I attempted to find 10 IPs that made their debut during the current generation of consoles, with no currently released or announced sequels, that I personally wanted to see more of, and that felt like there was room to expand upon. I failed, and was stuck at 8 until I allowed myself some exceptions. Now, moving on to the list, and why these titles made the cut.
Thursday, June 27, 2013
Update: The Zero Tolerance Schedule
So things around here have been a little haphazard as I'm sure most of you have noticed. My original plan was to post updates every Monday, Wednesday and Friday. However, I realized quickly that this schedule was much easier said than done. I had planned to pull myself back to twice a week, perhaps Tuesdays and Saturdays or something, but didn't get the announcement out before Tsaikotyk joined up and declared his schedule. Then, thanks to E3, things have been a little chaotic with the news, press conference coverage, etc.
Time to get this bitch back on track. For the foreseeable future, here's the schedule for us here at Zero Tolerance:
Tsaikotyk will be updating every Tuesday and Thursday.
Latency will be updating every Wednesday and Friday.
There is no content planned for the weekend.
Once Tsaikotyk returns from Evolution in Vegas on July 17th, we'll return to recording our podcast which will be released every Monday.
We'll be doing our best to stick to this schedule and I'm sure we'll apologize profusely if we fuck it up. Thanks for sticking with us while we work this mess out.
Time to get this bitch back on track. For the foreseeable future, here's the schedule for us here at Zero Tolerance:
Tsaikotyk will be updating every Tuesday and Thursday.
Latency will be updating every Wednesday and Friday.
There is no content planned for the weekend.
Once Tsaikotyk returns from Evolution in Vegas on July 17th, we'll return to recording our podcast which will be released every Monday.
We'll be doing our best to stick to this schedule and I'm sure we'll apologize profusely if we fuck it up. Thanks for sticking with us while we work this mess out.
Wednesday, June 26, 2013
E3: Abridged - Part IV
So over a week after the fact now, I'm finally getting around to finishing this series. I'd had plans to complete it earlier, but some personal illness got in the way of that. Finally getting around to watching the last of the press conference footage and I've got to say that I'm significantly more enthused than I thought I'd be. Roll up those sleeves. Bring down the cage. It's time for the Sony Smackdown.
Tuesday, June 25, 2013
Why Microsoft Still Needs to Lose Mattrick
After the news about the XBox One from this past Tuesday, and picking up from where I left off here, I'm almost stymied at how poorly they played out their hand.
This information came entirely too soon after how forcefully they presented it both at the console reveal, and at E3, yet it still feels like a case of "too little, too late", and even if it weren't, it's definitely coming from the wrong voice, as this is straight out of the mouth of the same person who said "The 360 is an offline product."
So, let's dive right into the update released earlier this week, straight from the desk of everyone's favorite President of Interactive Entertainment Business, Don Mattrick himself, translate some of this PR spin, and get to the root of what is really said.
"We imagined a new set of benefits such as easier roaming, family sharing, and new ways to try and buy games. We believe in the benefits of a connected, digital future. " - We had a bunch of great ideas, then you all complained because we tied it into our terrible policies. We deep-sixed all of it, though we stand by it, and may revisit this in the future, when Kansas finally gets off dial-up.
"Since unveiling our plans for Xbox One, my team and I have heard directly from many of you, read your comments and listened to your feedback." - We tried to wait until after E3, but the bitchmob was already too large, and still growing at an alarming rate. We're going to try and turn this ship around, and if we fail, it's your fault as consumers. You can also stop sending death threats now.
"I would like to take the opportunity today to thank you for your assistance in helping us to reshape the future of Xbox One." - We really just don't have a fucking clue what we are doing.
"You told us how much you loved the flexibility you have today with games delivered on disc. The ability to lend, share, and resell these games at your discretion is of incredible importance to you." - Okay, so you guys know about first sale doctrine, and refuse to go the same route as PC games because our consoles aren't backwards compatible, next gen probably won't be either, and you don't want games to vanish from brick and mortar stores.
"Also important to you is the freedom to play offline, for any length of time, anywhere in the world." - We were so looking forward to slamming you with Doritos and Mountain Dew ads during matchmaking, and making you repurchase all of your games every time our servers went down for extended maintenance.
"While we believe that the majority of people will play games online and access the cloud for both games and entertainment, we will give consumers the choice of both physical and digital content. We have listened and we have heard loud and clear from your feedback that you want the best of both worlds." - We know we're right, but you're stupid, so we'll let you have your way. You want it both ways, and we'll claim to give you that right here, but we're actually taking away all the interesting things we previously unveiled when we do away with the draconian DRM.
It's pretty clear that this is a thinly-veiled "Fuck you" to everyone who criticized their policies, while attempting to put on a facade of pro-consumerism in a bid for your dollars. While it may work in the short term, the sheer audacity of the situation, and to have it come from Mattrick is a slap in the face to anyone who has followed this story for more than two days.
If it was this easy for Microsoft to just pull an about-face, there's nothing to stop them from doing so again in the near future, with even less functionality, and even less consumer goodwill in mind.
This man has alienated more than half of your intended audience, including all of those serving in the US armed forces, who were huge supporters of the 360. Having him make the announcement is insincere at best, and a sign of things to come at worst. There is very little to gain by having some of your worst PR blunders embodied in one of your highest ranking executive posts, and very little to lose by promoting one of his subordinates, even if in an interim manner, as a show that, even at the corporate level, this man's methods, statements, and policies were not what was expected of someone in that position, are all undergoing review, and may be changed in the future.
Though, if you really want to save face, and possibly the embarrassment of a bad launch with all the pre-instilled distaste for the X1, consider taking this year off the table as far as a release, work on upgrading the hardware further, refine its aesthetic, lower the price, and re-brand it for a summer release next year. I don't want to see you fall flat on your face come release, because the market needs competition, and between the Wii U's current-gen hardware, and your PR calamities, I'm not seeing a lot of that around.
This information came entirely too soon after how forcefully they presented it both at the console reveal, and at E3, yet it still feels like a case of "too little, too late", and even if it weren't, it's definitely coming from the wrong voice, as this is straight out of the mouth of the same person who said "The 360 is an offline product."
So, let's dive right into the update released earlier this week, straight from the desk of everyone's favorite President of Interactive Entertainment Business, Don Mattrick himself, translate some of this PR spin, and get to the root of what is really said.
"We imagined a new set of benefits such as easier roaming, family sharing, and new ways to try and buy games. We believe in the benefits of a connected, digital future. " - We had a bunch of great ideas, then you all complained because we tied it into our terrible policies. We deep-sixed all of it, though we stand by it, and may revisit this in the future, when Kansas finally gets off dial-up.
"Since unveiling our plans for Xbox One, my team and I have heard directly from many of you, read your comments and listened to your feedback." - We tried to wait until after E3, but the bitchmob was already too large, and still growing at an alarming rate. We're going to try and turn this ship around, and if we fail, it's your fault as consumers. You can also stop sending death threats now.
"I would like to take the opportunity today to thank you for your assistance in helping us to reshape the future of Xbox One." - We really just don't have a fucking clue what we are doing.
"You told us how much you loved the flexibility you have today with games delivered on disc. The ability to lend, share, and resell these games at your discretion is of incredible importance to you." - Okay, so you guys know about first sale doctrine, and refuse to go the same route as PC games because our consoles aren't backwards compatible, next gen probably won't be either, and you don't want games to vanish from brick and mortar stores.
"Also important to you is the freedom to play offline, for any length of time, anywhere in the world." - We were so looking forward to slamming you with Doritos and Mountain Dew ads during matchmaking, and making you repurchase all of your games every time our servers went down for extended maintenance.
"While we believe that the majority of people will play games online and access the cloud for both games and entertainment, we will give consumers the choice of both physical and digital content. We have listened and we have heard loud and clear from your feedback that you want the best of both worlds." - We know we're right, but you're stupid, so we'll let you have your way. You want it both ways, and we'll claim to give you that right here, but we're actually taking away all the interesting things we previously unveiled when we do away with the draconian DRM.
It's pretty clear that this is a thinly-veiled "Fuck you" to everyone who criticized their policies, while attempting to put on a facade of pro-consumerism in a bid for your dollars. While it may work in the short term, the sheer audacity of the situation, and to have it come from Mattrick is a slap in the face to anyone who has followed this story for more than two days.
If it was this easy for Microsoft to just pull an about-face, there's nothing to stop them from doing so again in the near future, with even less functionality, and even less consumer goodwill in mind.
This man has alienated more than half of your intended audience, including all of those serving in the US armed forces, who were huge supporters of the 360. Having him make the announcement is insincere at best, and a sign of things to come at worst. There is very little to gain by having some of your worst PR blunders embodied in one of your highest ranking executive posts, and very little to lose by promoting one of his subordinates, even if in an interim manner, as a show that, even at the corporate level, this man's methods, statements, and policies were not what was expected of someone in that position, are all undergoing review, and may be changed in the future.
Though, if you really want to save face, and possibly the embarrassment of a bad launch with all the pre-instilled distaste for the X1, consider taking this year off the table as far as a release, work on upgrading the hardware further, refine its aesthetic, lower the price, and re-brand it for a summer release next year. I don't want to see you fall flat on your face come release, because the market needs competition, and between the Wii U's current-gen hardware, and your PR calamities, I'm not seeing a lot of that around.
Sunday, June 23, 2013
Changes to Your Regularly Scheduled Broadcast
Okay, so I'm going to make a few announcements and come clean on a few things. There's no reason for me to hide anything from our readers here. I am, however, going to make a point of the fact that I am speaking for myself, and not for anyone else on the Zero Tolerance Games team, including those behind the scenes.
I fucked up. When the idea of a podcast was pitched to me, I jumped on it. Then after recording, I decided I wanted to be more involved. I picked up two weekly slots, and my first actual piece was kind of a runaway success. I thought to myself, "This is going great. In fact, I don't think it could possibly be going any better," and that's about the time shit hit the fan.
I overextended, got in a bit deeper than I planned to, and the amount and quality of content I had initially expected to deliver have suffered for it. This brings us to the announcements...
1. The podcast, which has yet to see an episode release, is on hiatus until the week of July 22nd, at the earliest.
Nik was nothing short of fantastic during our recording sessions, and I do not want this to reflect poorly on him. The first attempt ran for almost 3 hours of increasingly off-topic banter, and it really just turned into an uneditable mess. As the guy in charge of editing and recording, there was a lot more that I could have been doing to keep the show to task, and we called it a lesson learned, and thought "We'll get it right next time." For the most part we did. We had a session earlier this week, we kept it to topic, and the timing and length were where they needed to be. Everything was falling into place until we wrapped, and I closed out without saving my audio. I attempted to re-record to fill in the gaps, but after several attempts where it just came off as stilted and unnatural, I had to scrap this episode too.
