[Review] Love Live: School Idol Festival.

It's about damn time I did a game review ^_^

Here we go: "Love Live! School Idol Festival"

This iOS/Android social game has been out in Japan for quite some time now (I think more than a year ago?) and I recently picked it up. The English version was released around a month before this post. I won't go too much into the mechanics of the game as you can try it out for free and read the unofficial English wiki here.

But I'll at least skim through what it's about. The game is really simple, even by social game standards. Basically you use stamina gained over time to play songs (essentially rhythm games) which can give you Loveca Stones (it's the game's cash currency used for paid gatcha), coins (the game's free currency used for enhancing cards), friendship points (used to get more free version of gatcha), and random cards depending on how well you do. If you have no idea what these bolden words mean, then you haven't been exposed enough to social game mechanics. Hopefully I'll write an article about it and link it here in the future.

SO MANY CARDS!!!

The simple layman objective of the game is to collect as many cards as possible. Cards have rarity. The lower rarity ones can be obtained through the free gatcha which costs friendship points which is obtained simply by playing. The higher rarity ones can be obtained through paid gatcha which can be bought using real life cash OR completing one-shot objectives in the game (the game is rather generous at this too compared to other social games). Combining two of the same card will yield a more powerful (and naturally more unique) card.

And of course, better cards in this game will allow you to yield better score in your song attempts. Higher rarity cards will have better stats and have abilities that affect your play. It's really a very simple social game model.

Okay enough about mechanics. Let's talk about why the hell would you want to play this game. If you are a Love Live! fan and not playing this, you are either missing out A LOT or you are just trying to prevent yourself from bankruptcy. If you are NOT a Love Live! fan, give it a shot. It's a simple, polished rhythm game in my opinion. Remember to watch the anime if you actually like the characters! (mwahaha)

Simple Rhythm Game

What makes this game great to me? Firstly, its simple social game model allow players to quickly understand what they need to do. There aren't any overly complicated mechanics or number crunching. Getting better cards and performing better at your songs yield naturally yield better results. Secondly, its polish. Clean art, clear UI, voice acting (I cannot emphasize this enough), this game markets the Love Live characters and franchise really well especially with in-game events and login bonuses that reflect real life events like a character's birthday or airing of an episode. Thirdly, its generosity with Loveca Stones, the game's cash item. Normally in social games, the developers rarely want to give easy access of these cash items to players because...well...it is essentially giving the players money.

Highlighting the third point, I think some of us would start thinking how the heck does being generous to cash items lead of sales. There could be many reasons. It could be that the sales are already SO GOOD that the company can afford giving cash items away, sacrificing profit for happier players (which in turn brings more happy people, which in turn increases chances of them spending money, etc). However, this is a chicken and egg problem. If we assume that this hypothesis is true, there must still be something that allows them to start this cycle.

EVENTS!!!

Okay here is where I talk about what I really wanted to talk about. Events. In Love Live, so far there are only 2 kinds of events that happen periodically. One of them is a grind-fest, the other is PvP. Both have the same objectives: getting points.

The basis of participating in an event is very simple and is already used in some social games. Participating allows you to have a shot at an event-exclusive item, or in this case, a Super Rare card (the only thing higher is an Ultra Rare card). However, this game is generous. If you play the event regularly (regularly meaning if you have enough stamina, you play ANY song and do not lose), you will get the card no problem.

So when to people pay? In comes the infamous simple but powerful ranking system. Every player who participates has a rank depending on how much points he accumulated. Every 'region' of ranking will receive different rewards when the event ends (events typically lasts 10 days). In the japanese version I'm playing, the highest region of ranking reward is 2 free attempts at the paid gatcha and 2 of the event-exclusive Super Rare card. Why would you want another of the card? Remember that combining 2 of the same card will yield another card! So in reality, the event has 2 event-exclusive cards, one of which can only be obtained by being at a certain ranking. Why would you want a THIRD card? Mostly for collection. The 2 exclusive cards are after all, 2 different art. If I really liked that character, I would've gone for it.

Eye catching UI and presentation

It's almost perfect execution in my eyes. After seeing how events are designed, it's obvious that the people behind the events knows how to target their audience really well. It is generally accepted that if 10% of your social game's players actually spend money monthly, the game will be sustainable and rather profitable. I can just imagine that 90% of people playing this game are Love Live! fans, with maybe a quarter of that being HARDCORE fans, and...we know how otaku fans are. When the cash is no question and the thing they want appears right in front of them, it automatically goes to "buy first think later" mode. I'm not really a huge fan of the series but I can imagine that if the event has a character card I really love and there's a thousand me's competing for that card...wow...that game is gonna profit a hell lot.

And it goes back to the franchise as well! Love Live! is one of those idol animes where they would hold concerts in Japan and sell lots of albums. Players who play this game will end up knowing the songs, encouraging them to attend concerts and buy the franchise's goods and albums, and of course spreading the word. It goes a full circle. That's the beauty I see in this game.

If I had an ideal of how a social game promoting an existing IP should be done, this game is a great example I would bring up. Simple, polished, very engaged to the franchise, and effective execution of content release and balancing.

10 video games that impacted me

As a game developer/programmer, at one point I feel that it is worth reviewing what games impact my life, to find out the reasons behind the design decisions I make. This is obviously a difficult list to construct as I have played so many games up to this point. Being born in 1988 and having cousins and friends that grew up playing games means that I have the wonderful exposure to a great variety of games before my time on top of games during my time, and also after my time (i.e. games that I am not supposed to be playing at a certain age).

I decided that these 10 games are somewhat not listed in any particular order. It's hard enough to come up with a list of 10 games that impacted me. This means that I not only enjoy these games, but they also impacted me with its genius gameplay/music/mechanics/dynamics/aesthetics/art/concept that they made me view games development differently in some ways and also the reason behind some of my game design decisions. Then again, it is highly likely that maybe the top 5 are ranked higher in my opinion to the bottom 5. 

Anyway enough words. I can rant about it all day. Here are my top not-listed-in-any-order 10 games that impacted me.

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1. Final Fantasy 6

I might be biased with FF6 because it is the first RPG I ever played. However, I can't bring up reasonable reasons to debunk it from my list. FF6's cast of 12 unique characters and 2 secret characters were amazing. They all had their own unique mechanics, most stole a good amount of time explaining their background stories and they were ALL memorable in many ways. 

I just find FF6's storytelling very special because there is no real main character. People have debated over who the real main character is. Celes? Locke? Terra? My answer is that they all are main characters. The characters take turns being the driving force behind an arc. Sabin/Mash led an arc. Edgar led an arc. Even Cyan led an arc. It feels like you know the real reason behind every character's motivation to save the world.

