Archive for June, 2010
Gaming in the Media: A Rebuttal
1As gamers, we are constantly defending ourselves in regards to our hobby. We either have to deal with eye rolling, exasperated sighing, looks of horror, stifled laughter or even uncomfortable silence when we talk about gaming with or around non-gamers. Sometimes we forgo associating ourselves with gaming in order to avoid confrontation.
Gaming is more like religion then most people realize (as is sports, music, art, etc). Once you make up your mind about a thing, you feel the need to evangelize it. On the flip side, it’s very difficult if not impossible to be persuaded to change your mind about it. Also like religion, a lack of facts or experience doesn’t stop some people from chatting about gaming, especially if there’s a mic in their face. The best we can hope for in these situations is that there’s someone involved who can stand up for us when we’re not there or are unwilling to do it ourselves.
Here in NH, we have a local NPR affiliate who produces a segment called Word of Mouth. I enjoy this show, generally, because they present some insightful, entertaining and sometimes off-beat topics. Unfortunately, they occasionally venture into the realm of video games, usually with disastrous results. They can’t really help it, I suppose; they’re looking to create a radio show, to bring in the listeners, but they’re as ill equipped to deal with the gaming world as any non-gamer can be.
This week, however, they had an interview with Tom Bissell, author of Extra Lives: Why Video Games Matter (Kindle Ed). I haven’t yet read the book, but in hearing Mr. Bissell on the segment, he seemed knowledgeable, and eager to discuss games as more then the “violence simulators” that many non-gamers perennially portray games as being. He dropped the right names in the right contexts, and spoke about many situations that most gamers will find themselves nodding their heads in agreement with. Unfortunately, he was apparently a coke-head for a while as well, which is one of the only low points in his credibility as a spokesperson for gamers, but we’re used to having to take the good with the bad.
If you want to listen to the segment, you can find the MP3 or Windows Media on the website. If you feel compelled to tell them what you think afterwards (as I have, and as I hope you will, as conscientious gamers defending our hobby), you can approach the page thusly. I’ve reprinted my comment here, in case it was too long for them to publish. And because I want to pad this post out to an even more insane length.
Transcript as follows:
Although I tuned in late to the live broadcast, I was somewhat pleased with what I heard from Mr. Bissell. I also checked out what other outlets had to say about his book, and without having read it (yet), it sounds like a fairly balanced account of games, gaming and gamers (without the implication that gamers are also drug addicts).
Having been a video gamer for well over 25 years now, I’ve seen it all, from low-res Atari 2600 all the way through to the modern day hyper-realistic games like Heavy Rain. I’ve played Super Mario Bros., Myst, Call of Duty, World of Warcraft and far, far too many others to list — or remember. I follow industry news, and also follow and communicate with designers and developers through Twitter and other social networks. I’ve taken my role as a player as far as I can, and have since moved into the realm of independent game development.
What bothers me, though, is that most non-gamers really could care less, about gaming, about even considering what games are and can be, and most importantly, about Mr. Bissell’s book. The Cleavelend.com article you link to above opens by calling the book “first good general-interest book of its kind”. I doubt many non-gamers will actually be interested enough in the subject initially to bother giving it a read.
Public perception of gaming has progressed very little since the early days when it was considered to be strictly the domain of adolescents with limited social skills, or maladjusted male adults living with their parents. The Wikipedia entry on “video game culture” is actually an excellent primer for the non-gamer, as it shows the road map of what started out as a technological experiment at MIT, and has since become a veritable media juggernaut, easily on par with — if not having surpassed — music and movies in the US.
The issue of violence in games is a dead horse (pardon the pun). Violence is an easy way to model basic competition, and to inject a sense of urgency. There’s a great debate in the gaming community about whether or not games can be classified as “art”. Now, I’m sure many non-gamers who read that will dismiss it out of hand, but violence is only one way that games attempt to invoke an emotion: rage, fear — even a sense of accomplishment. Art without emotion is simply paint on canvas, or words on paper. If violence can evoke emotion, or if losing a virtual child in a mall can evoke emotion, then doesn’t that lend weight to the argument for games as art? Saying simply that “games are about violence” is like saying that “football is about running back and forth”. Both statements display ignorance and an absolute lack of insight into either, and serve no point in furthering any argument for or against.