2. There may be gaps in my posts for the next few weeks.
I have an upcoming trip that has been planned for months, and I essentially left myself with two options here. Churn out garbage to be able to cover that time, or keep to the standard of quality I expect from myself, still attempt to get as many pieces in as I can, and try to not worry too much about the gaps. After a lot of thinking about this, I decided to run with the second option, because I am simply not a fan of shoveling shit down people's throats.
As far as the key factors behind these announcements, they are as follows:
1. My job is seven days a week, and my hours are variable based on how much business we're doing that day. It's pretty difficult to schedule much of anything, and even harder to hold to the schedule when things pan out the way I expect them to.
2. I am going on a trip to the Evolution Championship Series this year, primarily as a competitor. This trip has been in the works for a few months, and I have had to devote some of my time to staying on top of my game. I will attempt to get some hands on time with the new Killer Instinct, and the games of the Indie Game Showcase there, so I can post my thoughts and opinions upon my return.
3. Time zones. The biggest reason for the failure to retain my half of the audio for the podcast was just due to generally being entirely too tired. There's a 3-hour time difference between myself and Nik, and by the time we get around to recording and finishing up, it can be close to 4 AM for me, and I still have to be up for work in the morning.
With all that having been said, I am truly sorry if I have disappointed any of you, and for any gaps that may occur in content during the coming weeks. I'll do my best to stay on top of things in the future, and appreciate your patience during this transitional period.
- Mike "Tsaikotyk" Kelly
I fucked up. When the idea of a podcast was pitched to me, I jumped on it. Then after recording, I decided I wanted to be more involved. I picked up two weekly slots, and my first actual piece was kind of a runaway success. I thought to myself, "This is going great. In fact, I don't think it could possibly be going any better," and that's about the time shit hit the fan.
I overextended, got in a bit deeper than I planned to, and the amount and quality of content I had initially expected to deliver have suffered for it. This brings us to the announcements...
1. The podcast, which has yet to see an episode release, is on hiatus until the week of July 22nd, at the earliest.
Nik was nothing short of fantastic during our recording sessions, and I do not want this to reflect poorly on him. The first attempt ran for almost 3 hours of increasingly off-topic banter, and it really just turned into an uneditable mess. As the guy in charge of editing and recording, there was a lot more that I could have been doing to keep the show to task, and we called it a lesson learned, and thought "We'll get it right next time." For the most part we did. We had a session earlier this week, we kept it to topic, and the timing and length were where they needed to be. Everything was falling into place until we wrapped, and I closed out without saving my audio. I attempted to re-record to fill in the gaps, but after several attempts where it just came off as stilted and unnatural, I had to scrap this episode too.
2. There may be gaps in my posts for the next few weeks.
I have an upcoming trip that has been planned for months, and I essentially left myself with two options here. Churn out garbage to be able to cover that time, or keep to the standard of quality I expect from myself, still attempt to get as many pieces in as I can, and try to not worry too much about the gaps. After a lot of thinking about this, I decided to run with the second option, because I am simply not a fan of shoveling shit down people's throats.
As far as the key factors behind these announcements, they are as follows:
1. My job is seven days a week, and my hours are variable based on how much business we're doing that day. It's pretty difficult to schedule much of anything, and even harder to hold to the schedule when things pan out the way I expect them to.
2. I am going on a trip to the Evolution Championship Series this year, primarily as a competitor. This trip has been in the works for a few months, and I have had to devote some of my time to staying on top of my game. I will attempt to get some hands on time with the new Killer Instinct, and the games of the Indie Game Showcase there, so I can post my thoughts and opinions upon my return.
3. Time zones. The biggest reason for the failure to retain my half of the audio for the podcast was just due to generally being entirely too tired. There's a 3-hour time difference between myself and Nik, and by the time we get around to recording and finishing up, it can be close to 4 AM for me, and I still have to be up for work in the morning.
With all that having been said, I am truly sorry if I have disappointed any of you, and for any gaps that may occur in content during the coming weeks. I'll do my best to stay on top of things in the future, and appreciate your patience during this transitional period.
- Mike "Tsaikotyk" Kelly
Friday, June 21, 2013
E3: Abridged - Part III
So here we are at the one-week mark from E3 and I still haven't finished my write-ups. You can blame The Last of Us and, by association, @Tsaikotyk for getting me on that train. Expect to see Part IV tomorrow, as I should finish this series off before it becomes too irrelevant.
Electronic Arts (EA):
Chief Operations Officer Peter Moore kicked off "The Download", EA's press conference segment. He stated that everything we'd get to see would be for the upcoming generation's Xbox One and Playstation 4 consoles. He got things rolling with a "beloved franchise that, over the years, has captivated millions of fans worldwide".
Plants vs. Zombies: Garden Warfare - With a trailer opening that looked like it would be EA's cash cow Battlefield 4, we instead received a 4-player-cooperative-third-person-shooter variation on the PvZ franchise. Goodie! Just what every tower-defense player wanted! Yet another bland, generic horde-mode shooter. Dear PopCap, fuck you. Nobody wanted this. Your idea to take "everything we love about action games and blend it with everything our fans love about PvZ" (Brian Lindley, Producer) is a piss-poor excuse to pander to the OTHER masses. The ones playing Call of Duty and Battlefield, and give them something. Well guess what? IT WON'T WORK. Hardcore gamers already have their realistic shooters, 4-player-coop-shooter fans already have their Borderlands 2, and casual gamers already have the ACTUAL Plants vs. Zombies. This is the kind of blind developmental stupidity that is causing so many studios to go belly-up. When you try to cater to every demographic, your game loses vision, flavor, and becomes the bland forgettable first/third-person shooter #3234273 that nobody talks about.
Oh well, at least you announced Peggle 2, and that will keep you afloat for another 7-10 years.
Titanfall - Two games made their debut on stage during Microsoft's conference, and were later reshown during EA's own conference. One of which was Titanfall (and the other being Battlefield 4, but who cares). Having already shown us the semi-cinematic trailer, and some quality gameplay footage during Microsoft's stage time, Respawn gave us a little behind-the-scenes look at the game with some of the developers. These people were working to create a fun game that blended the scale between the pilots and their mechs. An attempt at creating a multiplayer game that still gave you the feeling of a single player experience. And of course, redefining those giant robots. Titanfall still looks awesome, and I can't wait to play it on the PC. =)
There was a short blurb between presentations about EA's two new engines for the upcoming generation. In-house you had the EA Sports division working with EA Sports Ignite, and you had DICE (developers of Battlefield and Mirror's Edge) using the new Frostbite 3 engine. An engine that they'd be using in the upcoming game: STAR WARS: BATTLEFRONT 3. YES IT'S FINALLY HAPPENING.
Need For Speed: Rivals - Coming on stage after Ubisoft gave EA a huge disadvantage for their racing game. The Crew already promised to blend single and multiplayer experiences together in a living open-world racing game. So when EA showed us NFS: Rivals, it was pretty underwhelming. Through "AllDrive", they'd blend single, coop, and multiplayer modes together into one fluid experience. The game also has some level of tablet support.
Then star of Breaking Bad, Aaron Paul walked on stage and got to talk a little about his role in the Need For Speed movie. Fucking why? We've already got 6 Fast and Furious films. Why make another branded by EA? The director Scott Waugh commented that "Need for Speed is accurate and authentic to real car racing culture". This quote was immediately followed by footage of a police SUV being flipped off the side of the road, so I'm not entirely sure he knew what he was talking about. The movie will be hitting theaters in 2014 and I plan to ignore it. I will probably be too busy playing The Crew to notice.
Dragon Age: Inquisition - EA didn't give us a lot of details on Bioware's new RPG heading to next-gen, except that you get to lead an inquisition. The trailer showed us the sky tearing open and all hell raining down, and that we'd see the game sometime in 2014.
EA SPORTS: "IT'S IN THE GAME"
Now, I'm not a fan of sports games. I consider myself to be an actual gamer, and if you do too, then you also probably ignored this section of the conference. Well, to bring you some of the best out-of-context quotes from EA's press conference, I actually watched the damn thing. Here you go:
"It's always lacked the depth of true ball handling." - Sean O'Brien, Executive Producer - NBA Live '14
"Through major gameplay innovation, we've given players the ability to think intelligently and move more like elite NFL athletes." - Cam Weber, VP and GM of American Football - Madden 25
"For the first time players can now make intelligent decisions." - Matt Bilbey, Group GM - FIFA '14
"Lets fighters organically alter their strategies throughout the fight. This is a huge part of fighting and it takes a unique level of intelligence." - Andrew Wilson, Executive Vice President - EA Sports UFC
Battlefield 4 - Yes! The moment everyone who is not me has been waiting for! Modern military shooter madness! EA showed off the newest installment in the Battlefield franchise yet again. With "levolution", players can now "experience destruction and dynamic environments that react to your every move" (Patrick Bach, Executive Producer). Yeah, we had the start of that back in 2001 with Red Faction, where were you? Though to be completely honest, Battlefield actually surprised me, because it's one thing to spew words like "dynamic", which doesn't mean shit in the game industry. It's just a filler word that execs use to sound more important. I was impressed during their gameplay demo when their 64 person skirmish ended with the collapse of a skyscraper, destroyed by human player gunfire. That was impressive.
Mirror's Edge - EA closed it out by showing us Mirror's Edge, a poorly marketed, visually stunning and elegant first-person parkour platformer for the last generation. It's getting rebooted for next generation, and it looks even more stunning this time around. Let's just hope they don't fuck it up this time.
Part IV should show up tomorrow when I praise Sony for kicking in Microsoft's door and laughing in their face.
Electronic Arts (EA):
Chief Operations Officer Peter Moore kicked off "The Download", EA's press conference segment. He stated that everything we'd get to see would be for the upcoming generation's Xbox One and Playstation 4 consoles. He got things rolling with a "beloved franchise that, over the years, has captivated millions of fans worldwide".
