I said I’d get out of Power Point sooner or later.
A pleasant dream of things to come …
(Note: If the SWF doesn’t open by itself after unzipping the file, try putting it in a web-browser. I’ve still got to get my Flash legs, here.)
Archive for March, 2008
Frontlines of the Non-digital: March Reading
Published by March 25th, 2008 in Readings and Frontlines of the Non-Digital. 2 CommentsNice article in the latest April issue of Scientific American entitled: How Game Theory Could Stop Sports Doping, by Michael Shermer. He basically uses the prisoner’s dilemma and Nash’s equilibrium to explain (and pose a solution to) the problem of athlete’s use of performance enhancing drugs. The article is a good primer on what drugs are used in sports, how they enhance performance, and the underlying motivation to use drugs and keep secret the abuse. His five point plan to curb doping is a bit idealistic, but in theory he has some solid ideas. A must read for anyone who is concerned about the state of doping in athletic competition.
My best friend was visiting me for a few days last week and while he was here I did something that I haven’t done in a long time, and something that I’ve never really done right: I watched someone else play a video game.
The Never-Ending Story… of Stories in Games
Published by March 21st, 2008 in Readings, Games and Links. 3 CommentsFor those of you who are studying ARGs this semester, some the former members of ‘Mind Candy’, the creators of Perplexcity, have founded a new company called ‘Six to Start’ and their first project is called We Tell Stories. Made in collaboration with Penguin Books, the project is a series of stories written by professional authors exploring digital fiction. However, I have heard a rumor that there is an ARG hidden somewhere in the website, so happy hunting:
On a related note, Adrian Hon (one of the founders of Six to Start) recently gave a talk about stories in games at a Barcamp in Brighton, England. You can get a summation of the lecture at the Guardian Unlimited’s games blog here and Mr. Hon has posted his slides on his own blog here.
Dispatches: No More Heroes, Part Two; Or: A Perfect Day For Bloodfish
Published by March 19th, 2008 in Dispatches. 7 CommentsThis week month solstice on the Dispatches, we return to the Garden of Madness. Don’t expect too much in the way of landscaping, though…
Continue reading ‘Dispatches: No More Heroes, Part Two; Or: A Perfect Day For Bloodfish’
Frontlines of the Non-digital: March Madness Edition
Published by March 16th, 2008 in Frontlines of the Non-Digital. 1 CommentCollege basketball hysteria will soon cripple the nation (in this week alone, about $3.5 billion worth of productivity will be lost to the sport) and so it’s time to stop and take a close look at what it is about the sport that has people going mad. As a devote Kentucky Wildcat fan, I’m sure I could wax something eloquent about cinderellas, buzzer beaters, and the beauties of the zone defense (wink, wink Dave Hickey); but most fascinating about the next week (really next 3 weeks) is how folks who aren’t remotely fans will become caught up in the tournament. The reason? Largely because they joined an office pool and filled out a bracket trying to predict the outcome of the 64 team tourney (actually 65 but who’s counting). What’s with these damn office pools?
Continue reading ‘Frontlines of the Non-digital: March Madness Edition’
TETRIS: BEST/WORST MOBILE GAME EVER
with Rick Marazzani
Hopping over to the Mobile Summit I sat in on this lecture, which really turned out to be more about causal games than mobile games. The presenter, Rick Marazzani, started by stating that “Tetris is the best game ever”. According to him it was played by more people across the world than any other video game. He then took a more business oriented tack (as people who present on casual games are wont to do) and said that it had sold more units than any other game in history. In the lecture that followed there was a bit of an undercurrent that the success of Tetris in the long run had mostly been because of the changes that made it more acceptable to a casual audience, and that there may still be some improvements to make!
I failed to look closely at the date posted for the lecture and it turns out that Jason Rohrer will not be coming until April 11th, not this Friday, March 14th. The ITP gaming site usually posts about its speakers right before the Friday that they visit, that was not the case this time and I hadn’t noticed. My mistake and I apologize for jumping the gun. I will post another reminder when the date gets a little closer!
Thanks to Jason for pointing this out!
Jason Rohrer, creator of Passage, will be talking at NYU on Friday, March 11th at 1pm in the lobby of the 9th floor of Tisch (where NYU welcomes all it’s most distinguished guests from the games industry). He will be talking about ‘art games’ and “game mechanics as metaphor”.
Hope to see you all there!
Uncharted is a game that doesn’t know what it wants to be. Its spiritual cousin, Assassin’s Creed, couldn’t decide whether it was an open-world game, a platformer, or finally, an ARG. Drake’s Fortune on the other hand veers between over-the-shoulder shooter and CG film.
As a shooter the game is competent but unimaginative, incorporating the controls and cover system from Gears of War. Unfortunately, it fails to realize that what made the firefights in Epic’s game interesting was the strategy that went into moving from cover to cover, slowly flanking your enemy. Shootouts in Uncharted are usually just a beautiful version of Hogan’s Alley, with your character, Nathan Drake, taking shelter behind a box or pillar on one side of an area, and the enemies, hiding behind their boxes and pillars, exchanging volleys until someone peeks out at the wrong time.
As a CG film it does admirably, creating likable characters and a story that feels like a loving homage to the pulp comics of the ’30s and ’40s. However, it’s the mix of the movie and the game that makes Uncharted a little unsettling.
There’s a reason that Indiana Jones uses a whip: it is very hard to feel for the plucky, underdog hero if he spends most of his time mowing people down with an automatic weapon. With each successive cutscene featuring a wry remark from our hero after narrowly escaping death, or flirting with his female sidekick, I became more aware that in my time playing him I had killed literally hundreds of people. As a rule I’m not against killing people in video games, but in the end it was the incongruity between my character’s portrayal and what I was allowed to do with him that left a bad taste in my mouth.
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