I've figured it out. I was washing the dishes and lamenting the toll upon my graceful, supple hands and about to whisper, "Calgon, take me away!" when it hit me. I know the method by which video games can reach international prominence as a respectable art form worthy of unaminous acceptance and intellectual debate.
We need to get on Oprah.
You see, "The Oprah Winfrey Show", as it was once called, is a big deal. A really big deal because Oprah is a big deal; when Oprah nods her head, at least 50 million US women nod their heads as well. Likewise, when Oprah refutes a guest with "Oh, really?" you might as well burn all your business cards - no one will ever hire you again; when Ophrah found out an author had fabricated parts of a non-fiction book, she dragged him on the show and wrung a public apology from him, and his corpse was never seen again.
Maybe I'm exaggerating things here but if Oprah said, "We need to go to the planet Mars - next year," President Obama would make it happen. Why? Because these 50 million US women would tell their husbands, and husbands are people who would rather write their congressman than take out the trash.
Video games have often been in the news, but it has always been sensational, alarmist fear-mongering: video games are corrupting our youth, video games teach people how to shoot guns, or video games are pornography and a mental health addiction. This would be worthy of Maury Povich or the old Ricki Lake ("Which MMO-gamer is my baby's daddy?"), but we need acceptance and praise. We need someone like Oprah to say, "Wow, I had no idea this issue was so deep," and then cradle her head with her arm propped on the couch and listen, and nod, nod, nod.
What video games need it to get on Oprah's Book Club.
This sounds fantastical: Dan Houser isn't going to go on Oprah and talk about Niko Bellic as a complex man who has to face vast, moral issues; neither is Oprah going to summarize with, "Okay: who did say are the boss characters in this version of MegaMan?" However, let's face it: whatever Oprah touches turns to gold. If she likes you or your book, movie or product you can be sure you will be eat fois gras caviar hamburgers before the end of the year.
The inception of video games into the Book Club is important because of what the Book Club means: high art meant to be consumed for intellectual discourse. When a book makes it into the Book Club, not only does it help propel sales but also through Oprah's approval it means that this book is important, it's fascinating, it's art.
Here's how I came around to concocting this scheme: a while ago, my girlfriend recommended me the book "The Time Traveller's Wife", perhaps because the sci-fi element would interest me, or perhaps because she knows this book can affect me as it did her friend Ted, a man - who cried. For whatever reason and not wanting to cry, I didn't read it.
Earlier this year, I heard that this book was going to be released as a Hollywood movie; my immediate thought was panic, as I have resolved ever since "The English Patient" not to let a Hollywood movie come out before I had read the novel (we intellectuals have hubris; we are intellectuals, after all). To immediately spur my need to read this book and have a good cry in the tub surrounded by scented candles, I found out that "The Time Traveller's Wife" was going to be the topic in next month's local Book Club. (I can already see into the future and report that it will be disasterous, but I'll tell you how it goes after it happens)
So, I'm reading furiously with all the intensity that befits me, a hardcore gamer-cum-literature enthusiast, when I flip to the back of the book (it's a kind of "time travel") when I find to my bemusement that there is a section of questions written out for book club discussion. I tell you, I "lol-ed" at that; you mean to tell me that people are reading this book just to have the satisfaction of attending book clubs? What hypocrites!
Honestly, I can't think of another book that comes pre-packaged with questions so that a gathering of would-be book intelligensi wouldn't have nothing to talk about and just blink at each other. Are we so passive a critical audience that we wouldn't know what to talk about? What about a literary round-table of "Wasn't it cool when...?"
So far, the book is pretty cool, but I can tell the emo-gasm is going to come down hard like the Hammer of Dawn; by putting the chronology of the story through the perspective of Clare growing up, we can see this is a mediation into the importance of the present, and about a Buddhist-type concept of having to undergo the same trials again and again until you get it right, like the cycle of life and transcending reincarnation and achieving nirvana. But don't worry about me: I have a box of tissues ready.
To take us to the present, I was washing the dishes and lamenting my hands when BOOM! It hit me. Oprah. Give us your seal of approval and get video games out of the endless cycle of toys-made-for-children as well as video-gamers-who-behave-like-children. Also, make it the "Video Game Book Club"; we need a literary reference or else everyone will mistake it for a online fragfest rather than the jostling of intellectual ideas that it needs to be.
So, in the effort to kick-start video game book clubs across the world, I have compiled a list of questions to help get you started.
Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas
* How does CIA spook Mike Torino factor into Carl Johnson's life as a father figure? How does the placation of "Don't worry, you'll be back in no time for a blowjob and a baloney sandwich," affect CJ when coming from such a figure? How literal/metaphorical is this statement?
Half-Life/Half-Life 2
* How does Gordon Freeman's role as a silent protagonist affect his status as "the everyday" man, a person the average video gamer can relate with? Conversely, how does it belie his status as a scientist and otherwise brilliant man who can only now express himself of thought and feeling with a crowbar?
Space Invaders
* Space Invaders is a classic arcade game that has defined every video game ever made: a game where endless waves of cloned enemies are dispatched with again and again, all by exhibiting an awareness or artificial intelligence that doesn't befit their dangerousness. Discuss.
Final Fantasy and every JRPG ever made as well as the Metal Gear Solid series
* The plot and story are so convoluted with twists, surprises, betrayals and shocks because a sense of overwhelming and perplexity makes it easier to see something we don't completely understand with an air of awe and respect. Discuss.
