On the Pile With the Rest

 

Game Preservation

I was recently watching a video about the sound modulation used to voice the robotic Cylons in the original Battlestar Galactica.  As it turns out, the technique was lost to time and had to be reverse engineered by means of digital post-processing mixed with some antique electronics that were cutting edge when the TV miniseries was in production.  The end result was a very close approximation rather than a precise match, overall, the entire endeavor served to illustrate how painstaking it can be to reconstruct something if the method for making the original is forgotten.  When people talk about preservation, especially with regards to skillsets, I feel like they really just want to save on a whole lot of effort somewhere down the line when some as-of-yet-unborn historian or wants to know how his or her predecessors did it.

Worse still are techniques that have not only been erased, but the products are also irrecoverable.  The burning of the Library of Alexandra marked the loss of countless books only known to exist because they are mentioned in other works that managed to survive down through the ages to the present day.  Marie Empress was one of the biggest stars in pre-WW1 Hollywood before vanishing without a trace.  What's more shocking though is the fact that not a single movie she appeared in still exists.  Like so many silver screen films, they have all been deliberately destroyed or eroded into nothingness due neglect.

Presented with these harsh facts, I feel like it isn't really all that difficult to understand why some people have strong feelings toward video game preservation.  Batteries die, circuits fail, monitors burnout, controllers break...it's an inevitable side-effect of age and use, particularly when a lot of these devices were never built to last.  Making digital downloads version of old titles is an optional solution, but requires emulation and, if truth be told a CRT monitor.  There is only one company left that makes these antiquated displays, but they are what old games were designed to be played on and as such the graphics don't match quite right on modern HDTVs.

Of course, all this is peanuts compared to the biggest issue of all.  Companies, either due to neglect or deliberate distain, will ensure their games eventually arrive at an unplayable state. Typically, these sorts of titles are MMORPGs or other games that require an online connection, while simultaneously lacking dedicated server support.  An incomplete list of titles at risk, dead or saved is available here (link).  I should mention that some of these games aren't very good (at least as far as aggravated review scores go), but it's still sad to think that with a little effort from the developers "dead games" wouldn't be a concern.

Another very weird case is games that have received so many updates and patches they only vaguely resemble what they once were.  Stellaris, as of Spring 2021, is almost an entirely different game compared to what it was several years ago at launch.  The same goes for No Man's Sky and Oxygen Not Included.  There was a time when the star voice actor for Destiny was Peter Dinklage.  Now he's nowhere to be heard.  In some games (such as Minecraft) it's possible to revert to older versions fairly easily, but most titles don't receive that amount of support.

So, what all this really comes down to is every single one of these kinds of games needs an end-of-life plan.  What that entails exactly can differ depending on the circumstances.  In one case it might involve releasing the source code, in another it could mean making the game shareware.  Ideally, developers need to put out a final version of the game that allows people who purchased the game to continue to have the ability to play it.  Some people might claim that publishers are just engaging in a bit of double-dipping in the hopes of selling the same game to the same customers (just on a different platform), but as Sony's attempt to kill their PS3 shop on the PSN has shown it's not even about that.  Is it laziness?...Greed?...a simple lack of foresight?...I don't know for sure, but I can say with complete confidence that it comes from a lack of respect for the art form.  Humanity has already made this mistake at least twice before with literature and film.  How about we not make the same mistake a third time with video games?         

Kenji, Come In!

Back in the days of the Sega Genesis (Megadrive, outside the USA) there were some real oddball games. One such example was Bimini Run (often misread as "Bikini Run"), the only title released by Nuvision Software (the company apparently had a few other games in the works, but went belly-up after only three years in the business). Players take the role of "Kenji," a secret agent on a mission to rescue his sister, Kim, who has been kidnapped by the evil Dr. Orca. To help him on his quest, he has a blond-haired bazooka-packing partner named "Luka." Sounds like a cross between James Bond and Miami Vice.

Right after pushing the start button, players can see Kenji and Luka dashing down a pier and into a red-striped power boat as they launch in hot pursuit.  One of Dr. Orca's black and yellow speed boats (not black and white?) is trying to make an escape with Kim onboard.  In this first stage, players must weave around numerous sailboats to close in on their target.  Colliding at any speed results in the instantaneous destruction of Kenji's ride leaving him and his partner floundering in the water.  On the other hand, Dr. Orca's boat can (and does) plow through any vessel that gets in its way - destroying sailboats in fiery blasts while taking no damage in return.  I didn't think it was  possible to outfit a speed boat with a ram bow, but in the 16-bit era it apparently was.  Once players close in they can open fire by pressing either the "A," "B," or "C" button on the controller.  "C" fires up into the air (so, not useful...yet), while "B" sprays rapid fire at surface targets (what kind of bazooka is Luka using?).  "A" is a charged shot that goes farther than rapid fire provided the player holds the button down long enough before releasing.  Shooting up Dr. Orca's boat stops it dead in the water.  Sadly, the boat is a decoy.  Despite this scripted setback though, players advance to the next mission.

The complexity jumps up here somewhat in that the player must now consult maps marked to the brim with islands, reefs and sand bars.  Aside from an interlude around the midpoint (more on that later), gameplay consists almost entirely of motoring from island to island with the assigned goal of knocking out radio towers and lookout posts along the shorelines.  Charged shots are required because rapid fire doesn't go up onto land for some reason.  To complicate matters, lookout posts occasionally shoot back.  What's more, it's possible to run aground which (much like other forms of collision) results in Kenji's boat exploding.  Because of all this its best to line up attack runs using the maps as a guide.  Just in case all that wasn't enough to deal with, there are endlessly spawning Orca boats and helicopters that fire bursts or take potshots respectively.  One hit is all it takes to destroy anything, but thankfully for the player enemy boats are not especially accurate.  A somewhat bizarre feature tied to all this is the inability for the enemy to fire at the player when not on-screen.  In this way it's possible to employ a weird tactic of out-of-sight-out-of-mind to avoid threats even if they are lurking just outside the player's field of view.

This might come as a surprise, but Bimini Run can be played two player in the form of shared screen co-op using two controllers.  One player pilots the boat while the other shoots.  As I recall, the driver can still fire charged shots.  There's also some sort of auto-aiming for firing on airborne targets, but my memory is a bit fuzzy when it comes to the details.  It may have been associated with the difficulty settings...Overall, the gameplay gets repetitive after awhile (except for the aforementioned midgame interlude).

It involves a large number of sea monsters.  Kenji and Luke get lost and the map shows nothing but mist.  Luckily for them a friendly mermaid shows up to act as a guide.  Interfering with all this are various waves of sea monsters (some flying) that, when shot, disappear in puffs of air like punctured balloons.  Perhaps Kenji and Luka inhaled a lot of exhaust fumes coming from the onboard engine?  Whatever the reason for this big-lipped-alligator moment, it offers some unique challenges.  Aside from beating off the hordes of monsters, players must follow the mermaid without getting too close or accidently shooting her.  Doing either scares the mermaid; causing her to dive underwater.  If this happens the Kenji and Luka have to idle about until she re-emerges.

Personally, I feel like Bimini Run was a neat idea.  Essentially, it uses the graphics style of Space Harrier or Super Hang-on but without being constrained to a set track.  If I have one major criticism it's that the endless swarms of enemies and limited fuel do not allow for a more methodical approach.  One other minor quibble I have is that Dr. Orca's secret base looks like nothing more than a hut made of coconut tree trunks and palm fronds.  I guess he blew most of his budget on speed boats and helicopters...even so, the thing I will always remember most about Bimini Run is the dude on the radio that constantly yells "Kenji, come in!" anytime there is a mission update.    

Build Better Battleships

Turrets for turrets sake...

