A Welcome Back and a Plan For the Month

I've decided it might be worth it to get up off my lazy ass and get working on actually talking about gaming again.  So without further ado, here's what I think my plans are going to be for the next month or so:

Games to Review:

King Arthur's Gold
Terraria
Dead Space 2
Crysis 2
Section 8 Prejudice
Earth Defence Force:  Insect Armageddon
Groove Coaster
Ace of Spades
Minecraft

As usual, I know I'm probably severely late to the party for a good 99% of these.  But, that's just my style I guess.  Anyways, watch this space. 

Interview with Roguedjack

Two weeks ago, I posted my impressions of an indie game by the name of Rogue Survivor, a roguelike taking place during the zombie apocalypse.  Graciously, the one man behind the whole title agreed to an interview, and I jumped on the occasion to ask some questions.  Without further ado, here we go:

Me:  When going through the conceptual design of Rogue Survivor, what inspirations and influences did you draw from?

Roguedjack:  I wanted to mix aspects I like in some games and combine them into something different and fresh.
From roguelikes I took the procedural content generation, tactical turn-based gameplay, and the player as an actor.
The sandox aspect (open-ended dynamic world) comes from strategy/sim games, where you are put against enemies, friends and competitors in a starting setting and the game world evolves from there.
The zombie apocalypse theme is really a side-effect or an after-thought rather than the primary motive for the game. I could have used any other theme or setting. In fact first I thought about a medieval world in a permanent state of war (think Mount&Blade). Then a space/pirate setting (think Elite, Privateer, Sid Meier's Pirates). Then I thought about a zombie apocalypse and said to myself that was the perfect setting. It is a setting people can relate too (your house, your town, your life) with a widely popular theme (zombies!).

Me:  What's in store for the fans of Rogue Survivor?  Any huge ideas or plans for the next releases?

Roguedjack:  Playing as an undead will be the major new feature. This will offer a very different gameplay.
And various improvements such as expanding the plot, demolition weapons and attacking other survivors directly.

Me:  What's the most difficult part about developing an AI for a game of this complexity?

Roguedjack:  Doing the survivor npc AI.
There are a number of conflicting features to balance, respective to the player.
Survivors must be able to survive on their own, but they must not be too good at it as to leave some resources for the player own survival.
I guess I could make survivors AI much better at self-preservation. But then it would be a nightmare for the human player, like a multiplayer cooperative game with players who don't really cooperate with you, only worse. Plus a proper goal-driven AI with planning would cost too much CPU cycles.
When adding new items or features I have to think about the impact on AIs and gameplay. For instance if I add a new powerful weapon meant for the player, what if the biker gang gets hold of one and start using it against the player? I don't want to fordib some items or actions for AIs so I have to handle that as to not make it game breaking.
Then of course there are the usal constraints of maintening suspension of disbelief when the player directly interacts with the livings AIs, and performance tuning which is more of a factor than in usual roguelikes because of the high number of actors active at all time.

Me:  What sort of games do you enjoy playing?

Roguedjack:  Mostly tactical fps, strategy/wargames, football(soccer) management and the occasional relaxing casual game (fighting game, puzzle). The only genre of I don't like are racing games.
I like games that puts you with a dynamic evolving world where you are not the only drive for change.

Me: Given the subject matter of your game, is it safe to say you're a huge zombie film or game fan?  If so, what are some of your favorites?

Roguedjack:  Well in fact not really, I don't like the gore in zombie movies. I like the setting a lot though and I think its potential is not used properly in games.

Me:  What sort of experience have you had as an indie developer?

Roguedjack:  I have made a bunch of other games over the years at various stages of completion, but kept them for me or my relatives. This has always been a hobby of mine.
My first completed game was a text adventure on Amstrad CPC 6128. "Interactive fiction" they call it nowadays. I've written games for Amstrad CPC, PC and a Texas Instrument calculator; in Basic, Pascal, C, C++, Java, C#; arcade, sims, adventure, wargames.
Rogue Survivor is the first game I release to the public. Well two, if you count a chess engine in C that played vs humans or other engines on FICS (Free International Chess Server).
Writing games is fun. I mostly like designing the rules, doing the AI and composing the music. Graphics are annoying as I lack the talent but I'm learning.
I would more than happy to do that for a living.

Me: What language was Rogue Survivor developed in?

Roguedjack: C# NET 3.5, with Managed DirectX for graphics & sound. I will try to get rid of managed dx as it seems to be a source of bugs.
I could have done it in Java+OpenGL for more portability. I prefer C# for its lambdas and properties. I also find it less verbose than Java, I kinda view it like C vs Pascal in this respect.
Next game will probably be in Java+OpenGL though, for a change, better portability... and less Microsoft annoyances and oddities.

