The original Metroid has a defining flaw that would later be rectified with its successor, Super Metroid. The open-ended environments are a composition of arbitrarily posted tile sets with little sense of direction. To put it frankly, the desolate planet Zebes is a maze. As a result, there’s a certain sense of dread you often feel when playing Metroid, as it’s very easy to lead yourself astray in the oxygen-less solitude and find yourself boxed in against an insurmountable tangle of similarly-looking tiles. Super Metroid avoids the confusion by providing sufficient scaffolding to lead players along without arousing their suspicion that the experience Super Metroid offers is a well managed, staged affair. In this way, it fools the player into discovering things for themselves, when in fact our exploration is preordained, and we love it all the more for it.

Let’s take a squiz at how exactly Super Metroid appears more open-ended than it actually is. Super Metroid utilizes the SR388 overworld as a hub which connects the player to the various planetary sub-sections. Overworlds are often interpreted as de-linearating a game and offering player choice, even though oftentimes they afford no such freedoms.Super Metroid‘s overworld is a guise. Players are free to search for and enter SR388′s separate domains before the game requires them to, but on stumbling upon Brinstar, Norfair or Maridia the player quickly realizes that their progress is limited by their current selection of power-ups. In this sense, the player’s sphere of progression is not tied to the seemingly open world, but to the power suit. Therefore, the limitations enforced upon the player are not presented in a way which can be translated into tangible areas of the map, by which, the player cannot properly understand what is or isn’t within their reach. The only way that they can find out is by looking for themselves. Not only does this unknown (but never hidden) factor liberate the player’s sense of exploration, but it also persuades them to gain their own bearings of the world through actual exploration. The map is therefore a clever aid in the exploration process, since it does provide that tangible reinforcement to the player.

The individual chunks of terrain that break away to your power-ups are doorways masked as environmental puzzles, where the power-ups themselves are switches that activate the opening of doors. When a player acquires a new power-up in Super Metroid, several gates are open. Of course, Super Metroid is still linear since the gates that lead to to the next major power-up (and so on until the end of the game) are pre-determined; all players will walk the same rough path. However, Super Metroid hides this very fact in three ways. Firstly, the player may take their own route to the next mandatory gateway. Secondly, when a power-up is gained, it opens the potential for the player to access peripheral weapon upgrades (which increases the number of items held), think of them as secondary doors. And lastly, on occasion, there is more than one mandatory gateway that leads the player to the next power-up; since there is some choice, this is thereby not linear. As you can see, it’s all effectively linear, but it’s mapped around a system of diversion. No first time player will stumble upon the perfect combination of clues to lead them linearly to the end of the game. Players will inevitably be de-routed, and on their way, stumble into weapon upgrades, dead ends, previously explored areas, and walk in circles; all are tricks to create a false sense of freedom.

So, the real meat of Super Metroid are the power-ups and respective gateways which forward the progression to the end game. These are directive tools which manipulate the player’s progression. And as can be seen, Metroid is highly managed, yet we love Metroid so much because the game tricks us into thinking that we are exploring by ourselves; however, we are exploring within the confines of a mold which is ultimately linear and intentional.

Since popularising the shoot ‘em up in 1978, the Space Invaders series practically went dormant for thirty years. Sure, Taito rolled out sequels and anniversary editions, but rarely did these games evolve the series in any meaningfully sufficient way. Such thinly-veiled cash-ins on the Space Invaders namesake could barely meet the legacy they were supposedly representing. The series’ presence in modern gaming was an embarrassment, to be sure. In recent years though, with the release of Space Invaders Extreme and its sequel, Taito have done good on one of gaming’s longest surviving brands by doing what they failed to get right before: tampering with the source.

In this light, Space Invaders Infinity Gene isn’t so much an expansion of an already great game like Extreme, but instead a tribute; an interactive construction of Space Invaders‘ legacy: the modern shoot ‘em up. And it all begins from stage one, the original Space Invaders, before moving into progressively more contemporary territory.

Like most age-old shoot ‘em ups, in Infinity Gene, the player increases their score through a combo system. However, after completing a stage or losing a life, you’re not presented with a high score table, but instead the points earned act as a currency which fill out an evolution meter. Once you’ve maxed out the meter the game “EVOLVES”. Evolving adds one of three things to Infinity Gene: new mechanics, bonus stages or graphic and sound unlocks.

Replaying a level, which you are free to do at any time, will give you another shot at adding more blue juice to the bar. As you progress it becomes harder to score the points necessary to evolve, meaning that repeated plays slowly become a requirement of pushing the mechanical game forward. Yet ideally—and particularly in the later stages—you don’t want to be spending your time replaying the same level repeatedly just to gain an extra inch of blue fill. You do, however, still want to max out the evolution bar since the pay-off for doing so will make life easier by adding new gameplay mechanics. The result is well-crafted baiting, but calling Infinity Gene a game of baiting would be to do the game a great disservice. Points are gained on the grounds of skilfully employing combos and hitting targets (although you can grind if you need to) and the rewards are new tools which feed back into the loop of gaining points. The more points you earn, the more “arms” (shooting techniques) are made available via a selection screen preceding each level, giving the player more applicable options in meeting the challenges of the changing level design. So, experimentations and commitment leads to rewards which foster more experimentation and commitment. By commodifying the traditional points system, Infinity Gene’s gameplay becomes more relevant to regular players (as opposed to high scoreboard chasers) in that it facilitates a system of progression tied to the context of the game (evolution). Of course, high scoreboards are still present for those who wish to pursue them.

Once players make it through the initial comfort stages, Infinity Gene switches up its enemy patterns to suit the different “arms”, persuading the player to first explore with their new tools. Later, experimentation become mandatory as the design moves into a tertiary phase where only certain arms are applicable in defeating the enemy patterns present in each stage. This sort of involving level design which motivates the player to be creative with the tools they are provided with leads back into the currency of points. The more the player understands the various arms, the better off they are for gaining high combos and claiming a better score which they are in-turn rewarded with more tools.

Speaking in the ethos of the game itself, Infinity Gene is a construction, where the player constructs a modern day shmp, piece by piece, through their committal to the scoring system (the very foundation of the arcades, also part of the ethos). In Infinity Gene the means support the ends as can be seen in this diagram:

Now let’s add some squiggly lines:

It’s worth explaining the squiggly lines in the diagram. They are the underlying methods of persuasion used ensure the player remains active within this framework. Firstly, to the far right, persuasion of completism is the human tendency for no stone to be left unturned. This is the reason why Tetris is so addictive, our cerebral matter craves order in a world of clutter. Tetris creates clutter, the player creates order and the two forces create an addictive dynamism. Infinity Gene feeds our obsessive compulsive nature via the user interface of the level select screen. The main levels are mapped out along the spine of an evolution tree with 2 branches possible at either side. Since the player can only evolve once per stage, the interface keenly marks all the evolutions which have yet been reached, enticing the player to correct the apparent mistake.

Secondly, the centre point, the player is made to believe that the game is evolving (even if they themselves are not personally evolving the game very much) through the minor visual details added to each progressive level. Level-to-level, nuance forms around the crusts of the visual design, until a set of stages are completed and the presentation reboots with new colours and effects.

Lastly, as the player progresses, the layout of the levels (which transition from blank emptiness to more structural as you go along) and enemy placements begin to favour a wider variety of “arms”, nudging, and at times forcing, the player to actively use the tools in which they’re unlocking.

A Conclusion on Conclusions

Concluding the analysis here, I can’t help but comment on the most effective part of Infinity Gene: the ending. After building up Space Invaders through the lens of Gradius, R-Type and the bullet hell sub-genre, among others, the game ends, the credits roll and then suspiciously, after the dust settles, a variant of the original Space Invaders loads up with a lone invader rapidly making its descent to the bottom of the screen. Immediately, the tactile feeling reverts back to 1978, you’re power-ups and arms are removed and the game changes completely, leaving you with a sudden point of comparison. This game about evolution devolves to the base value in order for its magnitude to be understood. Personally speaking, the impact felt at this point validates all of the play up to that stage.

Conclusion

Space Invaders: Infinity Gene isn’t trying to make up for 30 years of cruddy ports, but rather it’s a documentation of the shoot ‘em up genre during the period of time the self-proclaimed “KING OF GAMES” went intro retirement. Infinity Gene is a successful title, because it takes us on a journey where we meaningfully construct the results of a legacy left abandoned. The guts it takes to do this is commendable, but the execution is even more so.

The original Metroid may not be as sharp as Super Metroid, but it does have one trump over its SNES successor, being its initial assertion of exploration-driven gameplay. A year prior to Metroid‘s release, Super Mario Bros. had taught players that walking to the right-hand side of the screen would advance the game. Metroid, in a master stroke of studio-wide realization and subversion, did the exact opposite: it told players to go left. If the player walked left, instead of the assumed right, at the game’s onset, they would stumble upon Metroid‘s first power-up, the morph-ball, thereby allowing the player to bypass a stumbling block a few screens to the right. As with Super Mario Bros. and that first goomba, the player cannot progress until they have understood the fundamental principles of the game. In one fell swoop, Metroid succinctly communicated its doctrine of subversive exploration.

Super Metroid‘s takes a much less momentous approach but wisely integrates the morph-ball bomb technique, which becomes a crutch for exploration throughout the entire game. Early on in Super Metroid, after the player becomes acquainted with the basic controls, they’re lead through a cavern to a seemingly dead end. They’re as stuck and confused as anyone who’d just been lead down the wrong path would be. After some fumbling about, the player will likely go back to the wall, look around until they notice that at the bottom of the wall is a block with an unsuspecting texture which mildly stands out from the fungus growing around it. A short morph-ball bomb later and—voila!—the block evaporates and the game continues.

Right there, by raising the bar high in this initial instance, Super Metroid doesn’t just set a precedence for exploration but also demands the player learn the tools (morph-ball bomb) and adopt the observation techniques (out of place textures) required to explore properly. As put by co-creator Yoshio Sakamoto in an interview with RetroGamer magazine:

We wanted players to explore everything we’d made and then move on. That’s why we designed the maps in such a way that the player couldn’t escape without exploration, or in such a way that the player would end up back at a starting point before advancing. The player would be cornered/driven and would eventually be forced to stop and say, “Right, how should I think about this area?” That’s the essential point of Metroid’s map design.

Since such a significant chunk of exploration—namely in the first half of the game, but nonetheless throughout—is based around the morph-ball bomb technique, it can be argued that Super Metroid is simply more specific with what it teaches. This makes sense as Super Metroid scaffolds tutorials around the player continuously throughout the experience in the most minute and unnoticeable ways. The original Metroid, on the other hand, sets the player up briefly and then lets them loose on a massive environment with minimal help or suggestion.

Game designers create rules, a system of challenges and a gateway into that challenge (tutorial). Players, through their participation of the game world, mutually agree on the terms set by the designers. Therefore, there is something of a student and mentor relationship at work between player and designer. (Mr. Miyamoto recently commented on this phenomena a little himself). The foundation of this relationship is that of the relevant skills required to defeat the game: the teacher wishes to teach these skills, the student wishes to learn them. In which case Metroid is a test in observation and a test in the application of tools (power-ups).

