Videogameopolis: Fighting Imaginary Dragons

Usually when I write about video games, it's reviewing or examining specific content of games. I'm generally disconnected from the wider "gamer" culture, because I tend to avoid fan communities. Even those I'm ostensibly a part of I keep at arm's length. Fan communities tend to embrace extremism, both positive and negative, for things that are extraordinarily insignificant.

#GamerGate proves that the gaming community is no different. In fact, it seems that gamers are embracing extremism and fanaticism in a way that's a little shocking. The controversy was sparked by spurious claims against an independent games developer that lead to wider anger over fraternization between those who write about games and those who make them. Supposedly, games creators having any kind of relationship, even professional friendship, with journalists is a massive breach of objectivity and integrity.

The anger unleashed recently has been wildly destructive and misguided, mostly directed at women and those who raise issues of social equality. This has led to a campaign of harassment against indie game developers, freelance writers, and smaller games websites. Already, several writers have announced their departure from writing about games, deciding that the underpaid career is not worth the abuse.

There seem to be several major strains of anger coming together in the GamerGate campaign. The first is a small, but virulent group of misogynistic and racist individuals who are using the gaming community as their personal army of destruction. These people want to see women and people of color driven out of the video game industry. While they may not be the majority, their influence has made this event especially toxic and has helped guide it's aim.

Entwined with the former group are those individuals who believe that the gaming industry is too concerned with social justice issues, and that video games should return to just being "fun." They see the games industry opening up to new people and ideas, and fear that their preferred entertainments, such as violent shooters, will somehow go extinct. Both this and the former group are the creation of outdated ideals based on fear of change, and there isn't much to be done about them other than drown them out of the conversation.

The last strain is also the supposedly legitimate face of the GamerGate movement. These people believe that any social connections between gaming industry professionals violate journalistic integrity. The only path to true "objectivity," they claim, is to weed out the corruption by revealing every personal detail of those involved and driving out those creators that are proven corrupt. This crusade, like most, ignores the blinding reality. There is no objective journalism, and social connections are inevitable in any professional community.

Anyone expericing shock that journalists and their subjects interact socially should read Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail '72 and The Boys on the Bus. Hunter Thompson and Timothy Crouse examined political campaign writing in the 70s, and found connections between politicians and journalists just as entangled, if not more so, than those within the gaming industry. Unlike video games writing, which is relatively inconsequential, these men and women were producing the coverage that shaped how the nation viewed its presidential candidates.

As those books show, these kind of social relationships grow within any kind of professional community. If you spend the majority of your time interacting within the space of the games industry, it's natural that most of your social bonds will form in that space. GamerGate claims some kind of major conspiracy to promote "unworthy" games, but it's mostly a case of confusing the cause and effect. Journalists cover games and then build up a rapport with the creators. It's not a bad thing to disclose those relationships once they exist, but their influence is being vastly overestimated.

Even though the cries for integrity and objectivity are the front of the GamerGate movement, they are confused and misdirected. Writers have long examined actual objectivity problems within the industry, like major corporations paying for coverage by YouTube broadcasters. Major publishers have given gifts to and thrown lavish events for games journalists for years. In those cases, the games and personalities concerned are more acceptable to the typical gamer audience, so such breeches in journalistic credibility receive far less outrage. Now that the games press is giving increased coverage to smaller independent games, as well as examining social issues within more mainstream games, the gamer community looks to nepotism and corruption as the only explanation for why something they find irrelevant is getting so much press.

The rallying cry against GamerGate has been that the campaign needs to stop as long as it's continued to be used as a tool of harassment. It's status as a virtual witch hunt, primarily against women, is its most vile aspect, but it's also important to notice that the ideas at the core of the movement are fundamentally flawed, coming from a complete misunderstanding of how the professional world works. Disclosure and openness are important in writing, but expecting journalists to be social pariahs disconnected from the world they cover.

Videogameopolis: Chucky Mendoza and the Curse of the Pharaoh Review

Chucky Mendoza and the Curse of the Pharaoh

Developer: {ths}

Available from Itch.Io for $.99+ or Free (with optional payment) from Developer Website

Indie games tend to be labeled "retro" by people who don't appreciate the simpler, often pixel based aesthetics that those games often utilize. The reason for these art styles is usually not nostalgia, but rather a choice driven by artistic design or budget requirements. Occasionally, though, there's a game that proudly trumpets it's retro feel. Chucky Mendoza and the Curse of the Pharaoh sells itself as a nostalgic throwback to a simpler, more difficult era, one that may not be appealing to everyone.

Chucky Mendoza's feature list is a refutation of all the evolutions in game since its earliest days. It's a list of things the game doesn't feature, including "save points," "tutorials," "extras," and "achievements." Inspired primarily by 8 bit platforming games from the Commodore 64, it evokes their feel by avoiding any modern game design, except for slightly better pixel graphics.

Videogameopolis: Tone Friends Review

 

 

Tone Friends

Developer:  01010111

Available from Itch.Io for $1+

Tone Friends by developer 01010111 is advertised as a "cute collection of music and sound games for anyone to play." Comprised of five simple flash games based around the basics of music and sound, it's an interesting diversion that unintentionally pulls off a great feat. In a world comprised of exploitative business models disguised as games for kids, Tone Friends manages to be a great interactive experience for young children that can also teach a little about music, as well.

All games are entirely controlled by the arrow keys, and most are easy to comprehend with little instruction. The art style evokes some of the earliest video games, with simple pixel art work and black and white color palette. Flashes of color and some higher fidelity designs are used as accents, which stand out from the more primitive surroundings. Colors mark out success, help denote what's important in the game, or just provide extra feedback along with the sound.

Videogameopolis: Escape Goat 2 Review

 

Even though they encompass an incredible variety of ideas, most indie games tend to work within tried and true genres, whether to subvert them, perfect them, or use them as a tool for other purposes. Escape Goat 2 is a puzzle game that aims for perfection, minimizing most skill-based platforming while focusing on logic and timing puzzles. It also stars a purple goat and a mystical mouse, but that's not especially relevant. This game isn't a joke, unlike some other goat themed releases, and it deserves far more attention for its spectacular puzzle design.

Escape Goat 2 is the sequel to a pixel graphic puzzle platformer released in 2011. The original game received acclaim for its ingenious puzzles and intuitive learning curve, and even inspired a Hey Ash, Whatcha Playin? episode, but had to struggle through Greenlight to receive a release on Steam. The sequel has gained the honor of being the first game published by beloved developer Double Fine, but still has not received as much attention as it deserves.

Videogameopolis: The Benefits and Hazards of Indie Game Bundles

Over the last year or two, bundle sites have emerged as a growing force in digital content distribution. These sites run sales for limited amounts of time that "bundle" together video games, music, movies, even digital comic books, selling the complete package at a massively reduced price and often giving some of the proceeds to charity. The benefits to buyers are obvious, as they receive a large amount of content at a huge discount. However, the benefit to content creators, especially indie game developers, can seem more nebulous.

Recently, two independent games developers publicly refused to grant Steam keys, at least temporarily, to past purchasers of their games through bundles and similar sales. Their objections were mostly monetary, believing that the majority of these purchases were people massively underpaying for the product. By focusing on the money, they embraced familiar fallacies of the game development business while also endangering the greatest benefit of bundles, marketing and exposure.

Videogameopolis: Jazzpunk Review

Jazzpunk is a comedy video game. It's not a first person shooter, or adventure game, or any other traditional genre. It's an interactive experience that functions solely to get a laugh or smile, and its game mechanics either set up the punchline or are part of the joke.

Set in a bizarre alternative universe, Jazzpunk stars a secret agent named Polyblank, who you guide through multiple missions in a bizarrely anachronistic world. The themes are 50s and 60s spy movies with evil Russians and Bond style villains, but there's also cyberpunk technology and flying cars straight out of the Jetsons. All characters have the same shape as the silhouettes that mark bathroom doors, and they all make constant puns that imply they know they're in a computer, or at least partly electronic. It's Get Smart if Mel Brooks was obsessed with computers and further deranged.