Halo, Gears of War, Call of Duty and other online muliplayer shooters:
* Does fragging your same-sex friend and then celebrating your victory by tea-bagging your crotch in their vanquished faces denote a socially acceptable way to express my homosexual tendancies in an otherwise homophobic world? Is tea-bagging a safe practice that won't set off one's "gay pull-cord" and enact full-on flaming homosexuality?
That's enough for now. But you, Oprah: have your people call my people and they'll do lunch together. We need to talk.
Showing posts with label art. Show all posts
Showing posts with label art. Show all posts
Tuesday, May 12, 2009
Tuesday, April 28, 2009
Opinion: Why Video Games Aren't Evil
Last night, I met someone new and if that person will be you in the future, expect that I'll bring up my blog. And why not - I'm proud of it, I'm articulating my thoughts and making arguments. All of you "new" people should get wise.
When I told her my blog was about video games, the sky went black and mothers rushed out to pluck their children from the streets and away from harm. Because some guy told her so, she thinks that video games are evil and are fundamentally on par with drugs or alcohol. They are a waste of time and a corruption of the soul.
I kept smiling. I did. Despite all the many counter-arguments I had to politely offer her, I had one big thing to smile about: I had something new to write about the next day in my blog. Baby, your stern expression just made it to Last to Blame - consider yourself internet famous!
I don't know what would possess a person to immediately respond with the new information given them to turn around and rebuke what was said. If nothing else, that's a real conversation killer; the only thing after that is the aversion of eyes and an awkward silence to which I possess a superhuman capacity to stretch out longer than Marlon Brando's attention span when there is a buffet table nearby.
I'm not offended; really, I'm very surprised that there are people in the world who believe things without having experienced for themselves. I try, humbly, with this blog to explain my thoughts about video games and encourage people to think and interpret video games in their own way. So, Aurora, if you took my advice and are reading this, or are some video game bigot who blames these games for taking away your job, your wife and your dignity, please continue reading and let me explain the good about video games.
Before we get to that, I will say that when I tell people about my blog and I explain that it's about video games (and not music, say) people don't know what to think. I don't really know, myself, and I imagine they think I have a blog full of pictures of Mario and Zelda and write slash fiction featuring all the gravelly-voiced video game characters Ron Pearlman has done over the years. I don't know what the conception is, all I've got is my own perception.
I think the assumption of video game culture, if people even think it a culture, as a toy is deeply ingrained in the public, above all within the minds of gamers themselves. People lavish all this attention and time to video games in a way that pre-school kids will fight each other for a rubber bouncy ball. Video games are a culture and gamers should acknowledge this lest they let large corporations dictate the culture to them, like hip hop culture does. That's what I do here on Last to Blame; interpret video games as culture (which they are) and reappropriate this culture from the big money that makes it to the small guy like me who consumes it.
So, to begin: video games are a world-wide culture that has deeply affected many people. I think Aurora would argue that World of Warcraft players or other devotees of MMO's are deeply affected by addiction, but playing a video game does not necessitate addiction. Likewise, someone who works in the alcohol trade need not be an alcoholic; that's like saying sommeliers are all boozehounds, or that wine exporters are drug dealers. To get the subject of addiction out of the way, let it be said that any number of things can be addictive: alcohol, drugs, sex, food, the internet.. and video games. Video games simply gets a bright scarlet letter from the aforementioned tenuous link the public makes with video games and toys and children and also from the simple fact that video games are a new culture and many misassumptions arise from this.
If video games are culture, so what? Well, culture doesn't have any intrinsic value; rather, it's the importance and relevance it has to people, be it high culture (eg. Shadows of the Colossus) or low culture (eg. Onechanbara: Bikini Samurai Squad). What matters is the meaning and fulfilment that culture brings into the lives of those affected. Whether video games can inspire someone to get involved in cosplay or bake a video game cake, or as passive participants can stimulate and arouse excitement and emotions from us from a few hours of playing - well, this has affected us.
Even if video games are culture, it's still base, immature culture at that, right? Well, that's actually something I wholehearted agree with, but I don't leave it at that. Video games are a vibrantly changing medium; tastes and preferences often change at the speed of technological progress. While we have seen a glut of unoriginal games recently (ie. the success of Gears of War means we will see more copycats to come) it stands to chance that with cheaper technology independent game makers will come up with games that stand out against the status quo. Braid, Flower and Noby Noby Boy come to mind as games that are groundbreaking simply for existing in a genre where duplication and imitation are not just expected but encouraged; furthermore, upstart game developers like Molleindustria are making controversial games that are daring enough to instigate discussion on provocative subjects like multi-faith conflicts ("Faith Fighter") and sexual abuse in the Catholic church ("Operation: Pedopriest").
The consumption of video games as art aside, we can all still appreciate video games for what they are to most people: an interesting diversion for some, a hobby for most, and as fun for everyone. And let's take that statement at face value: video games are fun. A whole lot of fun. There isn't much to prove here, but rather let's accept it and not baggage this statement with further opinions and accusations like "things that are that much fun can't possibly be morally good and productive."