Me: Thanks again for agreeing to an interview, I really appreciate your time.

Roguedjack:  Thanks for your interest!

Roguedjack has released a great roguelike, so please visit his site at http://roguesurvivor.blogspot.com and show him some love for a fantastic game.

Rogue Survivor: Fuck Yes

Rogue Survivor caught my attention by pure chance.  I love roguelikes, anyone who knows me will testify to that fact.  There’s just something satisfying about wandering around in these giant arenas, plundering loot, and the waves of death you’ll be facing down.  Rogue Survivor plays off the thought of the ever popular zombie apocalypse and does it magnificently. 

The survivor AI is probably the crowning feature of Rogue Survivor, and it shines at all times as you go through the paces of finding shelter and other things.  Survivors are smart, barricading themselves inside buildings and offering up supplies in exchange for other materials.

Rogue Survivor is deliciously done though, extremely difficult, and is one of the rare roguelikes that doesn’t make you feel like you’ve seen it all before.  Screenshots won’t do the game much credit, but believe me when I say this is the sort of game you need to give a shot at least once. 

Wonderfully done, Roguedjack deserves a lot more support and fame than he’s getting.  So spread the word, plunder supplies, try to live through the night, and pray zombies don’t burst through your barricades in the night.

Nation Red: Holy Shit, Zombies are Badass

I picked up Nation Red yesterday thanks to the magic of Steam’s latest sale.  For a paltry $4 I got a game that’s high on challenge, even if it’s lacking a little in content.  There isn’t anything more satisfying than blowing away tons of zombies with an AA-12 while weaving in and out of them. 

One of the most satisfying bits about Nation Red is that it tries way too hard to be metal, and the crunchy goofy soundtrack lends some odd charm to it.  Don’t believe me?  Check this out then:

So much fire, it’s amazing.

Despite sounding like a Megadeth B-Side at all times, Nation Red is wonderfully satisfying to play.  The blood and guts flying all over the screen just get some stupid ass grin out of my face while I’m mowing through legions of the dead.  All in all, even though it’s back to full price, Nation Red is a wonderfully fun game.  It’s absurd in how goddamn grim-dark it tries to be, but I have the feeling that if it were a little cheekier it wouldn’t work. 

Also, if you’ve got the time, check out Foreign Legion:  Buckets of Blood, I thought it was wonderfully absurd in just how many shooter tropes it plays with.  Pretty simple castle defense game, but I love these absurdly simple experiences.  Beats out on the nasty grim shit like Gears of War. 

Got a suggestion for the next game I review?  Give us a shout in the comment box, we’d love to hear from you….handsome.

Cursed Mountain: Buddhists, Ghosts, and Snow

A Trip Into Some Snowy Hell

Cursed Mountain is a survival horror title that didn’t get a whole lot of press.  Released for the Wii and PC, Cursed Mountain follows protagonist Daniel on his trek through the Himalayas in the 1980s to find his brother, who went missing on a climb of treacherous means.  Cursed Mountain isn’t by any means what we’d call a great survival horror game, but it takes a unique premise and couples it some rather interesting gameplay mechanics. 

Half the time I was controlling Daniel, I was wondering why on earth he moved at such a slow clip.  Much like Fatal Frame, Cursed Mountain urges the player to avoid jogging so ghosts aren’t alerted.  The early scenes do a great job of depicting tension, and the setting is certainly a welcome one compared to the cramped mansions, hospitals, and other stock settings of most horror games.

Where Cursed Mountain fails is when it starts implementing combat.  Combat is one part aiming your mystical pickaxe, no joke there by the way, and adding gestures as per most lazy Wii developers.  Now, if there was some compelling reason as to why you need to blast things with your scyred pickaxe I wouldn’t be docking it.  However, what has the potential to be a sleeper hit turns into a bargain basement horror game while completely saying fuck you to the setting and ideas.

How can you fucking see in this game?

The sound design is wonderful to a fault, I found myself loathing Daniel’s voice actor and moaning aloud when your monk mentor instructs you on how to swipe at things to use them.  Daniel sounds like an effeminate Malcolm McDowell, the odd accent and lisp doing absolutely no favors to make me feel immersed in the game.

I feel about the same towards Daniel, truth be told.

