TV Watch: Lost, Recon

This episode seems to have hit with mixed reviews from fans, but I'm on the side that really, really liked it. On one level partially because Sawyer remains a pretty interesting character - consistent but unpredictable, likeable but a jackass, smart but good with a gun.

But mostly? Because I think it shows hope that the writers are not going to be holding back as we get into the last half of the last season of Lost. And I think the most interesting bits of this last episode weren't Sawyer.

But SmokeLocke.

This is the guy (or thing) that Dogen called the incarnation of evil. And also killed everyone at the temple who stood in his way. And plotted the backstabbing of Jacob since he himself could not kill Jacob. And I dunno, probably kicked a puppy.

Yet I kinda liked him this episode. And not just in a "wow, that's a cool villain" kind of way. It's impressive that would could otherwise be an amorphous killing machine presented himself in such a human way. Those people at the temple? Out to kill him. He doesn't want to be killed ... so he killed them. His primary goal isn't to destroy but to escape.

And he apparently had a crazy mom. Who may well have been like Crazy French Lady and Crazy Claire Lady. Some have even suggested it is Crazy Claire Lady and through a wild adventure of time travel, Aaron is SmokeLocke. I'm not really buying into that, though I think there is an interesting line of continuity between Walt, Alex and Aaron. Well, some continuity. Walt seemed to have powers, Alex doesn't show any. Alex and Aaron were born on the island, Walt was not.

My guess is that we lost a lot of backstory when Walt was prematurely removed from the storyline due to puberty related acting. There is a lot of grey zone with Michael's past, considering how little we know of Walt's mother ... and if the other island kids are of note ... the mother is the important one to watch here. Vincent, originally Walt's stepdad's dog, has a very loose, potentially non-canon link to the Hanso Foundation via the Retrievers of Truth portion of a previous Lost ARG. So there may be a very tenuous link to DHARMA with Walt's mom, or at least his stepdad. All we really know of Brian Porter is that he was an American lawyer working in Amsterdam (Hanso is HQ'd in Denmark).

Let us remember one of the fundamental themes of Lost: kids are important, and almost all pregnancies on the island end very, very badly. So the identity of SmokeLocke's mom is fairly core to what the hell is actually going on here ... it's unlikely that she is just some random crazy broad.

What's fun is that it once again feels like Lost has almost laid out enough clues in the past to point us in the right direction, bringing some of the old mystery feel to the show again.

The side story also, once again, showed an unlikely pairing ... Miles and Sawyer being both cops and partners. The Girl pointed out that they were both con men in the past (Miles being a somewhat unorthodox one, but still...). Like Alex appearing in an LA school, this is obviously not just the days of their lives if Jacob / The Island weren't a part of it.

My guess at this point? "LA X" as it were, is the island. It might not be tropical, and it might not be surrounded by water ... but everyone is stuck there just as they were in Season One. They may have arrived in a different way, but LA X is the same kind of fishbowl that the entire show has been playing with. Now, I don't know if the writers have any great reveals in mind to connect these two, or to show LA X's artificiality ... or if it will just vanish in a big white light at the end of the show (or what was the color of the exploding sky? Violet?) ... but I'm sure it bears little connection to the "real" off island world.

For the really super spoiler avoiders, stop reading now (though I'm only talking about the previews and not any plot spoilers).


Next week, however, is the episode many a Lost fan has been waiting for ... and if the writing so far has started to form a cohesive backdrop to end this story, then this one will be a milestone. Why? Because it appears to focus on Richard Alpert - who stands at the intersection of many things concerning the island and may have some pretty keen perspectives on what is going on. Certainly not one to miss.

Movie Watch: The Last Broadcast

Some people brought The Last Broadcast to my attention after the Paranormal Activity review, and for good reason. The Last Broadcast is essentially a Blair Witch Project prototype, though it is unclear how much influence or inspiration BWP actually got from Broadcast, which was released one year earlier.

It follows a very similar vein as the other movies - low budget, documentary and self-documentary style story telling, more hints at horror than the actual thing. It's not quite as successful - the overall composition feels less tight and there is a lot of relatively boring detail dragged into the background of the murders central to the plot. Occasionally the low budget aspect shows itself in unwanted ways - but these are really just details to be forewarned about before pressing play. The movie is worth watching if not for the place it holds alongside similar films. After watching it, it feels odd if Blair Witch didn't lift from the Broadcast as some many elements are the same - a trip into the woods, a supernatural presence, characters videotaping each other, etc., etc. Oddly the real difference is that Broadcast insists on a more traditional framework in some of the plot in some places ... but I'll leave that intentionally vague as to avoid spoilers.

Basically - if this kind of horror film has interested you in the past, you owe it to yourself to check The Last Broadcast out, even if only as a historical curiosity ... but also because for what it is, it manages to be pretty entertaining.

