Star Wars Episode VII Review: The New Hope Awakens

After watching Episode VII - The Force Awakens, it was clearer to me than ever that the crucial missing element of the prequels was the fun interplay between the main heroes. Many aspects of the prequels are compelling as pulp adventure, but the flat direction and dialogue makes them feel sort of awkward and lifeless ("I love you because you're not like sand."). In Episode VII the characters bounce against each other in interesting ways, and are simply fun to watch.

On the other hand, Episode VII made me appreciate Lucas' boldness a bit more. He may have gone overboard on fan-service now and then (like WAAY overboard), but he did try to make something fresh and new, whereas the plot of Episode VII is basically a carbon copy of Episode IV - A New Hope.

Summary with *spoilers*:

Arriving in a Star Destroyer, the Evil Empire, led by an ominous masked Dark Jedi dressed in black, wreak havoc on the rebel defenders. But before being captured a Rebel Leader manages to put the critical info they are looking for in the care of a cute Droid who is sent away to wander a Desert Planet. The Droid is captured by a junker but our Hero, who has lived on this planet since childhood and knows its dangers, rescues it and brings it back to their humble abode. Meanwhile the Rebel Leader is tortured by the dark Jedi.

The Hero is forced to leave their flawed but familiar life when the Evil Empire attacks their home, and joins with a wise old Mentor who tells them about the force. The Hero is exposed to the weirdness of the wider galaxy at a space-port cantina filled with bizarre aliens, and are spotted by a spy who alerts the Evil Empire.

After the Evil Empire demonstrates the power of their Death Star by destroying the home of the Rebel Leader, the heroes sneak aboard on a rescue mission. They succeed, but the wise old Mentor is struck down by his once-ally, the Dark Jedi.

Compelled to flee by the death of their mentor, the hero escapes but must later confront the Dark Jedi on the surface of the Death Star. By using the force, the Hero prevails and escapes the exploding death star, with an assist by the Millennium Falcon. Back at the Rebel Base there is much celebration, and Chewbacca’s contribution is largely ignored.

[/end spoilers]

Obviously I'm exaggerating the similarities for effect (though not all that much really). Things diverge here and there, and my hope is that J.J.'s intention was to bring everything back to square one, sort of wipe the slate clean, before romping off on new space adventures.

Definitely there is a lot that's done right. Abrams captures the tone of the originals, and the action is fun and intentionally a bit sloppy since we aren't dealing with perfect Jedi monks (one of the best action beats in the prequels in my opinion is the clumsy struggle with Obi-Wan and Jango Fett slipping around in the rain). There were also lots of other little homages scattered throughout which frequently delighted me (though at times the references seemed to come every few seconds, which drew me out of the moment).

Certainly the overwhelming similarities with A New Hope are intentional. Lucas himself had the idea that the prequels would "rhyme" with the originals, yet this becomes a delicate balancing act. Reincorporation creates connectedness and familiarity, but also staleness and predictability. J.J. Abrams understands the value of mystique and the unexplained, and the best parts of Episode VII are the new and strange, and the hints at larger stories and mysteries. (Han Solo confronted by the Greedo equivalents, angry Irish man and space Yakuzah, was definitely my favorite moment, and captured everything I love about Star Wars.)

I'm eager to see where Rian Johnson takes us next, and I sincerely hope that this first film is used as a launchpad to explore a broader Star Wars universe, rather than successive entries simply wallowing in fan service (*cough*Star Trek Into Darkness*cough*). Joss Whedon has repeatedly proven that fan expectation can be leveraged to subvert and surprise, rather than simply appease.

I'm not ready to call him Jar Jar Abrams just yet. In some ways Episode VII is a great Star Wars movie. I'm just not sure it will ultimately be anyone's favorite Star Wars movie.

Or maybe it will. Star Trek Into Darkness might be someone's favorite Star Trek movie if they haven't seen Wrath of Khan.

The Good, The Board, and The Ugly

The awesome folks at The Good, The Board, and The Ugly podcast were kind enough to request I join them on their latest episode. I had a blast talking about Steampunk Rally and a number of other games.

Steampunk Rally: Dice Tower Review

Copies of Steampunk Rally have been arriving at peoples' doorsteps and I'm very pleased at how well it's been received. Early Kickstarter hype always artificially inflates a games boardgamegeek rating, but I'm pleased that we actually got a nice bump when people started actually playing the game.

After all these Steampunk Rally posts, I imagine you've either ordered the game already or tuned out in disgust, but if you're still on the fence you can check out this comprehensive review from the Dice Tower network. I'm a bit sad Tom Vasel himself didn't give his thoughts, but I'm pleased by what was put together here and very happy that people are having fun with the 8-player mode.

Heart of Crown Review: Goofus and Gallant

Heart of Crown sports one of those euphonious names that only seem to result from sketchy Japanese-to-English translations (I just watched an episode of an anime that included the line "please stop the mystic power generator," spoken with great earnestness of course). It belongs to the "deck building" family of games which began with Dominion in 2008. The core idea of deck building, acquiring cards throughout play to beef up the awesomeness and combo-potential of your deck, has been taken in a lot of different directions since that unarguably seminal game: steampunk economics, a global warming post-apocalypse, epic space battles, the struggle for Canada, and superhero punching (or Alien punching, if you prefer). Heart of Crown may at first glance appear regressive since it hews more closely to the original Dominion than any other subsequent effort in terms of both theme and general mechanics. However, labeling it a Dominion knock-off would be a great disservice once you realize that it addresses each of Dominion's failings in a highly direct and effective manner, elegantly bending those flaws into powerful assets ...like Batman.


Actions
A minor annoyance in Dominion is remembering how many actions you have left to play. Several cards give you additional actions, and then of course those cards require an action to play, so the math gets... yeach. It's not gamebreaking or anything, but it means a lot of counting on your fingers, which can be detrimental to managing a hand of cards (and Marduk help you if you lose count and have to retrace your steps).

Heart of Crown neatly solves this by simply putting an arrow on the right edge of cards that don't require an action, and a second arrow on the bottom edge of cards that grant an additional action, and require that each card (after the first) must be played with a arrow pointing to it. It's extremely intuitive, involves no counting, and also makes it easy for opponents to check your "math," and it allows the designers to easily balance the various card powers by simply giving them different numbers of arrows without requiring reams of extra text and rules exceptions for what does and doesn't require an action to play. (The arrow icon could be slightly clearer though, it blends in a bit until you know what you're looking for.)


Chaff
Dominion utilized a clever system of adding purchased "Victory Point" cards to your deck, creating a catch-up dynamic wherein the players with the most points by necessity also have the most cludged-up decks, and forcing the players to make tough choices between improving their deck's functionality or actually gaining points. The problem is that the actual experience of drawing a hand full of useless 6-VP province cards is dull at best and incredibly frustrating at worst.

Heart of Crown expands on this dynamic to create difficult in-the-moment tactical choices. If you draw a hand with points cards, you can "bank" these cards and get them out of your deck (and in fact only banked cards add to your score), but you can't purchase any cards that turn. So a hand full of points cards, rather than a wasted turn, feels like an efficient opportunity to bank, and a hand with some useful cards and some points cards suddenly offers an agonizing choice rather than merely an inefficient turn. Furthermore, this mechanic allows you to better slim and hone your deck, reducing late-game randomness.


Combos
In Dominion, you can buy two cards that you intend to play off each other, and then proceed to never ever draw them both in the same hand.

In Heart of Crown, you can stow action cards for use on later turns (depending on how awesome your "kingdom" is).


Market
In Dominion, all the purchasable cards are available right at the start of the game. This reduces randomness and allows for lots of long-term planning, but it also makes the turn-to-turn decisions less interesting since you mostly know what will be available and don't really need to react on the fly. An experienced Dominion player can look at any card setup and immediately say "oh those three cards are going to combo well," and then proceed to pursue that theory and potentially make few to no further choices throughout the game (aside from paying attention to how fast other players are accelerating the endgame). Also having to try and internalize what every action card does right from turn-1 can be a bit daunting if you're at all inexperienced.

Subsequent deck building games like Ascension and Marvel Legendary address this by having a limited selection of random cards to select from. This forces on-the-fly strategizing, but it also increases the random factor, and potentially limits the overall strategizing that a player can do. Heart of Crown finds an interesting middle ground wherein there are always eight different types of action cards available, but which cards and how many of each card shift over time, emphasizing both short and long-term planning (and also reducing setup time). I'm slightly concerned that, because you see a bigger portion of the action cards every game, certain combos might become known and always exploited when possible, but there are expansions to remedy that.


Maids
Dominion did not feature adorable anime handmaiden cards.

