61 Frames Per Second

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• Love-Hate: In Defense of the Cutscene

  As a follow-up to yesterday's post about the intersection of passive and active media in games, I'd like to defend the humble cutscene, for when used in moderation, cutscenes can enhance the experience of play. The way I see it, Blizzard has mastered the cutscene. They are brief, infrequent, and they pack a wallop. For example, the epic scale of the battles truly comes alive here:  Wow! Look how huge that battle cruiser is! Did you see that zergling rush at the end? Here we are given a dramatic representation of what presumably goes on behind the familiar sprites during the game's core play experience. We see the panic in our soldiers' eyes and the callousness of our generals. The film does more than just further the story, it enhances the game. It grants players a sense of empathy by creating an emotional connection. It's much easier to relate to a marine than before, when all we've seen of him is this:   Read More... Posted Jun 19 2008, 05:00 PM by Cole Stryker with | with 1 comment(s) Filed under: bioshock, half-life, cole stryker, cutscenes, starcraft

• It’s What’s On the Inside That Counts: Rise of the Argonauts and the Pressures of HD Development

  Rise of the Argonauts premiered at E3 2007 and in the time since Codemasters debuted its action-RPG – as the title implies, it’s based around Jason’s mythical quest for the Golden Fleece – HD gaming has started to mature. Which is to say, videogames running on high-end systems have started to look absolutely ridiculous. Titles like Naughty Dog’s Uncharted, 2K Boston’s Bioshock (and a number of other games that artfully use the Unreal Engine 3), and, of course, Crytek’s Crysis have set a precedent for game visuals that’s becoming increasingly difficult to live up to. When I sat down with Codemasters to get a look at Rise of the Argonauts, I was disappointed. Not necessarily with the game, as some of the ideas behind its role-playing, such as currying favor with gods to develop a character’s abilities, are very interesting. I was disappointed in myself for recoiling from Rise’s visuals. Why is the character just sort of floating over the ground instead of having his feet naturally deform to the terrain? Why isn’t every grain of dirt perfectly rendered? Where are the character model’s pores? It took a moment for me to step back and realize how ridiculous it was to think like this. Not every game can feature the detail of the best of the best and not every game world needs to function like our own. But it doesn’t change the fact that I’m starting to expect these things from every game and I’d bet I’m not the only one. Read More... Posted Jun 17 2008, 10:00 AM by John Constantine with | with no comments Filed under: bioshock, rise of the argonauts, crysis, codemasters, uncharted

• Where is The City of Metronome?

  Back in 2005, Swedish developer Tarsier came to E3 with a big game they’d been cooking up called The City of Metronome. Metronome, even three years later, remains a visual feast, its faceless characters, early 20th century fashion, and twisting cityscape sitting somewhere between Edward Gorey and Pixar, Ralph Bakshi and Alex Proyas’ Dark City. Tarsier had also created an exciting foundation for play in Metronome; every action was based around sound. A player could control the city’s citizens, alter architecture, and even fight using sounds recorded in the game. And recording wasn’t just a clever twist on item collection either, as the player could create their own noise to record by interacting with the world (breaking glass, having a conversation, etc.) Few games in the past five years have been as conceptually exciting or strange as Metronome. Read More... Posted Jun 11 2008, 10:00 AM by John Constantine with | with no comments Filed under: john constantine, bioshock, where is, Playstation, city of metronome, psn, take-two, tarsier

• Bringing Sexy Back: Susan O’Connor

  Back in the day, Nerve had a motto: Good writing is sexy. In the past ten years, as Nerve’s grown out of its spunky, firebrand early days and into its current incarnation as a mature, established purveyor of cultural commentary, the motto has disappeared from the magazine. But it lives on in everything we do. Good writing being sexy is a belief we cannot shake, a universal truth that colors all of our endeavors, and it’s at the heart of 61 Frames Per Second. Painful as it is to say, good writing is still rare in games. Dialogue, expository text, all writing really, takes a backseat to the creation of every other asset in a game. Hell, in some cases, I’ve seen promotional materials better written than the game they’re humping (I’m looking at you Metroid Prime 3. Suburban Commando called, it wants its dialogue back.) That’s why Susan O’Connor is sexy. Recently named one of the most important women in games, the fact of the matter is that O’Connor is one of the most important people working in games, period. Read More... Posted May 28 2008, 10:00 AM by John Constantine with | with no comments Filed under: john constantine, metroid, gamasutra, bioshock, bringing sexy back, susan o'connor, gears of war

• Games to Film: Et Tu, Bioshock?

  I had a peculiar experience shortly after turning thirteen years-old. My uncle Bob was the epitome of class and cool in my mind. He lived in New York City with his artist boyfriend and knew about a world of culture that I only had the vaguest ideas about. As a birthday treat, Bob offered to take me to what would be my first Broadway show, a performance of Show Boat. As we drove into the city though, I was increasingly perturbed by the signs plastered all over town for Big: The Musical. What the hell was the point of that? Big was perfectly fine as a movie! I couldn’t conceive of a single reason why this perfectly charming story needed inexplicable dance numbers crammed into it. Ever since, I’ve been very much at odds with adapting works of art to other formats. It is, by and large, a pointless endeavor with rare positive results. Read More... Posted May 12 2008, 12:00 PM by John Constantine with | with 2 comment(s) Filed under: john constantine, 2k games, gore verbinski, ken levine, bioshock, games to film