Tag Archives: PC Game Review

Sherlock Fails to Catch Jack the Ripper – Game Review

Box cover for the boardgame: Sherlock Holmes Consulting Detective – Jack the Ripper & West End Adventures. Image from the internet.

Jack the Ripper may be part of the collective consciousness, but I really didn’t know anything about the case until this week.

Earlier this year I was introduced to a boardgame called Sherlock Holmes Consulting Detective. It was less board and more oral story with an interesting concept and a terribly frustrating execution. The short version: you play as members of Holmes’ Baker Street Irregulars. By tracking down leads you are challenged to solve the case in as few steps as possible in order to beat the amazing Sherlock Holmes. Unfortunately, Sherlock cheats. He uses information you the player don’t have access to, magically traces only the correct – generally obscure or illogical – leads and makes up answers at the end. Anyway, with my family, we played all 10 cases, grew frustrated with the system and moved onto other things.

That is until my brother brought home the expansion/sequel. Now, I know he is going to do a much better (and more detailed analysis) of the game when we finish this next series of 10 cases. But in the meantime here is my feelings of the matter. We are, to date, only four cases in to the expansion and have just concluded the Ripper Series.

First, I would like to say that I like the general concept of the series. I like the idea of tracking down clues and solving mysteries. We have even decided to dismiss the scoring system of the game which encourages players to visit as few locations as possible and ultimately miss out on much of the story. Instead, this time around we are not counting our leads, but chasing up whatever clues catch our fancy – while trying to accumulate enough knowledge to answer the random assortment of questions at the end.

The first four cases of the expansion are all tied to Jack the Ripper. Obviously you cannot identify Jack until the end of Case Four. However, you are still given a series of questions to answer related to the earlier cases. I liked the idea of creating a great arch with smaller steps. I even liked the new mechanics which allowed you to get more information from different locations/witnesses by adding clue numbers together (under specific conditions). This meant you could learn more about a character you had already been introduced to.

What failed was the writing ultimately.

A spread of the board and game sheets for Sherlock Holmes Consulting Detective – Jack the Ripper & West End Adventures. Image from the internet.

I learned that the case of Jack the Ripper actually did consist of a confusing mass of information and misinformation. The police did a terrible job and the coroner actually included wrong information in his report. An unknown and highly debated number of women are actually attributed to Jack. The newspapers actually fabricated letters apparently from the serial killer. So, this does explain some of the conflicting testimonies you are presented in the game.

Unfortunately, the writers, chose one of the weakest culprits to be Jack. Even Watson points out some of the numerous flaws to Sherlock’s weak explanation at the end of the fourth case. It was so utterly unsatisfying. Thus, I cannot say I am terribly excited to proceed with the other cases, though how they can be worse is difficult to imagine.

Yet, all was not lost. By playing this game, I did learn more about Jack the Ripper. And more interestingly, I discovered that my brother’s first novel was inspired by the case. No, it does not follow any one of the theories. But I can now see the influences of this bloody and violent case on the writing of Thyre. Something I found far more interesting that Sherlock’s impossible solution.

What’s the appeal of MMO’s? Nevernevernever

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MMOs – the games of waiting.

Today is another posting day that I’m wholly unprepared for. While my colleague gave me an excellent topic involving algae, I feel a more pressing matter is at hand. And I do have some backup D&D stories waiting in the wings so don’t fear that I’ve been posting more opinion pieces and less trashy shorts. Those are coming in good time.

You see, my friend has wrangled me into playing a delightful game called Neverwinter. And he’s done this mostly for the title. And because he knew it would annoy me.

Neverwinter is a free-to-play massive multiplayer online role-playing game (MMO). These delightful beasts have been around for some time, the first notable ones created back in the late 1990s with Ultima Online and Everquest. The most famous, without a doubt, is World of Warcraft (WoW). Millions of people log on to Blizzard’s behemoth every month and it has worked its way into the public consciousness through television shows like The Big Bang Theory and South Park. I’d be very surprised if someone hasn’t heard of it at least in passing. For a time, WoW’s success had a huge impact on the gaming industry. The amount of money it brought in through the combined revenue of the game’s purchase ($60 – and Blizzard is loathe to ever put anything on sale) and it’s monthly fee ($15) made it one of the most profitable ventures in gaming. Its success inevitably spawned numerous copies and clones with many industry experts predicting that this new online development was the wave of the future. And, for a time, that almost seemed right.

