The innocence of gaming

You know, I've been wanting to discuss a certain state of gaming, that exists within both the history of the medium, as well as the individuals that play them. Sort of that "fall of innocence" type of arc, where being new to something meant nothing but discovery and joy in the nostalgic mind of your memory, but now you've got higher standards and stuff of that sort. I think one of the best ways to describe it, was in fact through... well, more Turok talk. I was looking back on the original Turok remaster community on steam, and stumbled into a fascinating comic vs game magazine page on the subject of the game.

Now Turok in itself is a pretty fine example of innocence from a game time and design standpoint. Being one of the first 3D shooters, as well as one on consoles, the game designed itself weirdly just as much as a platformer. You ran around, collecting keys, making these odd daring jumps, all while firing up some crazy weapons in a crazy world where dinos, robots, alien gorillas, cyborgs, and poachers can co-exist in the same level, and the 2nd to last boss is a cyborg T-rex. There's absolutely no depth to the story or goals, it's just going level to level picking up keys, collecting weapon parts, and blowing stuff up. What really caught my eye though was how they discuss tips and weird habits you can do in the gameplay. We're talking about killing a Purrlin with 140 knife stabs, playing the game with a steering wheel controller, or going "ancient warrior" mode and the best way to take enemies down with strictly a bow and knife. This isn't necessarily gone from the present, as we as players and a community love to talk about weird and creative ideas. There are people out there right now beating Dark Souls with their guitar hero controller, or practicing a run specific to a character's armor set in the game. People have made up their own weird roleplay style within skyrim, and have tried turning it into a fantasy adventure simulation of sorts. However, I feel its grown uncommon, and it's especially odd to see a developer themselves encourage this type of attitude in an otherwise open game.

However, how much do we appreciate games like this today as well? The games were from a simpler time, when they had less features and to a point almost drove the player creatively. What enemies can I get away with just knifing? What if I turn on cheat codes, and play the whole game with the spirit mode power-up active? Things like that, and apparently it was even common to the point of the developer encouraging it. Heck in some ways, I'd even say the simplicity is a part of what makes the game awesome. Not every game needs an XP system, stealth, or flashy take-downs. Hell this game even has mandatory secondary fire, meaning you can't switch to conserve dragon's breath shotgun ability. Yet I've weirdly grown to appreciate it, because rather than never using that ammo, I find myself more often just saying "fuck it, they'll replenish it faster this way anyways, let's just enjoy the auto-shotgun some more". Meanwhile in Turok 2, it's less predictable, and the option to conserve is taken more heavily. Plus there's just no normal automatic shotgun, so I just don't use the explosive rounds as much. However if you read what people say, most unanimously agree that this game remade and remastered was not worth the asking price of $20. How come? Well, it's just limited compared to everything given. We're kind of spoiled with modern gaming, and honestly to answer my own question, I think many of us don't appreciate this stuff as much as we could. I'm not applying that as a full blanket statement, because I know there's those die-hard "everything was better back then" guys, who will still religiously pick up these games and map out every damn secret, every little niche detail, and could chart out hitpoints of gun to enemy type on a chart (even testing Acclaim's Purrlin statement). Those guys definitely exist, but so to do the guys like me that have to shove themselves into a corner and condition themselves to embrace the game, to see it as anything more than a small budget game in today's market.

I'm not here to nag on anyone though, just reflecting. I think it's important that we take the time to step back and think of the games out there that still try some simpler and interesting things, but of course within good reason. I'm kind of confused how we got to a point where people complain at the idea of a $40-$60 3D platformer, when they were the bread and butter of massive worlds, and in-depth content. Still for whatever reason, we're at that point, and I think it's worth a quick and admittedly somewhat confused article to make note of that. To go and try and find a passion in the simple again, to try and challenge yourself to become truly immersed in the mundane, and to try not to take even the simpler games for granted. I'm not saying you should be willing to pay $60 for a sidescroller, or even $20 for Turok, but that if you do enjoy them... well, try to look beneat the surface. Turok doesn't have to just be a game about running around collecting keys, shooting things, and getting to the end. Think about it for a second. You're a native american character with super weapons up against cyborg dinosuars. Clearly you can get a little creative and interested in that, so that you're not just boringly trudging from A to B as if you had to hurry for a review. Stop and appreciate stuff like that a little. Maybe take the time to enjoy gliding around in Yooka-laylee when it's out, or try a knife run in Turok, or try that old glitch out in Super Mario Bros rather than just watching it on youtube. Try to occasionally get into that mindset again, of the very first time a video game caught you, and sucked you in, and you could just go on and on about it like everything was a brand new discovery. Easier said than done, but... eh, doesn't hurt to try a little.

Thankfully some indies still design games with this childishly creative mindset

Playtonic, you made it political

Well this is just a sad controversy that benefits nobody. Jontron was apparently set to voice act in Playtonic's upcoming game, Yooka-laylee. It was a perfect fit, a youtube famous fan being cast in the successor of one of his favorite games. Most of his fans were fans, and so everything seemed good, and someone even made a humorous video based on the idea. Only, there's a problem: Jontron has come under fire from the typical over-reaction in outrage culture. Now I think some of what he said was a little weird, and I'm not here to tell you what to think on that, except what should be common sense that it's certainly a bit absurd to assume he's a white nationalist (he's a child of Iranian legal immigration), or to headline him in such a light as some have. While this has been the case for a few days, only recently has Playtonic decided they were done being happy with good innocent PR near the launch of their game, and decided to issue a statement that separated them from Jontron. Here's the statement, borrowed from a site that actually knows how to do appropriate headlines.

"JonTron is a talented video presenter who we were initially, two years ago, happy to include as a voice contributor in our game. However, in light of his recent personal viewpoints we have made the decision to remove JonTron's inclusion in the game via a forthcoming content update. We would like to make absolutely clear that we do not endorse or support JonTron's personal viewpoints and that, as an external fan contributor, he does not represent Playtonic in any capacity. Playtonic is a studio that celebrates diversity in all forms and strives to make games that everyone can enjoy. As such, we deeply regret any implied association that could make players feel anything but 100% comfortable in our game worlds, or distract from the incredible goodwill and love shown by our fans and Kickstarter backers."

