Return to the Deep (Part 1 of 2)

With the release of XCOM: War of the Chosen, I find myself wondering what (if anything) Firaxis has planed for the XCOM franchise.  My hope is they come around to the idea of taking the action underseas like they did for the sequel to the original.  For all I know the developers have considered everything I'm going to mention here, but I thought it might be fun to go over some potential features a Terror from the Deep remake (or re-imagining) could entail.

Generally speaking, water is 800 times more dense than air.  This fact alone has dramatic influence on the nature of any combat that might take places in such an environment.  Squad-based weapons and tactics that work well on land have to be adjusted or replaced entirely when fighting in the ocean depths.  If you've seen movies such as "Leviathan", "DeepStar 6", "The Sphere", or most significantly "The Abyss", it's easy to see how there is a certain methodical deliberateness to every movement and action taken.  That might sound like a negative (reducing the pace and intensity of the action), but in a turn-based strategy game I think it fits rather well.  Teams operating in small units of 4~6 individuals makes a lot more sense under water (where oxygen consumption is an ever-present concern).

Another feature that can be re-emphasized is the horror aspect of XCOM games.  It's a feature that faded away in XCOM 2, but could make a big comeback because fighting a war hundreds of meters under the surface is a terrifying proposition.  The darkness, the cold, and the crushing pressure all add up to an unwelcoming environment.  Throw hostile aquatic aliens into the mix and you have a great recipe for creating some serious anxiety and fear.  The aliens don't even need to be particularly unnatural looking.  Real sea life such as lantern fish, Gulper Eels, goblin sharks, and spider crabs are already creepy as is.  Just modify their designs a bit (perhaps because the aliens have combined them with human DNA) and you've created high-octane nightmare fuel.

Stealth and detection could also be expanded on in interesting ways, both tactically and strategically.  Sunlight doesn't penetrate to the deeper parts of the ocean and even shallow places are poorly illuminated at night.  Electric lamps, underwater flares and chem-lights are pretty much a given, but these methods of improving visibility are somewhat hampered by rapid light absorption that aren't in the blue/green spectrum, as well as diffusion caused by turbidity.  Obviously, acoustic detection pays a very big roll in underwater surveillance, whether it be passive (listening) or active (sonar).  Much like actual submarine warfare, this could lead to some interesting gameplay dynamics involving back-and-forth cat-and-mouse situations.  One could send out pings and risk detection, but potentially find a target...or stay silent and hidden, but possibly unable to locate a target.  A significant portion of the research tech-tree could be dedicated to improving detection systems as well as countermeasures.  In terms of infrastructure, the player would build and deploy listening buoys in various sea zones rather than satellites over continents.

As for the battlefields in which tactical engagements take place, one might be inclined to think they would be flat and boring.  While it's true that much of the ocean floor is relatively flat and featureless, the areas in the game need-not-be.  Sunken shipwrecks, coral reefs, kelp forests, hydro-thermal vents, and underwater ruins are just some of the spots battles could take place.  I rather like the idea of a mission taking place under a polar icecap with columns of frozen water extending from the pack ice on the surface down to the ocean floor...or perhaps a storm-wracked shoal at night with flashes of lightning penetrating the churning seas overhead.

Surprisingly, real-life firearms can work underwater provided some modifications to the design are made.  Even so, it's oftentimes more desirable to used compressed air rather than chemical explosives to launch projectiles.  Ammunition can also vary a great deal.  Everything from harpoons and spears down to bolts, darts and flechettes have potential uses.  More exotic armaments could include sonic or electric devices, as well as psi-based weaponry.  As for things that go boom, it would be pretty easy to substitute rockets and grenade launchers with mini-torpedoes and lancejet (an underwater variant of gyrojet) bombs.  Underwater blasts tend to have more powerful shock waves than their above-water counterparts, but do not throw shrapnel out nearly as far.  In game-terms this might mean more damage, but in a smaller blast radius than on land.  Close combat in Terror from the Deep came in the form of power drills for XCOM aquanauts and giant pincers for the aliens.  In reality, there is a fairly lethal underwater melee weapon called a "powerhead".  As silly as it sounds shrimp have surprisingly powerful punch that, if scaled up to a larger size, could be deadly to humans.  Capturing live foes could be handed by a net launcher or tranquilizer dart gun.  A submersible equivalent of the SHIV would make for a great unmanned support vehicle (particularly for the purposes of scouting).

Merry Xmas!

Here's a Christmas-themed video game story.  Dwarf Fortress is the game, and it comes courtesy of Youtuber (and all around nice guy) Kurggsmash:

Let'em Age

It's a commonly held belief that the flavor of wine improves with age.  While true for a few specific kinds of wine, such as Cabernet Sauvignon, the vast majority only really benefit from the first six months to a year of mellowing.  So, what does any of this have to do with video games?  Well...games, much like wine, aren't always ready for consumption when their bottled up and sent off to market.  Early access titles are the most obvious analogy, but there are many other titles that claim to be finished products when in fact they are in dire need of bug fixes, balance tweaks or simply additional content.  In some instances though, waiting doesn't result in a better game because the support team has moved on to other assignments or the post-launch funding dried up.  Regardless of the particulars, there a few games that (much like fine wine) just need some more time to realize their full potential.  Here are three such examples.

Phoenix Point, brainchild of Julian Gollop (creator of the original XCOM series) has recently moved from early access to full-priced retail game.  However, it's still rough around the edges.  Nothing here that can't be fixed with a few patches, but it will probably take some time to get right.  Combine that with the large amount of DLC in the works, plus a planned console port of what is currently an Epic Game Store exclusive, and it's not hard to imagine this game being a vastly better piece of entertainment software in a year or two.

Control feels a lot like a cross-gen game in that the rendering engine is being held back by the limitations of available hardware.  Granted there are a few PC enthusiasts out there with really high end graphics cards able to do proper ray tracing, but for console owners no such option exists.  Next-gen Xbox and PS5 both promise to support ray tracing though, so waiting until the hardware becomes a more affordable mass-market feature is probably a good call.  Oh...and the game also has two paid expansions in the development pipeline.

Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order is a typical example of media tie-in games having to comply with the timetable of the franchise they are based on.  In this case EA and Disney mandated that the game launch before the release of "Rise of Skywalker," the IX mainline film and final installment in the new trilogy.  Needless to say, it wasn't quite ready.  A number of minor bugs, annoying glitches and pervasive jankiness marred peoples enjoyment of the game to varying degrees.  Despite those issues, the game has received a lot of praise with regards to story and mechanics, so I'm sure Respawn Entertainment will get things cleaned up in due time.

There's an old saying that goes "patience is virtue," but when it comes to incomplete video games I'd argue that waiting is just common sense.  In all three of the examples I've sighted, each game will almost certainly be cheaper, less buggy, and more fun to play next year than now.  Then again, who am I to tell you not to drink red wine when it's rough and raw?     

Adventures in Undertaking

Warning: Mild gameplay spoilers follow for Death Stranding up to about midway into chapter 5.

After the second boss battle in Death Stranding, the protagonist (Sam) finally gets access to proper firearms.  No more having to fend off would-be thieves with fists, stun bombs, decoy luggage cases, and that weird-looking bola launcher.  Now the tables have turned, I though.  Normally, I avoid the MULEs (literal cargo cultists who harry Sam whenever he intrudes on their territory).  However, I had an order to carry out; six stolen parcels that needed to be recovered from a MULE base.  Not a problem, I confidently proclaimed.  I have a freshly printed assault rife at my disposal if things get hot.

Things got hot pretty quickly.  The MULE base was on flat ground with little in the way of places to hide.  A patrol truck full of MULEs spotted me when I tried to sneak in...so I opened fire.  Now, I should mention that I was playing Death Stranding with a 5.1 surround sound system...and said system (for whatever reason) was set to a high volume for ambient sounds (like gunfire), but low for the center voice channel.  Die-Hardman was saying something to me over the com, but I couldn't hear him above the roar of automatic weapons fire.  No time to read subtitles either...too busy shooting MULEs.  By the time the dust settled there were 13 dead MULEs and BB-28 (Sam's Bridge Baby) throwing a fit.  Apparently the little guy isn't a fan of mass murder.  So, basically BB-28 went catatonic.  Nothing I can't fix later, I said to myself as I leisurely gathered up the packages I needed to complete the order.  It was only then that the I realized all those dead bodies had to be disposed of.  Otherwise, they would become ghosts ("BTs") and potentially unwanted explosions ("voidouts").  Well, crap...I guess I got to clean up this mess, I muttered.  I didn't know where the crematorium was on the second, larger map.  After looking it up on the internet though, I realized that it was beyond an area I had been avoiding because it was crawling with BTs.

I went through the tedious task of putting six of the thirteen corpses in body bags and loaded them into a requisitioned MULE truck.  Bodies are heavy and floppy which makes carrying them a pain even with a power skeleton attached to Sam's legs.  Eventually, I headed out only to quickly realize I wasn't going to make it to my destination without BB-28's help.  I needed the Bridge Baby's ghost-sensing ability to slip past that BT infested area.  Only one option available; rest in a private room.  As it turns out, people working in distribution centers don't approve of me parking a truck full of corpses out front while I take a rest inside their facility.  To be precise, it came out to minus one-thousand likes...ouch!  On the plus side though, they did dispose of those six bodies that were in the truck.  I still had seven more (getting riper by the minute).  Better get to it now that BB-28 is back in action, I declared.

I drove the (then) empty MULE truck back to the camp and bagged up the other seven bodies, loaded up six of them, and left the last one behind.  With BB-28's assistance, I managed to avoid the BTs for the most part...had to floor the truck around a final pair waiting in ambush.  The ghosts were out of the way, but I had a new problem - timefall.  It was raining hard and these junky MULE trucks have open tops that don't protect cargo from degradation.  Those containers I had taken back from the MULEs were rusting real bad.  So, I parked the truck, jumped out, and zapped everything in the back with a repair spray.  No sooner had I taken care of that problem than I realized I had yet another - I was almost out of juice.  The battery indicator for the truck was in the red.  "Almost run dry," Sam said (echoing my own thoughts at the time).  I managed to feather the accelerator enough to limp truck, bodies and cargo out of the rain before stalling on a uphill.  Suddenly, I have (what I thought was) a brilliant idea.  I'll just set up a charging station using a spare PPC that I have attached to my suit...except I'm off the grid...CRAP!

Here is an excerpt of my train of thought at this particular juncture:

Well...the crematorium isn't exactly far, but it isn't all that close either when you got six bodies to deliver and can only haul them one at a time on foot.  By the time I've ferried each of them to the incinerator the one I left behind at the camp will certainly have popped....unless...I have one of those floating carriers in the truck and much to my surprise it can accommodate two corpses.  With a third on my back, that means I only have to make two trips instead of six.  

Even so, it was hard going.  I somehow managed to wear out two pairs of boots, but I made both round trips and dispose of all six bodies.  On my way back from the the second trip I noticed the MULE truck has partially auto-recharged it's battery so I used it to limp back through BT territory.  The battery died again soon after though, so I ditched it and grabbed an abandoned reverse trike.  Racing back to the camp, I snatched up the last corpse and took it to the crematorium.  All told, it took about one full hour of real-world time.  Before I left the area, I decide to hook up the local shelter to the network...and low-and-behold what do they give me?...blueprints for a non-lethal assault rife...

Well, time to get that rusted out MULE truck recharged so I can drive the cargo stowed in the back to the distribution center and complete the order that started this mess to begin with...oh...and good thing there aren't really any cops in Death Stranding because some guy hauling a bunch of dead bodies in back of an open truck isn't exactly a good look even if you claim to be a de facto undertaker.

Difficulty with Transparency

A conversation I've seen coming up a lot on video game forums and in gaming related podcasts has to do with the difficulty settings in Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order.  Specifically, the game is surprisingly up front in explaining in detail how (and in what ways) each setting affects the experience.  It's a nice change of pace considering nine times out of ten, games only give some generic explanation that goes something like this:

• Easy - for players unfamiliar with the franchise/genre
• Normal - the default setting
• Hard - for veteran players who desire a real challenge

Easier-than-easy (if it exists at all) usually has some text about being for players who just want to enjoy the story, while harder-than-hard tends to have the word "masochist" somewhere in the description.  If a player wants to know concrete facts about how each difficulty setting adjusts the gameplay, they are often forced to look it up on a wiki page or consult with others on a message board.  To put it bluntly, this is a bad system that can tarnish the experience.  The original Halo was famously way more fun on the hardest difficulty setting because it encourage players to engage with the full breadth of the mechanics in the game.  Conversely, many strategy games seem to shed a lot of their gameplay elements at higher difficulty settings because anything other than a narrow and highly optimized approach is guaranteed to result in failure.

Obviously, the solution here would be to explain everything upfront.  Even so, there might be problems in terms of granularity.  It's not uncommon to see differences in difficulty do things like reduce enemy damage, accuracy and health all at once, while simultaneously boosting player resilience and damage output.  Compound this with tweaks to AI behavior, and the result is a massive change due to the way subsystems interact.  One way too avoid the problem of having one setting being too easy and the next being too hard, is to have custom difficulty settings.  I really preferred playing Golden Eye on my N64 with enemy accuracy turned way down, but enemy damage cranked up to the max.  I think these setting options make for a very tense, but not necessarily frustrating experience.  I'm also not a fan of bullet-sponge enemies so whenever possible I like to adjust the setting to remove that annoyance as well.

To some degree, players have to know what they are getting into.  Otherwise how are they supposed to know what settings would best suit their play style.  It's kind of a chicken-or-egg paradox.  Regardless, a lack of flexibility is almost always a determent in the long run.  The RTS genre serves as a particularly good example of why transparency and customizable difficulty options are important.  Nobody likes cheating AI in games that don't have asymmetric gameplay.  It can feel really unfair when computer controlled opponents can build new units without having to expend resources or wait on construction timers.  In the past, I would sometimes play games like Starcraft and Homeworld against bots, but never above the medium difficulty setting (the cutoff point for AI cheats).  If I wanted a more challenging (but still mechanically balanced) experience, I would just add more AI opponents.  The difference between one cheating AI opponent and several that have to play under the same constraints as the player might seem irrelevant.  Once you get past that first glance though, employing tactics like divide-and-conquer or strategic raids against resourcing operations are only feasible if the AI doesn't cheat.

I tend to look to XCOM and the mod making community (in particular) as an example of modular difficulty done right.  Being able to check a variety of boxes that customize the overall experience is a great feature to have available in pretty much any game.  That said, sliders are also nice.  Whatever the case may be though, developers need to get away from the needlessly opaque labels of "easy," "medium" and "hard."           

Find the Fake

...and the answer is the last one.

2019 Award Winners

It's a bit early this year, but the list is complete and there aren't really any major game releases until 2020.  So, without further ado here are the winners.

Avant-garde Award:

Say what you will about Hideo Kojima, the guy is always trying new things.  In the case of Death Stranding, he has taken the walking sim genre and melded it with the likes of Spintires and Truck Simulator to beef up the gameplay in what would have otherwise been a purely story-driven experience.  Some of the concepts work better than others, but I'm sure there are video game developers that will find inspiration in his latest work.


Backlash Award:

Bioware Studios has done a lot to squander consumer goodwill in recent years.  No more so though than in the case of Anthem.  A botched launch, poor subsequent support, and little to no transparency haven't done much to alleviate concerns over this game and, frankly, the future of Bioware itself.  While I don't know if it deserves all the ire it has gotten there has been a definite lack of new content and story progression.  Of course, it's probably hard to come up with a plan moving forward when the project managers keep quitting. 

Brutality Award:

Conspicuously absent for the last couple of years, this award category has made a triumphant return with Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice...or in my case a whole lot more times than that...ugh...dragon-rot everywhere!  Having played every Souls game and Bloodborne, I can confidently say this is the hardest FromSoftware game to date.  No amount of grinding for levels will avail you here.

Canvas Award:

Overland definitely has some areas of the game that could stand a bit more improvement.  That said, one thing it does excel at is visual presentation (particularly with regards to color pallets).  I especially enjoyed the contrast between warmer tones for stuff like fire, life and all things human against the cold and unwelcoming glow of the alien interlopers.  The game also starts off with a nice vibrant autumn sunset, but as the game progresses the look changes to the drained and bleached black and whites of invasive "reefs." 

Ecology Award:

Aside from the fact that it copies all the sights and sounds you'd expect in a Stars Wars game, Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order reuses quite a few gameplay elements found in other third-person action/adventure games.  A lot of reviewers have mentioned Dark Souls, but that's just scratching the surface.  This game is really a Frankensteinian amalgamation of mechanics found in the Zelda, Uncharted, Tomb Raider, and Prince of Persia franchisees, as well as the the Metroid Prime series.

"Engrish" Award:

English is a hard language to master, especially for non-native speakers.  That said, there's something special going on in Spaceland with lines like "you came here and you'll regret it!" and "for how long have I been in the sickbay?" It's as if these lines of dialogue were written by someone who was trying to impersonate what an American would sound like. "I'm a famous explorer of the farthest reaches of the galaxy."  Indeed, I can tell you've been away from home for a long, long time.

Esoteric Award:

It seems straightforward enough; roll dice and apply the results to cards.  Except the number of dice and variety of cards increase over the course of the game as do the available character classes and starting conditions for each dungeon.  Combine that with procedural generated elements and the strategy aspect turns into one of those probability equations that increase exponentially as the variables keep piling on until it overwhelms even the most analytical mind.

Lemon Award:

Fallout 76 won this exact same award last year, but I cannot give it to any other game; Australia forcing refunds, broken premium services, patches creating new bugs and re-instating old ones (plus making the game more of a grind), pay-to-win features despite claims the contrary, "real-life bugs" ranging from helmet mold to non-canvas bags.  The list goes on and on for a game so janky it even broke my award system.

Testosterone Award:

A kind of sci-fi spiritual successor to the more fantasy themed Slain: Back from Hell, Valfaris has just as much gore, twisted architecture and heavy metal music as its predecessor.  The whole look and feel of the game seems like it was pulled directly from sketches in some head-banging high schooler's notebook...and your female AI companion is a naked floating hologram wreathed in green flame because why not? 


Underdog Award:

The original Pathologic was one of those games that has lots of great ideas, but fumbles when it comes to executing on them.  Pathologic 2, on the other hand, fixes pretty much everything that was a problem in the original and gives the entire presentation a massive upgrade in terms of graphics.  Sadly, poor sales have resulted in hard times for the developer.  As is, only about a third of the game is story complete.  Hopefully, the Pathologic IP can gain enough of a following to fully realize the world envisioned by its creator.

Best Avoided

There are certain enemies in certain games that are a real pain to deal with.  Among those there a small select few that are downright panic inducing for some.  The first time I can remember it happening was when a friend of mine freaked out upon encountering a band of monks in the original Bard's Tale...needless to say it didn't end well for him.  I've heard people online claim that the psychic monkeys in System Shock 2 or headcrabs in Half-life 2 trigger a similar reaction, one of primal fear.  While I've never been all that upset by any particular type of video game enemy, there are a few that I have learned to dread.  Here's three in particular...

From Demon's Souls to Sekiro, Hidetaka Miyazaki has a knack for creating monsters the get under your skin (figuratively, and sometimes literally...).  The "winter lanterns" in Bloodborne can kill the player's character simply by holding line-of-sight with them for a short period of time.  Personally though, I feel like that enemy (troublesome as it may well be) is not nearly as bad as the croaking basilisks in Dark Souls.  Normally, when one dies in Dark Souls it's a slap on the wrist, but being struck down by a basilisk results in being cursed - a status effect that does not go away upon subsequent deaths.  It's a pretty big debuff and not easily removed although it does have a few minor perks as well.  Even so, in a game known for its punishing difficulty being cursed is the last thing most players want.

XCOM has earned a reputation for being quite challenging early on.  One of the most difficult parts of the game is the first terror mission involving chryssalids.  Believe it or not there was an even worse kind of enemy in XCOM: Terror from the Deep, the "tentaculat."  Basically a big floating brain with a beak and tentacles, the tentaculat bears a strong resemblance the the "grell" found in the table-top RPG Dungeons and Dragons.  Gameplay-wise, they are tough and have a high movement rate, as well as the ability to move vertically or horizontally.  Their form of attack is identical to a chryssalid's zombification, complete with hatching a new tentaculat upon death.  I had a full squad of veteran aquanauts nearly wiped out  by just a couple of these things...bad times.

The last example comes from Dwarf Fortress (a game I've been playing quite a bit as of late).  No, it's not the werebeasts.  Yes, those things can destroy an entire fort if proper quarantine procedures are not put into effect, but the enemy that has caused me the most grief is those accursed "bogeymen."  Fast, hard to hit, and likely to ambush the player anytime they travel alone at nigh, I have lost more good adventures to these guys than I care to count.  Needless to say, I'm glad the next version of Dwarf Fortress will be giving them a much less ubiquitous roll in the the game.  Although, it's my understanding that they might be even more deadly...

Hammerspace

The title of this blogpost is a term derived cartoons.  Particularly, instances where a character produces an item or object far too large to have been concealed on their person.  Often times this would come in the form of a mallet pulled seemingly out of nowhere.  Where did that come from?  For all intents and purposes it was tucked into some kind of pocket dimension, accessible to a particular individual at a moment's notice.  The old table-top RPG Dungeons and Dragons had a similar concept with the magical "bag-of-holding," essentially, a container that drastically downsizes anything places within.  Video games designers were quick to adapt the concept of hammerspace into their games, but I don't think they were ever (generally speaking) entirely comfortable with the concept.  Space Quest III's narration text, "You shove the ladder in your pocket."  Followed by the word "Ouch!" was the first instance I can recall a designer pushing back on the absurdity of it all, albeit for laughs.  So, why are game developers willing to turn a blind eye to something that is completely unrealistic on a fundamental level.

The simplest answer is they are not.  In fact, I get the impression that a lot of thought and energy has gone into trying eliminate hammerspace.  One of the most common solutions is an encumbrance system.  These weight limits were fairly ubiquitous in early table-top RPGs and (unsurprisingly) ended up being incorporated into a lot of CRPGs.  In more recent years, the concept has fallen out of fashion (Demon's Souls is the last game I've played that used it).  One of the problems with an encumbrance system is it still doesn't really reflect reality in that players can still haul way more stuff on their characters than would ever be humanly possible.  In some cases this would result in hilarity in games like Diablo and Dungeon Siege, causing a massive explosion of dropped equipment all over the screen when a player character was killed.  Another big problem with abstractly measuring weight is it doesn't account for bulk.  Some objects (say, for example, a big bag of fluffy cotton) aren't particularly heavy, but do take up a lot of physical space. 

One way to simulate both weight and volume is with inventory tetris.  It can be found in games like Betrayal at Krondor, Resident Evil 4 and Dead Space.  Again, it isn't a popular solution among gamers though it is perhaps a bit closer to reality.  The problem with such a system is instances where an object is very small but incredibly dense, such as a bar of gold.  Oddly enough, the original XCOM (released way back in 1994) had a system that accounted for both space and weight - calculating burden against the strength of the carrier and adjusting movement rates accordingly.  Even so, the system had its quirks.  Armor (or lack there of) was not factored into weight restrictions and a 80 item limit on missions was the result of programming limitations rather than some kind of lift capacity on the in-game air transport craft.

Taking a step back, it's easy to see why a lot of game developers give into the temptation of hammerspace.  Managing inventory is a tedious task and in loot-driven games can be an outright punishment in that it forces players to leave valuable booty behind.  That is unless a core aspect of the fun is logistical planning.  Darkest Dungeon, Astroneer and most recently Death Stranding are built around making important decisions based on limited inventory capacity.  In an interesting case of reverse cross-media influence the table-top RPG Torchbearer uses an inventory slot system very similar to what was invented in video games.  Another instance where this sort of restraint can be interesting is in the case of equipment definingly the character's role.  Some FPS games let the player carry all the guns, but others such as those in the Halo series force the player to decide on a class (made up of two guns) and stick to it.  An alternative approach might be to make encumbrance restrictions adjustable in the options menu, or perhaps tied to the difficulty setting.  Regardless, the takeaway here is developers that don't want hammerspace need to integrate the limitation in a positive way rather than a negative one.

A great example of how not to do it is Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild.  Weapons degrade as they are used, and certain weapons are more effective against certain types of enemies.  This incentivises the player to carry a lot of (and a wide variety of) weapons.  However the game places a strict cap on the number of weapons Link can carry.  It should be noted that the number is (even at its lowest) still more than what is realistic.  Instead of this neither-here-nor-there system, a much more enjoyable approach would be to tie weapon usage into some kind of progression system.  Want the player to use more variety?  Give an EXP boost based on cooldown timers, or number of times used.  Want players to haul around fewer weapons?  Provide a stat boost (speed, damage, stamina, health, etc.) if they carry below a certain limit.

In truth, I don't mind hammerspace as a concept.  The "Tain" in the Myth series or "Dite" in Metal Gear Survive hint at the storytelling potential of having an in-fiction pocket dimension.  Alas, the vast majority of the time hammerspace it just hit points of a different color - concepts overused by developers because they lack the creativity to come up with an innovative alternative.     

One Straw too Many

Aside from the Homeworld series Warcraft and Starcraft were some of my favorite RTS games growing up.  For whatever reason I never got into Diablo (although my brother did).  I also never played World of Warcraft because, as I have stated in the past, I'm not a fan of MMORPGs.  As one might guess, I haven't been very interested in Blizzard's more recent releases either; Hearthstone?...pass.  Overwatch?...No, thanks.  Even Starcraft II failed to get my attention since so much design focus was placed on the E-sports side of things.  Still, I always held onto a glimmer of hope that the studio would return to the aspects of their games that interested me the most.  Sadly, ever since Blizzard was bought out by Activision, I feel like whatever talent the studio had remaining simply disappeared.

It's something that really began to show at the last Blizzcon with Wyatt Chung's rhetorical question, "Do you guys not have phones?"  In other words, their focus had become totally fixed on mobile platforms, microtransactions and tapping into the Chinese marketplace.  My understanding is that China is an especially lucrative place for video game companies, not just in terms of new player potential but a lack of stigma when it comes to loot boxes and pay-to-win gameplay elements.  Those things, along with free-to-play or fee-to-pay games, have become a plague on the industry.  The fun and interesting parts games are inevitably eroded away by more repetitive, more obfuscated, and more addictive gameplay whenever these revenue models are utilized.  It has reached the point now where playing live-service games is about as enjoyable as chain smoking.  Honestly, I don't see why that kind of electronic entertainment should be tolerated any more than regular casinos.  Taking the most unhealthy parts of video games and magnifying them to make a quick buck is as devious as all the glitz and glamour of Las Vegas...yet, despite all the awfulness associated with this industry trend, Blizzard keeps marching toward that golden grail of gambling in video games...piling those straws on that camel's back.  That is until just recently, when a big chunk of wood got chucked on top.

Actually, I'm not alluding to Blizzard laying off a bunch of employees despite record profits.  No, that was a big stick, but "log" I'm referring to here is the banning of Blitzchung by Activision/Blizzard/PRC for taking a pro Hong Kong stance.  It's one thing to be selfish and money grubbing, but quite another to be complacent in denying people basic human rights.  Upsettingly, this isn't even an issue unique Blizzard or the video game industry.  In fact, quite a few American companies such as Apple, Disney and Google (the providers of this very blog hosting service!) have been guilt of disturbingly similar behavior.  I've seen a lot of people trying to frame this as a free speech issue, but I fail to see what's controversial about being for human rights or opposed to hate speech for that matter...It's not taking a political stance so much as having an ounce of moral integrity.  Something a lot of the head honchos and these companies (and the NBA) seem to lack.  It's particularly duplicitous coming from places like Disney, who stylize themselves as being progressive.

Another thing I've seen some people online try to do is claim that this is actually just racism against Chinese people.  While I'm sure that is a motivating factor for some, I don't understand how it invalidates calling out American companies and the Chinese government on their human rights abuses.  Just to be clear, if we were to consider this form of whataboutism valid then it could be used to dismiss any criticism of any institution.  Don't like the way Spain is handling Catalan?  You're just racist toward Spaniards.  Don't like Brexit?  You just hate the Britons.  Don't like the way the American government handles...well...anything recently?  You're just prejudiced against fat, orange men with bad hair - You get the idea.

The camel's back is broken and this has been a long time coming.  Blizzcon is just around the corner and I hope protestors make things truly awful for all those executives and Blizzard and Activision.  I also hope that in the future things become awful for any corporate executive that doesn't have the moral fiber to put fundamental human rights before profit margins.

Halloween Nope

Exhuming the Past

Retro-style graphics are certainly a popular choice among indie game studios.  I have to admit, I have a soft spot for pixel art.  It tends to bring back memories of playing games on my Apple IIc.  Nostalgia aside, there is a good reason to utilize older visual styles in that they tend to be less resource intensive than high-res textures and massive poliginal count 3D objects.  That said, there is one style that might be better left buried.

The original Sony Playstation had some great games and, thanks to its CD-ROM drive, high quality music/sound for the time.  What it didn't have though, was enough memory.  Textures, in particular, were very blocky with a tendency to warp when viewed from certain directions.  The lack of filtering and low polygonal models didn't help things either...even so, there are a few surprisingly nice looking games.  Just last month, I posted some animated GIFs from Vagrant Story that still hold up surprisingly well.  Another game that uses the limited processing power of the PSX to its advantage is the first Silent Hill.  The short draw distance introduces clastrophic aspects of horror by blanketing the player's surroundings in fog or darkness.  The monsters that emerge from the gloom are also murky and shrouded, giving off vague impressions rather than particular details.  It ends up working extremely well in this case because the player's brain is forced to fill in the gaps (a key aspect of the horror genre).

Perhaps influenced by the original Silent Hill, a number of more recent indie horror games have tried to emulate the visual style.  Inspired by a post on the 4Chan message board and made into a game for the Haunted PS1 Summer-Spooks Gamejam in less than 30 days, Lost in the Backrooms is one such example.  Currently, it's available for download over at itch.io for free.  Overall, it isn't a bad game (especially considering the constraints under which it was made), but Lost in the Backrooms does end up feeling a lot like the "Blair Witch" except with a bunch of empty halls instead of a forest.

Another obscurity is Paratopic.  Once again, it's an indie horror title.  The look is very PSX era aside from better draw distances.  There's also a story of sorts (albeit told in a very convoluted manner).  Perhaps that, too, is in the spirit of the original Silent Hill.  There are more examples I could go into: Back in 1995, Vaccine, Banned Memories, Devil Daggers, Garden Variety, Prototype Mansion and Dusk.  However, I think people familiar with the visuals of those games will understand what I'm getting at.  No Gouraud Shading, low-poly rendering and little to no filtering on blocky textures, are the hallmarks here.

Getting back to my original point, the presentation in these games is very...grimy.  The 3D objects are too jagged to have the impressionist vibe of Overland.  Simultaneously, the textures are too muddy and unfiltered to give off the clean simplicity of Grown Home.  I understand that what I'm saying here is highly subjective.  By all means, if PSX era graphics are your prefered aesthetic don't let me ruin your enjoyment.  Some people still like CRT monitors and vinyl record players after all...I, for one though, would be happy if this particular mold-ridden corpse of game presentation was not brought back from the dead in a big way.

First Fortress, Final Year

We're now into our third year, and the amount of migrants has gone from a sporadic trickle to a nonstop flood.  The miners, carpenters, and masons are working like mad to to get enough bedrooms made for everyone.  In addition to that, we have a mayor and captain of the guard demanding sumptuous accommodations for themselves.

On a more positive note, we have converted the old meeting hall into a hospital (complete with soap, beds, splints, crutches, traction benches and a chief medical dwarf).  Our militia has swollen to seven, two of whom are noteworthy.  The first is "Iron Fist" the planter.  He got the nickname after beating a wolverine to death in the strawberry garden with his bare hands.  The other is a newly arrived hunter who has already roused my ire.  Before I assigned him to the military, he took to hunting opossums near the stream with his crossbow.  That was perfectly fine, but one day he decided to bring down a wild mare.  In this endeavor he succeeded by killing just such a horse.  However, an enraged stallion chased him away before he could collect the corpse for butchering.  The image of a dead horse rotting in the sun doesn't sit well with me.  Equine symbols have become synonymous with the fortress.  There are five such statues on display outside, and countless stone figurines of horses have been traded to merchants in exchange for goods...this may well be an ill omen.

We have three more artifacts, two of which are rather unimpressive (a hatch cover and a bone amulet).  The most recent one though is a nice leather shield.  I gave it to Blue Bell...may it guard her well.  There would have been yet another artifact in the fort if not for a lack of desired construction materials.  The dwarf in question was a wood burner who, due to excessive obtuseness, went nuts and attacked our poor bookkeeper while he was on the way to his office.  Another dwarf tried to intervene and suffered a serious leg injury for his trouble.  Eventually, the human hammerman put the berzerk dwarf down for good with a blow to the noggin.  I don't have anyone officially appointed to the position of Hammerer, but it seems this human has preemptively assumed the role.  Overall, the incident was a bad bit of business with two dwarfs now in the hospital and a third dead one consigned to our tombs five z-levels down.

All the new rooms have been carved out so I decided to have the miners do a bit of exploratory digging.  Thus far, the only metal I've found that can be smelted out of all this rock is zinc.  I really need to get some better equipment for my militia so that they'll be ready in the event of a...what's that?

Oh no!  Get everyone underground!  Hurry!  A group of ten goblins has arrived outfitted with iron armor and weapons of iron and silver.  I call out the militia while the goblins are preoccupied with a couple of water buffalo we have (correction, had) in a pasture outside.  Now, here is where I make a serious tactical blunder.  Thinking that the stream will be difficult for the goblins to cross in their heavy armor, I send out the militia to attack while their forces are split on either side of the waterway.  My spur-of-the-moment plan doesn't work at all.  The archer goblins on the far bank let loose volleys of their deadly arrows, hitting one dwarf in the leg (dropping him before he can even swinging his weapon).  There is a brief clash...and my dwarfs are massacred.  Even Iron Fist is helpless against the goblin onslaught...but what's this?  There are only five dead dwarfs.  Where is Blue Bell?  Where is the Beekeeper?

As it turned out Blue Bell was engaged in her favorite off-duty pastime, hauling huge boulders in the mines far below.  She heard the alarm, but for some reason didn't drop the big rock she was carrying.  Hence, she missed out on the disastrous initial skirmish.  As for the Beekeeper...he overslept.  In fact, right after his companions-in-arms were slaughtered he stumbled out the front door (sleepy-eyed) toward the goblins.  I ordered him back inside, but he ignored the command and instead continued his slow advance as surprisingly ill-aimed goblin arrows flew past all around him.  Closing in, he entered a martial trance and hacked left and right as he drove right through their center.  Sadley, the blows from his copper axe couldn't penetrate iron armor.  Even so, two of the goblins were injured by the shear ferocity of his blows.  Then it happened...an arrow hit the Beekeeper in the arm causing him to lose his grip on his axe.  More wounds follow and he perishes after being impaled by a goblin spear...twice!  Poor Beekeeper...he had the heart of a warrior.

The situation has become dire to say the least.  I've ordered the doors locked, but we have no hope of repelling the siege.  With more than seventy dwarfs still inside (including a baby and six children) we have no choice.  The fort must be evacuated.  The question is, how do we get out?  Remember that this fort is built into one of two hillsides with a stream between them.  My miners have managed to dig a tunnel under the flowing water to the other hill.  All they need to do is clear a little more dirt and we'll have a way out.

We've broken through to the surface, and the dwarfs are fleeing out the exit in single file.  The human bard has agreed to lead them to the safety of her hometown not far to the south.  The goblins, who were milling around the front entrance, take notice.  The exodus is taking too long because there are so many dwarfs.  We need more time.  I ask Blue Bell to do the impossible; she must fend off the goblins.  In a bit of comradery the human hammerman joins her.  The goblins approach and many blows are exchanged.  The hammerman goes down despite a heroic effort.  Blue Bell, with bronze spear in hand, strikes down one goblin...then another.  The fighting rages on for awhile, but she is pierced by many goblin arrows...dying much like Boromir in Lord of the Rings.  Her noble sacrifice was not in vain though, the dwarfs have escaped...and while the fort is lost, as long as they survive things can begin again someplace new.  Strike the earth!

Epilogue

So concludes my first attempt at Dwarf Fortress.  Not a bad run, all things considered.  I learned a lot and have already begun a new fort in another world utilizing what I learned from my first try.  Incidentally, I did go back to the fortress in adventure mode to properly entomb the remains of Blue Bell and the Beekeeper.  I figured they deserved that much, at least.  I also found the artifact earring, amulet, and hatch cover, but couldn't recover the leather shield...possibly because the ASCII icon for it looks exactly like any other piece of leather clothing.  While I was looking around near the stream outside the fort, I happened upon a wandering bard.  After chatting for a bit, I gave him the hatch cover.  I didn't have any use for it, but perhaps it will inspire him to share the tale of this fort and the dwarfs that once dwelled within.  

First Fortress, Second Year

Looking through my dwarf's personality traits, it appears that most are polytheistic.  In order to satisfy their spiritual desires I've ordered the construction of a temple complex arranged in a clover shaped layout.  The "petals" are three rooms, each dedicated to a different deity.  I selected the three most popular, but for the rest I added a stairway in the center of the complex that leads down to another chamber for general use.

A human caravan came to trade, and had a variety of interesting items.  We didn't have a whole lot to offer in return, but with our meager bins of semi-precious stones and carved nicknacks we managed to secure some fruits and vegetables...as well as a bar of silver.

No sooner had our trade negotiations with the humans concluded than one of our dwarfs entered a strange mood.  He promptly claimed a workshop and after gathering up quartzite (plus that one bar of silver), got to work on a mysterious construction.  As it turned out, the object was just an earring.  I had it placed on a pedestal just outside the entrance to the temple area.  Even though it's nothing special in terms of value, it is the first artifact made in the fortress.

More migrants...and a lot of them!  We now have a much wider range of skill sets in our labor force: a planter, a lye maker, an armorsmith, a milker a beekeeper and a butcher.  I'm going to have to expand the housing accommodations...since our fort has over twenty dwarfs, I decided to build a tavern too.  The meeting hall just isn't big enough anymore.  The craftsdwarf is hard at work whittling wooden goblets, while the carpenter puts together chairs and the mason carves some stone tables.  We've stocked up quite a few barrels of apricot wine, perry and (of course) beer in an adjacent room.  As for someone to run the place...I decided on the Milker since there aren't any milk producing livestock around anyway.

