Rant - Wet Demo

So the first game on my holiday wish list is released today and I’m considering actually buying it later on in an incidental trip to the city. The demo was tossed to us silver-membership peasants a few weeks ago and I have to admit I couldn’t wipe the smile off my face from start to finish. Wet is shameless, whizz-bang shooty fun, beautifully stylised and appeals to my belief that realism is boring and best enjoyed by boring people. I will say it has probably shown off all the tricks in its hat, which is only a worry because the demo's maybe ten to fifteen minutes long.

Aforementioned shooty fun is intensely satisfying and intuitively controlled. Seems every third person game nowadays needs a slow-motion mechanic but Wet handles it quite well. There’s no limit and it turns off when not used. Remember games like Max Payne or Enter the Matrix when you’d find yourself starting a dramatic slow-mo dive before figuring out that was probably a bit of overkill, but you’d still have to watch yourself complete the motion all the while your focus or whatever metre is running dry? Wet doesn’t have that problem, if you’re not shooting things it returns to normal speed to wonder why you aren’t shooting things.

I have a strong suspicion (now confirmed by reading reviews) that the full version is going to include an upgrade system. Doesn’t really make sense to me, I mean are we playing a hardcore gun-fighter who knows all the tricks or some rookie who’s figuring it out as she goes along? Oh well, I suppose that makes the combo system relevant beyond ego satisfaction.

The camera is a bit too busy giving you a grind house filter to actually be useful, but smart enough to give the player control via the right analogue stick. It’ll still freak out when you try to backtrack quickly, which can make the acrobatic sections frustrating.

The game play mixes up here and there. There's vehicle section which makes Newton’s laws of motion cry. It’s also loaded with quick-time events although it makes them a core part of game-play so it’s hard to complain. They’re relative to the action that’s actually on screens, so if you think Rubi aught to jump chances are you press the jump button unless she thinks her sword is a better idea. Incidentally there’s a mash the button to open locked doors element, but nobody complained when Arkham Asylum did this. Other sections like the arena battle seem like the game’s staying “No. This isn’t realistic. You’re playing a game, remember?” but the absolute standout section is the Bloodlust/Berzerk/Rage (yeah I’m not sure what it’s called) section in which everything turns stock black, white and red. Your pistols magically transform into uzis but what the fuck right? It looks and feels so cool that my brain shuts down and becomes incapable of enough intelligent thought to criticise it.

All complaints registered, I guess I’m just one of those wanky gamers who can enjoy a clearly flawed game entirely for its art direction (see also the most recent Prince of Persia and Fable 2). I’ve been looking for a good no brainer, cathartic violence game for a while now, pretty much since God of War got a tad old and retailers are still asking to much for Devil May Cry. So until Shoot Em’ Up is adapted for button mashing, this’ll do. This’ll do nicely.

Short Rant - Halo Wars

So I just picked up my new Xbox 360 and everything works the way it should (touches wood). It was $11 cheaper to buy it with Halo Wars, which trades in for about $85 if I bring it back before Wednesday. I haven’t been into Real Time Strategy games since Warcraft III and I'm not a fan of Halo, but I was intrigued enough by an RTS designed specifically for console controls to not trade it in straight away.

After trying out the first few levels last night, I plan to trade Halo Wars in today. It has the same main problem that I've had with most RTSs in that I spent most of the game just watching numbers get bigger. The action system isn't worth much, most battles can be won just by selecting all your troops and clicking on the opposite side of the map. The cutscenes are beautifully rendered, but a little perplexing in that they mostly involve watching ground level gunfights. Basically serving to show the player what they'd probably rather be doing.

The building system is inventive enough and disproved my theory that RTS games haven't changed at all since their conception. Resources are handled automatically by structures, so you don't have peons or SCVs or Tiberium Harvesters to shake your impatient power of god fist at but it's still fucking boring.

I suppose if you're into RTSs this is an imaginative take on the genre and not just copy pasted from a much more functional PC version. Me, I'm going to see if any of the city EB stores have Left 4 Dead.

Fallout 3 Pre-Release Thoughts

I'm still alive. I just fell under a sizable pile of uni work for a while there. This Friday I'll hand in my final assignment after four years of study, but in true geek form, that day I’ll be more excited about picking up a copy of Fallout 3.



Fallout 3 has all the elements to potentially be my new favourite game. It employs elements of RPGs and shooters, follows an open world storyline in a post apocalyptic electro-punk setting, and includes the voice talents of Liam Neeson, Ron Perlman and Heroes' Malcolm McDowell. It's definitely my most anticipated game release of the year, and a distant second to The Dark Knight for my most anticipated release of 2008. Unlike The Dark Knight however, Fallout 3 was at risk of not reaching Australian shores at all.

On July 4, Fallout 3 was refused classification by the Australians Office of Film and Literature Classification (OFLC), effectively banning it in the land down under. Admittedly when these screenshots were released I had my doubts that it would make it past the censors, however it wasn't the violence that caused the ban. While our classification system is in need of an R18+ rating, that’s a debate for another time. An adults only rating would not have saved Fallout. The OFLC's gripe was that the game contained real life drugs (referred to as chems) that basically performed the function of say, health or strength potions. These were depicted a realistic manner, which in their view pushed the boundary of science fiction drug references to real life drug references. Because a game may not offer incentives for using narcotics, not only was the game not to be advertised or sold within Australia, it was illegal to own a copy that had been obtained overseas.

