Wired 360 Controller for PC

 

The Xbox 360 controller is the best designed controller I have ever used. There, I said it. The Dual Shock design was perfect when I was 12, but as an adult it becomes literally painfully clear that when Sony added analogue sticks to the design in order to keep up with the N64, nobody with the hands of the average adult male ever tested the thing for any period of time*. Ergonomically, it's shite. The 360 controller by contrast was designed for people with hands rather than horrible shriveled vestigial claws... but then I like both the Dreamcast and the N64 controller, so what do I know. 

One design was good and lasted 1994-7, the other is a hateful turd that has haunted us since 1998.

I recently picked up the Wired 360 pad for my PC after the backlog of games I had that were shit on mouse and keyboard was getting ridiculous. As a gamer with a heavy PC bias (after my 360 e74'd on me, all my consoles are now old/retro) I've been resisting shelling out for a gamepad for a while, out of some misguided distrust of console controls. I mean, I even played (and loved) Darksiders using the keyboard and mouse, and that game was crying out for a controller. Still, now I have it, I'm massively impressed with it. The price can be a bit steep: £25 in all of the stores I went to, and around £18 online, but the official 360 controller is the way to go. The build quality and ergonomics are both top notch, especially with the wired pad, as the back doesn't have the battery pack restricting finger placement. 

PC gamers, including me, will often defend the relative expense and complexity of PC gaming on the basis that the PC is still the best tool for the job. Yet, many of us will use keyboard and mouse on games where a controller would be measurably superior. Genres like RTS and FPS will never be better with a controller, but as I learned, it's stupid to cheat yourself out of a superior experience out of sheer bloody mindedness. My own anecdote is that I was stuck on the last mission of Earth Defence Force, (which I had been playing with mouse and keyboard) yet I beat it on the first try after I bought the gamepad. Controllers have their place in PC gaming, and role will only increase as the PC becomes the secondary ported-to platform for titles from the big publishers and developers.

*I am aware of the Dual Analog controller that predated the Dual Shock and had arguably better ergonomics, but it wasn't produced for very long and isn't really all that relevant. 

Steam Sale Haul: Earth Defense Force: Insect Armageddon

Earth Defence Force: Insect Armageddon (PC)
Developed by: Vicious Cycle Software
Published by: D3 Publisher
Sale Price: £11.24
Standard Steam Price: £14.99

Oh Earth Defence Force, where do I start with you? Part kaiju movie, part Serious Sam, with a sprinkling of the customization and weapon feel of Armored Core, EDF: Insect Armageddon is an experience like no other... well maybe except for the other EDF games.

The premise of the game is simple, aliens are invading Earth using giant bugs and even bigger robots, as the leader of strike force Lightning, it's your job to defend the streets of New Detroit from this menace. That's it. Still, the story is pretty much irrelevant, this isn't a game about tight narrative, or even vaguely comprehensible narrative. No, EDF is a game all about spectacle and unremitting cheese.

No more than anything else I've ever played, EDF feels like a B-movie. Objectives and 'story' details are given by the disembodied voices of 'Ops' and 'Intel' (no character interactions or story cutscenes here), and are without fail delivered with all the passion and believability of an actor in an Asylum film. Yet, instead of being awful, the combination of the cheesy voice acting and the giant bugs (especially as they're called ravagers in game) just works. The cherry on top is the sprinkling of nonsensical or inappropriately used military jargon. The Modern Warfare favourites of "Oscar Mike" and "[callsign] actual" make frequent appearences and just add to the campy B-movie feel. The best part is that it's never entirely clear whether it's being done intentionally or not. To continue the B-movie comparison, some of the magic is always lost when it's obvious that the schlockiness is being done on purpose. EDF: Insect Armageddon never falls into that trap, something that is very much to its credit. 

Thankfully, the great job that was done in setting the campy scene does not bleed into the gameplay too much. It's generally fluid and tight, if verging a little into the repetitive by the end of the game. Missions take place on large square maps, full of destructible objects like buildings. Objectives are simple, usually involving fighting to a specified map marker, planting a bomb on either a destroyed aircraft or ravager tunnel,or killing all of the ravagers in a set area. That's really it, the fun of the game doesn't come from complex objectives or scripted set pieces, it comes from dealing with the threat presented in any way that gets the job done. By the end of the game, you'll be demolishing every building on the map as you kite huge robots around, shooting missiles into their weak points and desperately trying to avoid their attacks. It's very simple, but it works. The lack of guidance on the objectives and the freedom that gives you in return makes for a great gaming experience.

Admittedly, the gameplay does admittedly get a little stale by the end of the game. Mainly due to the lack of standard enemy variety. There are three main bugs, metal versions of each plus a few others like exploding ticks and flying interceptors, but you face so many at a time that a new enemy will become a familiar sight within the level that it's introduced. There are bigger boss-like enemies that require more thought to defeat, either because they have specific weakspots or are just very tough, but even these get a bit stale after a while thanks to the game's very Serious Sam approach to using these enemies: what was a boss that you fought mano-a-mano two levels ago, is now going to appear in pairs backed up with a mob of fodder bugs too. The game does try to prevent monotony by giving access to tanks, walkers and various types of turrets at different points of the game. These do make a change, but you're never going to be relishing the chance to use one. Using them is also, as is the spirit of the game, totally optional.

