Yeah, yeah, no update for two days. Sorry, but life calls first!
Anyway, I just received word, through our friends and GameSpot, that both Crysis 2 is delayed and that Dead Space 2 is coming to every platform to ever exist ever. Meaning, in essence, that it's coming to handhelds and mobile phones and consoles and PC.
For the first part, Crysis 2, I'm not at all perturbed, and you shouldn't be either. The original Crysis came out almost three years ago, and still remains the benchmark for how good your PC is. I say that if it takes three years to catch up with graphics technology on the hardware front, I don't think anyone should worry about a few more months of hardware dev time and releases to help ease the processor destroying monster that will be Crysis 2. Like Portal 2, I'm willing to wait a little more because I know that CryTek wants only to make sure the game will be the absolute best it could be. They received a lot of flak for their handling of the original Crysis, what with its strange premise, cliffhanger ending, unidentifiable island and giant, yet inconclusive, boss fight. For a game as massively changed as Crysis 2 seems to be, not only is a three and a half years reasonable, I'd say that it asks a little much. For the first part, the folks at CryTek are building a whole city from the ground up, in cyberspace. The opportunities for dynamic action, death defying stunts, open world gameplay are endless and the sheer amount of detail that goes into creating a realistic virtual environment take equally endless amounts of time and dedication. Also, like Portal 2, CryTek seems to be expanding not only the environments but also the game mechanics, and, based on the already rather complicated mechanic of Crysis, that is a tall order.
As for Dead Space, not much to say beyond, "Wow." I didn't play the original, due in large part to lack of funds and interest, so I can't speak to the game itself. I may have to do what I've done with other game series and play the second game quickly to follow the first, to see what they improve. Then again, I don't really care for horror games, so maybe not. I applaud EA for pushing it so hard, since the response at E3 was so positive.
More tomorrow as I crawl home from my pre-GenCon gaming.
Xiant
Showing posts with label Sequels. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Sequels. Show all posts
Tuesday, August 3, 2010
Sunday, August 1, 2010
Camping
Taking a break from FFXIII and back at BC2. What seems to plague a good many Rush games is the idea of camping. Being a progressive objective gametype with an offense and defense, camping is always going to be a factor, especially on defense. Heck, that's what defense play can be, though good defenders actually move around the map rather than posting up with an ammo and health pack and spamming with nades and noob tubes. Where it really becomes an issue is on the offensive side. You take a single base and then suddenly someone decides its best for the team to sit on their duff and watch the defense push back. This notion seems to be contagious, as the entire team soon follows suit. Perhaps the most amusing part about this syndrome is that, when the game is all but lost, someone finally sees that there is an opportunity, but by then, it's too late. Then the game switches, and the rage quitting begins.
It certainly has its place in FPS games. There are times when you must camp, as is the case with Rush and defense, or in Call of Duty when you just need that last kill or two, or, if your team is good enough to spawn trap, sit back and watch the kills rack up. Certainly there are time when, tactically speaking, camping is probably a better proposition than rushing. However, I take the OpTic crew's ideals that I'd rather lose by rushing than win by camping.This is, of course, more applicable in CoD due to the faster nature of that game series, but it applies in BC2 as well. The name of Rush is rush for a reason. The attacking team needs to rush intelligently and fiercely, then take a quick breather and repeat the process until the game is won. The strategy a team uses must revolve around the environment, how players react to air support and other vehicles, what they destroy and what they leave standing, but rushing teams need to do just that, rush. I've played just one too many Rush games where a team pushes the enemy back then takes just that instant too long and finds themselves unable to push again. The momentum shifts and something in the minds of the players changes, forcing them into a regiment of "sit in a corner and kill when you can." I understand that, at the end of the game, K/D padding is something to think about, but, again, I've been in games when it is literally the very last ticket that allows the attackers to blow up the M-Com and they then have 75 brand new tickets to push once again. It really only takes a few tickets to decide a round. It's those games that are the most enjoyable, the ones where every second could spell the end of the entire base. Games where both teams sit and take pot shots at each other are boring, and spawn trap games are both frustrating and endlessly boring.
I understand the camping mentality. I do. It almost guarantees a kill or two, and smart campers move around a couple spots intermittently, farming their kills as they go. It is an easy, if uninteresting, way to get points and keep an objective safe. Some players do it to troll the enemy team and make them mad, others do it because they don't yet have the skill to do anything else. Others do it just because they're lazy. All three reasons have their place, I suppose. You'll find fault with any of them. The trolls need to get a life and find another way to make their lives enjoyable than making the random person on the internet mad (who hasn't done that? Think of a more productive thing to do). The lazy people probably have better things to do, and I'll admit laziness is a good excuse. The skill factor comes with time, but to really get better, you need to get out of that corner and try other things. I can only bush wookie for so long. I switched to the VSS auto sniper and C4 and I feel like a fuzzy assault guy with boom boom blocks. I'll admit that I actually prefer the VSS play, most times. The bush wookie has his place too. If he takes out defenders when they're doing their job and covers his allies and throws motion mines, then he's doing a good job.Camping for them is a job. That's what a sniper does, and wt some recon guys do and do well enough to shoot up the scoreboard. What I don't condone is joining a team halfway through the round, banking a mediocre score with a few headshots and motion mine assists and finding myself at the top of the scoreboard. If, within 3 kills and 5-6 assists I am doing better than the 15 other people on my team, something's wrong. Either people aren't hitting shots or they aren't really doing anything. It's sad, really.
Camping sucks done wrong, and when it's done right it's still rather annoying.
Xiant
It certainly has its place in FPS games. There are times when you must camp, as is the case with Rush and defense, or in Call of Duty when you just need that last kill or two, or, if your team is good enough to spawn trap, sit back and watch the kills rack up. Certainly there are time when, tactically speaking, camping is probably a better proposition than rushing. However, I take the OpTic crew's ideals that I'd rather lose by rushing than win by camping.This is, of course, more applicable in CoD due to the faster nature of that game series, but it applies in BC2 as well. The name of Rush is rush for a reason. The attacking team needs to rush intelligently and fiercely, then take a quick breather and repeat the process until the game is won. The strategy a team uses must revolve around the environment, how players react to air support and other vehicles, what they destroy and what they leave standing, but rushing teams need to do just that, rush. I've played just one too many Rush games where a team pushes the enemy back then takes just that instant too long and finds themselves unable to push again. The momentum shifts and something in the minds of the players changes, forcing them into a regiment of "sit in a corner and kill when you can." I understand that, at the end of the game, K/D padding is something to think about, but, again, I've been in games when it is literally the very last ticket that allows the attackers to blow up the M-Com and they then have 75 brand new tickets to push once again. It really only takes a few tickets to decide a round. It's those games that are the most enjoyable, the ones where every second could spell the end of the entire base. Games where both teams sit and take pot shots at each other are boring, and spawn trap games are both frustrating and endlessly boring.
I understand the camping mentality. I do. It almost guarantees a kill or two, and smart campers move around a couple spots intermittently, farming their kills as they go. It is an easy, if uninteresting, way to get points and keep an objective safe. Some players do it to troll the enemy team and make them mad, others do it because they don't yet have the skill to do anything else. Others do it just because they're lazy. All three reasons have their place, I suppose. You'll find fault with any of them. The trolls need to get a life and find another way to make their lives enjoyable than making the random person on the internet mad (who hasn't done that? Think of a more productive thing to do). The lazy people probably have better things to do, and I'll admit laziness is a good excuse. The skill factor comes with time, but to really get better, you need to get out of that corner and try other things. I can only bush wookie for so long. I switched to the VSS auto sniper and C4 and I feel like a fuzzy assault guy with boom boom blocks. I'll admit that I actually prefer the VSS play, most times. The bush wookie has his place too. If he takes out defenders when they're doing their job and covers his allies and throws motion mines, then he's doing a good job.Camping for them is a job. That's what a sniper does, and wt some recon guys do and do well enough to shoot up the scoreboard. What I don't condone is joining a team halfway through the round, banking a mediocre score with a few headshots and motion mine assists and finding myself at the top of the scoreboard. If, within 3 kills and 5-6 assists I am doing better than the 15 other people on my team, something's wrong. Either people aren't hitting shots or they aren't really doing anything. It's sad, really.
Camping sucks done wrong, and when it's done right it's still rather annoying.
Xiant
Thursday, July 29, 2010
Final Fantasy XIII: Character Development
Short post, this is in two parts. I'll compare FFXIII to VII a lot, since that is the closest game that Square emulated for XIII.
What was really impressive about VII's characters was, as I said, their complexities and depth. The multiple plot threads, mindsets and personalities that each character possessed evolved and found resolution as the game progressed, reaching their endings only when the game's end came into sight. What FFXIII does, and wrongly, in this case, is quicker development. Having played a little farther into the game, I need to clarify a few things. The whiny little kid is no longer whiny, but now fills the role as secondary "friendship is everything" talker to Snow. The anime is showing something fierce both in his current mindset and the entire game's art style. That aside, the kid is a little better than he was a few hours ago, but he's slowly approaching Snow's one-sidedness. There is one thread of thought he still needs to tie up, but for now the only reason he's still around is because he likes these people. Sure, in VII there were a couple people like that, but they were temporary. Again, each character stuck with the party because some part of them was incomplete without the completion of the end goal and the happiness it brought. If they had a name and more than 10 lines of dialogue, they were deep, meaningful characters with motives beyond "save the world" or "I'm really curious" or "these people are nice and I'm kinda stuck with 'em." To XIII's credit, there is one overarching theme that ties the party together, but there needs to be more, as I've said again and again.
Another thing that bugs me is how quickly characters move from one emotional state to another. One minute they're laughing, the other their angry and confused, the next, laughing again. Emotions don't fade that quickly, at least not for anyone I've ever met. Ways of thinking change too quickly as well, and Lightning's monologue about herself was about as forced as I've ever seen. She, of everyone, needs to change slowest, evolving in small, delicate steps. At this point, I think Square dropped the ball on their "female Cloud." He remained cold and distant for essentially the first disc and half of the second. He moved with the group because he had too and, deep down, he knew he needed them more than they needed him. There was certainly that attention to the whole "FRIENDSHIP IS AWESOME" is VII, but it wasn't nearly as pronounced. Cloud's trust in the party came based on his own morals and how everyone seemed drawn to him, but he remained always unsure. In XIII, unlike its model VII, that uncertainty is voiced again and again, in no uncertain terms. Subtlety, Square, Subtlety. We don't need to hear that they don't know what to do. We can tell from their body language and the tone of their voice and the look in their eyes. What's irksome about the style in XIII is that the subliminal signals are all there, presented in high definition picture, and gamers who have at least three functioning brain cells can see what the character is really thinking and feeling. Yet apparently Square thinks much less of their players' intelligence than they used to, because, and I'll repeat, they give us everything verbally.
