Twenty Sided

By Shamus Posted Tuesday Jun 3, 2008

Filed under: Random 46 comments

I know that I frequently bellyache about needing to enter CD keys. I feel I need to draw a distinction here:

CD keys are something I grudgingly accept. I don’t object to them the way I object to (say) online activation. I certainly wouldn’t forswear a game over a CD key. I complain about them in the same way people complain about those invincible plastic shells that retail electronics come in. They’re annoying and they waste a half a minute of time, but they don’t challenge my ownership of the goods inside.

When I moan about CD keys it’s usually because I’ve encountered a poorly-implemented one. One of my games here (I think it’s Unreal Tournament 2003 or 2004) has the key printed in a narrow sans-serif font, which makes it hard to differentiate some characters, which leads to repeated attempts. Ugh. Just as bad is if I have to enter it twice, for no dang good reason. I also hate if the sucker is hard to find. (I think it was Half-Life 2 that claimed the CD key was on the “back of the CD case” when there wasn’t one, and I eventually found the thing elsewhere among the boxed ephemera.)

But the problems really start when the CD key isn’t enough. When they want a CD key and the CD in the drive and SecuROM, then it can be said that the pirates are offering a superior product, while legit users are punished.

I’m writing this here so I can link back to it later, because it’s not always apparent to new readers that online activation is a deal-breaker, while CD keys are just an annoyance I enjoy complaining about.

Shamus Young is a programmer, an author, and nearly a composer. He works on this site full time. If you'd like to support him, you can do so via Patreon or PayPal.

 Site Theme UpdatedPrevious Post

Next PostPwning English 

46 comments

Depths of Peril:
First Impressions

By Shamus Posted Monday Jun 2, 2008

Filed under: Game Reviews 53 comments

 Indigo Prophecy:
Final ThoughtsPrevious Post

Next PostDepths of Peril:
Gameplay 

Developing a game for an established genre is a difficult task. You have to design the game, drawing from titles you’ve enjoyed in the past and integrating those concepts with your own ideas. You need to polish and refine established gameplay to make the game fresh and interesting while remaining true to the core experience fans expect. I imagine the most frustrating moment for a developer comes when some jerkface reviewer comes along, appraises their efforts, and calls the whole thing a “Diablo Clone”.

Depths of Peril is a Diablo clone from Soldak Entertainment. They sent along a review copy for me to try, which was a very nice way of completely wrecking my Memorial Day weekend.

Actually, “clone” isn’t fair at all. Diablo “clones” are just games which belong to a genre nobody has bothered to name. They get lumped in the with “RPG” games, which doesn’t make any sense. For whatever reason, “RPG” has come to mean “game where you level up”, which is a genre so broad as to be meaningless.

Pedantic etymology aside, Depths of Peril is a particularly good example of whatever kind of game you want to call it. It’s the first one I’ve seen in years that had the guts to innovate and evolve the gameplay set down by Blizzard Entertainment a decade ago. (Fate was the last Diablo clone I played. My review is here. Dungeon Siege is another I’ve played, and the review for that can be found between the following quotation marks, “Meh.”)

Appraising games like this is like judging chili recipes. Each one is a slightly different mix of the same essential ingredients: Wilderness areas with little side-dungeons to explore. Fixed character classes with set appearances. Random loot drops. Quest-dispensing NPC’s in town. Common, Rare, and Unique item types, along with collect-them-all item “sets”. NPC hirelings to accompany you. Elite and unique monsters. Health and mana potions. A smattering of attribute and skill points to “spend” on each level up. And so on. The ratios of the ingredients change, but in the end they’re all making the same thing.

Depths of Peril hits all of these key notes you’d expect, offering up a nicely polished experience built atop familiar and established gameplay. But the thing that sets Depths of Peril apart is the fact that it’s not really an RPG. It’s a strategy game.

Continue reading ⟩⟩ “Depths of Peril:
First Impressions”

Shamus Young is a programmer, an author, and nearly a composer. He works on this site full time. If you'd like to support him, you can do so via Patreon or PayPal.

 Indigo Prophecy:
Final ThoughtsPrevious Post

Next PostDepths of Peril:
Gameplay 

53 comments

Dear Sirs

By Shamus Posted Sunday Jun 1, 2008

Filed under: Rants 76 comments

 Oblivion:
Mod HellPrevious Post

Next PostThe DRM Crusades 

Dear Flagship Studios, (And EA)

Dear sirs. I am currently in the process of installing your product Hellgate: London. It may be of interest to you that not everyone enjoys typing in those gigantic strings of garbaldygook, which you sometimes refer to as “registration codes”. In fact, I do not enjoy it. I do the very opposite of enjoying it. I bring this up because your installer made me type it in at two different places during the process of installing your product. It seems like I could have been spared one of those. At least.