Of course, there's the awesome artwork. Since I am trying to create an sprite-based RPG, I realized that what they did to their sprite animations were very creative. Not forgetting the genius music of uncle Nobuo too. Not much to explain here; his music has always been highly regarded.

In my opinion, FF6 is very darn near perfectly developed. Story is great and did not interrupt gameplay pacing, mechanics incorporated made sense in the game environment, almost every of the 12 characters were given the spotlight in the main plot, music was awesome, art was fantastic, the list just goes on. Sometimes it gives me a headache on how the game developers manage to put all those ideas together and not cause the game to implode.

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2. Everquest

Seriously, I didn't want to explain my reason behind this because it is difficult. I wanted to go like "You old Evercracks understand why" and leave it at that, but that obviously won't do, right? =)

So here I go.

Everquest was introduced to me by my good friend John. At that time, we were kids at 14 years of age and were really interested in fantasy stuff like DnD unlike other kids. Thinking back, I guess I would've been really into Diablo 2 or Ragnarok Online if not for Everquest and things might have gone differently. Either way, let's talk about Everquest.

Everquest, to me, is like the USA Basketball Dream Team of 1992. Due to its circumstances, luck and what its made of, it became a legend that will never be repeated again. To put it bluntly, it was an accident. At my time of playing (think I missed the vanilla bandwagon and entered at Velious or Luclin when the game was arguably supposedly declining), I think there were like 12-14 races, almost all of them having their own unique starting location. Classes were each remembered for their uniqueness. Raiding, even if it was invented in some other game before, started with this game.

The game was also one of the exemplary "immersive" games. Lighting played a role, along with Dark Vision/Low-light vision. I remembered creating a Human after playing a Wood Elf for so long and was surprised at how I couldn't see in the dark (I had to max out my gamma settings). The games was also mainly played in first person, mainly because the third person camera sucks, adding on to the immersiveness. And yes, those were the days of exploration with maps, following roads hoping that you were walking in the right direction, asking passer-bys to confirm, memorizing the whole of Kelethin and leading lost newbies to their destinations.

Everquest was also extremely brutal, especially now when you consider other MMOs that arise. Experience loss upon death, begging for cleric rez to get your experience points back, respawning naked and needing to travel back to your corpse (like Diablo 1/2, but definitely a lot worse), begging necromancers to summon your corpse because you cannot remember where it was lost, easily more than half the classes cannot solo, the list just goes on. It's not necessarily a good thing, but this post is about games that impacted me which does not necessarily bring up good points (usually it will though). I remember mourning (at myself) for every death that happened in the game.

I had tons of memories in the world of Norath, both good and bad. Wandering in the game felt just as fun as leveling up. Thinking back, the grind was seriously ridiculous though, but hey it's one of the first MMOs to ever be created. Games made back then tend to be harder.

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3. Fallout 2
It was hard to decided between this and Fallout Tactics, and much harder to say which comes up on top because both are essentially very different games. I have to give Fallout 2 the lead in the end though. Fallout 2 was the first open-ended world game I have played that has no time limit restrictions (Fallout 1 had). The pacing was great and blends well with the story, giving you a crappy spear (since you start as a tribal), then giving you a really crappy gun and finally when you first get your handgun you fell like a god. Everyone who played Fallout 2 remembers the dumb spear you have to live through the starting part of the game. Also, speech dialogues and dialogue options were so good that it makes you wonder why games nowadays fail to accomplish such depth (probably second only to Planescape: Torment). Did they spend so much time on 3D animations and graphics that they neglect storytelling as a whole? Entirely possible.

The amount of content was immense. There is just so many things to do that you will forget what is the main objective in the first place. It was like the Skyrim of the past, though Skyrim was nowhere as complex mechanically (sorry, I'm not a Skyrim fan so don't hate me). The NPCs that follow you were really memorable, whether they have a bone through their noses or not. You have no idea how shocked I was when I saw what happened to Harold in the later Fallout games. Harold, to me, is the second most memorable non-party NPC in Fallout 2. First, of course, goes to Lynette whom we all love to hate.

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4. Baldur's Gate 2
After mentioning Fallout 2, it's only fair to mention Baldur's Gate 2 from Bioware. In my opinion, Baldur's Gate 2 was the best game Bioware ever made; better than Old Republic, better than Mass Effect, better than Neverwinter Night, better than Dragon Age and without debate better than Jade Empire.

Baldur's Gate 2 had very memorable characters, most of them complete with background story and their own OST. Speaking of OST, this game had a pretty decent one. Side quests are epic, involving plane shifting, fighting demi-liches (as if liches were not epic enough!), dragons that lag your computer for no reason, beholders that run a cult, etc. Itemization and loot were done well compared to RPGs of today. Just an example, do you remember what killing dragons yield you in Dragon Age? I don't. Killing dragons in BG2 yields you a whooping +5 Holy Avenger that can be upgraded to +6 later in the game.

Overall, the game has pretty good replay value considering that some party members you obtain don't really get along with each other and considering how many different classes and kits there are in the game. You will replay just to form a different team of characters and try out different classes and their nonsense.

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4. Capcom vs SNK 2
This game got me into the fighting game scene many years back and is still one of my favorite fighting game of all time despite how broken the game is. The ability to select UP TO 3 characters, choose your meter-type (groove), and adjust their power level (ratios) allows for theoretically tons of combinations. The game boasts over 40 characters, very distinct OST that loops in my head even today and a very memorably annoying in-game announcer.

In all, the game is very polished (except for Morrigan and her really badly done sprite sheet) and has been one of the fighting game community's major tournament games back than before Street Fighter 4.

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5. Ultimate Marvel vs. Capcom 3
For basically the same reason as CVS2; UMVC3 is a game with tons of possibilities. Because I missed the MVC2 bandwagon back then, competitive fighting games that can have 6 characters on the screen at the same time is totally new to me. On top of that, this game is extremely hype. No matter how much I hate it for its brokeness, just commentating or watching people play the game is fun.

I don't think I have played around in any fighting game's training mode longer than UMVC3's. It's not just to figure out frames, setups and combos, but also to experiment with other teams and making them work decently. It's like forming a deck in trade card games but with your skills coming into play.

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6. Atelier Rorona
And we are back to JRPGs! Rorona is quite an eye-opener for me because up till 2011, I have been playing RPGs (not just JRPGs) with the usual "follow the storyline, level up, get epic loot and kill the boss" type of gameplay. Rorona, or rather, the Atelier Arland series, did not have that. It was essentially a crafting game. If you are familiar with MMOs and tradeskills, this is a game that revolves around it more than fighting.

Basically in Rorona, you need to craft to save your shop. To craft, you have to adventure to pick materials or fight monsters for them. But you see, unlike other RPGs, fighting monsters (or bosses) are just obstacles and a means of getting better material so that you can craft better objects. I find that I spend most of my time in the game looking at my inventory than figuring out dungeons (as if there is a need to figure them out). It was an eye opener and I figured that there are indeed other ways to run RPGs other than "go to dungeons and save the world".

