OnLive/Survival Horror/Career in Game Design.

With the recent announcement at GDC of an upcoming service that will allow the user to stream AAA titles direct to their television using a simple and inexpensive box, we decided to get our teeth into the possibilities this could represent. Could it be the Cloud computing everybody’s been dreaming of or a patchy first attempt at something that may not work properly for a decade?

We finish off our weeks-long discussion of the impact of Resident Evil 5 with a talk about survival horror and how far it’s come, along with what could be done to bring RE back to it’s roots.

We’re very pleased to have on Ryan Astley (who was with us the whole show and throws his hat in the ring many a time), a listener with a background in game design. For the final part of the show, we talk to Ryan about his education and subsequent career in designing architecture and assets for various video games while working for a midlands-based company.

To see Ryan’s work go to http://www.ryan-astley.com/

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Written By: Alex Shaw

Iâve been writing furiously about Resident Evil 5 for over a week now, exorcising demons I was clinging to regarding the controls, inventory, acting and story but to prove Iâm not all bile and fury, itâs time for a bit of post-mortem praise. There were some excellent moments in playing through story mode which you forget while your bloodâs boiling over control issues. For those who havenât yet finished, Iâll steer clear of spoilers.

The depiction of an African village is extremely detailed. Thereâs some very compelling evidence pointing to casual, clumsy and thoughtless racism on Capcomâs part, which would make for another article altogether, but the fact remains that the sun-bleached township you begin at, with its oppressive shacks and buzzing flies, is very evocative. The scene is horrible and you wish you werenât there, but thatâs surely the point. Now while the labyrinth of locked rooms and puzzles that formed the backbone of the whole series is gone, whatâs in its place will make for great replay value. Being able to dive in and out of each level, with or without a friend, and hold onto a consistent stash of loot and weapons means you can explore every nook and cranny on multiple occasions. The mercenaries mode yet again adds the element of score-beating and rewards to emphasize the new arcadey nature of the core game. In addition, the cut scenes are undeniably pretty, with a lot of stuff flying about and some impressive fighting, and working for achievements was a welcome addition, which made me alter my playing style several times. Finally there is one very effective moment when you have to be very, very quiet that had my nerves shot to hell, harkening back to the tension of the Nemesis theme.

If the series is to progress and weâre going to get that reboot that Capcom are hinting at, I have some suggestions here which may interest them. Firstly; take it back to the mansion. Itâs where we go to in our heads when we think Resident Evil. Ditch S.T.A.R.S, Umbrella, Chris, Jill, Claire, Leon, Wesker and everything else. What they equated to thirteen years ago is not where story games need to be going. For a reboot, we need new characters, plot, settings etc; itâs in a mansion, there are zombies, puzzles and weapons. That should be all that remains of the original story. From then on, we need new ideas.

A more successful blend of action game and survival horror requires a nimble character you can rely on with a solid control system. No more movable turrets. This means running while aiming (at the expense of accuracy), and being able to dodge an attack (but not run rings around slow enemies.) Go back to slow zombies as the main grunts of the game. Introduce much faster, more intimidating enemies in thinner numbers (the Crimson Heads of the GameCube version, for example) further on. Since 28 Days Later weâve had the zombie upgrade of screaming, charging infected in popular culture, but theyâve never quite been done right in a survival horror game. They always move too slowly or stop to attack, or in the case of Left 4 Dead, attack en masse without the creeping weight of a Resident Evil encounter. They need to be savage, blood spewing maniacs who never stop moving.

Hereâs the formula; enclosed corridor + fast zombie + half-empty handgun and the exit in sight. Tension up the wazoo! Survival means scraping together everything you have. Bring us back to a place where every single bullet counts and careful organising of your inventory kept you alive. Allow us to keep a hand free and pick up something like a herb in an emergency, even if we have no slots empty (again at a loss of firing accuracy because youâre shooting one handed.) The gameplay should involve running between rooms, braving the prowling undead and giving us the binary choice of the original games; shoot now and this room might be safer, but youâll have less ammo, or run for it and the room stays lethal. The taking of responsibility for your environment and being permanently wary of what is around the next corner is something that needs bringing back. The spirit of these games is very much alive, but something has been lost along the way as action games evolved. To successfully instil us with horror, Capcom are going to have to make us fight to survive and that means holding on to your last bullets like youâre in Die Hard, and every slowly opening door will once again make us hold our breath.

