Jun 08

Xbox One and the PS4

Now that Microsoft and Sony have had their big next generation console press conferences, we should have a level field to compare them.  Unfortunately, neither side wanted to play ball.  Sony made their pitch at developers while showing lots of games and no hardware beyond the controller.  Microsoft made a pitch for the unified living room showing hardware but few games.  These presentation left gaming fans wanting more.  That should be a good thing for an upcoming launch.

Sony translated their conference into a steadily building positive buzz.  Yes, there were some haters, but overall they received positive coverage and dominated the console news for nearly two months.  Microsoft sort of exploded onto the scene.  Or perhaps they imploded.

Here’s the goal of any news conference especially one dealing with rampant speculation.  Replace all bad messages with your message that puts your product (company, candidate, etc.) in the best possible light.  No one really achieves that completely, but success is measured by how close you come to that goal.  Microsoft had a near total failure.

Now a failure to communicate doesn’t mean that the product will be a failure.  It just makes things more difficult.  It also doesn’t reflect on the quality of the product.  Based on everything I’ve read, I’d expect the two products to be very similar inside the box.  They both have AMD 8 core x86 chips with AMD graphics integrated on the system chip.  The PS4 has more graphics cores and faster memory, but the impact on multiplatform games should be minimal.   In fact, the similar architectures should make porting much easier.

Raw power has rarely been the deciding factor in console wars.  The upcoming generation will probably come down to focus and exclusives.  Both controllers look to make modest improvements on the versions they are replacing.  I don’t know if lighting effects trumps vibrating triggers or not.  I don’t think Sony’s touchpad will be a significant factor, but I know I’ll feel less silly swiping on my controller than I do making some of the silly gestures I make with the current version of kinect.  Speaking of kinect, it and Playstation’s move both feel gimmicky.  I’ll have to see something compelling to change my mind.  In general, I do support more controller options over fewer.

So what about focus?  Sony only wanted to talk about games and especially game developers.  That easily resonated with gamers.  Microsoft wanted to own the living room.  I don’t have a problem with that goal.  It’s just that every effort thus far has been a flaming disaster.  Not to mention that everyone has a different idea about what ‘one box’ should do.  Here’s mine.  I need a cable box plus an over the air tuner.  I need a DVR with multiple tuners.  I need a surround sound receiver with multiple HDMI and legacy inputs.  I want streaming and downloadable video.  I want a game player with backwards compatibility.  I want a blue ray and DVD player.  I need internet access that supports apps and channels.  I need to be able to control it with a remote, with voice and my smartphone or tablet. I want a seamless, consistent interface.  Clearly I am insane.  Honestly, on that list, Microsoft doesn’t do too badly.  The problem is making what they offer work with what I have.

Theoretically, my receiver has HDMI control (or Consumer Electronic Control, CEC) after a firmware update.  I haven’t actually tested this out.  My TV does not.  For some reason Tivo doesn’t seem to support it either.  Perhaps Microsoft could work that out since the Tivo can be controlled over the home network and both need to be ‘online’ to keep working.  Even if I had all CEC devices, there’s no guarantee that they would play nicely together with the XB1 as they’re from different manufacturers.  Even people with CEC devices from the same company have had problems with compatibility.  There have been anecdotal reports that the more CEC devices you add, the less stable the setup.

If CEC isn’t the solution, then we’re stuck with an IR blaster.  Don’t get me started on IR blaster problems.  Even if it works, I dread to think where I’d have to place a blaster to hit my Tivo, receiver and TV.  Perhaps you can daisy chain them together at cheap Microsoft accessory pricing.  Of course, the rest of the world can avoid this trouble since the TV features aren’t available there.

Update:  I’ve heard that Microsoft is going to use Kinect 2.0 as an IR blaster.  The Kinect points the wrong way, but they claim that the signal will bounce off the walls and still work.  Good luck with that.  It’s even worse since the XB1 has no way of knowing if the blast bounce worked.

If I get it all working, it sounds nice.  I can use voice control for everything.  Well, it doesn’t sound like it will initially be able to access anything recorded on my Tivo.  I also wonder if I can exclude voices.  I really don’t want my three year old shouting, “Xbox, watch Word World.” and having that work when I’m trying to game or watch a show or movie.  There have already been threats of griefers shouting “Xbox, turn off” over voice chat.  That shouldn’t work, but I wouldn’t throw out that headset just yet.

