Take play seriously!

Is the mainstream media's view of gaming range from the short-sighted to laughable?  This week CNN, one of the world's biggest news outlets, published a peculiar report from E3 asking whether the Wii's new controller (the Wii U) would breathe new life in to the ailing console.  There was no mention that this was a completely new console or new hardware for the Wii and will doubtlessly lead many millions of Wii owners down a distinctly misinformed area.  Would similarly poor reporting be accepted with regards to other areas such as sport, news or even movies?  This terribly misinformed article made me think about other views of gaming in mainstream media.

Ranging from the horribly misinformed, and infamous Alan Titchmarsh video games conversation (I couldn't find one without captions) through to an array of horribly negative reports in a wide number of mainstream publications, is enough positivity or even balance given to our increasingly popular hobby?

The Times UK has separate film, music, books, TV and stage sections on its website.  The BBC makes some effort with it's Click section available under the 'technology' heading, not in the 'entertainment and arts' area of the website.  The BBC does devote a regular BBC one TV show to a mature look at movies but nothing specific for games.  CNN reports on films, music and TV under its 'entertainment' section and again any scant gaming news is placed in 'technology'.  The Daily Mail includes film, music and theatre reviews without a look at games at all; if you search for the word game on the site one of the top stories to appear is a negative story about Carmageddon's kickstarter project.  There is some effort made by some national newspapers online sections with The Sun, The Guardian and the Daily Mirror containing reasonable sections on gaming although from my experience the amount of space given to gaming within the newspaper is minimal.

Is it fair to compare gaming to other areas with regards to the amount of coverage it deserves?  The statistics seem to suggest that yes it is.  Global video games revenue is certainly comparable to that of the movie and music industry and, from a business stand point, is significantly more profitable than movies.  Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 beat Avatar to a billion dollars worth of sales by a day and through ongoing sales, map packs, and Call of Duty: Elite continues to be a cash cow for the publishers.  Finally the average gamer is reported to be in their 30s and close to 50% of US homes own a dedicated gaming console.

Why then, is gaming viewed so negatively in the mainstream?  Obviously a number of violent video games are made and sold although reports suggest that only 5% of game ratings in Europe are given 'Mature' ratings and only 4 of the top selling computer games in 2012 were rated at the highest age rating.  How different is this to movies with such films as the Saw films, Hostel and The Human Centipede gracing the UK recently.  Although it shouldn't really matter what the rating of the game is.  With an average gamer age of 30, isn't it up to the parents of gamers to manage what children are playing not up to games to be pilloried for violence.  In a strange twist, violent movies such as Tarantino's Inglorious Basterds get nominated for numerous Oscars and the Daily Mail review calls for more scalpings but the same newspaper contains dozens of stories about the effect of gaming.

I personally want gaming to be treated with more balance in the mainstream media.  The games industry is still in it's infancy in comparison to music and movies and there is plenty of room for growth.  I hope that as the current generations grow up, it will be viewed in closer terms to other entertainment and artistic businesses.  As an adult working in a professional job, colleagues and friends are still somewhat surprised by the fact that I still choose gaming as a primary hobby and the idea that perhaps I should have moved on is noticeable (no such prejudice exists when I say I'm going to watch a movie however).

(Zom)Believe in giving little games a go.

For the last few days I've been satisfying my wait for The Walking Dead Episode 2 by playing a little indie game called Project Zomboid by Indie Stone.  The version I have been playing is the current 'full release' of version 0.15d which is several months old and is soon to be replaced by version 0.2r which addresses some of the issues I faced (if this is the case then I have not included any gripes about it here).  I can't claim to be an expert on this game having played for a length of time in low double digit hours but have tried to get a taste of much of what is available at present and some of what is to come.

The game itself is about survival; plain and simple.  It challenges you to tell the story of your own death in the game world.  There is no pretence that you can 'win', you simply last as long as you can.  I guess a little like Tetris in that respect, you'll never finish it, simply increase the delaying of your inevitable flesh chompy death.  In order to help you survive you have a deceptively detailed crafting mechanic to help you.  You can use planks and nails to board up windows and doors, you can chop down doors to get planks, you can use sheets to make bandages and to cover windows and so on.  There is plenty of food to eat although some of this spoils and goes off if you don't do anything with it and can be combined with other things to be cooked.  The player has some simple 'moodlets' that let you know if your character is tired, hungry, scared, sick, wet etc. This allows you to carry out actions accordingly.