Written By: Alex Shaw

I’m very proud to announce that I’ve begun writing articles for the website Platform Nation. Check them out here, they are a fine source of gaming news and reviews with an excellent forum section and plenty of podcasts including of course Edie Seller’s Gamehounds.

My first article for them is My Old Friend Nintendo.

I sit
gazing into my rapidly cooling coffee. It’s two in the afternoon on a sunny day
in a sleepy New York bistro. Nintendo, sitting across from me
laughs uproariously into his cell phone and says his goodbyes to the caller,
closing it and setting it beside his untouched cup.

"That was Time magazine,â he says.
âThey want to do an interview with me this week.â

âI know,â I say. âYou just agreed to
meet them Friday after lunch.â Nintendo nods and takes out his Blackberry,
tapping at the tiny keys and smiling.

âMmm,â he says.

âThat was the day we were going jet
skiing on Drake Lake,â I say pointedly. Nintendo stops
tapping and looks at me as if waking from a dream.

âCan we make that Saturday?â he asks
and starts to check his Blackberry. âNext Thursdayâsorry, the Tuesday after
that?â I look at Nintendo as he starts to pencil me in and my shoulders slump.

It was
never like this before. We met in 1985 when we were both very young. It was one
of those friendships that you find yourself holding up as the yardstick to
every relationship. He was fun back then, and honest. We"d play at exploring castles,
rescuing princesses, battling fire-breathing monsters and all the other things
kids find to do. We grew up together and our friendship only became stronger.
We played better, smarter games, went Kart racing and got into RPGs exploring
vast imaginary worlds. He learned new skills and I learned from him.

Then came
high school and college and we still kept in touch, even though we saw each other
less. I hooked up with an ex-girlfriend of his, who was a little more mature
then either of us, causing an undeniable rift – yet still every time we met it
was like we were kids again, but with encounters tempered by our newfound view
of the world. The imaginary lands never seemed more vivid and real.

Of course
people change. They grow up and move on to greener pastures with the
inevitability of little Jackie Paper. The last time I saw Nintendo he wasnât
doing too well. The imagination was there in his work, but he was having an
awful time of getting people to really pay attention to it. I was frankly
worried about him, but the distance between us was growing vast and noticeable.
We kept in touch; we both got jobs and moved in different directions. The way
it always goes.

Next thing
I know, itâs New Yearâs 2006 and heâs calling me up, blind drunk and very
happy. His business ventures in Japan, America and Europe are all paying off so well, he can
barely get the stock in to meet demand. Iâm so incredibly happy for my old
friend and tell him so, but for the first time it doesnât seem like heâs
listening to me. Then he calls me the wrong name. I mention it, and he mumbles
something and hangs up.

Itâs July
15^th 2008. Today. I havenât seen Nintendo for four years and heâs sitting across
from me in the bistro, with the world at his feet.

âI saw your work with the space
project,â I offer, âGreat stuff.â He looks up at me from his iPhone.

âThanks,â he beams. âWhat did you
think of the sports programmes?â

âAlso good,â I say diplomatically. I
donât want to bring any personal feelings of indifference into the
conversation. Iâm trying to be as positive as I can be, but itâs hard when heâs
received seven calls since weâve been sat here. I feel like the proverbial
third wheel.

âAnd what about that music project?
That looks like great fun doesnât it?â

Not wanting
to be painfully honest, I change the subject. âAre you planning any more
projects based on your old creations?â I ask hopefully. Nintendoâs brow creases.

âThatâs a lot of effort for
not much return,â he says absently, ordering us both another coffee. âThe last
one took three years to make and made substantially less profit than a cheap
little Carnival I set up in two days.

âBut it was such a great piece of
work,â I press on. âSurely thatâs what counts in the end; building something of
substance, something of merit. Something that will last and future generations
can appreciate.â He looks stumped and chews thoughtfully on a biscotti. Then
Time magazine calls and Iâm alone again for fifteen minutes.

âSo Iâll
put you down for jet skiing on Duck Lake on Tuesday the twenty-ninth, OK?â
Nintendo repeats.

âDrake Lake,â I say quietly and nod.

âSwell,â he says, rising from the
table, throwing down a handful of bills. âListen, I have to run, Iâve got to be
on the Tonight Show, and they start recording in three hours.â

âIâll see you later,â I say, locking
eyes with him. He smiles, but his eyes are on his Blackberry again.