Heart of Crown addresses this by featuring adorable anime handmaiden cards.


In summary, Heart of Crown is basically Dominion 2.0, and I mean this in the best way possible. Dominion itself is a brilliant, important and innovative game, and Heart of Crown brings a whole host of improvements to the table (and I didn't even get into the fascinating game of chicken involving the Princess powers). There's enough diversity in this genre to justify owning a few different deck building games; Legendary Encounters is a pretty different game from A Few Acres of Snow, for example. But to be honest, given the choice between Dominion and Heart of Crown, I would pick Heart of Crown every time.

...sadly Heart of Crown is not available in English, and as far as I know there are no specific plans to remedy that, which renders this review ...entirely pointless! On the other hand, it gave me the opportunity to type the phrase "please stop the mystic power generator."

Sonic Retrospective: Gotta Go Fast!

I was raised as a Nintendo kid, so I didn't really grow up on Sonic The Hedgehog. Sure I have a few fond memories of the Genesis games from when I was younger, but mainly I was in the Mario camp. (Actually I was in the Donkey Kong Country camp, but that's another topic.) It's widely accepted among most gamers that Sonic games were fantastic until he tried to go 3D and, to put it mildly, failed to make the transition with the seemingly-effortless aplomb of Mario (though he undoubtedly fared better than some mascots).

Long ago I played through and quite enjoyed Sonic Adventure 2, but the other 3D entries I've attempted to play over the years, specifically Sonic Heroes and Sonic and the Secret Rings, turned me off them faster than almost any other games I can remember. SatSR was brave enough to attempt adapting the formula to motion controls, which for me wasn't the issue, nor did I have a problem with jumping required first doing a ducking-slide-thing. The issue was that this pre-jump slide thing, which you needed to do constantly, slowed Sonic's speed to a crawl (thus making the jump feel pretty wimpy), and worse, it took him an extremely long time to accelerate to full speed when allowed to run interrupted, making the whole experience feel a bit like trying to run through molasses or perhaps navigate rush-hour traffic.

Sonic's mission statement of going really fast was originally a gimmick to sell kids on Sega's “blast processing” (which arguably was not a thing). Leaving aside the issue that Sonic's capabilities don't really measure up to the hype, this focus on speed has been a constant difficulty in terms of game design. A fundamental issue has always been the struggle to find reasons for the player to actually want to go fast. Like most platformers, the Genesis entries rewarded patience and precision (i.e. not barreling into enemies and spike traps), which made for enjoyable gameplay but sort of ran anathema to the alleged central concept. Over the years, Sonic Team clearly realized this issue and has attempted to resolve it in two ways: give players time restrictions (e.g. something chasing them or a reward/pat-on-the-back for finishing a level quickly), give Sonic abilities (like the spin attack and homing attack) that reduce his vulnerability while going fast (to try and counter the inherent loss of control and response time), and add on-rails section where players can "cut loose" and go really fast without worrying about randomly running into a hazard (popping up even in the early 2D entries as pipes and loops).

Which brings us to near-present day and the game that not-so-subtly prompted me to contemplate Sonic's history: Sonic Generations. Despite everything I'm going to say, the game's really not bad (certainly superior to Star Trek: Generations). There's obvious visible effort in terms of honoring the character's history (without overly bogging it down with drawn-out cutscenes), catchy remixes of old songs, pleasingly rendered environments that pay homages to earlier entries and effortlessly transition between 2D and 3D, and even plenty of clever level design. Trust me, if Sonic Team were as incompetent as some people believe, these games would be virtually unplayable. It's obvious that they understand the difficulties associated with the character and continually work hard to try and ameliorate them. (In fact to be honest I'm having more fun with the 3D levels than the traditionalist 2D levels, which sort of runs counter to the popular narrative that the designers have somehow "lost their way" since transitioning to 3D, as does the lukewarm response to Sonic the Hedgehog 4.)

Yet those inherent Sonic-specific difficulties are definitely on display as well. In order to give that sense of speed, the game makes use of extended on-rails sections. I have no inherent objection to on-rails gameplay, in fact it can be extremely enjoyable. The problem is that combining on-rails gameplay with regular gameplay poses a number of additional challenges. If a player's control is removed entirely (e.g. the Genesis pipe sections), the sections are basically nothing but cutscenes: flashy but meaningless, and devoid of actual tension. But to give the player even a modicum of control invites the possibility of disaster. In one section of Generations, Sonic was intended to bounce off a spring and land on a grind rail, but because I was trying to help and was pushing the control stick towards the rail, Sonic somehow managed to overshoot it and die. As expected, on my second attempt Sonic made it onto the rail when I made no inputs with the controller. In essence, the game was punishing me for trying to play it at all. Yet just as often, Sonic will fall to his doom or barrel into an obstacle because I failed to give an input in time. Thus, like an ornery housecat, the frenetic action in the game has so far repeatedly come down to a central challenge of trying to deduce when the game wants me to play and when it wants me to leave it alone.

The other continued frustration in Sonic games throughout their history has been that the punishment for screwing up, aside from losing rings or potentially falling to one's doom, has been stopping Sonic dead in his tracks, which is extremely frustrating in a game about going fast. An important tenet of game design is that failure should be fun. It should be glorious and spectacular and perhaps darkly satisfying. But the way Sonic games punish you after every minor screw-up by abruptly halting the action is far too understated. Despite the power rings colorfully flying from Sonic's sprawled form (which does help a bit. Try and picture how jarring it would feel without the ring effect), the loss of momentum, in the context of a Sonic game, is anything but fun. It would be like if every missed note in Guitar Hero caused the music to momentarily halt rather than triggering entertainingly-dissonant notes to play. Instantly halting the action is the reason Bit.Trip Runner failed to reach the heights inherent in its premise (though Rayman Legends eventually made good on the concept simply by relaxing the required precision). Put more straightforwardly, it breaks flow. And by this point, Sonic Team must recognize that Sonic is best when he's going fast (*cough*werehog*cough*aka hedgewolf*). At slow speeds, his controls feel slippery, like he can't wait to get back on the open road.

Most platforming games don't suffer from these particular issues because they're not about going fast, but there is another genre that generally is: racing games. In F-Zero GX, a particular favorite of mine (and ironically published by SEGA), a player's race car is rarely stopped dead in its tracks (and if this does happen, the amusing novelty of it helps make up for the irritation). Instead, when a player screws up (e.g. runs into the side rails or other racers), they maintain much of their velocity but lose shields. Because the shields double as the boost gauge, the game tempts you into tense push-your-luck moments where the more you boost the more likely you are to run into obstacles and the more able to destroy you those obstacles become, so the central challenge becomes "how much?" which is a lot more interesting than Sonic's central challenge of "am I supposed to?" I've brought up the brilliance of this system before, but the relevant feature here is that screwing up and running into hazards doesn't put a damper on the action, rather it heightens the tension. It makes you think "maybe I should slow down a bit" while the racers around you immediately push those doubts from your mind and tempt you to boost just one more time. (Interestingly F-Zero GX also features the sideways dash which is so crucial to Sonic Generations' controls.)

So to summarize, if I could offer any advice to Sonic Team, it would be:

A) continue to try and find compelling reasons for Sonic to want to go fast. (Getting a final grade for finishing within an allotted time is not a very compelling reason.) Chasing or being chased (ala F-Zero GX) are good reasons. Letting Sonic smash through certain enemies/obstacles when he is going sufficiently fast (with clear visual indicators) would be another good incentive, as would enemies that punish tardiness (e.g. guided missiles) like in Sunset Overdrive.

B) find ways to punish failure that don't mean stopping Sonic dead in his tracks (losing rings is fine, though running in circles collecting them is irritating in 3D). Even having him sent flying in an unintended direction would be preferable (though I realize this pose level design challenges). Having him lose some velocity would also be acceptable, and could be very punishing were it actually necessary to go fast (though it's best if he has ways to quickly get back up to speed e.g. a dedicated "go-really-fast" button). Triggering things (e.g. alarms) that increase the perils of stopping or slowing down (e.g. the quantity of enemies chasing you) might also be a fun dynamic, forcing you to choose between proceeding more cautiously and facing the tidal wave of things you've triggered or doubling down and shooting the moon.

The other realization I came to is that, in my opinion, Sonic is best when he's racing through recognizably Earth-like environments. That's not because I want realism in my Sonic games but because it's much easier to get a sense of how fast Sonic's really going, and be awed by it, when he's running through an environment that you intuitively know the general scale of. For all it's myriad failings (including even having a freaking name), Sonic 2006 recognized this I think, and the real-world environments impart a good sense of speed. (Though perhaps they just did it for the sake of "gritty realism"; this is the team that brought us Shadow the Hedgehog after all.) Proper use of camera also gives a sense of scale and speed, though I realize how challenging this probably has been in the series (it was one of primary downfalls of Sonic 2006 and for what it's worth the camera only killed me a couple times so far in Generations, which is not bad considering). Showing off what's ahead better might not only help show off how quickly Sonic traverses it but also focus the gameplay more on timing and frantic choices rather than sheer reflexes.

