Comments on Dead Space

September 21st, 2010

Originally I bought Dead Space: Extraction because I’m a fan of on-rails shooters, and in this regard Extraction didn’t disappoint. Now, my brother already had bought the original Dead Space a few years ago, and although originally apprehensive to play it, I figured that if I rent the animated movie, Downfall, I could critique the franchise as a trans-media franchise (2 games, a comic and an animated movie) in succession to another article which you might hear about soon. Then I realised that Downfall was rubbish, mangled the continuity of the four “prequels” (there’s a new book, Martyr too) and in some cases broke it. In which case, it wouldn’t be worth the effort of picking up the pieces. (And when a supposed trans-media property breaks narrative, it’s obvious that the production is nothing more than a cash grab anyways). Finally, I played the original Dead Space, jotting down loads of notes as I went. After I completed the game, I did some research to see what others had written and then, alas, the nail in the coffin: Dan Whitehead’s review for Eurogamer.

Whitehead’s review invariably comments on every single criticism I’d scribbled down in the same OpenOffice document I’m writing in now, but, naturally, better written than anything I could muster. I love Eurogamer and their analytical and thoughtfully-worded reviews, but this one takes the crown as my favourite. Considering that everything I wanted to say has already been said, there’s little merit in me covering Dead Space, and since the continuity is such a mess I’ve given up on that too. There are a few comments that I’d like to add in my own words however:

The bogeyman confrontations in Dead Space are so rushed in order to catch you unaware that the 3^rd person gameplay is lacking any dimension beyond the knee-jerk reaction. Due to this, there isn’t wide enough a window in the moments to drive in new and interesting permutations to the combat. Shortly after the player tires of the same jack-in-the-box combat (1/3 of the way through the game, for me personally), the pace just shuts down. Since too much of Dead Space hinges on this thin, shock ’em rock ’em style of over-the-shoulder shooting, the game forfeits itself to boredom very quickly. Furthermore, the puzzles, narrative, boss battles and set pieces are all too simplistic to act as a saving grace, let alone a relief.

This is particularly evident as the game Dead Space attempts to mimmic (ie. Resident Evil 4) managed to continually keep the player engaged in its over-the-shoulder combat for an extended play time. It’s all about nuance in enemy variety which challenges the player in new and interesting ways, something Dead Space‘s blend of horror has no room for.

The audio logs in the game try their best to shock you with their highly-produced screams and industrial noises, but it all just becomes offensive in the end since none of the horrors you face as a player are ever so menacing.

I do like the node upgrade system though since I managed to sell off most of my ammo and health and use the cash to buy nodes, lowering my munitions and playing the game as a real survival horror.

Having played Extraction though, I already knew how to dismember the majority of enemies which aided in me gaining so many power nodes and almost maxing out my gear.

On the other hand, the repetition caused by the limited variety of space monsters also made the process of saving ammo to sell off considerably easier.

How is it possible for flies to exist in space? *slaps forehead*

The Ripper really does allow the player to treat the bloody dismemberment almost like sculpturing which itself is oddly enjoyable. If you become seasoned enough with this weapon you can use fewer saw blades to slice up the aliens and ultimate save money for your wares. This sort of nuance makes it one of the better weapons in the game.

Watching the developer logs on Dead Space, I really disparage Visceral’s ethos for development.

There’s a lot of clever directional markers which work to decompress the densely detailed world for the player. The red and green neon signs, the signage, the PA voiceover, the way chapters follow a similar pacing structure, the lightening and the way points which can be projected onto the floor.

The graphic artists are obviously fans of the Visitor font.

Other readings

Dead Space Wiki

Dead Space: The Shock Doctrine Goes Interplanetary

Puzzle Quest – Preliminary Thoughts

September 19th, 2010

I’ve just tucked a few hours into Puzzle Quest and wanted to lay down a few preliminary thoughts.

Puzzle Quest is quite addictive due to the overlaying of statistical and RPG elements to the already addictive simple match-3 puzzle gameplay of Bejewelled. The statistics send a ripple of randomness through the basic puzzling, while the spells inject a tactical dimension. Tying the matching of colours to respective mana types and attacking further introduce tactical play.

There are seven “colours” of blocks to match, each of which is tied to mana, experience points, health and attack, various spells require different amounts of various colours of mana, weapons and armour alter the player’s stats and have properties in game, companions also have their own automated properties which affect the playing field and enemies have their own list of spells and properties. With all these statistical features, the level of abstraction is far beyond the player’s reach in the minute-to-minute gameplay of deciding which gems to match. It’s better to not even bother trying to keep track of all this.

When you do match gems, the screen splashes with text and colour to signify certain effects coming into play. The animation is too quick to track and the variables are too numerous to comprhend. This is particularly tricky when the AI makes their moves in rapid succession.

The trick to beating Puzzle Quest is to think one to two moves ahead, thereby disallowing your opponent to gain the advantage. Yet, it’s difficult to visualise the formation of blocks when pondering a move (and subsequently any further matches that can be made after that move). Nevermind factoring in the abstract elements. Often times you’ll accidentally give the opposition a free stab at you.

Some enemies are too heavily supported by abstract mechanics, such as automated healing. Just before, I was fighting an orc. It was a slow match and due to his regeneration properties, he gained an insurmountable upper hand. This feels cheap and unfair.

The abstract mechanics are so tricky to follow in-game that they’re effectively random, which, as mentioned, forms the game’s addictive quality.

More as play develops.

Straight-up Interactive Narrative and Quake

September 16th, 2010

I thoroughly enjoyed the narrative aspect of Quake II, in fact, I prefer its narrative language over almost everything else out there. This might sound a little strange given that Quake II is not known for its storytelling prowess, but then again, that’s entirely the point.

Coming at it from a modern perspective where macho space marines populate 5/8ths of all video game narratives, Quake II‘s premise of a one man assault on an alien planet may come off as cliché. Then again id software wrote this cliché in the video game world with an angry American storming a Nazi base (Wolfenstien 3D) and a one man assault of an alien planet (Doom)…wait a minute. This backdrop is all that’s needed though, it’s simple to understand, unobtrusive and doesn’t command a great deal of your time.

The rest of the narrative is, as it should be, interactivity-based, as follows:

individual battles paint the picture of conflict on the Strogg homeworld
interacting with the elevators, switches and other devices define the technological make-up of the alien race
each level constitutes a part of the Strogg’s civil and industrial body, whether it be the mines, sewers, warehouse etc. Therefore, playing Quake II is to take a one-person tour through the interconnected life stream of the Strogg’s homeworld
each objective is a narrative way point
the graphical language of the grunge textures and prison-like architecture tells its own history which the player can discern for themself
enemy movement patterns, their visual character and the grunts they make design the personality of the actors
stealing a tank commander’s head to open a door, calling down an air-strike on a bunker, and defeating Big Gun and Makron act as set pieces
the non-hostile human characters are minor actors

This narrative, one which uses the strengths of the medium, trusts the player enough to let them connect the dots through their own experience. For the most part, the Half-life games tick every box here too which also makes it a pretty good story, but then the director jumps on the scene and ruins the experience in one of two ways. The first by throwing a bunch of talky, “love me! love me!” characters at you which bear little relation to what the player is actually otherwise doing in the gameplay. The second is the use of blatantly scripted scenarios which attempt to be organic, but fail for all their contrivances. The scripted sequences often fail to have an effect because you’re too busy not playing the game the director intended so that you’ll organically trigger an event at the ideal moment or, as is always the case with the original game, the scripting is so glitchy that nothing will trigger and you’ll be forced to restart from your last save. Quake II is almost completely hands-off when it comes to the director, the Half-life games can’t help themselves. Furthermore, the level design in Quake II is meaningfully aids in the combat and movement mechanics, yet Half-life, particularly Half-life 2 is full of so much whitespace its disastrous.

Quake II provides the player with the appropriate context for them to mould their behaviour to and then allows them to engage in the narrative as they see fit. There’s no pretension in trying to be a blockbuster (God of War III), falsehood in limiting the player’s engagement in order to offer choice (Bioware games) or fixed sequences where someone else is trying to do the talking (Metal Gear series), it’s just straight up interactive narrative. That is, a string of encounters punctuated by moments of switch-flipping and button-pushing and for this reason, Quake II has a fantastic, if not unassuming narrative.

Additional Readings

Mapping Stroggos. – Groping the Elephant

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Tags: quake ii

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