By contrast, this is how you do a hit piece. Fuck you, polygon

So before I get too deep into this, I knew I would kind of have to cover both sides at some point. In the middle of looking up bits to link, pictures, and research, I found another opinion article I think is worth a read for that, even if worthy of some criticism in itself. This is one of Jim Sterling's better political articles, because even though he does fall into his usual trap of over-assuming and bipartisan blame, not to mention glosses over the wrath of yellow journalism, he's still making a great and bold point that needs to be said. Jontron is the first event in this equation, and likewise Playtonic has every right to do what they did. I even love the small note about freedom of speech, because the SJW reactionary squad sure does love to drag "censor" and freedom of speech concepts through the mud, just as much as the regressive left crowd does for terminology like "nazi" and "racist". It's all true here, because the fact is Jontron got political first. He went and made his way onto subjects of this content, and consequences can happen. Still, I'm a game driven blog, and I feel that's also what Jim fails to remember. In the end, it shouldn't be about what Richard Gears, or an internet celebrity says, but rather the quality of the game and what they say. It's a selfish consumer perspective and bias, but I'll take that stance in this moment, and I'll confess I'm sad by this news. As far as I see it, they're the ones who caused a division when they actually went in to patch an actor (and possibly character and achievement) out of the game after it was already burned into the discs that are shipping out. That's way more divisive than "he said something I don't like"... on some stream you had to go and look for far from his normal recognized content, which was clearly marked for political discussion.

Here's the thing companies fail to realize when they try and make a statement by removing the guy... they actually made a statement. A lot of times, the intention was to remove themselves from their comments or views, and make a point to virtue signal how tolerant and loving they are. This never actually happens based on just a person's views, but rather if their views are actually being heard loud enough. An outspoken racist behind Mass Effect didn't have the same sort of audience or controversy as Jontron did, so he kept his job until he moved on to indie projects. The guys at Ubisoft just start every Assassins Creed game with a little disclaimer about their diverse team, and it's never questions how many of the thousands of any single game on what they actually believe. Truth be told, I wouldn't be shocked if at least one bigot or person who could be perceived as a bigot, was on that team somewhere. They do fine, because they never make a fuss or kick a guy off over it that makes news. A&E made a heated discussion when they tried to fight one of the Duck Dynasty members for their views, which was otherwise restricted to a disconnected interview. Moments where companies actually speak up in politics, actually cause divisions, is a big red flag where politics start. What has been for years, an innocent call back to 3D platforming, and welcomed pages of tributes and colorful nostalgia, is now drenched in the shouting arena of the culture war. Heck, I'll even confess whenever I cover this stuff, I've also dipped my toe in that water. ...but I'm not trying to sell you a product.

Can't we just... have this again?

What's even more hypocritical and discerning, is the reported handling of the backlash. The forums were lit up with all sorts of chaos on this issue, because like I said, you brought the poltics into your game. Not Jontron, the developers. I didn't even know he was in it until this happened, then I'll admit my curiousity drove me to the forums to get more info, and it was all on fire from other people who had met there to... speak less rationally of it. Be it the SJW defense force that think Playtonic somehow stopped racism, or the SJW reactionary guys who think "cuck" is somehow a clever insult that advances a conversation, the forums were littered with it. So what how does the team and publisher handle it? Bans! Discussions, requests for refunds, and more were banned until fairly recently. And good on them for changing their tune, but still that's some real bullshit that it happened to begin with. As some have started making a fairly good point on, it's funny how difficult and unsure the refund policy is. For a team that wanted to make a stand against a supposedly problematic individual, they have no issue taking money from his fans and supporters, and hanging onto it. Virtue signaling is a bit of a stupid and loose term I've come to learn in recent time, but moments like this are a clear example of it in a negative light.

The funny thing is, while I am personally disappointed on this occurrence, I'm not standing on some high hilltop telling you not to buy their game. That's a decision for you to make, and I still stand by the morals I've stated a few times before (quote from the subject of boycotting tombraider):

"I've stated before, and stand by the idea that a corporate's awful doings are only bad enough to kill the game for me if they directly stand in the way of my enjoyment. When you boil it down, its basic capitalism. Give me a product that is worth the money, and I will pay for it if its enticing enough."

I'm disappointed Playtonic did this, but I'm not like them. I can separate quality from my politics, unlike Playtonic. I can buy a game regardless if someone attached with it, is of a philosophy I can't align myself with. You have to be able to separate the art from the artists, otherwise you can find any number of good reasons to hate it or love it much more than it's worth. However, know that not everybody has my principles and morals. If people are truly taking the steps, and risking bans, to demand refunds... well, you see the results. You know you goofed. For a team that loves diversity, you sure know how to isolate within the act of making that exact statement. You made this political Playtonic. Jontron was just a mere cameo for fans, not a representation of you or your values, nor a political statement. Welp, you essentially told fans off by removing that good gesture and parading it around as a good thing. So now, they're telling you off, and I'll just sit by on the sidelines and watch this all play out. You've done nothing good for your light-hearted nostalgic adventure in this move. All that colorful fan art, the excitement in each and every level and character reveal, the gameplay, the testing, the successful kickstarters, it was all going so well. You were even good and set to move to the switch as it came out. Now all that is misplaced, because you had to step in the political ring, and your game is only being brought up now for the shitstorm you've opened up. Jontron's problems were that of his own, until you picked up the spotlight yourself. So you want some of his attention, I'll do you a favor, and end this on one of his Gifs. It has an important message to others that are thinking of doing this same kind of thing:

[Review] Turok 2: Seeds of Evil ('17 Remaster)

I've decided to start adding the soundtrack link if available at the start of a review. I can't speak for everyone, but I know reading with music isn't exactly distracting, and if it helps cover more ground for reviewing the product... why not? So here's the music link. Now moving on...

