The final adventure

During the last days a possible way to understand operating with pointers has messed up my mind. I need a little break, I'll think about something sweeter.
An orchestra. Hundreds of instruments playing the same song, coordinated brilliantly but with a lot of spare skills. That's because great solo players do not need an orchestra to be famous, they perform on their own, someone will go and listen to them anyway, paying.

A cuople of days ago this article http://www.gamecareerguide.com/features/898/game_narrative_review_shadow_of_.php caught my sight. It explains how Shadow of the Colossus plays a fundamental role in defining new play mechanics for adventure. To put it down clearly, the plot is not unveiled through the usual cut scenes or dialogues, but through the game appearance. Music, character interaction, art and the plot itself let the user guess what is lying behind the journey of Wanda and Agro. I would like to thank Nicholas Rotondo, the original writer, for the really interesting article.

One of the last colossi. Announced by a melancholy song.

This particular way of creating the title led thousands of people to interpret the narrative aspects of SOTC, its probable link to Ico, the roles of the lady and Dormin. But also led superficial players to snub the game, because they want to be guided, not to be challenged philosophically. That's why hardcore gamers label SOTC as 'sixteen bosses then a disappointing ending' and I label it as 'the best adventure on PS2'. Fumido Ueda needed something to add hardcore gamers to his crowd of praisers, but failed.

SOTC didn't have poor graphics. The technical side of the Sony game is exceptional, maybe the best on the console. The land in which the characters wander is infinite, the colossi are huge and challenging, the control system is almost perfect. The sensation of facing an excellent product, on the level of the other PS2 blockbusters, was real. So, nobody in the technical team is to be blamed, and neither Ueda himself who signed a masterpiece in terms of game design.
We now know that Shadow of the Colossus has an incredible amount of design and technical aspects that redefine a genre. It's not an actual action game, it's a mixture and usually a mixture leads to success. But SOTC is not a great success, at least compared to his enormous value. All the aspects concur to create an unique experience.

We were speaking about orchestras. SOTC is the song, well played by a lot of different instruments (art, plot, music effects, design concepts). Ueda and his team are the musicians. So, where are the solo musicians?
Maybe, to reunite the best orchestra in the World we could ask to the best viola player in the world to join us, and so we could do whith flute, piano, drum, guitar. Is this model applyable to videogames?
What if we put the producer of GTA to manage a new project by Ueda? The new idea would sell more. We'd be able to reunite all the players under the same flag. The producers would edit the storyline in a suitable way to let it be either fascinating and able to keep button-breakers close to the game. We could do the same thing with the technical department, with the marketing one, etc.

Then, everybody will be able to play that game, to reach its end and feel in the same way I felt finishing SOTC. These are the most important things: a genius in the game design and someone who can direct his team in a market-favorable way.

SPOILER:
The secret garden

Yes, you're right, I should get back to pointers now...

Finding negativity in beautiful spaces - 05th October 2010

Speaking about Online Gaming or Massive Multi-player Online, the first title which comes to my mind is not one of those 1000 FPS Unreal-like obstructing your lines, but a golf simulation called Shot-Online. When in the last days, discussing about problems in Online gaming, we were taught about the possibility for the programmers to 'cheat' the players, because of speed issues in handling a great amount of data coming from several platforms, I had no idea of what we were discussing. In SO you play following turns, wait for the other players to complete their next stroke, and then you have 30 to 60 seconds to hit the ball. Everything linear, like in real golf, everything under control, even if simulation (weather conditions, ball bounce, holes conformation) does mean a great part of SO success and aren't in any measure sacrificed.

Shot Online character creation screen

But I have to admit that managing 8 or 16 playing characters all in one must be something very painful for any system. All running, all shooting, all possibly involved in the action. Yes, I can guess why AI has to intervene and put on the brakes of extreme simulation in those cases. Programmers limit you, that's all they can do to let the game run as fast as you are used to see in the single player mode. Considering that someone doesn't even play the single player mode after buying an FPS, they are more than justified.

So, my personal experience cannot help me out in finding how I got cheated in the past.

No, wait, not so fast.

I love football. I mean American football. It's a great sport, where tactics and technique reach their perfect balance, and spectacular plays are recurrent. I played many football games, like QB Club, Joe Montana Football, NFL 2Kx and others. Obviously, many Madden titles. The last I bought was Madden 09 All-Play for Nintendo WII. Even if the presentation was not the best and some odious WII features were there to annoy me, most of the appeal was also present. In single player mode I can say that I liked that game, without considering that, for the anger of Xbox and PS users, I was able to design the receivers routes free handed thanks to WiiMote pointer!

But let's go to the bad notes, precisely the Online experience.

In Madden 09 AP you could use two different types of QB passages: the bullet and the lob. The first was performed by leaning WiiMote forward all of a sudden, while the second leaning it very gently. When WiiMote is in the standing position, the value of its Pitch parameter (Y axis) is 1.57. WII decides what type of throw you are doing by just calculating the speed you apply to make the Pitch value go from 1.57 to 0 (flat position).

Playing one on one, player A controls the attack and, big surprise, B controls the defence. To try and reach the opposing QB (A), the defensive lineman can do a lot of possible moves to get rid of the offensive line and, whether he can't go beyond it, to swat or intercept the ball. All is done interpreting the movement of WiiMote, along the axis and using its accelerometer.

You already know how it ends...

Number 55 is trying to reach Brett Favre, shaking WiiMote in many different ways

You cannot throw a bullet, you will always be obliged to execute a lob, no matter how fast you lean your controller. I'm not able to tell you right now how this happened, what kind of memory movements are involved and how the connection limitations interfere with this scheme, but I surely felt frustrated when this happened. Probably, the programmers couldn't tell with the same precision of the normal mode how fast you leaned the controller, so they decided to deny the bullet option from the Online features.

The Online experience dropped quickly, making me prefer the good single player Franchise mode.

I really hope, in a 3 or 4 months time, to come back here, open a post named 'Finding negativity in beautiful spaces - 2' and explain you accurately how technically this shame could happen.

In conclusion, guess what's the best Online WII game...

FIFA 11: How did we come this far?

Title: FIFA 11
Developer: EA Canada
Platform: PS3
Game modes tested: 1Vs1 multiplayer

Good start, posting a FIFA 10 image on a FIFA 11 related post. Well done!

It's been a long time since I haven't played any FIFA game. Playing with friends, it is common to flat around a standard (in our case Pro Evolution Soccer) and avoid anything else. The reason why this happened is that PES was much better than FIFA, let's say, 10 years ago. Better graphics, better controls, better feeling, much better and more suitable tactics.

But something must be changed if everybody is saying that FIFA has taken the lead. I had the opportunity to play the latest release this weekend (thanks Michael) and, even if now I can confirm that FIFA is the new king, I have to say that I'm a bit disappointed of how things are turning around for soccer simulations.

You could have seen, with the obvious time passing differences, those kind of animations 10 years ago, on FIFA 2000. Players always seem a little 'humpbacked' and clumsy when they try to pass the ball backwards. And at least two generations have passed since that day.

Chiellini might not be a great 'Casanova' but he is not that humpbacked!

Another thing: FIFA encourages pressure. If you press you will get the ball back. When everybody learns it, you'll end up pursuing players more than playing the football. With good results, considering that, unlike PES, you can retrieve the ball and press with the same button. This particular game feature halves the fun in multiplayer sessions.

If it is true that games come out 6 months after they have been completed because programmers have to take away many new stuff because they do not work at the moment, why don't wait a couple of years before coming out with a new game? Let FIFA out with the title 'FIFA 11/12'. You can update rosters online, or stadiums, or everything else, but your core programming team can go on and deliver something really different. When KONAMI realised that, we had PES 2 and PES 5, the best simulations of the PS2 era.

Unfortunately, nobody is going to follow my advice, and they're going out and buy any FIFA or PES (or Madden, or NHL, or NBA Live) coming out every single year. That's how the video gaming World goes nowadays, and that's how players wanted it to go. If they had wanted it another way, maybe now I would have played something better.

Anyway, far from footballistic perfection, FIFA 11 stands as one of the most outstanding soccer videogaming experiences. I really love the way you have to chase the ball once it is passed towards you and the genuine feeling with counter-attacks. Put the ball between the defensive and midfielder line, take Kaka` or Pastore or Snejider on that ball and see how they can prove their divine status.

I appreciate how strikers behave in these cases, proposing for the through pass in a smart way. In addition, you can, more than what you do with PES, see the difference between using Ronaldinho or Ben Arfa, for example. Not only on the graphics side.

This is not a review, just another blog entry. I'm not giving any mark, I just can say that I had a good time playing. Just because soccer is not like that from FIFA, it doesn't mean the game cannot be fun.

The contradiction - 30th sept 2010

The today additional induction was a really appreciated thing. Meet one more time before the course gets under way. Simply brilliant. And the explanations we had were nothing less.

A good hour spent keeping everybody calm about the difficulty of the teachings and adding information about the topics: PS3 programming, differences with the XNA suite, a brief look at what has been done in the past and to what we are expected to do this year.

I'm totally excited about the opportunity I grabbed and I really look forward to next week lectures, as I look forward to all the awesome thing this course is going to teach me, since the initial fear about my multiple lacks of heavy programming have been taken away for the moment.

But (and don't tell me you weren't expecting a 'but' somewhere in this post) something is not completely clear to me.

During our meeting the lecturer told us that games are nothing but streams of data conveyed in a certain way by a little set of instructions. He didn't mention, or I didn't get it, that games are most of all an artistic work obtained with a deep creative interaction between software house members. I know, we are not supposed to know this and we are (will be, maybe) basically programmers, but I think it is not fair that if someone of us has a different approach to the video-gaming industry he has to throw it away in the rubbish.

That's why this blog was born. To make my philosophical thoughts float above or under or in between this vital data streams, without denying them.

I'm absolutely not complaining and I'm more than ever convinced about my choice. I just want to make sure all this numbers, all this instructions, all this programming don't drain energy from my will to face the amusement dynamics and explore gaming solutions.

I'm happy to be a little “different”. Nobody ever says the word Nintendo when I speak with my peers, and I think that it is almost obvious since the course is intended to be a way to get into the high-programming positions, something not hugely required in Nintendo or other developers who privileges creativity over graphics or technological machine level solutions.

Maybe at the end of this academic year I'll be a decent programmer and an awesome video games reviewer, or perhaps the opposite or neither things. One thing is sure: I'll be playing my games, I'll be heavily interacting with game designers or graphic artists colleagues.

Leaving the room at the end of our today session, the lecturer told us: “Play games!”. To me, it sounds like a contradiction with what he said in the previous 59 minutes. I hope, in a 365 day time, not to contradict myself.