I picked up Guitar Hero 3 despite my initial disappointment with the demo. I'm playing through on Hard, so it's not quite so annoying, and the sequencing hasn't seemed inspired but it seems decent. It's still a fun game, and it generally has a good tracklist, though I think some of the choices are absolutely terrible. However, there are some absolutely fantastic guitar hero songs here (Knights of Cydonia, One).
The boss battles are a terrible idea, however. The first two bosses are so easy as to not even be an issue and the last boss is just insanely ridiculous. The song is already hard, and then they keep throwing attacks at you, during the time when you can charge up for your attacks, so you can rarely even acquire attacks to fight back with. Really annoying. I don't mind a tough game, but I hate when they rondo it up.
Anyway, aside from the boss battles, the game is good.
Sunday, October 28, 2007
Sunday, October 21, 2007
Battle of the Music Games
So, as any gamer worth his or her salt knows, this holiday, there is a battle upcoming of sorts. Between Guitar Hero 3, with Neversoft continuing the franchise started by Harmonix Music Systems, and Harmonix moving on to Rock Band, the spiritual successor to guitar hero, featuring drums and vocals.
Neversoft has previously announced several seemingly minor changes to the Guitar Hero formula, such as boss battles, battle mode, and a story with cutscenes. At first blush, these seem like minor changes, and possibly even welcome ones. And if that were all Neversoft had done to the Guitar Hero franchise, there probably wouldn't be a post here right now.
Enter Guitar Hero 3 demo.
Holy.
Fucking.
Shit.
How the fuck do you fuck up Guitar Hero? Neversoft knows. Terrible sequencing.
I played a few songs on hard... and it seemed... OK. Then I cringed at the tutorial, and brought it into work, and people at work played horrible, shitty battle mode and hated it. Then I played some songs on expert against my co-workers (face off, of course). Everyone agreed it was kind of weak, people didn't like the sequencing much, but I couldn't believe that would have such a huge impact.
I then took the game home and played it for a while. I was starting to think I was getting over the music game genre. I was almost ready to give up on Rock Band. I thought I was just through with the whole idea. I played portal for a while, then did some other stuff.
Then I sat down at my X box 360 and put in Guitar Hero 2.
Booted up Bark at the Moon on expert.
Yes. This was still fantastic.
Sweet Child O Mine? Fucking incredible experience.
Search and Destroy? Still fun as hell.
I put guitar hero 3 back in. Rock You Like a Hurricane? Decent, had some fun with it for sure.
Evenflow?
Holy shit it is a fucking horrible mess. I can't believe how bad it is. Nearly unplayable.
Basically what I'm saying is..... Fuck you Neversoft. Fuck you for ruining one of the best video game franchises to come along in the past decade.
Meanwhile, I'm going to rockband.com looking for info, listening to the tracklist, generally getting excited again, because I'm sure Harmonix won't blow it the way neversoft has.
Neversoft has previously announced several seemingly minor changes to the Guitar Hero formula, such as boss battles, battle mode, and a story with cutscenes. At first blush, these seem like minor changes, and possibly even welcome ones. And if that were all Neversoft had done to the Guitar Hero franchise, there probably wouldn't be a post here right now.
Enter Guitar Hero 3 demo.
Holy.
Fucking.
Shit.
How the fuck do you fuck up Guitar Hero? Neversoft knows. Terrible sequencing.
I played a few songs on hard... and it seemed... OK. Then I cringed at the tutorial, and brought it into work, and people at work played horrible, shitty battle mode and hated it. Then I played some songs on expert against my co-workers (face off, of course). Everyone agreed it was kind of weak, people didn't like the sequencing much, but I couldn't believe that would have such a huge impact.
I then took the game home and played it for a while. I was starting to think I was getting over the music game genre. I was almost ready to give up on Rock Band. I thought I was just through with the whole idea. I played portal for a while, then did some other stuff.
Then I sat down at my X box 360 and put in Guitar Hero 2.
Booted up Bark at the Moon on expert.
Yes. This was still fantastic.
Sweet Child O Mine? Fucking incredible experience.
Search and Destroy? Still fun as hell.
I put guitar hero 3 back in. Rock You Like a Hurricane? Decent, had some fun with it for sure.
Evenflow?
Holy shit it is a fucking horrible mess. I can't believe how bad it is. Nearly unplayable.
Basically what I'm saying is..... Fuck you Neversoft. Fuck you for ruining one of the best video game franchises to come along in the past decade.
Meanwhile, I'm going to rockband.com looking for info, listening to the tracklist, generally getting excited again, because I'm sure Harmonix won't blow it the way neversoft has.
Monday, August 20, 2007
This Console Generation
I've been reading another blog wherein the author is attempting to characterize each of the major console manufacturers and perhaps give some insight into their strategies, with perhaps a small prediction as to the winner. I figured I'd take a stab at roughly the same thing.
* Microsoft
I believe that Microsoft is currently the generation's leader, even if they temporarily lose the hardware market share crown, they're in the catbird seat as far as revenue thanks to the incredible attach rate of the X box 360. They also have by far the strongest lineup of any next gen console, and it will be even stronger by the end of this year. The company itself is a software company modeled on attempting to provide the widest accepted solution for any given problem and to throw resources at a product just enough to beat all competitors in the area. Then resources are thrown at a product only to convince users to upgrade to the next version of the product. Examples of this include Windows and Microsoft Office.
As far as video games, I believe they're simply looking to open up another revenue stream after witnessing Sony's resounding financial success in this market, and obviously they look at the X Box line as a way to break into people's living rooms and sell them the software and media they want to consume (witness X Box live marketplace and the Zune store). That said, they have managed to cleverly buy into some great first party studios in Ensemble and Bungie as well as above average to good studios in Rare and Lionhead. They have clearly made a strong first party commitment and as a games publisher have gotten to the point where they tend to publish only top rated games (Gotham, Forza, Gears of War, Mass Effect[yeah I know I'm tooting my company's horn, but it's got Buzz damnit]). The hardware itself has proven to be a bit flaky, this is not a surprise as Microsoft is clearly a software company first, and software is where they Excel.
