Tipping the Scale

Scale has always been a strange technical issue in video games. You're limited by the size of the character, and the camera angle, and the hardware. In old NES games like Zelda 2, Link was the same size on the world map as an entire village. Once he was actually in the village, the buildings were bigger, yet the inside dimensions never seemed to match the outside, like that magical car from Harry Potter that could seat seven comfortably in the back seat while appearing to be a standard size from the outside. Later (much later), Final Fantasy VIII graced the PS1, and towns were finally getting a sense of scale. Sure, Squall still appeared to be as tall as the buildings while outside the city limits, but at least they weren't the same dimensions anymore. I just think it was the hardware. The one game I can think of in that entire console generation that had an entire world set to scale was Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind. If you wanted to walk somewhere, it took you as long as it would in real life. It was improved even farther in Oblivion, and we now had a living, breathing world that resembled our own, if our own world had goblins lurking behind the registers at Wal-Mart.

Come to think of it, first-person-perspecitve games were always in scale. But the scope of the levels was always so constrained. Remember the first TimeSplitters that debuted with the PS2? The one where you didn't even have to look up or down, a la Doom? The levels, especially compared to sprawling RPG's like anything Square produced, were miniscule. Luckily, technology and game budgets nowadays are so out of control that even low-impact games can have a sense of scale and verisimilitude. Unless its Nintendo, then you're still doomed to be stuck with the kawaii big head, little feet, Pep Boys look. Hope you sprites have been working out your neck muscles! You're going to need them.

Puzzle Quest - The Hidden Addiction

When Puzzle Quest came out on DS, PSP, PC, Wii, PS2, PSN, and XBLA, I picked it up for $20. Yeah, it looked to be basically a Bejeweled clone, but it was a Bejeweled clone in which you could level up and cast spells and slay goblins! Awesome. I would play it on the toilet, where nobody would bother me, and I would often sit there until my legs fell asleep. "Just one more game," I would say to myself, "I wouldn't be able to stand up right now anyway, my feet are numb." Within days, I had already reached the last boss. It is not a short game. I was addicted. To a puzzle game. To a DS game! No way! But when I completed it, I put it away. Because it had an end point to the storyline, there was a time when it was eventually over. This is unlike other Tetris, or Lumines, or other puzzlers you can play ad nauseum. Does that hurt it as a brilliant game? I don't know...

When the year was up and I was looking over various Game of the Year awards in magazines and on the Internet, Puzzle Quest kept popping up as a final contender. I had played it (a lot) and yet had never considered it one of the greatest games of the year. This was pretty weird, because I don't want to play a bad game, no one does. Yet even though I sunk more time into it than just about any other game that year besides Oblivion, I discounted it subconsciously because of its simplicity and "casual" nature. A simple puzzle game can't be Game of the Year! But what makes Game of the Year? Is it addictiveness, a willingness to play it over all other games of its time? Because Puzzle Quest ensnared me completely, even with a simple, cliched fantasy plot and colorful yet unimpressive graphics that did their job and little else. Also, the music was just awful, and the loop was far too short for the amount of time an average person could sink into it. But I loved it. And I am hereby declaring it one of my favorite games of all time. Maybe Puzzle Kingdoms is good too...?

Another Shadow of the Colossus post...

Sometimes, creative decisions regarding a game's content are based on the platform's technological limitations. Mario had red clothes on a blue background because the colors looked best on the limited palette of the NES. He wore a hat so Miyamoto wouldn't have to animate his hair. He had a mustache to hide his facial features because it was far easier than creating expressions on his tiny, pixelated head.

Fast forward twenty years, and graphics are infinitely better, but there are still limits. Shadow of the Colossus was critically revered as a masterpiece of modern gaming. The biggest complaint: the PS2 holds down the game from reaching its full potential. Graphics! No way. Can a beautiful game really be faulted with living on a system that is not powerful enough to support its weight? Well, of course it can. There was draw-in in the distance. Textures were grainy. Every creature in the grain had sharp edges that should have been smooth. The scale was terrific, but the game could have been better (read: more beautiful) if it had even waited for one more generation before being released.

For a PS2 game, SotC was pretty. However, when it was released, the 360 was set to come out the next month, and that was much, much prettier. If Colossus had been released 2 years earlier, right in the middle of the PS2's life cycle, it would have been much more appreciated. Comments on its non-beauty would be non-existent. Imagine if it was a lauch title! It would've blown TimeSplitters, Evergrace, and Summoner out of the water. Still, with technological advancements, you need to evolve and innovate. Even graphics. Yes, a game can be good without stellar imagery to stare at while you slice and dice enemies, but the fact of the matter is that you are going to be spending a good amount of hours in this digital world you just purchased, and graphics are the only thing you can see. Taking too long to develop a game (*cough*Too Human*cough*) makes its eventaul release unimportant, unimpressive, and unnecessary. It's a thin line to tread between getting a game on the market quickly and making sure it is bug-free. Gamers don't care about that. They want both.

I'm the world's greatest!

A while back, I complained about the Guinness Book for having not enough beatable records in it. Then I remembered, oh yeah, there's already a place where all the game records in the world live: Twin Galaxies. So what's the first thing you do when you're a serious gamer and you see a bunch of scores you can beat? You find out which ones you already have. Apparently, I'm already the world record holder on about half the songs in Amplitude on PS2, and I'm sure I have beaten some of the records on Frequency if I could just find out where my game disc went! However, to actually beat the record and have it verified, you have to film yourself doing it. You can't just mail in picture of the high score screen. Since most of the Amplitude playing was about 5 years ago, I'm a little rusty and I'm having a hard time recapturing my ultra-high scores. But even today, I was able to play a few levels and almost double the world record scores on a few of the songs. It looks like it may not actually be the highest scores in the world, just the highest scores of a person that had the time and energy to submit a score. That could be me.

One guy on the site currently holds 5,019 records across all different types of games. In second place is 890. I may not be able to top Mr. 5000 but I think I could at least get in the top 10... I mean, how hard can it be to get 400 world records? Ok, maybe it would be tough. But, like Steve Wiebe from King of Kong, everybody wants to be good at something.