The Great World of Warcraft Experiment

I’m going to try an experiment.  It’s not scientific, and it will not be done with any great attention to detail, but it’s one about which I am curious.

I’ve been telling people for quite a long time that, at this stage, if you don’t know anybody in real life who plays World of Warcraft, there is really no need to pick it up.  The reason being that the game has been around long enough to be its own creature; each server is its own island, each guild a community.  Relationships have been solidified long ago, and only flesh-and-blood friends of those already playing tend to be the new players coming in.  If you don’t have an in, somebody who can get you into a good guild and help you catch up to everybody else so that you can justify the purchase of the game, then there is no real need to even give it a try.  Save your $15 a month; spend it on more games or comics or books.

But then again, there always seems to be a new guild recruiting in Stormwind whenever I log on.  Always.  So could there be a place for new gamers in this microcosmic world?  If I was a lonely man with no true friends that I see every day, could I find a social scene to call my own in this game?

I’ll never be able to re-capture being a brand new player again; I’ve been playing this game for a while now.  But I can emulate making a fresh start.  I’ll be rolling a Horde character on a new server, one on which I have never played, and see how it goes.  I’m going to be friendly and open; I’m going to approach players politely should I need help with a quest, and see if–at this point in the game’s life–if it’s possible to build the digital-only relationships that I’m sure helped the game grown in its infancy.

I won’t be playing this toon exclusively; I am part of a great guild on Kilrogg that is Alliance, and I have both a level 57 Rogue and a level 62 Death Knight on that server (as of this time of this writing), but I will be playing this character regularly.

I’ll be writing about how it goes.

Know The Witcher before he was a video game star.

You may remember that I had a brief bout of UNBRIDLED FRUSTRATION with The Witcher a few months back.   I’ve recently dove back into it (dialing down the difficulty because my blood pressure is high enough, thanks) and have found it a pleasing experience.  While I’ve gotten to the point that I can’t stand a linear RPG (sandbox game play FTW), I still find this game fun: it is odd how the “RPG effect” has come full circle.  Action games snuck RPG elements into their structure, and now RPGs are more fast-paced and exciting than ever.

It is sad that due to some questionable business practices, The Witcher will not be coming to consoles; good thing I got it for PC when I did.  But if you are a console-only gamer (or if you are a Mac only computer person), then you can still experience thedelight of this game in convenient book form.

You see, Geralt of Rivia (the titular Witcher) was the main character of a short story series written by Polish author Andrzej Sapkowski.  His first span of stories starring Geralt are collected in the book The Last Wish.  If you live in Poland, you can read all of his stories and the few novels he has written; if you live here in the States, you should be able to find and English translation of The Last Wish and the follow-up novel Blood of Elves at your local book store.

I love short story collections, and The Last Wish is among the best I’ve read.  Framed by the story of the atheistic Geralt recovering from a terrible battle wound at a nunnery, the tales of Geralt’s travel are gritty and real while being full of humor and humanity.  My only fault with the book is literally stylistic; there is no table of contents.  While, unlike most modern short story collections, this one should be read straight through, it would be nice to be able to revisit my favorites without having to flip through the pages.

And what are my favorites?  While I love them all, “A Question of Price” reads like one of my other favorite short stories, Robert Howard’s “The God in the Bowl.”  It has a much happier though just as satisfying ending, and it plays directly into the novel Blood of Elves.  The titular short, “The Last Wish,” has a well-orchestrated plot twist; it is one of my favorite short stories overall, not just of Sapkowski’s.

I’m reading Blood of Elves now, and it is a proper novel.  So far so good, though I prefer The Last Wish.  I can’t argue with the novel’s pace though: it’s smooth and logical.

If you have played and loved The Witcher PC game, do please give these books a try.  If you can’t buy them, check with your local library.  I’m sure they would love to do an interlibrary loan for you if they don’t have them right there on the shelf.  You won’t regret having read them, and your appreciation of the game and its characters will be much deeper and richer.  In case you were wondering, the story that the game tells is set after the events of the stories/novels and exists independent of them, so either way you’re getting a fresh narrative unhindered by obligations to another source.