As a developer, developing on Microsoft's platforms have consistently been the best experience of all console development, and an incredibly straightforward and easy way to make games. They provide fantastic tools (Pix, Visual Studio, xbperfview), and great support, and they've managed to consistently design easy-to-develop-for hardware, the only gotcha being the multicore nature of the 360.
They've learned a lot from their X box 1 mistakes and the 360 is a much stronger platform for it. Custom designed into a sleek shape that's easily acceptible to all, with a very strong first party lineup, and the best third party support of any "next gen" console, they have pulled off their strategy of coming out of the gate first and establishing a strong lead.
Strong, but certainly not insurmountable.
* Sony
If Microsoft is the leader, Sony is bringing up the rear. As a company, Sony is one of the world's leading consumer electronics manufacturers and they make everything from camcorders to cell phones. With Playstation and Playstation 2, Sony found that video games were a very lucrative market, and became Sony's most profitable division by far. At this point one could speculate that Sony needs video games to survive the way they have in the past, Blu Ray could also be a potentially torrential revenue stream if it goes their way.
From a games point of view, Sony has, in previous generation managed to be the third party leader as well as having the largest group of first party developers of all the major console manufacturers. They've built strong first and second party brands and own quite a bit of the most valuable "second tier" video game IP ( Ratchet and Clank, Jak and Daxter, God of War). Nothing quite as iconic as Mario or Sonic, but valuable nonetheless. Their first party group has managed to put out quality game after quality game, and I'd argue that they have the best first party of all the major console manufacturers. At least they did during playstation 2, Sucker Punch, Naughty Dog, Sony Santa Monica and Fumito Ueda's team have managed to put out some of the finest games the previous console generation had to offer. (Sly Cooper, Jak and Daxter, Ico, Shadow). Their "second party" has been strong too, with Insomniac. And in previous console generations, their third party connections made their position nearly unassailable, with Square, Konami, and Rockstar all creating exclusive or timed exclusive content for the Playstation 2 console.
This generation has seen a somewhat shocking shift in strategy away from attempting to secure exclusives (even timed ones). Having had rumors of having Assassin's Creed as an exclusive (among other games), only to find out that they were cross platform, was very surprising, given that Sony is also showing somewhat weak first party support with nothing so far coming from Naughty Dog, Sony Santa Monica, Sucker Punch, and only a new IP from Insomniac, the well recieved if not killer app quality "Resistance: Fall of Man". Given this new direction, Sony seems to be facing a very uphill battle. They've got quite a few cards in the deck waiting for the rest of the year, but aside from Ratchet and Clank, none of their major 07 titles feature clearly superior intellectual properties, certainly not proven ones. The beginning of next year should be strong with Metal Gear Solid, and the possibility of Killzone, but it seems like they've managed to miss another Christmas with their strongest lineup. I don't seem them outright failing but I do see them retaining their 3rd place role.
* Nintendo
Nintendo is a game company, they've been a game company for over 100 years and they will always be a game company. This may make people think that they are somehow nobler or better than their competition, Microsoft, and Sony. And I certainly don't begrudge anyone that opinion. That said, they are clearly as bloodthirsty and backstabby as either of their competitiors. They've been convicted of pricefixing, made disparaging comments about their competitors, and just been all around "meanies". That's not to say their competitors haven't done the same or worse, it's just saying that Nintendo for all it's cutesy "niceness" is not always Mr Nice Guy. However, they are first and foremost a game company, so they need this business more than either of their competitors.
This generation they've gone a completely different route, offering up what can only be described as basically last-gen hardware, with a completely innovative and different control scheme. The Wii with it's magic wand of a Wii remote is defining nintendo's offering this generation. The idea behind it being rather than dominating the competition with competitive or superior hardware, ultimately an arms race, Nintendo is instead opting to find completely new groups of consumers, currently not playing games. They're letting Microsoft and Sony go after the GTA and Halo players, and they're basically going after those people's parents, children, and younger siblings. While Nintendo will never admit that they're giving up on those people, indeed, Metroid Prime: Corruption is an example of how they're not. They haven't yet released a truly compelling game for that set of gamers. The console has sold like hotcakes, frequently outselling the X box 360 and ps3, and it seems it would sell even more, if there weren't any hardware shortages, but it's not clear how long this console's legs will be. In my opinion the control scheme is fun in small doses, for a select group of games, but I'm not sure if you'll end up finding a truly deep experience that can differentiate itself from previous games. Having got a Wii at launch, trying a bunch of early titles, and not wanting anything for it in a few months has doused my interest considerably, as has my disinterest in The Legend of Zelda, probably the most hardcore gamer aimed Nintendo title on the console.
The control scheme is interesting and innovative and it does reset the field for newcomers to video gaming, but I'm not sure if the pricepoint isn't too high for non-gamers to want to buy the thing, and while there are very strong looking titles on the horizon (Metroid, Smash Bros, Super Mario Galaxy), none of them seem to be as much a killer app as the one that actually comes with the console, Wii Sports. Mario looks rather complex, and as a first person shooter, Metriod is clearly a gamer's game. It's definitely a strong showing, but with no real competitor for Microsoft and Sony's flagship offerings ( to gamers), it's fairly clear that Nintendo is abandoning the core gamer demographics. The question is whether the non-gamer demographic can pick up the slack and buy games in high enough quantities to make it worthwhile for 3rd parties to develop for the Wii, if not, Nintendo could have the greatest marketshare and the least revenue. Also notable is with the most recent price drop, the X box 360's core system comes within spitting distance of the Wii in North America, and is actually at the same price in the UK.
