Be warned: Light spoilers for both Force Unleashed games follow.
You're dropped in to a space ship. Your objective is to find and kill General Rahm Kota, leader of defected Storm Troopers who resisted Order 66. Vader has sent you on this mission to test your abilities as a Jedi. You are Starkiller. You are the most powerful Force-wielder in the known galaxy.
In front of you, there are tight, silver corridors, crawling with maintenance droids and lined with windows. The cold, empty darkness of space peers at you through them, black except for the white freckles of stars, lightyears away.
What would the most powerful Jedi in the galaxy do? Probably throw a cleaning droid in to space, just to see what would happen.
Using the Force, you pick up a droid, watching it spin uselessly mid-air. It struggles against the invisible power around it, fighting to get back on its maintenance track. It resembles R2-D2, though you don't know its specific model number. Up and down, left to right, closer and further away. Yup, the Force works. All systems go. We are ready for launch, captain. Bombs away.
The droid whips out the window, clumsily smashing off of the ledge, the nostalgic "WAAAH" of the droid ringing out into the vast emptiness. The vacuum of space begins to violently pull the rest of the corridor out with it; other droids, boxes and power cells, shards of broken glass all go hurling out of the window beyond your control. Just as you begin to think that you might be next, a hefty metal barrier slides in place, accompanied by the reassuring sound of re-pressurization.
Everything's safe. The droids are gone. Now you have an innate understanding of how your Force powers interact with the world around you.
In the next hallway, there's a door. It looks the same as the thick, protective sheet that slid over the broken window. If it can resist the crushing power of depressurization, how do you get through it?
You annihilate it with your powers, of course.
With the press of a button, you unleash a wave of unparalleled power that blows the door open, seemingly effortlessly. What was once a formidable barrier is now a crumpled piece of metal, hanging on by barely a thread.
You are Starkiller. You are the most powerful Force-wielder in the known galaxy.
On the other side of the door is a wide-open hangar, filled with Troopers who are terrified of your very presence. They take poorly-aimed shots at you, running to and fro, taking cover and grouping up, trying to kill you as hard as they try to avoid you. But you know what to do. You know that you can pick things up and hurl them with your mind; you know that you can use the Force to literally blow people away. Within minutes, the hangar is empty of (living) Troopers, and you stand unscathed. You've thrown them in to the void of space, thrown them against walls and each other, dragged them across the floor and instilled fear in to their hearts before bringing their lives to and end.
You are Starkiller. You are the most powerful Force-wielder in the known galaxy.
The opening moments of the story proper in The Force Unleashed are brilliant. As soon as you're put in action, the game allows you to connect the dots with your imagination and experiment within your environment, free from harm and enemies. Even though you're only allowed a few minutes in this corridor playground, it shows you enough of what you can do to ignite your imagination for the rest of the game, and what that will bring in terms of abilities. It's the bait to hook the player, and it's one of the most effective hooks in any game.
While the rest of the game, at least on the initial playthrough, never lives up to the potential in the player's mind, it's clear that the concept of The Force Unleashed is rock-solid, if not technically sound. The Force, in the movies, is always preached as a passive, coercive ability that is rarely used in direct, destructive means. The Force Unleashed, however, puts the Force powers at the forefront, as a Force wrecking-ball.
"He's taking it to the limit [. . .] he's unstoppable," said Sam Witwer, voice-actor and motion-capture actor for Starkiller. This encapsulates how the player should feel while playing as Starkiller: an unstoppable force. An embodiment of power. From the moment you first hurl a droid out of a window, the player feels in control.
Fast-forward two years, to the release of The Force Unleashed 2. What was a flawed-but-promising game is finally receiving its sequel, a game that will be action-packed, filled to the brim with emotion, and obviously awesome force powers. If The Force Unleashed 2 is everything the first one was, but with less glitches, it would be an amazing experience.
Open to a room. Vader is talking to you, a clone of Starkiller, forcing you to cut down holograms of the Troopers you killed at the beginning of the first game. . . and your love interest. The game tells you how to play. Press X to lightsaber, press Y to lightning, Press B to Force Push, Right Trigger to grab, so on and so forth. Gone is the opportunity to fool around with your abilities free of harm. Either cut down the enemies with the proper button inputs, or be killed.
