Flexibility – Torchlight

I bought Torchlight a while back because I was in a Diablo 2 kick but couldn’t find my cds. So when it was really cheap on Steam I bought this wonderful little game that was created by several people who worked on Diablo together at Blizzard. There’s a good many things they do right, and a few things they do wrong. But what I really want to focus on is the flexibility in the game.

And this is just the first wave...

I’ve always had a love for magic users who can summon things in games. Not sure why but I always played as the Necromancer in Diablo 2 and a Death Knight in WOW. There’s something satisfying I guess, being able to rip souls from the netherworld in service to you.

Now what makes Torchlight does is like WOW, they give you several trees from which to build your character. Now instead of confining a player to building on useless talents they don’t want, in order to get a talent they do–instead the talents unlock at a certain level and you are able to add to them. Even better…you get a skill point halfway to your next level, and then at the end.

There’s something very rewarding about creating a character in a game and fine tuning them till they fit the hero you wish they could be. Torchlight gave me this power by catering to exactly what I wanted. I love to summon things. So I have some summoning skills: Imps, Golemn…plus I can buy spells which let me summon zombies, skeleton archers.

Well it’s come to the point where I’ve fine tuned my character so much, I barely have to do any work. I rush in with my Fear and Spider Web spell, and let my minions do the rest. Lazy? Hardly, I merely sitting back and enjoying the show; watching the fruits of my labor.

While the game is based a lot on the principles set by Diablo, I feel the game does a better job at letting you fine tune your character to exactly how you want them.

What’s your build?

Lazy Game Design Summed Up In One Picture

Making a game challenging doesn’t mean cheating the player.

If you’ve played Super Street Fighter IV, you know what a cheap bastard the last boss is.  But instead of fixing a design flaw in the original, they aimed to make him even worse. Read below:

“This is the most fan-responsive game in Capcom’s history,” Killian said.

Changes to the game will include balancing tweaks, but at least one famously irritating character won’t be made easier to take on, he’ll be made harder.

“Seth will be even cheaper and more irritating,” Killian said.

Hey, you know what Capcom, (insert your favorite colorful verb) you too! And people wonder why Japanese games are dying? Here’s the answer, lazy game design, tired cliches, and mindless grinding. Put down the cement glue, nut up and actually iterate when you make a game. This is why you’re failing. And if Seth is some of the best Japan has to offer, I can’t wait to see them out of the games race. Because there isn’t a place for tired horrible games, and so far that’s mostly what you have to offer.

But games being made in one place isn’t good. Not at all. Because if all stuff was just made in America the hero would be on steroids and the girl would have big enough boobs to break her back. Where is our angsty skinny overtly feminine emo protagonist?

Step it up Japan, not for my sake…for gaming’s sake!
* UPDATE * – I traded in the game. My body seems glad to be rid of it, as were those around me who had to here the profanities yelled during this game.

Who Stole All the Common Sense?

I’ve recently played two games. Borderlands and Super Street Fighter IV. Both I enjoyed immensely, except both had inexcusable flaws within them. How is a flaw inexcusable? When it defies all common sense. Let’s take a quick look:

Borderlands

- Offense #1 – Makes you watch all the intro logos and videos. I’m sorry but this is a carnal sin against gaming. I know you’re proud of your game but not allowing the player to skip the same damn logos every time you play is a horrible call. In fact if I hadn’t enjoyed the game so much, I would have stopped playing just for that. Every time you pick up a book, you aren’t forced to read the acknowledgments so why would you do so with a game? GET OVER YOURSELF! Luckily there’s smart people online that taught me how to get rid of it. Take that Take 2!

- Offense #2 – Making you watch the whole entire damn intro video if you don’t press a button for about a min. HEAVEN FORBID WE WATCH THE SAME DAMN VIDEO EVERY TIME WE START THE GAME, BUT IF WE GO AND GET A DRINK OF WATER IT ACTUALLY IS FASTER TO FORCE QUIT THE GAME AND START OVER. Of course by that point you have to watch their damn logos again. I shouldn’t have to watch the video even if I’m starting a new game. This is inexcusable. If this isn’t changed for the next game, count me out.

- Offense #3 – Don’t make a huge world with people you can supposedly talk to when NONE of them will EVER talk to you through the entire game. Come on guys, really? Were we all smoking pot when we came up with the logistics of the game? It’s a no brainer.

