Moar images?
I’ve been busy lately due to friends moving in for a while, but here’s some image lawls to make up for it:
IT'S OVER 9000!!!
Don’t you just love patch days?
Moar images?Steam: The Little Engine That Could
It’s one of the most utilized and enjoyed programs in the world: Steam.
Steam was a rather niche program for the longest time, so many gamers didn’t even realize its importance to the game industry until around 2007. So where did this symbol of digital distribution and indie game promotion come from? Well, that’s a story of trials and hurdles that often goes unappreciated.
Valve was enjoying the great success of Half-Life in 1998 and was being lavished with praise from the community for its release of mapmaking tools and a supported SDK [tools and information for the development of third-party games based off of an engine]. The SDK was received by many wide-eyed fans, who proceeded to make a multitude of mod games unsurpassed in number to this day.
It was commonly joked amongst gamers that when you purchased Half-Life you were purchasing dozens of games, since you only required Half-Life itself to have access to a large selection of single-player and multiplayer mods.
Snap the Delorean‘s clock forward to 1999: Counter-Strike’s beta has been released and is an overnight success. Valve offers to partner-up with the developers of the mod and they oblige. In the year 2000 (dramatic 80s music here) Counter-Strike 1.0 is released to the public. It is one of the most popular multiplayer games of all time, and through it many more copies of Half-Life are sold, to the point of Valve releasing Counter-Strike as it’s own game.
[Note: The Counter-Strike standalone game could run mods in a fashion similar to Half-Life. It was effectively just Half-Life for 'CS fans']
Welcome to Steam in in the earlier 2000s. Well, okay, I admit that this is SLIGHTLY exaggerated.
Skip forward again to 2001 and Valve is listening to the community. Many mods are popular, but the fans lose connectivity if they don’t maintain the latest copy of the mod they are using at the time. This wasn’t the only problem; cheaters (hackers) were running rampant and the anti-cheat systems of the time were banning people based upon their ‘WONid’ [World Opponent Network Identification], a virtual CD-key which acted as a registration number for a player. The main concern with this approach was that the hackers had figured out several ways to acquire the CD-keys of legitimate players (either through stealing or key generation) to obtain innocent players’ WONids, causing the loss of their games (or at least, their games being declined multiplayer access to large networks who shared ban lists). Valve decided it was time to create front-end software that would be compatible with future releases to deal with this problem, and the first steps towards Steam’s production began.
Valve’s intentions were rather noble; a system which automatically updated games, prevented piracy and halted hackers in their tracks. Unfortunately they struggled to get the project off the ground; upon approaching many developers to commission the production (including Microsoft, Yahoo and Realnetworks) they were turned away. The concept simply didn’t appear profitable.
Valve finally put their foot down and started independent production on the software in late 2001. A few names were thrown around (including Gazelle… yeah, I have no idea where that came from) before the program was called ‘Steam’.
Mid 2002 comes around and Counter-Strike 1.6 is ready for beta testing. Valve decides: this is the right time. They release Counter-Strike 1.6′s beta exclusively over the Steam program. Rumours spread that the program’s name ‘Steam’ was coined when the servers struggled to handle the stress of constant access and downloading prior to the front-end software’s initial release, but they were neither confirmed or denied (but were joked about by Valve representatives). Steam’s primary function at this time was to streamline game patching.
Over the next couple of years Steam grew in use. It provided front-end [operation before launching a primary game or program] matchmaking, updating and, eventually, a reliable counter to the growing annoyance of hackers. Unfortunately the software was considered buggy, unreliable and plain painful to keep updated; it would crash randomly, it would sometimes refuse to patch itself and it had issues with alt-tabbing out of games. The most famous of these bugs was the issue of Half-Life’s sound bugging: the game’s sound would completely crash upon alt-tabbing; if you did so intentionally, a third party program popped up or Windows forced your program to tab out, which was common at the time.
Steam's quality certainly improved with the release of Half-Life 2.
Steam wouldn’t be accessed by third-party games until the release of Half-Life 2 in 2005. Half-Life 2′s popularity was considered phenomenal; it was considered the “game of the year”, ‘revolutionary’ and ‘must have’ due to its innovative gameplay and in-game physics. Not only was the game popular, but it also happened to run on what was dubbed ‘the Source engine’ which was built specifically to interface with Steam. Game developers sprung at the chance to have their product advertised-by-affiliation. Smaller game companies and third-party developers began releasing downloadable games and demos over Steam.