If, however, you thought BWP was overhyped boring nonsense ... I would probably avoid it.

Could Valve Return Me To PC Gaming?

And by PC, I mean Mac.

I had just gotten done complaining about the lack of Portal 2 for the PS3 when Valve drops the hammer down. And by hammer, I mean glorious news for Mac users - the Source library of games and Steam? Interoperability with PC users? Kinda the best thing to happen to Mac gamers since Romero admitted he once used one.

I started to abandon PC gaming around the time Bioshock was released. I'm actually struggling to think of the last game I finished on the old CheapBox++, but I think it might have been Oblivion. I had been a gamer on the PC since ... ok, technically I guess since playing Parsec on a TI-99. Or Wizardy on an Apple? When you get this old, the memory is a bit fuzzy, people.

My point being - I don't have the old CheapBox++ around anymore not because I was some console fanboy nut raised on NES games. I stopped playing PC games because they started being too much of a pain in the ass. I've gone on and on at length in other posts so let me sum it up with: too much instability, too much playing with video settings, too much dependence on buying increasingly powerful hardware.

And folks, you can agree or disagree with my logic - but I've been pretty happy with it. Even with what might have been a karmically induced PS3 bricking which caused me to restart Fallout 3 not once, but twice ... I'll take that over fighting with a video card installation or getting booted off the Sony forums for complaining about PlanetSide any day.

So let's look at those key points, in semi-random order.

Too much playing with video settings
What video settings? Resolution? There's a total of like two video cards you can get for your Mac. Not to mention my current Mac library consists of a MacBook Pro and a Mac Mini. Video drivers on the Mac? They work. They work well.

Too much instability
The Lenovo Thinkpad I used before my trusty MBP would lock up like Fort Knox and occasionally require a 20 minute head start before it really get to work. The MBP has occasionally bouts of flakiness, but in part because of the reason above ... it is a damn solid machine.

Buying increasingly powerful hardware
This one is mostly self-defeating ... because it is not going to happen. I'm not likely to enter the desktop world again anytime soon (I don't know where it would go). Truth is, this MBP is in the "from my cold dead hands" arena for me. I don't even technically own it, it belongs to the office ... but I snarl at IT anytime they come near it.

So it comes down to the following questions:

How well will Steam run on OS X?
My issues with Steam are a matter of record. Literally, I think, since I contacted the Better Business Bureau when Valve refused to offer a refund. I've also frequently admitted that my many problems with the service appear to be abnormal and there are many a PC gamer who swears by it. I don't know how many technical problems Windows caused for Steam ... but it will be interesting to see.

Is Steam more consumer friendly?
Even if you love Steam, you should realize that it is wildly consumer unfriendly. You get billed for goods before delivery. Delivery? Not guaranteed. Technical support? Last I looked it was an utter joke. Some of this is the difference between digital and disc based goods, but some of it is just Valve being overly protective of their own ass. If that has not changed, and I honestly doubt it has, I'll probably only dip my toes in the Steam water for special occasions like Portal 2.

I'm optimistic ... though not wildly so. I don't see how it can be a bad thing, assuming it will be a good to great thing - but guessing the vast majority of my gaming will still be done on the old plasma TV.

Movie Watch: Ong Bak 2

In almost every way, Ong Bak 2 challenges what makes a good movie.

Unfortunately, I think it loses the struggle in the end.

Essentially an ostentatious and extravagant backdrop to show Tony Jaa's martial arts skills, Ong Bak 2 is a "sorta" prequel to Ong Bak ... but to say that Ong Bak isn't required viewing couldn't be more of an understatement. It's a different time with different characters and ... oh look, elephants.

First - the good. The film is beautiful. Jungle fantasy sets with great production value provide some impressive eye candy even before the fists begin to fly. And the flying of the fists is seriously top notch. It reminds someone why these movies are technically challenging ... you have to make it look like Tony Jaa just dropped a can of whoopass on some stunt guy's neck without, well, killing said stunt guy. The action is intense and insanely well directed.

Second - the bad. The story is paper thin and cliche. Worse, there's an attempt to make said paper thin plot interesting by making it non-linear. Which fails pretty miserably for the most part. Characters are introduced and summarily dropped and at times magically created from nowhere.

What's odd, and equally annoying, about those bad parts is that they walk over the parts which might be interesting ideas for a kung fu film. For one thing - there is very little dialogue. Why should there be? This is a pretty basic revenge story with a lot of fighting in between. We didn't come for poorly dubbed explanations - we came here to see fists! There's this keep it simple philosophy at the core of the film which just lets the kung fu speak for itself.

