Preview: Deus Ex Human Revolution

In 2000 a rather unique title arrived on the PC that became one of the first to blend two distinctly different genres into one: the first person shooter with the role playing game.  This hybrid, born under the title Deus Ex, became one of the most critically acclaimed titles of that year as well as this past decade with innovative character customization, large open environments to explore and a complex and exciting story where there is no necessarily good or bad path to follow.  The game saw a sequel three years later with the subtitle Invisible War though, due to simplification of the game’s design thanks to multiplatform development, the game didn’t earn the near the praise of its predecessor.  Soon after though Ion Storm shut down and we lost one of the best game development houses ever to come out of my home town of Austin, Texas.

It’s been a long time since then and Deus Ex is coming back this time under development at Eidos Montreal without the supervision of Warren Spector, the series’ creator.  Without his guise though can the game hope to achieve the same greatness at the beginning of the next decade that its forerunner earned at the beginning of this one?

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Of Icarus and Daedalus

The story of Deus Ex Human Revolution takes place in the year 2027 almost twenty five years before the events of the first game.  The world is in the midst of what is being called the Cyber Renaissance in which technology has advanced to the point where human augmentation with mechanical and cybernetic enhancements are readily available and changing the very way we go about our day-to-day lives.  Controversy over transhumanism is reaching its peak as protests between groups both for and against human augmentation are becoming more and more violent.

You play as protagonist Adam Jensen, a private security guard for Sarif Industries, one of the leading augmentation companies on the market.  When one of their private laboratories is attacked by a group of mercenaries, most of the staff is killed and Adam is mortally wounded.  To survive Adam is forced to undergo augmentation of several parts of his body including his arms and portions of his torso and head.  Adam is resentful of this necessary process and vows to hunt down those responsible for the attack initially with the aid of David Sarif, founder of the company.  Throughout his journey Adam will also uncover secrets of his past which will more than likely serve to be far more than a character affirmation.

One of the more interesting questions to be asked is, despite this being an affirmed prequel and reboot of the franchise, how strongly related is it to the game’s previous iterations?  The answer to that question may be that it is stronger than you think.  Trailers for the game as well as gameplay demonstrations for the press have previously revealed a man named Tong Se Hung, the owner of a large club in Shanghai’s Heng Sha district.  The two previous games, though set twenty five and fifty years after Human Revolution, had a key character named Tracer Tong who aided protagonists JC Denton and Alex D. during their quests.  Whether this is the same person or not (or perhaps a close relative) to Tracer Tong is questionable but the character design does match up with that of Tracer Tong.

Deus Ex games have always been known for having multiple themes and ideologies competing against one another and Human Revolution is no stranger to this as many intellectually stimulating ones seem to permeate throughout the title.  In addition to the controversy of transhumanism, the question of us enhancing the human condition through unnatural means and whether doing so removes our humanity in the process, is but one of the major themes.  The metaphorical phoenix plays a role as Jensen is reborn through his augmentation.  Jensen is also haunted by dreams of playing the role of Icarus, the greek myth of the boy whose father, Daedalus, fashioned a set of wings from bird feathers to escape their prison.  During the escape however Icarus flew too high against his father’s commands and, as a result, the wax binding his feathers melted and he fell to earth.  This seems to be strong metaphor for the gameplay itself as you can continuously enhance Jensen throughout the game leading to the question of whether he is more man or machine at the end of his journey.

If You Want to Make Enemies, Try To Change Something

Deus Ex was a radical departure from other shooters of the time, incorporating strong RPG elements such as character enhancements as well as weapon customization.  Human Revolution is going the same route if not further than its predecessors.  Since a large portion of Jensen is now cybernetic you can purchase (or earn through skill points) various different abilities and attributes to suit your play style.  It should also be noted that you can only equip a certain amount of these enhancements during a playthrough meaning that the game will have a strong amount of replay value.

The most recent demo of the game had Jensen infiltrating a heavily guarded penthouse to retrieve some vital intelligence.  From the main menu the player chose to enhance Adam’s arms to be able to lift and move heavy objects.  Doing so gave him access to a vent to crawl through by allowing him to move a large cabinet underneath it.  Later enhancement demonstrations during the demo included x-ray vision and near invisibility.

Character enhancements aren’t limited to just hack tools and the like: players can also augment Adam’s combat capabilities.  In addition to adding to the much demonstrated melee “blades” built into his arms Adam can also unleash a devastating 360 degree attack that sends and detonates small explosive charges in every direction, a handy tool for a scenario in which he becomes surrounded.  Weapons can also be customized with various attributes such as different types of ammo.

One of the most important aspects of the Deus Ex series is the power of choices and decisions that affect more than just the plot.  Though given a mission objective, unless it was mission critical, you could almost always choose how to go about it or even not do it at all.  Ten years ago this was a radical notion for gaming but nowadays it is present in many games the most recent and true-to-form title for this principle being Mass Effect 2.  During a recent gameplay demonstration at Eidos Montreal’s studio this was seen to be an almost intact carryover from the previous games.

The demo that was shown involved Adam being sent to retrieve an augmentation from a corpse at a Detroit police station.  Unfortunately the morgue Adam needed to access was off limits to anyone but key personnel.  With this set up Eidos showed off three different approaches to such a predicament: social, stealth, and combat.

Eidos first demonstrated a combative approach to retrieving the augmentation.  Marching right in the door the player had Jensen march right past the front desk and into the otherwise restricted areas of the station.  Despite being told to return to the lobby the player continued on, inciting a horde of attacking officers.

Combat in Human Revolution is most comparable to that of the Rainbow Six Vegas titles of 2006 and 2008.  While a first person shooter at its heart, the game utilizes a third person cover system for almost any cover you come across.  During the ensuing engagement the player entered the menu and combined a revolver with some explosive rounds, creating a sheer weapon of destruction, and thereafter went to town on anyone who stood in his way.  Finding the morgue door locked the player again opened the menu and combined a frag grenade with a mine which easily took the door down.

The second approach demonstrated was a social one in which the player would attempt to persuade his way in the morgue in plain sight.  The player had Jensen approach the front desk and began a conversation with Sergeant Haas, a man whom Jensen had served with on the force several years previous.  The conversation, which involved many passive and aggressive actions, had Jensen reminiscing with Haas, countering Haas’ questions and, eventually, having him give Adam access to the rest of the building.  This approach also allowed the player to learn new bits and pieces of information that wouldn’t have been able to learn had any other approach been taken.  The coroner in the morgue even offered up a full autopsy report to aid the player, something that was otherwise unavailable.

