geardrops [blog]

Other M is coming out, and it looks to be quite a polarizing game. Reviews trickling down the line are consistently panning it for its story, which, if you’ve been listening to the developers, is the reason for the game’s existence in the first place. Thankfully, it seems to be front- and end-loaded, with the middle left blissfully free of unskippable cutscenes.

(Unskippable cutscenes? Ballsy. They better be good.)

Before I get into that though, I have a rant. It’s related.

Seriously guys. One of the first things we tell people who are learning to write is to avoid the infodump. Show. Don’t tell. You think because you’re dealing with button-mashers it’s okay to break cardinal rules of Good Writing? Well, if someone said it was, it wasn’t. So stop it.

I sat for twenty fucking minutes during Super Paper Mario last night, wading through goddamn useless exposition of WHY it was so important I had to save Princess Peach. I know it’s important! This is Mario! That’s all I’m supposed to do! I save the princess and catch a game of golf or tennis on the side. Maybe some go-kart racing. I don’t need dimension-encompassing, apocalypse-inducing storylines to make me want to jump on Goombas and gather coins. You’ve trained me from a tender age to do this.

MrMike thought it was important I play Paper Mario 2. It was a platformer, he claimed, not an RPG like those other smelly Paper Marios were (note: the “smelly” comment may be my addition). Someone didn’t tell the writers that, apparently, but hey, the 2D/3D mechanic was pretty awesome once I got there, after about five-thousand tendinitis-inducing button presses to skip the dialogue. (Also why did Luigi keep calling Mario “bro”? I spent the entire opening scene waiting for him to lift his shirt and point out The Situation.)

Thank you for your time.

Games like Metroid have a particular need to avoid delving into backstory, in my opinion. Here, we have a character whose life story has been alluded to in previous games, whether subtly (hey guess what, she’s an orphan raised by the Chozo, which is why she gets this badass suit) or more overtly (see: Fusion). She has never said a word. Hell, until the end of the first game, no one even knew she was a she.

We have been given wisps and ghosts of her past. So what did we do? We filled in the blanks. And you will never fill in the blanks as good as we did. No one can make a story as powerful as the story a person can make for themselves.

Is everybody familiar with Plato’s Theory of Forms? Summary: There is the Idea of the thing, and then the Form of the thing. The Idea sits above all things, above our minds, pure and perfect. Then we sad little mortals pull it down into reality, for us to see, cutting imperfections into it as we do. The statue Donatello carved is never going to be as flawless as the statue he saw in his mind.

In case my point isn’t obvious, this is a potential problem with Other M. We’ve made our own history for Samus, piled the seductive flesh on the skeleton we were handed. And in doing so, we set the bar so goddamn high, you may never be able to reach it, let alone pass it. No matter how much of a badass you write her as, she was always a better badass in our minds. No matter how emotionally powerful or tender those moments you made are, they were more powerful and tender in our minds.

(Related: Anakin’s Fall To The Dark Side.)

We, as fans, were granted the unique ability to make these things for her, without having to write them down, make them concrete. They can live in their little ephemeral nests, perfect and untouched, and always better than what you give us. I’m not saying you shouldn’t try. But for fuck’s sake, be careful. You have to try.

And when Kotaku describes your storytelling as containing primarily “… those tired themes of protagonist immaturity, weapons of mass destruction, and possible government conspiracy that have been strip-mined by the makers of Metal Gear and Resident Evil” and then goes on to say “Thankfully, the cut-scenes involving these themes are mostly placed near the beginning and end of the game” ?

That shows me you didn’t try at all.

With a bonus level at the end.

Disclaimer: If you think a game should have been on this list and it wasn’t, it’s likely I simply haven’t played it. Bear in mind, I am but one woman, and in this decade I finished high school, college, started a master’s degree, went through some roughness, moved out of my parents’ basement, and in general did shit.

Listed in no true order except that my favoritest of ever is the last one…

World of Warcraft

Anyone who knows me knows I’ve sunk too many hours of my life into this game. Even running a /played on every one of my characters across every server is inaccurate, because I’ve deleted level 25 characters for petty reasons, like not liking their name or eye color or whatever. I still miss the days of rolling through Molten Core and Blackwing Lair with nothing between me and death save a priest who likes to remind warlocks that they have healthstones and life tap is not an excuse.

Eternal Darkness

The game that clearly played too much tabletop Call of Cthulhu, persistently demanding you roll for sanity and taking particular delight in your rolling a 1. I loved how obviously this game read Poe and Lovecraft and maybe a few history books. And anybody who has played this remembers the tub. That’s all I have to say.

