To Boldy Go...

The Green Skinned Chronicles (aka. my time in the Star Trek Online Beta)

(WARNING: MASSIVELY NERDY ROLE PLAYING TO FOLLOW)

Captain's Log: Stardate 20100119

The Captain is dead.  The First Officer is dead.  Heck, even the janitor who cleans the latrines on deck 17 is dead.  Or at least I assume he is (poor Roger).  Cause when they tell an Ensign that she is now the highest ranking officer on board the ship, that must mean that most of the crew has met their end.  I am Alia Neajea, and I am now the acting Captain of the USS Avalon.  God save us all.

The Borg came back.  I don't know why, but they came back and they attacked our fleet.  I was ordered over to the Khittimer to help them beat back a Borg boarding party.  While I was there, the Borg decided to go have another party over on the Avalon.  The kind of party where you kill or assimilate everyone on board.  When I got back, I was told that I was now Captain and we needed to go get back in the fight.  Lucky me.

Well, somehow we got our weapons and shields repaired, at least enough to get back in action and take out a few damaged probes.  Then one of the cubes showed up.  Thank God it was already damaged as well.  If it had been at full strength we would have all been dead.  Instead, we joined an assault team and blew them back to the scrapyard.

The Avalon was then ordered back to Earth.  I obeyed, expecting to be sent back to drydock for a while until the new captain arrived.  Imagine my surprise when the Admiral informed me that I was now the captain of the Avalon.  I guess with the war against the Klingons, and now open conflict with the Borg, Starfleet has a shortage of commanding officers.  Of course, he didn't make me a Captain.  He made me a Lieutenant.  But I'm in charge now, regardless.  I never asked to command.  I suppose most people join Starfleet in dreams of sitting in the big chair of their own starship, envisioning themselves as the next James T. Kirk.  Me, though?  I just wanted to see the stars. Well, now I'm in command, so it's time to show everyone, especially myself, what I'm made of. 

A Call For Reason

That's it. I'm calling it. This year is to be referred to as Twenty Ten. No more of this "two thousand and ten" nonsense. Twenty ten. And Twenty shall be the standard for the years to come. Mark it well.

"Whoa there, man!" I hear you say. "You can't just up and call it! There have to be discussions! Evidence has to be presented! You need to present a compelling case before we can just go ahead and call it twenty ten." Well I have a compelling case. I have an irrefutable arguement that will end this debate once and for all. What is this ironclad evidence? Mega Man.

That's right, I'm invoking the blue bomber himself. You see, at the start of every Mega Man game, they display the year it takes place in. But in order to keep from tying themselves down to a specific date, they use 'X's. This results in a date like 20X6. Now consider how you would say that date. Would you say "twenty x-ty six", or would you say "two thousand and x-ty six"? Two thousand and x-ty six sounds stupid, doesn't it? Twenty x-ty six is clearly the correct way to say such a date, so it clearly must be the correct header for this year as well. Ergo, twenty ten.

So now that Mega Man and myself have logically shown the correct way to say this year and blown the arguments for "two thousand and ten" out of the water, I look forward to hearing "twenty ten" being proclaimed across the globe. For if we cannot unite in the pronunciation of the year, how can we ever hope to stand together once the robot rebellion inevitably comes to pass? For the good of all mankind, I welcome you to Twenty Ten.

Weekend Pep Talk

Hey man, we need to talk. Yes, I know by talking to you, I'm actually just talking to myself. We should probably go see someone about that. It's not exactly a healthy thing. But before you go see some quack about getting some happy pills, let's talk about this weekend. You know what we need to do. You've been putting it off for some time now. Sure, you had good excuses. The holidays were here, family was in town, friends were here to visit. Those are valid reasons, but at the heart of it, you were still making excuses. Now, though? It's time. We need to play some Dragon Age.

