T w e n t y S i d e d
Continue reading ⟩⟩ “#8 Live Action Ramgar Pummeling”
#8 Live Action Ramgar Pummeling
#7 Relationship Shy
Continue reading ⟩⟩ “#7 Relationship Shy”
Spider-Man Part 9: The Web of Spider-Sneak
Spider-Man gets a tip from Yuri that the Demons are seizing a lot of the Kingpin’s holdings. Spider-Man still thinks this is a gang war problem. By this point in the story the player has run into spontaneous clusters of Demons doing various crimes around the city. They seem to be amassing weapons and money and Spidey is wondering what their next big move is.
Yuri is invaluable here. As a member of the police force she can feed Spider-Man all the exposition we need and act as a sounding board for our lead character. Without her, Spider-Man would need to convey all of his plans and fears by narrating to himself. That works fine in comics where the writer controls the flow of time and can have Spidey recap recent events in a single full-page panel, but in an open world having the player character endlessly chattering to themselves would be incredibly tedious.
Spider-Man and Yuri figure out that the Demons are likely to attack one of the Kingpin’s properties at the docks. Yuri sends officer Jefferson Davis with a warrant. This means Spider-Man and Officer Davis can conduct a proper search and gather evidence.
Before they can do the search, Spidey needs to knock out all the guards, so I guess now is a good time to talk about the…
Continue reading ⟩⟩ “Spider-Man Part 9: The Web of Spider-Sneak”
EA’s Problem Isn’t Greed
I’m sorry to say that if you’re a long time reader of this site, then my column this week is just a shorter, more focused version of a rant you probably read two years ago. Still, this is sadly an evergreen topic and revisiting it every couple of years is probably not overkill.
I’d love it if gaming culture would focus more on EA’s flagrant mistakes and less on the catch-all term “greed”, because greed is such an easily dismissed term. If you’re an aging executive, then an outcry regarding greed falls perfectly into the horrible stereotypes about Millennials that are popular among Baby Boomers. Meanwhile, the criticism of, “This obviously bad decision destroyed IP that was worth hundreds of millions of dollars” is a lot more damning outside of gaming culture.
Based on the feedback at the Escapist, this argument seems to have fallen of deaf ears. I think a big reason for this is that we don’t all complain about game companies for the same reason. For a lot of people, calling EA out regarding greed is an act of catharsis and they don’t particularly care if their argument is persuasive. They’re just venting frustration. For me, critical analysis is an attempt to explain a mistake so that people will stop making it. If an executive or a shareholder ever read my work, I’d want them to find it instructive and illuminating. “Ah! So it’s not that gamers are entitled babies, it’s that EA is releasing products that hurt sales and damage their brand!”
Having said that, it’s likely that we’re both just shouting into the hurricane. Some people complain about greed and I complain about lost revenue potential, but the odds against a shareholder or an executive reading what any of us have to say is astronomicalParticularly since they seem so disconnected from gaming culture..
Continue reading ⟩⟩ “EA’s Problem Isn’t Greed”
Andromeda Part 21: Not-so-Great Scott
All of the surviving Pathfinders meet and agree to ignore Tann’s orders for everyone to abandon the main plot. The meeting is interrupted with the news that Scott is awake. So let’s see how that plot thread has been going.
There are two ways things can go with your sibling. One is kinda dumb, and the other is dumb and obnoxious.
Scott is Confused
Then again, I might NOT say that. Because it's really dumb.
If you visit Scott while he’s still in a coma, then SAM will use Scott’s cranial implant to “make contact”. Scott will be able to converse with you from within his coma, with his ghostly disembodied voice coming out of SAM’s speaker system. He’ll ask about Dad and he’ll ask about Habitat 7, and if you tell him that Dad is dead and the planet is a wasteland, then he’ll freak out, panic, and the doctor will give him something to help him… sleep???
Continue reading ⟩⟩ “Andromeda Part 21: Not-so-Great Scott”
Diecast #247: Mailbag!
Last week I asked for mailbag questions, and you delivered. Well, technically the email system is the one that did the delivering, but you get what I’m saying. Here is over an hour of question-answering.
Hosts: Paul, Shamus. Episode edited by Issac.
Show notes: Continue reading ⟩⟩ “Diecast #247: Mailbag!”
#6 Touch Attack
Continue reading ⟩⟩ “#6 Touch Attack”
From The Archives:
Revisiting a Dead Engine
I wanted to take the file format of a late 90s shooter and read it in modern-day Unity. This is the result.
Dead Island
A stream-of-gameplay review of Dead Island. This game is a cavalcade of bugs and bad design choices.
Charging More for a Worse Product
No, game prices don't "need" to go up. That's not how supply and demand works. Instead, the publishers need to be smarter about where they spend their money.
Punishing The Internet for Sharing
Why make millions on your video game when you could be making HUNDREDS on frivolous copyright claims?
PC Gaming Golden Age
It's not a legend. It was real. There was a time before DLC. Before DRM. Before crappy ports. It was glorious.
Crysis 2
Crysis 2 has basically the same plot as Half-Life 2. So why is one a classic and the other simply obnoxious and tiresome?
A Telltale Autopsy
What lessons can we learn from the abrupt demise of this once-impressive games studio?
The Biggest Game Ever
How did this niche racing game make a gameworld so massive, and why is that a big deal?
The Plot-Driven Door
You know how videogames sometimes do that thing where it's preposterously hard to go through a simple door? This one is really bad.
What Does a Robot Want?
No, self-aware robots aren't going to turn on us, Skynet-style. Not unless we designed them to.