To be as blunt as Dorothy Parker and a rucksack full of door knobs: video games are fun, and that's okay. Video games don't need to solve the world's problems and cure the world of cancer. Video games are entertainment that may at times include a thoughtful metaphor, or include a newsworthy current social issue, or provide thought-provoking fodder or something that can make a grown man cry (so I've heard). When that season of "Lost" ended by opening a door that led to yet another door, the resultant face-palming by non-fans could be heard simultaneously throughout the world. To them, it's fun, it's a story, it's entertainment; this same type of attitude could be adopted by those who haven't quite understood video games.
Video games do have a bad rap for being violent, sexist and homophobic and even racist. True, yet we shouldn't brand all video games with the same brush. In fact, we should see that the more artistic video games become, the more violent and sexist and ignorant they can become; as the ability to express becomes more varied and articulate, so too can it convey objectionable themes and ideas. However, that's just the way it goes: "Triumph of the Will" (1935) is a well made film using several innovative techniques that won several international awards and continues to influence the way films are made today; however, it is also a brilliant and charismatic work of propaganda.
Video games also shouldn't be seen as a tool to instruct youngsters how to commit crime and used as a device to decay morals and values. Besides being clearly labelled to which age catagory the game is suitable for so parents will know what is and is not appropriate for their children, video games aren't simulations to instruct children to shoot guns properly nor are tutorials teaching how to carjack a car. If video games could really do that, then we are living in a generation of young super-spies with training in hand-to-hand combat and demolitions; furthermore, video games would have given rise to a whole generation of ninjas with lightning quick reflexes who can catch shot bows in mid air. If this was true, entire governments are at the mercy of these trained assassins who will organise to rebel once the nation's frozen hot-pocket and Mountain Dew supply runs out.
Video games are fun. Video gaming is a culture. Video games are an immersive experience that allow you to actively participate in experiences that you might never ever get the chance to do in real life: you could be a race car driver, an amnesiatic yet powerful blue skinned immortal, the general of vast armies and navies at your command, a dog. The exciting thing about the development of video games is that it appears to soon be only limited by the developer's imagination (and, unfortunately, the demands and expectations of the audience, but that's another story..)
There is, of course, the option that you could try a video game yourself, Aurora. I'm sure a round on the Nintendo Wii Fit board spinning a hula hoop wouldn't be so beneath you. And as I said, I wasn't offended by your statement. In fact, I thought it funny you didn't say anything about the music I had just performed for you, that being jazz, considering that around 30 years ago jazz was considered by your people to be "morally decadent" and outright banned.
So, you prefer Diana Krall over Lara Croft. Hm. Okay. Eidos isn't Blue Note after all. All the same, give video games a chance. I'm sure Diana Krall would approve.
When I told her my blog was about video games, the sky went black and mothers rushed out to pluck their children from the streets and away from harm. Because some guy told her so, she thinks that video games are evil and are fundamentally on par with drugs or alcohol. They are a waste of time and a corruption of the soul.
I kept smiling. I did. Despite all the many counter-arguments I had to politely offer her, I had one big thing to smile about: I had something new to write about the next day in my blog. Baby, your stern expression just made it to Last to Blame - consider yourself internet famous!
I don't know what would possess a person to immediately respond with the new information given them to turn around and rebuke what was said. If nothing else, that's a real conversation killer; the only thing after that is the aversion of eyes and an awkward silence to which I possess a superhuman capacity to stretch out longer than Marlon Brando's attention span when there is a buffet table nearby.
I'm not offended; really, I'm very surprised that there are people in the world who believe things without having experienced for themselves. I try, humbly, with this blog to explain my thoughts about video games and encourage people to think and interpret video games in their own way. So, Aurora, if you took my advice and are reading this, or are some video game bigot who blames these games for taking away your job, your wife and your dignity, please continue reading and let me explain the good about video games.
Before we get to that, I will say that when I tell people about my blog and I explain that it's about video games (and not music, say) people don't know what to think. I don't really know, myself, and I imagine they think I have a blog full of pictures of Mario and Zelda and write slash fiction featuring all the gravelly-voiced video game characters Ron Pearlman has done over the years. I don't know what the conception is, all I've got is my own perception.
I think the assumption of video game culture, if people even think it a culture, as a toy is deeply ingrained in the public, above all within the minds of gamers themselves. People lavish all this attention and time to video games in a way that pre-school kids will fight each other for a rubber bouncy ball. Video games are a culture and gamers should acknowledge this lest they let large corporations dictate the culture to them, like hip hop culture does. That's what I do here on Last to Blame; interpret video games as culture (which they are) and reappropriate this culture from the big money that makes it to the small guy like me who consumes it.
So, to begin: video games are a world-wide culture that has deeply affected many people. I think Aurora would argue that World of Warcraft players or other devotees of MMO's are deeply affected by addiction, but playing a video game does not necessitate addiction. Likewise, someone who works in the alcohol trade need not be an alcoholic; that's like saying sommeliers are all boozehounds, or that wine exporters are drug dealers. To get the subject of addiction out of the way, let it be said that any number of things can be addictive: alcohol, drugs, sex, food, the internet.. and video games. Video games simply gets a bright scarlet letter from the aforementioned tenuous link the public makes with video games and toys and children and also from the simple fact that video games are a new culture and many misassumptions arise from this.
If video games are culture, so what? Well, culture doesn't have any intrinsic value; rather, it's the importance and relevance it has to people, be it high culture (eg. Shadows of the Colossus) or low culture (eg. Onechanbara: Bikini Samurai Squad). What matters is the meaning and fulfilment that culture brings into the lives of those affected. Whether video games can inspire someone to get involved in cosplay or bake a video game cake, or as passive participants can stimulate and arouse excitement and emotions from us from a few hours of playing - well, this has affected us.
