Every Time I Think I'm Out...(Console Wars)

Okay, I keep not wanting to comment on console wars and talk instead about game design, but dang if this stuff doesn't get me worked up.  Here's a quote info from Kotaku's Brian Crecente:

But with Wii sales flattening and consumers looking for more bang for their buck this holiday, it would be a smart decision.  

Both Microsoft and Sony told Kotaku that they plan to heavily market their new prices during the holidays pointing out to consumers all the things they get for their $300.  

"This holiday," Greenberg said, "is all about value."

Oof.

Okay, so Wii sales are "flattening" according to last month's NPD results.  That's one month out of how many months?  All right, okay, so maybe they sold a little bit less than in previous months.  Still, it's pretty darn good considering the there were no new releases in July until the end of the month in Wii Sports Resort.  We might see a different tale this month.  We might not.  We'll wait until September to see what comes out, but I would posit that with two million copies of Wii Sports Resort sold already there were some Wiis sold.

Moving on.

So the holiday is all about value, Mr. Greenberg?  So, your consumer pays $300 and gets...what?  They get a console with a controller.  No games.  Those are extra at $60 apiece.  You can get a bundle that may cost $349 that includes one game, or if Sony and Microsoft really feel like taking it in the shorts they'll sell bundles for $299 and take a huge loss on the hardware that they just finally got the price down on.  Or, the consumer can pay $249 and get a Wii with Wii Sports.  For $50 more you get a controller and a couple more games.  I mean, which one is the value?

The things that these companies are pushing are things that don't get used!  It's like they're saying "Bigger Hard Drive Space!  Blu-Ray!  HD Capability!"  Most people are answering, "What?  Whatsamahoosits?  I don't have an HDTV.  Why do I need a hard drive in a console?  My kids like Wii Sports, and we all have fun with it.  Why don't I get that?"

This is killing me.  My head hurts.  I have to go lie down.  I hope Nintendo spanks all these companies this holiday season and teaches them a lesson.

They Just Don't Learn (XBox 360)

Microsoft finally lowered the price on their Elites! Yay for them! They're clearing out the Pros so that there will only be two models, the Arcade and the Elite, with the high end sitting at $299! This is fantastic news for everyone-

Via Joystiq

Oh.  So now there's a SUPER Elite that they're talking about. I follow. THAT point of entry looks to be at about $450. Instead of a price drop, it turns out to be, in consumers eyes, a price INCREASE. How do you figure? Well, consider this: Right now, in order to get the best possible PS3, it's $299. You have the absolute best system that they offer. In order to get the best possible XBox 360, it's $299. After this bomb drops, in order to get the best possible 360, you'll be paying $450, and for what? A bigger hard drive?

(What got into these console makers that they started making multiple and increasingly confusing SKUs during this console generation? They never did this before. Sega wasn't even this stupid, and they made some extremely questionable decisions.)

You know, when we worked at Best Buy, they talked about different segments of the population that you could market to. Some were more reliable than others. Best Buy's sweet spot was the squishy middle ground of soccer moms and wealthy 50+ guys. Those were the people who spent the most, per capita, and were more likely to stay loyal in the long run. The ones who were least likely to stay loyal in the long run were the 20-35 year old male. They were just looking for the latest and greatest and would go wherever they could get it, whether it was online or at a store. They really weren't Best Buy's target because they knew that those people weren't going to stick around. Best Buy, so far, is the most successful electronics retailer in the world.

What does this mean? Well, there isn't really ANY loyalty in the console race. One generation, Nintendo will be on top. Then Sony. Now Nintendo again, although a lot of people like Microsoft. People keep switching around. Why?

BECAUSE THE TARGET MARKET IS FICKLE 20-35 YEAR OLDS. They're the ones who check specs and actually care about larger hard drive sizes. You can't count on this demographic forever, since they grow up and have families and can't be bothered to put in the time and effort needed to keep up with the constantly changing consoles. The demographic you can COUNT on is the middle range, the 30-55 year old group who has families and has brand loyalty. Plus, just as a point of comparison, looking at those numbers, how long to you have people from 20 to 35? 15 years. How long does the second demographic last? 25 years. It makes sense to target the second group.

Crap like this is why the console race is getting wacky and Nintendo keeps curb-stomping the competition month after month. They picked the most loyal demographic and they're serving them. They don't have to worry about the 20-35 year old male. They'll get them on the way, but they won't focus on the young male because the young male will get distracted by the next bright shiny that comes along with a new 250 GB hard drive that does absolutely nothing for gameplay.

