Latest articles

Originally posted: August 14th, 2007

The title sums up why I consider multiple endings a terrible game mechanic.

It's at least tolerable in games like Castlevania (the ones with the "Metroidvania" layout, like Symphony of the Night), where you can find out you got a bad ending, pick up at your last save, and simply continue playing towards the real ending.

Resident Evil 1, on the other hand, demonstrates the wrong way to handle multiple endings (if you must use them, that is):

1. Make an arbitrary branching point halfway through the game.
2. Don't bother making it clear the branching event has two possible outcomes.

Now, when the player finishes the game and…loses, the only way for them to win is to replay the whole game all over again (or just the entire second half if they were lucky enough to maintain a save point from just the right spot). Wonderful!

Speaking of Resident Evil 1, I would rant about "limited save" systems as well, but unlike multiple endings, at least those appear to have gone the way of the interactive B-movie.

Read more

Originally posted: August 7th, 2007

Shadow of the Colossus has been said to be the closest a videogame has come to being fine art. I agree in at least one regard - It has the framerate of a Monet.

Sure, it has some of the best graphics ever seen on a PS2. It's easy to pull that off when you let the framerate hover around 10. I haven’t seen framerates this bad since games were using "It’s 3D!" as a marketing point.

The framerate is so bad it even affects the controls. I've played multiplayer action games on a dial-up modem that had less lag. (I'm not kidding. Quake 3 Arena's networking code was incredible...Even if the rest of the game was shallow as a frat kid.)

But how is the rest of Shadow of the Colossus? I don't really know. Just running around at the beginning gave me such a headache I haven't touched the game since.

Read more

Originally posted: August 5th, 2007

What makes those dumbasses think they need to know things like my gender in order to post a movie review? What a bunch of morons.

Read more

Originally posted: August 5th, 2007

Ahem...Director Paul Greengrass suffers from a little-known disease of which the lone symptom is a chronic inability to distinguish between a tripod and a paint mixer.

Yes, I just saw the new third Jason Bourne movie. Just like the rest of the series, it was great overall. Overall. BUT, just like the second one, the action scenes were the one part that blew. Scratch that, the action scenes were probably just as great as the rest of the movie, except I couldn't tell because the camera was spinning around so damn much I couldn't see what the hell was going on. It sure sounded like cool things were happening, though.

Interestingly, the first movie (not counting a version from 1988 that apparently exists - I haven’t seen that one yet) didn't have that problem. Turns out that was a different director, Doug Liman. For the second movie, Liman stuck to the producing side and handed the director role over to the caffeine junkie known as Paul Greengrass.

If there's ever another Bourne movie, please, Doug, kick Paul's ass to the curb and direct it yourself, okay? Better yet, redo the second and third movies yourself (maybe a "Producer's Cut"). I would really like to finally see what happened during those super-awesome action scenes.

Read more

Originally posted: August 5th, 2007

Those who have been following this, umm, I-irrationally-refuse-to-call-it-a-blog thing, (yes, all zero of you ;)) have undoubtedly noticed that most of these posts have absolutely nothing to do with homebrew game console development. Well, have no fear: I'll soon be moving this somewhere that actually makes sense. And by "soon", of course, I mean "whenever the hell I get around to it."

Read more

Originally posted: August 5th, 2007

I'm the kind of person that can manage to find something to complain about with just about anything, no matter how good it is overall. The Jason Bourne movies (below) and Resident Evil 4 are good examples.

Resident Evil 4 is great ("No shit, Nick, everyone knows that!"). But ever since I first got it, there's been something about the camera and movement (no matter how much better than the previous games) that just felt...off, and even a little motion-sickness inducing (And I've never gotten motion-sickness from a game - and I've played a lot of FPSes).

Yesterday, I went back to it to see if I wanted to finish it on Gamecube (I haven't beaten it yet) or trade it in for the Wii version (my decision: trade it). While playing, I finally figured out what made it feel so odd: Leon doesn't walk straight. If the camera is pointing straight ahead, and you hold "walk forward", Leon's direction is a few degrees right of center. My god, that's awkward. And it's even more annoying now that I know what's happening.

"So what? Just compensate by holding slightly left instead of straight up, like any other game." I would, except you can't turn by a small enough amount.

I hope the Wii version fixes this, but something tells me no.

UPDATE: Got ahold of the Wii version. Still has the same problem. Summary: On the plus, it's nice to aim with the IR pointer instead of an Analog stick. On the minus, they didn't go far enough when updating the controls for Wii (A problem common to a number of Wii games - I'll elaborate later). Overall "Resident Wiivil 4" verdict: Too early to tell. Ask me later.

Read more