Owen is a writer based out of Denver and currently preparing his first novel PUSH PULL for publication. In the meantime, feel free to explore his meandering thoughts, movie and videogame op-eds and situational playlists. If you know him from another life, this is a chance for exposure to his creative endeavors. www.owensader.com
I have heard of JPod before. I realize it when the main character writes a bio about himself and says his favorite game is Chrono Trigger for the “Sony Playsation”. And I instantly think to myself, who the hell picks the Playstation version of Chrono Trigger? The main character is 30 in 2006, at that age there is no way your first experience with the game isn’t on the Super Ninentdo. And then I remember, I’ve heard this somewhere… this same critique of this same passage. At some point in my life I read an article pointing out the exact same ridiculous point.
Some new FMVs, no way does that make up for the load-times
He just can’t leave the poor game alone though. Later in the book when they are collecting drug money, he enters a house and a biker gang member is playing Chrono Trigger on “Sony Playsation”.
All I can think is, “No he’s not. That scenario has never existed in the history of the world.”
So this post is about a novel, that’s about videogames. But as I’ve been reading it I realize, not really.
Novels and videogames are perhaps two of my favorite things in the world. But I’ve kept them in separate universes. They felt like different parts of my psyche, and ones that I shouldn’t mingle. But I chose this book randomly. It sat alone, facing outward, on a stand at the library, lego figures and a catchy name- “JPod” on the front. I didn’t put it back when the slip cover told me it was about videogames.
Douglas Coupland must be somewhat famous. The first real line inserts him into the novel in way that would imply he is well-known. It came out around the same time as Brett Easton Ellis’s Lunar Park, so they both seemed to have grown the idea organically and independent of each other, but his insertion in the story doesn’t seem to be a metaphor. It’s like a form of name dropping, but for yourself. Still the name rings no bells with me.
All this being said, the first two and a half ramblings pages (followed by “$”s and “Ramen Noodles” printed over and over) that serve as a prelude before the book begins, are amazing. Perhaps the coolest thing I have read in years. But does two pages mean a lot? Yeah, I guess it kind of does, as it’s a bright spot that you can hold onto. The rest of the book remains decidedly uncertain for me.
I rarely see DLC that interests me. Yeah, sometimes it helps the game providing more weapons, outfits, characters, and scenarios, but rarely does it seem like anything but a time extender. The new Assassin’s Creed 3 DLC however seems cooler than the actual game. The game itself has hardly registered while it constantly floats across the news sites. But an alternative history DLC is an awesome idea.
Yeah, it would be tempting…
A tyrant king George Washington is an excellent idea, and the whole concept of famous individuals succumbing to the desires of man offers amazing possibilities. Radically alternative history (vs. small strategic alternations, like being able to command Napoleon to victory at Waterloo) offers the chance to explore Faustian Tragedy in a way that literature and movies have been able to. That’s not to say this is the depth that The Tyranny of King George will have, however the mere possibility for the future makes it intriguing.
I never played the first Borderlands. I’m not sure if that’s a regret or not. But unintentionally I started playing the second. My brother and I were home, he bought a new PS3 on a whim and we lost about a day and half to the thing before I had to leave. The experience was more enjoyable than I would have guessed. It was beautiful, twisted, and even if at it’s core it’s not all that complicated, it was unadulterated fun.
When I made it home I bought a copy of Borderlands 2 for myself. I started a few new games, tested out the different characters, and even though I was playing alone really liked it. But then I played it the other night, and I realized I wasn’t having that great of a time. What had changed? The most obvious thing was the lack of coop. But it wasn’t even that.
I had started playing the game all wrong. Borderlands isn’t an MMO, but I began treating it like one. I did online research trophies, I looked up where vault symbols were before even clearing areas. I tried to get everything, maximize my “efficiency” in gameplay. And when you do that with Borderlands, it starts to come apart at the seams. The enjoyment of the game comes from exploring the crazy beautiful world and the psychotic characters. If you’re completionist, it could be a big problem, because it’s a long grind.
So I shut my computer, closed the iPhone browser, stopped looking at the trophies and “badass” ranks (cool concept, stupid name), and just played the game again. If I’m waiting on my brother I will still go back and clear out areas we’ve already gone through, but it’s only a nice side distraction, not the main show.
Puzzle Quest 2 is so far, pretty much exactly what I expected, if more underwhelming. It’s like a less ambitious version of the original. Which already left me queasy after I marathoned through it.
The difficulty just doesn’t seem high enough. You’re rarely at risk of losing a match. And when you are it feels arbitrary, because you’re more likely to lose against a random skeleton as your are against a boss. The biggest bummer so far however is that every match feels the same. Maybe it’s the character (Assassin), but every match is a struggle to build up enough magic to combo out the opponent in the same big magic strike. It doesn’t really matter which opponent it is. Some take more of a beating, but it’s always: combo, stick with a dagger, rinse and repeat as needed.
Title: Killzone 2
Maker: Guerrilla Games
Publisher: Sony
System: PS3
Cost: $10
If you love Bus Simulators, you’re going to love Killzone 2.
Is there a way I can shoot my own team members?
The first thing you’ll notice, or fail to notice, is the story. It’s ra-ra chest bumping, and poorly timed uses of the word ‘fuck’. To watch it and have any type of emotional connection is impossible. Honestly, I challenge someone to try, I want to know if it’s possible. But so what, it’s a terrible proxy cold-war style struggle (with the Helghast being the Soviets naturally), but not all shooters need deep stories.