Metroid‘s challenges, its tests, if you will, are built into its environment in the form of realizing suspicious chunks of area and then devising a way on how to clear that area to make progress to the next planetary subsection. Sometimes you’ll have the means to make headway, and other times you’ll need to mentally bookmark or flag down the spot to return afterwards. On a wider level though, Metroid, keeping in fashion with its exploration roots, also challenges the player in a third test of skill: the skill of mapping out one’s exploration.

In terms of what the player is constructing in their head, Metroid is an array of these “hotspots” (suspicious rooms which may be mined for progress) linked together into coherent routes and mapped around save stations. These mental pathways are connected through distinct visual markers which define particular chunks of environment from one another. When we play a Metroid game, we visualize these mental maps, with support from the in-game map itself (of which doesn’t contain the information gathered from exploration), and, in accordance to this mental map, we pursue the next string of clues.

Not only do we visualize these routes, often with aid from the map, but said routes are cross-checked against our current ability set as to whether they are viable or not to the area in question. Sometimes these clues lead us to undiscovered areas, sometimes these clues lead us to areas we’ve previously visited.
Most vividly we are concious of this play pattern right after we load the game up and begin at the last save point. It’s here that we gather our strategies and formulate a course of action, so at this point, the mental map is most relevant.

Keeping the Squeeze

Super Metroid, above all other games in the series, facilitates exploration management fantastically. The two most obvious reasons for this are the inclusion of an in-game map and the improved graphical capabilities over the original Metroid.

The in-game map works as a crutch for players to refresh their own mental map. Wisely, R&D1 chose to segment the main map away from the core gameplay by virtue of the pause screen, only offering a mini-map of surrounding rooms while the player navigates Samus. In this way, where pausing to check the map disrupts the flow of gameplay, players are persuaded into relying upon their established mental map.

With the added power of the SNES, environments – i.e. the visual markers which we use to identify and compress the landscape – are capable of being more distinct, hence making it easier for players to crystallize visual markers into their memory.

“Dead ends” – pathways that the player would preempetively follow before they receive the respective power upgrade necessary to progress in said area – from the original Metroid, now offer up minor weapon upgrades in Super Metroid, thereby decreasing player pitfalls and frustration while at the same time rewarding early curiosity.

Super Metroid is also a far more smartly segregated title than the original Metroid. The environments, while equally as large as the original Metroid, are focused into shorter, more succinct instances of play. Save points quarantine these instances of play that can later be mined for leads which allows for some dynamic threading of routes. Hub rooms, often near the entrance to a new area, take on a more skeletal structure with the purpose of each pathway conveyed more promptly. That is:

• some areas are hard blocked with sealed doors, indicating a long delay before the player revisits with new power-ups;
• some areas which require a currently-unavailable-but-soon-to-be-acquired power-up are softly marked, promptly too, as in the first room or so. Examples of these soft markers used to detract the player are a sudden absence of background music, flora and fauna met with apparent markers of essential-but-still-not-acquired weaponry (boost tracks, swinging junctions). These indicators, used to steer the player back on course, are made apparent in the first room or so (Metroid would often lead players down long corridors before confirming to players that they’re presence in the area was not currently required); and
• areas that the designers wish the player to advance through are often backed up by the respective sub-terrain theme music, denser wildlife population and a more visually “alive” environment.

The fascinating thing about Super Metroid is how the maps begin by following this skeletal structure and then, as the player subsequently revists one area multiple times over, hidden divergences bleed into the map structure (ingeniously represented by a different colour on the pause-screen map). The maps therefore begin in cocoon-like states, allowing the player to build a foundation of the environment, then, once their mental map consolidates, the pathways blossom into one another as reliance on the in-game map fades.

With the bleeding of the map, cleaner visual markers, fewer dead ends, a more logical and directed conveyance of purpose within the environments, Super Metroid constantly feeds the player’s mental map and thereby continuously drills the emergent skill of exploration management.

Games with good game design are those where all components of the game are grounded to a core philosophy or set of philosophies. The world of Mario is tied to jumping, the world of Metroid is tied to exploration, and in the case of the Wario Land series, Wario Land is tied to Wario’s wacky persona. Underpinning the philosophy of form meets function, Wario’s outwardly fat, greedy and cartoonishly sinister appearance are a reflection of his abilities and the interactions made possible within the game world. Let’s use Wario Land 4 as an example to briefly observe the way Wario’s character reflected by his interaction and abilities.

Weight

Wario’s array of moves are all tied to utilising his best asset, his visibly bulging weight and super strength. Just like the stylised visual appearance of the character, Wario’s strength and weight are exaggerated through his interaction. No ordinary obese man could crush through rock, create minor earthquakes, flatten small minibeasts or turn into a menacing snowball by building momentum off diagonal slopes, however, Wario can.

Aggression and Greed

Wario’s is presented as an aggressive character. In the game the player is persuaded to be aggressive, meeting the Wario persona, through the rewards of coinage which liberally flows from downed foes. The more aggression you show, such as by throwing one enemy at another, the more the player is rewarded. Unlike in prior Wario games, Wario has a health bar this time, so coins are no longer a currency for life. That is, they are no longer handicapped but instead free-flowing. As we can see, on element of Wario’s behaviour (aggression) acts as a means to highlight another (greed).

Self-deprecation

The folded levels of Wario Land 4 that require the player to reach an endpoint and then, pressed by a time limit, run back to the start of the level make fun of the stout fella’s inability to make haste under pressure. This, I’d argue, works to justify the cartoonish nature of the game through self-deprecation. Perhaps a more obvious example is the way Wario shape-shifts into various different forms. Each one seemingly poking fun of Wario as he is stung by a bee, turned into a zombie, set on fire or flattened into a pancake. Every transformation is met with an “oh no!” cry as though Wario wishes to avoid the humiliation.

Conclusion

As we can see, the way Wario can interact, and the way the player is taught to behave are all representations of Wario’s anti-hero persona. These interactive elements don’t just support the visual image of Wario, but are in fact pivotal in defining his character. It’s no wonder then that players of Wario Land 4 and the other Wario games, have such a vivid understanding of the character himself.

Three months ago, and with grand foresight, I vowed to consume as much media (games, movies, comics, books) as I possibly could before I’d leave almost all of it behind as I go to live abroad in China. Some of this media I managed to write about before I left, some of it I’ve subsequently caught up on over the past three months, and then there’s all that note-taking sitting in OpenOffice documents in my writing folder. God of War II belongs to the latter.

God of War II is a direct narrative and gameplay continuation of God of War, which means that, similarly to the Half-life episodes, God of War II streamlines the culmination of mechanics built up by the conclusion of God of War and re-uses them as a base for the beginning of God of War II. By virtue of being welcoming to new players though, Kratos is robbed of these abilities by his father-cum-uber-nemesis Zeus at the game’s onset, acting as a narrative justification to re-teach the ropes and warm players into the experience*.

For continuing players this amounts to a heap redux which God of War II‘s largely peripheral additions to the combat system fail to quell. (Newer players will similarly find the combat stretches beyond its means, but perhaps not as immediately as returning players). A smattering of aggressive new moves mapped to the L1 button when used in conjunction with the face buttons, a spiffied up Rage of the Titans (rage mode) and some new spells do fend off the familiar, but fail to sustain player interest through what is a significantly extended play experience.

That’s not to discount the peripheral additions though, since, as irrelevant as they are to the most established part of the experience (the combat), they do in fact play a part in pushing the game forward. Kratos has a couple of new weapons at his disposal, including a hammer, sword and bow. Aside from the arrow which can be rapidly shot between intermissions of slashing to maintain combos, none of these diversions are given enough spotlight to deliver attention away from the effectiveness of the Blades of Chaos. Smart players will realise that the best way to play God of War II is to ignore these distractions and rely on the tried and trusted attack patterns from God of War while adding a bit of oomph, now and then, with the new L1 attacks or the spells.

It’s a shame that there isn’t enough added variance to the combat as God of War II is an excellent example of good organisation of gameplay elements. God of War II shifts from combat, to puzzling, to platforming, to narrative, to boss battle with an exacting sense of understanding of how much can be bitten off of each of these systems. Furthermore, new mechanics, landscapes and enemy types are interspersed at the most suitable points in the game. You are always presented with something new and interesting just as your enthusiasm for your current occupation begins to wane. Sony Santa Monica clearly nailed this element with a hefty amount player testing, which is why it’s disappointing then that the depleted combat systems works only to subvert the games otherwise great pacing.

It would be remiss of me to forget God of War II‘s stronger emphasis on puzzles, platforming and set pieces, all of which have been well supported by the new time freezing, flying (Icarus’ wings), chain swinging and Medusa’s head mechanics. The set pieces, particularly the flying sequences, are always exciting and well connected to the context of the game (for example, obtaining Icarus’ wings). The boss battles are equally impressive in the way they draw on more elaborate forms of tactics and spatial awareness which isn’t encountered in the moment-to-moment combat.

But ultimately, none of this can save Kratos from that niggling itch that the combat is not fresh and exciting enough to sustain the experience. The end result, which is overbearingly evident by the end of the game, are the large slumps of uninteresting gameplay which undermine the entire production. By failing to directly address the heart of the experience (the combat) in a meaningful way, I don’t think that God of War II is deserving of its title as the “magnum opus” of the PS2. In saying that though, the combat still holds a level of succulence which cannot be denied and despite the lack of revision, God of War II is still a premier action game, particularly in light of the excellent pacing of the experience.

*This last point is surprising given that God of War III simply dumps immediate tutorial on the player.

The Tenets of a Metroid Game

Although Metroid can be categorized as a platforming shooter within a space-themed context, the franchise isn’t so much about the shooting or the jumping at all. Rather, Metroid is all about that misplaced bit of space rock. You know, the one with a little bit of extra fungus. The one that, after met with a morph ball bomb, will string you down a tiny alley to a small chamber containing the next power-up. Progression in Metroid hinges on the abilities granted by various power-ups which are connected to a string of environmental puzzles. It’s in the player’s ability to realize these puzzles through acute observation and then use their ability set to act upon their observations that Metroid reveals its true colors as a game of deep observation and multi-faceted problem solving. Metroid has always relished in being more than what it presents itself as, and series fans appreciate the franchise for valuing the deep implicit over the loud and overt. There’s a maturity in the series which has gone untarnished even as the franchise has evolved from two to three dimensions.

Metroid is also an innovator, but rarely proclaims its achievements on the back of the box. The Metroid games have not just defined but also realized a style of video game narrative that intertwines story with landscape. Oftentimes in a Metroid game, you’ll find yourself entering a world where events have long passed, and as the player you piece together story through the visual, audio and interactive pieces of the landscape (in the Metroid Prime sub-series text is also included). Through it’s environment Metroid builds a civilization and tasks the player as a defacto cultural architect. In this regard, many of the environmental puzzles, particularly those which require the use of machinery or are constituted with cultural relics, act as demonstrations of civil processes. Rarely do video games build lore this rich, or yet, so seamlessly into the fabric of the gameplay. Metroid is a narrative of few words, but with depth that many strive for.