*Predictions
Honestly, I'm going to cop out and say I don't know. Microsoft certainly seems to be doing everything right, but that doesn't account for the inexplicable band of Sony loyalists who won't let go of the Playstation brand until it's just completely senseless to hold on to it. Sony's high pricepoint can't last, especially without super compelling first party content, not to mention better third party support, that said, 100 million gamers is a strong statement. Nintendo certainly stands a good chance of becoming the generation's highest market share console, but I do still question how much fun I'm going to be having with my Wii in 2 years, where as I think the PS3 and 360 will still manage to be as fun as they are now. I do think Nintendo will continue to completely own the handheld market.
One thing's for sure, so far, with this much competition, the players are definitely winning.
* Microsoft
I believe that Microsoft is currently the generation's leader, even if they temporarily lose the hardware market share crown, they're in the catbird seat as far as revenue thanks to the incredible attach rate of the X box 360. They also have by far the strongest lineup of any next gen console, and it will be even stronger by the end of this year. The company itself is a software company modeled on attempting to provide the widest accepted solution for any given problem and to throw resources at a product just enough to beat all competitors in the area. Then resources are thrown at a product only to convince users to upgrade to the next version of the product. Examples of this include Windows and Microsoft Office.
As far as video games, I believe they're simply looking to open up another revenue stream after witnessing Sony's resounding financial success in this market, and obviously they look at the X Box line as a way to break into people's living rooms and sell them the software and media they want to consume (witness X Box live marketplace and the Zune store). That said, they have managed to cleverly buy into some great first party studios in Ensemble and Bungie as well as above average to good studios in Rare and Lionhead. They have clearly made a strong first party commitment and as a games publisher have gotten to the point where they tend to publish only top rated games (Gotham, Forza, Gears of War, Mass Effect[yeah I know I'm tooting my company's horn, but it's got Buzz damnit]). The hardware itself has proven to be a bit flaky, this is not a surprise as Microsoft is clearly a software company first, and software is where they Excel.
As a developer, developing on Microsoft's platforms have consistently been the best experience of all console development, and an incredibly straightforward and easy way to make games. They provide fantastic tools (Pix, Visual Studio, xbperfview), and great support, and they've managed to consistently design easy-to-develop-for hardware, the only gotcha being the multicore nature of the 360.
They've learned a lot from their X box 1 mistakes and the 360 is a much stronger platform for it. Custom designed into a sleek shape that's easily acceptible to all, with a very strong first party lineup, and the best third party support of any "next gen" console, they have pulled off their strategy of coming out of the gate first and establishing a strong lead.
Strong, but certainly not insurmountable.
* Sony
If Microsoft is the leader, Sony is bringing up the rear. As a company, Sony is one of the world's leading consumer electronics manufacturers and they make everything from camcorders to cell phones. With Playstation and Playstation 2, Sony found that video games were a very lucrative market, and became Sony's most profitable division by far. At this point one could speculate that Sony needs video games to survive the way they have in the past, Blu Ray could also be a potentially torrential revenue stream if it goes their way.
From a games point of view, Sony has, in previous generation managed to be the third party leader as well as having the largest group of first party developers of all the major console manufacturers. They've built strong first and second party brands and own quite a bit of the most valuable "second tier" video game IP ( Ratchet and Clank, Jak and Daxter, God of War). Nothing quite as iconic as Mario or Sonic, but valuable nonetheless. Their first party group has managed to put out quality game after quality game, and I'd argue that they have the best first party of all the major console manufacturers. At least they did during playstation 2, Sucker Punch, Naughty Dog, Sony Santa Monica and Fumito Ueda's team have managed to put out some of the finest games the previous console generation had to offer. (Sly Cooper, Jak and Daxter, Ico, Shadow). Their "second party" has been strong too, with Insomniac. And in previous console generations, their third party connections made their position nearly unassailable, with Square, Konami, and Rockstar all creating exclusive or timed exclusive content for the Playstation 2 console.
This generation has seen a somewhat shocking shift in strategy away from attempting to secure exclusives (even timed ones). Having had rumors of having Assassin's Creed as an exclusive (among other games), only to find out that they were cross platform, was very surprising, given that Sony is also showing somewhat weak first party support with nothing so far coming from Naughty Dog, Sony Santa Monica, Sucker Punch, and only a new IP from Insomniac, the well recieved if not killer app quality "Resistance: Fall of Man". Given this new direction, Sony seems to be facing a very uphill battle. They've got quite a few cards in the deck waiting for the rest of the year, but aside from Ratchet and Clank, none of their major 07 titles feature clearly superior intellectual properties, certainly not proven ones. The beginning of next year should be strong with Metal Gear Solid, and the possibility of Killzone, but it seems like they've managed to miss another Christmas with their strongest lineup. I don't seem them outright failing but I do see them retaining their 3rd place role.
* Nintendo
Nintendo is a game company, they've been a game company for over 100 years and they will always be a game company. This may make people think that they are somehow nobler or better than their competition, Microsoft, and Sony. And I certainly don't begrudge anyone that opinion. That said, they are clearly as bloodthirsty and backstabby as either of their competitiors. They've been convicted of pricefixing, made disparaging comments about their competitors, and just been all around "meanies". That's not to say their competitors haven't done the same or worse, it's just saying that Nintendo for all it's cutesy "niceness" is not always Mr Nice Guy. However, they are first and foremost a game company, so they need this business more than either of their competitors.
