STALKER: Call Of Pripyat Review: Third Time’s A Charm? [Review]

STALKER: Call of Pripyat is the third game in the first-person shooter STALKER series, but seeing as it’s also meant to fix its predecessors many, glaring failures, it’s also a first. Again set in a near-future world centred around the Chernobyl exclusion zone, Call of Pripyat is supposed to be more focused, and more importantly stable , than the horrendously “loose” Shadow of Chernobyl or Clear Sky. Whether STALKER: Call Of Pripyat manages this or not will, for most people (STALKER fans aside), be the deal-breaker. Loved Concentrate… Concentrate… Call of Pripyat benefits from a reduced vision and tightened design. Its quality over quantity, tedious, empty wastelands replaced in this game with more points of interest and a more dynamic look and feel to the world. It also features some excellent “linear” sequences, similar to a more restrained shooter, especially one late in the game that sees you slogging your way through some well-designed tunnel sequences. Alive: CoP feels like more of a natural game world than its predecessors. Instead of only finding other characters hanging around select areas, you’ll run into a lot more of them out in the wilderness. You’re more likely to run into a STALKER in the middle of nowhere for a chat, other times you’ll spy a band on the horizon being mauled alive by mutants. These little touches do a lot to break up the artificial feeling of emptiness that lingers in other STALKER titles. Cheeky Dwarf: CoP features telekinetic dwarves, which not only throw things at you, but can steal your weapons as well. Telekinetic dwarves. Brilliant. Sounds Great: While the voice-work in STALKER: Call Of Pripyat isn’t the greatest (see below), the music and sound effects are . The eerie, incidental stuff in the background is good enough, but some of the weather effects, like a howling wind or the crack of thunder, are great . Hate If It Ain’t Workin, Fix It: So I get my copy of the game. I install, boot it up, and within three minutes, I get my first blue screen of death, the first I’ve ever received on my current PC. Second time I boot it up, I get it again. Third time I get a little further, maybe 20 minutes in, but this is punctuated by temporary freezes. Then the game freezes for good, and I’m again reaching for the reset button. The longest I got in the game without a freeze or crash was around 45 minutes. Rough Around All Edges: You know things are bad on the trimmings side when the intro’s voice-over and its subtitles don’t match. The narrator (or is it the writer?) even gets crucial dates wrong. This continues through into poor writing, a poor storyline and terrible dialogue between characters. I know , these guys don’t speak English as a first language, but some better localisation wouldn’t have gone astray. Age Shall Weary Them: The first STALKER looked… OK. In 2007. In 2010, Call of Pripyat looks terrible, even its highest graphical settings doing little to mask the fact this is an engine well past its prime. It’s not all bad – some lighting and weather effects are nice – but everything else, from trees to grass to enemies and characters, don’t look so hot. Note, however, I wasn’t running DX11 in an attempt to just get the game to work . That might improve things a bit. Oh, That’s It? Almost the entire game is spent building you up towards reaching the town of Pripyat itself. Think Half-Life 2’s citadel. It’s always visible in the distance, it’s what you’re working towards, it’s the centre of intrigue . Yet when you eventually get there, after probably the game’s strongest sequence, you find it’s…well, it’s a run-down urban area. Like any other run-down urban area in the game. What a let down. Look, fans of STALKER’s particular brand of open-world misery will probably find this the best game in the series, as it’s a refined, improved product. It’s the STALKER they – and everyone else – probably thought they’d be getting in 2007. But that’s just the thing. It’s now 2010, and even in an improved state, Call of Pripyat is still too rough and too raw to recommend to anyone other than experienced STALKER fans. STALKER: Call Of Pripyat was developed by GSC Game World, released on the PC on February 2. Retails for $40 USD. A copy of the game was given to us by the publisher for reviewing purposes. Played single-player game to completion, and 5-6 multiplayer matches. Confused by our reviews? Read our review FAQ .

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STALKER: Call Of Pripyat Review: Third Time’s A Charm? [Review]

Shakespeare As Video Game Designer [What If]