Speaking of getting things working, the truth is that I’m going to wait before I buy an Xbox One.   It’s been a long time since I’ve been excited for a major console release (sorry WiiU).  Even though I don’t consider myself an early adopter any more, I’d be tempted to grab one of these consoles before Christmas.  If I do, it’s going to be a PS4.  It’s not just that I still have my abiding Playstation love from the PS2 or the fact that I’ve ended up playing my PS3 much more in the past couple of years than my 360.  It’s not even that the last few dashboard updates for the 360 felt like they were more about serving ads to me than improving my gaming experience.  No, it’s that I got burned hard on the 360 launch.  I went through at least four consoles (it might have been five though I try not to think about it too much, the flashbacks, the horror, the horror) in my battles against the red ring of death.  Yes, Microsoft kept sending me refurbished units, but it wasn’t until the dual die shrink Jasper units were released that I hunted one down and paid cash for the peace of mind.  I still remember looking at the model and serial numbers to make sure I got the right version.  To be fair, that unit has lasted for years without problems, but I can’t in good conscience buy another Xbox console without giving it at least six months to prove its reliability.

I must admit that I don’t understand smart match as a new feature for the XB1.  I’m all for better matchmaking.  After all, it must be hard to find people as incompetent as I am at online shooters.  I don’t understand why you’d ever want matchmaking that takes so long that you want to watch a movie or video.  And if I ever started playing another game while waiting to get into an online game, I’m unlikely to go back to the online game.

In short, Microsoft needs to turn this ship around and prove hardware quality and functional software to get me to bite.

 

Permanent link to this article: https://www.talkstrategy.com/2013/06/xbox-one-and-the-ps4/

May 26

Game of the Week: Game Dev Story

gamedevstoryI’ve probably bought too many Kairosoft titles.  Game Dev Story is the reason why.  At least, that’s where it started.  Conceptually, it’s pretty brilliant.  They made a game about making games.  Throw in a lot of game references and a retro art style.  It’s like catnip for gamers.  I suppose some PC gamers might be upset that the PC market gets short shrift, but you have to remember this is a Japanese game.

You start out as a small development house hiring some rookie developers.  They each have a job area (coder, designer, writer, etc.)  Then they’re ranked on abilities (programming, scenario writing, graphics and sound).  Your team works together to create games based on the type and genre you choose (i.e. Golf Simulation).   Based on their abilities, inspiration, breakthroughs, teamwork and luck, they’ll build up your game’s attributes such as fun, creativity, graphics and sound.  Then those attributes, platform market size, advertising and your popularity determine sales.  More sales means more money you can plow back into your next game, training people, improving resources, or outsourcing parts of development.

The best part of the design is that there’s always something you can improve.  You can level up your team or hire better team members.  You can train your team to increase stats and unlock new game types and genres.  You can develop for different game systems with larger installed bases.  You can use boosts to improve your current project.   Eventually, you can move to larger offices that support more team members.   You can experiment with mixing up different game types and genres (though they didn’t enjoy my ninja puzzle game for some reason).   You can take short term contract projects to boost your cash.  Later, you can even build your own game console and make games for it.

There are many different variables to tweak that makes each play-through different.  Random events spice things up as well.  Unless you’re trying to mess up, you’ll keep making better games that make more money.  That money lets you do things to make better games.  It’s a vicious cycle.  In fact, when I started up a new game just to refresh my memory on all those variables I lost myself for over an hour.

Don’t let the cute art style put you off.  There’s a meaty game here that will suck you in.  Though not all the Kairosoft games are this good, the best are something to behold especially if it hits one of your areas of interest.  With just a warning for addictiveness, highly recommended.

Permanent link to this article: https://www.talkstrategy.com/2013/05/game-of-the-week-game-dev-story/

May 23

Earth is Safe

google earthLookout is the antivirus software on my android phone.  It scans in the background, but it also scans any time an app is updated.  Most of my apps are ‘trusted’ apps and allowed to update on their own.  Every once in a while Google updates Google Earth.  Once it does, Lookout scans it.  Then I get this alert on my phone:

Scan Completed:  Earth is safe

It makes me smile every time.

Permanent link to this article: https://www.talkstrategy.com/2013/05/earth-is-safe/

May 22

Game of the Week: Fantasy Empires

Small FE CoverI could write a book about the golden age of SSI (Strategic Simulations, Inc.).  What a great name.  If you’re at all like me, you’d just want to support a company with a name like that.  There are several games I bought on the strength of that brand alone.  Fortunately, I was rarely disappointed, hence the golden age.  The first SSI game I played was Kampfgruppe which was way beyond my then thirteen year old mind.  Shortly afterwards, I played Phantasie.  That was much more my speed.  Then, I had a lot of fun with the AD&D games.

Eventually, I came across a game called Cyber Empires by Silicon Knights.  It was a neat mix of strategy and action set in a world of warring giant robots.  Looking back, it might have been a bit shallow, but I loved it.  When I heard that a sequel was coming, and that it would have the D&D license, I was ecstatic.  That sequel was Fantasy Empires.  I played it for a long, long time.

The story is wonderfully cheesy.  The Dungeonmaster is tasking a group of warlord challengers to battle to unite the world of Mystara.  They must conquer the world one territory at a time, building their armies, magic and heroes to conquer lands, one another and eventually the world.

Effectively, there are two parts to the game.  You have the turn based world map and real time action of the battles.  This was years before the first Shogun: Total War.  Here’s a look at the strategy screen:

Small FE Strategy Screen

The images are taken from my old paper manual.  It’s a bit dog eared from my constant flipping through it.  Sometimes I miss paper manuals.  Anyway, as you can see, most of the screen is dominated by the scrollable world map.   That’s the Dungeonmaster on top.  He has some neat animations that add to the game.  There are three orbs representing your current levels of Druid, Cleric and Magic User power respectively.  Those allow you to cast spells that affect an entire region.  Below the orbs is your gold piece total.  You’ll spend that quickly building your empire.  In the middle, below the Dungeonmaster, is the end turn button.  Across the bottom are the buttons you’ll use to build and manage your empire all framing the minimap.

Here’s what you can build in the game:  Keeps, castles, armories, temples, towers, armies (dwarves, elves, shadow elves, halflings, undead, orc and human fighters), heroes (elves, magic users, clerics, druids, fighters, and dwarves) and siege weapons (catapult, ballista and battering rams).  You’ll need nearly all of them to conquer the world.  Heroes, in some way, are the heart of the game.  They start off weak, but through battles and quests, they can grow quite powerful.  This is important in combat section of the game.

In combat, Fantasy Empires doesn’t give you tactical control of your troops like Total War.  No, you’re launched into a massive game of Gauntlet based on the units you brought to battle.  You do have the opportunity to set your battle lines before the battle as well as cast spells if your heroes have the ability.  You’ll have direct control of one of your units, usually the most powerful hero you brought to the battle.  You can also take control of any other unit on your side, but this leaves your heroes vulnerable so it’s often best just to use the hero leadership ability to maneuver troops around the battlefield.  Your hero only has attack and block buttons, but they’re quite powerful and can turn a close battle.

Castles and siege weapons add a bit more depth to these action oriented affairs.  The attacker can’t win without taking the castle.  To do that they’ll need to breach the walls either through magic or sheer force.  The magic can be through a global spell like earthquake or your magic users fireball attack.  Force is your catapults breaking down the walls or your battering rams breaking through the gate.  There’s just enough control to make you feel like you always have something important to do in a battle.  After the battle, heroes gain experience and regular troops can gain veterancy.

Between battles heroes go on quests.  Many times they die on those quests.  If they return, they come back stronger and may bring magical loot.  Some of it is equipment for them.  Others are might magical items stored in your vault to increase your power.  Most of these allow extra uses of global spell without draining your mana.  Some have other game changing powers.

There are other things I could talk about like the risks of sending armies by sea or the impact of range units in combat, but the most import thing to me is that this game started my love of the 4X genre.  Yes, even more than the original Civilization.  Highly, highly recommended (if you can put up with the dated graphics).  Here’s a map of the game world:

Small FE Map

 

 

 

Permanent link to this article: https://www.talkstrategy.com/2013/05/game-of-the-week-fantasy-empires/

May 22

10,000,000 is Amazon’s Free Android App of the Day

tenm10,000,000 was a recent game of the week.  Now, if you have an android device, Amazon is giving it away for free today only (5/22/13).  I’d suggest grabbing it.  Here’s the purchase link.

Permanent link to this article: https://www.talkstrategy.com/2013/05/10000000-is-amazons-free-android-app-of-the-day/

May 21

Kickstarter: Stonehearth

I think I was a bit burned out on Kickstarter for a while.  I have some sympathy for the founders of Kickstarter since they never planned it to be a game preorder site.  Of course, that’s not what it is.  It’s about microfunding development projects that are near to your heart.  It just so happens with games that the digital distribution costs are very low.  Giving the game itself as a reward just makes sense.

All that assumes that the project is completed and delivers in a reasonable amount of time.  Many of the early game Kickstarters not only haven’t delivered yet, but don’t plan to very soon.  It helps to keep the goal of Kickstarter in mind.  Many of my software purchases I consider to be votes for more games like the one I’m buying.  With Kickstarter, I’m just doing early voting in the development stage.

Anyway, Stonehearth is a new Kickstarter that caught my eye.  It takes the 8-bit inspired art style from 3D Dot Game Heroes throws in a bit of Dwarf Fortress style town building and management, and promises some D&D style adventuring as well.  I don’t know if they can pull that off, but I’m willing to support the dream.  Plus if they do pull it off, it’ll pretty awesome.

Check out the video to see if you might be interested.

Permanent link to this article: https://www.talkstrategy.com/2013/05/kickstarter-stonehearth/

May 17

Add on Items

Back when Amazon Prime first started, I liked it for convenient shipping.  They’ve since added a lot to the Prime package.  I was initially worried that the shipping  combined with 1-click ordering would result in too many impulse purchases.  In fact, I didn’t turn on 1-click for a while after I subscribed to Prime.  It didn’t actually happen.

The flip side, back when Amazon listed Prime as on a trial basis, was a worry that Amazon would cancel the program because people would grab one cheap item at a time because it was easy with Prime and 1-click.  Amazon got much better about combining orders that hadn’t shipped yet.  After adding all these features to Prime, they couldn’t really just cancel it.  I suppose they could just remove the shipping features now, but that would be a PR nightmare.  Mostly they’ve managed the problem by limiting items eligible for Prime.  It seems like they’ve relaxed that in recent years.

Strategically, I find their new solution interesting.  Now, a bunch of smaller items have been labeled ‘add on’ items.  You can’t just purchase them alone.  There might be a secret back door way that I haven’t figured out, but the system is designed to get you to buy $25 worth of Amazon items before you can place the order for the add on item.  Obviously, third party items don’t count.

I’m not sure if it is a genius or stupid move.  On the stupid side, you’re making it harder to purchase some items and emphasizing the limits of Prime.  On the genius side, you’re stopping people from buying items that lose Amazon money and encouraging customers to buy more at once.  It will be interest (perhaps only to me) to see how it plays out.

Permanent link to this article: https://www.talkstrategy.com/2013/05/add-on-items/

May 10

Game of the Week: Tomb Raider (2012)

tombraiderWelcome back Lara Croft. Or should I say hello to the new Lara since this is a reboot.  I know that much was made of how would Tomb Raider respond to the success of the Uncharted series.  Though both Drake and Croft share a lineage that includes Indiana Jones and Doc Savage, I always felt that Lara was closer to James Bond.  Maybe it’s just the British accents, but the world spanning adventures often thwarting a global conspiracy using technology and gun play always made the connection for me.  Lara had a few snazzy outfits as well.  The uneven nature of the ambitious adventures didn’t hurt the connection either, at least on the video game front.

I wasn’t reminded of Nathan Drake while playing the new Tomb Raider.  It actually was more reminiscent of Assassin’s Creed 3, especially the parts with young Connor.  You were working your way to becoming truly dangerous and powerful, but you were still vulnerable.  This new Tomb Raider feels like it dives into that part of Lara’s life. There are also some obvious parallels to the TV series Arrow even though almost all of work on Lara’s story must have been done before that series premiered.  Regardless, it makes for some good synergy if you experience both.

This is young Lara out on her first adventure.  She starts out injured and unarmed with minimal skills.  By the end she’s a machine of rolling death that even the slow witted antagonists start to fear.  I actually think they could have gone further with this.  She’s done so much that it would have been rewarding to see some enemies break ranks and flee once they realize SHE’S attacking.  I guess that means I was invested in the journey and development.

