Fucking sewer levels! I should be inured to them by now. They're a long-time staple of the rpg genre. And I can understand why that is the case. A sewer is basically a realistic pretext for a dungeon. They're underground. They're gloomy. People don't really know or understand what goes on inside them. It seems almost plausible that there could be monsters lurking in this overlooked and mysterious network of tunnels.
But damn, trudging through video game sewers is almost always miserable. They are cramped, dark, and drab. The various, nearly-identical looking tunnels tend to blur together after awhile, and it's almost always a confusing maze of switches, valves, and backtracking.
Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines' sewer level was no exception. By the end of it, I'd forgotten why I was even down there in the first place. Looking back at my notes, what happened was that when I broke into the museum to steal the Sarcophagus, some unknown party beat me to it. The Prince was furious, and gave me an open-ended mission to go find it. Our best lead was the information-brokers of vampire society, Clan Nosferatu. Clan Nosferatu are hideously cursed creatures who tend to live in the sewers . . .
I couldn't go directly there (of course), so first I had to stop by Hollywood and talk to the Anarch leader, Isaac, whose Nosferatu contacts recently disappeared. This turned out to be related to a supernatural snuff film, which I (of course) had to track down. The film turned out to be the product of a deviant Tzimisce vampire (an aristocratic vampire clan, allied with the Sabbat, who use blood magic to twist the flesh of their victims until they are tortured monstrosities) who I (of course) had to confront and slay.
Then, and only then, was I allowed to enter the sewers. Yay.
Anyway, a long, repetitive, and at times frustrating 3 hours later, and I've at last met with the head of the Nosferatu, who promises to tell me what I want to know . . . if I go to Chinatown and find his lost agent.
Of course.
Chinatown is interesting because apparently the main antagonists in this area are going to be the Kuei-jin. The Kuei-jin are one of those things from the old world of darkness that are, like 60% cool, 30% dorky, and 10% racist. They are mysterious, Asian vampires (the racist part), with a complex spirituality and relationship to the metaphysics of the afterlife (the cool part), with awesome martial arts- and chi-themed superpowers (the dorky part). So, right now, I don't know whether to fanboy-out or roll my eyes.
I really don't want to talk about them too much, because I know that if I do, I probably won't be able to stop. Let's just assume that they are a third type of special vampire, no more or less exotic than the Nosferatu or the Tzimisce, and leave at that.
Judging by the walkthroughs I've seen (I make no apologies - the game lacks both minimap and objective markers), I'm in the final stretch of the game, the last hub area. And going into this final area, I feel like the game's story is starting to fall apart. I, as a White Wolf fan, am thrilled to see cameos from more obscure parts of the game's lore, but I definitely get the feeling that if I were coming into this fresh, I'd be quickly overwhelmed by the rapid introduction of new fantastic conceits. I mean, the Tzimisce basically came out of nowhere and has a face like an alien. And while you can theoretically play as a Nosferatu (and I believe you meet at least one earlier in the game), running around their secret base makes them feel strange and unfamiliar in the way that the occasional deformed NPC does not. And why do the Kuei-jin have to be different (I know, well-meaning '90s racism, but still)? They look just the same as normal vampires, and you'd have no reason to think they were anything but another clan if it weren't for the info-dump their leader gives you at your first meeting.
From what I understand, the developer ran out of time and money while making the game, and if that's the case, then the last quarter is where it's really going to show. All these long sidequests I've been doing have distracted me from the main thread of the plot, but I don't think I've yet reached the point where the game's overall pacing is hopelessly shot. I've got my fingers crossed that the mystery of the Ankaran Sarcophagus will wrap up in a satisfying manner, but the recent sloppiness in connecting my mandatory quests to the game's main plot has got me worried.
Still, if I can spend most of the last few hours of the game above ground, I'll count it as a victory.
Thursday, March 10, 2016
Wednesday, March 9, 2016
Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines - 10/20 hours
I downloaded and installed the unofficial fan patch and so far it's been pretty good. The game looks a lot crisper and more detailed, which is nice, and I can actually read the nameplates on various doors, which is essential. It's still a very early open-world game at its core, but it's a lot prettier to look at.
The plot is continuing apace. Conflict between the Anarchs and the Camarilla is becoming more heated. Nines Rodriguez may have killed one of the Camarilla elders, or he may have been in the wrong place at the wrong time. Either way, Prince Lacroix declared a Blood Hunt on him, which is exactly as bad as it sounds.
While all this is going on, everyone on board a cargo ship carrying a mysterious sarcophagus was killed. Rumor has it that the sarcophagus contained the remains of an ancient and powerful vampire, and every supernatural faction in the city wants to get its hands on it. Some believe it could herald the end of the world. All I know is that chasing after this fucking thing has forced me into too many goddamned stealth missions. I'm a Brujah, dammit, specced for brawling. Why on earth would the Prince send me into a delicate situation that calls for the minimization of casualties?
I guess it's just one of those rpg conventions that you just have to learn to live with. You have the freedom to build your character however you want, but the challenges are fixed and sometimes you're just not going to have the tools to deal with a particular situation.
I'm not sure how I feel about it. On the one hand, it's "realistic" (or at least verisimilitudinous). If you take a video game as a simulated world, then it makes sense that purely by chance you're going to be shorter than some things and taller than others.
Except that chance has nothing to do with it. The virtual world is a designed place, which means that nothing that happens to me is entirely be accident. With that in mind, it becomes harder to justify putting roadblocks in the way of the player's progress. If a game allows multiple builds, it should be difficult (if not impossible) to choose a bad build. So far in my gaming experience, Deus Ex is the only game that really gets it right.
That being said, the main consequence of me being bad at stealth is that I had to kill some people I probably shouldn't have and thus my vampire boss yelled at me, which wasn't exactly a pleasant experience (especially since I couldn't throw his poor choice of agents back in his face), but I could shrug it off pretty easily, which just reinforces the advantage of choosing a combat build - had I gone with stealth, the sneaking missions would have been easier, but some of those deadly vampires I wound up fighting would have made for a frustrating cul de sac.
When I first started playing Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines, I was ambivalent about whether the game was an overlooked classic or a niche curiosity. And in the course of playing, I've assembled a wishlist of features that I think would make the game a lot better (customizable wardrobe and day/night cycle, for example). However, if I stop comparing it to the awesome open-world crime/vampire action-rpg I have floating around in my head and just take it on face value, I'd have to say that Bloodlines is pretty good. I wouldn't necessarily call it a classic (partially because I can't shake the feeling that it is only due to my preexisting familiarity with the lore that the story is as comprehensible as it is), but it's got decent gameplay, an interesting story, good voice acting, and atmosphere to spare (even in pre-patch form).
I may not be shaking my head in disbelief that I haven't played this game before, but I can understand perfectly why it has such a passionate and devoted following.
The plot is continuing apace. Conflict between the Anarchs and the Camarilla is becoming more heated. Nines Rodriguez may have killed one of the Camarilla elders, or he may have been in the wrong place at the wrong time. Either way, Prince Lacroix declared a Blood Hunt on him, which is exactly as bad as it sounds.
While all this is going on, everyone on board a cargo ship carrying a mysterious sarcophagus was killed. Rumor has it that the sarcophagus contained the remains of an ancient and powerful vampire, and every supernatural faction in the city wants to get its hands on it. Some believe it could herald the end of the world. All I know is that chasing after this fucking thing has forced me into too many goddamned stealth missions. I'm a Brujah, dammit, specced for brawling. Why on earth would the Prince send me into a delicate situation that calls for the minimization of casualties?
I guess it's just one of those rpg conventions that you just have to learn to live with. You have the freedom to build your character however you want, but the challenges are fixed and sometimes you're just not going to have the tools to deal with a particular situation.
I'm not sure how I feel about it. On the one hand, it's "realistic" (or at least verisimilitudinous). If you take a video game as a simulated world, then it makes sense that purely by chance you're going to be shorter than some things and taller than others.
Except that chance has nothing to do with it. The virtual world is a designed place, which means that nothing that happens to me is entirely be accident. With that in mind, it becomes harder to justify putting roadblocks in the way of the player's progress. If a game allows multiple builds, it should be difficult (if not impossible) to choose a bad build. So far in my gaming experience, Deus Ex is the only game that really gets it right.
That being said, the main consequence of me being bad at stealth is that I had to kill some people I probably shouldn't have and thus my vampire boss yelled at me, which wasn't exactly a pleasant experience (especially since I couldn't throw his poor choice of agents back in his face), but I could shrug it off pretty easily, which just reinforces the advantage of choosing a combat build - had I gone with stealth, the sneaking missions would have been easier, but some of those deadly vampires I wound up fighting would have made for a frustrating cul de sac.
When I first started playing Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines, I was ambivalent about whether the game was an overlooked classic or a niche curiosity. And in the course of playing, I've assembled a wishlist of features that I think would make the game a lot better (customizable wardrobe and day/night cycle, for example). However, if I stop comparing it to the awesome open-world crime/vampire action-rpg I have floating around in my head and just take it on face value, I'd have to say that Bloodlines is pretty good. I wouldn't necessarily call it a classic (partially because I can't shake the feeling that it is only due to my preexisting familiarity with the lore that the story is as comprehensible as it is), but it's got decent gameplay, an interesting story, good voice acting, and atmosphere to spare (even in pre-patch form).
I may not be shaking my head in disbelief that I haven't played this game before, but I can understand perfectly why it has such a passionate and devoted following.
Monday, March 7, 2016
Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines - 6/20 hours
Astonishingly, for once in my life I can follow a crpg's plot. I think I can credit this to extra-textual knowledge derived from the tabletop game. Basically, what's going on is that there are three factions vying for control over the city of Los Angeles and they all want to use me as a pawn against each other. The Camarilla, led by Prince Lacroix, want to manipulate mortal society from the shadows. The Anarchs, led by Nines Rodriguez, fancy themselves independent and egalitarian vampires, and just want to be left alone to hunt in peace (and it hasn't been shown in Bloodlines yet, but many Anarchs are part of the movement because they think they can amass more personal power outside the Camarilla's control). Finally, the Sabbat just want to kill shit and drink its blood.
The central tension of the political situation is that both the Anarchs and the Camarilla agree that the Sabbat are an existential threat and a danger to the Masquerade (Vampire society's tradition of staying out of sight), but they hate each other so much that cooperation is difficult, if not impossible. It is yet to be seen whether the main character of Bloodlines will favor one side over the other, or if he will act as a bridge between the two factions.
Mostly, this manifests in the form of me breaking and entering in order to fetch various items or kill various NPCs. There were some memorable moments, feeding my blood to a wounded woman in the clinic, discovering Therese and Jeanette were actually the same person, getting mystery-teased by the werewolf, Beckett. All this amounted to was me being jerked around by NPC after NPC, with it never being entirely clear who I could trust or what their real agendas are.
Which, you know, is exactly like the tabletop rpg, so well done.
The biggest barriers to my enjoyment of the game thus far are simply artifacts of its age. The low resolution makes it difficult to read signs. The lack of objective markers means I'm wandering around in circles more than I should. Dialogue is unskippable, even when you've reloaded after a difficult boss fight (though to be fair to Bloodlines that's a problem that even some modern games still inexplicably have). However, these issue aren't too serious. Exploring the World of Darkness in an immersive visual form is such a blast that I'm willing to tolerate a lot of awkwardness.
The central tension of the political situation is that both the Anarchs and the Camarilla agree that the Sabbat are an existential threat and a danger to the Masquerade (Vampire society's tradition of staying out of sight), but they hate each other so much that cooperation is difficult, if not impossible. It is yet to be seen whether the main character of Bloodlines will favor one side over the other, or if he will act as a bridge between the two factions.
Mostly, this manifests in the form of me breaking and entering in order to fetch various items or kill various NPCs. There were some memorable moments, feeding my blood to a wounded woman in the clinic, discovering Therese and Jeanette were actually the same person, getting mystery-teased by the werewolf, Beckett. All this amounted to was me being jerked around by NPC after NPC, with it never being entirely clear who I could trust or what their real agendas are.
Which, you know, is exactly like the tabletop rpg, so well done.
