Note: this isn’t another one of my massive internet wacky links and pics round-ups, which I’m long overdue on. It’s just how Mallory introduced me to one of her friends at her birthday party last Friday night. But before going into all that…
Leaving where I last left off: with SPX finally done and over with, it was back to business as usual. Actually, because various things had to be brushed aside in order to get ready for the show, after some well deserved couple days of R&R, not only did I have to face the music and play the wonderful game of catch-up (which I’m still in the process of doing, sadly), but also put the final touches on a major project that was scheduled for wrapping up around the same time as well. The worst part was how I had to miss one of my best friends from high school’s wedding this past weekend (sorry about that Steve, but congrats once again to you and Sam), though truth be told, I wasn’t exactly thrilled with the idea of going to DC two weekend in a row. It’s also why I haven’t been able to post updates, despite there being plenty to talk about (like the just past Tokyo Game Show). But despite it all, the past few days have still managed to be pretty rockin’! Literally.
Review: Rock Band 2 (Xbox 360)
Welcome and me & Katie’s new obsession. As noted previously, our band is called Hard Sudoku and my onscreen alter ego is Suzy-Q, a cute, indie-hipster-ish looking rocker chick with short, brunette hair and horn-rimmed glasses. When it comes to attire, I generally go for a mix of everything, though I lean towards gothic-wear, like corsets and frilly shirts (that are “evened out” by super short-short skirts) but the matador outfit I recently acquired is my new favorite, surpassing her Prince get-up. As for Katie, her main character is Bon-Bon, a hot mix of late 50s, early 60s fashion sensibilities, since that’s what Katie is all about. I/Suzy-Cool generally handle guitar while Katie/Bon-Bon does bass, though recently she created a second character, La-La, who is our singer. Meaning Katie does double duty… and because there’s no mic-stand for Rock Band, she came up with the idea of taping it to the top of the cat-scratch post since the top of it was the perfect height for playing while sitting on the couch (plus it wasn’t like the cat was actually using it anyway)….
… In the past I mentioned how the Wii version of Rock Band was pretty awesome, despite not having all the trimmings of the Xbox 360/PS3 iterations. And while I still stand by those words, its absolutely amazing how the entire experience becomes 20,000 times more engaging and enjoyable simply by seeing your very own creation rocking on-screen, and along with you. Literally half our time has been spent buying clothes and trying out different combinations. I know that sounds all pretty gay, at least for myself, a dude who is basically paying dress-up with his virtual doll, but given my other interests, which includes collecting little plastic figures of semi-naked, part cat/part WW2 machinery girls, as well as pervy iPhone games where you try to rub a girl of questionable age’s clothes off, it’s kinda par for the course.
As for the game itself, the other best part of the game is the absolutely amazing set-list. There’s just so much variety (though its kinda lacking in the Southern Rock this time around, as compared to the last one) and so many awesome songs. Granted, you still have crap like Linkin Park, Jimmy Eat World, and Panic at the Disco, but there’s still fine, fine offerings from Elvis Costello, Talking Heads, and Sonic Youth. Plus, and I guess Rock Band 1 and even some of the Guitar Hero games provide this as well… as someone who used to think 80s pop was extremely overrated (my early years was spent on a military base, listening to oldies and therefore never developed an emotional attachment to, say, Men At Work), RB2 has made me really appreciate the skills of certain folks, such as Duran Duran. And when you factor in how you can play (most) songs from part one via importing them in (though I am annoyed that Franz Ferdinand didn’t make the move, which wasn’t even in the first Xbox 360 edition… I guess it was a Wii exclusive), along with all the awesome additional tracks one buy from the marketplace, with more on the way (I know Motley Crue’s entire Dr Feelgood album was just made available), its literally the party game that just keeps on going and going (and this is one of the few instances in which I don’t mind DLC, and actually applaud it).