So how is the gameplay? As mentioned above, your character is a hybrid bus-person, that looks like a normal human idiot in cut scenes, but come game-time you’re behind the driver’s seat of a Winnebago motor home. The game can’t make up it’s mind if it’s a cover shooter, or a run and gun, so it takes a seat uncomfortably in between. The guns almost always feel out of your control, as if a 14 year old boy is trying to shoot a machine gun (but perhaps they were going for life-like gamer simulation, in which case I suck in war, much as I expected).
There are positives. Save points are generous. The game came out in 2009, and the graphics must have blown skulls, especially the environments. They’ve held up well, and it’s still a nice looking game by 2012 standards. Helghan is an intriguing world, and by the end you’ll probably find yourself identifying more with the red-eyed Helghast than your buddies (a cool trick, if only it had been intentional). The story, while bland for 90% picks up in the last 5 minutes, which if you’re going to have a good 5 minutes, that’s the place to put it.
Review: 2 Stars (Out of 5)
Memory: Brain Cox (think Bourne Supremacy) is the first thing you hear when you turn the game on.
I don’t remember a thing about the first Puzzle Quest. I remember where I played it, a coach in Prague while adjusting to jet lag. And I remember I played it a lot, but I’m not sure if I actually enjoyed it. I think it gave me headaches, but it could have been the situation I was in.
I read that Puzzle Quest takes place in the same world as the Warlords games. I don’t remember much of that either, but I think I liked it.
A pretty sweet old game.
Regardless of how I felt about the first one, I’m leaving for ten days, can’t find my pile of DS backlog games or my PSP, and the selection at Gamestop was minimal unless I wanted just the cartridge (who tosses cases?). So Puzzle Quest 2 it is.
I take a Dramamine, get on the bus to the airport, and start up the game…
Typically I don’t follow new release schedules so close. My usual modus operandi is to pick up a bunch of random games I know little or nothing about. Typically, they’re disappointments, but occasionally punctuated with the rare thrill of validation (Nocturne, Shiren, No More Heroes, all spring to mind).
So a new game is going to come out soon and I’m actually anticipating buying it immediately. The last time that happened was Dark Souls. What is it? Assassin’s Creed 3? Resident Evil 6? Harley Masternak’s Hollywood Workout? No, no, not those sure to be hits. I really want to play Tokyo Jungle.
Tokyo is left to the animals. With this setting. Who wouldn’t want to play as a Pomeranian leaving the safety of it’s apartment to get eaten by a hyena in about 5 seconds? I’m always interested in generational or DNA based games (which wikipedia calls Life Simulation Games, a term I hate because it makes me think of the Sims). Shit, I even played Seventh Cross: Evolution on the Dreamcast. Not long, but I played it.
As you might recall I returned Dragon’s Dogma and walked away with four somewhat interesting used games. Of the four I tried Killzone 2 first, as the dystopian covers with the fluorescent gas masks always caught my eye. A few hours in and I can say those covers are pretty misleading. Maybe having played Spec Ops: The Line so recently has made me jaded, but no one would want to stay for the story. The big bright-spot is the graphics. Three years old and it still looks amazing. They’ve made a world (the literal Helghast planetary environment, not the story, characters, etc) that could support something amazing.
Title: Spec Ops: The Line
Maker: Yager
Publisher: 2K Games
System: PS3
Cost: $50
White Phosphorus – This stuff is grizzly
I certainly wouldn’t have picked up Spec Ops if I wasn’t aware of it’s concept. But it was billed as Heart of Darkness set in Dubai. Ok, I can get into that. And it’s reference to the source material aren’t subtle, but they’re appropriate. You’re on the hunt for a man named Konrad, pronounced the same as Joseph Conrad. And as you push deeper into Dubai, things unravel further and further.
The setting is cool. But ironically, you rarely feel that you’re marching through Dubai except when you’re out in the open sands. The buildings, what you assume would make for the most interesting environments, are usually the most forgettable. The indoor settings are extravagant but seem to also conjure up colors from the 60s-70s, just in case you were to miss the Heart of Darkness references, they can hit you with Apocalypse Now. And maybe that’s the biggest complaint you can make against the game: that with the occasional fourth-wall breaking, and the Vietnam War style radio stations, all in an effort to show callousness, they sometimes push so hard that it pulls you out of the game.
But this is a small complaint to make. Many things about it are spot-on. The voice acting is solid, from the Dennis Hopper radio DJ (an Apocalypse Now reference that hits the mark), the main characters, and especially Konrad. Konrad’s look and sound is about as perfect as you can hope for. The charters repeat phrases in fire fights, but it doesn’t detract as they usually reaffirm the players mental state.
As a game it plays acceptably. A little too much stop-and-pop, and lacking some polish (trying to run from a grenade is way more difficult than it should be), but as you continue to play things meld together and on a second play through you’ll find yourself covering huge parts of the game rapidly.
And that’s really the thing about it. The initial experience is a solid three stars. But it demands a another play-through. The second time is better than the first. The pace of the story makes it difficult to appreciate everything the first time. On the second you find things more enjoyable, it moves briskly, and all the implications bear themselves out. Foreboding hangs over everything, and you realize it from the very beginning. One scene in particular is amazing, and having missed it the first time, that alone validated the return. The second play-through is enough to make the game worth another star.
Review: 4 stars
Memory: Difficult because most memories are spoilers. A safe one- Viciously beating someone to death with a rifle butt when they startle you.