Admittedly I'm only a couple hours into Generations which is why I made this more of a retrospective than a review, and perhaps the pulled-back camera angles and real-world environments come in later, but my short time with the game (and the frequent transitions between old-school and new-school) helped clarify for me these fundamental issues that have always plagued the series through both good times and bad. So far I've enjoyed my time with Generations, but I suspect this will diminish as the difficulty rises since I've mostly been able to cheerfully breeze through everything, and the moment I've encountered any sort of adversity the above issues rear their ugly heads and tip things over into frustration.

Rather than restrictively categorizing Sonic as a platformer, thinking in terms of racing games might help point to (less-band-aid-y) solutions since he feeds similar aesthetics (and yes I realize that Sonic has been in actual racing games, but that's incalculably stupid on the face of it. Why does Sonic need a car! That's as dumb as the Flashmobile!!). And racing against no opponents, stopping the player on a dime, having their inputs screw everything up...

...it all starts to sound suspiciously like Big Riggs: Over the Road Racing!

And that's no good!

Steampunk Rally Kickstarter Preview

The first review/preview of Steampunk Rally is up!

The Last Door Chapter 1 Review: Beyond the Veil of Crowdfunding

Good horror games have been a bit thin on the ground ever since the AAA industry apparently misplaced the recipe, but in inadequately-dark times like these one need only turn to the indie scene for delicacies like The Last Door. I've always been a big gothic horror fan, and the sensibilities of Poe and Lovecraft are put across strongly with retro-minimalist graphics that leave most of the horror to your twisted imagination.

In chapter 1 you receive a cryptic letter from an old friend and decide to pay a visit to his creepy mansion because you fear something is amiss. (Spoilers: something is amiss.)

Gameplay is standard adventure game fare. Puzzles are fairly basic and logical, but the emphasis is on mood, which is made all the more chilling by an excellent musical score that contrasts pleasingly with the otherwise retro aesthetic. The horror is more subtly chilling than panic inducing. There are a couple of jump scares, but they are deployed effectively and used as a spice rather than a crutch (to mix old and limp metaphors).

Mostly I'm posting this because I want to spread the word for selfish reasons. Currently they need about 6k in donations to make Chapter 2, and I want to find out where the story goes dagnabbit!

Tomb Raider Review: Baptism by Fire

Ms. Pac-Man may have kicked things off with her audaciously gender-specific bow and sassy single honorific, but ever since Lara Croft's debut (trudging up a snowy monutain in short shorts if I recall), Tomb Raider has been the central talking point for how women are portrayed in videogames. And although this has tended to overshadow other discussions of the series and has undoubtedly influenced successive videogame heroines, it's never been settled whether the portrayal has been a positive or a negative one. On the one hand, Lara Croft is a strong, independent woman who can kick ass with the best of them, which set her strongly apart from the gaggle of damsels in distress dominating the medium prior. On the other hand, her wardrobe and proportions (and marketing) present her as a sex object right from the start. So is Lara a feminist vanguard, or a demeaning symbol of the old guard? (or not a type of guard at all?)

I think an important thing to keep in mind in all this is that “sexism” does not exist in a vacuum. Lara's cold femme fatale attitude undoubtedly had more clout back before it became the go-to method for ensuring that female characters be regarded as more than just eye candy while not having to actually give them much character (because making your female character a real person is also dangerous, as we will see). In the same vein, there's (in my male opinion) nothing wrong with creating a female character intended to titillate; the problems come when all female characters in a medium seem to be designed to be most ergonomically ogled. It's all about context, is what I'm saying.

So now we come to the gritty reboot/prequel ambiguously titled Tomb Raider in which we find a very different Lara. Rather than an idealized sex toy, we find an attractive but realistically proportioned human. And rather than a hard-edged femme fatale(/cold-blooded killer) we find a realistically scared young woman in over her head. And yet her thorough transformation has done anything but allow her to escape the realm of gender politics. The controversy kicked off when an early trailer showed a scene in which Lara is threatened by a group of ruffians with what could without too much imagination be construed as rape. This, combined with a statement by the developers that the game would make players want to “protect” Lara, unsurprisingly provoked a Himiko-level storm of internet backlash.

So is the new Tomb Raider sexist? Having played through the story, I can say that the “rape” scene barely registers as a thing, though rumor has it that it was toned down in response to the fan outrage. Admittedly I have never personally been in a situation in which I feared being raped, so perhaps some might find the sequence more disturbing (though were I marooned on an island with a gang of murderous cutthroats, I imagine I would be more worried by all the shooting and knifing directed at me that by a little suggestive pawing). Failing the associated Quick Time Event actually results in Lara being choked to death rather than being raped, so that's better(?) As for Lara's characterization, I can unequivocally say that Lara is a more engaging and fleshed-out character, and certainly more well-rounded despite the smaller cup size (*badum tush*). But depth alone does not determine whether a characterization is sexist. Again I would say it's largely a matter of context. I do not see anything wrong with casting Lara as scared and inexperienced, and tasking the player with protecting her. If the concept took off and henceforth every heroine in gaming (and only heroines) became scared and inexperienced and in need of protection, that might start to become troublesome.

As it is, the dynamic feels fresh. The most obvious comparison is with the Uncharted series (which as others have noted is an ironic comparison, seeing as the Uncharted series clearly took inspiration from the Tomb Raider series to begin with, and yet improved upon the formula in enough areas that the flow of inspiration has seemingly reversed, at least for the time being), but in Uncharted the player is never “protecting” Nathan Drake. Here, through an impressively realized combination of scripted and emergent narrative, voice and visual cues, and yes probably cultural issues surrounding violence against women, the game does an impressive job of making you feel bad about allowing this poor girl to come to harm, and cheering her on in the occasion that she doesn't. The experience elicited an impressive number of squeamish “egad” moments from me after a slip of the controls would doom Lara in some brutal fashion, often impaled through the neck by something metal and sharp (with enough consistency that an armored scarf would be an extremely useful wardrobe upgrade). Even the regenerating health, of which I'm often not a fan, serves this aesthetic purpose. Whereas it always felt a little jarring for Gears' Marcus Phoenix, hardened convict/soldier, to find himself huddled in a corner sucking his thumb and waiting for his health to regenerate, Lara hiding scared in a corner with gunfire all around fits the characterization and doesn't feel like an interruption of the action.

Yet despite this “protection” dynamic, Lara is anything but a delicate little flower. In fact she goes through more punishment than probably any videogame character I've seen, to the point where it starts to become kind of silly. Tomb Raider's gameplay mechanics are commensurable to those in Uncharted, but I feel that the cinematic style works less well here. Where Uncharted's tone purposefully evokes an escapist Hollywood blockbuster through and through, Tomb Raider's tone has strong leanings towards gritty realism, and it starts to be a problem of wanting to have one's cake and drop it off a waterfall too. The game desperately wants us to feel like Lara's a real person in real danger, yet it also heaps on so much spectacle that Lara would most likely be a quadriplegic within the first 20 minutes of gameplay. I'm not saying videogame characters can't do unrealistic things in a game with a realistic tone, but I'm not sure the unrealistic things should also be emphasized with frequent “look how crazy and over-the-top this all is” cutscenes.

The frequent mini-cutscenes bring forth another issue that I feel plagues a lot of recent games. When the old Tomb Raider games would introduce something new, it would just sort of be there and consequently would be much more surprising. Tomb Raider II introduced spiders of unusual size (S.O.U.S.s) as an enemy near the end, but rather than heralding their arrival with an introductory cutscenes, you just sort of ran into them while exploring a dark cave, making them extremely unnerving and memorable despite their being animated with about four polygons. Conversely, modern games throw all sorts of well-rendered and novel threats at the player, but their consistent introduction by flashy cutscenes completely undermines their impact. Not only am I expecting something “craaazy” to happen whenever a cutscene starts, but because videogames are an interactive medium, I know that for as long as my control is taken away Lara is in no danger, so for the entire three-second sequence in which the roof starts to collapse or the wolves first appear, I jarringly feel less tension than when I had control and was doing something mundane. If Tomb Raider II were remade today, there would be a little cutscene introducing the spiders with a horde of them crawling out of something in all their many-polygoned glory, and I would be sitting back calmly waiting to play again. At least in a movie there is some miniscule chance that the character might get eaten by the spiders while you are passively watching, but with a game you know you're safe until the cutscene ends, or at least until a quick time event icon pops up. Indeed one of the few moments in the reboot that gave me genuine anxiety was the one time a new enemy was introduced without a cutscene. I'm not against cutscenes in principal, but too many games nowadays are using them to try and amp up tension in a way that does the exact opposite. Stop it!