Hey! Hold up a second, OK? I hear what you're saying! Yes, you've already played some of Dragon Age. It's been pretty awesome, in fact. You've got your character made, you went through your origin story and saw your family that was modeled by your own character's appearance. That was cool. And that sequence was pretty brutal as well. Then there was that battle in the tower. That got pretty intense. Good thing you had a warhound by your side. But now that you're in the first real town and getting quests, and the world has opened up, I can tell that you're balking at going forward. It is kinda intimidating, I know. Choices aren't easy, and this game offers a ton of them. Plus, the completionist side of you and the side that wants to appease your party members are kind of at odds too, since completing some of these side quests is bound to peeve at least one of them off. But this is a game that deserves to see some of your time.

Look, I know you've got errands to run and things to do. Decorations need to come down, and your car is filthy. Wash that thing, will you? Also, a haircut wouldn't kill you. But you've got to be able to fit Dragon Age somewhere in there. It's a great game. It probably could have snagged a spot on your top five list last month if you had bothered to play more of it. You and I both know that it's go time. So get out there and show those Darkspawn what you're made of! Although my stomach is growling pretty bad. I should go eat something. Also, I've got a lot of Dexter to catch up on...

Shattered Memories

Silent Hill: Shattered Memories is the kind of game I would love to make someday.  I love to play the traditional styles of video games, but if I were to actually get involved in making games, I would want to make the kinds of games that explore video games as a story-telling medium.  I often think about the unique methods video games can use to convey ideas and stories to the player.  These are methods that are different than films, television, or even books.  In games, the player is in control and able to interact with the world, instead of just being taken along for the ride.  Some of the best stories in games are ones that have the player make decisions that will impact the game in ways they don't see until much later, or have revelatory moments that flip the player's perspective of the story on its head.  Silent Hill: Shattered Memories accomplishes both of these and executes on them brilliantly.

Shattered Memories has been described as a re-imagining of the original Silent Hill, and boy is it ever.  If you're familiar at all with the original Silent Hill, you may think you know what to expect going into this game.  You start off as Harry Mason, you've just been in a car crash, and you're looking for your daughter Cheryl.  You might think, "Oh yeah, I got this.  Give me a pipe so I can start bashing the monsters from those crazy cultists."  If you thought that, you would be dead wrong.  Aside from the names of characters and the car crash, this game is completely different from the original.  I mean, it's shocking how different this is.  I'm not just talking about the lack of combat.  In the original, you were fighting (or running from, usually) a ton of creepy monsters of different shapes and sizes.  In Shattered Memories, you can't fight the creatures.  Instead, you get put into intense (and often intentionally confusing) chase sequences.  That's pretty different.  It also veers away from shocking and grotesque imagery, going more for uncertainty and a more mental approach to the horror (that still remains disturbing and effective).  But the biggest difference is in the story itself.  This is not the original Silent Hill.  And you know what?  I kind of like it better.

Now if you remember my horror games post, I had high praise for the Silent Hill series, so I'm not knocking what it has accomplished thus far by any means.  But the direction Shattered Memories takes is one that I would embrace wholeheartedly.  There have been some comments/reviews that Shattered Memories isn't really a Silent Hill game.  And they're right, when you consider the continuity of the series up till now.  All that crazy cult stuff and the horrifying "Otherworld" are gone here.  All the things you might think of that make up a Silent Hill game are pretty much gone here, save for the town itself.  And yet, the atmosphere and the psychology involved in the story make me feel like this very much deserves to have the Silent Hill name attached to it.  Let's be honest, the best game in the series (that would be number 2) focused away from the odd cult story and focused more on the characters and their psychological issues.  In that regard, Shattered Memories stays more true to that spirit than any of the other sequels.  Harry's journey gets more and more bizarre to the point where you wonder how on earth they could possibly resolve it in any satisfactory way.  And then they totally do just that.  I won't spoil anything, but I will say the ending allows you to actually look back at what has transpired, and see the meaning in all this stuff that previously seemed inexplicable.  It's really cool, and one of those tools I love to see storytellers use. 