Valve began to finally see a return on their investment. They began patching out problems with the Steam client with a new, focused zeal. Several of the major problems which hampered Steam were patched out and the program would become more streamlined. The program found itself with a more functional friends list, browser, game library and store. It also stabilized its capability to synchronize with games which were not intended to interface with Steam, allowing you to run them off of your Steam game library.
In 2007 the program finally gained popularity. Key developers (such as Eidos and Capcom) began online distribution of their games across Steam. Valve would see a major backlash from several key sectors of the game industry, who claimed that online distribution was designed to “steal money from important links in the industry”, such as distributors and stores. These claims were put to rest when game designers and producers across the world leaped to the defense of the software, claiming that it was the key to breaking the stagnant culture of game production.
Gamers all over the world now rely on Steam not only to play the games they love, but to also protect them as their own. The software also offers companies the opportunity to sell their older classic titles to a wide audience for Steam exclusive discounts (which are appreciated by gamers everywhere) as well as partnerships with LAN centres through the Valve Cyber Café Program. When you stack the aforementioned benefits up with the friends list, browser, game library, demos and free multiplayer weekends: Steam is the must-have program for gamers the world over.
So there you have it. Steam was only ever conceptualized for the benefit of Valve’s consumers, had to be produced by the developers themselves, ran at a loss for several years, required constant maintenence and patching, needed an obscene outlay of hardware and bandwidth to operate and was demonized by the industry’s media; but it pushed through all of its problems to become what it is today.
Kudos to you Valve. Kudos.
If you are one of the few gamers on the planet who have yet to download Steam, you can do so at http://store.steampowered.com/about/. The program is free, of course, as Valve always intended.
That’s all, TTYL!
Steam: The Little Engine That CouldManual Override!
You walk into your local store and pick up your game. Whether you’ve patiently waited for it to be released or you’ve bought a game on a whim, you know what you have to look forward to.
Perhaps you have a take moment to wait for a friend or loved one before you head home? Maybe you need to install the game on a PC and you have some time to kill? Whatever the reason, you decide the time is right. You pry the game’s box open and hear the obnoxiously sweet pop of a new case cracking open… but… wait, where’s the manual?
This is one trend i find myself completely intolerant of.
A gamer's manual collection, shown with pride.
It all started when game manuals began to degrade in production quality.
The first step in this process was removing the sections about the lore and story behind the game. Sure it was fluff, but it was entertaining fluff. Games (especially at the time when they first began doing this) could only convey so much about the plot without breaking immersion for the player. You couldn’t halt a game and pop up a random biography on a key character; it was out-of-place and your first instinct was to skip it.
Soon game companies also began to remove a lot of the real gameplay information. Some would argue that this was due to tutorials coming into fashion, but tutorials often didn’t exist in games that did this. Usually the game would opt to halt the action with some kind of popup (this item does this when you press this and, oh, we’ll pop up again later when you see something else it can be used for), or randomly break plot development to ‘train you’ on what an item or unit does. Even worse; existing tutorials would be compulsory and tedious. I’m just happy that eventually most game developers figured out that we’d want to skip them on the second play through.
Real-Time Strategy games are the most condescending when it comes to this tactic. Some RTS games theme entire campaign missions around the use of one unit that would easily be summarized by a third of a page on a manual.
Eventually game manuals simply ceased to exist in their basic form. Instead, you would have a slip which helped newbies to use the game’s disc in the first place (which itself devolved to ‘autorun the disc in this box’ or ‘put it in your console and press the on switch’) and you would be given the option to view a digital manual on a disc. This actually had some promise, since it meant that your manual could never be lost or ruined. Unfortunately, this method was the bane of a console-owner, since navigating a manual was always a pain when using a console control.
Finally we reach today’s standards; “Hey, we can’t even be bothered to put the manual on the game disc. If you want to see it, visit this website. We might also make it a painfully annoying-to-read PDF file as well.”
At this point it almost seems like game companies are just trolling us.