The third way of going about the objective involved stealth.  Instead of heading straight on back past the front desk the player had Jensen leave the station, go around the back of it, climb over a fence, and, while sneaking past a few armed guards, climbed a ladder to access the upper floors.  While on the upper level the player hacked into a couple computers gaining access to private memos and emails and utilized the cloaking ability to gain access to high traffic areas.  Confronted with a security door Jensen silently approached a guard and executed a non-lethal takedown.  Jensen then used the guard to bypass the door, hid the body, gained access to the corpse in the morgue, and exited the building through a sewer entrance.

All in all three different approaches to the experience promises stories to tell your friends about how you completed your missions and definitely shows signs of strong replay value to the game.  The non-lethal takedowns also raises into question whether the game can be completed without killing someone, something that isn’t easily accomplished in most games and is rarely implemented in shooters at all.  This doesn’t even come close to contemplating the possibilities of doing mix-and-match styles of play as you may choose to stealthily infiltrate the station and then, once the item has been retrieved, leaving the place Rambo style.

It’s Not the End of the World, But You Can See It from Here

Though I once had my doubts about the game what with Warren Spector not involved in the project at all and that this is Eidos Montreal’s freshman effort (oddly enough they are also working on Thief 4, another Ion Storm originating series) the game looks to be shaping up quite nicely in anticipation of its Spring 2011 release date.  It certainly has a lot to live up to though and one has to wonder whether the level design presented thus far reflects across the board given the current state of game design and the stronger focus on linearity than anything else.  With no mention either of a multiplayer mode, which this writer can only praise the high heavens for, the game has the potential to due credit to its namesake.  Will it though?  We’ll all find out next year.



Review: Medal of Honor

Long before I was introduced to the Call of Duty franchise I was a strong Medal of Honor fan.  At the time I considered it the definitive World War II shooter franchise (though not without a nod in Gearbox’s direction with their Brothers in Arms series).  These days however, we’ve switched from one oversaturated setting to the modern one, one that is quickly approaching such a state.  Hot on the heels of the Modern Warfare success stories, EA has chosen to reboot their classic shooter franchise with a setting that hits far closer to home than ever before.

But does the new direction for the franchise have what it takes to take on Activision’s giant?

Click to read the full review

They Shall Grow Not Old

Though the majority of the game occurs over a 48 hour period, Medal of Honor’s story begins during the initial invasion of Afghanistan by coalition forces.  The game begins in a village in eastern Afghanistan where a Navy SEAL team is sent to meet with an informant, Tariq, regarding Taliban forces in the area.  Despite being assured that the town is secure the team is ambushed and is forced to separate.  As Rabbit (the player character) and Voodoo make their way back to Mother and Preacher they search the village for Tariq they eventually make their way to a local fort and are able to rescue him.  At a meeting place outside of town Tariq pleas for their help and informs them of a sizeable Taliban force far larger than intelligence estimates hiding in Shah-I-Kot Valley.

Though the game isn’t clear about the transition of time between this and the next mission, the story jumps to the capture of Bagram airfield in December 2001 in which the same SEAL team (AFO Neptune) assists rebel Afghan forces in taking it from the Taliban.  This contradicts official reports that British SBS forces are the ones that took the airfield so it is clear that EA is taking some liberties with the actual history of the Afghanistan war.  Either way however it ends with Neptune securing the tower and fending off a Taliban counterattack with airstrikes.

From there the game jumps forward several months to March 2002, the beginning of Operation Anaconda.  We are introduced to AFO Wolfpack, a team of Delta Force operatives tasked with weakening insurgent forces near Shah-I-Kot Valley in preparation for a Coalition invasion.  From there on the game jumps between Wolfpack, Neptune, and a team of Army Rangers who all experience Operation Anaconda from their perspectives, each occurring progressively over the course of two days and eventually coming together for one final mission.  While the story ends on a somber note it definitely hints at a sequel which, let’s face it, is mandatory if you’ve put this much effort into your game.

One item of note is a sidestory that takes place throughout the course of the game.  Taking place during cutscenes inbetween missions is a conflict of interests between a colonel ordering forces during the operation from Bagram airbase and a general back in Washington D.C.  While the colonel is making progress using the AFO teams during the operation the general is dead set on putting large numbers of American soldiers on the ground in the valley whether the colonel likes it or not.  The general comes off as very arrogant and single-minded whereas the colonel is clearly the protagonist.  During one particular scene the general orders an AC-130 to fire on a convoy approaching Bagram that isn’t responding identification requests.  As it turns out it was a convoy or Afghan Nation Army forces that were on their way to the valley and thus a large friendly-fire incident occurs.  What strikes me about it is that the general doesn’t even bat an eye at causing friendly force casualties and isn’t held accountable for the incident.  This is probably meant to continue the plot but the lack of accountability makes it feel like something that should have been in there.

As We That Are Left Grow Old

With Medal of Honor being Danger Close’s seventh title in the series they certainly have their had plenty of time to get the gameplay down but with a new setting, weapons, and design goals there is the worry that it will not compliment the reset of the series like it should.  Thankfully though the team has created a very solid singleplayer experience.

Medal of Honor takes notes from many of the standard rules for shooters nowadays.  You can only carry two weapons in addition to your pistol, there is very little in the way of weapons customization, and the game uses a regenerative health system.  While these points are all fine and dandy they really don’t make the game stand out all that much from the other shooters on the market like Modern Warfare.

One element of the game that does set it apart from the others out there is Medal of Honor’s pacing.  While the Call of Duty series is specifically designed to give you almost nothing but fast-paced and action packed, the Medal of Honor series seems more methodical in its pacing.  Several missions in the game encourage stealth gameplay while others will have you outnumbered, outgunned, and running for your life.  There is never a point in which you feel you could take on the entire enemy army alone but at the same time you don’t feel like you are being handled by your NPC teammates.

