Written By: Alex Shaw

Some games youâll never beat.
Statistically only a small percentage of players see a game through to
the end, but thereâs a difference between getting pushed to the edge of
your abilities and laying (or throwing) the pad down and just never
getting into the game in the first place. I went back to Mass Effect
last week. It was one of the hardest moments in gaming for me. Not
because of the difficulty of the game, but because eight months had
elapsed since Iâd last sat in the Mako and wondered where to go.

Going back to games is
something weâve all faced. Maybe the first time round you werenât in
the mood, or you had too much on your plate or the game simply repelled
you by being tricky and convoluted, but then you started seeing it
everywhere, your friends kept staring at you aghast when you said you
hadnât even really played it and finally podcasters started talking
about the thing like it was a world changing event in gaming, one which
youâd missed out on. Those thoughts trickle to the back of your mind
and prick at you when youâre in bed, or walking down the street or
cruising Amazon. âYou never finished Mass Effect dickhead.â They say.
âWhatâs the matter? Is Little big planet too hard for you?â until
eventually. âYouâre not afraid of The Darkness are you?â Until you snap
and go on a budget spending spree.

This is the best thing about
the ordeal. You spend only a fraction of what these games originally
cost. I picked up Mass Effect for the British equivalent of $12, The
Darkness for $9 and LBP for $18. All of which add up to less than one
new game. The slow decline in price of any game on the market is a
godsend for folks who pick it up late, something that may go away when
itâs digital downloads only. Pleased with your bargains you take them
home, slap them in and fire them up again.

âand youâre back where you got
stuck before. This is the hardest part and the biggest hurdle you will
ever jump in that game. RPGâs are the worst offenders. With a
platformer or a shooter, youâre going to get fairly universal controls
and hopefully an easy to grasp interface. An RPG takes the five hours
youâve already played it just to get to grips with the complex combat,
leveling and item system, so when you come back, you have to re-learn
that in minutes or youâll die quickly and repeatedly. Final Fantasy XII
still has me stymied. Iâm not sure Iâll ever be able to go back to that
one because itâs a generation behind. The lumbering behemoth of
non-widescreen, standard definition, coupled with a wired pad of all
things, is a mighty enemy indeed.

But in the case of Mass Effect
I had two avenging angels on my side. Xbox Live and a good friend.
Quantum sat patiently and talked me through a difficult vehicle section
and the mine that followed simply by listening to my descriptions and
going from the memory of his past six runs through. Yes thatâs not a
typo, this man has spent hundreds of hours in that game, and who better
to have at my back? Now Iâm halfway through and really beginning to
enjoy the story and the world itâs set in. So next time you venture
back into an uncharted game that you just canât seem to break into, I
can thoroughly recommend getting a coach. Someone whoâs been there and
can dissolve your frustrations with knowledge and guidance. Quantum, to
me is better than a strategy guide. Thanks mate.

These are some of the best previous episodes of Digital Cowboys. Look for them on iTunes or indeed, here on the blog. The best ten are highlighted in bold.

• Episode 5 (May 22/07) Features a screwball radio play 45 minutes in.
• Episode
  9 (June 20/07) Was sequels and why they suck, where we worked out the
  mathematical likelihood of any trilogy being even good, let alone
  great. This data was extrapolated from 57 existing trilogies.
  
• Episode 10
  (June 26/07) Featured among other things video game controversy where
  we talked about Carmageddon, Beat em and Eat Em and Custers revenge.
  This was after Manhunt 2 was refused classification in the UK.
  
• Episode 11 (July 4/07) The first room 101 where we threw things we hated about films and video games into a room representing hell.
  
• Episode 13 (July 18/07) Was the 2007 E3 special, featuring Chewbacca and his PSP.
• Episode 18 (August 22/07) Where we looked at films that need remaking. It finishes on an awesome Clive Owen song.
  
• Episode 14 (July 25/07) One for Firefly fans.
• Episode 19 (August 30/07) Movies based on video games and why they all suck.
• Episode 24 (October 3/07) With the release of Halo 3 we did an epic episode looking at the whole trilogy. 
• Episode 36 (December 29/07) The games of 2007 roundup.
• Episode 37 (January 10/08) 2007 news roundup (Including Jeff Gerstman’s sudden exodus from Gamespot)
• Greatest Hits (April 22/08) Episodes 1-51′s best bits (Also look on the blog at April 6/08 for the trailers of the Bollywood movie of Digital Cowboys)
  
• Episode 53 (April 28/08) Retro games console test and Wii Fit
• Episode 55 (May 15/08) GTAIV Epic Review
• Episode 56 (May 22/08) After Empire magazine published the 500 best movies and Godfather was number one as usual, we decided to do our own, alternative ten greatest movies ever.
• Episode 58 (June 5/08) The NES special
• Episode 59 (June 12/08) The Sega special (featuring Tony Edwards)
  