Chain Rxn: The video game you’ll want to cook in a spoon.

Facebook users have access to an awesome game that a hardcore/core/serious (whatever label you want to use so long as it is not “casual”) gamer likes way more than he should: Chain Rxn.

It’s a very simple concept executed with such beauty it might just make you cry: you are presented with a board across which several colored balls bounce.  You can place one “bomb” on the board, which blossoms into a circle.  Any ball touching the circle blossoms out likewise.  In order to advance to the next board, you must catch a minimum number of balls in the resulting chain reaction.  Blossoms/blast radii/circles, whatever you want to call them, disappear after a few seconds, so you need constant chain reactions to stay alive and move on.  You get a score multiplier when you catch enough balls in said chain reaction, resulting in some pretty massive scores.  There are universal leaderboards, and you can also see how you stack up against your friends.

I’m calling it right now: it’s better than Peggle.

While Peggle is like peanut-butter-coated meth, there is one advantage that Chain Rxn has: a not-so-lopsided skill-to-luck ratio.  There is still a high degree of chance in Chain Rxn, but it calls for more careful observation of the board and planned execution.  You have to time the placing of your bomb just right so as to catch as many balls in the resulting blast radius as possible, with chains blossoming all out around the initial bloom for maximum effect.

You can try a stage as many times as you need to, but there are only twelve stages.  I can see this game expanding, adding more elements to the game.  In short, I hope that the developer Zwigglers brings us a full-featured version of Chain Rxn for Nintendo DS (I don’t see it being much fun on XBLA, and it’s perfect for the short session gaming that I do on the run).

And So It Begins: My Dungeons and Dragons career is underway.

Today (or rather, I suppose at this hour, yesterday), I had my first Dungeons and Dragons session.  It was only me, my Dungeon Master (DM), a single dungeon tile from the starter game, the dice, and the rulebooks.  It was brief–a single encoutner with only two goblins–but my was it fun.

I’m proud to say that I used a character I made myself, and not a sample character from the starter game.  I spent a good three hours toiling over the Player’s Handbook, making first a rogue and then a ranger.  I chose Human as the class because I found it to be most versatile and have the best starting powers and abilities.  If my video game habits are anything to go by, I’m sure I’ll be making and playing several characters.  I also plan on doing some DM’ing as well, one day.

It felt good to actually use my hands and some real math skills to do things like swing a sword, as opposed to just pressing a button.  It felt more like I was really doing it, like I was actually there.  It also felt good to use the game to tell a story (as opposed to the game having a story through which I just kind of waded).  Just in case you’re curious, my character “Longstrides” Quinn McCree, a human orphan adopted by a kind dwarf, who had grown up amongst the stout and sturdy race (and thus shares their intense love of good food, good ale, and good company–as well as their ferocity in the fight) and was the friend of many elves who lived in a village near to his childhood home (and learned from them the bow and a love of nature), was given a job by his uncle, an innkeeper: go into the basement of the inn and get rid of whatever is scratching about down there.

Well, he did.  We made a few errors, but considering my DM only had three hours to prepare (while at work, no less) and we only had 30 minutes to play I think we did quite well.

Part of the fun (some might say that all of the fun) of D&D comes from the creative aspect: developing a backstory for your character, fleshing out his/her personality, speaking in character while at the table.  I’m inclined to agree.  I plan on writing out Longstrides’ story this weekend, what brought him to that inn where he meets his fellow adventurers.

There is another creative aspect as well, one born of invention.  I’m fine with spending money on rulebooks, power cards, dice, and a sweet DM screen.  However, considering that conceiveably we could be running multiple games at once (this whole thing is part of our Play Me a Story campaign at Wayne County Public Library), I’m not keen on buying dungeon tiles and miniatures for every character and monster.  So it seems that some hands-on projects making our own miniatures and tiles is in order.  Somehow, I think that will make it even more fun and personal (and a better teaching opportunity for our kids).

Star Wars: The Old Republic–The trailer that will make you weep for joy like a broken and humbled man.