Super Street Fighter IV

- Offense #1 – When I want to restart a battle I’ve lost, why the hell do I have to go through 45 sec of useless loading? Ask me if I want to continue with my same character or a new one. If not you automatically load the battle. I don’t want to waste all that damn time watching the continue screen, then the choose character screen, then the choose stage screen, then the cinematic for the boss. Just let me play the !@#% boss and stop making things way more difficult than they need to be.

- Offense #2 - SSIV is a deep game and it takes a long time to get to learning how to use your character. Trouble is though that the characters aren’t balanced. Sure they’re balanced more than most games but not enough. The fact that whenever I go online to read about my initial character (Vega) only to read that he is considered the worst character in the game by the community. What’s worse, I thought the game was really hard playing as him (because it is). Then I play as Akuma and can do these ridiculous supers and attacks with way more ease…and they do way more damage. If you’re going to make a character that’s harder to master, you need the payoff to be good. I’ll still play as Vega because I’m getting pretty good, even if I never use his ultras or whatever, but don’t be lame. Put some thought into your game.

- Offense #3 - Just like Super Mario Kart Wii, the AI in this game cheats. And blatantly at that. I know its more fun to play real people but when you’re poor and can’t afford xbox live at the moment, you have to play the AI. The AI needs to be attuned so that it feels natural. Nintendo is the WORST offender when it comes to this, but SSIV is a close second. The AI should not be able to know exactly what I’m going to input, which it does (because the programmers are lazy). Sorry but the AI in this game is a big letdown.

- Offense #4 - This is a BIG ONE. Teach me how to !@#$ play the game. I mean really, is it asking too much? There’s things I had to read online that the game never did (and never will) tell me how to do, and it’s bullshit plain and simple. Sure I want to explore the character but teach me all about countering and all that other stuff that makes the game deep. How would you feel the next time you bought a computer I just threw a bunch of parts on the floor and told you to go at it? That was suck. Not being taught how to play SSIV properly sucks.

Again I love both these games (in a love/hate way) but these are INEXCUSABLE offenses to the player that even the worst of games have the courtesy of not imparting upon the player.

Mass Effect Manic: The Bizarre Dichotomy of the Future

I love the Mass Effect series, in fact it’s become one of my favorite games of all time with the sequel that just came out, which I am going to explore further on my next post.  For now though I want to talk about what Bioware presents to the player as normal and how they try to distract you from noticing.

Cardboard Cutouts to Clown Cars

The first Mass Effect was riddled with characters that looked exactly the same.  Almost every woman had dark hair and looked to be if not the immediate sister of the girl you met awhile back, was at least a close cousin.

In fact overall the characters in the first Mass Effect are boring at best and I’m just talking about the main characters.  How often do any of these characters show any emotion besides complete neutrality?  Not much…not much at all.  I mean when it came time to decide who lived on my team and who died I had a hard time deciding only because I could have done without most of them.  Sure they had different backgrounds but they had no soul to them which led me to the next best thing…appearance.  I made my team based on who was the coolest looking, so Garrus and Wrex it was.  Wrex in fact threw me for a surprise when you decided whether he lived or died.  He was pissed and you could feel it.  Why does that moment stick out?  Well for one you either kill one of your main characters or don’t.  But I think the real reason is its one of the only moments in the game where an emotion sticks out at all.

Now fast forward to the sequel.  How does Bioware fix the problem of characters nobody cares about?  Make them super nuts of course.  While I greatly appreciate the change from boring and bland characters…did we order a full serving of crazy?  Cuz I remember ordering just a side.  Let’s take a look:

Don’t get me wrong, I love most of these characters…but too many and too much personality.  We went from cardboard cutouts in the first game to a full-blown clown car.  There are way more real emotional scenes and dialogues within the sequel but with such strong personalities we need some middle ground.  For every Jack we need a Samara.  Keep the balance.

Barbies & Kens Are The Future

Another interesting thing to note is unlike Grand Theft Auto which is filled with people from every shape, creed, and what have you, in the future apparently everyone has plastic surgery and eat space paste because no one is anywhere near fat.  Is this realistic?  No!  Even if in the future obesity was rid of completely, would everyone be in perfect shape?  No!  It just really makes the entire world of Mass Effect flat.  Why do we never see many of the female counterparts of the alien species we’ve encountered?  Why are all of them flawless?  Who ever is doing the character design at Bioware did a superb job with the team characters this time, but just about everyone else is forgettable.  How am I suppose to remember a character when they don’t stand out?