Except, in the end ... it doesn't. Pretty and entertaining - the twisted plot distracts the viewer through much of the film and the otherwise climatic end actually turns into a confusing cocktail of moments. Not to mention that the (kinda spoiler) final cliffhanger appears to have for more to do with production funding and not storytelling.

It's fun - but not very good.

Still, I'd love to see a feature length action film with this sparseness to it. Heck, now that I think about it - I wouldn't mind seeing and hour and a half rendition of the hallway scene from Oldboy, but maybe that's just me.

Finally, the movie begs an interesting point against The Ebert Argument (that movies are inferior to film by the nature of their interactive format). If this had been a game with graphics that equalled that of the film, then the real complaint of such a review would be the length and not the plot. Course, that might just mean game reviewers care less about plot, but if the same story is told through different mediums and one is more entertaining than the other...

Anyway, not highly recommended - but fun nonetheless.

TV Watch: Lost, Dr. Linus

This episode was of note because the side-story was, for a change, nicely integrated with the on island story ... and also because both were pretty telling. While Sayid's two tales played off each other somewhat, here we get to see Ben Linus in similar moral territory, or more specifically we get to see Ben revisit an old moral quandry - would he save Alex or his power on the island, in a simpler setting.

I think it worked very, very well. I've always been luke warm on Ben ... he's fun when he's being all manipulative and evil, but there's an almost cliche aspect to it and I've always wondered how it will play out with the "we're the good guys" speeches The Others were known to give. But this is Ben at his best ... showing both his soft side, his manipulative side, and his please-don't-kill-me side. The guy has a lot of sides. Even if this is the last real look we get at his character, it is a darn good one.

On the parallel universe: clearly things aren't up to spec here. Alex should most likely be speaking French and not, say, be in the same school as Ben ... she was, after all, the Crazy French Lady's kid before anything else. The overt character interactions have now officially gone over the line of plausibility that there isn't a subtle hand at work creating this world for them. Also interesting that Ben and Ben's dad were in DHARMA and on the island until some point they decided to leave. What exactly happened to the island in this little snow-globe of a universe is up for grabs, but I'm guessing this must be "non-templed" Ben. So did Ben not get the same darkness as Sayid and Claire? Is this just how Ben is?

On island, I'd still love to see Hurley become New Jacob, but I think all signs are pointing to another Jack versus Locke showdown. Jack's seen the light, gotten the faith and is out to convince others. The most important tidbit about Richard, of course, is that Jacob's touch is responsible for his near immortality. So did Jacob touch Michael and that's why he was adrift in non-suicidal behavior? And does this mean Jack won't age?

Course Ilana has kept Sun in the running as a candidate. Hottest. Candidate. Ever.

These are pretty good party tricks that Jacob and AntiJacob can perform. Opening locks with their mind. Putting out fuses from beyond the grave. Keeping people from aging. I think we are safely out of sci fi related explanations, into something very old, very magical. I can't help but feel a little robbed from the early seasons' notion that Lost was like a puzzle ... if the solution to the puzzle is "it's magic!" well, that's a magic trick and not so much a puzzle. Not even a magic trick you can figure out, at that.

Still - the plot feels cohesive, and that's what I was really asking for out the last season. The revelations are still fun and they still fit into the larger aspects of the show. We're nearly half way there now, and I think the last few acts are going to rock.

Game Play: Assassin's Creed II

The first Assassin's Creed was one of those games that I heard plenty about, played a little, and saw the appeal - but didn't really feel the need to run out, buy a copy, and finish right away. It was only under several glowing reviews that Assassin's Creed II got put on the buy list, and even then I waited a few months to do that.

Now I feel a little guilty about that. I can't accurately compare the games, but standing on its own - the sequel is simply a great game. The Girl and I jokingly referred to it as Grand Templar Auto over the weekend (I can't be the first to come up with that, right?) - but there is a lot of truth to the concept. Assassin's Creed II essentially hands over a few city-states to you and lets you run around, take missions, assassinate people and generally have fun.

I recently commented that more games need to acknowledge the distinction between open world design (where you aren't restricted to a linear path spatially) and sandbox gameplay (where you aren't limited to specific gameplay solutions). AC2 cashes in on the first, but also manages a decent amount of the latter. At one point yesterday the game had strongly suggested I use thieves to lure away specific guards (prostitutes and mercenaries also an option) ... but it was simpler just to scale the building and drop in behind them. Combat in particular is pretty free form - the player is allowed a lot of different options for engagement and rarely does the action feel like just a button masher (in fact, simply button mashing will often get you hurt).

In other places, though, AC2 goes for straight out platforming. Find point A and trace enough jumping points to point Z, claim your prize. Many times this works out well, though I have very little love for jumping puzzles and even less love for timed jumping puzzles. When the controls are fluid, Assassin's Creed II is a dream - but when Ezio mysteriously launches in a random direction or grabs a random ladder, the effect is a bit jarring.

