More Super Mario Galaxy

I left SMG yesterday night (well, really early this AM) wondering whether I'd want to keep progressing through the game or file it away as a great exercise in fun Wii-mote based game play that had no deeper draw to it.

After playing another couple of hours, I must admit that I'm hooked. It's got just the right mixture of relaxing navigation and puzzle solving to learn the basic mechanics that is then combined with more interesting challenges that really make you feel smart for completing them.

And, it is all available in bite-sized chunks. Yes, I wouldn't want to play an hour and then let a week go by before picking up the controller again for fear of forgetting some crucial mechanic that would then block my progress. But it's still very accessible (at least to me) and at least the first few galaxies are designed to let you remember and practice the core components that you'll need to creatively assemble later on in the game.

At its heart, SMG, is really no more than a fun training sim. There is clearly a well designed syllabus that covers in-class lectures, hands-on lab experience, home work, and a grading system. There are extra credits and opportunities for make up tests to boost grades if you're struggling or failing. Failure is punished, but not too harshly.

But, best of all, the core work is fun to do over and over again. How do we make math textbooks and grammar rule books as fun and rewarding to explore as the world of Mario?

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.

Super Mario Galaxy arrived...

After a beautiful long weekend in Tahoe I was dumped back into the world of games.

Sadly my work schedule over the last two days meant actually working on games I can't talk about on my blog, though.

That said, Super Mario Galaxy arrived (from my Gamefly account). I'm looking forward to playing a Wii title as it's been a while. Hopefully over the next few days I should have some posts about SMG and some other games I have kicking around (God of War 2, Call of Duty 4, and maybe some more Xbox demos).

I also hope to get some board gaming in.

Universe at War: Demo

I tried the Universe at War demo tonight. I didn't spend too much time on it and left with somewhat mixed feelings.

The top menu item on the main menu was "Tutorial" so I jumped in on it. They had some decent ideas about how to map a PC RTS to a console controller (certainly no worse than other console RTS games out there right now) but the tutorial was pretty structured and boring. After completing it, I tried "Conquer the World" that at first made me think they just lifted the CTW feature from Rise of Nations. However, it turned out to be a multiplayer matchmaking interface that took place on a large conquer the world style map. I'm not sure if there was a meta game (I quickly exited when I tried to select a province and start a game as I didn't want to play against a stranger) but there's certainly some potential.

I then jumped into a skirmish battle on default AI. I'm thinking that the first battle should have probably been against a slightly weaker AI, though, as I was threatened the whole time.

While the UI seemed reasonable, it was extremely hard to find and select units (especially when there were a bunch of them). In the chaos of building up my base and trying to defend against attacks, I quickly lost my builders so I couldn't task them to fixing/building new things.

I may try it again if I work on another RTS, but for now I think I'll wait until someone revolutionizes in the space... None of the current generation of console RTS games really catches my fancy.

Finished The Darkness (and played some God of War 2)

I just completed The Darkness. It was created by the folks behind Chronicles of Riddick: Escape from Butcher Bay. I quite enjoyed the ride, even if it wasn't as polished an adventure as Uncharted and the combat never lived up to its potential (weapons + demon powers + minions) in terms of challenge or tactical/strategic feel.

What did I like most? I really liked the way I got to get to know my character better through his dreams and visions. These played at various plot points of the game -- and key ones repeated during reloads. Not only did this make load times much more interesting, but it really captured the feel of the moody/tormented main character.

The game was definitely adult themed and quite graphic and gory at times -- much like a good action/thriller movie. The sequence involving the death of my girlfriend was one of the more powerful sequences in a game. They captured the frustration, helplessness, and anger that I was supposed to feel just right.

As far as God of War 2 goes, I'm playing it more for research purposes right now. I've got a couple of games that I'm working on that are going for action combat. While I really enjoy the combination of action combat and quick time events, I think that it's a little unforgiving on default difficulty. I wonder if I would have been able to complete the first hour of game play without having played a bunch of the first version. That said, the first hour was a wild and fun ride. I look forward to playing more.