And you
know what? In a few years time, when the standard of his work is at an all time
low, his new friends have all deserted him and heâs no longer the man of the
hour, he may come to me, deflated and contemplative, with plans and ideas that
more closely resemble the heights he reached as an imaginative child with a
world of potential. On that day, when I could crow and sneer at his downfall, I
will instead sit back and look at his new ideas and encourage him in doing what
he always did best; creating worlds that were bright and fun and innovative, and
of undeniable substance and quality.

I tell
myself this as I watch him go. Who knows what will happen to him, but if my
battered heart knows anything itâs that heâll always land on his feet, and Iâll
always be there for him.

Edie Sellers Guest Stars.

In this episode, one of the best we’ve ever recorded, we are very proud to have with us one Edie Sellers, sometime professional radio host for KGO-AM Radio in the bay area of San Francisco, but more importantly host of the Gamehounds podcast.

We’re going to be taking a five minute spot on the Gamehounds weekly update or "Humpdate" starting next week, so we figured it would be a great way for our audience to meet her and vice versa.

Long known for her fierce liberal opinions and extremely well-read knowledge of video games Edie is just about the best guest a podcaster could ever ask for, so we took the opportunity and mercilessly grilled her on her views on everything from the shady dealings of Gamestop to the frivolous decisions of Nintendo.

Also discussed is Resident Evil 5 and the culmination of Alex’s week of furiously writing articles on it. Thankfully Tony is there too to lend a bolted down viewpoint.

Edie records Gamehounds every Saturday with longtime friend Cooper Hawkes. You can find it here. Check it out, it’s hugely entertaining and informative, and now the mid-week update has US on it, so there’s no excuses.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Part 5 of the Resident Evil Musings.

Does this sound familiar?

1. "Boom – Resident Evil!"
2. Hey you’re a white, average cop in their twenties. Your name is Chris/Jill/Leon/Claire.
3. Welcome to the scary mansion/police station/Raccoon City/Eastern European/African village.
4. Things are looking a little scary, thank God you have your pistol.
5. Aaagh… Zombies/Infected folks of mixed ethnicity!
6. Solve this puzzle.
7. Oops, the pistol’s a bit rubbish, here’s a shotgun.
8. Aaagh… monsters that are faster and more dangerous than zombies!
9. Here’s a bit with a train/tram/boat.
10. Hey you’ve reached the laboratory, now get to the bottom of this mystery.
    
11. Damn, it was Wesker what done it!
12. Aaagh… a Tyrant! Better use this rocket launcher.
13. All done. Fly away on the helicopter and stare at your partner with your dead, personality-free eyes.

It’s really as by the numbers as that, and this is coming from someone who loves the Resident Evil series. My biggest problem with 5 is that it does nothing with the formula. The acting is just as bad, the plot twists just as trite, but there isn’t anything new or sparky about it. Resident Evil 2 had branching story lines for the two leads, 3 had the ever-stalking presence of the Nemesis, Veronica had a scrolling action that did away with static screens, and 4 had the new controls and perspective. Aside from pretty graphics, Capcom have come up with nothing new for the series in five years… with the exception of an incompetent sidekick who gets herself in trouble or killed more often than a Doctor Who assistant.

Yes, it would appear co-op was what they were dangling their hopes on for this game, but if you don’t have a friend with you – if, say, your best mate is still waiting for his copy to come through the post, days after yours arrived – you have to make do with the AI to help you out as Sheva. But she doesn’t. Sheva wastes your good ammo and herbs, creates frustrating weapon trading scenarios and gets herself cornered and squished by axe-wielding brutes when you’re being relentlessly attacked. The brutal combination of non-pausing item control and belligerent, suicidal AI makes your single-player experience hollow and annoying, leaving you only able to see the similarities and lack of improvement on previous games.

Think of the advancements we’ve seen just in video games over the past five years since the last RE game. We’ve
had two Gears of War games, which picked up and ran with the third
person action perspective redefining it in the process; Silent Hill Homecoming, which by all
accounts has improved the control scheme of the original game and made
it easier to move and dodge, in a survival horror long known for its
steadfast adherence to slow, awkward progression. We’ve had Left 4 Dead
with its multiplayer orgy of never-ending fast-zombie onslaught,
twitch-fast controls and genuinely nerve-wracking pace. And we’ve had
games like Uncharted and The Darkness which worked on a tried and
tested movie formula and made the delivery fresh and interesting.

In truth RE5 is not a bad game experience. In relation to 50 Cent: BOTS
it’s a breath of air that, while not fresh, is at least breathable. But
another average outing in Umbrella-Town is not what I wanted. I want to
see this series that I cherish advance on the level that Metal Gear did
when it jumped from MSX to PSX. Maybe it needs a hiatus before a grand reboot,
but if Capcom do the same thing again for 6 then there’s going to be
words.

Screw Chris, Jill, Leon and Claire. They are mindless, character-free automatons which have no place in contemporary games. The day of the Mary-Sue superman whose abs ripple in the sunlight and
whose catlike reflexes are remarked upon and admired by all has long
since departed. We need flawed, fascinating, dangerous or vulnerable individuals, surrounded by a cast of similarly original creations. Capcom need to employ some western writers of high quality like J Michael Straczynski or Mark Millar if they wish to continue the form of homage to American movies, because their staff scripters and plotters are doing a horrible job.

And finally the controls simply aren’t good enough any more. If Capcom want an action game they need action controls. This means running while shooting, an intuitive item system you really can operate on the fly, canceling of animations if you need to move fast, and the ability to beat the crap out of your enemies without fulfilling certain criteria first. It’s what we’d all do in a survival situation and it’s time RE reflected this.

The rating I give RE5 is based on the game itself, but taking into account what it should have been. Tony maintains that experiences of Resident Evil 5 may vary.

Final Score: 6/10

Written By: Alex Shaw

Strangely enough for a game that’s got everybody so nitpicky and middling in their scores the one place that Killzone 2 excels is in it’s weaponry, specifically the sniper rifle. I maintain that this is the best SR since GoldenEye showed us how to do it, and it’s for such a simple reason; control.

As warped and twisted as our hands become trying to grasp the slippery eel of the PS3 Dual Shock, and as much as our confused fingers end up resembling a plate of fat spaghetti, as we search for purchase on the triggers, once you’re looking down the sights of this bad boy it all becomes clear. We can let go of the nubby thumbsticks with their supporating pustule rubber buttons on top and just lightly tilt the pad left, right, up and down and as long as you are pointed in the general direction of a Helghan warrior you can ease the sights dead centre between his glowing red eyes and squeeze off a round or two to encourage his propaganda-addled brain to launch through the back of his Kojak slap-head.

It’s delightful, and if only it didn’t require you to wrestle your avatar into cover to initiate, it might be the perfect weapon. We need more PS3 developers making subtle use of the tilty control. Not in a way that’s crucial to the game, but in little ways that make you smile in the knowledge that you’re not going to find that feature anywhere else.

We all have a pile of shame. It’s the stack of games we’ve bought and
are sitting on, but have yet to finish, or in some cases; play. Here in
order of priority is mine. PLUS the specifics of when they will be
considered beaten.

1. The Darkness (Finish on Normal)
2. Silent Hill: Homecoming (Finish one ending)
3. F.E.A.R 2 (Finish on Normal)
4. Chrono Trigger (Finish)
5. Dead Space (Finish)
6. Bionic Commando (Have to kill Hitler)
7. Burnout Revenge (Have to unlock a truly awesome car)
8. Shadow of the Colossus (Play once in my life)

Games I’ve Finished

Peggle
Resident Evil 5
Street Fighter IV
50 Cent: Blood on the Sand
Killzone 2
Super Street Fighter II Turbo HD Remix
Flower
Sega Mega Drive Collection
Streets of Rage 2
Left 4 Dead
Scene It?: Box Office Smash
Castlevania: Symphony of the Night
Gears of War 2
Fallout 3
Rock Band: AC/DC Live

Written By: Alex Shaw

While playing his latest game, in which this dangerous little animal goes to Iraq and massacres every person he meets, I began to despair for all human culture. It’s not that the developers of the game, Swordfish, were just uninspired in placing this rapper du-jour at the heart of a hot-button Middle-Eastern territory and then throwing seven hundred screaming Arabs at him, each with an AK-47, a bandana and a neat line in the most appallingly cliched dialogue, it isn’t even the fact that the game is broken on a fundamental level that only playing on hard mode would uncover, it’s not even that I hate this project, its subject and the way it’s been comported on a base level. No, the reason this makes me crazier than a bastard on Father’s Day is that this game is going to sell bucketloads.