The world makes little sense, then, which is entirely the point. Reality warping medications send the protagonist hurtling into each adventure, with simple instructions to complete, like retrieving secret documents or experimental technology. It quickly becomes apparent that the main point of the game is not to complete objectives, but to explore every environment and try to interact with every detail. Everything is a potential toy, and even random filler characters often have multiple lines of dialogue.

Videogameopolis: Nuclear Throne First Impressions

Independent game developer Vlambeer is no stranger to pain. The tiny two man team, along with occasional collaborators, have witnessed their best efforts stolen by unscrupulous rivals. Until recently, these clones of their games have also found a decent amount of success, discouraging these brilliant creators with a heavy dose of despair. Their fortunes have begun to turn recently, but it seems that they've decided to inflict some of that pain on others. Nuclear Throne is that pain, and it's exhilarating.

Nuclear Throne is the latest game to take inspiration from the "roguelike" genre, which is known for heavily randomized levels, high difficulty, and permanent death of game characters. These types of games give no quarter and no mercy, and only once chance to complete them. Traditionally, it's been a niche genre, due to the high skill level and time investment required. Recent games have taken the principles of these games but quickened the pace and shortening the experience. You can realistically finish in a couple hours, once you've played enough to not die within the first few minutes.

Videogameopolis: The Joy of Frustration

One of the great perils of nostalgia is that it often leaves people remembering fondly things that seemed terrible at the time. Everyone's heard some variation of the line, "When I was young, I walked to school barefoot in the snow uphill both ways, and I loved it." In the world of video games, there's a growing nostalgia for the extreme difficulty of games from their early days. The argument goes that games today are a shadow of their former selves, because they're too accessible, and there isn't enough challenge.

These arguments tend to overlook many factors for the differences in difficulty. Early video games were often designed first for the arcade, where a high level of challenge forced players to spend more of their precious quarters to continue playing. These games also often had unwieldy  or flawed controls, due to the primitive technology, that unintentionally made the experience harder. There's also the truth that while the default challenge of modern games is not insurmountable by most, these games usually include higher difficulty levels as an option, or focus on other concepts like story over punishing mechanics.

Videogameopolis: Hearthstone Beta Impressions

When something combines two popular obsessions, ones that have long been abandoned, you know there's potential for trouble. Hearthstone: Heroes of Warcraft is a new digital collectible card game (CCG) from Blizzard Entertainment. They've combined a simplified version of Magic the Gathering with the fantasy universe of World of Warcraft. While this is the second CCG based on Warcraft, it's the first completely digital game. It also has the makings of a truly addictive hobby.

When Blizzard first announced Hearthstone, it sounded like a money making opportunity first, and a game second. Card games are huge business, and digital card games can be a license to print money. Though they require ongoing development and balancing, virtual packs of cards are often priced at almost the same value as physical cards, and yet have none of the production and distribution costs. Although the pricing model is a bit expensive in the beta, the game so far is surprisingly polished and definitely not just a cynical marketing gimmick.

Videogameopolis: Shedding Some Greenlight

Games on the PC have rapidly evolved into a digital focused medium. Only a few stores still stock physical copies of games, and most of the best games are independent releases that are only available by download. While not necessarily the sole cause, Valve Corporation's Steam games distribution service is responsible for much of this change. It provided an easy way to purchase, update, and organize games on the computer, while also including many social and competitive features.

Steam has become so ubiquitous as a platform that many people refuse to buy games that are not available on the service. This has become a problem, as there is an inscrutable selection process for what games are available. Steam features many of the best games ever produced, but also some that are outright scams. Selection rules are sketchy and undefined, sometimes seeming like the personal preferences and whims of an individual rather than a corporate policy.

The Greenlight program was the supposed answer. In theory, it's a wonderful idea. Independent developers submit their game, in whatever stage of production, to Greenlight, and the Steam community votes on what games they want to buy. Unfortunately, the mechanics of Greenlight's voting system are shrouded in confusion and mystery, and until recently, the amount of games allowed on Steam from the program was pitifully small.

Things are improving, with dozens of games admitted at least a couple times a month. Still, there are many games that deserve to have a wider audience that still haven't been greenlit. Here are three games that should be on Steam and need more votes.

