Wednesday, February 20, 2013

In Space, No One Can Hear You Scream...For Your Money Back. (Pt. 2)



The public flogging of Aliens: Colonial Marines will continue in earnest. We have only scratched the surface of how terrible it truly is, in order to convey this I am forced to compare it to its "competition" (though in the end Colonial Marines never really showed up to the fight). I know I shouldn't be surprised, hedging your bets on a licensed title is not something I'd recommend - but there was tangible proof of this game's potential. No need to pontificate further, let's see just how well Colonial Marines stacks up to another recent sci-fi horror title.





Now if you have played Dead Space 3 you know just how one sided this comparison is. For starters I cannot for the life of me actually remember the protagonist's  name from Colonial Marines - Isaac Clarke however, is a name I won't forget.

 
  

I purchased Dead Space 3 out of boredom. When I saw what I thought the franchise had turned into I decided I no longer wanted a part. The addition of co-op irked me - the feeling of being alone fighting Necromorphs in a pitch black hallway is hard to maintain with two people playing (atleast I thought).  When the game came out I ignored it for a while thinking that it was going the way of Resident Evil - stumbling clumsily into being an action movie.

I couldn't have been more wrong.




Being the third title in any series (look at Aliens 3 after all) is often a burden too heavy for most titles to carry. Going up against a completely new IP from a great studio like Gearbox, I thought Colonial Marines would be the superior game - honestly. It didn't have to borrow from Aliens to be Aliens, it was Aliens. Boom, three in one sentence.

Dead Space however, was an idea recently formed and one that had obvious influences from such sci-fi hits as Aliens. Here lies its greatest strength however, Dead Space did not have to conform to anything, there were no limitations of where they could go with the game. They did not have to pay over-zealous fan service to their audience - and thus Dead Space evolved into a game that easily makes my top ten list - survival horror or not. 

Enough talk, let's see some action. I'll give Aliens the first punch. Feel free to watch as much as you want, you are not forced to endure all thirty three agonizing minutes. Oh, and uh if you happen to actually care, there may be a few minor spoilers as this is the third mission.





Hoo boy, wasn't that a blast? Everything about this game feels sterile - it is impossible for something to be emotionally effecting if it is impossible for it to connect with someone. Nothing about this game feels the way Aliens felt. The art style is a mess of multiple studios jamming together their finished products - it all feels so safe, so Nintendo 64.

Luckily the Aliens video game franchise knows how to take a punch. Once again, watch as much as you'd like - and beware possible spoilers for those wishing to play. There are a few moments when part of the development team talk about the game as well.


I told you that it wasn't a fair fight didn't I? Dead Space as a whole has done nothing but grow since the first in the series arrived on store shelves. All in all, I can't complain about any of these titles. This may only be my opinion, but I enjoyed each title as much if not more than the last - co-op and all.

The artists behind this franchise have done a masterful job at creating and maintaining atmosphere through three titles. Every corridor feels like it was hand crafted down to the smallest chip of paint. Everything pulls the player further into the experience, so much so that before you know it you'll find your heart rate rising to a fever pitch.

Long story short -



It wasn't a fair fight. When your game is put together by people who look like they actually care about what is being shipped you automatically win. I'm not saying the teams behind Colonial Marines were trying to make a bad game - I just get the feeling that their hearts, all three or four studio's worth, were simply not in it.

Oh yeah, and go play Dead Space. Start at the beginning if you have to, but I can't recommend it more.


Monday, February 18, 2013

In Space, No One Can Hear You Scream...For Your Money Back.




Once upon a time, there was a young boy. He grew up playing video games, watching movies, and reading books - losing himself in foreign worlds. One day, his mother would approach him about a watching a movie. This was not an uncommon occurrence, but he was skeptical - not all of these viewings movies he ended up enjoying. However, when something like Indiana Jones was introduced these forays into film classics were (obviously) worth every second.

On this most auspicious of days the film chosen was one that would ring through a genre this certain boy loved. The entire idea of space and what could possibly even be out in that ever expansive darkness was something that crossed his mind more than few times. Science fiction was a constant staple, in any and all forms - but I digress.



That's right, Aliens. One of my favorite films of all time, and what I still consider to be James Cameron's masterpiece. Even though it is a sequel (the original being Alien, another great movie), it holds the rare accolade of being better than the original. If you have yet to see this for some reason, I am actually asking you to drop whatever you are doing, go find a copy - it's 2013, just work it out - and watch it.




I could spend all day talking about this movie, but I'm going to move on. More importantly, Aliens is a franchise that has been ripe for a video game conversion since its inception. Many attempts have been made, some of them even considered good - but more often than not they were garbage.

When I was at last year's E3 there was a booth I couldn't wait to see. Gearbox Software, a truly talented studio (they are behind the Borderlands titles), had a booth set up for their upcoming release of Aliens: Colonial Marines. A game that finally promised to be the experience fans of the movie were looking for. After a beautiful demo and unimaginable amounts of hype the game itself hit store shelves on February 12th - and I couldn't have been more excited. I pre-purchased the game on Steam a few days before hand and pre-installed everything so that I could immediately play at midnight. The game unlocked and I prepared myself for hours of tense, terrifying sci-fi action.



Pretty cool right? That's the demo, the unfinished product. It could only possibly go up from there, right? Right?


No sir. What I, the consumer, was treated to is displayed above in agonizing detail. This title could possibly be the biggest disappointment I have suffered as a gamer. Dramatic, I know. Some of us really like Aliens.

What we are left with are a few simple questions that no one is answering.

1. What happened? 

Well, from what I have read from various news sources a few things occurred. The beautiful demo we were shown was indeed created by Gearbox Software, and it is just as good as it looks. Gearbox as an entity, however, only put in about a quarter of what was in the final game. When the game loads we are shown the usual logos - Sega, 20th Century Fox, Gearbox....and then a list of other smaller development studious. 

Gearbox outsourced much of the game to these smaller studios, the result was a disjointed and unfinished nightmare. This leads us to our next question.

2. How is this legal?

I'm not sure to be honest, I've heard a few people ask the same question. How can it be possible to show someone a game, and then sell them something with the same title that is obviously not what was shown. If I were to go to a car dealership and purchase a car - only to find that the people who sold me the car in the first place had replaced the engine with a sack of shit while I was sleeping, you would find yourself in the situation I and many other gamers are in.

Not to harp on Steam, but they won't issue refunds for the title if it is installed on your computer. This poses a problem for those of us that pre-purchased and installed the title after seeing the gameplay demo.

Imagine if you had payed one hundred and forty dollars for the collector's edition of this title. I'm still fuming over the loss of fifty dollars myself.
This does, however, opens the door for smaller games that fill the niche this supposed "game of the year contender" was going to occupy. For example...


Natural Selection 2 - an indie game that looks like it was made by a team one hundred times bigger than the more than four studious that worked on Colonial Marines. A game that is exponentially more thought-out, well executed, immersive, and only twenty five dollars at that.

Larger publishers are, luckily, killing themselves off with such horrible choices that one day, we will be left with only wonderfully put together titles made by people who actually throw themselves into its development. Gone will be the days of hundreds of people jammed into an office building making rocks for a game whose title they don't even know.

....and stop making Aliens games.