Another one of the more enjoyable aspects of the game is the way in which the levels gel with one another.  As previously stated, baring the first two levels of the game, the rest of the Medal of Honor experience is almost completely consecutive time-wise.  While some levels may be separated by just a handful of hours others instead occur back-to-back with characters you play as in the next level actually participating in the finale of the previous one.  One example occurs at the end a sniping-oriented level where AFO Wolfpack is actually laying down some sniper fire to cover the retreat of AFO Neptune.  This rate of progression helps me feel like I’m participating in a larger effort rather than jumping from conflict to conflict without much of a segue like what the Call of Duty series does.

Another enjoyable thing about the game is that your characters actually feel mortal and that they could die at any second.  During one level toward the middle of the game is one of my favorite scenarios in a game: the last stand.  I don’t want to spoil the moment but suffice it to say you and your squad find yourselves completely surrounded and what seems like the entire Taliban army rolling down the hills upon you.  As the sad violin music starts playing in the background while you defend your position one of your teammates next to you is calling on the radio for support, begging for anything to come rescue them.  However, nothing does and as your cover is run down and you begin running out of ammo your squad leader tells the radioman to call off the coming help.  The feeling that you know you are going to die has been done before (Medal of Honor Pacific Assault’s final sequence draws strong comparisons to this occasion) but in this one particular instance it is certainly well done.

Age Shall Not Weary Them

While the singleplayer component was developed by Danger Close, EA opted to instead have the multiplayer done by DICE, the same development studio responsible for the excellent Battlefield series.  DICE has always had the same flavor permeating each iteration of Battlefield and it certainly has translated to Medal of Honor, albeit with some considerable changes.  While the core gameplay of a Battlefield title is definitely there have been some considerable changes to the formula.

One of the most omnipresent changes to the formula is the compact nature of the maps.  While some of the maps feel as large as a Battlefield one it is very clear that EA is attempting to take on a more arcade oriented experience, meaning faster spawning, killing, and overall pacing.  While Battlefield maps are known to be some of the largest out there in the shooter genre Medal of Honor’s maps are no larger than your average Call of Duty map and can take seconds to cross instead of minutes.  There is also a surprising amount of verticality to some of the maps included in the game, something that you don’t really get in a Call of Duty map.

Medal of Honor’s multiplayer component consists of four main modes of play: Combat Mission, Team Assault, Sector Control, and Objective Raid.  Team Assault is Medal of Honor’s version of a team deathmatch and is pretty much where the heart of the multiplayer gameplay is going to be found.  Sector Control sounds exactly like what it is: a territories variant where two teams compete to control portions of a map.  Objective Raid is similar to Sector Control except it involves attacking and defending certain objectives on the map (like Call of Duty’s Demolition mode).  I’ll talk about Combat Mission in just a second.

Once again the Battlefield flavor is very much present throughout the Medal of Honor multiplayer experience but that’s not to say that there is not quite a bit of Call of Duty influence present here.  While the game is indeed class-based (players can choose between Assault, Special Ops, and Sniper classes) the player is able to customize their loadouts through a progressive ranking system.  Also present is a reward system similar to Call of Duty’s killstreak system called Scorechains and Support Actions.  Rather than the traditional kill count-based support you call in, Medal of Honor uses points based on actions you take.  These points that you earn can be used for offensive or defensive actions and get progressively stronger the more points you earn.  For example, earning fifty points will allow you to use your first support action which allows you to either issue a mortar strike or calls in a UAV to show enemy positions on your radar.  Further unlockable support actions can grant you offensive powers such as calling in airstrikes or defensive powers that grant upgraded ammo or body armor.  While a standard kill will only earn you ten points killing them in certain attributes of that kill, such as getting a headshot or the victim being of Tier 1 status (rank nine or higher) will grant you additional points.  You can also earn ribbons, repeatedly unlockable challenges, which grant you points based on what they are.

Probably the most interesting aspect of the Medal of Honor multiplayer component is the Combat Mission mode.  Though currently limited to three playable maps, Combat Mission is well worth its own weight in gold.  Players take turns as either Coalition or OPFOR forces and attempt to defend (if playing as an OPFOR) or attacking (as a Coalition member) a series of progressive objectives that vary in scope and significance.  The progression of these objectives is linear in nature and does not allow you to bypass it in favor of another one.  The Helman Valley level, for example, has the Coalition forces initially clearing a makeshift roadblock before securing a small settlement, a triple-A post, and finally a larger village.  As you play through the level and objectives are completed by the Coalition the map is expanded (lengthwise, ensuring linearity) and additional aspects of the map open up, changing spawning rules and giving you a brand new area to fight in.  The nature of Combat Mission is nothing short of fun when played with competent teammates but if you are the solo kind of guy who usually just wants to kill the enemy more than anything else then Combat Mission isn’t the mode for you.

Nor The Years Contemn

Medal of Honor is one of those games that takes two entirely different approaches to its gameplay and combines them into a single retail package.  While there have been some success stories in this department over the years there have been others that have just resulted in a terrible experience, gameplay or otherwise.  The latest iteration in the Wolfenstein franchise last year epitomizes this fact, as the multiplayer was outsourced and became an extremely lackluster experience.

Danger Close’s singleplayer experience is built on a heavily modified version of the Unreal 3 engine, an engine that, while still looking good, is beginning to show the end of all the bells and whistles it can produce.  Considering that it is now an almost five year old engine it’s understandable that the end of its lifecycle is just over the horizon.  However, given the work done by Danger Close on this engine it is clear that they were determined to make their version of the game look good and indeed it does.

One thing that struck me about the singleplayer engine is the facial animations.  Despite the fact that some of the faces look remarkably similar the animations are well lip-synced and definitely sell on realism.  The only complaint to be made regarding it is that, well, they are all delivered quite hard.  Almost all of the script in the game is focused on the moment and getting the job done and doesn’t really venture off and allow you to explore some of their characters.  I mean, sure, they are very good soldiers but there is that element that you want to know what else they do besides killing Taliban soldiers.