This generation they've gone a completely different route, offering up what can only be described as basically last-gen hardware, with a completely innovative and different control scheme. The Wii with it's magic wand of a Wii remote is defining nintendo's offering this generation. The idea behind it being rather than dominating the competition with competitive or superior hardware, ultimately an arms race, Nintendo is instead opting to find completely new groups of consumers, currently not playing games. They're letting Microsoft and Sony go after the GTA and Halo players, and they're basically going after those people's parents, children, and younger siblings. While Nintendo will never admit that they're giving up on those people, indeed, Metroid Prime: Corruption is an example of how they're not. They haven't yet released a truly compelling game for that set of gamers. The console has sold like hotcakes, frequently outselling the X box 360 and ps3, and it seems it would sell even more, if there weren't any hardware shortages, but it's not clear how long this console's legs will be. In my opinion the control scheme is fun in small doses, for a select group of games, but I'm not sure if you'll end up finding a truly deep experience that can differentiate itself from previous games. Having got a Wii at launch, trying a bunch of early titles, and not wanting anything for it in a few months has doused my interest considerably, as has my disinterest in The Legend of Zelda, probably the most hardcore gamer aimed Nintendo title on the console.
The control scheme is interesting and innovative and it does reset the field for newcomers to video gaming, but I'm not sure if the pricepoint isn't too high for non-gamers to want to buy the thing, and while there are very strong looking titles on the horizon (Metroid, Smash Bros, Super Mario Galaxy), none of them seem to be as much a killer app as the one that actually comes with the console, Wii Sports. Mario looks rather complex, and as a first person shooter, Metriod is clearly a gamer's game. It's definitely a strong showing, but with no real competitor for Microsoft and Sony's flagship offerings ( to gamers), it's fairly clear that Nintendo is abandoning the core gamer demographics. The question is whether the non-gamer demographic can pick up the slack and buy games in high enough quantities to make it worthwhile for 3rd parties to develop for the Wii, if not, Nintendo could have the greatest marketshare and the least revenue. Also notable is with the most recent price drop, the X box 360's core system comes within spitting distance of the Wii in North America, and is actually at the same price in the UK.
*Predictions
Honestly, I'm going to cop out and say I don't know. Microsoft certainly seems to be doing everything right, but that doesn't account for the inexplicable band of Sony loyalists who won't let go of the Playstation brand until it's just completely senseless to hold on to it. Sony's high pricepoint can't last, especially without super compelling first party content, not to mention better third party support, that said, 100 million gamers is a strong statement. Nintendo certainly stands a good chance of becoming the generation's highest market share console, but I do still question how much fun I'm going to be having with my Wii in 2 years, where as I think the PS3 and 360 will still manage to be as fun as they are now. I do think Nintendo will continue to completely own the handheld market.
One thing's for sure, so far, with this much competition, the players are definitely winning.
Tuesday, July 24, 2007
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows
Best fantasy series I've read? Probably not. Hard to say since I'm in the middle of 3 fantasy series which, at one point or another, I considered to be the greatest of all time. Harry Potter certainly has the best, most satisfying finish of any fantasy series I've read. (Finished Series include Lord of the Rings; Dark Tower; Memory, Sorrow, and Thorn; and Amber, among others. it's thematically consistent, doesn't rely on any deus ex machina, and, to some degree, keeps you guessing. All and all, a stunning conclusion to a fantastic fantasy series.
And obviously one of the most important series of books in quite some time, since it actually managed to get kids to read. American kids, no less!
Now the question that remains is what will Ms. Rowling do next? Whatever it is, I'll surely pick up a copy as soon as it's available.
And obviously one of the most important series of books in quite some time, since it actually managed to get kids to read. American kids, no less!
Now the question that remains is what will Ms. Rowling do next? Whatever it is, I'll surely pick up a copy as soon as it's available.
Tuesday, July 10, 2007
Best fantasy series ever?
The fantasy series I've been reading lately is the Malazan Book of the Fallen by Steven Erikson. It's based on a world created by Erikson and his friend Ian Cameron Esselmont when they were both younger and playing D&D. After several failed screenplay attempts they parted ways. Eventually Erikson began writing a series of novels in the world they created together.
The first book of the series can be very difficult to get into. Basically Erikson throws you into what seems like the middle of the story, seemingly expecting you to pick things up as they go along. Enough terminology and mythos is thrown around in the first chapter to confuse even the most stalwart fantasy reader. Winning through to the next two books, however, is it's own reward.
The world building in this series is simply the best I've ever encountered, including Tolkien, Jordan, and all the rest. The world is well thought out with rules for magic, heroes, gods, shapeshifters, etc. The cultures are well defined and seem to give true motivation to the people populating this world. This is likely due to Erikson's training as an anthropologist. The nod to anthropology permeates the series, cities feel designed realistically with actual problems such as irrigation and shipping solved based on the technology available to each race. This idea even extends to the roles of the sexes, given that a female mage could easily be as powerful as a male.
One of the other seemingly core goals of the series is to turn fantasy convention on it's ear, which the book does with great humor and success. The seemingly innocent boy who seems destined for greatness probably isn't, and the evil empire that couldn't possibly sustain itself probably can't. Most of the somewhat silly fantasy conventions we've sort of taken for granted end up somewhat surprising with how things turn out in this series. This leads to several amusing moments, and it definitely keeps you guessing.
The characters tend to blend into one another a bit, but still there are many standouts. I wouldn't say the characters are as well developed as the ones in The Song of Ice and Fire, but it gives pretty much any other fantasy work a run for it's money. Many "badass" characters abound, and they're all badass for different reasons. Their conversations contain real humor, and each character doesn't quite neatly fall into a pre-defined fantasy archetype. There is also a real sense of danger to the characters since Erikson doesn't seem to be afraid to kill a character off here and there.
The plotting of the series is something I, personally, find very well paced. The world is slowly revealed to both the reader and the characters as the story progresses, finding climaxes and convergences frequently enough to keep things interesting. The way the world and history is revealed is something I really appreciate. Somewhat reminiscent of Rhuidean in The Wheel of Time, but more of it, and more consistent.
