Uncharted 2, Ratchet & Clank: A Crack in Time. Yeehaw.

Just a brief post. This is another month that is swamped with work and travel.

I'm also going to try a more intensive writing project: http://www.nanowrimo.org/. I had a blast trying to blog 30 in 30 days, so I decided to try to do a "half-NaNoWriMo". 25,000 words in a month and I'm already a few days behind. Heck, I did about 15-18,000 words in August, so... Well. We'll see.

Uncharted 2. Yep, it was a sequel. Nope, there wasn't all that much new in terms of game play mechanics or depth of story. That said, Round #2 was still an incredibly absorbing and entertaining romp. Even though the twists and turns were cliche, I still got incredibly attached to the characters -- and the movie finale was as emotionally satisfying as Eternal Darkness, Prince of Persia, and Beyond Good & Evil. Why? Great dialog and acting. Naughty Dog are among the elite in this area. The only games that (in my mind) have competed are GTA IV (not a fan of the game play in these games, but the fourth installment actually made me and my wife want to watch cut-scenes they were so well written and produced) and possibly Chronicles of Riddick: Escape From Butcher Bay (not so much for the animation and physical acting, but definitely for the writing and voice talent).


Really, I kind of felt like I was playing a Joss Whedon epic in some ways. Specifically, the "Out of Gas" episode from Firefly (I actually haven't watched any of his other shows). The way that Nathan/Mal deal with adversity with humor and grit endeared both characters to me and made me care about the outcome of the game. Sure, in the back of my mind I knew that the hero of the story would "win" (i.e., kill all the bad guys and save the world). But at what cost? That of his friends and loved ones?

Ratchet & Clank: A Crack in Time. By my reckoning, I've given Sony over $500 of my hard earned cash and one Xbox 360 (which I traded for a PS3) because of the joy that Insomniac Games brings to me every time I get my hands on the next Ratchet & Clank installment.


My only complaint? I got stuck at the very end trying to figure out where the final boss encounter took place. It's something that I'm sure I wasn't alone in and probably was caught too late to fix. It's mainly sad, because the fix would have been pretty easy (and the issue may have, in fact, been exacerbated by a bug). Thankfully, the game is fun enough to grind around in that "being lost/unsure what to do next" wasn't really all that frustrating.


There were other minor complaints, I guess. The maps have taken a slight step backwards in terms of usefulness (hard to tell where you've been and where you have yet to explore). Flight controls felt awkward and unsatisfying. This meant that air combat needed to be nerfed so as not to block progress. The UI for inspecting, upgrading, and mapping weapons was unwieldy (I never did figure out how to map weapons to different hot spots -- but this was a minor issue because by default the game paused when I went into select mode).


But, really, none of those complaints really mattered. I was hooked from the first moment I smashed a crate and was showered by glowing, floating bolts. The feel, the look, the sound... There are few games that get this just right. Baldur's Gate: Dark Alliance, Lego Starwars, and Ratchet & Clank. I can just wander around for hours smashing things and watching bolts swirl up and around me.


In the end, the one thing that is clear to me is that the folks at Insomniac are lovers of games. Specifically, lovers of action adventure, action rpg, and platformers. Elements of Bioshock and Lego Star Wars were perfectly integrated. Sure, I didn't have the choice to either kill or save the Zonis, like in Bioshock... But it was a super nice touch to allow me to "fix" broken items (a la Lego Star Wars) when I played as Clank. Travel between worlds was a more integrated minigame like in Kingdom Hearts 2 instead of just a choice of menu selections.


In some ways, I'm left to wonder about how Insomniac goes about figuring out "what is the right amount of choice" for players. For instance, there were too many weapons for my liking (a complaint I have about previous versions of the game). I mostly grabbed them and leveled them all up because it was something to do while grinding. I would have been happier with just one wheel of weapons. That said, I totally understand the desire to present players with a wide range of entertaining and satisfying weapons (that's a big part of the franchise vision). I just find it hard to care about all of them -- at least at normal difficulty when I can level them all up via grinding so that they are powerful enough to overcome any tactical oversights.


Moreover, the game is based on a hub system, so the player almost always has choices about what to do next and can complete many segments of the game in an arbitrary order.


However, the player is never left with a moral or story choice -- either through dialog choice or game play. There are RPG elements to the game, but there is no RP. Given the difference in powers that Ratchet (he breaks things with his wrench) and Clank (he repairs things with his rod) bring to the table, I wonder whether players could have been presented with some compelling choices in terms of how to solve game play problems in ways that had an impact on the final outcome of the game.

Anyhow, much love and respect to the folks at Insomniac and Naughty Dog. Kudos on the well executed and polished games. I look forward to next iterations and new IP.

Maybe I'll even give Resistance 2 a try... 

Can I just say... Why does the PS3 firmware update experience suck so hard?

I use my Xbox 360 pretty much all the time. It's a no-brainer for me given my social network (mostly Xbox gamers) and desire to compile most of my achievements on one platform.

But, I do enjoy a number of Sony exclusive titles. Just finished Uncharted 2 and am about to start Ratchet & Clank Future: A Crack in Time. It seems like each time I install another Sony first party game, I need to update my firmware.


The thing is, I get updates all the time when I'm using my Xbox 360. And I never really even think to complain. Downloads are small. The UI is clear, easy to read, and pretty much pain free.


PS3 updates? Not so much.

• I have to do a button tap dance to even start the download process. It feels like I'm trying to enable "Big Head" mode on NHL Hitz. 
• Text is almost impossible to read against the dashboard background. The 360 dash does, essentially, a lightbox treatment where they bring clear focus (with no distracting background) to the updater window.
• The text I can read is filled with tech and jargonistic terms... I just want a "yes to accept" option so I can complete the transaction and get into my game.

On the plus side, I just heard the PS3 reboot sting, so I think the process has completed.

Now, on to Ratchet & Clank!

I'm playing and working, but not thinking and writing...

I've been swamped with work lately (the kind I can't blog about) and will continue to be swamped for the next week or so. Then, hopefully, I'll come back up for air and do some more posting.

What have I been playing lately?

• South Park (XBLA) trial version. It's a tower defense game with some co-op components. My initial experience was "meh" but I think I want to try it co-op with Liza to see whether that is where it shines.
• Defense Grid: Awakening (XBLA). I started out quite liking the game and still do enjoy playing it. It's a little hard to pick up and play after letting it sit for a couple of weeks (unit recognition and ID is difficult at default zoom; maps are getting pretty big and unwieldy given the camera limitations). But I'm going to keep going.
• Lucidity (XBLA) trial version. Think Braid but with time pressure right from moment one. The initial challenge ramp is just a little too steep for me to truly enjoy the game -- and this makes me worry because if the game only gets harder it will quickly become too difficult for me to play. I like the music, mood, art direction, and style of game play. I just want to be able to relax and enjoy it a bit more.
• Need for Speed: Shift demo. It actually kind of sucked me in even though I don't get into sim racers. I should actually talk a bit about why this demo was much more compelling to me than the Forza 3 demo. I should also talk a little bit about their more "casual" control options.
• Lots of Scramble, Wordscraper. Some Sorority Life and Cafe Wars (for Facebook).
• de Blob. This is a pretty relaxing Wii game that I'm going to spend some more time with. Some elements of Katamari Damacy with other more Nintendo like games involving cleaning and painting.
• Nancy Drew: Mystery of the Clue Bender Society. It's a DS game that I've been meaning to check out. I really enjoyed one of the latest ND games (a more "casual" release) but haven't enjoyed the core PC offerings and am not really enjoying the DS game.

