EDITORIAL: What type of gamer are you?

Now when I ask that question, I don’t mean male/25-30/married or whatever. I mean, what kind of games do you primarily play? Because I find it to be an ever evolving process; one I’m currently in the middle of. I’ve recently thought that I was in a bout of something most gamers have at some point; that is, gaming apathy. But that’s not really true. I’m playing the same amount of games as I always have, but it’s just the games have changed. And so have I.

Not that long ago, I was primarily a multiplayer gamer. Now? I can barely work up the enthusiasm to hit ‘start matchmaking.’ Time was I would have enjoyed nothing more than a Friday night in, plonked in front of the TV, beer in hand, playing whatever the newest game out was with my friends, starting around 9 and continuing, more often than not, long into the wee small hours of the morning. It was great fun, and I remember it fondly but these days it’s a Herculean effort to get a bunch of us together to play online (which nicely, makes it slightly more of an event than it would have been normally when it does happen). But this isn’t necessarily a trend that affects all gamers, perhaps just those of a certain age, because one look at the figures for Xbox Live online play shows you that a ridiculous amount of people are still happily shooting each other in the face every hour of every day. But I’m willing to bet that at least 80% of those huge figures are all 11-16 year olds.

You see recently, and maybe this is simply a getting older thing, I’ve come to expect a lot more from my time spent gaming. I want to be invested, I want to be entertained, and I want to be excited. What I don’t want is to be constantly annoyed that I’m having a bad game, and worrying about my K/D ratio (and also getting destroyed by 12 year old American kids). I want to feel like I’m actually progressing rather than simply upping my kill count and you can only get that from the campaign element of gaming. A worrying trend recently in quite a few shooters has been that the multiplayer option is actually the primary choice on the menu screen; this should never be the case in my opinion. In fact, DICE’s Battlefield 3 from last year actually has disc 1 dedicated to multiplayer, while the campaign part of the game is relegated to the second disc, almost like it’s an afterthought. Don’t get me wrong, there’s nothing wrong with online multiplayer (aside from the seemingly thousands of racist, misogynistic, homophobic people)

You see, I love campaigns. I love a good story to play through. I don’t have the time or the patience anymore to sit online and shoot people in the face ad infinitum; I want to enjoy the story the game has laid out for me. I feel it’s my duty to play what the developers put time and effort into. I’m probably the easiest gamer to cater for as I love a good linear campaign. For all the stick Call of Duty gets, it does produce good, strong, and yes, linear campaigns that tell a good, albeit ridiculous, story. I like to feel like I’m getting somewhere in a game; that’s there’s a specific endpoint to work towards. It’s why I get a little bored with open ended games after a while. Yes, I can appreciate the entire world that has been created but with a game like Skyrim, there’s almost too much to do, and no restriction on when you have to do it. It’s very unfocused and again, I do not have the patience to play something like that either, or the willpower to stick to the missions the game gives you; I could very easily spend hours just riding around the mountains killing anything I come across, but I always feel like I’m wasting my time I could be spending elsewhere. In, you know, real life. And while my game experience will more or less be the same as everyone else that plays it, it’s still very enjoyable. It’s telling that the games I’ve enjoyed the most recently are linear single player campaigns, like Alan Wake, Bioshock, Dead Space 2 as well as recent XBLA games Deadlight, and The Walking Dead. Linear is often used as a criticism, but if the game itself is as involving as the ones I’ve just mentioned any such criticism is null and void in my opinion.

So I ask you, would you rather play for hours and hours and hours online in Call of Duty doing nothing more than killing and getting killed, or play and become involved in a good strong 10-12 hour campaign that you’ll never forget? I know what I’d choose.

GAME REVIEW: The Walking Dead Episode Three

Blah blah blah choices. Blah blah blah point and click.  Blah blah blah zombies. This will be a short review as I’m not going to go into detail about the third episode of Telltale Games Walking Dead series, mostly because I’ve done it twice already and anything I say, including some of the stuff below will just me saying the same thing again, ie. it’s brilliant.