So, best fantasy series ever? Honestly I don't know, it's hard to say until it's finished. If you had asked me in book 4 of The Wheel of Time if it was the best, I'd have been hard pressed to disagree, yet by the 11th book it's worn pretty thin. The Song of Ice and Fire was going very well until the last book, where it all seemed to fall apart for me. I won't say Malazan is the best until it's finished, but I certainly am enjoying it immensely.
The first book of the series can be very difficult to get into. Basically Erikson throws you into what seems like the middle of the story, seemingly expecting you to pick things up as they go along. Enough terminology and mythos is thrown around in the first chapter to confuse even the most stalwart fantasy reader. Winning through to the next two books, however, is it's own reward.
The world building in this series is simply the best I've ever encountered, including Tolkien, Jordan, and all the rest. The world is well thought out with rules for magic, heroes, gods, shapeshifters, etc. The cultures are well defined and seem to give true motivation to the people populating this world. This is likely due to Erikson's training as an anthropologist. The nod to anthropology permeates the series, cities feel designed realistically with actual problems such as irrigation and shipping solved based on the technology available to each race. This idea even extends to the roles of the sexes, given that a female mage could easily be as powerful as a male.
One of the other seemingly core goals of the series is to turn fantasy convention on it's ear, which the book does with great humor and success. The seemingly innocent boy who seems destined for greatness probably isn't, and the evil empire that couldn't possibly sustain itself probably can't. Most of the somewhat silly fantasy conventions we've sort of taken for granted end up somewhat surprising with how things turn out in this series. This leads to several amusing moments, and it definitely keeps you guessing.
The characters tend to blend into one another a bit, but still there are many standouts. I wouldn't say the characters are as well developed as the ones in The Song of Ice and Fire, but it gives pretty much any other fantasy work a run for it's money. Many "badass" characters abound, and they're all badass for different reasons. Their conversations contain real humor, and each character doesn't quite neatly fall into a pre-defined fantasy archetype. There is also a real sense of danger to the characters since Erikson doesn't seem to be afraid to kill a character off here and there.
The plotting of the series is something I, personally, find very well paced. The world is slowly revealed to both the reader and the characters as the story progresses, finding climaxes and convergences frequently enough to keep things interesting. The way the world and history is revealed is something I really appreciate. Somewhat reminiscent of Rhuidean in The Wheel of Time, but more of it, and more consistent.
So, best fantasy series ever? Honestly I don't know, it's hard to say until it's finished. If you had asked me in book 4 of The Wheel of Time if it was the best, I'd have been hard pressed to disagree, yet by the 11th book it's worn pretty thin. The Song of Ice and Fire was going very well until the last book, where it all seemed to fall apart for me. I won't say Malazan is the best until it's finished, but I certainly am enjoying it immensely.
Thursday, April 19, 2007
Monday, April 16, 2007
Linux
Holy crap it's hard to get anything done in Linux. I just installed it on my PS3 so I could muck around with SPUs via IBM's Cell SDK, and it took HOURS just to get it set up the way I wanted.
But holy crap is it cool now that it works.
I liken it to a tough boss fight in a game, it was a horrible pain in the ass mess to win, but it certainly is satisfying.
But holy crap is it cool now that it works.
I liken it to a tough boss fight in a game, it was a horrible pain in the ass mess to win, but it certainly is satisfying.
Friday, April 6, 2007
Saboteur Announced
The game I've been working on for the last couple of years has finally been announced, there was an article in the April issue of Game Informer, and Gamespot has done a bit of a writeup with a video as well.
Here's a Link.
I'm pretty excited about it, Tom is the guy with the beard, our lead designer, and Phil is the other guy, he's our producer.
Here's a Link.
I'm pretty excited about it, Tom is the guy with the beard, our lead designer, and Phil is the other guy, he's our producer.
Saturday, March 10, 2007
GDC 2007
This year's GDC was very valuable to me. It was great to meet more Bioware and Pandemic Australia folks. Project Bravo sounds very cool, and it sounds like they have a fantastic team working on it. The dinner was nice, and getting to see Mass Effect was great, I'm really excited to play it. Some notes on some of the stuff I saw.
Playstation 3
Since I'm going to be starting PS3 development soon, I focused mainly on Sony's PS3 talks. I actually came away very impressed. Going into GDC I had assumed that the PS3 was barely more powerful than the 360 on the CPU side and definitely slower on the GPU side. I'm still pretty sure the 360 GPU is quite a bit better (mainly due to shared memory and processors), however I'm now fairly convinced that the PS3 CPU is quite a bit faster than the 360. After seeing the Edge demo and hearing some of the statistics it's pretty clear that you'll be able to do quite a few things on the PS3 that the 360 will likely be too slow for. Unfortunately for Sony, this seems to only be very useful for first party teams. Third party teams will likely end up with better looking 360 games due to availability of memory and extra graphics card power. Edge does look fantastic, however.
Sony Keynote
The Sony keynote was entertaining, if not totally relevant to developers. It really felt like an E3 keynote, not much about actual development or the development process. I'm going to reserve judgement on the Home stuff, but at this time it seems kind of annoying, I'd rather just use menus, I think.
I think people are kind of underestimating what's going on with SingStar PS3, because people aren't really talking about it, but this product could be huge. It has very broad appeal and a youtube like quality with the availability of uploading videos. Also having a song store that you can buy any song from could be a huge positive for Sony. Particularly since their parent company owns a record label.
Little Big Planet looks absolutely fantastic. I can't wait to mess around with this game. Great graphics, interesting gameplay, the ability to create my own content? Where do I sign up? And it looked like a lot of fun, too. Sony, Please don't let me down.
Miyamoto Keynote
The Miyamoto keynote was interesting, if perhaps overly long. I was also disappointed by the way the GDC people handled these "big talks". They didn't allow people to go straight in and wait for the talk, but instead opted to create a huge line that ended up having the same effect. The first people in ended up getting the best seats.