I've been getting a lot of use from my Raptr account. I actually need to add my Wii account to it as I almost forgot about my de Blob sessions. What I'm most excited about is that now that I'm about to descend into a mostly PS3 zone with the upcoming release of Uncharted 2 and Ratchet & Clank. I'll still be able to track and share my progress with friends -- most of whom are primarily Xbox users. Thank you, Raptr.com for integrating pretty well into my existing social network flow.

What else am I looking forward to playing, thinking, and writing about?

• The "Top 20 up and coming Facebook games". I'm curious to see what these social games have going for them.
• Some previous games that I've worked on. I really need to get a couple of presentations together based on the learn-to-play tutorials I've co-designed. Because these games are published I can talk about what we learned, what we did, and how to turn these learnings and doings into best practices. It will also give me a chance to play around some more with video-capture tech I've been sitting on for a while.

Raptr and Mirror’s Edge

So, I had a friend heckle me yesterday about my Raptr updates. Specifically, Raptr was updating my Facebook status with information about the game I was currently playing. It’s what I thought I wanted out of the service.

But, as it turns out, what I actually want is for Raptr to send updates via the Raptr application so that friends can “hide this application” if they don’t want to be spammed with what I’m gaming.

Until Raptr plays nicely with my Facebook status feed I’m going to have to disable the real time updates. Well, sort of. I’m sending real time updates to my Twitter account and will try nightly one-time status summary updates to my Facebook account.

This actually ties directly into Mirror’s Edge because the specific friend who heckled me was wondering what kind of masochist I was to have put so much time into the game.

I was profoundly affected by the question because normally I stop playing games that I don’t consider engaging and fun (unless I’m doing research on a competitor – which I’m not in this case). And I really was not enjoying Mirror’s Edge despite being 75% of the way through the single player campaign.

Several key issues emerge. I feel kind of weird talking about this game so long after its release. And I feel kind of weird making some of the exact same comments that I’m sure others have made.

The main issue is that I never once, not even for a brief minute, actually felt like I was engaging in cool and flowing parkour. Even after hours of playing I felt like:

• Every hop, jump, and roll was activated by an uncomfortable controller input motion.
• Every free run sequence felt like it had to be replayed dozens of times because of blind leaps to my death.
• Every combat encounter (even after ratcheting down the difficulty to “easy”) made me feel incompetent.

The two experiments that I (and I’m sure lots of other folks) would like to do are:

• Compare two sets of controls. The current set (where Triggers and Shoulder Buttons performed key actions) and an alternate set where Face Buttons performed key actions.
• Compare two cameras. The current camera (first person) and an alternate third person camera.

That said, I do not think that the core of the problem is either controls or camera.

I think it is one of progression. The level of mastery required to make the game “fun” to play was unsupported by level design and progression goals. I’m absolutely convinced that this is the kind of game that shows extremely well when experienced players demonstrate cool ways to navigate the world and complete objectives.

Unfortunately for the new player, the game did not have a default path that encouraged the player to progress, grow, and master core skills in order to complete new challenges.

• There were no real opportunities to just “free explore” levels in order to get a sense of the lay of the land and what kinds of ingress and egress routes were available.
• There were “skill challenges” that encouraged players to try to solve a range of basic and advanced problems like a skateboarding game would.
• Combat opportunities were too spaced out at the beginning of the game for players to understand and master it. Yes, you mostly could avoid combat – but combat was required at certain points in the game and the experience was frustrating (even on easy difficulty).

Ideally, default mission flow would have encouraged players to familiarize themselves with the world, learn new tricks and techniques, and advance their martial ability using a progression of: Problem introduction, practice with feedback (and non-penalizing failure conditions), technique mastery, and then task discrimination (learning when to use this versus other techniques).

Less ideally, there would have been additional game modes included that provided players with fun and increasingly challenging ways to practice and master techniques and learn about the environment. The Time Trial mode did not fit this bill.

In the end, I really wanted to like both Mirror’s Edge and Assassin’s Creed precisely because I love the fantasy of performing parkour moves in a video game. Yet neither of these games provided me with the same level of enjoyment of other action-adventure/platform games as Tomb Raider, Drake’s Fortune, or Ratchet & Clank.

The common denominator in my mind seems to be suboptimal controls (I found both Assassin’s Creed and Mirror’s Edge control schemes to be overly complex and unintuitive), frustrating combat (unforgiving one vs. one dueling in AC and ME), and in-game progression schemes that allow me to go off the rails and try to advance before I had mastered the core components.

In some ways, I’m just not good at dealing with crushing failure. I don’t like to try the same thing over and over again and I don’t get the hint that the game is sometimes just trying to tell me “go do something else for a while – you’re not supposed to be here yet”. I’m sure this is why I tend to prefer scripted, story based games in general over sandbox endeavors.

Adding to the game queue…

I’ve been buried in bizdev work (talking to prospective clients) and actual work (reviewing a game-in-progress for a current client) so I haven’t had much time to play many other games in the past few days.

I have been spending some time with Defense Grid and continue to enjoy it. For a spreadsheet game it’s pretty fun and I’m starting to get more and more into the “mathiness” of it all. My hope is that it teaches me to appreciate expert level play in RTS games more. I’ve always wanted to play them competitively, but I have just never had the patience to do the kinds of precise, systematic calculations that expert level play requires.

Anyhow, here are some more games to add to my queue:

• http://platogo.com/home. This is a game content creation and sharing site. Looks kind of cool.
• The Ludum Dare competition winners.
• Time Fcuk.
• ASCIIpOrtal.
• And some of the educational games content found in futurelab.

This is, of course, on top of the games I listed in a previous post. And I also want to talk about my experience with Raptr – a social networking application that has some serious potential.

And on top of that, I’ve pre-ordered the next Ratchet & Clank and Uncharted.

Hello holiday season!

Arkham Asylum, Fable 2, 9/9/9

I ended August with a bang. Lots of new games played. Lots of writing. Then I was called out on an emergency usability run for a week. I’ve quietly slipped back into relaxing and gaming at home and am looking forward to what September has to bring in terms of both game play and game creation.

My hope is to have some very productive down time. I’m not sure whether it will be another “30 in 30” idea or an effort where I focus more deeply on one or two tasks before being crushed by the onslaught of holiday titles.

For now, here are some brief thoughts.