Tense atmosphere and the sense of isolation felt by the player are also tenets of the Metroid franchise. In Super Metroid, the title screen with the baby metroid in the jar establishes an almost complete absence of life. Again, the setting, but, more correctly, the sound is used as a device to control mood. Where many other games opt for busy noise, Metroid instead opts for controlled instances of silence followed up crescendos which build and create tensions. Moments where little happens, but much is felt.

Since the atmosphere, narrative and overall framework for exploration are harmoniously built into the environment and therefore the gameplay, Metroid is a franchise that stands as a testament to good game design. As Metroid‘s design is very medium-centric, relying on the factors that define video games (interactivity, adaptive environments), the franchise excels at conveying atmosphere, narrative and challenge to the player.

More obvious to mainstream video games folk is the fact that Metroid, through protagonist Samus Aran, champions femininity without sexualization or even glorification of the empowerment of women. Metroid, particularly Super Metroid – the title in question – has been a standout title for speed running, the art of completing a game in the shortest time possible. Overall then, Metroid is an eminent video game series, a series which fosters exploration, harmonious narrative and gameplay, atmosphere, works against the grain of video game gender stereotypes, yet facilitates dedicated game communities through speed running. And for all this, in the sense of the games themselves, Metroid is modest about its achievements which makes it all the more a champion.

Now that we understand the different roles the player commandeers in a video game, we can begin to understand the rationale behind our choices made in Heavy Rain.

Because of the subject matter, I will obviously be divulging major plot spoilers, so I urge you not to read on if you haven’t already completed Heavy Rain. If you have, however, then please feel free to include your own rationale in the comments section below. Perhaps we will compile the most interesting responses in a separate article if there’s enough interest.

Trial #1
Driving into Head-on Traffic

Being the initial trial, the parameters of the Origami Killer’s twisted game aren’t yet so clear. Like many, I presume, I accepted this trial partly under the assumption that the game wouldn’t hurt me – that so long as I followed the rules, Ethan would remain unscathed. This assumption and the supposition that “hey, it’s a game and I should just play along” overrid the consideration set outlined in the previous article. My assumptions turned out not to be true — whether by my inputs or by design, I don’t know — as I completed the challenge, but flipped the car and could not reach my reward.

Trial #2
The Electricity Plant

Considering the pain Ethan went through in the prior trial, I felt a little uneasy about the electricity plant. You could just tell that things were going to get worse. There are two stages to this trial but only one decision, since you cannot bail out of crawling through the glass-filled chamber. The question is whether you’re willing to walk through the electric minefield. The generators instill a sharp sense of fright and my knee-jerk reaction would have been to steer clear. However, above all else, I wanted to relieve Ethan of this burden and I knew that irrespective of me, he would have seriously contemplated this decision. I don’t know very much about power stations and while venturing ahead would obviously put Ethan at high risk, this unfamiliarity with the danger allowed me the waver the ethical dilemma of any unfortunate consequences. As such, I made my way through, but misread the signs and nearly killed myself, prompting Ethan to automatically forfeit.

Trial #3
Cutting off the End of Your Finger

The third trial will always stick in my mind as its the most savage of Heavy Rain‘s emotional string-pulling, and the first time a game made me feel immense frustration and self-hate. You’re situated in a vacant room and asked to cut off the end of your finger in front of the camera with any of the utensils available in the room. The stress is compounded by the fact that you will fail to cut your finger from the bone on your first attempt and have to fight the agony in a second attempt.

This decision prompted a primal sense of rationality, so I was quick to make and execute on my decision. I decided to go ahead with it. There was, of course, some conflict. As a viewer and a director, I knew that I would be putting Ethan in a world of agony that he would never wish to experience and I would certainly condemn myself for watching, let alone participating in. The chips were stacked against me though; I’d failed the last two trials which meant that Shaun would drown to death if I didn’t produce results. There was nothing in my way this time. I could get a tangible result, all I needed was to go through with the torture. Furthermore, having gone through this much pain already, I imagine that cutting off a part of a finger would be within Ethan’s threshold of pain. I acted quickly and chose the first tool I could find: a pair of scissors. I didn’t even look for anything else; who knows, the game might go back on its rules, but I needed to ensure a win here.

Trial #4
Killing the Drug Dealer

Would you kill someone to save someone else? The rational answer is “no.” It doesn’t make sense to forfeit someone else’s life for the potential of saving another’s. Heavy Rain played on these assumptions though. The target is a drug dealer who, when spurred, tried to end your life. In which case, killing a violent drug dealer can almost be regarded as an act of community service; if caught, Ethan could vouch for self-defense. Another fold to throw your deliberation occurs right before you make the decision, when the drug dealer quivers that he too is a father and pleads against his potential retribution.

I chose in favor of my understanding of Ethan, who I believed wouldn’t go so far as to kill someone else. I made this decision before I even went to the house as I believed quite strongly in my interpretation of the avatar. I am pleased with the decision I made.

Trial #5
Drinking the Vial

The final trial is a fitting apotheosis to the game: would you sacrifice your own life for someone else’s? I had a feeling that it would all come down to this, but the means at which it does (drinking a vial of poison allowing enough time for you to free your son) removes any potential distraction; it all comes down to principles.

I chose not to drink the vial. I figured that given my completion of only one trial, it was likely that Shaun would die and that it would be better to let Ethan survive and live with Madison (who can counsel him) as opposed to letting Shaun survive but live with the anguish of watching his father die. In this way, it was better for Ethan as he had an emotional attachment which could aid him if his son did in fact die in the rain. This decision was universal amongst the roles. It is an ethically sound decision that I wanted to see happen and believed that Ethan would too.

End Game

My endgame hinged on my final decision before I left the hospital as Madison: the orchid in the hallway. This opened the way to the house of the Origami Killer, which I successfully escaped from. I also guessed the proper password for the address of Shaun’s whereabouts which lead to the final confrontation. I couldn’t solve the crime as Jayden, so it came down to a battle between Ethan and the Origami killer which I won. In the end, Madison, Ethan and Shaun move into a new apartment together and Jayden retires.

Conclusion

There you have it, the reasoning behind and outcomes of my Heavy Rain adventure. Despite failing terribly at points throughout the game, I succeeded in the end. What about you? What was your rationale and how did you manage your different roles in deciding on your actions? Please let us know through the comments.

Developed by Intelligent Systems rather than fixed regulars EAD, Mario Kart: Super Circuit plays the Mario Kart formula pretty safe between the lines of the first 2D and 3D iterations of the series (Super Mario Kart and Mario Kart 64, respectively). Rather than attempt to break new ground by introducing new play mechanics, Super Circuit sets its focus on being a well-executed hybrid of previous games.

For players of Super Mario Kart and Mario Kart 64, the mixed blood elements, namely the combination of the hop and power-sliding, are readily apparent. In Super Mario Kart, a push of the right trigger causes the player to hop, making it possible to leapfrog over minor obstacles, while, at other times, the hop can be exploited to displace your kart at an angle advantageous for sharp cornering. In Mario Kart 64, players could slip into a power slide allowing for long drifts around corners, closing with a speed boost if the player could sufficiently wiggle the control stick back and forth. Super Circuit kinda does both, leaning a little more towards the Super NES iteration. Hopping is still useful for bookending long turns and avoiding minor obstacles, however, if the player holds their slide down long enough a boost will automatically be granted—no wiggling required. Part of the problem with this design is that rarely is there a turn wide enough for players to earn a boost. Or putting it another way, the duration of time required to stay in a power slide is largely incongruent with the nippy curves and bends Super Circuit‘s tracks provide. Furthermore, the tipping point at which you’ll gain a boost (or not) is too difficult to judge, leaving you dependent on the safer bet of bunny-hopping each corner in a spasm of undercutting leaps and slides.

In regards these twist and turns, Super Circuit is a constant barrage of immediate, oncoming corners which leave you ill-prepared and exasperated. The flashing direction markers become a point of reliance, yet, through the brief visual disconnects created against the player’s place on the track, these signposts work to frequently hinder the player as much as aid them. Coming into a corner I found myself fraught with anxiety, thrown off by the directional aid and unsure of how to first judge the bend; at which angle to enter, and then whether or not to hold a slide, bunny hop or break-stop my kart. The split-second immediacy of the corners hampers flow and throws any form of tactical strategy out the window.

Intelligent Systems’ pragmatic, hardware-concious approach shines through well on the GBA. The use of bright colours help boost the back-light-lacking GBA screen and cups are streamlined to fit in around a portable-friendly 5-6 minute time frame. A quick run mode where you can play any track is also included for short bursts of play. The fact that the 2D character sprites are now modelled on 3D models (as opposed to the flat, textureless SNES sprites) visually make the competition easier to interpret

Intelligent Systems also display an astuteness in the track designs which draw and build upon prior games. Previous games featured shortcuts, yes, but Super Circuit almost goes overboard with hidden routes. (Such a generous number of shortcuts is quite rare in most racing games). Rainbow Road is an excellent example, ramps outline almost the entire track, peppered for all sorts of creative short cuts when teamed with a mushroom or boost pad. As this video below shows, it’s very easy to shave time off your position with a little bit of risk and initiative.

Those awesome loop-around ramps from Mario Circuit 3 return in various permutations, as do obstructions which can be avoided by hopping over, like water puddles. Overall, there’s a fine degree of creative nuance permeating each track, from shortcuts (both major and minor), to weather effects which change per lap, and course-specific obstructions.

On reaching the end of this article, I’m feeling a little uncommitted to my criticisms of the boosting system. I stand by what I say, of course, but I can’t also help but get that lingering feeling that I still haven’t grasped the way the Super Circuit is intended to be played. Having gold-medalled all of the cups (bar the SNES ones), at this point, I feel that if I’ve gotten this far without having properly understood the power sliding mechanics, then there must be something awry with the intuitiveness of this mechanic. I’m really unsure to be honest, if you have any experience with this title, then please do give a holler.

]]> http://danielprimed.com/2010/07/mario-kart-super-circuit-%e2%80%93-a-review/feed/ 1 http://danielprimed.com/2010/07/player-roles-and-heavy-rain/ http://danielprimed.com/2010/07/player-roles-and-heavy-rain/#comments Sat, 17 Jul 2010 10:57:05 +0000 Daniel http://danielprimed.com/?p=2504

Heavy Rain‘s core conceit is the question: How far would you go for the one you love? Those who have played Heavy Rain will know that this question is most obviously evident in the trials undertaken by the lead protagonist Ethan Mars, but it’s also one which ripples into the tangled stories of the other cast members. To follow through on this question, Heavy Rain establishes relatable characters (through menial, day-to-day context) and puts them in extreme situations which are constructed to press this question. These situations bring the player’s differing roles of agency to the forefront. In many respects, these sequences create deliberation between the different parties that the player occupies, which is why players agonize over their decisions; they can’t get everyone to agree and are forced into a tough compromise. Here is breakdown of the player’s roles of agency and the respective questions asked to each player role at each trial, using Ethan as the model: 

Co-author
If I were Ethan, what would I do? 
(based on the player’s understanding of the avatar’s principles combined with their own)

Avatar
Within my inferred understanding of Ethan’s character, what do I think he would do? 
(based on the player’s understanding of the avatar’s principles, independent of their own)

Viewer
What do I want to see happen, what is most entertaining? 
(based on the player’s compulsion)

Director
What is the responsible action, the right thing to do? 
(based on the player’s ethical interpretation)

When we play video games, we don’t just act upon our own whim, but rather our actions are influenced by the different ways we engage with the game. When I take the role of Solid Snake inMetal Gear Solid, I share this role with his—the avatar’s—doctrine. I know that Snake is cunning, inventive and stealthy, so my actions are mapped to my understanding of what it means in inhabit this character. I, therefore, have the freedom to act within my own interpretation of the character. This is called co-authorship. 

