61 Frames Per Second : valve

Steam Weekend Sales Will Save Us All (Money)

Joe Keiser — Thu, 19 Feb 2009 17:00:00 GMT

Some incredible numbers came out of the mouth of Valve co-founder Gabe Newell last night regarding those lovely Steam weekend sales that I spend way too much money on. What he shared could mean a lot for how we buy games in the future. In other words, how digital distribution will make gamer makers rich and gamers richer.

His key example was last weekend’s 50% discount on Left 4 Dead. I was apparently not the only human who bought the game at that price point—Newell revealed that sales of the game rose 3000 percent, bringing in more dollars for the game through the service than at any point in the game’s history—including launch. And it didn’t cannibalize retail, either.

Another unnamed game that was recently offered in a Steam sale saw its sales numbers jump 36000%. That’s a lot of percent! Has Valve stumbled on some kind of magical spell where everyone makes more money by charging less?

Well, sort of. These numbers have made me realize that the Steam sale is actually a brilliant new mutation to the digital distribution model, and one that can’t be imitated by brick-and-mortar retailers. Let’s create a hypothetical situation where Steam is offering Team Fortress 2 for five dollars in a weekend sale. If a store like Best Buy tried this, the only thing that would happen would be what is referred to as The FatWallet Effect—resellers would swoop in like vultures, buy everything, and post the games on Ebay at list price.

On Steam, it probably went more like this:

1. Revenues shot up as people who didn’t even know what TF2 was spent money they would never have otherwise spent on TF2, because it was cheap enough just to see what it was. People are pleased with Steam because Steam gave them a deal. Everyone makes more money.

2. More people know what TF2 is. Likely they understand its charms, so they love it and tell their friends how great it is. As a result yet more people know what TF2 is, and maybe some of them even buy more TF2. The community around the game grows, making the game itself more enjoyable. Everyone makes more money.

3. Team Fortress 3 comes out. Now lots of people know what Team Fortress is, and more people than ever love it. Sales of TF3 are higher than they would have been without that one TF2 weekend that happened, oh, four or five years ago (again, hypothetical situation). Everyone makes more money.

It’s a seemingly endless knock-on effect where everyone wins, and the fact that not everyone is doing something similar tells you just how young digital distribution is: nobody understands its unique advantages yet. But Valve’s pricing experiments are working out great, and signs point to them becoming increasingly aggressive. Which means we’ll all have more money to spend on more games.

Related Links:

Why Do Gamers Care So Much about Sales Charts?
Video Games: Bigger, But Still Not Bigger Than Movies
NPDeez Nuts: The Way Tomorrow Looks

Gordon Freeman's Prank Call

Bob Mackey — Thu, 29 Jan 2009 21:00:00 GMT

As gamers, we possess a relentless amount of trivia and information about the hobby we've invested so, so many hours into; and to those uninitiated with the world of video games, said knowledge is baffling and mysterious at best. So what, exactly, are we supposed to do with these brainfulls of data--aside from alienate our poor family members who wonder just what the hell we do with our free time?

Strangely enough, it turns out our vast wisdom on the topic of video games can be best put to use through the lost art of the prank phone call. And if you're still skeptical, all you need to do is listen to one of the greatest video game-related prank calls in recent history. Allow me to set the stage: the following events take place on the syndicated radio show Coast to Coast, where host George Norry entertains the delusions of his clearly insane callers--and they range from stories of bottomless pits to tales of secret garden gnome societies. But what happens when a savvy gamer calls in and recounts the story of Half-Life as the game's protagonist, Gordon Freeman?

The answer, of course, is hilarity.

Related Links:

Bleep Bloop: Actually Funny Gamer Comedy
Life of D. Duck: Freeware on Acid
61FPS Hits Bleep Boop, Gets High on Rock Band Fumes

Whatcha Playing?: Left 4 Dead

Cole Stryker — Mon, 26 Jan 2009 22:30:00 GMT

I finally got around to playing Left 4 Dead this weekend, a game that my 61FPS colleagues and I have largely slept on during the holiday rush. I'm pleased to report that I found the cooperation-focused shooter to be one of the most clever games I've played in a while, and the most important FPS since Valve's last game.

The game sets itself apart by forcing players to work together as they make their way from Point A to Point B. If you get swarmed by zombies while trying to be a hero, you run the risk of being incapacitated. Once that happens, the only way to get back on your feet is to be "revived" by a teamate. It's a simple mechanic that reinforces teamwork. A modestly experienced team that sticks together stands a much better chance of surviving than a team of rogue run-and-gunners vying for the most points. The other innovation that helps make this game a must-play is the AI, which randomly spawns items and enemies throughout the map, ensuring a slightly different playthrough each time.