And yet the story itself is dictated by your own actions.  I don't know what all the game is reading while you're playing, but it is somehow analyzing you as you play.  The most obvious method is via the psychoanalysis sessions you have with the game's therapist throughout the game.  But it is reading something more from your actual gameplay style.  When I finished the game, it began to profile me, and it was pretty spot on for the most part.  Eerily so.  And this is where the real beauty of the game lies.  As you play the game, the characters and story are altered by the choices you make.  This means that one person could see the game from an entirely different perspective than another.  While I'm sure the general flow and major locations remain largely the same, I have a feeling that the kind of story you experience and the resolution could be very, very different.  I've finished the game once, and I'm very interested in going back in to try a different approach.  To see some of this in action, check out this video and see how the player reacts:



I have to say, as far as stories in games go, Silent Hill: Shattered Memories and Uncharted 2: Among Thieves (my personal Game of the Year, if you recall) stand tall at the top of the heap this year.  Yet they both approach their storytelling in drastically different ways.  Uncharted goes for a tightly focused and thrilling narrative that parallels the best of the summer blockbusters.  Shattered Memories instead opts for a very experimental and intriguing psychological thriller that allows the player to basically form a story tailored for them.  While I am definitely looking forward to more games learning and utilizing the methods used in Uncharted 2, I would love to see more developers build on the work established in Shattered Memories.  And who knows?  Maybe some day I might actually get to do that myself...

Best of 2009: Uncharted 2: Among Theives

Last week, before delving deep into the worst of 2009, I said that my top five games weren't ranked.  That's not exactly true, because while I've waffled on which of the prior four were better than the others and not coming up with a real answer (thereby resulting in me saying, "Well then they're all good and therefore not ranked!"), Uncharted 2 stands tall as my favorite game of the year.  I talked about it back in October, so I'm sorry if I repeat myself here, but I can't help it when talking about this game.  It was the game I had been anticipating the most, and then the hype machine really got to me and made my expectations high.  Well Uncharted 2 not only met those expectations, but it blew past them to make one of the most memorable game experiences I've had in a long time.

 

I was a huge fan of the original Uncharted.  It was the first game I bought and played when I got my PS3 (Metal Gear Solid 4 technically came with the system, but I didn't play it until later).  The story and the characters hooked into me deep and left a lasting affection for them that had me craving for more.  The gameplay was solid as well, though it had more than a few frustrating moments.  Combat all too often forced you to fight waves of enemies that used cheap tactics, and when you died you would have to do it all over again.  It really started to feel like a chore, and I admit I groaned a couple of times when I realized I would have to hunker down and face yet another wave of pirates or mercenaries for the next ten minutes.  I would still recommend you go and play Uncharted: Drake's Fortune, though.  First of all because it's a great game, and second of all because the sequel might make it hard to go back once you've played it.

 

You see, Uncharted 2 fixes just about any issues the original had.  There are maybe two instances during the game where I recall really getting frustrated, and that was it.  The rest of the game is one of the most action packed thrill rides I've ever seen.  I know that's a ridiculous cliche of a phrase, but it fits Uncharted 2 so well.  The game moves at an incredible pace, and it's constantly throwing you into crazy situation after crazy situation.  It really is the video game equivalent of a big blockbuster movie.  Its greatest success is in how well these moments are executed.  The game starts you out being mortally wounded and having to climb up a train that is dangling off the side of a cliff, for crying out loud!  That's the opening sequence!  The next thing you know, you're engaged in a high stakes robbery, running for your life as a helicopter tears the building apart from under you, racing from train car to train car, and leaping from truck to truck as gunfire rains down all around you.  And those are just a few of the great moments in this game!