Batman: Arkham Asylum

Wow. Loved the downloadable demo. Loved the first few hours of game play. Loved the entire story mode. Hate the fact that I got so sucked in that I am now rather pissed off that I can’t get the last stupid hidden item likely due to a game play bug. Those “chattering teeth” don’t appear on any map and were probably lost in some sort of combat chaos and dropped through the world never to be seen again.

The thing is, I don’t go “completionist” in many games at all. Really, Lego Star Wars and Ratchet & Clank are the only games in recent memory I can think of where I was motivated to try and find all the hidden pieces. Lego Star Wars required cheating. Ratchet & Clank used a similar (and AWESOME) technique to B:AA in that they let you find maps that hinted where hidden objects were. Great idea, especially when the core mechanic (smashing things for bolts or navigating the world as the Dark Night) is so darn fun.

I knew I was setting myself up for failure early on in Arkham Assylum because the whole “chattering teeth” mechanic seemed fragile. They were often hard to see, were sometimes placed in precarious or hard to reach areas, and did not appear on the Riddler maps. But, I trusted the game because it did so much to earn that trust along the way. Core game play was incredibly rewarding, acquisition of new gadgets gave me confidence that once inaccessible areas would become accessible, great save game and check point system…

Ultimately, though, I feel a little let down. I’m going to do a bit more research online, but it bugs me that I couldn’t find those last three sets of “chattering teeth” on my own after finding the other 240+ hidden items. Sigh.

Still – great game. Go out and play it and tell me that you don’t actually feel like the Dark Knight from pretty much moment one. Combine that with some cool moments that evoke Eternal Darkness and wow. Favorite game of the year for me.

Fable 2

Yes. I know. Another game that I should have played long ago. I just found the first one so infuriating that I held off as long as I could. I still remember vividly the scene in which I pressed the B button by mistake early on in the game and took out a huge chunk of innocent bystanders. Then the guards came and my progress was halted. And then I did it again. And again. Never once meaning to do so.

And I quit the game because in my world, a mistaken press of the B button should never accidentally cause you to do something so bad that it makes you have to restart.

This is especially true in a game where the B button is usually “cancel” or “back” when accessing UI screens.

Guess what? Fable 2 has me doing the exact same thing. View NPC details. Think I need to exit the gestures menu by pressing B one too many times. Blast all friendly villagers (including my wife) unintentionally.

Then do this several times spaced out over several hours of game play. Grr.

The game tries to help players by adding a “turn off friendly fire” feature. As a toggle switch. I still don’t know whether I want it “on” or “off”. I think I have it set right as no one seems to die now when I make the mistake. They just get pissed off so I have to dance and sing and entertain them for a bit until they forgive me.

Other usability complaints are, really, too long to list. Inability to select NPCs easily (I gave a ring to the wrong person on a couple of occasions), useless maps that are too cluttered and small (and, strangely, no access to a larger version of the map on the BACK button), a “smart” d-pad that reminds me of Clippy in that it never guesses correctly what I want and makes me fear using the d-pad because inevitably I punish my dog instead of using a health potion, a difficult to navigate item system that makes it tedious to try and use consumables, and a completely impenetrable magic spell UI. Completely impenetrable.

I probably would have quit at about the same point I did with the original Fable at about 4 hours in, except that my wife was with me and we were playing together. Really, I blame my schizophrenic character development to her prodding: I’m a polygamous lesbian defender of the light. After about 10-12 hours of game play I’m at that strange point where I’m unsure whether I’m having fun with the game or just strangely addicted to the Sims world I seem to inhabit. So, I’m going to take a friend’s advice and drive the story forward a bit and see if the game doesn’t pick up.

After all of the above criticisms, I actually am somewhat hopeful.

One thing that is completely and utterly worth noting (and I know others have) is the inclusion of social “presence” data. I turned on the “let anyone show up in my world” option and have been fascinated by the presence of little avatars throughout the lands that I wander. Sometimes there are clumps of them chatting to each other in various hubs. Sometimes they are off wandering just like me.

It made me think back to Little Big Planet and how social presence made an otherwise not very interesting game (to me – I didn’t like the feel of the platforming mechanics) a great experiment and step forward.

I really think (and hope) that ALL games eventually include social presence into their games (multiplayer and singleplayer). It doesn’t always have to be synchronous – I’m playing Fable 2 almost a year later, but with less popular games there would probably be very few people playing at the same time I was. But the idea would be that people could help each other through the game through real-time chat and asynchronous notes/messages/movies.

You’d need a reputation system – one that allowed people to express their inner gamer. From “trusted helper” to “the guy who shows you how to cheese your way through an encounter” to “the folks who find each and every hidden object”. You could navigate the world, calling in assistance from others as you like.

And you could contribute if that was something that motivated you. Contributors could compete on leaderboards for different kinds of advice weighted by quality of their contributions. It would be like Amazon.com meets Xbox Live (or PSN, Steam, etc).

No need for the controversial Miyamoto “autocomplete this puzzle” feature. Just follow in the footsteps of those who went before you.

9/9/09

So, I list this date for two reasons. First, I pre-ordered Beatles RockBand for Liza and I. She’s a huge Beatles fan and does like Rockband. I have the Guitar Hero instruments and such, so I’m assuming everything will work together just fine. Yeah, we don’t have 2 mics, but I doubt both of us will do much singing anyhow.

We also went to see the movie “9” today as a matinee. The reviews on RottenTomatoes mostly got it right. Visually and stylistically it had its moments. However, the story reminded me a lot of the kinds of weak story we often get in videogames. It may have started out with something really strong and compelling and cool. Something that was told through interesting and engaging action and character development.

But, instead, the resulting story was one that seemed like it had been cobbled together as mortar for the various set piece bricks. Moreover, the actual plot line – if thought about like a quest system you’d have in a game – was pretty boring. It mostly involved 3 locations with the characters tracking back and forth amongst them. Think: The bard asks you to retrieve the wine from the rat cellar. You kill the rats and retrieve the wine. You return the wine to the bard and he tells you that he forgot his ring there, too. And the cave now has more rats because you forgot to take out the queen rat who has been breeding like crazy during your journey back to the bard.

Day 15: Puzzle Bloom

Puzzle Bloom is a puzzle game that incorporates elements of Ratchet & Clank (when you'd take over control of various robots as Clank; obviously this mechanic is used in many other games, too) and Okami or Super Mario Sunshine where completing levels leaves them looking lush and beautiful. I played through the trial version.

You control some sort of spirit that can leap from automaton to automaton. It looks like there are going to be several types of automaton with different skills that can be used to solve various puzzles.

Config issues:

The game wouldn't run in Chrome. It also wouldn't run in IE 8 at first (maybe because I still had window in Chrome open). Eventually the game ran, but it stuttered quite a bit.

The basic issue is that as developers push the limits in terms of what browsers can handle, the user experience can degrade sharply, especially if you have an outdated or unsupported browser. At some point developers and publishers are going to need to do a better job of config testing and providing better warnings for players on unsupported browsers. They may also need to do some scalability work to optimize for common causes of browser slow down.