I also want to point out that while I’m sure you have millions of fans who can’t wait to jump on your servers to share the gaming experience together, there are still some of us who actually play games on our own. As I understand this has not yet been made illegal, and I would like to enjoy the single-player experience for as long as possible before that changes. To wit: I don’t really want to be online with all the children that infect your service, a great screaming plague of illiterate thieves, con artists, crybabies, bullies, vandals, and pranksters. These sorts of interactions are available to me every day out in the real world, which is one of the reasons I spend so much time at home playing videogames.

With this in mind, I’d like to ask that in the future you not integrate “account creation” with the installer. Or, if you do, I would request the addition of a button labeled, “BUGGER OFF”, the purpose of which I imagine is apparent by now. One of the selling points of the game was the fact that it did not (claim to) require an internet connection. Now that I have broken the seal I learn that this is not really the case and in fact, an internet connection is indeed required, constantly, throughout the entire process.

And now the installation is complete, and I note that while the account registration was integrated, the patching system is not. For shame.

I am going to play this game. For your sake I hope the software does not vex me further.

Sincerely,

Shamus Young

Shamus Young is a programmer, an author, and nearly a composer. He works on this site full time. If you'd like to support him, you can do so via Patreon or PayPal.

 Oblivion:
Mod HellPrevious Post

Next PostThe DRM Crusades 

76 comments

Indigo Prophecy:
Final Thoughts

By Shamus Posted Friday May 30, 2008

Filed under: Game Reviews 30 comments

 Mass Effect:
Greg Zeschuk WIRED InterviewPrevious Post

Next PostDepths of Peril:
First Impressions 

There are three main characters in the game: Lucas, Tyler, and Carla. All three take a shower at various points of the game. For the men we just see their feet as they step into the shower, then cut away. For Carla, we are treated to several slow camera pans around her. In the international version of the game I believe she’s naked, while in the American version she’s wearing a sort of flesh-toned bikini in the shower. So not only is there gratuitous nudity, but it’s covered up with nonsense.

Another major edit to the game in the American version is the removal of the sex scene between Lucas and his (ex) girlfriend. I’ve read that this is not just a cutscene. It’s integrated the way many minigames are in Indigo Prophesy, in that you participate via mouse-gestures which translate into… (ahem) thrusts. (I’m just going by what I’ve read in Gamefaqs. I’m sure someone will correct me if I’m wrong.) This same game mechanic is used for manipulating items, opening doors, and climbing fences. I’m actually grateful my version doesn’t have this. I think it sounds more ridiculous than titillating. I don’t think of myself as a puritan, but I’m not sure I could participate in a scene like that, even for the sake of getting on with the game. It feels like something a fifteen year old would do while giggling, not a part of a grim psychological thriller. It would be like having the Team America puppet sex scene in the middle of Se7en. Again, I don’t have it in my version of the game, so maybe I’m misunderstanding what it’s really like.

In any event, I’m surprised the game has sections that are so clearly designed to pander to male gamers. There is deliberate female nudity, and the deliberate omission of male nudity. Then there is a sex scene enacted from the male point of view. I’ve never spent any time as a woman so I can’t say how a woman would react, but my gut tells me this would have a repellent effect on a female audience. It’s a shame because I think that otherwise this game would attract more females than your average point-n-shoot action game. There is a focus on what people are saying, thinking and feeling, along with a fairly strong female lead. I know it makes me a reprehensible sexist to suggest that men and women like different things, but I think that women would dig this game if not for the incongruous fan service. (And ignoring the second half of the game, of course. That part is bad for everyone.)

Still, I wholly endorse the first act of this game. If you see it in the bargain bin, I suggest you would be safe if you did the following: Continue reading ⟩⟩ “Indigo Prophecy:
Final Thoughts”

Shamus Young is a programmer, an author, and nearly a composer. He works on this site full time. If you'd like to support him, you can do so via Patreon or PayPal.

 Mass Effect:
Greg Zeschuk WIRED InterviewPrevious Post

Next PostDepths of Peril:
First Impressions 

30 comments

Greenhouse

By Shamus Posted Thursday May 29, 2008

Filed under: Video Games 27 comments

 The Truth About PiracyPrevious Post

Next PostFallout 3:
Questions 

A couple of days ago I posted to the Greenhouse forums, soliciting their thoughts on when we might get a standalone version of RSPOD. All I managed to do was re-light the dormant debate on the issue without getting any response out of PA / Hothouse Games. I nudged them again the next day. The thread has since fallen off the front page and I’m pretty sure the Hothouse guys are just ignoring it. Ah well. It was worth a try.

