Quick Late Review: Bioshock 2

(I'm going away on vacation, so I wanted to dump everything in my brain while it's still there. I have to stop writing games sometimes. Working on Avadon is making my brain melt.)

Looking at video games from an artistic viewpoint, Bioshock 2 might be the most unnecessary game ever made. Bioshock was an incredibly satisfying self-contained experience, and there's just no way to have a sequel make sense. How long can a city at the bottom of the ocean be run exclusively by insane, drug-addicted zombies before a poorly maintained pipe breaks and the whole place floods?

And yet, I can totally understand why Bioshock 2 exists. Someone said, "Hey! There's a really cool shooter at the core of Bioshock, and people would probably like to play more of it. Also, we like money."

So my review of Bioshock 2 is this: You can get the magical ability to make swarms of bees, and they fly around killing your enemies, and when they kill someone the body is infected with bees, and when a different enemy gets close to the corpse it explodes and makes more bees.

How can you not want to play that game?

Also, early on, you can get the ability to freeze the enemy you're fighting. Once you have it, all boss fights become completely trivial for the rest of the game. Once, when I was younger, I would have seen this as a flaw. Now I am old and slow and I think games just get too darn hard, so the ability to instantly freeze and obliterate everyone is awesome. In my fantasy world, I don't want to be a loser who is incapable of ever succeeding.

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Quick Late Review: Mass Effect 2.

(I'm going away on vacation, so I wanted to dump everything in my brain while it's still there. I have to stop writing games sometimes. Working on Avadon is making my brain melt.)

I played Mass Effect 2, of course. Bioware. Have to play. And I really, really liked Mass Effect, warts and all.

Mass Effect 2 is a lot of fun. The new action-based combat model is simple and fast-paced, so the action, while a little repetitive, is always fun. And the game conclusively shows that there is no problem that can't be solved by going from one end of a corridor full of crates to the other. The player characters are a little dull for a Bioware game, but they're fine. (Morden and Garrus are cool.) I suspect that there's just too many of them, so the interestingness got spread a little thin. I missed Morrigan.

But, as much as I enjoyed it, there was one thing that really bugged me. Bioware has said that Mass Effect 3 will be a bit lighter in the subject matter, and thank God.

So there's a woman in your party named Subject Zero. She is harsh and obnoxious and crazy and I wished I could throw her out of the airlock while covered in hurting fire. Like all of the other allies, there's an quest you can do to win her loyalty.

So I accept it, and we go to this abandoned research base. It turns out, Subject Zero was, while a child, subjected to horrible experiments to give her psychic powers. You learn, in blucky detail, how many other children were taken there and killed in other experiments that seem deliberately reminiscent of the work of Josef Mengele.

You also learn that this base was built by Cerberus, a pro-human organization that you work for.

You do learn, for what it's worth, that after Cerberus built the base they went a little rogue before all of the child-murdering started. As if that makes it better. Which, no. When you find out that your bosses helped start the Holocaust, it doesn't matter if they're a little bugged by what happened later. It's still, you know, bad.

I had a lot of fun playing the game. The zappy zappy was good. But that quest really put a bad taste in my mouth for the rest of the game, and this isn't like God of War, where the story is only a vague backdrop for the hacking. Bioware is known for story, and they took a seriously wrong step here. If you want to cover this sort of material, fine. But treat it with respect, don't just make it a little side quest meant to make things all edgy, and certainly don't expect the player to continue to support the organization that created the horrors in the first place. As someone who sometimes takes games seriously as an art form, it's embarrassing.

Also, if you are forced to have these yahoos on your ship, "helping you", asking for favors, and bugging you with their issues, you should always have the option of feeding them into the mass-energy reactor. Hey, your ship has to be fueled somehow.

(And hey, Bioware, still love you, right? Let's not let this little tiff interfere with our deep and lasting relationship, OK?)

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Avadon Developer Diary #1 - Where Ideas Come From.

Last week, after six months of hard work, we were finally able to announce Avadon: The Black Fortress to the world. Avadon is our next, all-new, Indie fantasy role-playing game. And, hopefully, trilogy. We're really excited about it. It's the first time in quite a while that we're doing something really new, and these monthly development diaries will say a bit about the new series and the ups and downs of making it.

So, for the first post, I wanted to write about where the idea came from. I am often asked where I get my ideas. So, if you ever wondered, here is one answer.

The First Idea

About three years ago, I saw that the Avernum and Geneforge series were drawing to a close, and I needed to come up with something new. This was, of course, both exciting and terrifying. Coming up with an idea that will determine the course of years of your life (and possibly put you out of business) is a stressful process.

