1999 was a banner year for me. I got accepted to NYU, I fell in love and the Sega Dreamcast was on store shelves. Indeed, all was right with the world.
As it happens, I wasn't the only one riding high at the end of the millennia. While I was busy crushing people's hopes and dreams in Soul Caliber, the fine men and women of Irrational Games were no doubt popping bottles of Moet in celebration of all the critical acclaim their newly released title, System Shock 2, was garnering. And rightfully so. An ambitious melding of survival horror, FPS and RPG elements, System Shock 2 was a towering triumph by every measurable standard. Tantamount to the game's success was the emphasis it placed on resource management and meaningful player choices - two things that have been increasingly absent from games in the 21st century.
Irrational is hoping to remedy that issue later this year when they release Bioshock Infinite with a newly revealed difficulty setting. Dubbed "1999" as a tip of the hat to their PC gaming classic, the new mode will purportedly require you to make judicious use of your ammunition and make hard, impactful choices regarding how to specialize your character over the course of the game. Irrational's full announcement can be found here. While they don't give any solid specifics about exactly how the minute to minute mechanics are being altered it's clear they haven't settled for the commonly used shortcut of simply upping the damage you take while decreasing the amount you dish out.
This is actually a pretty big deal in my opinion. Over the last 15 years our industry has slowly dropped the wall of exclusivity we used to huddle behind and embraced a policy of inclusiveness. The term "gamer" hardly paints a clear picture of a specific kind of individual any longer, as the age/gender/ethnicity range of people who play in some form or another has widened dramatically. With such a massive influx of new players who lack decades of experience or the energy to improve their skills, it only seems logical that developers would start making their games more forgiving in order to make sure their product appeals to the largest possible pool of consumers. This is one of the great truths of modern gaming. It honestly isn't worth lamenting or discussing any more than it already has been. It is what it is.
But there is a problem here, and it isn't one that I hear anyone talking about, and no, it isn't as simple as "games aren't hard enough anymore". You can go to any message board on the web and hear tons of those complaints, largely from grumpy old gamers like myself who just like sounding grizzly and battle-hardened. But it's largely untrue. Games today are plenty hard. Even something as mind numbing and broadly appealing as Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 can be hard. Turn the difficulty all the way up and watch how quickly you get killed for peeking out of cover at the wrong second. I can assure you that Doom was never nearly so punishing.
However, the reason Doom is a much better game (despite being almost 20 years older) is that it actively engages the mind of the player by requiring them to observe and comprehend many more nuances in order to succeed, regardless of how good of a shot you are. You tote around up to 7 different weapons, some of which share a common ammo pool, some of which don't. They all have quirks that make them well suited to different types of engagements and even specific enemy types. Each member of the game's varied bestiary exhibits different behaviors and when faced with a mixed group, you need to assess the relative threat levels of each and decide which ones to take out in what order, and how. You need to factor ammo levels for each weapon into your strategy too, conserving the rarest and most valuable ammo for emergencies or specific kinds of scenarios.
Simply put, modern shooters don't ask you to think like this. Sure, there are different guns. But all of them kill 95% of the fodder sent after you efficiently. It doesn't matter if it's a shotgun, an uzi, an AR or an SMG, if you put the cursor over the bad guy and pull the trigger, he dies. Ammo? May as well be unlimited. Each one of the endless number of corpses you walk over has ammo for you. Don't misunderstand, the games can be PLENTY challenging due to how quickly you can be killed and how good your aim needs to be, but they never make you think and they only seldom call on you to make tactical decisions, no matter how far to the right you push that difficulty slider.
This is a point I have a particularly tough time making to people when trying to explain why most forms of "casual" gaming don't appeal to me. The popular notion is that old timers like myself find this tidal wave of new players threatening, and that we write off super accessible games as some sort of a response to having our identity as "gamers" challenged. I'm willing to concede that there's a bit of that in there for some of us, but it's far from the whole picture. The real issue is that as layers of nuance get removed or marginalized in importance, games require less thought and strategy to play. While that's great for people who are just getting started, it translates into a lot less fun for people who have enjoyed ever escalating levels of sophistication for over two decades.
When Obsidian included a special "Hardcore" mode in Fallout: New Vegas in 2010, they showed that they "get it", and now Irrational joins their ranks in that regard. Ken Levine's studio has a lot of clout in this business and Bioshock Infinite is poised to be one of the years biggest titles. Hopefully "1999 Mode" will bring the right sort of challenge to the table and send a clear message to other developers: Veteran gamers don't want to die more, we want to THINK more, and developers who go the extra mile to cater to us will be rewarded with our dollars and our loyalty.
Friday, January 20, 2012
Monday, January 16, 2012
Optional Reality
As a grown man who has had a brief opportunity to run a business, the necessary evils required to be successful within a capitalist system are not lost on me. In order to truly prosper in such a jungle, one must be capable of not only revising some of their morals, but of bending their very perception of reality at times. Angry customers are really just "passionate about your product". Employees who know and exercise their rights under labor laws are "disengaged", and so forth. I get it. It's an ugly world out there, and there are infinity ways for the void to swallow you and your business up, which means you have to be willing to play a little ball in order to keep your head above water.
Someone needs to let Electronic Arts, and Taiwan based electronics manufacturer, Foxconn know that reality can only be bent so far.
Today, in a move that should surprise approximately NOBODY, Bioware, the formerly proud, independent studio turned EA sock puppet, announced that the PC version of their upcoming blockbuster-to-be, Mass Effect 3 would require EA's digital distribution platform, Origin in order to be played - regardless of whether it was purchased digitally or from a brick and mortar outfit. Despite the fact that Origin is a complete disaster of a service, this isn't the part that truly angers me.
No, the part that really gets my goat is Bioware towing the proverbial line for EA, claiming that Steam, the industry leading digital distribution service run by Valve, imposes Terms of Service (ToS) that are simply too obtrusive for them to be bothered with. This should be insulting to any video game fan with something grey and squishy between their ears. Not only is their statement a near word for word regurgitation of a statement EA made to defend their now famous snubbing of Steam during the release of Battlefield 3 last year, it also reeks of an incomprehensible disconnect from reality.
While EA has been quick to support other digital distribution services that they feel confident they can out-muscle, such as Impulse or Direct2Drive, the one they have chosen to exclude from their major releases for the better part of the last year is the only one with the user base to stand up to them. While I expect no less from a company that habitually buys it's way out of having to compete, it's astounding to me that they actually expect us to buy their ruse.
Publishers and developers in this industry don't exactly have muzzles on them when it comes to what they think about their business partnerships. For instance, it's common knowledge that Xbox Live can be a painful service to deal with, featuring regulations on everything from pricing to certification. So one would think that if Valve's service was as much of a hindrance to "directly supporting the players" as EA has repeatedly stated, someone (besides Valve's most well funded and devious competitor in digital distribution) might have said something. So far the only complaints are coming from the one company who stands to gain by making them.
For once, it isn't the corporate greed that's killing me here, it really isn't. If EA just came out themselves and said, "we have a competing product and it doesn't make sense for us to bolster our competitor's product with our software" I could entirely swallow that. It would still be an utterly moronic, short-sighted decision, but at least I wouldn't feel like EA was asking me to wear a baseball cap with a propeller on it while standing in the corner. But in this "no reality" zone EA exists in, hiding behind one of their wholly owned dev studios will TOTALLY throw us off the trail. I can see John Riccitiello giving the order, "Have the Bioware guys say it, nerds LIKE them. Don't they make all those games with the lightsabers and the dragon-elf-dwarf-whoosits?"
On a sadder note, some of you may have seen a story on the net over the past week about an electronics manufacturing plant in Wuhan, China, owned by Taiwanese manufacturing giant, Foxconn. Destructoid covered it in detail last week but the basics are as such: a large group of employees at this plant in Wuhan had been refused a pay raise and were given the option to either quit with compensation or continue working. 300 of them decided to leave, but were then refused the compensation promised, at which point they convened on the roof of the plant and threatened mass suicide. Thankfully, with the intervention of the town's Mayor, the crisis was averted.
It was a detail I found in 2 different articles covering the story that made it frightfully relevant to the post you are reading now.
Apparently, back in 2010, Foxconn experienced a rash of suicides. 14 men and women threw themselves from the top of their respective manufacturing plants and perished. One top ranking Foxconn employee was quoted as saying, "No matter how hard we try, such things will continue to happen." In that spirit, the company proceeded to put safety nets around the outside of all their manufacturing plants to prevent employees from voluntarily plummeting to their demise.
I would like to believe that I don't have to point out how shocking of a disconnect from reality that represents. But for those who are high ranking officers of a multi-national corporation, or are otherwise afflicted with some form of mental illness, I'll play through. At some point, in some cavernous conference room on the top floor of some corporate HQ in the sky, a VP of Foxconn raised his hand and said, "Excuse me sir, but I'm afraid that 14 of our employees felt so entrapped and undervalued that they committed suicide by jumping off the tops of some of our manufacturing plants." Then, some shriveled up prune of a man, probably wearing a robe of black sack-cloth, pondered for a moment, slowly sucked in what little air his decrepit lungs could hold and wheezed back, "Well, I guess we should put up some nets, so they can't do that any longer." Then a bunch of people, ACTUAL HUMAN BEINGS, all looked at one another and nodded in agreement.
I guess severing your link to tangible, human reality is just the cost of entry if you wish to manufacture products for Apple, Microsoft and Sony. Success is apparently a rare strain of insanity.
Someone needs to let Electronic Arts, and Taiwan based electronics manufacturer, Foxconn know that reality can only be bent so far.
Today, in a move that should surprise approximately NOBODY, Bioware, the formerly proud, independent studio turned EA sock puppet, announced that the PC version of their upcoming blockbuster-to-be, Mass Effect 3 would require EA's digital distribution platform, Origin in order to be played - regardless of whether it was purchased digitally or from a brick and mortar outfit. Despite the fact that Origin is a complete disaster of a service, this isn't the part that truly angers me.
No, the part that really gets my goat is Bioware towing the proverbial line for EA, claiming that Steam, the industry leading digital distribution service run by Valve, imposes Terms of Service (ToS) that are simply too obtrusive for them to be bothered with. This should be insulting to any video game fan with something grey and squishy between their ears. Not only is their statement a near word for word regurgitation of a statement EA made to defend their now famous snubbing of Steam during the release of Battlefield 3 last year, it also reeks of an incomprehensible disconnect from reality.
