Month: July 2011

Journalists vs Gamers: Why do we sometimes disagree?

Posted on by Nimgimli

This week Bastion came out on Xbox Live. The previews and early game journalist reviews for the game were crazy positive, but among my friends it isn’t quite as popular. Some of them like it (I personally like it a lot) and some of them don’t. There’s nothing all that unusual about that; but the ‘pros’ seem to be pretty universal in their love for the game.

This reminded me of a conversation from many years ago. Back in the olden times, when we had to use a donkey-wheel to power our computers, I was one of the editors at Strategy Plus Magazine. My fellow editors and I were talking about the disconnect between us and the readers when it came to unusual games. What we decided (or at least, what I remember us deciding… this was 15 years or so ago) was this:

Game journalists look at a ton of games. Some they play for a bit, some they preview, some they just see over the shoulder of their co-workers, and a very few they actually review, but every month they get exposed to dozens of games. And let’s face it, a lot of games aren’t all that original. One military FPS is pretty much like another. Not for hard core enthusiasts who’ll drill into details and demonstrate why his or her favorite is better, but from a casual observer (like the journalist who isn’t assigned to the game) they can all start to feel the same.

So when a quirky or unusual game comes along, it really stands out. Since it stands out, a lot of journalists will check it out; they’ll make time to play it even if it isn’t in their beat. And since it’s something different, they’re going to tend to like it, assuming it is at least a decent game. For them, it’s a breath of fresh air. It’s a sweet crunchy apple handed to them in the middle of the annual Doritos Tasting Marathon. Everyone loves Doritos but if you’ve been eating nothing but Doritos for a long time, an apple is going to seem amazing to you.

For those of us shelling out $50-$60 for every game we play, and who play 4-5 games a month, we might not feel like these games are ‘generic’ at all. If you only play Call of Duty you might not realize that most military FPS are brown, y’know? So we might see a lot more games as being unique than the journalist who looked at 25 games this month does.

And this is why I think Bastion is getting so many rave reviews from the journalists. It doesn’t take a lot to make a game stand out. In this case, it takes a gravelly voiced narrator and a colorful art style. I do really like Bastion a lot, but the actual gameplay isn’t really all that unique, is it? The aesthetics feel fresh and unique, and that has been enough to get the journalist’s attention and to stimulate different parts of their gaming taste buds.

There’s nothing nefarious going on; game journalists are people too, y’know. But I do think this is why so many of us wind up basing purchases on word of mouth, or ‘amateur’ bloggers who have gaming habits more along the lines of those of us who only see a few games every month.

And I think you can apply the same theory to movie reviews, too, but in all honesty I almost never read movie reviews so I may be off base.

One more time: I like Bastion a lot. This isn’t an anti-Bastion post. I’m using Bastion as a tool to talk about the occasional disconnect between people who’re given games to look at as their jobs, and those of us who have jobs so we can buy games to look at.

Real emotions from our games?

Posted on by Nimgimli

Over the weekend I read an interesting post by Dan Cook over at Lost Garden: Shadow Emotions and Primary Emotions. In it, Cook coins the phrase “shadow emotions” to indicate emotions that we experience second-hand, while “primary emotions” are emotions that impact us directly. Using Cook’s examples, feeling sad after reading a news story about a mother dying is a shadow emotion, while feeling sad because your own mother died is a primary emotion.

Cook says AAA game developers work hard to deliver shadow emotion experiences in much the same way that books and movies do. But, he suggests, game developers can do more and that games are one of the few art forms that can let us feel primary emotions. When your character dies in a permadeath game the feeling of sadness you feel is a primary emotion, for instance. (Still using his examples.) When a spawn camper takes you out several times in a row, the rage you feel is a primary emotion.

I think Cook makes some really interesting points, but I don’t want to follow him down this path. The basic premise of the essay seems to me that primary emotions are a goal game devs should reach for. My problem with this theory is that most of his examples are of negative emotions. Sadness and anger. His positive example (elation) revolves around hitting a goal in a game.

The problem, for me at least, is that as much as I gain satisfaction from reaching a goal in a game, that emotion is fairly fleeting. But if another player pisses me off to the point where I feel rage, I can carry that baggage into my real life far too easily. I’ll be in a bad mood for the rest of the day, sometimes. Maybe this is why I generally play solo?