Turok is a weird deal for me. It was one of the first ever console FPS games to exist, and yet for it's primitive time it managed to start off incredibly well in the 90's on the Nintendo 64. It pushed the tech, tried some interesting concepts, and threw players into a violent and chaotic cyber dinosaur world with a dash of native-american warrior theme to the mix. It did incredibly well for it's time, especially with Turok 2: Seeds of Evil being the best remembered. For the franchise's moment in the spotlight, there came an animated movie, multiple series of comics, novels, action figures, a multiplayer spin-off (before online play! Just think about that.), and holy crap someone redid the the music in a massive symphony recently! ...yet truth be told, I'm sure so many have never even heard of it before, because it just sort of died in the post-N64 world.

With Seeds of Evil specifically, I'm a weird nostalgic guy who wishes I could have told you more about the game, as it was probably my first FPS ever. I never actually played it beyond the first level, because it was just too weird and difficult for 6-7 year old me. The music, the atmosphere, the sound effects, the monster designs, they were all amazing enough to send later internet-using-me digging up all sorts of facts, lore, and wiki pages on the game and fascinated with it (I even discovered I had somehow wound up with a primagen action figure, probably something my dad randomly got). But that damn level design was so convoluted and weird that even in returning trips (never the less my first time, barely able to use a controller), I've never actually gotten beyond the first level. Despite this, hearing of a remaster by NightDive was nothing short of a very exciting headline to come across. They slapped a 45% discount on it's launch, and promised some improvements over map navigation, and I'm back in. However.... does playing it actually hold up to the cult hype? Was this worth remaking, or is it still held back by the primitive designs it was built upon?

Well this story is nonsense...

Okay, so the premise casts you as Joshua Fireseed, the current warrior in a bloodline of native-american warriors gifted with the title of Turok. You find yourself just conviniently discussing the first level plot with an alien women named Adon. She informs you an alien called the Primagen is causing problems in the world, and he needs to be destroyed by taking back and restoring six energy totems. Unfortunately he's convinced Dinosoids (genetically crafted dinosaur soldiers, because of course) to help alongside all the native militaries of the lands that hold the energy totems, so you go through each six levels to track down the energy totems, as well as the keys so you can make your way to fighting the Primagen. Each level has an introduction briefly discussing the horrible natives of the level, why they're mean, and then go fourth. More discretely, a sub-plot is happening where monsters who worship an entity called Oblivion are after you. There's more lore if you can dig it up and read on it, but that's about as far as the direct game itself will take you.

Cool scenes like this make for a great FPS setting

Very videogamey and contrived, but allow me to point out some things: You're fighting in a world of genetic dino soldiers, cyber bug aliens, a deity-like being of destruction called Oblivion who is praised by high-tech monsters who call themselves the Flesh Eaters, a telepathic alien antagonist who accidentally created a multiverse, zombies who come out of portals that are depicted with souls reaching out of them, and you start off fighting the battle with a bow and work your way up to drill missiles that scan for brains and exploding plasma laser rifles. Your very first enemy encounter has you go down a long dark hallway, only to see a half-raptor monster leaping at you. You'll struggle to figure out your bow, taking claws and frantically running back until you shoot it enough to find it rolling on the ground and twitching in any various gory animations. Then you'll know where this game's priorities went; The game is all about just making this ridiculous, campy, and creature driven world. There's no rules on time lines, or realism. It had an 80's "make it cool for toys" type of idealism. It's no wonder the Turok franchise's world is sort of burned into my mind, it's too amazing and crazy to forget, compared to the bland formulas of typical stories and settings. While the story is kind of lacking, it's almost like the devs treated this as a toy set of just stupid and immature fun, and with these crazy creature-horror designs and super weapons, I welcome that in any FPS.

How Remastered is it?

NightDive studios deserves a lot of credit, because they don't just do your standard remasters. They actually go in touching up the game to be playable by modern standards in the gameplay just as much as they do visuals. However of course they did in fact touch up the visuals, and even on an intel laptop, I managed to see a good amount of that extra shine. Not everything, but I ran it with a basic FXAA, managed to use better shadows, extended draw distance, 90 FOV, and was running things smoothly most of the time. I also played with the blur effects, as there's an option for object motion blur where say... a spinning Raptoid attack will have a blur effect when set on medium. There were a couple things like water reflections, that I left off, but it's clear that they added a good bit of options for an old N64 game. The only two things I know of that are subtracted, is the feature to change enemies blood, as well as the old school look spring method of aiming... which let's be honest, you'd have to hate yourself and be dead-set on playing this game at it's worst to want look spring aiming back. The graphics aren't incredible, but they hold up well enough that it's a smooth retro game session to boot up, and honestly there've been discussions before suggesting T2's textures were better than PS2's Turok Evolution to begin with. So this isn't a bad looking game for what it is, just don't go in expecting it to be on par with modern games. My only gripe for the remastering visuals, is they goofed up and added a sun in The Lair of The Blind Ones level, which is set almost entirely underground, yet you can see the sun glitch through at certain angles. Nitpicking, but still a very silly change.

Gameplay has also seen an overhaul, and if I were to be honest, I wouldn't be playing this if I hadn't heard about it's changes since they involve making maps actually doable. Supposedly a very few number of cryptic hall paths have been changed in the design, but I'm clearly not the person to ask about that. Then the objectives and switches were given a special icon of interest, so you don't walk past important switches. I've found the icon sometimes doesn't work as consistently as you'd expect, but it does the job for the most part. There's also a new crosshair option, the ability to change movement bobbing to weapon only bobbing, you can now warp between portal checkpoints as a sort of fast travel, there's modern saving & quick saving abilities, and AI touched up on a little bit, as well as a bit of extra blood (not that there was ever a shortage of it). Even multiplayer has been brought back for online play, with a new elimination mode (though I can't speak for it's quality). You can also change soundtracks between the louder but clear old PC version, and the bassier compressed Nintendo 64 one. For the purists out there, just about everything can be either turned off, or ignored. If you hate saves, then you can still depend on the life system. If you hate fast travel, you don't have to go into the portals for fast travel. If you want less HUD and no crosshair, tick the right boxes in the options menu. For everyone else though, these additions are amazing for adding either accessibility to a modern audience, or just making the game smoother for fans.