Metroid Prime

I’m really goddamn lucky Metroid Prime and Super Metroid came out in different decades. If I ever had to make the call between those two… well, it’d go to Super Metroid, but then I’d miss out on talking about teh darmaz surrounding Metroid Prime. The transition to 3D was ill-received by fans, until they actually played it, and then shut the hell up except for the occasional breathless utterances of gratitude. It managed to maintain the feel of Metroid, but move into a more FPS feel. Still doesn’t beat Super Metroid for Best Metroid Game Ever, but it’s been a wonderful addition to the series.

Psychonauts

Wacky art, hilarious writing, incredible character, fun, unique, yet intuitive gameplay… all of that is just longhand for “Double-Fine.” For those unfamiliar, Double-Fine is headed by Tim Schafer, who was responsible for the fun subset of LucasArts games, before Lucas decided to focus on the Star Wars IP, ride it hard and put it away wet. Schafer decided balls to that and ran off to make the same kinds of games, to the same kind of critical acclaim, but maybe weaker sales. I don’t know. Money is a mystery to me. Point is, if you missed this one, then fuck you, go fix it.

Portal

If you missed the meme, then I don’t know what to do with you. The only downside to this game is that it’s too short, and I mean this sincerely. You can roll out of bed on Saturday morning and blast this game beginning-to-end in the time it takes the WBKids morning line-up to wrap (make sure your DVR records Ben 10). Made as a final project by some clever assholes at DigiPen, music by Jonathan Coulton, this is the cleverest game to come out in some time. If you don’t understand, watch the trailer.

Team Fortress 2

Look, I don’t even like shooters. It’s thanks to the afore-mentioned Metroid Prime that I can even play in the first-person view. But this game rocked me, and I never would have played it if it wasn’t for the Orange Box. Personally, I favored the Doctor, because it’s fun keeping a rampaging Heavy alive, and if he drops due to sheer idiocy (seen it happen) I can sweep in with my needle gun and hacksaw and handle bidnizz (trufax). The trailers and ads for this game are hilarious, and worth your time searching for on the toobz.

Professor Layton

Deliriously entertaining, especially when you’re sitting in line at PAX. My best memory for this game is being stuck on one puzzle for a half hour, and bringing it to the PAX help desk. The Enforcer solved it for me, admitting he, too, was stuck on it for forty-five minutes before getting it. Kind of him. A collection of fun brainteaser puzzles with quaint art and a cute mystery. If you have a DS and you don’t have this game (there’s two now) you’re doing it wrong.

Super Smash Brothers: Melee

All I have to say is I was a motherfucker with Peach, Kirby, and Jigglypuff.

Soul Cailbur 2

Seung Mina. Taki. Sophitia. Talim. Raphael. Astaroth. Voldo. Ivy. Yoshimitsu. Cervantes. Link on the GameCube. Spawn on the XBox. Nobody remembers who was on the PS2, but that’s okay, doesn’t matter, why would you ever play a fighter game with anything that isn’t the GCN controller? (More on this later.) I rocked this game in arcades and on the Dreamcast for hours on end, and continued to do so on the GameCube. A good, fun 3D fighter, well executed.

Resident Evil 4

If you haven’t played this, kill yourself. You’ve missed out on the rebirth of the Resident Evil series, and the template from which RE5 was lazily lifted. If you wonder how much I loved this game, note that I named my beta fish Leon Kennedy. Yeah. That happened.

Beyond Good and Evil

I’ll rate this not only as one of the top games of the past decade, but also one of the most ignored. It enjoyed a renaissance some years down the line, but not enough to justify the dust it collected on shelves. It’s action-adventure, it’s stealth, it’s alien abduction and government conspiracy, it’s quirky, fun, and a hell of a good time. And, by now, it’s got to be super-cheap.

Rockband

Do I even need to say it?

Shadow of the Colossus

Made by the guys who gave us Ico (as if you couldn’t tell from the art style) this game is everything that is good about games, condensed. Boss battle after boss battle, and each one is fun. There’s really nothing bad to be said about this game. Anyone I know who has played it has fallen head-over-heels in love with it.

Katamari Damacy

Try explaining this game to someone, and they’ll think you’re crazy. Here. I’ll try: “Your father, the King of All Cosmos, has destroyed every star in the night sky on a drunken bender. It is now up to you, the Prince of All Cosmos, to fix it. You will do so by rolling around sticky balls and picking things up and those sticky balls become stars.” Yep. And somehow this was some of the most fun, creative, unique gameplay of the year. If that don’t sell you, check out the opening theme.