What I will say is that this is perhaps the most emotionally involving episode yet, with events happening that have rivalled some of the best films of recent years. To use an example, remember in LA Confidential when SPOILERS Kevin Spacey gets shot? Well, there is a moment in Episode 3 that shocked me to the core in the way that that did. And it shows how invested I am in the story that I hastily lashed out in anger (my own anger, not Lee’s) and made a choice I wouldn’t normally have made. And as pleasantly surprised as I was that Episode 2 went to the dark dark places it did, this third episode goes to those places and then some. A tearful encounter in the forest sticks out as a highlight; a triumph of storytelling, art design, voice acting and direction.

There were a few new additions this time round as well; for the first time, you’re able to actually fire a gun at certain points when zombies and bandits attack. It’s very basic but it works. And in keeping with the tone of the game, you’re even given a choice at times over if you actually want to shoot or not. It’s this kind of complexity that elevates it over other recent games; for example, right at the very start you’re given the choice to kill a woman in the distance who has been bitten, or keep her alive to draw the zombies to her. I went for the latter, and hated myself for it. But it made sense in the moment, and meant as the zombies were distracted I could get more supplies for the group.

So overall, this is one game series that’s going from strength to strength, and I cannot wait for the next episode of the best game I’ve played this year.

5 stars

CINEMA REVIEW: The Expendables 2

New review coming up, as soon I hammer my catchphrase into the ground. 

The sequel to 2010’s lacklustre but successful original packs in more action, more cameos and more humour to the proceedings which is a breath of fresh air after the very serious in tone original, but oddly the humour is both the film’s strongest and weakest aspect. The first film was supposed to be a throwback to the heyday of this type of action cinema, the 80’s. A love letter to that era of wanton violence, lots of shootouts, and a tonne of gore and one liners. But something felt off; it was too earnest. It was a serious film with aspirations to be tongue in cheek; and while the second film gets a better balance with this, it still feels off somehow.

Barney Ross (Stallone) is the leader of the Expendables. They’re kind of like the A Team, but with more violence and killing. They do off the books jobs for shady government types that normally involve blowing everything up with alarming regularity. They are hired by Church (Willis) to recover a device for the CIA, and during the mission one of their one is killed by the villain, called Jean Villa(i)n (Van Damme) and the rest of the film becomes a revenge tale. 

However, the problem is that the story isn’t really that exciting and you’re just waiting for the next set piece to begin, with boring exposition in between. The opening sequence (and all of the action scenes, if I’m honest) is rather awesome, I must admit, but then it’s just waiting around for the next barrage of gunfire. There’s no real chemistry or feeling of camaraderie between the group, they’re just walking hulking muscle men with guns, and half of them can’t really act; namely Lundgren, Couture and Norris. You get the feeling the film is just happy to coast along on the reputations of its stars. Which is fine, but it also pretends to be something better than that. When it’s really not. 

The tongue in cheek nature that the film is trying to replicate, the era of your Commando’s, Cobra’s, your Universal Solider’s, doesn’t really sit right. Perhaps it’s because the cinematic landscape has changed, especially in action cinema, in that films like that aren’t made anymore and as such everything in this film that’s trying to invoke a sense of nostalgia comes off as desperation. So, the first time Arnie pops up and says ‘I’m back’ it’s quite funny. By the third time, it feels like ‘Ok, we get it.’ The worst offender though, is not Chuck Norris reciting a Chuck Norris fact, but Arnie yet again saying ‘I’ll be back’ to which Bruce Willis replies ‘You’ve been back enough. I’ll be back.’ He leaves the frame; Arnie shoots a couple of guys and says ‘Yippee Ki Ay.’ Groan. The lines that work are the ones that reference the aging action stars without battering you over the head with lame rehashes of their lines from better movies. So when Willis says ‘that thing belongs in a museum’ and Arnie replies ‘Don’t we all?’ That works. As does the image of Arnie and Bruce mowing down bad guys in a Smart car, subverting the action star cliché and being genuinely funny but not stupid. 