And the reason to craft isn't the same for its other games. The game after it, Atelier Totori, was not about saving any shops, but about crafting to aid Totori's adventures in search for her long lost mother who was also an adventurer. The crafting mechanics is actually very simple to understand but deep, which makes it beautiful.

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7. Nethack
I found Nethack around 2004 I think, and it was the game that introduced me to the world of roguelikes (I haven't played Rogue though). The amount of things you can do is insane to the point where I thank the existence of Google, wikis and the Internet. Nethack made me seek other roguelikes old and new: Rogue, Dwarf Fortress, Civilization, Desktop Dungeon, Faster than Light, etc.

I find Nethack to be a nice, light and free game to carry around to play these days. It constantly amazes me that so much content can be stored in under 5MB AND I am playing the graphical version (the text-based version is waaaay smaller). A floppy disk WAS enough to store a playable game!

How did I find a 1980s game at my time? I have no idea, probably stumbled upon it over the Internet.

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8. Disgaea
I think Disgaea is the first game that showed me that hitting the maximum level isn't enough. The amount of hours I threw into this game over the course of a year is retarded, and it pales in comparison to other players who have a lot more time in their hands. This is on top of it's unique storytelling, lovable characters and over the top sprite animations. As the series evolved, Nippon Ichi just went nuts with adding crazier animations and grinding mechanics (as if it wasn't enough).

Words just cannot explain the insane numbers the characters' stats can hit in this game. We are not talking thousands, or ten thousands but millions or even billions (I have no idea what kind of numbers Disgaea D2 has). Honestly, when you start playing the game, you have no idea that it is possible to reach those kind of numbers. You can just imagine the feeling of accomplishment when you manage to hit those numbers and also the despair when the monster you challenged ripped you apart with multiples of the same numbers.

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9. Touhou: Imperishable Night

If you are searching for free japanese indie games, you will eventually come across this bag of worms (not in a bad way). This game is more inspirational than anything. It was single-handedly developed by ZUN, one of the few game developers out there I really give my hats off to.

The amount of other indie games, fan-comics (doujins) and even music remixes made by other people based on the characters from this series is incredibly phenomenal. Those who know or went to events like Comiket will understand. It's certainly inspiring that a simple bullet hell game made by ONE person could create such an insane craze in Japan, even today.

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10. Sengoku Rance
They say leave the best for the last. As if Rorona wasn't eye-opening enough, this game is ridiculous. It's one of the most popular H-game in Japan with incredible amounts of replayability. Sengoku Rance blended RPG with RTK-style games beautifully (supposedly the official genre name of RTK/Civilization games is "Historical War Simulation). It is painful to think that people shun away from this game just because it's a H-game.

Believe it or not, this game has decent storytelling. It is part of Alicesoft's long running Rance RPG series, and has a pretty large English fanbase who are hard at work translating the games for us. Mechanics-wise, this game has much to offer. Equipping characters, recruiting fallen enemies, performing negotiations, multiple endings, different troop types (ninjas, spearmen, foot soldiers, monks, mikos...), conquering enemy countries, dungeoneering for loot, the list just goes on. I think amongst the Rance series, Sengoku Rance is the most popular with the English fanbase and with good reason.

And there's soooooo many unique characters in this game. Again, replayability is the strong point of this game. People have reported to spend 200+ hours just playing this. I obviously have not completed it but I do want to return to playing it.

Review: "Antichamber"

Antichamber. Hmm how do I start? When I was at PAX last year, a shooter puzzle indie game with really simplistic graphics caught my eye. I took a glance and saw Antichamber, and players screaming "WTF IS HAPPENING?!" while they play. I tried it and I felt the exact same "WTF" moments for each and every puzzle presented to me. I was hooked and looked forward to its purchase.

Fast forward to Steam Summer Sales today. I saw Antichamber and instantly bought it. From a very matter-of-fact perspective, I think it's at most a decent puzzle game. I was at first caught off guard as I did not know that the game focuses on exploration. You basically go room to room, arranged like a maze, and try to solve each puzzle. If you can't, either you are not trying hard enough, or your 'gun' does not have the ability to solve. Your 'gun' basically manipulate small coloured cubes, and its ability get stronger as you progress. That's it really. Very simple idea. Fantastic level design around that idea. 

But let's not sing too much praises for the game. When the game fools with your mind once, you'd think it's amazing. However, if it keeps using the same trick, it gets monotonous and you will eventually 'accept' the amazing as something norm. That, I feel, is the biggest problem I have with the game. After it screws my mind with disappearing walls, floors, exchanging entrances, exits, teleports, illusions, teleports with illusion...it gets old. I would say that it is more of a genre problem than a game problem though. Imagine playing Portal without narration or story. There is no motivation for me at all to complete all the puzzles. 

One thing I would definitely change is to put the 'hints' or 'words of advice' to the puzzle at the START, not at the END of it. As I complete each puzzle, seeing the 'words of advice' at the end felt like the game is mocking me. I understand the designer's perspective though. I'm assuming he wants us players to get through the puzzles with our own hands and conclude with 'sayings' so that we will learn more about life. A novel idea, but it is just not working out for me. This is because all these 'sayings' are common sense, like most 'sayings' of the world. 

"The world looks different from the other side."

"Old skills are useful after we have learned new ones."

To me, all these abstract sentences hold no purpose. It's like me telling you "The space is black" and people start explaining it like "Oh it's very true! Black symbolizes nothingness, which can be read as having unlimited possibilities...etc". It's abstract! Like for programming, abstract code means nothing on its own unless some other guy decides to use it and interpret it in his own words, giving it more meaning. By itself...well the space is fucking black. 

Anyway, Antichamber is still a game worth playing and buying. I know that not many are going to share my opinion, and I can totally understand why. If I were able to look past these small little things, maybe I would be able to complete the game in one run. The level design is fantasic. Did I mention that the level design is really good? Oh The level design is really good! 

However, for some reason, prolonged exposure to the game gave me motion sickness, which never happened to me before =(

Review: "Monaco"

Monaco is a top down 2D colorful pixel art stealth indie game, where players choose different criminals to perform heists. Players can choose to complete the heist by themselves or cooperate with up to 3 other friends.

Monaco's story tells of 4 specialized criminals who performed a prison break and plans to escape Monaco. Along the way, they enlisted help from 4 other criminals to aid their escape. These 8 different criminals are the Locksmith, Pickpocket, Cleaner, Lookout, Mole, Gentleman, Hacker and Redhead.

