Writers Blocked
Been trying to write something worthwhile about Modern Warfare 3 for N4G, but here’s what it boils down to: If you like COD, if you like Modern Warfare, if you’re the sort of gamer that buys shooters because you just can’t get enough, you – and millions like you – are going to buy this game, the game is going to sell.
Which is probably why the Modern Warfare 3 demonstrations to the press were so completely phoned in. Activision could have sat us in a room, fed a monkey a banana and sent us on our way – the game is going to sell like fiery hotcakes.
Instead, Activision made us wait 25 minutes past the appointment time, then showed us a presentation that was 50% previously shown footage (at the Microsoft press event). Why? As with everything Activision, because they can. The game is going to sell itself to unborn children.
App Sanction: Colorbind
Even when in the thick of app review turnaround, it was nigh impossible to keep up with cream of the crop. That’s the excuse, anyway, for why it wasn’t until running into Colorbind‘s developer Daniel Lutz at GDC 2011 that I downloaded the IGF winner.
While at a PlayStation meet-up I bump into this guy, he tells me he’s traveled to San Francisco from far away Switzerland because his game is an IGF finalist, and I hit “Buy” (open bar makes a $2.99 app a steal, after all).
Any way I hear about an app that’s standing out from the crowd, it’s a win – and now, having finally cleared all the “Easy” levels (hey, that #25 boggled my mind) I’m telling you all it’s a worthwhile addition to your Puzzlers folder. Next mission: to check out Monospace.
Skull Eating
In Skulls of the Shogun it’s important to ingest the skulls of your enemies. What more do you need to know?
Bioshockingly Infinite
Bioshock Infinite is worth getting excited about – especially if, like some other me-shaped people, you found the first games in the series too absolutely terrifying to play without full daylight in a brightly lit room while surrounded by puppies.
If you’re more afraid of preview content than splicers, then don’t read this.
Desktop Dungeons at E3
The IndieCade booth had lots on offer – like Desktop Dungeons! Read my preview, fall in love, then play the Alpha build for free. If that doesn’t have you clicking “pre-order”, you’re hopeless.
Photo evidence
Hungry for Patronage
As mentioned back at the beginning of May, the National Endowment for the Arts has expanded its grant description to include video games. Since then, this news has picked up some steam, been reported on widely, and in the case of the E3 2011 Into the Pixel reception, been cited as evidence of video games’ growing acceptance in the arts field.
This grates – that the industry is seeking a stamp of approval and legitimacy not only from an external source, but from the government. It’s just so unnecessary, and a symptom of our patron-hungry culture. Art in the United States does not have a widespread system of patronage like days of yore, a large reason why sites like Kickstarter are flourishing. The arts in American are starving for patrons, but the video game industry is not.
What follows is a piece I wrote some time ago for a print publication targeting the non-gaming populous, and since it has some relevancy here it seems a good time to get it digitized.
Skyrim at E3
Back from the E3 void, the content starts rolling today – with a Skyrim preview to kick things off. Why start with Skyrim? Because it’s probably the nerdiest, wordiest, nerdiest…well, hope you enjoy!
Sony E3 Press Conference Details
SCEA Press Conference and Special Event
Monday, June 6th, Los Angeles Memorial Sports Arena3:30-5 pm: Pre-show reception with world renowned DJs and LAs best food trucks including Empanadarama,Yappy Dog, Cheeseball Wagon, Komodo and more.
5-6:30 pm: Press Conference
6:30-8 pm: Enjoy hands on time with almost all of the press conference content on over 120 PS3 and NGP kiosks. Arcade to include special appearances and musical talent.
8-9:30 pm: Special performanceFive Hours of Sony
Registration emails went out yesterday for Sony’s E3 press event set for Monday, June 6, 2011 – and the 5-10 pm time slot prompted some amusing comments. Confident it will be a 5 hour lecture with a 15 min smoke break in the middle.
Not so much – as the invite mentions, Join us for a special event immediately following the press conference.
Speculation fiends, speculate!
2011 Into the Pixel Winners Announced
The Academy of Interactive Arts & Sciences and the Entertainment’s Software Association today announced the winning pieces of the 2011 Into the Pixel collection. There are seventeen works in total that will join the permanent collections, and include artists from Naughty Dog, Insomniac Games, Valve Software, Bioware and Big Fish Games, to name a few. The works will be unveiled and on display at the 2011 E3 Expo from June 7-9 in the Concourse Foyer.
The Pelican Inn (Pub) by Andrew Kim, UNCHARTED 3: Drake's Deception™ Naughty Dog, Inc.
A juried exhibition, Into the Pixel is in its eighth year of collaboration between the Academy of Interactive Arts & Sciences and the Entertainment Software Association. Martin Rae, president, Academy of Interactive Arts & Sciences spoke on video games as art, remarking, “Now that public institutions have accepted video games as a legitimate form of art, there is no question that video game art has and will continue to have a place in the contemporary art scene.”
Flemmeth by Matt Rhodes, Dragon Age 2, BioWare
Glenn Phillips, Senior Project Specialist & Consulting Curator, Department of Architecture and Contemporary Art, Getty Research Institute went on to say, “Into the Pixel showcases the incredible creativity, skill and artistic talent that pervades in the video game industry. You really see that there are great artists working across every genre of video games, and at every stage of the production process.”
Cronos Battle by Tyler Breon, God of War® III, SCEA/Santa Monica Studio
Into the Pixel 2011 Winners:
Title of Artwork Artist(s) Game Company Amorphous Drake Lucas Graciano Legends of Norrath Sony Online Entertainment The Bridge Erik Zaring & Anders Gustafsson The Dream Machine Cockroach Inc. The Cottage Hamzah Kasom Osman Drawn 3 Big Fish Games Cronos Battle Tyler Breon God of War® III SCEA/Santa Monica Studio Dead Walking Chris Moffitt, Brad Crow, Nathan Stefan, Bart Tiongson Orcs Must Die! Robot Entertainment The Dragon Play Brian Thompson and Hamzah Kasom Osman Drawn: Dark Flight Big Fish Games Flemmeth Matt Rhodes Dragon Age 2 BioWare Good Friends Matthew Halpin, Andrew Matthews, Matthew Preece, Radek Walachnia, John Laws Kinectimals Frontier Developments Ltd Grim Exploits Colin Foran, Claire Hummel, Ryan Wilkerson Trenched Microsoft Game Studio/Doublefine Incident at the Workshop Ivan Simoncini Alien Swarm Valve Software Market Fire, Columbia (Shop Sweeper) Ben Lo BioShock Infinite Irrational Games Normandy Mikko Kinnunen Mass Effect 2 BioWare Oktonok Cay Cannery David Guertin Ratchet & Clank®: All 4 One Insomniac Games Paper World Say Oh and Damian Kim Paper World Namco Bandai Games The Pelican Inn (Pub) Andrew Kim UNCHARTED 3: Drake’s Deception™ Naughty Dog, Inc. Stahl Arms Jesse van Dijk Killzone® 3 Guerrilla Swamp Skull Jeff Haynie Mystery Case Files: 13th Skull Big Fish Games Into the Pixel 2011 Jurors:
- Glenn Phillips, Getty Research Institute, Senior Project Specialist & Consulting Curator, Department of Architecture and Contemporary Art
- Nora Dolan – Independent Curator
- Ryan Wilkerson, Microsoft Game Studios, Senior Art Director
- Matt Hall, Timbuk2 Studios, Senior Partner Production Designer
- Brian Moore, Microsoft Game Studios, Art Director
E3 Scrapbooking and Basket Weaving Class
Given an art project, you think the Type A would take over and that badge would be all filled out, but nothing doing: mostly just want to write in sassy things like “Ratchet is my Hero”:
When attendees show up is there going to be that awkward moment where everyone sort of peeks around to see who actually did the homework the substitute teacher assigned? Whatever, I like stickers.
Detected!
To succeed at LA Noire you need to put up with some weird running, the occasional difficulty descending a drain pipe, and have mad interrogation skillz. Seriously, I am detecting the poop outta these investigations and it is not easy. On top of that, my preferred driving style (fast, reckless, dangerous to all pedestrians and most streetlamps…) seems to be discouraged. When completing cases, you can be dinged at the end for damages to the car, to the city, to the fine people of Los Angeles – though the same does not apply if you pick up a Street Crime mission in the middle, which is a budget saver. Oh, and I should try not to run people over. Got it.
Within LA Noire is another, secret game – spot the celebrity (“celebrity”?). You can’t trip over a murder suspect without going through that weird “Ahhh, whose voice (and often, face) is that?” It’s distracting, but the reward of figuring out that’s Carla Gallo in the apartment is about as nonsensically satisfying as any legit mini-game.
There’s talk about LA Noire making PS3s overheat. Haven’t toasted any marshmallows yet, but there’s no denying that the game makes the fan whir a little harder – can’t say it’s any more than playing Red Dead Redemption, though.
Dragon on Dragon (on Dragon)
My friend Kyle pointed out that there will be unlimited dragons in Skyrim. Unlimited dragons. On one hand, the completionist in me wants to kill all the dragons – on the other, unlimited dragons. Either way, it’s almost like they have a dragon giving its scaly middle finger to games with “Dragon” in their name that have fewer dragons than unlimited.
Resistance is Pretty
Well, the boxart and logos are. Don’t worry, EU, same for you.
Reviewing Free [to Play]
Back at GDC over lunch with Christine Yeo from Perfect World Ent the notion of reviewing free games came up. This is something a bit of brain space has been devoted to, so now comes the waxing speculative.
Largely with the dawn of iPhone app reviews (and apps), the decision of whether or not to review free apps came up. With an inbox full of review requests for paid apps, time management was an issue and the answer was clear: No thank you. A free app costs only as much as the player’s time, and there was little value to be added to the equation by reviewing such an app – while simultaneously trying to quantify the value of time versus the app. Nope, the math was just not working out.
Free-to-play MMOs, however, are increasing their presence in the Western world and so the question comes up again – is it relevant to review what is free? Here the answer is yes. Where time commitment on a free app runs something like 20 minutes maximum before determining if the player wishes to continue, the time likely to be invested in an MMO before its worth can be sussed out tends to run higher. Certainly, some just won’t run or are broken beyond reviewing comprehension, and in those cases the less WPM spent on the debacle the better (as with any lame app). Without reviews, doesn’t the MMO player find themselves adrift in a sea of time-eating possibility?
While LOTRO may or may not make your butt look big, finding the right free-to-play MMO seems a lot like trying to find a good pair of jeans – you want back-up.
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