Now, the ordinary gamer will be slightly annoyed by the visual filter that saturates everything when you attempt to defend yourself.  As depicted in the screenies, it’s this nasty black stuff that just swarms all over the place.  The first time was pretty cool, added a little bit to the overall feel, but then I found myself having to do it constantly. 

I was instantly reminded of Constantine, starring Keanu Reeves of course, and the nasty look Hell had in that film.  Playing this game is a bit like watching Constantine, great concept with a shitty execution. 

Another five dollars I’ll never see again.

Now, while I can at least excuse Keanu for the simple reason that he’s a pretty cool guy, Cursed Mountain doesn’t get the same excuse.  It’s a great concept, sure, but the oversaturated visual effects, uninspired gameplay mechanics, and creepily voiced main character just kill whatever great things I felt about this game going in.

Within ten minutes of fighting my first enemy, I went from going, “Hey, this is pretty cool so far,” to “Why can’t dying just end this?”  Developers take note, a good horror game doesn’t need to rely on combat, just take a look at Amnesia or Penumbra.  Both stellar games, both really fucking scary, and you don’t have a singular weapon on you the entire time.  Both are going to be looked at quite extensively in the coming weeks by yours truly, and hopefully I can will myself to play for more than a half hour at a clip. 

Am I shooting this in the dick?

I won’t lament things though, I only spent five bucks on this turgid piece of shit.  So, really, you get what you pay for.

As a parting note, take a look at a little gameplay from Amnesia by Frictional Games.

I guarantee you, you’ll be running a lot.

Fatal Frame 4: Cute girls, Awful Ghosts

Fatal Frame, or Project Zero for you filthy diehards, is one of those rare series in horror that maintains a great consistency in terms of atmosphere, scares, and overwhelming dread.  I’d dabbled over the years with games like The Crimson Butterfly, but usually my rental time would be up and I would be forced to go get something else.  I dunno why, seeing as how my library has always had at least one Silent Hill and one Resident Evil amongst the other titles, but I just sort of avoided Fatal Frame for whatever reasons.

Well, all that changed last week when I procured a copy of Fatal Frame 4 for the Wii.  An import only sort of affair, Fatal Frame 4 is a stellar game that I’m honestly a little appalled will never be making it to our fabled American shores.  Now, this isn’t to say it’s unplayable because the filthy pirates amongst us have devised a translation patch and get to play this gem in a manner similar to watching a subtitled film.  I however don’t get such luxuries and as such I’ve had to use a combination of Wikipedia and various guides to play. 

Gah, someone needs some moisturizer.

Initial Impressions

Upon my booting up of Fatal Frame 4, I was amused by the fact that the game doesn’t fuck around by throwing you right in the middle of a spooky ass place.  Your opening scenes are spent in an abandoned facility, and the echoes of your footsteps only underscore the simple fact of the absolute silence surrounding you.  One of my biggest complaints about modern horror games is how they underscore every little bit of the score with a musical motif.  Fatal Frame 4 doesn’t afford it self such nasty little amusements.  This may be in part of Grasshopper Manufacture’s involvement.  As any gamer that loves some of the more esoteric titles know, Suda 51 doesn’t trifle with cheap scares.  Fatal Frame 4 follows three young girls who return to the place they were kidnapped, and it’s a game rife with various nods to Shintoism and a decidedly different take on the occult. 

If you’ve lived under a rock for the last ten years, you’ll know that Fatal Frame’s combat isn’t quite the shotguns and explosives of Resident Evil.  You have to use a supernatural camera to damage your enemies and your efforts are greatly rewarded by them getting in really close.  The ghosts in this game are rather nasty, looking far more disheveled than I was expecting.  You really feel bad for these girls as they traipse about this place, well except for the bitch in the opening.  Nothing good ever comes of walking off with no one following.

Someone needs to tell Ke$ha to get a new publicist.

I love the fact that Fatal Frame doesn’t necessarily need the standard elements of making you jump in your seat.  By using a smart combo of isolation and dread, you can really feel like you’re completely alone in the world.  This is my first entry proper into the series, as I lack the hindsight to account for my lack of playing Crimson Butterfly through to completion.  You aren’t some boulder punching madman fighting a dude in sunglasses though, you’re a small and frail girl navigating a hellish maze littered with the souls of the dead.  You’re urged to keep pressing on to find your companions, you’re urged to keep going deeper and deeper into the black abyss.  Fatal Frame succeeds where a game like Dead Space fails, and that’s by making sure you’re not some hardass engineer with a master’s in asskicking.

Is she wearing a French Maid costume under there?

Go Buy It Plebes!