The avatar is also their own character, so they can exist independently of the player. As mentioned in the previous article, there are times when we are not in control of the avatar. For instance, in cut scenes. In these instances the avatar is in their own frame of mind, without our influence, which affects how we think respond to the second question. Another way to think of this is, “if there was a cut scene here, what would the avatar most likely do?”

Different types of games emphasize different roles. Open world action games such as Just Cause 2or Saints Row often feature “empty” avatars or at the very least avatars bent on fun and mayhem, because these games are viewer-centric. That is, the player’s actions are based around whatever seems fun or entertaining. Injecting prescribed character into these avatars works against the impetus of enjoyment as it supposes the player model their behavior around the predefined persona of the avatar. This was apparent in Grand Theft Auto IV, where some players felt uncomfortable with simulating the murder and destruction which the previous GTA games reveled in. Because Niko was a responsible, good-willed avatar such actions would contradict his innocent persona. 

The director is the Jiminy Cricket-esque conscience which puts ethical considerations into focus. Normally, most games are ethically sound, but occasional titles, like Heavy Rain, force the player into moments of moral and ethical deliberation. It’s here where we must consider our role as the director of the experience. 

All character-based games feature co-authorship and the avatar’s prescribed perspective. In video games the player needs a body to inhibit and a base level persona to model their behavior on; these are basic requisites that determine play. The presence of the other two roles depends on the subject matter of the game. What is most fascinating about Heavy Rain is the way these moments make the player conscious of their multiple identities within the interactive medium. We’re not just making one choice, we’re making many and under pressure.

['Design Discussions' is a new, regular-occurring column for Kombo by Daniel Johnson, explicating on elements of game design through a case study approach. This piece is a footnote to the initial column Deconstructing the Video Game: Three Pillars of Design for Interactive Drama (Heavy Rain), so it is recommended that you read the prior article first.]

With contextual interactivity, players are somewhat at the mercy of the director. The director is the person who assigns all points of interactivity and the time frame in which they can be initiated, rather than the player. This system coerces players into cooperating with the narrative, and although a handful of people seem to outright refuse this system, it’s a far more persuasive, even-handed approach towards director control than the alternatives. Let us assess the issue of persuasion with traditional video game narrative techniques and conclude with a contrast to Heavy Rain. 

Complete Control – In-game Narrative

Broadly speaking, in recent years, in-game narrative has proven to be a very organic and effective way to deliver supplementary narrative and contextualisation. The sound logs in Dead Space which play over gameplay are one such example commonly used throughout the industry (also seeBatman: Arkham Asylum and Bioshock). Despite the successes in conveying minor information, in-game narration is an unreliable way of delivering important information to the player as it only leads the horse to water. As anyone who has ever played with the gravity gun while sitting through one of Alyx’s talky scenes in Half-life 2 can attest, there’s no guarantee that players will cooperate or pay attention, particularly when they’re given the liberty of retaining their regular ability set. 

No Control – Cutscenes

So how does one make the player cooperate? By taking complete control away through the form of a cutscene. Cutscenes are embroiled in their own infamy in that they can feel as though the designer is taking over, and in some cases, dominating the interactive experience. Players can get particularly antsy during unskippable or overly long cutscenes, which is why they must be well implemented such as a reward for an extended period of play or to conclude/open a chapter or scene. Even though cutscenes are loathed by some, they are an infallible means of control for developers to steer the narrative. 

Partial Control – “Disabled Scenes”

A recent hybrid of the cutscene and in-game narrative (perhaps slanting closer to the latter), are the scenes where the majority of the player’s mechanics are disabled besides those which allow the player to observe (walking, camera movement). Batman: Arkham Asylum‘s introduction scene did this particularly well as Batman and company wheeled a bound Joker into Arkham Asylum, giving air time to the Joker’s menace. These scenes walk the line between the two other techniques. 

Conclusion

The problem with these techniques is that it creates rifts of uneven control. One minute you’re playing the game, maybe absorbing some in-game narrative on the side, then you’re passively taking part in an interactive cutscene, which prompts a cutscene with no control whatsoever and then you’re free to keep playing. The gears of interactivity are constantly switched back and forth that inevitably creates a consciousness which removes the player from the experience.

In Heavy Rain, these bumps are smoothed out and the level of control remains constant throughout. There are scenes where you can walk around and explore, and scenes which are closer to interactive cutscenes, yet the disparity between the two is minimal. Heavy Rain also trains the player to always be ready for action from the beginning which allows the switch to be more seamless. This is all very similar to the principles behind Dead Space‘s narrative (the in-game HUD and narrative) where breaks in immersion are avoided. Because the level of control remains consistent, Heavy Rain is capable of creating narrative experiences which are highly immersive, but also avoids the contrived nature of games like Dead Space.

['Design Discussions' is a new, regular-occurring column for Kombo by Daniel Johnson, explicating on elements of game design through a case study approach. Today he debuts this column with the first in a series of posts exploring Heavy Rain.]

To wit: Heavy Rain is a radical revision of the medium, changing, and in many cases eschewing, video game-defining principles which have remained largely unchanged since the arcade era. If it weren’t for such a deep-seated departure from stagnant norms, Heavy Rain would not be capable of being such a competent piece of drama, let alone an emotionally engaging one. It’s quite surprising actually that such a revisionist approach would be met with such a gripping context on debut, but it only makes Heavy Rain‘s message all the more potent and worthy of critical discussion. 

As is the case with properties which attempt to elicit an emotional response, I think many writers have, quite naturally, first conferred with their personal side. In which case this article and the accompanying columns will attempt to take the opposite approach by deconstructing elements of design, thereby allowing us to have a clearer understanding of Heavy Rain‘s unique direction. 

Deconstructing the Video Game: Three Pillars of Design for Interactive Drama

Heavy Rain‘s backend is an inversion of most typical gameplay systems. For one, Heavy Rainemploys a contextual-based input system where the player’s actions are built into the environment or the scene, initiated by following on-screen cues which mimic the real life action. This works differently to most video game systems which begin with the basic mechanics (usually walk, attack, grab, etc.) and then stack vertically as jump, punch and then “jump and punch while in the air” mechanics are added. Because Heavy Rain relies on a contextual system of interactivity, it’s also a single tier system as opposed to most games which contain the aforementioned layers of vertically-stacked mechanics. There is only one “mechanic” in Heavy Rain, so to speak. That’s walk. Heavy Rain is built around walk and interactivity is mapped horizontally to the environment or scene. In this single tier, contextual system, basic familiarity with the controller and on-screen interface are the only requisites for play. 

Heavy Rain, as a very atypical type of game which through its unique design has circumvented many of the issues facing modern interactive narrative, forces us to reassess the definition of a game. So then, I purpose this question: what is a game and does Heavy Rain meet this definition? For the sake of this argument, a game is a win condition and a set of rules for the player to meet that condition. Does Heavy Rain have both a win state and rules? Well, it certainly has rules, despite their differences from most traditional games, however, the win state argument is very unclear. There are two possible conclusions here, either Heavy Rain has no win state or the win state is the ratification of the narrative. That is, you win by participation, only your inputs may vary the narrative. Participation is a win state, but it’s a condition which deconstructs the intrinsic crux that all games operate on: skill. So then, is a game without skill a game at all?

Definitions aside, there’s a lot to unpack there, so let’s distill my explanation into 3 succinct bullet points. Heavy Rain deconstructs games by the following three means which I have ranked by order of importance: 

• The Absence of Skill




• Contextual Input Over An Established Ability Set




• Single Tier Complexity

Let us now turn to how each point works to deconstruct the former view of video games and, in its place, re-build a system for interactive drama. 

The Absence of Skill – More than Narratives of Mastery and the Removal of Ludo Narrative Dissonance

Without skill, Heavy Rain forgoes the previous skeleton of video game design almost completely. Games, in the traditional sense, those in which are skill-based, orientate around systems of mastery. That is, games facilitate the player’s learning and eventual mastery of a set of rules (known to players as their abilities). This means that video game narrative abides by a documentation of mastery. For instance, the protagonist’s journey of development or the increasing peril of a threatening situation. Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time and Halo are two respective examples of such narratives. In Prince of Persia, the narrative works with mastery in that the Prince develops as an adult (conveyed by his banter and actions regarding his female accomplice Farah) as the player masters the rules of the game. Halo‘s narrative works within a framework of mastery in that challenges of mastery are substantiated by the intensity of the war which peaks at the game’s conclusion. These are fine examples of narratives which work harmoniously with the properties of the medium.

This is all well and good, but don’t you see what’s happening here? If narrative and game are to work harmoniously together (as in Halo, Portal, Prince of Persia and Super Metroid, for instance), then the narrative potential is constricted by mastery. The alternative is that skill creates conflict and separation between these two parts (see further below). By marginalising skill, Heavy Raindoesn’t abide by a narrative of mastery and as a result there isn’t an imbalance between the rules of the game and the narrative of the game (also known ludo narrative dissonance). I’m far from an expert on contemporary video game narrative, so I won’t proceed to run through a myriad of examples pertaining to ludonarrative dissonance, but rather the two examples below should highlight the case quite clearly.

The Psychological Advantage of Meeting the Win State

By removing skill, Heavy Rain breaks loose from the expectation that work yields reward, in turn breaking the psychological advantage players formerly had over game narrative. Video games are absolute systems and thereby struggle with interpreting grey subject matter (unlike literature and film which are rich in ambiguity). As hard as developers try to make video games grey, they’re effectively pushing a boulder uphill against that aforementioned friction known as skill. Players know this, which is why grey game narrative mostly fails. Player’s know that if they meet the win state then the grey narrative (moral choice, for instance) cannot legitimately impact upon them. 

(There are exceptions, like Execution, where the player’s assumptions are preyed upon to shocking effect, when it fails, however, (for instance, when the game forces the player to make a morally wrong action), it’s pure deceit and therefore derided by the gaming community).

Mass Murder

Even when developers are successful at developing a good narrative within the constrains of a skill-based system, ludonarrative dissonance is still very likely to occur, as was much discussed withUncharted 2. Despite Nathan Drake’s warm charisma, throughout Uncharted 2 he murders hundreds, maybe thousands of people—he’s effectively a mass murder. Uncharted 2 is a 3rd person shooter which means that Drake/the player needs to shoot a large number of targets in order to train themselves for each trial. Yet, at the same time, Drake’s killing spree conflicts with his “good boy” characterisation.

