Lots of Monkeys

I’ve been in the Beta for City of Villains for a few weeks. Officially, the Non Disclosure Agreement has been lifted and I can talk about how the game is.

I am having an awesome time. It is, in the geek vernacular, “Airwolf.”

The Rogue Isles look fantastic. There is a lot of character in the artwork of each building, every alleyway, even the streetlamps. On the whole, it contributes to the flavor of the Isles as being a mish mash of different cultures. Streets (if they exist) are haphazard, more like the layout of a country village than a city grid. Overall, the developers, the artists, and the musicians have created a place that is very, very different from Paragon City.

Paragon City is the Birthplace of Tomorrow. The ultimate planned metropolis. Sure, it has its problem areas, but overall, the city is neat, orderly, and well lit. You can walk down the street and generally, feel safe.

The citizenry are for the most part, well mannered.

The Rogue Isles by comparison, are what is buried under rubble when a place like Paragon City is created. It is not planned. It is not pretty. It was swept aside and forgotten.

The people? Let me break it down for you. The police are disapproving of your evil ways. The criminal element that is already here, doesn’t want you cutting in on their action. The citizens that you enact villainy upon are not exactly welcoming. Occupying hero forces? Yeah, they definitely want to send you back to prison, but it’s not their first choice.

Hell, the people who busted you out of prison and brought you here in the first place dislike you.

Did I mention that this game is awesome? *

I am playing a Mastermind, which is an Archetype based entirely on letting your henchmen do a majority (if not all) of the fighting. My current specialization is Necromancy, but I could have picked from Mercenaries, Ninjas, or Robots. All they need now is Pirates and Spaghetti Monsters.

Looking forward for its release at the end of the month. The open beta should be coming soon

* And by awesome, I mean totally sweet.

Due to a clerical error. . .

I’m giving away prizes!

• Grand Prize: One 30 day free trial to City of Heroes (retail box)
• First Place: One 14 day free trial code for City of Heroes (online code to download the client from NCSoft)

Now, I’m not just giving these away, you’ll have to earn them. Basically, I want a unique, cool hero idea. I want their Name, their Archetype (Blaster, Defender, Scrapper, Tanker, Controller), and a bit of background as to why they are in the hero biz.

Extra points for:

• How they arrived in Paragon City.
• Costume idea.

Best entries as decided by me, Morgan and Yuriko will get a shot at these fabulous prizes. You may want to browse the City of Heroes website for background on the game itself.

Good luck. Have fun! Email me your entry. You know where.

Update: I am accepting entries all the way up to 3:33pm next Thursday, June 16th. Winners will be announced next Friday.

I’m walking down K Street at quarter to ten on a Tuesday evening. It’s cool for a DC summer night, and the walk back to the hotel is a brisk one.

I’m alongside Constance Steinkuehler, a researcher who focuses on learning and cognition. Of late, her research focuses on MMOGs (Massive Multiplayer Online Games) and the forms of learning, thinking, and social interaction within the context of those games.

Tomorrow, we will be presenters at the Online Computer Library Center’s Annual Meeting.

Tonight, she’s geeking out about God of War with me.

“Did you play the sex minigame?!”
“Of course I did!”

We’re walking alongside a few other people from the OCLC. Some of them pause and ask us about what we are talking about. We start to explain the scene, and the gameplay elements. More than a few giggles escape when we talk about rotating the analog stick first one way, then another way, then all the way around.

Someone jokes about the sex minigame and her husband.

Constance and I continue talking about God of War. We rave about its unapologetic faithfulness to the spirit of Greek mythology, and its place as possibly one of the best morality plays, ever. Kratos is a morally ambiguous protagonist.

He is definitely not a hero.

We talk more about the blood and the nudity.

“This is probably not the sort of thing we should show at the presentation.”
“Probably not. But I have the sanitized trailer.”
“Great!”

We talk about how the game reminds us both of Prince of Persia with better implemented combat. We move on to other games. She chides me about the fact that I’m playing Jade Empire.

“I’m surprised you like Jade Empire. That game is really girly.”
“Tell me about it. Whenever Dawn Star gets angry at me because I haven’t talked to her in a while? Please!”

But then we go back to God of War. I almost spoil it for her, and she tells me that she’s only three or so hours in. She may have been stuck at one point, but she’s going back to it. I mention the fact that it’s only about eight hours, but it’s a good eight hours. I complain about single player games that are longer than 40 hours.

“I will suffer the worst abuses in MMOGs, you name it—grinding, crafting, whatever. But as soon as I’m in a single player game and I come to a stopping point, forget it. You’ve lost me.”

She makes an interesting point. I’ve quit a lot of single player games at around the eight hour mark, unless they had something spectacular about them. MMOGs, I play for a ridiculous number of hours. Sometimes I get nothing done, but I still put in the hours. It has to be the social aspect.