Plants vs. Zombies: Garden Warfare - With a trailer opening that looked like it would be EA's cash cow Battlefield 4, we instead received a 4-player-cooperative-third-person-shooter variation on the PvZ franchise. Goodie! Just what every tower-defense player wanted! Yet another bland, generic horde-mode shooter. Dear PopCap, fuck you. Nobody wanted this. Your idea to take "everything we love about action games and blend it with everything our fans love about PvZ" (Brian Lindley, Producer) is a piss-poor excuse to pander to the OTHER masses. The ones playing Call of Duty and Battlefield, and give them something. Well guess what? IT WON'T WORK. Hardcore gamers already have their realistic shooters, 4-player-coop-shooter fans already have their Borderlands 2, and casual gamers already have the ACTUAL Plants vs. Zombies. This is the kind of blind developmental stupidity that is causing so many studios to go belly-up. When you try to cater to every demographic, your game loses vision, flavor, and becomes the bland forgettable first/third-person shooter #3234273 that nobody talks about.
Oh well, at least you announced Peggle 2, and that will keep you afloat for another 7-10 years.
Titanfall - Two games made their debut on stage during Microsoft's conference, and were later reshown during EA's own conference. One of which was Titanfall (and the other being Battlefield 4, but who cares). Having already shown us the semi-cinematic trailer, and some quality gameplay footage during Microsoft's stage time, Respawn gave us a little behind-the-scenes look at the game with some of the developers. These people were working to create a fun game that blended the scale between the pilots and their mechs. An attempt at creating a multiplayer game that still gave you the feeling of a single player experience. And of course, redefining those giant robots. Titanfall still looks awesome, and I can't wait to play it on the PC. =)
There was a short blurb between presentations about EA's two new engines for the upcoming generation. In-house you had the EA Sports division working with EA Sports Ignite, and you had DICE (developers of Battlefield and Mirror's Edge) using the new Frostbite 3 engine. An engine that they'd be using in the upcoming game: STAR WARS: BATTLEFRONT 3. YES IT'S FINALLY HAPPENING.
Need For Speed: Rivals - Coming on stage after Ubisoft gave EA a huge disadvantage for their racing game. The Crew already promised to blend single and multiplayer experiences together in a living open-world racing game. So when EA showed us NFS: Rivals, it was pretty underwhelming. Through "AllDrive", they'd blend single, coop, and multiplayer modes together into one fluid experience. The game also has some level of tablet support.
Then star of Breaking Bad, Aaron Paul walked on stage and got to talk a little about his role in the Need For Speed movie. Fucking why? We've already got 6 Fast and Furious films. Why make another branded by EA? The director Scott Waugh commented that "Need for Speed is accurate and authentic to real car racing culture". This quote was immediately followed by footage of a police SUV being flipped off the side of the road, so I'm not entirely sure he knew what he was talking about. The movie will be hitting theaters in 2014 and I plan to ignore it. I will probably be too busy playing The Crew to notice.
Dragon Age: Inquisition - EA didn't give us a lot of details on Bioware's new RPG heading to next-gen, except that you get to lead an inquisition. The trailer showed us the sky tearing open and all hell raining down, and that we'd see the game sometime in 2014.
EA SPORTS: "IT'S IN THE GAME"
Now, I'm not a fan of sports games. I consider myself to be an actual gamer, and if you do too, then you also probably ignored this section of the conference. Well, to bring you some of the best out-of-context quotes from EA's press conference, I actually watched the damn thing. Here you go:
"It's always lacked the depth of true ball handling." - Sean O'Brien, Executive Producer - NBA Live '14
"Through major gameplay innovation, we've given players the ability to think intelligently and move more like elite NFL athletes." - Cam Weber, VP and GM of American Football - Madden 25
"For the first time players can now make intelligent decisions." - Matt Bilbey, Group GM - FIFA '14
"Lets fighters organically alter their strategies throughout the fight. This is a huge part of fighting and it takes a unique level of intelligence." - Andrew Wilson, Executive Vice President - EA Sports UFC
Battlefield 4 - Yes! The moment everyone who is not me has been waiting for! Modern military shooter madness! EA showed off the newest installment in the Battlefield franchise yet again. With "levolution", players can now "experience destruction and dynamic environments that react to your every move" (Patrick Bach, Executive Producer). Yeah, we had the start of that back in 2001 with Red Faction, where were you? Though to be completely honest, Battlefield actually surprised me, because it's one thing to spew words like "dynamic", which doesn't mean shit in the game industry. It's just a filler word that execs use to sound more important. I was impressed during their gameplay demo when their 64 person skirmish ended with the collapse of a skyscraper, destroyed by human player gunfire. That was impressive.
Mirror's Edge - EA closed it out by showing us Mirror's Edge, a poorly marketed, visually stunning and elegant first-person parkour platformer for the last generation. It's getting rebooted for next generation, and it looks even more stunning this time around. Let's just hope they don't fuck it up this time.
Part IV should show up tomorrow when I praise Sony for kicking in Microsoft's door and laughing in their face.
Wednesday, June 19, 2013
What Developers Can Do to Interest Me in Next Gen
I apologize for the lateness of tonight's update. I had initially intended to do a piece on the first Dead Space here, and then, after gushing to a friend about how great The Last of Us really is, I was thinking of doing a piece on storytelling in games, and why television tie-ins are a mediocre idea at best. I had about half of that piece done when I encountered some technical difficulties, and lost all my progress. It's been a rough night for writing.
Instead of rehashing what I had already written, I decided to start fresh on a new topic, deadline looming overhead. I've been feeling very unimpressed with a lot of the offerings of the current generation, particularly those from the large AAA publisher-developer complexes, primarily due to uninspired titles with brown palettes and an array of various firearms, all built around the same uninspired multi-player for the 3rd consecutive iteration. That having been said, as the title of this suggests, here are some things developers can do to get me interested in next gen.
Gameplay - This should be the foremost priority. Make it fun, try new things. In eras gone by, nearly every game of note had some sort of gimmick to differentiate it from others in the genre. Bring that back. Seriously, it's getting stale, and I've had enough. Some more focus on single player content would be nice as well. I don't see how a 4-6 hour campaign justifies paying $60 for Call of Duty, when I can spend $15 on Counter-Strike: Global Offensive if I want to play a multi-player modern military shooter, not to mention all the DLC map packs that will be released over the course of the year that people actually play that iteration. If they make these games something that can't be beaten with a one night rental or on the first day of ownership, and they won't have as many issues with the used games market. Make it worth buying, and more importantly, make it worth keeping. Use some of the extra memory in the next-gen consoles to keep track of things like enemy ammunition in first- and third-person shooters(Do they ever run out?), and make them drop exactly what they're carrying, not just two rounds for a pistol, particularly when they've been emptying AK-47 magazines at you for 3 minutes.
Storytelling - Tell as much of the story as possible through gameplay. This is something The Last of Us did particularly well, especially in its closing act. Cutscenes are great and all, but using too many breaks immersion. Make sure that the gameplay is as compelling as the story; this is something I see Quantic Dream struggling with, though with what I've seen of Beyond: Two Souls thus far, it seems like they're getting on the right path. Don't add things just for shock value, and add an option to skip them, because that means the story functions without them, and they add ultimately nothing(Looking at you, Modern Warfare 2). Have believable human characters. Stereotypes and subverted tropes have been done to death, and there are still far too few female protagonists. Avoid cliffhangers. There's something really great about feeling that a story is complete, and then having another chapter become available. Games like Psi-Ops where it's intentionally left open for a sequel that never came, and likely never will, just leave players feeling bitter.
Environment/Level Design - Open things up more, and use more locations. If I wanted to play an on-rails shooter, I'd have a light gun, and a copy of Time Crisis 2. If the sole difference is that I can choose when to walk down the corridor, the design is flawed, and needs to be re-done from scratch. In this era, it should be completely unacceptable.
Graphics - The industry has pushed the boundaries, as far as what the current-gen systems can do, and most games releasing now are beautiful. They've done their job well, and they can stop. All the memory and processing cycles that would be saved by just putting a temporary freeze on increased polygon counts, and custom shaders, could easily be used, to not only add new dynamics to gameplay, but also to give players a consistent 60 FPS, with fewer repeat textures, and larger, more varied landscapes. We get it, you like showing off how pretty your game and engine are, and that's fine, but when it becomes a detriment to originality, causing you to feed us the same incredibly linear corridors, just to maintain frame rate and memory ceilings, IT BECOMES A PROBLEM.
Marketing - Cut back on the in-your-face, "We've taken over 7 different websites for a month"-style ad campaigns. It's irritating, massively inflates the budget, and doesn't do a lot to promote the game unless it's a new IP from an established company. Everyone knows that there's another Madden, another FIFA, another Assassin's Creed coming this year, and in all likelihood, the next year, and the year after that. People know what to expect from these games. The people that you want to buy them already have plans to do so. Save the money, increase profit margins, and spend it on developing better games or marketing sleeper hits.
There's room for innovation and improvement in nearly every department, and really, just one or two would be enough to garner more interest. However, to just accept minor improvements will do very little to refresh the industry, and that stale feeling will return much faster than if they were to continually attempt to improve in all these categories in an iterative manner. These are just a few of the myriad ways that the big players in the industry could change, and I'll probably do a follow-up in the future with even more.
Instead of rehashing what I had already written, I decided to start fresh on a new topic, deadline looming overhead. I've been feeling very unimpressed with a lot of the offerings of the current generation, particularly those from the large AAA publisher-developer complexes, primarily due to uninspired titles with brown palettes and an array of various firearms, all built around the same uninspired multi-player for the 3rd consecutive iteration. That having been said, as the title of this suggests, here are some things developers can do to get me interested in next gen.
Gameplay - This should be the foremost priority. Make it fun, try new things. In eras gone by, nearly every game of note had some sort of gimmick to differentiate it from others in the genre. Bring that back. Seriously, it's getting stale, and I've had enough. Some more focus on single player content would be nice as well. I don't see how a 4-6 hour campaign justifies paying $60 for Call of Duty, when I can spend $15 on Counter-Strike: Global Offensive if I want to play a multi-player modern military shooter, not to mention all the DLC map packs that will be released over the course of the year that people actually play that iteration. If they make these games something that can't be beaten with a one night rental or on the first day of ownership, and they won't have as many issues with the used games market. Make it worth buying, and more importantly, make it worth keeping. Use some of the extra memory in the next-gen consoles to keep track of things like enemy ammunition in first- and third-person shooters(Do they ever run out?), and make them drop exactly what they're carrying, not just two rounds for a pistol, particularly when they've been emptying AK-47 magazines at you for 3 minutes.
Storytelling - Tell as much of the story as possible through gameplay. This is something The Last of Us did particularly well, especially in its closing act. Cutscenes are great and all, but using too many breaks immersion. Make sure that the gameplay is as compelling as the story; this is something I see Quantic Dream struggling with, though with what I've seen of Beyond: Two Souls thus far, it seems like they're getting on the right path. Don't add things just for shock value, and add an option to skip them, because that means the story functions without them, and they add ultimately nothing(Looking at you, Modern Warfare 2). Have believable human characters. Stereotypes and subverted tropes have been done to death, and there are still far too few female protagonists. Avoid cliffhangers. There's something really great about feeling that a story is complete, and then having another chapter become available. Games like Psi-Ops where it's intentionally left open for a sequel that never came, and likely never will, just leave players feeling bitter.