Combat is also varied up by the use of a class system with each having access to different weapons and abilities. The four classes (or armors) are the Trooper, Tactical, Jet and Battle. Troopers are the basic all rounders, capable of using the largest array of weaponry; Tactical can build turrets and other support structures; Jet uses a jetpack, unsurprisingly and energy weapons; the Battle armour, my personal favorite, carries the heaviest weapons, has an energy shield, the most health, but moves the slowest. At the end of each stage, the class you're using gains experience based upon your kills in the mission. As classes level up, they gain more health as well as access to new abilities and higher tiers of weapons. The maximum level for each class is dictated by the difficulty level played. Higher difficulty: higher level cap.

The class system is a nice idea, giving that little extra depth to a game that could be far too easily written off as shallow and basic. However, the way that classes level up means that unless you want to replay missions many times, you'll want to stick to a couple of armors at most for the majority of the game, lest you spread your xp too thinly and end up at too low a level to deal with the latter stages of the game. Your experience per armour is cumulative though, and you can replay any mission once it's completed, so you can at least resort to level grinding if necessary. 

Game modes are restricted to the Campaign, a 'remix' version of the Campaign, and a wave based survival mode. All can be endlessly replayed on the various difficulties. They're also all available in single or multiplayer. By default in singleplayer, you have two AI squadmates that can revive you when you're downed and provide general combat support throughout the levels. In hosting a multiplayer game, you allow other people to jump in and out of one of those slots. So you play as you would in singleplayer and unless you create a private match, other people can jump in and out of the squadmate slots as they please. If you're joining a game, it works like any other console matchmaking

service. You select a specific mission (or any if you aren't fussed) and the game will automatically search for appropriate matches connect you to that host. The multiplayer is smooth, the drop in, drop out system doesn't impede gameplay, and also means that you can set up an online game and just play as you would offline without having to sit waiting for people to join before you can get started. Online multiplayer really isn't my thing, but this implementation is at least strong.

Earth Defence Force: Insect Armageddon is a very strong game hidden under a well applied layer of b-movie charm. It's not going to be for everyone, nor is it a competitor to the big triple-A blockbusters, but it doesn't need to be. This is not a £40 Activision or EA backed monster, it's a fun £15 game. A B-game if you will. The thing is, this B-Game happens to be to other B-Games what Escape from New York is to B-movies. It's just good. It has it's flaws, and yet when you're demolishing half a city battling a robot whose foot is taller than you, whilst your AI companion is suggesting starting a construction company, they don't seem to matter any more. If you can appreciate a bit of cheese with your third person shooting, I'd heartily recommend EDF: Insect Armageddon, especially for the price it is, it's definitely worth a look. 

Good Campy Fun 8/10

Steam Sale Haul Review: Singularity

So we're in the midst of Steam's Christmas bargain bonanza once again, and once again I've been cleaning up. I've long maintained that Games are the best value form of entertainment and with the deep cuts that our friends over at Valve are making to the prices, it's never been more true. With all the games I'm buying, (if it's under a fiver and remotely interesting then I'm having it) it felt like the perfect opportunity to have a go at a few reviews that attempt to come down on the side of brevity. I won't be doing everything, maybe only three or four, since I already know that some things aren't going to work as reviews and others will take me forever to finish.

Singularity (PC)
Sale Price: £3.74
Standard Steam Price: £14.99
Developed By: Raven Software
Published By: Activision

Welcome to Russia. Sorry, Яussia.

**The following refers to the single player only because I couldn't get a game in multiplayer**

It's not all that uncommon to find a game whose vision outstrips the capability of the developer to deliver that experience. There are plenty of games out there that get by on goodwill for the concept and respect for the endeavor that they represent, in spite of technical problems and  sometimes sub-par implementations of  what were clearly good ideas. Until Skyrim, Bethesda games would often hold this crown, their sheer scale and vision allowing forgiveness of their quirks, bugs and in some cases downright broken-ness. What makes Singularity is amazing in that it manages to be almost the complete opposite.

Singularity is not a bad game. As a campaign driven FPS, it's technically proficient, a well executed example of the genre. Yet, in spite of getting everything right in terms of the actual implementation of gameplay concepts: it just isn't at all remarkable.

Being unremarkable doesn't mean that it's boring by any stretch of the imagination. The shooting is good and solid with an array of different weapons. From the standard FPS family meal of the Pistol, Shotgun and Assault Rifle, to more exotic weapons like the Dethex grenade launcher replete with rolling remote control grenades or the Seeker with its manually controllable bullets; the arsenal is varied and generally satisfying to use. This is surprising in a game that comes from the guys that brought the world Solider of Fortune. By the same token, nobody should be surprised to learn that full dismemberment of enemies is in effect here: nothing gives in-game shooting a sense of weight quite like blowing a guy's legs off with a shotgun. There's even a weapon upgrade system powered by finding, often hidden, collectable weapon tech boxes around the world. These can then be spent on improving damage, clip size and reload speed for each weapon. Not all that exciting, but it's at least another thing that the game can claim to do competently. 

Aiming down sights: the next generation gaming experience is here!

Guns are only a portion of your arsenal though. Singularity, like most non modern military shooters, has its gimmick weapon: the Time Manipulation Device (TMD). As its name suggests, the TMD has time based effects upon enemies and objects in the environment. Initially, it can only age or rejuvenate specific items, age enemies (to dust), and let out a shockwave as a melee attack, but through the magic of a few story specific upgrades, you're soon able to grab objects and projectiles, and sling around pockets of stopped time. The fun of messing with time is short lived though, as many of your combat abilities will rapidly wear down the TMD's energy. This is understandable, as the game loses all challenge if you can dust most of the enemies on sight. 

Given the limited charge, most of what you end up using the TMD for is puzzle solving. An example that crops up a couple of times in game is the rolling garage door that is stuck slightly open but still too low to get through. Simple enough: age a metal crate so it crumbles small, place it under the door, then rejuvenate it so it grows back to its original size, opening the door as it does so. The game is full of minor puzzles like this that use the fact that objects change size under the effects of the TMD. It's an interesting system in concept, and it doesn't really get boring by virtue of the game's short 5-6 hour campaign length, but once again, it's just a little unfulfilling. Being so qualitative it's a hard thing to really pin down, but the best comparison is with the physics puzzles way back in Half Life 2. Solving some of those could feel genuinely rewarding: they made you feel smart. Singularity's puzzles just don't. They're just another place where one of the game's systems, though well made, fails to make an impact.

Still Яussia.

The whole time manipulation deal is very central to the plot of Singularity, a plot that once again shows that when in doubt, blame the Russians. Essentially, the story comes down to those pesky 1950s Ruskies, with their perverted science, messing with a new element (E99) that has a warping effect on time. As a plucky, silent, American soldier sent to investigate strange radiation readings on said island 50 years later, you find yourself being flung backwards and forwards in time, changing the past to impact the future. The odd thing is the fact that other characters seem to be perfectly aware of you changing the timeline. You'll travel to '55 a couple of times in the game in order to create events that will change the present. In spite of you being the only one that travels through time, other characters (who are part of the history you have changed) will comment on what you've done. 

The plot of the game isn't truly bad. Despite being set in Soviet era Russia, and you know it's Russia because the game font is full of backwards 'R's and 'N's, it doesn't come off like the product of a right wing lunatic with a stiffy for the Cold War as so many games and films... and books, do. Like so much of this game, it's just a bit throwaway. The game attempts at mystery by leaving 'cryptic' messages on walls for you to uncover with the TMD. The game doesn't go anywhere interesting with them though. It's also fairly obvious where they've come from anyway, so the reveal at the end of the game has no impact. It's the same with the tacked on moral choice at the end of the game. It's essentially a 'choose your ending' moment. Since it's the only story choice in the entire game and none of your previous actions have any impact upon it, it just feels like a tacked on afterthought. 

As a technical exercise, Singularity is once again competent but uninspiring. Sights, sounds and implementation of physics are such as you'd expect from a shooter from 2010. There are some nice effects when large structures are built or decay in real time, like watching the paint flake off of the walls of a room all at once, or a door go from pristine to rusty before your eyes. Nevertheless, these are uncommon occurrences, and can't make up for the fact that the rest of the game looks a little muddy. The game definitely looks of its time in most respects, yet many of the textures have a definite first-generation Source engine game vibe to them. If anything, the impressive aging effects make the rest of the game look a lot worse by highlighting what could be achieved as contrasted with how the game looks most of the time.

I don't think I've ever played a game like Singularity before, a game that gets things right to such an extent, and yet manages to be an ultimately forgettable experience. I can't mark it down from any technical angle, well apart from maybe looking a little ropey for the time, and yet I can't recommend it at anything other than sale price because was such a resounding 'meh' for me. I maintain that it is not a bad game, it just isn't a great one either.

Good but passionless: 7/10

A few more thoughts on Chrono Trigger... and Chrono Cross.

Leading off from my gushing reminiscence about how I originally found, loved, and subsequently went back to retread, Chrono Trigger, I feel that I have more to say about the game. For one thing, I have finally finished my play through, with all side missions complete and all techs learned. Though in spite of this, I largely stand by my previous comments. The only additional negatives for me are that the game reuses a few tracks of  the (admittedly great) music a little too often, and the fact that even with triple and dual techs, I still found myself using the same 2 or 3 party variations all the time. The three characters of a casting bent (Marle, Lucca and Magus) barely ever got used. The former problem is excusable in that it's likely one of hardware limitations. The latter I have to cut some slack because it came as a consequence of an aspect of the game that I really like: most characters have a healing technique and/or at least one offensive spell. So unlike many other RPGs, I never felt shackled to a healer character that sucked at everything else. In CT I was able to roll with a very physical attack heavy party of characters that I liked and still had access to offensive magic to deal with enemies that resist physical attacks, as well as healing techs for the tougher battles. I imagine that other people probably have their own small set of go-to parties that they use over and over.

The real thing that I thought about when I finished the game (yes I have a New Game+, no I probably won't be going for the other endings), wasn't a new criticism of the game, it was dissapointment in its sequel: Chrono Cross. Now don't get me wrong, it's was a well produced game for the time, a game whose scope is far in excess of Trigger and that lets you as the player have much more agency over what's going on. Looking at review scores from the time too, it was very much a good game. Though for the record, I don't really like it.  My problem with Cross isn't with the game itself but with how it relates back to Trigger. The long and the short of it is that it essentially makes the events of CT redundant. The way it does it too is in that really shitty, years after a series finished, shoehorning-in-a-sequel retcon kind of way. Like Terminator 3 appearing out of nowhere and shitting over everything years after T2 neatly and awesomely wrapped things up. Like with Terminator 3, I try to pretend that Cross didn't happen.  

I feel that Chrono Cross really should have been another IP, or could have done the trope of one of the other Squaresoft series and had no links to the previous game. Instead, Cross is littered with unnecessary callbacks to CT, each one putting more of a downer on the previous game. The main kick in the nuts is that fact that Lavos is back again, rendering the entire previous game pointless. Moreover, little touches: like meeting ghosts of Chrono, Marle and Lucca as children, or Robo being reduced to the "Prometheus circuit" (confirmed to be the case by the game's creator). Yes, this circuit is important to the plot, but it's still an unceremonious end to such an awesome character. Full disclosure: Robo is my favourite character in Chrono Trigger. As I've been subtly hinting, my main problem with Chrono Cross is how it discards most of the previous game, and what it doesn't discard, it actively undermines. Once again, I don't deny that Chrono Cross is a good game, or even that its story isn't worth telling. I just believe that it could have told that story without splattering shit all over Chrono Trigger's story.

So this was a bit of a nerd rant. Still, I couldn't help but feel the satisfaction of finishing Chrono Trigger's story being tarnished by the fact that I know that canonically, bugger all was really achieved. Sadly, this realisation means that I've become something I once sneered at. I'm now no better than people that claim that Lucas raped their childhood by making the Star Wars prequels. Oh dear.

Sometimes my Own Longform Writing Annoys me.

Pre-worn side stand on,
Steam sale stealing my money,
Hiding for 5 days.

Haikus suck all balls,
Pretentious theft of culture,
Am I now hipster?!

On the other hand,
Pointed communication,
No excess bullshit.

Hmm am in two minds,
Like the clipped direct form,
Still shit type of poem.

Old Game Memories/Revisited: Chrono Trigger.

Chrono Trigger is a game that holds a special place in my heart. Not because it reminds me of lost childhood: I have never owned a SNES so didn't have the chance to play it when it was new. Besides, I was five when it came out, and somehow I don't think I'd have been old enough to appreciate it in the way I was enjoying, say, Sonic at the time. 

No, my first encounter with Chrono Trigger came around 7 years ago (oh god, it's really been that long) when my previous flirtation with the dark art of emulation really took a turn for the serious. In this great lull of 2004, the period that stood between getting my first good PC the previous year and building my first great gaming rig in the following one (which would lead to me falling down a rabbit hole of PC gaming that I never escaped), I became enamoured with the possibilities represented by emulation. I was able to play all the greats I remembered from my time with the Mega Drive as well as the games my SNES equipped brethren had raved about, but that I had never really had a chance to get to grips with. Soon though, I had gone far beyond the known, into the realm of games I'd never even heard of before. Alien Soldier, Wonder Boy in Monster Land, Strider, Metal Warriors, Megaman X, ActRaiser,  these titles and many more all fell into my voracious grasp. 

However, it was my love for the Final Fantasy series that really dominated the nature of the games I played. At the time, I owned every Final Fantasy that I was capable of playing, from IV-X(-2... I know, I was young and foolish). As exciting as it was to buy the newer games as they were coming out, it was the process of going backwards, of filling the earlier gaps in my collection, that really opened my eyes. Final Fantasy VI captured my imagination in a way that none of the others, even my beloved VII or XI had. A feat made all the more astonishing by the fact that I played the other two when they were pretty much new! When their visuals, at least, were fresh, shiny and exciting. The version of VI I played only had the original sprite graphics and a few added FMV sequences. Remember, this was at the time of the PS2, the game was now ostensibly two generations out of date. In spite of this, VI won me over. I loved the characters, the setting, the story, even the battle system had nuances that differentiated it from all of the other ATB based FF games. |In fact, I would still argue that Final Fantasy VI is the best of the lot.

How did this get in here?!

The most important thing Final Fantasy VI did for me though was to direct my attention to the golden age of Square and Enix' (as well as a few others) vast outpouring of titles on the SNES. Even now, I would consider the battle for best RPG console to be between the PS2 and the SNES. With this newfound knowledge my consumption of emulated games came to an all time high as I burned through 40+ hour RPGs. Some were finished, some weren't. Some (not naming any names here, Star Ocean) generated corrupt save games when I was 15 hours and totally destroyed my motivation to play any more. In this sea of Lufias and Illusion of Gaias, one name stood out, one game that rose above the rest. That game, of course, was Chrono Trigger.

Chrono Trigger held me in complete awe. Even more so than FFVI, I was enchanted by every aspect of the game. The story was great, the characters sympathetic, and the game's main idiosyncrasy: time travel, made for a fascinating way to view the world. It also gave the designers the ability to justify giving you not only very distinct scenarios to face but also vastly different environments to explore. The different time periods all very much having their own flavour that kept the game from feeling bland. It's hard to convey in words without totally deconstructing the game, but suffice to say, Chrono Trigger had such an impact on me that for the longest time I considered it to be a contender for my favourite game ever.

I don't have any screenshots, so it's going to be awesome Toriyama character designs instead)

In the intervening time I've tried to play Chrono Trigger again but it's always ended up being spoiled by something getting in the way: responsibilities; newer, shinier games; or hard drive failures that destroy my save file and instigate some sort of meta rage-quit. Recently though, the prospect of shelling out a large amount of money to have a bunch of CT merchandise imported, got me wondering just how good the game is now, if it still deserved the reverence I held for it, or if itis just a case of shit smeared goggles. So in the interests of intellectual rigour I decided that I would hold off on buying anything until I'd played through Chrono Trigger again. Both to make sure I wasn't wasting my money buying items related to a crappy old game, and because I'm a dick that gets angry at others for being scared to be critical of their loves. It'd hardly be fitting of me to hold that view without doing the same to the things I hold dear.

With this in mind, I've been playing Chrono Trigger for the last few days and have got reasonably far into it. Far enough at least that I feel that I can comment on how it has shaped up compared to my memories.  At this point, I have to admit that it's as tight as I remember it being. As an overall package, it's about as advanced as an RPG could be on the Super Nintendo. In fact, I think I appreciate it more now than I did when I first played it. Being that now I have a much larger wealth of gaming experiences to fall back on as well as a reasonably developed knowledge of the larger context of gaming, it's history, trends and the capabilities of consoles in varying eras. I keep noticing the little things as I play, like just how expressive the character sprites are. In an era where JRPGs, especially, are pushing for more and more spectacle through ever better visuals, it amazes me that I feel these characters to be more 'human' despite being silent sprites with a limited animation selection than more modern, ostensibly better looking, fully voiced characters of other games. 

Moreover, even though I have the game's soundtrack, I never fully realised how well utilised it is in the game. It always gives areas and scenes an ambiance or emotional intensity that just feels right. Yet it does this without being obtrusive, adding to the experience without distracting from what's going on. When I wrote about Mass Effect 2 I commented that bad sound choices draw attention to themselves. That doesn't mean that good sound work is all about being forgettable, more that it should fit the tone of the action onscreen to the point where the two are so well matched that it just 'feels' right. This, obviously, has a large element of subjectivity to it, but as far as I'm concerned, CT nailed it.

There are other little touches too, like being able to equip characters within a shop's menu, not just an option to equip whatever gear you just bought, but to totally re-equip every character, even those not in your party. It's only a little thing, but even people who love JRPGs will cop to how annoying it is to come out of a shop menu only to have to go straight into the equipment menu. Switching party characters is a snap too, just hit Y and you can swap them out. No going to a specific area or save point to do it, very convenient. I also enjoy the lack of unannounced random battles in the game. Virtually all enemies in an area are visible to you and you can choose whether or not to engage them.

As well as generally being avoidable, the battles in Chrono Trigger also happen to be some of the best in any JRPG. They have the standard battle menu and share an ATB derived turn based system with the contemporary Final Fantasy games, but that's where the similarities end. For one thing, all battles take place in the game environment: when you touch an enemy, your characters draw their weapons and it's on. No loading, no switching to a battle screen, just instant fighting. This also means that there are no battles on the world map, which is a big plus as it means that you are free to explore. I always used to hate getting lost on an FF worldmap as it would invariably mean more battles that were either too easy to be engaging, or an absolute slog as my characters ran out of MP and were reduced to physical attacks. The battle system itself is also interesting in that characters learn 'Dual Techs' and 'Triple Techs' that are dependent on who's in the party in a given battle. This adds an extra element to consider when deciding who to put in the party, as characters that were seemingly less capable can be redeemed by contributing to a strong Dual or Triple tech. Beyond that, it's a slick, well executed take on turn based RPG combat. I'd call it it one of the best, if not the best examples of the breed. That being qualified by the fact that I haven't played enough RPGs recently... or ever, to make a definitive claim. Still, I like it.

In the midst of all this gushing, it seems almost a shame to talk about Chrono Trigger's issues, but it needs to be done... so it will be. For one thing, the set up for the plot is paper thin. It's a good romp once it gets going, especially the stories of individual party members, but in the beginning it all seems very consequential. The grand set up for the rest of the plot, the lynchpin action that sets story proper into motion, is one character seeing the end of the world (this is very early into the game) and deciding that they (your party) have to stop it. That's it. On the plus side, at least shows some character agency: it isn't the standard foretold prophesy nonsense, or your party being swept up into events outside of their control. I suppose it also allows the game to move along at a decent pace. Still, the almost nonchalant way that your characters decide to save the world was a little grating to me.

Best character: Robo. Hands down.

Another small problem comes from enemies respawning in areas that you've cleared. I wouldn't mind if this happened if you go more than a certain distance away, (in FFXII enemies only respawned once you were three loading 'gates' away from their area) or if an amount of time had to elapse etc etc. But it takes the piss a little that you can clear an area of enemies, enter a side room to look for treasure (thus causing a new area to load) and when you leave, the place you had cleared will be full of enemies again. Yes, it's less annoying than random battles, but it can still get a little irritating as there are some fights that you will have to do again. You may be able to see almost every fight coming, but that doesn't mean that they're all optional. 

This leads into the final real criticism that I have to level at the game: the frequency and subsequent dullness of normal battles, something that honestly, is more a problem with the genre than CT itself. In fairness I like JRPGs, I like most kinds of turn based combat, but nothing wears out a good thing more than repetition. As good as CT's battle system is, and it is good, it does become tedious when you're just cutting your way through lackeys without even having to pay attention. So long as you're the correct level for an area, most battles will be easy enough that 'hammer A to win' is a perfectly valid strategy. No magic, no awesome Dual Techs, just pound standard attack until you win. In fact, you're actively discouraged from using fancier attacks on weak enemies as that'll drain you of MP pretty quickly, and could leave you out of options if a tougher enemy does appear. This all changes when faced with a boss or miniboss as it actually becomes worth playing properly, and the combat system shines for it. The rest of the time though, the lack of challenge makes for a lack of fulfillment. Still, as I said, this is a genre rather than a game problem. Even then, CT is far from the worst offender, it only really becomes a problem if you get lost or have to double back on yourself in an area made up of several sub rooms or floors with each needing you to pass through an enemy-respawning load.

If my criticisms seem nitpicky or unnecessarily harsh, it's because I held this game to such a high standard before, so any flaw becomes magnified tenfold.  Nevertheless, my intention was to find out if CT was still as good a game as I remember, and as far as I can tell, it is. It may have more competition than it did back then, but I still hold it in very high regard. If people listened to me, I'd urge anyone even remotely interested in the genre to play it any way they can. (can't see the recent iOS version being very good though, too long a game to play on an iPad) Chrono Trigger is a classic, and not in that damning with faint praise 'good for it's time' sort of way. It's still an amazing game. So amazing that I can't even fathom how people playing it 16 years ago must have felt. 

How much was it to import that stuff again...?

Do bikes know it's Christmas time at all?

So my bike has destroyed a throttle cable. It goes without saying that I'm not impressed. It couldn't have happened at a worse time either, well unless you count it going whilst I was away from home... or if I had a job to get to or something. Whatever. I'm still battling the christmas strain on the postal service to get a new cable before new year (as I live in the sticks and nowhere within 150 miles even stocks one). Sadly, this isn't the only issue, as a panel was cracked in the process of getting the bike to a point where I could take the tank off to actually check out the carb end of the cable. In absolute terms, it's no biggie, a bit of fibreglass here, some filler there, a whole mess of sanding and painting etc etc. But in this context all it's done is add insult to injury. 

The only silver lining is remembering back a couple of years ago when something like this would have set me mewling and shitting myself. This was something that only occurred to me after I had the bike in bits. It's quite nice to be able to think how far you've come along.

A Weekend on the Killing Floor

I must confess, I tend to avoid multiplayer shooters like the plague, especially the kind of high difficulty, low player count game wherein one weak link (like say someone who can't snap off headshots as well as a 14 year old full of Mountain Dew and racism) will spoil it for everyone. Still, a few days ago when Killing Floor had a free weekend on Steam, I had to give it a go. After all, the price was right.

My God, I was impressed.

I played the majority of the matches over LAN with my brother, which admittedly gave us a significant reduction in firepower compared to the 6 players that the game seems to expect, and on anything other than the easiest difficulty, require. On the flip side though, at least I could concentrate on enjoying the game rather than on how much I suck at FPS compared to everyone else on the internet. It was because of that, that I was able to appreciate just how good this game is.

Yes, that is who you think it is.

The basic set-up isn't all that uncommon these days. It's essentially a horde game: enemies come in  waves of ever increasing size and difficulty, killing enemies yields cash which can be then spent on weapons and upgrades at a store in between rounds. A simple weight system keeps you from tooling up with more weapons than an African Warlord. After the final conventional round, you have to face "The Patriarch" a huge undead monster with a minigun come rocket launcher, a massive amount of health and the ability to cloak and regenerate. Kill him and victory is yours. Simple. Well, in theory at least.

In practice, I only ever saw the Patriarch on the easiest difficulty, wherein he was less a creature of unstoppable horror and more the only thing that even had the slightest chance of killing me.

This is a very British game, and I love it for that.

Personally, I didn't enjoy playing it on easy. Yes, it was the only way to win with just two of us, and it was fun to actually see the upper tier weapons, but I just didn't find it as fun as really having to fight to stay alive (then fail woefully) on the harder difficulties. The combat is so engaging, that it wasn't all that fulfilling or fun when it was a cakewalk.

Speaking of combat, Killing Floor has some of the best shooting of any game I've played for a very long time. Even better than E.Y.E. I'd like to think that the old-school sensibilities come from the fact that Killing Floor started life as a mod for Unreal Tournament 2004, back when dinosaurs roamed the Earth. The guns definitely have a chunkiness to them that has more in common with that era of shooter than this one. Still, having never actually played the mod this is just speculation.

What I loved most about the combat, even more than the chunky, authentic (if not realistic) feeling guns, was just how frantic it felt. Like somebody had strapped a Nitrous bottle to an old Rainbow Six game. As I said, the guns have an authenticity to them and this expresses itself in a few different ways. For one thing, there are no crosshairs in the game, it's ironsights or firing blind. What really has the biggest impact however, is the fact that reloads take a believably long amount of time (compared to more arcade-y shooters) this contributes to a huge feeling of tension, especially when you've got a mutant eight-legged reindeer (more on that in minute) baring down on you.

Reload times were such a consideration that I started basing my tactics around them, eschewing fully automatic weapons and shotguns in favour of high powered pistols and semi automatic rifles. Automatic weapons were far to easy to empty in the heat of the moment, making reloads all too frequent, and shotguns, once emptied, needed to have each cartridge reloaded individually. A far too time consuming process, especially on the perpetually empty double-barreled shotgun.  This wasn't really that much of a problem since I've come to prefer rifles and powerful pistols in most games: it always feels badass to be methodically popping heads left and right with nerves of steel as the horde descends upon you.

Yeah, these aren't action shots, too hard to play and screenshot.

The game sells itself as a survival-horror co-op, which isn't really right. Yes the maps often have a lot of great creepy atmosphere, and the creatures are grotesque, but the very nature of co-op undermines the feeling of solitary helplessness that is really key to videogame horror. I do have to give credit where it's due though. The tension generated by the combat, the huge volume of enemies, and the well designed maps which never give you a too easily defensible position, mean that (unless you're playing it on too low a difficulty) you only ever feel like you're surviving as opposed to thriving. You may be in control of the situation, but that could change at any moment.  That's something I love, and since advances in standard of control and graphical fidelity have killed the survival horror genre as it was back in the halcyon days of Resident Evil 1-3 and Silent Hill. I feel that emphasising the survival aspect as a mode of creating tension, rather than trying (and failing) to be scary, may be the way that the genre has to go.

For the sake of full disclosure, I have to add that there is the possibility that the reason that I didn't find the game in any way horrifying, may have something to do with the fact that I was playing a Christmas themed version replete with grappling elves, bloated vomiting Santas (the fuckers), the aforementioned scuttling mutant spider reindeer, homicidal ginger bread men, and a very jolly Santa derived Patriarch. If anything, this just made things surreal, especially on the festive maps, wherein the soundtrack to your slaughter was made up of Christmas songs. Though since a lot of Christmas songs do inspire a blood rage in me, this was still somewhat fitting.

My kind of Christmas

This being me, I can't leave this without mentioning some of my less great experiences with the game over the weekend. My main gripe with the mechanics is that I wish that there was some sort scaling within a difficulty level based on the number of players in the game. Fun as it was to be playing LAN co-op rather than online with whoever, we were stuck in a weird position of either winning easily or getting totally destroyed. I feel that if there was some modification based upon player count as well as difficulty level, the game would be able to provide much more appropriate levels of challenge.

My other main concern relates to just one enemy: the Clot (or elf in this version). Why on earth does it grapple you!? When the Clot attacks, you become stuck in place until you kill it. Sounds reasonable enough doesn't it? Well let me tell you something, when you're in a high wave, surrounded by enemies and running low on ammunition, it doesn't seem so reasonable when you die because one of the creeps in the mass surrounding you happened to be a Clot and the little shit stopped you from running. Especially when the damn thing is attacking you but is obscured behind a larger, tougher, monster so you can't see it to kill it... WTF Blizz!? Clot is OP! etc.

So, my Killing Floor weekend was good one, plenty of bullets and plenty of blood. I was mightily impressed with the game, and whilst it isn't going to get me totally into online multiplayer shooters, it did remind me how good LAN can be. Now I just wish that someone would make a campaign driven FPS with the combat mechanics of this. It would be a hell of a lot better than the other thing I went back and played that weekend; the buggy, bloated, over-hyped, darling of the e-peen waving, hardware forum arsehole: Crysis. That's another story though.

Mass Effect 2 (PC) Short Review

Mass Effect 2 
Developed by Bioware
Published by EA
Available on Steam for £19.99

The Mass Effect series may just have one of the best "lived in" sci-fi universes going. Even ignoring the amazing design, the rich tapestry of inter- and intra-racial interactions and the feeling of this being a real, living galaxy. I find the biggest strength of the world to come from the fact that Bioware have managed not to fall into the trap that most sci-fi and fantasy worlds do, wherein every non human character is just an example of a set of racial traits. Well, apart from the obligatory 'black sheep' whose soul defining characteristic is not fitting the mold. Drizzt anyone? In a Mass Effect game, a character's race will generally give you no prior indication of their disposition or opinions, something which really makes the universe compelling and elevates well above the mire of generic ten-a-penny sci-fi and fantasy settings. 

It's a good thing that Mass Effect 2 has this grounding in such a well realised world too, because it really helps to make up for foibles that would be serious deal breakers in other games. The most pressing of which is the combat. It's definitely much more developed than in the original Mass Effect. There's now an ammunition system rather than the previous game's overheating mechanic and cover, whilst still clunky, is more intuitive to snap into and out of. None of this deals with the the main issue with the combat, which is that it doesn't feel satisfying. It may be closer to a cover based third-person shooter like Gears of War than the first game was, but it's still  lacking a feeling of engagement that betrays its rpg-centric Bioware roots. In essence, even though this game has had many of it's predecessor's overt RPG trappings stripped away, it still feels like there are modifying dice rolls going on in the background every time you fire a shot. Because of this, it's hard to really feel potent in combat. Yes, enemies will fall and some of the encounters can be impressive, but it can be difficult to shake the feeling that victory was more down to chance than personal skill.

Thankfully, despite the shifts toward being more action oriented, Mass Effect 2 really shines as a sci-fi RPG. The universe is compelling with great attention to detail meaning that it feels populated with people rather than a bunch of drab racial archetypes. Running through a hub area you will overhear snippets of conversations that, whilst scripted rather than dynamically generated, give the universe some life. The believability of the setting is a testament to Bioware's strengths as creators of worlds, as even though there are only a handful of hub worlds each with a very limited scope of exploration, the world as a whole feels as expansive as a fully open Bethesda epic.

Onto the immersive backdrop is placed some great character interaction and development. At the start of the game players can elect to create a new Cmdr. Shepherd or import one from a Mass Effect saved game. Importing providing both, minor but welcome, bonuses to the player and consequences in how characters in the game world receive Shepherd. In true RPG fashion though, the commander's real role is to be the player's vessel, he/she lacks any real personality beyond what the player gives them. The real stars are the members of the team. Every one of them is deep, interesting and have conversation options designed in such a way that interacting with them feels fluid.  By the end of the game I had become attached to my team in a way that rarely happens in games. Between the amazing writing and the great voice acting, they came across as actual people with developed personalities and not just two dimensional heroic archetypes.

The only downside of the interactions with the other members of the team is something that pervades almost every speech encounter in the game. Almost all conversation options have an impact on the game's binary paragon/renegade morality system. The main product of the system is that a high enough score in either direction can unlock new speech options in future encounters that can open up new approaches to problems. As a consequence of this, I at least often found myself responding to a character in a way that I didn't really want to, just because I knew that a less interesting response would give me points in the appropriate morality direction, and that since there's a finite number of points in the game, it wasn't worth risking throwing them away.

Still, this is not a huge problem and, hamfisted an implementation as it is, it does at least give the player's actions some consequence in the game world, even if those consequences are that by not being a straight Paragon or Renegade, the player finds themself in a story situation that they can't effectively resolve to their liking. On top of this, since at least Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic, Bioware RPGs have required the player to make at least two playthroughs to see everything. No this isn't a real defense of the system, but it does at least show it to be a product of deliberate design and not sloppiness. Obviously it's a matter of player preference, but I, at least, quite like the idea of my in-game actions having consequences on the story and the world, and if the price of that is making a choice between true role-playing and powergaming, so be it. 

As with anything with any sort of budget these days, Mass Effect 2 looks and sounds good. From a technical standpoint it looks a little tired, essentially having the first game's graphics with a few minor updates. Still, apart from a few niggles like everybody of the same species/gender seeming to share the same body model, the game is easy on the eyes; the models and textures aren't noticeably bad, and the subtle filmgrain effect enabled by default helps to further smooth everything over.  The biggest boon to the game's visuals is the great standard of design throughout, as evidenced on everything from characters to ships and from weapons to environments.

In terms of audio, nothing really overly draws attention to itself, and this is far from a bad thing. It means that the audio is doing everything right as far as delivering an immersive experience: subtly enhancing the experience, rather than jarring the player out of the world by drawing undue attention to itself. The voice acting is generally of a high standard, really contributing to giving characters, particularly the Normandy's crew and Shepherd's teammates, their depth and believability. If a complaint has to be made then it's that the male Shepherd voice is a little on the flat side. Touching or tense moments can sometimes have a little of their shine taken off by the limited emotion expressed in the voice. It isn't really that bad, this isn't old Resident Evil voicework by any stretch. It is noticeable enough to be worth a mention though.

You get used to seeing the world from over Shepherd's shoulder.

In Mass Effect 2 Bioware have produced a amazing action-RPG based in an amazing setting whose greatness is only slightly tarnished by an overly pervasive binary morality system and a, whilst technically proficient, ultimately unengaging combat system. Nevertheless,  these are charges that quite honestly could be levelled at almost any RPG, and it would be no more justified to dismiss Mass Effect 2 over these issues than it would be to write off a large proportion of the genre. While I enjoyed the first, Mass Effect 2 is the game that really cemented the strength franchise and its setting for me. I would highly recommend this game to anyone even mildly intrigued by idea, it really is that good.

9/10