Plucky Pixels

New trailer for Mad World

noreply@blogger.com (Rayna) — Mon, 06 Oct 2008 14:25:00 +0000

I love Platinum Games and when I first heard about this game I was really interested in seeing how they'd do the black and white graphics. And in this new trailer, wow! It looks fabulous! And ultra-violent too:) I can't wait to get my paws on it...

Flexibility is part of the job

noreply@blogger.com (Rayna) — Mon, 29 Sep 2008 12:36:00 +0000

That's one thing you can say about working in the video game industry, things never get stale.

For one, projects have a fairly short lifecycle. Production might last 6 months and is rarely more than 3 years. Starting a new project is like starting a new job, it keeps things fresh. One thing people often state that they enjoy about it is that things never get dull because they're in a constant state of flux.

Well, my project just fluxed. We've been put on hold. That used to be the kiss of death around here. On hold was a kind way of saying cancelled, but recently a bunch of those projects have been resurrected, so there's hope yet. We know that our product is a good on, it's fun and has good potential to be profitable.

Like a bad breakup, we were told it's not you, it's us. There were significant licensing issues from Day 1 and just 3 days before beta they decided that we need to put everything on hold until those licensing issues are finally resolved. It's not unexpected, I've been waiting for them to say that since we learnt about that speedbump.

Regardless, I've been assigned to another existing project, one that had also been resurrected after being put on hold. It's a fun Wii project that takes me outside of my comfort zone. This pony is going to have learn a whole boat-load of new tricks. Here's hoping I can keep up with the demands!

Force Unleashed: Dev Team were the Jedis, Managers took the project to the Dark Side

noreply@blogger.com (Rayna) — Fri, 26 Sep 2008 12:16:00 +0000

Dammit. I wanted to like it. Just another major release to add to the pile of disappointments this year.

The gameplay is still fun, don't get me wrong. Slicing through crowds of stormtroopers, throwing Wookies off cliffs, exploding TIE fighters, that's all pretty awesome and it'd take a whole lot of awfulness to make that kinda stuff NOT fun. You start the game feeling powerful. You don't feel crippled or weak. It'd be pretty hard to feel like you're a badass if you didn't start out with at least a few cool powers. The designers and artists and programmers did a fantastic job with this game.

The ones who fucked it up and made it disappointing are the people who decided it'd be a smart idea to let all those talented people go before they could finish up the project. There are just some absolutely BAFFLING bugs left in the game! The most obvious one I saw was a major FX bug in the very first opening level, where this gorgeous vista off a cliff, where you see destroyers and TIE fighters battling and exploding in the distance, is marred by the smoke FX being large blue squares in the sky. It's ugly and obvious and it's likely very easy to fix. There are no excuses for leaving something like that in a finished game.

And that's saying nothing about the floating characters, clipping and other issues I've seen, nevermind some of the game-ending bugs I've heard about elsewhere.

That's exactly why you need to keep a team around, to give a game polish, to make it look like it was a loved and cherished project. This could have been a great game if they'd had a chance to apply those little finesses. But as it stands, it's certainly not up to level of quality that most people would expect from a powerhouse like LucasArts.

I do have to say, one of the things I love most about working in the industry is working with tons of other passionate gamers. Lots more trading opportunities! I traded my copy of No More Heroes for my Lead Artist's copy of The Force Unleashed. I'm so happy I didn't have to shell out $60 for this game. The gameplay is fun and all, but I really don't want to support a company that treats its employees like that only to release a half-finished product.

Sims, a game most popular with teen girls, is made into a movie for teen boys

noreply@blogger.com (Rayna) — Mon, 22 Sep 2008 18:51:00 +0000

Sorry, I keep forgetting, girls aren't supposed to be interested in video games right? I mean, that's why Hollywood is taking the world's best selling IP and are making it into yet another teenage boy movie. It's not like they actually looked at the marketing numbers behind the game that shows that the majority of players are female, most of those being teenaged girls. I mean, it's a video game, girls would never want to see movie made out of an icky video game!

