Guitar Hero: World Tour and Left 4 Dead

It was a weekend of high profile titles: One new IP (Left 4 Dead) and one sequel (GH: 4).

Left 4 Dead is an example of a game that is built for co-operative play from the ground up. Notice even that the top option on the Start Menu is to play the co-op campaign. Second option: MP. Third option: Single Player game.

I haven't played with strangers yet (or MP variants), but so far the game has been a blast. Nail biting suspense, tactical depth that makes the game challenging and fun, and decent bots to substitute for when you don't have enough friends online and don't want to play with strangers.

When you get to spend 3 years loving, crafting, and building a game that -- at its core -- is based on an extremely fun premise (co-op survival horror vs. zombies) and you are committed to iterative design, you have an opportunity to deliver a powerful and polished experience. Valve has done just that.

Guitar Hero: World Tour is a game I'd been meaning to pick up for a while. I've written about the "flow" that I've experienced on a couple of occasions while playing Rock Band with friends and I wanted to study that a bit more. The initial experience was daunting and not really optimized for a more "newb" like myself... But once I got going I definitely got sucked in and I can't wait to play some more.

I'll have more specific comments and updates as I dive deeper into both of these games. I also have 2 DS games on the way (I'll be traveling a bunch, so I figured I should): 

• Sonic Chronicles (the Bioware RPG starring Sonic)
• Nancy Drew: Mystery of the Clue Bender Society (I want to see how these games translate to other platforms)

Leeeeeeroy Jenkins (and some Rock Band)

Short post tonight. Sadly, with all the packing and side projects I'm engaging in these days, my game time has been limited.

However, today I did get to engage in some Rock Band and some World of Warcraft CCG gaming.

Rock Band was fun. It was the first time I'd played it completely sober with strangers. And these strangers were quite good. I'm still shocked at how bad the game shell UI is (especially if you just want to quickly dive into a song and start playing) and at how poorly the Easy and Medium difficulty levels are calibrated. Yet I still had a blast. The social aspect of the game gave me the strength to struggle through the multiple failures until I was able to at least keep up and not ruin the game for my band mates.

The World of Warcraft CCG session was fun and refreshing at the same time. We did the raid on Onyxia -- a barbarians at the gate scenario where 4 of us played cooperatively against the DM. One of us had never played WoW before, I had played for a few weeks (capped at about level 27) and the other 3 players (2 team mates & the DM) were all hard core WoW players (we were at a party celebrating the one year anniversary of their guild -- and they even had a tabard-decorated cake).

We all ended up having fun. We didn't get into any really cool combos or complex social interactions, but it was clear that the game would require strategic cooperation to win the quest. Unfortunately we needed to call the game off before it finished (I had to rush off to a hockey game) but it was clear that we were about to be decimated.

Funnily enough, one of my companions had the Leroy Jenkins card and got a chance to play it during the game. It did exactly what you'd expect it to do: Screw down all your allies while buffing you for a heroic attack. Well done, Blizzard.

Rock Band continues to grow on me...

I wrote in an earlier post about how, surprisingly, I enjoyed playing the drums on Rock Band. Well, tonight I met up with friends after some board gaming to chill out assuming that I'd either play some drums or (to everyone's horror) sing because I never got into the guitars in Guitar Hero.

However, I jumped in on bass (medium difficulty) and had a blast. I experienced bursts of the sense of flow that I had while I was drumming and I wonder if it has less to do with the kind of instruments that were available and more to do with the number of people who were able to play at once. This is mere speculation, but 2 player co-op in the original Guitar Hero never felt as electric to me as the 3-4 player modes of Rock Band. Of course, maybe it was just the addition of the drums or the mic. But I really do think it has more to do with the social pressure (and reward) of trying to gel with multiple people. You feel extra bad when you can't hold your own weight -- and you feel extra good when the 3 or 4 of you are in sync and rocking out.

I'll have to investigate this further.

Side note: We played board games at an awesome game store in Queen Anne called Blue Highway Games. The game was called Power Grid and it was quite fun. The only problem: No beer.

OK, I finally get it. My life as a drummer.

I could understand the appeal. I even enjoyed watching people (especially non-gamers) play the game. But I just never enjoyed playing Guitar Hero. The gameplay was too boring at the easiest level and seemed disconnected from the actual flow of the music. Higher difficulty levels brought frustration that I knew could only be overcome with dozens of hours of practice. Practice... Not something I intentionally want to do while gaming.

On Friday night I took a few turns on the mic at Rock Band. Yeah, I've done karaoke with friends before after a few drinks and it can be fun. I'm a terrible singer, but I've gotten over that. And now I get to play a fun co-op game with my closest friends who are really into the game.

However, I've said it before that even the "fart in a bag" game can be fun if you add co-op play. What surprised me about Rock Band was that I played again on Saturday night. And this time I took over the drums. I'll admit that while watching (and listening) to others play, the drums seemed pretty lame. The dull thuds on the drum pads sound disconnected from the game's soundtrack and break the immersion of the game -- to the observer. But, to the player the feeling of flow (once you've gotten over the constant failing for the first 15 or so minutes) is incredibly rewarding.

I was hooked. And I even thought I might want to try the single player drummer career mode on my own. I started to wonder what it would be like to ramp up the difficulty and really get into it. I'm thinking about going to a friend's place this afternoon and playing again...

One challenge the game does not overcome (admittedly a tough challenge given 4 player co-op) is game setup UI and flow. Man was it ever hard to set up individual songs especially if there were first time players in the mix. The rowdiness and drinking added some extra difficulty here, but come on -- that's the kind of environment that this game is built for.

It makes me wonder what kind of field research the folks did on this game before launch. Did they actually roll it out at bars with first-time players? I have a feeling if they did they would have come up with a "party" or "social" mode where controls and sessions could be streamlined:

• Eliminate the complex UI by ditching profiles and band member setup.
• Have playlists that you can set on the fly (without going back to gameshell).
• Have a "social" difficulty setting that is more equivalent to the "easy" setting on the original Guitar Hero if one of the players fails twice.

Note that I'm not saying replace band campaigns (these are obviously fun and essential) but make a party-friendly mode that fits with an evening of drinks, newbs, and livin' the rockstar fantasy.