There are those brilliant Squaresoft moments though (Square Enix really lost something), and as you may expect, they come from Sahz. He remains the only character to evolve but remain damaged, complex and interesting. I won't say why because that's a big part of his story, but the scene I just finished really shows that some people at Square still value complex characters with pasts that affect the present and that the future is not always an easy thing to see. Maybe this is because Sahz is the oldest in the party, and has more on his plate then the others. That's really bullock though, since the only character less than 15 years old is Hope, and as one dimensional as he's becoming, 14 is plenty of time to garner plenty of stuff to hate about life but not be able to voice. It's disappointing but for XIII Square really made the game for themselves and not their fans. How much can we make ourselves look awesome, they may have thought. The characters, save Sahz, are over-thought and overdone, but with 40 hours of game left to play, anything could happen.
Xiant
What was really impressive about VII's characters was, as I said, their complexities and depth. The multiple plot threads, mindsets and personalities that each character possessed evolved and found resolution as the game progressed, reaching their endings only when the game's end came into sight. What FFXIII does, and wrongly, in this case, is quicker development. Having played a little farther into the game, I need to clarify a few things. The whiny little kid is no longer whiny, but now fills the role as secondary "friendship is everything" talker to Snow. The anime is showing something fierce both in his current mindset and the entire game's art style. That aside, the kid is a little better than he was a few hours ago, but he's slowly approaching Snow's one-sidedness. There is one thread of thought he still needs to tie up, but for now the only reason he's still around is because he likes these people. Sure, in VII there were a couple people like that, but they were temporary. Again, each character stuck with the party because some part of them was incomplete without the completion of the end goal and the happiness it brought. If they had a name and more than 10 lines of dialogue, they were deep, meaningful characters with motives beyond "save the world" or "I'm really curious" or "these people are nice and I'm kinda stuck with 'em." To XIII's credit, there is one overarching theme that ties the party together, but there needs to be more, as I've said again and again.
Another thing that bugs me is how quickly characters move from one emotional state to another. One minute they're laughing, the other their angry and confused, the next, laughing again. Emotions don't fade that quickly, at least not for anyone I've ever met. Ways of thinking change too quickly as well, and Lightning's monologue about herself was about as forced as I've ever seen. She, of everyone, needs to change slowest, evolving in small, delicate steps. At this point, I think Square dropped the ball on their "female Cloud." He remained cold and distant for essentially the first disc and half of the second. He moved with the group because he had too and, deep down, he knew he needed them more than they needed him. There was certainly that attention to the whole "FRIENDSHIP IS AWESOME" is VII, but it wasn't nearly as pronounced. Cloud's trust in the party came based on his own morals and how everyone seemed drawn to him, but he remained always unsure. In XIII, unlike its model VII, that uncertainty is voiced again and again, in no uncertain terms. Subtlety, Square, Subtlety. We don't need to hear that they don't know what to do. We can tell from their body language and the tone of their voice and the look in their eyes. What's irksome about the style in XIII is that the subliminal signals are all there, presented in high definition picture, and gamers who have at least three functioning brain cells can see what the character is really thinking and feeling. Yet apparently Square thinks much less of their players' intelligence than they used to, because, and I'll repeat, they give us everything verbally.
There are those brilliant Squaresoft moments though (Square Enix really lost something), and as you may expect, they come from Sahz. He remains the only character to evolve but remain damaged, complex and interesting. I won't say why because that's a big part of his story, but the scene I just finished really shows that some people at Square still value complex characters with pasts that affect the present and that the future is not always an easy thing to see. Maybe this is because Sahz is the oldest in the party, and has more on his plate then the others. That's really bullock though, since the only character less than 15 years old is Hope, and as one dimensional as he's becoming, 14 is plenty of time to garner plenty of stuff to hate about life but not be able to voice. It's disappointing but for XIII Square really made the game for themselves and not their fans. How much can we make ourselves look awesome, they may have thought. The characters, save Sahz, are over-thought and overdone, but with 40 hours of game left to play, anything could happen.
Xiant
Tuesday, July 27, 2010
Final Fantasy XIII: Initial Impression
So the game's been out for months. So it's more linear than any to come before. So it's been reviewed and played into the ground by people willing to pony up 60 hours of their life. None of that matters to me. I skipped FFXII because it looked absolutely not worth a moment of my time. I almost did the same to FFXIII. I'll be the first to admit that I probably would never have picked it up if I hadn't gotten a great deal on it in the UK. 47 bucks for a $60 game and I got the damn thing in England. I'm gonna play it until my hands fall off and write about it here.
That doesn't mean, though, that I won't rip the thing to shreds in an effort second only to Ben "Yahtzee" Crowshaw in Zero-Punctuation. I'm going to be as brutally honest as I can here and stray from my scoring review, since, for now, I haven't finished the bloody thing.
Here we go. First, let me say that, despite their best attempt at recreating the magic that was Final Fantasy VII, Square failed on all counts, at least in the first parts. To begin with, there's no world map. -10 awesome points. You spend about 2 hours in FFVII and then you get a full glimpse of the huge world you will tread all over. You walk in a straight line ad infinitum in FFXIII. Second, there is no clear villain from the start. The opening cutscene and subsequent early play define the setting, certainly, and show that there is something we should be fighting, but what, we really don't know. Again, within 2 hours of FFVII's beginning, I know there's a guy called Sephrioth and that he's really bad and he's going to be the final boss. You just know it. Within 2 hours of FFXIII beginning, there are at least five candidate final bosses, I have no idea how to fight effectively and there is almost no clear direction for the story.
Also, and this is the real big part, the characters are not nearly as complex as they need to be. In FFVII, within 15 minutes of starting the game, there is something very, very wrong with Cloud, and you sense confliction even as you feel put off by his blase attitude. Lightning, on the other hand, is just cold, hard and downright mean. I've spent five hours with her and all I know is she wants to kill something really big and really powerful with no other reason than that she's really mad at it (and that it's cursed her to "die" when it's done with her). We know that we want to beat Sephiroth because of a broken past, something buried deep in the lore and literature of the ages. Cloud is certainly cold and has his mean points, but there is a soft side of him, a side brought out by memories of a better time. He is more human than Lightning to begin with, filled with emotions of love and hate, sadness and joy that play out even despite the much inferior graphics.
The supporting characters too lack a depth seen in past FF games. Their goals are too simple, too defined by only what is on the surface to be effective. Snow, pushed by love for his fiance and nothing else. Hope, wanting revenge and whining constantly. Vanille, who everyone seems to universally loathe and who is somehow the narrator. If anyone has even a vestige of the character of FF's past it is Sahz. He, I think, carries more confliction and interesting depth than any of the others. Why does he have a chocobo? What is his past, his reason for joining and staying with the party? There is a tension within him that none of the other characters possess. Certainly there is tension, but it doesn't run as deep or as strong as it does in Sahz. If I'm interested in unfolding any character to see the underlying layers, I want to see his. Lightning I want to see evolve the most, since Square tried to model her after Cloud, a superior character, in my opinion. Vanille I want to shut up and see that the world is not a constant positive place. Hope I want to grow a pair (I know he's like 10) and man up to both his feelings and the responsibility he now holds. Snow I want to grow complexity. He is the most one sided character where I am in the game, about 8 hours in.
Also, I want to know who the ****ing final boss is. Who am I supposed to hate? Give me someone I know that'll be: "That's gonna be a fight for the ages."
Xiant
That doesn't mean, though, that I won't rip the thing to shreds in an effort second only to Ben "Yahtzee" Crowshaw in Zero-Punctuation. I'm going to be as brutally honest as I can here and stray from my scoring review, since, for now, I haven't finished the bloody thing.
Here we go. First, let me say that, despite their best attempt at recreating the magic that was Final Fantasy VII, Square failed on all counts, at least in the first parts. To begin with, there's no world map. -10 awesome points. You spend about 2 hours in FFVII and then you get a full glimpse of the huge world you will tread all over. You walk in a straight line ad infinitum in FFXIII. Second, there is no clear villain from the start. The opening cutscene and subsequent early play define the setting, certainly, and show that there is something we should be fighting, but what, we really don't know. Again, within 2 hours of FFVII's beginning, I know there's a guy called Sephrioth and that he's really bad and he's going to be the final boss. You just know it. Within 2 hours of FFXIII beginning, there are at least five candidate final bosses, I have no idea how to fight effectively and there is almost no clear direction for the story.
Also, and this is the real big part, the characters are not nearly as complex as they need to be. In FFVII, within 15 minutes of starting the game, there is something very, very wrong with Cloud, and you sense confliction even as you feel put off by his blase attitude. Lightning, on the other hand, is just cold, hard and downright mean. I've spent five hours with her and all I know is she wants to kill something really big and really powerful with no other reason than that she's really mad at it (and that it's cursed her to "die" when it's done with her). We know that we want to beat Sephiroth because of a broken past, something buried deep in the lore and literature of the ages. Cloud is certainly cold and has his mean points, but there is a soft side of him, a side brought out by memories of a better time. He is more human than Lightning to begin with, filled with emotions of love and hate, sadness and joy that play out even despite the much inferior graphics.
The supporting characters too lack a depth seen in past FF games. Their goals are too simple, too defined by only what is on the surface to be effective. Snow, pushed by love for his fiance and nothing else. Hope, wanting revenge and whining constantly. Vanille, who everyone seems to universally loathe and who is somehow the narrator. If anyone has even a vestige of the character of FF's past it is Sahz. He, I think, carries more confliction and interesting depth than any of the others. Why does he have a chocobo? What is his past, his reason for joining and staying with the party? There is a tension within him that none of the other characters possess. Certainly there is tension, but it doesn't run as deep or as strong as it does in Sahz. If I'm interested in unfolding any character to see the underlying layers, I want to see his. Lightning I want to see evolve the most, since Square tried to model her after Cloud, a superior character, in my opinion. Vanille I want to shut up and see that the world is not a constant positive place. Hope I want to grow a pair (I know he's like 10) and man up to both his feelings and the responsibility he now holds. Snow I want to grow complexity. He is the most one sided character where I am in the game, about 8 hours in.
Also, I want to know who the ****ing final boss is. Who am I supposed to hate? Give me someone I know that'll be: "That's gonna be a fight for the ages."
Xiant
Wednesday, July 7, 2010
InFamous 2: ReBoot of Combat
I'm exhausted right now, so I'll make this quick.
On IGN.com, there is a video showcasing InFamous 2's combat features. It seems melee is now a major part of the InFamous mechanic. This is a good thing, since the basic three button melee from the first game, while amusing to use on bystanders and fallen but not dead enemies, played little role in actual combat.
This addition to the gameplay should be as no surprise, given that Cole now sports a giant cattle-prod and such things aren't good from any range but shockingly close (boo). The actual combat itself is rather fluid, consisting of punches and kicks interspersed with the electric powers. The ice powers should also add an interesting twist to the way you deal with your enemies. The game itself is probably still in the early alpha stages, so combat will see major tweaking as development continues. One thing I want to see in the end though, is the closing distance mechanic that came in Zone of the Enders: 2nd Runner.
Here's what I mean. You take in your tough baddie close, rough him up and shoot him into a building from a hundred feet away. You then use the electrical powers to somehow bend space around you to appear in front of him and continue your assault. This will have to be a late in the game ability, since by the time it's usable the big enemies should have the ability to counter or recover from damage. They are super baddies, after all.
