Articles by VorpalBunny
This past weekend saw the Art History of Games Conference. Gamasutra has offered some insight about two of the talks that occurred there, reporting on both John Sharp and Frank Lantz's talks.
Sharp traced the trajectory of both art and of games. He looked at how both have been viewed through the ages and commented on how it was not until the High Renaissance that we started looking at art as leisure for those with money. It was no longer just in the service of religion or the personal.
Games, however, were tied in with more basic instincts, but fulfill many of the same roles. They can offer deeper meaning, provide room for introspection, et cetera. However, the last note argues against what Lantz calls the domestication of games: "In the end though, Sharp said that the relationship between games and art remains fraught. 'To display a game in a gallery is to take away a part of its game-ness.'"
Lantz seems to make a similar argument, saying that we need not change games to conform to ideas of what is art, but use games to change how we define art. After all, the definition of art is constantly changing, and having its boundaries pushed. This is true of any art form, and makes much more sense than trying to apply the principles of film, literature, and so forth to the medium of games wholesale.
Therefore, instead of asking, "Are games art?" our focus should be elsewhere. Instead of seeing art as a definition that needs be met, we should see it as a definition whose parameters can be expanded and encapsulate a new form.
High Voltage games, best known for its championing of the Wii-exclusive The Conduit, has released the above teaser trailer for its 4-person co-op zombie, werewolf, vampire fest along with the announcement that the game would no longer be Wii-exclusive. In an interview with IGN, CEO Kerry Ganofsky and creative officer Eric Nofsinger, they reveal both the non-Wii-exclusivity (now for Xbox 360, PS3, and PC) as well as discussing more in depth their perception of how The Conduit was received.
They realize that the economy has a large part to do with their sales, though their willingness to go across platform and "Bringing our third internal IP to all the current-generation systems allows us to show off what our company can really do and get it into the hands of the most gamers." Championing for the Wii does no good if your company can't sell those games.
Set to release on Halloween of 2011, we still have some time to wait for The Grinder, which is fine, as they promise to still reveal more on the contents of the games through this year's GDC and beyond.
EA has been kind enough to remind us that the Sims franchise is turning ten. As in, today.
February 4, 2000 saw the rise of a game that certainly changed the way many people think of games. When first getting into discussing games, and not just playing them, a former professor of mine was hosting colloquiums looking at how games served as narrative frameworks, and how they both borrowed from other media and used new frames with which to provide us our information.
One popular example he would use to look at how games allowed players interactivity and choice was The Sims. Love it, hate it, feel meh about it, it has helped us look again at the term gamer. In many ways, it feels like it has given rise to the 'casual' audience some gamers bemoan these days. As it boasts being the top-selling PC game of all time (and that's not really hard to believe, especially when they can state that the entire franchise has sold 125 million units worldwide), it's also helpful to remember the community the games have created: here was a new community of modders, designers, and machina-concerned tinkerers.
It was also among the first games to allow us--gay, lesbian, or bisexual gamers--to experience our romances in games. The series' evolution of our relationships, from 'roommates,' to civil partnerships, to full-on marriage, has been in line with the reflection of how our societies see these issues, and the importance visibility plays in having these issues discussed in even the most casual of spaces.
Therefore, when EA boasts:
If the games were buried in a time capsule, when unearthed in 100 years, The Sims would give future generations an instant understanding of how people lived between 2000-2010...
The popular franchise has also kept pace with societal trends such as "going green" with The Sims 3 allowing players to live off the land, grow their own food and or use pedal power or a Toyota Prius to travel, all in an effort to reduce their personal carbon Sim footprints.
I really see what social trends they have noted and included. College life, the rising trend of the young adult (not the same category as the novels or films catered to such) versus adult demographic, and, as I stated above, gay relationships.
As a fan, I hope for another ten years with as much experimentation as the past three titles have provided, based on the simple concept of Maslow's hierarchy as envisioned by Will Wright. It also makes me wonder what exactly this game will say to a new generation of gamers in not only game design but society in another ten years.
For those of us who may have missed the Bioshock 2 launch trailer on Jimmy Fallon last night, here it is. A full three minutes, thirty-five seconds long, it is rather glorious.
Nothing incredibly new, but gosh is it pretty. Plus, more footage of Big Sister always makes me happy. Now to wait six more days...
Steam turned 5 this past year, and as digital distribution continues to trend alongside excellent Steam sales, it comes as no surprise that they announced a userbase 25 million strong. They note that 10 million of those accounts have active Steam profiles, indicating that the adoption of their platform is as much about the community as it is the games being downloaded (I personally used Steam long before I ever digitally bought anything from them).
The announcement further highlights that this growth is a 25% increase from 2008. Furthermore, unit sales increased 205%, a trend that has been years in the making, as Valve notes. Unfortunately, they do not mention anything beyond percents, so while the number is impressive, it is hard to tell exactly how impressed we should be.