Bioshock

Sure, it’s apparent the writers read Atlas Shrugged, but don’t let that deter you. Artistically rendered, wonderfully written, intense gameplay, and subtly horrifying, this game will knock you on your ass, even if you hate the FPS genre. Fort Frolic was so incredible I restarted the game just to play it again.

F-Zero: GX

If you haven’t played F-Zero before, I don’t know what to do with you. This is the pinnacle of non-realistic racers, the exact opposite of Gran Turismo. You don’t steer, you drift. The speeds you’re racing at can’t handle sharp movement. The gameplay hasn’t really changed from the original on the SNES, because it didn’t need to. Race for three laps, boost takes away from your life, power up strips to regenerate life, and boost bars to get you through the patches when you’re low on health. This was a favorite at Steak Night in college.

Mario Kart: Double Dash

There’s a divided camp here, on where this game peaked. I’m a fan of the GCN version. Others say the N64 version is superior. Either way, this is a game worth your time. Change the setting to maximize the madness that items can induce, because this game isn’t about speed, it’s about awesome upsets. As for me? I brought the Blue Sparks.

Fatal Frame 2: Crimson Butterfly

This is and isn’t a rough call for me, which Fatal Frame to pick as the top. Both one and two are incredible (we’re not going to mention three). But Crimson Butterfly tips it over for me because this is the first, and thus far only, game to have ever successfully given me nightmares. The graphics here have aged beautifully. The game is wonderfully laid out, knowing just when to let you feel safe, and just when to horrify you. Pick this game up, play the first level, and then come to grips with the fact that what you have gone through is one very tiny house, and you have only fought one ghost. This? This shit right here? That was your fucking tutorial.

Silent Hill 2

There’s a reason Yahtzee called this game the pinnacle of storytelling in games. Say what you will about the controls, but when you come to story, characters, atmosphere, camera positioning, replayability, general cohesiveness of a game, this one’s hard to beat. This game has aged wonderfully, and is playable even a decade later. If you can handle creepiness and horror, this is the best of the series, very closely followed by the first. (The only reason the first loses out to the second, for me, is the controls.)

Holy hell. What a goddamn good decade in games. You don’t even realize it until you step back and try to list what came out.

BONUS LEVEL: Best Controller of the Aughts

Unlike above, this is a for-reals countdown.

Number Five: Wii

Why would someone so obviously a Nintendo fan hate the WiiMote? Because it hurts my fucking wrist, that’s why. I’ve been playing Metroid Prime 3 as of late, and I can’t play for very long because of that goddamn remote and my combination carpal tunnel and tendinitis. Terrible design, and worse because many games don’t support the optional GameCube controller. I’m a gamer. I don’t want to get off the damn couch for every game I play.

Number Four: XBox

Oddly, I’d rather use this controller than the WiiMote, and that should be saying something. My narrow hands, suitable for delicate surgeries and withdrawing lost keys from narrow crevices, are more at home wrapped around this carved-stone controller than something that requires my wrist to twitch minutely for hours on end.

Number Three: XBox 360

Hooray! Microsoft learned! Still not the best controller for prolonged gaming sessions, as my fingers are unable to curl, but the size is significantly more manageable.

Number Two: Sony

Let’s not kid ourselves, I’m lumping all Sony controllers into one because there’s been no real change over the years. Which isn’t a bad thing. A solid design, comfortable, well crafted for extended gaming sessions. The only real difficulty is the labeling of the buttons instead of making them distinct shapes. Combos are a bit hard to learn when they tell you it’s up-over XXO and you have to look down to see what that means. Still, one of the best controller designs, a solid tradition they have no reason to change.

Number One: GameCube

For my cold, wraith-like hands, nothing beats the GameCube controller. Sharp curves on the underside to allow my fingers space to curl around it, buttons placed so that combos are intuitive by touch alone, this controller is, in my opinion, the peak of controller-ness.

As per the usual summer activities, I will be attending ComicCon. The schedule has (finally) been released, and the time has come for me to parse through and find what it is I wish to peruse.

Thursday

• 10:30-11:30 Science Fiction That Will Change Your Life ]Room 8]
• 12:30-1:30 Richard Hatch: Battlestar Retrospective [Room 6A]
• 1:30-2:30 Avatars, Icons, and Antiheroes [Room 7AB]
• 3:30-4:30 Evolution of Fantasy [Room 3]
• 4:30-5:15 Terry Gilliam’s The Imaginarium of Dr Parnassus [Hall H]
• 8:00-10:00 Dr. Horrible’s Sing-along Blog [Room 6A]

Room 6A for Dr Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog? Fucking Room 6A? Seriously, ComicCon, didn’t you learn from last year when you had to open up THREE MORE ROOMS to accommodate everybody? And had to cancel the PANEL because there wasn’t ROOM? Just leave Ballroom 20 open, you will fill it, believe me.