To all game developers and distributors: If you’re gonna be tight-fisted about it and refuse to print a game manual, then stop selling them in the same fat boxes intended to CONTAIN game manuals.
It’s a let-down every time i pop one open to find nothing but a CD-Key sticker and a disc.
Oh, and one more thing: Gamers love our manuals. We treat them as collectible items and rarely even consider throwing them away. If you think that it’s environmentally irresponsible to be printing something that will likely be treasured or kept indefinitely by whoever buys it; i think you need to go and harass a book store and get your priorities straight.
That’s all from me. TTYL.
Manual Override!Seriously Twisted
Those of you who had the opportunity to mess around on the Playstation (whether you owned one personally or not) would likely have played Twisted Metal.
Twisted Metal featured the two key points of well-designed gameplay; it required only a small amount of finesse to pick up and play [it was easy to play] and it featured a rather high skill cap [it was hard to master].
Being the kind of game it was, it was also great fun. If you’ve ever played any game from the Rampage series, you know what kind of gameplay i’m talking about. To spout out an incredible overused quote: “Tragedy is when I cut my finger. Comedy is when you fall into an open sewer and die.” – Mel Brooks.
Don't taze me, bro!
Twisted Metal’s shenanigans came from a combination of racing and destruction, as did the objectives of the missions or maps. Believe me; when you combine tank-tough cars and excessive weaponry the collateral damage is obscene. However, despite all the mindless fun and mayhem, the game actually had a story arc that was vaguely interesting.
The story starts with an everyday family man with a wife and daughter. One day they go out for a drive and a freak accident causes their vehicle to have a head-on collision with a brick wall. Naturally they are all killed (although his daughter makes an appearance in a later game, but that’s another story) and the man’s face is basically burnt off. Nice.
So while he is in limbo he is approached by a being known by the alias ‘Mr. Ash’ who says he will return him to life in exchange for souls (face not included). The specifics of it aren’t really portrayed and you are left with an open-ended interpretation of how things play out (which works out rather well, actually) but my understanding of it is that he gains the power to grant wishes. The power is stolen from a demon named Minion (who would try to win the power back in the future) either by the man himself or by a demon transferring the ability to him.
2 years of seething self-hatred and existential issues later, the man reappears with the alias of ‘Calypso’ and announces a contest: Twisted Metal. Racers who choose to compete do so at horrible risk, but have the opportunity to make a wish of their choosing if they are victorious.
Sweet Tooth might be using too much hairspray.
The wishes themselves are incredibly powerful but there are two twists on Calpyso’s power.
Calypso seems quite capable of granting anything the victor desires but, unfortunately for him, seems incapable of manifesting these powers for his own gain beyond a certain level. In previous games he has even been arrested, incapable of doing anything to protect himself.
Unfortunately for the racers, Calypso is a freakin’ nutcase with issues. Due to this, he rarely actually grants wishes as they were intended. He tends to take particular pleasure in screwing with the more noble or heroic wishes, since he usually lets the more greed-based or malevolent wishes come true. One example was when Spectre explained that he was an aspiring actor and wished “Make me famous! Make it so the entire world knows my face!” so Calypso stretched Spectre’s face out like dough to a massive size and left it floating face-down above New York City.
You’re probably wondering why i’m even bringing this game up?
Behold, the trailer from E3 2010:
[I understand that it's hard to hear the announcer in parts of this video, but the information and footage provided show the game's potential.]
This game was slated for release around mid-2011.
After watching various videos and reading press releases regarding this new game, it seems that the video i’ve linked pretty much sums it all up. I recommend watching it through and (trying) to listen to what the announcer says about the game. If not, just enjoy the random explosions and carnage going on.
This game is definitely on my watch list.
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Here’s another question i’ve received from a reader:
“Hey there. I played some wild 9 and it was fun but the graphics are old. Do you know if they released a sequel? I’d like to try that.” -Rachel, regarding the Gimmick Games article.
To the best of my knowledge; there has never been an official sequel to Wild 9. If you are looking for something of the same feel you might enjoy Bulletstorm, which is what i consider its spiritual sequel.
I mean, you could have called the game ‘Wild 9: Bulletstorm’ and renamed the protagonist to ‘Wex’. Maybe throw in a small, goopy green alien thing that yells ‘momma!’ for good measure. I’d probably have accepted it. Why?