Mr. Bissell struck a chord when he mentioned how Gears of War wasn’t about the violence. Violence in GoW is placed in the context of a story: you play the role of a soldier on a planet that invaders have conquered. You are one of the last of your kind, and the story from that point is about survival. It’s not the greatest or most original story ever told, but it empowers players in a way they cannot be empoered in every day life. It makes every little hard won victory a cause for celebration, even if the victory isn’t real. One aspect of the story in GoW covers a soldier’s search for his wife who was lost during the invasion. Even in the midst of the blood and gore, there are threads which are woven in and which burn brighter because they aren’t what you expect to find after hours of gun play. But the average non-gamer only sees chainsaws and bullets. It’s a wasted opportunity to see the hard work that designers and developers are capible of when rejected in such a dismissive manner.
I’ve written here in the past when the show has featured segments on video games, and I was saddened to hear that Ms. Prescott hasn’t changed her tune in the least. It seemed to me that she took pride in not having a “gamer gene” (yet continued to throw out references to games and their ilk), and repeatedly attempted to steer the conversation back to the depiction of violence for a good portion of the segment. While disappointed, I’m not surprised, as this is typical of the non-gamer who attempts to come to grips with the idea of why people game. I’m thankful that Mr. Bissell took the time to write this book, and that he spoke very highly of games, gaming and gamers at the level where so few people ARE allowed to speak when confronted by a non-gamer in the media. I look forward to reading this book, even if it IS like preaching to the choir.
OnLive Is Live
6OnLive. Anyone who has heard of it has no doubt immediately thought: there’s no way this can work.
It does. The real question, however, is: does it work well?
That depends.
I signed up for the Founding Members program, which gained me a fee-free year of subscription, and a coupon code for one free game on the service. Of course, before I burned through that, I wanted to be sure that the service could meet my “exacting standards”. Honestly, I’m not a hater, so my standards really consist of “is it usable?”, and not “can I pwn noobs with mah l33t sk1llz”.
Gearing Up
OnLive asks you to install their platform, a small download and quick install. It’s very painless — certainly less painful then having to download multi gigabytes. If you’re using IE (or another supported browser, I assume), you’ll be able to launch direct from the website. Otherwise, OnLive places an icon on your desktop and in your Start Menu.
Once logged in you’re greeted by the OnLive dashboard which contains all of the options you need for managing, playing and viewing. The big logo in the center is where the general options reside, but they’re pretty limited. The one option you might expect to see — video options — is non-existent because OnLive streams the video to you after it’s been rendered on their server. If you want to adjust the video as it were, you can resize the entire game window.
Moving Out
The Marketplace is where you can choose the game you want to play. Several of the games, if not all, have demos, which fire right up. My first foray was into Borderlands, which I play every week with my local friends. The game was snappy to load…much quicker then my local copy loads from the install on my hard drive.
Each game features a nice dashboard of it’s own, which gives you info on the title: it’s Metacritic score, ESRB rating, supported controllers, publisher and developer info, genre and release date. There’s also a trailer which plays, for atmosphere, and a button that allows you to either buy the game, or play a demo. At the bottom, you have a stable of other trailers, but you also have two of the more interesting features of the service at your finger tips for that game: Arena, and Brag Clips.
I played several demos. As soon as you start, you see a popup window that lets you know you have 30 minutes of demo time to kick the tires. When you get down to 10 minutes, you’ll see another window. In essence, you’re not limited to a section of the game, you’re limited to 30 minutes of the full game (including cut scenes, unfortunately). The good news is that if you save a game during a demo, purchasing the game will allow you access to that save, so nothing is wasted.
Extra Extra!
The Arena, available from a game dashboard or the main page, allows you to watch games in progress. It works really well. I watched some Assassin’s Creed II and Just Cause 2 being played live. Each time you view a game, you can see who’s playing, how many people are viewing, and you can rate the gameplay. You can also add the person as a friend. When you are playing, you’ll see a popup in the upper right corner of the screen that lets you know when someone drops by for a view. It even shows you their name.
The Brag Clips section has been mentioned before. When you press Alt-B, you’ll get several seconds of the last game play action posted to the Brag wall. You can then view all of the Brags others have posted. It’s a good system, since it allows you to take a recording after you realize that “damn! I should have recorded that!”
But Does It Work?
Yes, it works. I don’t know where my nearest data center is, but I’m in New Hampshire. Unless there’s one in Boston (unlikely), then I know that there’s one in DC…several hundred miles away from me.
The two biggest concerns are quality and control.