About this time, my wife and I went to see a Hungarian one-act opera called Bluebeard's Castle. I am normally not a fan of opera. Exactly the opposite, in fact. But some friends had cheap tickets, and we had babysitting, so, you know, whatever.

And what was it like? Well, I will quote Wikipedia.

"The basic plot is loosely based on the folk tale of Bluebeard, but is given a heavily psychological reworking—some would say psychoanalytic or psychosexual"

So you know it was a totally fun time. As far as I'm concerned, an evening out is a failure if it doesn't involve the word "psychosexual."

Anyway. The opera is about Bluebeard, this incredibly scary guy who lives in this huge, dark castle. He brings home his new, young, pretty wife and is showing her around. His castle has seven doors, and he unlocks and opens them for her one after the other. Each door looks out onto some cool room or vista. Some open onto treasures. Others onto subterranean realms. Or far-away lands. (So this is already sounding like a Paper Mario game.) When each door is opened, they sing about it. At length.

So then they get to the last door. Bluebeard refuses to open it. His wife begs for him to. He refuses. This goes on for a while. Finally, Bluebeard gives in and opens the door. Bluebeard's other wives (!) walk out silently. They take his new wife and pull her through the door, which closes behind them. Bluebeard sings about how sad he is. Opera ends. Very psychosexual.

So I'm sitting there watching this, and what I'm thinking is this: Who is this Bluebeard guy? He's very powerful. Very rich. Has a castle full of magic doors. He mentions how he has great influence with the court. What's his deal? Where did all that wealth come from? What does he use those portals for? What is his day job?

And here was my idea. He's a warrior. Or an assassin. Or a spy. He can go wherever the king wants, and do whatever needs doing. Something needs to be found out? Some rebel needs to die? That's what Bluebeard does, and he is well paid for it.

Turning a Glimmer Into a Game

These ideas bounce around in my head for a few years, getting massaged into a more video-game-friendly form. And that brings us to Avadon.

In Avadon, the land of Lynauus is split in two. There is the Pact, an uneasy alliance of five nations, banded together for safety. On the other side is the Farlands, the enemies of the Pact, barbarians and monsters and old, crumbling Empires, kept weak and divided. But they long to get their revenge on the Pact. To put together armies and destroy these upstarts.

And the Pact is protected by Avadon. Avadon is a fortress in the wilds, a law unto itself, separate from the government. Its warriors are tasked to find problems when they are small and do whatever it takes to remove them. Avadon is ruled by Keeper Redbeard, the smiling, jolly, utterly ruthless master of the Black Fortress. He has been in charge for sixty years, though he doesn't appear to have aged a day.

As the game begins, you have just arrived at Avadon's gates. And you have found that, after decades of steely, unbroken control, things are going terribly wrong. Redbeard wants to see you. He needs a pair of fresh eyes, and it is a bad idea to disappoint him.

And that is where the new series came from. Over the next few months, I will say more about the world and the gameplay itself.

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Just Announced - Avadon: The Black Fortress.

We have finally, after six months of hard work, gotten our new fantasy RPG series to the point where we can announce it to the world. It will be Avadon: The Black Fortress.

You can now see the screenshots and first details of the story. In the nine months or so it will take to finish the game, we will also be putting monthly development diaries up. That will give nice little breaks from my ranting.

Hope it looks interesting, and we'll have a bunch more information soon.

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God of War 3: The Anti-Art.

I just finished God of War 3. Having absolutely loved God of War 1 and 2, there was no way I wasn't going to play the next (last?) game in the series. And, since I was playing it while the whole Roger-Ebert-Games-Aren't-Art thing was bouncing around teh Internetz, I couldn't help but view the game through that prism.

First, I have to say that the game is a lot of fun. Nothing beats the God of War series for providing an experience of non-stop, visceral ass-kicking. The game was cool throughout, all killer no filler, and the graphics and production values were predictably gorgeous and expensive.

But what really kept striking me as I was playing it was how it was the perfect example of what I call Anti-Art.

What do I mean by this? Well, I think that something is functioning as art if it connects with you and stimulates your thoughts and feelings in a complex way. And, by complex, I mean summons feeling more complicated than, "Ahhh! I'm scared!" or "Whee! I'm excited!" or "Arrr! I'm angry!" You'll have to meet me halfway on this definition. Better minds than I have been defining Capital-A "Art" for several thousand years. I think the above should give an idea of what I'm trying to get at.