I don’t care that it doesn’t show any game play.  I don’t care that it uses tired slow-down/speed-up tricks.  I don’t care that there is no release date for this game.  All I care is that it’s on the horizon, and there is no way that it will be anything but pure sweet nuggets of joy.  This game is going to be like bacon-wrapped Twinkies–dipped in chocolate.

Seriously, the Star Wars faithful have had to go through a lot this past decade.  It’s time we had something to shine over.

Microsoft E3 Keynote

For us video gamers, E3 is like a sports draft, election night, and a hot date all rolled into one.  Massive amounts of speculation to be confirmed or denied (in real time, thanks to the Internet: you crazy kids who never had to wait for your EGM features don’t know how good it is nowadays), a few surprises, and–if all goes right–a great feeling when it’s all over with.

Microsoft popped out their keynote today, and I’ve got to say that my previous “meh” attitude about the rest of the year has reached nearly debilitating amounts of joy.  It’s gonna be a good twelve months for 360 and PC gamers.

Now, I’m not going to pretend that I was there.  I would have love to have been there, but I’m not there.  I’m not a well-traveled video game journalist.  I’m just a fat dude with a laptop and a reliable Interent connection.  So if you want professional, in-depth coverage and commentary, check out Kotaku and Joystiq.

If you want my opinion on the big news items from today, read below.

• Halo: Reach is indeed in the works. Microsoft rolled out a teaser that would make Michael Bay stand up and clap, and it ended with a Spartan saying “We’re not going anywhere.”  The Halo games may be the finest recruitment tool that the US military never realized it had.  The trailer implies that Spartans, not Marines or ODST, will be the main player-characters, and I am using the pluarl because I see this as a squad-based shooter.  Maybe even third-person.  After all, also revealed was the “Firefight” mode for Halo 3: ODST (think Horde mode), and 3rd-person shooter Gears of War did kinda-sorta steal the thunder of the Halo series.  If this game ends up being a 3rd-person tactical shooter, remember: you heard it here first folks.
• Star Wars: The Old Republic will have full-voice acting. I’m cool with this, so long as you can skip the dialogue and get to the freakin’ quest.  In even bigger news, the first cinematic trailer is out and it is beautiful–really beautiful.  This is what the prequel trilogy should have been, but no: we’ve got Jar Jar Binks and Darth Vader giving a slack-jawed “Noooo!!!” at the end of it all.  I will be picking this game up, and if any game can kill WoW it is this one.  I don’t think it will, due to economics of both time and money (that’s a whole new post), but last time I checked there are more people who don’t play WoW than do; this game could bring in those who would have never picked up an MMO otherwise.
• Summer of Arcade is back, or: more reasons to stay broke. Marvel vs. Capcom 2 and a re-imagined TMNT: Turtles in Time won’t be hard sells.  Shadow Complex from Epic Games looks pretty sweet, for Contra fans, but it damn sure better have co-op.
• Metal Gear Solid: Rising is coming to the Xbox 360. Awesome.  Five hours of cut scenes punctuated by a few seconds of game play here and there.  I loved every part of Metal Gear Solid 3 except for the cinemas and the original Metal Gear Solid truly captured my imagination, but am I the only person in the world who thinks that Metal Gear Solid 2 was the world’s biggest vanity project?  Am I also the only person in the world who has not played Metal Gear Solid 4–and is perfectly fine with it?  In short: life was fine without a new Metal Gear Solid, life will continue to be fine.  Doesn’t mean I won’t buy it, doesn’t mean I will.
• Ozzy Osbourne is in Brutal Legend. \m/
• Project Natal is going to eliminate the need for the controller…supposedly. I’m sure this will be awesome for at first, but I see too much potential for gimmickry.  That, and so many games require complex body motions: can you imagine playing Gears of War with your body?  Yeah, I’d have a coronary.  Peter Molyneaux, who gave us the Fable series, is involved so we’ll have at least one innovative game, but I see this quickly becoming Wii Remote for the 360.
• Left 4 Dead 2 will be released this year. Too soon.  Way, way too soon.  It will apparently bring lots of cool stuff to the table–more melee weapons and an advanced AI Director–but Valve, would it have hurt you to sit on this thing for a year so I’d feel like I had gotten my money’s worth from buying the first game?  Are times that tough?  Oh, and this game will be set in the South.  Get your stereotypes ready, boys!  EE-HAW!  Break out the Beam and put your arm ’round your cousin’s waist–we gwine to a shindig!
• Nintendo continues to betray its once longtime fans and focus entirely on bringing in new gamers who may or may not stick with the hobby. Okay, we don’t know that for sure.  Their keynote is later this week.  I’m pretty sure I’m right however.  I’ll bet this year they’ll announce Wii Music 2: this time, all you do is put the disc in the machine and dance.  It’s like a CD player with Miis!  What fun!