As soon as the tutorial is over, Vader decides you must be killed and a new clone awakened, but you leap out of the window before that happens. Cue an 'action' sequence of dodging airborne debris while you fly through the air. Follow that up with some bland platforming, and then running away from a ship that's going to kill you, and then you leave the level.
Each level of The Force Unleashed 2 is a repeat of the previous, just with a new location. Enter area; fight Storm Troopers; ramp up to Force-resistant enemies; fight AT-STs; fight big boss; cue cutscene. Gone are the playgrounds of the previous game, allowing you to chain together combos and attacks to create a machine of destruction. Each enemy, except the regular Storm Trooper, has one attack that makes them vulnerable to all other attacks. The game boils down to doing an attack to make an enemy vulnerable, and then throwing them off of a ledge/into a fire pit/at a fan blade/into the sky. Larger enemies all have projectile attacks that you can grab mid-air, and they never attempt to close the distance, so any larger enemy is taken out just by throwing their own attacks at them. Any real trouble that you may be in is averted by a 'Rage' meter; press the GET ANGRY button, and then every single one of your attacks becomes instantly lethal, lasting for the better part of a minute.
To illustrate the lack of creativity on this game's part, here's a video of the Dagobah level.
Unfortunately, the video starts with the previous level's boss battle, which was an exercise in tedium and entirely lacking in challenge; a lazy chase of the big-budget action moment that ended falling flat on its face. After that, there's a cutscene in which Rahm Kota says something about Dagobah, for some reason, and for some reason also, Starkiller goes to Dagobah (for some reason). Once you land there, you get to walk in a straight line, picking up collectibles which just litter the ground. You know, Dagobah. It's where I keep all of my lightsaber crystals. For storage purposes.
Eventually, you encounter Yoda, who just spouts some cryptic bullshit, and then for some reason you see the future, and then the story continues. And that's Dagobah. Just senseless fan-wankery that serves absolutely no purpose. It's a stroll through a tightly guided, poorly-realized location that fans like, but one that entirely misses the point of the location. You're guided there with the vague mission of 'finding yourself,' and all you do is walk for three minutes towards a cutscene that lets you glimpse an attack on your love interest. By the time you get to your love interest, the attack has already happened, making the whole trip a pointless endeavor. You don't learn anything about Starkiller. No mysteries are revealed. You're not given a new objective. You just visit, and then leave. Luke Skywalker went to Dagobah and became a Jedi; full of determination and drive, eager to put an end to the tyrannical reign of the Empire. Starkiller goes to Dagobah, gropes himself, and then is late for an appointment.
Everything about The Force Unleashed 2 feels unfinished. It's a collection of thoughts and ideas for a sequel that never form any sort of cohesion. What if you didn't know whether or not you were a clone? What if you went to Dagobah? What if you could use the Jedi mind trick? What if the story were more personal? It's almost like playing a stream of consciousness, but you can throw Storm Troopers around. Nothing about it feels tight, or refined. It certainly doesn't feel like two years worth of development time. It's a glossier, shinier version of the first game, but without any heart or passion.
You were Starkiller. You were the most powerful Force-wielder in the known galaxy.
May 11, 2013
May 16, 2011
Forever Thinking with Portals
In 2007, Valve released The Orange Box compilation, advertising that it had five games for the price of one. Half-Life 2 and its episodes (including the never-before-released Episode 2), the much-anticipated Team Fortress 2 and a little project called Portal. Of all five of these games, Portal was the one to take home all of the awards. People were obsessed with it, and it has spawned a meme that everyone knows: The cake is a lie.
Now, we're all sick of that meme now, but it goes to show how a well-made game can invade every aspect of people's lives, even those who don't play it. The credits song, Still Alive, found its way onto the Rock Band DLC list and everyone from my closest friends to my girlfriend to my mom has at least played Portal, and I've never heard a bad thing about it. Penny Arcade had a hilarious comics concerning the use of Portal (here), and to this day I find myself talking to my friends about what we would do with a portal gun.
Portal 2 was released recently, and I'm sure many of you have played or heard of it. It even caused Dyn, Inc. to give employees an extra day of paid time off to play the game, since so many were staying home anyways. Portal and Portal 2 are games that thrive entirely on brainy, smart and clever things. The gameplay is all about solving puzzles, finding where to go and making sense of the crazy things that your portals can get you to, or enable you to do. On top of that, the character development is based entirely on jokes and quips and one-liners that are often aimed at the player, but so well demonstrate the animosity and intentions of whoever's talking to you. Hell, there's a character that gores on a rant about developing a combustible lemon and burning a house down with it, but it manages to be inspiring, sad, chilling and touching all at once.
As I walk about the halls in school every day, I'm thinking with Portals. I imagine crossing hallways more quickly, or going up stairs really quickly, or putting one at my house so that, at the end of the day, I can get home instantly. The world of Portal, the technology and the characters, are all so endearing and genuine and funny that it worms its way into your brain in a way that only true masterpieces can. Any time I see a white wall, I think, "A portal can go there."
Also, the ending was fucking crazy.
In 2007, Valve released The Orange Box compilation, advertising that it had five games for the price of one. Half-Life 2 and its episodes (including the never-before-released Episode 2), the much-anticipated Team Fortress 2 and a little project called Portal. Of all five of these games, Portal was the one to take home all of the awards. People were obsessed with it, and it has spawned a meme that everyone knows: The cake is a lie.
Now, we're all sick of that meme now, but it goes to show how a well-made game can invade every aspect of people's lives, even those who don't play it. The credits song, Still Alive, found its way onto the Rock Band DLC list and everyone from my closest friends to my girlfriend to my mom has at least played Portal, and I've never heard a bad thing about it. Penny Arcade had a hilarious comics concerning the use of Portal (here), and to this day I find myself talking to my friends about what we would do with a portal gun.
Portal 2 was released recently, and I'm sure many of you have played or heard of it. It even caused Dyn, Inc. to give employees an extra day of paid time off to play the game, since so many were staying home anyways. Portal and Portal 2 are games that thrive entirely on brainy, smart and clever things. The gameplay is all about solving puzzles, finding where to go and making sense of the crazy things that your portals can get you to, or enable you to do. On top of that, the character development is based entirely on jokes and quips and one-liners that are often aimed at the player, but so well demonstrate the animosity and intentions of whoever's talking to you. Hell, there's a character that gores on a rant about developing a combustible lemon and burning a house down with it, but it manages to be inspiring, sad, chilling and touching all at once.
As I walk about the halls in school every day, I'm thinking with Portals. I imagine crossing hallways more quickly, or going up stairs really quickly, or putting one at my house so that, at the end of the day, I can get home instantly. The world of Portal, the technology and the characters, are all so endearing and genuine and funny that it worms its way into your brain in a way that only true masterpieces can. Any time I see a white wall, I think, "A portal can go there."
Also, the ending was fucking crazy.
Apr 22, 2011
Paid to Play
There are two kinds of people in the world: those who are willing to change and those who are not. People who are not willing to change do business the old-fashioned way, on old-fashioned hours and with old-fashioned rules. No going on Reddit or playing Flash games during work, keep your work and your hobbies separate, do your job the way we tell you to do it.
Those people are what I like to call stupid.
If you're alive and have once talked to another human being, you've heard the term "Facebook me" or "Google it", and that's not a coincidence. Both of those sites are massive money-machines, run by extremely smart people providing extremely smart services. Google is on top of the world (literally, it fought the Chinese government once), and Facebook is fast approaching. Two direct competitors, each forcing the other to innovate and pave the way for the future. What do they have in common though? Awesome work structure.
If you've ever been inside the Facebook offices, seen a video of what goes on in there or even if you've seen The Social Network, you'll know that the Facebook offices are not full of rules and regulations restricting you to your workspace and only allowing you outside during lunch hours. It looks like a really spacious college dorm room more than anything else, and that kind of comfortable atmosphere is proven to lead to higher productivity. After all, if you love your job, you want it to do well.
Google has the same thing going on. Here's a link with photos from both offices, and you can see that both of the offices are not what comes to mind when you think 'professional'. Google has a goddamn slide in their office. People are riding bikes around, or just sitting and talking, and someone's in what looks like a massive sound room just hanging out. Despite these places not looking like the epitome of usefulness, these are arguably the two most well-known companies of our day.
So, seeing that, why aren't all companies that deal in technology going for relaxing atmospheres like that? Obviously, most companies can't afford such massive, spacious offices, but that's not what it takes to create a relaxed atmosphere. Each day, Google has each engineer work 20% of their time developing their own ideas. That's a fifth of their working time that they are allowed to take a break and develop something personally (which has led to the creation of several other Google-owned services, like G-mail). It seems simple, really: do things to make people like their job.
Dyn Inc., in Manchester, New Hampshire has taken this in and decided to do something about it. Being a software company that supplies Twitter, Twitpic and Wikia, their employees have to know computers. And if you know computers, guess what? You probably like games. After seeing that their attendance plummets yearly when a blockbuster game is released, they decided to add an extra day of paid time off so you can indulge in your videogaming.
Yeah, I know, right? How great is that?
Small steps like these can go a long way to showing your employees that you care about them and their hobbies. Allowing people free time to pursue what they personally want is a simple way to revitalize and refocus a person, and a lot of old-fashioned businesspeople could learn from these Google, Facebook and Dyn, Inc.
There are two kinds of people in the world: those who are willing to change and those who are not. People who are not willing to change do business the old-fashioned way, on old-fashioned hours and with old-fashioned rules. No going on Reddit or playing Flash games during work, keep your work and your hobbies separate, do your job the way we tell you to do it.
Those people are what I like to call stupid.
If you're alive and have once talked to another human being, you've heard the term "Facebook me" or "Google it", and that's not a coincidence. Both of those sites are massive money-machines, run by extremely smart people providing extremely smart services. Google is on top of the world (literally, it fought the Chinese government once), and Facebook is fast approaching. Two direct competitors, each forcing the other to innovate and pave the way for the future. What do they have in common though? Awesome work structure.
If you've ever been inside the Facebook offices, seen a video of what goes on in there or even if you've seen The Social Network, you'll know that the Facebook offices are not full of rules and regulations restricting you to your workspace and only allowing you outside during lunch hours. It looks like a really spacious college dorm room more than anything else, and that kind of comfortable atmosphere is proven to lead to higher productivity. After all, if you love your job, you want it to do well.
Google has the same thing going on. Here's a link with photos from both offices, and you can see that both of the offices are not what comes to mind when you think 'professional'. Google has a goddamn slide in their office. People are riding bikes around, or just sitting and talking, and someone's in what looks like a massive sound room just hanging out. Despite these places not looking like the epitome of usefulness, these are arguably the two most well-known companies of our day.
So, seeing that, why aren't all companies that deal in technology going for relaxing atmospheres like that? Obviously, most companies can't afford such massive, spacious offices, but that's not what it takes to create a relaxed atmosphere. Each day, Google has each engineer work 20% of their time developing their own ideas. That's a fifth of their working time that they are allowed to take a break and develop something personally (which has led to the creation of several other Google-owned services, like G-mail). It seems simple, really: do things to make people like their job.
Dyn Inc., in Manchester, New Hampshire has taken this in and decided to do something about it. Being a software company that supplies Twitter, Twitpic and Wikia, their employees have to know computers. And if you know computers, guess what? You probably like games. After seeing that their attendance plummets yearly when a blockbuster game is released, they decided to add an extra day of paid time off so you can indulge in your videogaming.
Yeah, I know, right? How great is that?
Small steps like these can go a long way to showing your employees that you care about them and their hobbies. Allowing people free time to pursue what they personally want is a simple way to revitalize and refocus a person, and a lot of old-fashioned businesspeople could learn from these Google, Facebook and Dyn, Inc.
Apr 11, 2011
Nintendo 3DS Derives Deceitful Discernment
The recent release of Nintendo's 3DS has been met with, among gamers, generally positive attitudes. Being from Nintendo, not a lot of people doubted that it would be successful, and it has sold decently well (though I notice it's still stocked in almost every store I've been to). Right from the get-go, though, Nintendo has done what it can to cover its ass regarding the 3D functionality. They said that you should take a break every thirty minutes to avoid feelings of nausea or illness, and they have warned that children under six years of age should not play the 3DS as it might damage the development of their eyes.
Even though eye specialists have said that there are no harmful side-effects whatsoever to be concerned about, that hasn't stopped certain sources from conducting their own non-peer reviewed, half-assed, blatantly biased and defamatory "study" on how the 3DS affects people who play it. The Sun, an overseas newspaper/gossip paper, decided to get in on this 3DS-hating with their own shitty experiment, deciding to follow no guidelines whatsoever. If you read the link, you'll see that they fail to define anything going on (such as how much 3D is being used, what the baseline for human heart-rate of blood pressure is) and subject the fellow to playing the 3DS while doing different activities.
Yeah, in order to test the effect of the Nintendo 3DS, they have the person playing do other things.
I hope I don't have to explain why that immediately invalidates everything they claim to have discovered. Yeah, viewing 3D in a moving car makes pulse and blood pressure go up, and yes it causes nausea. So does just being in a goddamn car.
The conclusion they come to is that the longer you play the 3DS, the higher your heart rate and blood pressure will be, and they fail to take into account that they had the subject walk around and ride in a car while he played the 3DS. The link I posted (here, for convenience), has a satirical but also serious follow-up, in which they have one of their staff members go out and read The Sun while sitting, walking and riding in a car. I don't want to spoil it, so please give it a read, the results are great.
It pisses me off that gossip magazines can get away with doing such biased, prickish things without getting any backlash at all. Likely, they'll have higher sales and the 3DS will suffer a little because the folks at The Sun who did this study are completely clueless as to how to actually carry out an experiment. Or they did this on purpose, and they're just assholes.
The recent release of Nintendo's 3DS has been met with, among gamers, generally positive attitudes. Being from Nintendo, not a lot of people doubted that it would be successful, and it has sold decently well (though I notice it's still stocked in almost every store I've been to). Right from the get-go, though, Nintendo has done what it can to cover its ass regarding the 3D functionality. They said that you should take a break every thirty minutes to avoid feelings of nausea or illness, and they have warned that children under six years of age should not play the 3DS as it might damage the development of their eyes.
Even though eye specialists have said that there are no harmful side-effects whatsoever to be concerned about, that hasn't stopped certain sources from conducting their own non-peer reviewed, half-assed, blatantly biased and defamatory "study" on how the 3DS affects people who play it. The Sun, an overseas newspaper/gossip paper, decided to get in on this 3DS-hating with their own shitty experiment, deciding to follow no guidelines whatsoever. If you read the link, you'll see that they fail to define anything going on (such as how much 3D is being used, what the baseline for human heart-rate of blood pressure is) and subject the fellow to playing the 3DS while doing different activities.
Yeah, in order to test the effect of the Nintendo 3DS, they have the person playing do other things.
I hope I don't have to explain why that immediately invalidates everything they claim to have discovered. Yeah, viewing 3D in a moving car makes pulse and blood pressure go up, and yes it causes nausea. So does just being in a goddamn car.
The conclusion they come to is that the longer you play the 3DS, the higher your heart rate and blood pressure will be, and they fail to take into account that they had the subject walk around and ride in a car while he played the 3DS. The link I posted (here, for convenience), has a satirical but also serious follow-up, in which they have one of their staff members go out and read The Sun while sitting, walking and riding in a car. I don't want to spoil it, so please give it a read, the results are great.
It pisses me off that gossip magazines can get away with doing such biased, prickish things without getting any backlash at all. Likely, they'll have higher sales and the 3DS will suffer a little because the folks at The Sun who did this study are completely clueless as to how to actually carry out an experiment. Or they did this on purpose, and they're just assholes.
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