The quality is, in my opinion, pretty good overall. Normally Borderlands apparently loads the more detailed textures as you get closer to them, so at times you’ll see the more detailed textures “pop in” as you move. With the OnLive version, when I was moving quickly, it seemed that the textures didn’t really have time to pop until I stopped moving, at which time they instantly appeared. However, when playing Assassin’s Creed II, I noticed that the overall image seemed to shift into low bandwidth mode; it switched from native desktop visuals to what I can only compare to a really decent VHS quality visual. Once I paused in the action, or if there was a cut-scene, the visuals returned to normal quality. For some, this will break the game. I’m not so picky, and I’d rather OnLive adjust for responsiveness even if it means sacrificing a bit of quality here and there.
Controls, however, seem to be the biggest concern when it comes to OnLive. Having played Borderlands locally, I can say that yes, there does seem to be a very, very slight lag — for me. Before people get out the pitchforks, know this: I am used to playing Borderlands locally, and have a feel for the controls. For someone who has never played it locally, they won’t know a lick of difference. I was able to pull of head-shots and down enemies with as much ease as is needed to enjoy the game to it’s fullest. Dirt 2…well, I suck at racing games on any platform, but as soon as I overcompensated for a turn and smashed into a wall because I laid on the arrow key for just a bit too long, I new that the controls for that game were probably spot on. I had no issues whatsoever with Red Faction: Guerrilla.
Verdict? YMMV
I’m using one of Comcast’s higher tier Internet packages, but sometimes it’s flaky. OnLive does a system test on every startup, and when the network seems to be having issues during play, a “Network” popup appears on your screen to let you know. Again, it seems that OnLive will sacrifice visual fidelity to keep the responsiveness acceptable, which is how it should be.
This is the kind of service that will vary from person to person. My experience may be better or worse then yours. I can’t help that. However, if you managed to sign up for the Founding Members package, jump on it as soon as you get confirmation that you’ve been activated. You can’t beat free.
Which brings us to the question: is it worth the monthly fee that they’ll be charging, which is currently $4.95USD? I can’t speak to that. There’s a monthly fee, and then you have to “buy” the game on top of that. Some people call this “double dipping”, but consider this: Xbox Live is $50 per year. OnLive is $60 per year. You pay $60 per game for the Xbox. A PlayPass for Borderlands is $29.99. Pre owned Borderlands for Xbox is listed at $32.99 on Gamestop’s website. The problem here, though, is that once you stop paying for the OnLive service, you lose access to the game that you’ve paid for. That’s not cool. Also, it seems that this PlayPass varies by game. Batman: Arkham Asylum allows you to buy a 3 ($4.99) or 5 ($6.99) day pass. Finally, there’s a disclaimer on the market: A PlayPass entites full access to the game for as long as it’s available on the service. That’s a chilling statement, as it means that what you pay for may up and vanish at the whim of the publisher, leaving you empty-handed. However, according to the OnLive FAQ, they plan on keeping a game on the service for at least 3 years after their release on the OnLive service (not after their retail release, if the two events differ).
OnLive works. That much is certain, although depending on your location, your mileage may vary. Don’t let the technical side scare you away from it. Instead, be worried about the scatter-brained licensing hoops that you’re forced to deal with, and the gateway fee. If you can think of the monthly fee in terms of what you get from XBL, then OnLive looks like it might not let you down. Otherwise, find a friend who has access and give it a try with an open mind.
[Gallery not found]What Microsoft and Sony Missed
2Yesterday saw the first of the Console’s Big Three press events, with Microsoft taking to the stage to talk about their upcoming Xbox offerings (with a tiny bit of WinMo7, but absolutely nothing about PC gaming). The majority of their time was taken up with talk of Kinect (ne Natal), showing the required Sports game (mad flailing included), but also a Forza game, and a Star Wars rail-shooter that allows players to swing their arms around like they’re wielding lightsabers. As if.
Today is Sony’s turn, and we can no doubt expect a decent chunk of their presser to include news on Move, their wand-based motion tracking peripheral. We’ve seen some hints of what Move is and and how Move works, but we’ll finally get a more solid view, and even a release date (if we haven’t gotten one already).
Reaction to these motion controllers has been mixed at best – dismissive at worst. Hell, a Nielson study shows that a good chunk of gamers don’t even know these things exist. While Microsoft demoed their versions of titles that are basically available for the Wii (sports games, EA Active), we’re still left with the question of what exactly do we have to look forward to with Kinect? I have a sneaking suspicion that we’ll see a lot of the same types of titles with Move.
