June 15, 2010
E3 Day Two Roundup
The Facts:
Ubisoft’s conference and they take the floor and introduce… a game teaching you to breathe… It’s not a -bad- idea, per se… breathing is important… but… breathing for the two hours I might be playing the game sounds like hard work… I’d better get on Wii Fit and train up! … Seriously, is this it?
Don’t worry, Ubisoft make things a little weirder by selling you laser tag. Honestly, this looks like a laser tag set. I think I’d rather just go to a laser tag place where they have all fancy shapes and props and things because… my living room isn’t big enough for four people to take cover…
Then Ubisoft goes totally normal with the announcement of a new Micheal Jackson game. Saying that it measures dancing and singing and uses Kinect, tells me I’m supposed to dance in front of a camera and try to pull off this guy’s dancing moves… that will be… painful…
Ubi also showed a trailer for a new game called Project Dust. I’ve got to agree it looks a lot like Populus and it makes me wonder where all the god games ever went? There used to be such a run of them then they seem to have died out.
And Ubisoft’s mascot, Rayman is back. In 2D too? Wow! With the new Sonic game as well, we seem to be going into a new era! Of 2D games and Live Action games (see Crytek)… I feel like I’ve been here before… You should watch the trailer either way. Since Raving Rabbids, the Rayman team has had a skill at making me giggle at least .
A new Driver game which shows that Ubisoft havn’t gone completely sane yet. When you’re about to crash you can teleport into a different car… because Tanner was in a coma… and now he has superpowers… Well, Kotaku saw it demonstrated, I havn’t so I’ll reserve judgement until what the hell are they talking about?
A trailer for the mostly forgotten I Am Alive. I was really hoping this wasn’t dead and it looks like I won’t be disappointed. Kotaku makes a good prediction that seeing as this wasn’t shown at the Ubi presentation, it’s probably going to be console exclusive. And those don’t look like Wii graphics…
And big 360 news, more importantly… I PREDICTED THIS :D. Kinect games are going to have purple boxes instead of the classic green. Okay, not so big news, but I predicted it and that means something to me!
Trailer for Lord of the Rings: War in the North. I’m not saying this is a bloody affair, but with no Wii release and what I see in the trailer, this may not be an E for Everyone title, which for content about a war is actually a good thing, in my opinion. It doesn’t show gameplay or really anything at all, so the trailer isn’t too exciting, but it’s there.
The full Kinect Star Wars trailer is out and… I think they would have been better off not showing it. It reminds me of the Force Unleashed game on the iPhone. I imagine myself just doing a series of pre-learned actions in specific situations. Kind of like the Wii swordfighting game on Wii Resort.
The Crytek Live Action game…. well, there’s a trailer now for Kingdoms. I was expecting a few Live Action games with the release of Kinect, but… Crytek aren’t the team I’d expect to be doing it. Also, the This Is Sparta style doesn’t seem to fit with my expectations for Kinect -or- Crytek. I know they said they wanted to get out of the jungle but…
Now this is probably one of the more interesting things I’ve seen so far this week and it might surprise some of you. A new Scribblenauts trailer. The first Scribblenauts was a neat thing to show your friends, but it didn’t really work as a game because the controls were iffy and the levels were… well… “lame”. Both of these appear to have been adressed (maybe not fixed). I just hope I don’t end up using Cthulhu on every level like in the last game…
Kotaku has a nice gallery of Kinect launch titles and… they look good. I’m shocked, but happy. Even the Wii Sports ripoff looks good and Kinectimals, despite being hard to say, actually looks nice. I will be watching…
Bit more on the Pirates of the Carribean game. A new trailer that shows less than the one I saw yesterday of the game, but more of the story. That medallion looks familiar, hmm? I wonder if when they said “Not based on the movies, but based on the mythos”, they meant “based on the mythos but cheaper than hiring the actors again”?
UPDATES:
Nintendo announcements… I’m going to go through a few briefly and see if you can spot my problem with the Ninendo announcments:
A new Zelda game. Zelda: Skyward Sword (with 1:1 sword movement with Wii Motion Plus. I seem to remember something similar being offered with Twilight Princess…) (Although Miyamoto’s intro was great 🙂
A new Mario Party game. Mario Sports Mix. (Exactly what it sounds like.)
Another collection of Wii minigames. Wii Party. (I’ve never bought these before…)
A new Donkey Kong game. Donkey Kong Country Returns. (Donkey Kong Country was probably my favourite SNES game after Mario All Stars)
A new Kirby game. (The first one on the Wii.)
A new Kid Icarus game, Kid Icarus Rising. (Bringing back another classic Nintendo character to the new generation.)