I can name a dozen Metal Gear Solid characters off the top of my head.  Why?  Not because I’ve played it more, because I haven’t.  But because each character is so distinguishable from the next.  Does anybody look like Revolver Ocelot?  How about Drebin the arms dealer?  We remember them because there aren’t a bunch of them running about.  I’m fully aware an RPG can call for a lot of characters but has that ever stopped Zelda, Diablo, or Final Fantasy?

You have an incredible story, so why not paint it with memorable characters?  But don’t drown us in paint.  Keep us wanting more.

The Travis Touchdown Conundrum

Art by immortalSHI over at DeviantArt

As I pursue my writing career I’ve hit somewhat of an impasse which I’ve touched upon a blog post a year or so ago but it has arisen again and continues to vex me.  What I’m so curious about are protagonists from popular stories that hold no connection or pathos to them and thus should not be good characters…but they are.

Pathos (pronounced /ˈpeɪθɒs/; Greek: πάθος, for ‘suffering’ or ‘experience’) is a communication technique used most often in rhetoric (where it is considered one of the three modes of persuasion, alongside ethos and logos), and in literature, film and other narrative art. Pathos represents an appeal to the audience’s emotions.

The character I want to touch on in particular is Travis Touchdown of the Wii game No More Heroes.  It’s a Japanese game that’s garnered enough attention to come to the west and be somewhat successful.  This should make it a good game right?  Well no…the gameplay is rather poor, frustrating, and tedious.  In other words it has nothing going for it.  Very recently the sequel came out entitled No More Heroes 2: Desperate Struggles.  Has the gameplay gotten better?  Marginally so but it’s still pretty abysmal.  So why do I even bother talking about the game?  Because there’s something about it that allures loads of people (myself among them) to it even though it’s terrible.  And the part that sticks out is the writing and presentation.

The game serves as a satire that makes fun of both Japanese and American culture while also pointing out various tropes of gaming (though it does this somewhat poorly, falling under its own satirical trap).  It’s also absurd, referential, and breaks the 4th wall, something that isn’t done in gaming enough.  The main character Travis Touchdown has no redeeming qualities to him.  He’s cocky, a jerk, and I would almost say he’s a sociopath to some degree.  In the first game the reason you killed all the enemy bosses was to become the #1 assassin.

You end up killing your half sister and twin brother (he might be half too…not sure).  Now while I understand that there is humor within the satirical writing of the cliches of action movies and games, satires must be able to stand of their own merit.  Even Alice in Wonderland (a satire on the British monarchy and parliament) with some of the most ridiculous characters, still has a plot to it and there is pathos for Alice as she is lost in a land by her curiosity and learns several lessons on manners throughout the book.

But why does Travis work?  It’s absolutely maddening trying to work out the logic of why as a character he is likable protagonist.  The same can be said of Alucard from the anime show Hellsing.  He’s invincible, all powerful, has no redeemable qualities other than killing Nazis, yet he’s strangely intriguing.  Don’t mistake this post as a complaint, it is more an earnest wondering of logistically why these characters work and so far I haven’t met anybody whose been able to explain it to me.

As I was writing this however Chasmang over at Boldstate offered me this:

“Video games are so full abused stereotypes that any deviation from the norm is a breath of fresh air. I may not be able to pin down exactly why I find Travis to be a good character, but I know I like him, and I know it has something to do with how I’ve never met anyone like him before.”

Perhaps Travis only works for those of us who are very familiar with the tropes and conventions of video games, with their often lazy cliches.  Or perhaps its something else.  If you think you’ve got the answer or even a piece of the puzzle feel free to comment as it would be a great burden off my mind.

***UPDATE***

Michael over at The Brainy Gamer offered this insight about Travis Touchdown:

I’m a big fan of Travis Touchdown, and I think he’s one of the most indelible video game characters of this generation.

I think the NMH games create a distinctive relationship between game/Travis and player/Travis. The game (and Suda) has an odd adulation/ridicule thing going with Travis that very few games do. He’s simultaneously baddass and inept; heroic and ridiculous; confident and awkward. Suda pours all his personal predilections and hobbies into the character, and then sort of stands back and laughs at his creation.

The player’s relationship to Travis is equally disjointed. He’s not really my avatar, even though I control his actions. I don’t really like him, but I want him to succeed. My perspective on him is purposely distanced 3rd-person. He’s a hyper-distorted construction, and I think the game never wants me to forget that.

Plus, visually, I just love his look. In the generic world of thick, impossibly muscular, military-style male protagonists, Travis sticks out like a sore thumb…which is exactly what he is.