There is a basic introductory story mode that includes a nicely tense lead in to the game and some good character introduction with a shotgun toting psychopath.  The true heart of the game however lies in its sandbox mode.  The opportunity to choose from a small set of similar player characters, choosing some skills from a skill tree and surviving for as long as you can is thrillling for a number of play throughs.  Do you want to sacrifice being overweight to have the bonus of strength or hard of hearing to have the bonus of great sight but remember, when you're dead, you're dead!  No save points!  No chance to try again so you better not make a mistake or it's game over for good. 

My personal longest survival was a fraught affair, holed up in a house with as much food as I could muster early on.  All the windows sheeted over and spiked baseball bat in hand I even managed to hold out through a few days with a sickness and fever.  The problems came as food (and Whiskey) began to run low after a dozen days and I needed to venture in to nearby houses for supplies.  On reaching a warehouse the goods were too good to turn down and I overstocked.  Weighed down by a shotgun, stacks of food and gas canisters progress home was slow and I was caught out in the open at night.  Even an expertly crafted Molotov Cocktail in their midst wasn't enough to hold off the drooling hoards of flesh-eaters and I was destined to be starting again.

The crafting system is still limited in what you can create.  There are bugs and crashes early on.  The graphics and moodlets are reminiscent of The Sims from 12 years ago.  But it's unfair to judge Project Zomboid for its flaws as it is clearly in its early stages with big plans for growth.  Playing like The Sims meets Left 4 Dead, if Indie Stone can apply some polish there is clearly a diamond here waiting to be discovered.

The Project Zomboid community looks as if it's thriving with tens of thousands of views of posts in the company's own forums and an impressive 11,000+ likes of the company's Facebook page.  Even celebrity gamer Graham Linehan is a fan.  It's certainly a community and a game that I will be keeping a close eye on in the coming months and years to see what they can do with this with more and more input.  Is it possible that this could become the next Minecraft and go big?  I say, why not?  This is doing something that I haven't seen anywhere else and clearly there is a desire for what Indie Stone are doing.  Whether the core of the game will be able to be kept as the game becomes more popular and there is more call for casual features to be added will be interesting to see.  Whilst some sort of ability to save and return is a necessity, I for one hope that we don't see too many more casual friendly features added as the fear of death is the mechanic that keeps tension in each playthrough.

If you want to know more you can find the game at http://projectzomboid.com/

Game design by numbers.

Having seen both the Sony and Microsoft conferences over the last 24 hours, I can't help but feel a worrying convergence in the games market.  Only a few of the games weren't big number sequels or copies of other, already popular games.  Playstation All Stars: Battle Royale looked like PS3 Super Smash Brothers (with less lovable characters), as I said yesterday Forza Horizons looks like Need For Speed or Burnout and the similarities between COD, Battlefield, MOH Warfighters and Ghost Recon Future Soldier are startling.

Some of the stand out games of E3 (Beyond, Watch Dogs and The Last of Us to name the top three from Sony's conference) were new IPs and both doing something different to the rest.  With many of the games sticking to accepted formulae how do we expect to find the next big thing?

I worry we're stuck in something of an 80s action movie era.  The films came thick and fast with various muscle-bound, wise cracking heroes and sure, there were some hits, but the majority were forgettable movies with a by the numbers plot that could practically be interchanged.  Save the world... blah blah... kills the bad guys... yeah yeah... get the girl... and so on.  This could be said of many of the current set of hits.  Take a heroic protagonist/group of soldiers, put them in a world ending conflict and blow stuff up.

Why does this problem exist though?  I can only suggest that it's our fault.  Probably not yours if you're reading this as it's a pretty obscure gaming blog and only likely to be read by hardcore gamers.  But is it the masses of gaming that cause this.  Call of Duty sells like the proverbial hot cakes every year no matter how bad it's considered by the majority of players and why wouldn't EA, Ubisoft and co all want a part of that action?  Forza 3 (Metacritic 92) sold less than 4 million copies but Need for Speed The Run (Metacritic 68) sold around 4.6 million, it must be noted that NFS, whilst much worse, is on all formats.  Why wouldn't the excellent Forza try to become more like the mediocre Need for Speed if it can boost sales?

How do we change this problem then?  I implore everyone who reads this to try something different in gaming.  Go and download Journey on your PS3, The Walking Dead on everything, To the Moon or Frozen Synapse on PC.  Support smaller developers and let them give us games that take risks.  This has happened in movies with smaller indie film makers rising up to give us such film beauties as The Royal Tenenbaums, Lost in Translation and Up In The Air.  I'm not saying that I don't want to play the next Splinter Cell, (I really, really do want to play it) but I am saying get out there and try something little and give it a chance. it may surprise you.

No need to cry.

Quanitc Dream's David Cage said this week that we didn't need a new generation of consoles yet and set an ambitious 2017 date on the requirement of 'the next gen'.  Anyone who saw Kara, the remarkable video from the studio, will certainly agree that Cage is doing something that many don't.  However, is he correct that the current generation of consoles is too tilted towards violence and RPGs and that we don't need a new generation of consoles for another five years?

Firstly, are we oversupplied with violence?  To get an idea of this I took a look at the top selling games on Xbox 360, PS3 and PC.  Thirteen of the top fifteen 360 games could be construed as violent or RPGs and eleven of the top fifteen PS3 games fit in to to the same category.  This certainly does seem to back-up the idea that we are perhaps oversupplied with these games but is Cage taking too simplistic a view on things.  Perhaps the games being made are there because they sell.  Hardcore gamers complain about the likes of Call of Duty and its identikit clones but perhaps that is because we, the gamer, continue to buy them.  Quantic Dream's own Heavy Rain sold well at around 2 million copies (as of GDC 2011) but this doesn't begin to touch COD MW3's 6.5 million day one sales in the UK and US or MW2's 18 to 20 million total sales.  Perhaps game designers aren't lacking imagination as Cage said, perhaps they are simply caught by the unavoidable fact that our hobby is many people's business.

On the second suggestion of no new consoles until 2017, I'm torn.  The most interesting games I have played in the last few months have not needed more polygons or better hardware.  To The Moon, Journey or Lone Survivor have all been interesting, quirky, different and thrilling in their own ways.  The industry is full of people and teams pushing boundaries and finding new and exciting way to use the hardware they are given.  I believe that David Cage and his team are capable of doing remarkable things with the current generation of hardware and I can't say I'm too ready for more.  After seeing the Wii U and it's difficult to comprehend tablet controller, I worry that one day we will pine after this generation of controller based gaming.  Without some brave souls I worry the ever increasing expense of console manufacture and game design will drive developers to need to appeal to the chattering masses.

What do you think?  Do you want more David Cage and something from Kara or are you happy to see more COD and it's itterative sequels?  Do we need a new console generation or are those wanting it setting us up for an incremental decline to casual gaming?

And here is that video... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j-pF56-ZYkY

The Walking Dead - The adventure game I always wanted.

I write this first post whilst keenly awaiting the second episode of Telltale Games 'The Walking Dead'.  I have wanted to love adventure games all my life, having attempted to play a huge number over the years.  The only one I can remember completing from start to finish is Grim Fandango and, despite starting Sam and Max, several Monkey Islands, Full Throttle, Leisure Suit Larry (to my shame, but I was of an age) and the more recent Back To The Future and Puzzle Agent, they were never the game I wanted.

Where The Walking Dead gets it right and so many others failed is character.  From the stark opening dialogue with a cynical US cop through to the shocking finalé of this opening chapter I was living Lee Everett's life.  I didn't have to labour through obscure puzzles, linking up strange objects and jumping through far-fetched logical links.  I didn't have to spend a long time in the same three room setting.  I did get to make genuinely troubling moral decisions.  I did connect with an array of well written and scripted characters in a mature and well-paced storyline.

Of course, this is a zombie game and there is the chance to smash undead skull but I'm not coming back for the action.  I'm coming back to find out what happens to Lee, Clementine, Carley and company and to find out if Lenny is going to get his just desserts.

Sadly I've only been able to play through the short few hours once because I want my snap decisions and reactions to be the ones that I must live with without being tempted by other (possibly more attractive) outcomes.  I'm looking forward to coming back though when all five episodes are released and playing through the whole story with some different outcomes. 

Hopefully Telltale can manage to keep the pace, variety, tough choices and great cast entertaining me throughout the remaining four episodes.  I trust that they will.