- Both games utilize a ‘rig’ gauntlet, letting you throw enemies/objects around with an electric lasso. Both also grant benefits to catching things in mid-air, or throwing enemies into certain environmental hazards for progression.
- The games share a common need to spout cheesy-yet-entertaining dialogue (one-liners).
- The main character of each game looks the same. I mean, they are even both space-guerrilla agents.
- You can do hideous things to enemies for laughs in either game; In Wild 9 the freakin’ slogan is ‘torture your enemies’ and you do so for both fun and advancement. Bulletstorm promotes it in a similar way, implementing a ‘point system’ which pays you ‘points’ based on creative attacks against enemies, which you can spend like currency.
Give Wex more guns and change his perspective to that of a First-Person Shooter and you have the foundation upon which all of Bulletstorm is built. I’m not knocking the game… in fact, i’m recommending it based upon the similarities. If you enjoyed Wild 9 then you will probably like Bulletstorm.
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That’s it for now. TTYL!
Seriously TwistedI Know That Song: The Top 4 Most Recognizable Game Melodies!
There are some tunes that just stick with you, whether they are songs that remind you of a time in your life or clever marketing jingles designed to drive you bonkers with their catchy sounds.
Why do we remember video game music? Well, there are 2 primary reasons:
- The music in a video game typically exists to accentuate an experience for you and, through this, tends to stick in your mind through a memory-link process. Therefore, video game music is addictive on a personal level.
- On the medical side of things; when a person recognizes a tune (particularly music with a pattern, hence the existence of a chorus being so standard) the mind releases dopamine, triggering the brain’s sense of reward. Think of a subtle feeling similar to eating when you’re hungry, or laying down to rest after a long day. [Source]
Which of gaming’s signature songs are the most catchy? If you hear a remix of one of these 4 tunes fly out of a jukebox at the pub, you might just recognize it as one of the…
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Top 4 Most Recognizable Game Melodies
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4: Still Alive (Portal)
Portal was widely considered the ‘game to own’ of 2007-2009. Winner of countless rewards ranging from specific fluff awards like IGN’s greatest game villian of all time (GlaDOS, also happening to be the voice of Still Alive) to legitimate awards such as the GDCA’s Game of the Year.
Still Alive itself was a meme in the making. Upon completing the game and presuming GlaDOS to be destroyed, a rather hilarious semi-ASCII cinematic would pop up with the game credits along with GlaDOS (almost cheerfully) singing. The song has gone beyond the game itself; it’s been given new cinematic videos by fans, remixed into club music and played by tribute bands dedicated to entirely different genres.
To top it all off: The song was composed by none other than John Coulton. The combination of the game’s ‘meme’ effect (it triggered the psychological need to socially pass it on as information within human culture) with the cult-following of John’s rather hilarious musical talent proved to be potent, causing it to become widely recognized as ‘that fun song from Portal’ even far outside the gaming community.
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3: The Legend of Zelda Theme (Zelda series)
This song was composed by none other than Koji Kondo, who is considered a legend in gaming’s audio industry. Koji is one of the true veterans of gaming audio; he has worked exclusively with Nintendo since 1984 and has proved time and time again that all you need is a catchy foundation and a great medium of interaction to bring outstanding results out of an otherwise simple tune.
Remember: systems back in the ’80s were very hardware limited. Koji did outstanding work considering the truly finite resources he had at his disposal.
A rather simple name for a rather simple tune; The Legend of Zelda Theme plays very heavily on a distinct pattern, more-so than any other melody in the top 4. Koji also succeeded in giving the song a very dramatic feel, causing it to create an immersive experience for Zelda players. This isn’t a small achievement when you consider just how ‘primitive’ the consoles were back in those days.
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2: Victory Fanfare (Final Fantasy series)
Everybody has heard this tell-tale tune at some time or another.
Victory fanfare varies rather noticeably between each game in the Final Fantasy series, but the opening tune for this song never changes and is highly nostalgic. Well… with the exception of Final Fantasy X-2. It didn’t stick; the removal of the distinct opening to Victory Fanfare had such poor reception with fans of the series that Square-Enix reverted the change with Final Fantasy XII.
