Written By: Count Stex

After a good 35 years of life, and 25 years of gaming or there abouts, I still find plenty of time to spend with my games. Of course not having any children helps here, and as you know by now a girlfriend who games as much as I do. It has come to my attention however that I have become quite regimented in my game play make up. But I’m not here to tell you how I am going to mix this up, or ask for ideas of how to change it. Quite the opposite in fact. I thought it might be interesting to ask how everyone else plots out their gaming weeks, and how it works for them.

So I should start with the way things are working, and have been working for me, for some time now. Whenever possible I game 7 days a week, even if some nights it’s just the odd hour, or  even just watching Linda play something. To my mind this is still gaming as whoever isn’t actively playing it always on look out for on screen cues the focused player might miss or overlook in the heat of play. However the part that I’m interested in here are the styles of play I partake in of a week night, as opposed to weekend play.

You see I’ve noticed my week nights, when time is more limited, and for that matter brain power is lower from a day sat idly at a desk, the focus is on the familiar. So there is likely to be some Gears 2 horde mode with friends, or left to my own devices of late a few [hundred] attempts at a new TRIALS HD record or achievement. These styles of play at very much in the drop in, drop out vein. Things that can be played for very short periods if required, or extended to longer sessions. This works great given the limited time available and interruptions for little annoyances such as having to eat.

Come the weekend however and this is when the more expansive gaming can take place. So I’m more likely to be marthoning through a single player experience, or continuing along on a multi-deca-hour RPG, games where retention of information plays a key part in the gaming world. The weekend is also when most new games will be properly tested out, having been started in a feverish rush upon receiving them in the post, or clutching them all the way from the local store.

So my question to you is this, am I unusual in this segregation of my play styles? It’s quite possibly not something you’ve really thought about, but when you look back at the past week or so can you see any patterns emerging?

Let me know your thoughts…

Steven Jones

We’ve set up an interview with OCP at PAX for next week. These folks have made it their duty to bring fictional products to life for consumption by geeks and nerds like us throughout America. If you’ve seen the movie Idiocracy in which Mike Judge (Beavis & Butt-Head) foretells a horrific future where idiots have taken over the Earth, you’ll remember that they like to water their crops with a Gatorade-like drink named Brawndo. It was the stuff of dreams until OCP made it real. Fans of Anchorman (Dodgeball is better) will remember his cologne: Sex Panther. OCP make that too. Most recently they started making the synthetic drinkable blood from True Blood out of tasty blood oranges.

So we’re going to ask them about some products we’d like to see them make. Most likely they’ve thought of them already and there will be reasons (licensing, sanity) why they haven’t been produced yet, but we want to gauge their reactions and hey, some of them they might not have thought of. We need your help dear readers to give us a sizable list. I’d suggest something you can eat, drink or spray on yourself as that seems to be their MO right now.

I’d like to see them do that baby-food stuff Robocop eats (they take their name Omni-Consumer Products from that movie incidentally) I’m sure my daughter would love it. Duff Beer obviously. Pawtucket Ale from Family Guy. Butterbeer from Harry Potter almost seems likely. But most of all, I want to taste Slurm from Futurama.

I’ve been confined to the couch for nearly a week now with an inner ear infection. Basically whenever I straighten up or stand I get dizzy and nauseous. As I’ve recovered I played games from my old pile of shame and managed to complete Half Life 2, Bionic Commando Rearmed and Shadow Complex. However it made me look at what a pile of shame represents. To date it has been a collection of games I have started but not completed. Some people may also have games they have purchased but not played, but I’m not dealing with that today. No, I’m looking at the wording. Why are we ashamed to have these games on a backlog? Surely if they were that good in the first place we would have found ourselves captivated, unable to put them down. Shadow Complex was like that for me, and Trials HD has similarly gripped Tony. Isn’t it a failing on their part? Should not the makers of these games themselves feel ashamed?

The last game on my list to get finished before PAX was InFamous, which I have on rental. I’ll come clean here. I hate InFamous. Sorry Elaine. I hate every polygon. I think it’s sloppily handled, ridiculously plotted with dislikable characters and joyless combat with faceless, witless enemies. But everybody who has played it kept telling me it got better so I stuck with it. I’m halfway through and I just played yet another miserable hour killing more scarecrow mobs and dodging water like I’m in GTA III, getting my marching orders from my turd of a best friend, my sharp-tongued shrew of a love-interest and some pushy fed I’ve never met. I’ve had it with InFamous and it’s off my pile of shame and into a new pile. The pile of absolution.

