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Comments
I remember reading that and thinking that as intelligent and knowledgable as Film Crit Hulk is, his expertise doesn't necessarily extend to games. Games are mechanical, and their mechanics are the all-important factor separating them from other forms of narrative media. So their mechanics can be (and often are) themes in and of themselves, but especially when used in conjunction with narrative. Given that Mass Effect makes such a big deal out of allowing you to customise your Shepard on a psychological level (mildly, at least) and provides a plethora of opportunities to make choices big and small, considering choice to be a theme of Mass Effect seems entirely reasonable to me.
As for the endings? The bottom line for me is that they were bad endings, and the nature of games allows them to be altered after release. BioWare did the right thing by changing the endings, even if the fanbase was being all bitchy and stuff. BioWare have been doing a bunch of experimental stuff lately, and I think they need to be a bit more grounded. Dragon Age 2 didn't work, the endings of Mass Effect 3 didn't work, by and large The Old Republic is losing popularity swiftly over a number of issues; all the while, developers like DC Projekt Red and FromSoftware are experimenting in ways that fall within the needs of an actual game. It's almost as if BioWare are adapting in-house release books into video games rather than making games from the ground up, and it shows because their idea of narrative experimentation doesn't necessarily have much to do with game mechanics.
I saw something in the comment sections that addresses this.
>Given that Mass Effect makes such a big deal out of allowing you to customise your Shepard on a psychological level (mildly, at least)
But as I've said, the choices don't really make you control Shephard all that much, it's just more of a good cop-bad cop alternate which with tends to lead you down the same road.
I don't know if there's ever going to be a game that allows true freedom. Skyrim comes the closest but I also think that results in its extreme lack of focus. Art has to have a direction and the consumer has to be left out at certain points, especially when they don't like it.
On a complete side note, Moviebob's thing on Gaming adaptations into movies is pretty predictable with things we already have all said, but the idea of reworking Castlevania in Die Hard with Dracula instead of Hans Gruber is awesome.
They do not always have effects directly on the gameplay, but blah blah Quarian geth conflict etc.
There's one of the biggest complaints about the ending of the game; it lacks agency- both character agency and player agency.
It is true that you cannot truly have choice in a video game, as each path has to be programmed within the game, especially if you wish to have cutscenes and such. However, that does not mean that you cannot have multiple paths that are influenced through the player's choices throughout the game, and actually differ based upon them.
Okay, I was going to go further into this, but I'm going to just paste something then leave.
The point is less that Mass Effect has a semblance of freedom and more that it forces players to make decisions, and that those decisions aren't always easy or clear. Other games do the choice thing better, but not with as much emphasis or visceral impact (apart from, perhaps, the Witcher games).
Okay, I'm reading the comment sections, so I'm just going to emptyquote a comment I think make a legitimate point.
And also, apologies to Alex for all the times I misinterpreted him about interactivity within stories.
I don't recall any of those instances, but I'll take your word for it. Apology unnecessary, but accepted.
So this is what Mega Man fans get as a 25th anniversary present.
I take back what I said about Mega Man fans, this is like getting coal in your stocking instead of presents. It's not even like Sonic 06, which was incredibly bad but hyped to high heaven. It looks like they put the least amount of effort possible, outsourced it to some Chinese company and shat it out onto the iOS store. The only thing that would make this even more insulting is if they included a "fuck you" message with the game.
Still, promising myself not to be bitter and hateful no matter how justified. It really makes me feel terrible and I really don't want to end up a bitter person because that's not who I want to be.
I'm honestly not surprised, Capcom has been trying to kill and bury Megaman ever since Inafune left.
The way I see it, Mass Effect had three main draws:
Note that I am not putting "the basic story" on there. The basic story is pretty hit-and-miss. ME2, for example, is great in spite of its fairly stupid overall story.
The thing is, the original version of the ending relied entirely on its story premise, and entirely lacked any references to your past decisions or indications that your final one had consequences. Your team members didn't even show up during the last hour or so and lots of the stuff contradicts the rules the world has established.
The basic story premise behind it is fine, but all of the stuff people are playing the game for are missing. It's like if a Pokèmon game ended with an excellent military FPS level. Okay, that was well-made, but what the hell happened to my Pokèmon game?!
Contrast the final ending, which is pretty good (not the high point of the series, but acceptable), despite barely being any different at all. The only differences are that the consequences of your decisions are shown, your party members actually show up and the big worldbuilding contradiction is handwaved. The starchild's plan is still remarkably stupid ("I kill people so they won't die!"), but it matters a lot less when the stuff you're playing the game for is present.
In other news, Hideo Kojima seems to have an interest in using his in-house game engine for Silent Hill. It doesn't mean he's working on it, but it's certainly intriguing.
Using his engine to do it would be fine. Having him work on it would be a disaster. I love his games, but he doesn't get indirect storytelling.
I think he could do a mean Silent Hill but it really depends on a level of adaptability that nobody is sure he has due to the fact that he has worked almost exclusively with giant robots.
I'm not so sure...I mean, he is good with metaphor, as MGS2 shows, but his normal style is to have lots of talking heads exposition, which wouldn't really work for a horror game.
Well yeah but how do we know that's his normal style and not just something he feels comfortable doing with MGS due to whatever reasons (Probably because it's a personal work rather than a work from an established franchise)
We are talking about Kojima here.
It's a pretty big risk.
Honestly, considering the place in which the franchise is right now*, I'd say that it's one worth taking.
*Bullshit land.
That's a point I hadn't considered.
Fair enough. Pretty much any major creator shakeup to Silent Hill would be worth trying at this point.
So, the infamous Zelda artbook Hyrule Historia(which revealed the timeline and such) is getting an international release thanks to Dark Horse Comics. Thoughts?
Neat. I don't really care much for the timeline, but hey, concept art. I loooove concept art.
Steam is selling the Alan Wake games for $10 total right now. I'd very much recommend that purchase to anyone who doesn't have them.
Eh, class starts in a few hours, so might as well kill Web Spider in my challenge run. Certainly harder than say Jet Stingray or pfft... Colonel. But still pretty damn easy.
Anything I should worry about for the last 3 bosses (Peacock/Owl/Dragoon), Glenn?
Peacock's a bit easier once you know just how he teleports. though if I remember correctly, his homing shots are a bitch.
Good to know about the teleports. Bad to know about the homing shots, though I seem to hear that it's a good way to get hits in on him.
Gonna save Dragoon for last because he's my favorite.
EDIT: Fighting Mandrill in X1 dashless with no upgrades. Fucking Dash Punch, you really need to see that thing coming.
EDIT2: Now I remember how I beat him without the dash, Charge Shots stop his Dash Punch.
I always loved that about X1. You see different hitstun animations when you fight either buster only or via an unconventional order.
Thank goodness he flinches out of that or I would've been fucked Buster only. I wanted to know if my previous Buster only fight against him was a fluke or not.
Also, real men play Flame Mammoth's stage in molten lava mode.