Aside from that, I found a lot to like in the new Tomb Raider. Combat feels tight and transitions from stealth in an organic way, and enemies behave in a believable fashion. The bow is really fun to use whether you're picking off confused enemies from the bushes, shooting ropes to traverse the environment, exploding/igniting things, or murdering various animals (which feels more justified with Lara as a hungry castaway rather than merely an eccentric tourist). The “survival instincts” ability works nicely. It functions much like Arkham Asylum/City's “detection vision” to highlight important features, but because you can only use it while stationary, you aren't incentivised to ruin the pretty graphics by simply keeping it on at all times. The leveling system doubles as a sort of built-in tutorial as you learn various skills, and it doesn't feel shoehorned in *coughangelofdarkness*. And I like the way that tombs are integrated as optional side-puzzles since it makes you feel clever for finding and completing them.

Overall my impression is mixed, but I feel this is an impressive first go at reinvigorating a waning icon. (Certainly I'm more optimistic of Lara's future than Sonic's.) I'm excited to see where this reborn franchise goes, and I'm pleased that it contains a reasonably fleshed-out protagonist regardless of gender. Really I'm happy they didn't just make her a female Nathan Drake.

"Wakka wakka."

Surrogates Review: Determinedly Pointless

I saw the Bruce Willis movie Surrogates a while back and it frustrated me. Enough so that I intended to write a post on it, but doing so has taken me several months because I wanted to gather my thoughts it was sort of unmemorable and I forgot about it.

Surrogates is the most frustrating type of movie because it is not straightforwardly bad such that one can simply mock it or discard it, rather it is quite watchable and competently constructed, yet falls drastically short of what it might have been. This is mostly because Surrogates has quite a strong and socially relevant premise.

The idea is that it's “the future” and humans, rather than living normal lives in our flawed meat-bodies, have adopted perfect android bodies as “surrogates” (title drop!) through which they experience and interact with the world from a neural interface at home. Not only is it more fun to be a physically perfect meta-human, but it also makes life a whole lot safer when anything bad that happens to your surrogate can be solved by, worst case, going out and buying another one. However, FBI agent Bruce Willis discovers the existence of a weapon which has the ability, when a surrogate is shot with it, to overload its system in a way that kills the real-life person operating it.

This all sounds dandy until one realizes that the last bit completely undoes everything about the premise of the film. What makes the world of Surrogates intriguing is the idea that one could live as an immortal avatar of one's self, which could have interesting ramifications for an action thriller of this sort. For example, how can you stop a terrorist who cannot die? To what lengths might someone go when they are in no physical danger? And how does the average hooligan behave when their actions can't physically harm others or be effectively traced back to them?(see: The Internet) None of these ideas are properly explored because the plot's central devise precisely nullifies all of the potential of its premise, and we are left with a standard action film in which people are shot and then die as a result.

On top of this, the film has one of the dumbest moments I've ever seen. Bruce Willis discovers that his boss might have been working with the bad guys all along (as one does in these sort of movies), so he wanders into FBI headquarters after getting suspended (as one does in these sort of movies), gets his boss alone in his office, and proceeds to stab him (or rather, his surrogate) in the back of the head so he can paw through his computer and transfer some incriminating files to a USB. After the download completes, he causally walks back into the main area just as one of his co-workers receives a call from an angry boss complaining about a stabbing incident and suggesting rather vocally that perhaps someone should stop our hero from leaving the premises. Then we cut to him driving away. Wait, what?

It's been clearly established previously that when harm comes to a surrogate, the user is instantly booted back to reality, and the boss is shown to still be sitting in his neural interface chair while he makes the call. This means that in order for the scene to play out the way it does, the boss finds himself at home having been “murdered,” then decides to wait a while and give our hero a fair chance, or maybe hunt around behind couch cushions to find his fairly large phone and then go back and sit in his neural interface chair, and then make the call. Meanwhile our hero casually walks through an office building full of employees who have just been informed that he killed their boss and should be immediately detained. No reason to show how that played out, just cut to him driving away. No, it's fine, no need for an action movie to show how its hero escaped from what appeared to be an inescapable situation. This is one of the few instances where showing our hero jump out a plate glass window or single-handedly fight off a bunch of trained FBI agents actually would have made more logical sense.

Aside from the largely wasted premise and some sprinkles of idiocy, Surrogates is actually decent. It mostly fails as an "ideas" movie, but as a straight action thriller it's moderately engaging, and it does at least get some mileage out of the concept that one doesn't know precisely who one is talking to when interacting with a surrogate. For example, this review was actually written by Ron Perlman.

Mass Effect 3's Ending Doesn't Suck

**Warning! Huge spoilers below!**Like seriously, "you are NOT the father" level of spoilers**Do not look directly at the spoilers unless wearing proper eye protection**

About a month ago I posted some thoughts about Mass Effect 3. I didn't say much of anything regarding the ending, partly because I didn't want to spoil anything. Little did I know that an internet storm was brewing, with nasty, big, pointy teeth. Apparently the ending was so bad, on so many levels, that it actually ruined everything that had happened up to that point, as well as earning a place alongside such fabled endings as "A WINNER IS YOU" and "CONGRATURATION THIS STORY IS HAPPY END THANK YOU."

The thing is, not only did I not have this reaction to the ending, I actually thought it was pretty good.

It might have helped that I didn't read any of the hype preceding ME3s release because, looking back, some of the statements made seem basically like lies, such as "It’s not even in any way like the traditional game endings, where you can say how many endings there are or whether you got ending A, B, or C.....The endings have a lot more sophistication and variety in them.”

No, actually that is completely what the endings are like. You either (A) destroy the Reapers, (B) control the Reapers or (C) merge with the Reapers. Aside from minor variations, any real differences between outcomes have to be inferred.

And I have no problem with this. Most of my questions were answered before the final showdown, and I respect that the events following your final decision are not explicitly spelled out for you. I like a little bit of mystery (and Shepard is dead after all, generally). I also don't mind that everyone's story ultimately comes down to a 3-way choice. Many of the choices throughout the series, when all possibilities are examined, don't have the great divergence in outcomes that is being implied. It's just the fans never collectively compared notes on any of the earlier choices and their consequences. Or maybe everyone assumed that every choice they made would be acknowledged and accounted for in the conclusion in some way that showed that it all really mattered. Well I'm sorry kids, it doesn't really matter; you were playing a videogame the whole time.

I've read a lot of rants against the ending, and people unhappy with it generally deny that what they wanted was a happy ending, and that their objections are only about logical inconsistencies and a lack of choice and explanation. I'm not sure I buy this. Mass Effect's ending is pretty dark. And it's not dark in an Empire Strikes Back "what will our heroes do now?" kind of way, like all too many videogame endings. It left me with a feeling of hollowness like many critics describe, but for me this hollowness was mixed with respect for BioWare being willing to let there series end on such a downer. It was made clear all along that if victory were to be achieved, it would come at tremendous cost. Most of the fan-made or proposed endings I've seen try to wrap things up far too cleanly and happily. We've become so enured to saving the galaxy that we don't expect there to be negative consequences, even though the idea of consequences has been stressed all throughout the series. We're narratively spoiled. For the record, I have seen no ending suggested thus far that I prefer to the one we got. The "indoctrination" theory is intriguing, but it merely defers the issue.

I've read complaints that the final choice invalidates your previous hard work because two of the choices are equivalent to the aims of Saren (merge with Reapers) and the Illusive Man (control Reapers). So you spent the entire first game trying to stop Saren from achieving his goal of merging organics and synthetics, yet in the end you decide this is actually the best solution. This is called DRAMATIC IRONY. This is actually my favorite aspect of the endings, and it fits perfectly with the theme of grey morality that permeates the series.

I've heard various complaints that certain things about the ending are illogical. I disagree, but I won't argue point-by-point. I'll agree that it isn't clear why Joker is using a Mass Relay when he ought to be trying to help out in the final battle, but this didn't occur to me at the time, so it didn't ruin anything for me.

The one point which I do agree on is that I was hoping to see my war assets actually take part in the battle. I think a few cutscenes could have been done away with if I could have seen the Blue Suns shooting at some husks, or a bunch of Geth ships take down a Reaper. That would have been a lot more meaningful to me. Aside from that, I was quite pleased with the ending. I found it satisfying, intriguing, heartbreaking, ambiguous, ethically challenging, memorable, and unique.

I'm very glad BioWare are sticking to their guns and not planning to change the ending with DLC and merely plan to pad it out and explain things a bit more. I could see this potentially improving something that, in my humble opinion, was never broken to begin with.

Now go and rest our heroes!

hundredth post!!!1!!1!ONE!!!

Huh, somehow I managed to write 100 posts. Not sure how that happened.

If I'm going to keep sharing my most intimate thoughts about games here, I feel like there's something I need to disclose. A shameful secret that I've been hiding for years.

                                 I do not like Super Mario Bros. 3.

Again and again I've seen people cite this as their favorite game, or the greatest game ever made. And it's not that I think the game is good but overrated, I genuinely do not care for it.

If you're still here and haven't gone to report me to congress or something, permit me to try and explain myself.

It all started when I was a small boy renting SNES games from the local video rental establishment. One wintry afternoon (I assume, since I grew up in Calgary) I took home a little cartrage called Super Mario All-Stars. It had versions of all the classic Super Mario titles: Super Mario Bros.; Super Mario Bros. 2 aka Doki Doki Panic; Super Mario Bros.: The Lost Levels aka Super Mario Bro. 2; Super Mario World; and... Super Mario Bros. 3.

I loved this collection and rented it several times. I've always had a soft spot for Mario games, what with their inviting graphics, jaunty melodies and refined gameplay, and each of the games in the collection offered something unique for my young mind to devour... except Mario 3. That one just weirded me out for some reason. I had no problem accepting Mario 2 and its odd Arabian theme, but there was something about Mario 3 that just felt wrong or off-brand somehow, like it was clearly the black sheep of the Mario family. 'Oh well,' I remember thinking, 'they can't all be home-runs.' (I guess I thought in baseball analogies back then.)

Flash forward a decade and a half, Al Gore invents the internet, and I find it scattered with people waxing nostalgic about how great Super Mario Bros. 3 was, yet I find myself looking back on it the same way I look back on my first trips to the dentist's office. So what did I miss?

With commendable optimism I grab myself a copy off of Wii Virtual Console and fire it up, eager to see what my younger counterpart missed all those years ago. 'Okay' I thought, 'the music and the graphics still don't appeal to me, but I'm mature enough to look past that now.' A few levels later I feel my enthusiasm start to fade as the game continually finds new ways to irritate me.

'Well the game's over two decades old,' I hear you say. 'Of course it's not going to hold up to modern scrutiny.' Pipe down, Strawman, I'm a retro gamer. I just played through and enjoyed Castlevania 3, and it has a couple of mechanics that are objectively awful. Dated gameplay does not faze me.

To be safe though, I went back a replayed Super Mario World, and for me the difference was like night and day. Where Mario 3 felt weird and frustrating, Mario World easily won me back with its smooth gameplay and inviting presentation. Yes Super Mario World was released later on a better system, but when you throw out claims like "best game of all time" it doesn't mean "best game ever for nine months, going by North American release date."

I've put several hours into Mario 3 now, just trying to suss out what I find so un-fun about it. My main issue stems from the fact that Mario controls sort of like a freight train and begins moving quite fast once he gets any momentum behind him. Sonic the Hedgehog has a dash attack that allows him to plow right through enemies, but Mario can only defeat enemies by landing on them, which becomes quite a bit more challenging at high velocity. Couple this with a lenient timer and the fact that the levels seem specifically designed to have stuff unexpectedly pop out and kill you, and a slow and cautious approach tends to work a whole lot better. This pretty much kills any flow since as soon as I start to do well, Mario takes off like a bat out of hell and I have to put on the brakes or risk running headlong into some minute projectile, or landing a jump two pixels in front of an enemy. The screen also seems a little reticent to show what's about to hit you.

However I think most of my irritation stems from the level design rather than mechanics themselves. Enemies always seem to be in the most awkward locations, making them difficult to avoid even when they don't catch me by surprise. I'm all for challenge in games, but where I find Super Meat Boy's levels satisfyingly frustrating in an "I can't believe I just did that" sort of way, in Mario 3 I'm usually saying "I can't believe I let that kill me!" I don't think the Meat Boy method of shortening the levels and giving me infinite lives would fix the problem, although it might have prevented a few controller-shaped dents in my wall. The airship levels are pretty rad though.

A lot of the problem is that I just can't get past the presentation. I think it's some sort of uncanny valley type thing. Titles like Super Mario World and Super Mario Galaxy appeal to me because, despite the things that set them apart, they somehow embody that familiar Mario-ness I've come to know and love. Titles like Super Mario Bros. 2, Super Mario RPG, and Yoshi's Island appeal to me because they are so wonderfully unlike anything else in the Mario-verse. But Mario 3 somehow manages to straddle the line and be just familiar-yet-different enough to make me subtly uncomfortable, like it's Hannibal Lector wearing Mario's face or something.

Ultimately, I can't make a very compelling case for my position. The controls are tight for the era, and there are no major flaws present. It's a "death by a thousand cuts" kind if thing. Mario 3 is not a bad game by any stretch, and I'm not trying to suggest that it doesn't deserves its place in gaming history, I'm merely saying that I would rather eat glass than play any more of it.

Why DKC 2 is better than DKC Returns

In my personal opinion, the SNES Donkey Kong Country trilogy offered some of the best platforming gameplay ever designed. My opinion is undoubtedly clouded somewhat by nostalgia seeing as Donkey Kong Country was the first videogame I ever owned (except for a weird handheld Sonic game in which the titular hedgehog could occupy about three positions on the screen, the music to which I have spend the better part of two decades trying to erase from my memory).

I have, however, replayed the 2nd and 3rd installments within the last year or so, and they hold up. I also recently had the pleasure of playing Donkey Kong Country Returns, a lovingly crafted throwback to the original series by newcomer Retro Studios. Returns is a great game, with some truly stellar level design, but I'd like to lay out a few reasons why for me it doesn't quite dethrone Donkey Kong Country 2, which is probably my favorite platformer of all time.

Reason 1: The Roll
I've been a minor Wii defender for the past few years. Sure it has as bad a case of shovelware-itis as the iPhone app store, and when a game is ported over, the motion controls are usually implemented horribly (gestures are not buttons!), but most of the first-party stuff has been top notch, and the Virtual Console is like a candy store for a retro gamer.

And yet, in a title that obviously had a great deal of care and effort put into it, made specifically for crotchety oldschool fans such as myself, we have one of the two central actions assigned to the "shake" motion, with no other control options. There's no reason it had to be like this; the game only needs two action buttons which the Wiimote, conveniently enough, has. Maybe they thought no one would want to use the "shake" command if the player could change it to a button. I can't say I'd dispute that.

Aside from the issues that come with the waggle, such as the roll not always registering when you want it to (which doesn't happen too often, but one in a hundred times is still enough to be a little infuriating), the move itself just isn't as interesting as it used to be. In the SNES games, the roll speed/distance was heavily influenced by your prior momentum, and you could easily jump and change direction mid-roll. This made it much easier to incorporate rolling into your gameplay since it would hardly break your stride. The roll in DKC Returns sends you forwards much farther, always, making it eminently possible to overshoot a ledge. It may be partly due to my comfort with them, but in the originals I utilize the roll constantly and unconsciously, whereas in the new one I found myself thinking "doesn't look like I can make this just by jumping, better break out the roll." It becomes a key to open figurative locked doors strewn about the levels which, combined with the physical invocation, breaks flow somewhat.

Reason 2: The Economy
I'll just come out and say it: the economy and lives system in this game is essentially broken. Extra lives were always rare in this series (heh, "rare"),and this entry is no exception. However, they've added a store wherein you can spend coins to purchase, among other things, extra lives. You accumulate coins like Pigpen accumulates dirt, and lives are roughly two coins apiece (15 for 7), so before you complete the first world you'll be able to buy enough lives to open a balloon conglomerate.

Thankfully the game doesn't actually need a lives system, so this isn't a huge problem, but it feels like the developers were afraid to implement such a system, but also wanted to be oldschool, and compromised by implementing one that should have no effect on the game's difficulty whatsoever as long as the player is awake (although they may start to run down if you're playing coop, which is a weird disincentive).

I have mixed feelings about harsh failure penalties, but I will say that some of the most exciting parts of replaying DKC2 were when I was running low on lives and trying desperately to reach the next save point. That's the kind of gameplay you don't get much anymore. It's not like playing a modern game with badly placed checkpoints, you're fighting for your life so that the previous 40 minutes of gameplay weren't for naught. There are valid reasons why you don't see this kind of punishing gameplay anymore, even in hardcore indy titles like Super Meat Boy or I Wanna Be The Guy, but all the same something has been lost.

It's not that the difficulty has been dialed back much. Some of the unlockable temple levels are quite challenging, and the secret fruit-float level is about as challenging as anything in the originals. The game is clearly aimed at those looking for a challenge, so it just irks me that the lives system is generous to the point of being completely irrelevant.

Reason 3: The Bosses
Not sure exactly why, I think the reasons varied from boss to boss, but I didn't particularly enjoy most of the boss fights in the new game, whereas I generally have in the previous entries. Here they were presented less ominously, and rather than epic struggles, they mostly just felt like "complete this pattern several times without screwing up." Not a huge deal, but slightly disappointing. I would like to do a more in-depth analysis, but apparently they were also pretty forgettable as well.

Backpedaling
This isn't to say that everything in the new game is a step back. The level design is some of best and most varied I've ever seen in a platformer, the ability to grab onto moss is interesting and well implemented, and simultaneous coop is a lot of fun. Also they didn't include Kiddy Kong.

Overall I'm really happy with the job Retro Studios did, and I hope they consider continuing the franchise. Now if you'll allow me to put my nostalgia goggles back on, I need to go watch the rest of Cadillacs and Dinosaurs.

Sucker Punch Review

Steampunk Nazi Zombies.

Back to Back to the Future: a Critical Restrospective

Somehow I had managed to avoid the Back to the Future films until very recently. Eventually I grew tired of the constant teasing and the threats of physical violence and decided to sit down and watch the trilogy over the past couple of years. I'd like to give my take on them as someone who has no nostalgic stake in them.

The first film is relatively straightforward by time-travel-story standards. Marty McFly simply has to 'fix' the the timeline he has inadvertantly screwed with, and manage to get back to future, or present (though Back to the Present doesn't sound as good). Overall, I feel that this film is the strongest of the trilogy as everything holds together well and I have no particular criticisms. The scene with the clock tower is thrilling, and the final few seconds of the film are fantastic (and I'm not sure how I avoided having them spoilt for me).

The second film is probably the most rewatchable as it has the most labyrinthine plot and some really smashing visuals, particularly in the 'future' segment. However I also feel that it is ultimately the weakest of the three as greater emphasis is given to the series' antagonist, Biff Tannen. Through no fault of Thomas F. Wilson, Biff is a pretty weak villain. He's completely one dimensional and, worst of all, not all that threatening. Perhaps due to this, there weren't any scenes that felt particularly suspenseful to me. In the first film, Biff's the stereotypical Hollywood jock, but by the second, his evil jock persona has ballooned out of all proportion. For me, Biff is not a strong enough villain to build an entire film around, though a valiant effort was made.

The third film has some great elements, but is held back by some noticeable flaws. Introducing a more distant historical setting is a nice change of pace, and the old west is realized in a way that is both tongue-and-cheek and believable. I love that Marty's historical equivalent is also played by Michael J. Fox. The Biff equivalent is still weak, but downplayed from the second. The big problem is that while he was never mentally intimidating, here he no longer seems physically intimidating either. And while the fairly straightforward plot holds together pretty well, there's not much of a sense of urgency about anything since there's no particular hurry to get back to 1985, and no apparent threat of messing with the timeline. In essense, Biff's role as a source of tension has been dialed back with nothing dialed in to replace it, though in my opinion this still makes for a stronger film, and a good amount of excitement is generated in the climax. The movie does have one extremely bothersome plothole though. Early on, they save Clara from plummeting off a cliff, but are mildly concerned that this may have disrupted the timeline after discovering that she was indeed supposed to die. After she and Doc Brown fall in love, Marty suggests bringing her back to 1985, but the Doc dismisses this idea as he is afraid it will disrupt the timeline. No!!! Leaving her in 1885 is what will disrupt the timeline! Hello? Hello?! What's worse is that this is never pointed out, and the entire 'disrupting the timeline' idea is dropped like horse pucky. Come on, you're smarter than that, Doc. Think, Brown, think!

Overall, the series is pretty solid. All three films range from decent to great, Michael J. Fox and Christopher Lloyd are both endearing and enduring in their roles, and the only big problem is that the sole antagonist is not intimidating, although this isn't really a problem in the first film. I think it would have been interesting if, for the second or third film, they'd introduced a rival scientist, or maybe a cruel version of Marty from an alternate timeline. Ultimately though, Back to the Future is the rare film that is both enjoyable for adults and appropriate for children, and it is no small feat that they were able to duplicate this achievement two more times.

I'm interested to try the new adventure game that has come out. It's nice that Christopher Lloyd is reprising his role, and the guy doing a Michael J. Fox impression is outstanding.

I close with the immortal words of Sam Neill: "Where we're going, we won't need eyes!"

Aquaria Review: Life is Much Better Down Where it's Wetter

Water levels have gotten a bad name in videogames, somewhere just above "Sewer Level" and a bit below "Ice Level." This is justified, as the control schemes for said levels tend to be atrocious. However, there is a game that proves conclusively that swimming controls can not only be tight, but also fun and engaging...

Ecco the Dolphin for the Sega Genesis!

And it's various sequels!

...but also Aquaria!

In this impressive debut from ambitious indy-developer Bit Blot, you swim around exploring a massive aquatic environment as a mermaid-type creature named Naija, and the controls for doing so are rather impressive; the entire game can be played comfortably with just a dual-button mouse, leaving your other hand free to hold a tasty beverage or pastry. To swim, you hold down the left button (no rapidly tapping A here), and the distance at which you position your cursor relative to your avatar determines Naija's speed and direction. It's not only intuitive, but it allows a high degree of control once you master it, allowing you to effortlessly dart between obstacles and enemies, push off from surface to surface, and stop on a dime (or sand dollar) to avoid danger.

And you will be thankful, because danger you will find. This game may be about a singing mermaid, but it's not for sissies. It's by no means the hardest game I've played, but it will challenge your gaming skills, particularly if you go after some of the optional side-bosses. For example, there is a crab boss who hangs from the ceiling and is immune to all your attacks. When I finally realized what the game intended me to do, I believe I said "are you mad?" out loud. Perhaps I failed to try some easier maneuver that would have worked, but frankly I wish I had this reaction to games more often.

I must admit, when I first started playing Aquaria, I wasn't hooked. It seemed reasonably well made, with excellent production values, but I'm not a huge fan of exploration games, and I found myself getting lost and a little bored. I had gotten the game as part of the Humble Indie Bundle (possibly the best $25 I ever spent, even when I could have paid a penny, or saved that penny by pirating it, like 25,000 people apparently did), and I had no particular expectations about Aquaria. After having some trouble getting Penumbra to run properly, I decided to give it a fair shot. Here are my three basic Aquaria tips for anyone playing for the first time.
1: Use your map. The world of Aquaria is larger than you think. Much larger. Even when you are confined to a smaller section of it, getting your bearings is crucial to avoid just swimming around aimlessly.
2: Save often. This game doesn't mess around. There's no auto-saving here, and save points are not all that abundant. If you pass by a save crystal and don't bother to use it, you will likely regret your decision.
3: Mark locations on the map. This isn't critical, but as this game is in the style of a Metroidvania, you will find yourself wanting to go back to some particular feature you saw, and not being able to remember where the heck it was.

Once I had put an hour or two into the game, I started to realize that there was a lot more to it than my initial impressions had led me to believe. Yes, the game's main focus is exploration, but along the way you face many challenges, and the game slowly unveils a plethora of interesting abilities to deal with them. Rather than revealing its hand from the get-go, there is enough interesting content to discover that the experience continually gets better as you play, which for me is an extremely rare quality. I'm glad this is the case, because the game took me about 20 hours to complete, which I wasn't expecting from an indie title.

The world itself is huge. When you start out, you have no idea how flippin' massive Aquaria's game world is. With no hub world, and the ability to "teleport" only gained late in the game, traveling from one place to another can be quite a daunting task. However the game's inherent challenge and its variety of locales and enemies generally keep traveling from becoming tiring. I tend to dislike exploration and travel in games, but the slow pace works, and is I think necessary here, to create a world that feels truly epic and immersive. Also the game never feels like it's sending you to and fro arbitrarily in order to pad its length. On the contrary you often get very little indication of where to go, and are free to explore the world pretty much however you wish, but you ought to pack a lunch.