There are four heroes, four playable zombie types, four levels, and (basically) four guns. It might seem like a skimpy game, but therein lies its minmalist grace, which lies just under the gory surface. It isn't worth playing by yourself, but, like all the best shooters (Tribes, TF2), the multiplayer is what makes it. The Source engine is nothing to write home about, but these simple improvements on the world's most stagnant genre made this FPS refugee hungry for more... BRAINS THAT IS! HURR DURRR!

Black Mesa: Source: Oh Right, That Still Exists

Bob Mackey — Tue, 02 Dec 2008 01:00:00 GMT

In honor of the first Half-Life's 10th anniversary, I've been thinking of replaying the original over my long-awaited Christmas break. But now, I may hold off a bit longer after seeing the trailer for the Black Mesa: Source mod and nearly pooping myself. I just gave you fair warning.

If you've been anticipating this mod as much as I have, then you'll know that seeing this much content is pretty big news. I'm no programming genius, but I imagine it takes quite a bit of work to remake an entire game--and a pretty big one, at that--in an entirely new and more powerful engine. The Source engine may be beginning to show its age a bit, but there's no denying this is a major step up from Valve's previous attempt to give Half-Life a minor graphical upgrade with their own Half-Life: Source. For now, this entire production is fan-made and free, but it wouldn't be too strange for Valve to pull another Willy Wonka (as they did with the Portal team) and invite the Black Mesa: Source folks onto their team. As of now, this thing legitimately looks like it's worth money.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go chug a bottle of NyQuil. When I wake up months from now, I should be greeted by both Black Mesa: Source and the Policenauts fan translation. Cheers! (Tell my friends and family it was an accident.)

Related Links:

Now At Your Local Dollar Store: Half-Life
Entitled PC Gamers Whine about Rights
GOG is Great

Left4Dead: The Most Important Training Simulation You Will Ever Play

John Constantine — Thu, 16 Oct 2008 01:00:00 GMT

I am not embarrassed by many things. For example, when I invite a delightful young woman over to my apartment for a romantic liaison, I know full well that one of the first things she is going to see is a gigantic vinyl Godzilla. It sits on a mantle over a television surrounded by seven videogame consoles. The fridge is empty save for countless individual packets of soy sauce, a pitcher of water, and a lonesome bottle of Miracle Whip that may or may not have been there when I moved in. There is a framed map of Zebes from Super Metroid hanging in my bedroom. These are not things that label me “a catch.” I am also not embarrassed to admit what a terrible cliché I am. Like countless other men of my generation, raised with a nigh on religious devotion to media, I too have a Zombie Plan. The plan details what I will do during the initial weeks of the zombie apocalypse, that is to say, when my urban home is overrun by the brain-hungry undead. The plan is multi-tiered and incredibly thorough. I have this plan because it is important to be prepared for zombies. I also have it because I enjoy daydreaming about the zombie apocalypse. I am not embarrassed by this, and apparently neither is Valve, makers of Half-Life, Portal, Team Fortress, and this fall’s Left4Dead.

Left4Dead, a four player co-operative FPS built on Valve’s Source engine, is like a training simulator for zombie plans. The game plays out over four “films”, each one broken into five chapters and the goal of each is to move across city streets, dilapidated buildings, and other locales infested with zombies – 28 Days Later-style speedy zombies, not Romero-esque shamblers – to reach safe rooms. You load up on ammunition and healing items and then you go back out and you always, always stick together. There is no surviving the zombie apocalypse alone. The game plays with the same speed and immediacy of all Valve’s games, foregoing a realistic feeling of character weight in favor of brisk play. It is awesome.

I got to play Left4Dead’s split-screen co-op today, which only allows for two players, though you can still invite an additional two to join you via Xbox Live. At first, I felt like the game was just Half-Life 2 with head-crabless zombies. That was before I went into the apartment building and a horde of almost twenty sprinting corpses flooded into a single room. Since I was using a shotgun, one of only a handful of weapons available in the game, I found myself having to bludgeon zombies away to give me enough time to load just a single shell and blast them away. This was all while still looking around to make sure my companions weren’t getting overrun or in my line of fire. It was an intense and unique moment, unlike anything else I’ve played. I was equally impressed with the unscripted nature of Left4Dead. While the rush in the apartment was triggered by walking through a door, I accidentally brought on an onslaught of zombies outdoors because I accidentally set off a car alarm. If I hadn’t gone to see if the environment was fully interactive (read: Can I break this car window?), our trip through the level would have been much easier.

Of the many, many exciting games coming out this fall, Left4Dead might be the most important. Yeah, it’s fun. But it’s also educational. After all, no zombie plan should go into effect without being tested first.

Related links:

The Ten Greatest Fire Levels in Gaming History, Part 2
Games to Movies: Why Is It So Gad-Danged Hard?
Unknowable Horrors and Spiraling Madness: H.P. Lovecraft and Videogames
Trailer Review: House of the Dead – Overkill
The 61FPS Review: Dead Space

Google to Buy Valve?

Cole Stryker — Wed, 17 Sep 2008 15:00:00 GMT

Still a rumor, but what does this mean? Mashable's Stan Schroeder thinks its an odd choice, but the value of Steam would make it a worthwhile purchase.

With Steam, Valve has managed to do what no one else has: they’ve made it so easy and simple to download games that users are actually willing to pay for it even when they have a choice of pirating the same content for free.

Of course, Google will likely rebrand the service and offer online distribution for many things other than games. I wonder how will this affect the development of games like Half Life. Obviously, if Google's going to buy Valve as a company rather than just the Steam platform, they are going to also take over the development studio. Is Google looking to delve further into the gaming industry, perhaps as a means of beefing up the lackluster Google Lively? I suppose they could always sell Valve's developmen arm if not. Maybe they are simply looking for ways to weasel their ads into games.

Neither Google nor Valve have confirmed or denied this rumor. Look for an announcement at this week's Game Developer's Conference.

(via Mashable)

Game Designers: Rockstars, Auteurs, Dweebs?

John Constantine — Thu, 03 Jul 2008 15:00:00 GMT

One crummy thing about living here in the good ol’ U.S. of A. is that we don’t get issues of Britain’s Edge Magazine for a full month after they hit stands in Britain. Yes, I know, it’s a hard life. We’ve been at war with two separate nations for close to a decade, the economy is disintegrating, and our health care system is an atrocity but all that pales in comparison to not getting pretty videogame rags in a timely manner. But I digress. Yesterday, while flipping through their July issue, something stuck out about their Platinum Games cover story: the photo spread of Atsushi Inaba, Hideki Kamiya, Shigenori Nishikawa, Hifumi Kouno, and Tatsuya Minami made them look like a god damn boy band.

I’m conflicted about the emerging designer-as-rockstar image. Once upon a time, it wasn’t unusual for a game to be made by a single person, but in 2008, it’s the rarest exception to the rule. Big games, the vast majority of games the public plays, are made by studios whose collective creative vision makes the game what it is, not one woman or man’s vision. Instead of celebrating and promoting the individual, the rockstar of David Jaffe, Cliffy B, or Shigeru Miyamoto, maybe it should be about the rock band image like in the Platinum Games spread. I’d wear a Valve t-shirt over a Gabe Newell one any day, wouldn’t you?

Related links:

Independent at a Price: Sega and Platinum Games
Clover Returns, Heavy as Platinum

The Ten Greatest Opening Levels in Gaming History, Part 3

John Constantine — Fri, 13 Jun 2008 01:45:00 GMT

Sonic the Hedgehog - Green Hill Zone

By the time the original Sonic the Hedgehog came out, Super Mario World had been out for six months in Japan. In almost every way, Mario had the edge on Sonic — more levels, more power-ups, more variety, more gaming. But there was one thing you couldn't take away from Sonic, and that was the sheer dazzle of starting up the game and entering Green Hill Zone. To this day, Green Hill Zone looks spectacular, with its sparkling ocean, lush vegetation and abstract geometry — not to mention Masato Nakamura's unforgettable music. Mario had a lot to offer, but in terms of pure physicality, most of Dinosaur Land seems awfully drab next to Green Hill Zone. (Plus, it was 1991 — "zones" were just cooler than "lands", for Chrissakes.) — PS

Shadow of the Colossus - Valus

Shadow of the Colossus’s opening moments are less mysterious, and therefore less grand, than the opening moments of Ico. As players, we are given exposition and context through narration (however vague it may be) and the game’s protagonist Wander states a clear goal while an evil god tells him how to achieve it. This is a far cry from the confounding and almost entirely silent internment of a horned boy in a decaying castle. But Shadow of the Colossus’ first level, toppling the colossus Valus, is a singular moment in gaming history. Valus stands at one end of an enclosed valley opposite you and, at first, it doesn’t seem that big. Then you run towards it, feeling the ground shake through your controller, the music swells, and you jump on its enormous leg, searching for a handhold. It is, in the truest sense of the word, epic. Even God of War 1 and 2’s opening battles against the hydra and the Colossus of Rhodes seem miniscule in comparison. — JC