This is for every game I have assessed and played properly but was neither challenged by nor enjoyed. This is a way of saving myself countless hours of fruitless gaming with something I’ve become obliged to finish just because I started and was obliged to start just because everyone told me I had to. UFC just made this new grade too. Sorry MMA fans. I just don’t get it. As Jagger said; I’m a Street Fighting man. If he adopts my new pile idea, Tony may very well feel relieved to let go of The Chronicles of Riddick, a game he’s tried hard to get through in both it’s original Xbox and 360 incarnations, and even though Heavy Rain makes me tremble in anticipation, Fahrenheit (Indigo Prophecy) better buck up its ideas and get gripping next time I play or it goes the same way (My wife has just informed me she will carry on with this one even if I bitch out). This may seem heavy handed, but think of it like this; I have finite hours and nearly infinite games. I want to keep up to date with the most significant titles and indie oddities, but not at the expense of enjoyment and that sense of connection you get with a really satisfying game. I’m sure all of us have at least one title in our pile of shame that we keep being told to play but are afraid to admit we don’t get on with. My advice is just set it down.

I’m not going to let my titles hang over my head any more. I need clear skies this holiday season because we’re about to get barraged with games, starting with Arkham Asylum this Friday. The one significant setback to this is that I have Shadow of the Colossus sitting in my PS2 where it’s been for months on end. I’m two Colossi in and pretty certain I know how the game is going to pan out. Is abandoning this game the act of a philistine who is depriving himself of one of the greatest works of gaming history or a realist unable to contend with wired pads, murky SD graphics and plodding Japanese adventures any more? The fact that everyone’s answer to this will be different is what leads us to cling to these games in the first place.

The last of the XBLA Summer of games series could well be the best. The hero; Jason is an ordinary guy (trained by his secret service father but that’s beside the point isn’t it?) who, when backpacking with his girlfriend Claire stumbles upon a giant, labyrinthine underground base of a small, covert military force. After the two minutes of plot it’s down to hurling yourself from room to room, creeping through vents and murdering hundreds of soldiers, all the while uncovering an increasingly ludicrous plot, set against the backdrop of a world created by Sci-Fi penman Orson-Scott Card in his book; Empire.

Epic Games and Chair’s Shadow Complex takes the form of a 2.5D side-scrolling platform shooter. The reason for this update in perspective becomes immediately apparent. It’s powered by the Unreal Engine 3 in all it’s shiny beefiness and the addition of angles to this well-worn genre gives a genuine feeling of depth. It feels like a simplified 3D game and if you relax your eyes you can see the curves that have been added to what would otherwise be straightforward, but the final effect lends itself to run-and-gun gameplay in a very accomplished manner.

Ammo is infinite, you only have to manage out your reload times and conserve grenades, so it’s not simply a Contra style bullet-hell. In fact while scrabbling inside air vents you feel more like John McClane (albeit with a Nathan Drake voice and appearance provided by the now-legendary Nolan North). Playing through may remind you of games you’ve played in the past. The obvious Super Metroid and Castlevania SOTN are also (for me at least) accompanied by last year’s Bionic Commando Re-Armed (R.I.P Grin) Out of This World (or Another World), Flashback, Alien 3, Rolling Thunder 2, and finally Prince of Persia. In fact, with a little more emphasis on stealth (which is entirely possible with silent melee kills) this might even feel like the missing 16-Bit incarnation of Metal Gear we never got to experience, what with its walking tanks, expandable armory, laser sights, faceless guards, hiding in the walls and floor and ridiculous plotline. Just to throw one final name into the mix, if this had been the G.I. Joe game instead of the rushed excuse we got this month, then old school Joe fans like myself would have been justifiably thrilled. Just give Jason a Katana for the melee kills and you’ve got everyone’s favorite Arashikage ninja.

I’ve seen controls being brought up as a low point and must confess I’m baffled by this. It takes some getting used to, and aiming is important before you start blasting, but I genuinely felt comfortable with the way Jason handles. Equipped to take on the legions of gun-toting guards with precision and a huge bag of tricks. Flinging a grenade into a party of three chatting guards and watching their bemused reactions before it blows and you charge past has become instinctual, yet never gets old.