That's the bottom line though ... AC2 has few flaws which aren't core to the genre in general. There's some control collision (do not forget to hold up when Ezio tries a leap grab, or face a long plunge...) and some odd mechanical problems (I can run into the person I'm trying to tackle in some situations ... but not actually tack them) - but the large play world, excellent use of free running and highly entertaining combat does far more than simply compensate, it really nails it in places.

The story is quite decent as well, and the player can see some real growth in Ezio as a character. There are a few RPG style options when it comes to inventory control (though it mostly boils down to buying a better X), as well as some control over a town to gain income. Add in some brain teaser puzzles you unlock while frolicking about Italy, and the game is a very complete package. Highly recommended.

Now That Is A Dungeon Master's Room

There are stained glass windows, faux dungeon walls, a metal portcullis, dragon statuettes and a rack of swords.

.

Via, with a couple more pics, Make (via boingboing).

TV Watch: Lost, Sundown

This might have been my favorite episode this season so far.

First, the sidestory didn't suck or bore. It was a great Sayid short, and in some ways reflect on Sayid's on-Island story as well. I do openly wonder where the writers are going with Mr. Parallel Universe. There something keenly false about it (Jack not remember his appendectomy, Desmond's appearance and disappearance on the plane) and seemingly overly interconnected (Oh, Hi Jin). Will the sidestory Losties realize this? Easy money is that no matter what, MPU is going way for the "real" world - but will the real world send them a note at some point? Will the two realities ever get along? Or at least acknowledge each other?

On-Island is where the action is at, though - at like we've seen on previous moments of Lost goodness ... two sides are reaching a boiling point. Anti-Jacob tearing through the temple while various Losties are still figuring out what the hell is going on ... ok, I guess it's more like a toppling point at the moment. One big question I have is: why does Bad Jacob need an army? He's invulnerable, can morph into a killing cloud, and seems to know nearly everything about everybody. And he seems very keen to get people off the island.

If we divide out the stakeholders and big bads over the seasons, they always seem to have one of three goals: keep everyone on the island, get off the island or kill everyone on the island. Bad Jacob for some reason is picking the second two. Clearly if you want to join his escape, he has a use for you ... otherwise you're just a potential obstacle.

Another Lostie I know brought up the notion that Dogen's speech about how everyone has two parts to him might explain Jacob and Anti-Jacob quite well. They're two sides of the same entity, which is why it may have specific rules about who can kill what and where it can be when. Or something.

On a side note - why was Dogen the protective factor of the Temple? That seemed way convenient. On a side, side note ... notice how Illana calls everyone by their last (candidate) names?

I am, however, off the sci fi theory at this point. Old gods, perhaps, but anything E.T. is feeling more and more like a departure from the continuing themes.

Can't wait for next week. I wouldn't want to be in Kate's shoes.

For Friday: OK Go, "This Too Shall Pass"

If there's an unspoken rule the Rube Goldberg contraptions should be not just elaborate, but overly so ... OK Go may have just constructed on of the best ones ever:



I don't quite remember the last time I saw one that complex, but I'm pretty certain it was on the Internet.

Heavy Rain: The Spoiler Free Review

I'll be releasing two different Heavy Rain reviews. This one will be quick, and be 100% spoiler free. Later I'll publish a spoiler heavy review which is for people who have played the game but want to see how opinions might fare on Rain's actual storyline and execution.

Non-spoiler summary: Heavy Rain is an interesting evolution of interactive fiction. It bears a heavy resemblance to adventure games of the past, but uses the relatively modern concept of Quick Time Events (QTE's) to have the player keep their hand on the wheel, so to speak, of the story's plotline. I'm sure 99.9999% of readers know the idea - but for clarity, players are given an alloted time to match an input presented on the screen. Succeed and you move to one branch in the game, fail and you move to another branch.

QTE's have a mixed audience. Game designers have a love affair with them as it allows them to introduce cinematic moments which would normally have very little interactivity and give the player a hand in them. Depending on how narrowly you define the concept, you can blame Bluth for the entirety of Dragon's Lair's game mechanic or as recently as God of War for popularizing the notion.

David Cage first utilized this blend with the PS2 title, Fahrenheit (called Indigo Prophecy here in the States). Cage's take on QTE's is different than most - there is a real effort to match the motion being presented to the player to the one being portrayed on the screen. This was true in Fahrenheit and is extended in Heavy Rain. There's a large percentage of interatctions which aren't narrative as much as they are immersive. Quantic Dreams wants you to feel closer the protagonist on the screen, so when they open a car door ... you'll pull the controller stick to the left.

Dialogue is handled by options floating around the currently controlled character, as are the character's own thoughts to provide the player with insight and the occasional hint. The end result of all this is a character with their own brain that can be nudged, at times harshly, in one direction or another.

This is an important distinction. The characters in Heavy Rain are not avatars. You cannot go anywhere and do anything, you can move around, succeed, fail, have conversations and make basic choices. But you can't play someone like they are a jackass if the character isn't one. This is what places the game apart from most games - Heavy Rain is actively constructing a narrative for you - with real characters who are in conflict with each other, a plot which puts most any game plot to utter shame, and consequences which may not be apparent while you're playing out a scene.

The question of whether Heavy Rain is good relies a lot on the story - and in this spoiler free edition I'll just say: the story is good. If you're playing for the story, you'll get your money's worth.

The real question is whether Heavy Rain is for you ... because it certainly isn't for everyone. Even if it handles QTE's better than most every other game, they are still QTE's. Also, this isn't Max Payne ... you aren't going to run around shooting everything while occasionally getting punctuated with the storyline. The game is a essentially a 9-10 hour long movie with you pushing buttons.

And I think that's the bottom line: Heavy Rain isn't a game in the traditional sense. Or rather, it's a game in the sense of some very specific traditions - but more Zork or King's Quest than Halo or Final Fantasy. If that's intriguing, go play it. If it isn't, God of War III is due out next month.

Lockergate: Hurt Locker Producer Goes On Email Tear

The e-mails by Nicolas Chartier, one of four nominated producers for "The Hurt Locker" and who put up the financing to make the front-running film, violated the academy's rule against sending mailings that "attempt to promote any film or achievement by casting a negative light on a competing film or achievement," according to academy spokeswoman Leslie Unger.

The initial e-mail was sent Feb. 19 and obtained by The Associated Press. Subsequent e-mails, posted by the Los Angeles Times, showed Chartier giving more specific instructions, asking Oscar voters to rank "The Hurt Locker" at No. 1 and "Avatar" at No. 10 on this year's preferential ballot for the newly expanded best-picture category.

-- 'Lockergate'?: Producer apologizes for e-mails

They're considering taking away Chartier's Oscar tickets or (more unlikely) removing Hurt Locker from the ballot. I can only imagine the tension behind the now expanded Best Movie category, with small productions like Locker going up against blockbusters like Avatar, but Nick needs to learn one of the golden rules of Internet decorum: everyone involved in a flame war looks like an ass.

How Heavy Rain Shows Ebert Is Wrong

I'm leaning at this point to write a couple of Heavy Rain reviews, ranging in their spoiler-ness - but this isn't one of them. This is a response to the Destructiod column Why Heavy Rain proves Ebert right There won't be much in the way of spoilers (no more so than the original article), but probably some. Well, one.

To get to the crux of it, let's quote the Ebert man himself:

Yours is the most civil of countless messages I have received after writing that I did indeed consider video games inherently inferior to film and literature. There is a structural reason for that: Video games by their nature require player choices, which is the opposite of the strategy of serious film and literature, which requires authorial control.

I am prepared to believe that video games can be elegant, subtle, sophisticated, challenging and visually wonderful. But I believe the nature of the medium prevents it from moving beyond craftsmanship to the stature of art. To my knowledge, no one in or out of the field has ever been able to cite a game worthy of comparison with the great dramatists, poets, filmmakers, novelists and composers. That a game can aspire to artistic importance as a visual experience, I accept. But for most gamers, video games represent a loss of those precious hours we have available to make ourselves more cultured, civilized and empathetic.

-- Roger Ebert's answer man

There are lots and lots and lots of issues with Ebert's stance, not the least of which that art is less meaningful is it is participatory. More specifically, though, I'm taking issue with the examples the Desctructoid column uses to give strength to the stance. I will agree - Heavy Rain speaks to the heart of Ebert's argument. The player, as intruder to the narrative, as the potential to derail the storytelling intended by the original storyteller (in this case, the makers of the game and more specifically, David Cage).

I just don't think player derails the story in the way Anthony portrays. This is his evidence (here be spoilers):

Even ignoring the fact that Ethan specifically tells Madison nothing matters apart from saving Shaun -- he doesn't say "nothing, apart from me getting my freak on" -- this is a guy who has gone through immeasurable mental and physical trauma to save his son (unless you made Ethan refuse to complete any of the trials, in which case I'd have to ask why you're even playing the game). This is a guy who knows that every wasted second brings his son closer and closer to death. Under no circumstances would it make any sense for this guy to have sex with Madison.

But if you're curious about how the sex scene will play out, or if you have some personal interest in getting these two characters to screw regardless of their motivations, you can force Ethan to have sex with her. Congrats: you get to watch a sex scene and a murder at the same time, as Ethan's true character is obliterated before your eyes. Ebert proves himself right: your ability to control the story has resulted in a bad story.

And I disagree because I, in playing the game, arrived at the exact opposite conclusion in this scene. Ethan, having been rather brutalized at this point and presented with an attractive woman in his hotel room who has been helping and now clearly willing ... what straight man wouldn't get his freak on, as Anthony puts it. The Girl and I were on the couch while this was unfolding and it was pretty clear to both of us that Ethan would go for it.

So the ensuing scene for us didn't seem jarring or narrative breaking in the least. Now - here's the counterpoint I'm trying to make ... Anthony has his opinion on Ethan's character, I have mine. If Anthony chooses to have Ethan get it on, even if he feels it would make for a bad story - well, that would be because Anthony is choosing a sex scene over story. Heavy Rain provides the tools, Anthony has simply made his bed and then proceeded to complain about it.

But if we go back towards the days of gaming and media originally colliding, when DVD's were king and a notion like Tender Loving Care seemed like a good idea, this sort of "player as director" notion was exactly the goal. Maybe a senseless sex scene, to that player-director's opinion, doesn't make the most sense ... but it's there because that is the story the player-director wanted to have.

Which seem to put gaming in pretty even keel with movies. If the director feels a sex scene will increase the entertainment value, story be damned ... there is a good chance there will be one. And how many movies have sex scenes in them?

Anthony's version of the story was bad to Anthony, but because of the choices Anthony made. His premise is founded on the concept that the sex scene makes for a bad story under any circumstances and hence the lack of an authorial dictatorship makes for art which is less than what a movie might provide. And yet in my viewing of the same scene, I could see Ethan being too weary for the old beast with two backs, but for the most part I just assumed he wasn't gay.

Long time readers of Cathode Tan will know this next section of the article got my ire:

"But," you might say, "what about a game like Half-Life 2? That's a linear story, but you still have the freedom to dramatically sabotage it. You can spend the entire prologue throwing milk cartons at the residents of City 17, if you really want to. How is that any different?"

You can definitely sabotage Half-Life 2 if you wish, but the alternative to "sabotage the story" is not "get bored and feel useless." While you don't have any input over the direction of HL2's story, you still have a personal reason to keep playing: the action sections that comprise the majority of the game are fun enough that even if you don't give two shits about Alyx Vance, your input still feels relevant.

If you wanna sabotage HL2's story, you can, but you'll still have some fun with the shooty-shooty stuff. If you don't sabotage HL2's story, then the shooty-shooty stuff just feels more meaningful. It's an imperfect combination of story and gameplay, but the failure of one part doesn't destroy the entire experience. As Heavy Rain consists of nothing beyond some QTEs and a boatload of story decisions, it's got nothing to fall back on if the player decides to ruin the story by screwing with the characters.

Ah, yes. Let's recap Half-Life 2's story one more time. Gordon Freeman is transported to the future where the guy responsible for ruining the Earth is running it, and he runs around a lot, meets a few people, blows up a few more, then decides to trap himself to watch a few cut scenes and then blow the whole thing up.

The story sucked. And Gordon was a horrible protoganist. In fact, he isn't really a protaganist as much as he is a reader surrogate. Alyx is far more of a central protagonist to even the paper thin HL2 plot than Gordon, who is mostly a voyeur with a gun.

Anthony has it backwards, I think. You can't screw with HL2's story, partially because there isn't much of a story to begin with and also partially because you have no real control over the story. You can play (shooty-shooty stuff) or not play (throwing milk cartons), but can't shoot Alyx or side with the Combine or make any real impactful decisions. Heck, you can't even speak.

Heavy Rain's "boatload of story decisions" offers the player control, but largely it still the story the player decides on. And while the end result may or may not be a story the player likes will differ from player to player, at least Heavy Rain had the bravery to try and tell a story with real characters in real conflict that have real interactions. Ethan alone goes through more of a development arc than probably nearly every character in every game produced last year combined.

Now, I did have my own issues with Rain's storytelling - but I think blaming it because the player wanted to see some nookie is a pretty weak addition to Ebert's notion. And don't even begin to use Half-Life 2 as a counter-example, unless you really want to frame what storytelling is in the first place.

First Person Evolution

I've been playing first person shooters since ... well, there have been first person shooters. Possibly even before, depending on how you define the concept versus the coined genre (I once coded a 3D maze program that was in the back of a computer magazine).

OK, I'm old. Let's move on.

Doom inspired more than a few clones, and Quake practically created the concept of similar games being called a Whatever killer. Quake killer, Half-Life killer, Halo killer (this trend in the media may have died with Haze ... or at least it should have). During this generation, most of the feature changes were similar across titles: level design and weapon design. Duke at least gave us a funny character, which was a step up from the generic marine.