There’s not much Shakespeare in video games, no major Hamlet games and only scattered hopes for a Macbeth one . The lead creator of Dante’s Inferno thinks the writer himself, could have been a game design visionary. Hey, the Wall Street Journal asked Dante’s Inferno lead game creator Jonathan Knight the question: WSJ: You mentioned Shakespeare as one of your interests during your MFA. What do you think he would have been like as a game designer? Knight: Shakespeare would have been on the forefront. He was an innovator and not just a great story-teller. Arguably, he’s more of a medium innovator. He borrowed heavily. “Hamlet” is a complete rip-off of a story on the prince of Denmark. Some people think he lifted it from a work that actually came between the two stories. He was such a master at harnessing the new. For him, the new medium was open air theater on the south side of the Thames. He solidified a big portion of the English language with his plays much like Dante did with Italian vernacular. There’s more in the original article, including tidbits about what Knight and the team at EA’s Visceral Games omitted from their adaptation of Dante Aligheri’s famous poem. On the Shakespeare front, possible game designer, yes. And wouldn’t it be interesting to see a master of merging the highbrow and lowbrow making games — or is that exactly what we have already, perhaps, at work in studios around the world? Dante’s Inferno: Do Classic Poems Make Great Videogames? [The Wall Street Journal]

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Shakespeare As Video Game Designer [What If]

Kotaku’s Top Five List of Top Ten Lists [Lists]

Each week throws off several new video game lists ranging from the humorous to the trivial. What’s better? A list of those. Here’s a roundup of the rundowns out there. • The 50 Greatest Gaming World Records [Games Radar] When I was nine I decided I would set the world record on Atari 2600 Defender. (The reverse in that game was a great way to slow things down when you had too many enemies on your ass. I used it repeatedly.) I rolled the score twice and then realized the polaroids of a screen rolled twice are indistinguishable from ones rolled once. Or even three or eight times. Plus I didn’t even know what the record was. So I gave up. That’s the only thing keeping me off this list. • The 25 Worst Video Game Stock Photos [GameSpy] This is a common complaint, and despite that, stock photos of people playing games still suck, if not insult the intelligence. Maybe it’s because actually playing a game is just not that dynamic of an activity. GameSpy has 25 of the most egregious depictions. • 10 Games You’ll Miss for First-Gen Xbox Live [Technologizer] Luke got this discussion started last week after Microsoft announced it was ending online support for its console. Here’s another writer’s list. I absolutely forgot about TimeSplitters: Future Perfect. I really did enjoy that game. Crecente sent it to me back when I was going through a rough patch in 2005. Very good memories. • “Sorry, I’m Dead”: 30 Most Memorable Video Game Quotes [OC Weekly] Lots of old standbys here, from “A winner is you,” to “All your base.” While Duke Nukem’s kick-ass/chew-bubblegum/out-of-the-latter delivery is indeed iconic, everyone knows Rowdy Roddy Piper said it first in They Live . • 10 Games of the 90s That Have Aged Well [Site] The Kartel started this subject last week with seven games from the 2000s that have aged well. Now they move back a decade, to the 1990s. Counter Strike, Starcraft, Metal Gear Solid, Final Fantasy VII, Street Fighter II, all very good choices.

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Kotaku’s Top Five List of Top Ten Lists [Lists]

The FPS: Where Freedom isn’t Free [Weekend Reader]

As game designers become more like film directors, the paths they lay out for players becomes increasingly scripted and, frankly, downright restricted. Still the illusion of freedom persists in this genre. The blog One Dimensional Man deconstructs this kind of design, and comes up with another illusion – the illusion that the game isn’t linear, and how the stage may be skillfully set for that. “Pseudo non-linearity,” is the term the writer coins, and an expert example of it can be found in the opening sequences of Half-Life 2 . I agree that hamfisted mechanisms such as invisible walls sort of break the third wall, and at minimum are things working against immersion. But I’m not sure I ever felt that my freedom to explore anywhere in an FPS was part of the bargain in the first place. Hell, it’s not completely part of the bargain in an open world RPG like Fallout 3. In Grayditch, an entire town, only a few buildings have doors that may be opened. The others have the kind of locked facades the writer calls a design flaw. But we can’t have everything. The key for a designer is knowing what we can have, and then how to discourage or prevent us from needlessly pursuing what we can’t. Freedom Is Dead, And Why It Doesn’t Matter [One Dimensional Man, Dec. 17, 2009] The introduction to Half-Life 2 is a particularly useful archetype. The player (as Gordon Freeman), finds themselves trapped in the dystopian City 17, a living and breathing hell house of fascistic undertones (and a not so subtle reference to the dissolution of the Jewish ghettos in Nazi Germany). After a brief encounter with an old friend (Barney, undercover as one of the faceless Combines) it soon becomes clear that the mission is one of escape. As Gordon Freeman makes his way around the spatially imposing City 17, navigating its various alleys, back roads, and crumbling apartments, the sense of a genuine, living and breathing world is certainly palpable. Other ‘evacuees’ offer small talk, ‘Combine’ guardsman patrol the streets, while sinister public service announcements play on giant, dominating screens. The world conveys a sense of it pre-existing the player’s arrival there, which is really, for all titles that strive for immersion, one of the apogees of virtual design. What one may not be consciously aware of however as they navigate through this dystopian sprawl is that Gordon’s escape route is quite immaculately linear; an effective straight line in the figurative sense. And yet one could be entirely forgiven for thinking this virtual City as fully, spatially unfastened, naked to the whims of electronic exploration. This is due to the creative design principle of pseudo-nonlinearity. City 17 employs several techniques to psychologically re-orientate the player in this way, all operating generally around this one principle. Perhaps most psychologically effective, are the Combine guardsman who ‘dynamically’ operate to cordon off certain parts of City 17’s various stairwells and pathways as Gordon attempts his escape. They are dynamic in the sense that they allow for a passing glimpse of the virtual world outside the player’s immediate field of view, before finally forcing them back en-route (often by way of a hard whack from an electro-truncheon) to be left with only the tantalizing suggestion planted into their own imagination; that of a fluid world that only marginally pre-empts subjectivity. Simultaneously, a colossal barrier to immersion is shattered as the familiar constrictive sense of the ‘developer behind the curtain’ ruthlessly chopping and cutting parts of the world from view is countered by effectively showing the world behind that curtain – if only briefly. This is sufficient however, as in the process an illusion of freedom, or rather of non-linearity, is actively cultivated in the player’s mind; the world becomes actualized, feels more three dimensional, as the artificial barriers to exploration are, in turn, naturalized, effectively reshaped into actors of the story operating against the player. In the process, they are absolved of their essential artifice as agents of linearity. Pseudo-nonlinearity may also be achieved without the aid of such dynamic tools (which, it is worth stating, cannot always be relied upon – owing to the context of plot or narrative) and this is certainly a more common approach to environmental design that one finds. In practice, the fundamentals remain largely unchanged as the principle barrier to exploration must still undergo the same process of naturalization; that is, it must be configured so as to maintain consonance to the inherited semiotic array of both narrative and environment. For instance, in introducing an obstruction into a particular environment, the environment must also be able to passively disclose the ‘story’ of why that obstruction is present there. The closer fidelity is able to be maintained between the obstruction to individual progression and the dynamic motivation to progress (i.e. the narrative) the greater the linearity ‘deficit’ is reduced. To use a common example from modern FPS design: a wrecked car or coach laying across a road or landscape forces the player onto a different path, effectively manipulating them into the appropriate, pre-determined direction. While this form of static obstruction may appear a rather brash imposition and unconscionable artifice, this hinges upon how effectively it is naturalized in respect to its narrative and environmental arrays. By ensuring that it conforms to the animus of these two factors, its symbolic charge as both artifice and bearer of linearity can be effectively neutralized. To put it simply, the narrative should, either directly or indirectly, be able account for why the obstruction is there, while the environment (by means of inference) discloses how it got there. These two environmental operators (static and dynamic) form the basis of environmental design from the principle of pseudo non-linearity. By deploying them, developers are able to mitigate the lingering problems associated with this shift toward a narrowing of exploration in favour of greater control. Of course, the ever-critical gamer will often be able to penetrate the façade, and readily deduce the reality of linearity on display. However, awareness, or pre-awareness should not detract from the overall effect, which like a magic trick, is able to retain much of its prestige despite knowledge of this basic deception. – One Dimensional Man Weekend Reader is Kotaku’s look at the critical thinking in, and of video games. It appears Saturdays at noon. Please take the time to read the full article cited before getting involved in the debate here.

Continue reading here:
The FPS: Where Freedom isn’t Free [Weekend Reader]

The FPS: Where Freedom isn’t Free [Weekend Reader]

As game designers become more like film directors, the paths they lay out for players becomes increasingly scripted and, frankly, downright restricted. Still the illusion of freedom persists in this genre. The blog One Dimensional Man deconstructs this kind of design, and comes up with another illusion – the illusion that the game isn’t linear, and how the stage may be skillfully set for that. “Pseudo non-linearity,” is the term the writer coins, and an expert example of it can be found in the opening sequences of Half-Life 2 . I agree that hamfisted mechanisms such as invisible walls sort of break the third wall, and at minimum are things working against immersion. But I’m not sure I ever felt that my freedom to explore anywhere in an FPS was part of the bargain in the first place. Hell, it’s not completely part of the bargain in an open world RPG like Fallout 3. In Grayditch, an entire town, only a few buildings have doors that may be opened. The others have the kind of locked facades the writer calls a design flaw. But we can’t have everything. The key for a designer is knowing what we can have, and then how to discourage or prevent us from needlessly pursuing what we can’t. Freedom Is Dead, And Why It Doesn’t Matter [One Dimensional Man, Dec. 17, 2009] The introduction to Half-Life 2 is a particularly useful archetype. The player (as Gordon Freeman), finds themselves trapped in the dystopian City 17, a living and breathing hell house of fascistic undertones (and a not so subtle reference to the dissolution of the Jewish ghettos in Nazi Germany). After a brief encounter with an old friend (Barney, undercover as one of the faceless Combines) it soon becomes clear that the mission is one of escape. As Gordon Freeman makes his way around the spatially imposing City 17, navigating its various alleys, back roads, and crumbling apartments, the sense of a genuine, living and breathing world is certainly palpable. Other ‘evacuees’ offer small talk, ‘Combine’ guardsman patrol the streets, while sinister public service announcements play on giant, dominating screens. The world conveys a sense of it pre-existing the player’s arrival there, which is really, for all titles that strive for immersion, one of the apogees of virtual design. What one may not be consciously aware of however as they navigate through this dystopian sprawl is that Gordon’s escape route is quite immaculately linear; an effective straight line in the figurative sense. And yet one could be entirely forgiven for thinking this virtual City as fully, spatially unfastened, naked to the whims of electronic exploration. This is due to the creative design principle of pseudo-nonlinearity. City 17 employs several techniques to psychologically re-orientate the player in this way, all operating generally around this one principle. Perhaps most psychologically effective, are the Combine guardsman who ‘dynamically’ operate to cordon off certain parts of City 17’s various stairwells and pathways as Gordon attempts his escape. They are dynamic in the sense that they allow for a passing glimpse of the virtual world outside the player’s immediate field of view, before finally forcing them back en-route (often by way of a hard whack from an electro-truncheon) to be left with only the tantalizing suggestion planted into their own imagination; that of a fluid world that only marginally pre-empts subjectivity. Simultaneously, a colossal barrier to immersion is shattered as the familiar constrictive sense of the ‘developer behind the curtain’ ruthlessly chopping and cutting parts of the world from view is countered by effectively showing the world behind that curtain – if only briefly. This is sufficient however, as in the process an illusion of freedom, or rather of non-linearity, is actively cultivated in the player’s mind; the world becomes actualized, feels more three dimensional, as the artificial barriers to exploration are, in turn, naturalized, effectively reshaped into actors of the story operating against the player. In the process, they are absolved of their essential artifice as agents of linearity. Pseudo-nonlinearity may also be achieved without the aid of such dynamic tools (which, it is worth stating, cannot always be relied upon – owing to the context of plot or narrative) and this is certainly a more common approach to environmental design that one finds. In practice, the fundamentals remain largely unchanged as the principle barrier to exploration must still undergo the same process of naturalization; that is, it must be configured so as to maintain consonance to the inherited semiotic array of both narrative and environment. For instance, in introducing an obstruction into a particular environment, the environment must also be able to passively disclose the ‘story’ of why that obstruction is present there. The closer fidelity is able to be maintained between the obstruction to individual progression and the dynamic motivation to progress (i.e. the narrative) the greater the linearity ‘deficit’ is reduced. To use a common example from modern FPS design: a wrecked car or coach laying across a road or landscape forces the player onto a different path, effectively manipulating them into the appropriate, pre-determined direction. While this form of static obstruction may appear a rather brash imposition and unconscionable artifice, this hinges upon how effectively it is naturalized in respect to its narrative and environmental arrays. By ensuring that it conforms to the animus of these two factors, its symbolic charge as both artifice and bearer of linearity can be effectively neutralized. To put it simply, the narrative should, either directly or indirectly, be able account for why the obstruction is there, while the environment (by means of inference) discloses how it got there. These two environmental operators (static and dynamic) form the basis of environmental design from the principle of pseudo non-linearity. By deploying them, developers are able to mitigate the lingering problems associated with this shift toward a narrowing of exploration in favour of greater control. Of course, the ever-critical gamer will often be able to penetrate the façade, and readily deduce the reality of linearity on display. However, awareness, or pre-awareness should not detract from the overall effect, which like a magic trick, is able to retain much of its prestige despite knowledge of this basic deception. – One Dimensional Man Weekend Reader is Kotaku’s look at the critical thinking in, and of video games. It appears Saturdays at noon. Please take the time to read the full article cited before getting involved in the debate here.

See original here:
The FPS: Where Freedom isn’t Free [Weekend Reader]

The FPS: Where Freedom isn’t Free [Weekend Reader]

As game designers become more like film directors, the paths they lay out for players becomes increasingly scripted and, frankly, downright restricted. Still the illusion of freedom persists in this genre. The blog One Dimensional Man deconstructs this kind of design, and comes up with another illusion – the illusion that the game isn’t linear, and how the stage may be skillfully set for that. “Pseudo non-linearity,” is the term the writer coins, and an expert example of it can be found in the opening sequences of Half-Life 2 . I agree that hamfisted mechanisms such as invisible walls sort of break the third wall, and at minimum are things working against immersion. But I’m not sure I ever felt that my freedom to explore anywhere in an FPS was part of the bargain in the first place. Hell, it’s not completely part of the bargain in an open world RPG like Fallout 3. In Grayditch, an entire town, only a few buildings have doors that may be opened. The others have the kind of locked facades the writer calls a design flaw. But we can’t have everything. The key for a designer is knowing what we can have, and then how to discourage or prevent us from needlessly pursuing what we can’t. Freedom Is Dead, And Why It Doesn’t Matter [One Dimensional Man, Dec. 17, 2009] The introduction to Half-Life 2 is a particularly useful archetype. The player (as Gordon Freeman), finds themselves trapped in the dystopian City 17, a living and breathing hell house of fascistic undertones (and a not so subtle reference to the dissolution of the Jewish ghettos in Nazi Germany). After a brief encounter with an old friend (Barney, undercover as one of the faceless Combines) it soon becomes clear that the mission is one of escape. As Gordon Freeman makes his way around the spatially imposing City 17, navigating its various alleys, back roads, and crumbling apartments, the sense of a genuine, living and breathing world is certainly palpable. Other ‘evacuees’ offer small talk, ‘Combine’ guardsman patrol the streets, while sinister public service announcements play on giant, dominating screens. The world conveys a sense of it pre-existing the player’s arrival there, which is really, for all titles that strive for immersion, one of the apogees of virtual design. What one may not be consciously aware of however as they navigate through this dystopian sprawl is that Gordon’s escape route is quite immaculately linear; an effective straight line in the figurative sense. And yet one could be entirely forgiven for thinking this virtual City as fully, spatially unfastened, naked to the whims of electronic exploration. This is due to the creative design principle of pseudo-nonlinearity. City 17 employs several techniques to psychologically re-orientate the player in this way, all operating generally around this one principle. Perhaps most psychologically effective, are the Combine guardsman who ‘dynamically’ operate to cordon off certain parts of City 17’s various stairwells and pathways as Gordon attempts his escape. They are dynamic in the sense that they allow for a passing glimpse of the virtual world outside the player’s immediate field of view, before finally forcing them back en-route (often by way of a hard whack from an electro-truncheon) to be left with only the tantalizing suggestion planted into their own imagination; that of a fluid world that only marginally pre-empts subjectivity. Simultaneously, a colossal barrier to immersion is shattered as the familiar constrictive sense of the ‘developer behind the curtain’ ruthlessly chopping and cutting parts of the world from view is countered by effectively showing the world behind that curtain – if only briefly. This is sufficient however, as in the process an illusion of freedom, or rather of non-linearity, is actively cultivated in the player’s mind; the world becomes actualized, feels more three dimensional, as the artificial barriers to exploration are, in turn, naturalized, effectively reshaped into actors of the story operating against the player. In the process, they are absolved of their essential artifice as agents of linearity. Pseudo-nonlinearity may also be achieved without the aid of such dynamic tools (which, it is worth stating, cannot always be relied upon – owing to the context of plot or narrative) and this is certainly a more common approach to environmental design that one finds. In practice, the fundamentals remain largely unchanged as the principle barrier to exploration must still undergo the same process of naturalization; that is, it must be configured so as to maintain consonance to the inherited semiotic array of both narrative and environment. For instance, in introducing an obstruction into a particular environment, the environment must also be able to passively disclose the ‘story’ of why that obstruction is present there. The closer fidelity is able to be maintained between the obstruction to individual progression and the dynamic motivation to progress (i.e. the narrative) the greater the linearity ‘deficit’ is reduced. To use a common example from modern FPS design: a wrecked car or coach laying across a road or landscape forces the player onto a different path, effectively manipulating them into the appropriate, pre-determined direction. While this form of static obstruction may appear a rather brash imposition and unconscionable artifice, this hinges upon how effectively it is naturalized in respect to its narrative and environmental arrays. By ensuring that it conforms to the animus of these two factors, its symbolic charge as both artifice and bearer of linearity can be effectively neutralized. To put it simply, the narrative should, either directly or indirectly, be able account for why the obstruction is there, while the environment (by means of inference) discloses how it got there. These two environmental operators (static and dynamic) form the basis of environmental design from the principle of pseudo non-linearity. By deploying them, developers are able to mitigate the lingering problems associated with this shift toward a narrowing of exploration in favour of greater control. Of course, the ever-critical gamer will often be able to penetrate the façade, and readily deduce the reality of linearity on display. However, awareness, or pre-awareness should not detract from the overall effect, which like a magic trick, is able to retain much of its prestige despite knowledge of this basic deception. – One Dimensional Man Weekend Reader is Kotaku’s look at the critical thinking in, and of video games. It appears Saturdays at noon. Please take the time to read the full article cited before getting involved in the debate here.

Continued here:
The FPS: Where Freedom isn’t Free [Weekend Reader]

Guild Wars 2 Explores The Five Races Of Tyria [Clips]

ArenaNet recruits top-notch voice actors to introduce players to the five playable races of Tyria, with tons of Guild Wars 2 gameplay footage included. While I wasn’t a big fan of the original Guild Wars, Guild Wars 2 is shaping up to be the sort of game I can really get behind. It’s got amazing artistic direction, a nice selection of races to play with, and an expansive world to run my adorable little asura through. This trailer features the voices of Troy Baker from Fullmetal Alchemist, Steve Blum from just about everything, Jocelyn Blue from Invader Zim, Felicia Day from The Guild, and Kari Wahlgren, who has appeared as countless video game and anime characters. Need to figure out who’s who? Check out the Q&A NCsoft provided with the clip under the video. RACES OF TYRIA TRAILER QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS with Ree Soesbee – World Designer and Writer In the Races of Tyria, the latest preview video for NCsoft’s upcoming MMO Guild Wars 2, we explore the world of Tyria through the eyes of the five playable races in the game. Meet the noble and resilient humans, the war-mongering charr, the brilliant inventors known as the asura, the mighty shapeshifting norn, and a new race of nature spirits, the sylvari. From these five races, mighty heroes shall rise! Who are these characters in this video and what’s their significance in the overall story of the game? The characters in the video are the members of the famous adventuring group, Destiny’s Edge, renowned for their bravery and skill. Although Destiny’s Edge no longer travels together, tales of their heroic deeds are told in every part of Tyria. · Logan Thackeray-Captain Logan Thackeray is a commander in the Seraph guard of Divinity’s Reach, defender of the last human kingdom. When danger threatens, Logan faces it with the determination of a man who knows that he is the only thing standing between all that he loves… and its utter destruction. · Rytlock Brimstone-This ruthless charr warrior has risen quickly through the ranks of the Blood Legion to become a Tribune of great renown. He stands foremost among the charr of the Black Citadel, carrying a sword of fire and leading their armies to greatness. · Eir Stegalkin-Eir is a norn hero and tactician of great renown. There are those who call her a visionary, who say she speaks to the Spirits of the Wild. With her companion wolf, Garm, Eir roams the icy Shiverpeaks, bow and blade in hand, searching for meaning in the snow’s silence. · Zojja- The foremost apprentice of the venerable asura inventor Snaff, Zojja seeks to live up to her mentor’s legacy. Zojja’s intellect is unrivaled even by members of the Arcane Council of Rata Sum, and her ability to multitask across a spectrum of disciplines inspires awe and jealousy among her fellow asura. · Caithe- Her blades are as swift as a blooded sunset, her movement as silent as the fall of night. Caithe was among the first sylvari to step upon the earth of Tyria, but where the others turned toward the sun, she sought shadow. She has never been afraid to gaze into darkness – or to seek truths that others fear. You show off some very interesting environments in the Races of Tyria video. Can you tell us more about them? The video takes us across the vastness of Tyria to the homelands of each of the five signature races of Guild Wars 2. · Divinity’s Reach-A breathtaking monument to the human spirit, this shining city is the capital of Kryta and a bastion of hope to embattled mankind. · The Black Citadel-Capital of the Iron Legion, this massive charr war-keep was built on the ruins of the conquered human kingdom of Ascalon. · Hoelbrak – In the frigid heights of the Shiverpeaks the norn have built this grand encampment, with huge lodges where they seek the wisdom of the Spirits of the Wild. · The Grove-Deep in the Maguuma Jungle, this mystical settlement has grown around the Pale Tree, the birthplace of all sylvari. · Rata Sum-Rising from the jungle, this metropolis of geomystic generators and giant ziggurats is full of brilliant asura and their golem servants. Some of the voices in this video seem familiar, can you identify the actors? How big is voice going to be in Guild Wars 2? Seamlessly integrating voice into the game experience is a key feature of Guild Wars 2, so we have gathered world-class voice talent to help bring the world of Tyria alive. This video introduces the five iconic heroes of each race, all voiced by accomplished actors: · Logan Thackeray the human defender is voiced by Troy Baker (Fullmetal Alchemist, One Piece). · Rytlock Brimstone the charr warrior is voiced by Steve Blum (Spectacular Spider-Man). · Eir Stegalkin the norn is voiced by Jocelyn Blue (Invader Zim, Space Jam). · Zojja the asura is voiced by Felicia Day (Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog, The Guild, Buffy the Vampire Slayer). · Caithe the sylvari is voiced by Kari Wuhlgren (Wolverine and the X-Men, Aliens in the Attic). The video ends with the question, “What’s your story?” – how important is story in Guild Wars 2? Story is a huge element in Guild Wars 2. From the moment you choose your character’s race, you’re taking your first step down a road that only you can travel. You’ll explore a vast, living world where your actions have real consequences. You’ll immerse yourself in a rich, powerful narrative that is personalized to and influenced by your character.