Anyway. I call God of War 3 Anti-Art because not only does it not try to create any such feelings in the player, but it goes to great effort to prevent anyone from feeling anything when playing the game more complex than "Arrrr! Hit! Hit!" The story exists not to engage the player but to alienate him or her (Who am I kidding? Him.), so that nothing distracts from full appreciation for the carnage. If you are the sort of player who cares about story, God of War 3's story is designed to make you ignore it.

And this isn't an accident. I think it is, on some level, the purpose of the design from Step 1.

(Some spoilers for the game are ahead, I suppose, although God of War 3 really can't be spoiled.)

So What Is This Game About, Anyway?

The God of War games are Greek mythology on speed and shrooms. You play this guy named Kratos. He's a Spartan. He wants revenge on the Gods. In particular, he wants to kill Zeus, his father. He wants revenge because ...

OK, you got me. I played the first two God of War games a few years ago, and I can't remember what he wants revenge for. He killed his wife and child in a berserk rage, once, and I think he blames Zeus for it, or something.

The point is that God of War 3 never, in the game or the documentation, says exactly why the main character wants revenge. I think that this little detail is remarkably telling. (It doesn't matter if they made it clear in a game released five years ago. This stuff has to be repeated in The Now.) Revenge plots can be very emotionally compelling. They really connect. People tend to have an innate sense of justice, and a desire to see a wrong righted is a really easy way to suck someone in. But ONLY if we know the crime that is being avenged!

Without that, what the game gives us is a character who staggers around, bellowing his desire for revenge. I swear, every cutscene goes, "Hi, Kratos!" "I want revenge! Hack hack hack!" "Urgh. (Die.)" And, without purpose, we are only enacting the mind-boggling violence in the game purely for its own sake.

The Chopping. And the Sawing. And the Intestines.

And, oh Lord, the violence. You press in the joysticks to simulate gouging a character's eyes out with your thumbs. You saw a god's legs off (plenty of blood and bone shards jutting from stumps) for his boots. You rip out a titan's stomach and he holds his intestines in his hands. You snap Hera's neck for, as for as I can tell, no reason at all. The result of your destruction of the Gods is unbelievable death and destruction on the world's surface. These actions are interspersed with the hoarse gruntings of what must be one of the simplest and most unlikeable protagonists in gaming history.

So if you are, like me, a story-guy, what you have is someone doing unbelievably horrible things for entirely nebulous reasons. What, apart from the action, is there for my mind to grab hold of? The parts of the game, like story and character, that normally contain the "art parts" are so shriveled and gross that you can't get anything out of them. Leaving the cool hacky parts.

Kratos is a horrible person wreaking unbelievable havoc, and you are controlling him. You are the one doing all these things. This alone is enough to alienate anyone halfway sane. It certainly prevented me from lowering my psychic boundaries and ever identifying with any character in the story, even for a moment.

"How Dare You Say What I Do or Don't Relate To?"

Of course, just because I can't relate to the game doesn't mean other people won't. Fair enough. But I will express one unfounded opinion.

Kratos is nothing but a pure expression of self-hatred and mindless, sociopathic violence. I know there are people out there who can really relate to that. But if you are really into that and can go, "Yeah, that's totally me!" I might humbly suggest that spending a lot of hours feeding and reinforcing that might not be entirely healthy. Just sayin'.

And the Ending

So at the end of the game, you've killed most of the Gods. You have had to rescue Pandora from a labyrinth, so that she can open her magic box and give you a weapon to kill Zeus. Your desire to save Pandora to atone for killing your daughter is a plot point. This might have been a good fig leaf for the sociopathy, but then Kratos sacrifices her to kill Zeus and she dies. So, that.

Then, after a huge, epic (really fun, don't forget the gameplay is really fun) boss fight with Zeus, your foe almost dies but gets up again and you get sent into this gorgeous, super-trippy sequence where you explore this dark black outerworld and relive everything you've been through and then you meet the ghosts of your wife and child and they hug you and there's some tender words about forgiveness. Then you find Pandora's Box and open it yourself and learn that the weapon you need to kill Zeus is Hope. You had the power inside you all along. Also, Love is the Fifth Element.

So I'm playing this, and it's really cool, and I'm thinking, "Sure. It's a little late, but there's a little humanity here. Something I can sort of accept. Maybe this isn't going to be all horrible and ..."

Psych! Sucker! Then you leave the dream world and kill Zeus by smashing his face against a rock, bones cracking, blood spraying all over the camera, in a sequence as visceral and unpleasant a bit of violence as ...

OK. I think you get the point. (Video here. Go a minute in. NSFW.)

So What's Your Point?

I have to state again, I had a lot of fun playing God of War 3. It was really cool, once I figured out to, emotionally, hold it at a great distance. Nobody does this sort of gameplay better. And, while I wasn't thrilled with the violence, and I wouldn't let my daughter play the game until she was nine or so, I'm not immediately against it. I'm no anti-game zealot, and I never will be.

The fascinating thing about the experience, for me, was that the ugliness was so sustained, so pure and undiluted. A lot of people worked on God of War 3, smart people. They must have realized, at some point during the years working on the game, what they were making, and the effect it was likely to have on people.

When people consider games as an art form, they tend to ask three questions: Are They Art? How Should That Art Affect People? Will They Only Affect People in the Old Ways, or Are Their New Untapped Ways For People to Connect With Video Games?

They should also realize that not everyone welcomes the idea of a game as an artistic statement. It is, in fact, possible to purge art from your game, to attempt to intentionally repel players from everything but the sporting aspects. Maybe Art is stupid. It wasn't something I expected. In some cases, it might even be a good idea. But, I confess, I tend to hope for more.

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A Game Worth Noticing.

I feel bad for missing it, since it's been out a week, but Basilisk Games finally managed to get Eschalon: Book 2 out the door. I haven't played it yet, of course, but I will soon.

One of the worst things about what I do for a living is that hardly anyone else does it. You might think that not having competitors is a good thing. It is not. In the game industry, competitors help as well as hurt you. When EA spends millions of dollars advertising Dragon Age and Mass Effect, they aren't just pushing their games. They are also advertising the whole idea of playing RPGs. Dragon Age makes as many potential customers for me as it takes.

Also, I love writing Indie games, and I want others to have the same fun.

So I wish Basilisk Games a ton of luck. Releasing one game is a huge achievement. Releasing two games is, I don't know, what's bigger than huge? Huge-Prime?

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Video Games Are Art. Kinda. Sorta. If You Squint.

I'm coming to the Roger-Ebert-Games-Are-Art-No-They-Aren't shoutfest a little late. But playing God of War 3 sort of got me thinking about it again.

I've gotten e-mails asking me for my opinion of Ebert's trolling, but, as much as I respect the guy, he makes it clear in his writings that he is totally uninformed about the art form/activity that he is writing about, and he has no intention of becoming otherwise. That he would call out computer games without, so far as I can tell, actually playing any is kind of stunning. I don't know what he's thinking. He never seemed like a flamebait kind of guy. But, unless he ever shows any interest in learning about the field, there's no point in engaging him in any way.

But this is another of those times when I think Tycho at Penny Arcade summed it up with uncharacteristic clarity, brevity, and conclusiveness.

"He cannot rob you, retroactively, of wholly valid experiences; he cannot transform them into worthless things."

I have occasionally obtained from computer games the mental and emotional stimulation that I get from quality works of art. Because of that, for me, there is no argument about whether video games are art. They have been art to me, and you can't tap two blue mana and counterspell my experiences.

I have had that engaged, moved, elated feeling when playing Shadow of the Colossus. And Planescape: Torment. And Dragon Age: Origins. And Portal. And Grand Theft Auto IV. (Don't laugh.) And Bioshock, a little.

But, while that is not an exhaustive list, it is pretty close to one. I've been playing computer games for over thirty years, and I can easily count on my fingers the number of successfully truly artistic moments I have seen in games. Have you noticed that rebuttals to Ebert always name the same handful of games? I mean, sure, most game have stories, but they're so flimsy and perfunctory and two-dimensional that even gamers can't seriously defend them as art. Even a bad story is art, I guess, so then all games are sort of art, I guess, but that's a pretty thin gruel. We should be shooting for a better argument then, "Yes. They are art. Crappy, terrible, crappy art, undeserving of the attention of thinking people."

And that is why criticisms about games not being art have such sting. The simple truth is that, for the most part, the people who make them have absolutely no interest in engaging the players in more than a very limited number of ways? The game industry is great at making adrenaline surges and not much else, and the incredible potential the medium has is pretty much entirely wasted.

I try really hard in my games to create stories and characters that really grab the imagination, as much as my limited budgets allow. For some people, I succeed. Enough to keep me in business, anyway. But it's lonely work, and I am grateful that people like Roger Ebert are jabbing at us and suggesting that maybe we could do more.

I'll write more on this topic and God of War 3 once I've played it a bit more. There are still a few Gods left that I haven't brutally slaughtered.

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