Icons like this are now there to help you

...but what's it play like anyway?

However I know this audience doesn't even know what the core game is like to begin with, so I guess it's weird that I'm only just now getting around to it. Well, Turok 2 worked like an old FPS in it's base mechanics and principles. You had static numerical health, a large set of crazy weapons and alterations of the weapon types, and the gameplay was a mix of exploration, key hunts, shooting up crazy enemies with patterns and wild abilities, and occasionally there was some platforming involved. The maps are really complex in design, more so than any 3D FPS I can think of. It was linear, yet felt like an open world. We're talking about six levels, where each one could take you an hour or more easily. I personally found myself spending up to as much as 3 hours on the second level. You have to complete several objectives on most levels, like rescuing people, or blowing up enemy equipment, and along the way picking up the keys that allow entry to future levels. Then proceed onto finding the exit portal. Finally, you have a mini-wave defense thing where you've got to kill enemies off before they can overwhelm and destroy the energy totem of that level. This all adds up to be quite an adventure, and it's not hard to be lost even with a few of the modern readjustments. Some people revel in it and love the sense of adventure and depth it has, while others may even find this to be game ending for them. I'll say the fact that I'm reviewing this (instead of being stuck on level 1) means it's a good improvement, and there's more of a drive here than there was for the hollow original, Turok: Dinosaur Hunter, but it's not perfect.

Keys are one of many absurd amount of collecibles

Here's where the game get's a little stupid with itself at a level design point. You're not only navigating these massive levels, where the tech for the time reduced most complex designs to corridors with roughly the same texture, but on top of that there's this mandatory multi-tier collect-o-thon going on. You have to collect 3 or so keys, find every objective, find the exit portal, and it's all done through networks of tunnels, halls, hidden switches for doors, and enemies who may or may not respawn once you're backtracking the area. Oh and then there's the Primagen keys... hang on, you're in for a ride with this explanation. Every level has a primagen key, and to get one you'll usually need to get every special Turok ability. To get the ability you need to 1) Find a feather usually hidden somewhere. 2) find the switch to open a warp portal 3) Find the warp portal itself, sometimes backtracking if the switch came after it. Then you get to trade the feather with the ability. *Sidenote: hope the portal is the right one, because it looks just like the Flesh Eater portal which is an entirely optional collect-o-thon system of it's own. 4) Every ability was designed to work with the prior level, so you have to go back to the last level, find right spot, and get the key from that level, then go back home and put the key in place. Now ain't that some super-contrived, hoop-jumping bullshit on top of an already over-complicated madhouse of level design. That's not to take it out on NightDive though, this is 1998 Iguana Entertainment's design. NightDive gave us the easy way with fast travel, because they were also probably thinking "screw this shit!" when testing and remastering the game.

However where I think the game shines it's best, is the FPS element (whenever you're not fighting spiders at least. fuck those enemies). For starters, the ammo and weapon choice is some of the most finely balanced I think I've seen in a long while. On medium, it hits that perfect sweetspot where you've always got ammo for something, but what it is and who you need it for varies so wildly and unpredictably that you're on the edge of your seat with nearly every encounter. You only have about 10 shots of explosive shotgun ammo, 20 for regular shotgun, and 10 for explosive tekbow, so every piece of it is counted for in your head as you go through the ranks. Pistol holds up to 50, which looks nice and secure up until you realize how fast enemies chew it all up. You wind up getting in a habit of looking for headshots, balancing the ideas of retrievable arrows with quick and efficient, but very limited, explosives. Then on top of all that, the gunplay just rocks, and you always have enough extras half-way through the game that you can afford to expend a little for the sake of how good it feels to gib an endtrail, or even just pop a weak little raptoid and watch them juggle in the air. The game seemingly encourages you to roast spiders and leapers where it hands you the flamethrower ammo, and there are small segments at times where you pick up a key, and a lockdown trap activates where you're surrounded with respawing shotgun ammo, and a bunch of raptors, and it just puts a smile on your face. On that note, so to does the detailed enemy animations, where even the mildest hit will have most flinching, and deaths end in dramatic topples, gutteral gargling, monster screeching in pain, or that last twitching breath before they flatline. That sort was quite ahead of it's time. The gunplay is just full of it's own sense of violent but crazy character, and it's no wonder that Turok seems to be known for it pretty well.

Gunplay is so good!

So when everything comes together, Turok is still a weird game that feels odd to play, or stranger to recommend. On the FPS side, it really does everything almost too good to be true. The setting is filled with crazy awesome sensibilities, the music is gripping and on powerful effect with it's drumming and trumpet symphony sound, the sounds are distinctive and appropriate, the gunplay is gory, unpredictable, and engaging, and then the map design has you truly working to get around and explore things. However, sometimes the level design is just a bit too demanding, and you're practically forced into a corner where beating it means you're practically doing a full completionist run (the only thing optional, are the flesh eater portals). You have to have this almost OCD mentality of checking every single corner, and that's what will break the game for some people. Don't forget the damn primagen keys either, where they went collectible-inception on people and made a portal for a collectible to get another collectible, on another level, to add to a list of collectible tokens you need to get to the last boss. I'm sorry to some of the people that believe this is the best way because it's "hardcore", but Turok 2 gets ridiculous with it. I get why some people love this stuff. Doom and Duke Nukem 3D are well loved for their maze-like maps, some people love the thrill of charting this stuff out, but you can do all that with optional rewards, and also without forcing some padded out backtracking nonsense. I don't hate the map design for being complex, I hate it for being superficially padded. The new Tomb Raider games are an exceptional example of how Turok could do this right, with a semi-open linear path full of all sorts of awesome prizes, loops, and side objectives. I obviously know they couldn't do that so easily back in 1998, but I'm reviewing this for a 2017 audience, not a 1998 one. This mission design didn't hold up the best.