Friday

• 10:30-11:30 Coraline [Room 6A]
• 3:45-5:00 Sony Pictures Entertainment: Legion and District 9 [Hall H]
• 4:45-5:45 The Mighty Boosh [Room 6A]
• 10:00p-Midnight Spike and Mike Double Feature [Room 6BCF]

And Coraline in 6A. Really, organizers. Do you want to piss people off? Guarantee that they will be turning people away for this panel.

Saturday

• 1:00-2:00 SteamPunk Meet-Up! [Room 24 A]
• 2:45-3:45 Sony Pictures: Zombieland and 2012 [Hall H]
• 3:30-4:30 Spotlight on Ray Bradbury [Room 6BCF]
• 3:30-4:30 SLG Publishing [Room 10]
• 6:00-7:15 Adult Swim Development: The Venture Bros. Panel [Room 6A]
• 8:30-12:15 Watchmen: Director’s Cut [Room 6BCF]

Sunday

• 3:00-4:00 Full-time Creative Work on a Part-time Schedule [32 AB]

Of course, there are overlapping times, and I probably won’t make it to everything I want to go to. But we shall see.

Photos here.

Day One - October 31

Spent the bulk of the evening around drinks with Shweta, Emily*, Jeff, and Ann*. Conversation was mainly of the speculative variety, from loved fiction to their Clarion experiences to politics, though we mostly grazed that latter topic with frustrated fists and let it be. I have not had a “Clarion Experience” myself, but I enjoyed being a fly on the wall for this one. And as long as I didn’t mention my lack of Clarion, I remained unnoticed by Emily and Shweta and their odd desire to see me go to Clarion.

It’s likely to not happen, though I appreciate the sentiment.

I tried to subtly snipe a photo of Nathaniel from Abney Park. Ninja I am not. He cornered me over whiskey and tea and we discussed everything and nothing.

Met a lovely group of people and drank Black Bush. The topic of the day for this and many conversations was how wonderful the steampunk community is. Which, truly, it is. But more on this later.

Met more lovely people who apparently were Platform One. Had a lovely discussion about music and general creativity, and did my best to explain steampunk to someone who demanded more punk and less steam. But our punk comes not from our willingness to destroy but our willingness to create and reclaim that which has been lost. We say no-thank-you to the society that demands we drink and party every night, that rampant and tawdry consumerism is a sign of being confident in one’s self, and that maybe, just maybe, sitting in your room with a soldering iron and a cup of tea is an okay way to spend your Saturday night.

Moreover, unlike regular punk, steampunk owns the fact that the visual aesthetic is a big part of the identity. But this is perhaps an essay topic for later.

Day Two - November 1

It took me a day, but I discovered the game Damnation, demo of which resided in the lobby just by the vittles stand. I spent far too much time here, waxing about this game. I, by history, am a gamer, and this is a good game. I’ll likely make a post exclusively about the game once it’s released. It’s got a steampunk look to it, though I can’t speak to the steampunk feel from the demo. It was standard shooter goodness, with a bit of magic powers, and some acrobatic platform-jumping. If you’re a fan of things like Resident Evil 4, Bioshock, or HalfLife, as far as gameplay goes, you might enjoy this one.

The VanderMeers held a panel, solo (duo?), though I believe they were supposed to have others with them. Which led to them interviewing one another, not having rehearsed the questions beforehand. The highlight of the whole thing was when Ann embarrassed the living hell out of Jeff. She opened the interview session with, and I’m paraphrasing: “Now, Jeff doesn’t know I’m about to say this, but we’ve done this before, asking one another interview questions. But we’ve always done it naked. So this will be the first time we interview one another with clothes on.” I’m not exactly certain, but I think Jeff turned purple at one point.

What I took away from that panel was the five awesome things of steampunk, which Ann claimed to have bogarted from someone else: one, it’s something the genders can share; two, fantastic visual aesthetic; three, it’s goth’s nicer cousin; four, it bridges the subgenre gaps; and five, it goes back to the “promise” of science, of a glorious future-that-could-be. The last could be another essay topic all on its own.

The VonSlatt keynote was wonderful, and I won’t do you the disservice of summarizing it. Instead, I’ll link it. I particularly enjoyed his discussing tinkering with respect to open source projects; I feel too many stare at a computer as a terrifying black box with a shaman inside, and I work to demystify the thing to my friends.

