The new issue of the Escapist has an essay by Jason Rohrer in which he outlines his hopes and dreams for the future of games. Though the piece is wide-ranging, the core of his argument is that the problem with the industry is actually that most developers put gameplay first, trumping whatever artistic visions the creators might have had. According to Rohrer, in order to elevate games to a form of ‘high art’ it’s going to take putting the gameplay, as defined by the mechanics of a game, in service of the expressive potential of games, instead of rehashing old genres and slapping on any theme that comes to mind.
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400 Words About Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots
Published by June 20th, 2008 in 400 Words. 2 CommentsLet’s clear one thing up right off the bat: Hideo Kojima does not make games.
Kojima makes media products that incorporate games. They also incorporate animated movies, as well as motion graphic novels, as well as radio dramas. Calling them ‘interactive movies’ though would be like calling film ‘recorded dramatics’.
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Dispatches: Metal Gear Solid 4, Part Three; Or: Dulce Et Decorum Est
Published by June 17th, 2008 in Dispatches. 1 Comment
Today on the Dispatches, we reach the end of Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots, and perhaps the end of the Solid Snake’s story, altogether. But just because the Metal Gear saga’s over doesn’t mean the series isn’t about to continue, in all likelihood.
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Every now and then I play a video game that really shows what’s possible with the medium. A game where the context and the gameplay are tightly woven, with the meaning reinforced by every element, from the smallest player action to the larger possibility space. It’s even better when a game like this is really about something. Something that sticks with you long after you’ve stepped away from the screen.
Dispatches: Metal Gear Solid 4, Part Two; Or: Peace Is Our Profession
Published by June 15th, 2008 in Dispatches. 0 Comments
Today on the Dispatches, we cover the next stretch of Snake’s journey, all the way from the jungles of South America to the darkness of Shadow Moses, with a little bit of Eastern Europe along the way, and explore how Kojima manages to save this game from his own poor plotting with good old fashioned hunting and surrealism.
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Dispatches: Metal Gear Solid 4, Part One; Or: Why We Fight
Published by June 13th, 2008 in Dispatches. 2 Comments
Today on the Dispatches– oh, who am I kidding? Like none of you saw this coming…
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Adam Parrish gets a nice shout out from GrandTextAuto.org for his thesis “New Interfaces for Textual Expression.”
Ian Bogost has already expressed some love in the comments, too!
Dispatches: No More Heroes, Part Three; Or: Raise High the Beam Katana, Carpenters!
Published by June 9th, 2008 in Dispatches. 3 Comments
Today on the Dispatches, we finally reach the finish line of Suda 51’s No More Heroes, a real piece-of-work in every meaning of the phrase.
What Games Have to Teach Us About Speed and Trajectory
Published by June 9th, 2008 in Games and Links. 1 CommentThere’s a pretty great Arkanoid-style game up on Kongregate called Mr. Bounce. Goes to show that old games never die, they just get retooled.
300 Words About Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare - Multiplayer
Published by June 6th, 2008 in 300 Words. 0 Comments“RPG elements” is sort of game designer’s code for “no skill required”. With the exception of World of Warcraft, most games that have players earning experience points and unlocking new abilities don’t require mastery so much as a willingness to sink the right amount of time.
In opposition to its single player campaign, which emphasizes gritty, quasi-cinematic realism, the multiplayer in Call of Duty 4 has a lot of numbers. Players get points for almost everything they do. Killing an enemy, killing an enemy while crouching, killing an enemy with a certain gun, etc. These points will then unlock new guns, attachments to guns, special abilities called ‘perks’, such as dropping a grenade as soon as you die.
All this creates a single player, meta-RPG that lies on top of the different games of Deathmatch and Capture the Flag and King of the Hill, and keeps Call of Duty 4’s multiplayer from being well made but ultimately average.
This meta-game acts as an opiate for the mass of players who will never play the game on a high level but because of the realities of sorting and matching players by skill level still have to roll with the big boys. No longer are you purely concerned with your kill to death ratio. For every person you bring down, you get just a couple of more points towards the next piece of kit that you want to try out.
The downside of this is of course that the difference between doing well and doing poorly is often having a laser sight. In the end though a skilled player will be able to overcome these types of disadvantages, and the rest of us will enjoy the consistent pleasure of playing with new toys.
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