Bioshock Analysis pt. 2, or: Morality in Video Games

(This entry was written for SNHU's GAM-205 class in the Fall 2017 semester.)

    Believe it or not, this will be the final blog post for this class and the final blog post before I graduate! This means that I'll be ready for the job market for anyone seeking a writer! I've actually got some ideas already for some games that would probably fit the indie market, so I'm personally leaning towards that category of game design. I'll probably be taking a bit of a break from the blog for a bit, but I'll continue with some reviews soon. Anyway, this week I'm continuing to talk about Bioshock and morality/karma systems in video games.

Bioshock Analysis pt. 1, or: Philisophical Objectivism 101

(This entry was written for SNHU's GAM-205 class in the Fall 2017 semester.)

    It's not a common sight to see a video game take a notable political stance on an issue. It's even rarer when the game is a mainstream release that gets sold in major retailers. The game in question is Bioshock, a game released in 2007 by 2K Games. A lot has been said about the content of this game, but what may be most interesting is how it introduced players to the idea of philosophical objectivism via showing a dystopian system run by objectivism. All screens are from the remastered version because that's the version I had installed. Plus, it has Steam achievements.

From what little I grasp of Objectivism from Kingdom of Loathing, beating you up isn't unethical. You're responsible for not getting a wrench in your skull if that's important to you, buddy.

A Closed World Analysis, or: Procedural Rhetoric

(This entry was written for SNHU's GAM-205 class in the Fall 2017 semester.)

    For this week, I want to talk about 'Procedural Rhetoric' and how it's used in the game A Closed World.

    A Closed World has you playing a young adult of indeterminate gender (the game asks your gender, but it changes a few minor details) who is in a deep relationship with someone else in the village in which they both live. However, the player's beloved becomes tired of the oppressive attitude the other villagers have toward their relationship and goes into the forest. According to the other villagers, it's a place of no return filled with demons and a beast that would destroy the village. Unsurprisingly, your character goes into the forest as well, seeking to find their beloved and reach the other side.

This War of Mine Analysis, or: Persuasive Games

(This entry was written for SNHU's GAM-205 class in the Fall 2017 semester.)

    This week's entry is about persuasive games. The topic of persuasive games can be a bit misleading. It's not about games that convince you to spend your life savings on their in-game currency so you can, I don't know, be a pretend celebrity with the help of a in-game representation of Kim Kardashian. No, persuasive games are games that attempt to convey a message about real life issues through the gameplay. A good example of this would be This War of Mine, by 11 bit studios.

Sorry, unknown graffiti artist. Boatmurdered was several years ago.

World of Warcraft Analysis pt. 3, or: Examining Death Rituals in WoW

(This entry was written for SNHU's GAM-205 class in the Fall 2017 semester.)

    Before we start, I would like to bring up the return of Bubsy, of all things. For reasons unknown, the company behind the revival of the Giana sisters decided to bring the Bubster back in a $30 purchase. As a fan of Arcade Pit (Sundays at 8PM EST,) I naturally had to watch as Smight and TieTuesday, two streamers from Something Awful, played through it on Halloween. They both got through the game in just under an hour, and they both wound up returning it. It's kind of sad that they'd bring Bubsy back in a game that feels so generic and short, but at least that Space Funeral-inspired 'Bubsy' RPG (based off of this blog) has a decent shot at being better than the new Bubsy. Yes, the concept for the character and game is...unusual, but somehow, a transgender not-Bubsy makes more sense to me than Sexy Shelob, and those are both characters I never thought I'd encounter. Crazy world, huh?

    And now for the main article

    Today, I'm talking about death.

A topic that Nethack players know way too much about.

World of Warcraft Analysis pt. 2, or: Burying a Computer and "Just Like Bart(le)!"

(This entry was written for SNHU's GAM-205 class in the Fall 2017 semester.)

    Unfortunately, this blog post will be a little bare bones when it comes to pictures. My desktop computer, which has been with me for about six or seven years is finally dying. Until I can transfer my stuff onto my high-powered but heavy laptop, I won't really be able to access much of the stuff on my desktop, like Steam pictures. Anyway, I'm talking more about WoW this week, and mostly it's on character identity and the Bartle Test.

    The Bartle Test is a online test that sorts the players of online games into four groups based on what they enjoy. These groups are achieving, exploring, socializing, and killing.  When I took the test this week for class, my readout was as an EASK. This meant I enjoyed exploring the most, achieving second, and killing last. I want to apply that rating to my experience this second time with WoW:

    Exploring: These people enjoy exploring the world and discovering its lore. While this was my highest ranked group in the test, I don't really feel this way with WoW. Sure, I can tell you all about what the endings in The Binding of Isaac mean or I'll go running around underground in Terraria, but the story/world is contained in those individual games. WoW has a whole backstory involving the RTS Warcraft games, books, and all sorts of other media I'd need to read to learn all about the World... of Warcraft. And when you count world events that happen in WoW, there are some things I might not experience that could give important context to the lore of the world. Some people enjoy buying multiple products to get the whole story for something, but I don't feel that way.

World of Warcraft Analysis pt. 1, or: Holy Cow, I'm Actually Back

(This entry was written for SNHU's GAM-205 class in the Fall 2017 semester.)

 
    Well, pigs are flying and the planets have aligned. I actually got back into World of Warcraft. Granted, it's only for a few weeks on the 'free until level 20' plan as part of a college course, but it's still a minor miracle, I suppose. Now sit down, because I've got a story about my first time playing WoW.
     I was about 13 or 14 when I got into WoW for the first time. It had been around for a year or two, but I didn't really pay it much attention until a friend of mine and my sister's then-boyfriend mentioned that they played it, and suggested I join. I started it up, got on the same server as my friend, and created Holayle, the Tauren Shaman. Unfortunately, I wasn't easily able to play with my friend because he's several years older than me and thus had a busier schedule. Eventually, he and the then-boyfriend stopped playing. I stayed playing for a few months, but without anyone I knew playing, the charm had left, and I eventually resigned Holayle to the void.

Just pretend Isaac has horns here. And hooves. And that Afterbirth+ came out in like 2007.

Braid Analysis, or: Embedded Narrative in Gameplay

(This entry was written for SNHU's GAM-205 class in the Fall 2017 semester.)

        Today, I'm going to tell you a story. Rather, I'm going to talk about something and details in what I say will come together to imply a story. That's how embedded narrative works. It's a type of narrative structure where the story (or a story) can be found through details that are present in the narrative. I'm going to show a good example of how this can work through the classic 2009 puzzle-platformer Braid.

Don't cry, Don't raise your eye, It's pro'bly nuclear wasteland.

Limbo Analysis, or: Narrative Elements in Gameplay

(This entry was written for SNHU's GAM-205 class in the Fall 2017 semester.)

    Today, we're going to be talking about LIMBO.

No, Percy. LIMBO. Not 'Limbo of the Lost.' Benny Briggs isn't in that game. As far as I know.

    LIMBO is a game developed and published by the studio 'Playdead.' It's a monochrome puzzle-platformer where you run, jump, and explore eerie environments. If you don't read any external information about the game, that could be all you know, as the game gives no details on who you are, what you're doing, or anything else. But a quick peek at the Steam description reveals everything about the story (at least the concrete details) in one sentence: Uncertain of his sister's fate, a boy enters LIMBO. This is all the story given as we control this boy as he tries survive a harsh world with giant spiders, other kids (or are they older?) who set traps for him, and brain worms that make you walk to your doom. Or it just gives you a serious craving for some fast food.

"I'm thinkin' 'bout Burger King, 'cause he's a Burger King parasi- whoaahoah. No, McDonald's is the best."

Card Hunter Analysis, or: Talking about difficulty in games

(This entry was written for SNHU's GAM-205 class in the Fall 2017 semester.)

    For this week, we were supposed to do a deep analysis of the free with paid content game Card Hunter. Unfortunately, we wound up having some problems with the reading. As such, I won't be able to do as deep of an analysis as I was supposed to do. However, when we were talking about our experiences in the game, a discussion came up about difficulty in games.

Real, otherwise, and involving the cruel fiend known as the RNG.

    For those who don't know, Card Hunter is a turn-based tactical game based off D&D where your party uses cards to battle monsters, with the cards you have based off of your equipment, class, and race. Going to the discussion, the game starts with a pre-made mid-to-late game party to give you a taste of how a stronger party will function as you fight some mooks and an acid-breathing dragon (although I thought black dragons breathed acid, not green.) After that, you start with a first level party that eventually consists of a fighter, a wizard, and a cleric. One of the students in my discussion group felt that the enemies were too powerful and able to move more than he was, leading him to rage quit the game after a while. The other student in my group said that the difficulty felt fair to him. After playing through the game a few hours, I feel like I have to side with the second student. I'll try to explain why.

Civilization 3 Analysis

(This entry was written for SNHU's GAM-205 class in the Fall 2017 semester.)