Line of sight leads to importance of positioning

Stealth games are an interesting genre to me. I think it is safe to say that it is difficult to design one that is 100%  about sneaking aroumd. Usually, stealth games incooperate NPC-disabling aspects in varying degrees, from basic knocking the lights off enemies to permenantly killing them with a stab to the back to plain manslaughter. Metal Gear, Thief, Splinter Cell and Hitman all have the same trend. One of the reasons is that designers would want to empower the players, and empowerment is one of the most powerful ways to provide fun to the players. Not allow players to disable enemies seems rather counter-productive (not saying that it is impossible to create a stealth game like that; I totally believe that it is doable). But one must remember that disabling an enemy will trivialize that area of the level the enemy is at. As an example, if you kill everyone on a level in the stealth games classic Thief, completing that level will be a walk in a park.

Monaco did not move away from the trend. However, Monaco has a very strict limitation on this topic on disabling enemies. Lets throw in some game facts so that we can get a better perspective. The tools players can carry is limited; one tool per player, and each tool's ammo is obtained by collecting every 10 coins which are littered throughout the map. On top of that, only half the tools are actually harmful to enemies (weapons). Also, enemies can revive each other. This makes weapons cost-ineffective for the heists, espacially when the other non-lethal tools are really good (like the Smoke Bomb which blocks enemy line of sight, or the EMP which disables all nearby electronic devices like alarms or cameras).

Information relayed to players is clear and concise

This bring us to the next feature of the game. Monaco features 8 unique professions the players can choose to play. For a new player, I found that I have the most ease completing most of the levels with The Cleaner. Like I mentioned before, disabling enemies in stealth games can trivialize the level. It so happens that The Cleaner does this very well. He is able to disable anyone he touches as long as they are not alerted. After using him for the first time, I could never stop. Only on very specific scenarios will The Cleaner have trouble. In a nutshell, The Cleaner is generally useful in all maps because he can potentially get rid of the greatest threats that is common in them. The other classes are quite the opposite; they are useful on specific maps and can suffer badly if the map does not cater to their abilities.

The Locksmith, who opens locks faster, is good at levels where you have memorized the map and going for speed runs in places with a lot of locks. I do not have much of a problem with him as locks are one of the most common things you encounter.

The Pickpocket, who has a monkey that collects coins, is probably as powerful to me as the Cleaner as he has the potential to avoid the need to interact with enemies. He is easily my second choice to clear a level, should the Cleaner face difficulties. 

The Lookout, who climbs vents and stairs faster and can detect NPCs while sneaking or standing still, is useful in co-op matches because she can help other players detect enemies from hidden places. I do not use her much as her ability is really only good for escaping, and I try not to get myself spotted most of the time.

The Mole, who can destroy walls, might perform really well in levels with lots of walls to break as he can bypass certain obstacles. The only problem is that very few levels give The Mole this chance. Some levels can just simply shut his abilities down with good placement of NPCs and giving very few walls for him to break through without screwing himself.

The Gentleman, who wears disguises (a shield for enemies detecting you), is probably only good for running across security cameras. I have not found a security camera which I have problems bypassing with other characters though.  In my opinion, his ability is the most boring.

The Redhead, who will charm the first person who spot her (you will have to go out of sight to lose them), is very good or very bad depending on the level's NPC placement. I find her really annoying to use because if I charmed the wrong person, I would have to get rid of him as if I was being chased, in which case it is almost no different from getting chased in the first place. 

The Hacker, who hacks computers faster and can hack through power socket, is also very dependant on the level. This is because all characters can inherently hack through computers, so using the hacking mechanic is a common ability. The only difference is the The Hacker can hack faster and hack in more places, and again the extra places the Hacker can hack is dependant on the level (like if some wise-ass designer decides not to give you sockets to hack through). 

I have already mentioned about The Cleaner. So of course, the Cleaner has areas where it is problematic for him, like when there are too many enemies together in one spot. However, that situation is just as problematic for other professions, save maybe the Pickpocket. 

Hector is his monkey

But I must stop myself from going into a tangent about stealth games and its design. The problems I faced with each profession are just my opinions and I can see how each of them cater to different players (maybe people find unlocking doors fast better than disabling enemies, since if they can unlock doors fast, they have less problems running into patrols for example). In the end, because of its limitations of disabling enemies, I find myself sneaking and hiding, bidding myself time as an enemy walks by, more than actually trying to disable enemies (even for The Cleaner). 

Monaco is essentially a very well-executed stealth game. It has interesting mechanics, features and rather well-written scripts and dialogues before each heist (although it sort of went downhill after they met the Hacker). On top of that, it has a really good soundtrack! I would definitely recommend this game for everyone to play, casual or not. 

Skyrim Review, thoughts and rants.

Already, ten days has passed since Skyrim's release and people are either enjoying it fully while other are beginning to compare it with other games. At first with the previous 2 Elder Scrolls, namely Morrowind and Oblivion (I didn't play the first two) , I thought they were rich yet barren. If you compare Skyrim to old classics like Baldur's Gate, where you plan your party and your characters, go to the deepest dungeons, slay the big dragon and get epic loot, coupled with excellent storytelling, itemization and combat mechanics, Skyrim will automatically seem to pale in comparison. I can see where old school RPG players are coming from and what they yearn for. I am a huge fan of past Black Isle and Troika games and I am still waiting for an RPG that is like theirs

After like 3 iterations, Bethesda refuses to give proper itemization and interesting combat mechanics. You still left click 100 times to melee a monster to death. But people still love it. Recent games I personally enjoy like Witcher 2 got flushed into being a cult hit, sharing the same fate as previous Black Isle games. Yet games like Oblivion (which I personally dislike) are cheered by most gamers as a great RPG. Obviously amongst all the bad thing I found in Oblivion, Bethesda is doing something right which I did not notice and care much about back then because I believed that they were in the wrong.

So the question is, what are they doing right? Why do they choose to stick with mechanics I disagree with after every iteration? I have to stop comparing to the RPGs I know and essentially ask what are they trying to achieve. From the looks of it, Bethesda wants to create an immersive and realistic open world experience, to a certain extent because we know it is not fully possible, feasible and desirable. At the same time, they want to provide constant challenge for the players.

There are a few things below they implemented for this design I wish to discuss and examine. A quick recap and disclaimer though, I do not particularly like any of the mechanics they implemented, but just picking them out and see how is it possible that such mechanics appeal to their target audience, which I assume is just "as many people as possible".

'Blend' Combat Mechanics
In combat, you do not 'autoattack' or execute 'moves'. You simply slash/punch/cast spell. As boring as it sounds, it's actually quite close to what you do in real life. It is debatable whether this is a good or bad approach, but despite arguments, it is a strange undeniable fact that some people do enjoy left clicking 100 times repeatedly to kill a monster so long as he receives the proper feedback. Throughout the past 2 Elder Scrolls games, they did nothing but improve the feedback. Whether the feedback is enough is irrelevant in this discussion. The point is that it is an improvement. Skyrim makes it a little more logical with their new dual-wield mechanic.