Particle effects in Medal of Honor are a mixed bag.  Some of the effects in the game are outstanding and really sell you on the environment you are in.  Smoke effects are done quite well and have a different flair from that of Infinity Ward’s design as they seem to billow a bit more naturally.  One particular scene has you creeping through a village that has just been obliterated by airstrikes and as you tread carefully there are sporadic fires everywhere with a lot of ambient smoke.  It really sells on the feeling of being in the aftermath of what was just depicted on screen.  The downside however is the explosions.  A war game simply isn’t a war game without explosions so it is a required part of any experience.  Unfortunately though, while the detonation of a grenade is well done the much more massive ones you’d expect feel quite canned in nature and don’t look realistic at all.  After all, the detonation of a 105mm howitzer shell should not have the same impact that a 40mm shell would.  Some of the explosions are great set pieces though: several key objectives blow up so nicely that not only is dirt and mud sent flying and lands all around you but the fine dirt remains ambient in the air, giving a nice representation of the power of that explosion in that environment.

At the Going Down of the Sun And In the Morning

DICE has always been known for creating great game engines and Medal of Honor is no exception in this regard.  In the three recent Battlefield titles DICE has utilized an engine known as Frostbite, an engine specifically designed to allow for procedurally destructible buildings and imperative sound design.  While the Battlefield titles have benefited from this it seems as if Medal of Honor was given the short end of the stick.

That isn’t to say that Medal of Honor is a bad multiplayer experience because of this; far from it.  The problem is that, given that you have the Frostbite engine you’d expect to have it fully implemented into the gameplay.  This isn’t the case however as many of the design imperatives are clearly missing or are almost not there at all.

The biggest culprit in this case is the lack of destructible buildings you’d want to be wiping out.  Instead what we get is partially implemented, makeshift walls and covered windows.  That’s it, nothing else.  With version 1.5 of the engine being used for Medal of Honor you’d figure that it would demonstrate all the more the power of the engine but it seems as if DICE had their hands tied with this game.

What they couldn’t accomplish with the first half of the equation they definitely did so with their focus on immersing you into the experience.  Simply put I’ve never seen a more immersive audio and ambient event system in a multiplayer experience to date, and that’s saying something.  While in the game not only will you hear Coalition and OPFOR forces talking to one another they will also call out different types of enemies in the area.  This is one such game that, though you don’t want to do it to hamper a team, you could take off your headset, listen to the voices around you, and still do well when playing.  DICE also has a lot of scripted events occurring just outside of the maps in the game and while they have no impact on the gameplay they do really help seal the feeling that your participating in a war instead of a multiplayer map.  Both of these are especially helpful in selling the Combat Mission mode, as you’ll hear Python 1, the Coalition team used in all of the modes and maps, conversing with Bossman, an actual character in the singleplayer.  If you’ve ever wanted to find a multiplayer experience that feels as significant in scope as the singleplayer this is probably your best bet… at least until the game’s inevitable sequel.

We Will Remember Them

Medal of Honor had a lot of things blocking it from trying to be a successful game.  Amidst the several strong yet inanely stupid controversies over the game’s design, the much complained about beta experience, and the questionable usage of DICE’s multiplayer design to a game that isn’t supposed to play like a Battlefield title, at the heart of things beats a good game with a strong future coming its way.  Though there is little here that can help drive Call of Duty fans across the aisle it does help bridge the game between Battlefield and Call of Duty, if only halfway across the chasm.  So, for the Call of Duty or Battlefield fan out there, if you are looking for a new, slightly different experience from what you’ve been playing for years, Medal of Honor is certainly your game.  The future only looks brighter for this series, though, in my opinion, a return to the World War II setting wouldn’t be a bad thing if they could keep it this exciting.

Review: Enslaved Odyssey to the West

In 2007 a lesser known independent developer called Ninja Theory published a major Playstation 3 exclusive in the form of Heavenly Sword, a title that, while short, was praised for its storytelling and stellar graphics.  Despite community pleas for a sequel however Ninja Theory decided to go in a different direction with a new IP.  Enslaved, Ninja Theory’s newest title, marks the company’s first entry in multiplatform development while staying true to many of the design rules of Heavenly Sword.

Is it worth your money though?

Click to read the full review

A Monkey By Any Other Name

Enslaved, like many popular titles over the past few years, takes place in a post-apocalyptic setting.  Decades after two world wars lead to a mechanized apocalypse humanity has returned to a state of tribalism with communities banding together in order to survive.  Mechs left over from the war litter the landscape and are still programmed to kill the humans they once obeyed though almost all of the giant ones, known as Titans and Leviathans, perished long ago.  With this return to tribalism however so too has slavery, the main source of it being an unknown organization called Pyramid.  The story begins onboard a Pyramid slave ship bound for the west.  As monkey regains consciousness in his containment pod he witnesses a young girl break out of her pod and approach a console.  Within seconds of her going to work on it alarms begin to go off and signal the beginning of the end for the aircraft.  Monkey escapes and follows her to the escape pods only to find himself latched on to the outside of her pod which launches just before the ship crashes.

Monkey reawakens a short time later after the pod has crashed into a ruined building.  In an act of sheer desperation, the girl, Trip, has fitted Monkey with a slave headband that she’s hacked to work for her.   Trip wants to get home to her wind farm community that’s hundreds of miles away but she knows she’ll never make it with thousands of killer mechs inbetween.  As such she offers Monkey a deal: if he can see her safe return she will remove the headband.  If she dies however so too does he.

Enslaved’s story is loosely based on Journey to the West, a 16^th century Chinese tale of a pilgrim’s journey to India to retrieve sutras from the living Buddha.  However, other than the names of the characters the comparisons pretty much end there.  Instead, Enslaved is more appropriately a tale of reaction and, later, revenge against the slaver organization Pyramid whose abductions of humans number in the tens of thousands.  The ending to the game is nothing short of fantastic and brings to a close Monkey and Trip’s journey on a cliffhanger note, though no more severe than many other games nowadays.  The ending fits perfectly with the overall moods and themes of the game so if you are looking for a singleplayer game with great potential going forward then here you go.

One thing I found most interesting about the game’s characters is their explicit lack of knowledge in regards to the outside world.  The first third of the game takes place in the ruins of New York City with crumbling skyscrapers and deep rifts into the ground signifying the end of civilization as we know it and yet Trip and Monkey know almost nothing about the city.  There is even a point to where they actually speculate about how many “tens of thousands” of people used to live there and construe Grand Central Terminal as a kind of gathering place.  The stark contrast between the most famous city in the Western Hemisphere with their complete ignorance of it gives an interesting look into the world they live in but it also makes the player wonder about the world that was.  Enslaved does very little to allude to the world before the end of civilization but it is a bit refreshing to see a post-apocalyptic title that is focused on the here-and-now rather than of the remnants from the past.

Bad Dog

Enslaved’s gameplay can be split into two different categories: platforming and close/midrange combat.  Monkey’s name is well representative of his nature as he is extremely agile and capable of some unusual, if not extreme, parkour, an element of platform games that have become far more common in recent years thanks to titles like Uncharted.  Monkey’s agility in the game not only feels smooth and natural but it also flows very well in almost every situation.  Several instances in the game have him dodging gunfire as he is flying across the side of a building and, as in this example, demonstrates how the game rewards the player for learning how to utilize Monkey’s rhythm of movement by having him take less damage.

In addition to being light on his feet Monkey is also a strong fighter.  The majority of the combat in Enslaved involves close-range melee fighting against an assortment of different mechs who have different rhythms and methods of attack.  Utilizing both his fists and his staff weapon, Monkey is capable of causing unrivaled blunt-force trauma to his mechanized enemies.  Though the combos Monkey can pull off are fairly limited but the flow of them, like Monkey’s parkour abilities, feel natural with nary an animation cut when switching from a heavy to a light attack or vica versa.

While Monkey is to be considered the main character of the game Trip is far from a damsel in distress with nothing to add to the game.  Though it is in your best interest to keep her out of harm’s way Trip has several tools at her disposal that can make your job easier.  In addition to being able to heal you with health vials should you be unable to find some first aid she can also distract mechs with a decoy light show.  Should she be attacked by a mech she automatically engages an EMP blast that temporarily disables all nearby mechs, allowing you to rescue her.

The End of the World Never Looked So Good

These days, when games are set in a post-apocalyptic scenario, it is very common to see a dying world where hope isn’t something that’s widespread.  Almost every end of civilization set-up in video games these days are composed of bleak, urban environments with nothing but shades of grey and brown to be seen all around.  Thankfully Ninja Theory was smart enough to realize that a world without humans wouldn’t exactly be an ugly one.  With the apocalypse having happened decades beforehand nature has taken its course and is actively in the process of reclaiming the land for itself.  During the course of the game I couldn’t help but be awestruck at several sections of the game.  One great example comes early on in the second chapter of the game where you get to explore the initial sections of New York.  Amidst crumbling buildings and long since destroyed vehicles stand tall trees with various types of plants growing along and up the walls of humanity’s creations.  There’s just something to like about seeing pieces of giant mechs littering the landscape and seeing strands of ivy growing up them.

One thing that the game does provide very well is a sense of scale.  As you travel through the remains of New York and beyond you get a much greater sense of the world before the end and just how chaotic it must have been in the final days.  Several later environments actually tease you with just how powerful and large these mechs were, as one such environment has you fighting inside the palm of a long since dead Titan.  You really get the sense that the wars before the events of Enslaved were massive in scale, far beyond what we experience in the first half of the 20^th century but thanks to the art direction it certainly doesn’t feel like a dying world.  Rather, thanks to its design it feels like this is a world that is recovering and on the way to a renewed state of liveliness not seen since before the industrial age.

The good looks aren’t limited to the environments however: much of the beauty of the game comes from the character design.  Using NaturalMotion’s Morpheme animation system, Ninja Theory has created some of the best looking and best acted faces and bodies in Trip and Monkey that I’ve seen since Uncharted 2.  You can really feel and see the emotions on these characters, especially Trip, as she experiences fear, shock, loss, and all those other face-wrenching emotions.  It’s not just limited to the facial animation though.  Andy Serkis, the award winning actor who played Gollum in Peter Jackson’s Lord of the Rings trilogy, stars as monkey and his acting of the part is nothing short of stellar.  Lindsey Shaw, a young actress whose career has begun bearing strong fruit, plays a delightful and completely believable Trip.

A Journey Well Traveled

If you would have asked me three years ago if Ninja Theory had enough under its belt to stay alive in an industry filled with fierce competition at every turn I’d have said no.  Heavenly Sword, while a good game, was far too short to merit a $60 price point and its console exclusivity really cost the game any replay value.  With Enslaved however I think that Ninja Theory has succeed in bringing strong, mature storytelling to the masses with enough content to justify a full price purchase and with DLC on the horizon designed to compliment rather than intrude on the story it certainly is a keeper in my book.  During this review I tried my best to not ruin the story for you: what you read above is mainly a glancing pass at a deep and wonderful story with excellent potential.  So if you’ve been looking for a unique title this year that doesn’t follow the norm when it comes to game design be sure to check out Enslaved.  If anything, experience the story in its whole with a friend.

Oh, and someone get Roger Ebert on the phone; I can’t find a better candidate out there for cinematic storytelling than this.



Review: Hydrophobia

Downloadable games that are not legacy titles, i.e. titles that bring back warm and fuzzy nostalgic feelings of when they were originally released a decade or so back, usually don’t get my hard-earned cash unless there is something truly unique about them.  As such my time at E3 2010 was mainly composed of taking as many of the seemingly endless triple-A titles as possible.  However, on the final day as I was about to actually leave the show for my flight back to Austin, I stumbled across a singular console in the Microsoft booth in the South Hall in what I discerned to be a collection of XBLA-bound games.  This console was running the oft-mentioned but rarely seen Hydrophobia, a game that I had heard about before but didn’t really stick with me as a must see.  Wondering along the aisle with my forty pound backpack that held my camera and my large tripod I decided to capture some footage of the game (which you can watch here) given that I could not recall actual gameplay having been show of it before.  It was then that I was approached by Peter Jones, one of the producers of the game.  After a conversation about it he agreed (much to my glee) to allow me to capture some footage while he walked me through the game.

Walking away from that half hour demo I was actually excited for it and gave it my rating for the top new IP of the show.  Now that the game is here however do I still feel that same way?

Click to read the full review

Row, Row, Row Your Boat

Hydrophobia introduces us to a world that sounds a little too realistic to ignore: a near future where the planet is suffering under a population boom amidst dwindling food resources.  In the middle 21^st century Earth is experiencing what is called the Great Population Flood where resources are strained to the breaking point and is on the verge of complete chaos.  To help separate the wealthy from the affected countries, the fortunate live aboard the Queen of the World, a city-sized vessel that wanders the oceans away from the worries of the rest of the planet.  NanoCell, a philanthropic company dedicated to answering the resource question, is set to announce a revolutionary way of producing clean drinking water for countries suffering from the Flood aboard the ship on the Queen’s 10^th anniversary.

Enter Kate Wilson, a young systems engineer who is one of the lucky ones to be able to serve on the Queen.  Kate suffers from hydrophobia however with fierce memories of her drowned sister haunting her whenever she closes her eyes.  After a perceived glitch occurs in the network she maintains she decides to forgo the evening’s festivities and heads below deck to fix the problem, much to the lamentations of her friend and coworker Scoot who is at work himself.  As her elevator descends below decks an explosion rocks the ship.  The elevator goes into freefall before stopping temporarily thanks to its emergency brakes.  Kate scrambles out just in time and discovers the ship has come under attack.  Neo-Malthusians, radical follows of Thomas Malthus who believe that the only way to solve the population problem is to eliminate it, have infiltrated the ship and are taking over.  Cut off from her network and only the voice of Scoot in her ear Kate has to escape from the engineering decks and somehow make it off the ship alive.

The story of Kate’s journey through the bowels of the Queen of the World is something of intrigue wherein we explore the depth of her trust in Scoot, her paranoia of having to fight the Malthusians, and her constant fear of the water.  The combination of these three elements coinciding with the events happening aboard the Queen of the World should theoretically combine in a catalyst of intrigue but the overall delivery of the story ends up being a lacking affair.  Most of the story elements are told on-the-fly and don’t allow for much speculation as to the state of the world beyond the Queen, much less anything else happening onboard.  Most of the background events can only be discerned from collecting documents littered throughout the game but even these are short and their contents don’t really offer anything of worth to the average player.  The Malthusians, probably one of the most intriguing sets of characters in the game come across as your standard angry enemies and there’s little to no depth to them.

The one thing that really got to me about Hydrophobia’s character design and storytelling was that it was delivered in a very flat manner.  This is something to expect of many games nowadays but for a planned trilogy of games you would think that the story would actually keep you occupied and driven toward your next goal.  Sadly this is anything but true.  Character conversations are dry and the accents are both far stronger than anticipated or needed.  This may be the hick Texan coming out in me but half the time I was thankful the game has subtitles enabled by default because I very often had a hard time figuring out what the heck Scoot was saying.  Kate isn’t much better though her panicked delivery of lines at several moments in the game were very believable.  It is also fair to say that I was a little disturbed when the ghostly voice of Kate’s sister came out of nowhere in the middle of an underwater section but since the voice is only used but a handful of times it doesn’t exactly reinforce Kate’s hydrophobia like it should.

The most disappointing part of the story however is sadly the most important part when planning out a series: the ending.  Simply put, while the section leading up to it is fraught with tense moments and excellent set pieces the actual ending of the game is one of the biggest cutoffs since Halo 2.  You literally meet a character you saw earlier in the game, are given a goal, and the game fades out to a “to be continued” screen.  With so much going on at the time and the promise of multiple hours of story gameplay I’d hoped for a lot more than this.  One can only hope that Dark Energy improves on this crucial aspect but I’m not crossing my fingers.

Gently Down the Stream

The elephant in the room that has to be mentioned is the technology Hydrophobia is made on.  Dark Energy’s Hydroengine is something of a marvel in modern gaming (and gaming history in general) thanks to the fact that it is the first game engine out there to actually calculate the physics associated with the flow and movement of water and objects therein.  Rarely does water serve any other purpose than to be a cosmetic effect with little more power than to delay and funnel invading army in a strategy game.  The Hydroengine however is the real thing and I’ve got to say it is a thing of beauty.

Utilizing physics calculations and theorems I can’t even begin to fathom Dark Energy has someone created something that is both functional as well as properly implementable to a video game.  Imagine if you will that you are in a corridor with shotgun-bearing Malthusians coming after you.  With little more than sonic rounds in your gun you can only but hope to temporarily stun them but that’s when you notice that window holding back a roomful of water.  Charging up your shot you fire and shatter it, watching as hundreds of gallons of water come rushing into the corridor, crashing against objects in the way and causing the enemies to slip and fall.  This is no scripted sequence or a one-time event; this is something that occurs quite often within the Hydrophobia gameplay formula.

To put it simply this engine is probably one of the biggest advancements since high dynamic range lighting or even Volition’s GeoMod technology.  The movement and power of water is not something to be underestimated in this game: you will live and die by the flow of it.  The Hydroengine is also capable of diffusion of other liquids based on their properties so if you cause a barrel filled with oil to explode you will see the remaining oil burning on the surface of the water and you can watch as it moves with the waves.  If you find yourself in an underwater combat sequence and get shot you will see blood erupt from your wounds and disperse in the very same manner you expect it to in real life.  It’s simply too good to be true and yet it delivers.

Merrily, Merrily, Merrily, Merrily

Had the game been based entirely around the manipulation of water you could have expected far better reviews of the game but then there’s the gameplay itself.  While the Hydroengine is a significant advancement, when you center all of your energy on making it work without complementing all that energy upon the way you actually want players to experience the game you know you are in for some trouble.  The basic description one could attribute to the Hydrophobia experience is that of a third person shooter and puzzler.  Unfortunately neither of those seem to be properly implemented into the gameplay.

One of the reasons why is how the controls work.  Now with a controller like that of the Xbox 360’s there are plenty of buttons to utilize but sadly Dark Energy has seen fit to include an obscure control scheme that doesn’t fit in at all with many of the standards adopted by the development community.  For example to select a different type of ammo for your weapon (the game utilizes different ammo as opposed to different weapons which makes sense) you have to hold down right on the d-pad, select your ammo with the right stick, and then depress the d-pad in order to complete the action.  The Y button corresponds to jumping which is obscure in this day and age and despite being a cool tool the movement of your perspective when using Kate’s MAVI (a transparent datapad) is quite sluggish.

Movement in the game overall is a mixed bag.  Composed of either running or walking the game actually has trouble figuring out when exactly to engage one or the other.  Often times I found myself having to return the left analog stick to its original position before pushing it forward all the way just to get Kate to start running.  Couple this with a cover system that doesn’t like to work but when you are in just the perfect position and you will find yourself having quite a few retries of various areas that are filled with guns that kill in just a handful of shots.  Even if the cover system worked properly the aiming is a problem because the perspective doesn’t reflect the actual direction the shot will go in while in cover.  Often times I’d be charging up a sonic round shot and unleashing it only to have it hit the cover I was using and kill myself despite have the targeting reticule clearly lit up red on an enemy or object.  Please fix this Dark Energy.

The overall design of the map offers a small dose of intrigue while bathing in a sea of dullness.  Almost 90% of the Hydrophobia experience is a corridor crawl with sporadic combat with 5% devoted to larger, more open areas and the remainder devoted to obscure puzzles that are sometimes broken before you enter the room.  One section that frustrated me for a good half hour requires you to climb up the wall in order to activate a switch and put out some broken pipes that are ablaze before proceeding.  The problem was that a barrel had exploded when I entered the room and much of the oil that was on fire was sitting atop the vending machine I was supposed to climb up on, resulting in my instantaneous death every single time.  Efforts to move the oil elsewhere did nothing to fix the problem so I was forced to reload the beginning of the Act II and replay through that entirely before I could actually get it to function properly.  I understand trying to demonstrate the power of a water engine but when it can end up breaking the game you need to set up safeguards for the player just in case.

Life is But a Dream

Dark Energy’s Hydrophobia is a game of mixed promises.  While it clearly has the makings of greatness the end result is a game with a terrible cliffhanger ending, weak controls, and a game design that needs a lot more to it than corridor crawling.  Do I look forward to the inevitable sequel?  Absolutely.  But am I satisfied with what I have right now?  No.  Fix the issues I mentioned above and you could have a solid experience I’m willing to drown myself in but don’t count on me coming back for seconds if you can’t get it right next time around.

Review: Dead Rising 2

When the Xbox 360 fist launched five years ago one of the teased games from Capcom was Dead Rising.  From the trailer all one could discern was a fairly ugly reporter walking around a supermarket amongst hundreds of zombies.  When the final product arrived however we were treated to a free roaming zombie playground with a seemingly endless motley of ways to dispose of the undead menace set against an interesting (if B-movie quality) storyline with franchise potential.

With the zombie gaming craze seemingly reaching its zenith though does Dead Rising 2, coming from a Western developer now, complement the well-established genre?

Click to read the full review

I’ve Covered Wars Ya Know

In the aftermath of the Willamette, Colorado incident, the world has changed in response to the existence of zombies.  Public opinion is split between disgust for the infected and those who seek to cure them.  The one general consensus though is that zombies are not regarded as citizens and can be considered property.  As such, zombie killing has become an unofficial sport with the flagship source of entertainment being Terror Is Reality, a pay-per-view show where contestants compete in American Gladiators-esque events for cash prizes.

Enter Chuck Greene, professional motocross rider, handyman, and father of one.  During a zombie outbreak in Las Vegas Chuck lost his wife to the infection.  He was able to escape along with his daughter Katey who was unfortunately bitten in the process.  Katey is now dependant on Zombrex, an anti-zombification drug developed following the Willamette outbreak that requires strict regular doses.  The drug however is expensive and as such Greene does everything he can to prevent the loss of this daughter.

That means he has to go where the money does.  Needing to purchase more of the drug, Chuck competes in an episode of Terror Is Reality in Fortune City, the go-to alternative now that Las Vegas is gone.  When leaving the event to pick up his daughter, an explosion rocks the arena elevator and knocks Chuck unconscious.  Awakening to chaos, Chuck realizes that the arena’s zombies have escaped and are quickly turning Fortune City into an undead paradise.  Chuck finds Katey and escapes to an emergency shelter before the doors close.  After fetching some Zombrex and giving Katey her required shot a news report frames Chuck for the outbreak.  With only three days to clear his name before the army comes into town and arrests those responsible.

Chuck’s story unfolds in the same manner Frank West’s did in the original Dead Rising.  Told through a series of ‘cases’ that occur over the course of those three days, players must meet the deadlines in order to discover the truth of the outbreak.  Miss even a single event and it’s game over so time management is something of a necessity.  The pacing of the story is far more generous this time around and actually develops in a far more interesting way than what was experienced in Dead Rising.

That being said however there are several problems with the game’s story.  For one, apart from having a main character being a dedicated father and having some pun-tastic lines during cinemas, Chuck really isn’t all that interesting a character.  There’s a lot to be said in that Chuck is meant to be a blank slate character for players to customize or dress-up but when you don’t include moral decision making you’re not allowing this to take place.

Another problem, and probably the most predominant one in the entire game, is the design of the overall story.  Even if you haven’t seen any of the trailers or pre-release marketing for the game you pretty much know from the first time you see a character whether they’ll be good, bad, or end up dead.  Many of these roles too are cookie-cutter in design and are almost completely see-through.  The survivors that you rescue have roughly the same amount of character that Dead Rising’s ones had so there’s been no growth in this department.  It would have been nice to be able to recruit survivors to go out there and help you rescue others but once they enter the safe room they pretty much aren’t leaving.

It is also worth noting that the game, like Dead Rising, has multiple endings based on how you progress through the game.  Players who go the distance and make certain decisions will unlock Overtime mode.  Overtime mode plays out in a similar manner to that of Dead Rising’s in which you are pretty much alone and have to accomplish certain objective to unlock the best ending for the game.  Despite it being the ‘true’ ending to the game the end results are pretty much anti-climatic.  You beat the final boss and walk into the (zombie-filled) sunset without any resolution to many of the questions that come up later in the game.  These questions will most likely be answered in the upcoming Case West epilogue but it would have been nice to have some closure, especially for those who will not be able to purchase this piece of downloadable content.

Zombies Man, They Creep Me Out

Dead Rising set up a new model of zombie-based gameplay four years ago and hearkened the beginning of the zombie game craze we’ve been experiencing since then.  Utilizing a sandbox yet linear story experience, Dead Rising answered the question of how to properly do a zombie game while giving the player a sense of what it’s like to be in the middle of a full-scale zombie outbreak.  There really hasn’t been a game to come along and add on to this style in the four years since the original game’s release so Dead Rising 2 doesn’t have much to compete with.

Fortunately though, despite not having competition to breed innovation with, Dead Rising 2 is more of a refinement of the original formula rather than a reinterpretation.  Retaining the same formula, in-between case events you are pretty much free to do whatever you please and while Frank West had plenty to do in the first game Chuck Greene has just as much if not more to do.  Luckily the pacing of the game is far more generous this time around and allows you to accomplish far more between cases than before.

