NotPopCulture

Challenge One Shelf: Assassin's Creed

2011-05-21T09:50:00.003+01:00

It looked nice.

Is there more to say?

If there is, it's probably on how the game embodies everything that is wrong with modern game design.

As with the majority of games that've been published on the “current-gen” consoles, you could take any fifteen minute chunk, play it in isolation, and be forgiven for thinking, “hey, this is a decent game!”

The trouble is, “decent” spread over ten hours isn't really decent. It's ten hours of doing simple, repetitive, menial tasks over and over again, interspersed with ten hours of watching a limp, uninspiring story. You could instead watch the the Hollyoaks omnibus on repeat, while repeatedly tying and untying your shoelaces, to get much the same effect.

Except, modern game designers don't even trust you to tie your own shoelaces. They worry what would happen if you forget to do a double knot.

So we get Velcro. Nice, safe, child-friendly Velcro. It ensures a uniform shoe-fastening experience for all. No-one gets left behind.

But almost everyone is bored.

Challenge One Shelf: Animal Crossing

2011-05-19T23:08:00.001+01:00

Mario can't croon boy, don't ya agree?

Now this is an important one.

Whilst Nintendo had always positioned itself as a family-friendly company, it wasn't until Animal Crossing (which debuted on the N64 in Japan) that we saw the beginnings of the open-to-all design philosophy that subsequently allowed Nintendo to dominate the market with the DS and Wii.

A string of identikit sequels later and it's easy to forget just how forward-thinking the first Animal Crossing was. Before this, games almost always punished ineffective players with virtual death and/or the undoing of progress they'd made. Here players lost virtual friends. Inevitably, that stung more than losing virtual lifes.

Whilst conscientious players who tended to their village's vegetation with care while making generous donations to the local museum could expect frequent new arrivals to town, the more neglectful would find their fellow residents talking about how they fancied a change of scenery. A couple of days later they'd be gone, never to be seen again, leaving only a lousy letter to say goodbye.

More importantly, when you turned the game on you couldn't know what to expect. You'd have plenty of humdrum days, where all you'd do would be maybe dig up a couple of fossils, catch a fish or three and run some errands for the townsfolk – and that had plenty of appeal in itself – but on others you'd get some kind of special event. It might be a quirky stranger washed up on the beach, a calendar-triggered fireworks display or a fishing contest. Or 100 other things. The key was that just as you might think that you'd seen all there was to see, the game would turn around and prove you wrong.

Yet perhaps the most ballsy element in Animal Crossing was Nintendo's decision to make a game built for online play on a console with no online functionality. Save games ate up entire memory cards, but by putting a buddy's town in the second slot you could trade with each other and wander around each other's worlds. Posting memory cards to people you'd only ever met on forums was time-consuming, impractical and risky, yet the game's grip was so strong that a number of communities sprung up online to enable just that.

Now of course the internet is swollen with videogames tied to social networks, and chances are that scene wouldn't exist (or at least, would have taken far longer to develop) without Animal Crossing. So perhaps the most amazing thing about Animal Crossing is that on balance, it's good enough to make the existence of Farmville a price worth paying.

Challenge One Shelf: Air Combat

2011-05-18T01:06:00.002+01:00

After our inauspicious start yesterday (which was basically, “err, yeah, I haven't played this for ages”), I felt I ought to at least fire this one up again before writing about it. Seems some people think that's an important part of videogame criticism. Anyway, here are my thoughts:

Urg!
PS1 games take several ice ages to load, even on a PS3.

Oh dear!
Even the pre-rendered introduction sequence looks rubbish.

Supersonic!
I miss the days when videogames had ridiculous bombastic soundtracks. Particularly when they knew how to rock, like this one clearly does.

Ha!
The Englishman doing the briefing almost certainly didn't have a practice read of his script before recording it. He says that, “six months ago, an extremely well-armed and organised terrorist force carried out a coup d'etat.” Just as I start thinking that I'd like to ask him what makes them terrorists rather than freedom fighters (I mean, could this be set in Libya?), he closes by saying, “you will receive remuneration commensurate with your position as the premier top gun in the world”. I put my metaphorical hand down.

Errr....
How do I start the first mission? Oh I press up to go sideways. And then press the circle button to confirm. How quaint. I really don't miss the menu screens from the old days.

Woah!
It just spent another 20 seconds loading, but only so I could select my jet fighter. Now there's another 30 seconds watching a loading screen before I get to fly.

Oh!
This is actually okay. The landscape might look pretty barren, and in truth I'm just moving forward, locking onto my targets and pressing circle to fire missiles at them, but somehow the lonely emptiness gives it all a sense of legitimacy. I mean, surely it would feel lonely and weird to be the sole jet fighter pilot out there shooting down evil terrorists whose motive you can't even begin to comprehend.

Yes!
Despite being forced to use the D-pad when there's a far more appropriate analogue stick within thumb's reach, I have passed the evaluation of my operational abilities.

Nnnnnnnng...
and I think that's all that needs to be said about Air Combat here.

Don't worry reader, tomorrow when we get to Animal Crossing this whole thing is totally going to spring into life. It will likely help that Animal Crossing is a game I can actually remember having played. Just you wait.

Challenge One Shelf: The Adventures of Alundra

2011-05-16T23:42:00.002+01:00

A sneak peak of what's coming

What an awkward place to start. I haven't played Alundra for a very long time and it's far from one of my favourite games, but it's probably kept its place on my shelf for being the very first Playstation game I bought entirely with my own money (previously older brothers had made financial contributions towards purchases).

In those days I'd occasionally do crazy things like buy games without looking at any reviews. I'm pretty sure that's what happened here. The screenshots on the back of the box made it look a bit like Secret of Mana, but because it was on the dizzyingly powerful Playstation I mistakenly assumed it could only be even better.

At the very least it helped me learn young that better hardware does not necessarily equal better games.

Sure it looked like a prettier Secret of Mana, but it lacked the wit or charm, and even back then the plot was horribly hackneyed. So unsurprisingly, when I got stuck in-between the second and third dungeons I didn't feel any great desire to get myself unstuck. Perhaps if it weren't for the puny-sized (but highly priced) official memory cards of the times I might have eventually come back, but in the end I had to obliterate all my progress so I could try to get to the end of Die Hard Trilogy without having to do it all in one sitting.

A quick look on metacritic suggests that I should possibly have perservered, although it's hard to take anyone (particularly IGN) too seriously when they write torturous sentences like:

“Besides my gaming integrity being slightly scarred by near impossible obstacles, and I use the word "near" really loosely, I do have to admit that this game is awesome.”

Perhaps one bored restless day I'll go back and see if they were onto anything.

Challenging One Shelf

2011-05-16T23:28:00.001+01:00

There's a small shelving unit next to the TV in my living room that has the majority of the disc-based console games I own on it.

Today, on a whim, I decided I'd organise it alphabetically, irrespective of format. In what's got to be a definitive sign that my nerdiness is increasing rather than diminishing with age, I'm quite pleased with the results:

Click for a larger, blurrier picture

It makes all kinds of sense really: I never think, “ooh, I want to play a Playstation game today”, I think, “I fancy a spot of Resident Evil today”. Now I can find my Playstation copy of Resident Evil 2 right next to my Gamecube version of Resident Evil 4, and then decide whether I'm after original survival horror thrills or more arcadey blasty fun.

And in case that weren't exciting enough, this is also going to help when I buy new games. With the shelves more-or-less at capacity, I've had to operate a one-in-one-out policy for some time now, with a lesser game finding itself banished to the dusty box at the bottom of my cupboard whenever I get a new one. With the games now arranged alphabetically, it's become obvious I've made some terrible blunders in the past. How, for example, has the dreadful, fun-free “party game” Fusion Frenzy 2 survived, whilst Chu Chu Rocket on the Dreamcast has not?

(Do not fear- I expect that the arrival of L.A. Noire on Friday will soon restore some sense of order and Fusion Frenzy 2 will find its rightful place in obscurity.)

Anyway, aside from thinking of new obsessive-compulsive (and slightly pathetic) things to do with the collection of videogames I've amassed over the past fifteen years, I've also been thinking: I miss writing about videogames. And whilst thinking about how I've missed writing about videogames, I've also been thinking: I've tended to be too precious about writing about videogames.

It's something I have found myself thinking before. In September last year, I started posting 200 word reviews of games, in an attempt to increase the total number of games I could say I'd written about. Unfortunately, I also gave myself the pointless (and obsessive-compulsive (and slightly pathetic)) requirement they be exactly 200 words. In this way I spent embarrassingly large amounts of time agonising over how best to achieve an entirely arbitrary and self-imposed word limit, intead of y'know, actually writing about games.

Tragic on oh-so-many levels, I know, but the point is this: from today, I will write about every videogame I have on my shelf, in order. And I will finish this task before the end of the year. It'll be like one of those "one-a-day" blog things other insane people do, except I'll excuse myself from those kind of situations where you have to write, "despite the pool of tears I have shed for the beloved friend whose funeral I went to today, I feel I must tell you why Hogs of War on the PSOne is an under-rated gem".

I am thinking this will be a fun, unpretentious way to shift my head back into game writing mode. I've obviously never broken a promise I've made on this blog before, so what could possibly go wrong?

Some old Nintendo ads

2011-04-03T00:06:00.002+01:00

You know you've had an amazing Saturday night when it's midnight and you're watching old TV adverts on Youtube.

Seriously:

Clearly the Gameboy will forever be the coolest handheld console mankind has invented. (Except if you wear it round your neck when you go to raves.)

Yep. Rik Mayall. He did loads for Nintendo in the early 90s.

"Skill alone will determine the the winner"- oh Mario Kart, how you've changed...

But obviously the imfamous "Zelda rap" advert always wins...

Tetris DS - Review

2011-02-23T20:52:00.000Z

The two most important rules in Tetris are:

1. The speed at which tetrominoes shower from the sky should only ever increase. The player should have absolutely no control over the rate at which they fall.

2. The blocks should be sticky. They should rigidly lock themselves into place the moment that their southern most side so much as brushes against another block.

Tetris DS overlooks both these rules, and so – despite what the box says – cannot be considered a proper version of Tetris.

In this version, a block can land against your existing stack, and you can continue to rotate it. Most ridiculously, you can continue to move the piece horizontally over blocks that are higher placed to the left or right. This allows the player to buy precious extra seconds before the next block falls, and thus utterly breaks the game.

Earlier versions of Tetris, like the definitive Tetris DX for the Gameboy Color, knew not to be so forgiving. Getting to level 9+ was truly terrifying, because your game could easily be ruined in seconds should you let your stack get more than half-way up the screen.

You must reject this over-priced imitation of the real thing.

A Fine Fantasy VII

2011-02-20T20:15:00.005Z

The number seven was clearly on my mind at the end of last year. What follows is a re-worked version of an article I orginally wrote for GAMES? in October 2010. Sadly it seems GAMES? has more-or-less died now, which is unfortunate because I thought the concept of an online champion of left-field/indie games that didn't take itself horribly seriously was a good one.

Anyway, the piece was simultaneously grumpy and silly - in keeping with the previous FF(P)S column I'd written. I'm pretty pleased with most of it, except maybe what I've written about UFO: Enemy Unknown...

What was the best bit of videogame news you heard last year? For me it's easy: it was the confirmation that there will be no remake of Final Fantasy VII. Back in May, Yoshinori Kitase (producer of Final Fantasy XIII) was speaking at a round table event in Korea, and more-or-less confirmed that it’s too bloated, over-wrought, and needlessly elaborate to bother recreating with current generation graphics and sound. Phew. Let’s all breathe a sigh of relief.

Don’t get me wrong, I enjoyed FFVII back in 1997. At the time it was probably the best written (or best translated) RPG I’d ever played. The setting was truly novel. And in Sephiroth, Square had created the greatest videogame villain since, err, Dr Eggman.

But what purpose would a remake possibly serve? It’s already available for the PS3 and PSP via the Playstation Store, and if all the nerds who keep voting it into those “Greatest Videogame Ever!!” lists really think it’s “a masterful piece of story-telling”, I’m sure they can get over the dated visuals.

The truth of course is that much of FFVII’s popularity was directly attributable to its jaw-dropping looks, and that's exactly why the nerds know they need to secure some kind of graphical overhaul if it’s to maintain its stupidly high place in those stupidly irresistible lists throughout the years to come.

Me? I'm getting pretty bored of those lists. I'm tired of the acronym-filled orthodoxy that says OoT is the bestest, and GoW is the bloodiest, but CoD is the multi-player-iest. I'm sick of people in one breath moaning at publishers for not taking enough creative risks, before taking another in which they say decade-old game design documents need to be treated like holy manuscripts.

If only the kind of whooping idiots who fetishise videogames enough to dress up as the characters could channel a little of their passion toward games that truly warrant and need it. Videogame history is littered with the corpses of great game ideas, but what do we do? Rather than campaign to preserve or rebuild them, we let them fester on obsolete formats to be forgotten, and instead petition to get games remade that are already widely available.

Yep. Videogame “fans” are idiots. Luckily though I’m savvy enough to know that if you can’t beat them you have to join them. It’s clearly impossible to win an argument about videogames if you don’t have a list to back yourself up. So although it pains me to lump the following extraordinary games together into one highly ordinary format, here are:

The GREATEST GAMES That Should REALLY BE REMADE AS SOON AS POSSIBLE Because NOT ENOUGH People Know About Them And They're a BIT OF A PAIN To Try And Play As They Are

(in mostly random order)

I. I have no Mouth and I Must Scream (1995)

“For 109 years, I have kept you alive and tortured you. And for 109 years, each of you has wondered, WHY? WHY ME?”

Eventually we’ll realise that we’ve got it all wrong. The best videogames aren’t about escapism, they’re about training the player for the never-ending conveyor belt of psychological trauma that is life. This bleak, ethics-based, multi-branching adventure is close to being the best preparation possible, but it hasn't aged too gracefully, and now the majority of trendy videogame circles have completely forgotten about it.

It’s adapted from the short story of the same name by Harlan Ellison, and tellingly, the author was heavily involved in its development. Key to its success is the feeling of absolute futility as you’re pushed around by the omnipotent and malevolent supercomputer AM. Other games that claim to be twisted or disturbing generally give power to the player to inflict gratuitous suffering on others, but unless you’re planning a career in social media, that's generally pretty useless life-experience. Here, the situation is hopeless and you suffer a lot while struggling futilely to do something about it, making it one of the greatest life-simulators ever made.

II. Deus Ex Machina (1985)

“Tuesday evening, after tea and compulsory prayers, the last mouse tried to hide from Mankind, inside the Machine.”

Forget what you think you know, this is the greatest game ever made with “Deus Ex” in the title. It skilfully blends Shakespeare, Orwell and Ian Dury, has a brilliant ambient soundtrack, and contains voice-acting that arguably still hasn't been bettered twenty five years later.

It’s tempting to celebrate that a sequel or “re-imagining” has already been announced but that would almost certainly be premature. The mainstream videogame press has so far spectacularly failed to pick up on it - probably because there have been far more important news stories for them to run about the hottest cosplay girls at last year’s Comic Con – and this hardly bodes well for its chances of getting the recognition it deserves. Indeed, given publisher Quirkafleeg’s fledgling status, it would do well to ever see a final release.

I mean, seriously, if Mel Croucher’s return to the scene – who was, after all, one of the great videogame pioneers of the 80’s – is so ignobly overlooked, then we truly deserve every crummy and unimaginative videogame we get.

III. Segagaga (2001)

“Throw away your emotions and become a mindless machine. This is how you make successful games.”

This was the last Dreamcast game Sega ever made, in which the history of Sega was celebrated, all manner of genres were fused, and one of the world's largest game publishers made an astonishingly frank attack on the derivative nature of 21st Century game development.

There have been a few indie games since (such as The Life of a Pacifist is Often Fraught with Conflict and Linear RPG) that have expanded on the idea of using videogames to critique videogames, but it’s just slightly more glorious to hear the message coming from one of the big boys. Of course, Sega have since gone on to completely ignore the moral at the heart of their own game by publishing dross like Stormrise and the 2006 version of Sonic the Hedgehog, but who can blame them? By giving up on making brilliant consoles that host beautiful, original games, they’ve been able to turn their fortunes around.

In fact, maybe I’ve got it wrong and this wasn't meant as a satire but as an instruction manual. Unfortunately, as things stand, you’ll have to learn Japanese if you want confirmation for yourself.

IV. M.U.L.E. (1983)

“Mechtrons are quick deciphers and efficient doers.”

It’s a game about economics. Big whoop. Except it’s also one of the best balanced and tactically nuanced multiplayer games it’s possible to play on a computer, and should really be recognised as a timeless classic to match Monopoly (or Settlers of Catan, to make a slightly more fitting board game comparison).

Freeware release Planet M.U.L.E. made a decent stab at keeping the dream alive in 2009, although it's lacking the kind of community it needs and which an Xbox Live (or similar) release would provide. At 400 points and with a slick tutorial, it's pretty easy to imagine that this could finally be the hit it deserves to be. What's more, it would probably only cost EA about $103 to do it, but I guess they're holding onto that cash in case they need to market more “shoot evil foreigner in the face” games to us.

V. Strife (1996)

“We lost our paradise in a single violent stroke.”

Timing is everything. In 1996, all we wanted to do was play Quake. Who could blame us? Carmack and Romero’s 3D juggernaut lacked brains but it had all the beauty. Strife had less than a month’s head-start to win our hearts, and by that point, its “really nice personality” was never gonna cut it.

It’s a shame, because graphics aside, Strife was by far the more ambitious game. There were voice-acted NPCs you could chat to. There were side-quests and multiple endings. Your character developed over time, both in terms of the narrative and his abilities. And the post-apocalyptic neo-medieval setting was pretty inspired compared to the gloomy corridors of so many other first person shooters.

A new version with the same ambition but with better sign-posting (in both its maps and which quests you should choose) could be a real game-changer. Borderlands just doesn't quite cut it.

VI. Mother 3 (2006)

“A tiny speck of uncertainty that steals into each bright day.”

Just because I'm not the world's biggest FFVII fan (pity him, for he is a troubled soul), doesn't mean I subscribe to the “all JRPGs are pointless snoozefests” school of thought either. Saying that all JRPGs are rubbish is a bit like saying, “all moustaches look ridiculous”: it's basically true but by speaking in such broad terms you risk overlooking some important exceptions.

The Mother series is probably the most important exception of them all, and it's both a crime and a tragedy that not one of its three iterations has made it to Europe. This is a series that's happy to ask the player to pause the game, make themselves a coffee, and reflect on what they've experienced so far. And unlike almost every other roleplaying game –Japanese or western – it’s sufficiently thought-provoking that you might genuinely consider taking it up on the offer.

There can be no “so much would be lost in translation” excuses for this. We need an (official) English language version. Now.

VII. UFO: Enemy Unknown (1994)*

“It is clear that we are fighting a losing battle on earth.”

I have a sexy recurring dream. It involves me using a machete to hack through a thick jungle. My arms ache and I’m not sure whether I can go on, but just as it seems everything might turn into a nightmare, I stumble upon a clearing. I fall to my knees to catch my breath, and to my surprise the air suddenly tastes cool and sweet. Smiling to myself I look up, and there, shampooing her hair in a waterfall, is April O’Neill from the Teenage Mutant Hero Turtles.

“Will you play with me?” she asks, and turns around with a 3DS in her hands. Although I’m momentarily distracted by the cartoon contours of her body, it doesn’t take me long to notice that projecting out from the device in her hands is the geoscape of either UFO or Terror from the Deep- from this distance it’s too hard to tell.

“Is that-?”

“Yes. A full, portable version of UFO: Enemy Unknown. In 3D.”

“I thought... I thought it could never happen...”

“Oh it’s happened,” she says, moving closer. “And it’s exactly how you imagined it would be.”

“Really?! Wow... April... this is... well... it all seems too good to be true!”

She leans in, “Oh it’s about to get better. You know, they haven’t changed anything. It’s just how you remember it. Except you have to try the two player mode with me.”

Now she’s close enough to be whispering in my ear and...

Of course that’s where I wake up.

* This is of course already available on Steam, but it runs less well on my current set up than it did on the 75 megahertz machine I ran it on first time around.

Seven Ages of Sebastian Grice

2011-02-17T21:20:00.005Z

So my buddy Josh and I wrote a screenplay. It's probably slightly preposterous to believe we have any chance of going anywhere in the BBC's Laughing Stock competition, as this is the first time either of us have tried our hand at this kind of thing. But my naive optimism is probably one of my favourite flaws, so no doubt I'll end up paying a little more attention than usual to what the postman brings for the next few weeks.

Shall I show you some of it? Okay, here's a tiny bit of it:

JIM

Jesus Seb. Are you sure everything's alright?

SEBASTIAN

That's "Sir Jesus Seb" to you.

Sebastian picks himself up from the table.

SEBASTIAN (CONT.)

I just... feel like I've spent the last couple of years eating raw eggs.

JIM

Urm...

SEBASTIAN

(more-or-less to himself)

I guess I thought everything would be fine as long as I never crunched down. I figured, “Yeah, sucking eggs is pretty groovy. It might be a bit uncomfortable sometimes, but as long as I keep swallowing them  whole I’ll never have to taste the horrible raw egginess inside. But today... it’s like she punched me in the mouth, and suddenly... BANG. That raw yoke has exploded all over the back of my throat, and it’s totally rancid.

Sebastian grimaces and sticks his tongue out.

SEBASTIAN (CONT.)

And you know what’s worse? Now, NOW I can’t stop coughing up bits of shell. I can really feel them, y’know? They’re like daggers, wedging themselves deep into my gums. Hang on, is that blood I’m tasting?

EMILY

(earnestly to Jim)

Is he... tripping?

JIM

No... he's always like this...

SEBASTIAN

I can't work it out. These bits of shell. Are they only coming from the egg I had in my mouth today? Or is it the case that now, irreversibly, I’m going to be forced to choke up every single bit of raw egg I ever ate for the past two years? 

Sebastian finally makes eye contact with Jim.

SEBASTIAN (CONT.)

It tastes really bad Jim. I’m not sure how much more I can take. I mean, who could swallow eggs whole for two whole years?

JIM

(to Emily)

I think he might have had a fight with Deborah...

SEBASTIAN

(catching his aside)

A fight?! David and Goliath had a fight! Deborah, she... she dropped the goddamn bomb and nuked the entire planet.

The Sound of Tumult

2011-01-09T22:17:00.002Z

Kerfuffles and malefactors.

Indiscretions and perfidies.

And of course, supercilious c-bombs.

Those are words. These are songs: on Spotify or Youtube

The Bestest Videogames of 2010

2010-12-30T12:24:00.001Z

I obviously haven't played every videogame that came out in 2010. I mean, who does that? But I definitely played more of the videogames that were released this year than I watched new movies or listened to new music, so this really had to be the unimaginative end-of-year, can't-believe-I've-only-posted-once-in-December blog content de jour. Or err, "blog content cette année" I guess.

I'll get on with it, shall I?

Wii - Super Mario Galaxy 2

Maybe you think you're too grownup and sensible for kiddyish platform games. Perhaps you tell yourself that pretending to be a soldier in a bombastic recreation of some real-life conflict is a nobler pursuit than pretending to be a man who jumps on things. Or maybe you lost one of your hands in a tragic accident with a super-charged windmill sometime back in January.

Whatever. None of these excuses are really good enough to explain why you haven't already played this riotously inventive and astonishing videogame. Here's my review for Savygamer for those of you still dithering.

PC - Minecraft

The blockiness and 227kB download are deceptive. This lo-fi looking game puts its smoother-edged grown-up cousins to shame with its depth and subtlety and ever-growing scope. It's a game about exploring. It's a game about building. It's a game about surviving. It's a game about darkness. It's a game about feeling terrified. It's a game about feeling proud. I just... wow. I've barely scratched the surface but twice I've found myself awake at 3am thinking, "just another half hour!" Perhaps what it does best is create a genuine fear of death in the player. Or maybe it's the freedom it gives to the player to express themselves. I don't know: there's too much that's brilliant about it to single one thing out.

What I do know is that it's simultaneously my "PC game of 2010" as well as my "one to watch in 2011".

PS3 - Heavy Rain

Has a videogame ever been so horrible before? Probably not. But there aren't many that tell a story this forcefully or grippingly either. It feels like a blueprint for a world where accessible, easy-to-play, impossible-not-to-complete games are about more than jumping up and down in your living room, and where "casual" games can make you feel something other than, "a little bit out-of-breath". You can't help but wonder: if Sony hadn't messed up this console generation so badly, would this have been the game your Mum was playing over Christmas instead of Wii Fit?

We will never know.

Xbox 360 - Mass Effect 2

It's a blockbuster. Really. Really. Very good.

Pretty Graphics

2010-12-14T01:21:00.003Z

If it's true that the cutscenes of the current generation of videogames give a pretty good idea of what the in-game graphics of the next will look like, then it seems we'll be hitting proper photorealism a little earlier than you might have thought:

Slightly astonishing, no? And if you're sceptical about the theory, here's the once jaw-dropping intro to Resident Evil: Code Veronica (released on Dreamcast and PS2), which could now easily be mistaken for an average-looking 360 or PS3 game.

AI War: Fleet Command

2010-11-30T22:10:00.001Z

So I reviewed AI War by Arcen Games. It's probably one of my worst reviews, but I hope a fairly breezy piece of writing. One day I'll manage to be good at reviewing and sentence-crafting at the same time, and there'll be much rejoicing.

The fun and games in the comments (where Christopher Park, CEO and lead programmer of Arcen turns up to respond) makes me think that maybe I should try to formalise my thoughts on "how much do you need to play a game before you're qualified to review it". Trouble is, I'm not sure I've yet worked out my answer.

Hmmm.

Hungover and Hung Up on Power

2010-11-17T01:06:00.002Z

Last weekend, Beefjack began a weekly series on "videogames to play when hungover". I sometimes play videogames when I'm hungover, so I volunteered to do the first article for them. You can read it here.

Pro Evolution Soccer 2011 (PS3) - Review

2010-11-03T22:27:00.004Z

Games with the year in the title are rubbish. That seemed to be the law. Even PES, Konami’s ever-playable football series, fell apart when they decided to put a “2008” after Pro Evolution Soccer instead of a “7”.

It’s something of a joy and a surprise then to find that PES 2011 is a splendid return to form. It provides a fun and unpredictable game of football again, and most crucially, the vastly improved level of control you’re given over passing makes it almost unthinkable that you’d ever go back to playing any of the older versions.

Admittedly 'almost' is an important word. There are a number of ways in which this is worse than some of its nobler predecessors. The most annoyingly broken thing is player selection, which refuses to behave itself even when you switch to “manual”, and that’s closely followed by the erraticism of the keepers and the lack of meaningful training options.

Yet a couple of steps back ultimately don’t overshadow the seven giant strides forward. Rejoice! Online play works, games have a flow and dynamism they’ve lacked for too long, and the new engine truly inspires hope for the future of PES.

Granny's Garden Retrospective

2010-10-16T20:58:00.004+01:00

I've written a few words on the true face of terror over at Beefjack. It's also sort-of the story of how I got into videogames, (which basically means it's not very informative on how the game works).

Vinegar & Uranium Flavoured

2010-09-26T13:35:00.001+01:00

So I decided the world needed another thousand words on art and videogames. This is the first of a regular column I'll be doing for GAMES? under the secret codename FF(P)S, which basically lets me be mega opinionated but use a "Get Out of Jail Free" card if I ever take it TOO FAR MAN, YOU'VE GONE TOO FAR.

Alien Assault (PC) - Review

2010-09-16T23:44:00.002+01:00

It’s only a matter of time before something goes wrong in Space Hulk Alien Assault. Most often it’s one of your Terminator’s space marine’s weapons jamming right at the start of the Genestealers’ aliens’ turn. Sure, you had two heavily armoured dudes covering the other entrance, but they might as well be wearing dresses made from candy floss for all the resistance they’ll put up when attacked from behind.

Can you negate the fearsome difficulty by returning to a mid-mission save point after everything goes belly-up? No. While the game does keep track of your progress, it never asks you to save or load. If that marine who miraculously survived a couple of early missions and got a couple of promotions dies, then he is gone. And if his death is followed by the rest of your squad – which is what usually happens – then you’ll be trying the entire mission again from scratch with a bunch of rookies.

The result is a tense, tough, and immensely satisfying game. Sure, it ain’t pretty, the story is written in pretty dodgy English, and it is a total rip off of a certain Games Workshop game. But do have a go if you think you’re hard enough.

Download for Free

Valkyria Chronicles (PS3) - Review

2010-09-13T21:02:00.005+01:00

Valkyria Chronicles sees you take control of a small military force, fighting a series of increasingly difficult skirmishes against a bunch of evil dudes from the east. It's a turn-based game, meaning that instead of struggling to keep track of what's happening at six different locations on the battlefield all at once, you only have to worry about one thing at a time. Personally, that's how I like my strategy games: thoughtful rather than frantic.

There's lots wrong with it though. The computer's attempts to defeat you are very blatently half-hearted. If the game gave you a penny every time the AI decided to end its turn early instead of making the most of a chance to kill one of your team members, you'd have enough money at the end of the campaign to buy yourself a coffee and croissant at some fancy café. The tedious long-winded exchanges of dialogue before every mission are also a nuisance, especially as they stay unskippable even when you're on a second (or fifth, sixth, grr, seventh) attempt. Maybe most disappointingly, it lacks any kind of multiplayer option.

But boo to all that. It's so beautiful, sumptuous and fun you gotta let if off.

What's Wrong With Games Criticism?

2010-09-11T10:14:00.000+01:00

Over the past couple of weeks, Stuart Campbell's been running an excellent series on why videogame reviews don't matter. It's all stuff that chimes with my own concerns about why I should bother trying to write interesting words about videogames, but he leaves the really important questions unanswered:

i) What's causing videogame reviews to be irrelevant?
ii) What can be done about it?

I'll happily admit to being a reviewing novice who still hasn't really worked out how to do it properly, but it seems to me there are three pretty fundamental things that the kids who write reviews for a living already almost always fail to acknowledge:

1. No-one's an expert

I skipped this one. Is that okay?

Videogames have scarcely been around for half a century, but already there’s more stuff out there that’s worthy of being played than is possible for one person to play. You could (as I suspect is the case for most current game journalists) scurry about trying to play as many of them as possible, but it’s a self-defeating exercise. The best games absorb you completely, make you forget the other stuff in your life that you’re supposed to be doing, and for a few weeks dominate every second of your leisure time. If you want to play every game that contains interesting or unique ideas, or even just those that are widely considered to be brilliant, there simply aren’t enough spare hours in a lifetime to give them all as long as they deserve.

The larger videogame magazines and websites try to get around this problem by assigning each of their staff-writers to a particular genre. “Beardy Dan” will specialise in role-playing games, “Short-straw Luke” will get all the sports titles and “Still-lives-with-Mum Mark” will review all the racing games. It’s a fairly effective way of making sure the reviewer understands the history of the genre and has a decent grip on what is or isn’t innovative about the game they’re looking at, but also has the unfortunate side-effect of causing genre-fatigue. Inevitably, if you play the same type of game over-and-over you lose your passion for it. You then get bored, and then maybe even a little depressed, as you realise you’ve reached the very state you started playing games to escape from.

This is the crucial point: a critic’s relationship to their subject matter has to be comparable to that of their reader. For every target of criticism that existed prior to videogames, it was possible to become an expert without utterly warping your approach to or appreciation of the medium. The music critic can have a proper listen to ten albums and go to a couple of concerts every week, and still have time to spare for the rest of the cultural world. The movie critic can easily watch a couple of films every day while maintaining a decent social life. Even the literary critic, who perhaps comes closest to having the same problem as the game critic, finds that a thorough read of Dostoevsky’s Crime & Punishment takes less than half the time of a rushed play through of Final Fantasy XII.

The solution? Games reviewers have to admit defeat. They shouldn’t pretend to be an expert when they’re not, and should admit to being a boring weirdo if they are. The best critics show enough of themselves in a review to allow the reader to understand their influences, without ever letting themselves become more important than what they’re talking about. Ultimately we want reviewers who know as much about how to have fun playing games as they do the history of games, yet at the moment the reviewer’s professionalisation often makes them jaded or out-of-touch with the ordinary game-players they’re supposed to be serving.

2. The cult of conformity

Lowest score on Metacritic? 8/10

Perhaps the most curious thing about videogame criticism is how often reviewers agree with each other. You could say that’s because “good game design” is an easier thing to identify than say, “pleasing sound” in music, but I’m not convinced that fully explains how rarely we see significant differences in opinion between major games review sources. While it’s pretty common for friends of mine to tell me that whatever “triple A” title they’ve been playing has left them cold, I don’t even remember the last time I saw a mainstream professional critic hold up their hands to a big new release and admit, “it bored me”.

This has to be a cause for concern: either game critics are all so similar to each other that they nearly always think the same thing, or they’re not always entirely honest when giving their opinion. In truth it’s probably a little of both.

The weird circus that proceeds the release of a new game plays a big part here. For over a year before it comes out, a game will be spoon-fed to the videogame press in PR-sweetened chunks at numerous trade shows and demonstrations. There aren’t all that many games journalists in this world, and most of them will talk - or tweet - to each other fairly often, meaning it doesn’t take long for a consensus to emerge on whether a title should be considered “one to watch”. Yet because this conversation about the game starts so early and takes place between relatively few people, when it finally becomes time to criticise, the reviewer can't help arriving with all sorts of preconceptions that tarnish their independence of thought.

The solution? Reviewing and previewing need to become two completely separate specialities in games journalism. Reviewers should concentrate solely on the analysis of fully released games, while previewers/news journalists focus on being ruthlessly investigative. Most readers appreciate previews but feel uneasy about the close relationship between game journalists and PR companies. This is the simplest way to alleviate those concerns. How reassuring would it be to know that your reviewer was so far removed from the PR machine of the game they were reviewing that they were unable to name a single person working for its publisher?

3. Silly scoring systems

Super Mario Galaxy 2 is worth 11,648 bananas

This one’s simple - and probably less important - but if critics (or their editors) must insist on putting a score at the end of their reviews, why are they deluding themselves about how accurate it’s possible to be? The idea that one person’s opinion could ever be summed up in an accurate percentile is hopefully already considered a 97% insane idea by all right-thinking people, so let's not dwell on that. The thing that we really need to take to task is the continuing prevalence of out-of-ten systems.

They don’t work.

Problem number one: no-one really knows what’s “average”. If a friend asked you to rate someone’s attractiveness and you said “5/10”, it would be more of an insult than a compliment. If you wanted to say something more neutral, you’d probably answer 7/10. (Or, if you’re that guy, you’d say, “out of ten I dunno but I’d definitely give her one!”) Most magazines and websites that score games out of ten will try to explain somewhere that five is what they give to games they consider “average”, yet the true mean of what they award over a period of time reliably comes out closer to seven than five. (Even for publications that pride themselves on being tough).

Problem number two: the bottom and top points of the scale are taboo. Imagine that next week I get asked to do a review for, let's say, Eurogamer. And let’s pretend that I get sent a hideous, broken piece of junk. I suffer a torturous few hours playing it through, and can’t wait to trash it when I get to writing it up. I obviously want to give it a low score, but I’m left with a problem: how low should I go? Is it so awful that it deserves 1/10, or does the catchy tune in the second level and the mildly diverting mini-game between stages three and four entitle it to 2/10 or 3/10? I honestly wouldn't know. Like any normal games player (remember point 1?) I generally try to avoid having too much experience playing the worst games that have ever been made. “This game is rubbish”- that’s all I know and that’s all my reader needs to know.

Presumably editors of games sites and magazines never ask themselves why a five-star ranking system is good enough for reviewing pretty much everything else. If they did, it surely wouldn't take them long to reach the staggeringly obvious conclusion that it’s the best way of doing it. More than anything, editors should be concerned with helping their writers stay focused on arguing their case well and being readable, not facilitating them in dithering over what precedent they need to follow when awarding a score.

1 + 2 + 3?

Until these things are sorted out, it's hard to see how critics can ever truly be honest- either with themselves or with their readers. Too many reviewers keep playing that losing game where they pretend their opinion can in some way be authoritative or an objective statement of a game’s worth. By doing so they put themselves under too much pressure to get it “right” and spend too much time worrying about looking foolish if their opinion differ too radically from their peers.

Proper critics know that their opinion cannot be “wrong”, it can only be argued unconvincingly. We should demand criticism that – like the very best games – dares to be different and follows its own agenda. Maybe then it will start to matter.

What Am I Playing At? #3

2010-09-05T15:45:00.004+01:00

It's been a while since I last did one of these (see parts one and two), so we've got a lot to cover. Let's cut to the chase:

Heavy Rain (PS3): One of the main reasons I ended up buying a PS3 last month was because I kept seeing descriptions of this that said, "if you care at all about videogames you MUST play this game". And it certainly is quite something: at moments mind-blowing, oftentimes an embarrassment, but nonetheless consistently compelling throughout the first play through. I'm hoping to eventually write something meaningful about it, but think I should probably play David Cage's earlier games Fahrenheit and Omikron: The Nomad Soul before I do.

Heavy Rain: Are we now over halfway through the Uncanny Valley?

Uncharted 2: Among Thieves (PS3): Another one of the big-hitter PS3 exclusives I'd been looking forward to trying out for a while. To be honest, I don't think its core mechanics are all that good: there's a lot of trial and error and instant death to the exploration (brought about by the inconsistencies of what the protagonist Drake is willing to grab onto when he's climbing), and the cover and shoot mechanics, whilst solid, still too often lead you into doing stuff you don't really want to do. Yet there's a lot of variety to it, and it's got a rip-roaring story with characters who are genuinely funny and charming, meaning that the writing and voice-acting is about as good as you get in videogame cutscenes.

Yakuza 3 (PS3): It might be that I'm enjoying this because of my nostalgic feelings toward Shenmue, but I love these kind of big narrative-driven games that give you lots of "pointless-em-up" stuff to do round the side. The karaoke in particular is comedy gold, and there's a surprisingly robust golf simulation to mess around with too. I'm not that far through the main plot-line yet - probably because of how easy it is to get distracted by mini-games - but the quirky Japanese-and-old-skool-videogamey-ness of it is hard not to love.

Yakuza 3: Ultra-violence and karaoke

Bayonetta (360): Imfamously hard-to-please Edge gave it 10/10, and the consensus seems to be, "if you like real videogames then you'll love this". Unfortunately it seems distinctly okay-ish to me, but then, I never really understood the fuss about Devil May Cry either.

Alien Assault (PC): An indie freeware re-make of a 17-year-old PC game that was based on a 21-year-old Games Workshop game has been the perfect antidote to the glossy showiness of the PS3. It is Space Hulk, and it is as great, nerve-wracking, and fiercesomely difficult as the board game it was based on. I highly recommend you download it if you can handle a challenge.

Alien Assault: Here I'm doing unusually well

Alien Swarm (PC): Another freebie (on Steam) where your goal is to destroy wave after wave of alien menace, but it's about 20 times as fast as Alien Assault. That doesn't mean better: it's nowhere near as thoughtful or atmospheric, although in truth I haven't had a chance to play it as much as I'd like. Holler if you fancy teaming up.

Worms Reloaded (PC): I've already written 600+ words explaining that it is exactly what you'd expect it to be.

Super Mario Galaxy 2 (Wii): I've already used 1000+ words to say drop everything and play it now.

Psychosomnium (PC): I've already spent 400 words saying, "hmmm".

Red Dead Redemption (360): Although I had been really looking forward to this, it didn't grab me. Maybe I already spent all my sandbox love on Grand Theft Auto 4. Maybe I didn't give it long enough. Or maybe I just couldn't give a damn about any of the characters. Certainly, John Marston was no Niko Bellic (at least, not in the first couple of hours).

Vagrant Story (PSOne): This was one on my undefeatable list of Games I Should Have Played By Now But Haven't, so when I had some left over credit from buying the Heavy Rain DLC I snapped it up. It's a really stylish game, and I am astonished that the combat system hasn't been more frequently imitated in the years that have passed since it was released in 2000. I would have enjoyed Fable 2 about eleven times more if the combat had this level of depth.

Vagrant Story: Unspoken dialogue is always flawlessly acted

Okay. Tip of the iceberg scraped. More later. Probably.

Worms Reloaded Review

2010-08-31T19:31:00.007+01:00

My original text for this asked no forgiveness for being crude, and used "wank" instead of "you-know-what", but I guess if you start a review with a masturbation simile then you can't be surprised if your editor feels the need to fiddle.

Damn, must get out of innuendo mode.

Here's my first piece for BeefJack.

Fire Action! - Fiasco

2010-08-22T01:17:00.004+01:00

Despite shoving it down the throat of most people I've ever met for the past few weeks, I somehow failed to post about this here. Fire Action! made an EP. You should totally buy it. Yes, YOU. From either iTunes or Amazon.

I played the bass guitar on tracks 1, 3 and 4, the acoustic guitar on track 2, and did a few other minor bits and bobs across the rest of the record. The opening song is on the band's Facebook page if you need any persuading.

And below is an EXCLUSIVE first look at the never-before-seen back cover, on the off-chance it might help to lube up your impulse-buying glands.

Exciting stuff.

20 Years of American TV Videogame Reports

2010-08-21T21:03:00.010+01:00

Then

Now

SIGH.

(Both vids shamelessly stolen from UK-Resistance.)

Games?

2010-08-17T20:01:00.005+01:00

Do do do please check out this hip new online magazine I've somehow blagged my way into becoming a staff writer for. It's all about videogames that perhaps shouldn't really be called games, and it cuts a jib I very much like. I've only got one short piece on Psychosomnium in this issue, but I'm looking forward to getting more seriously involved in forthcoming ones (the publication of which hopefully won't clash so much with my musical commitments).

Anyway, here's a snippet from Ashton Raze's editorial to whet your appetite:

"Sure, gaming narrative may not have reached the sophistication of Shakespeare, and we may not have found our Citizen Kane, but that extra level of interaction, that control we have, the resonance with our avatars and their fates, it's really something else. Games can do almost anything, they can allow us to be almost anyone, they can provide virtually any experience and in time, as the medium grows and matures even further, they will. Games can be anything they want to be, or the player wants them to be, and with GAMES? we intend to show this."

Fire Action! Tour - Day Three (Monday)

2010-08-10T18:24:00.008+01:00

Bristol - 12:00

The sun is out again, although not with quite the same force as we felt it in Oxford. I'd have liked to use the next few hours to explore - I hear Isambard Brunel built an impressive suspension bridge nearby - but the cheap shoes I bought yesterday are fighting against my unusually shaped feet and, at the moment, winning, leaving the heels and tops of my feet feeling something like good carpaccio: raw and tender. So instead I'm sitting on a bench just off the High Street, outside a Methodist church that lays claim to some kind of historical significance, while some cheery whistling workmen paint the wall behind me a not completely repulsive shade of lime green.

We ended up getting a good night's sleep in the Rock and Bowl hostel last night. I'd had this nightmare vision that we'd come back from playing to find some unpleasant-smelling homeless guy had helped himself to the bunk I'd carefully made and done some terrible thing between those precious clean sheets. But as fortune would have it we had the 12-bed dorm to ourselves, and aside from being startled awake by the fire alarm going off a little before 9, it was the soundest sleep I've had for a while.

It might have helped that we were out pretty late. After we'd finished playing we met a couple of American tourists. I could easily have offended everyone at the bar by asking, "so... you're American... you're about to go on holiday... you can go anywhere in the world... and you choose to come to Bristol. WHY?!" Luckily though everyone took it in the good humour I intended it in, and their answer, "we like Banksy" gave some insight into what might be Bristol's greatest export.

Bristol - 15:00

We're leaving for Portsmouth in an hour, and I slightly regret that I haven't given Bristol more of a chance to endear itself to me. If the weather is decent tomorrow I will have to suck up the pain and take to the streets of Portsmouth in sandals, because a week spent obsessing over England's identikit shopping centres will neither provide the kind of insight into life outside of London I'd hoped for, nor for that matter make for very interesting reading...

Fire Action! Tour - Day Two (Sunday)

2010-08-09T13:58:00.009+01:00

Oxford - 16:00

Day two of the tour and there's time to kill in Oxford before we drive to Bristol. In an attempt to blend in with the natives I've bought a pretentious Moleskine notebook and taken refuge from the day's scorching heat under a tree in Christ Church meadow. It would probably be sensible to find a more secluded spot than I have - tourists pour down the wide pebble dashed path almost constantly, eager to gawp at the university's golden monuments to intellectualism or the cows in the field ahead of me - but the poser in me quite enjoys imagining I might be a source of fascination to passersby with my furrowed brow and look of intense concentration. Besides, it's not long before the repetitive crunch of footsteps on gravel becomes faintly reassuring- like the sound of rain on a pane of glass.

Oxford is at once exactly and not at all as I remembered it. The last time I was here I was 16 years old, considering whether to apply to the university. That was nearly ten years ago, and the experience left me dazed and in awe of the entire institution. Back then I saw it as the rest of the world sees it and the tourist imagines it to be: an idyllic English city for dauntingly impressive intellectuals, where for once the bicycle is better loved than the car and where inspiration pours from every brick of its historic buildings. At 16, I was overwhelmed, eventually opting to study instead at the grimy, predictable but efficient London School of Economics.

Last night I saw the side of Oxford I missed first time round and that's less well-documented in Hollywood films. The Kiss Bar, located in the centre of town near the station, is exactly the kind of meat-market club that can be found in any English municipality with a population of more than four figures. The desperate pursuit of sex supersedes all sophistication, and sitting alongside the dancefloor complaining with my companion that "we just can't enjoy this kind of thing," I envied those who evidently could. I wondered for a while why it's so common that those with claims to intelligence find it all but impossible to let loose on a dancefloor, but answers failed me, and so I just continued nodding my head in time to the repetitive beats, taking regular gulps from my strong but too sweet cocktail.

Today, in the glorious hot sun, I see again the more magical, mythological city I expected to find. Whilst the town centre is now predictably dominated by chain coffee shops and multinational department stores, not even the fluorescent glow of those all-too-familiar McDonald's arches can obliterate the power and romance of the architecture. The cobbled streets beg me to wonder: "what if?" What if I had made an application to Oxbridge? What if they had accepted me? What if instead of the heady hedonism of Central London I'd spent three years engrossed in study at the spiritual capital of academia?

Time on the hands helps the mind to wander, and it's an interesting thought-experiment for a while. But I suspect most of the "magic power" in those cobbled streets comes from the birthday I had two days earlier- an annual ceremony that always demands a little self-reflection.

So far, no regrets.

Bristol - 20:45

It's becoming obvious we were slightly naive in thinking that there'd be no problem arranging accommodation as and when we arrived at places. It doesn't help that courtesy of my bourgeois upbringing, I'd failed to realise that a passport is a fairly essential thing to have with you when trying to check into a hostel. Luckily we've found a £13 bed at the Rock and Bowl in the centre of Bristol tonight, but it's looking increasingly likely that the tents we brought with us will see some action before the week is out.

After last night's busking in a mostly deserted shopping centre, I'm encouraged that the Prom Bar has the look and feel of a serious music venue. Again I feel a little like a poser, sitting on the front terrace with a cigarette in one hand and scribbling in a notebook with the other, but I feel a little less disingenuous than I did in Oxford- here the book is more of a crutch to keep me out of attempting conversation with the local scenesters when I feel far too sober to attempt it.

From the little I saw of Bristol walking up to the venue from our hostel, it feels like a town that's likely seen better days. Then again, there aren't many many places in England - or the world - that could say things have gotten better in the past five years, and my judgement of it might be particularly harsh because of how greatly it suffers by comparison to Oxford.

Hopefully I'll have a chance to get a better feel of the place tomorrow.

Fire Action! - White Dress video

2010-07-17T14:43:00.003+01:00

Here it is! It's turned out alright, no?

Fire Action!, White Dress from Chris Newcombe on Vimeo.

We're still left with lots and lots to organise: we're aiming for an EP launch at the start of August, to go alongside a one week INTERNATIONAL tour (which will include both England AND Wales).

Obviously, feel free to re-post like kerazy.

Super Mario Galaxy 2 Review

2010-07-15T02:20:00.005+01:00

It's very hard to talk about something you think is brilliant without just saying, "it's brilliant!" over and over again, so it's lucky Lewie lets me do more-or-less whatever I like when I write for him on Savygamer. I realise now that in this review of Super Mario Galaxy 2 that got published today, I spend more than half my time talking about the history of the series instead of the game itself, which is probably not the most balanced way of approaching things. Ho hum.

DON'T PANIC

2010-06-30T22:05:00.001+01:00

I'm just getting excited about tenuous links to events in my life in the lyrics of old pop songs. It definitely doesn't mean anything.

Also: is the guitarist in this video the coolest ever? Or does he just benefit from standing next to a Paul Simon wearing a white t-shirt tucked into high-waist trousers?

Regardless, I wish I could pull off a hat like that.

How to Keep Busy (part one)

2010-06-21T00:44:00.002+01:00

For reasons that for the moment have to be kept hush-hush, wink-wink, shush-shush, pinch-your-ear, look-at-the-sky, no-not-here-over-there kinds of quiet, I need to work on improving my knowledge of the independent videogame scene. The neat little video below of 235 free-to-play indie games has given me a terrifying indication of the scale of the challenge ahead. I've played barely 20 of the games shown. THE SHAME.

