4 those who see(k) the art in games
Archive for March, 2008
Zero Punctuation: Zack & Wiki
03 years ago
by Void
in Entertaining
Yep… two in a row! that’s a first!
… so… after hearing a lot of people praising this game… a game that to me didn’t sound all that much like a deep story (and indeed with kid-appealing characters) and indeed seems to promise the big thing i hate: punishing for trial and error… it’s a bit refreshing to see it can be viewed in another way. Like with Halo 3 Yahtzee seems to be my other side of the story… until i get to play them myself. Kinda looking forward to trying them out… but certanly not as much as I would if these puzzles would be integrated into … let’s say… another of those fascinating stories about destiny and fate and freedom and character and… that the Soul reaver games have. Btw, did i ever mention that I found in Soul Reaver 2 some of the most brilliantly elegantly designed environment puzzles: theres this room at one point which through very interesting use of fire/water/platforms manages to be at least 3 types of puzzles in one place. Very impressive in it’s minimal elegance! … though of course I wouldn’t have cared about that as much if it wasn’t in the context of a mind twisting fascinating story about destiny.
Zero Punctuation: Turok
03 years ago
by Void
in Entertaining
Me… myself i’m excited about the abandoning of health meteres IF they mean games stop being punishingly difficult and if you want to you can finish them without the frustration of dying. It really bothers me when even I (somebody for who games have been an important part of his life) end up dying a ton of times and feeling like abandoning it all in frustration… and wondering what are people who are just giving gaming the first try supposed to do.
(more…)
The 1UP Show: Episode 03/21/08
03 years ago
by Void
in Entertaining
Again nothing exciting from any artwork perspective that I can think of…. the only thing that got me a bit interesting into thinking was what seems to be a brilliant design idea described in the multiplayer mode of Rainbow Six: the one where the fact that killing the captains stops people from spawning makes the game a two-stage event where at the start people are going at it like mad while in the second part they care for their lives because spawning has stopped. I find this design concept a fascinating building block!
What is the mass-market?
0
Just read a pretty interesting article: it starts from the recent MS Xbox 360 price drop and their statement that this brings it to the mass-market and discusses what the mass-market really means.
The mass-market isn’t "one thing for everybody", it’s "something for everybody". It’s not a Holy Grail, a monolithic audience just lying out there waiting for the Right Product – it’s a collection of niches, some larger than others, some very small indeed. Fill enough niches, and you can call your platform – and your medium – mass-market. Simply keep pumping your efforts into one or two niches, and you’ll always be on the sidelines.
I dissagree with the article in that I believe that price points are still a big deal in bringing everybody into games but the article does make some very interesting points. What do you think?
Microsoft and the Mass-MarketPSN ad with an indie spirit
03 years ago
by Void
in Entertaining
A different kind of audience is growing…
The 1UP Show: Episode 03/14/08
03 years ago
by Void
in Entertaining
Wish i could say there was something exciting about this show… but I don’t find anything artistic about Smash and as for Dark Sector: I see nothing about a deep story and the 3d artwork doesn’t inspire me in any way feeling kind of generic. And I really cant encourage a story about a soldier goes mutant when the result is what looks like endless hordes of mutants to kill. The time tweaking game sounds interestesting, but I’m not really loving it’s mario gameplay so… until i try it I can’t say more other than I wish more games would spawn deep discussions like that.
Using a Live Orchestra in Game Soundtracks
0Here’s an interesting article with a lot of insider’s details.
The only reason to use a live orchestra in a game soundtrack would be to make the game better than if you had not used an orchestra; to make the game more immersive, more engaging, more fun than if it didn’t include the orchestra. And on the business side, it would be helpful if you could sell enough units to pay for it.
www.gamasutra.com/view/feature/3492/using_a_live_orchestra_in_game_.php
(more…)
Tim Sweeney on the future of hardware
0
It’s been many years now since I’ve ‘declared’ Tim Sweeney as one of my personal heroes… and he’s still going strong: right now I’m quite excited about his latest statements in an interview on tomshardware.com. I find the whole interview fascinating, but here are some snips to tempt you:
There is a long life ahead for Unreal Engine 3. Version 4 will exclusively target the next console generation, Microsoft’s successor for the Xbox 360, Sony’s successor for the Playstation 3 – and if Nintendo ships a machine with similar hardware specs, then that also. PCs will follow after that.
That’s a huge shocker… it used to be that engine generations would follow pc video card technology. It might not have been every video card generation but every 2-3 generations there’d be something big like T&L or shaders… Big stuff. Actually I think this will be great even for PC gaming: more standardization & a wider audience.
Zero Punctuation: Burnout: Paradise
03 years ago
by Void
in Entertaining
Again two thougts:
a) he mentioned Carmageddon! Had a lot of fun with that one… but as I’ve discovered recently with the ocasional frustrations when crassing in Flatout 2: I’ve started wondering why crashing and taking curves using the wall was fun there but is frustrating here. I think the answer is, as it frustratingly common, difficulty: in Carmageddon the competition did the human mistakes I did, took time to explore the scenery, got lost, wasted times in curves… you can’t really enjoy crashes and stunts if you’re under pressure. You need to be relaxed and enjoying yourself to focus on crashes and stunts and exploration, not woried that somebody’s going to take the 1st,2nd and 3rd place as Yahtzee so eloquently puts it. This is the second time in recent memory that Carmageddon popped to mind: the other one being when I finally got around to playing a bit of San Andreas: it’s nice that it rewards stunts, but it’s nowhere near as satisfying as it was in Carmageddon because you have to do really rare ones to get noticed and even then the rewards are tiny: Carmageddon rewarded you both for exploring (hidden areas) and even when you ‘failed’ (fun crashes appreciated by bonuses & money)… all in a "no pressure" atmosphere. Burnout world with Carmageddon principles: now there’s a game even a person such as myself (don’t care about cars) could enjoy.
b) I think Yahtzee missed the point: I’ve discovered how to enjoy Burnout with previous installments in the series: one hour after work: with it’s loud music, high speed & cool graphics it’s a very nice shot of adrenaline coming home from work all tired/bored-like. But then you should stop… That way you avoid frustration too and you don’t notice as much that you’re "level grinding"… well, actually I stopped for other reasons: my eyes were all red and hurting :P there’s just so much I can take of that speed. I suspect Yahtzee tried to play the game continuously for long periods of time :P
PS: again, I’m not a car enthusiast… actually I’ve often wished there were less vehicular games… but wrap it in enough speed/graphics/adrenaline/interesting backgrounds and I might be willing to give it a try and see what all the fuss is about.. Well, maybe it’s my way of excusing myself for not playing simulation realistic games :P