This seems strange as it is the reverse of what game designers would want to do with their RPGs. Usually you would think "Let's have this mechanic where players can do combo A or do combo B and get different results!" Witcher 2 had some form of a combo system, Dragon Age was a hotkey-fest, Dark Souls have much focus in tactical maneuvering and usage of weapons. What if there are people who actually find all of them too difficult? Going through playtesting sessions for the games I make, it might not be far from the truth. Ultimately, clicking the left mouse button 100 times is not only logical to the common player, but also easy to adjust to. If you complain about your swings missing because the AI is moving around you, you obviously have not been in a fight.

Seriously, you either like this mechanic or you don't. It offers almost little to no depth, which may seemingly be a bad thing, but can be a good thing.

Scaling
Enemy and item scaling according to player level has been something in Morrowind, Oblivion and now Skyrim. This part is really tricky. For one, it theoretically gives constant challenge to the players. However, it does break immersion or 'suspension of disbelief'. For example, I should be able to defeat the same named monster easier when I level up. To make matters worse, itemization scales with level as well. The designers are probably hoping that most players do not notice this scaling mechanic and only see the challenge before them. This has improved over the past Elder Scrolls though. It is no longer possible to make a level 1 character and kill trash mobs until the end of the main quest.

On the other hand, without scaling, it would mean that designers have to separate areas into level ranges, just like what most MMOs are doing now. This could run into the risk of players not visiting certain areas because its 'level is too low'. Also, if not done right, players will feel that the world is deliberately crafted and that his path is determined from the start. It's like how in Everquest where players who start in Freeport and just go from Freeport -> East Commons -> West Commons -> etc. In the example of WoW, players who start as an Orc just go from Valley of Trials -> whatever the troll village is called -> Razor Hill -> Barrens.

Somehow they must empower players the freedom to explore where-ever they want without making it too boring or too difficult AND at the same time ensure that certain monsters are a dangerous threat to the new player. They want to provide a world where players can explore, yet they want players to survive most encounters so that they don't feel frustrated. This really feels like some tug-of-war relationship between immersion and the need to provide constant challenge.

I have mixed reviews about Skyrim's execution of this mechanic. Some people said the game scales badly (as in they are getting killed at later levels), some say that the game is too easy (they just kill everything with or without min/maxing). Most of them are still playing Skyrim despite this, so I assume that it is working fine. For me, I haven't encountered any problems yet.

Pitiful Quests
Lack of carrots at the end of most trash quests demotivates many players from playing. Most of the quests do not promise good rewards for the effort you put into it. Is it really a problem? Is it okay to be asked to clear a fort of bandits for nothing more than 100gp and no further progression afterwards? For good measure, 100gp in Skyrim is worth as much as looting 2 or 3 of said bandits you slay. Not to mention that it is possible for you to just travel to the destination without triggering the quest and kill the bandits yourself if you need the gold.

But what if that was not the point of the quests? Essentially, going by their design of having an open world, the main point of quests is probably to gives you a reason to explore. Maybe it allows the players feel that they are doing favors for the NPCs, as opposed to mindlessly walking around to kill monsters. Most of us veteran players know better, but will others know? I myself feel cheated when I was awarded the 100gp, I mean seriously they could really give me more. Then we talk about 'pointless' quests that don't even ask you to explore OR reward you with anything. Maybe the design was to let players feel that the game is more alive? I don't see it, but is the problem with players like me?

The quests does not work out for me, but I can appreciate what they are trying to do. Amazingly, non-hardcore-RPG players I know are able to talk about "the lady who sells potions in Solitude whose daughter was missing in action". For those who don't know (spoilers), there's this alchemist lady in Solitude who simply ask you to talk to a certain person, and return to her once you get information out of him. The reward was non-existent and it is really pretty pointless as a quest, but somehow, people who explore the area remember.

Immersion + Numbers?
I mentioned immersion, but yet there are numbers. What gives? Well, there is a limit to how far you can push the idea of immersion into the game. The hard fact is that for some things, players need to know its exact details. It won't help much if I were to

You can see how they evolved from Morrowind to Skyrim. Morrowind was very detailed as they gave me actual base stats and derived stats to try to min/max. In Morrowind, I can see my Strength, Willpower, Intelligence, Agility, etc. Skyrim is almost totally opaque. The only numbers I see are my gold pieces, the amount of stuff I got, my HP, MP, SP, my weight limit, my skill points, armor rating and . That's about it really. You can tell that they are pushing towards that direction of game play, where players should not need to worry about anything more than what is directly affecting them.

Is this a good thing? I prefer my game transparent, but honestly with their design, I can see why they just choose to hide everything from the players. It is mainly because of this Skyrim feels so mainstream, I believe.

Conclusion
These points are some of the gripes I have about the game (I might add more), which I think makes the game successful. Having written the points down allows me to appreciate the game more than I did before when I was just bashing. Despite this however, I stand by my feelings that Oblivion isn't a good game (Morrowind is better) because there are other points about that game which I totally don't agree with. Skyrim, however, is a huge improvement, enough for me to accept it as a 'good enough RPG'.

I can see how Besthesda's game designers are constantly pulling off a balancing act with all those implementations. They are always pursuing a white/black color but constantly end up somewhere in the grey area.

Finally, I am going to quickly label what I like and hate about Skyrim thus far aside from its game design philosophy.

First with the likes:
- Level Design. Not fantastic, but at least every dungeon I walk into isn't some direct copy of another. At least there are books (yes, I read them, some of them are quite interesting) as a lazy way to fill me in about the dungeon. Some dungeons are actually interesting enough to leave me wondering about it (I think there was one with a forge and ingots of moonstone outside a tomb).
- Graphics. God, I love the harsh snowstorms.
- Performance. Remember when Oblivion was lagging like crazy because it is compiling shaders and scripts on runtime? Skyrim's performance is awesome. I only managed to crash it once by running other games behind and alt-tabbing Skyrim like crazy.
- Shouts. Seriously, I didn't see this coming. Although some are useless, they are quite interesting to have.
- Dragons done right. Last dragon I saw was Dragon Age which isn't really interesting to fight with given its predictable behavior and small arena. I think I saw my friend fight a dragon in Dark Souls which was quite impressive, but it is scripted in an area. Dragons in Skyrim can appear anywhere and they kind of manage to get its AI working for every area they are in (i.e. they have to dynamically allow the dragon to access its surroundings). There are rare bugs of course but I don't really expect them to get it perfectly right even with tons of testing .

And what I didn't like:
- Talents. Firstly, they are badly designed. Secondly, I think they do not fit the design philosophy of their game. They could execute it more elegantly by letting NPCs teach you certain talents, maybe make you get talents by doing something (block 100 hits to get 20% better a blocking perk!). They could do some Fallout 3 thing where they give you perks based on the random things you do (kill 100 rats = 25% better at killing rats). I strongly believe that will fit in much better than what they have now.
- Spellcrafting. It was there in Morrowind and Oblivions. Where has it gone? It was easily one of the more unforgettable mechanic they implemented. I suspect it's because of the new implementation of the dual-casting mechanic which could cause problems for the spellcrafting system.
- Horses. Goddamit just get it right already!
- Riding horses. Why is it not in first person?
- Interface. I suspect that they are catering more towards console. In fact, it is quite obvious. The mouse input is occasionally buggy.
- Ugly interface. It's just looks really primitive to the point I think that they are placeholder art.
- Fast Travel. I should really have a whole rant dedicated to this topic. I hate the concept of Fast Travel, especially in the game like Skyrim. The carriages that transport you to main cities are actually good enough and it works just like how subways work. I'll probably talk more of this another time.

I think Skyrim is a pretty good game and an improvement from its predecessors. It is great in its own way and I really shouldn't compare it with conventional RPGs. It is different. It is a game catered more for Explorers than Achievers, almost just like how there are people who like Minecraft and those who don't. I can see how Achievers can easily get bored with its content, but for Explorers, this game is a friggin' gold mine.

I will definitely keep playing the game with my 'Captain America' unarmed cat build. I'm honestly not that much of an "Explorer" type player (I actually prefer to 'explore' different builds and play-styles) but I would love to see this build being viable in the game at Master level. Once I reach near end-game, I will try to post a guide on my build =)

Review: "SpaceChem"

Ever want to feel like an engineer? Or experience what it is like to be one? If you loved puzzle games like Picross, Sudoku and enjoy spending hours on an your office computer playing minesweeper, you should definitely give SpaceChem a try.

You play a Reactor Engineer, unbinding chemical atoms and synthesizing them to create new compounds to fulfill your quota. In each reactor, you control two Waldos, which are basically things you control to do stuff to atoms and molecules (being really vague here I know). The trailer video should roughly explain what's going on:



So far my experience with SpaceChem has been nothing but positive. It has polished, simple graphics which is good because at higher levels you will most probably be forming a mess so...messy that it is difficult for you to keep track what's happening. If you have ever programmed, it feels alike to looking at nested while loops.

I do agree that this is not a game for everyone, but if you enjoy puzzle games, do give the demo a shot. The cool thing about this game is that it will ask you if you want to record your solutions and post them on YouTube, so that you can compare your solutions with others around the world.

And don't worry if you made a mess like the video below:

Review: "Patapon 3 "

There are quite a few mixed reviews about Patapon 3 as many people do not like the direction it's taking. No longer do you command a horde of patapons to battle in Patapon 3. Instead, you command 4 (only 4, don't look at the trailers) really beefed up patapons, one of them being your main character. Some patron fans dislike the change, but honestly not everyone wants another Patapon 2 grindfest. Patapon 3 also attempts to delve into the multiplayer aspect of the game, so it sensibly elaborated and enhanced the heroes from Patapon 2, as well as porting over Patapon 2's multiplayer gameplay to single player. This makes alot of sense since both modes will no longer be treated differently.

There isn't really much to bash about the game. In a way you can say they made the game more mainstream, in a good way. Basically each character you control now has an archetype and depending on which archetypes the are, they will gain access to different classes. You will select your main character's archetype at the start but you can access other archetypes once your basic archetype's class hits level 15, so essentially you will get to try out all classes in one playthrough.


That is the main change in Patapon 3. There are other small changes like architems. Once you level an equipment past level 10, you will choose it's type to be your architem. Architems can leveled past your blacksmith level (which starts at 10). Once you get an architem past the next ten levels, you blacksmith level will increase, allowing you to upgrade your other items to that level. One thing to note is that if you want to change architem, it's level will drop to your blacksmith level. However you can go to your friend's blacksmith and upgrade the type of weapon he has choosn as his architem without suffering any penelties. Sounds a little complicated, and I didn't really get it the first time either. An example: you choose spear as your architem and upgrade it to level 27. Blacksmith level is now 20 because you hit the 2nd tenth milestone. All your items can be upgraded to level 20 until your architem hits 30.

If you skipped the wall of text above, you probably made the right choice but it was necessary to at least have it there because it's one of the important changes to the game. Aside from that, they removed a all of those mini games from Patapon 2. In fact, I can safely say that Patapon 3 is not the same as its predecessors, so there are bound to be people who hate it, and those who have a newfound love for it. Multiplayer becomes a key factor to the game much like Monster Hunter or other raid-based MMOs out there. Sure you can solo your way through, but higher level dungeons are multiplayer-only and to experience the whole game, you HAVE to play with your friends. Period.


As far as plot is concerned, Patapon 3 writes its scripts in comedy to the point where its almost like those random Cartoon Network shows. You will laugh a bit, raise your eyebrows a bit and sometimes facepalm but it's enjoyable all around. Patapon 3 really narrows (again, not a bad thing) its scope to the individual Patapons and that makes the game enjoyable in a different way.

Patapon 3 is different, 'nuff said. There will be haters, but looking it as a solitary game, it's definitely worth giving it a try before making any rush conclusions. It's still grindy as hell though, just not as much as Patapon 2. Below is a gameplay footage (walkthrough really) found on YouTube so click at your own risk as there much be spoilers. I just wanted to show the dialog of the characters mostly.

Review: "Portal 2"

Short version of the review:
Portal 2 rocked!

Long version:

More Gameplay Elements
We shall observe Portal 2 as a consumer, a game designer and a game developer. There are so many things done right that I could not possibly list them all out. But first, we must talk about what are we to expect from a sequel of a game which revolves around one and ONLY one mechanic: Shooting Enter and Exit portals. From a game designer perspective, one mechanic can only entertain for so long. The question is not how to find new ways to use the mechanic (it's nigh impossible, too much effort for possibly a dead end), but how to make the mechanic act on other gameplay elements (the easy, fun way out).

So rightfully, as a consumer, one should not expect new ways of using the portal gun as it is. One should look forward to more elements to use the portal gun on. As far as this aspect is concerned, the Portal 2 team came up just enough to entertain us. From the gravity beam, the 3 different gels to the catapult thingies, it's more than enough to mix and match and come up with puzzles that will entertain us.




But of course, just having elements is not enough. Elements are just that: elements. Once an engine is up, elements are easy to implement. In fact, only the level designers and possibly the QAs are having headaches over it. So much more can be done and the team indeed delivered.