That aside, it was an interesting keynote. There was no information about new nintendo products (which I enjoyed), and he mainly talked a lot about Nintendo's business strategy and his own personal vision for making games. It was an interesting talk, but there wasn't a huge amount of new information. Miaymoto is a very engaging speaker (though it was translated), and he showed an amazing facility with the wii remote (which he used for his slideshow).
Odds and Ends
All in all, it was a great experience, I love San Francisco, and I was really glad to have the opportunity to attend this year's Game Developer's Conference. Even if I hadn't learned anything from the sessions (I did), I would have really enjoyed networking with the people from Pandemic and Bioware and just experiencing the event.
Playstation 3
Since I'm going to be starting PS3 development soon, I focused mainly on Sony's PS3 talks. I actually came away very impressed. Going into GDC I had assumed that the PS3 was barely more powerful than the 360 on the CPU side and definitely slower on the GPU side. I'm still pretty sure the 360 GPU is quite a bit better (mainly due to shared memory and processors), however I'm now fairly convinced that the PS3 CPU is quite a bit faster than the 360. After seeing the Edge demo and hearing some of the statistics it's pretty clear that you'll be able to do quite a few things on the PS3 that the 360 will likely be too slow for. Unfortunately for Sony, this seems to only be very useful for first party teams. Third party teams will likely end up with better looking 360 games due to availability of memory and extra graphics card power. Edge does look fantastic, however.
Sony Keynote
The Sony keynote was entertaining, if not totally relevant to developers. It really felt like an E3 keynote, not much about actual development or the development process. I'm going to reserve judgement on the Home stuff, but at this time it seems kind of annoying, I'd rather just use menus, I think.
I think people are kind of underestimating what's going on with SingStar PS3, because people aren't really talking about it, but this product could be huge. It has very broad appeal and a youtube like quality with the availability of uploading videos. Also having a song store that you can buy any song from could be a huge positive for Sony. Particularly since their parent company owns a record label.
Little Big Planet looks absolutely fantastic. I can't wait to mess around with this game. Great graphics, interesting gameplay, the ability to create my own content? Where do I sign up? And it looked like a lot of fun, too. Sony, Please don't let me down.
Miyamoto Keynote
The Miyamoto keynote was interesting, if perhaps overly long. I was also disappointed by the way the GDC people handled these "big talks". They didn't allow people to go straight in and wait for the talk, but instead opted to create a huge line that ended up having the same effect. The first people in ended up getting the best seats.
That aside, it was an interesting keynote. There was no information about new nintendo products (which I enjoyed), and he mainly talked a lot about Nintendo's business strategy and his own personal vision for making games. It was an interesting talk, but there wasn't a huge amount of new information. Miaymoto is a very engaging speaker (though it was translated), and he showed an amazing facility with the wii remote (which he used for his slideshow).
Odds and Ends
All in all, it was a great experience, I love San Francisco, and I was really glad to have the opportunity to attend this year's Game Developer's Conference. Even if I hadn't learned anything from the sessions (I did), I would have really enjoyed networking with the people from Pandemic and Bioware and just experiencing the event.
Saturday, March 3, 2007
Protoyping is Underrated
Maybe underrated is the wrong word. Underutilized? I'm not going to say that prototyping is the silver bullet that will save the game industry from itself, but man, it sure can help. The ability to think, talk, act, and decide upon things based on decisions made while actually playing the game versus trying the same things when all you've done is thought about the game is just very powerful. How can you really decide that something sucks when you haven't even tried it? Some ideas are just obviously unfeasible or just plain don't sound like fun, but there are plenty of things that only show up once they're partially implemented.
A lot of companies pay lip service to prototyping but actually end up just implementing things too fast. And frequently gameplay can be one of the last things to be implemented. Having something up and playable is rarely as high a priority as prety graphics, this is somewhat understandable due to the fickle market that seems to be easily swayed by graphics, thus causing publishers to depend on graphics as a selling point and making it more difficult to sell them on gameplay alone.
And let's face it, fantastic gameplay with crappy graphics will rarely sell huge copies unless there is something truly amazing, new, and different (witness Wii). Even then it's unlikely. How many "fantastic" games do hardcore gamers lament as being killed due to an ignorant or immature marketplace. So yeah, prototyping is a tough sell to a manager of a game studio.
But it's really important to sell it.
I think it's the difference between a crap game and a mediocre game, a mediocre game and a good game, and a good game and a great game. It's the difference between spending time, money, and manpower on something that's not worthwhile and saving your resources for what really works. It's the difference between long masturbatory discussions about "big ideas" and hard nosed, nitty-gritty discussions about what's working and what isn't.
So now that prototyping seems to be A Good Thing, how do you do it? Normally a game team consists of artists, programmers and designers. Designers is a pretty broad term, usually this refers to level designers and mission builders. Programmers control the functionality of the game. They're the ones who do the implementation. If a programmer has game design or visual inklings or can be trusted to properly iterate a system, it's probably smart to have them be the driving force behind prototyping the feature. Some programmers don't have this inclination and are still useful to have to implement things, so in that case, the programmer should be paired with a designer or artist depending on the feature. This way a programmer can implement the base functionality and the designer or artist can then take what's there and tweak it and ask for different or more functionality. An example of this could be a skin shader that a game needs to make a character look right, and a programmer who isn't that visually inclined. That programmer could go to an artist, show him or her what it looks like, and expose parameters in the 3d modelling package for the artist to use to make the shader look right, the artist could also ask for different looks to the shader, which the programmer would have to then go and implement.
The same could be done with a design feature, a programmer could implement a drivable vehicle and expose a bunch of tuning parameters, and a designer could step in and tune the parameters to make the vehicle "fun", and thus be the driving force behind the prototyping.
The one constant rule is whomever is actually doing the prototyping is in control of the feature. Having a document written up for a programmer to then "follow" is not prototyping. One gets a feature into the mindshare of the team, gets it implemented by a programmer, and then either the programmer iterates on it, or exposes values for other teams to use for iteration. No one is reading a document and implementing, because whatever is in the document isn't as good as what can be implemented. Period. Long, detailed design docs that aren't a product of prototyping are by and large masturbation.
Anything too difficult to prototype as a game mechanic is very likely too risky to implment in the game, and so should seriously be considered for cutting, even during preproduction. Prototyping should be able to come before technology. If there isn't enough technology to prototype, then the team should be reduced in size until there are enough programmers to build an engine for prototyping and enough artists to support the engine efforts, or an engine should be licenced that allows prototyping. There should be no designers on a team like this. Unless they can prototype in some other, existing game engine while the other departments are working. Having a team of people churning out documents that no one will read is an incredible waste of time. Even if people do read them, they're usually not well-considered enough to be actual gameplay features.
Agile development seems to be a good way to go about prototyping with a focus on refactoring. Early prototypes should be hacked in to get the feature visible to the various departments, and then refactoring should be used to ensure the code stays maintainable. Unit tests may also prove useful in this endeavor. This relies on a very good prioritization of features, however. Without a strong list of features with a good prioritization, you'll end up prototyping the wrong things first.
In the future, as game projects become so expensive that any wasted time or effort is a huge blow to the product's success, I think prototyping will become the difference between a successful team and a failing team. Prototyping shows the compromises that will have to be made early, and it shows the best parts of your game early. It saves tons of time, effort, and money. It's just the right thing to do.
A lot of companies pay lip service to prototyping but actually end up just implementing things too fast. And frequently gameplay can be one of the last things to be implemented. Having something up and playable is rarely as high a priority as prety graphics, this is somewhat understandable due to the fickle market that seems to be easily swayed by graphics, thus causing publishers to depend on graphics as a selling point and making it more difficult to sell them on gameplay alone.
And let's face it, fantastic gameplay with crappy graphics will rarely sell huge copies unless there is something truly amazing, new, and different (witness Wii). Even then it's unlikely. How many "fantastic" games do hardcore gamers lament as being killed due to an ignorant or immature marketplace. So yeah, prototyping is a tough sell to a manager of a game studio.
But it's really important to sell it.
I think it's the difference between a crap game and a mediocre game, a mediocre game and a good game, and a good game and a great game. It's the difference between spending time, money, and manpower on something that's not worthwhile and saving your resources for what really works. It's the difference between long masturbatory discussions about "big ideas" and hard nosed, nitty-gritty discussions about what's working and what isn't.
So now that prototyping seems to be A Good Thing, how do you do it? Normally a game team consists of artists, programmers and designers. Designers is a pretty broad term, usually this refers to level designers and mission builders. Programmers control the functionality of the game. They're the ones who do the implementation. If a programmer has game design or visual inklings or can be trusted to properly iterate a system, it's probably smart to have them be the driving force behind prototyping the feature. Some programmers don't have this inclination and are still useful to have to implement things, so in that case, the programmer should be paired with a designer or artist depending on the feature. This way a programmer can implement the base functionality and the designer or artist can then take what's there and tweak it and ask for different or more functionality. An example of this could be a skin shader that a game needs to make a character look right, and a programmer who isn't that visually inclined. That programmer could go to an artist, show him or her what it looks like, and expose parameters in the 3d modelling package for the artist to use to make the shader look right, the artist could also ask for different looks to the shader, which the programmer would have to then go and implement.
The same could be done with a design feature, a programmer could implement a drivable vehicle and expose a bunch of tuning parameters, and a designer could step in and tune the parameters to make the vehicle "fun", and thus be the driving force behind the prototyping.
The one constant rule is whomever is actually doing the prototyping is in control of the feature. Having a document written up for a programmer to then "follow" is not prototyping. One gets a feature into the mindshare of the team, gets it implemented by a programmer, and then either the programmer iterates on it, or exposes values for other teams to use for iteration. No one is reading a document and implementing, because whatever is in the document isn't as good as what can be implemented. Period. Long, detailed design docs that aren't a product of prototyping are by and large masturbation.
Anything too difficult to prototype as a game mechanic is very likely too risky to implment in the game, and so should seriously be considered for cutting, even during preproduction. Prototyping should be able to come before technology. If there isn't enough technology to prototype, then the team should be reduced in size until there are enough programmers to build an engine for prototyping and enough artists to support the engine efforts, or an engine should be licenced that allows prototyping. There should be no designers on a team like this. Unless they can prototype in some other, existing game engine while the other departments are working. Having a team of people churning out documents that no one will read is an incredible waste of time. Even if people do read them, they're usually not well-considered enough to be actual gameplay features.
Agile development seems to be a good way to go about prototyping with a focus on refactoring. Early prototypes should be hacked in to get the feature visible to the various departments, and then refactoring should be used to ensure the code stays maintainable. Unit tests may also prove useful in this endeavor. This relies on a very good prioritization of features, however. Without a strong list of features with a good prioritization, you'll end up prototyping the wrong things first.
In the future, as game projects become so expensive that any wasted time or effort is a huge blow to the product's success, I think prototyping will become the difference between a successful team and a failing team. Prototyping shows the compromises that will have to be made early, and it shows the best parts of your game early. It saves tons of time, effort, and money. It's just the right thing to do.
Friday, March 2, 2007
Innovation is Overrated
I'm a game developer, and I used to frequent several game forums that I had read before I entered the game industry. One of the common topics in game forums has to do with innovation in games. Both bemoaning the lack of innovation in major games and celebrating small indie games that innovate SOMETHING for God's sake!
Personally I don't think game mechanic innovation is usually all that necessary. Give me a well-executed polished, by the numbers, game almost any time. The core design still needs to be solid, and if innovations have been made that your game has completely ignored, I might take issue. But overall give me Halo2 before Indigo Prophecy any day. I'd rather see a game that executes fully on all of its goals and manages to create a fun experience than see something that I haven't seen before but is done poorly.
This isn't a topic reserved for game enthusiasts, game professionals also fall into the innovate or die trap. It happens all the time where there are a ton of "shoot for the sky" feature requests, and not enough attention is being paid to the core gameplay.
This is not to say that innovation is bad, I think innovation can be fantastic, especially when well executed. I just think it's overrated. I'd much rather see execution than innovation.
Personally I don't think game mechanic innovation is usually all that necessary. Give me a well-executed polished, by the numbers, game almost any time. The core design still needs to be solid, and if innovations have been made that your game has completely ignored, I might take issue. But overall give me Halo2 before Indigo Prophecy any day. I'd rather see a game that executes fully on all of its goals and manages to create a fun experience than see something that I haven't seen before but is done poorly.
This isn't a topic reserved for game enthusiasts, game professionals also fall into the innovate or die trap. It happens all the time where there are a ton of "shoot for the sky" feature requests, and not enough attention is being paid to the core gameplay.
This is not to say that innovation is bad, I think innovation can be fantastic, especially when well executed. I just think it's overrated. I'd much rather see execution than innovation.
The Current State of New Fantasy Novels
In the past decade or so, I've noticed an incredible explosion in the number of high-quality fantasy novels beinig published and coming into the public eye. Ever since the beginning of The Wheel of Time, it seems like I've had a decent fantasy novel to read ( I started WoT in '98). Here's my opinion on the current state of many of the "big series".
Wheel of Time
Seems almost "on hiatus". There haven't been many (any?) big plot developments in the past couple of books, and it seems like Jordan has written himself into a corner here with the sheer number of plot threads he's opened, it seems like with so many plot threads you wouldn't be able to write so many pages about characters whining and squabbling and generally not getting along. What started as a fantastic series has turned into something I force myself to slog through.
The Song of Ice and Fire
Another series that started out as pure genius. The beginning of the first book instantly drew me in and I was hooked for another 2,500 or so pages. Fantastic plot, wonderful pacing, incredible characters who go through real change. An instant fantasy classic. Then A Feast For Crows came out. MARTIN JORDANED IT UP. The pace slows to a crawl, I get to read about a bunch of characters I don't care about! GAH! Another series I'm forcing myself to read???? Fortuantely Dance of Dragons looks to solve my problems by focusing on the characters I'm more interested in. Hopefully it won't take too long.
The Malazan Book of the Fallen
This series took a bit to grow on me. The first book was hard to get into as you're sort of thrust into the action. Then the second book picks up with a completely new cast of characters. However the third book starts and it really beings to rock, picking up from the ending of the first book and showing probably the best designed fantasy world I've ever read about, complete with an amazing history and cast of wonderful characters. The novels are full of badass characters who go around doing badass things and can be killed at any time. Another series (much like Song of Ice and Fire) where no one is safe. I've read all the way through the last book and so far all the books have been good. I have VERY high hopes for this series.
Harry Potter
As it enters into its final chapter, the Harry Potter series has grown and matured. Each time I start one of these books I forget just how damn good they are. Such wonderful tales woven into such a magical atmosphere. Granted, the stories aren't particularly "adult", but they're still interesting, and the books are nearly impossible to put down. With the final book coming out in July, the question is whether Harry survives or not, I'll be first in line to find out.
I'm also reading another, finished, series called The Prince of Nothing. So far I'm liking it, if it's not quite pulling me in the way some of these other series have.
Wheel of Time
Seems almost "on hiatus". There haven't been many (any?) big plot developments in the past couple of books, and it seems like Jordan has written himself into a corner here with the sheer number of plot threads he's opened, it seems like with so many plot threads you wouldn't be able to write so many pages about characters whining and squabbling and generally not getting along. What started as a fantastic series has turned into something I force myself to slog through.
The Song of Ice and Fire
Another series that started out as pure genius. The beginning of the first book instantly drew me in and I was hooked for another 2,500 or so pages. Fantastic plot, wonderful pacing, incredible characters who go through real change. An instant fantasy classic. Then A Feast For Crows came out. MARTIN JORDANED IT UP. The pace slows to a crawl, I get to read about a bunch of characters I don't care about! GAH! Another series I'm forcing myself to read???? Fortuantely Dance of Dragons looks to solve my problems by focusing on the characters I'm more interested in. Hopefully it won't take too long.
The Malazan Book of the Fallen
This series took a bit to grow on me. The first book was hard to get into as you're sort of thrust into the action. Then the second book picks up with a completely new cast of characters. However the third book starts and it really beings to rock, picking up from the ending of the first book and showing probably the best designed fantasy world I've ever read about, complete with an amazing history and cast of wonderful characters. The novels are full of badass characters who go around doing badass things and can be killed at any time. Another series (much like Song of Ice and Fire) where no one is safe. I've read all the way through the last book and so far all the books have been good. I have VERY high hopes for this series.
Harry Potter
As it enters into its final chapter, the Harry Potter series has grown and matured. Each time I start one of these books I forget just how damn good they are. Such wonderful tales woven into such a magical atmosphere. Granted, the stories aren't particularly "adult", but they're still interesting, and the books are nearly impossible to put down. With the final book coming out in July, the question is whether Harry survives or not, I'll be first in line to find out.
I'm also reading another, finished, series called The Prince of Nothing. So far I'm liking it, if it's not quite pulling me in the way some of these other series have.
Thursday, March 1, 2007
First Post
Man I hate blogs, so I figure, lets just go ahead and start one.
Hell yes.
This is going to rock so hardcore.
Sweet.
Hell yes.
This is going to rock so hardcore.
Sweet.
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