Halo: Reach in the works?

So some Internet treasure hunter unearthed shaky proof that Bungie is working on a game called Halo: Reach.

Right now, it’s purely conjecture.  After all, Bungie has said that Halo 3: ODST will be the last Halo game, but if there is anything that George Lucas has taught us it’s that there is no such thing as a dead horse.  Case in point: old school Star Wars fans facepalm over this new…thing…masquerading as Star Wars (the Clone Wars animated series), but eight-year-olds the world over are eating it up.  The core base of a franchise might get burned out from over-saturation and relentless marketing, but there will always be a new fan base.  In other words, Halo 3: ODST is far from the final Halo game.

So if Halo: Reach is to see the light of day, what kind of game could it be?  I’m rooting for something similar to ODST, a game in which the Master Chief is not the main character.  Don’t get me wrong: I love this character, and find him much more iconic and interesting than Gordon “Determind Silence” Freeman, but his story has been told.  True, the original Halo trilogy only told of his involvement in the later stages of the Human-Covenant War, but the novel The Fall of Reach (really good by the way; give it a read) told his entire origin, detailing every major event in his life up until that fateful moment when the Pillar of Autumn exits slipspace right in front of Installation 04.

I would find Halo: Reach a far more interesting game if it told the story of what happened on the ground in the Battle of Reach.  This would be a perfect set-up for a squad-based shooter where you play as a UNSC Marine.  Imagine Call of Duty 4 set in the Halo universe and you’ve got an idea of what I am speaking.

No matter what Bungie does, I’m sure it will be pretty cool.  The Halo trilogy was very well executed, even if the developers did work largely under the “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it” mentality.

ALA/Verizon Libraries, Literacy, and Gaming Grant: A Winner Are We!

About a month ago, the American Library Association (ALA), in partnership with Verizon, named the winners of the Libraries, Literacy, and Gaming grant.  Out of 390 applicants, 10 libraries were chosen to receive $5,000 to create programs that will use games (video or otherwise) to help kids and teens learn how to use technology, think critically and creatively, and explore concepts in a hands-on manner.

I am proud to say that Wayne County Public Library, my employer, was one of the 10 libraries.  I am equally proud to say that I was the primary author of the grant proposal and will serve as Project Coordinator on our grant-funded project: Play Me a Story, a series of programs that use games as a springboard for creating narratives.

It’s going to be a great year for libraries as the ten grant winners implement their programs.  It’s also going to be a great year for gamers.  With libraries embracing games as a way to teach, the non-gaming public will (hopefully) begin to appreciate video games as something more than a recreational pursuit, and will see the educational value of good, old-fashioned play.

I want to thank the great team I have to work with at Wayne County Public Library (names withheld because I don’t have their permission and it’s way too late to call them) and the great experts giving us their advice and guidance throughout this initiative (WARNING–SHAMELESS NAME-CHECK: Beth Gallaway, Dale Lipschultz, Eli Neiburger, Scott Nicholson, plus a bunch of others).  I want to give a special wave to my friend and guild leader  Liz Danforth.

By the way, let me say again: 10 winners out of 390 applicants.  Pretty freakin’ mind-blowing.  It’s like going through Left 4 Dead on Expert without dying.

X-Men Origins: Wolverine is gloriously violent.

“Visceral” is one of the most overused adjectives in video game criticism.  I hesitate to use it when speaking of games; it’s a very powerful word, and the overuse of it demeans it.  It should only be used when absolutely necessary.