Since we know that the Beast, the super-super-super powered villain introduced in the last game is making an appearance, he too should have this power, but it should be far more developed and evolved. The attacks should come quicker and fiercer, leaving little time for Cole to wrest his way out of the onslaught.
All this, however, obviously leads to the idea of just spamming that one attack at the expense of all others, and the Beast could be really annoying if the attack is too powerful. Balance issues in InFamous 1 were fairly well done, seeing as all attacks had a limit and the ultimate attack was a one shot before recharge.
Back on the topic of overall combat, I want to also see chaining of attacks. Seamless chaining, no less. A lightning bolt to the head followed by an electric grapple to throw into far away building to warp melee is something that would not only wow audiences but would be incredibly satisfying to pull off. InFamous is a super hero game, and SuckerPunch brought us the powers in the first game. What needs to happen now is bring in the cinematic combat, the fast paced, explosive, huge scale asskickery that you see in the best superhero movies.
That's it for now,
Xiant
On IGN.com, there is a video showcasing InFamous 2's combat features. It seems melee is now a major part of the InFamous mechanic. This is a good thing, since the basic three button melee from the first game, while amusing to use on bystanders and fallen but not dead enemies, played little role in actual combat.
This addition to the gameplay should be as no surprise, given that Cole now sports a giant cattle-prod and such things aren't good from any range but shockingly close (boo). The actual combat itself is rather fluid, consisting of punches and kicks interspersed with the electric powers. The ice powers should also add an interesting twist to the way you deal with your enemies. The game itself is probably still in the early alpha stages, so combat will see major tweaking as development continues. One thing I want to see in the end though, is the closing distance mechanic that came in Zone of the Enders: 2nd Runner.
Here's what I mean. You take in your tough baddie close, rough him up and shoot him into a building from a hundred feet away. You then use the electrical powers to somehow bend space around you to appear in front of him and continue your assault. This will have to be a late in the game ability, since by the time it's usable the big enemies should have the ability to counter or recover from damage. They are super baddies, after all.
Since we know that the Beast, the super-super-super powered villain introduced in the last game is making an appearance, he too should have this power, but it should be far more developed and evolved. The attacks should come quicker and fiercer, leaving little time for Cole to wrest his way out of the onslaught.
All this, however, obviously leads to the idea of just spamming that one attack at the expense of all others, and the Beast could be really annoying if the attack is too powerful. Balance issues in InFamous 1 were fairly well done, seeing as all attacks had a limit and the ultimate attack was a one shot before recharge.
Back on the topic of overall combat, I want to also see chaining of attacks. Seamless chaining, no less. A lightning bolt to the head followed by an electric grapple to throw into far away building to warp melee is something that would not only wow audiences but would be incredibly satisfying to pull off. InFamous is a super hero game, and SuckerPunch brought us the powers in the first game. What needs to happen now is bring in the cinematic combat, the fast paced, explosive, huge scale asskickery that you see in the best superhero movies.
That's it for now,
Xiant
Tuesday, June 29, 2010
Metal Gear Rising (also, my birthday)
Let's get this out of the way. Today (I'm on Eastern time, so it's just after midnight) I turn 21. So yay for me, I guess. Before I go any further, no I don't plan on plastering myself to the floor today or any other day. I can't stand beer and I have little tolerance for alcohol. I also know when to stop. That's done, on with the games.
Metal Gear Rising, the upcoming Metal Gear game from Kojima Productions, follows the blond wimp (former) from Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty Raiden. For those who never played that game, do so now. Stop reading and buy it, then play it, and do it twice. Then play MGS3: Snake Eater. It's even better. That done, go back to basics and borrow the original from someone or buy it off the PlayStation network (I think you can get it there). Then finally watch (as that's mostly what you do) MGS4: Guns of the Patriots. It is at this point, and at this point only, that Rising would make any real sense, or have any relevancy.
Backing up a bit, though, why I call Raiden a wimp? Again, if you know the Metal Gear series, you know how much a hard boiled badass Solid Snake really is and how exchanging him for some scrawny little punk with major emotional issues (bordering on the emo) seems like a giant slap in the face from Kojima and company. Granted, the kid knows his way around a gun, but the drama that he brought to the Metal Gear series sans any real testosterone grated at every Metal Gear fan's nerves. I'm not really being fair here, since the point is to explain it how you'd hear it from the internet hate machine (minus the profanity and lackluster use of the English grammatical structure).
But since I don't write to be like the internet but to be intelligent and as unbiased as possible, I'll put up why I think Raiden had a place in MGS2 and why he deserves the now apparent two games Kojima plans to make for him. First, we saw Snake's more human side in the first game, the conflict within him and his past (which, to that point, we knew little about). Second, the sudden shift from Snake to Raiden (call sign snake at first) put us on edge given that the opening sequence very neatly mirrored the intro from MGS. This excludes the section where you played Snake at the beginning. Third, and perhaps most importantly, if you listened until the end of the credits in the first Metal Gear Solid, a small sound clip hinted at something much bigger that Snake alone may not have been able to handle. To that end, a new player in the game that would become the grand conspiracy became necessary. However, Snake must not be that player, because in the first game he was essentially led around by the nose. So now it's Raiden's turn. And again, in introducing Raiden, a fresh-faced new recruit with connections wholly outside of Snake's sphere of influence, the other half of the picture, and its major players, could be brought into focus.
All that, and Kojima didn't want a battle hardened Snake being preached to about how to hold a gun and go prone (since new players certainly wouldn't know).
After the horrid fan reaction to Raiden's character, Kojima wisely left the timeline of the first two MGS games and focused on the man who started it all. Play the game to find out who. When he came back to the present and near future in MGS4, things were very different, Raiden had all but disappeared and the puzzle pieces slowly fell into place. Raiden did not, of course, become playable for any period of time during MGS4, as it was really Snake' story that mattered, he did play a pivotal cinematic role in the game's endgame. What is interesting, however, is that Kojima not only completely redesign his character but also disposed of most of his body and personality, making them robotic and quite cold. Rising and its sequel, are to answer the questions of how this happened.
Snake has a near and dear place in my heart as possibly the best spy action hero ass kicking guy to ever live (next to his "dad" and his mentor, of course), and I really want to see more of him, but I know his story is over, and there is nothing left to say. I was, however, very intrigued about Raiden, far more than I was in the days of MGS2. The new game mechanics Kojima plans to implement, i.e. destructible environments, gore and dismemberment, ninja style sword play and an unknown story telling device allow him to break ground in a way he hasn't since the first MGS. There's a part of me that wishes he'd stop with MGS4 and let the Snakes finally rest, but I know that the fans would never stand for that, and a man like Kojima always has ideas spinning in his head. Plus, Kojima Productions in a successful business, unimaginably so, and so he wants to profit from it (still).
When ever the game is going to come out, I want to wait and sit on my thoughts, hear what both the critics and the populace has to say. I'll make my decision then, and I honestly hope I'm not disappointed. Honestly, I don't think I will be. Heck, if I can sit through the hour long cinematic at the end of MGS4 and enjoy the game for what it is and more, I'll be able to handle a little emo drama from its best Kojima produced purveyor.
Thanks for reading,
Xiant
Metal Gear Rising, the upcoming Metal Gear game from Kojima Productions, follows the blond wimp (former) from Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty Raiden. For those who never played that game, do so now. Stop reading and buy it, then play it, and do it twice. Then play MGS3: Snake Eater. It's even better. That done, go back to basics and borrow the original from someone or buy it off the PlayStation network (I think you can get it there). Then finally watch (as that's mostly what you do) MGS4: Guns of the Patriots. It is at this point, and at this point only, that Rising would make any real sense, or have any relevancy.
Backing up a bit, though, why I call Raiden a wimp? Again, if you know the Metal Gear series, you know how much a hard boiled badass Solid Snake really is and how exchanging him for some scrawny little punk with major emotional issues (bordering on the emo) seems like a giant slap in the face from Kojima and company. Granted, the kid knows his way around a gun, but the drama that he brought to the Metal Gear series sans any real testosterone grated at every Metal Gear fan's nerves. I'm not really being fair here, since the point is to explain it how you'd hear it from the internet hate machine (minus the profanity and lackluster use of the English grammatical structure).
But since I don't write to be like the internet but to be intelligent and as unbiased as possible, I'll put up why I think Raiden had a place in MGS2 and why he deserves the now apparent two games Kojima plans to make for him. First, we saw Snake's more human side in the first game, the conflict within him and his past (which, to that point, we knew little about). Second, the sudden shift from Snake to Raiden (call sign snake at first) put us on edge given that the opening sequence very neatly mirrored the intro from MGS. This excludes the section where you played Snake at the beginning. Third, and perhaps most importantly, if you listened until the end of the credits in the first Metal Gear Solid, a small sound clip hinted at something much bigger that Snake alone may not have been able to handle. To that end, a new player in the game that would become the grand conspiracy became necessary. However, Snake must not be that player, because in the first game he was essentially led around by the nose. So now it's Raiden's turn. And again, in introducing Raiden, a fresh-faced new recruit with connections wholly outside of Snake's sphere of influence, the other half of the picture, and its major players, could be brought into focus.
All that, and Kojima didn't want a battle hardened Snake being preached to about how to hold a gun and go prone (since new players certainly wouldn't know).
After the horrid fan reaction to Raiden's character, Kojima wisely left the timeline of the first two MGS games and focused on the man who started it all. Play the game to find out who. When he came back to the present and near future in MGS4, things were very different, Raiden had all but disappeared and the puzzle pieces slowly fell into place. Raiden did not, of course, become playable for any period of time during MGS4, as it was really Snake' story that mattered, he did play a pivotal cinematic role in the game's endgame. What is interesting, however, is that Kojima not only completely redesign his character but also disposed of most of his body and personality, making them robotic and quite cold. Rising and its sequel, are to answer the questions of how this happened.
Snake has a near and dear place in my heart as possibly the best spy action hero ass kicking guy to ever live (next to his "dad" and his mentor, of course), and I really want to see more of him, but I know his story is over, and there is nothing left to say. I was, however, very intrigued about Raiden, far more than I was in the days of MGS2. The new game mechanics Kojima plans to implement, i.e. destructible environments, gore and dismemberment, ninja style sword play and an unknown story telling device allow him to break ground in a way he hasn't since the first MGS. There's a part of me that wishes he'd stop with MGS4 and let the Snakes finally rest, but I know that the fans would never stand for that, and a man like Kojima always has ideas spinning in his head. Plus, Kojima Productions in a successful business, unimaginably so, and so he wants to profit from it (still).
When ever the game is going to come out, I want to wait and sit on my thoughts, hear what both the critics and the populace has to say. I'll make my decision then, and I honestly hope I'm not disappointed. Honestly, I don't think I will be. Heck, if I can sit through the hour long cinematic at the end of MGS4 and enjoy the game for what it is and more, I'll be able to handle a little emo drama from its best Kojima produced purveyor.