Mainstream journos, when handed this game, will judge it based on the built-in audience of Fiddy fans. This means they won’t look upon it as a real game, but another installment dropped atop his merchandise mountain. Thus it will get away with its multitude of sins. Dedicated gaming press have seen it as a guilty pleasure and a fun arcade romp. I felt no guilt and not the least bit of pleasure playing this, merely a cold deadness where joy once resided and a deep, unremitting fury that this man earns more per year than some of the countries he would gladly visit to perform his bling-fueled genocide. Of course it’s 50 Cent, not Curtis James Jackson III, who’s the neanderthal-browed mass murderer in this game; a sub-human killing machine whose only goal is to get back a skull covered with diamonds. Unfortunately this is apparently the same character he plays every time he sets foot onstage or does an interview for MTV. Unless it’s not, unless it’s him and all this playing characters bullshit is a hangover from childhood games that allows these arrogant, angry halfwits to do and say anything they like as long as there’s some comforting fiction to hide behind.

It’s morally repugnant, needlessly violent, sleazy, mysogynistic and utterly trite… I respect that, but it’s also horribly written and riddled with glitches to the point where it doesn’t feel like a game any more than Paris Hilton’s Stars Are Blind single resembled real music. It’s just a cheap, vanity project for a man with the emotional development of a nine year old. Worst of all, the game’s been applauded for not being quite as bad as the execrable Bulletproof, released on the previous generation of consoles. That it’s not entirely unplayable is not a plaudit and should not enter into the debate on the quality of this game, which is lower than Fiddy’s IQ, thinner than his library and more untraceable than the sum totality of worthwhile actions this man has done with his career.

P.S. Graphics and sound were adequate.

Final Score: 2/10


 

Written by: Alex Shaw

Part 4 of the Resident Evil musings.

Here’s something that’s been driving me batshit crazy lately. The greatest detractor from the reality of any given action game is that we are obliged to see all the animations. In Resident Evil 5 if an enemy is pulling back a spear to plunge it into your chest you can blast him in the face with a shotgun shell and the game will often, but not always do something like this.

Hmmm…

That should really have killed this mob here.

Still, I’ve started so I’ll finish.

Better luck next time pal.

And lo and behold, your shotgun is ineffective, while his pointy stick wins through and robs you of a third of your energy. If you sidestep, he pivots on the spot like one of those teacups at Disney World and homes the point in on you with laser-guided precision. In other words, if you’re in range, that stick’s hitting you no matter what.

The level of response to a good 40% of your shots in RE5 is nonexistent. You can plug an axe-wielding behemoth in the kneecaps, head, wherever; the game is not registering bullets hitting bone, it’s keeping count of the mobs internal damage bar. You have to shoot him precisely ten times in the head with your shotgun to take him down. Do it nine times and that guy WILL survive long enough to splatter you with his axe. On the tenth hit, he will crumble to the ground as his bar runs out, but his head will not explode. You didn’t shoot him really, you just rolled the dice enough times to lower his HP to zero. Other mobs are slightly different. In the classic RE4 manner, you can kneecap them and keen headshots are rewarded, but in later levels, they are tougher and eventually every enemy will have this internal stamina bar and nothing but the predetermined shot count will take them down. Passing this off as an action game is a fallacy. It’s an action RPG, with all the reactions of World of Warcraft’s expressionless enemies programmed in.

Worst of all, is Chris’ unending ability to not get out of the way when he needs to be quick on his feet. Not only can’t you run and shoot,or run and reload, but you can’t cancel a reload on the fly. 2001′s Halo saw Master Chief able to melee in the middle of a reload if caught unawares or suddenly ambushed, and yes he could reload while running. The lumbering dolt Redfield, stops moving with all the grace of his dribbling rabid foes and starts his three second reload cycle. Any damage he receives while this is happening is an unavoidable penalty, because that gun is going to get reloaded, same as the pointy stick was always going to hit you. In Capcoms own Street Fighter 4, it’s possible to cancel special moves
in order to fake out your opponent. Are Capcom serious in their
assertion that standing there like a nob and fiddling with your weapon
heightens the tension rather than just frustrating? The only horror you end up feeling is of your character’s inability to perform the actions you need to survive.

Fortunately to counter this it’s possible to limp through the game on a shred of energy if you keep Sheva close because she will tap you out Dom style every time you hit critical status. Of course if she’s in trouble you both die. Do it all again, try harder next time. Now they have pointy sticks and wooden headmasks, which are impervious to magnum shells. They must be made of the same titanium wicker as the impenetrable doors.