Zederick

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Everything posted by Zederick

  1. BioShock Infinite

    Agreed as well. On the one hand, I appreciate that the game is trying to say something (a low bar, but one that surprisingly few games really reach), but I wish it had done a better job of it all: * The moral equivalence is forced and unfair - yes, the revolutionaries are also violent and extreme, but their uprising against slavery was morally justified * The racism it depicts is the caricature racism that white guys (like myself) can look at and comfortably say, "You never see that in society nowadays - sure is nice that racism is over forever!" * The game talks about infinite potential and choices and variety and then goes out of its way to force you into making only one choice (because video games) It bugs me that the expectations are so low for storytelling and serious thought in games that it has been and will continue to get a pass on all of this.
  2. LucasArts is no more

    I didn't have a PC growing up, so I missed a lot of the classic Lucasarts games - but I got to play some of them at my friends' houses. I had so much fun with them that I ran one friend's PC through a VCR and made a tape of a full playthrough of Sam & Max so I could watch it at home. Rest in peace, Lucasarts.
  3. Thumbs at GDC?

    Weird! I'm afraid that couldn't have been me - I work at 2K Marin, only have a regular kilt, and don't smoke. Now I'm curious to find my Riot doppelganger. Obviously, we must fight. But I still endorse meeting up! How about tonight at Local Edition, say at 9ish? All thumbs welcome - I'll be the guy with long, purple hair.
  4. Thumbs at GDC?

    I'm not officially attending GDC this year, but I am in town and can make it to meet-ups after work. I was kind of surprised it wasn't mentioned in the most recent 'cast.
  5. This is something that's always irritated me with LoMa games: they're designed in such a way that they are large time commitments that ultimately are won and lost in very, very short moments. Most problematic of all these turning moments are often somewhere in the middle of the game -- and then the game continues for another 10-25 minutes during which time one side is obviously going to lose no matter what, as those players get increasingly frustrated and blaming each other. It's a design that's excellent at making people tense and angry, and usually points that anger squarely at the weakest player, which usually means the newest player. In my experience with the different LoMas, this seems most highlighted in Dota2 (because the micro of the game is so important, which makes it especially punishing to new players). This seems really weird coming from Valve, who normally do such an amazing job of making games accessible and welcoming for new players. But even though I had player a lot of LoL and was eager to try Dota2 with friends, it absolutely drove me away after a couple of games. Normally, listening to the thumbs talk about Dota2 makes me wish I had gotten into it, but this episode did a good job of reminding me why I didn't.
  6. SimCity: The City Simulator

    I really love that "Eras of Sim City" idea (whoever came up with it first), and I'll add an idea that I was playing with in one of the episode threads:
  7. 7 Grand Steps