Which brings me to one of the coolest features in Aquaria: the recipe/cooking system. Okay, no, hear me out. Remember what I said earlier about this game not being for sissies? You're just going to have to trust me when I say that the recipe system in Aquaria is one of the most interesting and well designed and fleshed-out systems I've ever seen in a videogame. The idea is that slain enemies and plants will drop a wide variety of ingredients (and logical ones; no squirrels and amorphous blobs dropping coins and broadswords here). You are then able to combine these ingredients in your inventory to create food items that provide various benefits when ingested, like healing or stat boosts. As the game progresses, you will encounter new ingredients and recipes for more and more powerful dishes, and like Eternal Darkness' brilliant spell system, you are free to experiment with combinations of ingredients to try and discover recipes yourself. Instead of grinding through combat for experience points, you'll find yourself hunting down particular enemies just because you really want to make some turtle soup. And dropped ingredients don't blink out of existence, they simply float down into the depths, requiring you to delve down after them. The whole system is extremely well balanced - ingredients are plentiful, yet you never have enough of what you need and will be forced to make legitimately difficult choices as to how to allocate them.

The other thing that really stood out to me was the music. For weeks I've been unable to get the main theme out of my head, and for once I'm glad. Many of the songs in the game riff off of this melody in interesting ways, and a huge factor of my enjoyment came from the way the music set a strong tone throughout. Music also plays an important role in gameplay, similarly to the way it's used in Ocarina of Time, except that you often have to sing a little tune in the heat of combat in real time. I actually wish that the tunes were a little more difficult to play and to remember, since these are some of the most intense moments of the game. The story is nothing revolutionary, but it gets the job done, and the excellent and abundant narration, combined with the music, really makes the experience.

On the negative side, the admirably simple controls don't always work the way you want them to when trying to perform certain abilities. And the lock-on system for projectile attacks is fine most of the time, but on a couple of boss fights I had to switch the auto-aim off to actually hit anything. The whole thing feels pretty darn polished though, and not just for being an indie title. The biggest disappointment is that the secret ending teases at a sequel that will probably never be.

On the surface, what might initially appear like a lame concept (seriously it's about a singing mermaid baking cakes) or a Zelda ripoff belies one of the most unique and engaging games I've ever played. It also goes to some surprisingly dark places (figuratively and literally), and in the end Naija probably racks up a body count comparable to that of Kratos, including deities.

To the prospective consumer: if you like exploration adventure games, this is a must-play. If you don't, give Aquaria a shot anyway. It just might surprise you.

And to the developers, Alec Holowka and Derek Yu: thank you for crafting this unforgettable experience. Aquaria is the kind of game that makes me proud to be involved with the hobby. Also I beat your stupid hanging crab boss.

The thing with The Thing

So I got around to watching John Carpenter's 1982 remake The Thing. I'd never watched it before, and for the record, I thought it was good. A couple of things struck me about it though.

Firstly, in my opinion, the film would be exceedingly middling without the fantastic practical effects on display. That is, if the alien were CGI, I feel the whole thing would be exceedingly meh. The plot and characters are decent, but not exceptional. The film does succeed admirably in creating mood and tension, but I feel this is as much due to the creature effects as anything. This isn't to knock Carpenter's directing or the soundtrack, both of which are excellent, but if The Thing were released today with the standard computer effects, I doubt it would attain the cult status that it has. Perhaps the 2011 re-remake will test my theory, assuming it doesn't suck altogether.

This isn't a knock against The Thing. There are a great number of excellent movies that would be hugely diminished if their practical effects were removed: 2001: A Space Odyssey; King Kong (1933); Team America: World Police. At the time though, The Thing received critical flak for having too much style over substance, and I feel that our opinion on the film (currently 80% on rotten tomatoes) has morphed partly due to ennui over CGI and a collective nostalgia for physical objects.

Overall, I think that CGI has improved the medium of film by making it possible to show almost anything at an acceptable cost. This in turn affords screenwriters more creativity, and consequently more films with fantasy elements are being released today than ever before[citation needed]. The problems come when directors and studios come to see CGI as a panacea, forgoing all other types of effects. Plenty of films, even horror films like Drag Me to Hell, use CGI heavily and are better for it. Then you have Peter Jackson's King Kong, which features excellent locations done in miniature, and dinosaurs that look worse than Jurassic Park, a film that came out twelve years earlier. I think the rule of thumb should be this: if it's magic or something ephemeral, use CGI, if it's something physical, strongly consider some sort of practical effect.

But getting back on topic, while the pacing and atmosphere in The Thing work well, the plot has a few issues, and I want to bring up the most major problem I had, and please keep in mind that no normal, well adjusted person would be as bothered by this as I.

A certain ways into the movie, the characters collectively realize that the alien is taking human form. To ascertain whether one of them has been taken over, the doctor proposes the idea of a blood test. They'll each donate a sample of their blood, and each in turn will be mixed with a sample of regular emergency blood that they know to be untainted. Based on previous observation of the interaction between alien cells and normal cells, if a reaction occurs, then that donor is infected. This plan is scrapped when it is discovered that blood bags in storage have been tampered with (e.g. they have tentacles growing out of them).

The issue I have is that with the established fact that alien cells react with normal cells when the two are mixed, the previously described experiment could easily be performed without the uninfected blood bags. What the characters need to do is mix blood samples between every combination of two people. If there is a reaction, then one of those two people is an alien. After running through every combination, based on who reacted with who, you could divide everyone into two groups, Group A and Group B. Everyone's blood would react with all members of the opposing group, and with no members of their own group. As is stated at one point in the film, the infected must not outnumber the uninfected, or else they would simply reveal themselves and overpower them (ala Werewolf/Mafia). Thus the smaller group are the ones infected, and they may be promptly disposed of by the larger group.

Also there are no shape-shifting aliens in Antarctica, so there's that too.

The Resistance Review: Voltage over Current

I like Werewolf. Quite a bit actually. I’ve not had the opportunity to play it a lot since most groups I game with are Euro players more interested in strategy than player interactions and more irritated than some by the early and repeated player elimination. Getting enough people together to make Werewolf interesting can also be prohibitive, but there’s nothing quite like a well run game of Werewolf with a group that’s willing to really get into it, especially when played at a convention with 30 other people (I won that one, by the way...).

There are a number of recent Euro/Ameri-style games that use a traitor mechanic (including one of my own designs if it ever comes out), and I tend to play a lot more of these due to the reasons above, but they rarely evoke the same level of involvement and pure character analysis that a good game of Werewolf does. The Resistance successfully straddles the line between Werewolf and more "gamer-y" games with a straightforward system that provides significantly more information and clues as to who the "spies" are, while remaining open enough that the interpersonal aspect remains front and centre.

The system is extremely simple, to the point where everyone I brought this out with seemed initially dubious that it would even be interesting. There are two phases of voting in each round, the first done publicly with everybody to determine which players will comprise the "Mission Team," and the second done secretly by the mission team to determine whether that round’s mission was successful. Accidentally putting even one spy on the team is potentially disastrous since it only take one to sabotage a mission, but then again the spy may choose not to do so in order to earn the group’s trust.

Once players get into the swing of things, they may be surprised at the amount of subtlety present. There are a number of different ways to suss out who might be lying, and equally many ways to lie and subtly manipulate. I definitely recommend playing with the plot cards as these are anything but fluff and add a lot of complexity to the deduction while being quite straightforward and adding minimal randomness. The game definitely rewards being able to successfully read people and lie, but it also heavily rewards logical deduction. I frequently made my head spin trying to form an explanation for myself of who the spies were that could even match up with everything I’d seen and heard, regardless of who I suspected, realizing that my two prime suspects couldn’t both be spies, unless Player A was more savvy than I thought...

Despite its simplicity, the game is a tiny bit fiddly. There are several different sets of cards, and the way the mission cards need to be repeatedly sorted and passed around can cause some confusion. I haven’t thought of any solutions, and it’s more than acceptable given the game’s strengths, but it did turn off some players at first. For example, players are asked to close their eyes at the start ala Werewolf to allow spies to identify each other. At first several people scoffed at this as seeming stupid and unnecessary, and there is even a variant in the rules that allows skipping this step, but after a half-dozen plays I definitely think it improves the game in a number of ways if the spies know who each other are from the start.

If I were to point to any serious flaw, it would be that some games are not going to be as interesting as others simply because players get lucky and manage not to send the spies on any missions. This happened in my first game before we had gotten into the groove, and it seemed as though the game was outright broken. This situation is rare though, and the game is short enough that it shouldn’t be a big deal to ride out the occasional session where the resistance just gets lucky and the spies can’t do much except impotently scheme and pretend to look pleased, and if your group has eased into the accusatory spirit then even these less-interesting sessions are still enjoyable.

The game also seems noticeably better with more players. As I say, I’ve only played a few games, but I had a lot more fun with seven players than with six. The deduction becomes a lot more complicated, and there are more people trying to talk at once (which you want in a game like this). More players also makes the above issue occur less frequently.

