Welcome to the Home of Game Strategies and Stories
6 May 05
I'd love to say I still have a hangover from Cinco de Mayo, but it's not a good idea to drink much around a baby. In fact, since David was born, I've hardly had a drop. I hadn't really thought about that. Oh well.
Note for the future. Sweet Potatoes, David enjoys taste, not allergic, but massive gas. Avoid in quantity. Buy gas mask.
I added some new screenshots from Blitzkrieg II. Check them out Here.
Cossacks II has a patch out. You can find it Here.
I don't play too many online FPS's. I tend to like my action a little slower and more tactical as if you couldn't have guessed. Anyway that means I totally missed an important point brought up in Penny Arcade's The Hookup. It's the fact that the HD era, ends the level playing field of online console shooters. It's a good read. Check it out Here.
Finally, Voodoo Extreme has an update on Darwinia. It seems that sales have only been ok. I suggest you fix that. I have my copy (waiting in the backlog with everything else). In case you've forgotten, Here's the link to Bill Harris' impressions.
Jason
Comments?
5 May 05
To all our Mexican readers, happy Cinco de Mayo. Here in Texas it's mostly about eating and drinking. Probably with an emphasis on the drinking. Cheers.
I was going to put up the announcement of Shattered Union, but it sounded familiar. It turns out it's already been announced by Poptop. The latest announcement just adds that it will be published by 2K Games. Consider this your announcement of such.
I'm going to steal a bit from Gamasutra again. Timegate Studios, makers of the Kohan series, is working on a strategy heavy FPS using Unreal 3 technology called Section 8. Here's the interesting bit:
Unusually, the studio is asking for help from several quarters, including a few nontraditional ones: the team put out the call on their website for "established studios, independent contractors, and the Unreal community to facilitate the development of the project. We are seeking experienced level designers, art production studios, and even mod teams to collaborate with on the project."
I wanted to go over freedom in games. There's been a lot of talk about games and violence, and I've covered it myself. People are always looking for scapegoats. The latest version is the California games regulation. I still think an important distinction is being overlooked.
There are many in the banning/censoring/regulating crowd that don't play games. While their numbers may be shrinking, they're still the majority. The problem with non gamers is that they can't spot the difference between representative gameplay and exploitation play. Exploitation is doing the worst things possible in a game world to dramatize the violence regardless of whether any players would actually play that way.
That gets us to the problem of freedom in gameplay. As games like Half Life 2 give us freedom in physics and games like Jade Empire give is freedom in moral choices, those games are hailed as groundbreaking for offering more to the player. Grand Theft Auto III is one of the most copied game styles today because it mainstreamed the idea of letting players play as they wanted, how they wanted, and when they wanted. It was nowhere near the idea of total freedom, but it moved far beyond the linear progressions that gamers had gotten used to.
The dark side of that was quickly shown as GTA III replaced Doom as the poster game for bad behavior. By letting gamers have more choices, opponents were able to use the darkest choices in the game to rally opposition around. They pretty much ignored the fact that you could play the game as an honorable bad guy who looked out for civilians and only killed scum.
That's what worries me. In the future developers might have to put restraints on the level of freedom and reality in their games just so their good game can't be abused into something much darker than intended. That doesn't sound so bad on the surface, but limits like that can often kill emergent gameplay.
I would argue more realistic consequences are better than artificial limits. Draw too much heat to your activities and your virtual criminal career will end quickly. That's not an acceptable solution to the banning crowd because the act can still be committed. They don't look at the game beyond the horrific they want/don't want to see there.
It will be an interesting debate to watch as technology marches forward. Developers will naturally want to create games with more freedom. The task they should be focusing on is how to keep the story moving forward without placing too many barriers in the players way. I fear that more time will be spent on preventing evil play instead. After all, no one wants to make the game that started the bans.
Jason
Comments?
4 May 05
I haven't had contest in a while mainly because we're still in the red from the last contest. Hopefully that will be over soon. Until then I'll try to point out interesting contests when I see them. Right now Penny Arcade is giving away copies of the Battle for Middle Earth. Check it out Here.
I suppose I could rag on EA again after they reported disappointing results and forecasts. I think the share price plummeting was probably painful enough for them. Here's some suggestions. Either make original games or significantly improve for a sequel. Don't try for a sequel within a year. Finish games even if it means pushing back ship dates. Keep your employees happy. Listen to their feedback all the way up and down the chain. Reduce prices and make it up through volume. Now you know why no one listens to me.
I'd love to say I've made major progress on the FAQ pages, but today wasn't a good day for getting things done. David wasn't being difficult as much as demanding. He's so cute it's hard not to give him attention when he wants to play. After a busy day today, he should be more tired tomorrow so I can get more done. I'm still awaiting your feedback.
Jason
Comments?
3 May 05
My internet connection is on the fritz again. I think I might have an idea as to the problem, but I'll have to discuss it with the ISP. Regardless, hopefully this won't be a long term outage and I'll be able to get this up some time soon.
I've been thinking about ways to make the site a little more user friendly. One of the things I've come up with sounds kind of stupid, but I'll run it by you anyway. I was thinking that a general purpose FAQ for strategy gaming and one for tactical gaming might be useful. First, it could provide a little focus on the areas we cover. Then it could make sure we're all speaking the same language (in a gaming sense). Finally, and obviously, it will answer questions people, both newcomers and veterans, have about gaming, storytelling, and this place.
I'd like to start with the basics first. I'd appreciate it if you would send me questions you've had to answer about your gaming hobby. I'll try to come up with as many as I can, but I'd appreciate your input so I don't overlook too much.
Then perhaps we could go into a little gaming history. I'd like to keep the focus on strategy and tactical gaming, but other examples may be necessary. Feel free to send me any links you have to good gaming history sites or even brief stories of your personal gaming history and how it lead you to the types of games you play today.
Next, I'd like to go over the current state of strategy and tactical gaming. Any suggestions on the best games in their respective categories out there today would be appreciated. I'll probably go over the real time continuum again. We could probably use some analysis of trends today and projections for the future as well.
I'd like to wrap up with a section on storytelling. This might be the area where I need the most help. I'm sure some people have a lot of questions here, but I don't know what they are. Since that could well be the most important section of the FAQ, I don't want to miss anything. I'll go over the basics, but please send me the questions you have. I can't say there are no stupid questions because I know you people, and you'll try to prove me wrong if I do, but I can say that I won't put up any really stupid questions. If you're at all confused, ask away. That's what FAQ's are for.
So how do you get me these inputs and questions? Good question. There's my email at the end of this column (and all my columns). Then you could use the Comments? link to post a comment. You could also post in the Forum. Those last two would require a simple, free registration, but you've been meaning to do that anyway, haven't you? I thank you in advance for your help. I should have a draft up sometime this week. Hopefully, that will focus you as well.
Jason
Comments?
2 May 05
Now that we're in May I guess it's going to start to be wall to wall next generation console coverage. I'll try not to go overboard here and just hit the highlights. I won't pretend that I'm not intrigued by the whole spectacle. The companies really seem to be shooting for the moon on this generation. I probably spend too much time worrying that one will crash back to the Earth. The competition can only be good for gamers.
Let's start at the top with the chairman. Bill Gates has high hopes for the Xbox 2. He believes they have a chance to overtake Sony. It sounds like some people have promised him that with their jobs. I don't want to see people lose their jobs over it, but I don't have that kind of confidence in the Xbox 2. I think they'll grow beyond proportional market growth. With good exclusives, there's no reason they shouldn't spend most of that generation in the black.
Unlike this generation. Latest reports have the Xbox division back in the red as the Halo 2 effect wears off. I guess that shows how much they are losing on each console since I was expecting a pretty good quarter with continued Halo 2 sales, Mercenaries, new versions of the Street series from EA, and Odd world: Strangers Wrath. Oh well, with Jade Empire, Forza, and perhaps most importantly, GTA: San Andreas, the new quarter should be better. The rest of the year is starting to look a little bleak however.
Speaking of looking to the future, another one of those professional analysts has given his pronouncement. He's predicting a Sony win for the next generation. He also seems to have concerns about a tepid response for the Xbox 2. My feeling is that Microsoft will not be able to build the insurmountable lead they'd like in their head start time. If they're not hemorrhaging cash on each hardware sale, the console will be a success. I'm really curious to see if Sony can be successful with their "wait for the big one" PS3 strategy.
For this week's game, I thought I'd go with the biggest PC game coming up to offset all the console coverage. It's Battlefield 2 (official site) from Digital Illusions. They just announced a demo will be available in June. In case you haven't heard of it, Battlefield 2 is a large scale modern combat game. It's supposed to be highly tactical with necessary specialized roles, rewards for teamwork and even a commander's mode with a more RTS (RTT) feel. The key to the series has been the freedom to fight on land, sea and air while having an impact on the game. Battlefield 2 is scheduled to arrive on June 23.
Jason
Comments?
© Talk Strategy 2005