Our fort now has its first baby boy, and it was the tavern keeper who gave birth.  She must have been pregnant before arriving here.  Less than a week after the little was born though he almost ended up being the first death.  A wolverine spotted him while he was "helping" his mother pick peaches.  The animal must have thought he would make an easy meal.  What followed was a frantic struggle between mother and wolverine while the militia leader rushed out from her newly completed training hall to help.  Incidentally, I gave our military commander the nickname "Blue Bell" owing to her blue pet peacock and the name of our community" (The Bells of Color).  Anyway, Blue Bell still didn't have a proper weapon at that time.  In fact, all she had was a wooden shield.  Apparently, that was all she needed though because she bashed that wolverine to a red paste before collapsing from exhaustion.  Thorin Oakenshield would have been proud.  Among the dwarfs there were surprisingly no injuries.  I should feel relief, but a disturbing thought crept into my head...what if that wasn't an ordinary adult wolverine, but rather the young offspring of something far larger?

More migrants have arrived, and after trading with some dwarf merchants, I've decided to add two more citizens to the militia: a hunter (armed with an elven bow) and the Beekeeper (who has some talent with an axe).  Hunting is unnecessary at the moment, what with all the fish we're catching, and the Beekeeper has been unlucky with the six hives we placed outside for him.  It's my understanding that wax and honey aren't especially lucrative industries at the moment anyhow so perhaps military service is for the best.

Humans have come to visit in the past (no doubt to sample the booze).  However, two in particular wish to join The Bells of Color.  I agreed despite some unspoken reservations on my part.  One of them is a bard with a beautiful singing voice and a knack for telling interesting stories.  The other is a soldier armed with a warhammer so big it would make a troll blacksmith blush.  Speaking of trolls, there's a bridge going over the stream now that would make a good home for one.  I also decorated it with a few horse statues in various poses.  It seems to have gotten the attention of some real horses.

Sometimes I really hate being right.  A giant wolverine attacked a fisher dwarf as he was returning to the fort with his catch of the day.  It bit his leg so he punched it in the head.  Then it bit his arm.  So he punched it in the head again with his uninjured arm.  That gave the beast pause.  Although the fisher dwarf was too badly hurt to make an escape his ferocious defense bought enough time for the militia to come to his rescue.  The Hunter put at least a half-dozen arrows in the giant wolverine before the Beekeeper closed in and dealt it several harsh blows with his axe.  Once again though it was Blue Bell who got the kill, this time, with a bronze sword.  Overall, everyone seemed more upset by the rain (which began falling) than the vicious animal attack.  Dwarfs....     

First Fortress

As you have probably noticed, I've been mentioning Dwarf Fortress a lot  in recent blog posts.  Well...the reason for all that is I have been trying to teach myself how to play the game.  I gave adventure mode a shot for awhile, but (after getting devoured by a pack of boogeymen) decided to move onto fortress mode.  After watching Kruggsmash's crash course introduction video, I was able to get off to a decent start.  So, with respect to Dwarf Fortress tradition, here's my story.

Year One 

According to the map selection screen, the place I have chosen is a savannah region; a temperate zone tucked up against the mountains where a stream winds between two hills.  I decided on the slope that was closer to the wagon and had our miner get to work.  The dormitory, farm, brewery, and meeting room all came together fairly quickly.  For fun, I had my seven dwarfs chase down a wild hare.  What ensued was a re-enactment of the famous Monty-Python-and-the-Holy-Grail white rabbit battle.  One dwarf, in particular, was bitten no less than six times.  Thankfully, none of the bites drew blood.

There's no shortage of quality or variety when it comes to lumber here: walnut, willow, apricot and ginkgo are everywhere.  There's also a particularly large peachtree growing out of a shoulder of land just above the hillside entrance.  Its branches extend nine z-levels above the trunk, and the roots go at least three z-levels down.  Just before the end of spring the banks of the stream became white.  For a second I thought is was snow (as absurd as that sounds), but as it turned out there's actually just a lot of cotton grass in the area.

We have a pair of fisher dwarfs who have had a lot of luck catching river trout.  Birds-of-prey and herds of horses frequently visit us.  One of the cats we brought along has become a legendary climber while the other has proven to be quite the mouser, catching several rats and even a frog.

While the carpenter's workshop has been cranking out tables, chairs, barrels, bins, beds and doors, the miner has been digging down through dirt and sand to the bedrock.  It's mostly quartzsite, but there are traces of cobaltite, sphalerite and cinnabar.  I had the stonemason get started in his new workshop.  I have a special request for him.  The merchants came, but sadly we didn't have anything to trade.  After the fact, I asked our resident craftsdwarf to make a couple dozen quartzsite figurines.  My intent is to trade them away the next time a caravan arrives.  The image I chose was of a dwarf contemplating his pickaxe in outstretched hands.  Incidentally, I saw our expedition leader walking around with one in hand before going to bed.  Maybe, for dwarfs, these things are the equivalent of plush toys?

Two new migrants arrived.  One of them has a pet blue peacock following her.  This new arrival has the occupation of "fish dissector," but her skill set mostly consists of combat abilities.  I put her in charge of the militia since we already have enough dwarfs fishing right now.  There aren't any good weapons lying around right now though so I hope trouble doesn't rear its ugly head...speaking of rearing, that special stone carving project has been finished by the mason.  It's a statue of a horse rearing triumphantly.  I had it placed by the trunk of the peachtree that overlooks the fortress entrance.

Fall has come and we have no shortage of fresh fruit.  The brewer has gotten to work making peach cider, which will please more than a few dwarfs.  I've heard more than a little grumbling about having to drink the same old grog all the time.  Down bellow our miner and mason have been working on more permanent accommodations.  So far we have nine smoothstone bedrooms complete with doors, cabinets, chests and beds (of course) in various states of completion.  I've also assigned our resident craftsdwarf to practice a bit of gem cutting using some semi-precious stones we found.

It's winter and the elves are here to trade.  They don't have much of value, but in the interests of diplomacy we offered some of our figurines in exchange for a bow and some arrows.  Spring can't come soon enough...

Vagrant Story in Action