There’s a pretty good story here, but it’s bound to be controversial.  It’s not due to need to protect Lara.  It’s that the story is a puzzle that the developers let the player piece together as they as they find journals and artifacts.  In other words, you could miss most of it if you don’t go searching for all the collectables.  It’s a good idea in that you’re right there with Lara trying to piece together this mystery.  Again this could have been taken further.  There are several cut scenes that were written to be clear regardless of how much information the player had uncovered.  It would have been quite effective if they could have tailored them based on the player’s collection success.  It probably wouldn’t have made financial sense though.

The action is solid and the combat rewarding (especially if you concentrate on the bow).  You don’t have the freedom of movement of an open world game.  Everything is signposted and restricted in true metroidvania style.  It is more fun to play around old areas once you have all the gadgets.  The two big areas of success are pacing and sense of place.  The island feels big and hostile and alive.  You definitely feel like a raider even if the tombs are short, few and far between.  You also feel that everything is building towards a climax.  Your skills, equipment, the characters and the story are all soaring upward like the rockets from a fireworks display.  When the explosion hits, it’s satisfying and worthwhile.  I even appreciated the little head fake they gave us toward the end.

In summary, there are many things you could nit pick about Tomb Raider, but the game much more than the sum of it’s parts.  In the end you feel like you’ve been part of Lara journey from a young woman to the beginning of a legend.  Highly recommended.

 

Permanent link to this article: https://www.talkstrategy.com/2013/05/game-of-the-week-tomb-raider-2012/

May 09

The Old News Section

Some of you may have noticed that news.talkstrategy.com is down again.  It’s been hacked twice in the last three months.  I’ve been working on trying to convert the data to a more secure content management system.  Thus far I’ve failed.  I can’t really leave it up as a virus risk to people who wander by.  So it will be down at least until I get some kind of fix.  If anyone has suggestions on converting an old postnuke site to something more secure, I’m all ears.  I know I could hire someone to do it, but this task is just beyond my level of expertise.  That means I need to bang my head against it for a while before I give up.

Permanent link to this article: https://www.talkstrategy.com/2013/05/the-old-news-section/

May 04

Game of the Week 10,000,000

tenm10,000,000 or ten million is a combination endless runner, match three puzzle and roguelike RPG.  It’s odd and a bit brilliant. It’s available for iOS, Android and Steam.  It’s graphics are reminiscent of an early roguelike.  You could either call that inspired or ugly.  I wouldn’t argue with either.

The premise is very simple.  You wake up in a cell deep in a dungeon.  To unlock the exit, you have to score ten million points in a single run.  Don’t let your paltry first score scare you.  You’ll constantly be increasing your score multipliers.   Mine was somewhere over 120 when I escaped.  Your avatar starts running towards the right when you begin a new run.  He is stopped by doors, chests and monsters.  Doors and chests have locks that can be opened with keys.   Chests grant inventory items.  Monsters must be defeated with weapons or magic.

The real action happens on the puzzle grid below your runner.  You have to be constantly matching three.  You want to match swords or wands when facing monsters.  You match keys to open locks.  You match wood and stone to build up your resource stockpiles.  You match backpacks to gain inventory items.  Inventory items include single use attack items, keys and healing items.  These can be selected whenever you need them though you have limited slots to hold items.

Ideally you are constantly making progress to the right.  You match attack items as soon as you hit a monster. Kill it grab their gold and keep running.  You match keys as soon as you hit a lock.  You are matching resources and backpacks between obstacles.   You stop at obstacles and are pushed left by monster attacks.  The stronger the attack, the greater the knockback.  Once you are knocked back to the left edge of the screen your run is over.

Then you find yourself back at your cell.  Now you have some resources.  You can use your wood, stone and gold to upgrade the shops around your cell.  In the shops you can buy upgraded weapons, magic staves, potions, armor, etc.  Each upgrade makes you a little stronger, letting you run a little farther, scoring a little more.  The further you get in the dungeon and the higher you level, the tougher the monsters become.  So you are constantly balancing your equipment, dungeon level and potions.  Did I mention that potions always have a positive and negative effect?  This allows you to focus on what you need most.  So you might get extra gold and no experience or vice versa.

Of course, the puzzle board and monster appearance order are random, as are the items you stuff in your backpack.  It means each run feels different and you’re always making interesting choices.  At $2, this one is pretty much a no brainer if the subject matter interests you at all.  Highly Recommended.

Permanent link to this article: https://www.talkstrategy.com/2013/05/game-of-the-week-10000000/