Environment/Level Design - Open things up more, and use more locations. If I wanted to play an on-rails shooter, I'd have a light gun, and a copy of Time Crisis 2. If the sole difference is that I can choose when to walk down the corridor, the design is flawed, and needs to be re-done from scratch. In this era, it should be completely unacceptable.
Graphics - The industry has pushed the boundaries, as far as what the current-gen systems can do, and most games releasing now are beautiful. They've done their job well, and they can stop. All the memory and processing cycles that would be saved by just putting a temporary freeze on increased polygon counts, and custom shaders, could easily be used, to not only add new dynamics to gameplay, but also to give players a consistent 60 FPS, with fewer repeat textures, and larger, more varied landscapes. We get it, you like showing off how pretty your game and engine are, and that's fine, but when it becomes a detriment to originality, causing you to feed us the same incredibly linear corridors, just to maintain frame rate and memory ceilings, IT BECOMES A PROBLEM.
Marketing - Cut back on the in-your-face, "We've taken over 7 different websites for a month"-style ad campaigns. It's irritating, massively inflates the budget, and doesn't do a lot to promote the game unless it's a new IP from an established company. Everyone knows that there's another Madden, another FIFA, another Assassin's Creed coming this year, and in all likelihood, the next year, and the year after that. People know what to expect from these games. The people that you want to buy them already have plans to do so. Save the money, increase profit margins, and spend it on developing better games or marketing sleeper hits.
There's room for innovation and improvement in nearly every department, and really, just one or two would be enough to garner more interest. However, to just accept minor improvements will do very little to refresh the industry, and that stale feeling will return much faster than if they were to continually attempt to improve in all these categories in an iterative manner. These are just a few of the myriad ways that the big players in the industry could change, and I'll probably do a follow-up in the future with even more.
Monday, June 17, 2013
Why Microsoft Needs to Lose Mattrick
It's one thing to alienate and disenfranchise your current customers. It's another thing entirely to do it 3 times in one week. And that thing is called "A Day in the Life of Don Mattrick". I'm sure behavior like this was acceptable, perhaps even encouraged, when he was the President of Worldwide Studios for Electronic Arts, but Microsoft needs to put their foot down and tell him that this is not alright, if they wish to still have a console division.
Being anti-consumer whilst working at a publisher is par for the course, especially one that produces the same 4 sports franchises year after year after year, often with little incentive for current owners to upgrade, and rapidly plummeting second-hand value on the previous year's release, but for a console manufacturer, it's far less appropriate. To have their President of Interactive Entertainment Business* spout things like "If you don't like our policies for next gen, buy our current gen system!" with a smile on his face not only harms the potential install base of people who don't currently have an X360, but also hurts the likelihood of current owners sticking with Microsoft into the next generation. This will not only damage Microsoft, but also the bottom line of any studio already contracted into making a 3rd party exclusive.
To follow that up with "we're over-delivering value" upon being called out for charging $100 more than your competitor just shows how anti-consumer this man really is. He is awash in a sea of his own ego and hubris, when his accomplishments at Microsoft are akin to scratching an author's name off the cover of a book, and replacing it with your own. The 360 released two years before his arrival at Microsoft, had an entire year where it was the only 7th generation console, and came in under the release price of the PS3, yet nearly all the credit for the success of the 360 is given to Mattrick.
According to Wikipedia, with a citation to an xbox.com piece on how 2010 went for the 360, in the 3 years that he oversaw the console division, the number of installed units went from 10 million to over 50 million, and XBL membership increased from 6 million to over 30 million. Now, these numbers certainly sound impressive and look like a vast improvement, but the installed base to XBL membership ratio stayed at a consistent 60%. In the 3 years he oversaw the division, they apparently could not find a way to increase their sell-through rates on subscriptions. More importantly is how much of that install base increase was due to price drops, expansion into new markets, increased supply, purchases of replacement consoles, and purchases of additional consoles by people who already had one. I have had a friend who had 3 X360s die in the span of a year, and another who had no issues but had one in his living room, bedroom, and his kid's room. I've also known event organizers and gaming cafes with 20-30 each, with the ones owned by event organizers spending much of the year in storage. If these are typical stories, then the increase in your install base is not nearly as impressive as the numbers would seem.
He's also widely credited for the success of the Kinect, one of the fastest selling terrible peripherals in history. It brought in a large amount of money to Microsoft, and allowed them to fill the marketplace with shovelware so bad that it made Wii Sports look like a solid game by comparison.
And then there's the matter of the Xbox One. The X1 has been getting slammed left and right on forums, twitter, reddit, and even in the commercial-shill laden press. Instead of reassuring people that this product is, in fact, for you, instead of catering to those who have had week long or longer power and internet outages after a hurricane, winter storm, tornado, earthquake, etc, he reestablishes those points in such a way that it seems as though he wants you, the end user, to feel bad for even questioning their practices and price point. That's terrible marketing, and a stain on the company as a whole at this point.
While it may not placate everyone, I feel like MS could earn back at least a small amount of trust from the public, fans or not, if they just removed Mattrick, and had the interim executive announce that they are going to review and reconsider their announced policies regardless of whether or not they actually do or plan to. Mattrick has been a PR disaster for the past month, and if they really want to sell 10+ million X1s, this is the easiest way to go about it. Fire him, get him to resign, it doesn't matter how you do it, what matters is that you get it done. Your move, Microsoft.
*As an aside, this is possibly the most falsified sounding title I've heard in the industry. More terrifying than that is that it is his actual title. Did they let him name his position? It sounds absolutely absurd.
Being anti-consumer whilst working at a publisher is par for the course, especially one that produces the same 4 sports franchises year after year after year, often with little incentive for current owners to upgrade, and rapidly plummeting second-hand value on the previous year's release, but for a console manufacturer, it's far less appropriate. To have their President of Interactive Entertainment Business* spout things like "If you don't like our policies for next gen, buy our current gen system!" with a smile on his face not only harms the potential install base of people who don't currently have an X360, but also hurts the likelihood of current owners sticking with Microsoft into the next generation. This will not only damage Microsoft, but also the bottom line of any studio already contracted into making a 3rd party exclusive.
To follow that up with "we're over-delivering value" upon being called out for charging $100 more than your competitor just shows how anti-consumer this man really is. He is awash in a sea of his own ego and hubris, when his accomplishments at Microsoft are akin to scratching an author's name off the cover of a book, and replacing it with your own. The 360 released two years before his arrival at Microsoft, had an entire year where it was the only 7th generation console, and came in under the release price of the PS3, yet nearly all the credit for the success of the 360 is given to Mattrick.
According to Wikipedia, with a citation to an xbox.com piece on how 2010 went for the 360, in the 3 years that he oversaw the console division, the number of installed units went from 10 million to over 50 million, and XBL membership increased from 6 million to over 30 million. Now, these numbers certainly sound impressive and look like a vast improvement, but the installed base to XBL membership ratio stayed at a consistent 60%. In the 3 years he oversaw the division, they apparently could not find a way to increase their sell-through rates on subscriptions. More importantly is how much of that install base increase was due to price drops, expansion into new markets, increased supply, purchases of replacement consoles, and purchases of additional consoles by people who already had one. I have had a friend who had 3 X360s die in the span of a year, and another who had no issues but had one in his living room, bedroom, and his kid's room. I've also known event organizers and gaming cafes with 20-30 each, with the ones owned by event organizers spending much of the year in storage. If these are typical stories, then the increase in your install base is not nearly as impressive as the numbers would seem.
He's also widely credited for the success of the Kinect, one of the fastest selling terrible peripherals in history. It brought in a large amount of money to Microsoft, and allowed them to fill the marketplace with shovelware so bad that it made Wii Sports look like a solid game by comparison.
And then there's the matter of the Xbox One. The X1 has been getting slammed left and right on forums, twitter, reddit, and even in the commercial-shill laden press. Instead of reassuring people that this product is, in fact, for you, instead of catering to those who have had week long or longer power and internet outages after a hurricane, winter storm, tornado, earthquake, etc, he reestablishes those points in such a way that it seems as though he wants you, the end user, to feel bad for even questioning their practices and price point. That's terrible marketing, and a stain on the company as a whole at this point.
While it may not placate everyone, I feel like MS could earn back at least a small amount of trust from the public, fans or not, if they just removed Mattrick, and had the interim executive announce that they are going to review and reconsider their announced policies regardless of whether or not they actually do or plan to. Mattrick has been a PR disaster for the past month, and if they really want to sell 10+ million X1s, this is the easiest way to go about it. Fire him, get him to resign, it doesn't matter how you do it, what matters is that you get it done. Your move, Microsoft.
*As an aside, this is possibly the most falsified sounding title I've heard in the industry. More terrifying than that is that it is his actual title. Did they let him name his position? It sounds absolutely absurd.
A New Challenger Aproaches
E3: Abridged - Part III will likely be out sometime Wednesday. I've given Nik the night off to finish The Last of Us.
You may have noticed that there are no ads on this page. Zero. None. It may not stay that way forever, but I can assure you that the philosophy behind this page will not change. I will not bend for the prospect of monetizing my work here, free advance review copies, or miscellaneous swag. The integrity of the writing, and the unfiltered opinions therein, is the foremost priority.
I will be updating on Tuesdays and Thursdays, and co-hosting/editing our (weekly?) podcast. We did record a pilot episode last week during E3, but it went on for entirely too long, and got away from us in a lot of places. The replacement pilot episode should be recording later this week.
If you'd like to know more, feel free to hit me up on twitter and ask. I've got another piece to write.
I will be updating on Tuesdays and Thursdays, and co-hosting/editing our (weekly?) podcast. We did record a pilot episode last week during E3, but it went on for entirely too long, and got away from us in a lot of places. The replacement pilot episode should be recording later this week.
If you'd like to know more, feel free to hit me up on twitter and ask. I've got another piece to write.
Sunday, June 16, 2013
E3: Abridged - Part II
So, first of all, pardon me for the late upping of part 2 of E3 Abridged. Part 1 went up on Thursday. Then Friday happened and with the release of The Last of Us, I haven't had much time to eat, sleep, breathe, or think, let alone work on another write-up. It's been handed more perfect 10's than any game of note in my lifetime (GTA IV was not a game of note to me), and with the exception of a few mechanical glitches that I've encountered, it's deserved them.
I'll gush about it in a future post. Right now it's time to dissect:
Ubisoft
Rocksmith 2014 - Ubisoft tried to grab our attention by bringing in washed-up grunge guitarist Jerry Cantrell of Alice in Chains on stage to play the solo from Man in the Box (featured in Rock Band 2 for those of you who were under a rock while the Fake Plastic Instruments genre was at its high point), and then introduce us to session mode, where you can jam on your guitar, while the game simulates the rest of the band for you. Unfortunately, this is where having had friends that are drummers fucks with me, because the automated drums on Rocksmith are GOD AWFUL. They wouldn't know how to keep a tempo if you did it for them.
We're then joined by Aisha Tyler wearing the most ridiculous shirt I've ever seen. #girlwood *snrk*
Good for Ubisoft though. They realized that their CEO's and lead developers don't exactly have stage presence and someone that's a professional actor/comedian is significantly better at sounding interesting. With phrases like "Done a lot of dirty deeds to Alice in Chains" and "belly first, ass out". Way to grab my attention. Moving on.
Splinter Cell: Blacklist - Now I'm not really one to judge here because as previously mentioned, I'm not a big fan of stealth games. However, I can comment that we got to see about 10 seconds of actual gameplay mixed in amongst a lot of pretty cutscenes. Some vague concept of story was revealed with talk about a terrorist group called "The Engineers" and their attacks being labeled "The Blacklist", but that's about it.
Rayman Legends - Now I find it rather unfortunate that I still haven't gotten around to playing Rayman Origins, which I'm told is the "happiest most fun-filled game ever made". So, logically, if the first one was good, the second will be better, right? Well that's what we're hoping happens here. Lots of more of the same.
Mighty Quest for Epic Loot - Didn't see much of this game besides it's rather humorous trailer. It looks like a diablo-clone. Just what this world needs. Another diablo-clone. As if I didn't already have Diablo III, Torchlight II and Path of Exile.
South Park: The Stick of Truth - An RPG for people who enjoy South Park. Which isn't me. Though I do have to give them credit for being able to poke fun at game delays and launch dates.
The Crew - I'm going to take a second to gush about this segment. The Crew looks FANTASTIC, and not in the way that Forza Motorsport does. Ubisoft didn't bring a two-of-a-kind McLaren P1 to the stage. They didn't give us Driveatars. What they did show us was a trailer of all kinds of illegal vehicular activity. Street racing, off-roading, running from the cops. To be honest, the debut trailer made the game look like The Fast and The Furious: The (good) Videogame. They talked a little bit about how the whole US was your playground in The Crew. Open-world racing where the end goal is to take down (or more likely usurp) this criminal organization. They've created this online persistent world that blends single and multiplayer together. You and your friends can band together at any time to form a Crew and take on cooperative missions. Singularly, you can engage in all sorts of challenges. One of the ones that interested me the most was where you had to race a single car in a point-to-point challenge. The player was currently driving a high-powered street car, and his computer opponent was in a vehicle more suited to off-roading. There was no "out-of-bounds". Each vehicle applied it's strength in the point to point challenge. The road course was longer, but the player had faster car. However, the off-road was shorter, but required a different set up. Ubisoft bragged about the level of customization you can apply to your car, and being able to completely take apart the engine and rebuild it from the ground up. This is so much a part of the game, that they have designed an app for your tablet or smartphone that allows you to completely customize your car from these devices, and have it available as soon as you return to your console. Overall, this game blew me away and I'm really excited to see it in the next generation.
Watch_Dogs - Watch_Dogs is back this year with absolutely no gameplay footage. Just a fancy trailer. They did unveil to us that Aiden Pierce (the game's protagonist) is effectively a superhacker, whose obsession with surveillance has turned him into a vigilante. And that sounds badass. Who doesn't want to be cyber-punk Batman?
Just Dance 2014 - I had to talk about Rocksmith, so I've gotta talk about this too. Let's see, it's finally coming out as multiplatform. We got to see a list of pop stars likely to be on the soundtrack, including PSY. It will support 6-player dances, which is more than the number of controllers that can be connected to any system at a single time, so I guess that's impressive. There's some weird system where you can supposedly DJ and remix the music by dancing. It's the next generation of "your favorite party game". They might need to re-evaluate that statement, because last time I checked, my favorite party game was Cards Against Humanity.
Rabbids Invasion - This is a kid's show with Kinect support built in. Based on the fact that it is an actual TELEVISION show, with motion-tracking camera interactivity, I'm assuming (and will be pleasantly surprised if) this will remain exclusive to the Xbone. Because honestly, who doesn't enjoy screaming with their kids at the TV? Not me. I'd rather just scream at the kids.
Assassin's Creed IV: Black Flag - Ah yes, the pirate simulator that everyone's been talking about. I've tried to involve myself in the Assassin's Creed franchise, but I've never seemed to be able to care. The social stealth made sense when Altair's costume looked incredibly similar to the monks in the first game. However, Ezio didn't blend in with a single goddamn Italian. Being surrounded by 5 or 6 people while wearing an extremely unique outfit does not make you just "disappear". Try again. Sorry, off-topic. AC4 was another game where we saw a lot of shiny trailerness, and not a lot of gameplay. And the trailer didn't even contain a spot of blood. There were people getting shot, stabbed, and bashed over the head with bottles, and yet no one seemed to bleed. This seemed a little out of character for a franchise about ASSASSINATION, but more to the point, isn't that why most people play this game? For the violence? Anyways, Ubisoft brags that it's done it's homework on this one and created a realistic pirate experience. I doubt that being a rapist and spreading untold amounts of venereal disease is part of the core game mechanics.
Trials Fusion/Frontier - The Trials franchise is back with better graphics and a mobile counterpart. So you can eat shit and break your neck while indulging in impossible motocross feats in a whole new generation.
The Division - Yves Guillemot (Ubisoft's CEO) unexpectedly ran out on stage and interrupted Aisha to present this. Yet another franchise with Tom Clancy's name slapped on the front of it. Think of a post-apocalyptic world where a flu epidemic has caused pandemonium across the nation. No, this isn't The Last of Us, it's The Division, an open-world MMORPG cover-based shooter. Now, while I'm getting kind of sick of the chest-high-wall-shooter genre, this game's unique HUD, interactive environment and MMORPG mechanics make me rather curious.
Part III will cover the EA conference. If I can drag myself away from The Last of Us long enough to write the damn thing.
I'll gush about it in a future post. Right now it's time to dissect:
Ubisoft
Rocksmith 2014 - Ubisoft tried to grab our attention by bringing in washed-up grunge guitarist Jerry Cantrell of Alice in Chains on stage to play the solo from Man in the Box (featured in Rock Band 2 for those of you who were under a rock while the Fake Plastic Instruments genre was at its high point), and then introduce us to session mode, where you can jam on your guitar, while the game simulates the rest of the band for you. Unfortunately, this is where having had friends that are drummers fucks with me, because the automated drums on Rocksmith are GOD AWFUL. They wouldn't know how to keep a tempo if you did it for them.
We're then joined by Aisha Tyler wearing the most ridiculous shirt I've ever seen. #girlwood *snrk*
Good for Ubisoft though. They realized that their CEO's and lead developers don't exactly have stage presence and someone that's a professional actor/comedian is significantly better at sounding interesting. With phrases like "Done a lot of dirty deeds to Alice in Chains" and "belly first, ass out". Way to grab my attention. Moving on.
Splinter Cell: Blacklist - Now I'm not really one to judge here because as previously mentioned, I'm not a big fan of stealth games. However, I can comment that we got to see about 10 seconds of actual gameplay mixed in amongst a lot of pretty cutscenes. Some vague concept of story was revealed with talk about a terrorist group called "The Engineers" and their attacks being labeled "The Blacklist", but that's about it.
Rayman Legends - Now I find it rather unfortunate that I still haven't gotten around to playing Rayman Origins, which I'm told is the "happiest most fun-filled game ever made". So, logically, if the first one was good, the second will be better, right? Well that's what we're hoping happens here. Lots of more of the same.
Mighty Quest for Epic Loot - Didn't see much of this game besides it's rather humorous trailer. It looks like a diablo-clone. Just what this world needs. Another diablo-clone. As if I didn't already have Diablo III, Torchlight II and Path of Exile.
South Park: The Stick of Truth - An RPG for people who enjoy South Park. Which isn't me. Though I do have to give them credit for being able to poke fun at game delays and launch dates.
The Crew - I'm going to take a second to gush about this segment. The Crew looks FANTASTIC, and not in the way that Forza Motorsport does. Ubisoft didn't bring a two-of-a-kind McLaren P1 to the stage. They didn't give us Driveatars. What they did show us was a trailer of all kinds of illegal vehicular activity. Street racing, off-roading, running from the cops. To be honest, the debut trailer made the game look like The Fast and The Furious: The (good) Videogame. They talked a little bit about how the whole US was your playground in The Crew. Open-world racing where the end goal is to take down (or more likely usurp) this criminal organization. They've created this online persistent world that blends single and multiplayer together. You and your friends can band together at any time to form a Crew and take on cooperative missions. Singularly, you can engage in all sorts of challenges. One of the ones that interested me the most was where you had to race a single car in a point-to-point challenge. The player was currently driving a high-powered street car, and his computer opponent was in a vehicle more suited to off-roading. There was no "out-of-bounds". Each vehicle applied it's strength in the point to point challenge. The road course was longer, but the player had faster car. However, the off-road was shorter, but required a different set up. Ubisoft bragged about the level of customization you can apply to your car, and being able to completely take apart the engine and rebuild it from the ground up. This is so much a part of the game, that they have designed an app for your tablet or smartphone that allows you to completely customize your car from these devices, and have it available as soon as you return to your console. Overall, this game blew me away and I'm really excited to see it in the next generation.
Watch_Dogs - Watch_Dogs is back this year with absolutely no gameplay footage. Just a fancy trailer. They did unveil to us that Aiden Pierce (the game's protagonist) is effectively a superhacker, whose obsession with surveillance has turned him into a vigilante. And that sounds badass. Who doesn't want to be cyber-punk Batman?
Just Dance 2014 - I had to talk about Rocksmith, so I've gotta talk about this too. Let's see, it's finally coming out as multiplatform. We got to see a list of pop stars likely to be on the soundtrack, including PSY. It will support 6-player dances, which is more than the number of controllers that can be connected to any system at a single time, so I guess that's impressive. There's some weird system where you can supposedly DJ and remix the music by dancing. It's the next generation of "your favorite party game". They might need to re-evaluate that statement, because last time I checked, my favorite party game was Cards Against Humanity.