Even if video games are culture, it's still base, immature culture at that, right? Well, that's actually something I wholehearted agree with, but I don't leave it at that. Video games are a vibrantly changing medium; tastes and preferences often change at the speed of technological progress. While we have seen a glut of unoriginal games recently (ie. the success of Gears of War means we will see more copycats to come) it stands to chance that with cheaper technology independent game makers will come up with games that stand out against the status quo. Braid, Flower and Noby Noby Boy come to mind as games that are groundbreaking simply for existing in a genre where duplication and imitation are not just expected but encouraged; furthermore, upstart game developers like Molleindustria are making controversial games that are daring enough to instigate discussion on provocative subjects like multi-faith conflicts ("Faith Fighter") and sexual abuse in the Catholic church ("Operation: Pedopriest").
The consumption of video games as art aside, we can all still appreciate video games for what they are to most people: an interesting diversion for some, a hobby for most, and as fun for everyone. And let's take that statement at face value: video games are fun. A whole lot of fun. There isn't much to prove here, but rather let's accept it and not baggage this statement with further opinions and accusations like "things that are that much fun can't possibly be morally good and productive."
To be as blunt as Dorothy Parker and a rucksack full of door knobs: video games are fun, and that's okay. Video games don't need to solve the world's problems and cure the world of cancer. Video games are entertainment that may at times include a thoughtful metaphor, or include a newsworthy current social issue, or provide thought-provoking fodder or something that can make a grown man cry (so I've heard). When that season of "Lost" ended by opening a door that led to yet another door, the resultant face-palming by non-fans could be heard simultaneously throughout the world. To them, it's fun, it's a story, it's entertainment; this same type of attitude could be adopted by those who haven't quite understood video games.
Video games do have a bad rap for being violent, sexist and homophobic and even racist. True, yet we shouldn't brand all video games with the same brush. In fact, we should see that the more artistic video games become, the more violent and sexist and ignorant they can become; as the ability to express becomes more varied and articulate, so too can it convey objectionable themes and ideas. However, that's just the way it goes: "Triumph of the Will" (1935) is a well made film using several innovative techniques that won several international awards and continues to influence the way films are made today; however, it is also a brilliant and charismatic work of propaganda.
Video games also shouldn't be seen as a tool to instruct youngsters how to commit crime and used as a device to decay morals and values. Besides being clearly labelled to which age catagory the game is suitable for so parents will know what is and is not appropriate for their children, video games aren't simulations to instruct children to shoot guns properly nor are tutorials teaching how to carjack a car. If video games could really do that, then we are living in a generation of young super-spies with training in hand-to-hand combat and demolitions; furthermore, video games would have given rise to a whole generation of ninjas with lightning quick reflexes who can catch shot bows in mid air. If this was true, entire governments are at the mercy of these trained assassins who will organise to rebel once the nation's frozen hot-pocket and Mountain Dew supply runs out.
Video games are fun. Video gaming is a culture. Video games are an immersive experience that allow you to actively participate in experiences that you might never ever get the chance to do in real life: you could be a race car driver, an amnesiatic yet powerful blue skinned immortal, the general of vast armies and navies at your command, a dog. The exciting thing about the development of video games is that it appears to soon be only limited by the developer's imagination (and, unfortunately, the demands and expectations of the audience, but that's another story..)
There is, of course, the option that you could try a video game yourself, Aurora. I'm sure a round on the Nintendo Wii Fit board spinning a hula hoop wouldn't be so beneath you. And as I said, I wasn't offended by your statement. In fact, I thought it funny you didn't say anything about the music I had just performed for you, that being jazz, considering that around 30 years ago jazz was considered by your people to be "morally decadent" and outright banned.
So, you prefer Diana Krall over Lara Croft. Hm. Okay. Eidos isn't Blue Note after all. All the same, give video games a chance. I'm sure Diana Krall would approve.
Monday, April 27, 2009
Analysis: Bioshock and Compromise
Sometimes, some things are just too good for their own good.
While that seems to be a contradictory statement simply on its own, it makes sense (but not too much sense) when you consider there are many things that haven't enjoyed any success when it is fully conceivable that they should. Critical success does not neccessarily mean popular success; sometimes art is made that is so advanced that the current generation can not accept it (the term avant-garde comes to mind). The public can only handle so much.
This may seem to be critical of the average layman, who can't be faulted for being who he is, a man--a laying man, at that. In that case, to put it another way (other than saying the public can only accept so much), beauty is the beginning of fear. You know that new sports car? That fancy expensive one, the one you fantasize about? If you buy that, you're going to worry about it all the time; you're going to worry about it being stolen, scratched, towed, and even targeted by malicious flying birds and their gooey excrement. You know that hot, attractive girl? The one you fantasize about all the time? Once she becomes your girlfriend ("oh yes, she will be mine") you may find yourself constantly worried that someone may steal her from you. Again: beauty is the beginning of fear, and some things are just too good for their own good.
While these two points aren't necessarily the same, the same point can be made: the public can only handle so much. So, that's where Bioshock lands, firmly on its capable and talented feet and stooping low to bend to the lowest common denominator so that even the most lay of the layest of layman will "get" this game.
Bioshock is a beautiful game that takes place in the undersea city of Rapture. Based on the philosophies of Ayn Rand, Bioshock is an exploration of Objectivism gone catastrophically wrong. In the game, a charismatic leader named Andrew Ryan founds the city of Rapture as a capitalist haven safe against influence and pressure from outside political and religious powers. Literally shut off from the entire world at the bottom of the ocean, the Objectivist experiment of Rapture fails due to internal problems; this is suggested due in part to Objectivist dogma where the scientist, artist and capitalist aren't constrained by ethics or morality.
This is quite an interesting basis for a story; furthermore, Bioshock would continue down the "interesting path" some more and spin a tale of betrayal, deceit and domination. However, the fantastic research and writing that went into making this video game comes at a price: it's too good for its own good.
When applied to video games many gamers could only shake their heads in disbelief. "How can a game be too good?" they may say. I suppose this can be someone asking how vanilla ice cream can be too vanilla-y, or how someone can have sex too often and have too many orgasms. Well, I can't complain about vanilla ice cream nor about orgasms that are too good to have, but there is something to be said about Bioshock: its story and game play are terribly unbalanced with each other. Bioshock can't make up its mind whether it wants to tell a story or let you blow things up; stuck as a compromise, Bioshock delivers an interesting story in a way only video games can tell at the cost of overpowered game play that is too easy even for the average layman.
The story is too good for video games. I admit this sounds insulting to all video gamers and layman everywhere, lying down, but when the news broke that Bioshock is getting the Hollywood treatment with "name" director Gore Verbinski attached, who made alot of money and fame making movies about a ride at Disneyworld, I suspect the excitement was mostly over the fact that the great story in Bioshock would finally get told properly - in another medium that can tell stories well.
How can a story be too good for a game? Well, the high quality of a story in a video game can be detrimental when the developers emphasize the importance of the story over everything else; what this does effectively is subvert every other aspect including game play, difficulty, and enemy selection. You know (you laymen guys), everything that makes a video game a game.
First, the game is entirely too easy. Of the three difficulty levels, the hardest level is about the same level as most other games' mild medium difficulty level; compared to a hardcore game like Ninja Gaiden, Bioshock's hardest difficulty level is on par with the former game's easiest difficulty level. Other elements add to this ease: the game pauses when selecting weapons or plasmids, basic enemies (splicers) are all the same and so similar stategies can be used against them throughout the game, weapons are upgradeable to over-powered status, after halfway through the game money becomes so easy to make that a 500$ maximum capacity is forced on the player (unlike my wallet in real life), a map and a directional arrow points to the objective so that getting lost in a level is an impossibility, and furthermore no penalty is ever exacted on the player for dying - the player is instantly resurrected at a Vita-chamber to redo a level until ultimately he succeeds.
Secondly, the game play is so unbalanced that not long after beginning you become a
unstoppable powered tank. The average enemy soon doesn't have a chance against the player, and in fact by the game's end you are pretty much just as powerful as the end boss. It appears the makers spent alot of time designing cool ways to blow things up real good that they forgot to give you a suitable opponent; while it may be argued that Big Daddies are tough mini-bosses, the truth is they don't appear often enough and once you learn the technique how to take down a Big Daddy quickly it actually becomes routine quite quickly. In fact, one of the biggest challenges in Bioshock is cycling through your weapons and plasmids regularly to use them all equally, whereas in most cases you'll stick with one familiar weapon and upgrade it to make short work of all splicers and Big Daddies.
The fact of the matter is that the game has been designed to be overly simple and easy for the simplest of laymen to ensure that absolutely anyone and everyone can make it to the end - to ensure that this story gets told, from beginning to end. In four (and a compound) words: great story, bad game play. This is the antithesis of most games that have a bad story but great game play. Video games have traditionally not had great stories because usually they have been about game play, the meat and back bone of video games.
Consider all the audio diaries scattered through each of the levels. When put together they weave together the complicated social tapestry of Rapture, a blend of unbridled ambition and treachery and despair. An interesting part of the story... that isn't an integral part of the game. In fact, listening to these audio diaries will commonly displace you from the immersion of the game, and in fact distract you from attacking enemies. These side-stories are entirely skippable for those who wish to simply blow things up.
And that's a problem too: as a straight-forward first-person shooter, Bioshock is strangely unsatisfying for not having unbalanced game play. Bioshock looks beautiful, sounds realistic for sound effects and dramatic for voice acting and has period songs of the era, and is a high class offering that should be a great video game - but it isn't as much fun as DOOM to shoot monsters and blow stuff up.
This is where Bioshock deviates from the norm (watch out, lying-down people everywhere!). As a game, it isn't much fun or challenging, but as a story and as a work of original art, it is fascinating and nuanced and fresh. As a top tier well-hyped video game with enormous production values, it's clear that sacrifices were made to this game to make it enjoyable and accessible to everyone; to anyone who has studied art knows, art is something that is for anyone, but not everyone. Bioshock could have been something really special and extraordinary, but instead we have something that allows the basest fan boy to blow stuff up.
This isn't to say Bioshock doesn't understand its medium and the limitations thereof; on the contrary, the single most genius fact of the design of Bioshock is the use of linearity. Long a bane of video game design, Bioshock whole-heartedly embraces linearity as the basis of the shocking twist at the game's mid-section. Without explaining it completely to encourage people to play it for themselves, the linearity of the game and lack of choice is used to turn the entire convention of video game stories on its head. This same type of head-turning convention was last used to great effect in "Shadows of the Colossus" (2005), in which, without the use of speaking script, the player realizes in horrifying dismay that the colossus you are slaying aren't evil - the sad, melancholic music that plays upon killing a colossus is in stark contrast to the happy, heroic music that plays when you finally mount them.
This perspective as a gamer progressing through levels to satisfy an objective only to realize, after the fact, the real ramification of what you have done can only lie within the realm of objective-reaching video games that feature a challenge/reward system that films, TV and books can't compete. However, films - the film adaptation of Bioshock, for example - aren't limited by the conventions and devices of video games and so aren't constrained in storytelling: films don't have power-ups, crates to smash and tutorials telling you how to cycle through your weapons. Unlike a video game, films have a set, finite duration of time and will finish whether or not you can kill the end boss who has cheap-ass attacks. Movies tell stories; video games are stories unto themselves that depend upon your mad video game skillz, layman or otherwise.
It is with this sad fact that the Bioshock movie, if it ever gets made, will be much better than the original video game and become the best video game adaptation ever made. This is not so surprising since Bioshock isn't as much a video game as it is a delightful story set awkwardly as a period piece masquerading as a first-person shooter. While its confusing that this story wound up being told first as a video game, it shouldn't be surprising that this video game was made as a first-person shooter - it's these fps games that get bought. Getting bought means money. And money is an end in itself that ensures compromise over integrity.
While we may never know to what end Bioshock was compromised, it's clear that the result is an unbalanced game that has a better story than its gameplay. For being innovative and challenging as a work of art in the field of video games is noteworthy, but laymen should now understand why I enjoy playing Onechanbara: Bikini Samurai Squad more than this game. Chicks in bikinis using samurai swords to slice up zombies - now that makes a fun game; the movie... (Oneechanbara: The Movie (2008)) not so much.
There's hope for you yet, Bioshock.
Review: Pro's and Con's
Pro's:
+ great story - would you kindly get your foot outta my ass?
+ great visuals - water, that most intangible of elements, looks like water
+ atmosphere supports the story - immersive environment makes the 50's look hip again, no thanks to Marty McFly's dad
+ stuff blows up great - all underwater secret cities should have full tanks of flammable propane lying everywhere in case a video game gets made there
Con's:
- way too easy - Bioshock has an invincable "god" mode - it's called default
- the movie will be better
- could have had more varied enemy selection, like that gigantic walking spider-thing mech from DOOM, but that wouldn't have "served" the story
- once again, the best weapon in the game - the crossbow - is also the most low-tech; development time spent on hells-yes plasmids may have been better spent on crowd favorite "2x4 with rusty nail hammered through it"
Rated: 3 out of three stars on basis of it being art (as a video game, just enjoy the explosions); but play it on hardest difficulty, finish it and reflect on why more games aren't like this one. Highly recommended - as a barometer of the quality of video games.
Played on the Xbox 360 - twice: once on medium difficulty then on maximum difficulty. Took more time to play than neccessary.
While that seems to be a contradictory statement simply on its own, it makes sense (but not too much sense) when you consider there are many things that haven't enjoyed any success when it is fully conceivable that they should. Critical success does not neccessarily mean popular success; sometimes art is made that is so advanced that the current generation can not accept it (the term avant-garde comes to mind). The public can only handle so much.
This may seem to be critical of the average layman, who can't be faulted for being who he is, a man--a laying man, at that. In that case, to put it another way (other than saying the public can only accept so much), beauty is the beginning of fear. You know that new sports car? That fancy expensive one, the one you fantasize about? If you buy that, you're going to worry about it all the time; you're going to worry about it being stolen, scratched, towed, and even targeted by malicious flying birds and their gooey excrement. You know that hot, attractive girl? The one you fantasize about all the time? Once she becomes your girlfriend ("oh yes, she will be mine") you may find yourself constantly worried that someone may steal her from you. Again: beauty is the beginning of fear, and some things are just too good for their own good.
While these two points aren't necessarily the same, the same point can be made: the public can only handle so much. So, that's where Bioshock lands, firmly on its capable and talented feet and stooping low to bend to the lowest common denominator so that even the most lay of the layest of layman will "get" this game.
Bioshock is a beautiful game that takes place in the undersea city of Rapture. Based on the philosophies of Ayn Rand, Bioshock is an exploration of Objectivism gone catastrophically wrong. In the game, a charismatic leader named Andrew Ryan founds the city of Rapture as a capitalist haven safe against influence and pressure from outside political and religious powers. Literally shut off from the entire world at the bottom of the ocean, the Objectivist experiment of Rapture fails due to internal problems; this is suggested due in part to Objectivist dogma where the scientist, artist and capitalist aren't constrained by ethics or morality.
This is quite an interesting basis for a story; furthermore, Bioshock would continue down the "interesting path" some more and spin a tale of betrayal, deceit and domination. However, the fantastic research and writing that went into making this video game comes at a price: it's too good for its own good.