Storytelling
The team proceeded to create a more engaging storytelling. Back in Portal 1, it's basically no different from a flash puzzle game only that it is in 3D FPS-style with Glados randomly talking crap at the background. There's no character development at all. Now, in Portal 2, the characters you interact are more alive. Glados suddenly had a history, developed over time and her speeches are more engaging to the character. Same for the new Wheatley character, whose role provided an interesting twist to the game (alright I will not spoil). Even your character received some kind of background.

The team also broke away from just going room to room. There are quite a number of areas that are outside of the testing chambers. Basically, from a designer point of view, the consumer was given another environment to play with. This might seem to be a small change, but it affects the player in a huuuuge way. For one, he does feel that he was given more freedom, and more freedom, fake or not, in any designer or consumer's books, is a bloody good thing.

Anyways, I'll go as far as to say that Bioware has a thing or two...maybe A LOT to learn from these guys.

Graphics
The final thing to note is the graphics. Again, there isn't much I can type about graphics in the blog, but I can say that Portal 2's graphics is amazing. Seriously when you get the game, before every room just look at the surroundings. Dynamic soft shadows, shattered glass, water dynamics, the gel mechanic's decals on different surfaces, light, etc. The best thing is that they wasted no time in showing off their graphics. Right from the start of the game, you get to observe how light and shadow changes around you when things fall apart. It's no joke man.



Overall, Portal 2 is a great game. I can't wait to actually try to co-op mode, which is a brilliant add-on and another ball game by itself. It's really nice to see a novel idea go this far in the games industry. It gives me, and possibly other aspiring developers out there comfort that such novelty is Still Alive, that the game industry isn't just filled with the same old FPS, RPGs and Facebook games.

Review: "Dragon Age 2"

Good god, I don't even know where to begin. Looking back at my Dragon Age Origins review, I keep wondering where did Bioware went wrong with this game. Seriously, there weren't many things wrong with the previous game. The biggest complaints I had were mainly balance issues and a couple of personal opinions which disagreed with the game.

I'll list down the main problems up here first in case I forget as I write:
- Stats, Weapon restrictions/customizing equipment
- Fortitude
- Bugged import feature/ Buggy characters
- Lack of animation cancelling in combat/ Animation in general
- Lack of strategic view
- Incredibly cheaply generated instances
- Plot

From here on, be warned that some sections contain spoilers.


First off, I'll like to briefly discuss the good parts, however few the game has. Dragon Age 2 does has some improvements which I find pretty decent like the new Skill system. I'm kinda in support for the skill tree, although it might be just personal preference. I find it much cleaner and much more fun navigating the trees. Aside from that, there's the improved graphics, which I don't really have much to comment about.

Then everything just went downhill from there...


Stats and equipment restrictions
Bioware, or EA for that matter, I understand that you are streamlining stats for the sake of the masses. It's so obvious: Heavy armor can be worn if you have high strength AND constitution, light armor can be worn if you have high dexterity AND cunning, and mage robes can be worn if you have high magic AND willpower. On top of that, bows and daggers require dexterity, staffs require magic and sword/shield and two handed swords require strength. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out where this is going. It means that as a warrior, it simply does not make sense to try to play a light armor dex-based warrior because if I invest into dexterity and cunning, I won't have the stats to carry warrior weapons!

But why not just pretend to be a rogue then? Can't you carry daggers? Well, apparently Bioware decided to go "Well, what kind of warriors carry bows?" or something and only allowed swords/shields and 2 handed swords to only be used by warriors, daggers/bows to only be used by rogues and staffs to only be used by mages, on top of the stat requirements to wield them. Then what the hell, don't bother allowing me to customize my stats then. If you want to streamline a mechanic, just do it all the way. Why bother my rogue with other stats such as 'willpower' and 'strength'? Already by passing half of my stat gain to dexterity and cunning, I'm finding it a little hard to keep up with the equipment I found and it hard to find the remaining points to spend onto other stats. Seriously, if they are so supportive of restricting important things such as equipment, they might as well save themselves the trouble and restrict us from customizing stats.


Fortitude
This is a wonderful sub-stat that Strength governs. Apparently Bioware found it cool to send your characters flying when they are hit by a mob with higher strength value or something. Apparently, they also find it cool to tell you everytime you die in the loading screen that "All classes have their way of escaping. For instance, Fighter can use Stonewall, Rogues can use Evade and Mages can use Mind Blast". F*** it does not work when you are stunned or knocked back goddammit. What good are such abilities when you can't use them while stunned? Once I recover from my knockback, I'm just gonna WASD my way out of safety instead of spending stamina to enter ANOTHER animation and risk myself getting killed if the skill did not do what it's supposed to do (for mages and rogues, it's reducing aggro) because sometimes it doesn't.

It's gonna stupid to see a random guy or monster suddenly hitting your rogue/mage and he/she is doomed to die unless you somehow manage to stop him. Seriously my rogue have skills like Inconspicuous and Evade and I hardly use them because once I get hit, I'm gonna get chain stunned to death anyway. You may say I lack skillz or something, so then how would you use Evade? You obviously don't use it when you are not getting hit, and you can't use it when you are getting hit. So what, add strength to my rogue? I might as well make another warrior.

And if you are going to say I am supposed to manage the aggro with it, well take a look at the description: "The rogue leaps backward. Enemies within melee range will often seek an easier target instead." The second statement OBVIOUSLY implies that I use it WHEN I AM GETTING TARGETED (which usually translate to getting hit). Well, if I'm targeted and unlucky enough to fail my dodge chance with a 80% defense (to an even mob), what then? The skill don't even make sense at all. Same for Mind Blast: "The mage projects a wave of telekinetic force that knocks enemies back and diverts hostile attention." What good is it if you can't use it when stunned or knocked down?


Bugged import feature/ Buggy characters
There are a few bugs like the horrible Merrill Act 3 quest bug but such bugs are unfortunate since it does require quite a deal of testing to find. But Fenris' and Isabella's friend talent bug? What? This is so damn easy to test. It leaves me wondering if the developers even checked the numbers properly when they implemented the talents. For those who don't know, when you become good friends with Isabella, and if they are in your party, your main character will be hit by a permanent 5% attack speed DEBUFF every time you load the game. Check the video of a victim here:



This bug is rather unforgivable and it's really not that hard to test. This leads to me think that there is something funny about whoever programmed the Save/Load aspect of the game. Maker's Sigh potion also had a bug regarding Save/Load.

On top of that, they screwed those who imported from their Dragon Age: Origins DLC save or Awakenings save. Apparently, romances and other flags are not toggled properly when imported. This is apparent when Leliana appeared in the Exiled Prince DLC and implicitly tells my character that she did not romance with my Origins character. It may seem like a small thing but it has several several implications. Firstly in invokes the wrath of the perfectionist fanboy and people like me who purposely replayed Dragon Age: Origins so that I could port my character over. Secondly it raises the concern about future DLCs and expansions. Why can't Bioware even get something as simple as an import feature or Save/Load right? It feels like they are abandoning this franchise.