Videogameopolis: The Wolf Among Us

One of last year's video games of the year was an incredible tale of morality and consequences in a harsh, Hobbesian state of nature. Regrettably, I never played this game, even though it's primary gameplay was dialogue and choices, not gunplay or violence. That game is The Walking Dead, Telltale Games original story set within the greater Walking Dead fiction. I utterly detest anything with more than the lightest bits of horror, and zombies just exhaust me. I still felt like I was missing a minor cultural event, however, when the otherwise action obsessed mainstream gaming culture embraced something that encouraged thoughts, emotion, and analysis.

Last week, Telltale released the first chapter of its newest serialized game, The Wolf Among Us, titled "Hope". This game shares similar mechanics to The Walking Dead, and is also based on a cult comic book series. However, the settings and plot of both series are miles apart.

Videogameopolis: I Don't Want to Fight Those Monsters

 

Recently I finished playing two blockbuster video games, Assassin's Creed III and Skyrim, but I didn't actually complete them. Since these are modern AAA games, they were filled with excessive amounts of extra, often pointless, content, but I'm not referring to those parts of these games. I never reached the end of these games, did not see the end credits roll, and I don't have an immense desire to finish them. I was tired of fighting monsters, both literal and metaphorical, and had discovered a lot more about my own personality in the process.

In Skyrim, you play as an adventurer of self-determined origins who discovers he/she is Dragonborn, a unique form of warrior able to slay and absorb the souls of dragons. The main plot is rather thin, as it can essentially be summed up as kill dragons, find out who is bring back the dragons, and eliminate them as well. It's mostly an excuse to explore and interact with a huge fantasy world, buildling your own story along the way.

Exploring dark tombs and ancient ruins, my created character faced undead abominations, malfunctioning mechanical wonders, and a virtual legion of bandits and thieves of various sorts. It was interesting at first, but soon I found myself bored with bashing zombies with a large, blunt weapon. I focused on the game's minor content, building up a home of my own, adopting an orphan, then finally marrying a fellow adventurer. Instead of stealing from untouched ruins or disturbing otherwise isolated creatures, I was creating a better life for my character.

Videogameopolis: Gone Home

Over the years, I've experienced truly bizarre and fantastic things through the medium of video games. When I was a child, I explored fantasy worlds as Italian plumbers and a menagerie of anthropomorphized animals. As a teenager, I was a street fighter through Street Fighter and fought Hitler's army more times than I can count in first person shooters. Even as an adult, I've witnessed games that create immersive fantasy worlds that would have made my younger self faint, but only elicit minor excitement now.

Why then, with all this amazing escapism, am I most impressed and enchanted with a video game where you explore a large but mundane suburban home? Gone Home is that game, and it's one of the most refreshing experiences I've had in a long time.

VideoGameopolis: First Level

 

Long ago, in that bizarre time known as High School and College, I wrote video game reviews for a tiny gaming website. That website ceased to exist year ago, having never found an audience. I'm quite glad that it has disappeared, because most of what I contributed was embarrassing at best.

However, I did enjoy writing about games, and they are still one of my primary hobbies. While I don't feel like providing traditional reviews quite yet, I thought it would be useful to give my impressions of games I'm playing lately.

First Impressions: Disney's Ghosts of Mistwood

When a Facebook notification appeared for a game called Disney's Ghosts of Mistwood, I had to say I was slightly intrigued.  Disney being involved with a social networking game wasn't a surprise, with their Club Penguin franchise still active and other projects like Virtual Magic Kingdom come and gone.  The interesting bit was the setting, a swampy haunted mansion with a ghostly mystery.  I could feel the Haunted Mansion vibrations emanating from this game, and I was definitely sympathetic to them.

Chime- More Trance Inducing Than a Room Full of Hypnotists

Game logo from Zoë Mode (the developer)

Based on the recommendation of one of my favorite blogs, Twenty Sided, I downloaded the game Chime, which was just released for the PC on digital release platform Steam. The game is the first release by OneBigGame, a charity group that plans on getting developers, in this case Zoë Mode, to make games for free, then donate the profits to good causes. It's an intriguing idea, and for only five bucks, I thought it was worth supporting a charity and getting a few minutes distraction. What I wasn't expecting was one of the most relaxing, zen-like experiences I've ever had playing a computer game.