Eventually we got better controls, better AI, a horde of graphical improvements so technical that you'd need a degree in Carmackology to grasp, and well, more improvements to level and weapon design. Valve gave us scripted sequences, and various developers have tacked on new multiplayer modes. Eventually, someone added vehicles.

But for a moment - let's look at what is the same. In Borderlands, I shoot barrels to explode around enemies. I did that in Doom. The zombies in Doom dropped ammo when they were killed ... as did the necromorphs of Dead Space. Bioshock 2 is a landscape devoid of life but full of crates. The E2M2 level of Doom was a crate maze.

Before the crate maze? Lots of barrels. Let's dwell for a moment on the fact that Halo was revolutionary simply because you could only carry two guns. Crazy! And yet it helped give the game immersion, slimmer control requirements and added mechanics about weapon balance. And sure, there have been peaks and valleys of innovation. Deus Ex was earth-shatteringly brilliant, giving us a branching narrative, RPG-like stats and inventory control and a richly interactive world.

And then we had Deus Ex II.

Clearly I'm being intentionally myopic here. Dead Space may have had old school ammo drops and weapon control - but it also had a HUD-less design and really well done third/first person hybrid perspective. Bioshock 2 was not only carrying on traditional design concepts from Deus Ex and System Shock (two of the best shooters ever made), but introduced a highly original world concept and exceptional production design. These aren't things to scoff at, and I haven't even gotten to games like Thief or Mirror's Edge which challenge the very concept of "first person" and "shooter" being a strict relationship.

But this isn't about giving the love, it's about nudging an aging genre that a few pushes in a few directions won't suffice for the future. Borderlands and Bioshock 2 represent the outskirts of acceptablity to me now. I'd like to pose a few challenges to the genre.


Continue to mash with other genres
Some of the most notable examples in FPS gaming have relied on blending in action adventure (like branching narratives) and RPG elements (like upgradeable characters). Even MAG, which is in its heart a straight up military shooter, tracks skill points you can use to enhance your solider.

Great, but the genre could do more. id's upcoming Rage well bring in racing elements. There have been various attempts to bring RTS style action - but I actually think many of these have somewhat failed. The basic mechanics of the shooter have been done, and done, and done again. When I was modding Unreal, I had planned out a partial conversion which would have a static map with specific resources needing control, upgradeable characters (with a dynamic list of team members). It was actually supposed to be a mix of Unreal and X-Com. Like so many projects, I never finished it - only had a core pieces of working code. But that was for UT2004 - so I know the technology is there, it's just that nobody is designing it.

Drop the cliches
I was half-tempted to call these out individually, but let's lump them together: barrels, crates, unrealistic inventory drops, ghostly women whispering in your...

Actually, wait. I'm calling this one out for a moment. I think Halo started the trend, but I'm not entirely sure ... but I'm pretty certain not every game needs an attractive, spectral, female voice commanding the player. That most shooter games rely on messages being broadcasted directly to the player's ear is bad enough, but the majority of them being computerized/ghostly/holographic women brings it close to a bad Monty Python joke.

But continuing on: unrealistic inventory control, "find that key" style map control, monster closets, trap rooms, uberweapons ... need I go on? I'll give Bioshock 2 credit ... it riffs off many of these cliches so effortlessly they don't feel annoying, but not every shooter will be Bioshock 2. Games like GoldenEye and Halo made what were in actuality small mechanical changes to the core gameplay of the shooter, but in doing so have become classics in their own right.

Open worlds, sandbox gameplay
There needs to be a better distinction between the concept of open world design and sandbox gameplay - as shooters could do with a dose of both. Open world simply means a non-linear layout, where you aren't forced to wander in between point A and B to progress through the game. Sandbox gameplay means the player isn't required to do a specific task to progress, but can devise their own solution to the problem. Bioshock 2 dipped into the latter, allowing the player to setup their own style of defense for the Little Sisters (or not defend them at all). But again, this is a toe in the water. This was another subject myself and some fellow modders used to toy with. Once concept I never got down was "Unreal City", where all the games took place on the same map, and players would choose objectives from job boards ... including opposing objectives (so you might be tasked to kill player A, while I'm tasked with keeping them alive).

More Social Multiplayer
I frequently avoid online games because I find so many random people online to be total asshats. Whether it's the guy playing his guitar over his mic, or the one complaining endless about how unfair the game is, to griefers and PKers, to the racists and the children ... there's a good subsection of the online population I'd rather not associate with.

But hey, it's there and it might as well be tapped. Recently shooters have trended towards better and better coop play - which is excellent. Also, better squad mechanics are starting to arise, also excellent. But what about truly complicated social interactions? Deathmatch mechanics have pushed towards this at times - but why can't I have a nemesis? Or a sidekick? Roles in shooters are an all or nothing deal.