No one will dispute that MS and Sony are looking to get a chunk of that sweet, sweet casual gaming market that the Wii has almost single handedly elevated from the depths of Bejewled and Diner Dash Hell. Right now, neither the 360 nor the PS3 is capable of appealing to that fresh-faced demographic, thanks to the potty-mouth reputation of XBL or the bloody exploits of Kratos. Sure, the 360 has stuff like Viva Pinata and the PS3 has Little Big Planet, but each of those are designed to appeal to other family members once the hardcore gamer in the house has picked up the console and at least one hardcore FPS, sports or racing game.
In my opinion, neither MS nor Sony will be able to compete with Nintendo, despite the interesting capabilities of Kinect, and the Wii-like wands of Move. The Wii was a new product. From the start, it was designed to appeal to those for whom consoles have no appeal. It helped that Nintendo has a reputation as the “softcore” gaming house, with their colorful Mario games and their association with the evergreen Pokemon. Parents could easily and comfortably buy a Wii for their kids, and could then find something for themselves in Boom Blox or Wii Fit. The Wii was brought into the house because it was accessible from day one, had a non-threatening lineup, and was cheaper by far then the alternatives.
Both the 360 and the PS3 have significant hurdles. For one, the startup cost of each – including the motion controls – makes the Wii look like penny-candy. Right now you can get a 360 Arcade for less then $150, but toss on Kinect (rumored to be about $150, but there’s actually no official word) plus a game at anywhere between $40 and $60, and you’re now at 2x the price of a a Wii. The PS3 alone is still 2x the price of a Wii, so adding Move (rumored to be less then $100, but again, jury is still out) and a decent game, and now we’re approaching 3x the price of Nintendo’s console. The prices alone could be enough to put either of these machines out of the consciousness of the family looking for a gaming console. The second hurdle is one previously mentioned: the reputation of the 360 and the PS3. The reason why Wii owners went with the Wii and not the 360 (aside from price) might be because of the games lineup. There aren’t too many family-friendly titles on either console. Plus, the motion controls of the Wii are inuitive, while both the 360 and the PS3 rely on gamepads which often times are both oversized for smaller hands, and require a fair amount of thumb-dexterity to be able to manipulate the sticks independent of one another.
That leaves existing gamers to pick up the Kinect and Move bundles. Will this happen? I think it will, but I don’t think we’ll see people lining up at midnight launches to get their hands on these things. Because MS and Sony are releasing these devices in an attempt to attract a more casual demographic to their seen-as-hardcore hardware, the actual hardcore gamer might not want anything to do with these peripherals that weren’t built specifically for them – some gamers can be narrow minded at times. Sure, the motion menu navigation of Kinect is cool, and the Dance Central might even allow this white boy to burn up a dance floor, but waving your hands around in Halo: Reach? Dumb idea. On-screen yoga? They bought their 360 to play games, not exercise! Supposedly Move has integration into a PS3 FPS (Sorry…I forget which one, but I’m sure we’ll see it today), which could be a really big hit – or an unmitigated disaster.
I will certainly pick up a Kinect. My daughter will love Kinectamals, the vPet simulator, and I have been around long enough to know that launch titles for specialty hardware are always the weakest branches in the family tree. They’re shovelware designed to drum up interest while (hopefully) the more in-depth titles continue to be worked on. Move, I’m not sold on. As much as Sony will try, they’ll be going toe to toe with the Wii which is more entrenched and has a more ingrained mindshare with the market that they’re trying to assimilate. I think that of the two, Sony has the hardest battle to win. I don’t think I’d find much benefit to Move, especially since the PS3 seems to try very hard to maintain cache with a hardcore audience. I don’t know that they’ll find Move particularly exciting.
Trailers and Expectations
3I’m still flying high on the latest trailer to BioWare’s Star Wars: The Old Republic. Just prior to the trailer’s debut at the EA presser at E3, Massively mentioned that the trailer had been leaked to the Internet. Nothing new there, but the comments in the Massively post seemed to follow a general trend: nice movie, but what about videos showing actual game play?
It’s the curse of the industry: great trailers generate great hype, and often times the trailers precede any real in-game action by months. People love the gorgeous CGI and intense action, but upon release day, it’s not a trailer that developers and publishers are asking players to buy into: it’s the game itself. We all know that the measure of a game isn’t really in the eye candy, but really, the better a game looks the happier we are. It’s the icing on the cake.