    I have kind of a funny history with Civ 3. I was given it for Christmas around 2004. Mom knew I was a smart kid, and maybe she thought I'd be good at it. However, as a dumb preteen, I couldn't even beat the easiest difficulty level. Every game went one of three ways:

Even today, the faces of the leaders are kind of creepy. Especially on someone as corpse-like as the Queen here. So pale!

    1a: I'd play a peaceful game while not having a complete grasp of how the game works. Eventually, every single one of my opponents would decide that there was nothing I could possess which they couldn't take away. They demanded all of my techs and money, and I'd eventually quit when I realized how behind I was.

    1b: Same as above, but when the demands came in, but I'd refuse their demands, and they'd crush me for having the sheer audacity to stand up to a bully. All those anti-bullying specials that said to just ignore them were total liars.

    2:  Inevitably, after being bullied into oblivion a few times, I'd go for a more aggressive strategy and try to war with someone. Each time, my opponent would spontaneously discover the lawnmower and my ass would become grass.

    To summarize my first game in over a decade, I'm leaps and bounds ahead of the AI, despite my Civ 5 experience telling me not to spam cities. Also, despite my huge technology lead, Scandinavia still had the nerve to go to war after I rejected a demand. Maybe the AI is just intrinsically bloodthirsty. I knew that about Gandhi, but not the others. Now for the analyzing.

    One of the most analyzable parts of the game in my opinion is the technology tree. Looking at it, you can get a pretty decent idea of how Firaxis Games views/viewed the concepts of civilization. I'm also comparing it to the tech trees of the future Civilization games, because I'm a bit more familiar with Civ 4 onwards. The theme I'm analyzing is how Civ 3 seems to have a bias towards western civilization and industrialization.

Gandhi always knows how to cover his bases, I suppose.

Unexplored Review: One-eyed One-headed Marigold Monster Murderer (PC)

    One of the first roguelike games I've ever played was Nethack, a game about trying to find the Amulet of Yendor in the Dungeons of Doom, and dying repeatedly. I can't count how many of my wizards died to thing ranging from newts, to water demons, to swarms of friggin' giant bees and ants. It's probably what led me to spending almost 2.5K hours of my life having a small, naked boy kill hideous monsters in his mind by using his tears. The game I'm reviewing today is a bit of column B, but mostly it's column A. It's Ludomotion's top-down dungeon crawler Unexplored!

    The base game has a simple excuse plot: lead your supposedly human character into the dungeon and retrieve the Amulet of Yendor. It doesn't need a huge world-spanning tale explaining why your furry cyclops is seeking the Amulet. No quest for a god or anything. There are also two free DLC missions where you adventure in either the Mines of Moryondor or in the Aliens universe. If you go to that second one, be sure to bring some morning after pills.

West of Loathing Review: True Stick (PC)

    Last time, I reviewed Death Road to Canada to celebrate its birthday update. I actually managed to make it all the way there on my first time. Unfortunately, the border guard wouldn't let me in. From what I could tell between the cast-iron hockey stick beatings and their insistence that I was a hoser, they frown upon people revealing Canadian military secrets in order to make a Neon Genesis Evangelion pun. However, I still have some time to go travelling, so let's go west, young me and audience of indeterminate age! It's Asymmetric Production's West of Loathing!

Yee-haw! - Jon Arbuckle, Lasagna Cat, 12/03/1991

    A wise man once said that way down yonder on the Chattahoochee, it gets hotter than a hoochie-coochie. But down yonder over West of Loathing, it gets hotter than a... bunch of... clothing? Look, I'm not good at making up rhymes for country songs on a dime. What I am good at, however, is going to the wild frontier in order to serve justice and get rich. It's a very situational specialization, but it's coming in handy now, so let's use it. We only have to worry about things like bandits, rodeo clowns, and the fact that The Cows Came Home, resulting in herds of demonic cows roaming the west.

Death Road to Canada Review/Retrospective: Telling Random Strangers to COOL IT Since 2016 (PC)

    As much as I hate to admit it, I have a pretty sizable amount of games in my Steam library that I have yet to play. These games range from games I heard were good and picked up during a sale to the occasional day one purchase (including Undertale, just to show how unselective my apathy can be.) I always say I'll get to them soon, but I still have a whole collection of games that have never seen the light of my computer screen. Since today is as good of a day as any, I'm going to review one of these games.

Sorry, Mae. Not yet. I promise one day. Tell Toriel I said the same about Undertale.

