact. All of these things are part of your Silent Hunter III experience, but let me tell you about the most fascinating part of the game that you will get to know intimately: your navigational chart.
After the jump, who knew charts could talk? Continue reading →
If you’ve been following the series up to this point, you’ve undoubtedly been waiting patiently for something which up until now I’ve avoided doing, and I don’t mean taking unsolicited cheap shots at Tom Chick. That comes later. I mean talking about the AI.
After the jump, Gary’s AI Adversary, or GAIA (they really do call it that) Continue reading →
When I started writing, I was going to talk about a few different roads. I was going to take readers to some of my favorite places on Ibiza and Oahu. Together we were going to enjoy the coastal roads of Ibiza that wind through rock arches and past old medieval ruins. We were going to discover the interior wilderness of Oahu in a Land Rover. We were even going to take a delightful trip through the heart of Honalulu. We were going to, but then I found the road.
After the jump, let me be your Hawaiian sherpa Continue reading →