The biggest barriers to my enjoyment of the game thus far are simply artifacts of its age. The low resolution makes it difficult to read signs. The lack of objective markers means I'm wandering around in circles more than I should. Dialogue is unskippable, even when you've reloaded after a difficult boss fight (though to be fair to Bloodlines that's a problem that even some modern games still inexplicably have). However, these issue aren't too serious. Exploring the World of Darkness in an immersive visual form is such a blast that I'm willing to tolerate a lot of awkwardness.
Friday, March 4, 2016
Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines - 2/20 hours
I'm not too far into this game yet, but one thought has been dominating my first impressions - "damn, I wish this were a modern game." As I walk through the streets of the World of Darkness' Santa Monica, I can't help but see a dozen flaws that aren't really flaws so much as they are signs of the game's age. There needs to be about five times as many NPCs mulling around. Exploration needs to be more vertical. Alleys need to be narrower and have greater rewards for looking down them. There needs to be more ambient storytelling, where you overhear conversations between random strangers that reveals to you the details of the game's world. You know, stuff that wasn't invented in 2004 and probably technologically impossible besides.
I'm going to own this as a flaw on my part. It's not right of me to compare the art direction to something like Arkham City or your vampire's disciplines to the powers in more recent open-world superhero games like Crackdown or Prototype. It's just hard to pretend like the last ten years haven't happened.
Assuming I can, however, Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines stands on its own as a pretty good game. It definitely captures the sexy-goth/overcompensating nerd aesthetic that I've come to associate with Vampire: the Masquerade, and haunted house level was genuinely creepy. I'm not too far into the story, but it looks interesting in that frustrating way crpg stories can get when they don't quite trust you to stay on the rails.
You are some random slob who was made into a vampire ("embraced") by someone who lacked the permission of the head vampire in town ("Prince" Lacroix). So the Prince killed your maker ("sire") and then offered you a choice - "work for me or I'll kill you." In the first two hours, at least, that has mainly involved going from vampire to vampire and not commenting on the fact that they're demanding favors in exchange for you doing something that would benefit them immensely if they simply helped you do without making you jump through hoops (attack a hidden outpost of the "Sabbat," vampires who don't care about hiding from humanity, and are also even bigger dicks than your own faction, "the Camarilla.")
The arbitrariness of the tasks (so far, taking out a gang of drug dealers and removing a locket from a haunted house) is not something I'm going to hold against it though. An rpg wouldn't be an rpg if quest-giving NPCs didn't jerk you around for no conceivable reason. What makes the game most interesting to me is the fact that I'm familiar with the setting of the table-top rpg and so far Bloodlines seems like a pretty faithful recreation of it. I can't wait to get farther into the game and see how deep into the often bizarre rabbit hole of World of Darkness canon this game dares to go.
I'm going to own this as a flaw on my part. It's not right of me to compare the art direction to something like Arkham City or your vampire's disciplines to the powers in more recent open-world superhero games like Crackdown or Prototype. It's just hard to pretend like the last ten years haven't happened.
Assuming I can, however, Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines stands on its own as a pretty good game. It definitely captures the sexy-goth/overcompensating nerd aesthetic that I've come to associate with Vampire: the Masquerade, and haunted house level was genuinely creepy. I'm not too far into the story, but it looks interesting in that frustrating way crpg stories can get when they don't quite trust you to stay on the rails.
You are some random slob who was made into a vampire ("embraced") by someone who lacked the permission of the head vampire in town ("Prince" Lacroix). So the Prince killed your maker ("sire") and then offered you a choice - "work for me or I'll kill you." In the first two hours, at least, that has mainly involved going from vampire to vampire and not commenting on the fact that they're demanding favors in exchange for you doing something that would benefit them immensely if they simply helped you do without making you jump through hoops (attack a hidden outpost of the "Sabbat," vampires who don't care about hiding from humanity, and are also even bigger dicks than your own faction, "the Camarilla.")
The arbitrariness of the tasks (so far, taking out a gang of drug dealers and removing a locket from a haunted house) is not something I'm going to hold against it though. An rpg wouldn't be an rpg if quest-giving NPCs didn't jerk you around for no conceivable reason. What makes the game most interesting to me is the fact that I'm familiar with the setting of the table-top rpg and so far Bloodlines seems like a pretty faithful recreation of it. I can't wait to get farther into the game and see how deep into the often bizarre rabbit hole of World of Darkness canon this game dares to go.
Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines - Initial Thoughts
About the Game (From the Steam Store Page)
Vampire®: The Masquerade-Bloodlines™ delivers a new type of RPG experience-one that blends all the core elements of a traditional RPG with the graphical richness, immediacy and brutal combat of a first-person action game. The game plunges players into the dark and gritty vampire underworld of modern-day L.A. as a creature of the night. Players will develop their character's powers, interact with other characters and embark on story-driven quests as they battle mortals and other vampires with an incredible array of vampire powers and weapons. Powered by Valve's Source Technology, the game is based on White Wolf's popular Vampire: The Masquerade pen-and-paper RPG series and its official clans.
Previous Playtime
1.7 hours
What Was I Thinking When I Bought This
Over the years I've played a lot of the Vampire: The Masquerade tabletop game, and so a video game based on those rules intrigues me right of the bat (no pun intended). That Bloodlines also has something of a legendary reputation among the forums I frequent also helps matters along.
I don't remember the exact circumstances surrounding my purchase of this game, but I imagine it went something like "hey, this game everyone's been talking about is on sale for 75% off, I think I'll get it and see what all the fuss is about."
Expectations and Prior Experience
This is another one of those games where I've played through the tutorial, resolved to get back to it sooner or later, and then never did. From what I remember about the game, it seemed like a typical early 2000s 3rd person action-rpg. It felt like I had a lot of freedom in a very limited environment. Of course, I was still barely into the game at all, so I can't say whether or not it would have opened up or whether many of the apparent options were, in fact, trap choices, but my initial impression was that for its time it was an open-ended game.
What I'm expecting, going into it with more than a decade's worth of advancements in the open-world genre, is that it will be fun as an archaeological exercise, but that it won't have aged well, and I will soon run into the limitations of its outdated technology and subsequently the game's unavoidable limitations will frustrate me more than they should. I'm put in mind of another tabletop-based crpg game - Baldur's Gate, where I could admire the deftness with which the pen-and-paper game's rules were implemented, but ran into problems when it turned out that a faithful recreation of a tabletop game doesn't really work without a DM to moderate.
My biggest worry is that I'll commit to a character build and then, as I go through the game I discover that some of my chosen skills are useless because this is one of those games where you're given limitless freedom, but at the price of limitless freedom to screw up. I'm also worried that, given its age, things like in-game maps and quest logs will be inadequate. The last thing I want is to be stuck not knowing where to go with a character who specialized in computer hacking when the game expects me to be a combat monster.
Still, I can't imagine this game would have come to be known as such a classic if it were in the habit of pissing people off, so I'll probably be all right.
Vampire®: The Masquerade-Bloodlines™ delivers a new type of RPG experience-one that blends all the core elements of a traditional RPG with the graphical richness, immediacy and brutal combat of a first-person action game. The game plunges players into the dark and gritty vampire underworld of modern-day L.A. as a creature of the night. Players will develop their character's powers, interact with other characters and embark on story-driven quests as they battle mortals and other vampires with an incredible array of vampire powers and weapons. Powered by Valve's Source Technology, the game is based on White Wolf's popular Vampire: The Masquerade pen-and-paper RPG series and its official clans.
Previous Playtime
1.7 hours
What Was I Thinking When I Bought This
Over the years I've played a lot of the Vampire: The Masquerade tabletop game, and so a video game based on those rules intrigues me right of the bat (no pun intended). That Bloodlines also has something of a legendary reputation among the forums I frequent also helps matters along.
I don't remember the exact circumstances surrounding my purchase of this game, but I imagine it went something like "hey, this game everyone's been talking about is on sale for 75% off, I think I'll get it and see what all the fuss is about."
Expectations and Prior Experience
This is another one of those games where I've played through the tutorial, resolved to get back to it sooner or later, and then never did. From what I remember about the game, it seemed like a typical early 2000s 3rd person action-rpg. It felt like I had a lot of freedom in a very limited environment. Of course, I was still barely into the game at all, so I can't say whether or not it would have opened up or whether many of the apparent options were, in fact, trap choices, but my initial impression was that for its time it was an open-ended game.
What I'm expecting, going into it with more than a decade's worth of advancements in the open-world genre, is that it will be fun as an archaeological exercise, but that it won't have aged well, and I will soon run into the limitations of its outdated technology and subsequently the game's unavoidable limitations will frustrate me more than they should. I'm put in mind of another tabletop-based crpg game - Baldur's Gate, where I could admire the deftness with which the pen-and-paper game's rules were implemented, but ran into problems when it turned out that a faithful recreation of a tabletop game doesn't really work without a DM to moderate.
My biggest worry is that I'll commit to a character build and then, as I go through the game I discover that some of my chosen skills are useless because this is one of those games where you're given limitless freedom, but at the price of limitless freedom to screw up. I'm also worried that, given its age, things like in-game maps and quest logs will be inadequate. The last thing I want is to be stuck not knowing where to go with a character who specialized in computer hacking when the game expects me to be a combat monster.
Still, I can't imagine this game would have come to be known as such a classic if it were in the habit of pissing people off, so I'll probably be all right.
Thursday, March 3, 2016
Awesomenauts - 20/20 hours
I practiced with Yuri the space ape for the last four hours and I got fairly decent at defeating the bots. I won four or five consecutive matches, some of them quite quickly. However, I think my theory that the AI can't handle Yuri's vertical movement was correct. When I tried one last multiplayer battle, I was completely dominated by the opposition. Six deaths and zero kills.
It's all right, though. It would be nice if I had some extraordinary talent for Awesomenauts, but I suppose such a talent would carry with it an obligation to develop it. As it is, I can simply shrug my shoulders and content myself with being in the ranks of the unremarkable. I'm vain enough that it stings a little to admit this, but the empirical evidence is overwhelming.
I guess my time with Awesomenauts was enjoyable enough. I don't think I'd describe it as "awesome," but that's probably because it's not the sort of game that's aimed towards me. It doesn't have anything cumulative or narrative about it. It's just one activity, repeated indefinitely. The draw is excellence for its own sake, and the thrill of outwitting and outfighting your fellow players. It was fun, but I think I lack the killer instinct to get really into it.
Dipping my toe into the turbid waters of e-sports has made me think, however. Games have a lot of different uses. There's games as storytelling, games as creative toy, games as puzzle, games as simulation, games as distraction, games as social venue, and games as test of skill. It's kind of weird, then, that we just have one word to cover them all.
Perhaps more importantly, we have but one word, "gamer," to describe the people that play games. So all the thrilling diversity and complexity of the medium gets boiled down to the single most trivial fact. I'm sure many people play for multiple reasons, but it's also likely that there is a huge gulf in values between gamers with different fundamental agendas. "Hardcore" and "casual" don't even begin to do the problem justice.
I wonder if so much of the acrimony that is found in the gaming community comes from a disconnect in values. If the thing you value most in games is personal excellence and honest competition, then maybe it's an insult when people don't take the game as seriously as you. To enter an arena and not attempt the long climb of self-improvement, worse to not even care about doing so, to be content with sloppiness and mediocrity, it's not even a difference of opinion, it's a sin. It's squandering the potential that's inherent in the game itself.
Of course, that type of attitude is itself kind of silly. And if you view games more as a toy or a distraction, then the entirely necessary self-seriousness of a true competitor begins to look like self-parody. To be so intense about such an apparently goofy thing is comic at its core.
Different games can encourage different agendas. I think the reason survival-crafting and 4X games appeal to me so much is because I love games that allow for creative self-expression, the exploration of virtual worlds, and the creation of order from a disordered initial state. And it's hard to service those needs in a game that's also focused on winning and losing.
I think Awesomenauts is primarily a competitive-style game, but it's clear to me that it also tries, at least a little, to be a toy (the large roster of cute little cartoon characters you get to play allows room for exploration) and might, in theory, be a social experience (though I never really communicated with my fellow human players and subsequently did not bond with them in the camaraderie of shared competition).
All of which is a nice change of pace from my usual fare, even if I never quite adjusted my attitude to fully appreciate it.
It's all right, though. It would be nice if I had some extraordinary talent for Awesomenauts, but I suppose such a talent would carry with it an obligation to develop it. As it is, I can simply shrug my shoulders and content myself with being in the ranks of the unremarkable. I'm vain enough that it stings a little to admit this, but the empirical evidence is overwhelming.
I guess my time with Awesomenauts was enjoyable enough. I don't think I'd describe it as "awesome," but that's probably because it's not the sort of game that's aimed towards me. It doesn't have anything cumulative or narrative about it. It's just one activity, repeated indefinitely. The draw is excellence for its own sake, and the thrill of outwitting and outfighting your fellow players. It was fun, but I think I lack the killer instinct to get really into it.
Dipping my toe into the turbid waters of e-sports has made me think, however. Games have a lot of different uses. There's games as storytelling, games as creative toy, games as puzzle, games as simulation, games as distraction, games as social venue, and games as test of skill. It's kind of weird, then, that we just have one word to cover them all.
Perhaps more importantly, we have but one word, "gamer," to describe the people that play games. So all the thrilling diversity and complexity of the medium gets boiled down to the single most trivial fact. I'm sure many people play for multiple reasons, but it's also likely that there is a huge gulf in values between gamers with different fundamental agendas. "Hardcore" and "casual" don't even begin to do the problem justice.
I wonder if so much of the acrimony that is found in the gaming community comes from a disconnect in values. If the thing you value most in games is personal excellence and honest competition, then maybe it's an insult when people don't take the game as seriously as you. To enter an arena and not attempt the long climb of self-improvement, worse to not even care about doing so, to be content with sloppiness and mediocrity, it's not even a difference of opinion, it's a sin. It's squandering the potential that's inherent in the game itself.
Of course, that type of attitude is itself kind of silly. And if you view games more as a toy or a distraction, then the entirely necessary self-seriousness of a true competitor begins to look like self-parody. To be so intense about such an apparently goofy thing is comic at its core.
Different games can encourage different agendas. I think the reason survival-crafting and 4X games appeal to me so much is because I love games that allow for creative self-expression, the exploration of virtual worlds, and the creation of order from a disordered initial state. And it's hard to service those needs in a game that's also focused on winning and losing.
I think Awesomenauts is primarily a competitive-style game, but it's clear to me that it also tries, at least a little, to be a toy (the large roster of cute little cartoon characters you get to play allows room for exploration) and might, in theory, be a social experience (though I never really communicated with my fellow human players and subsequently did not bond with them in the camaraderie of shared competition).
All of which is a nice change of pace from my usual fare, even if I never quite adjusted my attitude to fully appreciate it.
Wednesday, March 2, 2016
Awesomenauts - 16/20 hours
It's always hard to assess one's own progress when learning a new skill. I think I'm improving, but Awesomenauts doesn't track stats for practice games, so I can't say for sure. I'm still at about 50% win ratio, but the victories feel more decisive and the losses feel more hard-fought.
The problem is that there are so many factors that go into a match that it's hard to isolate the influence of "my personal skill" on the outcome. The AI seems to have more difficulty with some characters than with others. So if I get a couple of good teammates and the AI gets a bad team, then it usually goes pretty well, despite what I do. On the other hand, if the AI opponent gets a good team draw, it can be a real struggle to stay alive.
It's also likely that the character I'm playing also influences the outcome (I'm still choosing "random" on the character select screen). When I played as Yuri, the jetpack-wearing space ape, I managed to get 11 kills with one death. When I played as Admiral Swiggins, the octopus who had apparently attained a high military rank, I managed to get two kills with eight deaths. Either I'm much better with Yuri, or the AI can't handle the character's unusual verticality.
Regardless, my success is greatly dependent on which character I draw. It seems clear to me now that if I want to advance in skill or take on multiplayer I need to narrow my focus. Pick three characters (so that I an always get one if the other players choose my favorites) and practice with them exclusively until I have the confidence to take it to the next level.
