The Game Critique

The following is a comment I posted over on the latest GameCritic’s podcast. It may seem a little rantish, but that’s why I’m going to expand on it at the end.

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You said during the podcast that Nintendo had revolutionized gaming. I have to respectfully disagree. They have only revolutionized it superficially. What they have done replaced button presses with Wii-mote waggles. The idea is to simplify gaming with simple controls that can make sense. And for Wii Bowling or Wii Tennis its perfect. But as soon as you take the control outside of that simple one type movement control you up the complexity of the game. There may only be one button, but if you translated each movement to a button press or analog stick movement you’d realize how equal the complexity is for anything other than the mini-game compilations. Given the nature of motion control at present and its impreciseness it makes the controller even more complex and frustrating.

It has been proven with testing that for an abstract action a button press that stays consistent within the game, i.e the same button for the same action, makes more sense than trying to emulate the action, mainly because it is easier to replicate input with a thumb press than it is to move the entire arm in the exact same manner.

I have no doubt that motion control can offer a different experience, but developers are still treating it as a standard controller and are having to make up for the loss of button with waggle. Then there are the games that do not need it, but add it in out of some necessity of being on the Wii. Twilight Princess comes to mind where you had to act out many of the actions, where the Gamecube controller used a few simple button presses to perform the same actions.

Yes the current gen controller are prohibitive, as were last gen. In fact there is a high learning curve for new gamers, but kids some how manage it. That’s another issue of cognitive age response and learning, but the NES has a D-pad and 2 buttons. Some games now can work with that. The idea is not to simplify the machine, but the in-game system. If you gave a newcomer a game on the 360 or PS3 that only utilized the d-pad and two buttons there would be no problem in getting into it.

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I should add some testimonial I hear about the new Wii Motion Plus. I cannot verify the validity of these comments, but it sounds truthful to me. That yes it does change gaming on the Wii, but does come with some problems. Namely, when the Wii first came out people were waving their whole arms, because that is how they thought and were told it would work, but then people adapted to only moving their wrists, for it was the basic movement not the degree that mattered. Now Wii Motion Plus changes all that because now you have to control it like you first thought it would work and will cause people to re-adapt.

It is a minor concern yes, but it is worth saying. It also attaches to my argument of the Wii-mote’s movements being a replacement for button presses. Now with full motion recognition it is supposed to have 1-1 replication. The thing is you can only replicate simple motions. If you design something too difficult people would not be able to replicate the action in their own house. The basic idea of escapism that most, not all, games are based upon would suffer with this idea. Sword, tennis racket, baseball bat swinging are all basic motions that we all understand in real life and replicate on the Wii. However if you want any finesse with those motions or to do more complex motions like rowing, driving, etc. you will be sorely disappointed. One problem is that it does take some practice or practical knowledge of those activities to do them correctly. Secondly, there is a certain amount of resistance required to do them properly. Without that resistance, with the new fine motion controls you are going to overshoot what you were doing, it is going to look ridiculous and immersive breaking on screen and more than likely you are going to fail. I can see scenarios where the motion breaks the experience instead of immersing you.

Example: Say you are rowing a boat the Wii-mote and Nun-chuck are the oars. But you speed up because you get into it and there being no real water resistance you suddenly see your character flapping the oars around like a chicken with its wings. A real person cannot row like that and yet you are seeing it. Immersion broken.

It wasn’t understood when it was first created, but the control is much more than an input device. It is a blank slate of iconography. Each button, each analog stick is a symbol for an action. It is different for every game, so the controller is a blank slate. The player learns and know that the icons (buttons) are, but they have no meaning on their own. There are basic principles that people understand about the buttons, because they generally hold true through all games and if not there is a reason for it. In North America anyway on the Playstation, X is ok, O is cancel, left analog stick for movement, right analog stick for camera. This works for First Person shooters as well. In Japan X and O are reversed, but they remain the same for all games in that region. The only exception I can think of is the Metal Gear Solid series that does that for specific purposes, but that is getting a bit of topic. The controller is a bunch of icons. The game than tells you what those icons and symbols mean. You then associate when you need to do something with that icon for the rest of the game. Humans are very iconographic. We associate people, concepts, countries and ourselves with icons and symbols of the greater whole.

The Wii-mote in the name of simplifying the control removes that iconographic interface. People get sucked in by meaning and association, its why we can read, because letters are nothing but icons to sounds. Movement however is not an icon. You cannot be shown a picture of it and understand what the motion means to the game world. You may know to move the Wii-mote left will aim left, but there is no mental association going on that allows your conscious mind to focus on the interactive area, but rather on the interactive motion of your avatar. It forces the mind to think about what you are doing step by step rather than as a whole experience. That is not how people function in the real world. We do not think about every step we take, we just walk. We do not take into account every letter in this sentence you are reading right now, we just read it and comprehend what it is saying.

Simplification is needed for new gamers in the current market, but the Wii and everyone copying them is the entirely wrong approach. Simplifying means cutting away complexity, not replacing it. Most of the Wii games, use the classic Wii controller, which has the same amount of buttons are a Gamecube controller. If you want it to be simple, create games that could be played with an NES controller. Everyone got that back in the day. There is only a D-pad and two buttons to worry about, but the association will stick and it the representation can be understood by the player as he immerses himself in the game.