[via Level Up]

Castle Crashers soundtrack for free!

noreply@blogger.com (Rayna) — Wed, 17 Sep 2008 13:01:00 +0000

When I was talking about the Castle Crashers game the other day, did I mention the music? I should have mentioned the music because it's completely awesome! In any case, you can download all the tracks for free from the Newgrounds site! The music is just as fun and quirky as the game, they did a really great job making use of the user-generated content on their, perfect use of the creative commons licence!

Deciding your fate before you even start playing Fable 2

noreply@blogger.com (Rayna) — Tue, 16 Sep 2008 14:35:00 +0000

This is interesting...

Molyneux claims that the Pub Games "hack" was intentional and that people who exploited it will see the effects when they play the game. I love that idea! What a great concept:)

Castle Crashers = t3h awesome

noreply@blogger.com (Rayna) — Mon, 15 Sep 2008 12:59:00 +0000

I know I've been hating on a lot of games lately. There have a been a bunch of highly hyped games released recently and it's rare that anything ever lives up to the hype (maybe games marketing people need to let the game speak for itself a bit, and auteur game designers need to spend more time designing and less time presenting keynotes at conferences). But there is one game that's had a lot of buzz lately that really needs a lot more attention...

Castle Crashers is everything that a hack-and-slash game oughta be. It's fun! You get crazy weapons! There's tons of enemies! It's fast-paced! Neat puzzles and weird stages are thrown in to break things up. And it's fun!

The graphics seem to be one of the turn off for people, unfortunately. They see the cartoon-y style and dismiss it as some kiddy or girly game. The style is adorable, sure, but it's also insanely wacky the deeper into the game you get.

It's not all cutesy! There are deers shitting themselves so much they zoom across the screen! There are gigantic weird cat type things that take up the whole screen and shoot laser beams at you with their eyes! LASER BEAMS!!!!

It's more than the cute graphics though, it's the level of polish in the game, it's the details that are there. It's the hidden word on the main map screen, the picture in the castle of the big bad boss holding up a prize-winning fish, it's aliens dropping the top on the pyramid in the background of the desert, it's the dev team in stasis on an alien ship.

As for the combat, it's easy and gratifying. You can play any character any way you want, focusing on strength, agility, magic or defence. There are weapons to collect that add to those stats. And better yet, some take away from other stats, so choosing a weapon isn't just choosing between good and good, it's deciding the way you're going to cripple yourself too. It's really tough to play well-rounded. You get weapons like sticks, axes, swords, maces and light sabres. Oh yes, you can be a castle crashing badass defeating aliens and laser beam-eyed cats with a LIGHT SABRE!

The main reason why you can specialize in certain things while crippling yourself in others is because this is primarily a co-op game. Local or online you can play up to 4 people. And that's so awesome! If one of your comrades falls in battle, you can revive him. You can juggle beasts back and forth. And then, you all turn against in each other when it comes time to vie for the affection of the princesses.

One of the other cute features is the animal orb you get as a companion. You can switch between them throughout the game as you collect them, each one with a special ability like finding food, finding loot, hurting enemies, etc. Some are easy to find, but others you have to search for...

It's addictive and silly and rewarding and oh so much fun! Especially on a market where great co-op games are few and far between.

In other words, Castle Crashers is everything that Too Human should have been. And they didn't need 10 years to achieve better quality and more fun for those 10 hours of gameplay.

Akoha - Making the world a better place through games

noreply@blogger.com (Rayna) — Thu, 11 Sep 2008 13:08:00 +0000

Ok, so they've officially launched, so I can freely blog about the awesome project that Akoha have been working on so hard for so long.

I went to their pre-launch party a few weeks back, thanks to my buddy Simon who's been working away on the project forever. The party was a blast, but what I find even more exciting is their idea.