    Yeah, the rules for what does and doesn't affect each chance can be a little maddening at times - I've had successful children who tried to get a spouse every turn and were turned down every time for no reason I could tell, to say nothing of my confusion over what does and doesn't prepare a child for their coming of age. I'm a little torn over whether the uncertainty of those sorts of rules are a problem or a deliberate vagueness. It certainly inspires a degree of superstitious play, which leads to interesting stories, but not always satisfying game-playing experiences. Of course, the single change I'd make if I could would be to have spaces on the board highlight when you pick up a token with their symbol - especially if they then display the space a character will move to when you hold the token over their slot. There have been too many times, especially early in playing, when I misjudged where a move would take a character, or moved the wrong one, or so forth. It seems like a good UI fix, but of course those aren't always easy to implement.
  8. Normally I'm opposed to adding frustrations to gameplay in the name of realistic simulation, and I'm sure it'd be "less fun*" than the in-the-box Sim City, but sometimes it makes for a whole new type of gameplay and challenge. And sometimes, as with Andrus' coughing fits in Cart Life, the frustration is part of a desired experience other than "fun*." * a uselessly vague phrase.
  9. Maybe I've watched too many political intrigue shows, but I'd really love to see/make a mod for the new Sim City that implemented a bunch of the awkward, local-political issues that make real city development messy. For example, if each district had an alderman who represented that area's interests, and you had to get a majority of the city council to approve a set of new changes, sometimes requiring entirely separate projects to build up good will or to alleviate concerns. With good systemitization, there could be very interesting systemic challenges and unpleasantly realistic frustrations that lead to the sort of odd city development that's made our own beloved cities. For example, imaging your city is having a power crisis, so you need to build a new power plant. The council agrees that something has to be done, but none of the aldermen want it done in their district - one doesn't want the pollution in the area, another doesn't want the eyesore lowering their property taxes, and so on. The alderman in the oldest part of town is most desperate for it - her constituents are suffering the most from the power shortage - but the one location that would be perfect, an old warehouse, is technically a historic location so you can't build there. As the mayor, you might include a set of other local improvements to convince an alderman that the plant will be a boon to their neighborhood specifically (in addition to the city as a whole), or you might appeal to the council as a whole to build it in the district of an unpopular alderman. Or maybe you'll just cut the budget to the fire department near the historical warehouse and wait for an "accident" to happen, then swoop in and build on the still-smoking rubble. Sim horse-trading and sim corruption at its finest!
  10. It was a fun game for a while, and the ship-building was very enjoyable in that "spreadsheets in space" sort of way. But the plot was pretty painfully boring, and it had glacially slow plot pacing. Even worse (to me), it pulled a total dick move... (minor spoiler warning) Late in the game, there's one dungeon where your intrepid team has a choice of whether or not to burst into a particular room. By this point, you've been doing this for dozens of dungeons, and it's just the basic way to enter a room. But in this one, if you enter, you all fall down an elevator shaft and die. No warning, no rolls, just immediate Game Over because you did the thing that game taught you to do. And with the way the game's save system is set up, it ensures you have to redo the entire dungeon all over again. So yeah. I had fun playing it, and got my money's worth, but that was the point where I just quit it forever. It broke my cardinal game design rule: Thou Shalt Respect The Player's Time.
  11. Like I said, the combination of Dota2's derivative (to be charitable) character concepts with the excellence of Valve's art design makes for some really unusual results. It's like seeing a brilliant but faithful remake of Manos: the Hand of Fate.
  12. I tried getting into Dota2 and this was exactly the issue that hit me. Some elements, like the unintuitive gameplay and the derivative characters seems contrary to Valve's traditions of quality and player friendliness, which are highly visible in other parts of the game. And while I can't be sure because I don't know the inner workings of Valve's magical Shangri-La, it seems like there are two conflicting internal goals: 1) Create a faithful upgrade of the original Dota - which means keeping all of the derivative chracters, recreating gameplay that was based on rough edges of the Warcraft 3 engine, and generally catering to the hardcore fans. 2) Make it "a Valve game" in all the inclusiveness and polish that it entails - meaning brilliantly informative character design, with friendliness for new players and a strong attempt to encourage good behavior in the community. In some cases, it's been great: in particular, Valve's player-rating system is fantastic and should be a template for every multiplayer game in the world. It's a brilliant way to harness the community for good while \disincentivizing the terribleness that seems to grow on hardcore game communities like a fungus. In some cases, it's weird but interesting, like seeing how very derivative characters can still be designed in an excellent, informative fashion (see the Dota2 art bible here http://media.steampowered.com/apps/dota2/workshop/Dota2CharacterArtGuide.pdf). In many cases, it's very, very conflicted. Nowhere does this come out stronger than a game that goes to such lengths to have tutorials for new players, but still expects actual competitive players to rely on complex and largely untutorialized mechanics like Orb Walking and Creep Denying (both legacies of Warcraft's engine). It really feels like there must be two teams in Valve that are constantly fighting over Dota2's development. And to do that, they may have to decide whether they want to make a game that welcomes new players, or one that gives the hardcore fans what they want.
  13. Confirmed: Mars Rover looked back and saluted as Sky Crane bravely gave its life for science: http://www.latimes.com/news/science/la-me-0811-mars-curiosity-photo-confirmed-20120811,0,5983256.story Its first duty was to deploy half a bottle of beer onto the ground for its fallen science-buddy. Bruce Willis has already accepted the role of Lt. Skyler Crane in the upcoming movie adaptation.
  14. I generally agree with the thumbs on achievements, but there is one extra case where I find achievements add to true game experience: when the achievements encourage you to try new challenges, playstyles, or odd tricks that the developers included. The biggest example of this is the heroic achievements in World of Warcraft (like "One Light in the Darkness") or Valve's achievements for Half-Life 2 (carrying the gnome all the way through the game). I still find the achievements' pop-up annoying, but they add a depth of gameplay and encourage enough interesting new experiences that I can forgive them.