There’s the very real possibility that Fatal Frame 4 will never make it to our shores, which is a crying shame.  However, you can make sure you need brown pants on a permanent basis by ordering it now.  It seems to be sadly out of print so it looks like your best bet is eBay.

Hmm, so much for sleeping.

Dead Space: It’s Resident Evil 4…..in space!

A Look At EA’s Hyped Horror Game


I suppose I came to Dead Space about two years too late.  After a 2008 release to critical success, the survival horror game from EA’s Redwood studio apparently set some high marks.  Now, after having played it to completion I can say that’s it’s decent, but not quite the horror fueled nightmare I was expecting.  The simple fact that our hero Isaac is quite possibly the most badass man in a technical position since Gordon Freeman may have something to do with it.  The plot is rather simple when the game thrusts the gamer into the midst of it.  Isaac Clarke is sent to the Ishimura to get systems back online.  Isaac’s an engineer, which you really wouldn’t guess during your playthrough of this game.  Most of the engineers I’ve met aren’t hardly the type for scrapping, their more concerned about running a raid on Naxx to the utmost efficiency and complaining about how majoring in English was a bad choice. 

This seems an awful lot like some happy psychology hating church


When you first boot up Dead Space you’ll be struck by how damned pretty it can be.  The nasty bloody environments are gorgeous and it really shows what the power of a huge production studio can do.  It’s like discovering that a chicken in a can isn’t as tasty as that made by a graduate of Le Cordon Bleu.  Having a whole chicken in a can is a whole different sort of horror when you consider exactly what your digestion track may be doing after cooking the fucker.  Dead Space is a pretty game and greatly benefits from all the major production behind it. 

Buh, how did they make space look so neat?

Major productions, as my esteemed colleague points out, don’t benefit from the sight of what makes something truly scary.  So we’re left with the simple fact that our mute Mr. Clarke is a badass.  I don’t mean badass like Batman, but more or less Ripley from Aliens with a dick. 

Isaac, it just has some indigestion from all the yummy flesh.

Now, ordinarily I wouldn’t complain about this.  Leon S. Kennedy made having a foppish hair cut and spouting out dumbass phrases a lesson in badassery.  He looked stylish while doing so, this may be in part because Capcom really had to use a French model to make Leon into the envy of every man and make girl parts’ a-quiver.

I’ve been figuring out how to get my hair to part like that for six years.

Dead Space does tie into the notions of abandoning the survival part of the survival horror genre.  You don’t really feel like you’re fighting for your life, but just sort of blasting ugly things nonstop as you go through the motions of it.  Simple thanks to EA for making it seem like engineering is a great career choice.  Now, I can’t really say too much on the plot because it was beginning to make my head hurt, also spoilers are bad.  Dead Space does terrific things as far as immersion and making nasty baddies go.  Demon babies, bladed arm things, things that jump a lot, and something that looks suspiciously like a vagina and a burst boil had sex are all present and accounted for.

As pictured:  Da sexy

In short, Dead Space is the sort of game that should really end up in most gamers’ libraries.  It can be picked up at your local game store and can be picked up if you don’t live in the stone age on Steam, Direct2Drive, and a few others I’m sure.

Next up is a retrospective look at my favorite sci-fi movie of all time, that other movie directed by James Cameron about aliens.

A Look at Silent Hill

If you're a gamer, you've no doubt heard of Silent Hill.  Konami's franchise is probably the keyword to most horror gamers these days.  Killer soundtracks, freaky villains, and a twisted setting have made the franchise rather memorable.  I've been sloughing through the second game thanks to the holiday that's impending and would like to just take today to take a look back on Resident Evil's far scarier cousin.

Silent Hill

Oh, Harry Mason, you really are the archetype for the everyman in gaming.  You suck with a handgun, you have to go into filthy dingy locales, and ultimately you fail to recognize when to run away from a scary as hell sort of place.  The original Silent Hill follows Mr. Mason on his little quest to find his adopted girl, along the way he wrecks his car and ends up in Silent Hill.  Now, Silent Hill isn't full of your standard little denizens.   There aren't the quaint shops full of knick knacks and the local fairs. Silent Hill is a nasty ugly place that freaks normal people out.  For good reason too.  If you looked at a place like this, you aren't thinking warm and cozy.  Here's a few screenshots for nostalgia's purposes.

Well, I think it's safe to say it isn't custard, marmalade, or corn syrup Harry.

Very few games will make you wish quiet was all you heard.  Lots of ambient nastiness.

Wrong, a gun with no bullets is better than nothing.  You're asking for monster rape.