When applied to video games many gamers could only shake their heads in disbelief. "How can a game be too good?" they may say. I suppose this can be someone asking how vanilla ice cream can be too vanilla-y, or how someone can have sex too often and have too many orgasms. Well, I can't complain about vanilla ice cream nor about orgasms that are too good to have, but there is something to be said about Bioshock: its story and game play are terribly unbalanced with each other. Bioshock can't make up its mind whether it wants to tell a story or let you blow things up; stuck as a compromise, Bioshock delivers an interesting story in a way only video games can tell at the cost of overpowered game play that is too easy even for the average layman.
The story is too good for video games. I admit this sounds insulting to all video gamers and layman everywhere, lying down, but when the news broke that Bioshock is getting the Hollywood treatment with "name" director Gore Verbinski attached, who made alot of money and fame making movies about a ride at Disneyworld, I suspect the excitement was mostly over the fact that the great story in Bioshock would finally get told properly - in another medium that can tell stories well.
How can a story be too good for a game? Well, the high quality of a story in a video game can be detrimental when the developers emphasize the importance of the story over everything else; what this does effectively is subvert every other aspect including game play, difficulty, and enemy selection. You know (you laymen guys), everything that makes a video game a game.
First, the game is entirely too easy. Of the three difficulty levels, the hardest level is about the same level as most other games' mild medium difficulty level; compared to a hardcore game like Ninja Gaiden, Bioshock's hardest difficulty level is on par with the former game's easiest difficulty level. Other elements add to this ease: the game pauses when selecting weapons or plasmids, basic enemies (splicers) are all the same and so similar stategies can be used against them throughout the game, weapons are upgradeable to over-powered status, after halfway through the game money becomes so easy to make that a 500$ maximum capacity is forced on the player (unlike my wallet in real life), a map and a directional arrow points to the objective so that getting lost in a level is an impossibility, and furthermore no penalty is ever exacted on the player for dying - the player is instantly resurrected at a Vita-chamber to redo a level until ultimately he succeeds.
Secondly, the game play is so unbalanced that not long after beginning you become a
unstoppable powered tank. The average enemy soon doesn't have a chance against the player, and in fact by the game's end you are pretty much just as powerful as the end boss. It appears the makers spent alot of time designing cool ways to blow things up real good that they forgot to give you a suitable opponent; while it may be argued that Big Daddies are tough mini-bosses, the truth is they don't appear often enough and once you learn the technique how to take down a Big Daddy quickly it actually becomes routine quite quickly. In fact, one of the biggest challenges in Bioshock is cycling through your weapons and plasmids regularly to use them all equally, whereas in most cases you'll stick with one familiar weapon and upgrade it to make short work of all splicers and Big Daddies.
The fact of the matter is that the game has been designed to be overly simple and easy for the simplest of laymen to ensure that absolutely anyone and everyone can make it to the end - to ensure that this story gets told, from beginning to end. In four (and a compound) words: great story, bad game play. This is the antithesis of most games that have a bad story but great game play. Video games have traditionally not had great stories because usually they have been about game play, the meat and back bone of video games.
Consider all the audio diaries scattered through each of the levels. When put together they weave together the complicated social tapestry of Rapture, a blend of unbridled ambition and treachery and despair. An interesting part of the story... that isn't an integral part of the game. In fact, listening to these audio diaries will commonly displace you from the immersion of the game, and in fact distract you from attacking enemies. These side-stories are entirely skippable for those who wish to simply blow things up.
And that's a problem too: as a straight-forward first-person shooter, Bioshock is strangely unsatisfying for not having unbalanced game play. Bioshock looks beautiful, sounds realistic for sound effects and dramatic for voice acting and has period songs of the era, and is a high class offering that should be a great video game - but it isn't as much fun as DOOM to shoot monsters and blow stuff up.
This is where Bioshock deviates from the norm (watch out, lying-down people everywhere!). As a game, it isn't much fun or challenging, but as a story and as a work of original art, it is fascinating and nuanced and fresh. As a top tier well-hyped video game with enormous production values, it's clear that sacrifices were made to this game to make it enjoyable and accessible to everyone; to anyone who has studied art knows, art is something that is for anyone, but not everyone. Bioshock could have been something really special and extraordinary, but instead we have something that allows the basest fan boy to blow stuff up.
This isn't to say Bioshock doesn't understand its medium and the limitations thereof; on the contrary, the single most genius fact of the design of Bioshock is the use of linearity. Long a bane of video game design, Bioshock whole-heartedly embraces linearity as the basis of the shocking twist at the game's mid-section. Without explaining it completely to encourage people to play it for themselves, the linearity of the game and lack of choice is used to turn the entire convention of video game stories on its head. This same type of head-turning convention was last used to great effect in "Shadows of the Colossus" (2005), in which, without the use of speaking script, the player realizes in horrifying dismay that the colossus you are slaying aren't evil - the sad, melancholic music that plays upon killing a colossus is in stark contrast to the happy, heroic music that plays when you finally mount them.
This perspective as a gamer progressing through levels to satisfy an objective only to realize, after the fact, the real ramification of what you have done can only lie within the realm of objective-reaching video games that feature a challenge/reward system that films, TV and books can't compete. However, films - the film adaptation of Bioshock, for example - aren't limited by the conventions and devices of video games and so aren't constrained in storytelling: films don't have power-ups, crates to smash and tutorials telling you how to cycle through your weapons. Unlike a video game, films have a set, finite duration of time and will finish whether or not you can kill the end boss who has cheap-ass attacks. Movies tell stories; video games are stories unto themselves that depend upon your mad video game skillz, layman or otherwise.
It is with this sad fact that the Bioshock movie, if it ever gets made, will be much better than the original video game and become the best video game adaptation ever made. This is not so surprising since Bioshock isn't as much a video game as it is a delightful story set awkwardly as a period piece masquerading as a first-person shooter. While its confusing that this story wound up being told first as a video game, it shouldn't be surprising that this video game was made as a first-person shooter - it's these fps games that get bought. Getting bought means money. And money is an end in itself that ensures compromise over integrity.
While we may never know to what end Bioshock was compromised, it's clear that the result is an unbalanced game that has a better story than its gameplay. For being innovative and challenging as a work of art in the field of video games is noteworthy, but laymen should now understand why I enjoy playing Onechanbara: Bikini Samurai Squad more than this game. Chicks in bikinis using samurai swords to slice up zombies - now that makes a fun game; the movie... (Oneechanbara: The Movie (2008)) not so much.
There's hope for you yet, Bioshock.
Review: Pro's and Con's
Pro's:
+ great story - would you kindly get your foot outta my ass?
+ great visuals - water, that most intangible of elements, looks like water
+ atmosphere supports the story - immersive environment makes the 50's look hip again, no thanks to Marty McFly's dad
+ stuff blows up great - all underwater secret cities should have full tanks of flammable propane lying everywhere in case a video game gets made there
Con's:
- way too easy - Bioshock has an invincable "god" mode - it's called default
- the movie will be better
- could have had more varied enemy selection, like that gigantic walking spider-thing mech from DOOM, but that wouldn't have "served" the story
- once again, the best weapon in the game - the crossbow - is also the most low-tech; development time spent on hells-yes plasmids may have been better spent on crowd favorite "2x4 with rusty nail hammered through it"
Rated: 3 out of three stars on basis of it being art (as a video game, just enjoy the explosions); but play it on hardest difficulty, finish it and reflect on why more games aren't like this one. Highly recommended - as a barometer of the quality of video games.
Played on the Xbox 360 - twice: once on medium difficulty then on maximum difficulty. Took more time to play than neccessary.
Monday, March 23, 2009
A Start to Articulation
Damn, I thought I was special, I thought I was different from everybody else. Not anymore-now I have a blog.
As it's the first post, who's to say how dilligent I'll be with this? My Myspace page has really all but dried up. Facebook is cool, but I find it quite a drain on my time (why won't my friends just shut up?). Furthermore, on Facebook I don't get a chance to talk about what I really want to talk about...
...video games. This is exclusively a blog devoted to video games, and my many nefarious thoughts concerning such. Which will be many, as I have a few which I hope to publish here.
First off, why video games? For something that many would see as a toy and for others at best a hobby, why talk about something as trivial as video games? After all, there are many important issues worth discussing affecting the world at large, and video games just aren't that important in the long run. They're entertainment, they're a distraction, they're something just for fun.
True. I won't buttress the importance of video games against things that really do matter (no examples needed for clarification; just about everything is more important than video games). However, I am moved to blog about video games because I disagree with just about everything that concerns video games.
Video game journalism is non-existent or populated with shills. Video game reviews have no original thought or discussion. Casual gaming is ruining video games, as are the trend towards having easier and easier games. Video games are art, but are the lowest form of art on the planet. Online gaming is a fundamentally flawed experience that will only become more popular in time. Video games are incapable of telling a good story. Video gamers are the reason video games can't improve and become something better than what they are now.
Now, those are a couple of things I wanted to get off my chest. I suppose I have some explaining to do.. well, I guess I better start posting.
One last thing: about the name. I signed up to a video game database and used the name lasttoblame, and I just like it. It doesn't mean at all that I am the last person to blame others; instead, I always consider it to mean that you should consider me the last person you should blame. Sure, it's a simple twist, now that you've got it we're both on the right track..
As it's the first post, who's to say how dilligent I'll be with this? My Myspace page has really all but dried up. Facebook is cool, but I find it quite a drain on my time (why won't my friends just shut up?). Furthermore, on Facebook I don't get a chance to talk about what I really want to talk about...
...video games. This is exclusively a blog devoted to video games, and my many nefarious thoughts concerning such. Which will be many, as I have a few which I hope to publish here.
First off, why video games? For something that many would see as a toy and for others at best a hobby, why talk about something as trivial as video games? After all, there are many important issues worth discussing affecting the world at large, and video games just aren't that important in the long run. They're entertainment, they're a distraction, they're something just for fun.
True. I won't buttress the importance of video games against things that really do matter (no examples needed for clarification; just about everything is more important than video games). However, I am moved to blog about video games because I disagree with just about everything that concerns video games.
Video game journalism is non-existent or populated with shills. Video game reviews have no original thought or discussion. Casual gaming is ruining video games, as are the trend towards having easier and easier games. Video games are art, but are the lowest form of art on the planet. Online gaming is a fundamentally flawed experience that will only become more popular in time. Video games are incapable of telling a good story. Video gamers are the reason video games can't improve and become something better than what they are now.
Now, those are a couple of things I wanted to get off my chest. I suppose I have some explaining to do.. well, I guess I better start posting.
One last thing: about the name. I signed up to a video game database and used the name lasttoblame, and I just like it. It doesn't mean at all that I am the last person to blame others; instead, I always consider it to mean that you should consider me the last person you should blame. Sure, it's a simple twist, now that you've got it we're both on the right track..
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