Tutorial / Learn as you Play.

There were only a few basic controls to learn. They were presented by onscreen UI icons. Unfortunately, prompts could fade before you had a chance to successfully complete the prompt. Also, you could be instructed to perform an action that your mouse might not be capable of (right-click on some Macs, mouse wheel scroll on some mice).

It’s important to consider that, especially for browser based games, people may be playing on laptops. This often means no mouse wheel and that right clicking is harder to do than on a regular stand alone two-button mouse. This means that there need to be keyboard accelerators for right click and mouse wheel functions.

Otherwise, the initial experience was pretty intuitive and fun. The early puzzles taught basic moving and swapping controls in a safe and easy-to-practice and progress format.

Core Game Play:

Here are several interrelated thoughts…

• I really enjoyed the tangible reward of completing a puzzle. The music, sound, and visuals were impressive: Your boring, glum environment was turned into a beautiful oasis of peace and tranquility.
• Moreover, this was tied nicely into game play: These sequences served as the save game/checkpointing system. When you died, you returned to the last oasis you had created.
• Partway through the second level I was able to get the game into a degenerate state (stuck and couldn't proceed). This led me to notice a couple of things: There's no "pause menu" button. I mashed buttons and eventually found that ESC brought up a pause menu.
• Regarding the pause menu, there's no graceful restart button at the pause menu, only "continue" or "credits". I didn't even notice the "Back to Main Menu" option that was tucked away in the corner at first. I finally held my breath and clicked "Back to Main Menu" hoping that I wouldn't lose my progress.
• As it turns out, the above concern is much more severe than it originally seemed. The nature of the puzzle meant that if you made a common misstep when trying to solve it you could leave your guys in a state in which your creature/avatar could not jump back to another guy. After much finagling of the camera and the one automaton I could control, I managed to eke out a valid path and solve the puzzle without restarting the game again. There probably need a more graceful way of handling this issue.
• I uncovered further degenerate states as I played deeper. The next category was when one of my automatons died while not under my control. Sometimes there was no way to retrieve the automaton which meant the puzzle was not possible to solve. There are obviously multiple approaches one could take depending on design vision. It could be like N+ or Trials HD where it's expected that the player will get stuck and need to quickly and easily restart the level by pressing a face button on the controller. Or it could be like other platform/adventure games where if an automaton dies it respawns in a safe spot so it is available for puzzle completion (which is what happened during some puzzles I encountered later on in the trial version).
• Aiming/moving are sometimes problematic, especially when targets are moving erratically or rapidly. This is because a missed left click (intention = aim) means that my current automaton starts moving. I thought that this would have been prevented by having the move model be left click + hold, but even short, failed aim attempts end up nudging your current automaton. This can be annoying because sometimes the movement is enough to make the camera shift the map, which is disorienting. Other times this unintended movement could be fatal if you're standing too close to a dangerous object while trying to aim.
• The default camera angle and behavior makes it difficult to tell where your cover is (when trying to use blocks as protection against laser beams). I couldn't tell whether my ass was hanging outside the zone of protection via the default camera angle and was zapped several times when I figured I was safe.
• There are some cool puzzles that involve critical thinking. Moreover, some of the puzzles can obviously be solved in multiple ways, which is extra cool and invites me to retry some of them. One puzzle, that I had to retry several times, I assumed was a timing/sacrifice puzzle (I needed an automaton to die at precisely the right time in order to close a gate behind another escaping automaton). But after I completed the puzzle, I quickly discovered that I could have solved the puzzle using a "hot potato" approach (quickly jumping my avatar from one automaton to another until I could escape a deadly laser beam).

Main Menu:

Even though I encountered this first (when I fired up the game), I talk about some of the issues with it last.

• There was no mouse cursor state change when I moused over clickable items (like getting the pointer switching to a hand).
• There was no sound confirmation when I moused over menu item. There was only a slight color change to the highlighted item.
• Selecting the "Choose Checkpoint" option didn’t appear to do anything other than make the menu text disappear. It would be helpful to use additional cues to indicate to players that they need to select a tree to choose a checkpoint.
• Mousing over a tree/checkpoint highlighted the tree, but did not provide any useful information as to which map the checkpoint corresponded with. It would have been nice to have the mouseover behavior reveal a screenshot and/or description of where the checkpoint was and a time/date stamp of when it was created. It would have also been useful to have a clear indication of what the most recently completed checkpoint was.

Overall Thoughts:

One moment I was engaged and playing. And the next, the trial version appeared to end without any upsell screen or indication that the experience was over. I was just left at the main menu with nothing to do other than restart the game from stage 1 or replay the last stage I completed. This seems like a missed opportunity to teach me more about the game and get me excited about buying it when the full version is ready.

All in all it was a pretty fun game. However, there are some performance and controls issues that leave me a little worried about how I'll fare during more complex levels that require precise control under time duress.

• Performance is something that needs to be addressed through a config database (if it detects I'm using an unsupported browser or old release, it should put me into a lower graphics setting so that game stuttering does not affect game play).
• Controls probably need to be tweaked a bit to support laptop players who will likely be playing with a mouse pad. This means that right click is more awkward to perform than on a standard mouse, and that mouse wheel functionality needs to be added to some keyboard shortcuts.

Quick Diversion: Sonic Chronicles

I'm not a big DS RPG player -- and I don't think that Sonic Chronicles: The Dark Brotherhood is going to make a convert out of me.

The biggest problem so far (the first 10 minutes) is that there is no flow. The UI is cryptic and hard to manage, there's far too much reading (for my liking), and far too much flipping between the dual screens to make it easy to follow along with the story. Moreover, control is constantly being ripped from the player's hands by "cut scenes" that introduce too many characters and concepts at once.

The core mechanic should be fun enough to just "play with" in some sort of sand box mode until the player is ready to layer on some additional features and concepts. Ideally the first few few minutes will proceed more at the player's pace as he or she figures out the basic mechanics and controls. 

The other thing I noticed right away: I couldn't figure out which buttons to press to have Sonic move and jump. I soon realized that this was because the game is intended to be played button-free. Just the stylus. Now, I love me a good pixel hunter game and am generally a fan of the stylus input. But if I have an avatar in a 3-d isometric world and there are rings for me to pick up and ledges for me to jump up to, then I really (REALLY) want to use the Dpad and face buttons to interact with the world. 

If it looks like a platformer, it should play like a platformer. Sure, you can add RPG elements (maybe more story; maybe some skill advancement like in Ratchet & Clank). But the core mechanic of world exploration, jumping, and ring-picking-up needs to be more satisfying than pressing the stylus on the screen.

The problem gets worse when it comes to the "chase" minigame. What might normally be a fun challenge (running a course where you need to dodge obstacles and hit power ups) becomes tedious and boring. 

If there was a cool and inviting flow, I could probably look past some of the glaring usability issues that confuse and annoy me. But there wasn't, so I couldn't.

