Golden Age

Wow, I've been a longtime fan of the boardgame reviewers at Shut Up & Sit Down, but Quinns really hit it out of the park with this talk reaching out to non-boardgamers and he nicely sums up many of the things I love about the hobby. The only thing I'll add is to stress that Descent and Twilight Imperium are the exception; most modern boardgames play within a reasonable time frame and in fact require much less of a time commitment than most modern videogames.

Man of Stale

I'm generally not a stickler for movie logic. Generally I think it's more important that a movie hang together thematically and emotionally, and if telling a good story results in some plot-holes then so be it. But I thought Man of Steel was, while reasonably entertaining and well put together, a little bland and unengaging, so I'm going to go ahead and explain why I'm fairly convinced that the central plot actually makes no sense. (**Major spoilers ahead obviously**)

One aspect that differentiates this film from previous tellings of Superman's origin is that a great deal of time is spent on Krypton before Jor-El fires his son into space. General Zod also realizes that the planet will be destroyed and is staging a military coup that involves chasing Jor-El around on pterodactylesque things. This whole escapade adds a much needed breath of fresh air, but why is Zod after Jor-El you ask?

You see in this continuity Kryptonians have long ago taken to genetically engineering all of their offspring to fulfill specific societal roles. Zod and his friends are designed to protect Krypton at all costs, and he's of the ideological position that certain other genetic lines should be discontinued when they find a new home. Jor-El's very unhappy with all this genetic engineering stuff (and in fact his own son is secretly the first child in centuries created through some good ol' fashion Kryptonian lovin'), so he refuses to work with Zod and instead steals "The Codec," an artifact that houses all the data for future generations of Kryptonian test-tube babies, and inexplicably destroys it by encoding the information onto his sons "cells" before sending him off to Earth to start a new beginning.

Jor-El's strategy raises several questions. Seeing as it can be safely assumed that humans do not possess the means to create a new generation of Kryptonians using the Codec (assuming they would want to), it's puzzling that Jor-El seems to think that sending his son off with it will somehow lead to a new beginning for their race. But even if Superman somehow obtained the means to utilize this Codec, all that it would let him do is create a bunch of genetically designed Kryptonians that Jor-El is seemingly against to begin with. Indeed when Superman discovers a hologram of his father's consciousness on Earth, Jor-El gives no indication that he wants Superman to create more Kryptonians, and he certainly doesn't mention that "by the way, you have a bunch of data written on your cells that is the last genetic record of your people!"

Which raises the question: why did Jor-El go to all the trouble of stealing the Codex in the first place? If he merely didn't want Zod to have it (and just felt like dooming his entire race), would it not have been a lot easier to simply destroy the Codec? And if he only wanted Superman to have the Codec (for whatever inexpiable reason) presumably Kryptonian technology is advanced enough to maybe have a copy-paste feature that could avoid destroying the original (and likely his species' only chance at salvation)? It would seem that if Zod was engineered to protect Krypton at any cost, Jor-El must have been engineered to provide the villains with a MacGuffin at any cost.

But the madness certainly doesn't end there. After Zod and his pals show up on Earth, they discover that the Codec is written on Superman's cells and that they must capture him dead or alive to retrieve it, despite the fact that they make this discovery after having taken a sample of his blood! Or do you need all of his cells?! One might assume that a hidden message would want to be written in someone's DNA or something, seeing as cells have a habit of dying and replacing themselves. The only conclusion I can come to is that perhaps Kryptonian cells do not die and that Superman has retained each individual cell that the Codec was written on when he was a baby. Perhaps when he decided to (somehow) shave he was unknowingly committing genocide!

Assuming that retrieving Superman's body will be no trouble, Zod sets about terraforming Earth so it can be a new Krypton, which will have the unfortunate side effect of wiping out all human civilization. No particular reason it needs to be Earth though. You would think that perhaps he could choose an uninhabited planet to terraform (seeing as Earth would be de-inhabited anyway) and Superman might even help out by turning over the Codec (i.e. himself) in order to save not only the Earth but his own race as well! Presumably there would need to be something preventing Zod from simply choosing another planet since this would lead to a rather unexciting climax (or maybe Zod just really hates human for no reason), but this solution is never even proposed or mentioned by anyone.

Zod's right-hand woman named Zodalina (maybe) does tell Superman that morality has been "evolved out of" Kryptonians, which is a fantastically stupid statement for three reasons:

1) "Morality" is an evolved trait that allows us to live and work together in groups. Lack of morality is a trait of lower lifeforms (for example, slugs are total wankers).

2) Nobody with the goal of creating a perfect society populated by superior beings would ever intentionally engineer them with no morality. Psychopath Land is not even a place you want to visit. (Psychopath Land might be L.A.)

3) They clearly do have a morality. Their extremely central moral precept, which they will do anything to follow, is to protect/reestablish Krypton at any cost. That is their moral imperative. The only character in Man of Steel with no discernible morality is Jor-El.

Basic Tips for Game Designers

Good tips here for anyone who wants to start designing boardgames, or videogames for that matter (although someone stealing your videogame idea after it's released is a little more plausable).

Shadow of the Eternal Darkness

I've previously expressed my great admiration and love for Eternal Darkness: Sanity's Requiem so I was extremely excited to learn that the same team that developed the original is currently crowdfunding a freaking sequel!!!

Okay technically it's a "spiritual successor" in that they won't be able to use the same name, and it's unclear how closely they can hew to the original inanity mechanics given Nintendo's absurd patent, but there's gonna be a new Eternal Darkness guys! Holy crap!

Or at least there will be if it gets funded, so go make it happen! And while you're at it, go show Double Fine's Humble Bundle a little love too. Mantarok commands it!