We all know that no game will measure up to the trailer porn that we’re treated to during the run-up to the game’s release, so why do people get defensive? Some don their tinfoil hats and think that these trailers (expensive and time consuming to produce, no doubt) are tossed out because the real game isn’t far enough along to show anything. Some people just want the smoke to clear, dammit, and the developers to level with the public: show us what you’ve got. But since we do know that these are only trailers, and that the real game won’t be as pretty or as action-packed as these cinematic gems, how can some people express skepticism about the actual game play immediately after watching one of these trailers? What’s the correlation in people’s minds, and do people really think that trailers have ANYTHING to do with actual game play?
Update: The Official Site has absolved you of any moral quandary you may have about bootleg trailers by posting the actual trailer on their website. May the Force be with you.
Lord of the Rings Online To Go F2P
3In a move that surprised everyone (or no one, depending on which side of the “I Told You So” fence you like to consider yourself on), Turbine this morning announced that their AAA MMO Lord of the Rings Online will be following Dungeons & Dragons Online into the realm of Free to Play this fall.
Details are, of course, scarce right now, but according to the official US lotro.com page, current subscribers who wish to maintain their monthly fee will be considered VIPs, while lifetime subscribers will be VIPs without the monthly fee. Details can be found on the official site. The Turbine store will be making an appearance, so VIPs and Lifers will get a monthly stipend of Turbine points. There’s currently no word on any content differences between VIP and free players (a la DDO), but since the Twittersphere is now in the process of exploding, followed by the general blog-o-sphere, followed by the official news outlets, I’m sure we’ll be hearing more over the next few days.
I can’t really express what this means because it not only came from left field (the Turbine folks are now the undisputed Masters of Secrets), but because this is the first AAA MMO to make the switch from P2P to F2P. Turbine saw success with DDO in both subscribership and revenue, and on paper it might make sense to take LotRO in the same direction, but it’s a gamble, since many players will no doubt opt to drop their subs and subsist on the freebies. It’d be interesting to hear if the recent acquisition by Warner Brothers had any hand in this decision.
So there you have it. NO ONE has an excuse not to jump with both feet now into one of the most engaging MMOs on the market. Congratulations to Turbine for taking this bold step, and congratulations to MMO players around the world for having this great gift dropped into our laps
Update: I had to bang out this post quickly to get in during the hype, and since that time, there’s been a lot of discussion on Twitter around this announcement. Since then, I’ve had time to digest some opinions, and to clarify why I think this is a fantastic idea, and why it won’t impact the quality or community that LoTRO has come to enjoy.
Turbine took DDO free to play. It had been P2P previously, but it’s success was potentially questionable. Moving the game from P2P to F2P was an unprecedented move that Turbine pulled off, and which earned them a lot of positive press.
Unfortunately, it seems that there are many people who do not view LotRO‘s move in the same light. One argument is that the influx of non-paying players will dilute the excellent community that the game enjoys. Another is that RMT, as the new breadwinner for the game, will become the main focus of the development and decision teams, and that the overall quality of the game will suffer for it.
I disagree with both points. Firstly, if the community is as great as the claims lead us to believe, I have faith that they’ll pull together in solidarity and force the jerks back to the Barrens Chat from whence they came. It’s true that by removing the barrier of monthly payment, a game is wide open to non-committal players who have nothing to lose and everything to gain by creating an account, but I think the fact that LotRO was P2P is a strength: many people already have opinions on the game. Some have played and disliked it, and won’t return for any reason whatsoever. I think those who take advantage of this new model will be those who were always curious, but couldn’t justify the (additional, if playing another subscription MMO) fee. Being financially responsible seems to me to be the mark of someone who won’t log in to grief people. It’s a stretch, but it could be the case.
Secondly, Turbine isn’t stupid. They know that RMT won’t convert free players to VIPs. Only the continued dedication to the quality of the overall game can do that. DDO is also the touchstone in this argument. Since going F2P, DDO has received content updates, and will be getting guild airships in the coming months, so it’s obvious that Turbine hasn’t let DDO flounder while focusing on adding silly hats to the cash shop. I expect that with a golden property like Lord of the Rings, the bar will need to be set even higher for LotRO in order to maintain that quality, and I expect that we’ll see Turbine living up to it.