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Guild Wars 2 Explores The Five Races Of Tyria [Clips]

Far Cry 3 Is Go [Ubisoft]

According to a comment by Ubisoft’s Kevin Shortt, development on the third installment of the Far Cry series is underway, and so far things look “pretty exciting.” Shortt made mention of Far Cry 3 during a recent media junket on the Avatar video game. UK magazine OPM asked the writer whether or not he was working of Far Cry 3, to which he replied: “No I’m not, but I know the team are and what I’ve seen looks pretty exciting.” And so we get confirmation of a game we were pretty sure was being made in the first place, which is still pretty nice. We don’t have any details regarding the setting, plot, game engine, or platforms, but still, good to know. Far Cry 3 looking “pretty exciting” [CVG]

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Far Cry 3 Is Go [Ubisoft]

Cooperative Multiplayer with the Devil You Don’t Know [Mutliplayer]

New Super Mario Bros. Wii released a week ago, and even its lighthearted cartoon environment and four-player cooperative mode still manage to bring out the worst in multiplayer behavior – if you don’t know your partner, that is. “Being granted the opportunity to be friends or adversaries, games allow us to act out the worst of human pathologies and encourage behaviors that would get us yelled at, arrested, or killed in the real world,” writes Jamin Brophy-Warren for Slate. This is hardly a news flash. But it’s depressing to consider that, in a Mario’s return to a 2D platformer after 20 years, we still haven’t progressed much further than adolescent brothers taking advantage of the game to antagonize each other. I’d argue that the reason he had a bad experience with it is because he didn’t know his co-player. That made the guy completely unaccountable, and his provocations would stand unless and until the writer called him on his bullshit, which would be more uncomfortable to do face-to-face to a stranger in a “fun” environment than just walking away. Brophy-Warren ponders why multiplayer is an inherently brutish or uncouth pursuit, and I think he answers it in his last paragraph: When you game with people you know and respect, you’re more likely to actually cooperate. Otherwise, “Most cooperative games lie in a vast middle ground, however, a no man’s land between altruism and gaming Darwinism that offers up a host of ways to misbehave.” Et Tu, Mario? [Slate, Nov. 13] Jesper Juul, a video-game researcher and professor at NYU’s newly minted Game Center, argues that multiplayer games give us three things to balance. Players want to win and they want the game to be fair, but they also need to navigate whatever relationships they have outside the game-that is, if you shoot your friend in the head in Call of Duty, you’ll have to answer for that in the offline world. My brother and the jerk from E3 were solely concerned with winning. I mostly cared about the game being fair. None of us, though, sat down and talked about the third factor-what we were planning to do during our journey as in-game teammates. This planning comes up most frequently in massively multiplayer games like World of Warcraft. In that game, players create guilds and go on quests in pursuit of gold and weaponry. Defeating an enemy yields goodies that guilds must choose how to distribute. In a perfect world, everyone would work together to give the appropriate items to the most deserving players. There is a breed of WoW player, however, known as the “loot ninja” or “greeder,” a scoundrel who steals items from fallen comrades or takes more than his share after a battle. (There are also more flagrant modes of sabotage. In the infamous Leeeroy Jenkins video, an overexcitable player decides to take on a difficult boss single-handedly, sabotaging his guild’s meticulous plan. The results are predictably surreal.) This type of stuff was happening long before World of Warcraft. In side-scrolling brawlers such as the early-1990s title Streets of Rage, power-ups appeared along the way that could heal your wounded party or give players special abilities. Bleeding-heart video-game liberals like myself would argue that health packs should always go to the weakest member of the party. This would often lead to discussions about who “deserved” the triage, which begot a lot of petty bickering, which begot fistfights. This Photoshopped box art for Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles II-which includes the tagline “It’s My Turn to Get the Pizza You Asshole I Need it More!”-is a perfect encapsulation of the phenomenon. Part of the problem (and the joy) of playing games is that such behavior isn’t explicitly condoned or condemned. Looting and friendly fire aren’t forbidden by most games, which leaves us to figure out our own rules. This is the right decision: Good game designers allow players to be whoever they want and trust they’ll come to their own consensus about what constitutes “fair play.” That’s why the New Super Mario Bros. Wii was more enjoyable when I played it as God intended-with a good friend and copious amounts of beer. There was no back-stabbing, and no one’s feelings were hurt. – Jamin Brophy-Warren