Conclusion:

The Turok 2 remaster was a great project thanks to NightDive's hard work and care put into it. The classic game is a fun shooter with one of the coolest imaginative universes in gaming, distinctive music, and known for it's crazy gore and gunplay. A few will even thank it for it's complex and exploration driven levels. However it wasn't until the remaster that it was accessible under modern audiences, with the sloppy PC port long ignored, and the N64 version being stuck with that forsaken spring aim. I think Turok 2 was forgotten a little too easily, and it's good to see it back. Now everyone blast lizard people again, with enhanced settings, more ways to navigate the insane maps, and adjustments that balance and perfect the core formula of the game to it's best ability. There's even online multiplayer, and they kept the cheat code menu and that angry iguana logo. The level design is still a bit too complicated, and objectives can be contrived, there are parts of the game alongside it's lacking story that prove it's still confined to some designs of the 90's. However it's gunplay and intense journey to stop the primagen from ruling the Lost Lands, make for an first-person adventure that I'd recommend every FPS fan give a chance. It won't be to everyone's liking, but it was certainly a good enough game worth salvaging. To that end, NightDive did a good enough job making the definitive version of a cult classic, and I'm personally happy to play the game again. I hope they continue this trend, and find themselves working on future Turok games. Hint: Evolution, someday? Maybe? Please!?

The best time to step through the portal as Turok

LINKS

OST: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YnxI7Yu5yl0

Symphony: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tz-QMgIU0B8

Primagen toy: https://c1.staticflickr.com/9/8513/8508868542_54360c45a0_b.jpg

Raptoid animation: https://youtu.be/Xk3cmax0doo?t=1m18s

PS2 Evo vs N64 T2: [Evo] http://vignette2.wikia.nocookie.net/turok/images/1/14/Turok-evolution-20050331035245317-1082877.jpg/revision/latest?cb=20140313232743  [T2] https://i.kinja-img.com/gawker-media/image/upload/s--c3B73yxN--/c_scale,fl_progressive,q_80,w_800/oiv9viqpmfjvc8rchujm.png1

PICTURES:

Zombie - https://steamuserimages-a.akamaihd.net/ugc/155778251306738796/C40B0C4DB368D9DF6A5C33B7EA758444195BDD1E/

Dark marker point - https://steamuserimages-a.akamaihd.net/ugc/155778490551819092/B502C57B5C71FA6D3A3E17E17CAF9AF22338820B/

ALT marker - https://steamuserimages-a.akamaihd.net/ugc/155777951179393490/AF8735B35C42EAC66AD1BD3D761F963F42A736A5/

Key objective - https://steamuserimages-a.akamaihd.net/ugc/82594465637358415/AEC30BBABE0851262B0929A7172D5BE1815BFEE7/

Dead Raptor - https://steamuserimages-a.akamaihd.net/ugc/155778251306738629/A7ED653A93B79BF3F9DAA6C5CCD797643FD19E60/

Gunplay Image - https://steamuserimages-a.akamaihd.net/ugc/87098056441377438/5F609ADA62762F49E2C9695875AFDC022F0823ED/

Joshua Fireseed Portal - https://steamuserimages-a.akamaihd.net/ugc/90475754516924153/3B9B63079AC297EDBF5186BC27158ADEAD59BE6B/

No Zelda, you're not incentivizing creativity.

So I thought about writing an article about Zelda's hot topic as of late, and the idea behind it's crazy weapon durability. However I'm still fresh and early into the game, and well... I haven't seen everything. Maybe some would even suggest I'm in the tutorial levels. So I feel it'd be too early, and even naive, to discuss the entire system. Besides, it's even got some minor positives to go with what is mostly a negative. For example, while some people want a durability meter or some way to know how much life their weapons have left, I'm kind of glad that it's kept a mystery so you aren't gripping onto it's numbers. You'll still be paranoid on weapon use, but not down to number crunching it. Likewise I like the improve weapons like a branch, or bone arms, and how you can throw them at the end of their use. However, while I won't discuss the entire system and mention things like the repair system, the master sword (beyond the knowledge even that is fucking breakable!), there is a defense on the system I've been meaning to address. The idea has been circling around that the durability is a mechanical balance, to get you to keep weapons in rotation, or to use creative strategies. Bombs, physics, throws, etc. Now that's all fair and good to a point, but with Zelda's mentality, we've gone far beyond that point.

Okay so the idea is that when you can't possibly hold onto the idea of weapons being a legit source of combat, your mind starts to grasp other work-arounds and tricks. That's all fair and natural. You'll be looking to the environment, physics, bombs, pick off guys with your bow, etc. Well for starters, your bow & arrow has limits and I've hear implications it can break, so that idea can just fuck right off and become a part of the problem I'm discussing. The problem isn't that Zelda has limitations on it's main set of weapons, it's the fact that you will literally lose the majority of any weapon to any single combat encounter. You'll run in with a tree branch, batter a goblin, break the weapon, take his weapon, break it on the other goblin, decide to use your club on the bigger goblin, and then lose that to. Each in between weapon grab is a a pause in the combat, and a grab at another weapon in the encounter. Now you can use bombs, or physics in the right scenarios to even that up, but my point is those weapons break down really damn quickly. Swords and axes are only mildly closer to a moderate limit, being about able to withstand 3 or so fights maybe. Meanwhile I had a highlighted sword pulled out of a stone like a secret, and it wound up being a rusty sword that broke the next real encounter. That's the case we're actually looking at here.

You've let her down, Link!