X-Men Origins: Wolverine is the most visceral video game experience you will have this year.

Forget the abomination that was the movie; while following the same disgraceful storyline, this game does far more in delivering the penultimate Wolverine experience.  Within the first five minutes of the game proper (an unskippable…insert gamer rage here…and lengthy cut scene serves as an introduction), you will guide Wolverine to sever the limbs off of no less than ten enemies or so, leap across a jungle chasm–claws first, of course–at a gun-wielding foot soldier, leap off of another cliff–claws first–into a pack of bad guys, throw a few poor souls off of a mountainside, and then leap on to a helicopter to pull the pilot out of his driver’s seat and make creative use of the rotor as the instrument of his terrible, sickening doom.

Do not let Focus on the Family get a hold on this game; we’ll never play anything but Wii Music for the rest of our lives.

Wolverine the game–unlike Wolverine the movie–is, needless to say, visually stunning and relentlessly brutal.  Wolverine’s famed healing factor is given the full, real-world treatment in that flecks of skin and muscle chip away with every gun shot or machete slice, slowly revealing the skeleton and vital organs underneath.  If one can avoid taking damage long enough, Wolverine’s health will regenerate–and his body will grow back in real time.  The effect is at once sickening and beautiful–sickening in that one moment Wolverine is a ghoulish figure of pain who unnaturally becomes whole again right before your eyes, beautiful in that for once gamers can rip loose and take risks that were never afforded them in God of War, Devil May Cry, or Ninja Gaiden (much like Master Chief’s recharging shields allowed for FPS gamers to engage in more heroic deeds once Halo came along).

The combat is also far more primal, far less restrained, than most other video games.  While Wolverine does have defensive tactics, they serve very specific functions and/or are simply there to give variety to the game play; most of the time a flurry of slashes and stabs will work just fine.  His primary attack–the one you will be using whenever possible, even if another strategy presents itself–is the lunge, a space-clearing leap that would look just as natural executed by a wolf or a tiger.  It has Wolverine digging his claws into an enemy’s lungs and following up with any number of finishers.  What I find especially satisfying about this technique is that it is so elegantly integrated into the level design; you are forced to use it at times, but it always feels natural (boarding a heavily fortified enemy vehicle for instance).

While Wolverine may heal, however, his enemies do not.  Arcing globules of blood splatter across the screen and the limbs of fallen enemies fly around like so much debris.  Wolverine’s fatality-like quick kills are far more intense than anything Kratos could ever dream up: evisceration, decapitation, tearing (not cutting–tearing) victims in half, using an own enemies arm iron-clad arm against him, and a curb stomp that would make Marcus Fenix soil his power armor are all part of Wolverine’s repertoire of hurt.

Be warned however: if you are not an action junkie then this game will get real old, real quick.  Even for those who love action games, it’s best enjoyed in short sessions, as that helps keep the experience alive (I stopped tonight’s session only about an hour or two).   While the presentation is pure sadistic euphoria, the mechanics are pure copy-and-paste from every action game since the original Devil May Cry–right down to the non-intrusive but not-really-necessary leveling system that allows the gamer to create their own idealized version of Wolverine.  It doesn’t help that there is little variety in the enemies–especially the mini-bosses that pop up exactly when you don’t want them to.

A few glitches have hindered my experience a bit thus far, the narrative is told as flashbacks within a flashback, and the light puzzle solving here and there is almost absurd in its implementation.  Quite frankly, this game is actually rather mediocre, all things considered.  It could have easily been not even as interesting as Wolverine’s Revenge from 2003, a game I rather enjoyed that nobody else seemed to.  What wins it over into the A-class of games is it adrenaline-pumping combat that never lets up and never compromises.  It doesn’t take itself too seriously, yet it doesn’t mock the source material either (in fact, with it primarily being based on the movie, it even does the job of its source material better than the material itself).

Play X-Men Origins: Wolverine.  Try it as a weekend rental.  Its graphic and disturbing and not for the weak of sensibility, but its also a great example of how a game can play it safe while still feeling fresh at the same time.  It’s like ordering the same sandwich for lunch every day, and then one day a new chef takes over and makes that sandwich with just a little extra something you can’t quite put your finger on, but it makes that sandwich taste extra delicious.

Of course, were Wolverine your new chef, that extra ingredient would probably be the grisseled shoulder of the old chef, who is screaming on the floor in the kitchen.

Half-Life: Ten years later, it’s still revolutionary.

I never had a computer capable of running Half-Life back in the day, so of course it was one of the first games I intended to play when I built my new gaming rig.  Played it I did; for a solid week it was my world.  No other game existed save for this one.  Having finished it, and having taken the time to let the experience truly sink in, I can say without a doubt that this is truly one of the greatest video games ever made and even (one could say especially) at a decade old it’s fertile ground for those looking for innovative game design.

Of course, the game has its problem.  If you ever use the phrase “On Rails” around me, I will no doubt clinch my fists and narrow my eyes in anger.  That level is the most horrendously off-balanced stretch of game play I have ever experienced.  Chock full of artificial difficulty, this level is one that I can imagine many gamers just gave up on and walked away from; I was close to doing so myself.

I didn’t however, and I found many moments of sheer joy–punctuated by the same absurd difficulty at the most inopportune times–and genuine excitement that I had not felt since (and for those who played the game upon release, would not feel until) the original God of War.

Half-Life plays like an action movie.  The narrative starts out with a ho-hum commute to work for Gordon Freeman, everybody’s favorite ass-kicking theoretical physicist (more on the plausibility of “ass-kicking” being an appropriate description for a theoretical physicist later).  There is a sense of dread in it all, and sure enough it’s not long before something goes horribly, terribly wrong.

What follows later is hours upon hours of highly tactical gun fights, feats of incredible agility and athleticism, nerve-grating moments of suspense, and the giddiness that comes with picking up weapons of mass destruction.  It’s every Jerry Bruckheimer production you’ve ever seen condensed into a video game; a video game with seamless flow (no true cut scenes here) and logical level design.

Unfortunately, the cinematic design also results in some very cheap shots on the gamer.  More often than not, you’ll find yourself falling out of a ventilation shaft or on the wrong end of an explosion that you had no choice but to endure.  Challenging combat and tests-of-reflex are one thing; robbing me of 30 health points just because it looked cool is another.  Theformer gives depth and complexity to a game and the latter creates needless challenge.

While generally well-paced, Half-Life does seem to drag in a few areas.  While never quite as needlessly extended as say, Halo, it does prolong the satisfaction of a win when it seems as if the gamer has already earned the right to claim victory.  The first half of the last four stages really could have been cut.

All in all, however, my faults with the game play is a result of my preferences, not any glaring flaws.  Be it 2009 or 1998, Half-Life is a work of genius.  Portal remains Valve’s true masterpiece, but Half-Life is certainly something of which they should always be proud.

Except for the narrative elements of it.

Seriously, a theoretical physicist with no established military training is able to carry an entire arsenal on his back and can lay waste to entire squadrons of US Marines?  I know that if you go looking for realism in video games you’re setting yourself up for disappointment, but could we at least establish that maybe Gordon Freeman has a military background?  I’m sure we could, but we know next to nothing of Freeman.  He never speaks, never shows his face in-game, and all we know about him is his age and alma mater.  Every other character is equally thin (full disclosure: I have started playing Half-Life 2 and so far, it has a much deeper narrative and more fleshed-out characters) and the story is standard survival-film fare.  It’s only at the very end that things get interesting (and I do mean the very end).

Don’t get me wrong, I believe that games should be games first and narrative devices second, and Half-Life is a nearly flawless game.  I was just expecting more narrative from a game heralded for its story.  As it is, the story of Half-Life is more interesting for its possibility, for the things that aren’t discussed but you can see working behind the scenes,  than for its actual execution.

Make no mistake though: I hold Half-Life as a classic and I highly recommend that anybody who has never played it download it from Steam right now.  While sometimes more of a test of patience and perseverance than actual skill, it is a lesson in level and puzzle design while still offering up combat that rivals that found in any recent shooter.  You’ll have a good time, when all is said and done, and you won’t look like a fool anymore at video game conventions.