The best has been saved for last. The secrets and the competition. The Shadow Complex is vast and many many rooms and hidden items can be passed by if you rush about. The map tells you both where you should be heading (by means of a Dead Space style blue line) and which rooms still have remaining hidden items, as well as which ones you’ve already bagged and which rooms have additional exits you haven’t tried yet. The beauty of this being that a lot of these are inaccessible from the off and can only be acquired on returning with a new skill. This makes backtracking an optional item hunt and a very welcome series of game-lengthening side quests. The competition with friends is so simple that most XBLA titles would do well to adopt its style. Like Geometry Wars and indeed the recently released Trials it has internal score comparisons. Whenever you do something interesting like a stealth kill, a red bar pops up to give your running tally and also casually mention that one of your friends happens to have two more than you. I’m currently engaged in a Legolas/Gimli style contest with Lefty Brown of The Married Gamers podcast for who can silently massacre the most hapless (Cobra) Soldiers.

I may be biased because I grew up on this sort of immersing shooter in the 16 Bit era and it feels familiar and pleasant, like spending a weekend with an old school friend you haven’t seen in years and who in the meantime has become even more fun to be around, but I also genuinely believe that the folks who weren’t present for that era will get a lot out of this too. It’s the best 1200 points I’ve spent this year, and I can tell I’m going to be replaying this in the coming weeks. There is also likely to be more of this story as Card’s book Empire serves as the backdrop for more upcoming games. Let’s hope they all reflect this quality.

Rating 10/10

I’ve just encountered the Think B4 You Speak campaign after having it flagged by Penny arcade and I have found myself torn in two.

The basic gist, if you’ve not heard of this is that it’s an effort to stop people using the term “Gay” in a derogatory sense, as in “That movie is so gay!“, in this case meaning “crappy“.

The ads are actually kind of patronizing and heavy-handed. “It’s like saying ‘That is so gamer with more video games than friends’.” And yes, that’s a neat and hurtful equivalent that any young and naive ‘gamer‘ can grasp. But the message is delivered with such a rap on the knuckles that I almost feel sorry for the teenagers on the other end of my 360 headset spouting casual bigotry. By its very nature the term in this context is not meant to hurt or offend, but is simply a foolish, trendy phrase that’s found its way into the lexicon on the back of South Park and a couple of other shows. The way in which it’s being countered however is a calculated exercise in singling individuals out, by people who should know better.

So like I say. I’m torn between complete agreement that offhand offensive terms inadvertently insulting minorities should be ironed out of our culture and standing up for the rights of dumb kids everywhere to be offensive little gobshites.

It brings me to mind of the comedy routine of my favorite dead comedian Bill Hicks, talking about the pedestrian right-of-way law instituted around the time of the L.A. riots (anybody stepping into the road must be allowed to cross the street by oncoming traffic)

“Yes, cos only in America does common courtesy have to be legislated.”

If you’re like me, then you’ll have had at least a few nights when you just couldn’t put a game down. When the cold, grey fingers of dawn crept through the un-curtained window and you found yourself waking from a daze, running endlessly into a wall and surrounded by empty crisp-packets or worse, full plates of stone-cold food left there by some well-meaning relative.

World of Warcraft, take a bow, you have made fools of us all.

But some games you manage to knock on the head an hour or two past the time you planned to go to bed, and finding yourself under the sheets you suddenly realise what a terrible mistake you’ve made. Because, you see, you may have finished with the game, but the game isn’t finished with you.

I’ve found myself lying in bed and looking up at imaginary buildings, searching for snipers after a COD session, racing headlong into a concrete wall and physically convulsing in surprise after Burnout and eventually actually shoving my wife after a particularly nerve-shredding Dead Space campaign. The obvious worst games are the ones that keep you on a razor’s edge of tension, requiring lightning reactions to survive. That mindset is hard to shake and the brain usually won’t let go. It would be easy to say just don’t play these games before bed, but that’s a tall order if you’ve been playing all evening on the newest installment.

