Deathmatches marked, mapped, graphed

Some while back when I was still attending the BeyondUnreal forums I pointed someone in the right direction for some UnrealScript help. She was writing a mutator to track deathmatches into a graphable format. Why would one do that? So that you can create stuff like:



Check out Alison's online presentation of her project "Marked for Destruction". It's a pretty kanifty example of converging data into approachable art forms. It's also just neat to see someone who asks for help on a forum actually finish something :). If it catches your fancy, watch her blog for more.

Sly 3D in ... real 3D

According to IGN, Sly will ship with 3D glasses. Wonder how Gamefly will adjust to that? Any rate ... it's trying hard to shirk the "gimmick" angle:

Instead of just a little gimmick of seeing a game in three dimensions with lots of pieces flying towards the viewer, this feature will help players out as well. Dodging lasers will be easier with some depth perception. For the collectors out there, there will be some objects that can only be attained in the 3D mode. Of course, there will also be levels that will be designed with 3D in mind just to provide a fun and unique experience.

C'mon. It's a gimmick. And you know what - that's really OK. It's a very cool gimmick and it's good to see people trying things like this. Anyone remember Leather Goddess of Phobos and it's Smell-O-Vision?

What I've always wondered is why someone doesn't use similar technology to seperate out multiplayer screens on one monitor. Yeah, it would take some creative art production and design, but it would be neat to play a strategy game off a console where your opponent had no idea what you were plotting.

Evidence A

Please examine this image to the right. It's from a game called Cold Winter, which IGN just reviewed. Now, I'm not knocking the review. Not saying it's off-base or anything. However this image is apparently indicative of a 6.5 on the IGN scale, which in scientific terms is something of "slightly above average", but academically we all know that a C+ isn't going to make your parents happy.

Point? Point is that there's nothing really wrong that I can tell from the screenshots except that it doesn't look as good as the wow candy we've all seen recently. So while some people didn't like Doom 3 because it was too dark and scary, it still raises the bar for everyone. The review very aptly points out the differences between the game's mechanics (good) and it's production values (not so good, except oddly the voice acting).

I couldn't get a read for how bad the framerate is. That would be a potential deal killer, but everything else is just indicative of how production orientated mainstream gaming has gotten. How the hell do people keep up with that? If me and some friends had put together something equivalent to those screenshots and people complained it looked like crap, I'd never stop groaning.

Like I said, I don't the review is wrong.

But I think it's an indication of what's wrong.

Our Tears Are Shiny

The Girl and I booted up Shining Tears last night, hoping for a solid bout of wacky cute two player action JRPG goodness.

Sadly, that trend I mentioned is prevalent in the game. Since we had rented it from Gamefly, we didn't have the manual and therefore had no idea that the appropriate way to start a cooperative game was to play through some of the single player.

OK folks, let's step back here.

Do reviews of the game say it's a two player title? Yes
Does the box say it's a 1-2 player game? Yes
Does it make any sense to hide a coop game under single player play? No

Cooperative play isn't a gimmick or a bonus. It's something people factor in when they buy a game. Sometimes (particularly for myself) it's the reason I buy or rent a game. A game like Shining Tears, which really took an effort to play around with how two different characters interact, is really missing the boat by short changing what could be one of the better features.

Developers should learn from Snowblind and Raven Soft. Look, couples that game together stay together. Don't mess with a good thing.

That's Really Smart

Thanks Independant Gaming Source for pointing out Project Nero, a Torque powered project utilizing a lot of big words:

The game uses the AI to allow simulated robotic agents to cope with changing environments and situations, and form adaptive tactical solutions. The end result is a game that adapts itself to the strategies desired by the player, while still allowing the AI-controlled entities to operate as autonomous agents.

They said Funkydilla

Funkydilla. It is a truly innovative rhythm-action game. You have freedom, choice and direction, and you can steer a path through the music. It can be different every time according to how you play because you can take the music wherever you like. On top of that, you can play it with only one button. User interfaces don’t get any simpler than that.

-- Zoonami FAQ

IGN's got a bit on Zoonami and basically puts a big post-it as one to watch on their forehead. Why? Well Martin Hollis is partly responsible for Goldeneye and Perfect Dark ... and if you're unfamiliar with those games then I weep openly for you. They've also gained PSP developer status, so watch your hands.

Lucas is a whore

Since we're talking about opinions and Star Wars anyway, let me make something clear before the deluge of Star Wars III game and movie rains upon us completely.

I think George Lucas is possibly one of the biggest whores on Planet Earth. I'm up for nominations about potential challengers, but from my perspective the field is clear, so to speak.

Look, if you're a big old Jedi fanboy who is right now brainlocked between what flame or defense or whatever to post, just go play with your lightsaber. Nothing I'm about to say matters to you anyway because you've long been sold on the idea that Star Wars is a gentle, nostalgic reminder of a simple yet visually grand epic can be told. Like the old television serials, but brought to life with modern splendor.

Fine. Personally I think the Star Wars legacy is about how an innovative film sold an audience on a somewhat what cut and dry story and instead of keeping hold of the grandiose nature that Episode IV began and Empire managed to scratch into, Lucas decided f' it, let's make some money. Jedi was all about selling ewoks and TIE fighters. It never really nagged me until old George started in with the sequels. Instead of offering a deep and interesting backstory with psychological thrills about the galaxy's most mass murderer ... we got midichlorins, scenes stolen from his own movies and some crappy dialogue about sand.

Here's the deal. I don't really care about the Revenge of the Sith because the Jedi are about to get what they deserve. You heard me. The whole premise is idiotic that this mega-powerful brat gets to stomp all over any kind of respect and authority and all the while people gasp as he "turns" to the Dark Side. Turns? More like glances, you gits - he was always dark. OK, first he was just annoying - then he was always dark.