But whatever WoW was, one thing became clear: it was one of a kind.

A strew of failed games and collapsed companies piled at Blizzard’s feet. No single contender could match the subscription base even with some developers reportedly throwing billions of dollars into the development of their own monstrous MMO titles. The core base of WoW was reticent to leave and unlike the early predictions, it didn’t seem that this game was the next evolution in game design so much as the birth of a new genre. Thankfully not every company chose to chase this new market and their titles those sold well prompting the multi-million dollar publishing houses to pursue those next ‘big things’ that will undoubtedly revolutionize the industry this time! In the meanwhile, small studios have attempted to carve out their own niches in the shadow of WoW. Neverwinter is such a creature, wielding two unique weapons it hopes to win its player base with.

For one, Neverwinter is the first MMO to use Wizards of the Coast’s D&D brand combined with its 4th edition ruleset. This is a little surprising, since out of all the editions the king of table-top role-playing developers have made, 4th edition is the one most like a video game. The designers even admitted to drawing inspiration from none other than WoW itself when creating it. Wizards had quite a bit of success shopping around the D&D property in past years. Games like Baldur’s Gate, Planescape and Icewind Dale have achieved various degrees of critical acclaim and commercial success. Perhaps the largest brand is Neverwinter Nights which saw two separate releases from different developers. It was also the most recent releases which doesn’t surprise me that it’s become the setting for Cryptic’s MMO.

Now, I’m no expert on the genre. I played WoW for a grand total of five hours and promptly deleted it from my hard drive. I played it at the bequest of a friend but knew I was never going to get into it. Its price scheme I disagreed with and I don’t think any game could justify both a full price purchase on top of monthly subscriptions. Especially when I’m so used to free multiplayer as a PC player. But there’s no doubt that Blizzard makes the majority of its money through subscriptions so most of its competition has attempted the same. The only MMO I played to any serious degree was Guild Wars which required a one type purchase of the core game though it sold expansions to keep up its revenue flow.

So, Neverwinter is rather the perfect offering to return to the genre. For Derek, it’s in the damnable Forgotten Realms and has us treading through the old familiar stomping grounds of Neverwinter Nights 2. For me, the game doesn’t cost a dime.

I’ve found the experience so far to be… interesting. These games are billed as role-playing though there’s even less of that than in your regular RPGs. There’s a decent character creator with standard D&D characteristics like hometown and religion but none of these have any sort of impact on either the game or your interactions. It’s strange to me that the greatest appeal of MMOs is the idea that you’re inhabiting a shared world with others that should make it more realistic and engaging. You aren’t interacting with scripted NPCs anymore whose dialogue is limited to what is written and usually walk the same paths doing the same activities every time you greet them. No, in an MMO that stranger on the street is another player – another human being – with their own goals, quirks and attitudes. It’s the sort of situation that should give rise to an unending series of unscripted play. However, in execution, this is never the case.

I don’t know what it is, but massive multiplayer experiences seem to strip all of the creative layerings of a game and focus almost primarily on the mechanics. The quest systems are nowhere near as dynamic as a single player game and are essentially variations of ‘go here and fetch this.’ You will either be directed to spacious maps filled with static camps of enemies and asked to scrounge around for four feathers, heads, crates or whatever and watch as other players run by on their own menial errand. Given the free-for-all nature of these areas, it is not uncommon to come across your goal only to find someone has already cleared it before you. This requires you to stand and wait for whatever it was you were sent after to poof into existence before your very eyes. There is no real excuse or explanation for this in the world itself. It’s as if the game is kindly asking the players to ignore its bare gears while they churn distractingly before them.

There are also dungeon instances which are a little better. These are areas you enter by yourself or with a group and it locks you out from the global maps. While you’re rummaging around these dungeons, you won’t ever run into some random player who stumbles in after you as each of these instances are generated separately for every visitor. Here is where you’ll find the slightly more complicated quest sequences reminiscent of your single player RPG since the designers don’t have to worry about the player arriving only to find everyone already dead. However, even these instances have an artificial feel to them since they are so removed from the experiences of the rest of the game solely because they remove that ‘massive’ component. Furthermore, the design for these areas inevitably turns into a long corridor, encouraging the player to power through all opposition in a race to the finish. There they will expectedly have a big fight with some large boss, get whatever treasure they came for then are spat back out into the world where other players are rushing past with a conga line of enemies pursuing them on their way to the next checkpoint.

The result is this sort of mutant world that is far more plastic and unreal than if you were to strip the players from it. You load into a town and are flooded with trading messages, bunny hopping elves, and stampedes of horses or other exotic mounts trampling the poor citizenry into dust in their haste to complete the next big collectathon. Crowds of players will just stand idly before vendors waiting for auctions to finish or the start of some new quest or dungeon. It really feels like an amusement park than an actual world with queues forming before the next ride and visitors waiting their turn before rushing to the next line. It’s a bizarre product in a genre that’s always strove the most for immersion and the illusion of real worlds. Role-playing games arguably spend the most of their development trying to realize these fantastic worlds to such a degree that the players will – even if for a moment – get lost in them or believe them to be real.

Now, the reasons for this are obvious. Because the goal of games are to entertain, developers strive to make a homogeneous experience for every player. This way, no one person will feel like they missed something great or exciting because it was done before they got there. Thus, every NPC stands rigidly in place, waiting patiently for the next visitor before doing its routine, retiring and waiting once more. Players are aware of this, and likely feeling they are in a playground, they just fool around in the manner of the system they’re in. The world never takes itself seriously – at least in any sort of execution with NPCs having barely any character at all and everything working on a rigid timer – so players react in kind. Interactions are left strictly to discuss the bare mechanics before them. You aren’t grouping up with some fellow adventurers to stop the evil frost giants from descending upon the halfling villages. You are grinding the dungeon skirmish in the hopes that it’ll take less then a dozen repeated runs for the orc shaman halfway through to drop the blue totem you want to improve your item build.

Now, I’ve spoken very little on whether the game is enjoyable. I think there is some entertainment here, but it’s mostly in the shared experience you have with your friends. Unlike other games, MMOs feel like a board game. They’re something you sit down to play. With single player games, discussion between players is often about the story or character development. With board games the story and dressings are always nice and a brief amusement, but no one plays Settlers of Catan to imagine being an individual on the edges of some frontier trying to carve out the the foundations of a society. They play to get the most points to win. I’m not entirely sure what winning constitutes in an MMO but hopefully I can find out and tell you whether the journey there is worth it or not.

Assassin’s Creed Review Part 2 – everything is permitted

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< Return to the Assassin’s Creed Review Part 1

The nice thing about reviews of games is that I don’t have to source my own screenshots.

Continuing with my summary of Assassin’s Creed II, I’ll just preface now that this is heavy on spoilers. Though you should know this as it’s a part two. If you haven’t read the first then what are you doing here?

Now, I’m sure no one is reading this just to get my opinion on a piece of entertainment. Most who know me already write me off as ‘the man that hates everything’ and naturally assume that I… well… hate everything. This isn’t true, of course, as I have a number of things I absolutely adore. For books, I’m a huge fan of the old Thieves’ World anthologies. They’re a fascinating piece of literature that would actually make a rather decent discussion for this blog. You see, the world of those books – named Sanctuary – is actually a collaborative work slowly pieced and patched together by the numerous contributors to the books. They are like a professional take on a D&D role-playing session, where each author plays with the setting and their fellow’s creations in a manner well beyond what the original creator intended. How they created a comprehensive world with very little direction is rather impressive, as is seeing the impact of even the smallest details from one story rippling out amongst all the others. It’s a neat format that captures the creative process where you can see some authors begin to lay the foundations for one story idea only to be wholly swept up in the grand events of another.

I also really enjoyed WALL-E. The curious thing with movies is that often times anticipation plays a large role in the enjoyment I derive from it. With WALL-E I was expecting some middling affair but was really curious how they would try and create a full length feature film without dialogue. Well, if you’ve seen it, you know that expectation is not accurate. What I didn’t expect was for the movie to have some pretty deep themes and to explore them as much as they did. For that, I was caught off-guard and between the greater story that it told and the general skill in the telling, I really enjoyed it. I think its an excellent example in audience misdirection as well as demonstrating that character development doesn’t require brilliant dialogue and can be achieved even with Pokemon-esque entities that only repeat their names.

Then, we have Assassin’s Creed II which is just terrible.

When discussing with some friends about the game, I generally get the argument of “I don’t know why you focus so much on the plot” or “It’s just a silly video game.” I want to point out that neither of these are justifications. They are excuses. It’s a lazy defence that dismisses criticism without trying to properly analyze or examine the work in question. Put simply, I care because the writers don’t. And if no one cares then we won’t have improvement. While the vast majority of people might not care that their video games have ridiculous stories with unbelievable plots and paper thin characters, the vast majority of people will recognize something that has compelling stories and deep characterization. The average dribble that is ‘just good enough’ is often lost and forgotten amongst the rest of the mediocrity released yearly. When pressed for what are their favourite movies, books and games people will gravitate towards those of quality and excellence. There might be the odd nonsense here and there but in general things that are done well stand out far better than things that are done ‘well enough.’

And Assassin’s Creed II really isn’t even that.

Apparently these continents do exist. I imagine they have yet to be discovered. Or rediscovered...

Apparently an ancient civilization preexisting prehistorical humanity was able to accurately predict the plate tectonics that would form modern Earth. Which they then recorded with lemon juice on old scraps of paper.

I was originally going to rant about the bonfire scene where Ezio charges a tied Savonarola to run a knife through his face because he thinks public burnings are barbaric but indiscriminate murder is perfectly acceptable. He then gives one of the most heavy-handed and ham-fisted speeches on free will and personal liberation that seems so wildly out of character for an individual who only recently learned the secret organization he’s been following holds these ideals. He condemns the people for seeking vengeance against a tyrant, then hops off his podium to run after the man who killed his family in order to run a blade through his throat. It was a crystal clear moment of a writer breaking ‘voice.’ This was no longer Ezio talking but the author espousing personal beliefs and feelings. It was so bizarre and distracting because not only did it run against the setting of Renaissance Florence but it even went against the very motives that drove Ezio for this thirty hour adventure. The moment Ezio charged the stage, he had ceased to exist and the writer had suddenly and obnoxiously inserted himself into the fiction. It might have been forgivable (or at least forgettable) if the same moment hadn’t come immediately in the next chapter.

No. Killing you won't bring my family back... or these thirty hours of my life.

Says the man as he strangles the last breath out of the Pope.

I’ve already mentioned how the series is constrained by its attempts to adhere to historical events but completely ignores them despite forcing its characters to do stupid things to make them occur in the first place. The revolt against Savonarola is portrayed as some bizarre abuse of an ancient MacGuffin but ignores that he was excommunicated by the Pope for accusations of corruption. Which would paint the character in a surprisingly sympathetic light since the Pope is the leader of the secret Templar society whose sole goal is to obtain ancient power without any consideration for the organization he’s leading. And the finality of the game involves literal fisticuffs with the Pontifex Maximus. Why? Because.

I am at a bit of a loss though, since the story for Assassin’s Creed II not only falls from its precipitous hangings in the closing scene but plunges so far into a deep, yawning chasm as to disappear from any sort of logical or reasonable basis as humanly possible. And its quite clear that the inanity of its endings is solely due to poor writing. Our final reward for slaying the man that murdered our family and leading us on a merry chase through the tourist vistas of Italy is a holographic recording that makes BioWare’s Mass Effect look positively Shakespearian.

were more... advanced in time. Your minds were not yet ready.

Translations: We have no damn idea of what we’re talking about.

We basically get a recording telling us “we are beyond understanding” because the writers have no idea what this ancient society is suppose to be. The hologram then turns to the audience and informs us that whatever goal you thought there originally was is wrong and that the series is now suddenly about stopping solar flares and hunting down lost temples scattered across the Earth to do… something. It’s all vague and unsatisfying because the writers have zero clue where they are going with this. They recognize that they need to explain something but they just don’t know what that thing is. The process is embarrassingly fumbled and so transparent that it is ultimately unrewarding to the players that have sunk over 30 hours into achieving it.

As a writer, you need to consider what your pay-off is for your reader. They are going on this adventure with you, often investing numerous hours into following your characters and your plot. It is your responsibility to give them something for that investment. In video games, this is usually something cheap and simple. There are achievements that mark your progress or little cutscenes with smiling kids and sappy music. It is a rare company that actually rewards its audience with dialogue and manages to make it satisfying enough to actually justify the work. Knights of the Old Republic II is remarkable in that regard. At the endof its story arcs aren’t grand combats with floating fat Popes but a conversation tree with an important NPC. We have one in Assassin’s Creed II but instead of revealing something important about our character or the world it’s treated like an advertisement for the next game. “Congratulations, player, on achieving success. Tune in next time when you can run off and add eighteen lost temples to your collection of pointless objects. All anchored by a character so bland that he makes beige look positively festive.”

No, Ubisoft, I don’t think I will. You see, the reason writing is important is because it can be used as a reward and incentive for keeping your audience intrigued. Cop out and your audience won’t be engaged or invested enough to commit to where things go from there. They may even be like me who will turn to a company that can write decent stories and characters and forget all about your work in a couple of months. You’ll be little more than another leaf in the sea, drowned out in the mediocrity and washed into the horizon, never to be seen or remembered again.

Assassin’s Creed Review: Nothing is True (1)

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Pay no heed to the man burning behind me

Assassin’s Creed – Where we limit ourselves by history in order to completely butcher it anyway.

I’m not going to play ‘spot the paradox.’ It’s not the first time something meant to be profound ends up being completely inane and devoid of any meaning. Words have been written on the famous ‘Only a Sith deals in absolutes’ and I have no intention on delving into how these slight slips of the writer’s pen undermines their goals. I’m of the opinion that, if you can’t get profundity, you’re better off shooting for clarity. Otherwise you end up with such delightful gems like Assassin’s Creed II’s motto of ‘Nothing is true and everything is permitted.’

Now, I know that there’s an in-game explanation for that silly expression. And it’s true that Assassin’s Creed is a franchise that already starts on shaky ground. For a brief summary: Assassin’s Creed (AC) is a hybrid stealth and platforming game that follows a secret sect of assassin’s as they navigate historical events and cities trying to stop a secret organization from… doing… stuff.

I’m going to be completely honest, I’ve played the original and almost thirty hours of the sequel and I can say I have very little idea of what is going on. Some of that is due to laziness since details of the plot are revealed through exploring the cities and hunting down collectibles. While I enjoy the free-roaming/parkour system they developed for the game, collectible hunting doesn’t actually turn my crank and ends up generally being a large time sink with little payoff. However, the other reason I fail to follow the plot of this series is because it makes almost zero sense.

Point of discussion – http://youtu.be/hrz044bM_RE?t=5m30s

So let’s jump right into it. My first issue is this scene in the final half of the game. It’s the moment that all is revealed to Ezio about the Assassin Order and the secret motives of the Templar. It’s a rather tricky situation, as you are required to relay information to a character that the player is wholly aware of from almost twenty hours earlier. What’s really bizarre about this point is both its execution and it’s timing. First, it comes so incredibly late that it feels almost like an afterthought. It’s like the developers realized right before the finale that they never actually informed Ezio who he was actually working for. It’s a scene that feels it should have been performed much earlier. But what I found more bewildering is the complete fumbling of this encounter.

It’s obviously meant to be a grand reunion of all the characters and a twist reveal that all of Ezio’s friends have really been fellow assassins this whole time. Course, it makes you wonder why you were sent to do all the killing when Venice has no less then three full member Assassins stationed there and Ezio still hasn’t officially been welcomed into the ranks. I like this scene because it highlights the amateur attempt for cinematic flair for a complete disregard for the verisimilitude of the world. It’s been well established at this point that the Assassins are on the losing side of this war. The Templars are always better organized, connected and armed. And here, at the moment when they are known to be bringing in one of the most dangerous objects known to the Assassin Order, they all decide to randomly reveal themselves to the only identified Templar? And they just rush head long into a fight with him without attempting to set up a blockade or corner the man responsible for so much turmoil over the entire game?

This isn’t just blind foolishness but utter suicide. The game itself says that the Assassin’s greatest weapon is their anonymity and now their chief rival knows who they all are. None of them even have the decency to try and arrive masked! Even Ezio had the foresight to throw on a guard uniform. Ok, strike one for this scene. But wait, why are all these people here in the first place? I can’t even tell you who some of them are because their relevance to the story is so inconsequential. Why are the few Assassin’s no name leaders of street ruffians? Half of these characters don’t even live in Venice so either they all got the memo that Ezio’s surprise party was being held that night or they just showed up because they were needed to leap senseless to their deaths from the campanile at the end.

But my favourite part is when Machiavelli says, ‘the prophecy foretold that the prophet would come and it was you, Ezio, that arrived.’ Apparently, these characters are so profoundly shocked to learn that Ezio arrived at this midnight rendezvous even though they were the ones that arranged the meeting for him in the first place! Considering how Ezio has been a rather faithful lapdog this entire time, it shouldn’t really be shocking that he followed orders and came to this spot just like he was instructed. Course, these are the same people that took a year to find a shipping manifest from the warehouses they captured in the prior act so perhaps insight isn’t their strongest characteristic.

So, let’s ignore these piling issues and forgive the Assassins (whose sole activity is assassinations yet the Spaniard runs off rather effortlessly despite all of them being present) and examine this scene further. Ezio arrives in disguise to deliver the MacGuffin of great importance to the villain and though the Spaniard manages to sneak off, the first thing the Assassins do is not secure this device that apparently has the power to destroy the world but instead climb the largest tower in the city in order to fake brand Ezio’s finger before swan diving into the city’s smallest pile of hay. While I’m sure this scene was meant to be awe-inspiring, what it actually did was lend a real world explanation to a strict game play mechanic. In having every character Lara Croft into St. Marco’s Square, the game has now established that every Assassin possesses the super power to lock on to the nearest haystack and defy even the simplest physics without so much as a sprained ankle. For a game trying so desperately to ground itself in reality, this is one of those moments that completely shatters a person’s suspension of disbelief. The ‘leap of faith’ (as the game describes this action) is easily understood by the player as a mechanic of convenience. As the game encourages players to human fly up the largest buildings, the designers rightly assumed that once scaling the precious landmarks, players wouldn’t want to turn around and slowly descend the way they came. Having a quick jump to return to the ground saved time and was an easy reward for the player’s hard work. It was something that never needed grounding in the game’s world because it never served a real purpose in that world.

And in a game that’s trying so desperately hard to make a grand conspiracy involving every known historical event play into this grandiose struggle between two fictitious secret societies, they need as much help in maintaining that suspension of disbelief that they can get. But this isn’t the only time these characters actions don’t make sense with their motivations. Acquiring the MacGuffin was one of the most important motives of their Order but… you know… it’s okay to put that off and not worry about securing it because we have a hazing ritual to complete first for a guy that’s essentially been part of our order for almost ten years now.

However, character motivations and beliefs are a pretty universal problem for this game. I’m going to pull a Derek and leave the second part of my rant for another day where I discover that characters aren’t treated as living people but as vehicles for ham-fisting the most hypocritical heavy handed themes I’ve seen all month. Hopefully I can retain my fury to remember all of these grievances.

Continue to the Assassin’s Creed Review Part 2 >

Mask of the Betrayer Review

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Don’t ask about the image, there wasn’t a whole lot of options.

I have a friend and he hates me. After forcing me to finally finish Neverwinter Nights 2 the Original Campaign (OC), he was adamant that we begin the expansion. As a brief overview, Neverwinter Nights and Mask of the Betrayer are two computer role-playing games (cRPGs) set in the fictitious world of the Forgotten Realms. The Forgotten Realms, themselves, are one of a myriad of different D&D campaign settings published by Wizards of the Coast. Forgotten Realms has the auspicious distinction of being, arguably, the most famous of all the settings. So here, you get a Mask of the Betrayer review.

You have your dwarves, elves and halflings all running around such exotic locations as a city in the north (Icewind Dale) a city in the south (Baldur’s Gate) and a city with stupid names like Neverneath (Neverwinter Nights). It’s all very derivative Tolkien-esque fare made quite palpable for the masses. There isn’t any weighty christological morality, however, so it’s freed to explore more complex situations and conflicts than Biblical good vs evil.

It usually doesn’t, mind you, but the opportunity exists. Now, as I mentioned, my friend and I finished the OC and there hasn’t been many words devoted on my blog to this monumentous achievement mostly because the OC was probably about as exciting as parliamentary debate over a new highway infrastructure. Actually, if given the choice, I’d probably go with the debate to be honest. The plot for the OC was uninspired, convoluted, irrelevant and most offensive of all – boring. And to top it off, it was long.

It also had an annoying dwarf. Screw dwarves. The stumpy midgets aren’t useful for anything beyond dragon kibble. But given they’re all developing alcoholics, you’re more likely to upset your dragon’s stomach more than anything. At least they’ll slide down nicely.

I am pleased to announce that Mask of the Betrayer is everything that the OC is not. It’s short, interesting, explores the nature of love and faith and is, shockingly fun. I find this in direct negative correlation to the number of dwarves present. Which is to say there are none. Though the game adamantly insists on reminding you that there used to be dwarves like some sort of dangling punishment that they’ve been so benevolent in staying their hand over. However, we’re on the final act and we haven’t seen hair nor stench of the runty creatures so I’m feeling quite in the clear on this issue.

The story itself, however, poses a curious conundrum. I’m going to discuss spoilers but given the brevity of the game and the way it constantly reminds you about every plot point no matter what you do, I feel this isn’t too disruptive. Now onto my discussion!

For those not aware, there are two essential “magic” systems at play in your standard D&D setting. You have the arcane – purview of wizards and sorcerers – that often requires rigorous study and is usually theorized to shape the very fundamental nature of reality and the universe(s). Then you have the divine. This is the domain of clerics and is the powers bestowed upon them by their god for their strict piety and devotion. So separated are these two sources that they have unique interactions with their own spells and other profane creatures that stalk the realms.

Which is to say, it’s really, really, really obvious that when a cleric says he’s getting powers from a big bearded dude in the sky there’s probably some truth to that. Couple this with the fact that the Forgotten Realms has a serious issue with gods coming down from on high, getting killed and promptly shuffling around their seat in the celestial bureaucracy like a minority government trying in vain to oust their opposition, it seems that their existence based on the very nature of the world really isn’t one of uncertainty. For the Forgotten Realms, gods are and it would take an incredible amount of ignorance to deny this fact. Worship is more like a trip to the tracks where you chose the horse you think is likely to give you the greatest pay-out at the end.

But the story for Mask of the Betrayer revolves around a curious structure called the Wall of the Faithless. As the name suggests, it is a wall… formed of faithless individuals. As explained through their own characters, for all the people who insist on not laying a bet at all, when they die their souls are shunted into this ever stretching, moaning and howling structure to add their body onto its swelling length. The major events of the story are propelled by a character’s faithlessness but I find it most curious that the actual reason for this lack of belief rather perplexing.

It’s like basing a story on the actions of a globe-trotting journalist who insists that the world is flat. At some point there must have arisen a conflict when it seemed reality factually contradicted this person’s own beliefs. At the end of the day, Mask of the Betrayer doesn’t really delve into true issues of faith and faithlessness but uses these concepts as plot points to further the story. It tells a great tale without actually examining the elements that compose it.

Which is a shame since it’s almost a third shorter than then OC. I can’t help but feel like this is a gross missed opportunity. Wherein the OC had this plodding tale of some swamp man stumbling out of coddled ignorance into a world filled with two dimensional individuals and hours of inane fetch questing, Mask of the Betrayer jumps erratically between some rather heavy existential ideology with barely a moment to even ponder its own intrinsic consequences. There’s so much stuff here to actually explore, like self identity and the nature of souls, but it gets shuffled to the sidelines to push the story further at it’s frantic pace.

Why would someone believe? What causes people to lose their faith? What is the nature of man and gods and are either intrinsic or important to its own world’s functioning. For example, the nature of good and evil, justice and law. Are these the true creation of these divine beings (remember, they get shuffled about any time one of them has the misfortune of stumbling into the machinations of an epic level character) or are these concepts something far grander and primordial than petty deities squabbling over who gets the worship of stubborn hicks who refuse to move out of their swamp.

At one point, your party comes face to face with a dead god and have a brief conversation about how this divine hierarchy functions. The god then points out that one of your companions himself is faithless, and yet standing on the enormous spine of this echoing skeleton, said companion continues to profess his beliefs that gods don’t exist. Yet you’re given no time to actually point out or examine this contradictory moment as the narrative quickly pats you on the bum towards the next big point and click killing moment.

It’s the stuff you can write great stories about but they’ve given themselves so little time to actually explore it. The brief taste you get is tantalizing and I really wish that Mask of the Betrayer was the OC and that the OC was… well… just a unfortunate memory much like the dwarf.

FTL Review (PC Game)

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Well, seeing that my co-contributor has decided to brazenly post some of my stories already leaving me with little to write myself, I’ve decided to start this off with something a little special.

As my interests are greater than just writing, I have a tendency to peruse the digital landscape for some of my entertainment. As such, I thought I would start this off with a little review of a rare gem released last year.

And what better game to post on a blog called Out of my Mind than a game that is literally out of this world? First off, an FTL review!

FTL – also known as Faster Than Light – is a delightful pseudo-roguelike space faring, ship captaining game. That little genre title is a fancy way of saying that there’s not much to the actual game then you exploring a “dungeon” or “space sectors” in this regard and everything you really need and will use to win is found through your exploration.

The premise is simple, which is what I really like about it. You are one of the last remaining loyalists fleeing from the unstoppable forces of the rebel alliance as you try and deliver some crucial information to your leaders. It’s a cute little reversal and homage to Star Wars and kind of nice to take a perspective that isn’t from the scrappy little underdog. The rebels really feel more like a galactic empire, with their drones reaching the furthest flung space sectors and their fleets always nipping right at your heels (FTL engines) the entire journey through.

And while the story is light, I would have liked to see the designers play with that a little more. You’ll get the odd dialogue entry from the planets you visit about how they have no love for the rebels (especially when they are seen bullying around these little colonies) but I would have really liked for a narrative to be subtly woven through in these random exchanges. We could have seen colonies express why they never sided with the rebels. Perhaps we could get a few captains comment on where the fell on the conflict or even offer possible reasons why the conflict occurred. It’s not much, but it’s the sort of subtle storytelling that not only seems to be growing popular these days but also offer some extra form or replayability to the game.

As it stands, once you get to the end you have a rather unexpected boss fight and then… it’s done. There are a number of different styled ships you can acquire but since the game ends the same way every time I don’t know if I see the appeal for repeating just because of that. And, unlike other games in a similar style, your ship and crew are almost wholly determined by what you can scrap up through your exploration. Having these little story elements could encourage some people to try and seek out all the little events in order to understand the greater, global issue.

But I could only be saying this because I love stories. What really bothered me about the game, however, was a tonal shift. It’s made pretty clear that you’re being pursued by these scumbag rebels and your ultimate goal is to press through dangerous and treacherous space to reach the last friendly outpost. The game really seems focused on this journey – the crew that you assemble on the way and the tough decisions you make between them and how you’ll deal with the issues facing colonies and other ships you encounter. It’s got a very strong ‘flight to freedom’ vibe, so I was more than a little disappointed when I reached the end to realize not only is the journey pretty short (only about nine sector jumps in total) but then you’re inexplicably expected to face this enormous boss at the end. Needless to say, you die the first time and every playthrough after feels like you’re now preparing for this fight that you really don’t narratively have any expectation to face. I can understand the inclusion of the boss as a way to add difficulty to a game that would otherwise be too easy (if you just fled from every encounter and made a strict beeline to the end of each sector) but I really would have liked to see the challenge balanced better. Make the journey itself challenging, not some artificial encounter at the end.

All in all, I really enjoyed the game and it’s a strong showing for a little independent developer. And a lot of my criticism is probably unfair since the people making this are more game developers than writers. But, at the very least, I hope some of my complaints can highlight how important stories are to our entertainment and just how they can be included in a wide variety of ways. Really, we’ve been telling each other stories since the earliest recording of history and I don’t think all our fancy technology will ever replace the enjoyment of a good tale.

Anyway, for anyone who would actually care for a numbered rating but don’t want to be bothered with this rambling wall of text with little real “games journalism” information, this one’s for you:

8.5/10 successfully killed space spiders