Have you perhaps spotted my problems? Nevermind… Let’s carry on.
Some interesting news from Nintendo:
It’s official! Goldeneye is really being made! You thought it was a joke or a lie, but it’s here! (Same link as yesterday but what can I say? The trailer was real.) This is one of the most exciting things this year.
Epic Mickey. (Well, -I- think it’s good news :)) What can I say about Epic Mickey? It could go either way. But at the moment it looks to be going the way of Mickey’s World of Illusion (again on the SNES, but great!)
Time for a bit more on the 3DS seeing as it is (technically) a new console. It’s gone all 3D even in ways that Sony isn’t. 3D camera, 3D screen, 3D content. I’ll have to see how well their 3D content works, but I can’t imagine people wanting to watch movies on their DS. How immersive can it be if characters 3cm high are jumping out of the screen at me? Every movie will be like Small Soldiers!
Let’s move on calmly…
A trailer for the Warhammer 40k MMO. You might not care about Warhammer but some of this MMO’s features are really interesting… if they work. Personally, I lost interest the second I found out I couldn’t play as Chaos.
Paid for PSN. We all knew this was coming, (including me. See earlier posts). A premium version of PSN that you have to pay for. As usual, Sony are trying to spin it as “Elevating your game experience” but we all know it will be “lowering your game experience unless you have it”. I officially stopped buying non-exclusive games for my 360 when they started treating Silver members as second class citizens. Sony learning from Microsoft is not winning any points with me.
Tidbits – The Old Republic’s player housing is a ship in orbit. This sounds great to Star Wars fans, but it just sounds like a good excuse for intanced housing without needing the space to store it.
Portal 2 will be available on the Playstation from launch, including Steam (not multiplayer, just Steamworks.)
The Rumours:
The Review:
June 14, 2010
E3 Day One Roundup
(I’ll be adding to this as the day goes on. If I miss something let me know.)
Just the Facts:
Let’s get the big news over with right now. This screenshot sums it all up:
That’s right, Natal is now Kinect. (UPDATE: Coming November 4th with 15 launch titles) I have a -variety- of problems with this, but I’ll try to keep them to myself. All I will say is that it brings back memories to the “The Dolphin is now called the Wii, yes really now stop laughing” debacle… Also, coming in November if the hastily made title isn’t lying. Final bit of info we can garner from this? Natal is really big with the purple. Even to the point where I wonder if there will be some huge purple logo on the front of compatible 360 games. Natal is also going to finally look like the following picture (there are pictures that show it clearer, but this Gizmondo picture shows the size better)
See Natal in action in a simply awful trailer that wouldn’t even appeal to me if I -was- a mother of five (http://kotaku.com/5562557/see-kinects-games-in-action-courtesy-of-fake-families). I’m a little concerned that taking a drink during a movie is going to make it skip to the next thing on my 360, which will almost certainly be a Bugs Bunny cartoon at best and the Powerpuff Girls movie at worst.
Here’s a list of the game releases we’re getting… Kinectimals (which doesn’t flow off the tongue even slightly…), Kinect Sports (which isn’t even trying to hide it’s blatant rip-off-ishness with an original name), Kinect Adventures (which I suspect will be the first Kinect game in the bargain bin), Dance Central (This could either go two ways. The serious, or the not so serious route. The serious route is really going to isolate an audience) and finally, Joy Ride (which is the first of our “quickly-add-kinect-support” games. Voted most likely to be played with a 360 controller anyway). More games as I hear about them.
A LucasArts Natal title. Every single time there’s a new motion sensitive device, we’re promised a lightsaber game. Big question is if this game will rival the iPhone lightsaber app… Which was terrible… (http://kotaku.com/5562639/get-a-look-at-kinects-star-wars-game)
Speaking of Star Wars, we have a gameplay video of The Force Unleashed 2! If you don’t want any spoilers, just watch a trailer for The Force Unleashed 1. You’ll get the picture. Those who completed The Force Unleashed will remember two possible endings, so as always, how they handle this in a sequal will be interesting. My hope is just that The Apprentice doesn’t go all goody-two-shoes all of a sudden. If he did, he’d probably lose most of the appeal that got him a starring role in Soul Calibur IV (The highpoint of his career.) (http://kotaku.com/5562575/force-unleashed-iis-gameplay-shows-stormtroopers-aim-has-not-improved)
Cinematic Trailer for Assassin’s Creed Brotherhood (http://kotaku.com/5562704/assassins-creed-brotherhoods-e3-trailer). For those of you who are interested in this type of thing, it looks like Ezio is now in charge of a small group of faceless, nameless assassins and I’m sure I’ll be corrected, but was that Roderigo Borgio in the carriage? It would explain the papal guard… Anyway, as far as Assassin’s Creed trailers go (andthey generally go very well), this one is the least inspiring. I’m sure we’ll get a playable game out if though! Even with the new Creative Director.