• The chase sequence seemed optimized for right handed pen users. My stylus hand blocked the screen when I tried to tap Sonic to make him jump. 
• Moreover, during the chase sequence I couldn't figure out whether or not I was making progress, whether Sonic had to beat his pink sidekick to win a race, or even who I was racing against in the end.
• The UI screens require far too much text explanation -- and similar to other Bioware games, the first time players visit a new UI screen they are blasted with a wall of explanatory text that has no context and is skipped or forgotten immediately.
• Dialog trees were hard to figure out and difficult to navigate.

Interestingly, combat was one area that I thought was kind of fun. Mainly this was because it was a familiar turn-based format that is typical of many jRPGs, with an improved selection model (target an enemy with the stylus instead of toggling through them with the Dpad).

Although use of the stylus should have made spell casting/special moves even more fun to execute, the stylus UI indicators were hard to parse and the initial "spell" that Sonic was equipped with was too difficult to execute properly.  The game would have benefitted immensely by starting players off with simpler spells that recharged quickly (instead of a hard to execute spell that takes forever to recharge).

I'll keep the game in my backpack for now. I figure I need to spend at least another hour or so in order to pass final judgment. 

That said, it's hard for me to imagine whether the story behind Sonic will be enough to keep me interested in what is, after all, a DS platformer.

Lego Batman... Finally got around to it.

I'm wondering if the novelty has worn off of the Lego series. I find this hard to believe as I still just love (love) busting objects and collecting blocks/bolts/what-have-you.

Lego Batman promises more of the same goodness that Lego Starwars delivered in spades. They've taken a few lessons from Ratchet & Clank, which I think is a great idea given that this game is more about gadgets than about swapping heroes (if it was "Lego DC Heroes" then they could have had more emphasis on hero swapping). The Batcave seems very similar to some platform areas in the various Ratchet & Clank games; the magnetic boots (and winding metal paths) are clearly a tribute to the R&C goodness.

Maybe I'm not excited enough by the IP to forgive the Lego series' flaws... Or maybe some of the flaws are exacerbated in this version. I'm just not that compelled to continue on:

• Movies seem longer and not as good as the Starwars versions.
• Geared towards more hard core/experienced players (easier to fall to death early on; combat difficulty is a little challenging for the first 2 levels).
• Severe level design x camera interactions that make for cluttered/obstructed game play.

I wonder if I'm also a little bit sad that the combat system is so shallow. I've been playing a lot of action and action RPG games where more than just button mashing is required and I feel like my combat options in this game aren't that exciting. Pair this with the fact that the default gadget (boomerang) is not very easy to use in combat, I feel like it doesn't really matter what I do in combat -- just don't hit Y (switch by mistake) or hold X (go into boomerang mode).

I also wish there was a little more gravitational pull for the blocks -- I think I've become spoiled by other games where the essences released by a player's desctructive actions are automagically scooped up (instead of requiring me to run everywhere to try and pick some random block up).

No big surprise, but the UI and game shell menus could use some work.

• The classic "binary option; both of which look highlighted" problem (one is in yellow text; the other is in blinking white text).
• Jargonistic terms in the settings pages ("adaptive difficulty") and missing contextual text when having to choose upgrades (what the heck is "silhouette mode"?)

Considering that I've now basically spent $25 on it (2 months on loan from Gamefly) I should probably return it in favor of the next two games in my Q (two DS games: The Sonic rpg and a Nancy Drew game).

Housekeeping (and more Dead Space)

I took some time this evening to clean up my game queues a bit. I need to get organized as I'm falling behind and 'tis the season for decent new releases...

Dead Space is getting most of my console gaming attention. I have 2 friends who are playing Warhammer (the MMO) with some regularity, so I want to keep active with that. My Facebook gaming has slacked off a bit, but I still feed my D&D:Tiny Adventures addiction, play Wordscraper and Scramble with a couple of dedicated friends, and achieve the top achievement (cyborg) on Word Challenge once a week so I can impress my friends.

I really want to dig back into Midnight Club: Los Angeles because I love the game and it was starting to get to the really fun parts (cooler special abilities; cooler ways to pimp my cars). But, I'm backlogged on games I need to play for research purposes:

• No More Heroes, Alone in the Dark for a Wii game.
• Fable 2, Fallout 3 for an RPG.

And then there's Gears of War 2, which I don't really care much about -- except for the fact that everyone I know is going to play MP, and I do enjoy going through the co-op campaign on "insane" with friends.

I'm having a feeling I'm going to need to give up on playing through more of Half-life 2 (episodes), the Portal DLC, and GTA IV (which I was really starting to like).

I still need to play Call of Duty 4 and I just updated my "on my radar" section by replacing NHL 2008 with NHL 2009. Woof.

As far as Dead Space goes, I'm definitely starting to enjoy it more and feel like finishing it. It took too long to really get into the game -- and it wasn't until I basically decided to specialize in two weapons and just power them up that combat became fun. The game really doesn't support experimentation with different weapons because you die too quickly before you can figure out how to use them. The game also doesn't support pick-up-and-play because the controller scheme is so hard to remember -- and there's no in-game controller screen to remind you. 

Although I do wonder whether my main motivation to complete the game right now is because I'm over the half way mark, I think that the environmental and combat puzzles have gotten interesting enough to keep going. I do like the world, even though I haven't really been following the story. The zero-g portions of the game are pretty interesting and fun. It feels like it captures what combat in a true 3-d space would be like without being unduly frustrating. 

I've also started having more fun with the "grav gun" which can be very rewarding both in terms of item acquisition (grabbing far away things) and combat (firing explosive tubes or sharp body parts at enemies).

I still feel that the econ and upgrade system is clunky. Moreover, the progression curve is unsatisfying because instead of being exposed to cool new items and upgrades as part of the adventure (e.g., 1 hour in have the pistol; 2 hours shotgun; 3 hours machine gun) I just end up unlocking the ability to purchase these weapons without really trying them out first and seeing them in their best light. When my choice is between the unknown (which, when I first try it I fail at miserably) and upgrading something I'm already familiar with, I tend to go with the familiar.

Unlike other games that structure the experience around the acquisition of a new item (give me a rock, then surround me with scissors) this game presumes that you can decide which weapon you need based on a vague 2 sentence description. Then, after you buy the weapon, you don't have much chance to use it in a carefree way. The game is stingy about ammo drops and there are no sandbox areas where enemies (and items / money) constantly respawn.

Games like Ratchet & Clank do a great job of layering on new gadgets and weapons as part of the core progression path. They are integrated into the story and into level and enemy design. There's an economy backend that supports upgrades and non-critical path items, but resources are so plentiful that you're not really screwed if you end up buying something you don't like.

I'm basically sticking with the pistol (Plasma Cutter) and shotgun (Force Beam) and upgrading them and my armor. I don't even think I use the alt-fire on my Force Beam (I can't even remember what it is). I noticed that one of the achievements is to complete the game with just the Plasma Cutter. I actually don't think it would be that hard to do so.

I'll keep plugging away and hopefully finish it this weekend.