However I have a solution. Rather than not playing the games with the crazy jumping moments, play them until nearly time to sleep and then switch them out for something of a completely different pace. I’ve found Monkey Island Special Edition to be a fantastic sleep aid. because there’s no need for timing, no ability to die and no fatal mistakes (aside from that ONE bit, which could trip up a sleepy gamer). After twenty minutes play I’m nodding off as my brain calms down and becomes more attuned to dreaming. It may eat a little into your sleep time, but it beats a night of feeling like you’re playing the game scenarios over and over without ever actually achieving anything. Flower would also be a good one, or maybe singing some of the quieter, slower numbers on Rock Band.

Finally, there is actually a lot to be said for just foregoing sleep in favour of gaming every so often. You may feel like hammered shit in the morning, but I acutely remember the time I got home from work, played Final Fantasy VII until dawn, ate breakfast and then went back out to work. I got a lot done that evening and even though I was one of the walking dead that day, at least I could say I got a badass Gold Chocobo and Knights of the Round out of it and utterly destroyed the Ruby Weapon.

Written By Steven Jones (Count Stex)

One of the things which changed most when I moved in with my girlfriend, some eleven years ago now, was the shift from gaming being a largely solitary experience with occasional online forays and becoming a far more social and shared one. And it was in this area that console gaming had a definite advantage with it’s multi-port controllers and split screen action, something which PC gaming rarely, even to this day, offers. It’s that ‘same room’ gameplay that consoles always provided, and which the Wii has taken to heart both widening it’s audience and alienating some of it’s long term supporters in a single move.

When we started out however, it was the days of the Nintendo 64, and we took to our partnered gaming which each title that came along. Even solo play experiences such as Zelda could be shared by a gaming couple, as one took the controls the other would play as ‘spotter’ looking for things which one could easily miss as focus was drawn to particular events that required concentration by the active player. And of course there was the competitive game play of titles such as 1080 Snowboarding, a game we spent a lot of time playing as a couple, helped by it’s simple gameplay and mixed avatars as we always tend to stick to our own sex in games, role-play more than role-reversal.

However this competitive gameplay is not always the best mix for a gaming couple. Sure when you are playing your friends or siblings, getting one up on them can be great fun, and the trash talking can keep you entertained for hours. Things are a little different when, rather than friends leaving or siblings returning to their own room, you end up sleeping in the same bed as the person you where just headshoting. That’s not to say our gaming has ever caused us any problems, but the victory is never particularly sweet. The whole point of a relationship is to share and to support each other, and competitive gameplay against each other is alien in that atmosphere. Of course competitiveness can still be made great use of in group situations, where you can form girls vs boys setups and bring the oldest battle of all into the gaming arena, but that’s the safety in numbers where any animosity is dispersed with the laughter of a good group of friends.

So as a couple, cooperative gameplay is generally the best solution, and thankfully in recent years this has taken off far more than ever before perhaps as a response to the first generations of life longer gamers growing up and wanting a richer experience than just always trying to kill each other. That said, just sticking a second character on the screen and doubling the enemies isn’t always the best of solutions. Sure such ideas allow you to play with a friend and do enrich the general gameplay even if done without all that much care, however the are several factors which can raise a game from just supporting a co-op experience to really excelling at it.

On of the games series that have really stood out in this area are the Lego games. The series that started out with two titles based on the Star Wars franchise, and then progressed through Indiana Jones and Batman and is now looking to plunge into the Harry Potter books. Now these games are generally regarded as very well made and rated quite highly but always with the caveat that they are ‘childrens’ games with relatively simplistic gameplay and puzzle solving, and rather dismissed by the more core gamer, or at best only played with their own kids. However I think where these reviews and opinions go wrong is in trying to play these games solo. And to be fair I wouldn’t ever think of playing these on my own. I can imagine doing so, as an adult, to be a rather shallow affair, however as a couple they really do open out into a much greater world of fun and laughter that I can’t say we’ve truly had from any other franchise. If proof be needed of the effect these games have had on us it would be in our history with the titles. You see we first picked up the first Star Wars game on the PS2, and quickly followed that up with the Original trilogy game as soon as it was released. It was around this time that the Wii came along and saw the PS2 relegated to ‘disconnected’ status, however not wishing to loose out we picked up the Complete Saga collection of the Lego games for the Wii and played through the whole six episodes once more, having originally completed both PS2 games to 100%. Then as Indy and Batman where released we made sure to grab them on first sight and play through them too, out progress with Indy only slowed by wanting to intersperse the gameplay with watching the movies to ensure we would pick up on the plethora of in jokes that these games always include, both relating to the franchise being depicted and Lego itself. And truth be told, we’ve considered rebuying/borrowing them again on XBOX to grab some gamer points, knowing that we would have a great time doing so. That said the Wii really feels like the right home for Lego games, even though you play them all without using motion control really.. unless you have a Lightsaber.