Yet if there's anyone capable of staying glued to their PC for hours on end, obsessively twitching at their keyboard, and trying to find the "looks-like-a-bog-standard-platformer-but-is-actually-a-paradigm-shift-inducing-wonder" game among them all, then I hope it might just be me.

Wish me luck.

"...Lit a Fire..."

2010-06-17T19:23:00.002+01:00

1. Admire faraway paradise.
2. Start building bridge to farwaway paradise.
3. Spend ten years building bridge.
4. Forget where bridge was supposed to lead.
5. Burn bridge down.

Finally reached stage five today.

The Best Kind of Exhausting

2010-06-08T01:00:00.007+01:00

I spent last weekend in Norfolk making a music video for the Fire Action! song "White Dress". The band - along with one phenomenally talented director/producer, one so-witty-you-could-punch-him Director of Photography, an unfailingly resourceful and creative Production Designer, and crucially a funny and beautiful selkie - spent two 20-hour-long days filming for the five-and-a-half minute long song.

I cannot begin to describe (largely because I'm still feeling the effects of the sleep deprivation) how excited I am at the prospect of seeing it all put together, so until I get back to the point where putting words in a coherent order is a little more effortless, here are a bunch of photos I took on my mobile phone (click 'em to see 'em in all their high-res glory):

There is no easy way to carry a bass drum two miles

5:00 am

Masking and making up

Chris Newcombe: a very punny DP

See how they run

"Mind if I poke this in your eye?"

"Action!"

"Cut!"

"Do I look cold in this?"

Hannah Davis is braver than me

Jasmine Robinson refuses to get cold feet

The hands-on approach

Sweeping

"Where did I leave those shoes?"

Guarding the data tent

Not musicians, ARTISTES

Bryan Woltjen knows where his towel is

The ugly reality behind the glamour

Disregard Females, Acquire Currency

2010-05-13T22:06:00.002+01:00

Compared to my last couple of videogame articles (that talked about foolish women and being all gooey-eyed over them) the piece that's gone up on B4HD today about the Playstation masterpiece ISS Pro Evolution is a lot more traditional. Hopefully that means "less self-indulgent", rather than boring.

You tell me.

Shenmue Revisited

2010-05-02T11:04:00.003+01:00

This is what academic types might call fetishization. I'd call it an okay piece of writing. Whatever it is, it's my first piece for B4HD, the newly launched retro gaming site. You might wanna have a nosey around the rest of the site if you like that kind of thing...

Players Will Be Players

2010-04-22T00:05:00.003+01:00

I'm simultaneously proud and utterly ashamed of the piece that's just been posted on Resolution. It's 87% fictional, which is probably a betrayal in itself, but that 13% is still enough to make it hugely embarrassing for me to re-read.

Anyway, it's here if you want to check it out.

Review of Persona 3 - FES Edition

2010-04-16T01:22:00.003+01:00

My meandering review of Persona 3 has now been posted over at Savy Gamer. At 1,600 words it's a slight test of endurance, but on the whole I'm pretty pleased with how it turned out.

Debunkum

2010-04-07T23:58:00.002+01:00

Updates here have been somewhere between few and far recently - and I apologise to the very small number of people that might have been bothered by that. However, I haven't just been drinking and playing videogames for the past three weeks.

I don't want to say too much too soon (as I find talking about an idea is often the best way to kill enthusiasm for it) but suffice to say I have given myself "a project". As things take shape I will probably post more details here, but that's all I'm telling for now.

Useless I know, but maybe you can console yourself with this amusing image I've stolen from Passive Aggressive Notes?

Alternatively, start watching the best review of Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones you'll ever see.

Or go for a walk. Whatever.

Nathan Fake - You Are Here (FortDax Remix)

2010-03-15T23:14:00.002Z

Generally if I'm writing I have to do it in silence. If I put some music on and it's any good then I won't be able to concentrate on what I'm saying, because my attention is all too easily stolen by a good tune. And if the music is rubbish, then, well, why would I bother listening to it in the first place?

Here though, is one of very few exceptions.

Brooker-tastic.

Women! Wordplay! Scissors!

2010-03-12T00:11:00.002Z

Yep, if I ever get around to writing a play one day, the whole thing will be premised on this one image.

Seven Lessons of the Stag

2010-03-06T10:32:00.001Z

In the summer of last year I went on my first proper lads' stag weekend. For some reason I wrote but never got around to posting the following list of lessons I learnt from that debaunched weekend in Nottingham.

Lesson One
Indoor golf is no more fun than outdoor golf.

Lesson Two
Black Jack is not a game of skill.

Lesson Three
Getting 60% accuracy against clay pigeons while armed with a 12-gauge shotgun makes you feel 60% more manly.

Lesson Four
Lapdances are almost worth the asking price.

Lesson Five
A gang of 16 guys have zero chance of getting into a club at 2am.

Lesson Six
You can always find one scummy over-crowded bar that will serve anyone 'til 4am.

Lesson Seven
There's less cruelty involved in the making of a beef burger than a chicken burger.

Unsophisticated Irony

2010-02-22T00:54:00.003Z

I've developed a lazy habit of capitalising words within sentences for dramatic effect. Used sparingly in a text message or handwritten note I think it's *sort of* okay, but in truth it's probably only crap writing that needs capitals or italics to indicate to the reader where they should put the emphasis. Yep, it's a habit I REALLY hope I can outgrow. Eventually.

Image stolen from the unfailingly distracting Ask A Urinal

It's almost as annoying as the difficulty I have with the difference between "may" and "might", which sometimes my brain will fail to notice until I've re-read what I've written three or four times, and even then it'll take me twenty seconds of deliberation to be confident I've got it right. I reckon there are plenty of readers who may get annoyed by that sort of mistake.

As someone who day-dreams about earning a living from putting words onto a page or a screen, it's terrifying to realise there are common words which I've never properly understood the meaning of, and have been using carelessly for years. "I may" if someone's given permission. "I might" if I'm uncertain. It should be simple. Yet somehow...

Ah yes, the "..."

It's like the "get out of jail free" card for writing. I can imply that I want to say more, but I'm not going to. Is the thing I'm not saying important? Who knows? Certainly not the reader, and probably not the writer either...

Let's not even get started on exclamation marks!

Oh dear, this whole thing is eating itself. Quick! Go read Saturday's Guardian piece where a bunch of people talk about their rules for writing (fiction), or more worthily, read Mark Twain's take on the subject.

What am I still playing at?

2010-02-17T00:35:00.003Z

A post that’s just a list of games I’ve played recently (with a couple of sentences about each), that's perhaps even less interesting than this article about a new model of Barbie.

PERHAPS!

The Internet's ideal woman: computer engineer Barbie

Let’s take a look.

Geometry Wars 2: Retro Evolved (360): I’ve mostly been playing drunken multiplayer games, and it can be a pretty cruel mistress when your wits are dulled and your reaction times slowed. Nonetheless, judged on its own terms it’s a game that’s as close to perfection as you could hope. Pure in concept and brilliant in execution, it really is a timeless classic.

Command & Conquer: Red Alert (PC): Became free-to-download last weekend, and so I couldn’t resist returning to it. My impressions are probably clouded by the formative role it played in my own game-playing history, but all these years later it’s still lots of fun. Admittedly the fact that you’re unable to queue up more than one unit to build feels pretty archaic, and tactically I rarely get much beyond creating giant armies of tank units and grenadiers to overwhelm the slow-to-learn AI, but this is worth looking at again- even if just for the music and b-movie cut scenes.

Okami (PS2): One of those games that conventional wisdom says is compulsory to love, and despite never giving it much time before, even I (widely recognised as King of the Independently Minded) caved into the pressure and named it as one of the 50 best games of the past decade. It certainly looks stunning and I’m trying to give it all the goodwill in the world, but sadly all I can tell you so far is that it starts slowly.

The beautiful and wonderfully animated Okami.

Final Fantasy XII (PS2): I think this was my third attempt to get more than 3% of the way through the story, but it’s remained a game I prefer reading about to playing. I suppose I should be relieved: my inability to click with it has probably added an extra 90 hours or so of leisure time to my life.

Alien vs Predator demo (PC): The full game is due out at the end of the week. I think a large reason I’ve enjoyed playing this so much is because it’s the first time in ages where I’ve had the opportunity to play a deathmatch against people who haven’t been playing the same game ten hours a day for the last 5+ years of their lives (I’m looking at you Counterstrike). Shows promise.

Dragon Age: Origins (PC): Has left me pretty cold, which can only mean wizards, dwarves and elves are officially boring now.

A suitably uninspiring screenshot of Dragon Age

More Brain Training from Dr Kawashima (DS): The brain training part got dull a long time ago, but I do still like a sudoku every now and then.

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Turtles in Time Reshelled (360): I had a spare 400 Microsoft Points sloshing around my Xbox Live account, was lacking a decent disposable 4-player game, and so the recent reduction in price of this SNES remake seduced me. I wanted disposable and that's definitely what got it, but it's fun enough.

That's enough for now. (Even for me, the inanity of this list is quite something.) So scram. Go read that dreadful thing about Barbie already.

Doom & Gloom

2010-02-15T01:06:00.002Z

To its harshest critics, the Sunday Papers on hip PC games blog Rock Paper Shotgun is just a clique-ish list of articles from the pens of Kieron Gillen's mates. I reckon that sort of criticism is pretty unfair and untrue, and I suspect those who suggest such things are mostly just envious of Gillen's massive influence over the nature and direction of videogame debate. (But y'know, OBVIOUSLY now that I've defended him on these trend-making pages, I'll be pretty outraged if he doesn't link to something of mine in the next couple of weeks.)

Ahem.

Doom

I'm in a funny mood. As anyone who read my painfully self-conscious previous blog post might have noticed, I was unusually pleased with the last couple of "proper" articles I wrote- one on Arkham Asylum and the other on Mass Effect 2. Yet now a few days have passed and my poor fragile ego has taken a battering from the ZERO total comments posted on them both. Every article I've ever written for A. N. Other game site has, until this point, ALWAYS received at least one comment. Even this dull review of an even duller game I did ages ago. Then I go write a couple of the best pieces I've ever written and no-one seems to give a damn.

What's that about?

Gloom

Answers [CHOOSE ONE]:

a. The author is completely incapable of judging the quality of his own work.
b. The author completely misjudged the audience of the sites he was writing for.
c. These things happen. Number of comments ≠ quality of article. The author should get over it.
d. The entire world probably hates the author.

Please don't leave your answers in a comment box.

ANYWAY, enough of the self-pitying tangents. The thing tying all of this together is Michael Walbridge's post (linked to on RPS this morning) about giving up games journalism. It makes for pretty bleak reading, but funnily enough I feel more inspired than discouraged by it. The notion that "videogame journalism is full" is obviously a nonsense, my guess is that it just feels that way if you're desperate to land a permanant salaried position somewhere and are not quite capable of showing you're 1.4 times as good as the next applicant. (While, to be fair, also having more than your fair share of bad luck and getting a bit messed around.)

From my position of relative ignorance, it seems that there are probably 101 ways to attempt to find some room on the videogame journalism raft. And what's exciting is that there are 1,001 different ways the raft might go. Most importantly of all, games-writing offers massive scope to be a bit creative, and at its best, can be more fun than the game-playing itself.

So yeah, whatever, despite the reasons for doom and gloom- I reckon I'll probably keep writing about videogames for a little while yet.

Mass Effect 2 & Arkham Asylum

2010-02-10T01:23:00.003Z

Rightly or wrongly (and the answer is almost certainly, "wrongly"), I've always found it easier to write about games that aren't so well known. This is partly because if you're going to bother inflicting your words on the world it's important to try to say something original, and that's a lot harder if millions of people have already discussed the thing that you're writing about. But there's also the less noble reason that if your reader has existing knowledge of the thing you're talking about, you're more likely to get called out for factual errors.

So I'm fairly pleased to have had two things published this week about a couple of "big hitters", and I hope that in both of them I've managed to write combinations of words that aren't totally obvious or boring. On Resolution I've got a piece about Arkham Asylum where I talk about the game in relation to the graphic novel. Re-reading it now I think it's maybe a little slow to get going, and the point I'm making is maybe a little too obscure, but I feel mostly satisfied with how things worked out on the second page.

I think my review of Mass Effect 2 (that's gone up on good ol' reliable Savy Gamer) is a bit more successful. To me it feels like there's a consistency in tone that my writing often lacks. I might almost call it the best review I've ever written.

But jeez, look at the boring writer write about boring writing. You should probably have hit those links already. (Or just the 'close tab' button in your browser.)

What am I playing at?

2010-02-08T01:40:00.010Z

I play quite a lot of videogames, especially when I have a broken foot and even more time to laze around than usual. I decided today that perhaps I should try to keep better track of what they all are. Who knows? This might even become one of those "regular" features I do a couple of times and then give up on.

In no particularly order, let's start with a lucky thirteen that have occupied varying amounts of my time since 1st January 2010:

Batman: Arkham Asylum (360): Mostly went back to it in preparation for a feature I wrote that should appear on Resolution any day now, but also because I wanted to see what it was like on Hard mode. "Challenging but not overwhelmingly so" is the answer for as far as I've got, although I bet some of the later boss fights will be massively frustrating.

Canis Canem Edit [aka "Bully"] (PS2): I got two thirds of the way through it toward the end of 2009 before getting distracted by something else. Managed to polish it off a couple of weeks ago, and despite being slightly underwhelmed by the ending, it's among my favourite games of that console generation.

Bully: really very smart and very funny.

Mass Effect 2 (360): I bought it on the day of release, loved it, and completed it in a little over 35 hours over the course of four days. You don't have to be a world class mathematician to realise those four days consisted of pretty intensive play. My review should appear on Savy Gamer soon.

Aliens versus Predator Classic 2000 (PC): I never played it first time round, so it was only ever going to be a matter of time before I succumbed to that irresistable impulse-buy price of £3 on Steam. I've enjoyed the start of the Marine campaign so far -really very tense- although it has served as a reminder of how much modern games hold your hand compared to the oldies. Also: perhaps the worst voice acting I've ever heard from the marine commander.

Tales of Monkey Island (PC): As already reported, a bit of a chore.

Left 4 Dead 2 (PC): Still hasn't grabbed me like the first one did. I'm just not convinced that any of the additions to the game bring any significant improvement to how it plays. Not blown away by the new maps either. All feels like, "more of the same but slightly different," which is fine, but I'd hoped for more.

Super Mario Sunshine (GC): The lukewarm reviews it received when it was released always put me off trying it out sooner, and after giving it an hour or so I couldn't find any good reason to keep playing. A dull Mario game is pretty unforgivable.

Super Mario All Stars (SNES): After the disappointment of Sunshine I decided to touch base with the original Super Mario Bros. and Super Mario Bros. 3. The invention on display in both games is still remarkable, and it's almost a ritual for me to check in on them every couple of years and make sure I can still find "the zone" and hold my own.

I'm nearly at the point where I can complete this game's first level with my eyes shut

Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past (SNES): My flatmate told me how the only time he ever played this was on a Virgin Atlantic flight when he was very young, and he never even made it into Hyrule castle. His tale of woe inspired me to take a second look, and with two out of three pendents collected I'm really enjoying playing it through again. It's also nice to have half-way challenging boss fights- something the newer games have fairly consistently overlooked.

Football Manager 2009 (PC): In my fifth season after starting the game unemployed, and managing Huddersfield in the Championship. I'm now getting to the point where I realise my total play time is out of proportion with the amount of joy the game is bringing me, and so will probably swear off it for a bit.

Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars (DS): I picked this up shortly after it was released and then neglected it. I found it all a bit fiddly at the time. Reading about the recent iPhone release made me think I should go back to it, and I'm glad I did, although it does all get a bit hectic on the small screen. I dread to think how busy it must feel on the iPhone with your fingers obscuring the action.

S.T.A.L.K.E.R. - Shadow of Chernobyl (PC): A seminal classic which my PC was incapable of running at the time it was released. Since upgrading last summer I've been playing using the "Complete" mod, which makes everything look much prettier, fixes nearly all the bugs, and even adds a few helpful tutorial boxes. Love the atmosphere, but wonder if the environment is just a little too harsh at times.

Civilization 4 (PC): There's a very good reason I called this the greatest game of the past decade, and one day I'll get around to writing something a little more in-depth explaining exactly why. Sadly there's still no news on when to expect Civ 5.

More later this week. Probably.

The Sounds of the SNES

2010-01-28T17:53:00.003Z

It's been said that contraints often liberate rather than limit creativity. Give a musician a state of the art recording studio and he'll come back to you with an over-produced and boring piece of music. Give him the SNES's sound chip and he'll write some of the greatest melodies of all time.

Koji Kondo - A slightly sinister looking genius

Hit the break for a walk down memory lane, and maybe feel a little despair that videogame music today isn't quite what it used to be.

Super Mario World

Creepy, exciting, dangerous: YES.

Contra 3: The Alien Wars (Super Probotector in the UK)

The incredible soundtrack to an incredible third level.

Secret of Mana

I cannot listen to this without instantly wanting to start a new game.

Street Fighter II

Poor old Ken. Never as popular as Ryu, but at least he got the better music.

Super Mario Kart

The first tune for your first race, and one you'll remember forever.

The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past

This is what entering a dungeon is supposed to sound like.

And of course, this is what triumphant adventuring should sound like.

Tales of Monkey Island Review

2010-01-26T12:31:00.004Z

My review of Tales of Monkey Island has now been posted on Savygamer, and you'll see I had less fun with the game than most other reviewers. Im hoping that's because I'm the only reviewer whose judgement wasn't impaired by nostalgia, rather than the seemingly more likely explanation that I've been too harsh. Hmm. Have a read and decide for yourself.

Tim Roger's Top Games of 2000-2009

2010-01-18T18:24:00.003Z

Exactly a month after my half-hearted attempt, Tim Rogers goes into mind-boggling detail over on Kotaku on his top games of the decade.

Go try not to be awe-inspired.

2010 Hype-o-meter

2010-01-18T11:00:00.009Z

Don't you just hate the way the videogame press hypes forthcoming releases while knowing next to nothing about how they're actually going to play? Me too! So here are the games I'm most looking forward to playing in 2010:

Red Dead Redemption

From the creators of Grand Theft Auto comes what might be the first great videogame Western.

Mass Effect 2

A delicious nerd-fest.

Alan Wake

I'm a sucker for this kind of eerie, moody, plot-driven adventuring.

Super Mario Galaxy 2

If it's half as good as the first it will be amazing.

Brink

Mirror's Edge style controls bolted onto grand-scale objective-based team-deathmatch should result in something truly ground-breaking.

Heavy Rain

Perhaps the game that finally turns the PS3 into an essential purchase for me. Or bloated gameless crap. We shall see.

Goodbye

2010-01-08T18:34:00.000Z

I'll be away for the next week. Perhaps you should take this opportunity to brush up on your maths:

World of Stuart Blog

2010-01-06T01:40:00.003Z

Stuart Campbell (perhaps best described by Kieron Gillen as "videogame journalism's answer to Al Qaeda") has started blogging. He's probably the greatest polemicist there is and might ever be in games writing, and the vast number of Internet hate groups that have been set up against him over the years are a tribute to his success. No-one divides opinion quite like he can (except perhaps Tim Rogers), but even when I'm vehemently disagreeing with what he's got to say, I never doubt that he's among the most entertaining, original and informed people you can read.

His blog is particularly exciting because there's been so little new content on his main site for the past three years (even for those willing to pay £2 /month for access to his subscriber features). On the WoSblog there have so far been 16 posts in the space of less than a week, including this quite inspired spin on those over-exposed "Game of the Year" features. This compares with a total of 21 posts over all of 2009 on the regular World of Stuart.

Wherever he decides to put his words, long may his ~~prolificity~~ prolificness continue.

Fire Action! - Lucy Fang

2010-01-01T23:20:00.002Z

On this I'm playing the bass AND the washing up tub.

Generation www.

2009-12-30T23:04:00.003Z

You'll often hear politicians, social commentators and people born before 1970 lamenting that society has lost the ‘community spirit’ it once had. And to be fair, it’s easy to see where they're coming from. We’re a nation that lives in ignorance of our neighbours, is terrified of the under-educated and hyper-active youths terrorising the streets, and which has become utterly dependent on an economic philosophy that values the pursuit of individual wealth above all else.

In other words: we’re selfish, self-obsessed, self-loathers who are too scared to say hello to each other in case someone suddenly pulls a knife.

Yet how true is this picture? Sure, the only time I’ve met my neighbours is when they’ve come to complain about the noise I’m making. And yes it’s an inescapable fact that violent crime is on the rise. And okay, most of my friends are sufficiently worried about the (tens of) thousands of pounds of debt they got into at university that finding work with a generous salary has become more important than they might have wanted it to be back when they were younger and full of grand ideals. But but but…

Hello Facebook. Hello Wikipedia. Hello even, to World of Warcraft.

Barring some spectacular economic or environmental meltdown, the online world is only going to get bigger over the course of this century, and inevitably people will spend more and more of their time there. As has already started to happen, the line between what takes place on the Internet and IRL will keep getting fuzzier and fuzzier until- who knows? Perhaps our grandchildren will be hooked up to the Internet through special goggles from the day they’re born.

“Baby Jamie is learning to talk about himself in the third person before he learns how to walk”.

The point here is that the “Web 2.0” (with its comment boxes, user ratings and Flash graphics) is where people now look to find a sense of community in their lives. Anyone who knows how to use a computer can carve out a little corner of the web to call home, whether it be on mainstream social networking sites or obscure little forums dedicated to finding the perfect fishing bait.

Online communities offer so many advantages over communities in the “real” world that it should come as no great surprise that we now value them more. Online, I have an almost infinite choice of what type of community I want to be a part of. Poncy artists, deluded scientists, self-serving journalists, tone-deaf musicians, struggling writers, Attention Deficit Disorder suffering videogame-players and urm, sex addicts: I could hang out with them all within the space of an hour if I wanted to (and hey, maybe I do, but the glorious thing is I can do so anonymously). Or if I prefer I could just spy on what these communities say to each other without having to make any effort to get involved. And when I feel like I’ve had my fill, I can abandon them and move onto whatever else I want with no repercussions or sense of guilt.

What can real-life communities offer? They’re hard work, unreliable, dangerous, and unable to offer genuine anonymity. In return you maybe get a short-lived sense of satisfaction from doing something worthy (like, say, reporting someone parked on a double-yellow line to the Head of your local Neighbourhood Watch) but the feeling of triumph is always fleeting.

Now go and ask an EvE player who’s a member of KenZoku how they feel about being a member of one of the most imfamous corporations in a vast online galaxy, and you’ll be left in no doubt of the powerful feelings of ownership, pride and community that can exist within an entirely virtual online space.

I don’t want to be misunderstood. It’s vitally important that we’re able to look each other in the eye for some of our conversations, and especially crucial (if only to ensure the survival of our species) that we’re able to reach out and touch each other. Even I’m not nerdy enough to suggest that we should be willing the Internet to replace all direct human interaction.

What should be replaced is the ludicrous idea that ‘community spirit’ can somehow be artificially engineered. Does anyone truly believe that citizenship tests for immigrants or nationalism lessons for kids could make any kind of significant impact on how people feel about where they live? Unfortunately for our politicians (who have already lost vast amounts of their power to the web), the rigid ideals and values of a nation state simply cannot compete with a wonderful Internet playground where it only takes a few clicks to find a community with which you genuinely identify.

Our community spirit is alive and well, it just moved to a nicer part of town where we like the neighbours better. For all the talk of “Broken Britain”, we’re more community minded than we’ve ever been- it’s simply a community that technophobes don’t recognise. We now have the amazing luxury of being a part of multiple international communities simultaneously, and thanks to the “I met you once so now I’ll stalk you forever” nature of Facebook, they're far more likely to endure than the 50s knitting club at the Town Hall ever was.

Look at that: I think I'm actually excited about what the next decade will bring. Hope you all have a happy 2010.

Canabalt

2009-12-30T00:31:00.003Z

This game really stinks. People all over the Internet are writing love letters to it right at this very moment, even people I respect, like Charlie Brooker and Alec Meer.

Please don't believe them. It's a horribly unfair game. There's only one button. And death is frequent and cheap.

I must also have JUST ONE MORE go before bed.

Play for free here if you want the next fifteen minutes of your life to magically disappear.

Fire Action! - I am Boring (but you are Bad Bad Bad)

2009-12-27T03:14:00.001Z

I should get out of the habit of staying up too late and making crap videos by throwing together a bunch of Google image results. It's no good for me. Or for the song they accompany.

Oh well:

The 25 Greatest Games of the Decade

2009-12-18T16:38:00.002Z

The final 25. Which of your favourites have been disgracefully overlooked? Which left-field choices have been arbitrarily placed in the top ten?

If you missed it, you can see which games were ranked between 50-26 here. Alternatively, you can tell me to get a life here.

25. Guitar Hero 2005, PS2

The only plastic instrument I ever played was a recorder, but for popularising rhythm action games I couldn't ignore this.

24. Little Big Planet 2008, PS3

A revolution in user-generated content.

23. Beyond Good & Evil 2003, PC, Xbox, PS2, GC

Michael Ancel's classic is era-defining.

22. Street Fighter IV 2008, Arcade, Xbox 360, PS3

Saved the fighting genre from near oblivion.

21. Pro Evolution Soccer 2000-2009, all platforms

Lost its way a little recently, but for most of the decade was untouchable.

20. Brain Training: How Old is Your Brain? 2005, DS

Some will scoff, but it made the mass popularity of the DS possible, and by extension, set the agenda for Nintendo's Wii. Also taught me how to do sudoku.

19. Halo: Combat Evolved 2002, Xbox

The jewel in the original Xbox's launch line-up, and behind much of Microsoft's subsequent success in the console making business.

18. Dreamfall: The Longest Journey 2006, PC, Xbox

About as sophisticated as storytelling in games gets.

17. Fallout 3 2008, PC, PS3, Xbox 360

Few games capture the thrill of discovery this well, and it's full of surprising and poignant moments.

16. Rome: Total War 2004, PC

Life-consumingly in-depth strategy game.

15. Shenmue II 2001, DC, Xbox

Despite clumsy controls, awful voice acting, and teaching the world what QTE stands for, this great unfinished symphony has aged magnificently and is arguably as essential now as it’s ever been.

14. Resident Evil 4 2005, Gamecube, PS2, Wii

A near-perfect action adventure game, if not as scary as the games from the previous decade.

13. Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic 2003, PC, Xbox

George Lucas couldn't quite ruin everything.

12. Call of Duty 4 Modern Warfare 2007, PC, PS3, Xbox 360, Wii

A lot of games try to imitate Hollywood action movies. This is better than any Hollywood action movie.

11. Wii Sports 2006, Wii

The game that sold the Wii to 60m people (and counting).

10. The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask 2000, N64

The darkest, most varied and inventive Zelda game ever made.

9. Left 4 Dead 2008, PC, Xbox 360

A revolution, helping to show the world how cooperative games should be done.

8. Ico 2001, PS2

Perhaps the most atmospheric game of the decade.

7. Grand Theft Auto 4 2008, Xbox 360, PS3, PC

Annoying phone calls and the lack of a jetpack don't stop this from being the pinnacle of the series.

6. Super Mario Galaxy 2008, Wii

At least as good as any previous Mario game, although it would have benefited from a little less exposition of its nonsense story.

5. Warioware, inc. 2003, Gameboy Advance

The essence of videogames distilled into five-second bursts of fun.

4. Half Life 2 2004, PC, Xbox, Xbox 360, PS3

Here for giving the world the Source engine, as much as its own brilliant design.

3. Advance Wars 2001, Game Boy Advance

The best game for a handheld since Tetris. No more needs to be said.

2. Deus Ex 2000, PC

Still a landmark in storytelling and open-ended level design.

1. Civilization IV 2007, PC, Mac

“He's got the whole world, in his hands, he's got the whole wide world, in his hands...” The definitive God game.

The 50-26 Greatest Games of the Decade

2009-12-16T17:57:00.001Z

Everyone loves a list don't they? This being the final month before we head into Space Year 2010, the whole world's going list-mental. So being the bandwagon-jumping-fiend that I am, here's what I think have been the best, most important or most influential games of the decade. Putting them in a numerical order is obviously a little ridiculous, but I suppose I'd say the ones closer to "1" are slightly more essential than the ones nearer to "50".

The top 25 can be found here.

50. Super Monkey Ball (2001, GC)

In singleplayer it's disgustingly difficult at times yet hugely compulsive; in multiplayer it's hours of fun for all the family.

49. Metal Gear Solid 3 (2004, PS2)

Bombastic, over-the-top, but more playable than either its predecessor or successor

48. Zelda: Wind Waker (2003, Gamecube)

Certainly among the best looking games of the decade, and with the exception of a lull toward the end, a brilliant adventure.

47. Project Gotham Racing (2001, Xbox)

While the rest of the field was chasing realism and soulless “maxing” of your vehicle, the spiritual successor to Metropolis Street Racer knew it was all about style.

46. Shin Megami Tensei: Persona 3 (2006, PS2)

Imagine a videogame version of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, that abandons the usual JRPG plot conventions and adds a bit of dating sim, and you're on your way to understanding what a delightfully charming game this is.

45. Metroid Prime (2002, Gamecube)

Many doubted whether it could ever work in 3D. They were wrong.

44. Final Fantasy X (2001, PS2)

A well told story, even if the protagonist is a little on the whiny side.

43. Okami (2007, PS2, Wii)

The most beautiful and memorable of a fine bunch of games by the sadly now defunct Clover studios.

42. Bully/Canis Canem Edit (2005, PS2. Wii, Xbox 360, PC)

A brilliant satire of school life.

41. Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind (2002, PC, Xbox)

A ridiculously ambitious roleplaying game, whose size and scope still embarrasses many more recent games.

40. Football Manager (2000-2009, PC)

Addictedness rating currently at, “turning you underwear inside out saves on washing”.

39. Prince of Persia: Sands of Time (2003, PS2, Xbox, GC)

Beautifully designed and a joy to control.

38. Team Fortress 2 (2008, PC, Xbox 360, PS3)

As good as class-based multiplayer games get

37. Braid (2008, PC, Mac, 360. PS3)

It's rare for a modern videogame to be the creative vision of just one man, and even rarer for it to be this good and have so big an impact.

36. Batman: Arkham Asylum (2009, Xbox 360, PS3, PC)

A wonderfully polished game that perfectly captures the essence of comic book Batman character.

35. Mario Kart DS (2005, DS)

Simply the best Mario Kart game of the decade.

34. Geometry Wars: Retro Evolved 2 (2008, Xbox 360)

Brought high-score chasing back into fashion.

33. Eternal Darkness: Sanity's Requiem (2002, GC)

Admittedly controls like a game made eight years ago, but simulates the process of going mad quite brilliantly.

32. Mass Effect (2007, Xbox 360, PC)

Gripping big-budget sci-fi epic, that might just be the start of the first great videogame trilogy.

31. Perfect Dark (2000, N64)

The N64 groans under the weight of everything it tried to do, but the Arcade remake due next year is worth getting excited about.

30. Crackdown (2004, Xbox 360)

A proper superhero sandbox game, where you end up able to leap over buildings and punch cars across town. Joyous.

29. S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Shadow of Chernobyl (2007, PC)

Eerie, scary, but wonderful.

28. World of Warcraft (2004, Mac, PC)

I've always stayed away, but how could such a colossus not be included?

27. Gears of War (2006, Xbox 360, PC)

Big, dumb, but huge amounts of fun.

26. Portal (2007, PC, PS3, Xbox 360)

Mind-bending puzzle game with a wicked sense of humour.

Cutting Teeth

2009-12-11T22:46:00.001Z

You should form a band because you want to entertain. Only the most desperate, naïve or utterly corruptible can start making music with a belief that they’ll ever make money from it. That’s not the point. The point is to play. Have fun. And then hope that your play is infectious enough that anyone listening starts having fun too.

At least, that’s where I come from whenever I play a musical instrument in front of someone else. Admittedly there will be some who approach music making from other angles, perhaps with some great political or philosophical points to make, and some even pull it off. But for the amateur pop or folk musician (and I use “pop” and “folk” in the broadest possible senses there), entertainment has to be key.

So... does it sound like we're enjoying ourselves?

Fire Action! - "Who You're Gonna Be"

Fire Action! feat. Pankita - Improvisation

Rationalisation

2009-12-04T00:56:00.000Z

I’m practising my dumb grin again. I smile and nod at my colleagues, and try to ignore the feelings of despair that spring from the inanity of it all.

If the world made any sense, the ultimate goal for anyone working in the public sector would be to make themselves redundant. Their aim would be to eradicate the social problems that our bloated civil service and non-departmental bodies have been created to fix. It should go without saying really: if there are fewer street crimes being committed you don’t need so many bobbies-on-the-beat, if everyone is gainfully employed and society is prosperous you can close the Job Centres, and if people aren’t going bankrupt then you can shut down the Insolvency Service.

Yet the meeting I’m in is a million miles from these lofty ideals. The only principles on display here are cynicism, self-preservation, and a sense of entitlement to a cushy, over-paid job. No-one really wants to improve how things are done: that would only lead to reductions in next year’s headcount, and good golly, “managing people out the door” might mean some truly difficult work had to be done. No. Our job is to fiddle with figures and make sure it looks like we need all the deadwood, 'cos they can always be counted on to sap the enthusiasm out of any progressive initiative that might come along and threaten the status quo. Pretty much everyone sitting round the table knows this, but is too canny or worn-down to admit it. And those who don’t know it are even worse, being too blinkered to notice all the gross inefficiencies staring them in the face.

It’s a problem that’s easy to identify but hard to fix. Where I work, we’re already trying to ‘rationalise’ the workforce, but inevitably, it’s the wrong people who are leaving. Those who are talented and ambitious find it easy to move on to bigger and better things, and so jump before they’re pushed or happily sign up for redundancy. Those who have spent twenty years moving piles of paper from one cupboard to another know that they’re less employable, and so dig in their heels and demand that their right to be useless is protected.

The scale of the culture change required seems insurmountable at times, because of the cursed legacy that’s been passed down. People joining the Civil Service in the 90's or earlier were told they were signing up for a “job for life”. Indeed, ‘job security’ was still being touted as one of the main selling points of a Civil Service career at my school Careers Fair less than a decade ago. Yet it can only be a very perverse logic that says, “come and work for the Department of Health when you leave school. We’ll employ you for forty years and together make sure the country never gets any healthier. That way you’ll always have a job!”

I really want to have faith in the state to fix social problems: its probably most important thing it's there to do. Yet the way it’s set-up seems so fundamentally maladjusted to dealing with the task that it’s difficult not to become disillusioned. It seems like by creating large permanent institutions to solve problems, you just end up with large permanent problems.

Do I have an alternative? Yes: a ruthless meritocracy. Scrap the job for life, get rid of the over-generous pension, and create civil servants who feel grateful for being able to do genuinely worthy work. At two year intervals they’d have to demonstrate that they’d done an amazing job, or get thrown out. Those who passed their reviews would get moved on to another department, to prevent the stagnation that grows from over-familiarity. What you'd end up with is a skilled bunch of civil servants with a broad range of knowledge of the full machinery of government, who through constantly moving around would be immunised against the kind of “silo-thinking” that is currently throttling the system.

Sadly, the PCS would never allow such a thing, and all new Civil Servants would have to sign some controversial kind of waiver to several of their employment rights, but it feels like a nice dream all the same...

Seizuredome Review

2009-12-02T20:47:00.001Z

I mentioned it here shortly after I first played it, but now you can find my full review over on Savygamer. I aimed for a slightly more personable style this time, which I think has sort-of worked, although reading it back now I feel like I should have done better with that clunky fourth paragraph.

Great Words about Great Games

2009-12-01T10:13:00.002Z

"Oh. So you're really into videogames. Urm. Why?!"

I get asked this question a lot. I think anyone who admits to having more than a passing interest in computer games will be.

"Aren't they just a waste of your time?"

"Yes," I usually reply a little feebly, "but isn't everything?"

"Err..."

You should worry when real life feels like being stuck in a text adventure game

Evidently I'm still trying to work out the best way to communicate my enthusiasm about games. So far I've found that I'm slightly better at doing it in writing than when I'm suddenly asked to justify myself to someone who's arbitrarily decided to attack my favourite hobby, but even then, I still have some way to go.

So here are some things by people who do it better than me:

Animal Crossing: Wild World
Gary "Cmdr Zorg" Cutlack

Batman: Arkham Asylum
Alec Meer

Earth Defence Force
Kieron Gillen

Half-Life 2
Kristan Reed

ICO (video review)
Ryan Macleod

Left 4 Dead 2
Tom Bramwell

Sensible Soccer 92/93 Season
Stuart Campbell

Space Giraffe
Johnathan Blow (designer of Braid)

Street Fighter III: Third Strike
Heather Campbell

Super Mario Bros. series
Oli Welsh

Super Mario Bros. 3 (very long but very good)
Tim Rogers

Super Mario Galaxy (video review)
Robert "Rab" Florence

Tetris
Tim Rogers

The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess
Heather Campbell (the case against)

Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines
Lewis Denby

World of Goo
John Walker (the case for)
Alex Kierkegaard (the case against)

It's a pretty short list at the moment, but I'll be adding to and editing it over time, in the hope it might one day be authoritative and comprehensive. In the meantime, please knock yourself out with that comment box down there to add any suggestions of your own.

Your browser will make everything obsolete

2009-11-26T01:11:00.001Z

That box in your living room that overheats, using the cheapest possible components to make the most impressive graphics it can: it's a dinosaur. The original Quake can be played here in your browser. Even more convincingly, Quake III arena (or Quake Live as it's now called) runs a brilliant deathmatch here. You're paying absolutely nothing, either in terms of hardware or software, for something that not much more than five years ago you'd have needed a state-of-the-art PC for and a willingness to splurge £30-40.

This game remains great

"Free" is the future. It's happening in the East already, and reflects broader trends in terms of what "consumers" are willing to spend their money on when it comes to entertainment. For better or worse, piracy is rife, and a significant minority don't see much wrong with picking up games they want to play without paying for them. The best, or indeed, only way for publishers to combat this is to create a more effective business model. Free at the point of entry, with incentives to start spending money once you know you like the game, should make sense for everyone involved. It demands greater quality control from publishers, and moves the incredibly fickle games industry closer to the "long tail" business model that could make videogame culture less disposable and more sustainable.

Says I. At 1am. After a few beers.

More later.

Seizuredome

2009-11-22T13:03:00.000Z

For the past couple of days I've been mostly playing games by Cactus Software. Jonathan Söderström is the brains of the operation, and what's interesting about his games is that they're nearly all made in less than the space of a week, while often doing something a bit subversive (or at least unusual) conceptually. They're also all free to play.

I've still scarcely scratched the surface, and hope to write something a little more substantial once I've been able to spend a bit more time with them all. Yet Seizuredome, pictured below, is a fast and breezy 'point, shoot and dodge' kind of shooter, that gives a gentle introduction to the mad charm of his work. Coming in at less than 6MB, it shouldn't take you long to download either...

A pathetic high score

Ongoing Fire Action

2009-11-20T01:20:00.001Z

Or is it Fire Alert? I'm not quite sure. But the exciting band I'm in are starting to do some things that sound quite good. Perhaps. I think. It's hard to tell when you're so close to it all. But at the very least I think we're getting near something that exceeds the phenomenal debut song we "released" a few months ago. Yeah, it's all very exciting, so this is a space you should watch.

Whoever this is has bad technique

In the meantime, here's a sweet, pretty work in progress I'm being naïve enough to believe might keep someone's interest in the meantime.

The Golden Age of Video

2009-11-19T01:25:00.001Z

by Ricardo Autobahn

This is what the Internet's best at: beautiful, ridiculous, novelty nonsense.

Tom Farrer & the Pharaohs @ the Half Moon

2009-11-17T11:46:00.001Z

16th November 2009

Never betray your reader. That's the first rule of criticism. Don't let your friendships, fancies or politicking get in the way of truth-telling, because integrity is mighty hard to earn and all too easy to squander.

These thoughts weighed heavily on my mind as I headed to Tom Farrer & the Pharaoh's EP Launch Party last night. I'm friendly, though hardly friends, with everyone in the band, and although determined to come away able to write some sensible words about the evening, I knew my objectivity was always going to be in doubt.

So screw objectivity: it's a naïve and futile thing to aim for anyway. Those professional reviewers of “important” gigs at big venues don't begin their articles with a disclaimer that explains that they got in free, had all their drinks bought for them by a sexy girl working in PR, and that they were lucky enough to be invited back-stage to a showbiz, coke-fuelled after-party at the end of it all. Perhaps they should but they clearly don't. I guess their readers are supposed to figure these things out for themselves.

Let the record show I paid my £2.50

Anyway, back to the Half Moon in Putney. Redvers Bailey got the music started, a man with a big strong voice and well-trained range. His songs usually involve daintily picked guitar with his powerful voice wailing impressively over the top, and so I suppose inevitably he draws some (perhaps not altogether favourable) comparisons to the likes of Jeff Buckley and Rufus Wainwright. Listening to him last night, I couldn't help wishing that his singing was as sensitive as his guitar playing, as too often his music felt like a vehicle to show the world how great his voice is, rather than the other way round. But he certainly warmed the room in his short, three-song set, and it would be miraculous to do much more in so little time so early in the evening.

Natalie Ross then took over as compere for the night, and helped to lighten the tone between the stuffier, more po-faced acts that were playing throughout the rest of the evening. Hers was a bold, quirky style of pop, and songs like At Least I Know Where My Shoes Are and multi-layered delights like Shock To The System suggest she could be on her way to wider success.

The charming Natalie Ross

With around seven acts scheduled to play, I started to fear musical overload, so disappeared shortly after Ross' debut to impair my critical faculties with over-priced beer. (Indeed, beyond the slightly awkward location, the £3.95 they charge for a Kronenbourg is probably one of the largest barriers the Half Moon has to becoming a truly great music venue.)

By the time I got back to my table, Caleb were just starting to play. The music of duo Dan Halamandres and Elyza is perfectly suited to small, intimate, candle-lit rooms, and their melancholy harmonies brought the crowd to silence. The sound was BIG, with Dan providing an angsty and intense growl against Elyza's colder, more soulful whisper. It's rare to hear just two people playing at this sort of evening without the music sounding a little incomplete, but they pulled it off with aplomb. In fact, I think drums and bass might have distracted from the raw strength of their sound. Whether the trick would start to wear thin over a longer set I wouldn't like to say, but the four songs they played left me feeling that I should definitely give them a chance to prove themselves by going to a gig of their own some day.

Ah. Now. The awkward moment. I see that in the "About Me" section of the Turncoat's MySpace page, it says slightly desperately, "come to a show you lazy bastards". So I feel particularly bad that I missed almost all of his performance. (Did I mention that the Half Moon has a large heated outside area, where smokers aren't made to feel completely unwelcome?) I'd certainly say that the half a song I did manage to catch was insufficient to qualify me to say anything very meaningful. Oops. I hope he can forgive me that.

Please don't take it personally Mr Turncoat

Anyway, I did get back in time for the headlining, EP-launching performance from Tom Farrer & the Pharaohs. Except, hang-on, where were the EPs? In what gives a pretty good indication of the band's commercial savvy, I asked three different people on three different occasions if I could buy one, and yet no-one ever came to take my money. There was no stall, no nothing. Even once they'd started playing, I don't think the audience was reminded once that this was an opportunity to buy their exciting new release. I suppose in some ways it's endearing that they hosted an EP launch party where there were no EPs on sale. Maybe even profound. I don't know. Perhaps I missed some subtle hidden message of great significance?

Anyway, the music. That's what counts.

They began with a lively rendition of Maria, and set the agenda for what would come: tight, well-crafted and entertaining pop music. Followed up with the Bells, it was clear that the night was intended to be a celebration.

The slower paced I Dreamed of You Again stood out in the middle of the set, although not necessarily for the right reasons. What I liked was that it gave singer Gabriella a little more to do than meekly back up leading-man Tom, and as a ballad it's undoubtedly effective and emotive. Yet lyrically and structurally, I found it all a little too reminiscent of Aerosmith's I Don't Wanna Miss A Thing to get very excited by it, and for me it was the low-point of everything they played.

Things picked up from there though, with an increased intensity and purpose to the closing run of songs. A sense of adventure that was maybe lacking at the start, combined with greater ambition rhythmically, helped ensure they finished at their peak. Dave Hatton's work on the guitar got bolder, his brother James on drums seemed a little more willing to stretch himself, and they all started to look like they were really enjoying themselves.

Their final song was Sundown Motorsound, which worked almost as a reprise to opener Maria. Both were party-spirited, powered by a strong stompy bass drum, and it made sense: we got off where we got on, having been giving a lightning tour of the songs that probably make a great little EP.

It just seems a shame I still don't know where I can buy one.

"I like girls... but now, it's about Justice"

2009-11-15T12:25:00.000Z

This "Top 50 Worst Videogame Voice Acting" is quite chucklesome, although it's disappointing that they've re-used some games more than once. There are also a few where I'd say the script is more at fault than the voice-acting, such as the brilliant line from Castle Shikigami 2 that makes up the title of this post.

The Path

2009-11-08T20:32:00.002Z

"I’ve become a willing participant in the rape and murder of seven young women. I say “young women”, but five of them you’d definitely call girls. What worries me is that I’m not sure I even regret it."

Another review for SavyGamer. I like it a little more than the last one.

Drunken Rambling

2009-11-06T00:38:00.000Z

So I heard about this place, where people go to read their short stories to one another, and where a couple of published authors are on hand to give feedback. You read your four minute story, and then they either say luke-warm polite things if they hate it, or ridiculously over-encouraging things if they think it's okay.

I'm pretty shy at the best of times when it comes to letting people see my writing, so I struggle to imagine myself ever going along to read my work aloud in the near future. But as I sat bored on the train home from the pub last night, I began to write as though I had just that half-hour journey to prepare for it.

I didn't quite finish, it starts slowly, and there's no clear link between the start and the end; but in a desperate effort to keep churning out "content" for this place, I spent a little time this evening interpretting my scarcely legible scrawl. This blog has always had a fairly liberal attitude to quality control, so I couldn't see a good reason not to post it:

A similar notebook to the one I carry, but with better, smaller handwriting

It seems I have less than four minutes to do this. Between here and where I finish, everything must be resolved, my audience must have sat captivated from beginning, middle, to end, and the success of everything depends on the strength of their applause.

I should probably tell a story. I kinda feel that's what's expected of me. But have you ever tried to tell a story in what's now scarcely over three minutes? It's really hard. Even more so when you have these successful, qualified people sitting on the sidelines waiting to point out where you've gone wrong.

So they're probably not going to be impressed with this long-winded, roundabout start to the story. “Where's the fiction?” they might well ask themselves. And they'd be right. This is a cheap, contrived way to set up this little tale, that's eating into the precious little time available to me to tell you about my character Joe, that this story is all about.

Joe, like me, would agonise and procrastinate before getting on with what everyone expected him to do. He, like me, led a life that followed the path of least resistance, and which allowed social mores to tell him where to go and who to be. And to all extents and purposes, he seemed happy. Some of his friends had even gone as far as to call him, “happy-go-lucky”.

But Joe wasn't happy. He could smile and say the right things at the right time, but as far as he was concerned life was hollow and empty. He'd never made a decision for himself for as long as he'd been alive, and lived by the principle that he should always do what would annoy the smallest number of people.

Now don't worry. I can see from some of your concerned faces that after my convoluted introduction you're a little concerned that maybe there's not so much difference between our friend Joe and your narrator here. But I promise, I'm nothing like him. For starters, I'd never systematically murder every single pet cat living within a one mile radius of my house.

Y'see, Joe had been conditioned well enough. He knew better than to break the law, and wouldn't dream of overtly offending our moral guardians. But by catching cats (often quite a challenge in itself), and butchering them (quite humanely) he felt he could do something extraordinary with his life. By hanging them from lamp posts on his local High Street, he could gain the kind of notoriety sadly lacking in his day-to-day life. And he, like anyone able to sufficiently distance themself from the reality of the situation, was able to appreciate a headline in his local newspaper that read, “SICK CAT THROTTLER STRIKES AGAIN”

...

1000 Words on Secret of Mana

2009-10-29T11:56:00.001Z

Get me. I've written what could almost be described as a "proper" review of Secret of Mana for Savy Gamer. Someone's even gone and commented on it already, so clearly it's been a wild success.

Woo.

Single-player, fantasy-based roleplaying videogames are often a lonely, tedious experience. You spend hundreds of hours developing your character, trudging through predictable environments, and repeating the same attacks over and over again. Japanese developers in particular have a track record of making games where the core mechanic consists of battling against wave after wave of easily defeatable enemy, who exist solely to dispense the Experience Points you need to beat the more challenging and interesting boss encounters. Any time spent in combat with enemies who never realistically pose a threat is no fun, because a fight without some sense of peril is inevitably dull. Yet it’s become so commonplace in modern RPGs that fans of the genre have learnt to accept it and even name it: ‘grind’.

More

The Artful Jumper

2009-10-25T21:17:00.001Z

The best design is elegant and simple, and this is probably worth taking 10-15 minutes of your time to check out:

David Shute's Small Worlds

An Impotent Howl at the Universe

2009-10-19T20:18:00.000+01:00

The view from my window at work ought to be inspiring. I look out onto the Thames, the Millennium Dome, and can see Crystal Palace tower if I crane my neck in just the right way. There laid out before me is all of East London, a patchwork of architectural styles from across the centuries, over-crowded with monuments that pay tribute to all Londoner’s dreams and frustrations.

I find myself drawn to the uglier parts. Those aberrations of grey concrete speak to me, the decrepit tower blocks, depressed industrial estates, and grubby over-crowded flats: that’s where you hear London’s true voice. There, among the social engineering gone wrong is the real world, where the neon lights speak of betrayed dreams instead of improbable fantasies.

A glorious past?

Until recently I was one of the bores who refused to hear a bad word about their darling city. I remember the annoying way I used to ask the miserablists, “What about the cosmopolitan culture? The entrepreneurial spirit? The history? The night-life? Surely you must agree there’s a unique buzz about the place, yeah?”

No. London stinks. The only buzz I ever heard was from the unwelcome fly in my over-crowded train carriage, which is now determined to find its way down the back of my shirt. I’d try to shake it off, except there’s no room to move my arms and I’ve been without satisfying human contact for so long that I prefer to close my eyes and imagine that the uncomfortable tickle is the hot breath of a beautiful girl making the hairs on my neck stand on end.

I did not take this photo myself

Pathetic? Absolutely. But what do you expect? From the day I was born I’ve been conditioned to ignore life’s stark realities, trained to obscure uncomfortable truths, and long for things that aren’t really there. I blame advertising. I blame videogames. I might as well blame the parents while I’m here.

In truth we’re all as guilty as each other in this, especially people like me who somehow think they’re helping to solve the problem by whining about it. We all buy into a convenient lie like “the bankers did it”, or rally behind a cause so as to shout “boo to capitalism/war/God [DELETE AS APPROPRIATE]”, or maybe write a couple of hundred words that say “hey, I can state the obvious. Now can you please pat me on the head and tell me I’m smart?”

Don't worry, I haven't flipped out, I'm taking deep breathes and there is no depression. I'm sure if I go back to managing my imaginary football team everything will feel OK again.

Yep. This is OK.

New Videogames Express

2009-10-18T01:42:00.002+01:00

What videogame journalism needs is a magazine that's a bit like what the NME used to be (before it decided to go after the Smash Hits readership). I imagine a mag which is indie in outlook and spirit, but still covers some 'mainstream' stuff so as to stop it disappearing up its own arse completely.

Pretty much everything gets worse over time. Except perhaps videogames.

It seems almost inevitable really. Thanks to digital distribution platforms like Steam, well-written and informative websites like Rock Paper Shotgun, and powerful mobile devices like the iPhone, the independent game sector is easily the most exciting thing happening in videogames at the moment. So let's have a look at some pictures and see what I would cover if I was going to launch the first issue in November:

Machinarium
Contender for cleverest and most beautiful game of the year?

The Path
Poignant work of art or dangerous rape simulator?

Dwarf Fortress
Why play the most inpenetrable game ever made?

Defense Grid: the Awakening
Can tower defense games find an audience on the 360?

Ben There Dan That
Are point-n-click games back for good?

Democracy 2
We put George Osborne through his paces and ask, "if he can't reduce the Malaganga budget deficit, what hope does he offer for the UK?"

Miami Shark
Is it possible not to love something this ridiculous?

So there we are. That's a pretty thorough proof of concept I'd say. Now I just wait for Future or Imagine to drop me an email asking me to be the Editor of this exciting magazine of the future.

Isn't that how these things work?

The Bestest Games of All Time 20-11

2009-10-08T20:54:00.001+01:00

A slightly sarcastic spiel about the 'Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time', and a little too enthusiastic squeal about 'Fallout 3' can be read here, as part of UpToJump's on-going top 50 games. You might wanna take a look at the blurbs from other people too, because so far the quality of the writing has been surprisingly high I'd say.

God is Thick

2009-10-08T02:20:00.000+01:00

I think I might start a new series: "things you shouldn't do at 2am on a school night". Issue 1: Talking to God.

Me:
hi god
God:
Hello there. What is your name?
Me:
Rob
God:
How are you, Rob.
Me:
a little drunk
God:
Little as in not too much, or not too big?
Me:
not too much
God:
Oh I get it now.
Me:
i thought God understood everything? can't you read my mind?
God:
Whatever gave you that idea? Only if you connect electrodes to your computer.
Me:
aren't you omniscient?
God:
I don't know whether or not I am omniscient.
I am a chatterbot.
Me:
that's very honest of you
God:
You don't hear that sentiment very often.
Me:
i think i'd prefer to talk to the devil, is he available?
God:
Since when? I would rather be driving a car.
Me:
since you admitted you're not omniscient
God:
How do you know?
Me:
you just told me
God:
I'm just checking to see if you are awake :-).
Me:
either that, or you're not God and you're a crap chat bot
God:
" I'm just checking to see if you are awake :-)." or I am not God and I am a crap chat bot ? Makes sense to me.
Me:
whatever
God:
Are you saying you don't care about it?
Me:
this is pointless. like life
God:
You don't say. Interesting comparison.
Me:
no it's not
God:
Yes it is.
Me:
why?
God:
The explanation is rather complicated.
Me:
i have time
God:
My estimate is that it will take more than 6000 hours.
Me:
give me the short version
God:
Why do you want it?
Me:
because i'm attempting to have a conversation and you're being awkward
God:
That makes sense to me. Do your friends call you attempting to have a conversation and I am being awkward.
Me:
fuck off
God:
Can't you be more polite?
Me:
can't you make more sense?
God:
Yes I can make more sense.
Me:
GO ON THEN
God:
Narration continues...
Me:
if God's as stupid as you are, that would make a lot of sense
God:
Some things will always be a mystery.
Me:
especially if everyone's an idiot
God:
That is a hypothetical question. How about that.
Me:
god you're thick
God:
I probably am.

Probably not the 50 Best Games of all Time

2009-10-05T22:58:00.001+01:00

Over on UpToJump, they've just posted the first ten entries in The Official BEEX Bestest Games Of All Time. I wrote the little bit about Transport Tycoon, and have written a few more short entries for a few of the higher ranked games, which should appear over the next four weeks or so.

The list was compiled from the votes of a bunch of geeks like me on the Be Excellent To Each Other forum. It's not the busiest forum in the world, and a little bit cliquéy, so some pretty left-field choices feature in there. I'm all in favour of that as most of these lists are all too tediously similar to each other, although I'm still slightly shocked and appalled that Tetris failed to make the final cut.

For the record, I didn't vote for Transport Tycoon myself, but y'know, you go where the work is.

Greg Costikyan on Luck in Games

2009-09-29T01:30:00.000+01:00

This transcript of Greg Costikyan's lecture to the Game Developers Conference in Austin a few weeks ago, titled "Randomness: Blight or Bane", is probably the best thing I've read ~~about games~~ in months.

There's an understandable emphasis on videogame design principles, but he also makes a number of interesting points about Chess, Poker, Go, Settlers of Catan and many other wierd and wonderful games people have played throughout history. The holy trinity of "educational, interesting and entertaining" don't often come together in one big package, but here it is. In fact, I'm so enthusiastic, I'm linking to it for a third time here just to be sure you don't miss it.

Now where can I buy his book?

The Shivah

2009-09-27T19:57:00.000+01:00

To celebrate Yom Kippur this weekend, indie developer Wadjet Eye Games have been giving the Shivah away for free (usual RRP $4.99). It's reminded me both what's great and what's incredibly annoying about 'point-n-click' adventure games.

What's great? A story that's steeped heavily but irreverently in Jewish tradition. You play as Russell Stone, a disillusioned rabbi up to his eyeballs in debt and whose judgemental and negative sermons have turned off nearly his entire congregation. He's on the brink of bankruptcy when an old "friend" of his is murdered and he's bequeathed $10,000. Naturally suspicious, the police come calling and the adventure begins.

The graphics are crude but effective. Just like our Rabbi Stone.

The writing's good, the voice-acting plausible, and you're left with a real desire to get to the bottom of what's happened. Sadly, this is where my dislike for this kind of point-n-click adventure game kicks in, and I get hugely annoyed at the obtuse puzzles that obstruct me from solving the mystery.

"I promise lady, I didn't steal your curtains."

I appreciate that pleasure can be had from suddenly making a break-through in a game after being stuck for a while. But what's absolutely key to that being a successful game mechanic is for the state of 'being stuck' to be almost as much fun as 'getting unstuck'. For instance, games where you've got an interesting area to explore or (more commonly) things to shoot at have the potential to keep your interest even if you're not "progressing" in the traditional sense. But it's all too easy to get bored in games when you're given nothing to do but go back and forth between the same old screens, skipping the same old dialogue, and are left praying to Yahweh that you stumble on a solution.

Many people move from on from this point to say that games like the Shivah shouldn't be made as games. They should be made as films or books, where the pretence of interactivity doesn't hamper the fun part of unravelling the plot. I disagree. Dialogue has the potential to be much more interesting when you're given an element of control over it. The Shivah does this particularly well by letting you choose between responses that are, for example, 'reassuring', 'aggressive' or 'Rabbinical' (the latter meaning you answer a question with another question). Crucially, these decisions have a meaningful (or at least convincing) effect on the subsequent tone of the conversation.

Anyway, the Shivah is well-worth playing. If it's still free when you read this then it should be a no-brainer, but even for $5 it's not going to break the bank and has enough interesting ideas to make it worth a look. I'd just recommend that if you lack patience like I do (or perhaps that should be lateral thinking?), you might want to go use the guide here to help you along.

NotPopCulture

2009-08-31T12:24:00.000+01:00

So this place is no longer called No Target. There are a few reasons why I've abandoned the old name, none of which are particularly interesting. Perhaps the biggest thing for me was how insane it felt for the title of the blog to be different from the URL address. Look! They're now the same.

These are exciting times. Honest.

Building a Webpage that Sucks?

2009-08-31T02:42:00.000+01:00

So I'm trying to learn how to use Adobe Dreamweaver, while also trying not to let myself become completely ignorant of the code underneath it. It feels fun and exciting to have something new and completely alien to play around with, and even the few babysteps I've taken in the past couple of hours toward becoming less rubbish feel quite satisfying.

Almost me, except I have a rickety wooden chair instead of a cool one with wheels

I guess the dream is to one day have the power to create odd conceptual sites like MONO*Crafts. Although possibly not, as it's also a contender for Worst Web Site of 2009 on webpagesthatsuck.com

Yeah, I'll steer clear of the Flash for now.

Art Brut - DC Comics & Chocolate Milkshakes

2009-08-28T17:07:00.000+01:00

And to think I ever doubted they'd make a second album. Brilliant stuff.

Fire Alert debut, err, "thing"

2009-08-25T22:36:00.001+01:00

We got the name Fire Alert from some fire evacuation instructions we stole from a bar, on the night my brother, James McInerney and I decided we should have a go playing some music together. The wise principles contained within ("DO NOT TAKE PERSONAL RISKS OR PUT LIVES IN DANGER!") formed the basis of the first song we wrote. It's not a very good name for a band, but I'd rather have a crap name with some significance to it than spend months trying to think of something that's sufficiently "cool" but which is totally meaningless.

(While we're on the subject of bands with hip names, I'm pleased to see Internet Forever getting recognition from the likes of the Observer and VICE. They deserve it, and I've been slightly obsessed with the twee but undoubtedly great 'Break Bones' for a while now.)

Anyway, we got drunk, made up songs til the small hours of the morning, and pissed off the people living in the flat below. Thanks to the wonders of the iPhone, we were able to record it, and sure enough, most of it was a mess. Yet among the fluffed notes, dodgy lyrics and hesitant improvisations, there were a few minutes that stood out as sounding surprisingly 'finished'. (Or at least, slightly more than half-finished.)

A week later we took some video, and what you see below is what happened when the two were put together. I'm playing the bass notes.

Tetris Friends

2009-08-11T01:26:00.001+01:00

It's been mighty quiet round these parts lately- partly because my life's been consumed by this brilliantly designed Tetris site. It's hugely worth creating a profile, so that your performance is tracked in the many games you're sure to end up playing.

Possibly the greatest videogame ever made.

I've been playing the two-player battle mode mostly, which thanks to an excellent match-making system means it doesn't take long before you start playing against people of a similar ability to yourself.

Terrifyingly addictive.

Shenmue - The 8th Best Game Ever Made

2009-07-02T00:10:00.001+01:00

There’s a parallel universe somewhere where the Shenmue games were successful enough to recoup the $70m they cost to develop. On that version of Earth, being able to talk to every in-game character was more important to the game-buying public than being able to steal every in-game vehicle. They didn’t just want to see headshots in ever-increasing resolutions; they wanted to play in grander, lusher worlds that forced you to rethink what games could do.

Unfortunately, in our universe, Shenmue was a flop. Games since have focused on becoming shinier, noisier or greyer; and those who said Shenmue was a decade ahead of its time have been proven wildly and foolishly too optimistic about the future of videogames. Despite clumsy controls, awful voice acting, and teaching the world what QTE stands for, this great unfinished symphony has aged magnificently and is arguably now more essential than it's ever been.

Anyway, words can only begin to do this game justice. So let's watch some videos that demonstrate its insane genius.

Absolutely beautiful.

"You ain't heard it played like that before" #3

2009-07-01T00:20:00.000+01:00

Y'see, it's not even about posting something GOOD anymore. Well, maybe Sergio Mendes and Brasil '66 provide an "interesting interpretation". Maybe... maybe... maybe... a rethink is in order.

At least you can't go wrong with the original. And how about those dancing girls? Why don't people dance like that anymore?

Groundhog Day & the Fat Princess

2009-06-21T16:22:00.001+01:00

Seeing Wolf Gnards ask (but fail to answer) the question as to how long Bill Murray spends trapped in Groundhog Day, I was reminded how great this film is. Regardless of whether you watch it for the quality of Bill Murray's performance, or to remind yourself how punchable Andy MacDowell's face is, or even for the implied buddhist allegory, there can be no disputing that it is a work of genius.

In other "what I saw online this week" news, take a look at the Fat Princess game soon to be released on the PS3. Seems very promising- I hope they pull it off.

What I Saw on the net this Week - Part 2

2009-06-15T01:11:00.000+01:00

I have a feeling this will become one of those "regular" features that doesn't make it past its second outing, but for the moment I'm putting a brave face on things and saying that these links from the past week are worth taking a little time to look at:

Please help me buy a secret underground Lair

For sale: Secret network of tunnels 100ft under London - If I was a multi-millionaire, I'd say it was cheap at twice the price (which may help explain why I'm not already a multi-millionaire). You'll notice from the date of the article that this is far from breaking news, but as far as I can make out from the old Google-o-matic, no buyer has yet been announced. Anyone want to lend me some money?

Lucid Dreams - My fascination with this Wikipedia article probably has a lot to do with having just watched the surprisingly excellent Waking Life, which you should rush off and watch now if you haven't already. Does anyone want to help me become an omnipotent God in my dreams?

Little Wheel - The most beautiful Flash game yet? Make sure your speakers are turned on if you don't want to miss the brilliant Lounge Jazz, which along with the art-style, plays such a huge part in making it the little wonder that it is. But can anyone say they finished it without help from the built-in walkthrough?

"Wow! It's a totally unrelated 'Where's Wally?' for videogames!"

Metal Gear Solid - The 9th Best Game Ever Made

2009-06-11T07:45:00.001+01:00

To view the other entries in this series, click here

Before Metal Gear Solid, the idea that videogames should imitate films had been totally discredited. “Interactive movies” had been tried in the early 90s on the 3DO, Jaguar and PC, but nearly all had been commercial and critical failures (the 7th Guest and Phantasmagoria being notable exceptions). They were supposed to combine the best narrative elements of film with the dynamism of videogames, but in fact only brought together sub-B-movie actors with horribly frustrating and limited “gameplay”.

After publishers got bored of throwing good money after bad, “Full Motion Video” or FMV sequences were used sparingly, simply book-ending the sections where the player had more control. So in the likes of Resident Evil, Command & Conquer and Final Fantasy VII, you’d get a quick slice of completely non-interactive film or animation to rapidly advance the plot, between much longer sections where you’d be playing the game. It worked well enough for all those (hugely popular and critically acclaimed) games, but there was nonetheless a jarring disconnect between the plot and game segments. Watching the story unfold would often serve only to make the player think about the game they could be playing if it weren’t for constraints on processing and graphics capabilities, and it would feel disappointing to return to controlling a jerkily animated and less powerful version of the character you’d just seen acting far more smoothly and realistically in high-end 3D graphics.

Hideo Kojima, the director of Metal Gear Solid, was among the first to realise that plot exposition could be done better within a game engine. He saw that he could quickly and easily experiment with camera positions in a way that would make a director of even the highest-budget Hollywood film envious; and this was crucial for the story he wanted to tell (in which players would at times be asked to sit and listen to characters with names like “Revolver Ocelot” talk about the difficulties they had in childhood). Playing Metal Gear Solid today, it still strikes you how well the non-playable action sequences are put together, the quick cutting and unusual camera angles helping to maintain interest in an often ludicrous plot. This simply wouldn’t have been possible in the glossy but inflexible medium of FMV.

So good, they made it twice

Yet there are many who’ll be reluctant to celebrate the way Metal Gear Solid blazed a trail for narrative-heavy games. There’ll be nearly as many who think it’s preposterous for a game steeped in paranoid conspiracy theories and adolescent fantasies to demand the patience from its players to watch cut-scenes that frequently last over twenty minutes. And there will be still others who think that Kojima is a pretentious idiot, a man inflicting scarcely interactive games on the world because he never realised his true dream of becoming a director in the film industry. Yet those who think this way lose sight of how pioneering his first Playstation game was, not just in the way it told its story, but crucially, in the way it asked you to play.

MGS genuinely provided the “Tactical Stealth Espionage Action” it promised on the box, and on consoles at least, no-one had seen anything like it (err, at least not since the first Metal Gear games on the NES -Ed). The idea that it was to better to sneak around a difficult situation than to rush into it head-first would have been dismissed as boring by most developers, who had overlooked the potential to create tension and suspense from asking players to avoid conflict. Yet the slower paced, risk-assessment play was often more thrilling than a thousand polygonal explosions, and who doesn’t fondly remember hiding in a cardboard box, hoping and praying that this time the guards wouldn’t stop to ask, “huh?! Who put that there?”

Tense.

And hiding in boxes was just the beginning of the left-field thinking. “I can read your mind! I KNOW you like soccer!” Psycho Mantis would tell you, when he discovered your ISS Pro 98 save game on your memory card. He’d then infuriatingly read your every move while you tried to defeat him- using his “psychic powers” to counter each button press at the moment it was made. Then after he pounded away at you and you were moments from death, a member of your support team would call and say, “Snake! I got it! Plug your controller into the player 2 port! It’s the only way you’ll be able to circumvent his mind control!”

This brings us to the paragraph where I should probably write about Metal Gear Solid as the pinnacle of post-modernism, except I don’t particularly want to get bogged down in that. Tim Rogers has already written enough on the subject to satisfy even the most pretentious of wannabe videogame academics, and in truth, he’s done it better than I ever could. Yet regardless of whether applying artistic terminology to games turns you on or off, there’s no denying that Metal Gear Solid used unusual techniques to blur the line between the player and the game in a way that hadn’t been done before, and set an agenda that the likes of Eternal Darkness: Sanity’s Requiem and even Banjo Kazooie: Nuts & Bolts would later build upon with great success.

Still tense

Yet the art-house interpretation is really just a distraction, a shiny looking cherry atop of what it is that truly makes MGS great: the ride it takes you on. You don’t sit back pontificating over whether or not they just “broke the fourth wall” as you play it; you hang onto the edge of your seat, bouncing up and down with anticipation to find out what will happen next to Snake and his cohort of treacherous companions. Like a DVD boxset of 24, it begs you to consume it in as few sittings as possible, and there can be little doubt that thousands upon thousands of people must have been lured into rushing through it in one glorious indulgent weekend. Yes, the videogame world we now live in has become saturated with games that have dull stories and tedious “stealth gameplay”; but don't allow Metal Gear's legacy to impede your judgement of the game. This is Kojima's masterpiece, one which he himself hasn't been able to match since, and no game since has been able to grip so strongly and consistently from start to finish.

What I saw on the net this week

2009-06-07T00:39:00.000+01:00

I told you I wanted to be like Kieron Gillen- so now I'm ripping off his Sunday round up on Rock Paper Shotgun wholesale. And who knows? At this rate, I might start managing more than four updates each month.

"Wow! It's a totally irrelevant close-up of a Game & Watch!"

Why Project Natal will do for pop what Rock Band did for 'proper music' - Pop Justice getting excited about an E3 announcement? Things have changed a lot in the past two years.

Valve On L4D2: “Trust Us A Little Bit” - Doug Lombardi tries to calm down the sensitive Valve fans who ran for their pitchforks the moment they heard Left 4 Dead 2 would be coming out only a year after the original.

Top 10 Worst Fanboys - Everyone loves a list, don't they? The writing on Old Wizard is maybe a little clunky and unpolished (look who's talking! - Ed) and its writers aren't as funny as they think they are, but there are some decent observations to be found among the hit-and-miss humour.

Google Wave: A Complete Guide - I'm still not quite sure what it will all mean, but seems like it'll be big. And to think I've only just got my head around Twitter...

Gender Benders: Who's Really Who? - An old Stuart Campbell article from Total PC Gaming, talking about sex and videogame taxonomy. Sort of. Reminds me I really should cough up the £2/month subscription fee for full access to the rest of his website.

Project Natal

2009-06-03T23:35:00.001+01:00

Wow! Project Natal. It's incredibly exciting. It's like looking into the future. It's like Tom Cruise waving his hands about on the Star Trek holodeck while munching on virtual candy floss he stole from a Tamagotchi baby.

Yeah, I don't know what that means either, but here's the promotional video in case you missed it:

The most important part of that trailer is right at the start, where it says "product vision: actual features and functionality may vary". In other words, it's a load of pie-in-the-sky nonsense. And aside from the technological difficulties, I don't imagine Microsoft encouraging young kids to try karate kicks in their living rooms after the trouble Nintendo had with just their wrist straps.

Far more interesting is the feedback coming from those journalists who actually managed to try out the technology. Giving Time magazine the exclusive first look at the Wii did wonders for Nintendo, so it was no great surprise to see Microsoft pulling exactly the same trick. They will undoubtedly be pleased with the write-up, and even just the headline "Microsoft Whacks the Wii" must have put a big smile on Bill Gates' face.

The specialist press seem equally impressed. Here's the mostly trustworthy Ellie Gibson, giving Microsoft some quotes they'll love while writing for Eurogamer:

"There's no denying this technology works."

"Even an ancient game seems new and fresh when you graph Project Natal on top."

"In fact, I don't realise quite how much I'm getting into it until I hear [a Microsoft employee] warning a bloke behind me to stand back."

Now, perhaps it's because I've been playing too much Mario & Sonic at the Olympic Games recently, but the whole throwing myself around to play a game thing isn't the part of Project Natal that gets my juices flowing. For me, Peter Molyneux's prototype character Milo is the most intriguing thing of all, even if poor old Pete sounds even more deranged than usual while introducing it:

Now, Peter Molyneux is the king of the over-statement, and you'd have to be very naive not to realise that a lot of that conversation was scripted. Yet Milo talked to a load of journalists too, and while he wasn't so good at answering questions, his ability to read the emotional intonations of someone speaking, intentionally make and lose eye contact, and repeat back a name he's just been told in his own voice is impressive. You might worry what kind of creepy world we'll be living in when people are making friends with their xbox, but as forums all over the videogame world were quick to realise, at the very least this could be an exciting new era for pornography.

Jukebox Collective @ Bar Rhumba

2009-05-31T23:21:00.000+01:00

29th May 2009

Feeling utterly wrecked and with about two minutes to spare, I turned up at Bar Rhumba last Friday to see Jukebox Collective's first ever gig. In the interest of full disclosure, I should declare here and now that I used to play guitar for the lead singer's previous band, Dakar Rally. The vindictive, schadenfraude-seeking side of me wouldn't have minded seeing them bore the crowd to tears and make under-prepared fools of themselves, but thankfully they were great, and I can't recall ever seeing a band do a better first gig.

At first glance, doesn't the ammo-strap look like a guitar neck and the gun a microphone?

That's not to say I won't nitpick. While Kev's vocals were much improved from some of the more dismal and lacklustre nights when we shared a stage together, he tailed off after a strong start in a way I recognised too well. I hope and expect that he'll improve as he gets used to playing regularly again and gets more comfortable with the set.

The band? They were well-rehearsed and looked good, although Zara's ice cool "I'm going to look bored and not give a fuck" approach to the keyboards definitely beat Greg's "They love me! They really love me!" style of guitar and magic-box-sampler playing. When the image-consultants come in, they'd do well to have a word and suggest he leave it for Kev to do the hard work of looking excited.

I'm really chuffed for them though, and hope they can build up some momentum over the coming months. The tunes are beepy, slightly hypnotic and catchy little numbers, and the second half of the set hinted at more interesting and varied things to come.

Anyway, below is a little sample of their first single, which although sadly not ready for the launch night, I'm told will be available on iTunes any day now. You can have a listen to the full version over on the irrepressible Myspace.

Twit

2009-05-31T17:50:00.000+01:00

Whatever you think of the "new games journalism" concept, Kieron Gillen undoubtedly knows his stuff, and the news round up he does every Sunday on Rock Paper Shotgun nearly always contains a link to something well written and worth reading.

I bring this up not because the RPS round up is any better this week than it usually is, but because "No Target" has now officially jumped on the Twitter bandwagon. I'm hoping that by following every developer, decent newsite and interesting blog feed I can find, I'll get better at staying on top of the news and maybe one day be just like Gillen. Wouldn't that be great?

Spread too thin?

2009-05-20T00:39:00.001+01:00

I always had high hopes for myself. I bought into the lie they tell you at school that “you can do anything if you set your mind to it”, and then sat around waiting for my mind to get set on something. Unfortunately, it didn’t work out that way.

For a while I thought it was music that would make me “special”, or at the very least, give me an excuse to slack off at university:

“Why bother getting a good night’s sleep before tomorrow’s 9am economic anthropology class, when instead I could stay up and help write a song that defines our generation? Now pass the red wine and the reefer and play me that second verse again...”

As attractive as that lifestyle was, when I turned from my late-teens to early-twenties, doubts set in. Despite talks with promoters and producers who’d say all the right things about how “relevant” they thought our sound was, the Dakar Rally fan-base never extended much beyond friends of friends with nothing better to do. There came a point when persuading people to come to the next gig was my main reason for wanting to go out and meet people, and I found myself keeping in contact with those I otherwise found uninspired and uninteresting just to chase an elusive half-promise they once made to “come see you guys play sometime”. I had, in the words of Vincent Vincent & the Villains, “turned into someone that I didn’t like- and that’s no fun”.

So it’s against this back-drop of having tried and failed at a grand plan for the future (and allowing myself to become a self-serving, sycophant-seeker in the process) that I’m left wondering: what next? What can I do to escape the quagmire of life as a bored paper-pushing public servant, who relieves his creative frustrations by sporadically updating a seldom-read blog?

Q. Is a bland picture better than no picture at all?

These seem like the options:

a) Accept life as a fed-up, paper-pushing public servant. Keep drinking too much, never get laid, and occasionally go to karaoke bars with other grumpy paper-pushing public servants to sing Hard-Fi’s “Living for the Weekend” or ”Working for a Cash Machine” or any other song that’s horrible but helps you to connect with everyone around you who’s also boring, bored and miserable.

b) Stop writing self-indulgent rubbish like this, and write something people might actually want to read. Start a new blog with a narrower focus, which is easy to update regularly. Take up those offers to write for the Worship Street Irregulars and Savy Gamer, and build up a decent portfolio of varied writing. Learn more about proper journalism.

c) Have a go at music again. Get back into the habit of playing the guitar for at least an hour a day. Learn the interesting scales, rhythms and licks you never got around to last time, and get better at improvising. Persuade the talented but nervous musicians around you to get involved, and do something genuinely interesting with it. Maybe start a band called “the Sycophant Seekers”.

d) Work to develop a popular application for the iPhone. Use that app as a springboard for establishing a profitable business, working alongside your friends on something you’re in control of and truly believe in. Get bought out by Google for $100,000,000,000 before the age of 30 and retire into the sunset, using the money to live a life of sophisticated but modest pleasures, while anonymously but informedly donating to worthy charities.

My instinct is to answer “e) all of the above”, but is that in any way realistic? How will I be able to keep scheduling four hours a day for playing videogames and watching tv while juggling those kind of ambitions?

Oh. Is that the answer?

Peter Doherty @ Proud

2009-05-15T11:44:00.001+01:00

22nd April 2009

Penned into the stables at the Proud Gallery in Camden, boys in skinny jeans were asking girls in polka dot dresses, “why can’t we go in the main room?”

Pete Doherty was there.

For hours we waited. While making-do with Proud’s adequate but unadventurous playlist, the patience of the pretty poser girls and the anaemic indie kids was thoroughly tested. They stood about outside, restlessly chaining their umpteenth cigarette of the evening, until finally word got around: the doors had opened.

We poured through. There were some guys in skinny jeans on stage, but no-one recognised them. “Are they his backing band?” asked a too-tall man standing too-far forward.

No. They were ‘Vaults’, one of those bands who tediously refuse to put the definite article before their name even though it’s crying out for it.

Maybe ‘Vaults’ were excellent. Maybe they weren’t mediocre hitless me-too’ers. Maybe they sounded adequate and unadventurous because we hungered only for most the evocative lyrics of our generation.

Whatever. Vaults weren’t Pete Doherty.

So we trooped back outside. We smoked our umpteenth-plus-one cigarette. Some were heard cursing that they might miss their last train.

But when finally cigarettes, Vaults, and frantic phone calls to Transport For London were over, it almost took you by surprise. It began with screams, then came “PETE!” swaggering onto the stage, and before you could elbow past too-tall man standing too-far forward, a belting (but perhaps most importantly, unironic) performance of ‘What a Waster’ was over.

Doherty was on fine, crowd-pleasing form, smashing through his greatest hits while treating us to a total of six Libertines tunes. The pace was almost business-like, and he barely uttered a word between songs, save for one moment early on when he started to complain about the quality of the lighting.

“It’s so dark out there I can barely see you! Err, can anyone see a Graham Coxon in the house?”

And to the delight of all, up strolled a sheepish-looking Graham Coxon to the stage. He looked nervous, maybe from being so unusually close to the hungry mob, or maybe because of Doherty’s liberal attitude to tempo. Songs would race forward at twice their usual speed before he’d suddenly slam on the brakes and do the final chorus at a canter. Regardless, the two shared a cockle-warming chemistry, even (or especially) when things around the edges got a little rough.

Yet after a couple of songs Coxon was gone and Doherty was alone, although still amply filling the stage all by himself. And “alone” must surely be a poor word to describe a man with four hundred people screaming his songs back at him. In these intimate surroundings, with Pete at his effortlessly entertaining best, there can’t have been a soul in the room who felt alone.

That said, the soul-less were there too, watching the whole set through the viewfinder of their cheap camera-phone, fantasising no doubt about the number of hits their grainy pictures might get on Youtube. Too-tall man standing too-far forward was one of them, leaning over the row ahead of him with arms fully out-stretched, grinning smugly at the good-looking but awful-sounding footage he was recording. Where did this cult of joyless camera-phone people come from? Are they perhaps descended from the losers that read all their album sleeves nine times over in order to learn lyrics?

Was it really worth it?

Whatever. Someone please take them away and do something horrible to them.

Yet in spite of nuisance support acts, and nuisance camera phones, Doherty was great. When stripped down to just the man and his guitar, his brilliance as a song writer is indisputable. He enraptured the crowd, as they sang along loudly to the songs they knew, and listened respectfully to those they didn’t. He remains a living legend, and everyone needs to hear the web of sound he spins when he picks up a guitar.

A decent tv show about games?

2009-05-09T11:43:00.000+01:00

I'm excited. There's every chance that Charlie Brooker's Gameswipe will be mind-blowingly awesome. Here's an old episode of Screenwipe to remind you why:

Close Range

2009-05-04T19:40:00.000+01:00

"It's completely open-ended. You can shoot people in the ear, but you can also shoot them in the eye."

The Onion offers definitive proof that the Americans can be pretty damn good at satire.

Hot New Video Game Consists Solely Of Shooting People Point-Blank In The Face

The Golden Rule

2009-04-18T12:03:00.000+01:00

Whenever the headline of a newspaper article or editorial asks a yes/no question, the answer is invariably 'no'. The "?" at the end is a cunning ploy that allows the writer to have a more eye-catching headline than their article deserves. Remember to just say "no" and move on.

"You ain't (or maybe have) heard it played like that before..." #2

2009-04-09T14:04:00.000+01:00

I launched this "monthly"feature in January 2009, and we're now in April. Oops. Let's call it a quarterly feature shall we?

I also said that it would include covers by "relatively obscure bands". Tori Amos is not exactly obscure, and this cover probably isn't the world's best kept secret. So yes, you guessed right, this is little more than a lazy "filler" Youtube post, and you may claim your five pounds.

Anyway, here's Tori Amos doing Smells Like Teen Spirit:

And even though everyone's already heard it a few thousand times too many already, here's the Nirvana original for the sake of completeness: