Browsing articles from "January, 2009"
Jan 17, 2009
Wayne Santos

Still In The Geek Hall Of Shame

< ![CDATA[For having frakkin' The Dark Knight in HIGH FREAKIN’ DEFINITION, sitting on my shelf, STILL unwatched.

I’ll get around to it.  But after digesting a massive dinner and lazing around watching the extras for Iron Man , I kind of want to revisit certain scenes again…>

Jan 17, 2009
Wayne Santos

And Done

I’ve seen the end of Resistance 2 and my verdict of the game is that I’d give it an 8 to 8.5 because the overall value of the game (when taking the multi-player component into account) is outstanding, and you could play the title for months and months simply because of that.  Unfortunately the single player component is probably the weakest aspect of the game.  The story is told and paced in an awkward way, and it doesn’t help that this particular first person shooter is coming off the heels of Bioshock which is currently my personal high watermark for telling stories in the FPS genre.  I was also not too fond of the cheap one hit kill creatures the game occasionally scattered throughout certain levels.  Overall, it’s a solid package, but I’m a big believer in a strong single player component and Resistance 2 flagged somewhat in that regard.  The multi-player, however, is amazing.

Jan 10, 2009
Wayne Santos

Going Nordic

< ![CDATA[Time now to take a break from the cerebral wanderings of Bioshock to the more mindless hack n’ slash beat ‘em up genre with Viking:  Battle for Asgard

Jan 9, 2009
Wayne Santos

Marathoning

< ![CDATA[The Wife is pretty much fixed on Persona 4

Jan 5, 2009
Wayne Santos

NO! NOOOOOOO!!!!!!

< ![CDATA[Fuck YOU, Activision!  Oh my God, I didn't think it was possible to hate a publisher more than Electronic Arts, but Activision has been doing a bang up job the last couple of years of making exactly that happen.

Tim Schafer is getting sued by Activision.  They're trying to stop Brutal Legend from releasing.  The exact details are in this news story here, but here’s the entirety of the article for those that don’t feel like clicking.

LOS ANGELES – A lawsuit filed by Activision may keep Jack Black from becoming a “Brutal Legend” later this year.

Activision Entertainment Holdings Inc. sued game developer Double Fine Productions Inc. on Wednesday to try to stop the release of “Brutal Legend” by rival Electronic Arts.

The lawsuit, filed in Santa Monica, Calif., on Wednesday, claims Double Fine failed to deliver “Brutal Legend” on time. The suit also claims the firm then offered the completed game to EA.

“Brutal Legend” is scheduled for release in October. It features Black as a heavy-metal roadie transported to a mythical ancient world to fight evil.

EA has been heavily promoting the game at this week’s Electronic Entertainment Expo in Los Angeles. A gigantic banner of Black’s character, Eddie Riggs, is hanging outside the convention’s venue.

The lawsuit claims Activision paid Double Fine about $15 million to develop “Brutal Legend,” but the studio missed a key deadline last year. The suit claims Double Fine then said it would need another nine months and $7 million to complete the game.

Activision and Double Fine negotiated to try to keep the game on track, but no agreement was ever reached, according to the court filing. Activision contends it never relinquished its rights to the game and that Double Fine improperly transferred “Brutal Legend” to EA.

“Hey, if Activision liked it, then they should have put a ring on it,” Double Fine President Tim Schafer said. “Oh great, now Beyonce is going to sue me too.”

The lawsuit states that Activision has suffered “irreparable harm” and will lose not only the game, but also the ability to sell downloadable content based on “Brutal Legend” if the release isn’t stopped.

EA, which is not named as a party in the lawsuit, had no official comment on the filing.

Activision Entertainment Holdings is the former company known as Vivendi Universal Games and is a wholly owned subsidiary of Santa Monica-based Activision Blizzard Inc. The company has numerous top game franchises in its roster, including the “Call of Duty” and “World of Warcraft” series.

EA, based in Redwood City, Calif., is also a gaming heavyweight, with rights to the popular “Madden NFL,” “Medal of Honor” and “The Sims” franchises.

Jan 5, 2009
Wayne Santos

Trophy Whoring

< ![CDATA[

In gamer terms, this is a borrowed phrase from the Xbox 360, with its “achievements.”  A system wherein, games become a meta-game.  The way it works on the 360 is that Microsoft mandated that every game have a list of specific, in-game achievements which, when accomplished, would add to an overall “gamer score.”  Every game has 1000 gamer points, with the difficulty of the achievement scaled to how many gamer points you get.  So basically someone with a gamerscore of over 100K is either very, very good, or simply buys a lot of games.  People that play games with an OCD need to get maximum score for its own sake, or simply for the less charitable need to have bragging rights are referred to as “Achievement Whores” in today’s gaming circles.

Now last year, the Playstation got more or less the same concept, but instead of using Achievements and gamer points, they use trophies, and–to an RPG nut–the irresistable concept of “levels.”  In Playstation 3 terms, all games now have trophies, with bronze being the easiest to get, silver being moderately difficult, gold being freakin’ hard, and platinum for those that are stubborn enough to get every single trophy in the game.  As you accumulate trophies, you get invisible “experience points” which adds to a bar on your Playstation Network profile and when you get get enough, you “level up.”  Of course, you don’t actually get new abilities or anything like that, but it’s an interesting way to get a cursory glance at the gaming ability of people.  Since the system came out only last year–and it’s only THIS year that Sony has made it mandatory for ALL games to include trophies–the general progress of most gamers is pretty low, with level 2 or 3 being the average for the not hardcore, and level 5-6 being the average for fairly regular gamers.

Which is a round about way of me saying that I’m playing through Bioshock
again for trophies.  But least now the exact mechanics and motivations are more clear.

Jan 4, 2009
Wayne Santos

Another Day

Jan 4, 2009
Wayne Santos

And Done

< ![CDATA[Round 1 of Bioshock is finished and I have to say that I found it a remarkably thoughtful trip.  Not only did the game take its much promised critique of Objectivism and pepper it throughout the experience, but it also managed to pull some interesting twists on the idea “agency” and how acting on your own in videogames is rarely anything but.  But it managed to do it within a fairly sensible context within its own story, so everything actually adds up when you stop and put the pieces together.  All in all, one of the smarter games I’ve played in years and I enjoyed the experience immensely.  I think I probably got more out of it theme-wise than most FPS fans who probably just enjoyed the variety of weapons and tactics on hand to play with, but beyond the elegant game design, there was clearly a mind at work that had read Ayn Rand and… well, was kind of pissed about it, and put that sting into a game.  VERY impressive indeed.  Now for the replay to finish collecting those trophies…

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