This is definately worth mentioning to me, a new magazine from Best Buy and Future Publishing called @Gamer (http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/101324-Best-Buy-Launches-Gamer-Magazine). You probably know Future Publishing if you were a gamer back when Official UK Playstation Magazine was the only way to get demos, but I have more of a problem with the idea of targeting a game magazine at £5.99 a pop, to casual gamers. That kind of dedication is far from casual.
A release date for Fable III from Peter Molenaux, but we all know how I feel about promises when it comes to this topic, so let’s move on without getting our hopes up… UPDATE: Trailer now available and damn he managed to do it again. I’m excited 🙂 This one seems a lot more ambitious than Fable 2 with a real new world with steampunk… is that a submarine? Anyway, with the morphing weapons and such features I’m interested, but I’m not quite sure how many people really -loved- the dog from Fable 2…
Crytek are… They’re… Well it’s… Does anyone remember Night Trap? Wing Commander? Street Fighter: The Movie: The Game? Live Action… Crytek are making a Live Action game… No, seriously, look http://kotaku.com/5563091/crytek-exclusive-will-bring-live+action-combat-to-xbox-360
Pachter was right. There will be no shutting him up after this 🙂 http://kotaku.com/5563154/new-xbox-360-shipping-today-costs-299. Perhaps most interesting to me is the built in wi-fi. If I could get this free, that would be a selling point for me.
LATEST UPDATE:
Gamestop puts the price for Natal at $149… This looks bad for Natal as a universal 360 medium. If that’s the price we’re going to be looking at for Kinect, it’s not going to be in the hands of every 360 owner for a very, very long time.
Bit of Deus Ex news for the fans like me. An interview given here, the creator of Deus Ex 3, Jean-Francois Dugas talks about why he thinks Deus Ex 2 was unsuccessful. It’s only a few short sentences, but if you’re interested in games design, like me, it’s worth paying attention to. The key issue he brings up is that Deus Ex 2 was far less relatable than the first. Pointing out that the first game shows you the Statue of Liberty as the first sight wheras the second game might as well be set on Jupiter. (He also talks about how giving the player no character to play as at the start of the game can be a feature that truly weakens the game. ) If you were looking for some specific Deus Ex 3 information, here it is: Deus Ex 3 will -not- feature universal ammo for all guns.
Microsoft have a pre-prepared answer for if Sony suggest charging for PSN. It seems unlikely to me that Sony would start charging for the basic service which makes me imagine a Gold/Silver deal, which would be a serious let down for me, but it is only a rumour at the moment.
A new trailer for Call of Duty: Black Ops. The big question is really if Treyarch can pull it off. They’re taking over a very impressive mantle and this game will be the decider. The trailer is brief but does imply a lot of set-pieces. They were used well in Modern Warfare, so let’s hope Treyarch can find the right balance.
Developer of Rez puts out a new trailer. This could be competitor for -prettiest- trailer of E3. We’ll have to see what TeamIco do with their trailer this year.
New cinematic trailer for The Old Republic. As Kotaku says it’s not representative of gameplay, so it doesn’t mean much, but it will build up some hype. HOWEVER, Bioware have expressed a wish that The Old Republic continues to tell a story, so perhaps a cinematic trailer does show us a little something about the game. Like an enemy who’s a bit of a Darth Malek wannabe.
New trailer for Halo:Reach. The Fall of Reach is one of the more interesting parts of the Halo mythos, but the trailer does seem tostart wiht more of the same Halo we’ve seen before… until you start flying a ship. That’s… new… Not too sure if there’s much crossover in the space-flight-sim/fps crowd, but it’s nice that Bungie are going for something new.
Random news tidbits include a Battlefield Bad Company expansion in Vietnam, Crysis 2 will have 3D Compatability, Dead Space 2 will have… well, more of the same,
Completely unconfirmed rumours:
Microsoft’s new 360 leaked in an advertisement? (http://kotaku.com/5562412/so-whats-inside-the-new-xbox-360) This fits in with Micheal Pachter’s prediction, so maybe this really -is- the year of the Wii HD? (UPGRADED TO TRUTH – See Above)
And moments later a rumour from the other side of the fence, of a new Playstation 3 SKU (http://kotaku.com/5562595/rumor-500gb-playstation-3-coming-includes-new-wi+fi-move). Kotaku suggest that the hard drive size suggests that Sony have something new up their sleeve to use up all that space, but who knows. This could all be lies and half-truths.
Goldeneye remake coming? The trailer definately -looks- real and Goldeneye has such a fan following, I think it’ll see a great revival andit’s kind of nice that it’s going to be on the Wii.
Review of the Day:
Seems like Microsoft are getting Natal out of the way early. This gives people a long time to discuss the new name with people at the Expo and get used to it. How many people will be walking aroun the Playstation Move and Wii booths thinking “This would work really well on that camera thing I saw yesterday”? Obviously the main reason is simply so that developers can show off their Natal titles over the week and keep people talking about *grits teeth* Kinect…
Microsoft will need to show off at least a couple of hardcore games for Kinect this week or they’re going to begin to lose some of that hardcore fanbase that’s just seeing a dozen “family-freindly” games. Is it too late for Microsoft to appeal to the jilted Wii audience? Or is Microsoft inviting the same degree of Shovelware? November will tell.
Microsoft’s had the floor today. We’ll have to keep an eye out for what comes next.
MORE LATER
June 13, 2010
A New World is Coming
CLOCKWERKS GAMES IS BACK!
Yes, it’s been a while, but this site is reviving from the depths to send out more of the content that always should have been here in the first place. And what better week to do the re-launch? E3 is upon us and I’ll try to keep up to date with all the latest news from E3 as I hear it. If I miss something, don’t hesitate to let me know in the comments and I’ll add it as soon as I can.
Here’s the latest news:
Site news first of all. You may have already noticed the new homepage at https://clockwerksgames.wordpress.com/? Well that’s just the start. Over the next couple of weeks, ever single one of those titles is going to be linked to a page specially written for that topic. This website is growing and growing fast. Watch this space. For now, puruse the projects list and see if anything catches your eye.
Pre-E3 News:
I’d be loath not to point out that there’s some great pre-E3 coverage at Gametrailers with some exclusive content such as Itagaki’s new release Devil’s Third. I have no idea when this guy joined the team, but Devil’s Third definately looks like Ninja Gaiden in the city, so it might be worth keeping one of your eyes on this project.
Honestly, it’s the weekend before E3 so there is -no- news. So I thought I’d go into…
My most anticipated of E3:
Deus Ex 3 Human Revolution – I’m sorry to anyone who’s heard me talk about Deus Ex to exremes this week, but with the new trailer (which you can watch here), I’m back in the Deus Ex fever. If you havn’t played the original two Deus Ex games… it’s probably not a good idea to play them now, but take my word for it that Deus Ex will be something to watch.
Diablo 3 – I actually never got around to playing Diablo, but I can tell you that Diablo 2 is definately a game that is worth playing if you like click-and-loot RPGs. Not to mention, one of the coolest angel designs ever released. I’m a little wary about some of the new features, but Blizzard are smart people, so I have faith.
Killzone 3 – The year of 3’s I see. The jetpacks definately make me lose interest, but Killzone 2 is one of the most immersive FPS games you’ll play. Throw in Killzone 3’s 3D and we’ve got a whole new experience.
Mass Effect 3 and Dragon Age 2 – These don’t really deserve their own sections because the reasons for the anticipation come down to the word “Bioware”
There are plenty more heavy hitters coming this E3 but I have to get back to work, so these will have to sate you for now.
February 12, 2010
X10 News
X10 News
I’m going to try as hard as I can to link to all the best and most interesting news from X10 this year. If I’ve missed anything let me know. (This post will be edited as the convention continues.)
First thing first, a very cheeky billboardfrom Apple – Everyone knows Apple is secretly trying to get on the gaming scene and advertising their game device at Microsoft’s game convention is a little cheeky.
Video of Alan Wake in action! – See if you can spot the Zork reference… if you can’t, go play Zork. It won’t be long before you find it! This is the first time I’ve seen AW actually being played. Honestly, I can’t say it looks to be anything more than a polished Alone in the Dark (chapter select included), but let’s pretend I have higher hopes than this.
New Left 4 Dead content in the form of The Passing. – We all love VALVe, but seriously, these guys can do zombies like nobody else. (Not even me)
If you want to see this year’s promises from Peter Moleneux that he’s going to disappoint us with in Fable III look here. – Child of the last player? So it’s a lot sooner than last time, which throws away the excuse I always used for how similar F2 was to F1… Throwing us in as king straight away is a nice touch, but far from groundbreaking. Don’t get your hopes up until we see it in action. (We now have video, but don’t think for a second I’m convinced yet.)
