[Game Theory] Tell Me A Story...

Tell me a story...

A story?

Yeah. A story.

Well, what kind?

Hmm... I guess it really doesn't matter. You know, if I knew what kind of story I wanted to be told I wouldn't really need to actually hear it, now would I? I mean, where's the fun in that. Though, I will admit there's more to storytelling than the story itself.

I'm not sure I understand.

What I'm tryin' to say is that it doesn't really matter what you've got to say. It's all about how you say it. After all, a sequence of events can only go so far, and you have to be able to draw the line between mere documentation of an occurrence and truly being able to illustrate it perfectly for others to see.

Take for instance the well known Banjo-Kazooie. Here's a game that truly defines itself through its humor, wit and clever characters, despite having a plot that can be summed up into a few paragraphs. Granted, there are plenty of other great aspects of the Banjo-Kazooie franchise capable of carrying its weight, but many will agree that one of its defining features is that damned bear, Banjo, and his ever so daring friend, Kazooie.

Ahh, I see. So if you've got a weak plot you make up for it with interesting characters and witty humor to distract the audience?

Umm...(this is going to be a headache) Not quite. While it's good to have these things, you still need to have substance. I guess I over exaggerated when I said that your story doesn't matter, but I was making a point. In fact, it's important to have at least somewhat of a story to back these things up, otherwise your game could feel gimmicky.

Here. This time take the example of Chrono Trigger. Chrono Trigger was a great game for its time and is still enjoyed by many, although you might say it started some bad trends in the RPG game industry. Playing Chrono Trigger today might leave you with a bad impression. Especially if it's your first time playing the game. Without some sort of nostalgia to back it, you may find that it feels both dated and downright gimmicky. But what you have to consider is that the only reason Chrono Trigger may appear so gimmicky, is because after its release, countless ripoffs of the game have been produced. These days the use of such concepts as time travel, nonhuman party members and post apocalyptic scenarios are all too common. So despite their appeal to many gamers out there, including me, they can't be relied on to carry a game on their own.

Now do you understand?

Golly gee, that was an awful lot to follow. But I think I get the idea. Thanks to you and your grand wisdom, when I grow up, I'm gonna make games that don't suck!

Ha ha ha... That a boy, Johnny. That a boy.

Mission of the Week: Ace in the Race for Sprint 5P

This weeks mission at tetrisfriends.com is to win 1st place in Sprint 5P 10 times. Honestly, I'm a little unimpressed, but I'll still participate. But when you consider that they seem to only be releasing 1 mission per week(hopefully this will change in the future) this just feels lazy. But I digress.

Bowser's Inside Story is longer than expected...

Damn. I was hoping to have this finished by tonight but it's looking like it might not be done even by tomorrow night. I mean, I'm definitely going to spend a lot of time tomorrow playing it but I'll have school and other shit getting in the way. But whatever, because the article will at least be ready for publishing tomorrow.

High Ambitions this Weekend!

I'm going to accomplish three things:

1) Write the game theory I promised weeks ago.

2) Play through the entire new Mario & Luigi.

3) Review the new Mario & Luigi when I finish it.

Expect them in that order, as well as Mission of the Week for tetrisfriends.com this Monday.

Mission of the Week: Insomniac Cow for Marathon

As some of you may know, I've been playing quite a bit of tetris these days. Particularly at tetrisfriends.com. Ever since I've discovered this site I've been playing at least every other day. And with getting into the open beta and now their mission of the week thing they're running, I don't see any reason to leave or switch to another tetris site/community. I encourage any tetris lovers who read this blog to visit this site and play along, at least with the mission of the week. Each week when the mission of the week is posted(for as long as I am keeping up with the site) I'll be sure to post here at the blog to both let you guys know what's going on and also to log my progress. I'll also talk about their "personal missions" and "premium missions" once they start those as well, in these posts.

This week's mission is to clear 2000 lines in Marathon within 5 days I think. I've only played one game prior to writing this and I managed to clear 147 lines. For updated progress be sure to read the "Games I'm Playing" sidebar.

XNA Framework is appealing

As many of you know I had already attempted the monstrous project of creating a game a few months ago using the RPG Maker XP engine. While the engine is very friendly to those who aren't good at directly editing code, I'm considering exploring other options. One option in particular that appeals to me at the moment is using the XNA Framework, which is the framework developed by Microsoft used to make PC and 360 games. The only problem with this is I'm going to have to learn to program in C#, but that shouldn't be too hard. Honestly, I'm still not sure if I wanna do this but I might just experiment a little with it and make a shorter game(or a demo) before committing to an entire project. On the other hand, making games with the XNA framework opens up better marketing opportunities. This may be the path I choose to take for my independent game development.

Laptop has been got!

So yeah. Title says it all. Got my laptop and now all it needs is internet....

I actually ended up getting a different one. The only real differences between it and the one I posted a link to are that this new one has 1 less GB of RAM but 70 more GB of harddrive and a wider screen(as well as more keys on the keyboard including the keypad).

Megaman X4 and so on...

I'm not going to review this game, at least I don't think I will. At first, I was okay with it but now I'm starting to realize that the slight differences in controls and physics is starting to get to me. In Megaman X, X2 and X3, you tend to be very agile with lots of capability for quick timing. But in X4, that aspect of the game just feels ruined for me. There seem to be way more projectiles than necessary and you move very strangely. Either Megaman X4 truly is the downfall of Megaman(as the Nintendo fanboys like to claim), or I'll just get used to the new controls. *sigh*

9.14.09 update

So, yeah, didn't get laptop today but honestly didn't expect to. Definitely going to have it in a week(but if not, then something really has gone wrong lol). Also there will be a Game Theory tomorrow as I am going to make it a weekly thing for Tuesdays. I'm also considering having a day for each week where I review all the retro games I've been playing. That way, for those of you interested, you can expect them at a certain time. And for those of you who aren't, they will all be posted within a short period of time and therefore will be bumped off the page. I will still be doing reviews for newer games as I play them(still working on Layton...) but I'm just making this clear because I'm going to be playing a lot more retro games in the near future. Particularly PS1 games I've never played.

If All Goes Well...

I should have a brand new laptop tomorrow! This is what I'm getting. I'm only going to use Vista for about a month and then Windows 7 is out! That's going to feel like an awkwardly rushed transition...

Update: Not a big deal, but I won't be getting it until later this week in about 5-7 days. Still, I'm pretty psyched!

9.12.09 update

Wow, this totally isn't better than a game review, but you're going to have to deal with it. For whatever reason, I've been having a little bit of writer's block lately and can't seem to follow through with any of my good ideas. Because of this, I think I'm just going to stop making promises all together(dammit I just did it again). The one thing I really want to do though is have a Game Theory go up every Tuesday. If anyone has a suggestion for an interesting topic to write about for Tuesday, leave me a comment or email me.

[Game Theory] Designer Brand Levels?

I'm sure you've all heard of designer brand clothes. But designer brand levels? Alright, I'll admit it's just another term I coined. But that doesn't mean there isn't any truth to it? Come with me and take a look into one of the key elements of the gaming industry, and what I believe to be the most important to a franchise. Aside from characters, that is.

Level design is a very important part of the game development process, and is becoming more and more important every day. Hell, the college I'm planning on going to has not one, but two courses on it. And it's not just in platformers, RPGs, and other adventure games that you would expect. Even sports game are adapting some emphasis on their level design now. Even if it's as simple as adding weather effects to a field, although we're getting to a point where that doesn't even cut it anymore.

Recently I've been playing a lot of games that are famous for having some of the best level design in the industry, and by sheer coincidence. I have to admit that this article is a bit spontaneous and a little inspired by these games, because a lot of these games are personal favorites of mine. Games from the Megaman, Metroid, Mario, Advance Wars, and Zelda franchises, as well as some individual games like Oblivion and even a flash game called Use Boxmen(which by the way, you should all totally check out) all come to mind as I write this article.

Poor level design is one of the biggest things that can easily ruin a game for me. All too often I play games that have good mechanics and control, pretty good graphics, and maybe even a decent story or interesting characters, but I just get bored less than halfway through the game. Why is this, you ask? The levels just suck. They are uninteresting, uncreative and feel a little too much like that recurring dream you've been having. Few things bother me more than poor level design, and I'm beginning to realize it's one of the reasons I keep enjoying games of the same franchises.

Often times franchises like Mario, Zelda and Megaman in particular have their games feel like they are built off of a model that unifies them all. And this of course does lead to some repetitiveness, especially in basic play mechanics and level design. But while this can be a bad thing, for Mario and Zelda it usually ends up being a good thing. Personally, I love it when game franchises make games of very similar style but with defining differences. That feeling of an open world Mario level or a puzzling dungeon from a Zelda game. . . It's the very essence of what branding is supposed to be. And branding is the key word. Some game developers just don't seem to understand the difference between branding, and selling the exact same product, just in a different package.

It's quite hard to place my finger on what specifically makes level design truly shine in a game, but I urge any game developers(or future game developers) reading this to take this little nugget of wisdom: Once you have something that works, a framework, a blueprint, hold onto it. You don't have to reinvent the wheel every time you make a new game. Especially when working within a franchise.

The Diabolical Box: Day 13

So it's kind of sad this game is taking me so long, but what can I say. School is a total bitch. As of now I have 76 puzzles completed and if I had to guess 1800ish picarats. I cannot wait to do a proper review of this game. Hopefully I'll be done in a week at the most, though, I'm definitely going to have to pick up the slack if I want that to happen.

The Diabolical Box: Day 7

Ahh, not much to say this time, though good progress has been made. So far 59 puzzles solved and 1350 picarats. That and the story is starting to pick up! Next Layton update might not be for awhile, but some real posts will be coming this week(two almost ready for publishing!)

EDIT: Originally I said this was day 6 but it was actually day 7.