Metroid Prime - Space Pirate Frigate

To fully appreciate the beginning of Metroid Prime, play through the beginning of The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess. Both openings teach you how to play the game, but Twilight Princess teaches you like you're in the remedial class, instead of someone who (knowing Nintendo's fan base) probably has a doctorate in Zelda. It takes hours of cat-placating, monkey-placating and goat-herding to even get a sword. Prime takes it easy on you, but you never feel condescended to. Its tutorials are thoroughly skippable; expert players can finish the Space Pirate Frigate in five minutes flat. But beyond that, it's a beautiful, self-contained introduction to the game's spooky atmosphere. Every console Zelda after A Link to the Past has started you out in a village full of whiners you have to coddle before you get to adventure. Prime throws you into a dark, eerie spacecraft where something horrible has happened. Get in and get out before its orbit decays and you die. Chills. — PS

Half-Life 2 – City 17

“Wake up, Mr. Freeman. Wake up, and smell the ashes.” As Gordon Freeman, your journey through the bleak streets of City 17 begins a mere sixty seconds after the game’s title has faded to black. The mundane environment tells you everything you need to know about how life works in a world where civilization has crumbled; tired and scared citizens mutter in the corners of a train terminal, Combine soldiers threaten and abuse, and rare familiar faces urge you to escape immediately. Half-Life’s greatest success has always been keeping the player in constant control of the action while still herding them along a set path. Half-Life 2’s opening level, Freeman’s arrival in City 17 and his flight from the Combine across the city’s rooftops, engages and informs in equal measure while providing an immediate thrill through play. It’s remarkable that a first-person shooter’s most memorable level is its first, a level where not a single shot is fired. — JC

Click here for Part 1
Click here for Part 2

Previous Top Tens:
The Ten Most Adventurous Sequels
The Ten Greatest Fire Levels

The Ten Greatest Opening Levels in Gaming History, Part 2

John Constantine — Fri, 13 Jun 2008 01:30:00 GMT

Metal Gear Solid 2 – The U.S.S. Discovery

The opening level of Metal Gear Solid 2 is the finest Metal Gear game ever made in-and-of itself. Forget Hideo Kojima’s cinematic pretensions for just a moment and think about the raw play available in this self-contained prologue scenario. The tools of MGS’ trade may not be available to Snake in their totality here, but every inch of the tanker acts as a playground for the series' most fundamental mechanics. You can sneak through without ever being seen or you can kill every Russian soldier you come across. There is an expertly paced boss fight. There is skin-mag related humor. It’s all here. Now layer Kojima’s cinematic pretensions back on top of all that considering they are at their best (read: most restrained) here and you have a beginning that is, arguably, superior to anything the follows or precedes it in the entire series. — JC

Mega Man X - Awakening Road

This is not your father's Mega Man, says the opening stage of Mega Man X. Or it would, if it had a voice — but instead, it's got a brutal snare roll leading into a heavy rock instrumental. It's got a crumbling highway, complete with fleeing commuters (the latter of which ground the action in a more inhabited world than the NES Mega Man games ever featured.) And it ends with X almost getting scrapped by a mech-riding Boba Fett ripoff. Whatever our love for the classic Mega Man series, it never had this kind of drama. — PS

Einhander – Imperial Capital

Shoot ‘em ups, both vertical and horizontal, are usually gradual experiences. Gradius set the standard: an opening level that acclimates you to both the game’s challenge and its setting, you are the aggressor, going into a place to reach its center where defenses will be strongest. Also, excluding rare exceptions like 1942, shmups are fairly fanciful in scenario. More often than not, you’re fighting aliens, robots, monsters, etc. Einhander doesn’t start slow. Your ship flies into the middle of a bustling metropolis, literally crashing through neon billboards before racing through its ruined foundation. It is a human place and you are fleeing it, your first enemies police in pursuit. There’s a lot about Einhander that’s memorable, from Kenichiro Fukui’s techno soundtrack to its genius weapons system. But nothing sticks with you like the Imperial Capital. — JC

Click here for Part 1
Click here for Part 3

The Ten Greatest Opening Levels in Gaming History, Part 1

John Constantine — Fri, 13 Jun 2008 01:15:00 GMT

First impressions are important, in videogames as they are in life. The first moments you spend with any art can define your experience of it. They compel you to dig deeper, to more carefully consider the work or the hand that crafted it. Other times, they can be so startling that everything that follows is diminished. This week, 61 Frames Per Second looks at the ten greatest opening levels in gaming history. Stick with us past the first one though. They’re all great. — John Constantine