Contextual Input Over An Established Ability Set – Common-place Application, Immersion and the Director’s Control

Most traditional games centre their mechanics around a couple of core abilities from which they build. Super Mario Bros; jump, Gears of War; 3rd person shooting, cover, Street Fighter; offensive attacks, defensive manoeuvres are a few examples. These abilities, while only a limited segment of the avatar’s complete repertoire of possible actions, are the abilities most relevant to the core premise, be it jumping, shooting, fighting, etc. 

In an entirely contextual system, abilities are not bound to foundation mechanics, so the possibilities of potential actions are practically infinite, only bound by the relevancy to the environment. This system is an ideal match for Heavy Rain which isn’t a shooter, platformer or fighter, but instead an interactive drama which requires the player to pull off a broad range of actions. For this reason, players of Heavy Rain will do things they’ve never done before in a video game. Simple things like sitting in a chair, playing with your kids or signing your name.

It’s interesting to observe that Heavy Rain isn’t a primitive re-rooting of video games fundamentals, but is instead incredibly well realised. In fact, some of the points made here aren’t necessarily inherent to the design (of contextual systems), but rather examples of Heavy Rain‘s sharp ingenuity. Interaction in Heavy Rain is based around mimicry of real life actions through the medium of the controller. The weight that the imitation of actions through the controller and on-screen representation (the animation corresponds to the completion of the action) have towards the immersiveness is impossible to quantify, but, speaking in generalities, one would assume that mimicry would create a much more engrossing experiences as the simulation is closer to real life than arbitrary button presses which bear little to no correspondence to the on-screen actions. IfHeavy Rain weren’t a contextual based system, then these custom inputs would not be possible (probably because they would destroy pace) and the connection to the drama would be lost. 

The most important quality of a contextual system is that it gives power to the director, since the director dictates the points of interactivity. This, in turn, transforms the environment from a playground to a vision. Such a system forgoes the traditional means of narrative (in-game narrative, cutscenes, etc), which results in a game with a constant degree of control, rather than one which adds or removes levels of control when the director feels the need to talk. We shall explore this point individually and with more detail in a later column. 

Single Tier Complexity – Accessibility

The upheaval of the traditional approach to game design changes the playing experience immensely. The most obvious point is that it compresses complexity down to on-screen prompts, which makes Heavy Rain a very accessible game to non-players. The nature of the prompts scale according to how you answer a mandatory question which asks how familiar you are with video games at the start of the game. For Heavy Rain to be a legitimate piece of drama, it ought to be playable by anyone, otherwise skill rears its ugly head back in and new players are marginalised and excluded from certain parts of the experience.

Some of the criticisms of Heavy Rain have been that not all choices are made available to the player and therefore Heavy Rain does not fully deliver on the proposition “How far would you go for someone you love?”. This criticism is most relevant to the action sequences which play a large role in determining the fate of the characters (and the respective avenues for choice), yet are based on reaction, ie. skill. This criticism is legitimate as it shows how skill can be injected back into Heavy Rain‘s skill-removed system to potential detriment of the narrative.

Conclusion

As we’ve established, Heavy Rain deconstructs the video game by devaluing skill and all of the systems relating to skill. In its place is an input system which gives the director control over interactivity and allows for an infinite range of actions. Being a narrative-driven game, the single mechanic, walk and its accompanying contextual input, allows for an accessible experience which does not hinder newer players from choice. 

The next article will be a footnote to my previous point on directive control, before I look at the way Heavy Rain toys with player roles.

Everyday Shooter is a game which has touched me profoundly. I can’t believe that I’d be saying such things about an arena shooter, an unassuming, independently-developed one at that. In regards to my former post on games as art, Everyday Shooter excels at bridging the mechanical and contextual while never breaking equilibrium. As someone who despises the pontification of games like Flower in lieu of constructive analysis, I’m going to try my best to provide some sensible commentary on the inner-workings of this title. I’m pretty weary that I’m about to fail though as, despite the fact that I’ve been stewing over Everyday Shooter for the past year that I’ve been playing it, I’m afraid that I still can’t quite wrap my head around what makes it work. It’s really simple, I’m sure but it hasn’t hit me yet, so let’s make a go of it anyways.

General Gameplay

Everyday Shooter is a twin-stick arcade shooter in the vein of Geometry Wars. You use one stick to move your ship, a pixel, and the other to blast threats in any direction. Your movement speed decreases when doing both actions at the same time, facilitating tactical defense and escape strategies.

Inspired by Every Extend Extra, Everyday Shooter employs a combo system whereby destroying certain objects will cause a chain reaction of explosions. The combo system varies from stage to stage. In the first stage (the name escapes me now), explosions from destroying satellite-looking creatures remain on screen for a period of time where the player can temporarily fuel the blast will bullets, any fodder which touch the blast radius add to the combo.

Most enemy types leave a small pellet after they’ve been hit which your ship can collect (pellets have a mild magnetism to your ship) for points. After reaching a certain score, you gain a life and the threshold for the next 1up increases. These pellets can be later used as points to extend the default lives count of your pixel. It is intended that players will have to play the initial levels continually to slowly earn enough points to afford the necessary number lives to crawl their way to the final stages.

Since you’re constantly replaying the same levels to nudge yourself a little further and add credits to the bank for starter lives and an increased chance of breaking into the next stage, one might assume that Everyday Shooter is a repetitive experience, however each stage reacts organically to the player’s success. If you’re scoring well, more enemies will spawn, they’ll spawn additional little factories to spawn more units and flood you. Although the overall template is the same, because you never play two games exactly the same, your experience on each replay differs significantly.

Visual Significance

Each level plays out like an interactive piece of art pertaining a sense of narrative through the patterns of the procedurally-generated shapes. The shapes are sometimes representative of real life objects (birds, bugs, tanks) and sometimes metaphoric. No matter the representation, the shapes act as cogs in the piece’s overall pattern. Although the underlying themes of some levels are more obvious than others, the 8 pieces leave a wide window of interpretation for the player to relate to. Since the designer, Jonathan Mak, is a programmer and not an artist, all of the art in the game is procedurally-generated which contribute to the strikingly natural and organic appearance.

And the Magic…

It’s the thread that ties these two worlds together which is most important. Each level in Everyday Shooter is a dual layered system: a combo and chaining system which corresponds to the visual and aural system. The arena shooter is the interface for you to commandeer the artwork. Your ship is your brush and the bullet fire the ink, so when you play the arena shooter you channel the artwork and the artwork creates a mood which draws you back in to the arena shooter. These two halves have a striking, self-sustained unity. The aural and visual landscapes not only convey information to the read, they’re rich and palatable to the senses, they convey an emotion which the player subsumes and becomes enveloped in. The shooting itself is organic and challenging and the presentation is meaningful and informative so the two halves work together to create a very dense type of game. On completing a round of Everyday Shooter I feel an emotional weight in my chest, and I think that this is how it happens.

]]> http://danielprimed.com/2010/04/attempting-to-understand-everyday-shooter/feed/ 0 http://danielprimed.com/2010/04/resident-evil-2-%e2%80%93-levelpuzzle-design-discussion/ http://danielprimed.com/2010/04/resident-evil-2-%e2%80%93-levelpuzzle-design-discussion/#comments Thu, 08 Apr 2010 14:14:45 +0000 Daniel http://danielprimed.com/?p=2416

I’m a bit stumped on how to discuss Resident Evil 2. Make no mistake, this is a fine game and I’d sure as hell like to probe into the design, however, the most attractive part of this title (the construction of puzzle elements) requires micro-level analysis. That is, analysis of pre-supposed routes, the respective associations of the “puzzle pieces”, the ordering of environmental hints and notes, the positioning of safe and danger zones and how all of these parts work together to guide the player. As you can imagine, for me to deconstruct Resident Evil 2 at this level, I’d basically be reverse engineering large chunks of the game and that’s an enormous undertaking. So instead of printing off maps and scribbling all over them, only to share my esoteric analysis, I’ve decided to just talk generally about the puzzle and level design.

The Spencer Estate and Onions

I wish I had a better memory of Resident Evil 3 because of what I can remember it strayed away from the mansion-orientated design pertinent in Resident Evil 0 through to Resident Evil 2. In Resident Evil, the design of the Spencer estate works like an onion. The player remains in a solitary place, peeling off layers of access (via the solving of cryptic puzzles) until they reach the core. The puzzles are designed around exploiting one iteration of the mansion, peeling back a layer, gaining some new items and mining further into new areas or taking their new-found tools and re-applying them to the newest iteration. (Iterations, for example when you leave the mansion to go to the graveyard and come back in, enemy placement is different and you have new tools to use within the environment).

Resident Evil 0 and 2 diverge from this formula, but only a little. A large section (generally close to half) of each title is spent in an area akin to the Spencer estate (the Umbrella Training Facility and the RPD Police Station). This estate is then connected by a linear path to smaller “estates” with fewer layers of puzzle-solving (sewers, factory, water filtration plant, Umbrella labs). Resident Evil 0 and 2 diverge by the way of chopping up the mansion and spreading it out over several interconnected areas.

Resident Evil 3, if I remember correctly, mostly eschewed this design in place of a very fragmented, linear design on the streets of Racoon City. There were a couple of smaller “estates” (the clock tower and the RPD Police Station), but they were much more open-ended. I might be completely off my mark here, but I remember Resident Evil 3 being far more linear than prior games, substituting this freedom in the form of the run or die choices occasionally presented when faced against Nemesis.

Posing the Question of Playability

A few weeks back, I discussed how the Ecliptic Express section preluding the Research Facility at the start of Resident Evil 0 worked as a good tutorial to ease players into the experience. Besides a brief skip through the Racoon City streets at the beginning of the game (part of the only time you actually experience the city outdoors), Resident Evil 2 begins just as Resident Evil did: by dumping you in a large house with riddles to solve—there is no tutorial. On my first play session of Resident Evil 2 though I played for several hours straight, constantly making progress throughout this time and, in fact, only ended my play session because the hours were rolling past midnight. Contrary to Resident Evil where I was frequently drip-fed on a FAQ. I enjoyed Resident Evil 0 and 2 because they made me feel intelligent without sacrificing challenge, however Resident Evil was simply a lesson in frustration. It constantly made me feel stupid. The strange thing is that Resident Evil and Resident Evil 2 both start off on the same foot, design-wise, so how is it that my play experiences were so radically different?

To answer the question generally, I think Resident Evil 2 has a much clearer, obvious design than Resident Evil. In Resident Evil 2, the logic puzzles are—surprisingly enough—based on logic. If you have a crank handle, it goes in a hole. If you have a red gem stone, there will only be one spot where putting that gem stone would seem appropriate. If you have materials for explosives, a note will tell you explicitly that if you put those items together you will make a bomb. While not exactly obvious, Resident Evil 2′s puzzles are far from cryptic; they actually give the player a fighting chance at solving the problem for themselves. In Resident Evil, you’re often presented with items which have no context within the areas you’ve just visited (stones, dragon heads) and clues tend to be more confusing than helpful. In contrast, almost every time I found an item in Resident Evil 2, I knew exactly where I could apply that item and if I didn’t, the item was practical enough for me to assume where it could possibly be used later in the game.