• Episode 61 (June 26/Part 2 27/08) Metal Gear Solid special
• Episode 63 (July 11/08) Gameboy Special
• Episode 64 (July 18/08) E3 2008 Special
• Episode 67 (August 8/08) The second Room 101
• Episode 69 (August 21/08) Amiga 500 Special
• Episode 70 (September 11/08) SNES Special
• Episode
  74 (October 12/08) The dead console special. Turbo Grafx-16, Atari
  Lynx, Jaguar, 3DO, Sega Saturn, Nintendo Virtual Boy, Nokia N-Gage.
• Episode 75 (October 16/08) Our online friend Davus died. Tony hosted this one and we talked about the gaming community we build up around us. Probably one of the best episodes.
• Episode 83 (December 12/08) The death of the PS2
• Episode 86 (December 30/08) The games of 2008 awards ceremony double episode. After this, we had to decide what to do with the show.
  
• Episode 88 (January 16/08) Following the death of EGM; The decline of print in gaming journalism
• Episode 92 (February
  14/08) We got mentioned on ‘Gamers with jobs’. Kropotkin guested and we
  talked about mobile gaming. We also started our Twitter account.
  
• Episode 97 (March 20/08) Paul took a break, we got a new logo and ethos. Alex started writing for PN. Edie guested. Alex’s favourite episode.
  

In preparation for this week’s episode 101, which is focused on sex in video games, our listeners should check out Daniel Floyd on YouTube.

He has posted various mini-lectures on gaming elements. They are hugely entertaining and very well researched. Made in conjunction with James Portnow.

There is one on Sex.
One on Storytelling.
One on the uncanny valley.
One on learning in games.
And finally one on choice in video games.

Check them all out but especially the one on sex. My wife discovered it after I wrote my article on Sex in video games: how far we’ve not come.

Ep. 100 Part 3.

Brand New Segment/Shout Outs.

In the final part of our epic 100th trio, Chris O’Regan pops by to say hi and inadvertently stumbles upon the unveiling of a brand new segment on the show. Find out what it is exactly right here.

And finally we give props to the guys who’ve inspired and helped us through the years.

Chris can be found on his own podcast, The Superhappyfuntimeshow

The composer of our theme music, Mark Tschanz, can be found here and his 1995 album Blue Dog, featuring our theme Love Song, is available on Amazon.co.uk here and in the USA here.

Thanks once again to all of our listeners. Happy trails and see you next week, when we will definitely be back to the one-show format.

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Ep. 100 Part 2.

Eight Questions.

The questions we always ask our guests, turned back on the hosts, in this, the second part of our gigantic 100th episode. Some surprising answers.

Edie Sellers drops by near the end to say hi, the episode of Gamehounds that she mentions where Hawks goes batshit crazy about Wii Music can be found here: http://www.gamehounds.net/2008/07/

It’s the 23rd of July 2008 episode, and it’s a spectacular rant. Hawks, get your ass on our show!

Part three will be up tomorrow night.

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Ep. 100 Part 1.

Wii News/Guitar Hero Metallica/Wheelman

To celebrate 100 episodes we recorded an epic-length podcast for you. It’s so big in fact that we had to chop it into three portions.

Part one is the weekly news section, this week focusing on the Nintendo Wii, then we talk about what we’ve been playing; mainly an in-depth look at Guitar Hero: Metallica.

We’re also very proud to have Paul Shotton back on in guest form.

Part two will be up tonight, and focuses on us turning the eight James Lipton-style questions we ask all our guests back on ourselves. There were some very interesting responses.

We’d like to thank all of our listeners, new and old alike for tuning in every week. You’re what keeps the show going. Honestly. If we had no idea who was listening we’d have given up long ago. Here’s to 100 more.

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GDC 2009.

This week, Alex and Tony cover some of the stories that caught their interest around the annual Game Developers Conference held in San Francisco last week.

Among them are a long awaited PS2 price drop, the European release of the DSi, Batman: Arkham Asylum footage, the Modern Warfare 2 trailer, XNA and Left 4 Dead sales figures and Duke Nukem urinal cakes. There’s the likelihood of Wii Motion Plus being released this spring (Do you Americans have something called "Chinny reckon"?) and then of course there’s the inevitable backlash of OnLive

We follow up with final analysis of Resident Evil 5, Silent Hill: Homecoming and Dead Space and a look at Mad World.

Next week; a very special episode 100.

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Written By: Alex Shaw

Valveâs recent knee-jerk escapade at GDC had Gamehoundsâ Edie Sellers in a lather this week. On her podcast she expressed surprise and annoyance at their decision; namely the withdrawal of Kim Swift, project lead on Portal, from the yearly game design challenge, this year provocatively titled âMy First Timeâ. Itâs a dully predictable move in an industry still remarkably coy about sex. âMy first timeâ, was an open challenge, marrying sex and autobiography, and the final submissions from Swiftâs two substitutes and the remaining contestants showed invention and a mischievous streak, but certainly not the headline-baiting boldness that Valve would need to justify such cautious behavior.

You donât have to look far though, to see why they might not want their name attached to anything that could be misinterpreted as sordid or corrupting. The media-fueled hubbub over Mass Effect in early 2007 speaks volumes for how different the general public perceptions are between film and video games. The sex scene in Mass Effect is by all accounts no different to the kind of soft-focus, fare you would find in movies like Daredevil or Ghost, with lingering shots of perky backsides and a fleeting nipple or two. This was fed through the Fox-news exaggeration machine, given a quick bake in their conjecture oven and passed around between a group of people who havenât played ANY video games, let alone Mass Effect, and the resultant debate, now well-worn on YouTube borders on farcical. While Spike TVâs Jeff Keighley defended the gameâs content with maturity and crucially having actually played it, he was up against the wall of loudmouthed, opinionated busybodies spouting non-sequiturs like âWho can argue that Luke Skywalker meets Debbie Does Dallas is a good thing?â and my personal favourite, and the basis for this article; âWhat happened to Atari and Pinball and Pac-Man?â. This sentence crystallises the problem game developers face when trying to advance the industry in any challenging way. Too many people still envision single-screen 8-Bit arcade machines from the early 80âs when the words âvideo gameâ are mentioned, and they can only see children playing them, because why would an adult do so? Time has moved on, those children have now grown up and have children of their own. Now the games they play can be vast, complex odysseys with lifelike HD graphics, and the singular inability on so many peopleâs parts to marry this evolutionary step with the notion of a growing and maturing audience is what holds back sex in games.

Violence? No problem. We jumped that hurdle in the early 90âs with Mortal Kombat, a game so cartoonish and innocent now, that itâs very hard to see what all the fuss was about. Bad language has crept in slowly, seemingly one curse at a time, until with trailblazers like The Getaway, no word was unmentionable. Sex; however is still the thorniest subject in an industry that regularly produces entertainment that involves slaughtering Naziâs, drug-dealing or dismemberment on such a regular basis that we see these as commonplace, even conventional. A rough sort of acceptance has formed in the minds of outsiders. The above is just the sort of thing that happens in video games. But sex is different. Look at the examples we have of games that dared to deal with this nest of vipers; Custerâs Revenge on the 2600, in which you play the famous General defiling various Native Americans, Leisure Suit Larry, with its smirking innuendo and juvenile attitude, and Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas, with the drawn out court case over âHot Coffeeâ. Then thereâs the actual Japanese PC-based rape simulator âRapelayâ by Illusion Soft, which Amazon wisely decided to stop selling. Projects like this, whatever the intent of their developers make it hard to build a positive case for sex in games and seem to serve only to inflame public outrage.

Violence is horrible and illegal to the vast majority of non-incarcerated, non-military citizens, but sex means so many different things to so many people that there is no way to reach a general consensus. Itâs totally subjective, and highly likely to provoke a negative reaction. Itâs an act that can be beautiful, embarrassing, incredibly fun or utterly awful, different every time or always the same, may be meaningless or lead to life-changing relationships and indeed the continuation of the species. Asking why it canât be in a game is a question with its answer rooted in culture. I could (and should) write a thesis on this, but the short answer is that the public appreciation for sex is changing with the times, slowly, as we crawl away from the Victorian period when it became so utterly reprehensible to even mention. It took decades for sex and nudity to be accepted in books films and TV, but those are long-established entertainment forms and comparatively video games are still in their teens. It will take a few more generations before all the people who only remember Pac-Man are gone and those born into an era of Mass Effect and any other game that dares to tackle intercourse reach the obvious conclusion that people of all ages play games and those of a certain age should have no problem exploring relationships of all kinds, with and without sex. The detail and emotion-heavy gameplay of the future could indeed prove quite interesting. Taboos are broken all the time. Last monthâs cocky, male full-frontal in GTA: The Lost and Damned was a first, and whether Ms. Sellers is right and the scrawny chicken-neck of a reproductive organ on offer was a poor example or not, I agree with her that itâs steps forward like this that bring the industry that little bit closer to real maturity. Maybe then weâll get to see âMy First Timeâ as a full game.

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/

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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.