You've all seen the movie Pay It Forward, right? Well, this is a game where you play it forward, where you can make a difference in the world just by playing. You take on missions online that need to be completed in the real world. Missions include things like, making someone smile, inviting someone out for coffee, donating an hour of your time.

Those of us at the party received packs of cards with missions on them. Each card has an individual ID on it, so when we complete a mission, we give that card to the person who helped us achieve it so that they can go on the site and confirm that we did it.

The best part is that *they* now have the mission in their possession, so they can pass along the good deed to someone else. You can track the history of a mission on the site just to see how many people have been affected by that one good deed you did.

They were offering free starter packs to the first 50 people who requested them, so what are you waiting for? Learn more about how to play now!

Congrats on the launch at TechCrunch50! And good luck with winning Best in Show!

News RSS feed - see what I'm reading

noreply@blogger.com (Rayna) — Wed, 10 Sep 2008 12:40:00 +0000

I may not post every day, but I follow a ridiculous amount of feeds everyday. If you want to see what I think are the top stories of the day, you can check out my Google Reader page or subscribe to the feed for it. I include the top gaming news stories along with a few really random and weird tidbits:)

Spore: Life is unbalanced

noreply@blogger.com (Rayna) — Mon, 08 Sep 2008 12:19:00 +0000

I spent yesterday playing Spore. I've been waiting for this game for so long! It had all the makings of a masterpiece! All this year with games I've had such high expectations. And nearly every time I've been completely let down. I was really hoping Spore would break that streak. Unfortunately in continued it in spades.

The game, overall, is still pretty fun. You can create, destroy and mold all kinds of creatures and civilizations. Each individual part is fun in its own way. As a whole, though, the quality of the pieces seems to vary.

The first 4 stages can each be played in under an hour (according to the achievements), most will probably take 2 if you want to spend more time exploring and less time chasing goals. And it's nice to have that flexibility. However, the goals are always present and in-your-face, which makes it a whole lot less of a sim game, which are generally defined by the sandbox nature of them games.

While I can understand that different play modes will need different controls, it really seemed as though they weren't as consistent as they should have been throughout the levels. I found myself often trying to use some controls from a previous level and screwing up my pov. That kind of thing just shouldn't happen.

Maybe it's because I'm a civ-geek, but the civ mode of Spore seemed really weak. There was so little you could do. You collect spice, build any of 3 building types (houses, entertainment or industry), one unit each for land, sea and air...and that's it. It's really hard to fuck it up which means there's no challenge. There isn't even any fog of war. Really, it seems like a stop-gap while you're trying to get to space.

As for space, yikes. Talk about unbalanced! Some how, your civ only manages to build a single space craft! You have no fleet, no support, nothing. It's YOU against the rest of the galaxy! This means you're running fetch quests, kill quests, trading spice, trying to take over other worlds all while defending your home planet from the hungry hordes.

And your home planet is the most useless piece of crap out there. Really, it's a wonder that you were able to make to space at all! Every time you leave the solar system, they get attacked. And they have ZERO home defences, regardless of whether you were a peace or warmongering people. You, and your one lonely ship, is all that could save them from this fleet of a dozen heavily armed invading space crafts.

I was playing through the first round on easy just to see what everything was like. And if you have one, much less two, war-like civs near you, forget about playing unless you wipe them out immediately. Otherwise, your helpless little home planet will be calling on their saviour every 5 minutes.

I got so frustrated at this level that I had a rage-quit after a few hours. Really, it shouldn't be that difficult. I had it on the easy settings, all the other stages had been appropriately easy. Why were they making it so damned frustrating? I checked online to see what the forums were saying in the first 24 hours. And it turns out I wasn't alone in my frustration. Many players had the exact same issue. One ship against an entire galaxy is unthinkable. How could this have made it through play-testing?

I'll probably end up playing through several times, playing different types of critters. But I think my game will end happily when we build that first one spaceship. We don't need an epilogue for that story.

Working in the video game industry rawks

noreply@blogger.com (Rayna) — Fri, 29 Aug 2008 17:25:00 +0000

Yesterday, I felt like a rockstar! It was totally one of those days where working in this industry seems like one of the coolest things ever.

I spent the afternoon at the recording studio where they were recording the voice for the main character in my game. So much fun! I was happy to be there because I was able to ensure that he got the lines sounding like exactly what I was hearing in my head when I wrote them. The studio was tres cool, with leather couches and free food and drinks. Totally felt like a rockstar in that dim studio.

Then I went and partied like a rockstar with a rockstar at the private launch for Akoha's upcoming game. It's a really great concept that certainly captured my interest when it was first explained to me a few months ago. It was great to be there the event! I'm going to start playing it, waiting for them to do their public launch so that I can actually talk about what the game is all about, because it's something that everyone should hear about:)

Also, along with the open bar, they had David Usher! And the dormant 90s alt rock chick in me was all a-flutter! I went to his concerts way back when I was in university, possibly even high school. And there I was, less than 4 feet away from him. Such a fangirl moment!

All in all, a pretty awesome day!

Playing with The Force is AWESOME!

noreply@blogger.com (Rayna) — Tue, 26 Aug 2008 20:22:00 +0000

What do you mean you haven't tried The Force Unleashed demo yet? I was full of all kinds of squee when I gave it a shot this past weekend. I can't wait to play the actual game! Throwing things out of windows just to watch the decompression was one of my favourite things, along with spinning Stormtroopers in the air and slicing droids in half and taking on an AT-ST and.... and... it's just way to much fun!

Play on Xbox live with me?

noreply@blogger.com (Rayna) — Fri, 22 Aug 2008 12:15:00 +0000

Hey! I forgot to mention that I finally upgraded my Xbox account to gold recently, though it may have been implied by my ranting about Too Human's co-op play.

In any case, if you're interested in hooking up online to play some Too Human, Bad Company or any other multiplayer game, feel free to add NilPixelCount!

Review: Too Human

noreply@blogger.com (Rayna) — Thu, 21 Aug 2008 14:35:00 +0000

Pretty shit is still shit.

The game looks great! You can see that the art has been worked on and refined for these many years that the game has been in production. They've had time to craft beautiful unique worlds full of nord-punk scenery with ice and machines beautifully melded.

The drawn out process that Too Human has gone through also shows in game mechanics, but not in a good way. Oh the feature creep! You can see how concepts grew and spawned and mutated, until they had to perform a massive feature-ectomy too near the end. What's left is half-there, half-done, a frankenstein of a game. There are some great ideas in there, but they just aren't fully realized. And because of that, many of the issues are just unforgivable.

The biggest issue for me is the co-op play. That's the whole reason we bought the game, so that me and my finacé could play co-op together. Here's one of the first places you can see the effects of last-minute chopping. It was supposed to be up to 4-players and there was supposed to be local co-op. With everyone on the same screen, you don't need a way to track the location of the other players, they're right there with you. But when you have to play online and you're running around these immense spaces fit for gods and the characters are all darkly dressed so that they blend into the forbidding shadows, it's really easy to lose track of someone. No minimap, no locator, unforgivable.

The other problem we had with co-op, is no story. Being able to skip story elements when you're just blazing through a section for the billionth time, fine. But not even allowing players the OPTION of playing through with the story, unforgivable. We started straight out playing co-op, no tutorials were offered, no hints as to why were running from room to room. No guidance as to what our goal was. It's nice to have goals. Loot is great and all, but goals give a player a sense of accomplishment. There's none of that with the co-op mode. It's nothing but a grindfest for loot and that's annoying for players who may want to have goal markers along the way to the finish line. Unforgivable.

It wouldn't be so bad grinding through if there were at least different enemies. Too Human has 4. Four fucking enemies in the entire game. Those four are beautifully done, don't get me wrong, with each part capable of taking damage and crippling the monster in a different way. But 4 enemies? How many years has this game been in production? It's repetitive. Once you figure out how to defeat one type, you know how to beat a quarter of the game! Part of the fun of being a gamer is being able to suss out the patterns. You get that thrill all of 4 times. Unforgivable.