Victory Fanfare’s popularity mainly stems from association. Not everybody is a fan of the Final Fantasy series, but many have played at least one incarnation of the franchise. Victory Fanfare has also established itself as a pop-culture meme that’s stood its ground for over a decade, causing many people who didn’t even play video games to seek its source to satisfy their curiosity.
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1: Ground Theme (Mario franchise)
Super Mario Bros. was one of the most popular video games of all time and now spans back generations. If you are under 30 years old it’s a safe bet that your parents enjoyed a quick game of Super Mario Bros. at some point (or hated it, well, depending on how skilled they were at the game. It caused some rage!)
Super Mario Bros. has sold 40.24 MILLION COPIES and holds the place of second best-selling game in the world. Couple that with the fact that Ground Theme was used for the first stage of the game and you’ve got some truly massive exposure.
[TANGENT: If you were curious, the title is currently held by Wii Sports with 75.66 million units sold. Then again, they basically gave the thing away to anybody who bought a Wii so it don't even know if it should really be counted. On a side-note: the industry failed to collaborate accurate figures for Half-Life 2 due to it also being sold in The Orange Box and its popularity over steam]
Another Koji Kondo composition in such a short countdown? What a beast. Remember how intuitive the controls were for Super Mario Bros. (it allowed you to manipulate your jump height, move speed etc) as well as how smoothly the game actually ran on the system? Well, that doesn’t leave much processing power for game music. Hats off again, Kondo!
There is a reason for its popularity beyond simple exposure; The upbeat (almost calypso) tune was very distinct and quite memorable, mostly due to its higher pitch.
Ground Theme deserves particular praise for being a forefather to the use of dynamic music in games. When the time clock would fall below 100 the song would speed up in tempo, often inspiring panic in the player. Next time you pop in a modern game and enjoy its constant change in music dependant on the situation; remember the Ground Theme.
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Honorable Mentions from Referenced Gamers:
It’s true that alot of this article involved heavy research into game statistics, but the foundation of its production came from referencing several of my gaming colleagues. I like to grant freedom to interviewees at the end of each article to allow them to say whatever’s on their mind, so with this article when i decided to include my personal favourite, i also asked if there were any specific themes they would like to share.
While most were satisfied with the top 4 already listed, Ruil actually took me up on the offer.
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Fuzzwobble’s Favourite Game Music: Hell March 2 (Red Alert 2)
This song truly gets my heart pumping and I consider this to be Frank Klepacki’s masterpiece.
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Ruil’s Favourite Game Music: Chrono Trigger Main Theme (Chrono Trigger)
Ruil: There will never be a game like it ever again. It was a collaborative effort of the greatest developers of RPGs at the time.
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That’s it for this article. TTYL!
I Know That Song: The Top 4 Most Recognizable Game Melodies!Gimmick Games? Gimmick a break!
Forgive me for making a broad generalization, but the gaming industry is stagnant.
With how things are we can throw almost any recent mainstream game releases into two piles. The game is either a carbon-copy of a pre-existing formula, or it simple takes a pre-existing formula and tries to spice it up with a gimmick.
Also an accurate representation of a 'gimmick game experience'.
A carbon-copy game (typically produced by the AAA industry) will typically have dozens (if not hundreds) of clones. Most of the time you can only differentiate by noting differences that would be mocked by other entertainment industries if you even tried to pass them off as original content.
Essentially, carbon-copy games are trying to sell the same experience with barely-distinguishable differences. I could make a cup of instant coffee, put in another teaspoon of sugar, call it a ‘mocha-fantastico’ and give it to somebody. You know what? It’s coffee. All you end up with is somebody being disappointed and a hit to your reputation. Nobody wins.
They can be forgiven to an extent. Carbon-copy games know what they are and usually try to pull it off by making a slight improvement or by twanging at our nostalgia with a homage.
Gimmick games are made by pretentious companies with no imagination beyond a fleeting thought such as “What would [game here] be like if it had [this item/character] in it?”
A gimmick game is exactly what it sounds like. It takes a pre-existing formula that’s been proved to work and throws in a gimmick. You can probably think of a few examples of what you think are gimmicks right n0w, but many first guesses would more-than-likely be inaccurate. Portal would probably come to mind, but Portal was not a gimmick; it had unique characters, problems, gameplay and resolutions.