The structure is also noteworthy: going from city to city, playing various sets and winning over fans, plus acquiring money, to move onto other cities and to unlock new songs. Tons more fun than just going down a list. Sometimes you’ll be asked to play a special show on the behalf of the sponsor, though both Katie and I were shocked when after playing a set on the behalf of Hot Topic, we actually lost a good chunk of our fanbase, until it hit us: we had sold out! The game is smart like that, and it?s clear that it?s the labor of love of some hardcore music geeks. Hence why I’m going to keep bugging them every chance I get to ask them to get some Big Black and Killing Joke into their thang. Rock Band 2 is so good that at this point, I could honestly give a damn about Guitar Hero 4/World Tour, especially since some of their best songs are already on RB2 and most of everything else is pretty lame. Then again, it does have Michael Jackson, Ozzy, and my ultimate guilty pleasure, Dream Theater. Bottom-line: Rock Band 2 is the new high-water mark for what a music game, as well as what a party game can and should be. If you have a 360, there’s no excuse to nab the set-up… especially for those who have been sitting on the sidelines; the new guitars is the finest yet, and the new wireless drum-set is totally ace by virtue of being both quieter and again wireless.
Anyhow, I mentioned Silent Hill last time, but because of RB2, haven’t really touched it much. Meanwhile, Dave Mauro has been on a Halloween kick, meaning he’s been replaying all sorts of zombie related games, everything from Dead Rising to Tying of the Dead, SH Homecoming has been handed over to him for a review. Oh, also thanks to Dave, I now have a renewed interest in Bionic Commando ReArmed; I hadn’t bothered with the two player co-op mode before, and as it turns out, its the best part of the game! But enough about video games, time to talk about…
The Trouble With Hipsters
Back to Mallory’s birthday party last Friday night; it was loads of fun, the fifteen minutes Katie and I were there. It was a loud, crowded affair, one filled with plenty of noise and sweaty hipsters (though these folks were cool, unlike the ones later on), but hardly any food could be found in the entire two story penthouse (overseeing Houston Street), so we went out to score some dinner despite just arriving there (with the plan being that we would return right after nabbing some grub… as well as avoid the cops since there was some fear that it was starting to become a scene like that). On our way to St. Mark’s, to our favorite el-cheapo Japanese joint, Kenka, there was this angry dude screaming at everyone on the crowded streets: “This city is drowning in a sea of mediocrity! Go back to Nebraska!” Gotta say, I feel his pain. Then again, twenty bucks says he’s originally from Ohio and only moved here three years ago. It should also be pointed that maybe I can’t say jack since I’m not originally from here either. Though many native New Yorkers find it hard to believe that I’m not originally from these parts, such as Mooney. And looking back, it took maybe three hours for me to adjust to things around here upon my arrival back in 96. Anyway, when Katie and I finally made it to Kenka, we were shocked by the massive amount of people waiting for a seat. It’s always been a popular joint, but this was ridiculous. Katie actually pointed out that it had been a little while since we our last visit, and now school was back to session. Eventually we got in, mostly because it was just the two of us, but the dinner that ensued was the fucking worst. The food was awesome, as usual (though the kimchee they had that night was pretty piss-poor for whatever reasons), but the entire joint was filled with the most obnoxious douchebags imaginable. Nothing but NYU drones and Long Island guidoes. By the end of our meal, it was rather late, plus we were in such a foul mood that we thought it best to just go home. The next night, we met up with Mooney and was going to do Kenka again, but instead went to a much nicer and quieter place, devoid of such annoyances (though it was also MUCH more expensive).
Much has been said about hipsters as of late. The entire lot has been a steady source of headaches some time now, but it would seem that many others are beginning to feel the same way, or at least taking note, as evidenced by the large number of studies and essays popping up all over the place, like that Ad Busters piece I linked towards a while ago. Hell, the other day, I saw a thread on the subject over at NeoGAF of all places, though diehard gamer dorks bitching about cool kids stealing their hobbies is a whole different beast that I should perhaps touch upon at a later time. Point being, its no longer a Manhattan vs Brooklyn thing (or to an extent, a Brooklyn vs the rest of the world thing either); the hipster epidemic appears to be an actual epidemic indeed. At the very least, many people are finally sick and tired of their shtick, as well as their effect on certain things. I will simply echo Mooney’s sentiments by stating that they’re more or less just a bunch of rich, dumb white kids with no identity or sense of relevancy, all too eager to suck the life out of whatever’s interesting or “cool” that they come across, and make to it their own, pretty much ruining it for the rest of us in the process. And the stuff they produce themselves is just so ridiculous and retarded; as that crazy guy said, a sea of mediocrity. Not just a sea, but a celebration; everyone is such a precious little snowflake, and best of all is how everyone needs to get on their soapbox and scream the same stupid shit that everyone is saying, ad nauseam.
