Hello my name is…
It’s hard for some gamers to remember a time when every shred of information about a video game and all of its secrets wasn’t easily available online. I’m kind of an old guy though, having been given an Atari 2600 right around the time they were new, in 1978, so I remember when information about a game was as precious as gold.
My brothers and I spent a ton of time with our Nintendo Entertainment System and even though we kept all of our game cartridges (ha!) in more or less good condition, the boxes they came and any instruction booklets were generally lost within minutes. Because of that, unless there were names given in text on the screen while playing the game, we forget or never even knew the names of just about every character in every game we ever played.
So we did what lots of kids do and made them up.
“Metroid” won the lion’s share of made-up names, but here are five of my favorites from those long ago years of gaming fun.
5. “Mac Gargan”
Years later I discovered that this guy, from the probably totally forgotten game “Trojan,” was really named Armadillon. Which I guess makes sense in retrospect because he curled up in a ball and rolled around the room trying to kill you. But we thought he looked a lot like the Spider-Man villain Scorpion, whose real name was Mac Gargan, which was much cooler AND much dumber sounding than Scorpion. So that’s what we called him. A lot, actually, since Armadillon was a pain in the ass to beat.
4. “Creampuff”
I actually don’t know precisely why we came up with this name for the boss Eruga from the first “Rygar.” For some reason, the upside-down cone shaped body and creamy white heads made us think of sweet treats. I think this boss’s name was actually on screen at some point in the game, but that didn’t matter, we called him Creampuff anyway. In a related note, we had a friend who constantly called him “The Hideous Eruga Monster” which never made much sense either.
3. “Pinguins”
No one ever knew what ANYTHING in “Kid Icarus” was called, other than the Eggplant Wizards and Medusa, so we made up all sorts of names. I think these things are actually supposed to be snakes, or winged snakes, or something, but we thought they looked like penguins and we pronounced it the way our grandmother did, which was “PINguins.” But man, “Kid Icarus” really ruled!
2. “Devil Dinosaur”
Kind of obvious, I know, but that’s what we called this tyrannosaurus boss from “Karnov,” again because of the Marvel Comics character of the same name. What? You didn’t know Marvel had a comic in the 1970s about a giant red dinosaur and his hairy little friend Moon Boy?
However, this one is notable for another reason. I am the oldest of my brothers, and my middle brother, who was quite a decent gamer despite his young years, sometimes had problems remembering longer titles and names. “Karnov” was subtitled “Karnov, the Fire Breathing Russian” or something like that. It must have appeared on the title screen or in the one glimpse we got of the instruction book or something. Only my brother could never remember that, or even the name Karnov, so he constantly called this game “Conan the Russian Eater.” Awesomeness.
1. “Sand Ass”
Nowadays, I know the names of just about everything in every game I play. And even though I made up all sorts of names for these classic NES games as a kid, today I call them by their real names. Armadillon. Eruga. You get it.
But this one here, even today, I still call by the name Sand Ass. I am speaking of the Yellow Devil from the very first “Mega Man.” Why Sand Ass? Because of the way he would stream like sand across the screen, from right to left, over and over and over again, killing you every time while you were fighting him. And why, today, is he still Sand Ass? Because I fought this thing, honestly, about 8 million times as a kid. And beat him maybe three or four times. So I have had A LOT of time think about old Sand Ass here. And he will forever be Sand Ass to me.
- Matt
Good Game Get! Grappling Hook
Any gamer that has spent some time with Nintendo’s fabled “Metroid” franchise will be quite familiar with the illustrious grappling hook. SpeedRun Games has taken the concept of first-person puzzle-solving using this device in some intriguing new directions with their new game “Grappling Hook.”
A quick and easy purchase via download, currently available only for PC users but with Mac and Linux versions promised for the near future, “Grappling Hook” is a bit of a rarity in that it is an action-packed first person puzzler, combining elements of platforming, shooting, and exploration in a slick decidedly science fiction-heavy arena. The graphics are clean, attractive and exceptionally well done, and after a short introductory “message” from the supposed creators of the strange puzzle arena, the feeling of being imprisoned in some strange other-dimensional space fortress seems very real. The presence of a subtle and nearly ambient but well-executed electronic soundtrack certainly adds to the experience.
“Grappling Hook” rather gently ushers the new player into an escalating series of challenges with a few simple challenges and check points designed to convey all of the necessary information on how to move, jump, explore, find, and most importantly, escape. These tutorials are a necessary evil in most games, especially those that come without the benefit of a print booklet, but the way these tutorials are integrated into the environment is often tricky. The artificial nature of the “Grappling Hook” world, a series of puzzle arenas in outer space, lends itself well to the conceit of being provided hints and guidance from an invisible technological benefactor, but the execution is another matter and unfortunately the simple floating exclamation marks that the player moves through to trigger, and the basic, almost pop-up windows of text did seem a bit rushed. Occasionally, the actual text itself was strangely hard to understand, such as the line “Stop hooking in flight and fly far” which actually means to release the grappling hook beam while you are being pulled and to let your momentum carry you farther. While this may seem a small point to the casual player, the attention to even these smallest of details can do a great deal to enhance the overall gaming experience.
Aesthetics aside, the vast majority of the puzzle environments are incredibly well done and the challenges ramp up to an almost fiendishly difficult level relatively quickly. Intuitive clues and game mechanics allow even the most novice player to quickly grasp the nature of the goal (escape!) and how to do this. Combining simple keyboard commands that any computer gamer knows well – arrows to move, spacebar to jump, etc. – the player is soon moving through the maze with ease. Looking around is accomplished rather seamlessly through the motion of the mouse, although adapting to using the spacebar and 4 arrow keys with the left hand and a mouse with the right can take some getting used to. This became especially difficult during the platform jumping sequences, requiring me to actually switch hands or leave the mouse and use the keyboard with both. While I was desperately wishing for some better alternative to looking and moving, I’m really not sure what SpeedRun could have done differently here for computer users, most of whom do not have the luxury of playing with a controller or joystick. While movement, jumping, and looking got easier with practice, I was left wondering whetherSpeedRun had tried to fit too much into the control scheme and whether the learning curve might put off some gamers with less time to devote to simply learning how to get through the game areas.
For those with the time and patience to master the control scheme, “Grappling Hook” offers a series of 22 puzzles full of cold silver metal walls, electrified grids, moving blocks, glowing orange bits of code that must be found and “assembled” to activate the escape teleporter, bright green grappling hook targets, towering shafts, dizzying vistas, dazzling starscapes, and vertigo-inducing spaces. It is easy, and wonderfully so, to become almost completely disoriented at times within the game, and this only adds to the maddeningly difficult puzzles the player must try to navigate through. “Grappling Hook” is definitely not a game for the easily discouraged gamer, but like the best of challenges, once the player finally figures out how to work their way through some particularly gnarly sequence of disappearing platforms, electric floors, and cunningly spaced grappling hook targets, the thrill is its own reward.
Perhaps the only real downside to the game is how challenging some of the puzzles can be. A few of the platform jumps require almost impossible timing, and given the nature of the player’s movement – by pressing the arrows on the keyboard – it can be quite frustrating to keep falling from a ledge the player means to jump from instead. Again, the use of a joystick or controller would have mitigated this somewhat, but in a game titled “Grappling Hook,” perhaps there should have been more emphasis on that kind of movement over the kind of precision jumping usually reserved for strict platformers.
All told, “Grappling Hook” is a nicely done, beautiful, and incredibly difficult puzzler that will definitely sate the cravings of the hardcore gaming crowd but may prove a bit too frustrating for the less active gamer. The few rough edges are easily overlooked by those hungry for new challenges and with a little more time and polish, I expect even bigger and better things from future SpeedRun Games releases.
- Matt
Why We Just Might Be On To Something Here At GGG!
Before you read this piece, go here and read that one by Dave McCarthy. It’s important. I’ll wait.
Back? Good. That was a pretty great piece, wasn’t it? He makes an awful lot of really good points, some of which I will repeat here.