Beatles Rock Band Will Be "Outsold 2-to-1"

That's what this EEDAR analyst had to say:

Divnich says he expects Activison to ring up sales in the order of 3 million GH5 units across all platforms, compared to a projected 1.7 million for The Beatles: Rock Band. "I believe that at the end of the day, it comes down to marketing muscle, and Activision has proven in numerous showdowns that they can out advertise and out promote their competitor," he tells Joystiq. "If Activision relaxes on the marketing spend, while MTV Games kicks it up a notch, there's certainly a chance that I could be wrong."

There's another scenario in which this year's Rock Band could prove more of a contender. "The only concern I have with my Guitar Hero vs. Rock Band analysis is that Activision may focus less on marketing Guitar Hero 5 and divert funding to DJ Hero, a new brand in their Guitar Hero line-up," EEDAR's chief number man admits. "That would certainly change the game."

No matter what, Divnich doesn't see a very-worst-case scenario playing out for MTV Games and Harmonix, assuring us that "[The Beatles: Rock Band] will outsell Rock Band 2 this holiday season."

It might happen.  It might.  However, as anyone can tell you, slap "The Beatles" on anything and it will sell.  I think analysts are underestimating two things:  Rock Band works extremely well with Wii owners, and the majority of Wii owners are these so-called "casual" gamers that are put off by the difficulty levels of games like Guitar Hero.  They're more than likely more familiar with The Beatles than, say, Muse.  I think some of these analysts are going to find themselves unpleasantly surprised, but then again, what do I know?  I just play the games.

Once Again, Penny Arcade Explains It All

I like what they say about the PS3 here:

Reporters can't seem to decide if the three hundred dollar PS3 Slim is awesome or too awesome, when it's actually a barbed black crown of shame, and that's more or less the end of the discussion. It can't be seen as anything but a concession to a market that has consistently chosen their competitor's products - an act of contrition, the purest evidence possible that this brand is no longer sufficient to sway consumers.  There is an optional stand available that allows you to stand the system vertically, on its side - making the system a literal tombstone, as well as a figurative one.

It's a little harsh, but I get his point.  The Slim looks awesome, yes.  I'll probably get one once my nerd rage over lack of PS2 support dies down.  (I mean, seriously, how could you screw that up!  You have a library of HUNDREDS of great games that you just THROW OUT THE WINDOW?  I'm hyperventilating.)  But all of it was in response to Sony making some questionable, somewhat defensible but ultimately wrong decisions.

Sony Is Really Stupid

OK, so Sony decided to not put in downwards compatibility into the PS3 Slim.  Here's their reasoning:

"Now that we're at a point where we're three years into the lifecycle of the PS3," he told us earlier today, "there are so many PS3 disc-based games that are available that we think — and noticed this from our research — that most consumers that are purchasing the PS3 cite PS3 games as a primary [reason]".

"And it's not just like 50 or 60 percent. It's well into the 80 or 90 percentile range who are purchasing it for PS3 [games]. We do know that there are next gen consumers wanting to come over the the PS3. Most of those are consumers who have not utilized their PS2 for a little while and they're ready to jump into the PlayStation 3."

ARGH!

OK, so here's why people are buying PS3s for PS3 games and not PS2 games.  IT'S BECAUSE YOU CAN'T PLAY PS2 GAMES ON THE PS3.

Downwards compatibility acts as a user-friendly bridge.  When you buy a new system, like the 360, PS2, Wii, or DS, you're able to play games from the previous system on it already.  That means that you're not cutting off an entire library at the knees and you're making it easier for people to justify the upgrade costs.  The most popular systems of today have had built-in downwards compatibility.  Did Sony learn nothing from the PS2?  I mean, they sold 140 million of these things!  Now they're expecting people to basically throw away all their old PS2 games just because the PS3 is out?

And Sony wonders why they're lagging behind.

PS3 Price Drop! Shocking!

Shocking absolutely no one, the PS3 price is now $299.  I'm still on the fence about one, though.  I'll have to save my pennies.

The Importance of Understanding

That sounds like a really hippy-dippy title, but follow me on this one, please.

On one side, you have the Core audience shrieking like Glenn Beck about casual gaming, and on the other side you have Nintendo fanboys shrieking about core gaming.  It's basically a shoutfest with some sickening gloating thrown in every time something goes the right way for either group.

It's not enough to merely make "whoo-whoo" noises and imitate a train, explaining that the future is in casual gaming so get on board.  It's also not enough to merely snicker derisively at people who are freaking out over the casual "boom."  In order to get to the heart of the matter, we need to figure out why people are getting concerned on both sides.

First, I've said it before and I'll say it again:  The core is scared.  They're scared because they know, as everyone knows, that whatever sells keeps getting made.  Therefore, if games like Wii Fit and EA Sports Active sell, companies will start making more of those style of games instead of better, deeper content.  In effect, they're screaming, "You're ruining EVERYTHING!  Stop BUYING those things!  We've worked very hard to get gaming to this point, and we're not going to let it be wrecked."

Indeed, many people, including myself, have given years to video games.  We've given our time, money, and emotions to something that we care deeply about.  Games touch you on a different level than movies or music since YOU have a stake in how well it turns out.  If YOU play the game well, you enjoy it and if YOU do not, you won't.  They're a very personal experience for all involved.

Another sticking point for them is that they remember what happened when Mario first hit the scene.  Everyone tried making their own colorful 2-D mascot, and the NES was littered with piles of crappy 2-D platformers.  It was a trend that continued until the Playstation rolled around and RPGs exploded.  Then everyone and their mother littered systems for the next couple of years with crappy, uninspired RPGs.  When shooters took off, everyone started making their own bland shooters.  They know more than anyone else what happens when something gets popular:  It gets repeated endlessly and by everyone.

That's why there's so much passion on that side.  It's not because they're grating fanboys (although sometimes you might be excused for thinking so).  They're not ignorant.  They just care an awful lot.

On top of that, they're scared of a repeat of the 1983-84 video game crash.  As is the case with history, it's gotten distorted over the years.  Now, most people draw a straight line from the failure of the E.T. game to the crash of the Atari to the crash of the industry.  The lesson is simple:  Crappy games leads to an artificial bubble of uninformed players leading to a gaming crash.  Of course, there were far more issues at play, such as oversaturation of consoles on the market and a recession, both of which COULD be perceived as happening now.

So what's the truth?  Do the Hardcore have anything to fear?  Well, yeah.  Their fears are not unfounded.  As much as acolytes like Sean Malstrom may not want to admit it, there are risks involved with a more inclusive approach.  In the next article we'll figure out what the risks are, but why they're not that risky.

"LOL Wii Vitality Sensor LOL"

The war has begun, and the Vitality Sensor is the flashpoint.

That's what the hardcore would have you believe:  That Nintendo has gone one step too far with this whole "casual" thing.  Who do they think we are, anyway?  It's time to put an end to these stupid peripherals and dumb ideas and get back to making games.  The line has been drawn!  They must be stopped at all costs!  Nintendo has been on the defensive now too, with Iwata saying that it's a good idea that people don't understand what the Vitality Sensor is for.  That means that Nintendo is innovating, and everything will work out in the end.  Meanwhile, comparisons have been drawn to the Virtual Boy, and nerd rage is running at a fever pitch.

I don't understand all the clamoring and cacophonous clatter over an innocuous piece of plastic.  It's really not that bad, and certainly not a huge risk for Nintendo.  Frankly, it's a non-issue and should be treated as such.

Whether or not you agree with the aim of the Vitality Sensor (and I don't) you can at least see the potential.  Imagine Eternal Darkness where the sanity effects are tied to your own calmness and you'll get a picture for what can be done with this equipment.  Imagine Wii Fit keeping track of how you're feeling and helping you adjust your workout routine accordingly.  It's not for everyone, but-

...Wait, it's not for everyone?  You mean I don't have to use the Vitality Sensor?  It's not going to become integral to all my future games?  In fact, I can even ignore the thing at retail and be perfectly happy?  Wow!

See, the Vitality Sensor is only a peripheral.  It's not a new way of doing business.  Nintendo has launched Wii Speak with Animal Crossing, and it's been used in a couple of games, but it's not a necessity.  Nintendo bundled a mike with Hey You Pikachu (ugh) and didn't make that much use of it.  Nintendo bundled a mouse with Mario Paint.  The fact that a company releases a peripheral doesn't mean that they're gearing everything toward it.

At this point, Nintendo can afford to try out a really wacky idea and see if it works.  No one else in the industry has the clout to do it except Nintendo, so why not?  If it fails, it wasn't a huge loss and if it succeeds more money for Nintendo.  It's not nearly the amount of risk as, say, Natal (in which Microsoft is pinning a large chunk of their future hopes) or Sony's motion controls (which they're touting as the next big thing).  If Natal or Sony's motion project fails, it practically takes the company out of the race.  If the Vitality Sensor fails, who cares?  No big loss for Nintendo.

Here's the real underlying fear.  What if the Vitality Sensor takes off?  Then what?  Then you'll have Nintendo making really good games that use it, and you'll have Microsoft and Sony copying it, and you'll have another casual boom and I JUST CAN'T HANDLE THIS RIGHT NOW.  Then you'll be FORCED to get it and gaming takes another long stride towards oblivion and being turned back into a toy, a curiosity that is of no consequence, not the direction it SHOULD be going, towards Real Art that Says Something and makes a Statement, even if that Statement has to do with Girls In Bikinis.

I'll cover that fear in a different article.

I'm An Idiot

So I'm checking my Google Analytics to see how many readers I have, and for the past two weeks I've had no readers whatsoever!  I'm confused, wondering what I need to do to promote my site.  Can't figure out what's going on at all.  I even went on my site and clicked around and hoped to see the results the next day and nothing.

Remember the post I made called "Template Mistake?"  Where I said that I changed the template totally?  Yeah.  That cleared the script that runs Google Analytics.  It's back in now and I feel like a total moron.  So I've got that going for me, which is nice.

Adventures In Misleading Graphs

Oh noes! The Wii sky is falling! At least you would think so according to this graph.

Why, according to this, only 6% of Wii owners ACTIVELY use their Wii! That's hilarious! More people actively use their Gamecube than the Wii! See, the Wii is a fad after all. Cut and dried, right?

Take a look at the top number on the graph. Only 11% of 360 owners actively use their 360 and only 10% of PS3 owners actively use their PS3. Now, let's do a little math.

There are 50 million Wii owners. 6% of that number is 3 million.

There are 30 million 360 owners. 11% of that number is 3.3 million.

There are 20 million PS3 owners. 10% of that number is 2 million.

In other words, almost the same amount across the board use their system regularly. The gap in percentages is not that great, but the graph (and the way people are reading it) makes it look like "OMG A HUEGE GAP!"

Here's another graph that, surprisingly, isn't getting as much publicity.

In this graph, we see another side of the issue. We notice that the PS2 and 360 get about 22 minutes of use a month, and right behind that is the Wii at about 18 minutes. The Wii has more female users than male users (an underserved group), and the 360 has more male users than female users. Everyone is so quick to call graphs like this the end of Nintendo's dominance, but the reality is the only reason that the 360 looks like it's doing so well is because of all the male users. Nintendo can always lure back the male audience, and will do exactly that with Galaxy 2 and Metroid Other M. Microsoft is going to have much more difficulty sliding from male to female, and that's the real story of these graphs.

However, follow the graph. Just to the right of the Wii, we see the PS3 clocking in with fewer minutes per use by both genders. In fact, the PS3 has less than half the usage of the 360 and just a little more than half the usage of the Wii. Put another way, the system that supposedly appeals to the "rabid, hard-core players" barely gets touched.

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This is the kind of stuff that bothers me. I know I said I wasn't going to jump back into the console wars, but this sticks in my craw. If you're going to read a graph, don't just look for what interests you. Look deeper. The real story here is the gender disparity, which has to bother Microsoft and undoubtedly also concerns Nintendo, though not to the same degree. And while the Wii doesn't get as much use on a percentage basis, the same amount of regular users hasn't really changed. It's only a couple of percentage points behind the 360 and PS3, and the amount of minutes spent is actually comparable to those other systems as well.

Nintendo's Second Chance

Warm and fuzzy memories abound of the NES.  You mention a game like Super Mario Bros. 3 and you'll get warm smiles along with a fond, "I remember when..."  Even middling fare from those days gets a fond reception.  Mention Blaster Master and most gamers from that time period will at least know the name, if not the game.  Even a game like Golgo 13: Top Secret Episode is getting attention these days.  Never mind that most of the games from the NES era either weren't very good or were half-formed ghosts of a good idea, they're still revered and appreciated to this day.

Many times, we look at games of our youth with glasses that are well beyond rose-tinted, and that's not always a bad thing.  Time has a way of smoothing over even the biggest deficiencies.  For instance, take Punch-Out.  It's very loved nowadays, but can you really say that the half-formed original is better than what came afterwards?  I mean, you have almost totally random star gathering, a different stamina meter for each bout, and one of the most ridiculously hard final bosses of all time, even unfairly so.  Was it a fun game?  Yes.  When we take off the youth goggles, however, we have to admit that it's not as great as we remember it being.

Still, the key with the NES is that many people who had never purchased a gaming system before in their lives all of a sudden found themselves drawn to its siren call.  Nintendo became synonymous with gaming even though it wasn't the most powerful system out there.  Lots of developers (Nintendo included) found themselves desperately trying to leverage a few extra frames per second out of the system along with managing sprite flicker and slowdown.  Even Super Mario 3 has a few graphical glitches, like boxes that pop up randomly along the side of the screen and weird shadows along the edges.  Meanwhile, Sega pushed its 16-bit competitor out in 1988 in Japan and 1989 in the States with a system that worked better, looked better, played faster and sounded better.

Nintendo brought a large chunk of its built-in gaming population to the Super Nintendo along with heaps of great and mature games like Super Metroid.  It was still geared pretty heavy to the kiddies, with there being a lot of censorship (like Mortal Kombat's "sweat") but there were still a lot of quality, grown-up titles like Chrono Trigger.  Of course, as we all know, the Nintendo 64 started out strong and fell apart towards the end, and the Gamecube was almost Nintendo's death rattle.

So what happened?  Nintendo failed on several fronts.  They couldn't leverage the great exposure they received from the NES and the huge audience they built into a lasting lead.  The gamers grew up and moved on from Nintendo.  Was it because of the games?  Not really.  Goldeneye, Perfect Dark and Conker were very grown-up games, but with the exception of Goldeneye, they appeared too late in the console's life span to make a huge difference.  Add to that the high cost of production and Sony's brilliant marketing schemes and it was easy to see why Nintendo lost.  The gamers moved away from Nintendo and moved to other systems where the games were more numerous and, in many cases, better.

What does this all have to do with today?  Nintendo, after all these years, is finally back in the driver's seat.  They have a system that isn't the most powerful, but is the most intriguing and the most popular.  Developers are starting to gravitate toward the system because of its high adoption rate.  The games aren't always great, but they're pulling in a high number of people who had never purchased a system, along with kids who are getting exposed to games for the first time in a safe forum.  In other words, Nintendo is getting their second chance to bring along gamers and make them Nintendo gamers for life.

How can they avoid making the same mistakes?  First, Nintendo can't underestimate their audience.  When they censored the blood in Mortal Kombat, they didn't trust that their audience would understand that a game widely renowned for its over-the-top violence would actually be violent.  They thought they knew better and treated the gamer like an idiot instead of trusting them to make an informed decision.  That decision provoked derisive jeers of laughter and focused the harsh spotlight down on their policies.  They learned their lesson, but the damage was already done.  They need to avoid those types of decisions in the future.

Also, Nintendo made a huge error sticking with a cartridge format when everyone was moving to disc-based systems.  Of course, now Nintendo has wizened up and realized the importance of downward compatibility, but they could easily run into the same situation.  How so?  Games are getting bigger and bigger.  If Nintendo doesn't make the disc capacity appreciably bigger on their next system, they could easily be left in the same situation.  Final Fantasy VII couldn't fit on a Nintendo 64 cartridge, so Nintendo missed out on one of the galvanizing games of that generation.  With poor capacity, they could find themselves in the same situation again.

Even with these issues, Nintendo finds themselves in a singular situation.  Time will tell if they are able to make the proper choices or repeat past mistakes.

Discovered Something...(Super Mario Galaxy)

Regular readers will note that I'm trying to get 120 stars in Super Mario Galaxy as Luigi for no other reason other than "because I can." In doing so, I discovered how to beat the Cosmic Races. How come no one ever told me about the speed boost thing at the beginning?

In case you don't know it either, you're supposed to hold down the control stick forward, press Z when the number 2 appears on the screen, and the hit A when "Go" appears. I did it and beat a Cosmic Race already. I mean, just barely, but still.

Game Design: What Makes A Good Game?

We've talked at length about certain facets of good games, but we've never really crystallized what makes a game great.  It's easy to say that Game X is "good" and Game Y is "bad," but what makes them good or bad?  What is the objective of a game, and what are dealbreakers for games?  These three things end up tying together to make a great game, and you can't have one without the other.

1)  Controls.

The amount of enjoyment you have with any given game is directly related to how well the game controls.  Why do controls matter so much?  If your controls are poor, you cannot progress in the game with any degree of enjoyment.  This stymies the more important part of game design.  Controls can make a good game great (Super Mario Bros) or a great game merely good (the Gothic series).  However, controls mean different things for different genres and it's important to note what those things are.

For instance, in a stereotypical RPG, walking around in an overworld or in a dungeon doesn't require fancy controls.  You can get away with weird control quirks, like a slow walking speed or sluggish movement controls.  What you absolutely CANNOT get away with is poor menu design, since 90% of the game resides in those menus, battle or otherwise.  Likewise, a game like Resident Evil can get away with slow movement if you don't have to use fast reactions.  If you have to be able to react fast and you're not allowed to due to the sluggish controls, you've ruined your game.

Conversely, some styles of game rely solely on their controls.  Platformers have to be virtually pitch-perfect with their controls.  There can be no delay, no lag time whatsoever.  You have to have full and total control over the character at all times or risk ruining the experience greatly.  The Sonic games have demonstrated this:  Why the overall idea of the game might be okay, the controls usually lead to Sonic careening off a cliff or making some horrible mistake and getting killed.  Sonic games are now universally loathed.

2)  Challenging yet attainable goal achievement.

We've talked on this blog about the importance of goal achievement and how it adds to the overall satisfaction of a game.  There's a constant push/pull dynamic in gaming.  You want the player to progress, but at what degree and how fast?  Is it complicated or easy to progress?  Make the game too difficult and the gamer feels stupid and stymied.  Make the game too easy and the gamer doesn't feel they did anything special, which is the whole point.  They need to take you along, teaching you the skills necessary to proceed and then making a situation where you're able to use those skills.  Make those skills too complex and you've once again stymied forward progress.

I'm going to hold up Super Mario Galaxy as my example here.  If you take a person who's never played Galaxy and drop them into the final level, they'll be lost and die repeatedly.  Eventually, they'll give up and say, "I hate this game!  It sucks!"  However, for someone who's played Galaxy from the beginning, while the ending is challenging it's not horribly so.  You've been trained transparently throughout the game on what you need to do.  You understand how gravity works, you understand how to get Bullet Bills to work for you, and you understand how to defeat Bowser because you've done it already to varying degrees.

I'm going to use Mario 64 as my bad example.  There's one star on the Rainbow Road level called "Wall Kicks Will Work."  To get this star, you eventually get to an area where you're supposed to leap at a stone wall and hit the B button at the correct moment to send Mario flying in the other direction.  Sounds easy enough, but the timing and angle of the jump has to be perfect or Mario ends up just flinging himself against the wall and falling down.  It's much harder than it sounds because the game demands that you do it in a certain way.  You MUST kick and time your kick at the proper time and angle or risk failure.  It's frustrating and makes you not want to get that star.  Nintendo realized their error and fixed this skill in Mario 64 DS.  Now, the star is called "Wall Jumps Will Work."  You need to merely fling yourself at the wall and let Mario grip onto it as he slides down (which he does automatically), and then hit Jump again while he's sliding.  There's no mystical button press or strange timing involved.

Circling back to controls, this demonstrates that when you make your controls too difficult it stops people from enjoying the game.  When the taught skill is easier and more intuitive to use, goal achievement proceeds, satisfaction in the game rises, the gamer's self-esteem rises, and you've made a fan for life.

3)  Anticipation.

Great controls and good goals mean nothing if there's nothing to strive for.  This is where you can lump all the other supposedly "necessary" things about games:  Story, graphics, music, the works.  Those things are all in service of anticipation.

For instance, let's say you have marvelous bump-mapped graphics with full-screen AA, but everything in your game is grey and brown.  There's nothing special to see, and each level, as beautiful as it is, looks the same.  Will you continue?  Probably not.  There's nothing to look forward to.  Now, let's say that you have a less-detailed world but you're constantly handed new, inventive tools that you can use to manipulate that same environment.  Will you continue?  More than likely.  You'll be looking forward to the next tool and what else you'll be able to do to the environment.

The same applies with story.  The only thing a story is supposed to do in a game is provide anticipation.  That's why Final Fantasy VII's story worked: You wondered where it would go next and what was the true nature of Cloud, the protagonist, and Sephiroth, the antagonist.  That's why you didn't mind grinding levels or sitting through unskippable cutscenes.  They doled out just enough to keep you wondering up until the grand finale.

It's also why Half-Life's story works.  If you take Half-Life out of the video game realm and put it into the same terms of a book or a movie, the story falls flat.  However, in the sense of a video game, it's darn near perfect.  You don't know what enemy or challenge lies around the corner and you're eager to see the inventive nature of the game.  You want to find out what's going to happen next, and that makes the story good.  It's why Suda51's games still attract followers even if the design isn't always right.  You never know what audacious trick he's going to pull out from under his hat and that keeps you anticipating the next twist.  It's also why 2-D platformers really have to bring something new to the table to be interesting.  We've seen ice worlds and fire worlds and desert worlds a hundred times, so there's no anticipation.  They really have to try in order to give us something fun to see.  It's why a game like Kirby's Dream Land 3 is awful:  Once you've gotten past the first world, there are no new powers to see and no new ideas.  You don't care what happens next.

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If these three things seem a little simplistic, it's because, at it's heart, game design is a simple idea.  Give a person an obstacle course, the tools to manage it, and a reward at the end and they can't resist it.  Give a person a frustrating obstacle course, unwieldy tools and no bonus at the end, and they'll avoid it.  All the ancillary things that people THINK are important: Graphics, music, cool flashy combos, downloadable content and all the other buzzwords of the moment need to be in service to the three things listed above or they are worthless.

Cool! (Shadow Tower)

OK, here's a cool idea for a game.

See, this is the type of stuff that we never would have seen even back in the PS1/N64 days.  It seems that now, the developer's ambition is able to match up with the power of their tools more than ever.  When people complain about gaming somehow being "better" back in the old days, feel free to laugh loudly in their faces. 

Getting Back To Game Theory

I've been blathering on an awful lot about the hideously boring console wars.  I'm going to have maybe one more post up about them and then I'm backing off for a while.  I'm going to try and get back to my bread and butter: Game design.  Stay tuned.

Review: Little King's Story

I've been wracking my brain over how to start this review for Little King's Story. The blank page in Google Documents just sits here, mocking me, waiting for me to put something down. I'm not sure why. Maybe it's because there's not a whole lot to compare Little King's Story to. Maybe it's because every time I start talking about it, piles of positive things start spilling out until my writing is a jumbled mess of excited statements. I think I'll start at the beginning.


Little King's Story starts out when a sad, lonely boy named Corobo finds a magical crown that makes people do his bidding and worship him as the king. That doesn't happen when I wear my paper crown from Burger King, but maybe I'm not wearing it right. Either way, this entails him gathering an army, clearing the land of monsters, and expanding his kingdom to fill the space while wooing princesses and crushing other kingdoms beneath his adorable heel.

So, what is it about Little King's Story that works so well?

He who wishes to be obeyed must know how to command. - Niccolo Machiavelli

Little King's Story plays like a mixture of Harvest Moon, Pikmin, and a standard action-RPG. Your ultimate goal is to defeat eight neighboring kingdoms and become the greatest king of the land. People in your kingdom will get married and have children (with a little encouraging from the king, of course), while you'll meet and court various princesses along the way. You'll need to keep your advisors happy and worry about your townspeople's wellbeing as well.

You need those people on your side, since you'll be assigning them jobs and leading them into combat. Townspeople can be farmers, soldiers, lumberjacks, chefs, miners, florists, or even just stay as children. You'll want a balanced group, since you'll need many different types of jobs in order to tackle your goals. For instance, farmers can open cracks in the earth which can lead to treasure or soothing hot springs that will heal your units. Miners can break up large rocks that will open the way to new areas. Soldiers will cling to enemies while dealing high damage. Each one has their own unique purpose.

You'll also receive quests from your ministers or the town suggestion box. Your ministers may send you to defeat the king of a neighboring kingdom, and the townspeople may tell you of a monster blocking the entrance to an area or direct you to treasure maps. When you complete a quest, you'll get spoils which can be converted into money, which enables you to build new buildings, unlock new units, or just add to your burgeoning population.

So that's the concept, and it's a good concept on its own. However, like most things, it's not just the concept but the execution that makes Little King's Story come alive. Let's look at the presentation.

The ear is the avenue to the heart. - Voltaire

The music in Little King's Story is mostly classical numbers that have been repurposed for use in the game. The games starts off with a version of Bolero which is unique and tells the story nicely. Little King's Story then moves through other great numbers, like an excellent usage of The Nutcracker Suite and other tunes which will sound familiar. At times, I swear to God I heard the Super Mario theme tucked in the background too. Everything fits extremely well, and the various yelps and greetings of your underlings never get grating or repetitive. Excellent work all around.

On top of that, Little King's Story looks good. Now, I hate the phrase "Looks good for a Wii game," so I won't use it here. However, Little King's Story plays to the Wii's strengths. Color is used exceptionally well, and every unit is easily distinguished from other units very easily. There's a very useful minimap that shows you where enemies are in relation to you and your group, and everything looks great across the board.

Of special note are the cutscenes. Usually, an animated cutscene from a Japanese game about a lonely boy would have brooding characters and vapid, doe-eyed heroines staring off into the distance while J-pop plays in the background. Not so in Little King's Story. They have the look of a chalk drawing, and pile on the charm. You get the feel that a lot of love went into these, as if the designers just enjoyed everything about the concept and wanted you to enjoy it too.

Another great thing about Little King's Story is that it doesn't talk down to you. It discusses God, life, the anxieties of growing old, death, science and anything else it gets its hands on. In a rarity for a game on a Nintendo system, there's a character who's a drunk and they SHOW HIM DRINKING ALCOHOL. They don't dumb it down by calling it soda or anything. It sounds weird, but it just shows that this is a game that looks like it was made for kids that is aimed squarely at your scabby, blackened adult heart.

After climbing a great hill, one only finds that there are many more hills to climb. - Nelson Mandela

Unfortunately, there are a few flaws. One, the game can get unexpectedly difficult. There's nothing worse that running around, gathering spoils and killing dudes and then running into a battle that was a little over your head, getting killed, and having to reload your game. There is an easy way to warp back to your castle, but I was usually so into Little King's Story that I would forget about it until it was too late.

Two, the AI pathfinding is pretty bad. Your units can get hung up on the scenery and end up dying, or you'll send your units to fight and they'll all slam into a nearby mailbox and go back to their place in line. Here's another problem with the pathfinding: Let's say there are three targets: A hole that needs to be dug, a large, angry enemy, and a tiny little enemy. How would you prioritize those threats? I would say, kill the little enemy first, then the big one, and then dig the hole, right? In Little King's Story, all three things are equally important, so you'll have people trying to dig a hole while angry cow is stepping all over their kibbles n' bits.

Another flaw: Let's say my group is comprised of fighters, archers, farmers and miners. I'm in a battle. Do I want all four groups to get sent into battle? Of course not! However, in Little King's Story, whichever person ends up right behind you at that specific time ends up being sent next. You might end up getting some innocent people killed, or having to shuffle through your units until you find the right one for the situation. It's a headache.

Here's the solution: We're using the Wii Remote, right? How about giving us an onscreen menu that we can use to choose our unit's behavior. Let's say we ONLY want to use soldiers at this time. Let us do that. Let's say we don't want to fight but want to just dig holes (for whatever reason). Let us do that. A context-sensitive onscreen menu sounds like a little much, but it would have made the difference between a very, very good game and a legendary one.

History will be kind to me for I intend to write it. - Winston Churchill

However, that shouldn't deter you from getting Little King's Story. It's rare to find a game with so much charm. If I could rate this game on charm alone, it would get an A. As long as you still have a soul and can overlook a few biggish flaws, you'll love Little King's Story.

Digital Distribution Has Worked Out Sooooo Well For The Music Industry

Via NY Times:

A study last year conducted by members of PRS for Music, a nonprofit royalty collection agency, found that of the 13 million songs for sale online last year, 10 million never got a single buyer and 80 percent of all revenue came from about 52,000 songs. That’s less than one percent of the songs.

How crazy is that? And obviously, people didn't stop listening to music. So where did they get their songs from?

I'll let you put two and two together.

What Do I Want From Other Systems?

Since I talk about Nintendo so much, I thought I'd temper this Nintendo talk with what I want off of other systems.  This is an incomplete list, by the way:

Shadow Complex
Flower & Flow
Turtles In Time: Re-Shelled
Force Unleashed
Prince of Persia
MLB the Show
Ratchet & Clank: A Crack In Time
Uncharted & Uncharted 2
'Splosion Man
Braid

I'm sure I'm missing some stuff here.  In fact, I'm sure I'm missing an awful lot.  If Sony and Microsoft combined both their systems, I would be all over it as a matter of fact.  It's just that I threw my lot in with Nintendo, and while it hasn't been perfect, it's still been pretty satisfying.

So if anyone wants to buy me a 360 or a PS3, I wouldn't, you know, COMPLAIN.  Hint.

Digging Out My Wii Number

I'm getting sent a WiiWare game for review. A while ago, I reviewed Trine for the PC and all I had to do to receive my review copy was give my email address to the dev, they sent me a review code and that was it. Ta-daaa.

What was the process for WiiWare? I'll tell you. First, I was told to give them my Friend Code and add their Friend Code. They gave me a 16-digit number to enter. I decided to look for my Friend Code and went into System Settings to see where I could find it. It wasn't there.

So I put in Mario Kart Wii to see if it gave it to me. I had a Friend Code, but it was 12 digits and I could only enter in other 12 digit numbers to add friends. This was certainly suspicious, so I sent a message back saying that I needed their 12-digit number. After a while I realized that other people had 16 digit numbers as well, so where was mine?

You know how I found the code? Was it in Nintendo's help screens? Did they have a handy website? No, I had to open up a YouTube video where it showed me to go into the Wii Message Board (!!!) and open up my "Make A New Message" area (!!!!!) and there I could select Wii-to-Wii messaging where it finally gave me my number and enabled me to enter in their number.

I know people hammer on this system being ridiculous, and I feel like I'm piling on. It's not bad enough that they have Wii codes, but they make them so DIFFICULT to get to.