Gabe Newell states:
Steam turned five years old in March 2009. With the introduction of each new platform feature released over the years -- such as the Steam Community, Steam Cloud, and Steamworks -- we've seen corresponding growth in account numbers, concurrent player numbers and developer support for the platform. As such, we plan to continue to expand and grow the platform to better serve the developers supporting the open platform and millions of gamers logging in each day.
Considering their adoption of services like gifting games and being able to buy a four-pack of games with friends for a cheaper deal (recently joined in with three other friends to purchase Bioshock 2 for $34), this is hardly surprising news. Watching my Twitter feed over the holidays, each Steam sale day generated a healthy amount of buzz and excitement, with many cursing the service for all the smaller transactions that were occurring.
Of course, I am personally interested in what the future holds for Steam. What improvements would you like to see? Do you use Steam frequently? Or, perhaps like GOG.com founder Marcin Iwiński sees it, you consider it a form of malware?
Rejoice PC and PS3 owners, it appears that we now have confirmation that the DLC for Grand Theft Auto IV is to be released on your platform. The Lost and the Damned and The Ballad of Gay Tony will be both packaged together or sold separately on GFW LIVE and PSN accordingly.
Release is set for March 30, so you still have a small wait ahead of you, though a few games wait for you between now and then. For Games for Windows LIVE players, there will be 32-player multiplayer, alongside an advanced video editor.
It is becoming fascinating to note the future of exclusive content, seeing this DLC moving across platforms finally, and how the Netflix deals have gone. It also makes me wonder if Microsoft struck a deal with Rockstar to put a wait on the DLC titles, or if this can all be chalked up to development time/costs (as we are seeing with the staggered release, though noticeably shorter, with the Dragon Age: Return to Ostagar DLC). Either way, it's a future that should make many gamers happy, regardless of console choice.
To say I was a Sierra fanboy back in the day may be an understatement, as the boxes bearing the Sierra logo took up a sizable portion of the family computer games shelf. In the years since, I often forget what has become of the rights to those games, and opening up my e-mail, Good Old Games reminded me of the history including Codemasters and eventually Activision:
In a landmark deal for the DRM-free digital distribution movement, Activision Publishing Inc. is bringing a wide range of classic games to GOG.com!
It's now official, we're bringing you the biggest announcement in GOG.com's history - Activision with its wealth of PC gaming gems has joined our DRM-free family. With the announcement we're revealing first two classics which should be instantly recognizable to any fan of good, old games: Arcanum: Of Steamworks and Magick Obscura and Gabriel Knight: Sins of the Fathers. Other games from the Activision catalogue will be unveiled gradually in the coming weeks, so expect more from this publisher during Month of Activision on GOG.com!
So, if you want some steampunk fantasy RPG action made by Troika (another fanboyism) or want to swoon with Tim Curry voicing Gabriel Knight and his history with the Schattenjägers, know that you can do so on the cheap ($5.99 each) and DRM-free.
As I've moved away from the family games shelf that had all these titles, I look forward to what else they will be unearthing. Maybe they can get me the digital copy of the Quest for Glory series I strongly desire; I sometimes worry about that poor Collection CD that's been played to death.
The Game Developers' Conference has announced its keynote speaker for this year, the legendary Sid Meier. If you have played any of the Civilizations, or among my favorites, Alpha Centauri, the name might ring a bell.
His talk is titled "The Psychology of Game Design (Everything You Know Is Wrong)," and is to address how the primary focus in design needs to be the psychology of the player. His argument lies that hard sciences as we know them do very little to inform game design compared to looking at how the player interacts with said game.
GDC has also released news on other major talks to be occurring:
- Ubisoft Montreal lead designer Patrick Plourde will speak on 'Designing Assassin's Creed 2', discussing how "the design team faced the challenges of an enormous scope, one of the biggest development teams ever assembled and a limited time frame" for the critically acclaimed, Renaissance Italy-set action game.
- In a lecture entitled 'Get Your Game Out Of My Movie! Interactive Storytelling in Mass Effect 2', BioWare's Armando Troisi "will focus on the narrative design fundamentals used at BioWare and how they evolved for Mass Effect 2, explaining components of the just-debuted game's story design, problems encountered during implementation, and design choices made for the long-awaited franchise sequel.
- The always popular Game Design Challenge returns this year with a unique theme - the designers "must conceive a game that somehow incorporates the actual death of a real person." The contestants for the 'Real-World Permadeath' challenge, MC-ed by Eric Zimmerman, are last year's Challenge winners Heather Kelley (Kokoromi) and Erin Robinson (Puzzle Bots), facing off against Thatgamecompany co-founder Jenova Chen (Flow, Flower) and Airtight Games' Kim Swift (Portal).
Chen and Swift working together? Now that's something I'd love to see, considering my love for both Portal and Flower. Though, playing through Mass Effect 2 right now, the talk on how they made their design changes and decisions would certainly pique my interest. Having just finished another playthrough of Mass Effect, the game feels wholly different in many regards.