Kyle was ragging on Joystiq a bit ago and after looking at that site I couldn’t agree more. There’s an awful lot of tremendously exciting stuff going on the world of games, and so much of what’s truly new, innovative, unique, and exciting is completely ignored by what passes for “game journalism” these days. Sadly, a lot of this kind of writing is driven by that double-edged sword so common on web sites…chasing hits and advertising revenue.
For sites like Joystiq and I suppose many others, it’s important to attract as many hits as possible so that the site can earn more and more advertising revenue and, theoretically, develop into a better and better site. But the problem, the really huge problem, is that when you’re just chasing site hits, you’re catering to the lowest common denominator of what the average internet surfer really wants. And, as McCarthy fearlessly put it in his piece, “…most people are interested in bad things.”
So in order to generate as many hits as possible, earn as much advertising revenue as possible, and become the “best” or the “biggest” game site or blog out there, you basically have to fill your site with content about “bad things.”
Like what, you ask? Well, do a Google search for articles about any of the Halo games. Or Call Of Duty. Or God Of War. Or Gears Of War. Fuck, even those two titles are almost identical. Anyway, after you do that, then do some Google searches for games like PixelJunk: Monsters. Or Everyday Shooter. Or The Majesty Of Color. Or I Made This, You Play This, We Are Enemies. The numbers will be much much much smaller.
I know, it’s dangerous to equate popularity with quality one way or the other. Just because a game sells a lot of copies doesn’t mean it’s good. Nor does that mean that it’s bad. But again, McCarthy puts it best when he writes “I don’t think I’ve ever read anything interesting about God of War, or the Halo sequels, and what has Resistance ever contributed to the sum of humanity? I would rather read about why a bad game is interesting than another sixteen-page mind-numbing epic about how many different ways you can shoot someone in one of these bland, by-the-numbers borefests.” And THAT is what makes games like Halo or Gears Of War or Call Of Duty so excruciatingly bad. They are clumsy, indistinguishable, “by-the-numbers borefests” with little to offer beyond new weapons and minor enhancements on the type of nauseatingly dull gameplay that’s been done to death for years now. And yet…and yet…that is what generates hits.
We here at GGG might not get the most hits or the most attention and we don’t get any advertising revenue at all (thank God) but that keeps us honest. It keeps us writing about the kinds of games and art and stuff that we really truly like and enjoy. It’s a small slice of honesty and reality in an internet landscape dominated more and more by slickness, ulterior motives, astroturfing, marketing, branding, co-opting, hipsterism, hits and dollars but here we are and there are lots and lots and LOTS of other little gems out there too. You just have to know where to look. Although if you’re reading this post you probably already know that, and both Kyle and I are really thankful you’re here!
- Matt
FINAL FANTASY Episode 12: A New Hope
Okay, I’ve seen this done in bits and pieces in other articles online, but I’ve never really read a point by point comparison. So I’m doing my own. Here goes…
Why “Final Fantasy 12” is “Star Wars Episode 4: A New Hope.”
—Luke Skywalker is a naïve, parentless young farm boy living on a desert planet at the very fringes of a corrupt empire and he will gradually be transformed into a hero by taking part in adventures beyond his wildest imaginings. He is blond, good natured, and wants more than anything to be a daring pilot.
—Vaan is a naïve, parentless young city dweller living in a desert kingdom at the very fringes of a corrupt empire and he will gradually be transformed into a hero by taking part in adventures beyond his wildest imaginings. He is blond, good natured, and wants more than anything to be a daring pilot.
—The far-flung desert planet Tattooine, seemingly of little importance, will be the epicenter of events which will eventually break the power of the evil empire for good.
—The far-flung desert kingdom Dalmasca, seemingly of little importance, will be the epicenter of events which will eventually break the power of the evil empire for good.
—Han Solo is a roguish, devil-may-care space pilot and occasional pirate with a shady past, a criminal reputation, and a willingness to take on just about any job as long as the pay is right.