I was really, really hoping they were going to take the path forged by Telltale Games. Telltale has set the standard for how episodic gaming should be done, and it’s a shame to see Hothead stagger onto the field with so little idea of what they’re doing.

I really enjoyed the demo for the Penny Arcade game, and as I’ve said before – the $20 price point is irresistible to me. But I still expect to own games that I buy, and after waffling a bit I’ve decided their activation requirement is a deal-breaker for me. I really wanted to support them, but after a lot of fuss and attention for the fans at launch they seem to have wandered off. That initial wave of attention filled me with the delusion that we might be able to get them to re-think their policy of requiring the game to authenticate on install, forever.

Serves me right for abandoning my default stance of bitter cynicism I’ve cultivated over the last few years.

It’s just as well. Instead of worrying about RSPOD, I think I really, really need to get on the Sam & Max bandwagon. I played the Free Episode and it was fantastic. My next purchase will either be the Galactic Civ expansion or a season of Sam & Max. Decisions, decisions.

Shamus Young is a programmer, an author, and nearly a composer. He works on this site full time. If you'd like to support him, you can do so via Patreon or PayPal.

 The Truth About PiracyPrevious Post

Next PostFallout 3:
Questions 

27 comments

The Truth About Piracy

By Shamus Posted Thursday May 29, 2008

Filed under: Video Games 145 comments

 Authorization ServersPrevious Post

Next PostGreenhouse 

If you don’t get it, this might help explain the joke.

Yesterday’s scourging of ~~BioWare’s~~ EA’s clumsy falsehoods led us back to the old discussion about software piracy being “theft”.

I think the closest analogy of piracy is the one Bruce offered in the comments: It’s like sneaking into a movie. Sure, it’s not “hurting” anyone – nobody becomes poorer by virtue of your viewing of the movie – and you are not depriving anyone else of the product. (We must assume the theater is infinite in size and all the seats offer the same view for this analogy to work.) But most people recognize that sneaking in is still wrong.

In the case we’re dealing with, so many people are sneaking in the fire exit that there is a certain herd comfort to the act. After all, “everyone else is doing it and we’re not hurting anyone.” The sense of scandal is gone.

To combat this, the theater owner first began hassling everyone as they came into the theater to make sure they had tickets. This was a mild annoyance, but had no impact on people coming in through the fire exit. When that plan failed, they began frisking customers as they came in. This was very annoying and insulting, and many people wouldn’t stand for it.

Some people have quit going to the movies outright.

Some people buy tickets, run outside, and come in the back way along with all of the leeches to avoid the invasion of their privacy.

Some people sneak in and claim they will pay for a ticket on the way out if they liked the movie. Some of them even mean it and occasionally do so.

Some people sneak in, but rarely stay to the end. They usually leave halfway through, often to sneak into some other movie. They enjoy the thrill of jumping the fence and getting in more than they enjoy movies. If the movie was free, they wouldn’t bother seeing it at all.

Some of the people sneaking in do so because they are broke and can’t afford to buy a ticket. (Some of these would very probably find a way to pay for a ticket if they found they could no longer use the fire door.)
Since realizing the great influx of people into the theater through the fire door, the theater managers have gone nuts. Continue reading ⟩⟩ “The Truth About Piracy”

Shamus Young is a programmer, an author, and nearly a composer. He works on this site full time. If you'd like to support him, you can do so via Patreon or PayPal.

 Authorization ServersPrevious Post

Next PostGreenhouse 

145 comments

I’m Expressing My Discontent

By Shamus Posted Thursday May 29, 2008

Filed under: Movies 61 comments

 RSPODPrevious Post

Next PostAssassin's Creed is Very Hard to Quit! 

My face still hurts from the cruel touch of my dentist’s dread implements. Spore, Mass Effect, and RSPOD are all coming out encumbered by digital chicanery, and I will have no part in them. I’m miserable and angry at the world. My discontent has caused me to lash out and hurt those closest at hand. This process begins, dear reader, with you.

My desire to share my pain with the world is so strong that I will now afflict you with the following, an agonizing solicitation for a popular videogame. Behold, the Herald of Woe, the Murderer of Joy. The risible, eyeliner-wearing mockery of all that is Rock and Roll. I give you: The Guy Who Sings About Guitar Hero for the DS:

Play the video! Play it now, and know the meaning of tribulation!

Shamus Young is a programmer, an author, and nearly a composer. He works on this site full time. If you'd like to support him, you can do so via Patreon or PayPal.

 RSPODPrevious Post

Next PostAssassin's Creed is Very Hard to Quit! 

61 comments

OLDER POSTS



From The Archives: