The PlayStation 4 is Real

Aside from my raging disregard for freaking polygons, I'm kind of excited about the PlayStation 4.  Let me tell you why:

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I didn't know that I wanted to do this.  I didn't know myself to be a slightly vain person who wanted to instantly share their awesome(read: terrible) game play with the world, but I AM.  I can instantly stream my super awesome Mortal Kombat X: The Reckoning videos with everyone I know and then put it on Twitter?  I'm in, instantly(quite literally).

More exciting than the superficial "look what I can do" opportunities are what developers can do with this for  potential matchmaking opportunities.  Imagine a group of people watching a best of 3 fighting game or a 3 lap circuit waiting in the wings to take on the winner or top 3.  Granted, this is not so different from things available on PC, but the divide is getting narrower and I want to embrace it as it comes.

Download And Play?

Yes, yes, I know that this is a feature held by hundreds of PC games.  I understand that it isn't anything new, but it's such a great feature for a console generation that is guiding us slowly, but surely, to digital media.

Me: "Man, that game got great reviews and is right up my ally for style, I want to play it, NOW"

PS4: "Ok"

Me: "I'm not joking... NOW"

PS4: "Ok"

Simple, I know, but it's a world of difference for my time crunch.  Also: demos.  I hate waiting for Demos.  Now, I don't have to.

Getting Vita in the Game

I've had absolutely no reason to get a PS Vita.  None.  I don't regret not having one and I don't feel the need to get one... Until PlayStation 4 lets me play it's games on a Vita.  I've already sold my soul to Nintendo's Wii U(Also a decision I stand by), so why wouldn't I be excited for another system employing the same methodology and(for me) world changing control schemes.  Asymmetric game play is what I want all the time for now and forever.

What I Miss

PlayStation 2.  That's the last Sony game system I've owned and it was arguably the greatest game system I've owned.  I believe that Sony can deliver that again.  I believe that in their misguided search for poly-mega-flopagons, they create a sandbox for developers to make some of the most beautiful and rich games on the market.  I hope they do it again.

Am I upset that they don't have backwards compatibility right now? Yes.  Do I think that 90% of what was said during the announcement was graphical nonsense? Yes, but at the heart of the matter, this is a console on which some of my favorite medium's great games are going to be built.  I can't help but be excited for the prospect.  No matter my allegiance, I want great games.

There are other things to be excited about, but nothing rang true like these bullets did.  In the meantime, I have some Scribblenauts to play.  

ZombieU: When It Makes Me Start Again

If you haven't played ZombieU on Nintendo's Newest Console just yet, I really don't want to spoil anything, but try to not die.  This may seem like pretty obvious advice when it comes to video games and life in general, but this game is a little different.

When you play Call of Duty or Halo or Resident Evil or Gears of War of any number shooter/survival games, you die... a lot.  In fact, players die so much so that many of these games keep a running kill/death ratio as a mark for how good you are and the ratios are never high.  I don't play a lot of Call of Duty, but I don't think my Kill/Death is much higher than 0.  Then again, I'm awful at it.

In ZombieU, however.  My Ratio is much higher.  It isn't because I'm better at this shooter than others.  It isn't because the game is easier, though it does have a more forgiving learning curve than jumping into an online multiplayer match.  But the reason my K/D is so high in ZombieU, is that I'm afraid to die.

Wrap your head around that.  When were you ever afraid to die in an online shooter except for when your team is one kill from losing?  And even then, the kills happen so fast that it's hard to tell how many kills any team needs at any given time.  These other games are based on the desire to jump right back into the action after a death, essentially making death, not meaningless, but without punishment.

When I die in ZombieU(all 12 times), I start over with 6 bullets for my pistol and a cricket bat.  Yes, I can store up materials in a chest that carries over from survivor to survivor.  I can even hunt down my previous survivor(now zombie) and kill them to loot their body, but every time, I wake up on a bunk in my safe house with minimal supplies and even less hope.

I'd love to say that it gets easier.  But I'm 7 hours in and every time I get comfortable or confident, something awful goes wrong.  Sometimes the undead attack my safe house.  Other times I take a hasty step forward and find a room full of awoken, angry zombies.  Every decision I make has instant and very measurable consequences as the time survived, K/D, and other statistics fade from the screen after a death.