Then came the Party at the Center of the Earth. Mme Cavalaxis had the wonderful and decidedly drunken idea to dance. I followed, as did a few others. I decided our party was too small, and there were questing eyes in the audience, the longing look of, “I want to dance but none of the boys want to dance with me.” I pulled hands and we danced around the room until the floors were flooded.

Abney Park and Platform One put on good sets.

Day Three - November 2

My first event, after getting a Jamba and hiding the fact that my hair was in need of a deep cleansing, I went to a panel on Researching and Writing Steampunk, with Ryan Galiotto*, Gail Carriger, Mike Perschon, and Jeff VanderMeer, moderated by Ann VanderMeer. What I liked about the panel was the opening question, about entry points into steampunk. The answers varied from the clothing (Gail) to having a story idea and being told it’s steampunk (Mike) to comics (Ryan). It really does emphasize the all-inclusive nature of steampunk.

Gail did a very good, detailed writeup for this panel, over here.

So, that’s my redux of the con. Hope you enjoyed reading.

* If you have a link and spot this, let me know, so I can link you properly in the text.

Lad, I don’t know where you’ve been, but I see you’ve won first prize.

Gamers have one.

I can understand why. To the outsider, hearing the banter between two gamers heavily engrossed in CounterStrike or Soul Calibur can make us seem like a rather unwholesome lot.

I was tempted to give examples of said banter. But you know, I’ll spare you.

But when it comes down to it, many gamers are good people. In fact, some of the best people I know are hardcore gamers. And it’s not just a local thing.

In July, we posted about Zak Touilii, a disabled Australian teenager whose PS3 and games - donated by the Make A Wish foundation - had been stolen by thieves who broke into his home. Was a bastardly act. One which has in turn generated a very un-bastardly response: we’ve heard a bunch of Kotaku commenters got together, raised some money and presented Zak with a cheque for USD$425. Which should go a long way towards restocking Zak’s games library (Sony Aus having already replaced his PS3)

Things like this make me happy.

Suck on that, Jack Thompson.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sfkDxF2kn1I]

Link

An oldie but a goodie.

Druid Boy - Crank Dat

[youtube=http://youtube.com/watch?v=FdX8YwtLilw]

This will really only be funny if you’re a World of Warcraft veteran.

Look at his spell bar!

I know many who would chuckle at this video.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uGd1prlQCyY]

Not sure how many visit this page though.

But you can’t buy Thunderfury, Blessed Blade of the Windseeker.

Powerglove

In particular, check out their cover of Mortal Kombat. Not too shabby. Their Tetris is pretty driving, too.

(I’m trying to avoid folks like the Minibosses because, really, it’s kind of cheating. Those guys are so big as far as game music goes, they don’t really need my help.)

(But I guess I just linked them anyway, didn’t I?)

Shopping at Fry’s is a singular experience, and for those who have yet to live through it, consider yourselves blessed.

I have had many a poor encounter with its denizens, and far too few good ones to counterbalance.

Today’s encounter left my little gamer heart irritated.

I searched the aisles for three games which I still need to get: Zelda, Metroid, and Okami. I, as the little Nintendo nut that I am, have been derelict in my fannish duties. You’ll have to forgive me. I spent last year graduating university, leaving one shitty job to another shitty job, then leaving that shitty job for a great, but stressful, job. Let this one slide.

Also I play far too much World of Warcraft.

Zelda and Okami were both at full price, so I was curious to see what Metroid was marked at. Unable to find it, I approached the man in charge of the games department at Fry’s.

Man: Can I help you?

Me: I’m looking for a game. Metroid.

Man: Meh-troy-duh. Let me look it up.

I am, at this point, concerned by his slow pronunciation of the name. I understand it’s not “Halo” but still, Metroid is one of those games. Those games where if you know a sodding thing about gaming, you know the name. (Sure, people think Metroid is the name of the player in the suit — it’s not, she’s Samus Aran — and yes, she’s a she — but at the very least they know the name.)

Man: And how do you spell that?

Are you kidding me?

Me: M-E-T-R-O-I-D.

Man: What system is that for?

Are you frakin’ kidding me?

Me: It’s for the Wii.

Man: [typing] Wee Metroid

Me: Um.. It’s spelled W-I-I.

Man: Oh. Right.

Me: You know what? I’ll just go find it myself. Thanks.

And then he went on to tell my friend that the RGBHV cable would work for the A/V input. Yes, just plug one of the inputs to the video input. Pick a color. It’ll work.

Right.