Dead Space: More...

So now I'm about a third of the way through the game and I'm starting to enjoy the claustrophobic atmosphere even if the combat and econ/upgrade system seem lacking.

The econ system feels derivative of Bioshock and Ratchet & Clank -- except it feels older and more tired. There was nothing ground breaking about the econ in either of these games (they are similar to many other action-adventure w/ light RPG elements games) but they seemed cooler because of the sense of humor and the fact that some of the upgrades and new powers were pretty original and fun. Dead Space is much more like Mass Effect (and many other RPGs) where bonuses are a lot of "X% faster" and "1 point more" upgrades that just don't seem cool to me because they make me think about spreadsheets (I've talked about this before).

Combat is interesting but not very visceral or engaging. Even though aiming is required to be effective, I don't seem to be able to do it very well. Part of me would prefer a smarter aiming system (it's not a MP game, right) that maybe I could upgrade over time. I think that Crackdown has a pretty cool system for making limb/head shots interesting and fun without requiring pinpoint accuracy out of a third person shooter.

Where combat gets most visceral is when in close quarters with an enemy or during several canned sequences that are a lot like quick time events in God of War (and other games). The idea is to mash the buttons in the correct directions (or aim your weapon while you're being dragged on the ground) to try and let you experience much more up close and personal combat as opposed to always having ranged shooting. It's a great idea when done well. The problem with its implementation in Dead Space (at least so far) is that it's hard to tell when you've gone into a quick time event (I died twice mashing buttons during one sequence before I realized I was actually supposed to aim instead of mash buttons like in other sequences) and the control sequence is hard to figure out. When I'm being mugged by an enemy, an A button icon appears. But pressing A -- and even mashing A -- doesn't seem to do anything. I now mash the left stick and A button and it seems to work most of the time. That said, I have no idea how the mechanic is supposed to work.

In terms of pace, I'm torn. I get the scary claustrophobic ambience. I realize I'm in a special suit and can't just run and jump around (except in zero g, which is kind of fun). But it still feels a little sluggish and breaks the immersion when I can't just hop up or down on something waist high.

In terms of in-game controls and UI, it's a bit of a mess. It's super hard to access your inventory when you need to (for instance, to use another air cannister), the map is pretty complex and can be hard to use if you veer too far from the default setting, and the button mappings make it a lot harder to perform combat maneuvers than is necessary. 

Regarding combat button mappings, I expect LT to either (a) lock on an enemy (that I could then sub-lock onto a limb/head) or (b) sight my gun (where I get a reticle and a slightly zoomed in view. Currently it's option B, but without the reticle. It also feels extra wonky to pick stuff up and hurl it -- I feel like I need to press and release triggers and buttons in the right order or else it fails in unexpected ways. I feel like some of these decisions were made in order to have RT be both melee (alone) and ranged attack (with LT), which sort of makes sense (because you can't press a face button to melee attack while aiming the camera with RS) but ends up making default attacks (ranged, special powers) more complicated to execute.

I'm definitely torn on this game. I want to like it more and forgive it the flaws it has, like I did with The Darkness. But I loved the story and character development in that game. I'm not sure the ambience is enough to keep me going until the end -- and the story really does seem like a hodge podge combination of Aliens, Halo, and various other sci-fi movies/games.

I'll give it a couple more levels and see if it surprises me. Otherwise it's back to Midnight Club: Los Angeles.

Finished Super Mario Galaxy...

What a fun ride. It was enjoyable to the end. The pacing and challenge felt just right and the main plot progression allowed for skipping content that was less enjoyable (if you wanted to) while leaving huge chunks of the world to explore at your leisure after you beat the game.

It's the first Mario game I've beat. Usually I give up as they're too hardcore or frustrating. This one reminded me a lot of Ratchet & Clank with all the cool environments and puzzles. The sound and visuals were pleasing and the core platforming mechanic was enjoyable except for a couple of problematic levels where I had to fight the camera.

I'm tempted to play more... But my queue is getting longer by the minute.

More SMGalaxy Goodness

I'm just getting a short Super Mario Galaxy break in. This, of course, is another great feature of the game: I can just take in a 10-15 minute snack if I want, which makes it fit well with my schedule.

Moreover, the game doesn't generally penalize you for forgetting some of the game play mechanics. There is always a learn-as-you-play tutorial at the beginning of each level that introduces (or reintroduces) necessary mechanics. Of course, this is Super Mario Galaxy, so you don't FEEL like you're being put through a tutorial. But, through clever and enjoyable level design and scripted events you are forced to learn without even realizing it. This game is simply magnificent in this respect.

I recently encountered my first hiccup in game play challenge ramp where it took a little bit more of a struggle to figure out how I was supposed to approach the world. That said, the game had already built up so much trust in the way it eventually rewarded "just screwing around until you figure it out" that I felt comfortable persisting and eventually figured out the parts I was supposed to.

I have a feeling I'm going to end up liking this game as much as Ratchet & Clank and Kingdom Hearts 2 -- two games that (at least in my mind) have clearly influenced this version of SMG.

Super Mario Galaxy...

So far, Super Mario Galaxy has been a fun ride. It's still amazing how a game can take just a few elements, polish them to a sheen, and make even a basic tutorial fun and rewarding to play. It also marks the first fun Wii game that I've played in quite a while.

I still get a little disoriented when I try to navigate upside down, but after about an hour or so of playing, I seem capable of doing basic jumps, exploration, and combat no matter which way is up.

The sandbox element of the first hour or so is content is so rewarding. I figured out most of the techniques on my own through normal play before I was ever told about them (and required to use them) by different gatekeepers in the game.

Although I imagine that some folks would rather play the game with a regular controller, I am actually enjoying the wii-mote aspects of the game. The pointer can be used to grab gems (nice -- and I also hear that it's really fun for parents with young kids who can grab gems using the wii-mote while the parent moves Mario around) and shaking the wand is integrated well into both combat and exploration. It adds a nice rhythm element (kind of like playing the notes in Windwaker or navigating through a Quicktime Event in God of War. It certainly doesn't feel tacked on like the 6 axis implementation in games like Ratchet & Clank: Future Tools of Destruction.

I think what I like most about this version of SM is that it is much more Zelda like, and it also seems to incorporate cool aspects of other games like Katamari Damacy and Ratchet & Clank. It seems like I've only discovered a small portion of the game world so far and I'm pretty interesting how the game gets bigger and better as I progress.

The pause that refreshes...

Whoops. I was about 15 minutes into Uncharted: Drake's Fortune when my PS3 controller ran out of juice. I guess it has been sitting there losing its charge since my last ramblings through Ratchet & Clank: Future Tools of Destruction.

Sadly the USB charger cord is way too short to actually play while wired (I'd have to sit a couple of feet away from a projected image > 100" diagonal). Between the crappy cheap cord and the crappy cheap controller, I'm left to wonder: Who made the bigger blunder: Xbox with "the Duke" or PS3 with the "cheap knockoff controller & cord"?

Uncharted: Drake's Fortune... Initial Experience

So far I am liking, but not loving Uncharted: Drake's Fortune. I guess I've always been more of a Ratchet & Clank guy than an Jak & Daxter guy -- the Insomniac games folks just have me better figured out than the Naughty Dog folks do.

The game feels a lot like a mashup between King Kong and Tomb Raider with elements of Prince of Persia. There's a strong narrative, and the game switches me between traveling with a buddy, getting separated from a buddy, and then meeting up with the buddy again. I really do love the "hints via your buddy" system that these games employ (e.g., they stop and look at things; they talk to you; they trigger events that move the plot forward). As an aside, I really must give props to King Kong where the character played by Jack Black carried a movie camera around and actually pointed the camera at the things you were supposed to look at. Both meta and clever at the same time.

I generally prefer female leads in third person adventure games for the extremely shallow reason that if I'm going to be staring at someone's butt for 15-25 hours, it may as well be an attractive female butt. That said, the character I play is entertaining (in terms of dialog) and really reminded me of Mal from Firefly in the opening game sequence.

Now that I'm a few hours in, I have a few points to make re: Initial Experience:

• The difficulty setting was kind of catchy: All options were displayed (not hidden behind a spinner), with the default being "normal". There was also "easy" and "hard" and a locked "crushing" difficulty setting. Cheeky -- yet not at all confusing.
  
• The game seemed to take a while to load and I worried that this would be a problem. As it turns out, loads are really pretty fast in this game which is great because there is a reasonable amount of dying during some portions of the game (more on this later).
• While the writing, mocap, VO, and acting were quite good, there was a little bit too much of it in the first 15-20 minutes. Normally this is when I would want to start familiarizing myself with basic game play mechanics, but instead my learning and practice kept being interrupted by more cut-scenes.
• The first major "dang" was that I was immediately dropped into a firefight without having an inverted aim and look. Whoops. This was (as per usual) very disorienting and not the kind of thing you want to learn while not under heavy fire. I await the day when the industry standard will be that all games that allow you to aim/look using the right thumb stick will include include in-game calibration (like in the original Halo). Interestingly, Uncharted supported independent horizontal and vertical inverting (as opposed to other games I have railed against for either not offering horizontal inversion; or worse tying horizontal to vertical inversion). However, they also differentiate between "aiming" and "camera". While this is very cool (in some games I actually do want normal camera and inverted aiming) I messed up at first because I only adjusted the aiming and not the camera. I initially thought I had exited the options screen without saving my preference (because the camera was still "normal") and only after some fiddling did I realize that I needed to set both to inverted (actually called "flipped" in this game).
• I died during the first battle (5 minutes into the game). At first I was a little aggravated, but the game is very good about save points for the most part and quick loads are lightning fast. Learning by dying is actually OK in this game for the most part -- but, personally, I'd still rather not have the player die in the first hour or so.
• The initial puzzles seemed overly artificial. In some ways I'm sure they were done this way in order to teach the basic world interaction and puzzle solving mechanics.
  

Other usability/playability notes:

• The game really has a nice state of the art hinting system. At the L1 level my partner shouts out useful commands, investigates points of interest, and triggers sequences that progress the action forwards. On the L2 level, there are occasional on screen button icons suggesting that I interact with the world (triangle button) or with the diary that I found (select button). On the L3 level, whenever there is a pause in the action and the game is waiting for me to go somewhere in specific, the game will periodically flash the L2 button which directs my attention to the next location I need to reach.
  
• Also, the autosave system is excellent. Not only do checkpoints seem logical and forgiving, but the load times are so quick that dying frequently (which happens at the occasional choke point) isn't as frustrating as it can be in other games. I'm not opposed to learning by dying. I am opposed to being penalized for dying.
• Weapon combat is reasonably fun. It's very much in the Gears of War mode (run for cover; shoot from cover). There was also a bunch of attention paid to cool animations -- it's hilarious to watch my female companion blindly reach around a pillar and fire her gun blindly at the enemy.
  
• Some other cool things about combat:
• They added an interesting twist on aiming. By clicking the left thumb stick you can switch which shoulder you aim over. This makes it easier to see around things and seems especially helpful when targets tend to be grouped on one side of the screen because you can focus more of your attention on the more threatening side.
  
• The AI and combat/level design make it so that while you can turtle a bit, it's not an effective strategy. There are enough variants of "baddie" such that they present a challenge when they attack as a mixed force. Some are much more gung ho and charge while others sit back and plink away. And, of course, if you turtle too much you'll get grenaded.
  
• Two slight improvements to combat I would love to have:
  
• Better audio feedback when I kill someone off screen or that is hard to see (Half life 2 did an awesome job of this).
• Better music/visual cues when the combat sequence is over and it's safe to explore again.
• There are a couple of downers, though:
• I'm having a tough time with the hand to hand combat. The combos should be simple, but I can't seem to execute them correctly even though it should just be a matter of tapping square-triangle-square. I'm not sure what I'm doing wrong, but I tend to get slaughtered when I'm in close quarters.
  
• Death by ladder. I managed to die a couple of times while trying to climb down a ladder. This isn't unique to this game, but I figured I'd mention it.
  
• The Load Game interface isn't up to snuff. Load game slots contain no useful metadata at a glance. You need to hover over each slot and wait for the data to load -- there's no way to look at all of the saves at a glance and decide which one you want to select.
  
• Stupid 6-axis controller. I'd rather have a controller that felt beefy and had rumble functionality then a gyroscopically controlled "leaning" mini game when I walk across logs.

Game polish notes:

• I know I've said that the health bar is dead in another column. Uncharted recognizes this and does a great job of desaturating the world and playing up audible cues like grunts and gasping for air when I get hit.
  
• The U-boat exploration mission was cool. In order to simulate the narrow and claustrophobic feeling of being in a submarine they used a very Resident Evil-like camera and control scheme (e.g., camera close, but stationary; controls are screen relative). This was augmented further by adding custom animations to my character whereby as he maneuvered through narrow walkways and port holes, he would grab or push or touch things in a very human way. It was a neat way of making a fairly linear journey seem pretty immersive and cool.
  

Devil May Cry 4: Trial Version

I should mention that the Devil May Cry series never really appealed to me. Too button mashy and too much flipping between character-relative and screen-relative controls for me to enjoy exploration and combat; and the mood, story, and setting isn't enough to offset those issues.

That said, it's a popular and well-hyped series, so I jumped in on the trial version.

I started by just mashing the A button until I was dropped into game play. I wandered through the environment and kind of paid attention to the occasional "tip" billboard that appeared. Combat was not that exciting to me as the enemies weren't that impressive and basically I just needed to mash buttons until they died. There didn't seem to be any need for strategy (just don't use the gun because it seems useless) at this point.

Navigating the world was more challenging than it needed to be. I found myself playing the minimap (instead of finding my way by landmarks and lighting) to figure out where to go next. This was especially helpful when it came to locating doors. Doors generally did not stand out at all (looked bland; weren't lit well) and gave no indication that they were interactive. I eventually started smashing everything and accidentally opened a door by using my "B" attack (which is also the command to open doors and interact with objects in the world). I'm hoping that the level design doesn't have me opening doors during combat when I mean to attack...

While it is tough to tell what you can and can not interact with in the world, it certainly is fun to smash things. Not as rewarding as in Lego Starwars or Ratchet and Clank, but fun enough.

I wish I could understand the appeal of this game. I'm not sure whether the trial version would appeal either to noobs (the combat went from rather dull to almost impossible with no real ramp up) or experienced players (the combat didn't seem very over the top). But, I didn't get very far, so it's possible that the really cool content came further along in the demo which would be rewarding for people who played the previous versions.

More thoughts on Mass Effect...

So, I'm really enjoying Mass Effect for the most part. The "most part" being getting to know my character and supporting cast through interesting and engaging dialog.

Yep. By talking to people. Well, not even people. Scripted/AI bits of code that I can interact with.

It's interesting to reflect back on how attached I (and many others) became to the Weighted Companion Cube in Portal or how shocked I was when the white rabbit died in American McGee's Alice. Yet many "human" game characters with much more realistic graphics fail to spring to life.

Lots of variables come into play, especially in terms of the quality of the writing and immersiveness of the story. However, Mass Effect seems to succeed in making in game characters interesting and appealing in ways that other RPGs have failed to do in my mind. In some ways I'm reminded of Planescape: Torment with its incredible dialog amongst the main characters and the interjections between party members and various NPCs.

Where Mass Effect seems to take it to the next level is in terms of the cinematic quality of the cut scenes. They are shot like Hollywood sequences (similar camera angles, cuts, editing), feature gesturing and facial expressions that approach actual "acting", are recorded by high quality voice over talent, and are well-written snippets of dialog that convey drama as well as information.

In short, I'm actually being entertained by cut-scenes. Whoah.

Not surprising are some additional UI quibbles I feel are worth noting:

• Map/Journal integration is dismal. Yes, you can quickly go from Map to Journal via the Y button. However, what you really want to do is pick an objective from your Journal and then quickly plot it on your map (which then gets tracked in your HUD). Oblivion actually did a good job of this.
• Squad selection is painful and error prone. During the tutorial portion of the game you gradually acquire a bunch of NPCs that you can swap in and out. Later on you can swap NPCs at your spaceship hub (which I think was the same in KotoR). Unfortunately, there is no good way to micro your team management in one place (swap equipment, check stats and abilities, etc). All you get in the squad select UI is a big picture of the people you can choose from -- and each NPC is summed up by a single stats bar. This results in the possibility of severe errors in the first part of the game (because there is no way to change squad composition once you exit the squad select screen) and moderate errors for the rest of the game (because you need to select characters, inspect them, then go back to the select screen, lather, rinse, repeat until you get it right). Annoying.
• The Galaxy Map UI is designed in a way that makes it prone to a variety of errors:
• Discoverability: I couldn't figure out how to leave the original space station and go to my next location. I walked around and talked to people. I looked at the Galaxy Map. Finally I figured "it's been long enough, I must be where I should be" and walked outside -- only to find out I'd never left the station. Who knew that your default Galaxy Map view was too far in to suggest that you needed to zoom out several times in order to figure out where to go next?
  
• Usability: A zooms in. B should back out, right? Nope. X backs out. B quits the Galaxy Map. Let's just say that I exited the Galaxy Map several times by mistake.
• Usability: No integration of Journal and Galaxy Map. Forget where you're supposed to go? It's a multi-step process to call that screen up (exit Galaxy Map, go to Start Menu, go to Journal, find active quest, exit Start Menu, go to Galaxy Map, zoom out until you find a likely location, zoom in, select location).

I did experience my first vehicle combat scenario. It was about as uninteresting as I'd heard it was going to be. Luckily I figured out that holding the left trigger meant that I could at least see where I was going and aiming. But the combat feedback is so bad (basically you need to ignore all the beautiful scenery and focus on the ugly red health bar) that the whole experience seems rather hit and miss. It's too bad because it really could have been a cool mini game much the way that Kingdom Hearts 2 or Ratchet & Clank had space combat mission mini games during outer map exploration. Opportunity missed.

Platformed out... for now

Just completed The Simpsons Game. It was a fun send up to video gaming much like Bard's Tale was. The content was memorable and the writers and designers were able to make me laugh throughout the experience.

As expected, the gameplay was only so-so. And, there wasn't as much smashy-smashy as I would have liked. My bar is quite high for platformer/action-adventure games, especially with both the Ratchet & Clank and the Lego Star Wars series as shining examples of what these kinds of games can be.

Still, it was an excellent rental.

I also moved Ratchet & Clank: Future Tools of Destruction to the "done with" pile for now. I'd like to go through the game again and purchase more upgrades, but it's hard to justify mining existing content when the list of games to play is piling up -- and I don't get any gamer points for completing PS3 achievements.

I'm looking forward to some demos and XBLA games tomorrow. In between watching football and playing two more hockey games.

Speculation

A couple of co-workers were wondering why The Simpsons Game seemed to be reviewing poorly on Amazon.com.

Camera/controls are so-so for this game (not awful, but not as good as top platformers who've had many iterations to refine their craft). Of the handful of negative reviews that I can see, most seem related to the Wii version -- specifically the camera controls. It wouldn't surprise me if the developers dropped the ball in terms of optimizing camera/controls for the Wii/numchuck.

In my opinion (and I'm liking the game) the designers tried to make the game accessible to the masses and may have ended up failing folks who want to feel clever as they solve puzzles -- a big motivation for serious platformers. As implemented, this choice may also end up failing some of the very people that it was intended to help (inexperienced/newb gamers who are just interested in the IP) because the learning curve is still too steep for folks not used to having to manipulate the camera manually. Newbie gamers tend to hover their thumb over the face buttons (instead of the right stick - which contols camera) which leads to them getting into situations with a disadvantageous camera angle. More experienced shooter/action-adventure gamers keep their thumb resting on the right thumbstick in order to fluidly move/aim/look.

I tend to evaluate platformers in terms of:

• IP (am I interested in the content)
• Puzzle solving (am I mentally challenged without being frustrated)
• Visceral smashy smashy (do I get to break lots of things in spectacular ways)
• Engaging combat (variety of weapons to encourage rock-paper-scissors combat puzzle solving)
• Story (is it a platform-adventure game or an action-adventure game with platform elements)

So, Ratchet & Clank: Future tools of destruction rules my world (even though the most recent incarnation was probably the weakest in the series) because I love the IP and there is a ton of visceral smashy smashy. Combat was pretty good (in my mind). Story and puzzle solving are a little on the weak side, but totally outweighed by the rest.

I had a feeling that Simpsons will simply provide a cool IP experience with fun smashy-smashy, reasonable combat and story -- and so far this is exactly what I'm getting from it, which is great.

Then again, I rented it ;)