Look, this is a subject I know very well. I adore games that empower the user, and gift you with tons of creative options. On the vain, I love all the ideas Zelda: Breath of The Wild has on paper. Heck, just the fact you can pick up and throw your melee weapon at an enemy is kind of hilarious and awesome. It's a small step forward towards the stealth-action traits I love so much from games like Dishonored, MGS, Far Cry 4, etc. Even outside of that awesome circle though, my favorite games include things like Dark Souls, Doom, and R&C. Games where choice, experimentation, and the love of such things are around every corner. Yet not a single damn one needs to restrict your weapon to a freakin' one fight or one enemy beat-down scenario. They have limits, but nothing even remotely close to Zelda's slap on the wrist at every damn swing. To pick on an actual quote here, someone brought up that this was what Zelda needed to get players to enjoy it's crazy wheel of weapon variety. A crazy wheel that doesn't actually look quite as enticing as this, or this, and hell even this game is giving you more of a "wheel" and has it's share of restrictions. Zelda let's you carry like five melee weapons, most of which are going to break on the next guy's head you wack, and yet you're trying to tell me this is the only way to create diverse gameplay? This is the way you've got to be creative!? Sit down boy, we're about to have a talk here.

You cannot force creativity. Limits can breed creativity, but this isn't what a limitation looks like. Limited ammo is a limitation, limited resources is a limitation, but losing a treasure you found forever to smacking three goblins around is a butchering of what it means to even find treasure. That's not a limit, that's cartoonish levels of bad engineering, and an annoyance. I'm hearing it around all over the place, people who are actually experienced with these games are finding that the rewards aren't actually rewarding. Rewards are supposed to be actually cool things you can use, not things that will break forever, or a chore item you have to constantly repair. Yet for some reason I'm still hearing this argument that somehow this is for the better. I'm not sure how, or at what angle people are coming in at this from. Do they really need features to be forced out entirely for others to work? I... don't believe that's the real gamer experience, at least not in this extreme. If people really needed weapons to be phased out for other to set in, Doom players would still be using that terrible laser pistol, Dark Souls wouldn't have all those weapon strategies for advanced and weird elemental stuff, and we wouldn't know the humorous MGS box jokes. We have all these things, and functional games, because players actually like to experiment! I know, shocking. When put inside a creative box, we as human beings interacting in an art medium, are actually quite creative. Between the creativity, challenge, and skill, that's what makes games like Dishonored so fun on youtube. There's absolutely no reason Zelda can't be like that, save for the fact that weapons break if you dare to use them as weapons.

That video above is the result of pure player creativity and skill combined eloquently in an environment that lets your thrive on those two features. Zelda... basically slaps you on the wrist if you were to use any of those items beyond two or three times. That's what I don't get about this argument. There's a difference between balancing limits for core game quality, and restricting the player into things. Restricting you into a hall for a story is fine. Restricting a player into a temple to progress the story is fine. Restricting your weapons for creativity though? It's not creativity then is it? It's just taking away what you can do, destroying things the game tries to tell you to get excited for when you find in a dungeon, and ripping it away forever because... well apparently fooling with physics to watch that boulder or light those barrels for the 10th time is no mandatory. That's not creative. Forcing you to switch from stick to stick is not creative. Breaking your legendary sword just so you might swap to a goblin club that will then break is NOT creative. I don't know why that needs to be cleared up. Tying together a stream of plasma bolts, rocket shots just because it's fun, and trying rune combinations on Doom is. That's why Doom is my game of the year from last year, and why Zelda is getting it's second article of me bitching about it's stupid decisions. It kind of disappoints me that others are out there cheering it's bad decision, and pretending like gamers need their freedoms held on a leash to be considered anything close to fun, and the game is getting 10 out of 10 scores while ignoring basic stuttering problems and artificial limitations both in game and around it (with the wii U pad being useless). Zelda is a good game, but damn does it sure have it's problems stumbling into the open world scene, and there's a lot of angles like this where I'm wondering what the hell Nintendo was thinking.

According to fans, you can only enjoy this if your weapons are made out of paper. I disagree

Bait and switch

Holy shit, really nintendo!? I mean this was so dumb, I just have to make an impulsive article on just how stupid it is. Even with the switch out, getting mostly thumbs up, and Zelda being well loved, there's still something blatantly wrong and stupid about Nintendo's presence, and they just can't catch a break and actually do things right. Well, now the verdict has come out that Nintendo has actually held games back, because they lack confidence in their own console, and then they go out of their way to tell us about it through PR speak. This is why PR has a bad rep by the way. They tell you some bold faced lie directly at you, or try to make up poor excuses for problems they caused, or at the very least release the most cold and robotic tone of information out. There's good PR, but this is the PR people usually bring up with PR speak, and why it's hated. Nintendo is sitting there, telling you directly to your face that the Wii U gamepad was a complete and total distraction that drained the experience.

This is the exact Nintendo that built entire games like StarFox around the controls of the gamepad. This was the company, who said the sales of the Wii U were poor because nobody did the gamepad any justice. This is the same Nintendo that improved past Zelda titles with the gamepad giving you easy inventories TWICE, and people loved it. This is the same Nintendo that designs Wii U gamepads directly into some of their games for the effect. This is the same Nintendo that did that exact thing for this exact Zelda, through the Sheikah Slate, with a direct hint to it being a "familiar" device and hinting at the gamepad's use. Well now this same exact company is telling you that such a concept, such a gamepad design, would have been bad for the game. It would have been bad, that's why they successfully did it twice in the same franchise, and designed this current one with it in mind. But coincidentally, and I don't want to be a conspiracy theorist here so I'm just saying it happens by chance, that this is the only Zelda game on both Switch & U platforms, and it just so happens to also be the one that doesn't properly utilize the Wii U. For the matter, it doesn't even properly utilize the switch considering its framerate. I'm not trying to insinuate anything though, but um.... fuck you Nintendo.