Thanks for reading,
Xiant
Sunday, June 27, 2010
What's to Come for Medal of Honor
So I've gone over the major parts of the game and how they seem to me in a reviewer's sense. This being a beta, however, I can't give it a full review without talking about what I hope to see in the actual release. The end review will come after the PC patch, so I can give one review pre and post patch. We'll have to see what game I go for tomorrow, or what news comes up.
In this beta, we have two maps, less than ten types of guns and three class setups. There are crashes and glitches and map errors. All of this will change with the final release. But how, and how much? Here are my thoughts.
First, I'd like to see a couple more class setups. Something in an even bigger support role would be nice. Medal of Honor already distanced itself from its two biggest competitors, let's keep that going. Give something like a medic class or an engineer class, but take a great deal of combat capability from them. Give them a pistol and a low powered rifle, but make them absolutely necessary to a good team. Medics don't revive people. That's too Battlefield. Maybe have them set up shop somewhere and make the shop destructible. Reduce the bullet damage and maybe add an injury system, so that the medic doesn't go through a canned animation for any and all injuries. The engineer should be able to either destroy or repair the environments and/or alter it in ways regular troops cannot. The Frostbite engine already has destruction built in, so use it at least a little more. Maybe adding more alternate routes could be the engineers main job, and maps with impassable chasms cater to them making them a real necessity to the team. At a score chain for them maybe let them build a small bridge or destroy an otherwise indestructible passage way. At their next one, maybe let them increase the minimap for a small time, so that the full battlefield becomes visible with enemy emplacements and everything.
While I'm on that topic, add more to the scorechain, but keep it simple. Make it class based rather than universal. So the rifleman gets what's in the beta, and then each other class gets something of their own, even one or two things different.
DICE promised endless customization. So did MW2, but in the end the best set-ups always boiled down to a very small selection. Don't give an advantage to one set-up over another. Keep it balanced, which DICE is more than capable of.
Give us prone. The single player has it. Give it to the multi. That needs to happen.
More than a few maps. Give us a lot. This has been a long war, and Afghanistan is a big place. Maybe show us a fight over an oil field (controversial, eh?) in the true desert. Show us some cave fighting with very little outdoors. Underground even. If there are fully class based maps, make sniping even harder. Give us windage and bullet drop and true travel time. Make the distances feel right. Make us work for the shots.
If you implement an injury system, have it act like a real injury. Legs injuries should slow you down or immobilize, head injuries blur vision, arm injuries decrease reload times or end it all together, add idle sway to all guns like a sniper scope.
Add a weapon pickup system not unlike Battlefield's, but keep it away from the complete transfer. Just the weapon you're holding with the one on the ground.
All in all, be as realistic as the game will allow. Don't overdo it, and show us the best game you've ever made.
Do it DICE, we know you can.
Thanks for reading,
Xiant
In this beta, we have two maps, less than ten types of guns and three class setups. There are crashes and glitches and map errors. All of this will change with the final release. But how, and how much? Here are my thoughts.
First, I'd like to see a couple more class setups. Something in an even bigger support role would be nice. Medal of Honor already distanced itself from its two biggest competitors, let's keep that going. Give something like a medic class or an engineer class, but take a great deal of combat capability from them. Give them a pistol and a low powered rifle, but make them absolutely necessary to a good team. Medics don't revive people. That's too Battlefield. Maybe have them set up shop somewhere and make the shop destructible. Reduce the bullet damage and maybe add an injury system, so that the medic doesn't go through a canned animation for any and all injuries. The engineer should be able to either destroy or repair the environments and/or alter it in ways regular troops cannot. The Frostbite engine already has destruction built in, so use it at least a little more. Maybe adding more alternate routes could be the engineers main job, and maps with impassable chasms cater to them making them a real necessity to the team. At a score chain for them maybe let them build a small bridge or destroy an otherwise indestructible passage way. At their next one, maybe let them increase the minimap for a small time, so that the full battlefield becomes visible with enemy emplacements and everything.
While I'm on that topic, add more to the scorechain, but keep it simple. Make it class based rather than universal. So the rifleman gets what's in the beta, and then each other class gets something of their own, even one or two things different.
DICE promised endless customization. So did MW2, but in the end the best set-ups always boiled down to a very small selection. Don't give an advantage to one set-up over another. Keep it balanced, which DICE is more than capable of.
Give us prone. The single player has it. Give it to the multi. That needs to happen.
More than a few maps. Give us a lot. This has been a long war, and Afghanistan is a big place. Maybe show us a fight over an oil field (controversial, eh?) in the true desert. Show us some cave fighting with very little outdoors. Underground even. If there are fully class based maps, make sniping even harder. Give us windage and bullet drop and true travel time. Make the distances feel right. Make us work for the shots.
If you implement an injury system, have it act like a real injury. Legs injuries should slow you down or immobilize, head injuries blur vision, arm injuries decrease reload times or end it all together, add idle sway to all guns like a sniper scope.
Add a weapon pickup system not unlike Battlefield's, but keep it away from the complete transfer. Just the weapon you're holding with the one on the ground.
All in all, be as realistic as the game will allow. Don't overdo it, and show us the best game you've ever made.
Do it DICE, we know you can.
Thanks for reading,
Xiant
Medal of Honor Gameplay and Problems
Jumping right in here.
I've made mention of the fast paced nature of the game, and that is the only way I know to describe it. From what I've seen, and seen is all I have, of MW2, Medal of Honor is only slightly slower in the deathmatch mode and significantly slower in the objective gametypes. This is, of course, relative, since spawn times are, at their longest, only about 5 seconds long, and then only for the defenders. Attackers reenter in about 2 seconds tops. Modern Warfare 2 and its nigh-instant respawn times in all but CTF or no respawn in Search and Destroy, is faster. Dying is also faster, even more so than Medal of Honor, and with the number of different ways to die (air support mostly) and patently noobish ways to acquire said kills, not only do games last significantly shorter spans of time, but there is quite a bit more rage involved.
The deathmatch games last about ten minutes, which is comparable to anything in MW2, and for good reason. Respawn times are so similar and the map is much smaller. That is not to say the map is actually small, as it is moderate to large compared to MW2 maps. However, even with a twelve on twelve game, sometimes actually finding another player to kill takes time, especially if spawns recently shifted, instant respawn doesn't do as much to speed up play.
On the deathmatch mode, the score counting kills as well as support actions and revenge/savior/headshot kills, not to mention assists more than makes up for the lulls in battle, as well as lowering the time for gameplay. And speaking of time, DICE continues their idea from BC2 by not putting a time limit on either of their game modes. For Combat Mission, there is a built in limit on how long a match could concievably last, since the attackers have only so many troops to send in before they fail. In a 1v12 situation, with a full spawn trap, the match's limit is only around 200 seconds, or three and a half minutes. However, with the various people playing, and the different ways they play (cautious or aggressive or in between), the matches tend to go into the fifteen minute mark, though they don't really last more than 20 minutes at the maximum. The longest I've seen is a little more than 18 minutes.
That all being said, the comparison of MoH to MW2 and BC2 is impossible to ignore. If you follow anyone on YouTube with the beta in hand, and there are many, the opinions are out there, and they are, surprisingly, wide and varied. Some think the game is more of a Battlefield mod or outright copy, essentially DICE repackaging BC2 with a few changes to gameplay and new maps. Others see it as a mishmash of the two, hedging its bets between the warring franchises. Still others see it as the silent observer, who realized what worked and what didn't, and took its own spin while adding something of its own. The last one works for me. It is neither a copy of MW2 with a DICE touch, nor is it a BC2 mod with different maps. It isn't even a mix of the two, and here's why. First, there doesn't appear to be an air support problem. When I say problem, I mean that during play you don't hear ENEMY AC130 IN THE AIR! at all times, and there aren't constant assaults by harriers and helicopters and missiles aren't falling from the sky every five seconds, or at least, not guided ones. A human guided missile is a late scorechain reward, and you can't call a harrier strike to sit over the map and do the work for you. Secondly, the game takes only the actual engine from BC2, the Frostbite, but utilizes it in a very different way. The destruction is exceedingly limited, since C4 can't even destroy mud houses and it obliterates concrete in BC2. Add to this that the only vehicle acts only as a support unit, not as the primary attacker/defender. If this were a BC2 mod, even the deathmatch mode would have something like a tank or emplacement or something. If it were a clone of MW2, players wouldn't have to work quite as hard for their air support, and they wouldn't have a choice to be team players with defensive scorechains either, especially not when there's a viable mortar strike just waiting at 40 points. The weapons travel in similar paths and in similar ways to MW2, since bullet drop isn't a factor, but they do less damage all around, though more than BC2.
This idea leads nicely into the problems section. First, two things about weapons. Maybe reduce the damage a little bit, just a couple bullets more for each kill, and then make there be a little time between shooting and hitting. Less than BC2 but more than there is currently. I think also there needs to be a kill cam. Giving the weapon that killed you is certainly a nice piece of information, but also knowing from where the bullets came helps occasionally, so that players must move to remain deadly. It reduces camping, if only a little bit.
The lag, of course, needs fixing, as do the freezes on console and the random crashes on PC. I mentioned hacking already, and the server browser needs work, but I know a lot of this last stuff came, and is coming, in the patch.
All this being said, I am glad that DICE put MoH through a beta, because if all this stuff were in the final product, I can only imagine the flame and hatred the game would draw (and I look at MW2 here). Plus, DICE is even patching a Beta so that testing can happen. That makes me happy. Fixing a beta usually happens after it ends, and some companies don't do squat until they don't have to worry about actual gameplay occuring. Granted, these bugs in the beta are next to game breaking, and many are straying away for that reason.
If anything, I wish the beta were extended longer than just a month. This is a fun game.
Thanks for reading,
Xiant
I've made mention of the fast paced nature of the game, and that is the only way I know to describe it. From what I've seen, and seen is all I have, of MW2, Medal of Honor is only slightly slower in the deathmatch mode and significantly slower in the objective gametypes. This is, of course, relative, since spawn times are, at their longest, only about 5 seconds long, and then only for the defenders. Attackers reenter in about 2 seconds tops. Modern Warfare 2 and its nigh-instant respawn times in all but CTF or no respawn in Search and Destroy, is faster. Dying is also faster, even more so than Medal of Honor, and with the number of different ways to die (air support mostly) and patently noobish ways to acquire said kills, not only do games last significantly shorter spans of time, but there is quite a bit more rage involved.
The deathmatch games last about ten minutes, which is comparable to anything in MW2, and for good reason. Respawn times are so similar and the map is much smaller. That is not to say the map is actually small, as it is moderate to large compared to MW2 maps. However, even with a twelve on twelve game, sometimes actually finding another player to kill takes time, especially if spawns recently shifted, instant respawn doesn't do as much to speed up play.
On the deathmatch mode, the score counting kills as well as support actions and revenge/savior/headshot kills, not to mention assists more than makes up for the lulls in battle, as well as lowering the time for gameplay. And speaking of time, DICE continues their idea from BC2 by not putting a time limit on either of their game modes. For Combat Mission, there is a built in limit on how long a match could concievably last, since the attackers have only so many troops to send in before they fail. In a 1v12 situation, with a full spawn trap, the match's limit is only around 200 seconds, or three and a half minutes. However, with the various people playing, and the different ways they play (cautious or aggressive or in between), the matches tend to go into the fifteen minute mark, though they don't really last more than 20 minutes at the maximum. The longest I've seen is a little more than 18 minutes.
That all being said, the comparison of MoH to MW2 and BC2 is impossible to ignore. If you follow anyone on YouTube with the beta in hand, and there are many, the opinions are out there, and they are, surprisingly, wide and varied. Some think the game is more of a Battlefield mod or outright copy, essentially DICE repackaging BC2 with a few changes to gameplay and new maps. Others see it as a mishmash of the two, hedging its bets between the warring franchises. Still others see it as the silent observer, who realized what worked and what didn't, and took its own spin while adding something of its own. The last one works for me. It is neither a copy of MW2 with a DICE touch, nor is it a BC2 mod with different maps. It isn't even a mix of the two, and here's why. First, there doesn't appear to be an air support problem. When I say problem, I mean that during play you don't hear ENEMY AC130 IN THE AIR! at all times, and there aren't constant assaults by harriers and helicopters and missiles aren't falling from the sky every five seconds, or at least, not guided ones. A human guided missile is a late scorechain reward, and you can't call a harrier strike to sit over the map and do the work for you. Secondly, the game takes only the actual engine from BC2, the Frostbite, but utilizes it in a very different way. The destruction is exceedingly limited, since C4 can't even destroy mud houses and it obliterates concrete in BC2. Add to this that the only vehicle acts only as a support unit, not as the primary attacker/defender. If this were a BC2 mod, even the deathmatch mode would have something like a tank or emplacement or something. If it were a clone of MW2, players wouldn't have to work quite as hard for their air support, and they wouldn't have a choice to be team players with defensive scorechains either, especially not when there's a viable mortar strike just waiting at 40 points. The weapons travel in similar paths and in similar ways to MW2, since bullet drop isn't a factor, but they do less damage all around, though more than BC2.
This idea leads nicely into the problems section. First, two things about weapons. Maybe reduce the damage a little bit, just a couple bullets more for each kill, and then make there be a little time between shooting and hitting. Less than BC2 but more than there is currently. I think also there needs to be a kill cam. Giving the weapon that killed you is certainly a nice piece of information, but also knowing from where the bullets came helps occasionally, so that players must move to remain deadly. It reduces camping, if only a little bit.
The lag, of course, needs fixing, as do the freezes on console and the random crashes on PC. I mentioned hacking already, and the server browser needs work, but I know a lot of this last stuff came, and is coming, in the patch.
All this being said, I am glad that DICE put MoH through a beta, because if all this stuff were in the final product, I can only imagine the flame and hatred the game would draw (and I look at MW2 here). Plus, DICE is even patching a Beta so that testing can happen. That makes me happy. Fixing a beta usually happens after it ends, and some companies don't do squat until they don't have to worry about actual gameplay occuring. Granted, these bugs in the beta are next to game breaking, and many are straying away for that reason.
If anything, I wish the beta were extended longer than just a month. This is a fun game.
Thanks for reading,
Xiant
Saturday, June 26, 2010
Medal of Honor Map and Weapon Design
No intro today. Just content.
The maps in the Medal of Honor beta don't need, at first glance, much improvement from their current state. For what they are, they could very easily be final game maps (as well they might). There are a couple things I can say about them, since if there weren't, I wouldn't have much of a topic tonight would I?
Beginning with the Helmand Valley map, I think overall this map doesn't need a whole lot of actual physical changes. Of those it does need, the first is easier access for the one and only tank the map provides (barring the rare two tank game). The bridge has two boxes that impede tank movement completely which cannot be destroyed by Bradley bullets of any kind (something outside of any reality). While there is an alternate route for tanks, the way you have to drive the tank doesn't allow for a lot of quick, calculated movements and it's awkward to say the least.
As for infantry, the map doesn't really favor either side too much. While the attackers certainly have an uphill climb on their hands and limited troops, the decreased respawn time and multiple routes behind the defenders lets them put up an offensive that, if coordinated correctly, is impossible to stop. I'll talk about the respawn tomorrow with gameplay, but now I'll say that it needs tweaking. Also, while I'm on the topic of alternate routes, I have to say that the map is, if anything, too big, with far too much open space. First, with so much damage from weapons and so little health per soldier, pot shots take down enemies in no time. Second, if the shooter has any accuracy, even the best shooter won't last too long unless he spawns right in the action on someone who managed to make it to the front without dying. The map size also comes into play with the number of players per side. Even at twelve at maximum, a coordinated assault by three or four attackers from one of the many flanking positions compromises the defenders just long enough for the plant and the push forward. This, combined with the close together spawn points of the defenders and the tendency of spawn killing among many players leads to a very one sided game regardless of respawn times. Again, this depends almost solely on coordination or the skill of a few players, but it's not fun for the defenders in most cases.
The other map in the beta Kabul City Ruins, is all infantry, and its design reflects this. Close spaces and long corridors with specific sniping positions, easily accessible by anyone and rotating spawns, all combined with short respawn times keeps everything fast and hard. A couple parts of the map need fleshing out or removal, like the stairs to nowhere or the blocked off sniper house stairs, though this probably won't be an issue in the final product. Players quickly deduce the major lines of troop movement on the map and capitalize on them, but with the chaos of battle, and this map really rewards that, keeps things interesting. Adding to the strategy in the map design is the verticality. With different levels of play, whoever has the high ground has the advantage and teams who use it almost always win. That being said, with the multiple ways to said high ground and very short respawn times, barring a spawn trap, advantage shifts.
There are some negatives about this map, though. The above mentioned quirks aside, what breaks and what doesn't isn't always clear and the predicability of where the main conflict happens is something that might monotonize the game. While I don't think that destructable environments are really necessary here, since the map is far too small for that, something needs to happen to free up more of the map for play. For example, there is an entire middle hallway, quite large, in fact, that gets very little playtime, simple because it is so open. If parts of it received cover, even a little bit, it might take some of the load of the other three areas of major combat.
As with all things, the combat in the game relies on the weapons, and from where I see it, there are only six weapons in the game, with grenades being equipment. The rifle, the spec ops, the battle rifle, the pistol, the rocket launcher the bolt action. Stat wise the two factions are identical barring attachments, so I'll talk along these general lines. The rifle (M16, AK-47) is perhaps a little overpowered. Low recoil, especially if burst fired, and equal damage at all ranges makes it a universal death machine. Damage falloff, at least a little more than there is now, would be nice for it. Don't take it so far as the spec ops (M4, AK-74u), but more is better. As for the spec ops, these are probably the best balanced, though still a little over the top. The damage falloff isn't what it should be for a carbine, even at the longest ranges. Still, at all but across map, it's basically a rifle with a different name. The battle rifle (SVD and M21), with either scope, takes a little more skill to use, but because of the instant-shot-from-gun-to-hit and one hit kill headshots, accurate shooters with quick trigger fingers make quick work of almost anyone at long ranges and even quicker close up. The recoil on these is much more, almost too much, leading to wild shots sometimes. Still, it balances the weapon more for its power. The pistols (M9 and Tariq) are pocket rifles with much smaller magazines. The damage is a bit less, but not by much, and three to four shots kills. With across map accuracy, pistol play, while not quite so easy as rifle or spec ops play, is still possible. Rocket launchers, which I put the rifle grenade into, are a little weak, but with straight line shots and instant kill hits or close-by hits make them really powerful in the hands on someone who knows how to use them. The slow reload time and lack of ammunition, however, severely, and properly balance them, so they are perhaps the best balanced weapon currently. The bolt actions are great for either game mode, thought he play style differs tremendously between them. The accuracy and power balanced by the need to hold your soldiers breath makes running and running a little hard, but they are still not to be trifled with. At the longest ranges, a center mass body shot probably should be a one hit kill or close to it, but that's just me and my knowledge of sniper rounds at almost any range, especially bolt action. The only thing I have to say about grenades is that their blast radius needs a little boost and that you need to be able to throw them farther. Not as far as Call of Duty, but father than you can right now.
Thanks for reading,
Xiant
The maps in the Medal of Honor beta don't need, at first glance, much improvement from their current state. For what they are, they could very easily be final game maps (as well they might). There are a couple things I can say about them, since if there weren't, I wouldn't have much of a topic tonight would I?
Beginning with the Helmand Valley map, I think overall this map doesn't need a whole lot of actual physical changes. Of those it does need, the first is easier access for the one and only tank the map provides (barring the rare two tank game). The bridge has two boxes that impede tank movement completely which cannot be destroyed by Bradley bullets of any kind (something outside of any reality). While there is an alternate route for tanks, the way you have to drive the tank doesn't allow for a lot of quick, calculated movements and it's awkward to say the least.
As for infantry, the map doesn't really favor either side too much. While the attackers certainly have an uphill climb on their hands and limited troops, the decreased respawn time and multiple routes behind the defenders lets them put up an offensive that, if coordinated correctly, is impossible to stop. I'll talk about the respawn tomorrow with gameplay, but now I'll say that it needs tweaking. Also, while I'm on the topic of alternate routes, I have to say that the map is, if anything, too big, with far too much open space. First, with so much damage from weapons and so little health per soldier, pot shots take down enemies in no time. Second, if the shooter has any accuracy, even the best shooter won't last too long unless he spawns right in the action on someone who managed to make it to the front without dying. The map size also comes into play with the number of players per side. Even at twelve at maximum, a coordinated assault by three or four attackers from one of the many flanking positions compromises the defenders just long enough for the plant and the push forward. This, combined with the close together spawn points of the defenders and the tendency of spawn killing among many players leads to a very one sided game regardless of respawn times. Again, this depends almost solely on coordination or the skill of a few players, but it's not fun for the defenders in most cases.
The other map in the beta Kabul City Ruins, is all infantry, and its design reflects this. Close spaces and long corridors with specific sniping positions, easily accessible by anyone and rotating spawns, all combined with short respawn times keeps everything fast and hard. A couple parts of the map need fleshing out or removal, like the stairs to nowhere or the blocked off sniper house stairs, though this probably won't be an issue in the final product. Players quickly deduce the major lines of troop movement on the map and capitalize on them, but with the chaos of battle, and this map really rewards that, keeps things interesting. Adding to the strategy in the map design is the verticality. With different levels of play, whoever has the high ground has the advantage and teams who use it almost always win. That being said, with the multiple ways to said high ground and very short respawn times, barring a spawn trap, advantage shifts.
There are some negatives about this map, though. The above mentioned quirks aside, what breaks and what doesn't isn't always clear and the predicability of where the main conflict happens is something that might monotonize the game. While I don't think that destructable environments are really necessary here, since the map is far too small for that, something needs to happen to free up more of the map for play. For example, there is an entire middle hallway, quite large, in fact, that gets very little playtime, simple because it is so open. If parts of it received cover, even a little bit, it might take some of the load of the other three areas of major combat.