Prince of Persia 2 - Rooftop Chase

The original Prince of Persia was a unique and wonderful game, but it wasn't much for setting. Half the game takes place in a monochromatic dungeon, and the other in a monochromatic palace. 2 quickly makes up for it; about to be executed by the Vizier's goons, the Prince leaps through a window, and from there it's up to you to guide him across the palace rooftops, into the marketplace below, down a long pier, finally leaping into the hold of a departing merchant ship — all with those guards on your tail. The stage is a real nail-biter, and all the more memorable because the rest of the game is comparatively subdued. — Peter Smith

Strider – Saint Petersburg

I won’t lie. There was a time that I watched that glider fly low over terrible Slavic church spires to a brief fanfare of synthetic horns and I believed, for a moment, that I would never leave Eurasia alive. Then I realized that Strider Hiryu’s sword was practically the length of the screen and it could literally make people explode. Strider, as a game, has not aged well in the past twenty years; the control is wonky, you can’t really tell when you’re even hitting something, and there are times when stuff in its stages blows up for seemingly no reason. But that first level remains an incredible spectacle, coated in color and character, a place where robot tigers will scale towers and entire Russian parliaments will turn into hammer-and-sickle wielding robot dragons. Fighting robot apes and hordes of half-naked amazons a few levels later just seems pedestrian after that. — John Constantine

Final Fantasy VII - Assault on Mako Reactor #1

Presumably your retinas have just detached as a result of your vigorous eye-rolling. Re-attach those suckers and hear me out here: no matter how bloated, overrated and over-fanboyed Final Fantasy VII might be in retrospect, its opening is masterful. Up until that game, RPGs never started fast. You loaded up your neophyte warriors with whatever cloth armor and rusty dinner knives you could afford on your starting wage of ten gold pieces, and then you sent them out to the local forest to get their asses handed to them by killer squirrels until they could upgrade to some new silverware. Final Fantasy VI was a step in the right direction, with its haunting approach to a frozen, gloomy northern town. But VII's opening is still a dramatic highlight of the series, segueing from a lyrical vision of a flower girl in the streets, to a full view of a vast futuristic city, to a tense assault on a huge power reactor, all to the strains of the Blade Runner-esque suite that is Nobuo Uematsu's immortal "Opening/Bombing Mission." Put that jackass with the Sephiroth tattoo out of your mind, and take a minute to appreciate the scope and excitement of this sequence. — PS

Click here for Part 2
Click here for Part 3

Whatcha Playing: Another Slice of Cake

John Constantine — Fri, 16 May 2008 14:00:00 GMT

Having never been much of a PC or Mac gamer, I’ve come into Valve’s games far later than most. I experienced the original Half-Life second hand through my college roommate and only played through it myself last summer, on the PS2 of all things, in anticipation of the Orange Box’s fall release on consoles. When I finally did play through Half-Life 2 and its subsequent episodes, I was more than impressed. Valve’s reputation as peerless storytellers is more than deserved and despite being four years-old at this point, Half-Life 2 remains a high-water mark for game making free of the language and tools of film narrative. Writer Eric Wolpaw’s most impressive work in the Orange Box, however, is the widely lauded Portal, a perfect mix of Half-Life’s menace with the humor of his work on Psychonauts.

Up until last Sunday, I’d been waiting for a chance to race through Portal a second time for months. This wasn’t possible since my copy of the Orange Box had ended up in Korea. Damn roommates. Portal is a strange experience when you return to it. The shock and impact of antagonist GLaDOS’ quiet threats and the seamless integration of story and physical progress through the game’s space is lost, replaced by a comforting sense of familiarity. It remains funny but the tension is gone. The actual mechanical play is a different story altogether. Portal’s central mechanic of creating dimensional shortcuts on any surface lends itself to improvisation and creativity so there’s a natural impulse to try things differently. What struck me during my return visit was not just how flexible the game is but how inflexible I am as a player. Even when given the tools, I rarely push a game's boundaries. I can’t stop myself from taking the fastest, most efficient route. By the time I was hearing the inescapable catchy chords of “Still Alive” at the game’s conclusion, I was starting to wonder if there’s something I’m missing whenever I play through a game. Am I satisfied with the presented sense of adventure and discovery? Is the empowerment of success enough to keep me from finding different ways to succeed? Am I playing the game or am I allowing it to play me?

I didn’t come up with an answer and one week later there still isn’t one readily apparent. However, I’m now hungry for the open world of Bethesda’s upcoming Fallout 3. Maybe this time, I’ll be able to find a way to play differently. Here’s hoping.