And the worst offence of all is the camera. Every other review has already covered that much. It works against you and is utterly uncontrollable. Maybe there are 5 enemies in the game, if I could just figure out how to kill the fucking cameraman I'd be happy. Mapping the right stick to fighting so that moves can be about style instead of button mashing is an interesting idea. But if you're going to take away camera control, you'd better fucking be able to step up with some great cameras of your own. Unforgivable.

Along with cameras is the invisible wall category. Good lord! Those collisions are so poorly set. It's like someone did the collisions and then they made all the models 10% bigger or smaller. WTF? Forgivable, but it's just another little thing that adds to the big things.

As for cyberspace which some people detest, I find it more of an annoyance. The puzzles are lame and are more time consuming to get in and out than to "solve" the problems themselves. It's worst crime is that it breaks the flow. Yet again another feature creep that was obviously cut back to the point of impotence. Forgivable, but shoulda been cut altogether.

Another area where the cuts showed were in the classes. My fiancé played the Cybernetic Bioengineer, which is basically crippled. He needs combo points to heal, which means getting in the thick of things, except he's more of a ranged character. The two just don't work together! My Human Beserker was lots of fun, focusing on crazy combos. This meant that I had already destroy any low-end melee enemies by the time he was on the battlefield. Forgivable, but after this long the classes should be completely balanced.

The menus suck because once again they went for style over function. Pretty and unique, sure. But they take forever to load and exit, and those 5 seconds can feel like an eternity when you're trying to play a fast-paced game. Forgivable, but some things are standardized for a reason, to reduce user frustration.

As irate as I am about these things, there are some things that make the game good. The graphics are stunning (if a but buggy at times), the style-over-force rewards are good, lots of loot is fun. Juggling is ok, but it's more the combos I enjoyed. Zipping around the screen just destroying every enemy in a matter of minutes is pretty gleeful. Lots of loot is good, but it does break the flow since after nearly every battle you're ready to upgrade at least one thing.

They cut out a lot from the game and fans cried out when that news hit the intertubes. But I would say they didn't go far enough. The lack of focus leaves the game loose and full of holes instead of a tightly-packed gaming experience. Instead of trying to be everything to everyone, it should have focused on getting one thing perfectly right.

We will keep playing for a while. I just really hate that I'm forced to play through solo just to hear the fabulous story that Mr. Dydack has been pimping out. So many of these things could have been easily forgivable. But with the amount of time they've had to perfect the game, like everyone, I was expecting something far more polished and Too Human just didn't deliver.

New Heavy Rain trailer!!

noreply@blogger.com (Rayna) — Wed, 20 Aug 2008 17:22:00 +0000

Yay! Finally, footage from Heavy Rain that isn't a tech demo!

[via videogaming247]

How did people communicate with artists before Youtube?

noreply@blogger.com (Rayna) — Tue, 12 Aug 2008 12:38:00 +0000

I think that Youtube is the tool I use most at work. It really helps to cut down on communication problems! My background is in journalism, I'm used to writing things out. But even then, to nail a great description to get out the picture exactly as you see it in your head, it takes revision and editing.

As a designer, if I just want to explain quickly to someone what the picture is in my head on how I think something should be, Youtube is my go-to guy. Sure I can sketch something out, but stick figures don't really get me very far, especially if I'm trying to describe something in motion.

Plus artists are very visual people, showing them something as a reference works way better than trying to describe in non-technical terms what I want something to do (I want this whoosh-like thing to come down diagonally from that far corner over there and then fill the screen with a flash of white like blam and then have that cheesy transition that went do-de-do that they had in that show, you know the one, and then have the thing over there kinda twist up...) (oh yes, I'm awful for describing visuals using sound effects).

It's also great when working with international teams. Often, the native languages aren't the same so you're already working within a limited vocabulary. Plus so much of the way we describe things are related to things we're familiar with so the cultural references just don't add up. With video, the majority of the context and visuals are embedded right there.

Really, Youtube saves us all kinds of misunderstandings. I can't imagine how much longer production would take if I actually had to explain things!

Watchmen - Can it succeed?

noreply@blogger.com (Rayna) — Fri, 08 Aug 2008 12:33:00 +0000

I saw the trailer for Watchmen and was blown away. It's a fantastic piece of cinema! Great music, great visuals, perfectly synced, emotionally evocative. Plus I'm a sucker for comic book movies and as much as Alan Moore may not like the way they visualize his comics, I still really enjoy them.

But last night I finished reading Watchmen and I'm a whole lot more hesitant about the movie now. The trailer is so powerful, colourful and moving. But the comic is low on action, high on philosophy and just leaves you feeling slimey and uncomfortable. I don't think that the trailer really reflects the sentiment in the comics. And given the lack of action in the comic, I don't think it'll really translate well into a comic book movie, certainly not the type that we've become accustomed to seeing.

I'll still go see the movie of course, but I think my expectations are going to be a bit more realistic now. What's been the make-or-break thing for Alan Moore movies seems to be the casting. I mean, Hugo Weaving was just brilliant in V for Vendetta. None of the Watchmen cast are huge blockbuster names (thank goodness, when you see some of the previous names attached to the project, like Kevin Costner). But I can ABSOLUTELY see Matt Frewer as Moloch, he's one of my favourite character actors! It's really such a shame that Terry Gilliam didn't get to do it his way.

But as for the upcoming episodic game, I hope it will be based on the comic and not the movie. Because it could be pretty awesome! Everything that could make it a bad movie could make it an incredible game.

Porn-star-turned-producer uses her assets to sell theirs

noreply@blogger.com (Rayna) — Fri, 01 Aug 2008 12:37:00 +0000

When they announced that a porn star was going to be a "special producer" for Saints Row, I was wondering if they'd be using her mind or her body. But really, was there any doubt? I'm just happy that they aren't having any pretences about why she was hired onto the project. In my mind, it'd be worse to hire her and then try to treat her like a serious game dev, rather than have her use her special talents outright to shill the game.

How to be a better gamer

noreply@blogger.com (Rayna) — Thu, 31 Jul 2008 18:27:00 +0000

Ars Technica has a great article up on Being a better gamer. And they don't mean higher scores, faster run throughs, more kills. They mean how gamers can give back to the community. Personally, I participated in my local Child's Play drive last year and hopefully the more people who hear about these opportunities, the more people we'll be able to help out!

Top 10 Most Ridiculous Undergarments Worn by Women in Video Games

noreply@blogger.com (Rayna) — Mon, 28 Jul 2008 16:58:00 +0000

Wow, this top 10 list was just too good to share!.

WoW: After one month

noreply@blogger.com (Rayna) — Mon, 21 Jul 2008 12:19:00 +0000

So my first post wasn't all that favourable of a review of WoW. That was after playing for about 10 hours. I've now put in a month of time so I can now speak of it a bit more knowledgeably.

Not that I'll necessarily speak more favourably, though. I still think that the start of the game is designed to be discouraging rather than motivating. Starting up a new character must suck, especially if you've done all those same quests previously and know the areas like the back of your hand. What's the incentive to start a new character?

Well, obviously Blizzard has been asking that question themselves because just this week they dropped the level requirement from 40 down to 30 and cut the cost for purchasing mounts (which increase your speed by 60%) in half. With all the new competition out there from Age of Conan and the upcoming Warhammer game, they really need a way to get players to want to keep playing and trying new things, which means creating new characters.

MMOs are great for their open-worlds, yes, but it also means that enemy density is much lower, so you have to travel much further between places to find the enemies (or cripple creatures by them not recognizing that their comrade 10' away has fallen in battle). This was especially noticeable given that the last game we played together had been Diablo 2. WoW isn't quite the action-packed game that Diablo is.

The travel has been the most frustrating part of playing. Thankfully, I chose to be a Druid which first gets a Cat-form (which goes a bit faster than normal) and then a Travel-form (which goes even faster than that). So while travelling back and forth has been irritating, I've been at least better off than some. And when we got the news that we could get mounts (we were already level 38), we jumped at the chance.

We don't play it constantly or consistently. There's just so much other stuff going on that's far more interesting, plus tons of NEW games to play and try out! I just can't see how anyone could be fanatical about it, playing it endlessly, the same thing, over and over again.

That said, I have added another month of paid time on. It's something decent to fill in that co-op gaming gap right now. Plus, like my partner says, it's like a casual game. It's mindless and easy, but can have an intensity at times too. It's methodical and routine, so you can get into a groove.

Too Human Demo : Might Have Potential

noreply@blogger.com (Rayna) — Thu, 17 Jul 2008 12:51:00 +0000

Like I mentioned in the last post, the E3 2007 trailer for Too Human got me all hot and bothered. It was an awesome cinematic with humour and story to it. It was engaging and impressive.

Since then, I've been following the news of the game as its been developed. There's been all sorts of hubbub, from no local multiplayer to Denis Dyack challenging players to some preview players complaining about the length of the main story. I've been nervous, of course. Me and my bf have been anxiously awaiting a decent multiplayer experience.

It is a pretty big piss off that because we want to play it together, not only do we need to buy 2 copies of the game, but we also need to pay for gold accounts AND buy a second xbox. Why is it that they only want us to be able to play with strangers? Just so that they can make that extra $500 off of players? That alone leaves a bad taste in my mouth.

As for the demo itself. I dunno. I can see that it could be ok, but I don't know that it's worth the $500 investment just so that we can play a co-op game together.

The first big issue for me is the controls. There's a fairly standard control scheme out there that most players are used to, LS for movement, RS for camera, A/B to attack. I can't think of any other game that uses the RS for attacking! It's really frustrating at times to be moving around, trying to fix your camera (which can be awful at times) and all of a sudden your character breaks out into a swirly little flourish of moves. Controls are standardized for a reason! I can understand you might want to differentiate your game or make things work in a way that's better according to you, but it fucks over every gamer that's playing on instinct based on a control scheme that's used in every other game. Deviating too much from the standard just results in the player swearing at the TV (and I speak from experience).

The other issue I found was targeting. LB targets, so for juggling, which seems to be the "cool" thing they're pushing now, you need to use your guns, which are both the LT and RT. And that's just completely awkward! Targeting also blew donkey balls when it came to incoming missiles. Because I can't fucking look around with the camera, I can't target the missiles specifically. At least not in any way I could figure out, unless I was far far away from all other enemies. There was no way to ignore close targets to deal with the much more immediate and devastating threat of the missiles.

The characters themselves miss the uncanny valley, which is nice. I especially like their eyes and the way that their focus darts around and changes frequently. However their walking motions seem slightly awkward. Can't pinpoint way though. However they move very smoothly in battle. And I do like the gliding moves as they zip from one target to the next (though interestingly my bf disliked that particular part). It was easy to engage in epic battles and kill things without much effort, just swirling the RS around. I was disappointed in no button-mashing though. But the RS does make for an easier motion. I dunno, I think I would have preferred camera control, since the current cameras suck pretty badly.

The story looks like it could be ok. The voice acting is passable and doesn't detract too much form the game (Lost Odyssey was HORRIBLE for that). I'm not sure but I thin I recognize one of the voices from somewhere, but I can't find a list of the credits for the game yet.

I'm still torn on it. It could be fun, but I really wanted a co-op experience. And I don't know if the fun I'd get out of it would be worth the huge investment we'd need to make. We'll get one copy in any case. Maybe we'll wait for it to hit the used games racks before buying the second.

E3 2008 reports are boring so far

noreply@blogger.com (Rayna) — Tue, 15 Jul 2008 21:19:00 +0000

I've been watching the news feeds as E3 goes into its second day and so far I'm rather underwhelmed. Nothing very surprising has happened, most has been speculated for months now. And as for the trailers, nothing has wowed me like Too Human did last year.

The only ones that were neat so far are Ghostbusters, which contained more movie clips that game footage, and Fallout 3, which had some fun Bloody Mess in-game action.

Hopefully there'll still be something fabulous coming down the line...

Wii Fit!!

noreply@blogger.com (Rayna) — Sat, 12 Jul 2008 17:09:00 +0000

We started out today by going for breakfast and I came home with a Wii Fit! *squee* And yesterday I won 2 free tickets to see any Fantasia show I want, now I just have to decide which one. This is starting out to be a great weekend!

Playing easy, working hard: Making games difficult is fun

noreply@blogger.com (Rayna) — Fri, 11 Jul 2008 14:19:00 +0000

[This is my July entry to Corvus' Blogs of the Round Table. This month's topic is Hurts So Good, where we look at Difficulty in Games, why we sometimes set these games aside permanently, sometimes we forge ahead.]

The difficulty level in a game is inversely proportionate to the amount I enjoy it. I don't play games for the challenge. I play for distraction, for relaxation and for entertainment. I do NOT play games to take on something akin to having a second job. I don't want any additional frustrations in my life, I play games in order to escape from my problems.

When I started gaming, I didn't really care about getting to the end or winning. Heck, most games back in those days were designed to be unbeatable! The furthest I got in Mario was as far as the secret warps would take me. I couldn't actually play it through with any degree of skill. I didn't really have any desire to do so either because I didn't know of any winnable games.

Then with our first PC, adventure games burst into my life. I still love the genre to death! Even now, Day of the Tentacle leaves a lasting impression on me and Grim Fandango is currently installed on my PC. But to actually play them to completion? Ha! Playing DotT is how I discovered this amazing new thing called a walkthrough that I downloaded from a BBS. (You do what with the wet noodles?)

These days, I can't imagine making my way through most games without one! At the slightest frustration, like not knowing which gym to hit next in Pokemon, forgetting how to blow out candles in Zelda, not figuring out you can hit the gimps back in No More Heroes, I can check quickly online and then get back to my relaxing pastime. Even for games like Bioshock, I'll set everything on the easiest setting so I can blow through it, enjoying the story and having fun blowing shit away.

The funny part is that now I AM a game designer. I get to have my say in how these things are made. Currently, I work mostly on casual games, so games that are right up my alley. Games that are fun, distracting and easy. And yet frequently the feedback I'm getting about my games is that I'm making them too punishing and too hard! I've been amused to hear this, given my stance. But it's frustrating. I'm trying to figure out why this is, why I want to make games that are more difficult than the kind that I personally enjoy.

Maybe I feel like I should enjoy the challenge more. There are a lot of gamers out there who play for the challenge, especially the old school hardcore gamers. I'm certainly old school, but my title as hardcore would depend on your definition of that term. So because I don't like being overly challenged in games, I don't feel like I fit into that crowd sometimes. And maybe by trying to make games that are outside my comfort level, I'm fixing my targets on the type of gamer I *think* I should be.

Or am I trying to assuage guilt over having more fun with simple repetitive tasks rather than solving intricate puzzles? Most casual games these days have a "zen" setting, where you can just immerse yourself into the gameplay without thinking at all about challenges. But really, as a designer, I think that might something rather boring to make. Balancing difficulty and creating variations is part of the fun of design!

I think that's the really the reason why there's a difference between what I like to play and what I like to make. I find certain types of games more fun to play because of the stories, the characters or the flow. However, designing games provides me with a different kind of fun, balancing difficulty, coming up with variations and that schadenfreude feeling from messing with the players. I think it's ok to enjoy making different kinds of games so long as you're willing to familiarize yourself with the type of game you want to make.

I guess that means I oughta start playing more punishing games, dammit. Stupid revelations, ruining my fun!

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