One of the staple events of the case system is the mandatory event that occurs every morning at 7:00am.  With Chuck’s daughter Katey being infected, she requires a daily dose of Zombrex in order to prevent her from changing from a cute seven-year-old Mega Man addict to a shambling not-so-cute brain eater.  Zombrex is something that is not at all easy to come by: you can buy some at a pawnshop located in many parts of Fortune City but the price increases by the day and it ends up being more cost effective to find it on your own instead of trying to save up enough to buy some.  Some psychopaths and survivors you come across will have some but if you want to go the distance and earn the best possible ending it helps to go explore and find more.

While I don’t rightly understand why it is that some people go crazy in the Dead Rising series, Dead Rising 2’s selection of psychopaths is a nice complement to the original game’s collection.  Many of these are supplements to the villains from Frank West’s adventure, such as Dead Rising 2’s version of the chainsaw juggling clown Adam with child mascot Slappy whose weapons are just as ridiculous.  Even still there are plenty that are completely original such as the bizarre wife-seeking Randy and the praise-seeking cannibal Chef Antoine.  Many of these psychos can be completely skipped if desired and some can actually join you as a survivor if you meet certain conditions.  While preparing for some of these fights are a must, thanks to the game’s save system trial and error the eventual defeat of psychos is assured.

Survivors in Fortune City are probably the scene of one of the greatest and most important improvements made in Dead Rising 2.  While certain survivors were easy rescues in Dead Rising, the majority of them ended up being one of the hardest exercises to do as not only was the AI intent on not following Frank or his instructions they were also prone to simply being too dumb to be allowed to live in a zombie apocalypse.  Luckily this time around the AI has been dramatically improved.  Not only will survivors fight alongside you in a competent manner they will actually follow you and do what you demand of them.  This makes it possible to actually rescue multiple survivors across the map, something that was nigh impossible in the first game.  Thank you Blue Castle for getting this right.

Frank West’s story in Dead Rising was that of a reporter discovering a zombie outbreak and living to tell about it.  As such, photography was a big part of the game’s original formula.  This time around Chuck doesn’t have that ability.  What he does do well is kill zombies and does so in creative fashions.  Replacing the photography aspect of the game are combo weapons which offer increasingly more creative means by which to dispatch the undead horde.  Though the premise of being able to combine two ordinary objects to create an instrument of bloody death seems at first to be a kind of lousy way to replace such a popular game mechanic but it certainly grows on you.  With fifty different weapons you can create and utilize, the combo weapons system is certainly a fun mechanic, though not without its problems.  The durability of these weapons is questionable and usually only last long enough to give you a taste of their abilities before they die off.  Some of them are hit or miss affairs as well as many of the weapons will almost never be utilized by a player.  Certain staples to try out are the Paddlesaw (kayak paddle with a chainsaw), the Defiler (fire axe plus a sledgehammer), and the Heliblade (toy helicopter with a bowie knife).

Fun for Not Just One

One of the largest, and arguably the most desired, feature added to the Dead Rising experience is the addition of multiplayer.  Multiplayer was sadly missing in the previous game but Dead Rising 2 gives the player roughly everything they’d want and more in a multiplayer experience.  The first half of the multiplayer comes in the form of full drop-in, drop out cooperative play.  Though limited to online-only play, co-op allows you to drop in your Chuck that you’d been building in your campaign (story elements are not saved for the joining partner) ala Borderlands and help someone else out in their campaign.  Having a partner significantly decreases the trial and error nature of the game and makes for a more entertaining experience all around but there still is something to be said for experiencing the campaign alone.

The other half of the online experience is the Terror is Reality game show Chuck participated in at the start of the game.  Consisting of eight different events, up to four players can compete to earn cash that can be used in their own campaign.  The most notable ones are actually vehicular in nature with the biggest standout being Ramsterball which has you squishing zombies by the horde from within a giant hamster ball.  Though there is very little reason to actually play Terror is Reality other than to accumulate extra cash it is a fun diversion from the singleplayer antics.

Network issues are abound right now but given that this is launch week we can probably look forward to a fix for these soon.

Send More Paramedics

Dead Rising was a first year title for the Xbox 360 and as such as limited in scope and design.  The first game to utilize Capcom’s MT Framework engine, it was still a pretty looking game with, well, an ugly protagonist (though Frank’s final design was a significant improvement on his original).  With Dead Rising 2 however Blue Castle decided to utilize a custom engine (MT Framework has been restricted until recently to in-house development teams).  The results?

For the lack of a better pun, the new engine hits the classic Dead Rising feeling dead on.  Though the camera has been drawn in just a bit it is dynamic and can shift away from the player in certain situations such as being surrounded by a pack of zombies.  Animations in the game look exactly like they did in the first game though admittedly Chuck at first is a bit slow and lumbering.  This changes as you level up the character but it does give the impression that he is slower overall than Frank was.  The on-screen zombie count, amounting to a strong eight hundred at a time in Dead Rising, has been upped to a tremendous seven thousand in the new game.  Though you never see anything near that number you do get a sense of the engine being capable of that, especially when playing in an area at night.

With every custom engine though come some quirks however and Dead Rising 2 is no exception.  Certain sections of the game can chug along at strange parts of the game and there is noticeable pop-in but it is certainly not gamebreaking.  One issue that has afflicted this writer is that, upon installation to the Xbox 360 hard drive the game tends to take as much as ten seconds before initiating loading and saving operations.  In game this isn’t a problem when loading up individual sectors of the map but at the main menu it can take a noticeable amount of time.  Despite multiple reinstallations the problem still persists.  This is probably an isolated issue but it makes me question whether the game was optimized for hard drive installation versus disc streaming.

Chop Till You Drop

Dead Rising 2 is a game with almost no competitors when compared by gameplay formula.  In an age in which zombie games are becoming as commonplace as World War II games were less than a decade ago it is still surprising that no one has developed on Capcom’s original formula.  Despite that, Dead Rising 2 is a great refinement on the first game and is a near-required play for zombiholics.  It is fair to argue that Dead Rising 2 is to Dead Rising what Assassin’s Creed II was to Assassin’s Creed and if you understand how much an improvement that game was then you most certainly understand how strong a product this is.