Rabbids Invasion - This is a kid's show with Kinect support built in. Based on the fact that it is an actual TELEVISION show, with motion-tracking camera interactivity, I'm assuming (and will be pleasantly surprised if) this will remain exclusive to the Xbone. Because honestly, who doesn't enjoy screaming with their kids at the TV? Not me. I'd rather just scream at the kids.
Assassin's Creed IV: Black Flag - Ah yes, the pirate simulator that everyone's been talking about. I've tried to involve myself in the Assassin's Creed franchise, but I've never seemed to be able to care. The social stealth made sense when Altair's costume looked incredibly similar to the monks in the first game. However, Ezio didn't blend in with a single goddamn Italian. Being surrounded by 5 or 6 people while wearing an extremely unique outfit does not make you just "disappear". Try again. Sorry, off-topic. AC4 was another game where we saw a lot of shiny trailerness, and not a lot of gameplay. And the trailer didn't even contain a spot of blood. There were people getting shot, stabbed, and bashed over the head with bottles, and yet no one seemed to bleed. This seemed a little out of character for a franchise about ASSASSINATION, but more to the point, isn't that why most people play this game? For the violence? Anyways, Ubisoft brags that it's done it's homework on this one and created a realistic pirate experience. I doubt that being a rapist and spreading untold amounts of venereal disease is part of the core game mechanics.
Trials Fusion/Frontier - The Trials franchise is back with better graphics and a mobile counterpart. So you can eat shit and break your neck while indulging in impossible motocross feats in a whole new generation.
The Division - Yves Guillemot (Ubisoft's CEO) unexpectedly ran out on stage and interrupted Aisha to present this. Yet another franchise with Tom Clancy's name slapped on the front of it. Think of a post-apocalyptic world where a flu epidemic has caused pandemonium across the nation. No, this isn't The Last of Us, it's The Division, an open-world MMORPG cover-based shooter. Now, while I'm getting kind of sick of the chest-high-wall-shooter genre, this game's unique HUD, interactive environment and MMORPG mechanics make me rather curious.
Part III will cover the EA conference. If I can drag myself away from The Last of Us long enough to write the damn thing.
Friday, June 14, 2013
E3: Abridged - Part I
Ah, E3. Once a year we get a chance to watch the console gaming industry and its major players publicly humiliate themselves, while trying to convince us to buy whatever it is they'll be pedaling to us in the upcoming year. I've tried to stay atop the news as it unfolded during the long week and with so much to talk about, I decided it was best to break my write-up into pieces.
Microsoft:
After the reveal of the Xbox One, which could only be described as a press disaster, Microsoft decided that it was best to spend their E3 press conference being "all about the games". You would think this would be a good thing, seeing as how their reveal wasn't about the games at all. There were no games. Give me games. For the game console.
Speaking of game consoles, MS also showed us an "updated" Xbox 360 which looked exactly like the Xbone, and would cost the same as the existing X360. This was a push for us to purchase their soon-to-be-outdated console before the new one hits this November. We were also informed that Xbox Live will be passing out 2 free titles a month for Gold (paying) members until the launch of the Xbone. Something Playstation Plus has been doing since last year. Thanks for joining us Microsoft.
On to the games they announced for the X360:
Metal Gear Solid 5: The Phantom Pain - MS kicked things off with a trailer for Metal Gear Solid 5. Either the game comes with an optional slow-down/speed-up time function, or the trailer was a rather poor representation of actual gameplay. I'm not a fan of the series, but I don't really hate on it. All I really know is that MGS4 was more interactive cutscene and less video game.
Then we were shown a console specific version of World of Tanks, an online multiplayer game where tanks blow the shit out of each other. Now, as it stands, I don't know a single person that plays or has played World of Tanks on the PC. Frankly speaking, this just sounds like an online patch for Battletanx on the N64. Whatever.
Max: The Curse of Brotherhood. An indie title that seemed to combine the drawing elements of Okami with your standard 2D platformer. Now indie games have surprised me in the past. I'm a huge fan of Bastion and, in fact, most of my favorite games in my steam library are indie titles. However, we'll have to see how the little X360 title does when it hits later this year.
Dark Souls II - Everyone's favorite ragemaker! Little more than a fancy trailer was shown for this one. Though I imagine it's comprised entirely of death and frustration, like it's predecessor.
After telling us all about what we could expect to see on the X360, MS moved into their Xbox One segment.
Ryse: Son of Rome - A game about Roman warfare that seemed rather uninterested in letting you play it. Almost all of the footage from the press conference consisted of quick-time events and cutscenes. It was, however, pretty.
Killer Instinct - Look Microsoft, if we should have learned anything from Squarenix's whole Tomb Raider debacle, it's that we should let franchises from 1996 FUCKING DIE.
Sunset Overdrive - A stylized open-world shooter. Insomniac Games tells us that it's going to be a living world with user-generated content. Sounds like Little Big Planet with guns and free running/parkour. Nifty, but not enough to convince me to shell out the $500 for an Xbone.
Forza Motorsport 5 - These guys actually opened with an ad for McLaren. Appropriate since they brought on stage with them one of two existing McLaren P1's in the world. That's right, Turn 10 Studios brought a CAR. Good for you. Next time, maybe you can bring a gameplay video and impress me with that. What I enjoyed most about the Forza segment wasn't any of the shiny car footage they'd brought with them, but the word "Driveatar". A portmanteau of the words "Drive" and "Avatar". The game learns how you race as you race, then when you're away, creates an AI based on your driving "style". Interesting. But realistic racers will be realistic racers, and for that I'd need a driving wheel, which I have yet to acquire. So I, personally, will stick with my arcade racers.
Minecraft: Xbox One Edition - Okay, the people who like Minecraft are already playing Minecraft on the PC. A small handful might have the Xbox and mobile edition, but I really don't think that adding Minecraft is going to sell you any consoles, Microsoft.
Quantum Break - Promising to combine both television and gaming, I have little to no hope for this game. Defiance already tried that, and it fell flat on it's face. Aside from a shiny trailer with no game footage, we don't have the slightest idea what the story is, who the characters are, why we can stop time apparently... bleh.
D4 - A cel-shaded game about a murder mystery by Swery65. I actually had to look the guy up to find out that he is NOT Suda51, even though the game trailer makes it look and sound like he is.
Project Spark - This title looks like what would happen if Lionhead Studios, the developers of Fable, made their own version of RPG Maker, or a console release of a Blizzard game's map editor. After dicking around a bit, they showed us some clips of what the tiny little in-house (I'm assuming) "community" has created. While some things might have been legitimate games, or just a fun way to spend a Saturday afternoon, I did recognize blatant Limbo and Geometry Wars rip-offs amongst the clips.
Crimson Dragon - A little bummed that this was a Xbone exclusive honestly. From the team that brought us Phantom Dust and more importantly Panzer Dragoon Orta, Crimson Dragon basically looks like a 3D "on-rails" shoot'em up, similar to StarFox. It looked like a spiritual successor to Panzer Dragoon, and as someone who owns Panzer Dragoon, I'm kinda jealous of the Xbone. But not enough to make me buy it.
Dead Rising 3 - Capcom brought open-world zombies to the table, yet again. They also brought a lot of gameplay footage with them, which was something that actually made me happy. It's easy for publishers to forget that those of us who aren't in attendance at E3 won't get to see how these games play, and it's important to make gameplay trailers so that we know what we'll actually be getting our hands on. Otherwise you end up with things like D4 and Quantum Break that I mentioned earlier, which is the high-budget equivalent of showing us the box art. Sure it looks great, but what does it play like?
The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt - I haven't followed The Witcher franchise, but it's supposed to be some hot-shit fantasy RPG. There was almost as much talking done by the dev as there was trailer time. It promised a "multi-region open world", "dynamic and tactical combat" and to be the "defining achievement of the RPG genre". Frankly speaking, these are all things I've already heard said about Skyrim.
Battlefield 4 - No E3 would be complete without EA waving their modern military shooter dick in everyone's face, and MS got to show off Battlefield 4 during their conference. Now playing at an astounding 60 FRAMES PER SECOND. I'm pretty sure this is something that the Glorious PC Gaming Master Race already had. The highlight of the BF4 segment was watching them fire up the trailer without sound. Now this happened to Crimson Dragon as well, but they just rolled with it. BF4's presenter stopped the trailer and restarted it. When the video lagged out and took forever to load, the guy nearly left the stage! Oops! Sorry! Technical difficulties! Just, uh... go check it out at our booth. It'll be great!
Once the trailer did finally load, it was chock-full of gameplay. Unfortunately, it's the same kind of gameplay we've seen from every other modern military shooter so, UNIMPRESSED.
This was followed by a trailer for a new indie cave-crawler, and some random trailer for an as-of-yet unnamed "triple A" franchise.
Halo - What Xbox would be complete without Halo? The trailer really seemed to rip off Journey pretty hardcore and didn't feature anything besides Master Chief in a ripped cloak and some giant robot. Well, at least MS knows who they're trying to pander to.
Titanfall - Lastly, we got a look at Titanfall, a new game by Respawn Studios (former Infinity Ward employees that didn't get along too well with Activision). It's a sci-fi shooter that actually intrigued me. For starters, it's a sci-fi shooter that isn't Halo. Second, giant fucking robots. It looks as if everyone gets their own "Titan", which is a giant mech suit that you get to pilot the same way you moved around as a foot solider. Just from watching the trailer, the game felt really solid. Standard FPS mechanics, implemented in a sci-fi universe with giant robots and jet-packs. I honestly wouldn't care if this game didn't come with a singleplayer mode. The multiplayer looks awesome enough.
That wraps up the Microsoft conference and my opinions on just about everything. Next up, I'll be tackling Ubisoft and how Jerry Cantrell is NOT a McLaren P1.
Microsoft:
After the reveal of the Xbox One, which could only be described as a press disaster, Microsoft decided that it was best to spend their E3 press conference being "all about the games". You would think this would be a good thing, seeing as how their reveal wasn't about the games at all. There were no games. Give me games. For the game console.
Speaking of game consoles, MS also showed us an "updated" Xbox 360 which looked exactly like the Xbone, and would cost the same as the existing X360. This was a push for us to purchase their soon-to-be-outdated console before the new one hits this November. We were also informed that Xbox Live will be passing out 2 free titles a month for Gold (paying) members until the launch of the Xbone. Something Playstation Plus has been doing since last year. Thanks for joining us Microsoft.