So what is it that these Lego games bring to the table that few other games manage that makes them so very couple friendly? Well moving swiftly past the fact they are co-op games the first thing to consider is their no-fail system. In some ways that is an odd statement, many games would be very much lessened by anything of the sort, but Lego games are not about kick ass enemies and challenging kill boxes, they are about the adventure, or perhaps more accurately they are about the tale given the developer themselves, Travelers Tales! Actually the very fact that ‘dying’ in these games carries such a low price increases the fun that can be had just trying things out without the fear that doing something stupid will cost you the level or harm your general progress. Many is the time we’ve had ourselves in stitches laughing at each other as we completely fail to accurately complete a platforming section, or confuse which character you are and wonder why your partner is permanently running off a cliff edge only to realise it’s actually you. Secondly there is the drop-in drop-out aspect. It sounds like something which turns a game into a horrible mess of casualness. But this is the good casualness, not the sort that skimps on gameplay, but the sort that allows the gameplay to keep on rolling. What this allows is for some all-day gaming where having to get on with the real world events that inhabit your daily life as an adult don’t bring things to a crashing stand still. You can go put the laundry on, answer the phone, take toilet breaks, whilst the whole time one or the other continues with the game, with the AI taking over and helping you along. Maybe that sounds a bit sad, and the sort of story the tabloids would have a field day with, but it’s something that suits the life of a gaming couple. After all, gaming isn’t something we fit into our lives, it’s something around which our lives are based. Sure maybe not the only thing but certainty one of our cornerstones. The final aspect, and one that would be impossible for any other game to replicate, is that this is Lego for crying out loud! We grew up with the stuff, we know exactly how it works and these games play on that to great effect. We know you can’t kill Lego, anything that falls apart can always be put back together, it overcomes any negative feelings to destroying everything and and everyone and turns it into a playground that could be enjoyed by anyone from any age group.

I think there is plenty in the Lego titles that creators of games that would be considered more ‘core’ could learn from to make their games firstly more accessible, but mainly just more fun! Of course that doesn’t mean I want a whole load of Lego clones, but that more thought needs to go into cooperative games play than just allowing two people to have what is basically a solo player game, just you happen to be stood next to someone having the same solo game. Little touches can go a long way, even simple game mechanics like the buddy revival of Gears of War that encourage you to interact with each other can go a long way and in general things are definitely moving in the right direction. But this is something developers are going to have to become more and more aware of as gaming reaches out to a more mixed audience and becomes far more a part of accepted everyday life.

On my show recently, talking to Mr Maynard of Gamehounds and The Unknown Gamers of Saint Louis we started discussing the demise of the arcade and how it might be brought back. The prospect of a gamers pub was broached and a kernel of an idea began to hatch in my head. The response to that part of the show has been pretty positive.

SeijinAxeman: Arcade / Pub!! Awesome idea!! Except there should be an entrance fee and the games are free. And instead of just arcade machines there can be rows of PS3’s and Xbox 360’s for local LAN play. Call it Pubcade or something.

Daryl Sellick: The idea of the pub and the arcade is brilliant and it should make the games more competitve as people drink more

Steven Jones: Am I the only one thinking competitive game play, alcohol and people who don’t know each other all happing in the same place being a bad idea?

Bowlby: There is a perfect point while drinking where your mind and body become synched to the game. Unfortunately, everything after that is downhill from there.

Now these are all fine points and I’ve looked into some local places in my area that tried something like this and failed miserably. I’d really like to look at why, because frankly if there was a place like this nearby, I’d honestly go out more. Here are some of the obvious pitfalls of putting together a business like this.

Firstly a huge demographic of gamers are kids. Kids have very little money of their own (that they will part with for something they could essentially get for free) so if you kept a place like this open all day and charged for entry, they might pay a small fee and stay all day asking for free glasses of water every now and then. Net profit to you; zero. You also can’t serve alcohol in an establishment that mainly attracts kids. Well Pizza Hut manages it, but you’re asking for trouble from the parents.