As with all things, the combat in the game relies on the weapons, and from where I see it, there are only six weapons in the game, with grenades being equipment. The rifle, the spec ops, the battle rifle, the pistol, the rocket launcher the bolt action. Stat wise the two factions are identical barring attachments, so I'll talk along these general lines. The rifle (M16, AK-47) is perhaps a little overpowered. Low recoil, especially if burst fired, and equal damage at all ranges makes it a universal death machine. Damage falloff, at least a little more than there is now, would be nice for it. Don't take it so far as the spec ops (M4, AK-74u), but more is better. As for the spec ops, these are probably the best balanced, though still a little over the top. The damage falloff isn't what it should be for a carbine, even at the longest ranges. Still, at all but across map, it's basically a rifle with a different name. The battle rifle (SVD and M21), with either scope, takes a little more skill to use, but because of the instant-shot-from-gun-to-hit and one hit kill headshots, accurate shooters with quick trigger fingers make quick work of almost anyone at long ranges and even quicker close up. The recoil on these is much more, almost too much, leading to wild shots sometimes. Still, it balances the weapon more for its power. The pistols (M9 and Tariq) are pocket rifles with much smaller magazines. The damage is a bit less, but not by much, and three to four shots kills. With across map accuracy, pistol play, while not quite so easy as rifle or spec ops play, is still possible. Rocket launchers, which I put the rifle grenade into, are a little weak, but with straight line shots and instant kill hits or close-by hits make them really powerful in the hands on someone who knows how to use them. The slow reload time and lack of ammunition, however, severely, and properly balance them, so they are perhaps the best balanced weapon currently. The bolt actions are great for either game mode, thought he play style differs tremendously between them. The accuracy and power balanced by the need to hold your soldiers breath makes running and running a little hard, but they are still not to be trifled with. At the longest ranges, a center mass body shot probably should be a one hit kill or close to it, but that's just me and my knowledge of sniper rounds at almost any range, especially bolt action. The only thing I have to say about grenades is that their blast radius needs a little boost and that you need to be able to throw them farther. Not as far as Call of Duty, but father than you can right now.
Thanks for reading,
Xiant
Friday, June 25, 2010
MoH Beta Review, Part 1: Graphic and Sound Design
I wanted to make this blog about game news, reviews and critical interpretations (for #3, see the Portal blog), but no actual reviews have gone up. Tonight I rectify that in the first of what I think will be a three part series reviewing the Medal of Honor Beta. Tonight is the graphics and sound design, tomorrow is the weapon and map design, with day three covering actual gameplay and whatever bugs need ironing out. The fourth day, while not actually a review, will go over what I hope to see in the actual release in early October. So let's jump in, shall we?
Graphically speaking, this game is amazing. The computer I play on, and the one I write this blog on, has a much older graphics card, an NVidia 8600 GT. It stinks, I know. Regardless, even though I put almost everything on Low settings, the game looks wonderful. Granted, there's popup and the occasional see through then not see through walls, but overall it works. I think it's also a testament to the game that the low settings have the ability to blow my mind.
Specifically, I think the use of the small color pallet is really well done. Since Afghanistan is mostly a haze of greys, browns and other desert colors, that DICE managed to craft a game not only visually stimulating but that gives the ability to see enemies at almost any distance give credence to the subtle touches in the environments that separate them from the drab "there's more brown over there" graphics of other games. In the Kabul City Ruins map in particular, there is a huge range of colors concentrated in a very small area: namely, a silly looking TV. Breaking it is so very satisfying and almost always guarantees me a better game. The Helmand Valley map, on the other hand, is almost completely a set of five different brown shades scattered and mixed to create a desert environment. Even the tanks and trees and water is brown, if you can believe it. Again, it speaks to the skill with which DICE crafted the game that not only is the map entirely pleasing to look at, but it too allows you to see enemies from a great distance, if only as silhouettes.
The character design too is well done. Each class is immediately distinguishable from the others based on very basic differences, from the headgear worn to what kind of turban the class wears. The developers did their homework on this one, since I can honestly see these Taliban soldiers doing battle with the Coalition in the very cities and valleys where the game takes place.
I won't say a lot about DICE's sound design, because there isn't much to say beyond: it's second to none. Battlefield Bad Company 2 took sound to a new level with bullets falling on snow, buildings collapsing and tanks sounding different from within and without to the sound of a 40mm grenade or a sniper bullet landing next to you. MoH does BC2 one better and, while I've never fired an M16 or an AK-47, I think this is as close as I'll ever get to actually shooting and hearing one. I hear the rattle of the bullets in the magazine of the LMG's and the wing whistle pass the knife when I miss with it. I even hear the sound of the chamber opening and closing on the bolt-action sniper rifles. DICE makes a point of putting the absolute best sounds in their games, and Medal of Honor is no exception.
Thanks for reading,
Xiant
Graphically speaking, this game is amazing. The computer I play on, and the one I write this blog on, has a much older graphics card, an NVidia 8600 GT. It stinks, I know. Regardless, even though I put almost everything on Low settings, the game looks wonderful. Granted, there's popup and the occasional see through then not see through walls, but overall it works. I think it's also a testament to the game that the low settings have the ability to blow my mind.
Specifically, I think the use of the small color pallet is really well done. Since Afghanistan is mostly a haze of greys, browns and other desert colors, that DICE managed to craft a game not only visually stimulating but that gives the ability to see enemies at almost any distance give credence to the subtle touches in the environments that separate them from the drab "there's more brown over there" graphics of other games. In the Kabul City Ruins map in particular, there is a huge range of colors concentrated in a very small area: namely, a silly looking TV. Breaking it is so very satisfying and almost always guarantees me a better game. The Helmand Valley map, on the other hand, is almost completely a set of five different brown shades scattered and mixed to create a desert environment. Even the tanks and trees and water is brown, if you can believe it. Again, it speaks to the skill with which DICE crafted the game that not only is the map entirely pleasing to look at, but it too allows you to see enemies from a great distance, if only as silhouettes.
The character design too is well done. Each class is immediately distinguishable from the others based on very basic differences, from the headgear worn to what kind of turban the class wears. The developers did their homework on this one, since I can honestly see these Taliban soldiers doing battle with the Coalition in the very cities and valleys where the game takes place.
I won't say a lot about DICE's sound design, because there isn't much to say beyond: it's second to none. Battlefield Bad Company 2 took sound to a new level with bullets falling on snow, buildings collapsing and tanks sounding different from within and without to the sound of a 40mm grenade or a sniper bullet landing next to you. MoH does BC2 one better and, while I've never fired an M16 or an AK-47, I think this is as close as I'll ever get to actually shooting and hearing one. I hear the rattle of the bullets in the magazine of the LMG's and the wing whistle pass the knife when I miss with it. I even hear the sound of the chamber opening and closing on the bolt-action sniper rifles. DICE makes a point of putting the absolute best sounds in their games, and Medal of Honor is no exception.
Thanks for reading,
Xiant
Friday, June 18, 2010
The Heavy Update and More E3 News
Having made a great deal of noise about the Medal of Honor beta, not putting up first impressions of it seems to me to be a betrayal of words. And it is, but I do of course, have a reason (some might call it an excuse). First off, the beta didn't actually go live on Steam when everyone expected it to, though it did go up on the appointed day. That said, it was already rather late by the time I finished downloading, and as I considered booting it up to try it out, a friends of mine, TheDakon, who plays Battelfield and TF2 with me on occasion, already had it going. I asked him how it was, but soon realized he spent perhaps three minutes in the actual game. When I pressed him as to why, his response was quick and to the point. Because the beta had just gone live, everyone and their dog was in game trying it out, and the Steam servers were overloaded, as were the EA servers hosting games. Furthermore, several key functions were malfunctioning, so I decided, rightly I hope, to wait the until initial rush ended and the start up kinks began to work themselves out. I know that the consoles are also having trouble with occasional freeze-ups and other game-cracking things, so my patience, I'm sure, will be rewarded in the end.
With that out of the way, I think I'll get to talking about TF2 some more, this time on the Natasha. Because he heavy loves his guns, he names them, and Natasha is his updated weapon (he calls the regular gun Sasha). Sasha's main selling point is its bullets' ability to significantly slow down the movement speed of its targets. Every bullet causes the enemy to move at 75% their total speed for a little more than half a second. That being said, because four bullets come out of the heavy's gun per one unit of ammunition spent, this makes the falloff much more dramatic, so much so that it seems like you come to a near complete stop at all but long range. The tradeoff, for all valve update weapons have a tradeoff of some kind, is a reduced damage output, to the tune of 25%. Again, with the amount of ammo the heavy puts down range with each pull of the trigger, he still takes out enemies very quickly, put up against a heavy with Sasha, the one who wins is either whoever shot first or whoever has a medic. All things being equal, the Sasha heavy wins.
Natasha went through several update phases, as most times, when Valve updated the gun it would lose the slowdown quality. Valve fixed this only recently. As for me, I don't use Natasha as a rule, though I don't play heavy that often (the servers I play on often having a goodly number of skilled spies). However, when I encounter one, I find my teeth grinding, since I feel, and I think others do as well, that the slowdown is too much and makes heavy a much easier class to play, almost cheaply so. Plus, with even the moderate damage reduction, in crowded areas the heavy loses out to the constant assault of rockets, bombs and bullets quicker than with Sasha. His effectiveness dropped, the medic usually goes with the soldier or the demoman or, if he wants to just clear a room, a pyro, while the heavy sits back and eats a sandvich.
Thinking about it, I'll stick to a single class update weapon, since there's cool news coming out in the industry right now that some might not know about. First is Infamous 2, the game where you have electrical super powers the likes of which send ordinary citizens fleeing in terror and cars effortlessly flung into enemies. Infamous (the original) became a favorite among sandbox game enthusiasts for the ease of getting into the game, the story and unique method of its telling and, most of all, the superpowers, something not often seen in a complete sandbox. Cole McGrath, the main character, always seemed the reluctant hero, forced to battle forces for the reason that no one else would. Assuming you played the good side of things, Cole truly did follow Joseph Campbell's Hero's journey, with a few modifications. It was a story of growth and transformation from ordinary person to true hero. By the end of the game, Cole, while still somewhat reticent about his status as super hero, has no reason not to follow the destiny he begins to see before him, and while the city of the game's setting might be safe, there is a whole world that needs saving. With his powers only in their infancy, what Cole comes up with next is anyone's guess.
All that aside, there is one piece of trivia that bugs me a little bit about InFamous 2. Cole's voice actor and character design are completely different. In the first InFamous, Cole' voice was gravely and his head shaven. In InFamous 2, his hair is full and black and his voice is more southern, more relatable. While Sucker Punch, the makers of the game, have purely practical reasons for doing this (their vision of Cole's voice and the actor didn't match up, and the actor couldn't make it to face modeling from where he lived) I find it against the spirit of the game. The voice and appearance of the first game acted as a strong indicator as to both the kind of person Cole is but also shone a light on his internal conflict. His voice, a low, rough sound, mirrored his mental state and reluctance to hear the call to action. His yellow apparel and rucksack showed his link to humanity while still subtly separating him from it. He remained somewhat above and beyond the normal person, while still maintaining his humanity. With the blue t-shirt, the southern voice, Cole is now still more human that he was before, and seems much more casual with the whole idea of having his powers. Now, I don't want Cole dressing up in tights and a cape, but retaining some degree of separation, at least for me, should have been tops on the list. Cole is no longer part of the population. He is a man apart, a man above and beyond so many. I think his appearance should reflect that. His reluctance should be fading as the world heats up in danger and chaos, but I know that to be a room with Cole, a man within whom a huge electric charge always sits, would be uncomfortable to say the least. I don't, therefore, want to feel like I could let him into my house and have a drink with him. If he is to be the savior, make him seem, first visually, the savior.
Thanks for reading,
Xiant
With that out of the way, I think I'll get to talking about TF2 some more, this time on the Natasha. Because he heavy loves his guns, he names them, and Natasha is his updated weapon (he calls the regular gun Sasha). Sasha's main selling point is its bullets' ability to significantly slow down the movement speed of its targets. Every bullet causes the enemy to move at 75% their total speed for a little more than half a second. That being said, because four bullets come out of the heavy's gun per one unit of ammunition spent, this makes the falloff much more dramatic, so much so that it seems like you come to a near complete stop at all but long range. The tradeoff, for all valve update weapons have a tradeoff of some kind, is a reduced damage output, to the tune of 25%. Again, with the amount of ammo the heavy puts down range with each pull of the trigger, he still takes out enemies very quickly, put up against a heavy with Sasha, the one who wins is either whoever shot first or whoever has a medic. All things being equal, the Sasha heavy wins.
Natasha went through several update phases, as most times, when Valve updated the gun it would lose the slowdown quality. Valve fixed this only recently. As for me, I don't use Natasha as a rule, though I don't play heavy that often (the servers I play on often having a goodly number of skilled spies). However, when I encounter one, I find my teeth grinding, since I feel, and I think others do as well, that the slowdown is too much and makes heavy a much easier class to play, almost cheaply so. Plus, with even the moderate damage reduction, in crowded areas the heavy loses out to the constant assault of rockets, bombs and bullets quicker than with Sasha. His effectiveness dropped, the medic usually goes with the soldier or the demoman or, if he wants to just clear a room, a pyro, while the heavy sits back and eats a sandvich.
Thinking about it, I'll stick to a single class update weapon, since there's cool news coming out in the industry right now that some might not know about. First is Infamous 2, the game where you have electrical super powers the likes of which send ordinary citizens fleeing in terror and cars effortlessly flung into enemies. Infamous (the original) became a favorite among sandbox game enthusiasts for the ease of getting into the game, the story and unique method of its telling and, most of all, the superpowers, something not often seen in a complete sandbox. Cole McGrath, the main character, always seemed the reluctant hero, forced to battle forces for the reason that no one else would. Assuming you played the good side of things, Cole truly did follow Joseph Campbell's Hero's journey, with a few modifications. It was a story of growth and transformation from ordinary person to true hero. By the end of the game, Cole, while still somewhat reticent about his status as super hero, has no reason not to follow the destiny he begins to see before him, and while the city of the game's setting might be safe, there is a whole world that needs saving. With his powers only in their infancy, what Cole comes up with next is anyone's guess.
All that aside, there is one piece of trivia that bugs me a little bit about InFamous 2. Cole's voice actor and character design are completely different. In the first InFamous, Cole' voice was gravely and his head shaven. In InFamous 2, his hair is full and black and his voice is more southern, more relatable. While Sucker Punch, the makers of the game, have purely practical reasons for doing this (their vision of Cole's voice and the actor didn't match up, and the actor couldn't make it to face modeling from where he lived) I find it against the spirit of the game. The voice and appearance of the first game acted as a strong indicator as to both the kind of person Cole is but also shone a light on his internal conflict. His voice, a low, rough sound, mirrored his mental state and reluctance to hear the call to action. His yellow apparel and rucksack showed his link to humanity while still subtly separating him from it. He remained somewhat above and beyond the normal person, while still maintaining his humanity. With the blue t-shirt, the southern voice, Cole is now still more human that he was before, and seems much more casual with the whole idea of having his powers. Now, I don't want Cole dressing up in tights and a cape, but retaining some degree of separation, at least for me, should have been tops on the list. Cole is no longer part of the population. He is a man apart, a man above and beyond so many. I think his appearance should reflect that. His reluctance should be fading as the world heats up in danger and chaos, but I know that to be a room with Cole, a man within whom a huge electric charge always sits, would be uncomfortable to say the least. I don't, therefore, want to feel like I could let him into my house and have a drink with him. If he is to be the savior, make him seem, first visually, the savior.
Thanks for reading,
Xiant
The Demo Update and Portal 2: A Briefing
Again, apologies for the late hour. Life gets in the way, and habits need to form. Because tonight is still yet later than last, this will be the shortest blog so far, and I feel awful for it. Tomorrow will be better.
On that note, the Demoman's only actual ranged weapon from his update. The Scottish Resistance. The newest weapon, along with the Direct Hit, discussed two blogs ago, it is perhaps the most tactical weapon in the entire game. Remote detonation of sticky bombs with just the press of a button, long a staple of demoman strategy, does not apply with the SR. Valve's design philosophy for their updates seems to be, "How can we make our players play differently, and play smarter?" Their case in point is the Scottish Resistance. Because you have to be directly facing, and in some cases looking directly at, groups of SR bombs to detonate them, placement and detonation takes a great deal of memory and battlefield finesse, something most demoman players, so used to the original launcher, either do not possess or do not wish to learn. This, coupled with the increased amount of sticky bombs allowed on the field of battle at a time, makes the SR the hardest weapon to use effectively. Something that I'll touch on in the future, rocket/sticky jumping, is also made a good deal harder, since the SR requires directional detonation. Therefore, the demoman must look down to detonate the SR bomb, whereas with the regular launcher he need only click a button.
As for myself, while I play demoman only to wear the really sweet hat and get a few laughs, I don't particularly care for the SR. I tax my brain enough with the strategies of TF2, especially playing demo, that I don't need to think any more than I already do. On forums I've seen people say that a skilled SR user can singlehandedly hold down any objective with little trouble. This argument, however, turns stale if you take a moment to look at any class played skillfully. Search YouTube or PLDX.com and see that scouts, soldiers, snipers, demomen without the SR, pyros even, defending the objective with nothing more than their starting weapons, and allowing their team to push back.
While I can't say too much about Portal 2, having seen only scant details (along with everyone else save Valve), I noticed this during the examples of play I did see. Note here that this is more a personal interpretation and critical stance on the game, rather than a review, but it bears speaking to. In Portal, and its sequel, there are sentry drones voiced by the voice of the main villain, indeed the only character to speak at length during the first game at all. These bots add some black humor to the already horrendously dark and funny game by trying to murder you with twin machine guns, then saying, if you defeat them, "I don't hate you." In the original Portal, they seemed little more than drones sent by your nemesis to test and, more than likely, kill you. There were moments, and these were mere moments, where their pleas to be put down before being deactivated seemed somewhat genuine, but, of course, you know better.
In Portal 2, on the other hand, there are many more ways to torment and destroy these sentry bots. Fling them into a high energy wind tunnel, down a bottomless shaft, send them into an infinite loop ending only when you decide to laser beam them to death, or just do it yourself. Fun and merciless as this is, as I watched the demo being played, a disturbing side of me began to feel pity for these little machines. Put in front of us only to serve a very simple purpose, I looked back and realized that their statement "I don't hate you." Is a true one, fully honest and devoid of deception. Programmed with only one action and response, they are innocent casualties in the war between the player character and the antagonist. What makes this yet more powerful for me is that their responses to the laser beams and the wind tunnels now seem to involve pain and distress at their situation. Not robotic any longer, they seem to truly lament the state you put them in for your own survival, and just a little bit, I feel for them as less robot killers but instead beings whose feelings and bodies are tortured only for my and my captor's amusement. It is a sad state, I think, one worth lamenting, if considered in this way.
With this, I leave you.
Good night.
Xiant
On that note, the Demoman's only actual ranged weapon from his update. The Scottish Resistance. The newest weapon, along with the Direct Hit, discussed two blogs ago, it is perhaps the most tactical weapon in the entire game. Remote detonation of sticky bombs with just the press of a button, long a staple of demoman strategy, does not apply with the SR. Valve's design philosophy for their updates seems to be, "How can we make our players play differently, and play smarter?" Their case in point is the Scottish Resistance. Because you have to be directly facing, and in some cases looking directly at, groups of SR bombs to detonate them, placement and detonation takes a great deal of memory and battlefield finesse, something most demoman players, so used to the original launcher, either do not possess or do not wish to learn. This, coupled with the increased amount of sticky bombs allowed on the field of battle at a time, makes the SR the hardest weapon to use effectively. Something that I'll touch on in the future, rocket/sticky jumping, is also made a good deal harder, since the SR requires directional detonation. Therefore, the demoman must look down to detonate the SR bomb, whereas with the regular launcher he need only click a button.
As for myself, while I play demoman only to wear the really sweet hat and get a few laughs, I don't particularly care for the SR. I tax my brain enough with the strategies of TF2, especially playing demo, that I don't need to think any more than I already do. On forums I've seen people say that a skilled SR user can singlehandedly hold down any objective with little trouble. This argument, however, turns stale if you take a moment to look at any class played skillfully. Search YouTube or PLDX.com and see that scouts, soldiers, snipers, demomen without the SR, pyros even, defending the objective with nothing more than their starting weapons, and allowing their team to push back.
While I can't say too much about Portal 2, having seen only scant details (along with everyone else save Valve), I noticed this during the examples of play I did see. Note here that this is more a personal interpretation and critical stance on the game, rather than a review, but it bears speaking to. In Portal, and its sequel, there are sentry drones voiced by the voice of the main villain, indeed the only character to speak at length during the first game at all. These bots add some black humor to the already horrendously dark and funny game by trying to murder you with twin machine guns, then saying, if you defeat them, "I don't hate you." In the original Portal, they seemed little more than drones sent by your nemesis to test and, more than likely, kill you. There were moments, and these were mere moments, where their pleas to be put down before being deactivated seemed somewhat genuine, but, of course, you know better.
In Portal 2, on the other hand, there are many more ways to torment and destroy these sentry bots. Fling them into a high energy wind tunnel, down a bottomless shaft, send them into an infinite loop ending only when you decide to laser beam them to death, or just do it yourself. Fun and merciless as this is, as I watched the demo being played, a disturbing side of me began to feel pity for these little machines. Put in front of us only to serve a very simple purpose, I looked back and realized that their statement "I don't hate you." Is a true one, fully honest and devoid of deception. Programmed with only one action and response, they are innocent casualties in the war between the player character and the antagonist. What makes this yet more powerful for me is that their responses to the laser beams and the wind tunnels now seem to involve pain and distress at their situation. Not robotic any longer, they seem to truly lament the state you put them in for your own survival, and just a little bit, I feel for them as less robot killers but instead beings whose feelings and bodies are tortured only for my and my captor's amusement. It is a sad state, I think, one worth lamenting, if considered in this way.