These moments are held together with fantastic gameplay and controls.  Whether you're sliding between cover during a heated firefight, or clinging to ledges as you scale all the numerous obstacles and objectives, Nathan Drake does it all seamlessly.  If you die, you almost never feel like it's because the controls screwed you.  These gameplay sections also seem like they're paced better than in Drake's Fortune, keeping the flow of the game moving at just the right speed.  The combat sections definitely feel the most improved.  Combat worked fine in the original, but it seems superb here in Among Theives.  I can't really describe what it is that makes it better.  You just have to have played both games to understand.  When you play the sequel, you just feel like something got improved even though you can't describe what it is.  The best I can say is that I actually found myself looking forward to the next time I could clash with the villains of this world.  Add in stealth moments that are actually viable avenues now, and you've got a fantastic adventure that is hard to put down.

In my opinion, though, it's the characters that make the Uncharted world so great.  These are not the stereotypes that I've come to expect and hate in games like this one.  You know, the macho hero, the over the top villain, and the sexy-yet-fierce love interest.  Here, the characters seem fleshed out and real.  The incredible graphics really help here, as the character models are able to effectively express the emotions being presented without ever making you tilt your head at any Uncanny Valley stuff.  The voice acting is also top-notch, with probably the best performances ever in a video game.  You've got a slimeball antagonist, a truly frightening villain, some complex supporting characters...heck, you even develop an attachment to a character who never speaks a word of English!  And standing at the center of it all is Nathan Drake himself.  Nolan North delivers another amazing performance as our hero, giving just the right mix of charm, emotional range, and incredulity at the crazy situations he finds himself in.  Drake and his supporting cast are able to sell you on the world they are in and make you believe it, even if it's just during the time you're playing.  They let you escape, and isn't that why we're supposedly playing these things in the first place?

I can't wrap this up without mentioning the multiplayer.  I didn't really care that they were adding multiplayer in the sequel, since it's the single player experience that I love about these games.  I have logged a little bit of time with the multiplayer, though, and I've been surprised at how well the Uncharted gameplay fits into a multiplayer setting.  It seems pretty fun, and I'm looking forward to getting back into it at some point.  And if you read my Modern Warfare 2 post, you know that's not something I say very often.  This is a pretty neat bonus to keep you coming back, and it's something they didn't even have to add on when you think about it.  Kudos to Naughty Dog on this one.

Uncharted 2: Among Thieves raises the bar for action/adventure games, and really for video games in general.  The level of polish and care that's gone into this game shows, and delivers an experience that's a head above anything else out there.  I love the story, I love the characters, and I love the fun I have when I'm playing it.  In short, I love this game.  And that's why Uncharted 2: Among Thieves is my pick for the best game of 2009.

 

Best of 2009: Batman: Arkham Asylum

Maybe I should preface this with the disclaimer that I am a gigantic Batman nerd.  I have been since I was about 3 years old, and my love for the Dark Knight has only grown stronger.  And I should also explain that we Batman fans have had to slog through terrible Batman game after terrible game, just hoping that the next one will be good.  So with all that being said, I LOVE THIS GAME!!!

OK, let's scale back from that freak out.  From what I've read, you don't have to be a Batman fan to enjoy this game.  It's just a really good game.  But I believe that being a Batman fan makes it even that much better, because when you're playing it, the atmosphere, the characters, the story, and the controls all just feel right.  This truly feels like a Batman experience from top to bottom.  For the first time, a video game developer has made a game where you actually feel like you are the Batman. 

A huge thing working in Arkham Asylum's favor is the cast for the voice work.  Kevin Conroy is reprising his role as Batman.  If that isn't enough to excite you, I demand that you go and watch Batman: The Animated Series.  Right now.  Seriously, stop reading this and go watch an episode.  I'll wait.  ...OK, you back?  The guy voicing Batman in that episode you just watched?  That's Kevin Conroy.  That's why I was so happy he was involved in this.  He is Batman in my mind.  That is how Batman sounds.  And adding to that, in the role of the Joker, we have the one and only Mark Hammil.  Yup, Luke Skywalker.  But his ultimate role for me will always be the Joker, as that dates back to the Animated Series as well.  I think they got a few other voices from the cartoon in there, so most of the cast sounds the way I'm used to hearing them talk.  That's a big deal when the developer is trying to sell you on an authentic Batman experience.

Yet the great voice work could only carry the game so far.  If the cast had terrible lines or unnatural dialogue, then none of those guys could really salvage this game.  Yet the characters all behave and act the way you would expect Batman characters to.  I have to imagine a lot of credit goes toward Paul Dini.  Who is Paul Dini, you ask?  Why, he was one of the main writers on Batman: The Animated Series!  Yeah, you might be able to tell by now that I'm kind of crazy about that show.  But I'm crazy about it for a good reason.  It was a kid's show that didn't dumb down the characters for it's audience.  In fact, I think the writers had a better feel for Batman and his world than some of the comic writers creating the "official continuity".  The writers on that show had an obvious love for the Batman, and the way they told his adventures just clicked well.  That was the way Batman should act.  He wasn't too brooding, yet he still had a burden about him that compelled him to keep fighting.  This carries over to the game.  Paul Dini was one of the main writers, and I have to believe he brought over his experience from the cartoon and was able to give it just a slightly darker and more mature tone.  Not too much, but enough to make you feel like you were really in Batman's world and trying to bring down this circus of homicidal maniacs.

But this is a video game here.  And if the game play is no good, then all the other stuff is just a waste of time.  Thankfully, the gameplay is great and fits perfectly into a Batman game.  Combat in this game is not about surviving each encounter, as is usually the focus.  This is Batman, and if some random thugs can give him a real fight, then he might as well hang up the cape and cowl.  The Batman in Arkham Asylum can not only take on twenty thugs at a time, but he can theoretically take them out without taking a single hit.  That's the draw of the combat in this game: you try to dismantle each group of bad guys in the most awesome way possible.  It seems really simple at the start, but you soon become addicted to stringing together attacks, counters, and special attacks to keep the combos going and see if you can make it out flawlessly.  It's incredibly fun, and makes Batman seem like the awesome superhero you know from the comics and movies.  This is only enhanced by the stealth portions of the game.  Stealth in games is usually about making you feel like the prey, and hiding to survive.  In Batman, it's almost the opposite.  Batman can only take a few hits, since these guys have guns and he only has body armor, but you still get the feeling that Batman is the predator in these moments.  You slowly take each goon out, one by one.  When another one drops, the remaining guys get more and more freaked out, until you finally bring them all down to the ground.  You often do this with the aid of Batman's gadgets, which all feel useful and are vital in exploring the Asylum.  As you progress, you get better gadgets and upgrades that allow you to retrack your steps and discover new areas and items.  Yes, this is a Metroid-vania game.  The backtracking is kept to a minimum, though, so you always feel like you're moving forward.

In the end, Batman: Arkham Asylum is a game that effectively puts you in Batman's shoes and allows you to feel how awesome it is to be the Dark Knight.  Rocksteady has created an incredibly fun game and put it in a great atmosphere with a story that fits well within the Batman world.  If you're not a fan of Batman, there's still plenty of stuff in here for you to enjoy.  If you are a fan, well you probably already know all this, since you've likely played and beaten it by now.  And it was great, wasn't it?  Yeah it was.