    The game I am talking about today has just turned one year old, so it seems like a good time for me to jump into this pile of living corpses! It's Death Road to Canada, by Rocketcat Games!

Crash Fever Revisited: Potential.exe has crashed (iOS)

(Originally created 8-4-17)

    It’s been several weeks since I first reviewed Crash Fever. At the time, I felt pretty on the fence about whether it was good or not, so I finished off by stating it might need some time to fix itself up and do some translating, among other things. Well, I’ve seen some more of the world of ALICE, and now it’s time to pass a real verdict. Since I don’t have a gavel or a snarky white cat, I’ve gotten myself pumped for judgement by putting on a fake wolf head and playing some ‘All American Badass Mastered.’

Note: I do not own a wolf mask and I am not a post-apocalyptic warlord. As far as I know.

    I finally have to come out and say it: I’m not liking Crash Fever anymore. I still play it, for some reason, but the more content I see, the more I become irritated about the decisions that went into the game. There are some real problems with the game that could be fixed, but are still around after all the time the game has been out.

Hylics Review: Clay Moon over the Procedurally-Generated Heart (PC)

(Originally created 7-28-17)

    While the RPG Maker program is seen by some as a thing for making “Baby’s First RPG,” there have been some legitimately good games that come from that program. A good early example I remember playing is the freeware game OFF, a game that originally appeared in French before being translated to English. The library of freeware RPG Maker games includes such gems as the dream-exploring adventure game Yume Nikki, the Earthbound fan RPG Cognitive Dissonance, and the downright bizarre Space Funeral. We’ve also seen some RPG Maker games in online stores, such as To the Moon, Suits: A Business RPG, and the LISA trilogy. Today’s game is one of those that falls into the surreal RPG category, with the RPG Maker game Hylics, by a Claymation artist known as Mason Lindroth. 

    The game puts you in the role of Wayne, a crescent moon-headed man on a vague quest to defeat the Moon King, Gibby. There are also intermissions where you control a character whose name, according to the game files, is Dracula. No relation to the vampire, though. Joining Wayne on his quest are Dedusmuln, an esteemed archaeologist, Somsnosa, a friend of Wayne who seems to have stolen Ico’s hat, and Pongorma, the last of the Dread Knights. In reality though, the story generally acts as an excuse to get you to explore a bizarre-looking world and meet its surreal inhabitants.

Streets of Rogue Review: Grand Theft Gorilla (PC) (Early Access Version Alpha 31)

(Originally created 6-30-17)

    What would it take for you to go into rebellion against your government?

    For the people in Streets of Rogue, a game developed by Matt Dabrowski for tinyBuild, the answer is, apparently, “not much.” All the new Mayor had to do to get an underground rebellion seeking his blood was to raise taxes, ban chicken nuggets because of his allergies, and confiscate all the booze so he could hold a terrible party. Although to be fair, that last one is totally worthy of capital punishment. That’s not to say the rest of the town is perfect. The factories are an OSHA nightmare, the police force is highly corrupt, and the park is filled with cannibalistic hillbillies. As the newest member of the Resistance, it’s up to you, who or whatever you are, to make your way through this crazy city and take out the Mayor, causing a great deal of property damage all the while.

Crash Fever Review: ALICE in Schrodinger's Box (iOS)

(Originally created mid-June)

    Farming for cat food in The Battle Cats gives me the opportunity to see advertisements for a variety of cheap iPhone games. Sometimes I get to see a game advertise itself by listing the most obvious features that would be included in such a game. Other times the advertisement attempts and fails to tempt me with women in skimpy clothing. A few times I even get to see a South Korean company describe their game as an “awesome inflation game,” which only raises more questions, some of them not exactly work-safe. I bring up the topic of iPhone advertisements because they served as part of my experience with Crash Fever, an iPhone game created by WonderPlanet Inc. in 2015 (current version: 1.12.5.0).

Battle Cats Review: Meow It's Time for War (iOS)

(Originally created 5-23-17)

            When it comes to the iPhone video game market, I rarely traverse it to find entertainment. Not counting the bootleg games that love to infringe on the copyrights of characters like Elsa from Frozen, it doesn’t seem like there’s much creativity in the selection of games provided. As a rule, if your Bubble Bobble style game has to advertise itself by confirming that is has combos and power-ups, then you probably aren’t going to be a hidden gem in the sea of copycats. Speaking of cats, those are a big part of the iPhone game that I’m reviewing today, The Battle Cats, created by the PONOS Corporation in 2014.