Five-Point-Exploding-PR Technique

For the second year running, EA has been voted the “Worst Company in America” in a poll by the Consumerist. Is it possible that publishing bad videogames is in fact a worse sin than ruining the economy, murdering sea life or giving millions cancer?

Aside from the sample bias that people participating in online polls are more likely to play a lot of videogames than they are to own equity, swim in the Gulf or watch MTV respectively, EA's problem isn't actually an inability to publish good games. Seeing as they own half the industry's AAA developers at this point, a great many of the games they publish are in fact excellent. No, their problem is largely one of PR.

When SimCity failed to be playable by many at launch due to always-online DRM and dodgy servers, what was their immediate response? We made our game so fun that too many people just couldn't stop playing! (See, it's totally your guys' fault!)

In similar fashion, the response to the consumerist poll includes a beautifully laid out list of reasons why in fact you are stupid (and homophobic) for hating them. So enlighten us EA. Let's go through this sucker point by point:

-Point #1:
"Many continue to claim the Always-On function in SimCity is a DRM scheme. It’s not. People still want to argue about it. We can’t be any clearer – it’s not. Period."

Except that it totally is DRM. If the online features were not merely implemented to combat piracy, there would have been an offline option for the billions of people who do not have internet connections, sort of like every other SimCity game ever. (SimCity is not an MMO and never has been.) I also like how they're dubbing it the “Always-On function” since it conjures images of a product that is always ready to go when you need it rather than the complete opposite of that.

-Point #2:
"Some claim there’s no room for Origin as a competitor to Steam. 45 million registered users are proving that wrong."

You know what? I'm a registered Origin user. You know why? Because a ton of EA games require you to register and be logged into your account in order to play them (thanks to that lovely Always-On function). Do I use Origin for anything else? I suppose I gripe about it in blog posts. Admittedly that's a service Steam hasn't provided me yet.

-Point #3:
"Some people think that free-to-play games and micro-transactions are a pox on gaming. Tens of millions more are playing and loving those games."

Tens of millions of people also love Hollywood movies, but that doesn't prove that they all need to be teal and orange.

-Point #4:
"We’ve seen mailing lists that direct people to vote for EA because they disagree with the choice of the cover athlete on Madden NFL. Yes, really… "

Initially I actually agreed with this point... until I saw the new Madden NFL cover:

Disclaimer: not actually the new Madden NFL cover.

-Point #5:
"In the past year, we have received thousands of emails and postcards protesting against EA for allowing players to create LGBT characters in our games. This week, we’re seeing posts on conservative web sites urging people to protest our LGBT policy by voting EA the Worst Company in America. That last one is particularly telling. If that’s what makes us the worst company, bring it on. Because we're not caving on that."

Thank you EA for championing equality and inclusiveness by having 99% of your games star straight white male protagonists (along with the rest of the AAA industry, sadly).

I know times are tough financially EA. I understand that it's not easy being the most hated company in America (it's quite impressive actually when you consider the competition), and I sympathize that you feel the need to take extreme measures to combat piracy, but I feel like both might be resolvable were you to show a little more humility, benevolence and good faith and perhaps, just a thought, try to include features that make your games better than the version the pirates are offering rather than worse.

Teabagging for Cthulhu

Okay so I know it's not hip to care or talk about Halo anymore, but check it:

-As a small child, I played the Macintosh game Pathways into Darkness in which you navigate an ancient ziggurat attempting to defeat a slumbering Lovecraftian god. (I thought the dead Nazi lying out front was a turtle.)

-Shortly thereafter, Bungie released the Marathon trilogy in which you play a reanimated cyborg who may or may not have memories which resemble the events of Pathways into Darkness (which also happen to be summarized in garbled form in a computer terminal). Also more Lovecraft.

-Half a decade later, Halo descends from the heavens containing countless connections to the Marathon series. For example, both games feature a company on Mars named "Misriah." (Also the Marathon logo is plastered all over everything in sight.)

-Which leads me to the inexorable conclusion that the Halo franchise is in fact part of the Cthulhu Mythos. (In fact I'm certain there's a bit about the Flood in the Necronomicon somewhere.)

This connection also melds the Halo-verse to quit a few other things including Conan the Barbarian and uncomfortable racism. (Though of course it could all just be in Tommy Westphall's imagination.)

I guess what I'm saying is, if they ever do make that Halo movie, and they cast Arnold Schwarzenegger as Master Chief, it wouldn't be out of place is all.

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!

Gamifying Education

Someday I want to teach game design in an academic setting, so I've been doing Toastmasters to get better at public speaking and presentation. Here's video of my 10th speech, which I'll be giving again at the Calgary area contest next week.



I took the idea of reverse grading from this Extra Credits video and the baseball analogy from this excellent TED Talk. Thanks also to Iris Talbot for her coaching, support and camera.

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."

Sifteo Cubes

Ever since the boardgame Operation debuted in 1965, it's been clear that hybridization potential exists between electronic and non-electronic games. I've been excited for the possibilities ever since Microsoft unveiled the original 30" Surface, but the $10k price tag put that a little outside the mainstream market.

Well a new challenger has appeared. At $30 each, these Sifteo Cubes still aren't quite at the level where you could expect every customer to already own a set (or include a few in the box), but I could imagine quite a few interesting ways you could combine these with boardgames.

The tipping point draws near, folks. Some day all this stuff will be cheap enough that every boardgame can have electronic components up the wazoo and every videogame can have tablet support and action figures, and instead of distinguishing between videogames and boardgames we can just refer to them all as bideord games or something.

Or maybe that's a bad idea and none of that will happen because it's actually more fun to just tackle your friend while holding a PlayStation Move.