This game isn't for everyone and it's probably better for it.  I hope you give it a shot.  I hope you get to feel the same fear and panic I have felt.  Mostly, I hope you don't die.

Nintendo Land: What I Didn't Expect

When you pick up and play a Nintendo Mini-game compilation, you have certain expectations.  You think of playful versions of Nintendo's already playful franchises.  I imagine repetitive actions that must be performed at lightening speeds.  I remember always having four people in a room dying with laughter only to be screwed by some die roll or whim in the end.  These are the things that I expect.

This post is about what I didn't expect from Nintendo Land and why it impressed me.  We'll start from the top:

Single Player Experiences: If there is anything I don't expect to do with a Mini-game-fest is play alone. Historically the whole point is to encourage single couch multiplayer wrapped in a package of hilarity and fun.  Imagine playing Mario Party or Rayman Raving Rabbids by yourself.  You'd be competing with no one in a room with no one because the value is inherently tied to the multiplayer.  Nintendo Land on the other hand has 6 games, half of the games, that are single player only.  This strong emphasis is strange to see.  Did you ever sit around(or stand when appropriate) playing Wii Sports or Wii Play by yourself?  No, those games, once again, revolved around the multiplayer and barely offered the chance to play single player.

I think the part that really sold me though is that these single player offerings aren't bad.  In fact, some are even good!  While Takamaru's Ninja Castle and Captain Falcon's Twister Race bottom out my personal ratings, the rest of the options are not only worth checking out, but worth investing some time into.  Octopus Dance is a competent ape of Rhythm Heaven.  Yoshi's Cart is a puzzler that offers something I've never seen before in terms of translating from big to little screen.  Donkey Kong Crash Course is the kind of thing I can play for days, not unlike those labyrinth boxes or apps you can find on your phone.  Then Balloon Trip Breeze may be the best in the bunch in terms of replayability and fun.

Engage the Living Room:  All the single player experiences lead me into my next point of interest.  Historically, Nintendo has always been about same couch multiplayer and getting people of all ages and skill level into the games.  With Nintendo Land, they also seem to be giving those not in the game something to watch.  They're putting on a show.  Most of the mini games have an option to see the camera's image streaming the player's face from the game pad.  Even the single player games offer something to watch when I'm not playing.  I enjoy planning out the route for Yoshi's Cart and watching as the player's trail plays out.  People not playing the game, have a reason to watch and, for me at least, it's pretty engaging.

Replayability:  Once you figure out exactly the broken, awkward bowling swing that get's you the best scores, Wii Bowling looses it's luster.  Once the new wears off, Mini Games get returned to the used game shop.  This is where Nintendo Land borrowed a couple ideas from other major blockbusters, namely, unlockables.  As you play through the multiplayer and single player games within Nintendo Land, you will stumble across, find, and reveal all kinds of secrets including new maps and attractions.  While the "tutor" computer-thing is annoying and unable to be skipped, it does point out some really neat stuff wrapped up in this collection.  Essentially, Nintendo Land set out to make people want to play their silly little games again and again.  With me, it worked.

Nintendo Land doesn't reveal motion gaming to the masses like Wii Sports did.  It doesn't create a competitive yelling fest like early Mario Party's did.  It does, however, introduce the strengths of the game pad, asymmetric multiplayer(I'll spend some time on this later) and engage a watching audience like few games have tried before.  It does all this while being a really entertaining game with a lot of options.

And The Winner Is...

Me.

I'm the winner.  When Nintendo branches off and does their own thing, I am the beneficiary of the experiment.  I get to experience game types, styles and ideas of which I've only dreamed.  All because Nintendo refuses to do what the economy, strategists, and competitors tell them to do.

I've owned my WiiU for 4 days and only played 2 games on it and I'm already convinced that it is the system for me.  How can I possibly know this soon?  How are 2 games and several hours anywhere near enough time to make a judgement call on a system that, admittedly, has many bugs and kinks to work out in the coming months?  3 Words: New Gaming Experiences.

Lets take a look at what new things I've done on my WiiU in the last 4 days.

1. Local Multiplayer with a twist.  The Multiplayer suite of ZombieU is far from impressive.  5 Maps, 3 game modes and limited number of weapons with no customization should add up to a mediocre experience.  And the hook brings me back: Because of the separate handheld screen and asymmetric(different for 2 players playing the same game) style, I get to test the mettle of my nephew's first person shooter skills by throwing zombies of multiple types and styles at him in a poor-man's RTS manor.  I get to see him backing up into the strategically placed sleeper that will jump him when he gets close enough.  I get to take control of the survivor and let him throw zombies at me.  Simply put: I can't do this anywhere else.  Therefore, I will do it on my WiiU and laugh out loud every time my spitter covers my opponent in zombie-pus

2. A Sandbox I want to play in.  I've played Scribblenauts on the DS.  I played Super Scribblenauts on the DS, but now I've played Scribblenauts Unlimited on the WiiU and I can't go back.  The puzzles are entertaining and appropriately silly(Yes, this fireman can build a mech for you to fight off the zombie horde), but the strength is in the more, bigger, best mentality of these items.  Each item is liberated by the adjectives introduced in Super Scribblenauts, but now, I can take those items and make them my own.  I can literally make them my own.  I summon them to my item editor, change every characteristic imaginable, give it a new name and it is now mine, my own, my precious.  It is without a doubt the best item editor any console has ever seen.  I don't know why I would want a stick that grant's me invisibility and shoots grenades that don't explode, but that isn't the point.  The point is that I can make it and it's mine.

3.  Investing in the Community.  You won't find me on forums or comment sections or chat rooms about games.  This may be to my detriment.  I'm not much for the anonymity of the internet.  On the WiiU, however, I found myself commenting on people posts. I reached out to people asking for help.  I found people with similar thought processes and taste in games and I friended them out of the blue.  There is something about the way that Nintendo set out to integrate the Miiverse into the game experience and into the DNA of the WiiU itself that makes me want to contribute.  Add in the fact that their filtering software and community driven tools for reporting poor behavior not just work, but work well, and I'm in a community of gamers that I'm not ashamed to introduce my family to.  It's a brand new world of interaction for me in a gaming community.

4.  The Controller is Enough.  This is a silly, stupid,  mediocre feature that really shouldn't be mentioned, except for how amazing it is.  "Hey, can you turn that down?  We can hear those brains exploding in the kitchen!"  "Yeah, sure."  We've all had that conversation before, but now, turning down the volume requires no additional effort or searching for remotes or reaching for the "right" remote.  The WiiU Gamepad is the right remote, for the TV and cable box.  This isn't about me being lazy; this is about Nintendo wanting their console to be a part of every interaction the living room and I commend them for it.  No, this isn't some amazing new and crazy feature and no, it won't revolutionize gaming, but I love changing the input to the Blu Ray player for my wife when I want to make more hover tanks that shoot exploding sheep on my Gamepad.

The WiiU is far from perfect.  The load times between standard menu selections are a little ridiculous.  The friend system isn't quite as intuitive as it should be in Fall of 2012.  There isn't a "Halo" or "God of War" to drive sales yet.  There is, however, a strong pulse and piles of creativity in Nintendo's WiiU.

Pre Ordered

I pre ordered a Wii U.

This wasn't a surprise.  I meant to.  When I saw the tablet controller and HD graphics I wanted it sometime after launch. When they promised I could keep my Downloaded games from Wii Ware and Virtual Console, I was ready to line up.  When they said I could play New Super Mario Bros. U on the tablet by itself while other people do unimportant things on the television, I started saving my money.

Thanks Nintendo

Then Nintendo Direct happened.  I was already on Nintendo's side, what more could they offer to the guy who just wanted to give them my money already?

Well, I'll tell you... and what they gave me wasn't all directly from Nintendo...

I reach the counter, tell the owner that I want to pre order the Wii U.  He then hands me two lists: one, a list of hardware that can be pre ordered and then a list of games that can be pre ordered.  He looked down at them and he stops me: "Wait, I need to print the updated copies."

It was in this moment that I saw the entire, announced, launch game list.  There were some twenty five to thirty games here.  New Super Mario Bros. U, Scribblenauts, ZombieU, Aliens: Colonial Marines, The Wonderful 101 and on.  There were some third party cash grabs in there, but when isn't there?  There were some ports of Xbox and PlayStation games, but who cares?  I think back to the Wii's launch and I'm suddenly jealous in the past of my future self while I waited in line waiting for the Wii to get the console and my copy of The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess; only Twilight Princess...  This time, when I wait in line for a Nintendo Console, I won't have to be getting one game... I can get several.

The third party support of Wii U is outstanding so far.  Granted, I haven't gotten my hands on any of these things, but it's there.  People are showing up with games for a system that a lot of people have written off.  Oh, and I get a Mario game at launch...

Besides launch titles, the online integration at Nintendo Direct, stunned me.  I expected Hulu and Netflix, but Amazon and TiVo?  IMDB and Rotten Tomatoes?  Interactive quizzes during shows?  Friend's shared playlists to look over for ideas on what to watch?  Sports score updates?  What is happening?  Suddenly the dream to have Nintendo's little white box as the center of living room entertainment isn't so crazy, but it's the Wii U... not the Wii.

Then, as if it was thrown in, Nintendo mentions briefly that pretty much all memory solutions are supported by the Wii U.  Not as a stylistic choice, but because memory is getting cheaper and they want to offer us an option.  Then they tease Bayonetta 2, exclusively.  Then they seal the deal: $300 for white, $350 for black and a hard drive.

I get an email within minutes of the conference ending: "Gamestop is now accepting pre orders for the Wii U"... yeah they are...

A Tale of Two Purposes: Skyward Sword and Skyrim

I’m playing through two game simultaneously right now, The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim and The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword.  First a closer look at what those two titles are about, just so I don’t ramble on and lose those that have no idea what those games are.  

The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim, I’ll refer to it as Skyrim from here on out, is a fantasy Western RPG.  All that means is that you assume the role of a character and play through the game as that character.(RPG =  Role Playing Game)  This genre was once a very narrow description of games, today, RPG’s cannot be defined in a thousand words because of their variety and evolution.  So I’ll just say that Skyrim is a game where anything within the game’s universe is possible.  

It is set in a world of knights, kings, assassination, magic, demons, dragons, elves, orcs and anything else Tolkien has ever written about.  It isn’t based off of Tolkien by any means, but is certainly derived from the basis of fantasy that he set years ago.  You enter the world as a supposed criminal crossing the border into the land of Skyrim.

The game is a sequel(the fifth in a line of games) that explore this world and lore created years ago.  The way you play is completely up to you.  You can be a sneak-thief, you can be a mage, you can be a knight, you can be a conjurer that raises the dead to your defense, you can be a blacksmith, you can be an assassin: literally anything you want to, as long as it fits into the universe at hand, you can do.  You don’t even have to play the story, the world itself is filled with content outside of the story that actually drives the game.

The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword, which I’ll refer to as Skyward Sword, is also a fantasy RPG, but it is pretty obviously eastern.(you’d have to see the game to understand, but just accept that if you were to play it, you would see imagery and lines of dialogue that make no sense to a western population, but within the eastern canon, make perfect sense i.e. cats with giant ears that fly)

Skyward Sword lacks everything open and free that Skyrim embraces.  There are a few side stories, but they are all fluff to the main event.  Within Skyward Sword, you will play as Link and Link will be the same person no matter who plays him.  He has a destiny and must complete his destiny to save the world and, in this case, his girl, Zelda.  Instead of a fully realized world with options and choices, it is much more linear, more like reading a book.

These two games represent a very interesting crux in the world of gaming right now.  They are both single player games(as opposed to multiplayer games where you play with other people) and they are both RPG’s, but they are as different as Pac-Man and Street Fighter.  The crux is this: are games better when they allow for choice and freedom or are they better when they tell a linear story and limit the freedom of the player.  Most people I know, or more specifically, most of the people I talk to about games, prefer the freedom of Skyrim.  

I’ve put about 20 hours into Skyrim and I’ve spent, literally, as little time as possible on the story, and I’ve enjoyed every minute of it.  I’ve killed dragons, forged armor or all kinds of types and styles, I’ve destroyed necromancer dungeons that were threatening small towns, but I have no idea what is happening in the story, meaning, there is little to no weight on the quests I’m involved in.  Bad things happen when I fail, but the world moves on.  

There is weight in the story.  On the other hand, in Skyward Sword, I’ve played through just over half of the story and have enjoyed every minute of it.  Each part of the world is filled with puzzles and tasks for me to overcome in order to find my childhood friend and love of my life, Zelda.  She was kidnapped and I have to find her.  There are temples where I find tools to help me in my quest and Zelda is persistently kept out of reach as I move forward.  The character of Link has shifted.  I once was looked down upon as just a boy, but now, I’ve proved myself as the hero, chosen by the gods and I am on a mission.  There is a strong cinematic story that arcs through this game.

The most interesting thing that I find between these two experiences is that I kind of wish they were combined:  Skyward Sword employs awesome motion controls that mimic my sword strikes exactly, the combat and story are some of the best I’ve ever experienced in game, but the world is narrow and limited when I compare it to Skyrim.  Skyrim is wonderfully realized a world.  You can literally get lost in this sixteen digital square miles and just live as a hunter-scavenger in the woods and mountains, but the story is less compelling and less important because of the huge world it is in.  The button pushing combat is weak when compared to Skyward Sword.

The beauty is that both are phenomenal, but they address different drives within my mind: open freedom vs concise storytelling.

Battlefield 3 and the Perils of an Open Beta

I am of the opinion that public or at least a large private multiplayer beta testing is border line required for the successful launch of a multiplayer game.  Now the definition of a successful launch is far from objective, but to me a successful launch does not include heavy tweaking to balance issues, reworking crashed servers, and a host of launch bugs that make the online experience more trouble than it is worth.  The high traffic with a huge cross section of people playing in public betas is a great opportunity for developers to learn and tweak before a games launch.

The Battlefield 3 Beta has been supremely effective at nailing down the necessary data for their designated servers.  What it hasn't done so well is advertise for the upcoming blockbuster.  I get the feeling from the blazing internet that people are unhappy with the performance issues in the Battlefield 3 Beta.  That may have been an understatement.  I've read about 10 blogs and articles concerning the issues(graphics, glitches, and host connection issues) and most of them seem to think that the upcoming entry into an established franchise is going to be complete rubbish based on this beta.  People are citing cancelled pre-orders and disappearing vehicles as proof that this game doesn't have what it takes to be a great game.

I'm not quite as militant, mainly because I didn't experience the same issues.  I played for about 4 hours and was booted from a game once, and never experienced any of the vehicle glitches.  The graphics were obviously rough around the edges(the character models weren't as crisp as I've seen in preview videos and there were some textures that popped in a little late, nothing life altering) and some of the animations seemed a little twitchy.  On the whole, however, I really enjoyed my time with Battlefield 3.  Rush Mode was as compelling as always, the ebb and flow of combat as attackers gained ground or the defenders pushed back felt good, and, even though I was on an XBox 360, I enjoyed the number of players in the matches.  I'd be lying if I said I didn't miss the much larger battles of the PC arena, but my PC was occupied at the time so I'll take what I can get.

There was a time that if a game was plagued with issues at release, it was dead in the water, but now with patches and updates, a lot of issues can be solved post release.  I don't think that this is a bad thing.  I'm glad that developers have the opportunity to rectify issues with their games post release, but it is a little irritating when the first impression isn't up to par and patches take time to prepare and release.  During that time, I just spent money on a product that is far from satisfactory.

I'm glad that DICE decided to run the beta.  This gives them the chance to prepare their servers, maybe tweak a little balance, and iron out any bugs that occur when their systems are stressed by high levels of traffic.  I would rather a developer let me try their game for free to help them solve issues than to fix them post launch, post payment received.  At the same time, I hate the bad press Battlefield 3 is getting because they gave us a free opportunity to try their game.