On to the games they announced for the X360:
Metal Gear Solid 5: The Phantom Pain - MS kicked things off with a trailer for Metal Gear Solid 5. Either the game comes with an optional slow-down/speed-up time function, or the trailer was a rather poor representation of actual gameplay. I'm not a fan of the series, but I don't really hate on it. All I really know is that MGS4 was more interactive cutscene and less video game.
Then we were shown a console specific version of World of Tanks, an online multiplayer game where tanks blow the shit out of each other. Now, as it stands, I don't know a single person that plays or has played World of Tanks on the PC. Frankly speaking, this just sounds like an online patch for Battletanx on the N64. Whatever.
Max: The Curse of Brotherhood. An indie title that seemed to combine the drawing elements of Okami with your standard 2D platformer. Now indie games have surprised me in the past. I'm a huge fan of Bastion and, in fact, most of my favorite games in my steam library are indie titles. However, we'll have to see how the little X360 title does when it hits later this year.
Dark Souls II - Everyone's favorite ragemaker! Little more than a fancy trailer was shown for this one. Though I imagine it's comprised entirely of death and frustration, like it's predecessor.
After telling us all about what we could expect to see on the X360, MS moved into their Xbox One segment.
Ryse: Son of Rome - A game about Roman warfare that seemed rather uninterested in letting you play it. Almost all of the footage from the press conference consisted of quick-time events and cutscenes. It was, however, pretty.
Killer Instinct - Look Microsoft, if we should have learned anything from Squarenix's whole Tomb Raider debacle, it's that we should let franchises from 1996 FUCKING DIE.
Sunset Overdrive - A stylized open-world shooter. Insomniac Games tells us that it's going to be a living world with user-generated content. Sounds like Little Big Planet with guns and free running/parkour. Nifty, but not enough to convince me to shell out the $500 for an Xbone.
Forza Motorsport 5 - These guys actually opened with an ad for McLaren. Appropriate since they brought on stage with them one of two existing McLaren P1's in the world. That's right, Turn 10 Studios brought a CAR. Good for you. Next time, maybe you can bring a gameplay video and impress me with that. What I enjoyed most about the Forza segment wasn't any of the shiny car footage they'd brought with them, but the word "Driveatar". A portmanteau of the words "Drive" and "Avatar". The game learns how you race as you race, then when you're away, creates an AI based on your driving "style". Interesting. But realistic racers will be realistic racers, and for that I'd need a driving wheel, which I have yet to acquire. So I, personally, will stick with my arcade racers.
Minecraft: Xbox One Edition - Okay, the people who like Minecraft are already playing Minecraft on the PC. A small handful might have the Xbox and mobile edition, but I really don't think that adding Minecraft is going to sell you any consoles, Microsoft.
Quantum Break - Promising to combine both television and gaming, I have little to no hope for this game. Defiance already tried that, and it fell flat on it's face. Aside from a shiny trailer with no game footage, we don't have the slightest idea what the story is, who the characters are, why we can stop time apparently... bleh.
D4 - A cel-shaded game about a murder mystery by Swery65. I actually had to look the guy up to find out that he is NOT Suda51, even though the game trailer makes it look and sound like he is.
Project Spark - This title looks like what would happen if Lionhead Studios, the developers of Fable, made their own version of RPG Maker, or a console release of a Blizzard game's map editor. After dicking around a bit, they showed us some clips of what the tiny little in-house (I'm assuming) "community" has created. While some things might have been legitimate games, or just a fun way to spend a Saturday afternoon, I did recognize blatant Limbo and Geometry Wars rip-offs amongst the clips.
Crimson Dragon - A little bummed that this was a Xbone exclusive honestly. From the team that brought us Phantom Dust and more importantly Panzer Dragoon Orta, Crimson Dragon basically looks like a 3D "on-rails" shoot'em up, similar to StarFox. It looked like a spiritual successor to Panzer Dragoon, and as someone who owns Panzer Dragoon, I'm kinda jealous of the Xbone. But not enough to make me buy it.
Dead Rising 3 - Capcom brought open-world zombies to the table, yet again. They also brought a lot of gameplay footage with them, which was something that actually made me happy. It's easy for publishers to forget that those of us who aren't in attendance at E3 won't get to see how these games play, and it's important to make gameplay trailers so that we know what we'll actually be getting our hands on. Otherwise you end up with things like D4 and Quantum Break that I mentioned earlier, which is the high-budget equivalent of showing us the box art. Sure it looks great, but what does it play like?
The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt - I haven't followed The Witcher franchise, but it's supposed to be some hot-shit fantasy RPG. There was almost as much talking done by the dev as there was trailer time. It promised a "multi-region open world", "dynamic and tactical combat" and to be the "defining achievement of the RPG genre". Frankly speaking, these are all things I've already heard said about Skyrim.
Battlefield 4 - No E3 would be complete without EA waving their modern military shooter dick in everyone's face, and MS got to show off Battlefield 4 during their conference. Now playing at an astounding 60 FRAMES PER SECOND. I'm pretty sure this is something that the Glorious PC Gaming Master Race already had. The highlight of the BF4 segment was watching them fire up the trailer without sound. Now this happened to Crimson Dragon as well, but they just rolled with it. BF4's presenter stopped the trailer and restarted it. When the video lagged out and took forever to load, the guy nearly left the stage! Oops! Sorry! Technical difficulties! Just, uh... go check it out at our booth. It'll be great!
Once the trailer did finally load, it was chock-full of gameplay. Unfortunately, it's the same kind of gameplay we've seen from every other modern military shooter so, UNIMPRESSED.
This was followed by a trailer for a new indie cave-crawler, and some random trailer for an as-of-yet unnamed "triple A" franchise.
Halo - What Xbox would be complete without Halo? The trailer really seemed to rip off Journey pretty hardcore and didn't feature anything besides Master Chief in a ripped cloak and some giant robot. Well, at least MS knows who they're trying to pander to.
Titanfall - Lastly, we got a look at Titanfall, a new game by Respawn Studios (former Infinity Ward employees that didn't get along too well with Activision). It's a sci-fi shooter that actually intrigued me. For starters, it's a sci-fi shooter that isn't Halo. Second, giant fucking robots. It looks as if everyone gets their own "Titan", which is a giant mech suit that you get to pilot the same way you moved around as a foot solider. Just from watching the trailer, the game felt really solid. Standard FPS mechanics, implemented in a sci-fi universe with giant robots and jet-packs. I honestly wouldn't care if this game didn't come with a singleplayer mode. The multiplayer looks awesome enough.
That wraps up the Microsoft conference and my opinions on just about everything. Next up, I'll be tackling Ubisoft and how Jerry Cantrell is NOT a McLaren P1.
Thursday, June 13, 2013
Update: Something wicked this way comes...
First off, there should be an article here. There isn't. I'm still catching up on all the E3 footage between working and sleeping. I want to deliver the most comprehensive look at the show as humanly possible. So the whole of a weeks work will be posted this weekend sometime.
In the good news: I'm currently working with my good friend Mike "Tsaikotyk" Kelly on the Zero Tolerance Podcast which I'm really looking forward to. =)
You can follow Mike and myself on Twitter.
In the good news: I'm currently working with my good friend Mike "Tsaikotyk" Kelly on the Zero Tolerance Podcast which I'm really looking forward to. =)
You can follow Mike and myself on Twitter.
Friday, June 7, 2013
We both said a lot of things you're going to regret...
Okay, so maybe I was a little harsh on the Xbox One yesterday. I was only going off of things that were known as facts at the time, and since Microsoft has been so gracious as to clarify the features and capabilities of the Xbox One, I feel like I should apologize.
For starters, I was misinformed (as were most) as to the ever-watching electric eye of the Kinect 2. Microsoft has clarified by saying that "you are in charge of what Kinect can see and hear" and that when "you’re simply having a conversation in your living room, your conversation is not being recorded or uploaded". I'm inclined to believe them, being that they're a giant money-grubbing corporate whorebag that is releasing a cable box/DVR as a gaming console later this year.
I was also not detailed enough in my rant about Xbox One's online requirement. The console only requires that you have a connection once every 24 hours if it's you playing your own console. If you're playing on a separate console while accessing your own cloud-based library, it will require a connection ONCE EVERY SINGLE HOUR. But don't worry, this won't disrupt your viewing of Blu-ray discs or TV.
I also failed to mention Microsoft's stance on used and borrowed games. Originally, we were told that gamers could purchase used games and would then have to pay an "activation fee" in order to be able to play them. This too is false information. Microsoft came clean by saying: "We designed Xbox One so game publishers can enable you to trade in your games at participating retailers. Microsoft does not charge a platform fee to retailers, publishers, or consumers for enabling transfer of these games." They also clarified with this: "Third party publishers may opt in or out of supporting game resale and may set up business terms or transfer fees with retailers." The very same third-party publishers that have been scapegoating second-hand game sales for so many of their recent failures.
In closing, I would like to apologize to Microsoft, as well as my readership (assuming I have one), about my under-informed statements. Thank you, MS. Thank you for clarifying the absolute horror that is your next-gen console.
And Sony, I'm gunning for you next.
*All quotes used here are courtesy of IGN.com. You can find there article here.
For starters, I was misinformed (as were most) as to the ever-watching electric eye of the Kinect 2. Microsoft has clarified by saying that "you are in charge of what Kinect can see and hear" and that when "you’re simply having a conversation in your living room, your conversation is not being recorded or uploaded". I'm inclined to believe them, being that they're a giant money-grubbing corporate whorebag that is releasing a cable box/DVR as a gaming console later this year.
I was also not detailed enough in my rant about Xbox One's online requirement. The console only requires that you have a connection once every 24 hours if it's you playing your own console. If you're playing on a separate console while accessing your own cloud-based library, it will require a connection ONCE EVERY SINGLE HOUR. But don't worry, this won't disrupt your viewing of Blu-ray discs or TV.
I also failed to mention Microsoft's stance on used and borrowed games. Originally, we were told that gamers could purchase used games and would then have to pay an "activation fee" in order to be able to play them. This too is false information. Microsoft came clean by saying: "We designed Xbox One so game publishers can enable you to trade in your games at participating retailers. Microsoft does not charge a platform fee to retailers, publishers, or consumers for enabling transfer of these games." They also clarified with this: "Third party publishers may opt in or out of supporting game resale and may set up business terms or transfer fees with retailers." The very same third-party publishers that have been scapegoating second-hand game sales for so many of their recent failures.
In closing, I would like to apologize to Microsoft, as well as my readership (assuming I have one), about my under-informed statements. Thank you, MS. Thank you for clarifying the absolute horror that is your next-gen console.
And Sony, I'm gunning for you next.