Another mod concept: One player, unknown to the rest of the server, was a killer. They had enhanced abilities. But, they could could easily be overwhelmed in numbers - so that one player would score for kills, but the rest would score more if they could keep a majority of the people alive before killing the killer. It was a little bit werewolf, little bit The Thing.

Now I know the issue - for more role related play, people need to know their roles. A classic gametype which has gone the way of the dodo is a VP mode where one player was an unarmed VP and the rest of the team had to ferry them forward. Which was an awesome gametype, unless the guy being VP was a moron or simply had never played before. Then it lasted about ten seconds.

Hey, I didn't say it would be easy - that's why it's a challenge. Considering we live in an age where most players don't even crack open

Or even off the game field: better player marketplaces, lobbies, hubs. Sony Home is a moving towards failed experiment area, but doesn't mean it isn't an interesting idea.

Interface with more than a trigger
In many military shooters right now, there is the magic wrench/buffer/sparkle gun/hypo which magically repairs vehicles or people. While this mechanically fits easily with the rest of the game (especially the healing), it does make me want for more. id showed with Doom III that shooters can have richer interfaces (though that was more designed for mouse users, true...) - and yet for the most part we're left with just pointing and pulling the trigger.

Obviously single player could benefit the most out of this, and we've seen this in some instances with the Bioshock and Thief series, for example.

Another point is deeper interactions with the player and the player's inventory itself. Since Deus Ex, there has been a stripping down of this - simpler RPG elements with fewer options. In Deus Ex I could fiddle with my assault rifle until it was a semi-automatic sniper rifle. In Bioshock 2, I can tack a bigger barrel on another barrel, and that is about that.


OK, I think that's enough ranting for the moment. I gotta go find a cat playing a piano to rebalance the internets now.

For Friday: Bo Peep Bo Peep

Via Topless Robot, who refers to it as possibly the worst pop song ever written.

You can hate me later. Or now, your choice.

TV Watch: Lost, The Lighthouse

There's this scene in a relatively bad Buffy episode where Xander notes how funny it is that nobody ever noticed a Transylvanian castle in the middle of Sunnydale before. It was good humor and hung a lantern, so to speak, on how the show continually added locations to an otherwise vanilla California suburb.

In The Lighthouse, Jack wonders out loud how it is that nobody noticed a tall stone building before. Hurley responds with a rather deadpan, "Maybe we weren't looking for it."

Like Buffy, Lost has continually added new locations and for the most part has used the jungle foilage as a rationale for characters stumbling onto them. What I can't tell is if Hurley's response is the direct opposite of the intent in Buffy - not to dismiss the oddness by giving it a bit of recognition, but to specifically call it out. The island has been home to a lot of oddy placed things, some with potential explanations (genetically altered polar bears to survive the tropical climate) and some without (Kate's horse). Did people not see The Lighthouse because they just weren't looking, or was it actually not there because they just weren't looking?

The episode also pointedly reminded us of two important season one plot points - that Jack's dad wasn't in the coffin, and the corpses Adam & Eve. Hurley brings up the fan theory that Adam & Eve are, in fact, Losties ... which could be simply a fan nod or near confirmation. Either way, it's good to know the writers haven't forgotten about these points.

The end result of the episode seems to be a line in the sand and opposing teams. Anti-Jacob has Sawyer, Claire and possibly Jin and/or Sayid. Jacob has Jack and Hurley. The Temple is stuck in the middle, though Jacob doesn't seem capable of defending it any more (possibly because of his being dead and all). Winner seems to get control of the island, and hence be a protector or He Who Runneth Amoks (assumingly).

All in all I though this was a pretty good episode, but I do have one point of order I can't quite figure out (I know, how weird for this show). Claire disappears after seeing Christian Shepherd and leaves Aaron behind. She isn't seen again until she appears mysteriously in Jacob's Cabin, and hence we can't be sure if that was her or an apparition. Now she's CFL following SmokeLocke around, knowing that it is SmokeLocke ( or at least not Locke ). She thinks The Others have Aaron and threatens to kill Kate if she is the one who took her.

But - let's track that backwards. If Claire is in the company of SmokeLocke, then does that mean Christian's appearances signify SmokeLocke? And if Aaron was left behind after Claire followed him - why does she think The Others have Aaron?

I bring this up as an example of when Lost fans might have to take a deep breath and realize - that probably isn't going to get sorted out. It's chaff in a long and complicated storyline with a lot of noise in the signal. I'll be happy if the final explanation even keeps the Smoke Monster / dead people sightings marginally consistent.

Anyway, good episode.