With this, I leave you.
Good night.
Xiant
Thursday, June 17, 2010
The Pyro Update Weapon and E3
You'll have to excuse the late hour, and the fact that nothing went up today. I'll confess that this is as yet not a habit for me, and until it is, regularity will be something I'll have to work at. On a more petty note, since I haven't gone to bed yet, it is still Tuesday for me (at least in spirit). Because of this, and the fact that I have to get to an eye appointment early tomorrow, I'll make this brief, or as brief as it requires. The topic is the Backburner, the pyro's weapon of choice if he want's to help himself and not necessarily his team. Also, I'll give my opinions of what's been going on in the world of the Electronics Entertainment Expo, or E3 as the world of gaming knows it.
So, the Backburner. At first, the weapon seems like a handy replacement for the pyro's regular flamethrower. Crits from the back, which is generally where the pyro should be, being an ambush predator. At a current 20 hit points per crit, the damage per second (DPS) is over 450, which is enough to kill even a fully overhealed heavy (who has 450 hp). The catch, though, is that the pyro loses his/her airblast, the one thing that makes him/her more versatile than just a giant damage source. The ability to reflect rockets, flares, baseballs, sticky bombs, pipes and arrows allows the pyro to not only be offensive but also play a support role, keeping vital players safe for just that one second longer, which might be all that's needed. This also makes axetinguishing (the act of setting someone on fire, airblasting them into a wall and killing them quickly with the Axetinguisher) much more difficult, since the second step no long applies.
The Backburner, therefore, encouranges what TF2 players in the know call a "W+M1" pyro. Essentially, the pyro runs forward without regard to his safety and flames everything in sight. There is no advanced tactical thought, no idea of where to go next, simply a desire to ignite everything and let the chips fall where they may. While the pyro him/herself may certainly approve, a good deal of players do not, for the simple reason that skill is applauded in the game, as it is anywhere, and someone who shows no desire to go beyond the basics generally garners a good amount of criticism. This is, of course, putting it mildly. What one hears in game is often, almost exclusively, hate and insults.
Before I move on to E3, something I need to explain. I did not give the pyro a specific gender. This is not a mistake. The simple fact is no one, except Valve (and maybe even them still) do not know if the pyro is male or female. He/she could be a robot for all we know. There is a fan created reskin of the pyro without a top showing a bikini, but this is by no means canon. The answer to the three year old questions will be answered, the community hopes, when the Meet the Pyro promo video comes out. Somehow I don't actually think that'll happen.
On to E3 then. With the convention now three days old, I'm going to revise my plans again. I'll split my conversations from this point on between my thoughts on E3 and Medal of Honor (the beta starts tomorrow for me, I hope). The first thing I'll talk about is what Electronic Arts (EA) put up in their press conference. There was EA Sports, a good portion of the presentation, which I won't touch on, since I'm not a fan. There was the Medal of Honor demo, which I'll get to in a moment. Killzone 3 and Crysis 2 of course, which I'll talk about now.
I did not play the original Killzone or its PSP adaptation, but I picked up Killzone 2 pretty soon after its release. I played through the campaign, then jumped into multiplayer. The campaign was fairly good, with some nice set pieces and fun firefights, but it was generally a really grimy shade of brown all the time, and the ending turned into a grindfest worthy of a B-Class MMORPG. The multiplayer, however, was awesome. I'd never played a console shooter like Killzone 2 before, since, and I'll admit this now, I didn't jump on the bandwagon to play Call of Duty 4 (hate me if you must). The experience was an eye opening one, but enjoyable in the extreme. Certainly there were frustrations, for when aren't there? but in the end I appreciated the amount of thought and care the designers put into each level. Every game mode shifted seamlessly between the others, and the maps accommodated each beautifully. The matchmaking too worked really well. Experienced players generally didn't play with the newcomers, and those with hours and hours under their belt were barred from playing with anyone but their dedicated peers. When I got to this last level of play, and I'm vain enough to say that even here I could manage to come out #1 among these players, I slowly grew bored and returned to Team Fortress 2, my home among the multiplayer masses.
Killzone 3, then, I hope fixes the few things Killzone 2 did wrong, the main thing being the horribly responsive controls. Even with a high sensitivity, turning to face an enemy was slow going and unneeded deaths happened as a result. Also, I think the shotgun needs to be tweaked, since if you had any skill with it, rage among your enemies was common. On that note, the engineer class in general needs work, since it had almost no tactical use, and few people played it. I was awful, and so stuck to the support classes, occasionally moving to assault. Lastly, I sincerely hope that jetpacks somehow work their way into the multiplayer. Halo Reach is doing it. Killzone 3 should too... And no, I don't think much of the whole 3D thing. The TV's are too expensive and I don't want to wear something to watch TV. I already have two remotes for each TV. I don't need anything else.
Lastly, Crysis 2. My experience with the original Crysis was almost the complete opposite of Killzone 2. I played the campaign several times and enjoyed every one. The multiplayer sucked. The maps were too big, the weapons too clunky, the game modes to obscure and not nearly enough players to make it worthwhile. The campaign, however, I think, set a new tone for how shooters should be done. The sandbox environment of the game lets you tackle every encounter differently, no matter how many times you play through. Sure, the enemy spawns in the same place, and their reaction to you, blind fury, is the same, but how you take them out is up to you. Plus, there is a really nice social commentary tucked away in there, despite the seeming disconnect from reality with the whole "we're on the island why?" argument. With Crysis 2, I want the action ramped up to 11, where it was once only 9. I want bigger alien battles all throughout, not just at the end. I want more weapons and more customization. More types of ammo, new armor abilities (which I know we're getting) and most importantly more relevant setting. Of course, this last bit is already taken care of. Crysis 2 takes place in New York City under siege by Aliens and super powered human enemies and their tech.
We'll see.
Thanks for reading,
Xiant.
So, the Backburner. At first, the weapon seems like a handy replacement for the pyro's regular flamethrower. Crits from the back, which is generally where the pyro should be, being an ambush predator. At a current 20 hit points per crit, the damage per second (DPS) is over 450, which is enough to kill even a fully overhealed heavy (who has 450 hp). The catch, though, is that the pyro loses his/her airblast, the one thing that makes him/her more versatile than just a giant damage source. The ability to reflect rockets, flares, baseballs, sticky bombs, pipes and arrows allows the pyro to not only be offensive but also play a support role, keeping vital players safe for just that one second longer, which might be all that's needed. This also makes axetinguishing (the act of setting someone on fire, airblasting them into a wall and killing them quickly with the Axetinguisher) much more difficult, since the second step no long applies.
The Backburner, therefore, encouranges what TF2 players in the know call a "W+M1" pyro. Essentially, the pyro runs forward without regard to his safety and flames everything in sight. There is no advanced tactical thought, no idea of where to go next, simply a desire to ignite everything and let the chips fall where they may. While the pyro him/herself may certainly approve, a good deal of players do not, for the simple reason that skill is applauded in the game, as it is anywhere, and someone who shows no desire to go beyond the basics generally garners a good amount of criticism. This is, of course, putting it mildly. What one hears in game is often, almost exclusively, hate and insults.
Before I move on to E3, something I need to explain. I did not give the pyro a specific gender. This is not a mistake. The simple fact is no one, except Valve (and maybe even them still) do not know if the pyro is male or female. He/she could be a robot for all we know. There is a fan created reskin of the pyro without a top showing a bikini, but this is by no means canon. The answer to the three year old questions will be answered, the community hopes, when the Meet the Pyro promo video comes out. Somehow I don't actually think that'll happen.
On to E3 then. With the convention now three days old, I'm going to revise my plans again. I'll split my conversations from this point on between my thoughts on E3 and Medal of Honor (the beta starts tomorrow for me, I hope). The first thing I'll talk about is what Electronic Arts (EA) put up in their press conference. There was EA Sports, a good portion of the presentation, which I won't touch on, since I'm not a fan. There was the Medal of Honor demo, which I'll get to in a moment. Killzone 3 and Crysis 2 of course, which I'll talk about now.
I did not play the original Killzone or its PSP adaptation, but I picked up Killzone 2 pretty soon after its release. I played through the campaign, then jumped into multiplayer. The campaign was fairly good, with some nice set pieces and fun firefights, but it was generally a really grimy shade of brown all the time, and the ending turned into a grindfest worthy of a B-Class MMORPG. The multiplayer, however, was awesome. I'd never played a console shooter like Killzone 2 before, since, and I'll admit this now, I didn't jump on the bandwagon to play Call of Duty 4 (hate me if you must). The experience was an eye opening one, but enjoyable in the extreme. Certainly there were frustrations, for when aren't there? but in the end I appreciated the amount of thought and care the designers put into each level. Every game mode shifted seamlessly between the others, and the maps accommodated each beautifully. The matchmaking too worked really well. Experienced players generally didn't play with the newcomers, and those with hours and hours under their belt were barred from playing with anyone but their dedicated peers. When I got to this last level of play, and I'm vain enough to say that even here I could manage to come out #1 among these players, I slowly grew bored and returned to Team Fortress 2, my home among the multiplayer masses.
Killzone 3, then, I hope fixes the few things Killzone 2 did wrong, the main thing being the horribly responsive controls. Even with a high sensitivity, turning to face an enemy was slow going and unneeded deaths happened as a result. Also, I think the shotgun needs to be tweaked, since if you had any skill with it, rage among your enemies was common. On that note, the engineer class in general needs work, since it had almost no tactical use, and few people played it. I was awful, and so stuck to the support classes, occasionally moving to assault. Lastly, I sincerely hope that jetpacks somehow work their way into the multiplayer. Halo Reach is doing it. Killzone 3 should too... And no, I don't think much of the whole 3D thing. The TV's are too expensive and I don't want to wear something to watch TV. I already have two remotes for each TV. I don't need anything else.
Lastly, Crysis 2. My experience with the original Crysis was almost the complete opposite of Killzone 2. I played the campaign several times and enjoyed every one. The multiplayer sucked. The maps were too big, the weapons too clunky, the game modes to obscure and not nearly enough players to make it worthwhile. The campaign, however, I think, set a new tone for how shooters should be done. The sandbox environment of the game lets you tackle every encounter differently, no matter how many times you play through. Sure, the enemy spawns in the same place, and their reaction to you, blind fury, is the same, but how you take them out is up to you. Plus, there is a really nice social commentary tucked away in there, despite the seeming disconnect from reality with the whole "we're on the island why?" argument. With Crysis 2, I want the action ramped up to 11, where it was once only 9. I want bigger alien battles all throughout, not just at the end. I want more weapons and more customization. More types of ammo, new armor abilities (which I know we're getting) and most importantly more relevant setting. Of course, this last bit is already taken care of. Crysis 2 takes place in New York City under siege by Aliens and super powered human enemies and their tech.
We'll see.
Thanks for reading,
Xiant.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)