I can't help feeling, though, like I'll be missing out. This game provides me with a whole cast of colorful characters and I'm taking most of them off my list in order to pursue mastery in just a few. I wonder if the tradeoff is worth it.
That's the thing with me - as much as I admire mastery, I have the soul of a dilettante. I know it's foolish, but given a choice, I'll always take an expansive buffet over an exquisitely produced delicacy. I'm sure that when I go to the donut shop, I annoy the clerks unreasonably. I'll assemble a dozen donuts out of 10 individual kinds, and I can't help looking at the Awesomenauts characters in the same way. I want to try the cream-filled one, and the one with sprinkles, and the one that has bacon on the top (this is a real donut my local shop sells and it's surprisingly delicious).
Which is probably just as well. It's been suggested to me that it takes hundreds of hours to get good enough at an online game to be anything but the lowest rung on the multiplayer ladder, and that seems reasonable to me. And I can't imagine the dedication and passion that someone would have to have to gain that experience. You'd either need to pare down your games list to only a few games or play one consistently as a secondary game for months or years to get to that level.
As much as I might enjoy the easier Awesomenauts matches, the game as a whole simply doesn't call to me in that way. It's pleasant, but not compelling. I don't think I could commit to it long enough for my "pick a couple of characters to focus on" strategy to make much of a difference, and certainly not long enough to become a real specialist with any of the awesomenauts.
I think I've got to at least try, though. See how far I can take it in my remaining 4 hours. I'll almost certainly still suck at the end of that time, but maybe I won't be a complete embarrassment (hey, I think I just found my epitaph).
The problem is that there are so many factors that go into a match that it's hard to isolate the influence of "my personal skill" on the outcome. The AI seems to have more difficulty with some characters than with others. So if I get a couple of good teammates and the AI gets a bad team, then it usually goes pretty well, despite what I do. On the other hand, if the AI opponent gets a good team draw, it can be a real struggle to stay alive.
It's also likely that the character I'm playing also influences the outcome (I'm still choosing "random" on the character select screen). When I played as Yuri, the jetpack-wearing space ape, I managed to get 11 kills with one death. When I played as Admiral Swiggins, the octopus who had apparently attained a high military rank, I managed to get two kills with eight deaths. Either I'm much better with Yuri, or the AI can't handle the character's unusual verticality.
Regardless, my success is greatly dependent on which character I draw. It seems clear to me now that if I want to advance in skill or take on multiplayer I need to narrow my focus. Pick three characters (so that I an always get one if the other players choose my favorites) and practice with them exclusively until I have the confidence to take it to the next level.
I can't help feeling, though, like I'll be missing out. This game provides me with a whole cast of colorful characters and I'm taking most of them off my list in order to pursue mastery in just a few. I wonder if the tradeoff is worth it.
That's the thing with me - as much as I admire mastery, I have the soul of a dilettante. I know it's foolish, but given a choice, I'll always take an expansive buffet over an exquisitely produced delicacy. I'm sure that when I go to the donut shop, I annoy the clerks unreasonably. I'll assemble a dozen donuts out of 10 individual kinds, and I can't help looking at the Awesomenauts characters in the same way. I want to try the cream-filled one, and the one with sprinkles, and the one that has bacon on the top (this is a real donut my local shop sells and it's surprisingly delicious).
Which is probably just as well. It's been suggested to me that it takes hundreds of hours to get good enough at an online game to be anything but the lowest rung on the multiplayer ladder, and that seems reasonable to me. And I can't imagine the dedication and passion that someone would have to have to gain that experience. You'd either need to pare down your games list to only a few games or play one consistently as a secondary game for months or years to get to that level.
As much as I might enjoy the easier Awesomenauts matches, the game as a whole simply doesn't call to me in that way. It's pleasant, but not compelling. I don't think I could commit to it long enough for my "pick a couple of characters to focus on" strategy to make much of a difference, and certainly not long enough to become a real specialist with any of the awesomenauts.
I think I've got to at least try, though. See how far I can take it in my remaining 4 hours. I'll almost certainly still suck at the end of that time, but maybe I won't be a complete embarrassment (hey, I think I just found my epitaph).
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