New details on Crackdown 2 – The first game was and still is great (for those of you who havn’t bought it yet.) Again, we just have to hope they havn’t just “gone bigger” without considering what the franchise needs. More coming soon.
And here is your collection of new Halo Reach screenshots. – I love the Halo universe. Their detials are actually quite good and they really put some thought into the history. The brand is just way too saturated to be interested now. Halo releases arent groundbreaking anymore. Here’s a quick breakdown: Halo -2001, Halo 2 – 2004, Halo 3 -2007, Halo Wars – 2009, Halo ODST – 2009, Halo Reach – 2010. Bungie need to move on for a while. How about a new Marathon game? (And a Halo Reach video. A more “human” story? About aliens called Spartans? Fiiiiine.)
February 10, 2010
Smevy Train – Placeholder
I know I said I’d try to post a second “Ideas Factory” today, but sadly I gained access to the demo for a game I’ve been looking forward to for a long time. It rhymes with Smevy Train. And Chevy Lane. And Heavy Rai– Damn…
So, I’m reserving this spot to talk about Heavy Rain, David Cage’s ideas in general and an actual review, based on the demo (I don’t do reviews often.)
I’m sure everyone will be playing it tomorrow anyway, but for a rough outline, it was good, but some weird design decisions that make you go “Hmmm…”
Next time!
Let’s Play – Morrowind – Part 2 -Karnak and the Pod-People
Right, the first of the posts with my trying vainly to get back on some kinda schedule! Let’s go!
When last we left our… okay, let’s say “hero”, he had just sold some priceless family heirlooms he’d had for generations and bought some shiny new equipment but of course not shoes, because “beast races” can’t wear shoes…
February 8, 2010
Zzzzzzzz… What? What day is it?
I disappeared for a while last week, as you might have noticed. Sadly lots of distractions hit me at once and took me over. Hopefully this fortnight I’ll purge some of the half-written articles I’ve currently got in the buffer.
(In case you’re interested, I’m currently playing the Alien vs Predator Demo, waiting eagerly for Bioshock 2 to become available tomorrow and I’ve been playing an old game called Angband, that I don’t recommend you look up at all! There’s no such thing as a “new” Angband player.)
Coming up:
February 3, 2010
Psychology for Game Designers 101 – R…
I’m hoping this series will be one of the more useful and better written parts of this site, but it’s also going to be one of the most complex, so I may come back to these posts later and make alterations.
Introduction to Psychology for Game Designers
Game designers need to know a certain degree of psychology. Mostly, this is topics that seem obvious, such as, repeatedly killing the player with a punishingly hard section is going to cause frustration. However, with some more elaborate techniques the game can be developed into something far more impressive. A large proportion of game design revolves around trying to make the player think certain things and behave certain ways. For example, the game designer needs to show a player instantly if a character is a friend or foe and needs to always ensure the player knows where to go next, even if they havn’t been told. I’m not suggesting game designers spend a year studying psychology, but some learning of basic ideas can he helpful.
This document will be split into multiple sections. Firstly, a simple explaination of reinforcement in games, then a description of the psychology behind reinforcement, a section detailing some examples of reinforcement from popular games, some examples of ways to reinforce training and finally a summary of the article with points to consider.
Reinforcement
Reinforcment is the most simple of psychological concepts the designer must understand. I did construct a simple demo application to show reinforcement in a simple game, but WordPress doesn’t allow Flash embedding so instead we’ll move on.
It is worth mentioning that the true psychological definition of reinforcement is a little different than the pop-culture definition. I’ll be using the pop-culture definition mostly, but in the phychology section, I’ll explain the traditional classification.
Reinforcement is a form of player-training. Through rewarding the player for correct actions and punishing them for incorrect actions, the player eventually learns the correct way to play the game.
February 2, 2010
Fight the Clich̩ РThe Battle-Hardened Space-Marine
(… in power-armour)
Hmm… I’m not sure if this is going to be a series or just some random posts.
The idea is, I’m going to take some random videogame cliché and I’m going to beat it over the head with a baby seal until it’s dead. I’m going to explore ways of overcoming the clichés and their advantages (clichés exist for a reason. They’re good, but way overused.) Sure nobody’ll ever read this, but it’s good to get some rants out of my system.
The Battle-Hardened Space-Marine
If we’re talking videogame clichés, none are so prolific as The Battle-Hardened Space-Marine. I mean… crates come close, but we’ll come to those another time.
Shaking Hands with Death – Terry Pratchett
If you’re a Sir Terry Pratchett fan like myself, you may be interested in a speech he wrote, delivered by Tony Robinson (Richard Dimbleby Lecture – Shaking Hands with Death.)
Read the rest of this entry »
Clockwerks Games 