—Balthier is a roguish, devil-may-care sky pilot and occasional pirate with a shady past, a criminal reputation, and a willingness to take on just about any job as long as the pay is right.
—Han Solo prefers to stay well outside of the boundaries of the current war between the Rebel Alliance and the Empire, exploiting the lawlessness this creates for his own profit. Eventually, because of Luke Skywalker and Ben Kenobi, he is drawn into rescuing Princess Leia and becoming a sworn enemy of the Empire.
—Balthier prefers to stay well outside of the boundaries of the current war between the Dalmascan Liberation Army and the Archadian Empire, exploiting the lawlessness this creates for his own profit. Eventually, because of Vaan and Basch, he is drawn into rescuing Princess Ashe and becoming a sworn enemy of the Archadian Empire.
—Luke, Han, Chewbacca and Ben Kenobi take part in a daring raid on the Empire’s space fortress The Death Star to rescue Princess Leia.
—Vaan, Balthier, Fran and Basch take part in a daring raid on the Archadian Empire’s sky fortress The Leviathan to rescue Princess Ashe.
—Darth Vader, one of the main villains and a leader of the Empire, is a towering figure clad in a frightening armored suit, a voice-transforming helmet, and wielding almost supernatural powers. Upon his transformation, he discarded his old name of Anakin Skywalker and adopted the new name Darth Vader.
—The Judges, the main villains and leaders of the Archadian Empire, are towering figures clad in frightening armor, voice-transforming helmets, and wielding incredible magical powers. Upon their transformation, they discard their old names (such as Noah fon Ronsenburg) and adopt new names (such as Judge Gabranth).
—Lando Calrissian is an old friend of Han Solo’s and currently the administrator of Bespin’s Cloud City. He offers Han, Luke and friends sanctuary above Cloud City, only to later betray them. He explains that he betrayed them in order to make a deal with the Empire to ensure the safety of Cloud City.
—Vossler is an old friend of Basch’s and currently a part of the Dalmascan Liberation Army. He offers to join Vaan, Balthier, Fran and Basch in rescuing the Princess Ashe from the sky ship Leviathan only to betray them. He explains that he betrayed them in order to make a deal with the Archadian Empire to ensure sovereignty for the Kingdom of Dalmasca.
—Han Solo has a bounty on his head and is being hunted by the green-skinned alien Greedo. Han later shoots and kills Greedo in a bar on the desert planet Tattooine.
—Balthier has a bounty on his head and is being hunted by the green-skinned humanoid Ba’Gamnan. Balthier, Fran and Vaan later defeat Ba’Gamnan in the Nam-Yensa Sandsea desert.
—Han Solo has, as his co-pilot and most loyal friend, a tall furry humanoid Wookiee named Chewbacca. Their relationship goes back many years, began under undisclosed circumstances, and is far deeper and more complex than is ever explained in the film.
—Balthier has, as his co-pilot and most loyal friend, a tall furry humanoid Viera named Fran. Their relationship goes back many years, began under undisclosed circumstances, and is far deeper and more complex than is ever explained in the game.
—In order to force the Rebel Alliance into surrendering, the Empire uses their space fortress Death Star, capable of destroying an entire planet, into position near the moons of Yavin, the home of the Rebel Alliance base.
—In order to force the Dalmascan Liberation Army into surrendering, the Archadian Empire uses their sky fortress Leviathan, capable of destroying an entire city, into position near Rabanastre, the capital of Dalmasca and one of the homes of the Dalmascan Liberation Army.
—Obi-Wan Kenobi, a hero of the Galactic Republic and thought to have been killed by the Empire during their conquest of the galaxy mysteriously reappears, alive, on a desert planet.
—Basch fon Ronsenburg, a hero of Dalmasca and thought to have been killed by the Archadian Empire during their conquest of the world mysteriously reappears, alive, in a desert prison.
—Obi-Wan Kenobi becomes a sort of father figure to Luke, training him in the ways of The Force and showing him how to be a hero.
—Basch fon Ronsenburg becomes a sort of father figure to Vaan, training him in combat and showing him how to be a hero.
—In the deserts that cover Tattooine live all sorts of strange races including the Jawas, strange little cloaked beings with glowing eyes who communicate in a series of clicks and whistles and whose ways are entirely alien to the humans living on the planet.
—In the Nam-Yensa and the Ogir-Yensa Sandseas, the deserts that surround Rabanastre, live all sorts of strange races including the Urutan-Yensa, strange little cloaked beings with glowing eyes who communicate in a series of clicks and whistles and whose ways are entirely alien to the humans living on the planet.
—Han Solo is the owner and pilot of a remarkably fast and powerful little spaceship called The Millennium Falcon, his pride and joy.
—Balthier is the owner and pilot of a remarkably fast and powerful little airship called The Strahl, his pride and joy.
—In the Star Wars universe, Chancellor Palpatine shrewdly manipulates the officers of the Galactic Republic, eventually seizing power through murder, dissolving the Senate and proclaiming himself Emperor of a new galactic Empire. He believes power comes from force, threats and intimidations and sets out on a path to crush any rebellions and conquer more worlds.
—In Final Fantasy 12, Vayne Carudas Solidor shrewdly manipulates his father Lord Gramis and the officers of the Empire of Archadia, eventually seizing power through murder, dissolving the Senate and proclaiming himself Emperor of a new Archadian Empire. He believes power comes from force, threats and intimidations and sets out on a path to crush any rebellions and conquer more kingdoms.
—Darth Vader is ultimately defeated by a close family member, his son Luke Skywalker, who forgives him for his crimes and redeems him.
—Judge Gabranth is ultimately defeated by a close family member, his twin brother Basch fon Ronsenburg, who forgives him for his crimes and redeems him.
- Matt
Good Game Get! Everyday Shooter
Playstation Network, PS3, and PSP. Queasy Games, 2008.
The term “game-as-design” or some variation of that is thrown around an awful lot these days. It is most often deployed by writers and gamers who really have no clear idea how to articulately describe a game which falls even slightly outside the established bounds of gaming norms.
I’m currently paying Jonathan Mak’s “Everyday Shooter” and enjoying it a great deal. I know, I’m pretty late to the party since this thing is around 2 years old, but what can I say. Since I’ve been so into the game, I did some digging online to see if I could learn more about it, any sequels, or Mak himself. A lot of what I found made me mad, although it had nothing to do with the game or Mak.
Basically little more than a top-down multidirectional shooter with unusually beautiful and unconventional graphics, “Everyday Shooter” has been called everything from art to design to music, but seldom simply a game. I disagree with all of that, and I think that to continually try to position “Everyday Shooter” as something MORE than a great videogame does a disservice to Mak and his skills. Even Kyle, who wrote about the game previously, stated that it was BOTH a great game and a great album.
Most videogames, when you boil them down, follow a strikingly similar pattern. The player controls something on a screen and is given an objective. The player, through observation, trial, error, failure, and success, learns the internal rules of the “world” of the game, achieves the objective, and is rewarded. Nearly every single game I can think of, with the possible exception of “Noby Noby Boy” (now THAT is a piece of art far more than a game) follows this formula.
And so does “Everyday Shooter.” The player controls a pixel-shaped thing which shoots, they learn how to navigate the various stages, which things to shoot, which to collect, how to chain explosions, and how to survive. There are even bosses to fight. At the end of each stage the player is awarded with continued play and points so they can unlock other features. Absolutely no different than “Gran Turismo” or “Final Fantasy” or “Super Mario” or “House of the Dead” deep down.
What really seems to throw people is the graphics. Since the thing you’re controlling is just a little pixel and the things you’re shooting are just shapes and colors and boxes people are confusing abstract imagery with abstract game play. It’s really disappointing that so many years of similar games have really conditioned us as gamers to be completely confused by anything that looks different.
In a way, all the hoopla about “Everyday Shooter” reminds me of how “The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker” was absolutely BLASTED by the critics, well before the game was even out, because it looked too cartoony and unrealistic. “Give us 3-D realism!” they commanded, deciding that the game sucked before they had even played it. And of course many of them had to eat their words when the game arrived, sold fantastically, and was of course a delightful and beautiful adventure to play.
So again, while “Everyday Shooter” is an absolutely fantastic game, wonderful to play and play again, it is most definitely not a “piece of design work” or simply “art” (although art is a huge part of it). Nor is it an “abstract game” or a multimedia project. It’s just a game. A great one, but just a game.
- Matt
NEWER IS NOT ALWAYS BETTER: Medievil
Often, I can’t seem to think about, or write about, videogames without getting personal. It’s like Kyle mentioned in his previous post about Aerith dying in “Final Fantasy VII.” If it happened at the same moment that your parents were knocking on your bedroom door and asking if you wanted Papa John’s pizza, it doesn’t have the same impact that it does if it happened while you were alone in the dark and completely absorbed in hours of game play. So in that sense, I suppose that my feelings about the PlayStation 1 game “Medievil” are inextricably connected with how I was feeling during the time I played.
Even so, aesthetics are aesthetics and sometimes even the best game designers mess things up. And they really did when they redesigned “Medievil” as “Medievil Resurrection” for the PSP.
Generally, newer is better and portable is even better than that. Who among us has not been thrilled with the idea of walking around with a complete PS1 or Nintendo 64 in their pocket in the form of a PSP or a DS? If you said you’re not thrilled, you’re lying.
And so it was with great anticipation that I purchased the PSP game “Medievil Resurrection.” See, “Medievil” is one of my favorite games. It’s an overlooked gem and a real delight from the early days of the PlayStation 1, when videogames were not the multimedia juggernaut that they are today and you could find some pretty weird stuff on the shelves. When I bought “Medievil Resurrection,” I only did so because I had long since gotten rid of my PS1 and figured that playing “Resurrection” on the PSP was going to be only chance I had to enjoy the game ever again. I had read the reviews and they all seemed positive, indicating that “Resurrection” was a polished up version of the original.
Wow. Talk about crushing disappointment. I mean, sure, the graphics were smoother and more attractive than they were on the PS1 as you can see in this new screenshot…
…compared to the same scene from the old.
So in that sense, I was pleased. But that’s where it stopped. See, in the original “Medievil,” you play as Sir Dan Fortesque, a long-dead skeletal knight who was revered as the Hero of Gallowmere…in spite of the fact that all of his stories of heroism were pure fantasy and, in the back story of the game, he died within seconds of leading the first charge against the game’s arch-nemesis the Sorcerer Zarok.
Dan is a charming bumbler. He’s fairly lousy at what he does, he galumphs all around the screen like a donkey with broken knees, he swings his sword about as accurately as a department store mannequin, and all of the other characters in the game make fun of him mercilessly. You really start to feel for this miserable bag of bones, and as you play through the game, you start rooting for him to prove himself and be the hero he thinks he is.
Dan doesn’t get much help in the first game. He spends a lot of time getting his ass kicked and getting ripped on, and when he does get help, those who give it do so pretty grudgingly. The whole game creates this kind of “me against the world” mentality, in a very funny way that is instantly addicting.
To top it all off, Dan, lacking a lower jaw has a HILARIOUS voice. Most of the time he sounds like a drunken bum mumbling into a paper bag. If it weren’t for the subtitles, you’d have no clue what he was saying.
These two concepts, constituting the emotional underpinning of the game and some of the best design work, are completely lost in the new “Medievil Resurrection.” In that game, Dan is no longer alone. Instead he is being guided by some kind of weird wormy genie named Al-Zalam that lives in his empty eye socket. Why was this character needed? He has an incredibly grating, marginally racist voice and does nothing but whine for most of the game, only occasionally giving you any real help. Utterly unnecessary, and it all makes Dan seem more like a piece of moving equipment than a character.
And speaking of voices, Dan’s is utterly different in this game. Instead of sounding hilariously unintelligible, Dan now sounds kind of like Kenny (from South Park) on helium. Or, annoyingly unintelligible.
They also added in a few new levels and made some cosmetic changes to the look of the game, but they are really no better or worse, just different. I was so disappointed with “Medievil Resurrection that I didn’t even finish and instead sold it back. I thought I would never be able to enjoy those classic adventures of Sir Dan Fortesque again until I discovered that through the miracle of the PlayStation Network, the original “Medievil” was available for download to the PS3. I did just that, played through the entire game, and loved every single second.
If you have ever been curious about this game, do yourself a favor. Avoid “Resurrection” like the plague and head straight for the original. It’s a blast.
- Matt
Lego Final Fantasy
While looking for examples of asymmetrical character design in videogames, I came across what might be the most awesome Final Fantasy boss ever…Lego Safer Sephiroth from Final Fantasy VII. If the whole game looked like this, I would NEVER stop playing.
- Matt
gameplay vs. narrative
There’s been a lot of debate recently on quite a few blogs about the perceived contradiction between story and game play in videogames. In other words, to borrow a summation from the Spectre Collie blog, “If you’re putting narrative in front of the game play, you’re no longer making a game. You’re making a movie.”
That same entry goes on to look at things in a much more balanced way, such as considering how the best gaming experiences can balance narrative AND game play without either one suffering. Still, this is a fascinating topic and I think that whatever conclusions are drawn depend far more on the gamer than they do on the game.
For example, Square’s Final Fantasy series has been putting narrative at the forefront of their games to a greater degree with every installment. “Final Fantasy IX,” for the PlayStation 1, was the last game that really even allowed for any kind of nonlinear game play or traveling the world freely in an airship. With the next installment, “Final Fantasy X,” the game became an almost completely linear adventure with very little opportunity for the player to make choices that would impact the course of the game. I still enjoyed “Final Fantasy X” a great deal, but interestingly enough my reaction is based entirely on the narrative, or cinematic aspects of the game and not at all based on game play. Other than blitzball. Which I LOVED.
Square took this a step further with “Final Fantasy XII” allowing the player to control only one single character in the party and having the other party members automatically fight, heal, retreat or whatever based on pre-decided actions that the player pretty much programmed into them. I have real mixed feelings about “Final Fantasy XII,” and many of them are based on the fact that at certain points I could quite literally put the controller down and let the game play itself while I watched. Just like a movie.
The flip side of the coin is, of course, game play. I don’t remember a damn thing about the story, if there even was one, from the first “Devil May Cry” but I do remember having a blast shooting everything in sight. One blogger mentioned that in some games, the presence of a story actually makes the player feel even stupider, citing “Gears of War” as an example. In other words, don’t saddle your first person alien shooter with a bunch of stupid plot points to try and explain and justify what’s going on. Just give the player a huge gun, a goal, and let ‘er rip. I can see the logic in there.
Additionally, there is the concept of just what a game really means. Is there a narrative to volleyball or poker or Tetris? No, not at all. It would be stupid if there were. And yet millions of people play these games every day. Take it a step further. Is there a narrative to “Super Smash Bros.”* or “Mario Kart” or F-Zero?” No, not that I’m aware. Yet again, millions of gamers play, and enjoy, these games daily.
Perhaps this explains the appeal of first person shooters like “Doom” and “Quake.” I’ve never had any interest in playing those games at all. I figured they would be boring, especially since I am not especially good at that kind of thing and I really do prefer games with some kind of plot and narrative structure. Yet first person shooters are more popular than ever before, and probably billions of people have played “Doom.”
Ultimately, it just depends on what kind of gamer is playing the game. Some people want pure game play mechanics, no plot necessary. Some people want tons of narrative, regardless of game play. Most want both. Nintendo, in particular, does a fantastic job of blending narrative with challenging and innovative game play. Take a look at just about any Zelda, Super Mario, Metroid or Pikmin game for numerous examples.
- Matt
* Super Smash Bros. Brawl actually has a story mode with a wacky nonsensical narrative about the characters teaming up to fight a greater evil. The cutscenes are fun to watch, but it really is an incredibly weak story and the real magic stll lies in the meat of the game, the multiplayer gameplay.
- Kyle