Kry Reviews: PAX East

Penny Arcade Expo hit the east coast last weekend, in a show not lacking for attendance. The convention had pretty much everything your contemporary nerd can want for. Not to mention the choice of locale of Boston, which despite being an awesome city, I did not get to tour much of; I spent all waking hours at PAX, mostly.

PAX East 2010 was my first con since Origins 2002. This one was a lot, and I mean a lot, more packed. It seems foolish that there was never a gaming con held over here before (and very few nerdy cons in general). Well, with it being the first, perhaps I can forgive the prime error of selling too many tickets. The con was unfortunately oversold and/or the convention hall was too small. I found that out almost immediately on the first day, when I arrived half an hour early to go to the Keynote speech but found myself not even able to wait in line. This problem would rear its ugly head everywhere in the convention.

The de facto standard I found was an hour – hour and half wait for more niche panels (and that was only to get average seating). I didn't even bother with any of the bigger ones, as much as I would have liked to attend a panel by the Penny Arcade guys. The Exposition Hall had similar waits to try out any new games (Two hour wait for Starcraft 2, at least; good thing I got in beta already!). It was totally ridiculous and frustrating. Thankfully, I eventually found a nice reprieve with the tabletop game section. They had an excellent selection of tabletops, and more importantly, no wait to get them.

I got to try the more mainstream titles Settlers of Catan and Munchkin, both of which are great titles. I'm definitely hungry for more Catan. Seemingly everyone was though, as all the copies of that game were checked out several times for tournaments. A little bit of poor planning by PAX there as well. Betrayal at House on the Hill was a very interesting board game I got a couple tries in on it as well; it's a nice campy, horror-themed game that generates a 'haunted house' board randomly every game to keep it entertaining. One of my travel mates was ecstatic to play this game as it had gone out of print, and I will vouch that it was time well spent. Last, I tried Starcraft: The Board Game. Never again! That game is a complicated mess. I spent an hour trying to figure it out and was happy when it came time to give up.

Speaking of Starcraft, I hung out at the Blizzard/Nvidia section for a lot of the convention (by virtue of waiting in line, of course). I actually won myself a second beta key by playing in a Blizzard promotional 1v1 game. The game was Protoss vs Terran, and I came back from him destroying my main base with a whole lot of stalkers. I took the economy advantage back quickly with a well defended expansion and came in for the kill, ruining my opponent's day in the process. If people weren't dubious of my claims of having never played beta before, they certainly were after while I was exhibiting my mastery of hotkeys and build order, although my 60 APM was totally gosu.

PAX East 2010, clusterfuck that it was, was a show with a great amount of potential. I'm glad to hear that the convention has already been announced to reoccur, and in a bigger venue. I'm sure my complaints are well known by the show's staff, so I'm willing to forgive and forget in expectations of much greater things next year.

Kry Previews: Starcraft II

Starcraft II's beta FINALLY arrived last week, to a collective sigh of relief. Or perhaps a mass cry of rage at people finding their inboxes empty. Sadly, I have no beta key myself, but the mass influx of information coming from streams and videos has kept me quite sated, and quite ready to post some thoughts about how eager I am to play this game.

First off, let me preface this commentary by saying that I never really played Starcraft. I got into Warcraft III first, and by that time Starcraft was way past its prime. And indeed, when I tried out the campaign last year, it was a very frustrating experience; many of the things I took for granted as standard RTS items had not yet been invented in SC. Also, I tried to play SC the same way as WCIII, which was quite a mistake. The two games are fundamentally different.

But anyway, I got interested in SCII as soon as it was announced as the next strategy game from Blizzard. I've been following it quite rabidly since it was revealed seemingly an eon ago; that only served to psyche myself up and make the wait more unbearable. The game looks absolutely gorgeous now, especially from the HD videos being uploaded on Youtube. Not only are there beautiful visuals, but the system requirements, as always for Blizzard, are surprisingly low for the level of detail.

Not being a big SC player and having no beta access leaves me with little credence to make any commentary on balance, so I'll spare that (also the game being beta, and changes constant, already the first patch has come out at time of writing). One thing to note is that throughout the development process I have always been amused at the tears and rage from the whinier hardcore players over convenience changes like being able to select multiple buildings or having your workers automatically mine. Blizzard's paradigm is that mindless busywork like that should be lessened, and be replaced with other macro mechanics that offer intelligence and strategy in maximizing your economy. How people can be against that completely boggles my mind.

The single player and map editor are not in the beta unfortunately. Whenever Starcraft II comes out, expect a detailed review on the campaign, which Blizzard has hinted at it being quite epic, despite being limited to only one race. The map editor needs no introduction, to those unfamiliar with it, I only need say that the replay value of SCII will multiply tenfold with the creativity of the Blizzard modding community. I'm eager to try it out myself, if I recall correctly editing will be done with a C-based language; I may need to brush up on that!

Hopefully, watching all these videos will help me get ready to play SCII when it comes closer to release. I'm also really hoping that PAX next month will have the beta for me to try out, else I will be a very sad panda. Speaking of which, my journal on the visit to PAX will be next month's entry. It should be very exciting, my first big con since Origins seven years ago.

Kry Reviews: Estiah

Estiah is a browser MMO that I spent most of my winter break playing. Unfortunately, my gaming pc was on the fritz, so only the slimmest of pickings were available to me. To put things in perspective, the last time I played one of these games was Utopia some eight or nine years ago. The genre is as addictive as ever.

I was surprised to find information and publicity about Estiah quite scarce. It was created in 2008 by a couple of jaded ex-World of Warcraft players, though it bears little resemblance to WoW. Anyway, the game’s story is a pretty blunt. “You’re in fantasyland, go level up and clear dungeons”, would surmise it quite well; no high marks there, but then again that’s the story and setting of most MMOs these days, so it’s not really a detriment. The story mainly exists to explain why your character must use decks of playing cards (‘charms’) instead of actually using equipment.

Estiah, at its core, is basically a card game with a pervasive element of progression. It’s certainly an interesting fusion of two genres, and what I immediately liked about the game was its unique method of handling character development. You level up through boosting four standard attributes by working various daily jobs or mastering skills. Your attributes determine which types of charms you can use in your deck, and skills are rewarded mainly through battling with charms, but also from non-combat activities. These attributes do not directly affect gameplay at all, only what charms you are able to equip. Two special attributes also exist that determine your health points and the maximum number of cards allowed in your deck (‘spirit’). You get action points every couple of hours, which are the currency for boosting skills in arenas, PvP, or dungeons. There exist three tiers of class specialization so to provide incentive towards reaching the later levels.

Unfortunately, this progression element adds questionable elements to the game as well. What I particularly dislike is the extreme amount of metagaming needed to keep a competitive edge. A player should not need to be playing the system from level one, but that is unfortunately the case in Estiah. This problem is caused from having skills that reward health and spirit exist (at the least, exist that early), which corrupt the whole system by giving unfair advantages to those who exploit the game mechanics. This forces a standard for everyone to keep up that just isn’t fun. Another problem is that it’s necessary to study all the encounters beforehand due to the limited actions awarded per day. This kind of research would not be as significant a pre-requisite if there was a smaller penalty on action points lost for failing encounters. Also, one last concern is that the long leveling time and high degree of specializing mean you might be stuck with something you don’t enjoy. In a free game requiring a significant amount of dedication, that kind of commitment is not too appealing.

So I guess what killed Estiah for me was the massive amount of time I would have had to dedicate to a game that just didn’t seem worth it. However, if you’re the kind of player who thrives on min/maxing and is looking for an extra activity on the side, you may consider giving Estiah a go. I wouldn’t recommend it otherwise. It’s an all or nothing sort of game.

Kry Reviews: Left 4 Dead 2

Left 4 Dead 2 debuted mid-November, some might say in the shadow of Modern Warfare 2, to fairly strong reviews and sales. As I said in my prior thoughts on the demo, I was left with a very positive impression. After ravenously playing through all facets of the game, I can confirm those initial vibes. Left 4 Dead 2 is one of those seemingly few sequels that truly shine as an improvement in every way over its predecessor.

What really stands out is how much the atmosphere has changed over the first game. Where L4D1 heavily utilized darkness, in the process masking bland cityscapes and wilderness, to set the mood, L4D2 uses it sparsely. Most playable levels now happen in daylight, with visibility rarely impeded even on the darker levels. Indeed, the game takes on more of an action dynamic now (instead of emulating the survival horror genre, which was a bit of a stretch anyway).

Now, with all this additional scenery, Valve has labored to make the settings more interesting. Besides the Southern flair adorning everything in the game, each campaign strives to be unique, even telling a little bit of story besides ‘escape the zombies’. Some examples include attempts at stopping the zombie virus, survivor holdouts, or the military being up to no good. Those plots are extraneous of course, not affecting the gameplay; one of the beauties of the L4D series being that it does not need a cinematic storyline or labyrinthine plot.

Along the aforementioned 'action' line, L4D2 is designed to be much more ‘open’ than the original. The premier strategy there was to go from corner to corner throughout each level; very boring. New special infected, most notably the goo-shooting spitter, have been introduced to render this playstyle much riskier. Also, many new panic events force the survivors to stay on the move rather than bunkering down to stop an onslaught. And lastly, a more subtle change is that melee knockback is now limited to further punish sloppy play. These changes make the game much more exciting, though it can be rough for veterans to adjust to. An especially notable example would be the bridge finale, which the survivors must cross under an unrelenting swarm; it is the hardest challenge offered yet from the series.

There are new weapons and items, but no increased inventory space; survivors are forced to be more selective with their options. Each of the main weapon classes (shotgun, rifle, sniper) have had some variants added to help people tailor the guns more to their preference, but ammo piles are more limited so conservation is a key should one want to keep the gun they're most comfortable with. Melee weapons are an effective addition, but replace your pistols and have a bit of a learning curve (especially when dealing with latency). Bile bombs, taking up the projectile spot, lure infected to the target/area thrown at and serve as an excellent utility to get out of a tough spot. There are also: defibrillators to revive dead survivors, adrenaline shots to give a speed/minor health boost, and fiery/explosive ammo packs, which sound cool but are impractical.

L4D2 has some new interesting game modes as well. Realism is an addition to Campaign offered for masochists who find expert too easy. Within Realism, no teammate glows are offered, infected have more health and dead survivors are only revived by defibs or beating a level. Too bad the mode is trivialized by the one-hit kill magnum pistol. Another addition is Scavenge mode, in which survivors and infected duke it out in an attempt to find more gas cans than the other team. This mode fills a niche for shorter time length games. Versus Mode from the first game is back and offers an improved scoring system with less emphasis on surviving the level and health kits used, and more on total distance traveled; also the scoring total per round has been approximately halved. The tighter score really keeps the pace up and the game competitive.

As with the demo, L4D2 suffered from an imperfect launch. The game was slightly delayed, though I had no expectations to be playing at midnight anyway. For the first couple of weeks, achievement tracking was wonky and repeatedly dropped, frustrating players. The game still has some unresolved problems, most notable of which of course is server selection. Never does it seem to be I can find a game where all 4 (or gods help me, 8) players can find an acceptable ping without a couple tries, but hey, it's in a much more playable state than this time last year. My field of view complaints from the demo also still stand, the guns are much too zoomed in to the point of ridiculousness. And then there are the little things that add up: invisible objects, getting stuck, either as a survivor in some corners, or as a charger infected on traffic cones or mailboxes. Perhaps most infuriating is during expert campaign when special zombies cheat and slash you whilst stunned.

But still, what an improvement over the first game, which I can't really imagine booting up again, unless it's playing the levels ported over to L4D2. I'm really interested to see where Valve takes L4D2 with DLC content (and if they charge for it). They recently announced the first update, The Passing, which includes, among other things, a meeting with the beloved cast of the first game. As a final note, if there were to be yearly installments of Left 4 Dead that offer as much as this sequel has, well I’d be happy buying them all!

Kry Reviews: Modern Warfare 2

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 debuted last week in a huge splash that Activision is calling the biggest launch of anything ever. Unfortunately, this debut is a bittersweet one for me and my brethren who play on PC. Not a month ago, I was sold as a day one purchase of this game. However, many unexpected, negative things have cropped up about the game, and it is no longer even on my purchase list. Were it not for a roommate buying it for his Xbox and letting me get a quick playthrough of the campaign in, I'd not even have this review.

So what are these blights on the PC version? Firstly, MW2 is priced at $60, $10 above the standard for a new game on PC, which is unheard of; I do not want to support a price hike. Secondly, Infinity Ward, the developer of MW2, has stripped all control away from the end-user with MW2. All support for dedicated servers has been replaced with a matchmaking service, which means there will likely be no user custom content. And worse, within the service, multiplayer has been capped at 9v9. One of my favorite things about other war shooters, like Battlefield 2, are massive battles like 32v32. Taking that away from me was what really did MW2 in for me.

Once again, I played Modern Warfare 2 on the Xbox. As I mentioned in my prior review of Call of Duty 4, console FPS isn't really my bag, so my thoughts on the game only touch base with the campaign. And with regards to that, Infinity Ward's got a pretty sweet formula down (for those unfamiliar, it involves lots of explosions and dramatic narratives). It kept me pretty enthralled throughout the entire game, though that's really not long, maybe 5-6 hours tops. Unfortunately, the story in MW2 is extremely convoluted and left a good experience somewhat marred. The gameplay hasn't changed much from the original besides the addition of a few new interesting weapons and technologies, but when you're making a sequel to a near-universally acclaimed game, there isn't much you need to innovate on. One other small bright note though; the grenade spam so prevalent in the first game seems much toned down here.

Moral of the story; if you really need some Modern Warfare 2 in your life, get it on the consoles. Activision is attempting to set a very dangerous precedent with this release, and it is my fear that it will be successful. If not with MW2, than perhaps with publishing Starcraft 2? I know I have not the willpower to resist that purchase. Oh well, only time will tell.

Kry Previews: Left 4 Dead 2

Left 4 Dead 2 has been a game mired in controversy since its public debut at E3 in June. The long anticipated Left 4 Dead 2 Demo hit this week for preorders, and I eagerly soaked up everything in it. Though I never really hopped on the boycott bandwagon, I understood and agreed with a lot of the complaints. My research and the demo experience, though not perfect, have left me with a mostly positive impression for its November release.

The exception to this, and the most negative thing about the demo, was the absolutely awful handling of the release by Valve. The demo was delayed five or six times over an approximately one day stretch, with no official word on the matter whatsoever except an expected release time on a Steam community group. Honestly, it was kind of like chasing a carrot on a stick, with some delays not being posted until 5 minutes before the release date. This kind of PR is absolutely unacceptable, no matter what the product or company.

With that rant out of the way, onto the demo! The first two maps of The Parish, which is the fifth and final campaign, are showcased. This is our first time playing L4D in daylight. Besides that, many new gameplay elements are showcased, including: the new special infected, a dynamic panic event, as well as new guns, bombs, and melee weapons. These all add a refreshing amount of variety to a game that had threatened to become stagnant. But, what really psyches me up about the game is trying out the new gore system firsthand; it’s a marked improvement over Left 4 Dead and other zombie games (except, perhaps, Dead Space) in its... attention to detail.

The in-game issues with the L4D2 demo are small and strange. Playing the demo, I get the sneaking suspicion that it’s an Xbox game on PC. Not only do I keep hearing sounds that I know are from Microsoft, but also the field of view perspective is messed up; it’s zoomed in too far. The weapons take up a lot more of the on-screen real estate, which is a negative change. Lastly, L4D2 does not improve upon the loathed server selection system of L4D, and already, poor latency servers have ended games early for me.

Still, the demo makes a strong case for the game. It will very likely be what L4D1 should have been when it came out. And, if you pre-order the 4-pack of L4D2, you can score the game for $34 each, a very solid acquisition. The demo is released to the regular public on Steam next week, and on Xbox the following week. You'll have my full impressions on the game in a future entry.

Kry Retro-Reviews: Call of Duty 4

Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare is an acclaimed first person shooter title, released in late 2007 and developed by Infinity Ward; it proved an immensely popular title. As such, a sequel, Modern Warfare 2 is due out this November. Interest in playing the sequel is what drove me to give COD4 a quick run through. This is an abbreviated review. Since playing FPS games on consoles is an extreme source of frustration for me, I only ran through the single player of COD4; my review omits the multiplayer, which is a most significant feature.

COD4 is set in faux modern times, pitting the player as SAS and USMC versus terrorists of the standard Arab and Russian fare. Despite this common setting, COD 4 still offers a fresh, compelling narrative, and is able to keep interest throughout the entire campaign. It also disguises its linearity well. That, along with a very strong visual and aural presentation, makes for a solid experience. The only real immersion breaking experiences are with your teammates’ AI. It sometimes leaves you wondering as to why they will prioritize less dangerous targets or conveniently sit around doing nothing. This is more nitpicking though, and usually the AI is nothing short of stellar.

Gameplay is similar to your standard shooter these days, and it should be, as COD4 set a benchmark that many other titles have followed. Indeed, I do believe COD4 is one of the titles responsible for starting the current fad of automatically recovering health by not getting hit. But I digress. The campaign puts you in a variety of roles, and you can usually pick up the weapons you want to fit your playstyle as you progress through missions, so the game continually feels fresh until the end. You usually are given a surplus of ammo as well as secondary items, like grenades, to complete your mission. Speaking of grenades, my one biggest gripe about the campaign has to be just how many times I got killed by them. It’s pretty frustrating how easy it is to get instagibbed by them, especially because it doesn’t feel parallel at all to how many bullets it takes to kill me. It’s probably more me approaching the game the wrong way, but either way, it’s a cause for rage.

COD4 certainly feels like it’s worth the money, and with Modern Warfare 2 releasing imminently, it should be available for pretty cheap, if you’re into yesterday’s big thing. I will be picking MW2 up on launch, assuming it’s not just hype. Hopefully, it will sate my FPS needs for quite awhile. If not, well, Left 4 Dead 2 is coming out about the same time… so there is a contingency plan in place.