Perhaps on it's own Episode III will be a decent film, but it can't be part of a great epic because Lucas shot his wad trying to recapture the marketing lust of his other movies. He sold out his epic story, if he ever had one, to Mattel. So even if Sith avoids all the logical jumps, trite dialogue and unbelievably dull plot of the first two prequels - it fails before minute one because it's part of a flawed story.

I hope Lucas loves to roll around in a big bed of cash. He could have had a truly special series of movies, but kiddified them instead. Will I see it? Yeah, because my brother pointed out that we're of that odd generation that will get to see them all in the theatre on release. So I'll finish what I started. Even if Lucas didn't.

But in my heart, when I get to the theatre, I'll really be hoping just to see a trailer for Serenity.

Fallible Reviews

Brian sans kotaku gets into a bit of a debate with Kyle the VGOmbudsman over at the RedAssedBaboon about the fallible nature of reviews in gaming:

[11:26] Brian: but if you hand out a 45 percent to any game ANY you really need to justify it
[11:26] Kyle: but even if a game meets those, some people juts won't like it
[11:26] Brian: and if it completly disagrees with all of the other reviews out there, you're wrong
[11:26] Brian: :)
[11:26] Brian: lol
[11:26] Kyle: heh, a minority of one and all that

Which makes me wonder what Brian does for work all day.

But seriously, look at the difference between this IGN review and this Gamespy one. For one thing, we can definately rule out that Gamespy and IGN are in collusion for their reviews.

Not having played the game ... and not really intending to since all things Star Wars gives me a bit of nasuea these days ... I gotta say that while I don't disagree with Brian, I enjoyed the IGN review much more. The IGN review really gets into details about the game, citing extremely specific examples of gameplay mechanics which are farcical or annoying. The Gamespy edition is much more shallow and almost reads like it's an adaptation from a press kit. OK, perhaps that's a bit harsh ... but I didn't get nearly as much of a grip about the game than I did with Ivan's take on it.

Is IGN wrong? I think Kyle responds well. People keep reading reviews because they trust their opinions. I usually read several reviews if I'm questionable about a game to try and find specifics like Ivan reports. Whether or not I would have the same reaction to these mechanics is completely impossible for IGN to determine. All they can do is publish a review and if I play enough games where my opinion is counter to the what they post ... then I'll probably stop reading them.

Opinions on games don't mean much. I've heard so much nonsense about why X was so horrible (like, there were too many LEDs flashing on the gun model ... true story). Best you can do is take in the view and make a judgement for yourself.

Remembering GDC

Sometimes it's good to see a solid, sober account after the dust has settled. Course, sometimes the results are similar:

I suppose I should have seen this coming. These are folks who have to build games today, right now, under heavy budget and risk constraint. Although they’ve taken on some daring experiments, some which may succeed and others that have failed, I’m realizing they’re just not in a position to think too far outside the box, to push hard on innovation. That’s simply not a luxury available to them. (Or if they do have ideas, they’re not speaking about them in public.)

--Andrew @ Grand Text Auto

The Art of Quake 4

If you missed it on Blue's, you should check out this Gamespy interview about the art of Quake 4:

With this technology, basically, whatever you draw on your concept drawing, you can model and it can be in the game and look exactly like your concept. That's really exciting for artists -- being able to see your vision really come to life in the game.

-- Kevin Long

I've rambled to some length about how the push for big technology can have negative ramifications on game dev in general ... so it's good to get a solid reminder of the positive things this technology brings to the table.

GameFly offers free PSPs .... quietly

According to this news bit GameFly is offering up a chance for a free PSP if you become a new subscriber during May. There's virtually no real mention of this on GameFly itself, possibly because they don't want to annoy ardently faithful current subscribers like myself by showing off the truckload of PSP's they're tossing out.

Minor Victory

That's iTunes running an XMLRPC server with a Torque client listening to the audio data.

Stay tuned to this space for more.

Cue Spooky Antimusic

While Doom 3 seemed to be a loveithateit type game (I loved it), it would be hard to argue that the game didn't have merits on a lot of it's production values. For instance, the music:

I experimented with defining this new antimusic we were set on using. Doom³'s score would feature no traditional instruments except for a bit of piano and choir. Otherwise the entire score is purely electronic in nature. My sounds were built from various sources, including the FS1R and CS6X from Yamaha, Korg's M1, WaveStation and X5DR synths, an Emu Audity 2000 and an Alesis DMPro on the hardware side. In software, sources included countless sample libraries running on two GigaStudio machines, Native Instruments' Reaktor, Absynth, and Vokator, Atmosphere from Spectrasonics, and many custom recorded and designed sounds.

Interested? Check out the full postmortem at Music 4 Games. It gets pretty technical, from that audio geek point of view, but worth a scan.

Stuffed Kittens

Google ads are a wondrous thing. Trust me, I don't have them because they make me any money. I have them because they are freakin' hilarious.

Don't believe me? They're trying to sell me stuffed kittens. People, that's comic gold.

Kitten Powered Goodness

Found this wonderful rant on console hype via buttonmashing.com, although I'd like to point out that this is perhaps the best comment I've ever read in response to any blog post anywhere, ever:

Maybe the Playstation 3 will have a kitten inside it. An adorable, tiny kitten.

It's spooky to watch the hype machine in action. I almost got embroiled in a deep conversation about the XBox being a "media station" and all the insane jazz that would mean, until I reminded my friend about all the hubub about the PS2 being a DVD player.

How many people do you know actually use their PS2 as their DVD player? I know one. Everyone else I know got, you know, DVD players with features they actually wanted. Like a remote that wasn't optional.

These consoles will make our eyes water, I'm sure. All of em. What they won't do is change our lives, no matter how many pictures of a power button Microsoft publishes.