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Cooperative Multiplayer with the Devil You Don’t Know [Mutliplayer]

Cooperative Multiplayer with the Devil You Don’t Know [Mutliplayer]

New Super Mario Bros. Wii released a week ago, and even its lighthearted cartoon environment and four-player cooperative mode still manage to bring out the worst in multiplayer behavior – if you don’t know your partner, that is. “Being granted the opportunity to be friends or adversaries, games allow us to act out the worst of human pathologies and encourage behaviors that would get us yelled at, arrested, or killed in the real world,” writes Jamin Brophy-Warren for Slate. This is hardly a news flash. But it’s depressing to consider that, in a Mario’s return to a 2D platformer after 20 years, we still haven’t progressed much further than adolescent brothers taking advantage of the game to antagonize each other. I’d argue that the reason he had a bad experience with it is because he didn’t know his co-player. That made the guy completely unaccountable, and his provocations would stand unless and until the writer called him on his bullshit, which would be more uncomfortable to do face-to-face to a stranger in a “fun” environment than just walking away. Brophy-Warren ponders why multiplayer is an inherently brutish or uncouth pursuit, and I think he answers it in his last paragraph: When you game with people you know and respect, you’re more likely to actually cooperate. Otherwise, “Most cooperative games lie in a vast middle ground, however, a no man’s land between altruism and gaming Darwinism that offers up a host of ways to misbehave.” Et Tu, Mario? [Slate, Nov. 13] Jesper Juul, a video-game researcher and professor at NYU’s newly minted Game Center, argues that multiplayer games give us three things to balance. Players want to win and they want the game to be fair, but they also need to navigate whatever relationships they have outside the game-that is, if you shoot your friend in the head in Call of Duty, you’ll have to answer for that in the offline world. My brother and the jerk from E3 were solely concerned with winning. I mostly cared about the game being fair. None of us, though, sat down and talked about the third factor-what we were planning to do during our journey as in-game teammates. This planning comes up most frequently in massively multiplayer games like World of Warcraft. In that game, players create guilds and go on quests in pursuit of gold and weaponry. Defeating an enemy yields goodies that guilds must choose how to distribute. In a perfect world, everyone would work together to give the appropriate items to the most deserving players. There is a breed of WoW player, however, known as the “loot ninja” or “greeder,” a scoundrel who steals items from fallen comrades or takes more than his share after a battle. (There are also more flagrant modes of sabotage. In the infamous Leeeroy Jenkins video, an overexcitable player decides to take on a difficult boss single-handedly, sabotaging his guild’s meticulous plan. The results are predictably surreal.) This type of stuff was happening long before World of Warcraft. In side-scrolling brawlers such as the early-1990s title Streets of Rage, power-ups appeared along the way that could heal your wounded party or give players special abilities. Bleeding-heart video-game liberals like myself would argue that health packs should always go to the weakest member of the party. This would often lead to discussions about who “deserved” the triage, which begot a lot of petty bickering, which begot fistfights. This Photoshopped box art for Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles II-which includes the tagline “It’s My Turn to Get the Pizza You Asshole I Need it More!”-is a perfect encapsulation of the phenomenon. Part of the problem (and the joy) of playing games is that such behavior isn’t explicitly condoned or condemned. Looting and friendly fire aren’t forbidden by most games, which leaves us to figure out our own rules. This is the right decision: Good game designers allow players to be whoever they want and trust they’ll come to their own consensus about what constitutes “fair play.” That’s why the New Super Mario Bros. Wii was more enjoyable when I played it as God intended-with a good friend and copious amounts of beer. There was no back-stabbing, and no one’s feelings were hurt. – Jamin Brophy-Warren

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Cooperative Multiplayer with the Devil You Don’t Know [Mutliplayer]

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