I haven’t posted anything for almost a month. This is not due to lack of trying. My original plan was to finish up the last of my Beyond Good and Evil related posts now taking a total of 3 months of my life to complete, while the game took me less than two weeks. (Writing that post is like pulling teeth.) Then I was going to move onto Heavenly Sword and write out my thoughts there after replaying it for refresher. Then I was finally going to start on my first playthrough of Far Cry 2. (Ben you’d be so proud.) I also had a few post ideas for the interim while I was playing the games.

That was the plan and it looks like and has looked like for a while that will not be happening.

Instead what happened was a minor incident that escalated. Not to get your worries up, but it isn’t that big. A certain game on Steam went on sale a few weekends ago, Heroes of Might and Magic 5. For anyone who has noticed the few tweets that I’ve actually posted over the last week or two. This got me reminiscing about another game from my childhood that so thoroughly kicked my ass I have never won a single game of it. I would waste hours only for eventual defeat. Months passed and everyday I would be no closer. And that was before I learned there was a campaign mode. That game is Heroes of Might and Magic II.

For those of you who don’t know, Heroes of Might and Magic II is a turn based strategy game with fantasy monsters and your army controlled by heroes during battle. There is an over world filled with a variety of resources that have to managed and controlled. Everything is turn based and each individual turn doesn’t take up much time, but games take up a lot of turns.

I went on a short searching spree before tracking it down. I have all the manuals and extra inserts, but for the life of me I have no idea where the disc is. Wikipedia informed me of several compilation and one of them had games 1-4 for the price of one. I thought what a great deal. Now I think wikipedia lied to me. And none of the other compilations, for a reasonable price, exist on ebay or amazon that contains II. I eventually found a place I could download it for $15. I chose the 60 minute free trial first. After 60 minutes were up I was in the middle of my turn and a few seconds later I was $15 the poorer and one game richer. One hell of an addictive game richer. I am now on the last map of the good campaign and I have the evil side to go.

There’s more to this story.

At the beginning of this weekend another game was brought to my attention. This time on the PSN. It was Battlefield 1943, also for $15. It came with a 30 minute free trial demo. 30 minutes later I was kicked out and was soon $15 poorer and one game richer once again. I played and played this online multiplayer shooter. Then I noticed there was light outside, it was 5 am and I should get some sleep.

In short response what happened I got sucked in to two very addictive games that just ask of you “5 more minutes” at every twist and turn. The Battlefield 1943 Coral Sea challange doesn’t help one bit. I got sucked into games I did not expect, nor was I planning to. Is it just me? Am I that weak willed that I cannot do what I set myself out to do?

From what I’ve heard of people who’ve played Civilization 4, I am not alone in the turn based strategy game department, nor is that the case with online shooters. As for getting sidetracked by other games, isn’t that kind of the point. For a game to catch and hold the attention of the player. A game that distracts you from other games is a good thing, because it means you are engaged with the title. I use the term addictive and its true, both games are addictive. But a story cannot be as addictive as gameplay in our ludocerntric medium. It is the gameplay, the ludic elements that force us to continue on is such a manner. The continual interaction is not broken up and every second both both of these games has layer input and consequences. Not to say there aren’t story elements in either title, but they do not intrude into the game.

Another factor for their addictive quality is the quick play nature of the titles. For Heavenly Sword or Far Cry 2 I would have get over that initial hurdle of having to sit down for a significant amount of time to play the game. That hurdle may disappear once I am actually playing, but it exists as an obstacle that often isn’t overcome. No such factor exists with Heroes of Might and Magic II or Battlefield 1943. These are quintessential examples of in and out gameplay. I could stop typing and in 15 seconds be playing my next turn in Heroes and finish in another 15 seconds, save and be back to writing. of course one turn would lead to another and another and another and before I know it this would remain unwritten and I would have missed dinner…again. Same with Battlefield 1943. It would take about the same amount of time to jump in, then I can spend however long shooting, driving, running and then drop out and that be it, except one thing would lead to another and again I would miss my next meal for fighting in the Pacific campaign.

Both titles require a time investment to get what the game is offering, but unlike other AAA titles they don’t have the hurdle of time commitment that hype and excitement have to help to get over and actually put the disc in. It’s why everyone runs out for the first day, so when they run home the inertia lets them pop in the disc and they are off to the races. Maybe the real key is remove that hurdle altogether. The games can remain how they are, but somehow remove that hurdle that makes you think about putting the disc in, instead of just putting it in.

And now for the second half of this post’s title. The plan for now is, keep playing these addictive games, for I don’t think I can stop at the moment. Then post on them when the time comes. And if by some miracle of fate the mood strikes me, actually get back to all those drafts I have waiting to be finished and find their home here.

That includes some experimental stuff for here and for the design blog I work for, CreativeFluff, on the form of game design. Hope to write again very soon and not a month hiatus.