I can’t tell you how many things I’ve had to pass on some activity due to the knowledge that hipsters will be present. And here’s the part where I piss my friends off… as infantile as it might be, one can’t help but draw a line and choose a side; hipsters are the prime reason why I don’t venture into their primary home base, Brooklyn, nearly as much as I used to. Don’t get me wrong, there’s some really nice things about that neck of the woods, but its absolutely not the alpha and the omega of civilization as many claim it to be. In fact, it slowly become one massive cultural wasteland. Perhaps I still hold a grudge for people being legitimately pissed at me for claiming to live in one imaginary region while I was actually another? I love it when people brag how its got the best food/bars/parks/whatever, people are just spouting the same nonsense they like to hypnotize themselves with (again, this is a guy who lived in Bay Ridge, a super heavy Italian part of the borough for over a year, and not once did I have anything close that resembled halfway decent Italian food). All I can say is that I know plenty of people Queens that have none of the ego or inferiority complex that their neighbors down south seem to exhibit. I can’t figure out what’s worse; when white folks who live in the ghetto claim that they to love the culture, even though the original inhabitants would love nothing more than to kick his or her white little ass, or when said white people try to act the part of community activist and side with the yokels, making themselves look like bigger fools in the process. I remember one random blog by some random girl who was bitching about Ikea was destroying Red Hook and Brooklyn as a whole…. this person btw has been living there for about three months… and she didn’t have much to say when someone who had been there for years explained that Ikea had brought jobs and a sense of empowerment to the local community. Another reason why I don’t bother with Brooklyn that much anymore is the piss poor state of the MTA, but that again is going off-topic. For the record, there are some truly awesome things to be found, like… Rocketship Comics, Chip Shop, and…. I’m drawing a blank here. Oh, and a few friends, like Dave Mauro and Mike O’Connor. John Green also lives in a very nice place with his wife Marion, though they’re practically on the border of Brooklyn and Queens. As for Coney Island, I will make myself look like an even bigger Manhattanite snob by stating, been there, done that. Anyhow, back to hipster as a whole, I could go on, such as all the splinter groups, like today’s equivalent of punk dorks. Sorry, but if you live in NYC and you claim to be all punk rock but have no idea what Coney Island High was, give me a friggin’ break.
At this point, some might be wondering why in the heck am I torturing myself, as well as wasting time thinking about such nonsense? Well, they’re pretty hard to ignore, especially around in the Big Apple; as stated, they’re everywhere, especially at the stuff I like. Plus, being poor these days certainly doesn’t help things either. Either you live with other rich white people or you live among the angry non-white people that hate you for being white. Guess where I’m at? Actually, where I live is one of the few last places one can be in Manhattan without paying three grand a month for a studio, so I really can’t complain. But I do it because I like to (it’s my shtick…. I guess). Also, as the saying goes, we all hate who we really are, and by some people’s definition, I’m just as big of a faggy hipster as the next guy. Afterall, most of my wardrobe consists of t-shirts featuring wacky/arty-farty prints and I go to chiptunes shows, to name a few examples.
Anyhow, I guess that’s what helped to make the Killing Joke performance this past Sunday even more noteworthy and awesome; the virtual absence of hipsters whatsoever. I also one of the youngest people in the entire crowd, save for Mooney whose about give years younger than me, plus a scant few others in their early 20s, all industrial nerds. Not a single ironic shirt or douchy Willamsburg haircut in sight, thank God.