What most of these places offer is an extension of a LAN party; an organized gathering of like-minded gamers who play communally and buy drinks from the bar. Most of us can get that for free at home, just on a smaller scale, so you have to really push the community aspect of it, which takes a lot of setup and is probably why most establishments go under. If folks get too drunk they behave like asses and will likely not respect the peripherals, consoles or other players. Also if you want to make steady money you have to cater to a wide audience, including people who may only play games communally a few times a year at a friends house and might not respect the unspoken rules of the regular patrons. They will come in for the novelty and probably won’t have the best time.

Now here’s my idea. Not a pub, but a club; in the truest sense of the word. You sign up in advance, provide ID and get membership. Your details are stored on an internal system and you get an Xbox Live style player ID, contained on a membership card you wear on a lanyard when in the club. This automatically should make you more responsible because you’ve invested something already.

You pay a nominal fee for yearly membership and let’s say $6 at the door every night you go. Drinks are the usual bar prices, which should generate decent revenue from tap-beer and post-mix soft drinks. You may or may not know this but those large sodas you get at the movies and pay far out the ass for cost the theatre pennies for a dash of syrup and carbonated water. There’s also bar food and lots of hand-wipes so the pads don’t get all grungy.

The décor is similar to a large living room, couches everywhere, many TV’s (second-hand LCD screens are dirt cheap these days) 360’s, Wii’s and PS3’s are one console per TV. Classic, multiple-game arcade machines (including a Neo Geo) line the walls. There’s also a small stage with a Rock Band kit and it’s own TV. I’m thinking 100 folks max to keep the atmosphere fun but not chaotic. There’s house music until the Rock Band, Guitar Hero or Singstar starts and then entertainment is provided by anyone who wants to take the stage. There’s also a retro corner with many classic machines and old CRT TV’s. No handhelds would be provided unless someone can tell me a good way to ensure they don’t get pinched, but every member would be encouraged to being their own for any waiting periods or link-up games. There will be some rules and a code of conduct so that everybody respects other players, waits their turn and signs up for the karaoke sessions.

Here are the two things that might make this different from other places that didn’t do so well.

1. Persistent gamer profile. Every time you win a game, it gets logged on our servers, along with your high scores. In the same way that we become points-whores for Microsoft or trophy-trolls for Sony I’m hoping the folks who hang out at my club regularly would want to keep working on their profile and comparing it with their friends, who as opposed to XBL would be right there to be bought pints of beer.
2. Drinking while gaming, just as Bowlby said, will get you to the point of absolute nirvana, when your skills are the most fly and you are indeed having the best time. After that, yes, you might become an animal and start smashing shit up, falling down and puking, which is why we’d encourage folks to find that point and stay there as long as possible with soft drinks and food, rather than go over the line. Hence the name of the establishment, and I’m proud of this one; “Ape-X”

I’d like some feedback from you readers. If you’ve been to a place like this that actually works, tell me how. If you have any suggestions, let me know below. Clearly this is a hypothetical and obviously I have no idea how to actually run a club, but I’d like to take a look at the logistics of this, because frankly I miss the arcades and while there may not be a place for them any more (in England for sure), by God I’d go to this place in a shot.

I did discuss this with Commander Tim and Ghost World in the Gamehounds Humpdate dated 7/29/09 which you should all listen to, and according to Tim, who has witnessed many places like this fall apart in the past it’s just really hard to make money from these places. Having said that, there are some that work in the USA including Dave and Busters. Any suggestions on how to make it work in the UK would still be welcome.

This is all a matter of perspective but Harmonix and MTV games have (to me) slipped and fallen on their faces today.

Today’s Rock Band DLC is an album I’ve been waiting for since BEFORE Rock Band, after finally getting to play “Tonight I’m Going to Rock You Tonight” on Guitar Hero II and realising that the whole soundtrack to This is Spinal Tap would make for some fantastic gaming moments.

Put simply, it’s finally here but all the songs are from the recent “Back from the Dead” album; ergo – limp, keyboard-dependent renditions of Tap classics done in such a half-arsed way that I genuinely would have preferred cover versions from a band that at least understood why Tap rocked in the first place. Yes it’s a joke band, but I’ve been listening to that soundtrack since I was sixteen years old and the songs are ingrained in my head. Hearing them done ‘differently’ if you like these new ones or just plain ‘badly’ if you share my view, is worse than them not being on the Rock Band store at all, because at least if that were the case we could still hope, pray, wish and campaign for their release.
I completely understand if the original tracks were unobtainable or unusable, that’s often the case, but if Neversoft can get the surviving Sex Pistols back in to re-record a very accurate new version of Anarchy in the UK and if Harmonix themselves can produce a better non-master of Tonight I’m Going to Rock You Tonight on GHII, then there is absolutely no excuse for this shoddy and embarrassing output. I blame Spinal Tap as well for this godforsaken album. I’m just a blame-canon today and none shall escape my wrath.

On the upside I downloaded a whole bunch of RB tracks in the past week and can thoroughly recommend the Weezer pack, Disposable Teens by Marylin Manson and Get Up (I feel like being a sex machine) by the late, great James Brown.
If you want Tap at all costs, here’s a list of the DLC on offer today, but preview before you buy them. Some of them aren’t terrible, but my over-trained ear could pick out the floopy keyboard work and muzak styling in place of the original raw guitars. These don’t go to eleven. they barely hit three.

(Note: I’ve gone through YouTube and listened carefully to each track to assess which ones are the lamest. By and large they actually aren’t that terrible, just different. However, the unacceptably lame ducks are marked in bold for your ease of purchasing)

“(Funky) Sex Farm” (Sounds like a Vegas band that thinks they’re funny. They aren’t)

“(Listen to the) Flower People (Reggae Stylee)” (No longer feels like Tap in the 70′s. Just plain wrong)

” America ”

“Big Bottom”

“Cups and Cakes” (Trumpet switched for a limp organ solo. No spine to the song any more)

“Gimme Some Money” (Twangy 60′s Beatles style rhythm guitar switched for yet another  limp organ music. Fail!)

“Heavy Duty”

“Hell Hole”

“Rock ‘n’ Roll Creation”

“Stonehenge”

“Tonight I’m Gonna Rock You Tonight”

In summation, give me a time machine and a big boot because some folks are due an arse-kicking.

This is a piece written by Ryan Astley, a friend of the show recently recruited by Ruffian games and working on Crackdown 2. -Alex

Today marks the end of a large task I’ve been set by the lead artist to undertake. I’ve been working on this set piece for several weeks and the last few days have been the about cleaning up all the nooks and crannies, adding that extra bit of polish ™

Working for a games company does feel really different to many other jobs I’ve had. You sort of don’t see it as a 9-5 thing. It’s more of “let’s see how much work I can do today before my brain wants to explode”. Of course you have to be driven and committed to want to put this amount of effort into a project, and Crackdown 2 is definitely worth it.

Working with people at Ruffian games is inspiring enough. Chuckles and belly laughs are heard all day from play tests and new integrated features as the project develops. Its all smiles, a very positive atmosphere and I feel very lucky to be a part of it. It all comes from good planning, passion, experience and some fantastic talent.

When you think about working in games, think about what skills you need, might it be C++ programming skills, knowledge of 3DS Max to craft something awesome? That’s probably about half of it as its as much about needing good time management and organisational skills. Tasks can be amazingly complicated and will last several weeks, meanwhile everyone’s watching your stuff progress, and so it’s good to not prat around and start wavering for too long.

Games today have multi-million pound budgets, and that is well planned out and spent appropriately, so you don’t want to waste time and money.

In any creative industry you have to be ready to take a lot of constructive criticism. To be honest I find it very useful. There’s little point in having a huge ego in this game, you have to work closely with many others in your team and taking on board ideas from others is key. So it’s important that everyone gets along and communicates well with one another, less ego and more “lets get along and share ideas to make something great”

As projects eventually draw to their final stages of bug fixes and tweaks I could imagine I’ll be doing 12 hour days + to get my parts of the game up to scratch. In a year’s time it’ll all be worth it, seeing our game on the shelves hopefully scoring high in latest EDGE magazine. I’ll have my fist pumping in the air screaming “I FUCKING DID IT!”

So this weekend we’re all going on a Ruffian BBQ party

Ryan Astley – Ruffian Games