However, you don’t go to see this for the compelling plot and nuanced characters, you go for the action. Which is great, for the most part. And I will say, seeing Schwarzenegger, Stallone and Willis tear through the bad guys was a real joy. And Bruce Willis still has the best shooting a gun face ever. 

Big dumb fun. 

 

3 stars (it got one extra for the final shootout)

GAME REVIEW: Deadlight

New review coming up just as soon as I relive a traumatic repressed memory. 

 

The new game from studio Tequila Works, Deadlight is the second title in Microsoft’s Summer of Arcade series; a 2.5D side scrolling puzzle-and-platformer with zombies that’s part LIMBO, part Resident Evil and part Abe’s Oddysee. The player assumes the role of Randal Wayne, a down on his luck fellow searching for his missing wife and child in the middle of a ruined Seattle in 1986, while also escaping hordes of the undead (or ‘shadows’ as the game calls them) as well as the requisite shady military presence. 

Now you might well moan at yet another zombie game, however this one feels so much different. This isn’t an action title, like Valve’s Left4Dead series or the zombie mode  in Treyarch’s Call of Duty games. It’s a run, jump, roll and basically avoid the zombies at all costs game. And while you do get some weapons later on to bust some undead heads, you’ll find the best solution is only to fight them when you absolutely have to. The zombies are an oppressive presence, and one that is relentless and while they are your classic shuffling zombie which might not seem too much of a threat, get ganged up on and you’re pretty much dead immediately.

Fortunately though, dying isn’t much of a hindrance, as like LIMBO and Abe’s Oddysee, this is a trial and death game. Didn’t make that jump and ended up in the water? Respawn and time it better. Pulled the wrong lever and electrocuted yourself? Respawn and don’t pull said lever. Accidentally pressed jump and fell down a ravine/into a herd of undead/onto a mashy spike plate? Respawn and try not to do it for the fifth time in a row. 

A rare zombie killing.

This trial and death method comes into play rather beautifully during the puzzle elements of the game but most of the puzzles aren’t too difficult. There aren’t many that will stump you for any great length of time, which is nice, but at the same time a little disappointing. There’s nothing that has the fiendish difficulty of LIMBO, which I got stuck on dozens of times. The toughest challenge here is finding a certain item to push or pull so you can advance. 

However, nearly the whole middle section of the game is simply working out how to progress through an underground network of death traps. Some of which are very tricky. Navigating said death traps (as well as the zombies) needs a certain degree of precise timing, and thankfully the reasonably simple controls don’t cause too many problems. It’s standard platform stuff and nothing new, but it doesn’t last very long, and all the time you really just want to get back topside and enjoy the destroyed beauty of the world. 

Run, you crazy sumbitch. RUN!

Speaking of, the most striking aspect of the game is easily the art design. It’s nothing short of breathtaking; with glorious 2.5D rendered environments showing you a beautiful backdrop to this post zombie world. Collapsed buildings, cars abandoned on freeways, far away zombies fighting with army types; it let you have a glimpse at this ruined world and really sets the tone of the whole game. That tone being: grim. Grimmer than grim. The plot of the game is in the same vein. I’ll not spoil anything, but the feeling of isolation and futility pervades throughout creating an immersive environment to play in even if the story isn’t much kop. The final twist in the tale is something you can see a mile away, and the protagonist isn’t very sympathetic or even that interesting.  Although the last act of the game, in the 'Safe Zone' is terribly exciting.

Overall though, it’s merely ok when you’d want it to be amazing, it isn’t very memorable and clocking in with a completion time of less than three hours, it’s a fun ride while it lasts but has nowhere near the lasting impact of its obvious influences. 

3 and a half stars.