Do I really need to explain this further? I mean this just baffles the mind, and speaks for itself. This is highly disrespectful to the fanbase, just plain mean-spirited to screw your own game for a select audience, and honestly just mentally bankrupt for them to then boldly announce it. Not only that, but it's such a self-defeating position for Nintendo to put themselves in. They can't let the Switch be it's own awesome thing, they have to go and sabotage their very own console in order to help push it, but really this isn't going to push anything. We knew the Switch didn't have a gamepad like the Wii U, but was it's own portable thing. We also know it was supposed to be more powerful, so logically it is superior on most fronts. There would be people who stay behind though, and just choose to buy Zelda for the Wii U, the gamepad inventory clearly planned to be in there at some point was just a silver lining. A silver lining Nintendo, being the arrogant child of the industry they sometimes turn into, decide they can't let anybody have because... I guess they hate you if you don't immediately dash to the switch. You know what, they don't owe us features that just don't exist, but the game was both clearly designed with one in mind, and then they even go out of the way to make this stupid statement. They lack the confidence in the Switch, so they went and broke somebody else's fun to make sure the Switch was the absolute best. It's clearly malicious intent, or corporate stupidity and unintentional self-deprecation, and it hurts us as well in the end. The closest comparable event was when Naughty Dog (another gem for saying very stupid shit, despite making great games) said their own game Last of Us felt broken at 30fps when they were trying to sell the remaster. Then they turn around, and make Uncharted 4 a fixed 30fps because suddenly it's not broken when you're trying to sell people a shiny new game with maxed out graphics at the expense of performance. This tops it though, when Nintendo contradicts itself with designs left in the very game.

Fuck this PR talk that treats their audience like idiots, and fuck you Nintendo for what you did to your own game and console and those who were hoping for the best quality experience at their budget. In case you can't tell, I'm a bit livid and confused at this level of incompetence. I shouldn't be about something this simple, but then again this shouldn't have even happened to begin with. Don't shoot the messenger, I'm fed up with Nintendo's arrogant and childish bullshit. If they can't drop it going into the next generation, I'll just continue to drop support of them. I'm glad I didn't pick up a copy of the switch.

Now Playing - Horizon: Zero Dawn

Every time I try to write one of these articles, I usually wind up moving onto some other activity before I finish, or go so deep into the game I'm beyond the talk I started the article with. Let's see if this one get's finished and posted while I'm still playing. So.. this is Horizon. Obviously, being both a fan of creative themes, and Guerrilla's Killzone series, I really wanted to see how this would go. Unlike my habits with obsessing over Killzone, I denied myself too much info, and tried keeping this game a surprise. I'm... not sure I made the best of options, because this game really doesn't have a ton of surprises in it. Everything I didn't know about is generic open world stuff under the skin of this game's theme and lore, which were things I definitly knew about. The only surprises are a couple of the enemy types, like the fact there's a giant robot aligator, and a massive bull thing that shoots stuff out of it's horns, then a little shell carrier that's cheap as hell. Stuff like that is a surprise, but... radio tower dinos, vantage points, and dungeon rooms that unlock secrets, upgrade systems, and mods... not so much. However for what it's worth, nearly every single attribute is handled amazingly well.

Honestly, I think what I have to think about the game is shown in the way I love the story. It's a story we kinda know and have seen before. A strange person is an outcast to society, born by odd means with some messiah/demon questions floating about, and literally tossed into a group called the outcasts who are basically the criminals and rejects. She trains hard, rises to the top, just to be struck with a great conflict that gives her a motive to find her true purpose. Okay, so we got all the cliches out of the way, now let me tell you how freakin' awesome it is handled! You're in a setting barely ever done in gaming, where robot creatures rule the land, and man-kind as we know it has been mysteriously reverted back into tribal days. Why? Who knows. Newer civilization is a mix of sci-fi wizardry, and primitive spears. The underground is made entirely of metal, with giant wire tunnels, and massive flying conveyor belts. Your surface world is mixed with crumbling buildings and re-purposed towns mixed with fantasy and real cultures from a world that was once globalized. Then on top of all that, side-quests are handled witcher style (with actual story) with some incredible surprises and very well-written characters. The friend that introduces you to bandit camps is a former soldier, who fights them to make the best of his psychopathic tendencies. You help out an elder who is forbidden to talk to you, so she talks to you through praying to the goddess. Odd but interesting characters like that, coupled with this incredible and beautiful world full of mystery and a tried but true plot of equally gripping suspense, make this an incredibly compelling experience. Even if you need more than your two hands to count all the cliches, you won't be doing that at all when you realize that means putting down the controller

Gameplay is almost exactly the same way. Much like with the story, it ain't perfect. Cliches that seem like they're just there for a quota are present, and occasional misses will have you wondering why, but for the most part everything is good; even if you've seen most of it in some way before. Ultimately, I've concluded it's a mostly good mix of Far Cry and Witcher 3 gameplay. It has the drive and story/quest delivery of Witcher, feeling truly open world in that sense of going places, getting story, and traveling around. However it has an ubisoft (and more specifically, Far Cry because of outposts) way of dealing with map clutter and how the open world is actually used. You'll have these arbitrary boxes to tick off if you want to complete stuff. A lot of it has good contexts, like collecting cups for a merchant because he wants to learn about them from the old world. And the metal caves are explored to unlock data that allows you to work better with machines of the world. ...but then you're also doing things like finding some arbitrary data point to catch the slightest glimpse into the old world, even if it gives you nothing of meaning, and has no real logic. Or you'll be doing hunter lodge mini-games, with some clunky excuse that it's like a big hunter club for sport, but it's... really just a generic mini-game compilation thrown in. I'm not exactly complaining, but it's not exactly in my personal interests to fulfill this sort of world, and at one point I kind of groaned to myself when an interesting side quest marker just turned out to be a guy advertising the hunter mini-games. I guess it just sounds like I'm complaining, because I am covering the strange mix of open world tropes.

While I'm nitpicking things and making comparisons, I guess I'll just let out my complaints right now for the time being so we can get them out of the way anyways. Most of them are minor when taken into consideration with the whole picture. Then I'll resume talking about how awesome the game is.

Complaint round!

Uh oh, here we go...

• The saving can be weird. There's an auto and manual bonfire save deal going on, so you never know for sure where it really kicked in or where you should be stopping. At one point I did a massive trade, bought four new major things and offloaded a lot of junk, ran out to kill two broadheads, and climbed around for a vantage point. I fell, and lost EVERYTHING, even the shop transactions, just because... I didn't get to another fire? But then I later had the game save sometime in the middle of riding around on a mount, doing absolutely nothing of importance in between the last fire and getting that. What the hell, GG?
• The leveling system is one of those arbitrary garbage ones that waste your time and break the natural game flow. Look guys, just because it's an RPG doesn't mean you NEED to take away features just to unlock them. Only a very minor couple are true improvements, the others are needlessly expensive XP crap that you're just grinding for to make the character less powerful. There's a separate 2 then 3 point cost for a ledge take-down and a drop take-down. How much "skill" do you need to just jump off a rock and spear a guy directly below!? How much "skill" does it take to pull a guy down by his shoe? Why do I need 3 points to make a combat roll actually effective? These are things a character who, in their infancy could disarm a person, should be able to do from all their narrative-gifted training! Stop forcing skinner boxes over us. Just to show you how this gets in the way: I currently can't use a new bow, because I need to get the tinker ability to allow me to relocate the worthwhile mod (my original bow is technically more powerful than the new one, but that can become the better one long-term), but simultaneously I can't do the bandit camp I want to because it's filled with elites who you cannot kill stealthily until you unlock some stupid arbitrary piece. Both upgrades are locked behind layers of more useless upgrades I don't need, even with hours of leveling into the game.
• The dialogue choice system just had to take a page from bioware, of all things. I hate Bioware's style of this, and Guerrilla is barely doing it any better. You get the mean guy/smartie/loving moral boxes, and every time you choose one Aloy goes and shoves an extra paragraph in there that involves some message different than what you probably tried to say. I hate that. It's incredibly immature to sit there and think you can just break down somebody's thought process in a conversation as "mean/good/nah, I'll be witty today", and I don't just say that lightly. This is a game about robot dinosaurs, so I typically don't care for "mature" stuff. But this is a system that truly feels like it was invented by a 6 year old's view of morality, or someone who goes building strawmen for a living. For a story that wants to have an edge, this is the fastest way you disassemble it. And then the next bit, about how disconnected the actual dialogue is, is just extra insult to remind you that you actually never had a choice. The game betrays that choice, you just picked your poison.
• A couple of these guys are kind of cheap. It's not a huge deal, and for the most part every creature poses a good challenge, but some of them just feel a bit off. Like how the shell carrier can just spam massive lighting charges that cover massive ground and pull big damage. Then the projectile attacks just make no sense a lot of times, with them all following an unpredictable rhythm and splash effect. I've had many times where you can roll as soon as you see the animation, and still taken damage or find that it was coming right to where you rolled like they were psychic. On a similar note, I've even seen them miss in a similar fashion, firing upon a location I was never at, nor heading to, so there's kind of this skill-less dice roll to their projectile tendencies (and you can't rely on a last-moment roll, because again that splash damage is random... or the default roll just sucks and we're back discussing that horrible unlock system where you magically roll better after you pay 3 skill points). While I'm nitpicking combat, the camera also does some horrible things with the environment. I've had many shots prepared and fail because the deep zoom and tall grass decides it's more important than what I'm actually aiming at. Oh and... why is concentration a thing you need full power to use? If I start it and stop it to cancel, shouldn't I be able to use what's left again instead of being forced to wait on the cool-down? Maybe that's an intentional balance, but it's weird and I'm not a big fan of it.

Back to the awesome!

...and now we're back. In the grand scheme, those gripes aren't a whole lot. They're annoying, and even at times mess with the sense of fun going on, but there's a lot of fun typically going on anyway. For all the bad gripes, there's a lot of big and small awesome things beyond any list. Things like the launch-day photo mode, the awesome environments, the awesome fight sequences, the way the non-XP bar RPG elements are done so well, the stealth, and just that feeling of running into a new abandoned city and learning some more about the lore. Everything from the way your people speak of the land, to the way a shop will label a pair of keys "ancient chimes" is just cool and makes you push to keep going. I enjoy spotting every new creature, get curious at every other forked path that isn't where I was originally heading, and I love the way I can set up quest tracking so that it's only basic navigation until I put my own waypoint on it for emergency help if I'm having issues with some mountain pass. It's all a part of a game that's pretty amazing, even if it isn't breaking any big records. It's a great experience, and I'm finding myself frequently stopping for photos, while then suddenly finding myself regretting the lack of photos in combat because I was too engaged in the moment with them.

I remember that original reveal for Horizon: Zero Dawn. After all those rumors, supposed leaked images, and a long period of "we've got some kind of new IP" talk, we finally got a huge reveal. A nice CGI movie set the tone for the world, and then a sudden shock as we got a big chunk of quality gameplay footage that continues to look fairly similar to the final product in a lot of ways (at least I think, still haven't gotten to that T-rex machine myself). I didn't quite know what to expect fully, but I was really pumped. I've got to say, it mostly delivered. While not necessarily a big innovator, it managed to also stay away from most of my worst fears for what comes to mind with "open world RPG". It turns out to be a great action game with a rich world worth exploring, a compelling story with great characters and sequences, and while the open world aspect is generic there's just something about the land that still lends itself to a sense of discovery that keeps me energized and excited to push further. The world just gets your sense of wonder and imagination pumping, and it's almost good enough to hide the fact that you've got to grind just to unlock a pull-guy-off-ledge action. I don't know when I'll complete it, if it'll be a simple stick and true Far Cry type experience, or something like the Witcher where as much as I love it I just can't sink 40 freakin' hours to it without some diversions. Still, it's a game I'm glad to be playing, and while I'll be waiting on the next Killzone... I'm glad the team behind it got to produce something as interesting as Horizon. It's got it's problems, but it's mostly got a lot of fun and nice stuff worth seeing. Thanks Guerrilla.

It's a big and exciting world out there.