Too soon, we reach the Hamilton Crowne Plaza and everyone heads into the hotel. It’s an early start tomorrow, and there’s plenty to talk about.

I reflect for a bit on on our conversation on cab ride home.

I remember that in a conference call two weeks earlier, Constance approved of my game choices, specifically pointing out that I was most definitely, “a gamer.”

Now, I return the favor.

Videogames are fighting against an outdated perception. There are people who only see games as violent, morally corrupting, time wasters with no redeeming qualities.

These people have never felt the music in Rez, never watched Aeris die, never used a bomb to find a secret door, never dance danced, never fought their way back from the brink of defeat with a crash gem, never had an impressive KO streak against their best friends, never leveled an assassin only to lose them by not logging in, never read how a particular super hero ended up in Paragon City, never helped two young orcs find their way back to Orgrimmar, nor have they ever, ever in their entire life—rolled a Katamari.

And I do feel sorry for them.

Certainly, there is still a long way to go before videogames are as accepted as books, cds and movies.

But as a person who enjoys videogames, it’s good to see a gamer like Constance fighting against this outdated perception.

It’s a good thing she’s on our side.

I buy a lot of games. A lot of them, I do not finish. They sit, languishing on the shelves until the oft prophesied gaming apocalypse.

So why play so many?

I always hope that the next one will be something that draws me in completely. Instead of playing the game, the game itself drives me to its completion.

I do not know what type of a game it will be, or who will develop it, nor when it will come out. I can only read previews and reviews and then hope that it will be good.

Personally, I do not ask for a massive paradigm shift in gaming. I do not seek an oscar winning screenplay. Nor do I request production monies on par with this summer’s “blockbuster action title” starring the male lead of the moment. I ask for nothing more than it be fun to play, have a story I enjoy, and have a decent presentation.

I am often disappointed when one aspect of a game falls short. For me, it makes the experience less than the sum of its parts. Sometimes, one part of the game will be so stellar that I will overlook other aspects and complete it anyway, but that does not happen very often.

The story of The Bard’s Tale, starring Cary Elwes, was well done and laugh out loud humorous. The combat however, was standard hack and slash. Near the climax of the game, the “innovative” summoning aspect of gameplay grew repetitive. But the story and dialogue (in particular, the dialogue between the The Bard and The Narrator) never grew old. The game had character and it deserves kudos for letting you just walk away from the final battle.

I have a very short list of games I have actually played to their endings.

But first let me tell you about God of War.

God of War is the very definition of sleeper hit. I had paid little attention to this title, considering that it looked just like every other action adventure title. It was set in Ancient Greece. I yawned, passed it over. Instead, I watched the release dates for sequels.

It never occurred to me that Sony’s internal development crew could take an original property and apply it properly to an existing, tired, overplayed genre. It never occurred me that it could spring forth fully formed from that development environment and be a good game.

I am not alone, because I think everyone was surprised.

God of War mirrors the mythology upon which it is based. It is violent and brutal. There are many maimings of mythical monsters and multitudes of mere mortals murdered. (Also, there are mammaries. But then, it is Ancient Greece, so it’s all in context. Right. Okay, maybe the mammaries were added for the titillation (Ha! Oh man, how many nested parentheses (probably more) can I put in?), but I forgive them that. ) This is an adult game that has not merely embraced its “M” rating, but has put that rating on the rack and stretched it to see how far it could go.

Ancient Greece, in the developer’s vision, is a savage, unforgiving place filled with danger. It is the kind of place where a man will rip off a gorgon’s head with his bare hands. The kind of place where a man can be tricked by the gods into killing his own wife and daughter. A place where the Hydra eats people on the open seas, minotaurs carry very large axes, and the undead walk the earth in Ares’s name.

So, a fun place to visit, but you would not want to live there.

Then they added a very well put together game on top of that vision, and the result is God of War.

It is like other games. You can use other games to describe what the game is like. It has some puzzle elements that are similar to Prince of Persia. It has a stylish combat system like Devil May Cry. The resemblances though, are only nods to the games that it stands on the shoulders of.

Even more important, this game is fun. I played the game on Hard difficulty, and I enjoyed every moment of it. It was challenging, and the game never felt like it was taking a cheap shot at me. There are parts of it which are frustrating. But they were only frustrating until I changed my strategies, which I feel was fair. I had to think about how to fight, literally fight, through the levels. Boss battles required some pattern recognition as well as timing. It was a welcome change, and as I mentioned before, it was entertaining and fun throughout.

Normal should be a breeze for most people who play video games.

The developers also took some time to add DVD style extras to the game itself, provided that you can unlock the material by defeating it on Hard difficulty. Watching the game evolve from a .1 release to its retail incarnation was intriguing. You can also view levels that never made it to the final version

There are a lot to good things to say about God of War, and a lot of people are saying them.

I’m just going to say that God of War is one of the best games I have played in many, many months.

And it is on my short list.

Here is to the next one.