*All quotes used here are courtesy of IGN.com. You can find there article here.
Thursday, June 6, 2013
Rant: Next-Generation Garbage - Xbone and PS-Bore
This article was originally intended as a comparison between the released information on both the PS4 and Xbone, but honestly, after spending the better portion of a day thinking it over, I just couldn't bring myself to write a post about something I just don't give a fuck about. The Xbone and PS4 just don't interest me, and I think it's partially because I won't be able to afford either but mostly because they're just not needed. What does the next generation bring to the table that we're currently lacking, or would really benefit from? Jack-shit, but lets break it down.
Monday, June 3, 2013
Review: Bulletstorm - The Duke Nukem We Deserve
Back in 2011, between Gears of War sequels, Epic Games pulled a "Crackdown" on us. In collaboration with People Can Fly, they released Bulletstorm - a free game that came with a $60 invite to the Gears of War 3 multiplayer beta. Now I'm probably about to lose all my credit as a gamer and blogger when I say that I actually liked the Gears of War franchise. Chest-high-wall shooters were still relatively new and, lets face it, YOU HAD A FUCKING CHAINSAW ON YOUR GUN. So needless to say I didn't actually play a whole lot of Bulletstorm, just enough to know that Steve Blum voiced the main character and that was it.
However, the problem I have with the Spring season isn't the warm weather or the sunshine (though I'm none too fond of those either). The problem I have is that this is gaming's slow season and I need to find ways to keep myself occupied until the next big shitstorm of triple-A games hits the fan. So, with a vague memory and a song in my heart, I decided to revisit Bulletstorm.
Bulletstorm casts you into the role of Grayson Hunt, the very caricature of badass. Former-hit-squad-member-turned-alcoholic-space-pirate, Grayson's got more than just a chip on his shoulder, he's got a fucking brick house. You don't get a lot of history before crash-landing on some rusted-out overgrown tropical island resort, but that's a good thing because roughly 10 minutes into the game, story doesn't mean shit.
Bulletstorm is one hell of a linear shooter. The game grabs you by the shoulders, points you in a direction and says "go kill shit over there". It's pretty standard fare. In fact, I remember reading a post somewhere on the internet stating that the gaming market is so saturated with aim-down-the-sights shooters that even the shitty ones have solid mechanics. And they were right. Bulletstorm is FUCKING TERRIBLE. The story is practically non-existent, the whole game is point A to point B run-and-gun, the weapons lack inspiration, and don't even get me started on the dialogue. OH the dialogue. The one-dimensional characters use the word fuck like it's a comma, just about every "skillshot" is some tongue-in-cheek dick joke, and every cutscene is dedicated to our crew wanting, but trying very hard not to kill each other.
Anyways, the planet is populated by ferocious fucks bent on slaughtering anything that moves, be it from range, or with dual-axes to your face. So as you wander from decimated building to decimated building, you'll frequently encounter these reaper-esque bastards and have to paint the walls with their brains. One of the ways Bulletstorm tries to separate itself from the sci-fi shitter genre is by awarding you points for each kill, depending on how creative you get. These are called "skillshots" and as previously mentioned, most of them are dick jokes or other innuendos. Everything from the obvious "shove off a cliff" to the rather humorous "flare-gun-up-the-ass", gives you skill points. These points can then be spent at designated resupply points to purchase ammo and swap weapons. This is more or less useless, because you can go the whole game with just the assault rifle and collect ammo drops from nearly every baddie you kill. It is, however, really fun to watch them tuck and curl after you install a hot lead catheter. Oh, and then curbstomp them.
Over the course of the game you get outfitted with your fairly standard arsenal: assault rifle, sniper rifle, pistol, grenade launcher and shotgun. Woo fucking hoo. Bulletstorm tried to be different by giving you a "charge shot" for your weapons, which you had to purchase to unlock, and then purchase charges for. Fancy way of saying alt-fire. The dev's did manage, however, to produce a couple of nifty handheld carnage makers that weren't par for the course. I'm talking about the Flailgun and the Penetrator (teenage giggles go here). The Flailgun works like a sticky-nade launcher, but what's awesome is the Penetrator. Keep in mind, that this game was co-developed by People Can Fly, the very same people that brought you Painkiller and it's wondrous stake-launcher. The Penetrator fires FUCKING DRILL ROCKETS that pierce enemies and drag their carcass to the nearest wall. If you had fun with Painkiller's stake-launcher and Half-Life 2's crossbow, you'll have a fucking ball with this thing. The biggest bitch being that you only get the gun about an hour away from the game's ending. What kinda shit is that?
You also get outfitted with a grappling beam, which is used mostly for interacting with the environment, and less for dragging enemies towards you, since you'll probably forget its existence between required uses. However, the highlight of the game for me was the "return" of Duke's Mighty Boot. While neither Epic Games, nor People Can Fly have any ties to 3DRealms' notoriously awesome 90's FPS - Duke Nukem 3D - they have revived the time-honored tradition of melee attacks that involve taking a size 13, shining it up real nice, and sticking it straight into someone's teeth. Not only does your "Gravity Boot" send enemies flying into pointy and painful things (rebar, cacti, carnivorous plants), it also launches them in slo-mo so that, if inclined, one could empty a clip or two into the son of a bitch before he fries on those open wires. This is Bulletstorm's single most redeeming quality. Well, this and General Sarrano's first actual line: "Lick the tears off my dick, mudfuckers!"
All things considered, Bulletstorm is shit. It's a bad shooter with bad characters and a bad story. But at the end of the day, it was FUN. Kicking random faceless psychopaths into powerlines and skewering them with drill rockets was a good time for the whole family. It's vulgar sense of humor and ultra-violent, ultra-bloody executions, topped with it's foul-mouthed cast really reminded me of the days of Duke. When he was cool.
Duke Nukem Forever might have been the game we needed. Because after 14 years in development hell, we needed to know that it could be done. It could be finished. But in this reviewer's opinion, Bulletstorm was the Duke Nukem we deserved.
However, the problem I have with the Spring season isn't the warm weather or the sunshine (though I'm none too fond of those either). The problem I have is that this is gaming's slow season and I need to find ways to keep myself occupied until the next big shitstorm of triple-A games hits the fan. So, with a vague memory and a song in my heart, I decided to revisit Bulletstorm.
Bulletstorm casts you into the role of Grayson Hunt, the very caricature of badass. Former-hit-squad-member-turned-alcoholic-space-pirate, Grayson's got more than just a chip on his shoulder, he's got a fucking brick house. You don't get a lot of history before crash-landing on some rusted-out overgrown tropical island resort, but that's a good thing because roughly 10 minutes into the game, story doesn't mean shit.
Bulletstorm is one hell of a linear shooter. The game grabs you by the shoulders, points you in a direction and says "go kill shit over there". It's pretty standard fare. In fact, I remember reading a post somewhere on the internet stating that the gaming market is so saturated with aim-down-the-sights shooters that even the shitty ones have solid mechanics. And they were right. Bulletstorm is FUCKING TERRIBLE. The story is practically non-existent, the whole game is point A to point B run-and-gun, the weapons lack inspiration, and don't even get me started on the dialogue. OH the dialogue. The one-dimensional characters use the word fuck like it's a comma, just about every "skillshot" is some tongue-in-cheek dick joke, and every cutscene is dedicated to our crew wanting, but trying very hard not to kill each other.
Anyways, the planet is populated by ferocious fucks bent on slaughtering anything that moves, be it from range, or with dual-axes to your face. So as you wander from decimated building to decimated building, you'll frequently encounter these reaper-esque bastards and have to paint the walls with their brains. One of the ways Bulletstorm tries to separate itself from the sci-fi shitter genre is by awarding you points for each kill, depending on how creative you get. These are called "skillshots" and as previously mentioned, most of them are dick jokes or other innuendos. Everything from the obvious "shove off a cliff" to the rather humorous "flare-gun-up-the-ass", gives you skill points. These points can then be spent at designated resupply points to purchase ammo and swap weapons. This is more or less useless, because you can go the whole game with just the assault rifle and collect ammo drops from nearly every baddie you kill. It is, however, really fun to watch them tuck and curl after you install a hot lead catheter. Oh, and then curbstomp them.
Over the course of the game you get outfitted with your fairly standard arsenal: assault rifle, sniper rifle, pistol, grenade launcher and shotgun. Woo fucking hoo. Bulletstorm tried to be different by giving you a "charge shot" for your weapons, which you had to purchase to unlock, and then purchase charges for. Fancy way of saying alt-fire. The dev's did manage, however, to produce a couple of nifty handheld carnage makers that weren't par for the course. I'm talking about the Flailgun and the Penetrator (teenage giggles go here). The Flailgun works like a sticky-nade launcher, but what's awesome is the Penetrator. Keep in mind, that this game was co-developed by People Can Fly, the very same people that brought you Painkiller and it's wondrous stake-launcher. The Penetrator fires FUCKING DRILL ROCKETS that pierce enemies and drag their carcass to the nearest wall. If you had fun with Painkiller's stake-launcher and Half-Life 2's crossbow, you'll have a fucking ball with this thing. The biggest bitch being that you only get the gun about an hour away from the game's ending. What kinda shit is that?
You also get outfitted with a grappling beam, which is used mostly for interacting with the environment, and less for dragging enemies towards you, since you'll probably forget its existence between required uses. However, the highlight of the game for me was the "return" of Duke's Mighty Boot. While neither Epic Games, nor People Can Fly have any ties to 3DRealms' notoriously awesome 90's FPS - Duke Nukem 3D - they have revived the time-honored tradition of melee attacks that involve taking a size 13, shining it up real nice, and sticking it straight into someone's teeth. Not only does your "Gravity Boot" send enemies flying into pointy and painful things (rebar, cacti, carnivorous plants), it also launches them in slo-mo so that, if inclined, one could empty a clip or two into the son of a bitch before he fries on those open wires. This is Bulletstorm's single most redeeming quality. Well, this and General Sarrano's first actual line: "Lick the tears off my dick, mudfuckers!"
All things considered, Bulletstorm is shit. It's a bad shooter with bad characters and a bad story. But at the end of the day, it was FUN. Kicking random faceless psychopaths into powerlines and skewering them with drill rockets was a good time for the whole family. It's vulgar sense of humor and ultra-violent, ultra-bloody executions, topped with it's foul-mouthed cast really reminded me of the days of Duke. When he was cool.
Duke Nukem Forever might have been the game we needed. Because after 14 years in development hell, we needed to know that it could be done. It could be finished. But in this reviewer's opinion, Bulletstorm was the Duke Nukem we deserved.
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