I played Ultimate General: Gettysburg many years ago and enjoyed the time I spent with it.  Despite this, I never got into Ultimate General: Civil War, This Land is My Land, or their Age of Sail game.  For whatever reason though moving the timeframe forward to the ironclad, dreadnought, and battleship era of naval warfare sparked my interest.  Specifically, being able to design the armament, layout and general configuration of various classes of ships holds a great deal of appeal to me.  Since Ultimate Admiral: Dreadnoughts (as it is called) is in early access, I've been holding off buying a copy for myself.  Instead, I decided to watch some gameplay videos uploaded by early adopters.  Sadly, the selection leaves something to be desired.

I suppose the fundamental problem is a lack of content creators.  Of those few who do go to the effort, none appear to have much (if any) knowledge about the time period or naval architecture.  That's not a problem in of itself...after all, one of the major points of this game is to raise awareness and comprehension of the complexities that come with designing warships.  Rather than ignorance on the player's part, my gripe really stems from the "click bait" nature of what's available.  If you want to see banal and impractical then there are plenty of videos to choose from.  Now, I know I'm not alone here, and I have seen some pushback on people complaining about unrealistic designs.  "It is just a game, and why have a build-your-own-warship feature if not to showcase some crazy concepts?"  Those are perfectly valid arguments to make, but don't really address my chief annoyance - the lack of imagination.

It should come as no surprise that the creator of the vessel
uses an anime avatar

A "Double Nelson" or "Super Yamato" might be eye-catching in a Youtube thumbnail, but all we're really looking at here is more and bigger guns.  As far as I can tell, nobody seems to put much thought into speed or protection...let alone combat maneuvers.  I can only think of one person uploading VODs who actually tries to form proper battle lines, cross the enemy's "T" or set up screening formations.  These are basic naval tactics, and I'd love to see someone who combines them with different kinds of armor schemes or top speeds.

Another issue I keep running into is overly large battles.  While this might sound realistic at first (after all, there have been huge fleet combats throughout history) in practice, viewers end up looking at nothing more than a bunch of tiny green and red letter abbreviations scattered across vast swaths of ocean.  When you get down to the nitty-gritty of it, most large fleet actions were really made up of a series of smaller engagements consisting of opposing squadrons or in some cases slugging matches between individual pairs of warships.  In other words, there's no reason not to break these battles down into more manageable and visually interesting clashes.  A HMS Hood versus SMS Bismarck?  Sounds Great!  An early 20th century recreation of the Spanish Armada?  Not so much.  Now, I know some people will read that and think, "but the armada is way more epic!"  Not really...in execution, it amounts to a few ships on either side taking long range potshots at each other for while before finally just drifting apart...most likely to sink in bad weather because the designs are fundamentally incompatible with good seakeeping.

"50 vs. 1" sound like it will end in an epic blaze of glory, but in practice it's a whole lot of stern chasing until everyone runs out of ammo...or patience.  Oh well...if the patrons are happy then who am I to complain?  Still, I hope Ultimate Admiral: Dreadnoughts gets picked up by some players who have the understanding and creativity to show off the game's full potential.               

One-Eighty

It's pretty rare for me to completely change my opinion on a video game, but the aptly named Returnal has done just that.  When playing through this game for the first time, I think it's easy to get the impression that the entire experience is just hallucinations or a dream.  It's a well worn trope used in all kinds of media.  Games are no exception with some recent examples being Rime, Untold Stories, and The Vanishing of Ethan Carter.  However, upon closer examination, that might not be the case with Returnal.

Probably the single biggest indicator that the events of the game aren't all just happening in protagonist's head is the lack of a surprise revelation scene.  There's no pulling back of the proverbial curtain to reveal our heroine, Selene, wearing a straight jacket in a padded cell or a Jacob's Ladder moment where we see her floating facedown in a river.  Even so, there are a number of obtuse hints and tantalizing clues that point toward that and in the opposite direction.

Stepping back and viewing Returnal as a whole, it's not hard to notice a lot of dualities: Dead/Alive, Past/Present, Internal/External, Objective/Subjective.  Even Selene's eye are heterochromatic implying she is part of two separate and distinctly different domains...and yet, as everyone knows, eyes work in pairs.  The lack of concrete information (due to a severe case of unreliable narrator) can lead to contradictions.  Is Selene the daughter of Theia or is she an idealized version of what Theia hoped to become?  At a metaphorical level those two things could be one in the same.

I've seen a lot of back-and-forth online as to whether Helios is Selene's brother or son.  I'm not sure of either, but there might be a third possibility...he could be both.  It's gross and implies an incestuous relationship between Selene and her father (something there isn't much evidence for), but it would be keeping with the ancient Greek thematic elements present throughout the game (an Electra Complex, and all that).  For now though let's forget about it, Jack.  It's Chinatown.

Another duality that exists is the books in Selene's house.  She appears to have a fondness for both science fiction and mythology.  The former is obviously about a speculative future while the latter is about a magical past.  Neither actually exists and yet both coexist in the realm of fiction.  The creators of Returnal have gone on record stating that they are big fans of the cosmic horror subgenre.  The world of Atropos they created also feels like it's comfortably wedged somewhere between "Solaris" and Silent Hill.  The fundamental gameplay mechanic of live-die-repeat, normally an implicit game mechanic, is made explicit here in a way reminiscent of the novel "All You Need is Kill."  If you don't know what I'm talking read the synapsis of the film "Edge of Tomorrow" and that should clarify things a bit.

Moving on...there is the cryptic "White Shadow," something that sounds like yet another contradiction and yet exists in some form.  I've heard theories suggesting that it's a metaphor for the moon, or the name of an old rock song, but I prefer to think of it as the enigmatic astronaut that periodically appears over the course of the game.  Aside from being all white, it has a ghostly quality in that it doesn't seem subject to the constraints of normal time and space.  Could it be the shadow of an object occupying a higher number of dimensions?  That might sound like a stretch, but remember that the true antagonist of this game, Xaos, would fit nicely into the Cthulhu Mythos pantheon.  In particular, it can manipulate space and time in ways incomprehensible to us humans.  Despite having this mind-boggling power, there do appear to be limits as to what it can accomplish.  The Hivemind resists its influence, necessitating the lure that brings Selene to Atropos.

Now, here's were the car accident comes into the story.  Quick tangent: why is always a car accident in these kinds of games?  Soma, Dear Esther, and a few other games I've already mentioned the names of in this blogpost have one as a critical plot point.  People really need to drive more carefully...Anyway, I've read arguments for there actually being two car crashes along with evidence to support this in the form of different looking headlights on the cars seen in the game.  What if, though, these two accidents are the same just with some changes made by Xaos.  That might be pushing things, but I will stress again; it has the ability to manipulate time and space.  By extending its influence back into the past it can alter (but not necessarily rewrite) what comes after.  Again, that probably sounds like it would invite a vast array of contradictions...of which many are present in the game.  Selene is both alive and dead.  She was shot down and she shot herself down.  She was in a car crash and caused herself to crash.  She is dreaming and yet in a real place.  The planet Atropos has been labeled a Sisyphean purgatory by some people on the internet.  I can certainly see why they came to that conclusion.  Visually, it looks at least somewhat inspired by Wayne Barlowe's artbook entitled "Inferno."  Then again, couldn't Atropos simply be a cosmic trap designed to ensnare the damned?  Why not that and some form of afterlife?  From Selene's perspective they might as well be one in the same.  Is she "ascending" by trying to work her way through grief and pain?...or is it by becoming an Astra Scout and leaving it all behind?  Is being "severed" a metaphor for trauma victim?...or does it mean being the tool of an alien god?  Under these bizarre conditions, is there any irreconcilable quality to these pairs of conditions?  

One of the forum threads I visited when preparing to write this had a poll in it asking which theory people ascribed to: "TeamReal," "TeamFake," or "TeamBoth."  I, personally, am going with "Team it-does-matter."  It's not as elegant as the other three, but the inability to put the events if Returnal into nice neat categories - compatible with the bubble humanity resides in - is the essence of cosmic horror.  The fundamental nature of the universe isn't what humans think it is, let alone what it should be.  That aspect of Returnal won me over to it in the end.  Hopefully, I haven't lost any sanity as a result.