I think, when I come home from a long, tiring day at work, that ‘shadow emotions’ are plenty for me. I’m not sure I want my games invoking powerful primary emotions, either good or bad. I play to relax. I might be swayed if someone could convince me that we’d get as much positive as negative emotions out of our games, but I’d have to experience that kind of game to know for sure.

I’m also not sure how to categorize the feeling of contentment I get when I finish a game. Is that primary or shadow? I’m not sure it’s different form the feeling of contentment I get from finishing a book.

Anyway, agree or not, it’s a fascinating essay and I encourage you to give it a read.

Is Guild Wars a CCG?

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So with Alan Wake winging his way back to Gamefly, last night I hopped back into Guild Wars.

Now, I have to beg your patience, all you Guild War veterans… I’m probably about to cause you a great deal of eye-rolling.

I’ve added a few more heroes to my roster and each one brings some skills with them, and I’ve picked up the odd skill here and there. I could buy skills, but haven’t yet, since I read I can earn a bunch of them for free in one of the other campaigns, and so far I’m getting by with my limited selection.

But staring at those skill bars, and prompted by someone (my mind is like a sieve) mentioning how skills interact with each other and the best way to build a set for your skill bar, my brain suddenly switched into collectible card game mode. So all my skills…those are like my deck of cards, and part of the fun of the game is collecting more. The skillbar is like a hand of cards that I can put together and will eventually tweak depending on circumstances and companions.

Right? Am I right, Guild War vets? I mean, obviously there’s a ton more to it than just this skill collecting/arranging sub-system…

Anyway, another new thing I learned was that you can have more than one hero with you. I have no idea how I got it into my head that you could only have one. Last night I did a Mission with a party of 6, even though I was playing alone. I had my character +3 heroes +1 NPC who was part of the mission +1 Fire Imp ally. Crazy fun!!

Though, *gasp* at one point I thought “This would be better with friends.”

I unlocked the mission that in turns unlocks Eye of the North, but I’m sort of engaged with the Nightfall story now so I’m not sure I want to divert. And the mission I did had a bonus objective that I screwed up, so I’ll want to go re-do that.

Still having a lot of fun…still kind of bemused at how I wound up here after all these years.

My next goal is getting better about giving Heroes orders. Right now I let them run around in default behavior, which means swarming whatever I’m attacking. I was reading the Wiki and apparently you can ‘lock’ them onto a target, which, combined with calling targets, could be pretty handy if I’m a fast enough mouse clicker!

Dear Gamefly

Posted on by Nimgimli

Dear Gamefly,

I’m sorry to say, it’s time we had The Talk. While I really appreciate that we gave Us another try, it’s just not working out for me. This time though, it’s not you, it’s me.

You promised to get better and you did. When we were last together, your turn-around times were awful. I’d spend 2 weeks or more alone each month, waiting to hear back from you. It kind of broke my heart, seeing that empty mail box every day.

You’ve gotten so much better and 2 weeks has become 4 days. Even I can be alone for 4 days without becoming sad.

So why am I leaving you? Frankly, it’s the scheduling. I’m a spontaneous soul. Mercurial! I admit it, I want what I want when I want it. Call me spoiled. Serial monogamy isn’t my style.

I’m sure I really wanted to play Alan Wake when I slipped it into my queue, but when you arrived last week with Mr. Wake in tow, I was enjoying the tender mercies of Vindictus and Guild Wars. You and Alan waited patiently, it’s true, but I started feeling guilty about ignoring you. So last night I tore myself away from those others and gave my attention to you.

Was it good for you? It wasn’t good for me. It felt somehow hollow. It felt, and please forgive me for being so blunt, it felt like a chore. Spending time with a game should never feel like a chore. Please relay my apologies to Alan Wake. I’m sure under other circumstances I would’ve been delighted with his company.

I sent you and Alan Wake away this morning, and honestly it was a relief to have you gone. Then I looked at my queue and felt little but apathy. I wanted Guild Wars. I wanted Vindictus. Hell, I even wanted EQ2. I didn’t want Alice with her Madness Returning, at least not right now. Maybe some day. But not today.

And that’s why you and I will never work out, Gamefly. I just can’t schedule my needs in advance, and I can’t bear the idea of you sitting in the living room, waiting patiently, while I’m in the office enjoying the charms of another. You deserve better than that.

I hope you find someone who can appreciate your charms, Gamefly. But I’m not that person.

But I do wish you well,

-Pete

PS I still have a month left on my account so keep sending moar gamez until then, dammit!

Revisiting Guild Wars

Posted on by Nimgimli

I’m tired today. It’s my own fault, really. I was up too late playing video games (again). Will I never learn?

The only reason this is remotely interesting is because I was playing Guild Wars, a game that came out in 2005. A game that I’ve dutifully purchased every expansion for, yet never really played. I’ve tried to get into Guild Wars over and over again since it launched but it’s never ‘stuck’ with me.

Then this weekend I saw Scopique was playing it and that just sort of put it in my head again. I got to thinking about Guild Wars 2 and that mechanic where accomplishments you achieve in Guild Wars 1 will unlock stuff in Guild Wars 2. So I decided to give it another go.

Before I dove back in, I re-read Rubi Bayer’s excellent piece, Stop telling me how to get to 50 points when I only have 3 over at Massively. I also spent a lot of time using the Wiki to answer questions that came up, and browsed a bunch of Rubi’s other “Flameseeker Chronicles” to stuff my brain full of GW info.

I think every game that’s been on the market for a while needs a Rubi Bayer.

One of the things I learned was that I had a Fire Imp ready to be claimed, thanks to my purchase of one of the expansions. That little dude, while kind of a pain in the arse at times (he attacks any and everything he sees) really made my “party” of me and Koss (the first Hero you get in the Factions Nightfall [thanks for the correction, folks!] campaign) a lot more viable. And a lot more fun. That last time I tried Guild Wars my level 6 ass was being handed to me over and over. The Imp made it better.

Pretty soon I added a Monk henchman to keep me healed up, and I started to read quest texts more carefully, taking note of where they started and mentally assigning them a ‘level’ that way. I started doing a lot better, though I’m still probably spending skill points in dumb ways. But I feel like I’m getting a feel for the game. I got my dude from level 6 to level 10 which (get ready to laugh) is the highest level I’ve reading in Guild Wars.

Everyone has already at least tried Guild Wars, so I won’t go on about it much. But I just found it interesting that, 6 years after my initial purchase, and probably after a dozen false starts over those years, I’m finally enjoying the game.

PS Oh, one question for people who enjoy the game. Is the $10 (iirc) “Optional Missions” pack worth buying? And do I need it now or should I wait until I hit 20?

Vindictus!

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I don’t even know myself anymore. First I got lured into Champions Online, and now I’ve been playing Vindictus. Once again, I blame Eric. Thank god that kid isn’t a drug dealer or I’d be a wreck. Not only does he have me back playing MMOs, but he has me *gasp* using voice chat and yakking away.

Anyway, if you’ve somehow missed it, Vindictus is an action-MO-RPG. No, I didn’t leave off an “M” by mistake..it isn’t massive. Well, the towns where you shop and craft are massive, but when you’re ready to actually play the game, it’s 4-man instances, similar to how Guild Wars handles it.

So, things I like about Vindictus:

  • It has a nice JRPG vibe to it, and I like JRPGs. There’s a sense that there’s a story here, though I’m too low level to have seen most of it.
  • It’s very respectful of your time. You hang out in a town, then teleport to a “Battle Quest” where you’ll fight. It takes 10-20 minutes to go through one of these, then you’re back in town. How fast you go through is a function of how much scrounging you want to do (you can break containers to get gold and items if you like) and how many people are in your party.
  • It’s fast paced. The actual combat is arcade-style rather than triggered skills and cool downs. Combo attacks, active dodging, stuff like that. A nice change from the more sedate pace of most MMORPGs I play.
  • It’s free. You can spend real money but so far I’m not really sure when I’ll get around to doing it. When I do, it’ll probably be for some vanity item rather than on something I need in order to progress.

The first time I played I was asked if I wanted to summon a mentor, or something like that. I did so, and was surprised that an actual player had teleported into my instance. And he was personable and helpful. Most of the time since I’ve been playing solo, but the few times I’ve jumped into other people’s missions I’ve been pleasantly surprised by the community. At worst, people have been silent.

The devs did a good job on removing drama from playing. If you see an item, grab it. Everyone else can grab it too. There’s no worry about loot ninjas or anything along those lines. Maybe I’ve just been lucky but so far Vindictus is dangerously close to turning me into a PUGger.

Last night Eric and I ran through 4 (I think) missions over the course of a couple of hours. Sometimes just him and I, once with a friend of his and once with a couple of strangers. It was all fun, and the game has the monster-pinata thing going on. You kill a boss mob and hope to get something good. If you don’t…well, just re-run the mission and try again!

I dunno if I’ll be playing this for months, but hey, it’s free! No commitment..just fun. Nothing wrong with that!

Atari’s Customer Service

Posted on by Nimgimli

I’m the first one to bitch and moan at bad customer service, so it’s only fair to also draw attention to good customer service.

Last night playing CO I noted I had 3000+ points to spend in the cash shop. Woot!

Today I was over in STO land, and they were offering a deal on Atari Tokens. I wanted to buy some ST:TOS gizmos so I figured I’d spent some money. I ordered 2000 Atari Tokens.

I jumped into STO and it said I had 3300 tokens. Hmm. I checked paypal to be sure the transaction went through. It had. So I hit customer support. I was going to Open a Ticket when a “Live Chat” box popped up. I decided to try it, and a few seconds later I was IM’ing with Mike G.

One we got through the basics of me proving it was my account we were talking about, we started debugging the problem. He said he could see 2000 tokens being deposited in my account. I asked him why I was seeing the same 3000+ I’d seen last night. We went down the list of obvious things. Blowing away cache, trying a different browser, checking in game. Finally I asked him if they could credit me with 1 token just to see if my balance changed, and he left for a bit to see if that was a possibility.

When he came back I asked if he could see a running balance. He couldn’t, but he could see I’d gotten comped 400 CO points on the 28th and 2000 Atari Tokens today. The way he phrased that gave me pause. I logged into Champions Online and it said I had 5000+ points. Eureka!

It turns out that the free points I get from being a Lifetime Subscriber to CO aren’t usable in Star Trek Online. They’re CO points, not Atari Tokens. I apologized to Mike G for wasting his time; I’d never mentioned my previous balance was all freebie points from another game. He remained patient and helpful through the entire process and was very gracious in the face of my being a bit of a bonehead.

So once again, PBCAK (problem between chair and keyboard) but kudos to Mike G for working the problem (I talked to him for about 40 minutes before I realized my error) and never giving up!

A dip into Champions Online: Free For All

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Last night my buddy Eric (who you may know as BlamefulGecko) dragged me out of my self-imposed MMO exile and into Champions Online.

This isn’t the first time I played CO; I played at launch and even have a Lifetime Membership. But as with so many other MMOs I eventually lost interest and moved on to something else. According to the character select screen, it’d been 169 days since I last played my characters and if I recall correctly that was a 1 time log in during a welcome back week or something. Really it’s been since a few months after launch since I seriously played. (I still have my “Hall of Champions” listed over to the right, with some origin stories.)

Eric wanted to show me the new Episodes that Cryptic has been adding (similar to what they’ve done with Star Trek Online) so we did the first one. I probably didn’t get as much out of it as I should have, since I was feeling really clumsy and focused more on how to play than what was going on, but Eric did a great job of narrating the storyline as we played. It was a ton of fun!

Afterwards, Eric put on a fashion show of sorts, showing me his different characters and all the crazy-awesome costumes he’s created for them, including a lot of splashy bits that he’s either earned through playing or bought at the C-Store.

I found myself trying to remember why I’d stopped playing; I really enjoyed my visit to this comic book world. I might have to roll a new character to take through the tutorials and get my bearings that way, though. I’ve got unused points to spend, bags full of junk that I have no idea what to do with, and I was halfway through our play session before I remembered some powers work for as long as you hold down a key (and Eric had to remind me that you could ‘charge’ your travel power).

Everything old is new again, I guess. Thanks Eric!