Friday, December 29, 2017

January: Ladies First!

Mine had maroon hair, but you bet she was brown.
It's time to admit something: in games with customizeable or selectable characters, I pretty much always go female. Even better if there's a nonwhite skin tone, but I'm getting ahead of myself. During January, I'm going to do my best to stick to the theme of ladies in gaming. I might have to stretch beyond the obvious requirement of having a female protagonist, but I'll do my best to make it relevant. I'll stay away from games with non-humans, and ship games won't count unless the pilot is obviously female. Puzzle games and other titles with no protagonist won't count.

My first title is going to be the remastered Uncharted 3, of which the head writer and director was Amy Hennig. These games have memorable action scenes, unparalleled voice acting that backs up great writing, and look and sound gorgeous. All of this is Naughty Dog's signature quality on the entire series, and Amy Hennig has a lot to do with that. According to Wikipedia, Hennig believes that the creative direction of a script holds more importance than the graphics of the game. The fact that the Uncharted games are also the best in terms of production value just goes to show that Naughty Dog is one of the most talented AAA studios out there. As to why it's the first title in my ladies-first month is that I'd already finished two of the three Uncharted trilogy games in December.

After that, I'm planning to complete Chronicles of Teddy (exploratory action adventure), Dreamfall Chapters (slow-paced adventure), Momodora (action adventure), and Gravity Rush (action). These titles all feature female protagonists, and January is a great month to go through them together!



Also, there are always the games I come back to when trophy or story progress just seems too much at a given moment. My friends and I still play Overwatch almost daily: I'll do my best to stick to female characters unless I'm playing Mystery Heroes mode, which randomly selects heroes for you. Luckily, The OW cast is pretty evenly split between male and female, and the majority of my playtime is as Zarya, the pink-haired gravity gun-wielding Russian bodybuilder. Star Wars Battlefront 2 is where I'll have to make the biggest concession to not playing female characters. The devs added female storm troopers, and your gender for spawning as Rebel or Imperial troops is random.

I am Mother Russia.
While I don't expect these games to address the issues of how female characters are often shallowly written, it's a theme I think worthy of pursuing that will be quite fun. I certainly do think that female presence in gaming is improving and becoming more significant, for what it's worth. Either way, I have a handful of great titles to get to. Wish me luck!

Tuesday, December 26, 2017

Previously, in my living room

Despite several posts in the last month being more about frugality, that doesn't mean I haven't been bleepin and bloopin during these cold months. We actually got snow on Christmas Eve here in Seattle, and I can count on one hand how many times that's happened in my lifetime. Snow is my favorite encouragement not to go outside, login to the PSN and get to work.
You know you're humming the Duck Tales music

The Disney Afternoon Collection went on sale for an agreeable $8: 5 great Capcom-made Disney games and one real stinker, TaleSpin. Aside from TaleSpin, the games aren't super difficult, and offer some slick platforming in adventures that last about as long as an episode of their respective shows. The trophy list means beating each game twice, as well as doing its Boss Rush mode, all of which is very forgiving. New games to me were Duck Tales 2, Chip and Dale's Rescue Rangers 2, TaleSpin and Darkwing Duck. While the other games have the expected tight NES-era controls, TaleSpin doesn't really fit in, and is relatively a chore to play.

Take some time to look through Nate's journal as you progress
While we're on the subject of cheap collections, the Uncharted trilogy went on sale! These games are like playable action movies in the best sense of the concept. These aren't just games with cinematics simply connected with walking down corridors and shallow gunplay. Nathan Drake is the wisecracking over-the-top explorer turned spy turned ninja. Victor Sullivan is his charming older best friend who is still a ladies man, but always comes through at rough times. Elena Fisher starts off as a journalist in the wrong place at the wrong time, who owns up to the situation and ends up being pretty deadly. The voice acting is amazing, with plenty of sporadic character-defining banter and although events are scripted, there is a liquidity to the physics that makes each restart slightly different. The games don't really address their own violence, and keeps the story lighthearted as long as you stay ignorant of the fact that all the pirates and mercs are cannon fodder. This collection was released 2 years ago at $40 and was still worth it at that pricepoint, since the trilogy also got both graphical and technical overhauls. The first game is still a bit clunky, and is the hardest. However, between quick loading times, frequent checkpoints and a manageable 60 collectibles, the experience is really enjoyable.

Graphics.
Then you get to Uncharted 2, which ups the ante in every way. The game blows the lid off Nathan Drake's adventures with extra guns, extra explosions, extra jokes, and it's extra badass. There's a train level in it that will make you crap your pants. At one point, you end up in the most graphically-gorgeous location I've ever seen, and with this version's 1080p update, it's even more solidified. This area, Kathmandu, in Uncharted 2 ties with the train level for my favorite sequence in the series. The ohh-so minor gripe is that the original game opened with a metal horn and chime when it showed the NaughtyDog logo, and it's been replaced with the trilogy's own intro screen. Luckily this Southwestern Asian horn shows up in the music at points in the story, so all is not lost.

Greedy modern business practices spotted, Sir!
Flying in this game vs Battlefront 1,
some wins, some losses
Next on the list is Star Wars Battlefront 2. EA controversy aside, during the summer I promised myself I wouldn't buy it until the price dropped to $40. Whether the backlash of pissed off gamers cancelling half a million preorders, the release of The Last Jedi, or the holiday season caused the PSN sale, Battlefront 2 went on sale for $35. So, like cleaning up after a gold-pooping pig, I happily scooped that shit up.

There's no way around it: Star Wars Battlefront 2 is dope as DICE. With a very forgiving trophy list, I got to play through the campaign on a low difficulty, meaning I didn't get hung up and could experience the story.


Okay, now we're Luke on this bright planet...
One really confusing point is that when you first start the game, you choose between the Rebel and Imperial factions, which will bring customized challenges to earn extra currency. You're warned that you can't change factions, and this choice locks out of the other faction's tasks. I thought this meant they were dividing the single player campaign at least until you beat it, and then giving you a chance to go through the other perspective. I may have actually preferred this approach instead of what I got. I ended up playing a bunch of different characters from both factions with what felt like a few Forced (see what I did, there?) transitions at points, but ultimately was a really cool experience.

I can only complain about the loading time in Battlefront, which makes me more likely to play extra rounds without opening chests or switching modes, as even going to the main menu is easily 60 full seconds of loading time.
Time to get Ororo Munr-owned!

Last but not least is something I didn't know existed until seeing it at the sale: Marvel Puzzle Quest. Flashy gem-matching animations, flashier special abilities, awesome but limited selection of music: triple check.

Sunday, December 17, 2017

2017 honored titles

Instead of having a typical Top-10 list, I'm opting to give shout outs for extraordinary game titles I've had the pleasure and pain of playing this year. Keep in mind that the game's publish date may not have been in 2017. Looking through blog posts and my PSN profile, I have played over 60 titles this year, completing the trophy list for damn near all of them. One thing I noticed is the large amount of really well-done indie titles played this year. It's so nice that there are many alternatives to the full-priced games that take 40 hours to platinum and gobble up all your hard drive space, oppressively making you play multiplayer online. Not that that isn't worth it, sometimes *cough Battlefront II is amazing cough.* Also, it's worth noting that a great deal of games that I played and enjoyed this year are on sale for PSN's Winter sale. Get em cheap while you can!

That's said, let the ceremony begin:

Strider what??? I can't Hir-yu!
I have to say the funnest game to platinum was split between Strider and Infamous: First Light. Both open-world games are gorgeously designed with main campaigns that are shorter than 10 hours, and provide enough challenges to need some reflexes and timing. However, I got over any hard parts with just a few retries, so frustration was minimal. It also helps my frugal friends that you can usually find either title on sale for ~$10.

Speaking of enjoyable games with minimal commitment, I have to give kudos to Xeodrifter for being the shortest-but-sweetest. You could beat it in an afternoon and still have time to cook dinner, making sure to portion out the next day's lunch, of course. Xeodrifter is a side-view multiple-zone exploration action title with backtracking (yes, I'd rather call it that than Metroid-vania) and this gem was $3 when I bought it on the PSN.

On the opposite end of the spectrum, there's the fully-budgeted triple-A colossus Final Fantasy XII: The Zodiac Age. This game was everything I expected from SquareEnix and more: upgraded sound quality, including a remastered orchestral soundtrack, a super-detailed job system that encourages multiple playthroughs, and a larger game than the original PS2 title. It also wins the award for being the longest. The platinum trophy was about 20 hours too long in the inevitable grind it took to beat the final trial, but the main game and most of the extra stuff was really enjoyable. Also, it's still a feat that battle is compelling with the attack mechanic (pretty much) removed. The art direction is top-notch, as expected from a Japanese developer.

One of my more recently-played games on this list is Abzu, which deserves special recognition for being playable art. Gameplay mechanics are simple, and difficulty is almost nonexistent...this game has the same soul as Flower and Journey (these are distinct things with stupidly basic names ala Apple's naming scheme.) (The new) Ratchet and Clank also gets a seat at the table for having beautiful art direction. Every one of these titles looks cartoony at first glance. However, between bug-free gameplay, a decent soundtrack, great voice acting, jokes, and amazingly-tested controls, R&C games kill my theory that Western developers don't prioritize stability.

Darksiders II, however, is shining proof that stability just is not a priority to some developers and publishers. This game wins my award for buggiest game played in 2017, and I played both Smite games' betas and a slew of indie titles. Nothing pisses me off more than unfinished games, especially ones that show off money in other places. To be fair, the game had a charming protagonist, neat art direction and the gameplay was like God of War meets Zelda. It was just buggy as fuck, and that's my top gaming pet peeve.

Before we descend into the Pit of Negativity, I want to give the loudest shout out to a few independent developers. The best game I played in 2017 that was made by a small indie developer was Axiom Verge. As a matter of fact, this was developed by one person. The game has a kick ass soundtrack, stylized 16-bit graphics, tight controls, and is an absolute blast to play. This game would have been impressive with any size studio, but Thomas Happ did the impossible and I got to hand it to the man.

Next up, for larger independent game dev teams is Pyre. I already talked your ears off (or typed your eyes off) about it, and just want to add that, in a year of other anticipated-but-disappointing experiences, Pyre was a 2017 favorite. The game's concept of dynamic storytelling is ingrained enough that even the final song has interchangeable lyrics based on what your characters did in the story. I have never seen this before, and it shows that SuperGiant Games is thoroughly artistic and talented. If you like games where you can affect your own outcomes, there are few titles that do it as well as Pyre, but it may be worth mentioning Stories: The Path of Destinies. This game deserves recognition for having 16 distinct endings, being super fun to play, and making me laugh out loud at several points.

Lastly, two games that resonated with me were RPGest RPG Earthlock, and side-view tactics game Steamworld: Heist. The former hit most of the notes of JRPGs, but backed off of a few of the corny tropes like being a farmer, not dealing with romance, and a clever character-improvement system. Steamworld has great art direction and I am a huge fan of turn-based tactical combat. It's also one of the few titles with DLC that I bought and gobbled up immediately.

How-abso-freakin-lutely-ever, the year wasn't without it's lame notes.

Don't forget to hunt and craft for 2 hours first.
I'd have to share my greatest disappointment of the year as Zelda: Breath of the Wild. If they had added crafting to the usual formula, that would have been great. If they had added difficulty and lessened navigational hand-holding, that would have been fine. If aiming didn't suck...well that's something inherent to Nintendo games, so whatever. Breath of the Wild is all of these things, and a lot to change at once, and gameplay has been slowed down significantly. I know that this is blasphemy, and am open to investing more time to try and like the game. However, two restarts and 20 hours total have been invested so far into exploring, dying, having to craft and getting bored of the whole process.

At least Zelda works, though. The same can't be said of FFXV's DLC, which is the crappiest of crap, mostly because of how badly it contrasts with my favorite game of the generation. From the obvious gap-filling of the main quest's story to the untested and unwelcome gameplay change of single combat and snowmobiling, these expansions represent Japanese publishers being swayed in the worst way to follow shitty DLC practices in the industry. For better or for worse, the gameplay of the DLCs are all different, so Episode Ignius may prove to be good after all.

Star Wars Battlefront 2 didn't make the list of disappointments because it's pretty gosh-dang sweet. The publisher ruined the online experience, but the game is an improvement in almost every way over the first game. Graphics, less-swimmy controls, rarely-enough-occurring heroes that have a balanced impact on the map, and more distinct weapons are all things I wanted. However, every other match, I ran into a pay-to-winner with a max leveled Vader that decimated whatever opposing team was unlucky enough to play against someone with a larger wallet. This is a real consequence of a greedy publisher choosing money over integrity. At the same time, Overwatch is periodically ruined by awful members who are supposed to be on your team, so multiplayer games just have that vulnerability of being not-so-great sometimes.

All things considered, 2017 may have been my most productive year in terms of games completed, and that's considering at least 30% of my game time attributed to Overwatch. Maybe I can hit 80 different console games played in 2018.

Friday, December 15, 2017

Cold, hard, cash-saving

Time to dust off the space heaters and buy that bucket of Swiss-Miss! If you haven't already, you should completely ventilate your house once a week so all your cooties and heating system junk can go play outside rather than in your lungs. The 25 cents or so to heat your space back up is worth what you'd spend treating your sick self. Make sure to check your windows and sliding glass doors and tell your landlords ASAP so that your expensive heat isn't all seeping out. I still have to remind my girlfriend to wear a hoodie around the house if 65F isn't warm enough. You all must think I'm a monster, but I am a firm believer in the human body's ability to adapt, rather than needing certain comforts. I am also frugal af.

In terms of energy efficiency, one major difference I made was buying curtains. Most apartments are cheaply made and come with a set of white blinds. With a few screw and nail holes, I installed additional curtains, most of which I got at my local secondhand shop. For $50, I covered 3 large windows, controlling light and screen glare, and more importantly, temperature. I did this last year and have since had less issues with the sun heating up the place, and the cold freezing the place. While you wait to get curtains, you can at least make sure to open your blinds for heat and close them at sunset to get the most of natural energy. This might be obvious info, but lazy me always left them closed and ended up needing to crank that baseboard heater a little more.


We're also in hot drink season, folks. My workplace is connected to a Starbucks, which rakes in all the extra business of lazies who don't take the 2 minutes to make their own cup of their favorite hot beverage. Taking time to make your own drinks lets you step away from your workspace for a moment yet continue to be productive. You may even surprise yourself by making something you like more than what you'd buy.


Bad choice to have to make at 7am...
Also, the worst part of those cafe trips is the glistening, perfectly-cooked pastries that charm another $4 onto our cards. Then, there's the $6 yogurt, economizing your guilt; the 'healthier' option (until you read the nutrition label) is more expensive. I avoid this by eating two (2) packets of instant oatmeal, which currently totals 20 cents. I am far from immune to the charm of a good breakfast, though, as the weekends always bring something more elaborate. Once a month I hit breaking point and just have to go to a good local diner and over-eat myself into blissful oblivion. But $6 yogurts and $10 salads is just something you should only get in absolute desperation, if you're on a budget.


And finally, Christmas. It's a barrage of should-I, shouldn't-I emotions and the guilt of giving cheaper gifts or no gifts just might not be worth it for some of you. I would say that in the very least, make sure your Thank Yous are genuine or practiced. If you're in a situation where you receive but not give, the givers probably want your positive reaction more than to simply exchange stuff. As a side note, I personally think the majority of gift giving should happen on birthdays, rather than this predictable season.

If you are going for purchases, remember that you can switch over to https://smile.amazon.com and donate a portion of your purchase to a charity of your choice. I chose one of the Internet rights advocate groups, since the bored FCC decided to stop doing their jobs and sold us out. You can just as well choose animal shelters or help sick kids. Anyhoo, switching URLS (to smile.amazon) will preserve your cart, too, so you can do it just before checkout. Amazon didn't pay me to say this, I just figure you can support a good cause with literally 24 keystrokes or a mouse click.

Wednesday, December 6, 2017

Shoddy UIs I'm callin you out!

Me, when Daddy Apple, Grandma Google (not pictured)
and Mommy Microsoft change their UI
Apple is awesome at needless User Interface updates, though occasionally some useful features come out of their reckless restructuring. Finger gestures on their sweet-sweet touchpads is probably my favorite enhancement in the last decade. To contrast, Windows uses tried-and-true formulas and seems to think that there's no use in changing something that people already know. Remember the first time you saw a Windows (Start) key? Game changer. Then came the right-mouse-button key, and...nothing ever again to the keyboard. There are merits to innovation vs staying the course, but between the cracks are some poor choices for UI. Now, before I get started, I'll say that there are probably built-in solutions or separate applications that solve some of these issues, but the average user isn't aware, and that counts as poor UI to me.


You'd better have a good memory if you want to replicate that
Layer restriction: In designing my email signature, I wanted to copy and paste from my inbox, the main Outlook page. This is 2 layers back, from Signature (top layer) to Compose (1 layer down) email to Inbox. but since the dawning of time, Windows won't let you select the screen more than one layer back. I can move the signature box out of the way to see the composed email below it. However, I can't move the next layer (Compose email) or interact with it. I see this interactive layer restriction in many applications, even this very website when uploading media.

Another example: say I want to upload an image, but forget where the cursor is and corresponding text. Add on the fact that the photos I'm looking for are buried under a 10-folder directory path. Too bad, can't look without closing out of the upload screen. Why is this still the standard right now? At the very least, you should be able to make layers transparent at-will.

Most apps let you drag and drop between your file explorer and content creator, which is a sweet alternative, but you still get trapped in situations like Outlook.

File management on your smartphone: Why-ohh-why do I have to download a separate app to look at files on my phone in Android? Want to do the same on iPhone? Forget about it. On numerous occasions, I've put new music on my iOS/Android device, only to have whatever music app not recognize the song. Unless I've downloaded a file management app (why isn't this installed by default?), there's no way for me to check where the song went and begin a diagnosis without connecting it to a computer. Don't even get me started about needing iTunes to do the same for your iDevices. It's a silly form of restriction that Apple customers just deal with. A $1000 phone should be able to do anything and everything I want it to, damnit!

Traffic lights: Think about it, folks. We've shaken our fists at drivers who gun the engine through a freshly-red light. We've been the maniacs who are doing it, too. While drivers aren't blameless, ask yourself the question: how long is a yellow light yellow? The answer varies by intersection, not even block, city or state! There is no standard for something that is a daily danger (double-d for short. Actually, no one has ever called it that.) The burden is on the driver to make this split-second decision, when we could just implement something like a flashing yellow light that pulses 4 times before going red. While we're talking about good ideas for traffic lights, B.C. has flashing green lights that mean a pedestrian has activated the cross walk button, and so be on the lookout. Federal mandate, pronto!
Side note: that ad off to the right...

Ad placement in on Youtube: Using anything besides Chrome means I have to run Youtube without AdBlocker. Before the FCC ruins it and makes us all pay Comcast a Youtube premium, the company needs to pay for that data-gobbling with advertising, which I have no problem with in general. The problem is the 5-, 10- and even 30-minute advertisements that will begin in the middle of your hourlong video on the 110 reasons why Star Trek Discovery is the greatest show ever. We can all sit through a minute or so of commercials, but there's no rhyme or reason when these display; sometimes the videos stop mid-word!


an oldie, but Goldeneye had atrocious controls. Move with the stick
and aim with the D-pad or C-buttons. Gross.
Lack of customizeable controls in at least 50% of videogames: Why is this still a thing? If the controller has a trigger on it, why is the shoulder button above it the one to fire? Maybe the developers have thoroughly thought out the perfect control scheme. Good job, but there are always people who want something different, and might even get turned off by controls that aren't so great. I've written about this before, and there is also a collective of disabled gamers who have created their own controllers that don't work properly if a game doesn't have customizeable controls. There is just no good reason for this not to be a standard requirement. Unassigned buttons are Step 1 in designing controls, FFS!

Logins: I've already written an entry about password recovery. The gripe is when you put in the wrong info and the website doesn't confirm whether the login or password is what's wrong. This is probably a security feature, but is also frustrating because I personally have about 50 different accounts that use one of 5 email addresses. Even at my workplace, the handful of applications have different login schema, whether that's first.last or email or id#. Employers should read my blog!

Anyone can wave off these gripes as petty first world problems, but the businesses responsible for these had a goal of creating a good product that's easy to use, so there's that, too.

What about you: At work and in your personal life, how many accounts do you have that require a login? There's a poll under this post!

I am one of those people that uses the word  perfect subjectively. I think something is perfect if it does what it's intended to do ...