By August 7, a toned down version of the game was given an MA15+ rating by the OFLC. This version had substances such as morphine given fictional names and removed the short animations of them being injected or ingested. For Australian gamers this basically meant that it was no longer illegal to own Fallout and so it was safer to import it. However, on September 10, Bethesda Softworks announced that the changes made to the Aussie version were to be applied to all versions of the game. If I hop off my games-are-art and censorship-is-the-devil soapboxes for a second, I think this is actually a better game mechanic. In any given game if I want a health hit, I want it then and there. Waiting for an animation to play out can be the agonising seconds delay that usually ends in death. The kicker is, that our broken classification system has now bled over to the rest of the world's gamers.

This isn't the first instance like this either. Earlier this year, Australia was given a trimmed version of Grand Theft Auto 4, and to prevent mass imports from New Zealand, they received the same version. Anyone who was going to the trouble to import that game would have known that the only difference between the Kiwi and Aussie versions was the sticker on the front saying "18+" and so they ordered from the UK, who share our region code but received the full version. So the main people at a disadvantage were New Zealand gamers who, at no fault of their own classification system, received a toned down game. This was eventually was revoked and New Zealand retailers now sell the unedited version.

Now don't get me wrong, I don't think being able to see the drugs being taken and having realistic names is a crucial part of the game experience. Especially if they'd renamed the drugs something like Michael-Atkinson-is-a-scare-mongering-douche-bag. What bothers me is that our broken classification system is affecting the game content in countries where adults are allowed to buy adult things. Imagine if the say no to drugs theory was applied to all forms of media. Off the top of my head you'd lose movies from Requiem for a Dream to American Beauty. Not to mention that Super Mario Brothers didn't result in a generation of shrooming plumbers.

I think we've really lost a great platform for comment here. In my opinion science fiction and fantasy are the greatest genres to get a message across in as it allows something to become so fictionalised that it becomes more relatable. Take X-Men 3 for example. Sir Ian McKellen approached his character's motivation against a mutant-cure with the same attitude that he has towards the idea that homosexuality can be 'cured.' This could be applied to many groups of people who find themselves alienated or oppressed by modern society, while if the movie had been about an actual cure for homosexuality, while problematic on many levels, would speak only to a queer, already converted audience. Science-fiction and fantasy allows a level of comment not achievable in more realistic genres. It also means that the drug use was contextualised, as the protagonist has to put their moral objections aside and take what they have to in order to stay alive. More over the nature of the game itself, particularly in first person, gives the potential for insight into the issue that I don’t feel is as accessible by other mediums.

Essentially I don't think what we’ve lost in this game will deter from the experience, but I do feel that a great platform for comment is being cut short by a conservative and outdated rating system. Maybe I never got off my soapbox at all.

Extended Rant - Mass Effect

When I first bought my 360 the salesmen’s exact sales pitch was ‘Get Mass Effect get Mass Effect get Mass Effect get Mass Effect get Mass Effect get Mass Effect get Mass Effect.’ Then it turned out that he didn’t actually have a console to sell me to play it on so I left wondering if his brain worked the way it was supposed to, but still, it was enough to pique my interest.

My only other experiences with Bioware were Balder’s Gate 2 and Neverwinter Nights both of which I really enjoyed. I overlooked Knights of the Old Republic as I never really got into Star Wars, but I was interested to see that with Mass Effect, Bioware had dropped the Star Wars universe for one of their own creation.

I rolled a female soldier and got stuck into it. Right about the time the combat was about to get started I was waiting for a tutorial to pop up and tell how to point at the enemy I wanted to kill and watch the game do the rest. Then an odd thing happened: nothing. Gears of War being the last game I’d played and game play looking fairly similar I reverted to gung-ho instincts and aimed at an enemy and tried to shoot it to bits. Oddly enough, that bloody worked. The combat isn’t turn based. Sweet mother of Betsy it’s not turn based! Maybe they figured out that all the RPG fans who love repetitive mundane tasks were now on MMORPGS, whatever the case they’re now making real time combat so I’m prepared to look over a few first time insecurities and clumsinesses. There’s a cover system you’ll never use, and if you want to take a weapon out there are four buttons to help you (if it doesn't happen automatically), while if you want to use any of a stack of powers you have to pick from a wheel or a hot key all controlled by the same shoulder button.

As far as the story goes, it’s very Charles Dickens. Not to say it’s about poverty and has vivid descriptions of ugly people, I mean that it’s full of well developed characters and the plot is just an excuse for them to be there. The storyline borrows a lot from The Matrix Reloaded with the actual matrix replaced by the Milky Way, and manages to avoid the generally overdone ‘could we/should we’ sci-fi theme. For the most part, the major characters are deep, believable and conflicted, with the exception of one roughly man-shaped piece of cardboard with a name and some character traits written on it. Kaiden McCardboard aside, the characterisation only hits one major wall. Meet Liara, proof that the departments involved with game play and characterisation never really collaborated. In the cut scenes she’s the embodiment of compassion, in the combat she goes FUCKING BERSERK, going spell crazy and trigger happy in a manner that’d make Vikings blush. Once this crack has shown others start to pop up and I realised that one of the races of aliens look a lot like space bunnies and another are just toads in armour. After that the game had this creepy, space-age Wind in the Willows feel to it which thankfully wore of in time to be saved by the game’s best characterisation element, the hero himself/herself. In each cut scene you’ll be given the choice of how you want to go through it, usually polite, bitchy or too spineless to go either way. It mostly works to the same end but what makes it impressive is that none of it breaks character, which is a props to the voice actors more than anything. Here Bioware have proven that games can make a pliable protagonist without just making them a blank fucking pallet.

So if you play this as a solder it’s the sandbox(ish), story driven shooter that so many others have promised to be that still holds its ground as an RPG. The final level is like nothing else I’ve played, working itself up to the end boss fight by making you feel like the hardest badass in all Hardarseia in a merging of game play and narrative that’s raised my expectations of interactive storytelling.