While EA has been quick to support other digital distribution services that they feel confident they can out-muscle, such as Impulse or Direct2Drive, the one they have chosen to exclude from their major releases for the better part of the last year is the only one with the user base to stand up to them. While I expect no less from a company that habitually buys it's way out of having to compete, it's astounding to me that they actually expect us to buy their ruse.
Publishers and developers in this industry don't exactly have muzzles on them when it comes to what they think about their business partnerships. For instance, it's common knowledge that Xbox Live can be a painful service to deal with, featuring regulations on everything from pricing to certification. So one would think that if Valve's service was as much of a hindrance to "directly supporting the players" as EA has repeatedly stated, someone (besides Valve's most well funded and devious competitor in digital distribution) might have said something. So far the only complaints are coming from the one company who stands to gain by making them.
For once, it isn't the corporate greed that's killing me here, it really isn't. If EA just came out themselves and said, "we have a competing product and it doesn't make sense for us to bolster our competitor's product with our software" I could entirely swallow that. It would still be an utterly moronic, short-sighted decision, but at least I wouldn't feel like EA was asking me to wear a baseball cap with a propeller on it while standing in the corner. But in this "no reality" zone EA exists in, hiding behind one of their wholly owned dev studios will TOTALLY throw us off the trail. I can see John Riccitiello giving the order, "Have the Bioware guys say it, nerds LIKE them. Don't they make all those games with the lightsabers and the dragon-elf-dwarf-whoosits?"
On a sadder note, some of you may have seen a story on the net over the past week about an electronics manufacturing plant in Wuhan, China, owned by Taiwanese manufacturing giant, Foxconn. Destructoid covered it in detail last week but the basics are as such: a large group of employees at this plant in Wuhan had been refused a pay raise and were given the option to either quit with compensation or continue working. 300 of them decided to leave, but were then refused the compensation promised, at which point they convened on the roof of the plant and threatened mass suicide. Thankfully, with the intervention of the town's Mayor, the crisis was averted.
It was a detail I found in 2 different articles covering the story that made it frightfully relevant to the post you are reading now.
Apparently, back in 2010, Foxconn experienced a rash of suicides. 14 men and women threw themselves from the top of their respective manufacturing plants and perished. One top ranking Foxconn employee was quoted as saying, "No matter how hard we try, such things will continue to happen." In that spirit, the company proceeded to put safety nets around the outside of all their manufacturing plants to prevent employees from voluntarily plummeting to their demise.
I would like to believe that I don't have to point out how shocking of a disconnect from reality that represents. But for those who are high ranking officers of a multi-national corporation, or are otherwise afflicted with some form of mental illness, I'll play through. At some point, in some cavernous conference room on the top floor of some corporate HQ in the sky, a VP of Foxconn raised his hand and said, "Excuse me sir, but I'm afraid that 14 of our employees felt so entrapped and undervalued that they committed suicide by jumping off the tops of some of our manufacturing plants." Then, some shriveled up prune of a man, probably wearing a robe of black sack-cloth, pondered for a moment, slowly sucked in what little air his decrepit lungs could hold and wheezed back, "Well, I guess we should put up some nets, so they can't do that any longer." Then a bunch of people, ACTUAL HUMAN BEINGS, all looked at one another and nodded in agreement.
I guess severing your link to tangible, human reality is just the cost of entry if you wish to manufacture products for Apple, Microsoft and Sony. Success is apparently a rare strain of insanity.
Sunday, September 11, 2011
What's So "Maybe" About Catherine?
Before I get started, let me bring those of you who are unfamiliar with the game Catherine up to speed. Feel free to skip the following paragraph if you're already hip to the game.
Released in North America this past July, Catherine is the story of an embattled 32 year old man named Vincent. Like many men his age, Vincent is in something of a rhythm. He has a decent, if not high level or glamorous job. He has his own place and he has a long standing relationship with a woman named Katherine. She is thinking about marriage. Though he cares deeply for her, he isn't. The arrival of Catherine, a sweet, care free, built-for-pleasure blond complicates things when she seduces Vincent, unaware of his relationship with Katherine. Through a series of block puzzles and conversation trees, the player guides Vincent through the frightening, guilt-laden emotional minefield of sex, infidelity, love and commitment.
So with that said.....
One of the things that makes the concept behind Catherine so compelling to me is that I love art as discussion. Whether it's a game or a film or a book, I love stories that are essentially crystallized discussions about a part of the human condition. Those that know me personally know that love, commitment and fidelity rate high on my list of essential human concepts. Factor in my passion for games (particularly those of the quirky, Japanese variety) and Catherine should have all my synapses firing. But through 4 chapters, something is really bugging me.
Just an FYI there are NO SPOILERS ahead.
I think we can all agree that the best pieces of contemplative art pose questions without agenda and avoid giving the audience the feeling that there is a "correct" answer. While great works have been created that are not so impartial, and are no less great for being so, they constitute a "statement" as opposed to a discussion.
Catherine most definitely postures itself as a discussion. If it were a simple statement about love and fidelity it would task the player with escaping one of the women or definitively trying to earn the "right" woman's affection. Instead, the game gives you a choice about who to end up with and no, it's not a Fable style "bright 'n' shiny" or "dark 'n' spiky" kind of binary choice.
There are four endings for both women, varying from not-so-good to "perfect" depending upon the decisions you make in the game. After certain key choices, the game even presents the player with a pie chart showing a percentage of what players chose their first time through. All of this serves to make the player feel as if the game is a sort of interactive, impartial discussion about love, marriage and fidelity.
The problem is that the facade of impartiality breaks right down with the character of Katherine, Vincent's long time girlfriend and would be fiance. She is, in my opinion, an insufferable type of human being. It's as if the creators polled unhappily married middle-aged men, asked them what they hate most about their wives and used that as a metric when creating Katherine.
Every negative stereo-type associated with "the woman who just wants to tie you down" is made manifest by her. She is cold, subversive and has a knack for passive-aggressively deriding every little thing Vincent does. From his laundry habits, to his social schedule and even his commitment to work overtime when needed, there doesn't seem to be anything about Vincent that she actually likes. She seems to have only two motivations for opening her mouth and those are chiding him for some inane little thing, or not-so-subtly advancing her agenda of marriage and children. In 4 chapters, I can't recall a single warm, kind or loving thing she had to say.
Before going any further, let me share a little bit about where I am coming from, since it may appear to those of you who played the game that I am reacting to the character in such a way because I have had bad experiences with women or am possessed of a fear to commit.
Hi! My name is Vincent and I am 32 years old and recently divorced. That's correct! I share the protagonists age and name! Before you point to the "divorced" bit let me break that down for you. Similarly to Catherine's Vincent, I met my wife in school, we went our ways after, and eventually we reconnected. My now ex-wife was, and IS, a wonderful person and a great friend. We certainly had our problems, but her secretly hating me, as Katherine seems to feel about Vincent, was not one of them. She loved me precisely FOR what I was, not in spite of it.
Despite our issues, and the eventual ending of our union, I would recommend marriage to anyone. If love is a driving force in your life, like it has always been in mine, there isn't a better decision you could make in my opinion. And as an Atheist, I come to that without any sort of religious motivation. Seriously, marriage rocks!
Vincent, or any real-world man who doesn't hate himself would be patently stupid to marry Katherine. Women like her are the reason so many men see marriage as "the end of their life".
Perhaps I am being a bit harsh, but after 4 chapters of trying to be open minded, this is how I felt about the character. I have met plenty of folks, male and female, who don't agree. If I'm being honest though, I've spoken to more women who agree than men. Take that as you will.
Going into the game, I was positive that in my first play through I would patently ignore Catherine and marry my long time girlfriend. Sadly, the game doesn't make that entirely possible, as you have no choice about whether or not Vincent cheats on Katherine with Catherine. He just does (another quibble I have). But after seeing what Katherine was actually like, I still felt that Vincent's infidelity was inexcusable (as infidelity ALWAYS is) but I also felt like I understood where it came from.
And this is the exact point at which the "discussion" breaks down. If the player feels in any way that Catherine is some kind of respite from Katherine, it's not a discussion about marriage vs freedom any longer. I really applaud the creators presenting a more realistic, grey shade picture of infidelity than is typically portrayed in the popular arts, really I do. But in this context it has the side effect of opening the door for us to see Catherine as a hero figure, saving Vincent from a terrible life of being nagged to death by someone who doesn't truly understand or love him.
And boy is it a feat to make ME of all people feel that. I mean, if I met a girl who looked like Catherine in real life, I would say she had "3 miles of bad road" written all over her. On the surface, she's the kind of apex predator that a man normally stays far away from if he wants an actually rewarding relationship. But not only does the game paint her as sweet and gentle as can be, they made her competition a buttoned-up shrew of a woman. Nothing like making the decision for the player!
But I am still early in the game, so I suppose there is still time for Katherine to prove to me that she wants to marry me because she loves me so much rather than because she is getting tired of her mother nagging her about it. While initially I was intrigued that the game could make me even consider Catherine, I realized quickly that they only achieved it by making me hate Katherine. While the game as a whole is made from more sophisticated stuff than most, that very vital element is kind of a cheap parlor trick by the standards of other artistic mediums.
A good piece of contemplative art relies on the presence of a "maybe". Maybe A or Maybe B? Do I sacrifice my life and the lives of people I love to save an entire planet, or do I protect myself and those I love at incalculable human cost? Cliche as that for instance may be in the game world, at least I can see the "maybe" in it. But what's so "maybe" about Catherine?
Released in North America this past July, Catherine is the story of an embattled 32 year old man named Vincent. Like many men his age, Vincent is in something of a rhythm. He has a decent, if not high level or glamorous job. He has his own place and he has a long standing relationship with a woman named Katherine. She is thinking about marriage. Though he cares deeply for her, he isn't. The arrival of Catherine, a sweet, care free, built-for-pleasure blond complicates things when she seduces Vincent, unaware of his relationship with Katherine. Through a series of block puzzles and conversation trees, the player guides Vincent through the frightening, guilt-laden emotional minefield of sex, infidelity, love and commitment.
So with that said.....
One of the things that makes the concept behind Catherine so compelling to me is that I love art as discussion. Whether it's a game or a film or a book, I love stories that are essentially crystallized discussions about a part of the human condition. Those that know me personally know that love, commitment and fidelity rate high on my list of essential human concepts. Factor in my passion for games (particularly those of the quirky, Japanese variety) and Catherine should have all my synapses firing. But through 4 chapters, something is really bugging me.
Just an FYI there are NO SPOILERS ahead.
I think we can all agree that the best pieces of contemplative art pose questions without agenda and avoid giving the audience the feeling that there is a "correct" answer. While great works have been created that are not so impartial, and are no less great for being so, they constitute a "statement" as opposed to a discussion.
Catherine most definitely postures itself as a discussion. If it were a simple statement about love and fidelity it would task the player with escaping one of the women or definitively trying to earn the "right" woman's affection. Instead, the game gives you a choice about who to end up with and no, it's not a Fable style "bright 'n' shiny" or "dark 'n' spiky" kind of binary choice.
There are four endings for both women, varying from not-so-good to "perfect" depending upon the decisions you make in the game. After certain key choices, the game even presents the player with a pie chart showing a percentage of what players chose their first time through. All of this serves to make the player feel as if the game is a sort of interactive, impartial discussion about love, marriage and fidelity.
The problem is that the facade of impartiality breaks right down with the character of Katherine, Vincent's long time girlfriend and would be fiance. She is, in my opinion, an insufferable type of human being. It's as if the creators polled unhappily married middle-aged men, asked them what they hate most about their wives and used that as a metric when creating Katherine.
Every negative stereo-type associated with "the woman who just wants to tie you down" is made manifest by her. She is cold, subversive and has a knack for passive-aggressively deriding every little thing Vincent does. From his laundry habits, to his social schedule and even his commitment to work overtime when needed, there doesn't seem to be anything about Vincent that she actually likes. She seems to have only two motivations for opening her mouth and those are chiding him for some inane little thing, or not-so-subtly advancing her agenda of marriage and children. In 4 chapters, I can't recall a single warm, kind or loving thing she had to say.
Before going any further, let me share a little bit about where I am coming from, since it may appear to those of you who played the game that I am reacting to the character in such a way because I have had bad experiences with women or am possessed of a fear to commit.
Hi! My name is Vincent and I am 32 years old and recently divorced. That's correct! I share the protagonists age and name! Before you point to the "divorced" bit let me break that down for you. Similarly to Catherine's Vincent, I met my wife in school, we went our ways after, and eventually we reconnected. My now ex-wife was, and IS, a wonderful person and a great friend. We certainly had our problems, but her secretly hating me, as Katherine seems to feel about Vincent, was not one of them. She loved me precisely FOR what I was, not in spite of it.
Despite our issues, and the eventual ending of our union, I would recommend marriage to anyone. If love is a driving force in your life, like it has always been in mine, there isn't a better decision you could make in my opinion. And as an Atheist, I come to that without any sort of religious motivation. Seriously, marriage rocks!
Vincent, or any real-world man who doesn't hate himself would be patently stupid to marry Katherine. Women like her are the reason so many men see marriage as "the end of their life".
Perhaps I am being a bit harsh, but after 4 chapters of trying to be open minded, this is how I felt about the character. I have met plenty of folks, male and female, who don't agree. If I'm being honest though, I've spoken to more women who agree than men. Take that as you will.
Going into the game, I was positive that in my first play through I would patently ignore Catherine and marry my long time girlfriend. Sadly, the game doesn't make that entirely possible, as you have no choice about whether or not Vincent cheats on Katherine with Catherine. He just does (another quibble I have). But after seeing what Katherine was actually like, I still felt that Vincent's infidelity was inexcusable (as infidelity ALWAYS is) but I also felt like I understood where it came from.
And this is the exact point at which the "discussion" breaks down. If the player feels in any way that Catherine is some kind of respite from Katherine, it's not a discussion about marriage vs freedom any longer. I really applaud the creators presenting a more realistic, grey shade picture of infidelity than is typically portrayed in the popular arts, really I do. But in this context it has the side effect of opening the door for us to see Catherine as a hero figure, saving Vincent from a terrible life of being nagged to death by someone who doesn't truly understand or love him.
And boy is it a feat to make ME of all people feel that. I mean, if I met a girl who looked like Catherine in real life, I would say she had "3 miles of bad road" written all over her. On the surface, she's the kind of apex predator that a man normally stays far away from if he wants an actually rewarding relationship. But not only does the game paint her as sweet and gentle as can be, they made her competition a buttoned-up shrew of a woman. Nothing like making the decision for the player!
But I am still early in the game, so I suppose there is still time for Katherine to prove to me that she wants to marry me because she loves me so much rather than because she is getting tired of her mother nagging her about it. While initially I was intrigued that the game could make me even consider Catherine, I realized quickly that they only achieved it by making me hate Katherine. While the game as a whole is made from more sophisticated stuff than most, that very vital element is kind of a cheap parlor trick by the standards of other artistic mediums.
A good piece of contemplative art relies on the presence of a "maybe". Maybe A or Maybe B? Do I sacrifice my life and the lives of people I love to save an entire planet, or do I protect myself and those I love at incalculable human cost? Cliche as that for instance may be in the game world, at least I can see the "maybe" in it. But what's so "maybe" about Catherine?
Tuesday, August 23, 2011
Where Have All the Hammerdins Gone?
I have decided to take a small break from recounting my recent road trip across the country. I plan on getting back to it very shortly but right now I have something else fluttering about my mind and I don't think it will go away until I give it a voice.
The tune that has been incessantly blaring in my head of late is the slow death that the traditional RPG is dying today. WAIT! BEFORE YOU WALK AWAY LET ME ASSURE YOU THIS WILL NOT BE AN ELITIST RANT ON WHY HAND HOLDING SUCKS AND HOW MUCH I HATE PEOPLE! I SWEAR! HONEST!
Ok, now that a few of you sat back down, allow me to make some things clear about exactly what I mean when I say that the traditional RPG is dying a slow death. The key piece here is in how I define the term "traditional", as that is not a terribly specific, pre-defined industry term.
What is "Traditional"?
First off, I can tell you what I do not mean by the term "traditional". It is not a synonym for JRPG, single player RPG or fantasy RPG. Many games that could be described in these ways do not qualify, in the definition I will furnish, as a "traditional" RPG, though some do. I don't want anyone reading this and thinking I am about to evangelize the golden age Square JRPG's of the SNES era and claim that everything since has been bunk (but geez were they GREAT!) If anything, Square has been instrumental in poisoning the well.
Within the context of this article, "traditional" really means "adhering to the core gameplay philosophies of the genre". While I couldbore dazzle you all with a detailed breakdown of said philosophies, I will instead summarize these ideas into one easy to understand one. The traditional RPG experience is about the systems of chance, experimentation, choice and consequence present in the game that the player interacts with in order to develop their character. It is the presence of these systems that typify "traditional" RPG gameplay. They need not be the entire sum of the gameplay, but they do need to be present and pervasive.
There was a time when every game within the RPG genre made these mechanics central. RPG's in the 80's and most of the 90's were judged largely upon two things. One was the quality of the narrative. The other was the depth, challenge, diversity and balance of the games' system for customizing and progressively empowering your character(s) over the course of your quest.
The idea here was pretty simple but compellingly unique: instead of dictating the capabilities of the hero from the start and having them remain static, let the player decide what the hero looks like, what they are good and bad at, what type of weapons and equipment they use and what kinds of amazing powers they will wield. Then give them some rules and a framework to work within, as well as a wide variety of challenges and obstacles and then let them figure it out.
The end result was an experience that rewarded creativity, planning, problem solving, resource management and out of the box thinking. Learning and mastering these systems and investing time and effort into a successful character capable of carving a unique path to the end of the game was a truly challenging and rewarding experience.
Things Take a Turn.....
I'm not really sure when or why these changes started to occur, but they did. Little by little, these systems have been made less and less sophisticated. RPG's today offer fewer choices, less depth and less player input in crafting their character than they ever have. Discerning the genesis of this shift is best left for message board flame wars. What I find more interesting, and more threatening, is that it happened right under the noses of the stalwart RPG faithful and seemingly with our consent. As a result, the few RPG developers with enough resources to produce a AAA product have decided that they no longer care to "make 'em like they used to". And the sad truth of it is: we deserve it because we just keep giving them our damn money.
I could fill a book with examples from the past 10 years, but I don't need to. For a perfect example of the good and bad of this phenomenon, one needs look no further than the progression of gameplay systems in the popular Blizzard property, Diablo.
Case in Point
WARNING - the following paragraphs may contain acronym-alicious terminology, math and/or multifarious other forms of nerdery. I will try to keep it readable for all, but you have been warned.
When Blizzard released Diablo 2 in 2000, it was a watershed moment for action RPG fans. The game expanded upon its predecessor in every imaginable way, setting new standards for replayability, combat, itemization and character building in the Action RPG (ARPG) genre. With it's clever mix of fast paced, visceral combat and cavernously deep character planning and customizing, Diablo 2 (D2) and it's subsequent expansion, Lord of Destruction, became enduring classics. 11 years later, people are still playing them while while eagerly awaiting the release of Diablo 3.
We stand now, days from the beginning of the closed beta test for Diablo 3 (D3). The development process has been quite a bit different from that of D2. Actually, that may not be entirely true. The process may be quite similar, but the way in which the fans experience the development process has changed radically. We have twitter feeds to follow, developer interviews to watch and tons of message boards to exchange info and insults on. Sure, we had the Internet back then but that was Web 1.0. Now we have Web 2.0 socially-connected-everythingness! Dev teams and fan sites have near constant contact and the result is a front row seat to major design decisions as they happen. Sometimes this is awesome for both the fans and the developers. And sometimes it isn't.....
There's no need to draw this out, the development team on D3, headed by the always quotable Jay Wilson, has made some very controversial decisions in the past few months and with each one, Mr. Wilson has done his best to explain why these crazy calls (each crazier than the last) are going to make D3 a better game. In another era, we wouldn't even be hearing about internal play testing and design decisions, but in this one, we can do a Google search and find 20 minute long interviews with the project lead discussing his thought process. Here are some of the monumental changes that Jay and his many supporters in the player base feel will evolve the Diablo franchise:
-Players will no longer be allowed to distribute their character's attribute points (strength, intelligence, et al). These will now be distributed by the game automatically.
-Players will no longer detail a specialization for their character on a skill tree. As you level, all skills will become available to you.
-Players will no longer assign differing numbers of skill points to different skills to decide how relatively powerful each of their skills are. All skills will level in a uniform manner as the player character does.
-Players will no longer decide upon a set of skills and stick with them. Instead the player may choose 6 skills to hot key and switch these out freely whenever they choose.
-An in-game, player-to-player auction house will be established where, for the first time legally, players will be able to use real world currency to purchase gear and items if they do not wish to take time to earn or find during normal gameplay.
If you know the first thing about RPG's, you are, at this moment, scratching your head. Unless your idea of an RPG is Final Fantasy XIII. In that case, you can probably stop reading about now.
You read correctly. Blizzard has entirely automated the lion's share of character development and differentiation (one of the cores of RPG gameplay) for their decade-in-the-making sequel to the most successful ARPG of all time.
Let's hear it for progress?
The Aftermath
The first thing you need to understand is that these decisions were not made and announced all at once. They were made gradually and trickled into the drip-drop information i.v. that the hardcore fiends keep themselves tapped into from dusk 'till dawn. This was certainly a good thing for Blizzard because each of these announcements incited mini-riots on fan sites all over the web once they were brought to light. But as many times as that happened, Jay Wilson stepped up to defend and explain his team's decision.
To his credit, Jay Wilson seems like the kind of guy I would have a beer and a game of Dominion with. He really looks and talks just a like a complete RPG nerd, and I mean that in an entirely complimentary way. Normally, that is exactly the kind of dude I would want designing my next RPG or D&D campaign. But despite the good will, I initially had trouble getting behind the spin he was putting on these decisions.
Essentially, the "Jay Wilson Defense" goes something like this: "Over the decade of people playing Diablo 2 it became clear that system "X" was broken or frustrating for the player. We tried to fix it for Diablo 3. After many iterations and redesigns we did extensive internal testing, during which we just couldn't find a solution we were happy with. Therefore, we decided to remove system "X" from the game entirely. We think the result is a better game."
Now, admittedly, what Jay says about D2 is true, but if you ask Jay how the player will influence the strengths and weaknesses of their character in light of all these changes, he will quickly remind you of the different gear and items you can equip.....the gear and items you could already equip before the removal of all these other methods of customization. So we are being told that the only remaining method of customization is suddenly a viable stand in for the all the methods of customization it used to work in tandem with? Hmmmmm.
When challenge them about how these changes may limit the amount of control the player has on how their character develops, Jay or his message board supporters respond by championing how free and nonrestrictive the new system is and that you can do anything with your character now. Meanwhile I'm thinking, "Yeah, everything except, you know, change their attributes, decide which skills they have access to at what point in the game and which skills are their strongest ones.
I try not to be a cynic but it has been hard to stave off the feeling that Jay and company are trying to sell me a car without the engine while calling it the next big thing. Common sense tells us that no sensible automobile enthusiast would swallow that line, but one trip to the official Diablo 3 community site says otherwise.
Believe it or not, the same people who mapped out character builds down to the last skill point for over a decade in Diablo 2 are mostly overjoyed about these changes. According to them, planning out a character build is "tedious". They find having to stick with their character decisions "punishing". They won't even debate with you whether or not the few character choices that remain have long term consequences. They flat out concede that they don't and they love it. That bears repeating:
There are no long term consequences to any of the decisions you make in developing your character in this Role Playing Game and the players think that's awesome.
Apparently, everything I know is wrong.
So Now What?
Diablo 3 is only the most recent example of how developers are removing/ommiting large chunks of character building and other core gameplay elements from their RPG's. The Mass Effect series, Dragon Age 2 and Final Fantasy XIII are also part of the new "less is more" school of RPG design. There have even been talks of the ever-hardcore Elder Scrolls series getting streamlined for the fifth game in the series, Skyrim, which hits stores this November. The easy conclusion to draw would be that companies have decided to dumb down their products in exchange for the opportunity to to sell to the masses. But as averse as I am to this growing trend of "streamlining", I think evil CEO's and shareholders are just convenient scapegoats, not the real issue.
The real issue is that RPG gameplay conventions suck.
Ok, let me rephrase. The execution and implementation of traditional RPG gameplay elements has not improved in any significant way during the last 2 decades. If you go back and look at many of the great traditional RPG's and ARPG's made in the last 20 years I am sure you can find a gameplay element in each that was either imbalanced or not fun. Maybe it was equipment management, currency, character building or the exploration of dungeons/towns, etc.
Without mentioning exact games, I can say that I have made equipment choices that had next to no bearing on the outcome of combat and I have wandered around boring, generic villages for hours exchanging pleasantries with retired fishermen and belly dancers alike, until I finally find the one person who I need to speak with to trigger the next event. I have often spent more time in menu screens contemplating character skill decisions than I have actually using those skills, only to have those choices be nearly inconsequential to my party's success. If I could convert all the gil/munny/G/rupees I have pointlessly stockpiled by the end of all the RPG's I have played into dollars, I would make Warren Buffett look like Antoine Dodson (pre-Bed Intruder).
But was any of that fun? Well of course it was.....to ME! I'm a crotchety old RPG player who hates myself! But as it turns out, most people don't hate themselves nearly enough to pay $60 for 30-100 hours of self-induced torture. Go figure. And here I thought masochism was "in" this season!
It isn't to say that traditional RPG gameplay is inherently bad. Quite the contrary actually, at least in my opinion. The problem is that it hasn't gotten any better since MC Hammer. No one has been trying to figure out how to make exploring a town as engaging as fighting a dragon. No one stepped in after Final Fantasy VII and said, "Hey, maybe letting players turn all their characters into gods who can cast/do anything isn't as cool as it seemed on paper." No concerted effort has been made to make in-game currency have value to the player. As a result, these gameplay elements have festered over the years, becoming the very things players hate about RPG's rather than the reason to play them.
Average Joe gamers, and even hardcore RPG gamers are kind of over dealing with broken systems and they have dealt with so many that very few them have the desire to sink countless hours into another one only to find out its as broken, imbalanced and inconsequential as all the ones before it. Which brings me full circle to Diablo 3.
People have had 11 years of practice for Diablo 3. If Blizzard were to release a game with systems anything like Diablo 2's or its many clones, and it wasn't both revolutionary and flawless, players would have the system's loopholes figured out inside of a week. With the character development decisions trivialized, the game would devolve into yet another workman-like slog through RPG tedium. Fully aware of this possibility, the team chose, as so many other dev teams have, to stop trying to fix the "Old Yeller" that RPG character creation has become and just put it out of its misery. They decided to sacrifice many of my favorite RPG elements upon the altar of fun. While it's difficult for me to admit it, I think it's for the better.
That said, in my ideal world, developers would have been searching for ways to truly improve and tighten these gameplay elements all along, so that this eventuality could have been avoided. Truthfully, they weren't given much of an incentive. After all, we did keep forking over our money. We kept buying the same games, with the same flaws. Then a game like Mass Effect comes along and says, "to hell with these antiquated battle systems and let's make this a shooter/RPG!" and the crowd goes wild. Is it a "traditional" RPG? Heck if I know, but it's a damn great game. Who knew?
I think Diablo 3 will be a great game too. For better or worse, it won't be a thing like Diablo 2, or even its spiritual successors, Torchlight and Titan Quest. In the end, Jay Wilson isn't trying to sell us a car with no engine so much as he's selling us a Dodge Viper with an automatic transmission and launch assist. While I still hope someone out there can figure out how to bring the tried and true RPG elements of yesteryear into the 21st century without marginalizing them, for now I'm more than happy to settle for just having fun.
Death to the Hammerdin! Long live fun!
The tune that has been incessantly blaring in my head of late is the slow death that the traditional RPG is dying today. WAIT! BEFORE YOU WALK AWAY LET ME ASSURE YOU THIS WILL NOT BE AN ELITIST RANT ON WHY HAND HOLDING SUCKS AND HOW MUCH I HATE PEOPLE! I SWEAR! HONEST!
Ok, now that a few of you sat back down, allow me to make some things clear about exactly what I mean when I say that the traditional RPG is dying a slow death. The key piece here is in how I define the term "traditional", as that is not a terribly specific, pre-defined industry term.
What is "Traditional"?
First off, I can tell you what I do not mean by the term "traditional". It is not a synonym for JRPG, single player RPG or fantasy RPG. Many games that could be described in these ways do not qualify, in the definition I will furnish, as a "traditional" RPG, though some do. I don't want anyone reading this and thinking I am about to evangelize the golden age Square JRPG's of the SNES era and claim that everything since has been bunk (but geez were they GREAT!) If anything, Square has been instrumental in poisoning the well.
Within the context of this article, "traditional" really means "adhering to the core gameplay philosophies of the genre". While I could
There was a time when every game within the RPG genre made these mechanics central. RPG's in the 80's and most of the 90's were judged largely upon two things. One was the quality of the narrative. The other was the depth, challenge, diversity and balance of the games' system for customizing and progressively empowering your character(s) over the course of your quest.
The idea here was pretty simple but compellingly unique: instead of dictating the capabilities of the hero from the start and having them remain static, let the player decide what the hero looks like, what they are good and bad at, what type of weapons and equipment they use and what kinds of amazing powers they will wield. Then give them some rules and a framework to work within, as well as a wide variety of challenges and obstacles and then let them figure it out.
The end result was an experience that rewarded creativity, planning, problem solving, resource management and out of the box thinking. Learning and mastering these systems and investing time and effort into a successful character capable of carving a unique path to the end of the game was a truly challenging and rewarding experience.
Things Take a Turn.....
I'm not really sure when or why these changes started to occur, but they did. Little by little, these systems have been made less and less sophisticated. RPG's today offer fewer choices, less depth and less player input in crafting their character than they ever have. Discerning the genesis of this shift is best left for message board flame wars. What I find more interesting, and more threatening, is that it happened right under the noses of the stalwart RPG faithful and seemingly with our consent. As a result, the few RPG developers with enough resources to produce a AAA product have decided that they no longer care to "make 'em like they used to". And the sad truth of it is: we deserve it because we just keep giving them our damn money.
I could fill a book with examples from the past 10 years, but I don't need to. For a perfect example of the good and bad of this phenomenon, one needs look no further than the progression of gameplay systems in the popular Blizzard property, Diablo.
Case in Point
WARNING - the following paragraphs may contain acronym-alicious terminology, math and/or multifarious other forms of nerdery. I will try to keep it readable for all, but you have been warned.
When Blizzard released Diablo 2 in 2000, it was a watershed moment for action RPG fans. The game expanded upon its predecessor in every imaginable way, setting new standards for replayability, combat, itemization and character building in the Action RPG (ARPG) genre. With it's clever mix of fast paced, visceral combat and cavernously deep character planning and customizing, Diablo 2 (D2) and it's subsequent expansion, Lord of Destruction, became enduring classics. 11 years later, people are still playing them while while eagerly awaiting the release of Diablo 3.
We stand now, days from the beginning of the closed beta test for Diablo 3 (D3). The development process has been quite a bit different from that of D2. Actually, that may not be entirely true. The process may be quite similar, but the way in which the fans experience the development process has changed radically. We have twitter feeds to follow, developer interviews to watch and tons of message boards to exchange info and insults on. Sure, we had the Internet back then but that was Web 1.0. Now we have Web 2.0 socially-connected-everythingness! Dev teams and fan sites have near constant contact and the result is a front row seat to major design decisions as they happen. Sometimes this is awesome for both the fans and the developers. And sometimes it isn't.....
There's no need to draw this out, the development team on D3, headed by the always quotable Jay Wilson, has made some very controversial decisions in the past few months and with each one, Mr. Wilson has done his best to explain why these crazy calls (each crazier than the last) are going to make D3 a better game. In another era, we wouldn't even be hearing about internal play testing and design decisions, but in this one, we can do a Google search and find 20 minute long interviews with the project lead discussing his thought process. Here are some of the monumental changes that Jay and his many supporters in the player base feel will evolve the Diablo franchise:
-Players will no longer be allowed to distribute their character's attribute points (strength, intelligence, et al). These will now be distributed by the game automatically.
-Players will no longer detail a specialization for their character on a skill tree. As you level, all skills will become available to you.
-Players will no longer assign differing numbers of skill points to different skills to decide how relatively powerful each of their skills are. All skills will level in a uniform manner as the player character does.
-Players will no longer decide upon a set of skills and stick with them. Instead the player may choose 6 skills to hot key and switch these out freely whenever they choose.
-An in-game, player-to-player auction house will be established where, for the first time legally, players will be able to use real world currency to purchase gear and items if they do not wish to take time to earn or find during normal gameplay.
If you know the first thing about RPG's, you are, at this moment, scratching your head. Unless your idea of an RPG is Final Fantasy XIII. In that case, you can probably stop reading about now.
You read correctly. Blizzard has entirely automated the lion's share of character development and differentiation (one of the cores of RPG gameplay) for their decade-in-the-making sequel to the most successful ARPG of all time.
Let's hear it for progress?
The Aftermath
The first thing you need to understand is that these decisions were not made and announced all at once. They were made gradually and trickled into the drip-drop information i.v. that the hardcore fiends keep themselves tapped into from dusk 'till dawn. This was certainly a good thing for Blizzard because each of these announcements incited mini-riots on fan sites all over the web once they were brought to light. But as many times as that happened, Jay Wilson stepped up to defend and explain his team's decision.
To his credit, Jay Wilson seems like the kind of guy I would have a beer and a game of Dominion with. He really looks and talks just a like a complete RPG nerd, and I mean that in an entirely complimentary way. Normally, that is exactly the kind of dude I would want designing my next RPG or D&D campaign. But despite the good will, I initially had trouble getting behind the spin he was putting on these decisions.
Essentially, the "Jay Wilson Defense" goes something like this: "Over the decade of people playing Diablo 2 it became clear that system "X" was broken or frustrating for the player. We tried to fix it for Diablo 3. After many iterations and redesigns we did extensive internal testing, during which we just couldn't find a solution we were happy with. Therefore, we decided to remove system "X" from the game entirely. We think the result is a better game."
Now, admittedly, what Jay says about D2 is true, but if you ask Jay how the player will influence the strengths and weaknesses of their character in light of all these changes, he will quickly remind you of the different gear and items you can equip.....the gear and items you could already equip before the removal of all these other methods of customization. So we are being told that the only remaining method of customization is suddenly a viable stand in for the all the methods of customization it used to work in tandem with? Hmmmmm.
When challenge them about how these changes may limit the amount of control the player has on how their character develops, Jay or his message board supporters respond by championing how free and nonrestrictive the new system is and that you can do anything with your character now. Meanwhile I'm thinking, "Yeah, everything except, you know, change their attributes, decide which skills they have access to at what point in the game and which skills are their strongest ones.
I try not to be a cynic but it has been hard to stave off the feeling that Jay and company are trying to sell me a car without the engine while calling it the next big thing. Common sense tells us that no sensible automobile enthusiast would swallow that line, but one trip to the official Diablo 3 community site says otherwise.
Believe it or not, the same people who mapped out character builds down to the last skill point for over a decade in Diablo 2 are mostly overjoyed about these changes. According to them, planning out a character build is "tedious". They find having to stick with their character decisions "punishing". They won't even debate with you whether or not the few character choices that remain have long term consequences. They flat out concede that they don't and they love it. That bears repeating:
There are no long term consequences to any of the decisions you make in developing your character in this Role Playing Game and the players think that's awesome.
Apparently, everything I know is wrong.
So Now What?
Diablo 3 is only the most recent example of how developers are removing/ommiting large chunks of character building and other core gameplay elements from their RPG's. The Mass Effect series, Dragon Age 2 and Final Fantasy XIII are also part of the new "less is more" school of RPG design. There have even been talks of the ever-hardcore Elder Scrolls series getting streamlined for the fifth game in the series, Skyrim, which hits stores this November. The easy conclusion to draw would be that companies have decided to dumb down their products in exchange for the opportunity to to sell to the masses. But as averse as I am to this growing trend of "streamlining", I think evil CEO's and shareholders are just convenient scapegoats, not the real issue.
The real issue is that RPG gameplay conventions suck.
Ok, let me rephrase. The execution and implementation of traditional RPG gameplay elements has not improved in any significant way during the last 2 decades. If you go back and look at many of the great traditional RPG's and ARPG's made in the last 20 years I am sure you can find a gameplay element in each that was either imbalanced or not fun. Maybe it was equipment management, currency, character building or the exploration of dungeons/towns, etc.
Without mentioning exact games, I can say that I have made equipment choices that had next to no bearing on the outcome of combat and I have wandered around boring, generic villages for hours exchanging pleasantries with retired fishermen and belly dancers alike, until I finally find the one person who I need to speak with to trigger the next event. I have often spent more time in menu screens contemplating character skill decisions than I have actually using those skills, only to have those choices be nearly inconsequential to my party's success. If I could convert all the gil/munny/G/rupees I have pointlessly stockpiled by the end of all the RPG's I have played into dollars, I would make Warren Buffett look like Antoine Dodson (pre-Bed Intruder).
But was any of that fun? Well of course it was.....to ME! I'm a crotchety old RPG player who hates myself! But as it turns out, most people don't hate themselves nearly enough to pay $60 for 30-100 hours of self-induced torture. Go figure. And here I thought masochism was "in" this season!
It isn't to say that traditional RPG gameplay is inherently bad. Quite the contrary actually, at least in my opinion. The problem is that it hasn't gotten any better since MC Hammer. No one has been trying to figure out how to make exploring a town as engaging as fighting a dragon. No one stepped in after Final Fantasy VII and said, "Hey, maybe letting players turn all their characters into gods who can cast/do anything isn't as cool as it seemed on paper." No concerted effort has been made to make in-game currency have value to the player. As a result, these gameplay elements have festered over the years, becoming the very things players hate about RPG's rather than the reason to play them.
Average Joe gamers, and even hardcore RPG gamers are kind of over dealing with broken systems and they have dealt with so many that very few them have the desire to sink countless hours into another one only to find out its as broken, imbalanced and inconsequential as all the ones before it. Which brings me full circle to Diablo 3.
People have had 11 years of practice for Diablo 3. If Blizzard were to release a game with systems anything like Diablo 2's or its many clones, and it wasn't both revolutionary and flawless, players would have the system's loopholes figured out inside of a week. With the character development decisions trivialized, the game would devolve into yet another workman-like slog through RPG tedium. Fully aware of this possibility, the team chose, as so many other dev teams have, to stop trying to fix the "Old Yeller" that RPG character creation has become and just put it out of its misery. They decided to sacrifice many of my favorite RPG elements upon the altar of fun. While it's difficult for me to admit it, I think it's for the better.
That said, in my ideal world, developers would have been searching for ways to truly improve and tighten these gameplay elements all along, so that this eventuality could have been avoided. Truthfully, they weren't given much of an incentive. After all, we did keep forking over our money. We kept buying the same games, with the same flaws. Then a game like Mass Effect comes along and says, "to hell with these antiquated battle systems and let's make this a shooter/RPG!" and the crowd goes wild. Is it a "traditional" RPG? Heck if I know, but it's a damn great game. Who knew?
I think Diablo 3 will be a great game too. For better or worse, it won't be a thing like Diablo 2, or even its spiritual successors, Torchlight and Titan Quest. In the end, Jay Wilson isn't trying to sell us a car with no engine so much as he's selling us a Dodge Viper with an automatic transmission and launch assist. While I still hope someone out there can figure out how to bring the tried and true RPG elements of yesteryear into the 21st century without marginalizing them, for now I'm more than happy to settle for just having fun.
Death to the Hammerdin! Long live fun!
Friday, August 12, 2011
EVO Roadtrip Day 2 - Chicago, IL
Day 2 of my country spanning trip to Las Vegas and Evo 2011 was, in many ways, the true beginning of my journey. Sure, driving from New York to Philadelphia and then Pittsburgh is a pretty substantial amount of travel but due to planned stops for sight-seeing, food and gaming, I never had to really buckle down and go into all out "road trip mode". But my route from Pittsburgh to Chicago was far less meandering. No famous restaurants, no arcade stop-overs just 8+ hours of driving interrupted only by a quick refuel. Day 1 felt like something of a field trip. Day 2 was going to feel like a sojourn.
And so it did. I had pulled out of the hotel parking lot in Pittsburgh at around a quarter to ten and by the time I was standing in the next hotel parking lot in Chicago it was a quarter to seven. Aside from a delicious breakfast pastry I scored from the Potomac Bakery in Pittsburgh before departing, I had only had water, some nori waffers and a granola bar to eat and I was starting to feel like it. After checking in to my hotel room, I literally dropped my bags just inside the door and hopped right back in my Jeep to go find sustenance at a place called The Honkey Tonk BBQ. Their Memphis styled barbecue fare was exactly what I needed after 9 hours of nothing but driving and snacking.
After a much needed dinner of beef brisket chili and ribs had been washed down with a few glasses of whiskey, I was finally ready to get down to business. After hearing that it had one of the largest cabinet collections in North America, I could hardly wait to get a look at Galloping Ghost Arcade (GGA) in the neighboring town of Brookfield, IL.
While I did have an awesome experience at University Pinball, I had been surprised by how small it was compared to the arcades I had frequented growing up. The four linked AE cabs were the most impressive setup of their kind that I had ever seen in person but the rest of their collection, while wonderfully kept up, wasn't really my particular cup of boba. Certainly if you love pinball, shooting and racing games, University Pinball has higher quality cabs than say a Tilt or Dave and Busters or any other chain amusement center for that matter. But I was in search of a true arcade Shangri-La where I could relive the halcyon days of the American arcade as remembered from my youth.
I feel the need to tell you right now, that if you crave the same, stop reading this, hop in a plane/train/teleportation device and get to 9415 Ogden Avenue in Brookfield, IL to see what you have been missing.
Walking in the front door of Galloping Ghost Arcade, the place doesn't so much welcome you as it consumes you. A black tile walkway leads you straight to the concession/merchandise counter. The railways flanking the walkway are clearly there to ensure people go to the counter first before losing themselves in the wild forest of 80's and 90's arcade cabinets that dominate the rather substantial floor space of GGA.
Railways, barricades or no, I did not require restraining. All I could manage to do was stand there, slack-jawed, just inside the entrance as sights and sounds I had not experienced in nearly two decades flooded my eyes and ears.
"Hi, have you come in before?"
I avert my gaze from the sea of cabinets and back to the counter, where a tallish young man stands, smiling.
"Uhh, umm, no." I sputtered back.
"Ok, well it's fifteen dollars and then you just play as much as you like until we close which is usually around 2am."
My name is Vincent Lorenzo Ingenito and I am 8. I have just been informed that apparently, I have won an unlimited amount of chocolate ice cream which will never make me feel full or make me fat. I can eat as much as I like for the next 5 hours. Then I will die from happiness. The End.
I couldn't give the nice man my $15 fast enough. Until this moment, the last time I had seen a Shinobi cab like the one now staring at me from just a short distance from the counter, I was begging my father for quarters after tearing through the $5 he had already given me (yes, I was terrible at the game, sue me! I was 9. Jerk.) This was like Dad dropping me off at the arcade with an AMEX black card (which is clearly accepted at arcades) and saying he'd be back by the end of the day.
But before I submerged myself in all that golden-age goodness, likely never to resurface, I decided to check out what was on the OTHER side of the walkway, a smaller area with a row of homemade cabinets housing all of today's most popular modern fighters. While many home built setups like these tend to look really...well...home built, these jobs were really snazzy looking. Sharp, game relevant artwork and title cards adorned many of them, and all of them featured very solid construction and pitch perfect sticks.
Guilty Gear XX Accent Core, BlazBlue: CS, MvC3 and Tekken 6 were all present and lined up in addition to two really nice looking MK9 cabinets and the (hopefully) soon to be smash hit, King of Fighters XIII. Oddly, Super Street Fighter 4: Arcade Edition was mixed in with all the legacy SF games a bit deeper into the arcade proper. This seemed odd at first, but looking at the small group of people huddled around the MK9 machines, it started to make sense. While 6 or 7 people huddled around the two cabinets waiting to get some casuals in, not a soul was at any of the other cabs.
This kind of thing happens of course. Different communities latch on to different games for a multitude of different reasons. It was just surprising to see the FGC's red-headed stepchild getting all the love while the rest of the kids get no one to play with and Street Fighter, usually the class president, gets asked to stand in the corner. Curious, I decide to approach the MK9 cab for a closer look.
I'm only there a minute before I am reminded how much I love watching people play fighting games. The ebb and flow of a good match is part of it and that is something you can get from watching streams and YouTube vids. But being there, in the presence of the competitors, hearing the button slaps, watching their expressions, seeing the urgency, intensity, finesse and dexterity of their hands across the sticks and buttons and feeling the energy between them and the small crowd of spectators watching them is very powerful for me. I believe that, in it's purest form, it becomes about mastering oneself to master the mind of another. This mixture of inner and outer conflict results in a level of mental engagement that is totally unique, both in the gaming world and even in the world beyond gaming. It's one of the best reasons for arcades to exist.
Oh that, and because playing games face to face with friends is just a damn good time.
Here is a little footage that I think illustrates a lot of these points nicely. It isn't the highest level play, nor is it the most intense example of what I am speaking about but all the elements that make playing and watching fighting games in person something special are here:
The rest of my evening at GGA is something of a blur. Maybe it was all the whiskey or maybe it was the warm, fuzzy glow of nostalgia that creeps into your belly once you start walking the endless rows of classic arcade cabinets. One thing that really stuck out, was that even though I messed around on 20 or more different cabinets, I never had to contend with a broken button or a bum stick. Upon talking to the gentleman at the counter again, I discovered why: they take maintenance extremely seriously at GGA.
The owner of the place, whom was referred to by patrons and employees alike as "The Professor" (repeated attempts at getting an actual name were thwarted, not even kidding) was fully trained in cabinet maintenance and he also trained 2 other employees with his knowledge. According to the man at the counter they replace the sticks on the most popular games every 6 weeks, whether they are broken or not, to keep them in perfect working order. Even now as I was playing at 1 in the morning, a maintenance man was working on an NBA Jam cabinet in the corner. Further inspection of the facility revealed a large workshop in the back where tons of cabinets sat, in various stages of assembly, with parts and tools strewn everywhere. This is an approach I wish more arcades would take but sadly, few can afford to.
Before I left, I decided to take another stroll through GGA's extensive old fighting game section. As I did, I found many fond memories returning, not so much about the games themselves as the times in my life they marked and the relationships I formed while playing them.
Killer Instinct wasn't a great game per se, but I will never forget meeting my first real girlfriend at an ice skating rink I used to frequent to play it. That same girl would later stand by me in arcades and brag to her friends about how good she thought I was at Mortal Kombat 3. Not a small thing to a guy who, to that point in his life, had never felt terribly brag-worthy.
Around that same time I met a boy from my neighborhood who liked fighting games too. We were really into Marvel Super Heroes at the time. We would walk a couple of miles to our local arcade instead of spending money on a taxi or a bus so we could have that many more quarters to play with when we got there. We spent a whole summer doing that together. He ended up being the best man at my wedding and to this day, one of my very dearest friends. It all started with Maximum Spiders, Weapon X's and Magnetic Shockwaves.
As I finished my trip down memory lane, it was approaching 2 am and the other arcade I had hoped to visit was certainly closed. After leaving GGA behind, I decided to at least locate the other place and maybe check it out in the morning before hitting the road to St. Louis. The name of the place was Black Hole Arcade Pizzeria and from the pics on the web, it looked a lot like the arcade I haunted when I was a kid, which was why I wanted to see it.
Upon reaching the address I was having trouble finding it. I figured, "It's late, I'm still a bit tipsy, I'm probably just missing it." It took three trips around the block for the cold reality to sink in. Like so many other arcades in our country, Black Hole was no more. At some point, kids like the kid I used to be dragged their Dads there and met girlfriends there and made friends there, but the realities of the modern gaming scene and the economy proved too harsh to weather. For every story like Galloping Ghost or University Pinball there are ten Blackholes, Arcade Infinities and Chinatown Fairs. I knew all of this of course. Chalk it up to too much whiskey, or the nostalgia of GGA or the memories of my childhood arcade, but I found myself just a little choked up as I drove back to my hotel.
These places we still have are truly magical, but if we don't support them, they can only last for so long. If you take anything away from my story, let it be this: if you love games and you love the way gaming can bring people together, find a local arcade, spend some time and money there and tell ten of your friends to do the same. The day we stop doing that is the day the magic dies.
And so it did. I had pulled out of the hotel parking lot in Pittsburgh at around a quarter to ten and by the time I was standing in the next hotel parking lot in Chicago it was a quarter to seven. Aside from a delicious breakfast pastry I scored from the Potomac Bakery in Pittsburgh before departing, I had only had water, some nori waffers and a granola bar to eat and I was starting to feel like it. After checking in to my hotel room, I literally dropped my bags just inside the door and hopped right back in my Jeep to go find sustenance at a place called The Honkey Tonk BBQ. Their Memphis styled barbecue fare was exactly what I needed after 9 hours of nothing but driving and snacking.
After a much needed dinner of beef brisket chili and ribs had been washed down with a few glasses of whiskey, I was finally ready to get down to business. After hearing that it had one of the largest cabinet collections in North America, I could hardly wait to get a look at Galloping Ghost Arcade (GGA) in the neighboring town of Brookfield, IL.
While I did have an awesome experience at University Pinball, I had been surprised by how small it was compared to the arcades I had frequented growing up. The four linked AE cabs were the most impressive setup of their kind that I had ever seen in person but the rest of their collection, while wonderfully kept up, wasn't really my particular cup of boba. Certainly if you love pinball, shooting and racing games, University Pinball has higher quality cabs than say a Tilt or Dave and Busters or any other chain amusement center for that matter. But I was in search of a true arcade Shangri-La where I could relive the halcyon days of the American arcade as remembered from my youth.
I feel the need to tell you right now, that if you crave the same, stop reading this, hop in a plane/train/teleportation device and get to 9415 Ogden Avenue in Brookfield, IL to see what you have been missing.
Welcome home.
Walking in the front door of Galloping Ghost Arcade, the place doesn't so much welcome you as it consumes you. A black tile walkway leads you straight to the concession/merchandise counter. The railways flanking the walkway are clearly there to ensure people go to the counter first before losing themselves in the wild forest of 80's and 90's arcade cabinets that dominate the rather substantial floor space of GGA.
Railways, barricades or no, I did not require restraining. All I could manage to do was stand there, slack-jawed, just inside the entrance as sights and sounds I had not experienced in nearly two decades flooded my eyes and ears.
"Hi, have you come in before?"
I avert my gaze from the sea of cabinets and back to the counter, where a tallish young man stands, smiling.
"Uhh, umm, no." I sputtered back.
"Ok, well it's fifteen dollars and then you just play as much as you like until we close which is usually around 2am."
My name is Vincent Lorenzo Ingenito and I am 8. I have just been informed that apparently, I have won an unlimited amount of chocolate ice cream which will never make me feel full or make me fat. I can eat as much as I like for the next 5 hours. Then I will die from happiness. The End.
I couldn't give the nice man my $15 fast enough. Until this moment, the last time I had seen a Shinobi cab like the one now staring at me from just a short distance from the counter, I was begging my father for quarters after tearing through the $5 he had already given me (yes, I was terrible at the game, sue me! I was 9. Jerk.) This was like Dad dropping me off at the arcade with an AMEX black card (which is clearly accepted at arcades) and saying he'd be back by the end of the day.
But before I submerged myself in all that golden-age goodness, likely never to resurface, I decided to check out what was on the OTHER side of the walkway, a smaller area with a row of homemade cabinets housing all of today's most popular modern fighters. While many home built setups like these tend to look really...well...home built, these jobs were really snazzy looking. Sharp, game relevant artwork and title cards adorned many of them, and all of them featured very solid construction and pitch perfect sticks.
Guilty Gear XX Accent Core, BlazBlue: CS, MvC3 and Tekken 6 were all present and lined up in addition to two really nice looking MK9 cabinets and the (hopefully) soon to be smash hit, King of Fighters XIII. Oddly, Super Street Fighter 4: Arcade Edition was mixed in with all the legacy SF games a bit deeper into the arcade proper. This seemed odd at first, but looking at the small group of people huddled around the MK9 machines, it started to make sense. While 6 or 7 people huddled around the two cabinets waiting to get some casuals in, not a soul was at any of the other cabs.
This kind of thing happens of course. Different communities latch on to different games for a multitude of different reasons. It was just surprising to see the FGC's red-headed stepchild getting all the love while the rest of the kids get no one to play with and Street Fighter, usually the class president, gets asked to stand in the corner. Curious, I decide to approach the MK9 cab for a closer look.
I'm only there a minute before I am reminded how much I love watching people play fighting games. The ebb and flow of a good match is part of it and that is something you can get from watching streams and YouTube vids. But being there, in the presence of the competitors, hearing the button slaps, watching their expressions, seeing the urgency, intensity, finesse and dexterity of their hands across the sticks and buttons and feeling the energy between them and the small crowd of spectators watching them is very powerful for me. I believe that, in it's purest form, it becomes about mastering oneself to master the mind of another. This mixture of inner and outer conflict results in a level of mental engagement that is totally unique, both in the gaming world and even in the world beyond gaming. It's one of the best reasons for arcades to exist.
Oh that, and because playing games face to face with friends is just a damn good time.
Here is a little footage that I think illustrates a lot of these points nicely. It isn't the highest level play, nor is it the most intense example of what I am speaking about but all the elements that make playing and watching fighting games in person something special are here:
A tale of souls and sticks, eternally retold.....
The rest of my evening at GGA is something of a blur. Maybe it was all the whiskey or maybe it was the warm, fuzzy glow of nostalgia that creeps into your belly once you start walking the endless rows of classic arcade cabinets. One thing that really stuck out, was that even though I messed around on 20 or more different cabinets, I never had to contend with a broken button or a bum stick. Upon talking to the gentleman at the counter again, I discovered why: they take maintenance extremely seriously at GGA.
The owner of the place, whom was referred to by patrons and employees alike as "The Professor" (repeated attempts at getting an actual name were thwarted, not even kidding) was fully trained in cabinet maintenance and he also trained 2 other employees with his knowledge. According to the man at the counter they replace the sticks on the most popular games every 6 weeks, whether they are broken or not, to keep them in perfect working order. Even now as I was playing at 1 in the morning, a maintenance man was working on an NBA Jam cabinet in the corner. Further inspection of the facility revealed a large workshop in the back where tons of cabinets sat, in various stages of assembly, with parts and tools strewn everywhere. This is an approach I wish more arcades would take but sadly, few can afford to.
Before I left, I decided to take another stroll through GGA's extensive old fighting game section. As I did, I found many fond memories returning, not so much about the games themselves as the times in my life they marked and the relationships I formed while playing them.
Killer Instinct wasn't a great game per se, but I will never forget meeting my first real girlfriend at an ice skating rink I used to frequent to play it. That same girl would later stand by me in arcades and brag to her friends about how good she thought I was at Mortal Kombat 3. Not a small thing to a guy who, to that point in his life, had never felt terribly brag-worthy.
Around that same time I met a boy from my neighborhood who liked fighting games too. We were really into Marvel Super Heroes at the time. We would walk a couple of miles to our local arcade instead of spending money on a taxi or a bus so we could have that many more quarters to play with when we got there. We spent a whole summer doing that together. He ended up being the best man at my wedding and to this day, one of my very dearest friends. It all started with Maximum Spiders, Weapon X's and Magnetic Shockwaves.
As I finished my trip down memory lane, it was approaching 2 am and the other arcade I had hoped to visit was certainly closed. After leaving GGA behind, I decided to at least locate the other place and maybe check it out in the morning before hitting the road to St. Louis. The name of the place was Black Hole Arcade Pizzeria and from the pics on the web, it looked a lot like the arcade I haunted when I was a kid, which was why I wanted to see it.
Upon reaching the address I was having trouble finding it. I figured, "It's late, I'm still a bit tipsy, I'm probably just missing it." It took three trips around the block for the cold reality to sink in. Like so many other arcades in our country, Black Hole was no more. At some point, kids like the kid I used to be dragged their Dads there and met girlfriends there and made friends there, but the realities of the modern gaming scene and the economy proved too harsh to weather. For every story like Galloping Ghost or University Pinball there are ten Blackholes, Arcade Infinities and Chinatown Fairs. I knew all of this of course. Chalk it up to too much whiskey, or the nostalgia of GGA or the memories of my childhood arcade, but I found myself just a little choked up as I drove back to my hotel.
These places we still have are truly magical, but if we don't support them, they can only last for so long. If you take anything away from my story, let it be this: if you love games and you love the way gaming can bring people together, find a local arcade, spend some time and money there and tell ten of your friends to do the same. The day we stop doing that is the day the magic dies.
Wednesday, July 27, 2011
EVO Roadtrip Day 1 - Philadelphia, PA
"Welcome to University City" reads an overhang, as the first stop on my roadtrip draws near. It occurs to me that I have only the vaguest memories of Philadelphia, as the last time I visited I was on a day trip with my elementary school. What I definitely didn't remember was it being so CLEAN. Some older Philly residents might be quick to correct my use of the word "clean" and opt for "sterile" or "Pennified" due to the urban renewal initiatives led by the University of Pennsylvania, which calls the neighborhood home. But as an outsider, my shoulder is chip-free. From where I stand, University City looks like the best parts of Brooklyn: diverse and urban enough to have verve, but clean and quiet enough to seem sophisticated, at least at 3 in the afternoon when I showed up.
I park my Jeep on Pine Street and start walking towards South 40th. The architecture on Pine really jumps out at me for some reason. The buildings have a sort of classical charm to them that I didn't expect to find in this part of town. But I didn't come to University City for the atmosphere. Shortly after I round the corner of Spruce and South 40th, I see exactly what I came to see: the three mischievious yellow smiley faces outside the University Pinball Family Fun Center, home to some of Philly's finest Street Fighter and Marvel players.
I step inside to a familiar sight: a barred off counter, behind which a man sits, surrounded by the kinds of stuffed animals and knick knacks that seem very desirable to the 7 year old in all of us. It looks like a jail cell for escaped refugees from the Island of Misfit Toys. These furry felons are doing back to back life sentences, and the only thing that can free them is your Skee-Ball tickets. Sadly, I have neither the skills for, nor inclination towards ticket games. Sorry "big blue bat thingy", you're staying stuck in the slammer.
What I do have the inclination for, however, is some fighting games and University Pinball does not disappoint here. While UP has a great selection of fun arcadey distractions (including a row of beautifully kept up pinball tables and gun games), the highlight for many will be the fighting game quarter. There you can find, among other things, a homemade Marvel vs. Capcom 3 sit down cabinet, an old Marvel vs. Capcom 2 cab and UP's crown jewel: a row of 4 genuine, linked Super Street Fighter 4 Arcade Edition sit down cabs.
I put a stack of quarters (yes quarters) on the cabinet surface and plopped 2 in the machine. I felt my stomach tighten. This was the first time I had had this feeling since my teen years (read: forever ago). I've competed in tournaments and on line, and of course, against friends but none of that is the same. When you come in off the street into an arcade you have never been to, you are on someone's turf. And no one, especially not the proud warriors at University Pinball, wants to lose on their turf.
The games had begun. I run Dudley, usually with Ultra 1. Both of my opponents were running shotos, one Ken, one Ryu. I don't care what the tier lists say, I love fighting shotos with Dudley. Stuff those tatsus with stand or crouch fierce, bait out DP's after knockdowns for free combos, Ultra 1 fireballs or blocked sweeps on reaction...I love it. I took my first 3 or 4 matches against them, but then things got serious when the Ken player pulled an Inigo Montoya on me.
Him: I admit it, you are better than I am.
Me: Then why are you smiling?
Him: Because I know something you don't know.
Me: And what is that?
Him: I...am not a Ken player.
And out comes his Akuma.
This is a match I feel very comfy in as well, since I have a friend back home who mains Akuma. But I wasn't quite ready for THIS Akuma. I managed a round here and there but it was pretty one sided. Our third match came down to the last round with both of us at 1/3 life, ultras loaded. I was spacing and stalking for a fireball to U1 but he was wise to my game. He threw out a fireball and FADC'd backwards. I let the Rolling Thunder rip as soon as I saw the purple of the fireball. His backdash put him just out of reach for me. Then he demon'd and that was it. One second I was smiling because I thought I caught him, next second I'm looking at a screen full of Akuma's back.
We both smiled and acknowledged one another. Then he got up, patted me on the back and left me to simmer in my defeat. Now it was just me and the little girl. I have to give her credit, she never stopped trying. After a couple of matches I felt bad though and decided it was time to hit the road. I left the remainder of my quarters on her cabinet. "Thank you, thank you!!" she squealed, as her grandmother in the corner smiled at me.
Before I left I had a chat with the warden of the plushy prison. He seemed to do it all: maintenance, janitor, ticket redemption. I asked him about business and he said things have been going well, thanks in large part to the community of players who come through to do tournaments like Eric and WorstPlayer from the Shoryuken.com boards. The other major factor, he said, was that the owner of University Pinball owns the building as opposed to leasing it from someone. As he said that I couldn't help but think of the loss of Arcade Infinity and Chinatown Fair earlier this year due to lease disputes. It's a real comfort to know University Pinball won't be suffering the same grisly fate any time soon.
After finally leaving UP I took a short 15 minute drive to Philly's famous cheesesteak corner on South 9th. Like the tourist I was, I got a cheesesteak with onions and cheesewiz from both Geno's and Pat's. Every bit as good as the hype I must say. As I climbed back in my Jeep with a stomach full of South Philly's finest meat, I thought about the spirited 8 year old girl at UP and whether she knows how lucky she is.
I hope she knows to cherish her time at a place as special as University Pinball, because like many children who grew up in arcades during the 80's and 90's she may drive by it one day to see that it's doors have shut. It's a sad thought, but one I can't help but have after seeing my local haunt in Rockland County, NY get unceremoniously replaced by a mattress store. But having now visited University Pinball myself, I have hope. With luck, it will survive long enough for that 8 year old girl to come back one day as an 80 year old woman, with grandchildren of her own to come fight the good fight, play skee-ball and help some of those stuffed critters get out from behind bars once and for all, to get a sweet taste of freedom.
I park my Jeep on Pine Street and start walking towards South 40th. The architecture on Pine really jumps out at me for some reason. The buildings have a sort of classical charm to them that I didn't expect to find in this part of town. But I didn't come to University City for the atmosphere. Shortly after I round the corner of Spruce and South 40th, I see exactly what I came to see: the three mischievious yellow smiley faces outside the University Pinball Family Fun Center, home to some of Philly's finest Street Fighter and Marvel players.
I step inside to a familiar sight: a barred off counter, behind which a man sits, surrounded by the kinds of stuffed animals and knick knacks that seem very desirable to the 7 year old in all of us. It looks like a jail cell for escaped refugees from the Island of Misfit Toys. These furry felons are doing back to back life sentences, and the only thing that can free them is your Skee-Ball tickets. Sadly, I have neither the skills for, nor inclination towards ticket games. Sorry "big blue bat thingy", you're staying stuck in the slammer.
What I do have the inclination for, however, is some fighting games and University Pinball does not disappoint here. While UP has a great selection of fun arcadey distractions (including a row of beautifully kept up pinball tables and gun games), the highlight for many will be the fighting game quarter. There you can find, among other things, a homemade Marvel vs. Capcom 3 sit down cabinet, an old Marvel vs. Capcom 2 cab and UP's crown jewel: a row of 4 genuine, linked Super Street Fighter 4 Arcade Edition sit down cabs.
"What do you mean 'You don't play Skee-Ball'?"
I put a stack of quarters (yes quarters) on the cabinet surface and plopped 2 in the machine. I felt my stomach tighten. This was the first time I had had this feeling since my teen years (read: forever ago). I've competed in tournaments and on line, and of course, against friends but none of that is the same. When you come in off the street into an arcade you have never been to, you are on someone's turf. And no one, especially not the proud warriors at University Pinball, wants to lose on their turf.
The games had begun. I run Dudley, usually with Ultra 1. Both of my opponents were running shotos, one Ken, one Ryu. I don't care what the tier lists say, I love fighting shotos with Dudley. Stuff those tatsus with stand or crouch fierce, bait out DP's after knockdowns for free combos, Ultra 1 fireballs or blocked sweeps on reaction...I love it. I took my first 3 or 4 matches against them, but then things got serious when the Ken player pulled an Inigo Montoya on me.
Him: I admit it, you are better than I am.
Me: Then why are you smiling?
Him: Because I know something you don't know.
Me: And what is that?
Him: I...am not a Ken player.
And out comes his Akuma.
This is a match I feel very comfy in as well, since I have a friend back home who mains Akuma. But I wasn't quite ready for THIS Akuma. I managed a round here and there but it was pretty one sided. Our third match came down to the last round with both of us at 1/3 life, ultras loaded. I was spacing and stalking for a fireball to U1 but he was wise to my game. He threw out a fireball and FADC'd backwards. I let the Rolling Thunder rip as soon as I saw the purple of the fireball. His backdash put him just out of reach for me. Then he demon'd and that was it. One second I was smiling because I thought I caught him, next second I'm looking at a screen full of Akuma's back.
"That only works if your opponent has not studied option select techs.....which I have!"
We both smiled and acknowledged one another. Then he got up, patted me on the back and left me to simmer in my defeat. Now it was just me and the little girl. I have to give her credit, she never stopped trying. After a couple of matches I felt bad though and decided it was time to hit the road. I left the remainder of my quarters on her cabinet. "Thank you, thank you!!" she squealed, as her grandmother in the corner smiled at me.
Before I left I had a chat with the warden of the plushy prison. He seemed to do it all: maintenance, janitor, ticket redemption. I asked him about business and he said things have been going well, thanks in large part to the community of players who come through to do tournaments like Eric and WorstPlayer from the Shoryuken.com boards. The other major factor, he said, was that the owner of University Pinball owns the building as opposed to leasing it from someone. As he said that I couldn't help but think of the loss of Arcade Infinity and Chinatown Fair earlier this year due to lease disputes. It's a real comfort to know University Pinball won't be suffering the same grisly fate any time soon.
After finally leaving UP I took a short 15 minute drive to Philly's famous cheesesteak corner on South 9th. Like the tourist I was, I got a cheesesteak with onions and cheesewiz from both Geno's and Pat's. Every bit as good as the hype I must say. As I climbed back in my Jeep with a stomach full of South Philly's finest meat, I thought about the spirited 8 year old girl at UP and whether she knows how lucky she is.
I hope she knows to cherish her time at a place as special as University Pinball, because like many children who grew up in arcades during the 80's and 90's she may drive by it one day to see that it's doors have shut. It's a sad thought, but one I can't help but have after seeing my local haunt in Rockland County, NY get unceremoniously replaced by a mattress store. But having now visited University Pinball myself, I have hope. With luck, it will survive long enough for that 8 year old girl to come back one day as an 80 year old woman, with grandchildren of her own to come fight the good fight, play skee-ball and help some of those stuffed critters get out from behind bars once and for all, to get a sweet taste of freedom.
Tuesday, July 26, 2011
EVO Roadtrip: Crossing the Land of the Free in Search of Good Fights and Good Food
It has been a long week. At the time of this writing, I sit in a nicely air conditioned hotel room in Las Vegas, NV. Eight days ago, I was pulling out of the driveway of a beautiful house in the suburb of South Salem, NY, my parents already looking tiny in my rearview mirror as they waved goodbye to me from the bottom of the hill. They do not know when they are going to see me again, and neither do I.
I am moving, you see. The Lake Merced area of San Francisco, CA is going to be where I lay my head. But as a rabid fighting game fan since the days of Yie Ar Kung Fu, this nearly 3,000 mile sojourn holds a promise of something equally exciting to me, if not more so, than a fresh start at life on a different coast: the opportunity to attend my very first EVO World Championship. Spectating and playing in the grand daddy of all fighting game tournaments, against the highest echelon of players from across the country, and the globe, has long been a dream of mine and in just 3 more days, that dream will become a reality.
The road has been very long, but equally fruitful. In the last 8 days I have stopped in 12 different cities in almost as many states in search of arcades, independant game stores, gamer meet-ups and great local eateries. I can honestly say that I found at least one reason to come back to each and every city I visited. Our country, I have discovered, is full of beauty and is not lacking for good people, good food or good gaming scenes. I ate well, laughed often, bodied some people, got bodied by even more people and even managed to make some new friends along the way. Now I am going to share all of it with you fine folks, day by glorious day.
It HAS been a long week. But it's been a righteously kick ass one too. I hope you all will enjoy reading about it as much as I enjoyed living it! Check back daily for more!
Next up: Day 1 - Philadelphia and Pittsburgh
I am moving, you see. The Lake Merced area of San Francisco, CA is going to be where I lay my head. But as a rabid fighting game fan since the days of Yie Ar Kung Fu, this nearly 3,000 mile sojourn holds a promise of something equally exciting to me, if not more so, than a fresh start at life on a different coast: the opportunity to attend my very first EVO World Championship. Spectating and playing in the grand daddy of all fighting game tournaments, against the highest echelon of players from across the country, and the globe, has long been a dream of mine and in just 3 more days, that dream will become a reality.
The road has been very long, but equally fruitful. In the last 8 days I have stopped in 12 different cities in almost as many states in search of arcades, independant game stores, gamer meet-ups and great local eateries. I can honestly say that I found at least one reason to come back to each and every city I visited. Our country, I have discovered, is full of beauty and is not lacking for good people, good food or good gaming scenes. I ate well, laughed often, bodied some people, got bodied by even more people and even managed to make some new friends along the way. Now I am going to share all of it with you fine folks, day by glorious day.
It HAS been a long week. But it's been a righteously kick ass one too. I hope you all will enjoy reading about it as much as I enjoyed living it! Check back daily for more!
Next up: Day 1 - Philadelphia and Pittsburgh
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