Intrepid Homoludens

Damn you, toblix, for using that Angielara Jolie avatar. Bitch. If I weren't gay I'd hump my monitor right now. ........ [looks at Angielara again]..........ooh, and she does like girls, too.

I think they should have come with SuperHo's. You know, they charge a lot more, but you get THAT much more health and pleasure. But if you fuck with them they'll come after you with their switchblades, even call their girlfriends to gang up on you and you build a reputation with them as 'That-mofo-who-hurt-Shantay-you-see-him-you-slash-him' prick. They travel in packs, some of them are mean-ass lesbians and you DO NOT mess with them. That would be sweet.

Left - Fear Effect. Right - No One Lives Forever 2. There is a kind of worldly wisdom in the saying "It isn't what you have, it's how you work it." But let's face it, the majority of games (on all platforms) seems to lack even a modicum of these three 'S' words. For all practical purposes, many of them don't really need it. Certainly Mario and Zelda don't. Ditto Pokeman and the Quake series (where the cool factor is measured not by your moves but how huge your rocket launcher is). Studying the development, execution, and marketing of computer games, specifically the high production ones, I noticed how very few of them pay that much attention to design in terms of constistency of vision, originality, and cohesion. They seem fragmented, and the experience of entering their world, at least according to my experience, feels rather fractured. Emphatically, many of these games' conceptions of these three 'S' words feel provincial to me. To put it bluntly, a nerd's conception, one who has never left his dark cubicle to fully explore the real world and taste its various offerings, trapped within his adolescent carnal yearnings devoid of subtlety and efficacious restraint. The Hitman series, perhaps the finest embodiment of sexiness, sophistication, and style in a computer game. However, what scant number of games I feel present themselves successfully do it with damn good a conviction, perfectly or imperfectly. Take, for example, the sultry Fear Effect (PS1), with the dystopian Blade Runner like Hong Kong setting and the highly sexually manipulative yet distant Hana, her dark history and deadly profession cutting a swath of steely cosmopolitan eroticism in her wake. Fear Effect never hesitated in its certitude, it took no prisoners. Then there's No One Lives Forever and its sequel, the tongue-in-cheek humour and spy movie spoofing taking the limelight yet no more important than its cinematic knowingness or its smartness in period fashions and first class globetrotting. There's also the Splinter Cell series, pushing the concept of silence and stealth and espionage as in itself a selling tool of cunning gracefullness and clandestineness laced with an undercurrent of erotic electricity. No different ultimately is the Thief series. Deus Ex suggests the three 'S' words but unfortunately fails to deliver, in the end constrained by the nerd's inexperience with, and trepidations of, the delicacies of worldly sensibilities: why was J.C. not allowed to take any of the women from Lucky Money back to a hotel room, but only permitted to watch two women dance together and flirt with each other steamily? The experience felt stunted, the player robbed of opportunity. There was nothing there similar to the gravity of worldly satiety as in Fear Effect, or the heaving lovesick cynicism and urban weariness of Max Payne 2. The Hitman series, though, truly and eloquently proves that style can be everything, sophistication can be deadly, and sexiness a universe of nuances and exoticness far beyond the nerd's adolescent fantasies. Defying my receptivenss towards bringing gaming to as many as possible, I'll venture to say that the Hitman series is not for everyone, nor should it be for everyone. The beauty of this series lies in the very notion of it being an acquired taste. As with Thief and Splinter Cell and Deus Ex, it places heavy demands on the player, not just physiologically and intellectually but also psychologically and yes, cosmographically. That #47 wears an immaculate dark suit and tie (most likely custom tailored) and travels the world all in a day's work underscores the maturity and complexity of the game's universe, its elusiveness. A 13-year-old would not understand the gradations of this world, but certainly an older gamer experienced in matters of sexuality, cunning, and craftiness would. Considering the average age of gamers is 28 years, with growing demographic of older gamers (yes, we are the ones who grew up with Pong and Pacman), these three 'S' apply more than ever, especially with the advancing technology capable of rendering in real time the subtleties necessary (facial expressions, body language, A.I.), as well as more cinematic narrative, and more emotionally charged story subjects. You brilliant developer nerds, listen up! Go outside, get a tan, and fly off to Paris and have an affair with a countess! You have no idea what you're missing, whereas we older gamers do! So, whatchar thoughts on this?

It ultimately depends on what you want out of your investment. If you're after fame and money, sure, you'll give them what they want. But if you're in it for the love of new experiences and exploring uncharted territory to share with a very small niche market of gamers, then you have to accept that the rest of the world may not agree with you, you won't make much money. I'd take this second choice of pushing boundaries anytime.

You little whore! Admit it, all you want is to pick up some ho's and bang them in your Banshee and slap them around for your money back after.

Well, I've found it. It's very hard to find, though.

Two thousand times.

I haven't ignored all those other factors you so eloquently brought. If anything, my longwinded rant stems from my personal frustration over the cyclic conundrum of publishers giving consumers lame tripe, with consumers buying it because it's all they're being offered. It's an awkared symbiosis. We, as consumers, should be more savvy in what we want out of games. I own very few games compared to the next serious gamer. This is primarily out of economy, which forces me to be more discerning and aware of what I'm looking for specifically in a game. I consider myself a serious gamer by criteria that I want to become emotionally involved in the experience, I can't simply just pick up a game and drop it 30 minutes later. As per the reality of publishers going by numbers and dollars, that's a given in any industry, of course, and I haven't forgotten that, as you seem to think I have. There will be the maintstream mediocrity that rakes in all the money, but that's not to say that progress and innovation in content have no room at all. Again, that's a given in any industry, the possibilities that someone will break new ground, visionaries struggling at expression. What I'm looking for is that special game that explores uncharted territory by fusing technology with a sense of deep involvement that transcends the mere 'we-are-the-best-because-we-have-cool-graphics-and-tie-ins-with-the-latest-summer-blockbuster-movie' mentality, and appeals to the intelligence of the gamer. Until then there will always be gullible consumers and cold-headed publishers. It's turned into such a business, inevitably so. But that doesn't mean that I personally have to follow that bullshit. I'm too smart a consumer for that. And I argue that it already has been possible to bring a higher level of subtlety to games as to draw the player in beyond mere button mashing and rocket launching. I mean, I teared up at the end of of Syberia, didn't I? I felt a great pang of sentimentality at the end of Gabriel Knight 3, didn't I? I felt a certain swoosh of slickness and polish playing some Hitman 2, didn't I? It wasn't just the fundamental gameplay, there was also a particular talent the developers tapped into to bring that deeper involvement in the gaming experience. My argument is for them to push it further and deeper. The technology is already there and willing. Why stop so soon?

Well yeah, that's how I was trying to do it. I hate that stupid van, handles like a drunken horny grandmother wearing bikini and platform shoes in a bar full of supermodel men. The game's a wicked bitch, notice how slow moving garbage trucks and old stationwagons suddenly appear once you start that mission? You may need some therapy, but I will NOT be the one to do it.

Yep. manny, your grievance is pretty much a product of personal preference. It would be so unfair if you had your wish and I was never able to enjoy more games like Syberia and The Longest Journey. I do absolutely love Grim Fandango and am still upset about Sam & Max: Freelance Police being cancelled, but let's be real here. There is room for every kind of game under the sun. Why fuck it up for everyone by only cranking out clones of Grim and S&M?

Much of it also has to do with containing the content within the conventions of a genre. You don't typically expect romantic relationships between characters in a first person shooter. But it depends on the individual game. What if issues like that suddenly appear midway in an action game? For one thing it would throw the player off course in his expectations of what a game in that genre is 'supposed' to do, and he may have to re-align himself, especially if that subcontext became tightly integrated to his experience of the game. There was also the censorship laws back then, quite prevalent during the first half of the century in Hollywood. This was a double edged sword in that while it hampered directors' expressive freedom outright, it also forced them to become more creatively Machiavellian with their subterfuge at presenting otherwise forbidden themes in their films. A good example is director Ernest Lubitch's Design For Living (1933), where his suggestions of a menage a trois between a young woman and her two male friends are strategically veiled. And James, I think you'd be interested in knowing that in writing the script for our Curves of Danger game, I was actually working in that mindset (what if there some production code that prevented us?). Hence: This is partly exactly what's on my mind. I'm thinking that if/when this whole whorish yet natural obsession with technology levels off, we may begin seeing a re-focusing on content and its articulation. It may be a matter of writers and art directors being limited to the available tech, market constraints, and the provinces of developers and programmers, but if Hollywood directors back then were able to brilliantly circumnavigate the censoship laws, what's preventing highly talented writers, artists, and directors from doing the same to games? I disagree. Games really DO need to have these things. But I did specify that not ALL games should have them. I grew up on Atari, Intellivision, and hours and hours at the local arcade. We were so primitive then, but now look at what games can do today. That said, it's inevitable that there will be a focus on the content as per gameplay experience. A few devs, like Ragnar Tornquist (The Longest Journey, Dreamfall), Konami (Silent Hill series), and Benoit Sokal (Syberia series) are already exploring themes, subtleties, and drama in ways that your typical developer is scared shitless to do. Yes, there is absolutely ample room for Style and Sex. We simply need them to be treated with a more mature and worldly hand, beyond the adolescent nerdy programmer's fantasized and stunted projections that insult more intellgent gamers.

I agree, Half-Life's A.I. is still my benchmark. But Thief's guards were pretty decent, too. They see you, they actually hunt you down. Seems like Farcry's NPCs are a step above, they won't give up until they find you, and they seem to work with each other too. I'm looking forward to seeing how Thief: Deadly Shadows will do with its A.I.

I'm still stuck in Staunton myself. Last night I was trying a new tactic for stealing those 3 kinds of cars that Kenji instructed me to (I wanted a fast, nicely maneuverable car on hand to get me to those 3 cars). Naturally, being in a hurry, I crashed that damned Banshee. So I just decided to park it for a bit and take a break. Suddenly a huge streetfight broke right in front of me, gangbangers getting beat up by old ladies, hookers rumbling with suits. Many of them got floored and bloody. Then the money started appearing, and man, being the whore that I am I just ran up and grabbed all that floating cash and waited for more. Meanwhile the ambulances came and the gapers increased. More money appeared, and I was the happiest street punk. More change for the Pay-n-Spray!!

Perhaps the graphics are now a step down compared to, say, Doom3 or S.T.A.L.K.E.R., but it's ultimately the gameplay and narrative exposition I really look forward to. I may be a graphics whore, but I'll be damned if that's what games are for only.

Wtf.