GDC 2010 Announces Meier Keynote, Major New Lectures [Gamasutra]
On Sony's PlayStation blog, they've announced that there will be an event for the next few weeks, preceding the launch of Heavy Rain, called "Four Days:" The Heavy Rain Online Experience where:
You can experience "Four Days": The Heavy Rain Online Experience, a live online mystery that plays out in real time across three weeks, drawing you into the mystery and lore of the Heavy Rain universe. Between Tuesday and Friday every week there will be daily tasks for you to complete (leaving you the weekend to catch up if you fall behind). Each task will lead you to the next part of the journey. At certain key stages you will be prompted, while on other occasions you will need to deduce the right thing to do. You will receive an instructional email at the beginning of each of the three weekly events, and you can always turn to the Facebook Fan Page for help and discussion.
The post itself starts off discussing heavy rain in certain key areas as an ARG, but tongue-in-cheekly notes that lawyers hate the repercussions of changing weather patterns.
This event promises exclusive content and a more in-depth look at the world the game is producing. If you are interested, just take your umbrella over to the Heavy Rain website and register.
We already know about "The Passing" DLC for Left 4 Dead 2, but Valve has updated its blog to let us know of other patches on their way before said DLC.
Among the changes being made is also adding bots to the Infected team during a versus match, so as to make sure things are even. This seems like something that could have been done much earlier, as I recall people ragequitting in regular ol' Left 4 Dead and sometimes being the only Infected in a Versus match.
They even casually mention that it will make more interesting and possible the idea of a 1vs1 match, which I never even contemplated.
Also, it appears they are going to be experimenting with the auto-spawn feature during finales of the campaigns' versus modes. To quote:
So how do finales currently play out? Across all finales in Left 4 Dead 2 currently, a single survivor has a 34.56% chance of escaping. That includes the Concert Finale in "Dark Carnival", which boasts close to a 50% escape rate (and yes, a fix for everyone's favorite cheese spot is coming). Remove the Concert Finale, and we see the average drop to 29.61%. With these figures in mind, when we make changes, we can measure the difference and see how much the change impacted the balance.
They have also been measuring play modes, and it appears both campaign and versus are the tied for first place (I personally love scavenge).
Last, but certainly not least, they direct attention to CGSociety's interview with Randy Lundeen and Jeremy Bennett concerning technical aspects, level design, Survivor and Infected changes, and differences from the first game.
Gamasutra's Christian Nutt recently interviewed American McGee, appropriately known for American McGee's Alice, discussing his view of the gaming industry. During the interview, he goes on at length about how he was previously a project axer for EA, nipping developments that he could see would go nowhere. This leads to a rather curious viewpoint on Crichton I had not seen before, and his finding visions for games often being flawed and seeking to take on too large innovations.
As the interview progresses, McGee starts talking more at length between the differences of individualism and collectivism in development teams between the West and Asian countries. Using his failed project Grimm as an example, he showcases how while it was not a commercial success, it allowed them to create a development team that worked five days a week, eight hours a day, and no more. In other words, while he sees it as a commercial failure, he appreciates what he learned about running a team without crunch.
With many peoples' minds being on the Rockstar Spouses of late, he also focuses a bit more on crunch, which appears to be no different in China:
They're all working ridiculous hours, just like you do in the West. They're all working crunch, overtime, weekends, you name it. And in the West, before, in California, before there was that ea_spouse situation. I mean, the employers here take advantage of it.
They hire somebody for 40- or whatever-hour work week and then they get 60 to 80 hours out of them and they don't compensate them any more for it. Actually China, they're trying to crack down on labor laws and that stuff now. But it's a similar abuse. You get people who are passionate of games and then you take advantage of them.
The entire interview does not broach the topic of his sequel to Alice, so for those hoping, you may wish to hold out for more news, but it does serve well to highlight how what many view as differences in development teams is something that is hard to pin down exactly, but has some key sticking points.
Joystiq broke the news, and Kyle Orland via Twitter confirmed, that Crispy Gamer, who bought GamerDNA recently, has laid off its editorial staff, consisting of: James Fudge, Scott Jones, Ryan Kuo, Anne Mischler, Evan Narcisse, Kyle Orland, John Teti, and Elise Vogel.
In protest, it appears CEO and co-founder Chris Helman resigned, signaling a decision by the board of directors that may have been both hasty and a rather terse decision.
John Keefer, also a co-founder of the site who has since moved on to GamePolitics, has shared with Joystiq:
It's hard to see a dream die, especially one you put your heart and soul into. The site was created for the readers and to give them an alternative voice, to dig deeper than many of the sites out there and to make readers think about what they play and why they play. Personally, I had a lot of fun in the process. Thanks to all the people that read the site and became part of the growing community.
We would like to offer our condolences to all affected.
And girls who like girls who like rumble packs!
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