Games industry. I am disappoint.

My disappointment in the gaming industry really seems to be growing at an alarming rate.

The Christmas season is soon approaching and this generally means that developers are pushing their precious, baby games into the big bad world to be reviewed, bought and discussed by the public. But trips to my local EB Games, GAME and JB HI-FI don’t seem to harbour these plastic cases of time wasters.

Walking into EB, I make straight for the Xbox 360 corner of the store. I browse the shelves and I sigh to myself, “I wonder if GAME will have anything different”, and walk out.

Sadly, this isn’t the case. The process appears to repeat itself no matter where I wander in my quest for game-age.

The problem with games these days is that they’re just repeating the same stuff. Sequel after sequel after sequel and none of them good. Call of Duty: Black Ops just came out and all the reviews I’ve read or heard say that the story line is horrible, and I’m in the same boat as many. I won’t buy a game that has “awesome” status, simply because of the multi-player game. And any games that have come out require a peripheral I'm not buying yet (See: Kinect), or I have no interest in. The last game I did buy was Grand Theft Auto IV because it was $35 and I'd finished it before.

What bothers me even more is that game developers and publishers can't seem to produce consistent, interesting content throughout the year. Even if they only produced one game and released DLC through the year,* it would still be better than the sludge of games being released now.

Le sigh...

Hopefully there will be an onslaught of fantastic games before Christmas, and the gamer in will be satisfied. Although, the likelyhood of that happening isn't high.

* (Remind me to write a rant about XBL DLC and how it should be free on a later date.)

Two steps forward, 50 steps back.

Living in Australia comes with its perks; Beaches, sun, attractive people. It also comes with its disadvantages; backwards politicians who can take two very positive steps forward, then turn around, get in a fast car and drive way past the starting line.

Earlier this year, the Australian Government released a discussion paper on the non-existent R 18+ rating for video games. The response was fantastic. With petitions from EB Games and GAME retailers, the word was out about this and 59,678 responses were retrieved. An overwhelming 86 percent of respondents were in favour of an adult rating.

Well, that’s where we went wrong. According to those in charge, further research needs to be done before they can even start discussing the idea. Home Affairs Minister Brendan O’Conner tends to agree because of “interest groups” who had made submissions. These interest groups include 34 community churches.

Censoring games doesn’t make themes disappear and it doesn’t make games more “playable” for young people. It’s probably doing more harm than good. Censoring what isn’t good for the kiddies, doesn’t take away the themes implied.

I even wrote a letter to Michael Atkinson (when he was in power) saying that the adult rating was needed more than ever. A well researched, well written and quite logical argument was sent off to his desk. He sent me back the same form letter that was given to everyone who wrote to him.

In an election year, something that could sway thousands, if not millions, of votes, is probably not something you want to take too long thinking about.

OMG GRRL ON TEH INTERWEBS!!!!oneone!111

According to The Internet, I don’t exist. I am a figment of your imagination. Hi, my name is Adelaide, and I play videogames.

I wonder how the whole thing got started. I mean, who decided that girls don’t play games? Or that we don’t play games as well as boys. I could quite easily stand my ground against some blokes in Halo or L4D and do it regularly.

I’ll admit this “stereotype” isn’t really true. Most of my male friends just go along with it to annoy me, to which I shoot them in the back with a sticky grenade. But there are some (See Xbox Live) who quite ignorantly announce it and will do anything to muscle out a girl, especially when she’s 15 points ahead on Halo 3.

I pin it on jealously, and after being beaten by a girl, the emasculated feeling. As Sheldon Cooper from Big Bang Theory once said, “She must be cheating. No girl can be that attractive and that good at videogames.”

Digital Date Night

Date night is a night most girls love because, it’s a great occasion to get dressed up, go out to the movies and dinner to spend time with their special person. But, as much as I love going out with my boyfriend, I don’t like doing it frequently. It’s expensive and labour intensive. I mean, there is a process. Shower, make-up, hair, dress, shoes. It can take 30 minutes, or 2 hours depending on who you are.

Date night in my eyes is staying inside, get into some comfy PJ’s and pick up a controller and play games with my Yoshi. (That’s right, my boyfriend has a gaming nickname.) We get the same satisfaction out of playing games together, even if he does have a horrible taste in first person shooters and it’s far less expensive because we can eat in, we save gas because only one of us has to drive to the others house, and we don’t spend $20 on movie tickets. Still, I’m a little worried. It sounds romantic in some ways, if you strip it down it starts sounding like we’re just two mates hanging out. People who don’t really know us have pointed it out. But because of our financial situation, we’re doing the best we can -- we love our digital date night.

Which zombie is worth more?

I’m in for a long weekend...

On Thursday 22nd, Valve released new DLC for Left 4 Dead 2 known as The Passing. This includes a new campaign which is hard as concrete, an in-game blog and a new game type called “Mutation.” Mutation cycles different game types such as realism verses which combines the difficulty of realism with the interesting concept of Verses (which I’m still not sold on) or Chainsaw Massacre where you just run around with chainsaws.

This new DLC irritates me a little bit. While I’m a great fan of the original Left 4 Dead, and still believe that Left 4 Dead 2 probably could have just been added as DLC to L4D, I’m wondering just what Valve are doing at their development studios. Portal 2 is set to release very soon, all new DLC for a game that was released a year after the original (it shows in the feel of the game) but the game a lot of people have been waiting for isn’t set to be released this year or anytime in the future. The game I’m talking about is Half Life 2: Episode 3.

I thought the idea of episodic gaming was to get games released quicker. But Valve seems to subscribe to the well known Valve Time timetable and that doesn’t sit well with Valve supporters. I would rather be fighting Headcrab zombies than Boomers, Smokers and Jockey’s right about now.

My friend steals my xbox, and then becomes a convert.

"Addie, you love me right?"
"May be, why?"
"Can I borrow the Sexbawks for a little while?"
"Why?"
"'cause..."

This is a conversation with my friend, who I’ll call Jerkface to protect his identity. He is on school holidays and has decided this week would be the week that he’d steal my beloved Xbox and play Assassin’s Creed 2.

What’s interesting about this is he’s a PC gamer, and by rights would be my enemy if the platform wars ever decided to break free of the internet. Also, I know he’s got money to buy the game. You know, he probably would if Ubisoft didn’t have that silly “Permanent connection to internet” DRM that’s been rubbing people the wrong way.

Anyway, I think I’m starting to slowly turn him towards way of thinking about console! He even thought about buying an Elite. Not that he’ll ever admit it. If he keeps following my lead, he’ll be swooning like a lady whenever Nathan Fillon is on Castle.

But our princess is in another castle!

This week I started Pokémon Heart Gold a re-release of what is said to be one of the best Pokémon games. This got me thinking about Nintendo and the company. Even more than that, it got me asking myself, “Where did the Nintendo ingenuity that made them a household name go?”

Nintendo has released a new coloured Wii to attract a different demographic, Super Mario Brother Wii is almost the same as other Super Mario games, the new DS XL, which is the 4th redesign of the DS and the re-release of Heart Gold and Soul Silver.

What troubles me about Nintendo’s new design philosophy is that I haven’t noticed any new series’ that are worth the money it cost to develop them. Anecdotal evidence suggests that even though the Wii is winning the pissing contest between Sony and Microsoft, people buy the Wii and soon move on from the novelty of motion control and the gimmicks wear off quite soon after. And the DS isn’t much better. With games varying from Barbie Fashion Show to Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare – Mobilised, the handheld device can’t decide if it wants to accessorise humanity or blast it to hell.

I’m starting to think that if Nintendo can’t release anything that isn’t in the same league as games from the glory days of the late eighties and early nineties, they might be looking at the beginning of the end and in ten or so years, Nintendo might only be a memory.

A Step in the Right Direction.

Australian gamers may very soon have the rating that they’ve been crying out for for years. Last month, South Australian Attorney-General Michael Atkinson retired from the position. He’ll be on the back bench of politics for another four years, which means he’s basically not participating in politics much any more.

The change of heart could be caused by several things: Increased pressure from gamers, his desire to be with his family, or (and more likely) recent political blunders such as trying to get internet blogs censored. Whatever the reason is, it’s good news for gamers. New Attorney-General John Rau is in favour for an adult rating for videogames. Although, Atkinson said that he wasn’t the only Attorney-General s who didn’t support the idea of an R18+ rating. Why didn’t they ever speak up when Atkinson was copping the brunt of criticism for brick walling the rating?

I wonder if this means that censored games like Left 4 Dead 2 (Valve) will be re-released for Australian gamers who were forced to buy the censored, Australian version. I, like many Australians, don’t care since we got a mate to gift us a copy. Will the shift in policy affect game sales in Australia? Stay tuned!

Assassin's Creed 2 review

Assassin's Creed 2 is the highly anticipated sequel to the third-person-assassination game, Assassin's Creed. It follows the protagonist Desmond Miles as he dives into the memories of his ancestors; a well connected assassin's who fight against the Templar's. Desmond's latest ancestor is a young Italian man named Ezio who lived in the Renaissance.

A bit about our main character, Ezio Auditore da Firenze, this means, "Ezio Auditore from Florence." I'm not sure why Ezio's name has the addition of "From Florence", but the game does make mention of Leonardo Da Vinci and explains, "Like many destined to be superstars, he had no surname, Vinci being the town in which he was born." Further research explained that there weren't such things as last names so people who attach their profession and birthplace onto their names.

Ezio is the newest member of Desmond's family tree, as he is the latest ancestor Desmond possesses. Ezio is a complete ladies man, even if he throws off a bit of a gay vibe. Within the first 15 or so minutes, you've already quick-time evented with a very pretty young lady, and as you progress further, you make friends with a madam who obviously wants to do naughty things to Ezio (free of charge, of course.)

Gameplay is very similar to Assassin's Creed 1 with high profile fighting and low profile socially acceptable moves. High profile is still amazingly frustrating and makes you want to snap your controller into a thousand tiny pieces in some of the more intricate parts of the game (Assassin's Tombs, etc) and this ancestor still suffers from "I don't want to go around the object, I want to run up the object" stupidity.

Ubisoft listened to the criticism of the first Assassin's Creed game and took out the mandatory "do these missions to get information on your target" bits, but the game now seems to be a bit lax without them. The first game seemed to be stealthier with some of the mandatory missions, and now it's just "Raaagh! Ezio want revenge!" There are side-missions to do, but without the need to do them, I rarely felt bothered to do them. Some of the side puzzles are interesting and insanely infuriating. Although it was fun trying to figure out the link between Joan of Arc and Attila the Hun with my mum, who found the puzzles as find brain teasers. She's the show off who figured it out in 5 minutes after it took me 20.

Enemies come in varying levels of difficulty. From the common foot soldier, to the big blokes in the huge suits of armour with swords and axes the size of a large dog which make you go, "Welp, retreating is always a good plan." But with the new arsenal of weapons like duel wrist blades and upgradeable swords and daggers, they enemies become easier to deal with as long as you know where everyone is. But the combat is still very shallow and boring, like in the first game. Hopefully a little variation in the next game will be a great, and much needed improvement.

Assassin's Creed 2 also offers very limited customisation which is an improvement from Assassin's Creed 1. Synchronisation isn't gained by learning new abilities like in Assassin's Creed 1; you upgrade your armour and your weapons with money which, by the time you get half way through the game, you'll be rolling in it, but it's still not enough to upgrade to the best armour. Start saving now.

The game contains interesting titbits about the area Ezio is exploring, which somehow makes me relate to the game more. I've always been interested in history, and in a game that tries to make fiction in a non-fictional place, it makes you believe that something like this could have happened. There is always information available on characters and places which is fun to read.

The script for Assassin's Creed had a small case of the gremlins in my opinion. Everything seemed very... generic, script wise. Assassin's Creed 2 is much different. The characters are very well written and the game makes some amazing jokes. Ezio tells one of his enemy's that his sister, "didn't mind the handling he gave her last night" after said enemy accuses Ezio of getting others to handle his dirty work. Ezio's mother is also a delight. She says one of the funniest things in the entire game and it had me giggling for quite a while, but maybe I'm just immature. The NPC's also have their quips about why you're running up a wall, ("Why, it must be a drunken wager or something!") and the merchants will only but enjoying telling you that you only appeared to be poor when you buy something from them or sarcastically mutter, "No, I didn't think so" when you don't buy anything.

Assassin's Creed 2 continues the tradition of looking amazing like its predecessor. The game is bright and wonderful to look at, which is an improvement over the Assassin's Creed 1 Climbing up towers to gain viewpoints is still fun, and some towers are more difficult than others which makes the view from the top more exciting. There seems to have been more focus on detail in the buildings and surrounding world which makes it incredibly fun to explore.

Personally, I adore this game, even with its faults. There has been a lot of negativity about the game, and I don't see it. To love something truly, you accept the good with the bad. It's why I think that Psychonauts is the best game I've ever played. Even with the kind-of-bad controls, the game had a charm that I think was fantastic. This is the same reason I think Assassin's Creed is a great sequel. It's not the best executed game, it suffers from middle child syndrome (kind of like Empire Strikes Back - It was busy explaining more of the story) but it still serves a purpose and is great to play.

Honey, I'm home!

After a suggestion from my friend, Seth, I decided to start a blog to improve my writing skills. What exactly I'll write about is a mystery, but I'm tossing up between a run-down of my week, a or a "This week in gaming news" blog since games are a huge part of my life and despite the bad rap they get, are incredibly interesting. Even a gaming review blog since I'm writing a review for Assassin's Creed 2, so look out for that, Internet!

And speaking of Assassin's Creed 2, who here has heard about the absurd DRM that Ubisoft has come up with? For those who haven't (although, if you haven't, you should probably crawl back under you internet-less rock) Ubisoft require new PC games like Assassin's Creed 2 to be connected to the internet while playing and if your connection drops, the game will pause until a connection can be re-established to a Ubisoft server then the game will continue. While I think that the idea is crazy, bonkers backwards, the problem can be easily rectified - Don't pirate. Although, I think the people who are working on a crack for DRM like this find it as a challenge, they're not doing anything to help the problem.

Anyway, I think that's enough from me for this evening.

~Rade.