Matt's Game Blogamado

[Matador]

Don't remind me. I need an address, a television and an internet connection before I can play them.

Edit: BG&E's soundtrack is free online and it is amazing!

[Ben]

shit really? I loved that sound track. Gunna have to go download it.

[Leetmuffin]

Where can you download it?

[Matador]

Shit! You guys are gonna make me do the legwork?

(I love you anyways.)

[Matador]

Costume Quest and Stacking.

They use the same mechanic. Think about it.

[Ben]

I always saw Stacking as Mesiah without blood.

[Matador]

Lent my cousin my DS lite and some games. Did I make the right choices?

[Ben]

When you say she doesn't play many games, are you lending her these games as a way for her to actually play games and see what's out there and get her into games, or just expand her horizons in games.

As a way to get into games, I rekon Chrono Trigger/Tewey might be a bit much to be honest.
You can never go wrong with Layton or Pheonix wright though, those games are superb.
I'd say there are better platformers then NSMB though... mainly that's just my general distaste for Mario. Though something like Hatsworth might be a bit hardcore if she doesn't play games that much.

[Matador]

I forgot to add that I lent her Castlevania: Dawn of sorrow. Hatsworth was out of the question, as was Shin Megami Tensei: Devil Survivor. I would have preferred lending her Order of Ecclessia, though obviously not for storytelling... And true, it would have been maddening for her to have to turn to a strategy guide to get the false ending on that, and I'd have to turn her to a guide...

Actually, that might be a good clinical way for me to determine if a game is suitable to hand over to a new gamer.

To be forth coming, She isn't a console gamer. I think she's played World of Goo among other things. She's into Tim Burton (not touching that), so I showed her a trailer for Psychonauts and she seemed interested, though I think playing it would enthuse her more.

I'd like to introduce her to portal. I think that''s the best bridge for us to cross together.

The goal, I think, is to expose her to games a bit more than she currently is. I think she'd be great in the film industry... but I'd rather feed my desired media.

[Ben]

If that's the case I think it's more important to give her fun games then well written games.
Also I still reckon Dawn of Sorrows was better then Order of Eccelessia.

Ghost Trick would probably be an awesome game to lend her too.

Do you have access to any modern consoles yet? Cause if you really want to get her onto games you should show her stuff like POP 2007 or Enslaved. Short sweet, pretty easy games that have amazing storytelling in them.

[Matador]

I'm as worried about presentation as much as writing.

Ghost Trick is cool, and perhaps just as appropriate. I have a PS3, but I'm still living with my grandparents (for now), so it's not set up. I plan to show her some of the pretentious games (flower) as well as the good, not too violent stuff, like Costume Quest. I don't have my XBox with me, but depending on the price, I could pick one up because I have Psychnonauts, Prince of Persia SofT and Beyond Good and Evil. If I can't, I'll get the download versions of SofT and BG&E. I'll probably pick up a PS3 copy of PoP 2008 and get her into that. It's not a good example of storytelling in my opinion, but it for art direction and dificulty, it would be a good intro.

[Ben]

Try and snag a copy of Heavy rain for the PS3 then, also Enslaved has some amazing presentation (I'd probbably say monkey has some of the best animations in a platformer) not sure if you'd approve of the story telling (It's pretty cutscene heavy) but the actual story being told is great, to the point my missus wouldn't let me play the game unless she was there to watch. Difficulty would be good as well since it's a pretty damm easy game.

[Matador]

I'll keep that in mind.

Heavy Rain would probably be a good game for the two of us, If I can arrange to play with her every now and then. Heavy Rain was one of the reasons I got a PS3.

I did enjoy Indigo Prophecy, and I'll probably enjoy Heavy Rain... but David Cage's attitude; his school of thought is not where I want to take games. Just like I don't want to be Kojima, or Molyneaux, I don't want to be Cage.

[Ben]

haha yeah I had some serious issues with Heavy Rain, mainly that the game is uncanny valley as all fuck I spent the first 20 minutes playing that game just spinning around in circles laughing at how hilariously the animation is walking around that house.

[Matador]

Heh. I'm on the same boat as you. They leaned against the railing and fell straight over the fucking ledge. I think we've hit a barrier that would cost too much time and effort to cross.

My Grief with Cage is that he doesn't respect games. He wants to make interactive drama. His whole spiel at GDC was how immature and arbitrary games were. Some points I agreed with: Games rely on violence as a means to resolve conflict. It's true. Lots of games have done it. And you know what? Not every game has to fall on that trope.

But Cage thinks that games should be more like Movies. He wants a general plot, and to write every single possible action into the game for each scene. That's highly ambitious, but that makes him the story's author. That's fine. He can make his game his way.

But he believes all games should be like this.