The Resistance doesn’t quite scratch all the same itches for me that Werewolf does, but it has a number of notable advantages over it, the main one being no player elimination. And while I prefer it with more players, The Resistance does work fine with as few as five, which is not something I can say for Werewolf. It also feels like less of a popularity contest as there is more tangible evidence on which to argue your case (even if you’re a spy).

Despite the fact that there is more information on which to base your decisions, I generally prefer games with a little more "game" to them apart from the social aspect. My favorite hidden roles game is probably Battlestar Galactica since it combines the sociopolitical element with solid tactics and strategy and a well-fleshed-out theme. But it must be noted that Battlestar achieves its level of player involvement largely through it’s considerable gamelength. The Resistance had us vehemently arguing and hurling complex accusations in minutes.

In the end, if these sorts of social deduction games just aren’t your cup of tea, I don’t think The Resistance will convert too many people, but if the concept sounds at all interesting, or if you like Werewolf/Mafia but wish it didn’t have player elimination, then I suggest checking out The Resistance. On the other hand, doing so might put you on some government watch list, so maybe it’s safer if [Message Redacted]

Science Fiction/Double Feature

With the introduction of "Less-price-gougey Tuesdays" at the local cineplex, I got a chance to see both Inception and Predators one after another, and I'll try to give my thoughts on them without giving away too much.

I can't get very specific with Inception without getting spoilery, so I'll keep my critique vague. All in all, I thought it was awesome, but I do think it ran a bit long. The concept behind the film, of invading and navigating other peoples' dreams, amply warrants an in-depth treatment, yet as cool as the premise is, I didn't feel that it was explored to its fullest potential, and at two-and-a-half hours the screenplay dragged in places and at times even felt repetitive. I have the feeling that this was somewhat intentional to drive home the dreamlike aesthetic that the film does effectively convey, but I also feel that an already impressive film would have been made stronger had a few more minutes been cut, and I would likely be inclined to re-watch it more frequently. As it stands, Inception is still better and more original than the vast majority of films released, and probably the closest thing to a big screen adaption of Psychonauts we can hope for.

With its themes of what is really real, and of plugging into other realities, comparisons with The Matrix are inevitable. I wouldn't say that Inception is in any way ripping off The Matrix, but I also feel that The Matrix succeeded in a few areas where Inception fell short, particularly in terms of its action sequences. With the exception of a fantastically trippy setpiece in a hotel hallways, Inception's action falls drastically short of it's potential. This is not to say that the action is poorly shot or choreographed, but that because we are working in the realm of dreams, where conceivably anything could happen, a series of gunfights and car chases with generic goons just feels like a bit of a cop-out. Where The Matrix wowed us with its funky wire-fu and novel bullet-time effects, Inception sort of goes out with a whimper.

To be fair, Inception is meant more as an "ideas" film than an action film, and in that regard it holds up a bit better. Whereas the ideas behind The Matrix don't hold together all that well under closer scrutiny (such as the machines not having any apparent way of drawing new energy into the system they have constructed), Inception has a little more depth and ambiguity to pick at. That's not to say that the film is devoid of gaps in logic (there were a couple points I didn't get, but I won't pass judgment until I have a second viewing), but there are plenty of things that the films leaves you to turn over in your mind. But again, because so much could have been done with the concept, the result ends up feeling a tad disappointing. In particular, I would have liked to see more of the universal aspects of dreaming covered in some way, like when you're trying to run away from something and suddenly it feels like you're moving through molasses, or when your teeth don't seem to have been quite put in properly. I realize that the film is expressly trying to make us question what is and isn't real, but I can't shake the feeling that opportunities were missed.

A common complaint I've heard, of movies in general, is that the "dream-within-a-dream" is purely an invention of Hollywood and that this never happens to anyone. I can attest firsthand that this does happen in real life, and that it as trippy as balls. You wake up and say something like "what a peculiar dream that was. I'd best return to reality with a nice bowl of cornflakes. Then maybe some goldfish polo. I do hope the Queen has a spare dachshund." Later you awake in a cold sweat with the feel of scales and victory still on your palms.

Or maybe that's just me. I'm just gonna move on to Predators now.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Predators is the first film to feature the titular character, since the 1987 original, that wasn't awful. To be fair, I never saw the sequel to Aliens vs Predator, and I remember somewhat enjoying the first AVP film, probably out of some perverse fondness for the games, but I think I wouldn't be remiss in saying that both franchises went significantly downhill when they tried adding numbers or subtitles to their names. Just adding an "s" seems empirically to work out better. For the next installment, I suggest Predators'.

This is a film that I think would greatly benefit from a lack of foreknowledge. If you were somehow able to go into this with no idea what to expect and no knowledge of the original, or even just no idea that this was the movie you were going to see, I think the film would generate a respectable degree of tension and excitement. As it is, it just sort of feels like an homage, like it's just going through the motions (♪walking through the part♫), with little by way of surprises (and a painfully obvious Chekhov's Neurotoxin).

Unfortunately, the Predators are the weakest part of the movie. There's none of the unfamiliar menace they exuded in the original, and not even any of the cheesy badassery from AVP. After all these years, we finally get a Predator on Predator fight, and it looks exactly like what it is: two guys in rubber suits wrestling. I often argue that less is more, but sometimes it's just less. The Predators also seems considerably easier to kill in this installment; I guess they adhere to the law of inverse ninjutsu.

It's weird to see Adrian Brody take up the role once filled by Arnold "Aaugh" Schwarzenegger, but I would say that the cast is probably the strongest part of the film. The personalities are more diverse than the original, and I even like Topher Grace's weirdly-out-of-place doctor character. It was pretty funny to see Danny Trejo show up at the beginning when the previous trailer had him being a badass in Machete, only for him to be pretty much the first to die (that's not a spoiler, he's ethnic). When they're all just confusedly creeping about the jungle, it feels like a good episode of Lost. It's just a shame that the Predators are less menacing than the smoke monster.

Battlestar Galactica Boardgame Reviews

I just so happen to have in my possession both the Battlestar Galactica boardgame released in 2008, and the Battlestar Galactica boardgame released in 1978. To aid the prospective consumer, I have drafted a comparison of the two games highlighting some of their features and discrepancies.

In the 2008 version, humanity is on the brink of annihilation. Impeded only by a handful of brave Viper pilots, swarms of Cylon Raiders continually threaten to wipe out what remains of the fleet. Heavy Raiders bring Centurions onto Galactica that march inexorably towards the ship's vital systems, and the fearsome Basestars ceaselessly pump out reinforcements as their guns pummel Galactica unless silenced with a nuclear explosion. All the while, internal politics exacerbated by hidden Cylon agents threatens to tear the fleet apart from within as the humans struggle desperately to hold it together long enough to reach Kobol, the signpost to Earth.

In the 1978 version, there's a single defenseless and inanimate Cylon Raider that gets dragged around a lot. If you drag it into your corner, you win! All the other Viper pilots are trying to stop you for some reason by blasting you to pieces. Perhaps all the pilots are very drunk.

In the 2008 version, you can play as William Adama, Starbuck, or perhaps the enigmatic Gaius Baltar, any one of whom might turn out to be a Cylon agent secretly working to destroy the fleet.

In the 1978 version, you can play as blue.

The 2008 version uses a simple d8 to resolve ship combat (among other things), but the heart of the game's conflict is in the skill check system where players contribute cards to a face-down pile to deal with various crises. In each check some colors of cards will be helpful while others are harmful, and the cards are shuffled before they are revealed so it is unclear who has aided the humans and who has sabotaged them. The Cylon players will need to be subtle and choose their moments if they are to successfully destroy the humans' chances of survival without arousing too much suspicion.

The 1978 version has arguably one of the most ridiculous combat mechanic ever conceived. By playing a "laser torpedoes" card, you get to spin the spinner. The number result (from 1 to 6) tells you how many further times you get to spin the spinner. Each of these times, you check which of four colors the spinner is pointing to, and all the enemy Vipers in that quarter of the board get shot. By playing one laser torpedoes card, you could realistically shoot all, none or some of your opponents. Who knows? At least the mechanic is entertaining, in a putting stuff up your nose kind of way.

I would recommend the 2008 version to anyone who doesn't mind a somewhat longer and more complex game. The only real gripe I have with the game is that it can go upwards of two hours which keeps it from hitting the table as often as it would otherwise, but I still have a great time every time it comes out. Extra recommendation if you're a fan of the show, or enjoy an excuse to lie to peoples' faces.

I would recommend the 1978 if you have a sense of humor and would like to compare just how far boardgames have come in 30 years. Extra recommendation if you're a fan of Plan 9 From Outer Space, or anything else that sucks in a brilliant way.

In conclusion, the series finale was somewhat disappointing.