Friday Pragmatism | Return to videogames

There’s something wrong with the world.
After a year and a half’s absence, I’m interested in playing videogames.
Sure I never truly departed but I did only purchase roughly one title in this period. Now all of a sudden my release schedule is looking fully booked. Beginning with my recent purchase of Prototype, it seems that irrationally, developers are making games that are actually fun. Remember this is a personal perspective; I’m fully aware that for the faithful there have been plenty of games to play. I make no apology for playing most titles on easier settings these days, and enjoying shorter, sub-fifteen hour lengths.

Halo 3: ODST – I don’t ever play Halo online and am not interested in the multiplayer component other than co-op. That being said, while I’ve never been a rabid Halo fan, it is quite a cute and charming universe, with very approachable controls. ODST looks to be a blast, and I’m just marvelling at Microsoft’s skill when it comes to marketing. The new ‘We are ODST’ trailer of-course resembles the game in no way at all, but it’s creating exactly the kind of buzz that leveraged success and market expansion from Halo 3; it’s getting non-gamers talking about it. That short is most definitely a totally different product to the game itself, but I have no problem appreciating good production and marketing. The game will be standard Halo fare with a little twist as they tend to do with new games in the franchise, and that’s fine with me.

Borderlands – My brother purchased Sacred 2 and as such has requested I don’t play it unless we’re co-opping together. This is a fair call as I probably wouldn’t have purchased it for myself given its bugs and short-comings. Nevertheless, Sacred has turned out to be fantastic fun regardless of its flaws. Borderlands though is something else. I appreciate the dense statting of Fallout 3 and the ingenuity of VATS, I always enjoy watching other people play it. Borderlands shouldn’t really be compared with it though as its a much more traditional FPS with RPG elements integrated with it, hopefully quite well. The procedurally created weapons aren’t that important to me but the art-direction is amazing, and it looks like a tactile and fun open-world FPS where I can happily grind my character up to god-like status without it getting tiresome. A few of my friends are also keen for it, and for those that aren’t, I hope to win them over with real play experience so that they start doing the same. Jumping into each-other’s games should be great for 4p co-op.

Modern Warfare 2 – What I love about Modern Warfare is that it’s one very big and very short set-piece. On normal difficulty settings, it’s less about you being overly concerned about your health, and more about you seeing these amazingly crafted set-pieces. Whether it’s fighting frantically in the streets, clearing interiors or sneaking around with night-vision, silenced pistols and a sniper rifle, each level is a hand-crafted contrivance literally built out of marketing ‘awesome’. I have no qualms indulging these feelings. Modern Warfare 1 was fantastic fun, and 2 looks to be in keeping with the basic principles. Sometimes it’s just great to go to the cinema and see a good show.

Mini Ninjas – Brilliant art-style, approachable gameplay, minimal and atmospheric music, over-flowing with genuine charm. I downloaded the demo and was absolutely smitten with it. The sound-design alone would be enough for me to purchase this, but it certainly seems like all of the production-values have come together to craft a beautiful and serene experience. I downloaded all of the promo videos which were mostly character-promos, and I’m glad I have them. As their own product, they are well worthy of my time.

Stoked – I’m not exactly the extreme-sporting type, however I’ve always had a soft-spot for certain kinds of snowboarding games. It’s less about the awesome tricks and soundtracks (as now in the current generation I use custom soundtracks anyway), and more about the freedom of open-slope boarding. SSX Tricky had a nice sense of large-scale slopes, though of-course back then we were still immersed in track-style gameplay. SSX 3 was a great step in the right direction, but then I really fell in-love with Amped 3 in a massive way, one of the very few games I ever played right through to the end, and part of my selection of games that I boot up on occasion simply to immerse myself in the environment. Amped 3 was my introduction to semi-open slope gameplay where you can literally drop yourself off at the top of a peak and board down at your leisure, choosing any path you wish. Stoked is the first to have 360 degree peaks and a helicopter feature that allows you to drop from any point, not just the prescribed ‘ski-lift’ points of Amped. It’s an indie game so some of the production values don’t look the best, and allegedly the difficulty and controls are a little unbalanced, but no-one has said it’s unworkable yet, and the appeal of eventually having full access to the five peaks is enough incentive for me to play. I’ve been known to load up BT’s ‘This Binary Universe’ and just board endlessly down mountains to this often minimal, serene music. Stoked will be the first boarding game to include dynamic weather which in-game looks great.

Bayonetta – Still don’t know if I’ll ultimately buy this. Not because of its production values as they all look absolutely mind-blowing, but more because the eventual slope in difficulty will probably exceed the amount of time I have to play games like this. Bayonetta is absolute poetry in motion, with dynamic combat mechanics and hilariously bombastic finishers. I love the character of Bayonetta, her animations, voicing and characteristic sass, and it’s great to see sexiness portrayed in an older woman for once. The issue here is that the game will most definitely be taylored towards hardcore gaming which once upon a time I had the time and patience for, but may end up only playing through the first half of the game before setting it aside for other things in life. I’ll watch and play Rock’s copy which he will inevitably buy and make my assessment then. It’s great to see the old Capcom/Clover team getting back to their roots.

There are a few others, Left 4 Dead 2 if I can convince my co-op crowd to play it with me (which generally we don’t anymore as we are all quite busy) comes to mind. Also the recent footage of Lucidity is mind-blowingly gorgeous. There was that platformer for Wii that was demoed recently and the name eludes me – something to do with playing the shadow of a character in a platformer which visually looked interesting. Unfortunately I can’t warm to Team ICO’s new project as I feel I’ve had my fill of their brand of gameplay, at least in the vein that they are still attempting to fulfil. I don’t have a PS3 yet but my first purchase will be Flower, still my most treasured and important game experience of all time. I’d love to get Uncharted and its sequel when it releases as the second game is looking fantastic. Pixel Junk Eden would likely be another PSN purchase, as well as a sprinkling of other Playstation titles.

It’s a very strange place to find myself indeed where suddenly there seem to be more than just a few games tailored to my gaming wants. Perhaps someone did somecomprehensive research and discovered that there was cash to be made. If so, I’m delighted as I feel I’m in a strange demographic; we’re not hardcore but we once were, we’re not casual but we sometimes are, we love the crafting of gaming but often lack the time to play, we easily understand complex controls and mechanics but now no-longer have the patience for them and as much as we enjoy long, engaging games, we simply do not have the time for them and can only commit to short-time immersion. Most importantly, I think that as gamers with a traditional background, we are the most likely to get into niche and differently themed games that deviate from the art-styles of established genres. Regardless of how saturated the market is with male power fantasies, they’re still great games to play and one is not made a juvenile, ignorant misogynis simply by playing them, but it is increasingly refreshing to see games with such different themes and play-styles become more and more prevalent.

Last mention is Serious Sam HD, because sometimes there actually is a measurable price on nostalgia. Convenient XBLA download and pricing? Easy co-op? Bringing back the cannon in the back-pocket of the jeans? Swarms of enemies and a wise-cracking every-man hero? Sold.