Best of 2009: Assassin's Creed 2

This game could win any number of awards from me this year.  Most Surprising, Most Improved, and Best Use of Renaissance Art come to mind.  It also was one of my favorite games of the year.  I really didn't expect to be saying that before the game came out.  The original Assassin's Creed was a good game, and I enjoyed playing it, but it had some serious issues that really kept me from holding it in any kind of high regard.  Dialogue and missions repeated themselves far too often.  The beggars were the definition of annoying.  And worst of all were the drunk/slash insane people who only ever seemed to have a problem with your character.  Everyone else they let be, but when you came around, they came out swinging.  Maybe they all just really resented dudes with white robes and swords on their hips?  That's a weird kind of guy to pick a fight with, but I'm not going to judge them.  I'm just going to grab them and toss them into the street.  The story also left something to be desired, as they established a large fiction for their universe and then failed to satisfactorily resolve any of it.  Altair's story was left on a cliffhanger, Desmond remained a captive, and you still had no idea what the heck was really going on.  Altair, your protagonist for the majority of the game, was also extremely unlikable for most of the game, which made it hard to want to keep controlling him.

Thankfully, Assassin's Creed 2 fixes almost all of these issues.  The story is far more interesting this time, and it moves at a far better pace.  You feel like there is more variety to what you can do.  Ezio Auditore, the protagonist this time around, is far more likable, interesting, and sympathetic.  The world seems more engrossing too, filled with Italian Renaissance art and key individuals of the period.  All in all, it just was far more fun to play.

The original split its time between Desmond in the real world and Altair in the Animus a fair amount.  I'd say it was about 75% Altair, 25% Desmond.  Well in the sequel you spend closer to 95% with Ezio and 5% with Desmond, and yet the overall story with Desmond actually seems to take a larger role.  You finally get to find out more about the crazy conspiracy theory, Dan Brown style backdrop to the Assassin's Creed world.  In fact, I think my favorite parts of the game were hunting down the glyphs that are scattered around Italy.  When you find one, you delve into history and get to see their spin on how world events went down.  Then you get a segment of a weird video that features naked people running.  I'm not kidding.  And when you finally get to control Desmond again, it leads to one of the more surreal yet stunning moments in the game.  Not to mention one of the best ending credit segments in video game history.

I loved most of the side stuff you could do in the game.  Whenever I would unlock a district, I would immediately go scale every view point so I could find new codex pages, then get Leonardo Da Vinci to translate them, then go exchange whatever cash I could for paintings so I could return to my home base and pay an architect to improve my villa so I could make even more cash to upgrade my armor and weapons.  Plus, you get to display the paintings in your house, which makes you feel all kinds of snobbish.  Then you can also find tombs that you have to navigate so you can find pieces of Altair's ultimate armor, and these areas are where the control scheme works the best.  In the open world, it's a bit more frustrating, as Ezio will often leap to his doom when you really wanted him to jump onto a balcony or wire.  Despite that, the navigation still seems more elegant and streamlined than the original game, so chalk that up as another improvement.  There's always an incentive to continue on with the story, though, which is more streamlined and interesting than the original.  Instead of just pursuing a list of targets like in the first game, this time the assassinations have more weight and backstory to them.  You always feel like you're moving forward in the game and getting closer to some answers.  It also helps that the game looks fantastic, with stunning recreations of areas like Florence, Tuscany, and Venice.  After playing this game, I really would love to take a trip to Italy and visit these places in person, because this game makes them look beautiful.


One of my only real gripes with the game is that it's almost required to play the original first.  I want to recommend that you go out immediately and buy this game, but if you haven't played the first one, you may get pretty confused as to what's going on.  It lays down a bit of backstory at the start, but not nearly enough to get you up to speed on Desmond, the Templars, and the Assassins.  Plus, there is a significant moment in the game that showcases a character that was very obscure in the first game.  I wouldn't be surprised if some of the people who have played the first one didn't even know who that person was.  And I don't really want to recommend you play the original since this new one is so superior in every way.  Maybe you'd be better off reading Wikipedia or watching some videos on YouTube to get caught up on the story, and then play Assassin's Creed 2.

Assassin's Creed 2 was a game that I was far from caring about before it was released, and yet now I'm counting it as one of my favorites of the year.  This is a testament to the quality and polish that the team over at Ubisoft put into the game, and now I can't wait for the next chapter.  This is how sequels should be made.