“All My Life I’ve Been Waiting For This Moment To Come”
So yeah, saw Killing Joke at Irving Plaza, which certainly lessened the blow of not being able to leave town this past weekend. It was basically a dream come true, not just the chance to see one of my favorite bands of all time, in the flesh, but to hear them perform IMHO one of the greatest rock albums of all time, Pandemonium, in its entirely. I can’t even begin to calculate how many times I listened to it in high school alone, and it’s been a mainstay on my iPod since day one. When I first heard of them coming to NYC, I naturally became super excited and began to ask assorted friends if they wanted to join in, but sadly, there was zero interest. Virtually no one knew who the hell they were, hence the lack of even an opinion of the band. Eh, sucks to be them. Perhaps I’m being biased, but it was easily the best live show I had ever been to. Though Mooney did end up joining me, since he had heard of them and actually knows a thing or two about good music!
Again, the crowd helped to make the night; they were as hardcore as you can get, knowing every word of every song (including myself, a guy who normally doesn’t pay attention to lyrics, but once again, if you listen to something enough times, it simply becomes ingrained in one’s brain). Most were in their 40s and 50s… a bunch of old punk rockers, and they were my people. Speaking of age… for years I’ve cringed whenever hearing about some old, antiquated rockers hitting the stage yet again, well past their prime, in order to appeal to people’s sense of nostalgia and make themselves even richer. Never mind that I have yet to see the Rolling Stones live and constantly hear how they rock just as hard in their 60s as they did in their 20s, the very idea just seemed so silly. Well, I will no longer give old people shit anymore, because despite their age… and holy Christ, did everyone look old…. everyone in Killing Joke had just as much fire as I would imagine if I saw them live back in the day. Both myself and Mooney were literally blown away by front man Jaz Coleman’s haunting, visceral growls…. how that guy’s pipes have survived the test of time is anyone’s guess. As for Youth, man, what a guitarist. Simply amazing. Though for a guy who calls himself Youth, well, you know. Still, Jaz was the whole show, wearing a crazy person’s jumpsuit and Joker face makeup for some reason…
… As for the set itself, I had high expectations and they were surpassed on every single level. Unfortunately, not every single cut from Pandemonium was performed, though the songs that counted the most to me were, and it was interesting hearing certain pieces that were originally very heavy in the way of samples and drum machines stripped down and reinterpreted with just two guitars, one set of drums, and one tiny little synth. Plus they threw in some oldies but goodies, and the place positively exploded when they kicked their encore off with Eighties (which is their only hit song, far as I can recall).
Show was more or less perfect, though the crowd was still somewhat annoying in spots; I dragged Mooney up-front, since I absolutely had to get a good view of the action, and wondered early on if there was going to be a pit, but reasoned that there was just two many old folks for such stuff. But as soon as they hit the stage, a bunch of punkers began to thrash and shove everyone around them, including me. I did my best to avoid the action, though I couldn’t avoid the bimbo behind me. Katie noted earlier in the weekend, from our dinner at Kenka, that drunk girls are worse than drunk guys, and boy did that statement ever get validated that night; the aforementioned over the hill rocker chick dumped her entire drink, which was some combo of hard liquor and juice, all over my back at one point. Still, overall, the live show of 2008, beating out the Boredoms from earlier this year. Speaking of…
7777777
New York-Tokyo has been hosting a film fest since late last week, and because I’ve been so busy, I just haven’t had the chance to keep on top of it (the afternoon before Killing Joke was Genius Party, which I was pissed about missing, though I spoke to Hilary afterwards, who saw it, and said it wasn’t very good at all). The big marquee flick was the international premier of 77BOADRUM, which documented the Boredom’s 77 drums event last year that I sadly had to miss.
For the most part, the performance is presented in a straightforward manner, using a combo of footage that the director’s crew captured and stuff caught by the audience via cell phone cameras. Some of it was quite wonky; one can excuse the poor quality of the stuff filmed on phones, but the official camerawork was pretty iffy at time, to the point of being downright amateurish. Yet its all very raw, like the event itself, so it ultimately does the job of transporting the movie’s audience into the middle of the sound vortex that formed by the East River, right next to the Brooklyn Bridge on 7/7/07. The audio, in sharp contrast to the video, was flawless, and this coming from a video projection at the Anthology Archives, which is often the the worst place to hear, along with see movies. Back to the visuals, also shown quite a bit was the crowd, and as much as I wish I could have been there, I’m also grateful that I didn’t have to personally deal with the large quotient of worthless hipsters doing their silly hipster dance.
Inter-spliced was behind the scenes stuff, naturally, a look at the process that brought 77 different drummers together to make history. Apparently it was originally supposed to happen a year earlier in Japan, I’m assuming on 6/6/06, but things never came together, so New York City became the place to be. As for how everything actually worked, basically Eye served as the center of the storm, messing around with a mixer, screaming, and banging on seven guitar necks with huge sticks (I previously mentioned at their last show a gigantic guitar body that had seven necks, but because of transportation issues at the time, they had to create a facsimile). The latter instrument not only produced massive amounts of noise but also allowed Eye to help orchestrate the action; the color of the sticks gave clues for all the other drummers as to what do next. With him were three other members of his tribe, all on drums, and from there each additional drummer connected and spiraled outwards, with the theory being that sound travels to the right. In addition to Eye’s colored sticks, each drummer would look to the drummer to his or her right for certain cues, and also deliver them to the person to their left; the drummer at the very head of the chain was local Brooklyn musician Hisham Bharoocha, who was one of the main forces behind the event as well (and referred to as “the gate”) and all the way at the end was Brian Chippendale of Lightening Bolt. Rehearsals (which took place in Harlem of all places) were surprisingly sparse for such an ambitious event, yet in the end, the entire spiral of sound behaved like a finely tuned, completely unified army. Part of it had to do with the simple compositions that Eye drafted; each piece lead the drummers down a definitive course, yet still allowed them the ability to explore the space in certain parts. From order to chaos and back again. Though another reason why everyone was so on the ball the first and only time out had to do with the fact, I would think, was how they were playing with the Boredoms. All throughout the documentary are interviews with assorted drummers that more or less forms the love letter portion of things; when asked why they go involved, each performer basically responded by “to play with the Boredoms, duh!” One drummer/Boredoms fanatic helped to bring it all together, by explaining the evolution of the Boredoms sound, as well as Eye’s thought process (accompanied with performance footage from the early 90s, including their Pop Tatari shows in NYC, which I fondly recall watching on MTV back in the day, and was a prime motivator in terms of wanting to get my Washingtonian ass over to the Big Apple while in middle school), and how the 77 drums project perhaps represents the new pinnacle or the final manifestation of its current iteration.
Immediately before the screening, I was able to exchange words with the documentary’s director, Jun Kawaguchi, and asked about the home release of the movie. I knew from Mooney that a special double CD set of the performance was coming out in Japan, along with a DVD, which I assumed was the same thing, but turns out that they’re not. Because Kawaguchi’s English was not so hot, I wasn’t exactly sure what he was trying to explain, but I get the sense that the DVD will be the performance straight on, and that his work is more exploratory of the two. Meanwhile, I knew that Vice did its own behind the scenes look at the event, and from what I recall from what was shown on their website, it too was different. And because I’m the impatient type, I found a recording of the performance online and downloaded that. I’m still not sure if its a really good bootleg or the real thing, which I kinda hope its not, because the quality was not so hot; Eye was simply way too overpowering as compared to the drummers, all 77 of them.
I should perhaps the other highlight of that particular evening, and why I f’n hate the homeless population in the city. I sometimes wonder if there’s some invisible sign above my head that only crackheads can see that reads “CALL ME BIG GUY/YOU CAN TOUCH ME”. A super aggressive pan-handler was making the rounds on the F train on the way down to Anthology Archives, and when the dude finally came up to me, he poked me in the stomach and asked “Hey big man, can you spare me a quarter?” I felt my response of “No.” was nice and simple, but as Katie noted, I had that look on my face, which led to the guy bitching about me to the rest of the crowd, about being a cheap-ass and how pissed I was for being ugly or some nonsense. Not that its any consolation, nor that I needed any, but no one could give two shits about what he had to say. As he made his exit, a brief exchange of words ensued, though the only thing I could think of was that he should get a fucking job, with the real joke being that I myself didn’t have one! Yes, not nearly as clever as good luck scoring money for dope in the next train, or at least I have all my teeth, but it was the heat of the moment. And of course, as Katie and I made our exit a bit later on, yet another homeless guy, who was witness to the earlier exchange, explained to me what a jerk the first one was. As Katie likes to say, I make friends everywhere!
Back to movies: caught another NY-T film screening last night, this time with Hilary at the ImaginAsian(!!!) theater. The movie this time was the remake of the Kurosawa classic, Sanjuro, and I’m embarrassed to admit that I have yet to see the original (though I have seen Seven Samurai and Yojimbo, of course), so I really can’t draw any comparisons between the new and the old, though in general, I tend to strongly dislike remakes, especially if they appear to be carbon copies of the original, which I understand this new Sanjuro apparently is. But then again, the last Kurosawa remake I caught was Miike’s Sukiyaki Western Django, was totally out there, and totally stupid, so perhaps there’s something to say about sticking to what works. I also know most folks have been turned off by lead actor Yuji Oda’s attempt at being Toshiro Mifune, though I personally didn’t mind. Actually, I’m kind of a fan of Oda, mostly because of his work in Tokyo Bayside Shakedown. Anyhow, I thought the movie was pretty decent… well acted, nicely paced, with a engaging story, which again, is supposedly a carbon copy of the original. I guess I have to see that one now, and I’ll probably like it better, but as is the new Sanjuro is certainly not the worst thing in the world, and appears to be an ode to one of the true masters of cinema, hence once again the lack of unnecessary retooling, and telling a tale that is universal that, like all good stories, everyone wishes to tell themselves.
I Met Gina F’N Carano
Also yesterday was a massive EA holiday press event. So big it was that I brought along Dave to help cover ground, and because I’m frankly tired of writing, I’m just going to pass along his two cents….
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EA?s press event yesterday allowed me a chance to get hands on with a majority of the hotly anticipated titles dropping this month and next, as well as some exciting stuff coming later in 2009. The games I?ve been keeping a close eye on lately are Left 4 Dead, Dead Space, Mirror?s Edge, and Far Cry 2, and I got to demo all of them except the latter one. Except for some bad publicity due to questionable DRM issues, EA has been doing very well for themselves lately. EA used to conjure up images of sports games and play-it-safe action games, but they have been doing a good job of publishing plenty of interesting and good games lately. This fall lineup they?ve got this year, coming just after the release of Spore, is very impressive.
Out of EA?s fall lineup, the game I am most anticipating is Turtlerock Studio?s Left 4 Dead. Now here?s an interesting game with an interesting history: Valve hopes to get a certain AI guru working on Half-Life 2, but since he doesn?t want to make the move to their headquarters, he works on the bots for Counter-Strike: Condition Zero and Source. This AI guru then comes up with the great idea of marrying the traditional concept of the single player campaign with the more dynamic AI required for multi player games. And the result of course, is a four player cooperative campaign game. The idea is deceptively innovative, but is also part of a larger trend of bringing the multiplayer experience to campaign modes. Resistance 2 will be shipping in a few weeks with something similar to this with it?s eight player cooperative campaign mode, and before that we had Halo 3?s four player cooperative mode (although that was simply the single player campaign with three buddies). I don?t know if this is what players want, but this is certainly a trend that I am looking forward to seeing evolve, and developers seem to think it?s worth their while, so evolve it has.
Left 4 Dead is the latest addition to the Source engine family. Anyone familiar with that engine knows that this is good and bad. It?s good because the engine is very scalable and combines good graphics with great physics, but it?s bad because when looking at a Source engine game next to Dead Space, it looks dated. During one particularly frantic firefight I noticed that the books were being sent flying off a bookshelf due to stray bullets, so I began systematically shooting all the books off the shelf just because I thought it was so cool that I could. But perhaps a more practical example of the physics engine is the way the doors can be destroyed. Zombies will literally tear through them, and so will players as they spray bullets through the door for some blind headshots. And anyone who has played enough counter-strike will know how much fun it is to kill something on the other side of a thin wall. The Source engine is fantastic, and while the game did look dated next to Dead Space, it will look even better when I?m playing on my PC next month at max settings, and at any rate the excellent zombie animations make up for any other visual issues.
Left 4 Dead is shaping up to be utterly fantastic (and audiences apparently agree as the game has already sold more pre-orders than the Orange Box did), but there is one nagging problem: it won?t be out until November. It?s going to miss October?s zombie season, which is such a shame for those of us that love to get into the seasonal spirit (I?m finally making my way through Dead Rising in my search for good zombie games). EA?s got this problem solved though. Dead Space was just released this week, and for any fans of sci-fi horror (think Event Horizon), this game will fill that survival-horror niche nicely. I only played a little bit of Chapter 2 and a bit of Chapter 6, but what I saw suggests this game will fall somewhere between Resident Evil and Gears of War: the HUDless interface and moody lighting make for an immersive and suspenseful environment, and the fact that the game does not pause while navigating the inventory, and the focus on weapons make sure much of the suspense will be combat based.
The greatest selling point for Dead Space is certainly going to be the graphics. Simply put, this is a gorgeous game. Horror games are probably the genre that benefits the most from advanced graphics because immersion into the game world is so important to them, and beefing up the graphics is the quick and easy way to immerse players. And immersed I was. It?s not just the ?next-gen? graphics that make this a completely believable setting, but all the details as well. After restoring gravity to part of the ship, automated hand rails popped up along the catwalk and it was one of those details that was unnecessary, but makes complete sense, and helps to present the fiction as real.
The biggest problem with Dead Space is the lack of a quick turn 180 button. I understand the reasoning behind leaving the player feeling helpless while turning around, but there are two problems with this thinking: the first is that this game appears to be skewed more towards combat and the other is that Resident Evil 4 proved that a more nimble character does not necessarily make the game less scary. But hey, at least the character can strafe in Dead Space.
For anyone who hasn?t read up on the game yet, I?ll give a quick rundown on the HUDless interface in Dead Space, just because it?s so damn cool. First off, there is the health meter on the spine of the player, and right next to that is the stasis charge, both completely unobtrusive and entirely informative. The ship also helps with navigation by drawing a path on the floor to the next objective. The inventory system is a hologram projected in front of the character which must be navigated in real time. Since inventory management is so integral to survival-horror, it?s pretty amazing that they managed to completely erase the traditional HUD and put it on the other side of the Albertian window.
Dead Space might be the most innovative right now when it comes to immersing the player by removing the HUD, but it?s not the only one. Mirror?s Edge gives players a subjective view of the world as seen by a parkour athlete running from rooftop to rooftop. Rather than a floating arrow showing the way through the level, players simply follow the red paint. These hints can be turned off, but they are a great help for getting the hang of the game. Health seems to be monitored through the already standard method of a slight red tunnel vision growing in intensity until death, and since you only occasionally have a gun, there is no ammo counter. With any trace of a HUD completely removed, DICE then decided to go and throw in a crosshair. I?m hoping this can be turned off, but I forgot to check in the options for that.
Mirror?s Edge isn?t the first to offer this kind of gameplay, but the interesting thing is that it?s being done in the subjective view. With a third person camera there is the problem of the camera not being focused on what the player would like to focus on, and with the subjective view, you have the problem of not being aware of the character?s body. The problem seems to be solved here by the fact that the character will grab onto a ledge if she isn?t going to clear it completely. I?ve played enough FPS games with platformer elements to know that looking down at my feet while clearing a jump is not fun, and this seems like the simple and elegant solution.
Mirror?s Edge has everyone?s attention right now, and it?s because there is a large demographic of people that enjoy playing games in a first-person view, but do not enjoy violent games (see Portal). Metroid Prime grabbed a lot of attention years ago for being ?a first person shooter that?s not a shooter,? and Mirror?s Edge seems to be claiming that same territory. It most closely resembles a platformer if we?re going to shoehorn it into a genre. DICE definitely knows this because the best thing about platformers is time trials and speed running. I?m not sure about a speed run option, but the game will ship with 12 time trial levels. Players will be able to swap ghosts with friends or download ghosts from the best times on the XBOX Live leaderboards. Chances are that this will be one of those games where the campaign teaches players how to be good at the game, and then provides time trial challenges to keep them playing.
I mostly wanted to focus on these fall 2008 games, but I can?t wrap this up without talking about how impressed I was with Skate 2. I put in a lot of time with the Skate demo, but never felt compelled to play the full game. It held the promise of a game in which you can combine simple and intuitive movements to perform tricks in a way that makes sense and feels very natural. Skate 2 delivers fully on this promise with some additions that have clearly been part of the scheme from the beginning, but just didn?t make the cut in the first game because of the obvious difficulty of putting so much into one game, and so as not to overwhelm players used to the antiquated Tony Hawk style of skateboarding video games. Rather than describe all the new additions, I?ll present a completely possible scenario:
You?re skating in one of the game?s many parks, but it?s not quite to your liking. You press both of the ?feet? buttons (X and A) to hop off your board, and you grab two quarter pipes and put them forty feet apart and then place a picnic table between the them. You climb to the top of one of the quarter pipes, summon your board to you (accio board, LT), then you hold down LB to bring up the session marker context menu and mark where you?re at. You press X and A again to jump, and then press Y to put the board under you and drop right into the pipe to get some quick speed. Approaching the picnic table you press X and A again to hippie jump off the board and as it continues under the table, you continue pressing forward on the analog stick to run across the top, and then jump again and land on the board, then you go up the opposite quarter pipe, press the ?grab the world? button (RB) to do a grab on the coping. If you messed that up, you can simply bring up the session marker menu and choose to load your session marker and you will go back to the top of the quarter pipe.
Skate 2 has twice as many tricks as the original game by simply adding those two mechanics: independent control of the avatar?s feet and being able to grab onto anything. This really feels like a skating simulation because it?s not just the natural game mechanics, but the fact that players can hop off the board and move things into position however they?d like (and can even save the position of objects by setting a session marker, since objects can and will get knocked over).
Skate 2 is going to be a day one purchase because I?ve been toying with skating games for so long and really what I was waiting for was a skating simulation that felt as natural as Skate 2 does. I?m not sure how the Tony Hawk series will survive when this game is doing everything so right.
Even a year ago I would not have been terribly excited about the prospect of an EA press event, but they?re completely on the ball right now. They have some issues to work out in terms of deciding how to best deter piracy in their PC games division, but they are certainly publishing the right developers. I can?t wait to get my hands on these games again.
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… I should perhaps mention real quickly that my personal fave game of the event was actually a DS title: Henry Hatsworth in the Puzzling Adventure is this interesting mix of traditional platforming action (with a heavy emphasis on combat, to the point that it felt like Streets of Rage, with wide range of combos) and Tetris Attack-like puzzles. You basically move left to right and deal with buy guys on the top screen, then move blocks around to cleat the bottom one. Most interesting part here is how its being made by the same folks behind Madden all those other sports games that’s EA’s primary source of cash; the team behind Henry Hatsworth is a small, yet quite enthusiastic bunch who clearly wanted to do something different, something more relevant to their true interests, and it really show. More on that in near future.
Though the true highlight is that I met Gina Carano! She was on-hand to help with the promoting of Command & Conquer: Red Alert 3, which she stars in. I’ve had a major crush on Carano since her role as, appropriately enough, Crush on the new American Gladiators, plus I’ve even managed to get Katie on the bandwagon after showing her Carano’s last battle on the EliteXC special that was on CBS a few weekends back. I actually recorded the conversation via my iPhone, but I’m still trying to determine if the quality is good enough or if I should simply write everything out. But since this update is already way over due and long, I guess we’ll find out next time!