Silent Hill received rave reviews for turning Resident Evil's concept on its ear and taking heavy inspiration from Jacob's Ladder.  The next game in the series would turn out to be by and large the best to come.

Silent Hill 2

God, what a game.  You never really feel like you're safe, and there's a dude in a pyramid mask that loves to rape other monsters right in front of you.  I wish that was a typo, but you really can't mention Silent Hill 2 without paying some sort of nod to the main baddie, Pyramid Head.  Silent Hill 2 upped the ante in many regards and made the series into a classic franchise.  Now, this followed in Resident Evil 2's wake, which somehow dictated that a horror game's sequel needs to be awesome beyond a shadow of a doubt.  Well, Konami delivered.  You play as James Sutherland and you get beckoned to the eponymous town by your wife Mary.  Full of psychosexual imagery and dread, this is the sort of game you want to play during the middle of the day with friends who can snuggle you when the bad men come.  Here's a few screenshots to hopefully conjure up some wishes for the brown pants.

The graphical leaps for this game really took everything up a notch.  The constant ambience too.

Ah, Pyramid Head, very few implacable men in gaming can claim to be more terrifying than a busful of clowns come midnight.

Remember what I said about psychosexual imagery?  These nurses have the curves, but the bloody sacks are a little offputting.  Unless you're into that.

Sadly, I'm sort of lame in the respect where I've never sat down and played the newer games in the series.  I eschewed for Silent Hill 3 for the pure and simple reason that nightmarish hospitals sound awful to me.  Silent Hill 4 and later entries were less critically renowned.  Apparently the Western treatment of the franchise really rubbed critics and gamers alike the wrong way.  However, the series as it stands with the first three represent a golden era in gaming to some.  I remember switching off Silent Hill 2 in the middle of the day because I could hear shit scuffling against the ground.  That isn't the sort of thing you really want to test though.

In the future expect a bit of an analysis over various other horror greats as well as some of my favorite classics.

Awesome Shit To Play: Super Mega Worm

Have you ever played a really badass iPhone game?  I mean like the type you just sort of go wow at.  If not, you really need to check out Super Mega Worm.  Super Mega Worm is quite possibly the candidate for game of the year.  You jump around as a giant death worm and you crush and eviscerate all the pathetic humans in your wormy path.  Bonus points go to the decidedly retro design.  Anyways, I discovered this a couple of weeks ago and thought it was pretty fun.  So, I decided to give everyone a little heads up and give it a shot.  Here's a few images for your approval.

If you have a pair of eyes, it's pretty easy to see that Super Mega Worm is the hotness incarnate for the iPhone and iPod Touch.  I've wasted a lot of time playing this game and trying to see how much gore I can cover my screen in.

The Revenge of the Zombie Game!: Remembering Resident Evil

I've been playing a lot of the original Resident Evil as of late, mostly to get myself prepared for the Halloween season.  Despite the absolutely atrocious voice acting, it's sort of creepy still, the dated visuals not withstanding.  I still get transported back to the days of my youth when this game was released.  My father booted it up to see what all the fuss was about, and then we were treated to this iconic image:

Now, when I was ten this was quite possibly the scariest thing I had ever seen.  I felt unnerved seeing this nasty looking zombie turning to face Mr. Redfield.  Fast forward thirteen years and I've been a little seasoned as to horror fare.  I thoroughly enjoy Silent Hill, Dead Space, and others but Resident Evil still holds a special place in my heart.  Maybe that's because of the inherent campiness of the dialog in the first game.  Or maybe it's because one of the first Playstation games I ever beat was Resident Evil 2.  I dunno what the case for my love of the series is, but I can't really imagine the gaming landscape without it.  At it's base level it exploits our fears, not so much in psychological sense, and it works pretty splendidly still.  It reads like a log of some nasty event, like walking in on a roommate in the middle of masturbation, and it just gets worse from there.

So, while I enjoy the concept of blasting away at the undead, there's a primordial dread about the first game.  You've got guns galore, but you have a smattering of bullets to hold you over.  You could blast the first few zombies that come your way, but you'll be properly screwed when you do.  So despite the nigh impossible nature of the game at times, it still maintains some realism in that fact.  Resident Evil 4 and 5 did away with the scrounging of ammunition and made you into an unstoppable badass that takes time to punch boulders and suplex baddies.  Invigorating yes, horror filled not so much.

Anyways, I heartily recommend the series to anyone wanting to get their feet wet with the horror genre of video gaming.  After all, you can never have enough games where they talk about Jill sandwiches.