Here are some examples of common gameplay gimmicks:
- Forcing the protagonist to stop and solve ‘problems’ only solved by a ‘deus ex machina‘ device.
- Making a sequel and replacing the main character for no good reason.
- Remaking a game so the player controls a half-naked woman (skin-tight clothes also apply).
- Attempting (poorly) to loosely base a game upon a movie franchise.
- Changing where the enemies come from. You still fight in a city, but the fodder comes from the moon now; this game is different.
I could go on for hours but you get the picture. It’s an existing game with a difference to gameplay just noticeable enough to allow the designer to proclaim he’s not running a glorified xerox machine.
You know what the worse thing is about these gimmick games? They drown out the real potential. When you hear about a game from your preferred genre being a fresh and unique experience you immediately respond with scepticism. It’s this exact trained response which has put certain genres in a rut today (with the MMO market suffering the most).
Wild 9 is a classic example of an amazing game that went under the radar thanks to gimmick assumptions. Play it someday!
Luckily the fuzzy animal era died out. I’m talking about that dreaded time where game developers thought that all you had to do was copy a pre-existing game and replace the protagonist with a cute/cuddly/fluffy animal that will still ‘kick your tail’. Glad that’s over with… at least for the most part.
Speaking of gimmicks, there’s something that has to be said and i’m throwing it out there. All of you game companies who release ‘expansion packs’ for Real-Time Strategy games and just tag on a couple of units then market the product based solely on that single premise: You should go find a mirror and frown at yourself in disappointment. Trust me, we’re all doing it already. We appreciate those new units, but you are NOT selling the new units. 90% of us buy your expansion pack for the extended campaigns, new maps and (if we’re blessed with you making the effort) additional faction/s.
When we buy an expansion to an RTS game to find it’s just got 4 or 5 new campaign maps tagged on and a couple of new units we feel RIPPED OFF. That’s probably why nobody buys expansion packs for most RTS games anymore. You’ve ruined it for everybody and you have only yourselves to blame.
I’m not just talking about single-player mode here. Do you even realize how many RTS communities died off because the expansion packs were so lackluster that alot of people just didn’t bother to buy them? Incompatibility is death. I guess we can call it a blessing in disguise that Red Alert 3: Uprising didn’t support multiplayer. I’m pretty sure Red Alert 3′s community would have crashed and burned.
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Okay, it’s out of my system now. Time to answer a few questions i’ve received over the past week:
“I have read with interest these 2 articles, but i’m confused, what is a First Person Shooter? And what does Real-Time mean?” -Brandon, regarding the AGS series.
A First-Person Shooter (FPS) is a genre in which you view the world as you would through the protagonist’s eyes. While many FPS games allow you to toggle to 3rd person mode, you often spend most of the game looking down the barrel of a gun and, usually, aiming by looking around and positioning the crosshair in the center of your screen over a target. It’s a safe bet that you’ve played one before.
The term ‘Real-Time’ when attached to a genre states that you have to respond in, well, real-time. In the case of a Real-Time Strategy (RTS) this simply means that while you are giving orders to your units the action doesn’t stop. Some games allow you to enter a gameplay mode in which you can control and give orders outside of real-time (and some of those games are still considered RTS) but usually you play ‘on the fly’. Some games simply don’t require this prefix; there’s no such thing as the genre ‘Real-Time Action’ for example, since the statement is redundant.
“How do you know Obble was his name somehow related to yours?” -Jeff, regarding the LoL/HoN comparison article.
The name similarity is somewhat of a coincidence.
Obble’s original handle was OMGBoomLOL for a long time. For some reason though, people would pronounce his name as ‘Obble’. From my understanding, he changed his handle as he migrated from his previously occupied games and forums to the faulty pronunciation. A few years later we ran into each other and, sharing the same enthusiasm for both games and the mechanics behind them, have been good friends ever since.
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Many other questions have been addressed via reply functions or through email. If i haven’t responded to you it’s probably due to the answer already existing in an article or, well, there was just nothing to say. I just thought others might find the answers to these two queries interesting or informative.
That’s all for this article. TTYL!
Gimmick Games? Gimmick a break!