Perhaps not even incidentally, Resident Evil and Resident Evil 2 are cryptic and practical, respectively, for good reasons. Resident Evil is cryptic not only because it’s a “remake” of Sweet Home (which had arcane puzzle elements) but also because of the established of George Trevor plot arc. Trevor was intentionally hired to design the mansion on behalf of Umbrella head Ozwell E. Spencer because of his expertise of crafting puzzles, traps and secret doors. Resident Evil 2, on the other hand, is set in a suburban town, so the items available are practical commodity items and the puzzles are thereby more straightforward than the traps Trevor dreamt up.

The other point worth considering is the avenues open to exploration. Both Resident Evil and Resident Evil 2 dump you in a large house and leave you to your own devices. Resident Evil leaves the player stranded with two floors with doorways leading all over the mansion. A gunshot steers the player in the general direction. In the Police Station in Resident Evil 2, access to the higher floors are cut off, there are three doors on the ground floor, one of them is locked and in Leon’s game, a police office lets out a scream which explicitly indicates that the layer best investigate. Once you’ve explored the respective room, you’re locked out, leaving only one other avenue to go down. So it’s very clear where to go next, yet it doesn’t dumb down the experience.

Conclusion

Resident Evil 2 breaks the mansion design into several linearly connected areas and in doing so streamlines the overwhelming nature of the original game. Due to the suburban setting, Resident Evil 2‘s puzzles focus on practicality over arcane mystery and as the crux of the title therefore improves accessibility greatly. Overall then, these factors help make Resident Evil 2 a more user-focused puzzle experience which explain why such a title is so highly regarded.

You know, now that I think about it, if I were a FAQ writer, I probably could have quite easily followed through with my original idea.

]]> http://danielprimed.com/2010/04/resident-evil-2-%e2%80%93-levelpuzzle-design-discussion/feed/ 3 http://danielprimed.com/2010/03/resident-evil-umbrella-chronicles-%e2%80%93-side-commentaries/ http://danielprimed.com/2010/03/resident-evil-umbrella-chronicles-%e2%80%93-side-commentaries/#comments Thu, 25 Mar 2010 10:45:58 +0000 Daniel http://danielprimed.com/?p=2356

Here’s everything I couldn’t add to what I said before. Some pretty substantial comments this time, unlike with Dead Space Extraction. So, dig in!

Faithful Enemies Types Stretched Thin

One of the unavoidable issues when adapting a survival horror franchise like Resident Evil into an on-rails shooter is the cast of enemies. The original Resident Evil games were rather sparsely populated, creating moments of quiet solitude which would enhance the ensuing scares. An action-intensive rail shooter, on the other hand, lives off its fodder, and as a result, the selective cast of bio-organic weapons are spread thickly and stretched thinly over the action to the cause of trite repetition. You’ll constantly confront the same slew of primates, hunters, dogs and zombies, because that’s all that the source material can afford. Balancing continuity with prior games and the enjoyment of the rail shooter is a tricky task, one that minor enemy variations (visually, in the form of attack patterns and/or weak spots) could have proved a sound solution. Another possible solution is a less action-intensive direction as with Dead Space:Extraction. This would be more akin to the original games, however, I have doubts that it would have worked quite as effectively.

Weapons Cache

Resident Evil: Umbrella Chronicles‘ weapon cache of 15 unique weapons is spread across 5 main weapon types: shotguns, machine guns, revolvers, explosives, and uhh more powerful explosives. Only two types of weapons are ever all that useful: shotguns and machine guns. Shotguns are effective at clearing enemies quickly in tense situations and managing hordes of zombies ready for the critical shot. The machine guns are good for stunning enemies and clearing destructible objects. They both also double as functional main weapons. The other three types are too high-risk due to their destructive power and limited ammunition. Frankly, you’d be stupid to both using these weapons. I did for the final segment of the Resident Evil 3 chapter and wasted 40 minutes on Nemesis. And anycase, why use a magnum to headshot a zombie when the default weapon is equally as effective? As I said in the previous post, the critical shot system practically makes these weapons redundant.

Burnt Toast

I’m surprised that in all I’ve read about Resident Evil: Umbrella Chronicles not one person has commented on the overcooked visual presentation. Don’t read me wrong, I do like the visual presentation, but it clearly has a very dark, raw look to it, often bordering on monotone. Comparing the recreation of the Spencer estate to RE Remake reveals a weaker textual hue, the wallpaper is the most noticeable difference between the two. Furthermore, compare Umbrella Chronicles to its bloom-lit sequel Darkside Chronicles and there’s a remarkable gain in detail and richness. Also, the sound of the Samurai Edge, the default gun, is abhorrent and contributes to the style.

Cheating the Default Configuration

Anyone who plays this game with just the Wii-mote is a dill. The default configuration is plain horrendous, over-mapping actions to the most prominent buttons, requiring the player to reload by shaking the pointer and losing some minor camera control from the nunchuck. The best way to play is to use the Zapper configuration, but not to use the mold. That way reloading won’t throw off your aim and switching between weapons is easy. It’s unbelievable that this control scheme was not accepted as default, or at least firing off screen made available for those not using it separately (as much as the rapid movement isn’t appropriate to the accuracy-focus of Umbrella Chronicles).

Clear Visual Indicators

It’s almost funny how much information you can display on a firing reticle, in the case of Umbrella Chronicles the amount of ammunition held in your gun and the type of shot based on the hover of your cursor. Four dashes appear in each direction around the central dot to indicate that you are shooting an object, be it a zombie or a some destructible object, which is really handy for scanning rooms for hidden files.

Adapting Survival Horror to the On-Rails Format

On Twitter, if I recall, I said that I’d like to explore the differences between playing Resident Evil 0 (which I’d recently completed) as a survival horror game and a rail shooter. I hate to disappoint you, but the differences are pretty self-evident. What is interesting are the cuts made to adapt the original titles into a rail shooter. Chapters from Resident Evil 0 are more or less a straight conversion with some of the solo bits chopped out and re-thinkered, the other two games however are heavily redone. While it has been some time since I played Resident Evil 3, I don’t recall a hefty majority of the locations, supposedly much of the layout of Raccoon City was adapted from the Outbreak games which were made by the same developers. Nemesis also makes his appearance at the start of the third and final act, so the order is completely muddled and there is seemingly no intermission for when Jill is knocked out. The original mansion incident is more faithful, but at the same time, feels like a remade adventure where Chris and Jill’s story is meshed together (there’s always two players together and they are never apart, this justifies the co-op). Only purists are likely to complain however, and all of the adjustments and cuts are understandable.

An Added Word on Cannon

Just as a rider to my comments above, the Red Queen computer system, as seen in the new Umbrella Ends chapter, was actually from the Resident Evil movies, and then we have dilemma. Capcom has denied the Resident Evil movies from ever being a part of cannon, yet, right here, Capiva have created a thread. Interesting to ponder.

Being Reasonable with the Game’s Intents

I was originally planning on writing an article taking another swipe at the enthusiast media’s silly criticisms of this game, but somehow I couldn’t find enough reputable sources talking unfounded trash to fill an entire article, so I will just talk generally to eschew any accountability. There are two comments used to discredit this title which have really frustrated me: this is not a “proper” installment in the franchise and there’s no Resident Evil 2, waaaaaahhhh! People, we need to judge this/any game on what it’s trying to do and not what it isn’t. Just because Umbrella Chronicles isn’t a new 3^rd person installment does not make it a bad game. Umbrella Chronicles is a great stopgap for fans to do their homework and experience the original games in a new format, or, alternatively, as a point of entry for new players. In fact, I think that Umbrella Chronicles fits in quite well with Resident Evil 4: Wii Edition and the Gamecube remakes and ports—anyone can get their Resident Evil fix (minus RE5) on the Wii, and that’s pretty awesome.

Widescreen, Dammit!

This game is the first title in my collection to have mandatory, forced widescreen. There doesn’t seem to be any way to play in standard box-TV view, and that kinda makes me angry since I have a nice, box-TV at home. One of those decently-sized flatscreen models that went cheap as HDTV and all that rubbish was coming into the market.

]]> http://danielprimed.com/2010/03/resident-evil-umbrella-chronicles-%e2%80%93-side-commentaries/feed/ 0 http://danielprimed.com/2010/03/resident-evil-umbrella-chronicles-%e2%80%93-for-and-against-the-critical-hit/ http://danielprimed.com/2010/03/resident-evil-umbrella-chronicles-%e2%80%93-for-and-against-the-critical-hit/#comments Tue, 23 Mar 2010 05:33:43 +0000 Daniel http://danielprimed.com/?p=2351

One of the most contentious aspects of Resident Evil: Umbrella Chronicles is the targeting of critical, insta-kill shots. It’s understandable why this mechanic has received such harsh criticism, most of it’s founded, yet despite all the hoo-rah, there are solid reasons to defend the seemingly wonky. I wish to present both arguments as I see it. Again, video is a good point of reference, pity I can’t capture any myself.

Targeting System Introduction

Resident Evil: Umbrella Chronicles employs a two-tier critical hit system. On hitting any enemy’s weak point, a white flash is emitted (think photography flash), when your cursor is pointed over a zombie’s critical weak point the reticle will blink red and on landing a hit a blue flash is emitted and the zombie dies instantly. Insta-kill, “critical” hits only apply to zombies or crimson heads and not to any of the other enemy types. The weak point target is the head, the critical hit target is their brains, located at the tip of the head.

For

• Being a little more specific and targeting the brain adds a layer of depth to the weak spot concept
• Using the brain as the insta-kill, critical hit target makes logical sense
• The inclusion of a second weak point forces players to be more methodical and strategic (particularly when confronted with a zombie up close, which then becomes a method of stunning and gunning for the insta-kill).
• In turn, this system pushes players towards playing for accuracy and not to just spam enemies
• And this ties in well with the hidden files, moments of gameplay where spamming bullets at destructible objects is encouraged. Overall, the critical hit supports RE: Umbrella Chronicles in being tidily organised and segmented

Against

• To balance the 2 types of hits (3 if you count body shots), zombies takes roughly 3-5 head shots to down, this destroys the pacing
• Including two types of critical attacks is just confusing
• The system works against commonly accepted norms, being: head shots equal death, and that zombies go down with head shots
• Zombie’s heads therefore seem to be made of metal or something

Only Applicable for Zombies and Crimson Heads

(I didn’t want to preempt myself here, but it was necessary to include it in the above point as well). Zombies are the only enemy type whereby this targeting system is applicable, every other enemy in the game (snakes, dogs monkeys, lickers, hunters, all boss battles, etc) dies instantly by shooting their weak spot with the default gun (this is not so much the case with the other weapons).

For

• Zombies are a mainstay of the series, so it’s only appropriate that they’re given generous air time (through the long time it takes to aim precisely for critical hits, and the fact that zombies necessitate the critical hit variable)
• The confrontations with zombies are the most tactical of the entire game, they allow players to move between attacking and stunning (zombies in preparation for a critical hit) states

Against

• Presence of zombies become far too overbearing
• It’s also repetitive to be constantly met with the same enemy type
• Sequences with a mob of zombies act as pockets of slower gameplay (as the player tries for precision), this creates a wave of inconsistency throughout the experience
• Logically it doesn’t make much sense that the targeting rules in regards to zombies don’t apply to the other enemy types

Only Achievable with One Gun

I almost preempted this point too. This system, which I’ve just elaborated on, applies mainly, but not exclusively, to the default gun (the Samurai Edge). With zombies, insta-kill shots (the ones which add to your tally at the end-of-level grading) can only be triggered with the Samurai Edge. With other enemies though, a hit to the weak spot with the Samurai Edge is an insta-kill, but with other weapons, this isn’t always the case.

For

• Again we’re seeing a construction of rules which invite the player to be strategic, since only one gun can land a critical hit, it’s important that the player use the other weapons to aid in landing that critical shot, whether it be through stunning enemies or clearing non-zombie distractions
• Since the Samurai Edge has unlimited ammo, the targeting system doesn’t privilege those with a stockpile
• If any weapon could cause a critical hit, then obviously the rapid-firing weapons would reign supreme over the entire game, so it’s best to let the default weapon grant this power

Against

• Further unnecessary confusion, not only do critical hits only apply to zombies, but with use to a certain gun as well
• For players concious of critical hits, this design makes the selectable weapons cache partly redundant

Closing Statements

For

The dual layered critical hit system works to give Umbrella Chronicles more depth and strategy. Without the restrictions to enemy and weapon types, players would simply rely on a machine gun to spam-critical-hit their way through the title. Instead, Umbrella Chronicles disposes of norms to create a rich shooting system which encourages strategy and accuracy over random blasting.

Against

Resident Evil: Umbrella Chronicles‘ critical hit system is a non-unified one, and illogical at that. Zombies and the default gun are heavily favoured by way of establishing this system through the critical hit variable, and play therefore suffers from repetition. The other types of guns are also made redundant by this system. Furthermore, Umbrella Chronicles breaks the accepted norm that zombies die on head shots.

]]> http://danielprimed.com/2010/03/resident-evil-umbrella-chronicles-%e2%80%93-for-and-against-the-critical-hit/feed/ 0 http://danielprimed.com/2010/03/resident-evil-umbrella-chronicles-%e2%80%93-inviting-replayability/ http://danielprimed.com/2010/03/resident-evil-umbrella-chronicles-%e2%80%93-inviting-replayability/#comments Sun, 21 Mar 2010 12:58:37 +0000 Daniel http://danielprimed.com/?p=2346

Rail shooters, being a coin-sucking genre from the arcade, have traditionally been cursed with limited playtime—it’s part of the reason why console ports of popular arcade rail shooters always get a bad wrap. Resident Evil: The Umbrella Chronicles (just going to omit the ‘the’ from here on out), as a shooter, brings little additions to the standard formula (bar some neat tweaks and flourishes), what it does do, however, is address this long-standing issue of replayability. For reference/a general overview of this title, please refer to the video review below:

There are two facts which ought to first be distinguished. Resident Evil: Umbrella Chronicles is a game which features a large amount of content (22 separate levels, each lasting roughly 15-20 minutes) and invites players to replay its large selection of levels. The former point speaks for itself itself (more content equal longer play time) and although it’s unprecedented for this type of game, it’s a point which isn’t of interest for this discussion. What’s of greater interest is the way in which Umbrella Chronicles maximises replayability by selling itself to different types of players. In a sense, Cavia (the developers) are attempting to solicit extended play time from players, and this is how they do it.

NB: Assigning a type of gamer to a respective heading just adds a nice touch. Of course, I’m talking in generalities, there is overlap.

Grading System

Player Type: The Perfectionist

On competition of each level your performance is graded on five different factors: clear time, number of enemies killed, number of critical hits, number of objects destroyed and the number of files obtained. Ranking systems such as this always prey on perfectionist tendencies, particularly in a twitch-based genre such as the rail shooter.

Sorry for the Japanese.

What I really like about the grading system is the individuality of each ranking variable. The tally, as a combination of factors, doesn’t entirely hinge on the player’s reflexes or shooting consistency (as with many games of this nature) and in turn opens itself up to being rather inclusive. The ‘files obtained’ variable is fixed on multiple play throughs (ie. once you’ve gathered a file at any stage, it will add to your ranking, you don’t need to find it again on subsequent play throughs) and along with the ‘objects destroyed’ variable (which is pretty easy to score well on) loosens the rigidness considerably. These variables act as bait, so that when a player does the rail shooter part well, and is graded respectively, their overall rank is pulled up, encouraging them to consider going for another round. You’re more likely to find new hidden files on repeated play throughs, so even if you don’t do so well, you’re rank is still likely to increase some, again, acting as motivation. So, in this regard, the grading system serves both perfectionists and normal players, inviting them to better their high score.

Hidden Files

Player Type: The Resident Evil Fan

Resident Evil: Umbrella Chronicles is basically one big fangasm, so it’s unsurprising then that one of these points would be dedicated to the fan children. The hidden files, strewn behind destructible objects in each level, provide insight into the characters behind the events of the four main chapters—a damn compelling reason for fans to replay completed levels. Sadly, most of the archives contain previous material ripped straight from the original games themselves (the journal entries and so forth), however, all bits of information pertaining to the final chapter, Umbrella’s End, are entirely new. So although the rewards are a little gimped, the most significant files are those which are the most difficult to obtain. In anycase, completing the archive (quite a momentous task), is quite the feat, one that should satisfy fans and completists alike.

Upgradable Weapons

Player Type: The Completist

Your ranking at the end of each level gives you stars which you can then spend to power up your weapons. I guess this serves the completist audience most, however, any type of player can benefit from improved weapons. Improved weapons assist with score board chasing and provide more ammo for random environment blasting in pursuit of hidden files. Since my 22hrs of play time didn’t reward me with enough stars to upgrade even half the weapons cache, I figure that only a completist would replay levels to max out all of the available weapons, making it the most likely candidate.

Alternative Paths

Player Type: The Tourist

Alternative paths are a genre staple and depending on how they’re handled can multiply play time significantly, ideal for tourist players who prefer to see all the locations on offer. The traditional method of divergent paths is to simply present two options, encouraging the player to replay in order to experience the path which went previously unselected. Other games are much more elaborate, House of the Dead II, for instance, is famous for its organic path system where the player’s route through each level is skill-dependent, allowing for a myriad of pathways which open and close depending of whether the player meets certain conditions. Umbrella Chronicles plays is pretty safe, going down the traditional route. In the final chapter though, there are sequences in a maze-like laboratory where many options are presented. Fortunately each route is quite substantial and makes at least a repeated play worthwhile.

Co-Op Play

Player Type: Multi-player

Explains itself really, cooperative multiplayer invites players to approach the content with two angles: with a friend or by oneself.

Conclusion

Cavia succeed on two fronts, the first of which is to offer a generous amount of content, the second is to farm that content for as much as its worth. The second option is the more intelligent one, in regards to development efforts, it takes much less effort for developers to convince the player to replay stages than it is to create all new ones. Resident Evil: Umbrella Chronicles is therefore quite intelligently designed to address this issue which has plagued the genre for many years, in turn establishing a new identity for the console rail shooter.

]]> http://danielprimed.com/2010/03/resident-evil-umbrella-chronicles-%e2%80%93-inviting-replayability/feed/ 0 http://danielprimed.com/2010/03/dead-space-extraction-side-commentaries/ http://danielprimed.com/2010/03/dead-space-extraction-side-commentaries/#comments Tue, 16 Mar 2010 06:41:33 +0000 Daniel http://danielprimed.com/?p=2329

Fugly Boxart

I bought Dead Space Extraction cheap for $20 and even then I almost regretted buying it. Never have I felt so prompted to go back and refund a game I just bought for the sole reason of offensively bad boxart. Take a look for yourself.

Despite looking blatantly cheap, the horrified woman and the angry dude in the background don’t really resemble the respective characters in the game. In fact, the cover simply fails to represent the high production found in-game. It’s an abomination.

PR Shenanigans

Visceral Games coined the term “guided experience” (or something to that extent) to distinguish Dead Space Extraction from the swath of other rail shooters on the Wii. It kinda reminds me of a similar PR move made recently by Atlus who went to great lengths to separate Shiren the Wander from the association to rougelikes. For those unfamiliar with the term, a roguelike is an ultra niche style/genre of game which bears a likeness to the classic game Rogue. I will throw some links in at the bottom of the article for reference. Anyways, Shiren is clearly a roguelike, yet Atlus wanted to dissociate its game from the genre because roguelikes have a bad connotation. The same can be said for Dead Space Extraction‘s PR shenanigans where Visceral are clearly trying to distance themselves from a genre which is seen as derelict in this industry, unfortunately. Although Dead Space Extraction is a very unique rail shooter, it’s still a rail shooter.

Head Spin

People have winged in the past about how these games can be very disorientating as the camera wobbles around. I agree with the complains, it’s true, but you do get use to it and it becomes significantly less of a burden as you adjust. At the same time it makes you sympathetic towards the Japanese who tend to feel motion sickness from playing first person shooters.

Wiimote Speaker Logs

Throughout Dead Space Extraction you can pick up text, sound and video logs. The video logs disrupt the flow of the game as do the text logs. The sound logs though, come through the Wii speaker, and although they only last a few seconds, they do a tremendous job at inserting you into the atmosphere. Probably the best use for the Wiimote’s speaker yet.

Apeing Silent Hill

On completing the first level of the game, a chapter which runs deep with psychological hallucinations, I pondered just how liberally Dead Space ripped from Silent Hill. I guess it’s not really stealing considering that Silent Hill owns that entire psychological horror space, but I just feel that the level preps players up into thinking that the franchise is nothing but a pretender. Fortunately, my perceptions changed over time and Dead Space has its own justifications for all the psychological and religious undertones, all of which will most likely be brought to the forefront in Dead Space 2. Still, the first level genuinely overdoes the visual illusion thing.

Untimely Instructions

Just a little nitpick this one. Quite frequently text cues appear on screen after completing a suggested action which obviously defeats the purpose.

Multicultural Cast

Dead Space Extraction sports a surprisingly varied cast of both males and females coming from a range of different cultural backgrounds. Lexine Murdoch, the female lead, is quite clearly Irish, the protagonist (Nathan McNeill) is American, his gung-ho war buddy seems to be English as does the suspicious Warren Eckhardt. Along the way you also encounter an Indian lady who later becomes a playable character and there’s an American-born-Chinese in the prologue too.

Viewpoints of Many

To coincide with the multicultural cast, Dead Space Extraction places you in the role of several different characters which exposes some personality traits and plot lines not seen through the other members of the cast. It’s a great idea, but isn’t hugely capitalised on in a medium-specific way, since each protagonist plays the same.

Additional Readings

Active Time Babble Roguelike (Episode IX)

@play Column – GameSetWatch

]]> http://danielprimed.com/2010/03/dead-space-extraction-side-commentaries/feed/ 0 http://danielprimed.com/2010/03/dead-space-extraction-%e2%80%93-an-inspired-take-on-a-conventional-genre/ http://danielprimed.com/2010/03/dead-space-extraction-%e2%80%93-an-inspired-take-on-a-conventional-genre/#comments Sun, 14 Mar 2010 23:28:03 +0000 Daniel http://danielprimed.com/?p=2325

Dead Space Extraction is the most progressive of its Wii rail shooter brethren, and probably the most groundbreaking title in the genre in recent memory. The proportioning of gameplay states (which tends to emphasise atmosphere and storytelling) along with a diverse myriad of other mechanics culminate in the realisation of a different breed of rail shooter, one which I think is long over due. As you’ve probably guessed, I’m going to talk about the various points which make Dead Space Extraction unique, however, if you need a refresher, or haven’t yet heard of this title, the video review below lend a hand.

Narrative and Atmosphere

As much as Visceral Games attempts to dissociate their game from the term, Dead Space Extraction is fundamentally a rail shooter. Perhaps a better way to describe it is a rail shooter with lots of narrative and atmosphere. Guesstimating for a second, maybe 40% of the game is purely narrative and atmosphere setting, the 60% is representative of the time you’ll spend shooting at things. That might sound measly, particularly considering the 7 hr length of the main story, but Dead Space Extraction marries the atmosphere, narrative and shooting so well together that each part feels necessary to complete the experience, in turn justifying the excessive amount of passive play time. (And anyways, theres an entirely separate mode which contains nothing but shooting).

Some might interpret this change in agenda as a fundamental change to the genre, but it’s not, structurally there’s just greater padding between the shooting sequences. The re-proportioning does, however, give Dead Space Extraction a unique feel and in fact gives credence to the “guided experience” mantra put forth by EA’s PR folk.

Each of these 3 main gameplay constituents supports and justifies the presence of the others. Since it’s difficult to explain on paper here’s a list of examples to back up my case:

• The proportion of shooting sequences increases as the story, and panic therein, progresses
• The atmosphere draws the player into the environment which makes the shooting more engrossing and meaningful
• The inclusion of a narrative and supporting class of characters add realism and a human element to all the horror and necromorph dismemberment
• The narrative and atmosphere setting allows the action to breathe into phases of warming up and cooling down
• Since the atmosphere supports the shooting, moments of suspense and jack-in-the-box scares don’t feel cheap, they bleed into the gameplay
• Traditional rail shooters are very rigid, every turn of a corner leads to a shoot out, Dead Space Extraction surprises the player with its lack of shooting, shooting therefore becomes more important and suspenseful

Patented Dead Space Elements

Dead Space sported a few nifty mechanics set around the Resident Evil 4-themed framework which splintered the franchise off in its own direction. Fortunately these original elements have been adapted to Dead Space Extraction and work a treat.

Strategic Dismemberment

A real game changer, I think. In the Dead Space games the most effective way to down Necromorphs (the angry, disfigured space mutants) is to blow off their limbs. “Strategic Dismemberment”, as it’s called, adds a new dimension to the traditional shooting formula, since what was once a single main target (head shot) is now shared amongst the limbs. This change allows the individual design of the space mutants to be more meaningfully characteristic. They’re not all zombies, they have limbs in different places, some short, some large, and that affects the traditional method of play greatly.

Paralysis

Paralysis is a supplementary mechanic which supports the dismemberment. As firing holes into your foes’ head (or body) is no longer suffice–instead players needs to bang off several specific parts of the body–targeting requires greater precision than usual, the action therefore needs to slow to support the required boost in precision. The paralysis technique allows the player to temporarily freeze their enemies so that they can dismember with ease. Surprisingly, this little addition breathes a great deal of strategy into the shooting as it’s a finite, self-charging resource which ought to be used tactically. Also, the other Necromorphs tend to que up and wait their turn while one of their buddies is right in your face, so the paralysis allows the player to take control of the pacing of the alien onslaught, it gives them strategic wiggle room.

Grabbing Objects

Many rail shooters have a grabbing mechanic, however Dead Space Extraction does it a little differently. The grabbing mechanic isn’t technically the same as the shooting (place reticle over and fire to pick up an item), but an actual reach into the screen (via some white light super power) followed by the object floating in front of you, think Elebits instead of, say, Resident Evil: Umbrella Chronicles. Although a very simple trick it allows for some nifty applications such as dragging debris, scavenging for items and tossing gas cylinders.

Zero Gravity

Zero gravity sequences are fixed chunks of gameplay which mostly involve no shooting (save for a single boss battle), where the player scans the environment for a predetermined landing area and pushes themselves towards it. Occasionally they’ll need to clear space debris obscuring their path. These sections do a great job at relaxing the pace without withholding the player from interaction.

Alternative Fire

Alt fire isn’t anything particularly new, but Dead Space Extraction puts an interesting spin on the formula. To initiate alternative fire, you simply tilt the Wii mote 90 degrees. With some weapons, the types of fire correspond to the respective Wiimote orientation, for example with the line gun or plasma cutter holding the Wiimote horizontally will send out a horizontal slice, while holding the Wiimote vertically will send out a vertical slice.

Puzzles on Demand

Inter-spliced between the gunplay are small puzzle sections where the main character has to solder wires on a malfunctioning terminal to open a door, refer to the video for reference. Generally speaking, they’re a neat distraction, however at times you’ll be forced to solder wires and fend off an aggressive hoard of Neromorphs at the same time which creates an invariably tense atmosphere when trying to steady your hand. In co-op, each player is assigned mandatory sections wires to solder which keeps things fresh.

Freelook

Another minor trick which Dead Space Extraction employs is the occasional opportunity to freely scan the environment for a designated number of seconds. These brief moments act as preparation for you to nab some equipment before an oncoming series of shootouts. As with the branching paths, this is another way that Dead Space Extraction gives players the freedom of control which is otherwise absent in this genre.

Ripper

The Ripper is a weapon with Turok-like ingenuity, a gun which fires saw blades. Sure. Big deal, right? Well actually, the player can manipulate these saw blades with the Wiimote by reaching into the screen and directing them at alien fodder. I was greatly surprised by this nasty little weapon. Again, please refer to the video to get a clearer impression.

Glow Worms

Glow worms too, are quite inspired. Basically the Ishimura lacks torches, so the engineers instead use glow worms (think glo sticks) for light. You light up the little wormy by shaking the nunchuck.

Conclusion

The final few points are rather self-explanatory and perhaps not worth the effort of writing in words, however, these smaller points combined with the atmosphere, narrative and the Dead Space franchise frills give Dead Space Extraction a distinct flavour. It’s one of those games that feels inspired by good ideas which are cleanly implemented and well thought out, a game which stands as both a great Dead Space game, but also a great rail shooter and narrative experience.

I’ve also been playing Resident Evil: Umbrella Chronicles recently, so please look forward to some writing (possible comparative) on that particular rail shooter. You can also find similar commentaries on Link: Crossbow Training and House of the Dead II and III: Return, if you’re interested. I’m very interested in mapping the current state of the rail shooter, so expect more to come.

Additional Readings

Developer Commentaries – Gametrailers

Dead Space Extraction – Dead Space Wiki

A Distinct Vision: Nick Earl And Visceral Games – Gamasutra

There are a couple of odd inconsistencies in Resident Evil 0. It’s a given in this series to expect a crummy plot and wooden characters, but defeating Marcus and the leech queen at the end of the game was disappointing in how irrelevant it was to what I consider to be Resident Evil 0‘s core asset, the empathetic relationship between Billy and Rebecca. Resident Evil 0 defeated my expectations by delivering a un-bombastic narrative, a good story. I found myself deeply engrossed in these two characters and their journey as two strangers. They didn’t speak much and nor did they need to as their relationship developed through the pragmatic functions of the game. Including Marcus as a villain feels contrived, as though the series is carrying out it’s duty of upholding the mannequin heroes and villains trope. Continuity-wise he was already accounted for by the in-game journals and notes, there was no need to resurrect him. And overall I feel disappointed that Resident Evil 0‘s great narrative was squandered by series ritual.

Marcus, as the deliverer of forced narrative, also detracts from the relationship that I feel the player makes with the environment. This association with ‘place’ is perhaps what people might call the player narrative, it’s difficult to classify since the aforementioned Rebecca-Billy relationship is also probably part of the player narrative too, although it also has fixed narrative from the director. In any case, Resident Evil 0 is a beautiful game. Sure, it may be a little monotone in comparison to Resident Evil Remake, however, I think it’s easy for the player to grow an attachment because it’s so convincing. Admittedly, I am a patch disappointed at the lack of animation gone into the stills (what is there is phenomenal), originally hearing that the stills were much more animated than RE Remake, but what is there pulls the player in with great ease. Marcus, just as before, breaks the relationship a little, we don’t care about him, we care about his estate and the activity that happened around it.

The final, and I guess most obvious, disparity regarding the plot is just the difference between the professional rendering of the environment and the vintage of the gameplay compared to the dialogue. Again, improbable video game nonsense that has the quality of a teenage fan fic, set at ends with the high quality presentation. Similarly, the tank controls and the presentation don’t match either.

Other inconsistencies are well established, like how Resident Evil 0 was marketed as Resident Evil on a train (the Under Siege 2 to accompany my Syphon Filter analogy ^_^), when in fact it’s just the B-sides of Resident Evil Remake. Seriously, the train sequences composes the game’s intro and everything after that is Resident Evil redux, mansions, laboratories and the like.

To conclude my extended commentaries of Resident Evil 0, I figure that it’s worth mentioning the forced sexism imposed by the game since it is a disparity of sorts. This sexism is the justification for the partner zapping system. That is, each protagonist is assigned traits which differentiate them from their partner and therefore forces the player to utilise each characters strengths. These traits can be inferred as sexist, on two levels. The first being that Billy is stronger than Rebecca, both in health and the ability to push large crates, while Rebecca can mix herbs and chemicals. Yeah, that’s pretty blatant in assigning gender stereotypes. The second point is a direct consequence of the first in that since Billy can take more hits, it’s best to use him most of the time since after all this is a game of survival and using the character with the most HP is the the wiser decision. Unfortunately, the unintended—second!—consequence, on top of the first, is that since Billy becomes the default character for tackling enemies he needs to store all the important items, and Rebecca is thereby relegated holding duties. So what is Resident Evil asserting? That women are only good for holding things?

I don’t honestly believe that Resident Evil 0 is sexist, it’s just an interesting observation to make. Theorising for a minute though, I reckon Capcom probably wanted to remedy this issue (not just for sexism’s sake but to keep a balance between the usage of each character) by prescribing Rebecca with her own solo sections without Billy. There’s the first part of the train sequence before they team up, the entire factory area and it’s extremely useful (although not mandatory) to use her for the first floor of the laboratory. Overall, these constitute maybe a quarter of the game, which is pretty significant.

Conclusion

This posts marks the end of my Resident Evil 0 coverage, I also wrote a post 2 years ago on Resident Evil Remake and although it’s shit, maybe you wanna check it out. You know, despite some pretty significant flaws, I really enjoyed Resident Evil 0 as it partly mirrors the atmospheric game of solace I mentioned in The Ideal Prince of Persia. Try it out, I think you’ll dig it.

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