Lack of animation cancelling in combat
When I first saw the new animations, I thought it was a change for the better, but I could not be so wrong. During an animation, I am only allowed to perform a command (drinking potions or casting spells) only after the character completed the current animation. As if the Fortitude thing I stated above isn't bad enough. Not only Bioware thinks enemies chain stunning me is a fun thing, they even went ahead to implement self-inducing stun! It was ridiculous to see my mage low on half, pausing the game, switching the camera to his view and see him in the middle of his staff-twirling antics (the last animation for auto-attack that takes 2 full seconds), and realize that he refuses to drink the damn health potion until his animation is done.

It's not like it's even hard to implement animation canceling. Oh wait! If you have coded animations before, you'll know that animation cancels from one to another naturally UNLESS you put code to restrict it. What does this mean? It means that Bioware intended to restrict your characters from cancelling his animation, so that he can't suddenly drink a potion in the middle of his attacks. Yes Bioware, aesthetically it's good. Mechanics-wise, it's horrible, not fun and ruins one of the main features Dragon Age claims to bring (remember they emphasized strategic thinking in combat?). Speaking of which...


Lack of strategic view
Seriously Bioware. The best thing that EVER happened to me in Dragon Age: Origins is the existence of his semi-ingenious mechanic that allows me to see most of the battlefield from a bird-eye view. Why did you take it away? Is it because you want to be in sync with the console versions? Is it because you suddenly decided not to make combat strategy, but instead more arcade? Might as well just turn the whole game into an FPS then. Otherwise, I just don't understand why it was removed. The camera is restrictive and painful enough to control in battles already with all the weird corner issues. If your reason is to make it more arcade-style, it STILL doesn't make sense from the previous reason (animation cancelling). There seem to be almost no direction in the game just by considering these points. It seems that the guys making Dragon Age 2 had no idea what made Dragon Age 1 good.

If they are taking into reference Mass Effect 2, they really are idiots. They are DIFFERENT games. Mass Effect can live without strategic view because it's mostly a point and shoot game. Their enemies are based on that. You are not going to see enemies chain spells of doom on you. In Dragon Age, knowing where each and every mage on the field is important. Knowing where the low-hp mobs are is important. Knowing where the archers are important. EVEN MORE SO when you give me crappy mechanics like Fortitude and restricting my animation cancels.


Incredibly cheaply generated instances
I've gone through instancing and ranted much about it in the past, but this takes it to another level. I wanted to kill someone when I went through all the random missions in Mass Effect 1. All the missions look the same as each other because of instancing. But it's okay. Those are just very unimportant sidequests.

But Dragon Age 2? When I saw Fenris' mansion's layout look exactly the same as the Bartrand mission and MANY MANY other sidequests (the Blood Mage that killed your mother quest, Silent Sisters (?) quest, the list goes on...), I was disgusted. But the worst, the most dirty trick they did was to give me the map of the dungeon and find out that most of the corridors are inaccessible. Like the ONLY difference (aside from minor texture changes and other aesthetics etc) between Fenris' mansion and the Silent Sisters mansion was that different doors are locked, but I was able to see the entire map (which ultimately looked the same). Otherwise, both mansions are EXACTLY the same as far as layout is concerned. It's disgusting. I thought Mass Effect 1 had it bad. This is not even trying. I can't even say that it's called instancing. From what I've studied so far, this is very close to 'cloning'.


Plot *SPOILER ALERT*
Finally we come to the final ingredient. There're so many ways to begin. When I tried to explain how discontinued the plot seemed to my friends, it was difficult. The overall story is actually digestible, but the plot was bad. What I meant was the way the story was told, and how the game lead me through the story. Lemme try to explain.

First you tell me that Hawke was from Lothering, ran away from the darkspawn to Kirkwall, find out that their uncle used up all their money and tells you that you need to find work. Hawke then finds someone to serve for a year in return for allowing her into Kirkwall. Fair enough. It's just a prologue.

Next, time skip 1 year. You tell me Hawke decided to go to the Deep Roads with some dwarves to get rich. After 200000 pointless quests, none more epic than the next, you managed to get enough money to allow the dwarves to let you into their merry party. Then in the Deep Roads, you found a curse idol, the leader of the expedition, Bartrand, stole it and locked you up in the cave where you found it. Obviously, you found a way to leave the cave.

Chapter 2, you tell me that Hawke became rich. Eventually Varric found out and decided to seek his brother Bartrand for revenge. You found him and do whatever. Curse idol cannot be found (or most of it anyway). Qunari attacks Kirkwall, you fight for Kirkwall, you meet leader of templar and leader of mages. Qunari was defeated and you suddenly become Champion.

Okay let's stop here. The next chapter is going to be the FINAL chapter. So after hours into the game, I still have no fucking clue who the BBEG, or what drives Hawke, which ultimately means that the game does not play with my intrigue and feed my curiosity enough for me to continue. To put it simply, there is no hook and no bait. If you are saying that those does not matter, you are wrong. A story without hook is not a story; it's a documentation or a biography. In fact, my companions are more interesting than me. They have their goals and BBEGs. They know what they want. When I played Hawke to this point, I had no idea what Hawke wants. He/She feels like some errand boy/girl running around aimlessly to do everyone's bidding as long as it is within his/her interest.

So the qunari is not the bad guy. So Bartrand is not the bad guy. Suddenly in chapter 3, you are telling me that the leader of the templars is the BBEG? Wtf? I just met her and she had NOTHING to do with whatever I was interested in in the previous chapters. And why she became bad? Oh apparently her sword has the cursed idol crafted into it. My brain just exploded. It reminded me about the crew in FF8 'suddenly' remembered that they are all from the same orphanage in the middle of disk 2. And I thought back than this was bad. I really didn't expect Dragon Age 2 to top it, doing the exact same 'revelation', only this time you tell me at the END of the game. Not only that, you tell me that the templar leader is a possible important NPC only at the START of chapter 3 and confirmed that she is the BBEG ONLY BEFORE the FINAL quest of the whole game. It utter crap.

Compared to DA:O, DA2 had almost no epic moments. In DA:O, the dwarf quest was really epic. The elf quest was kinda epic. The mage quest was awesome. The human quest was also epic...you get the idea. I never complained about DA:O being bad in terms of plot really. The whole playthrough of DA2 was just underwhelming. I can barely remember most of the quests. None of the quests in DA2 tops the DA:O elf quest which I thought was the worst among the main quests in that game (and it was still very well done despite that).

Well, that's about how I felt about DA2. On the bright side, they did implement the cross-class exploit system from Vanguard: Saga of Heroes which I liked alot. But the bad stuff far far FAR outweighs the good stuff. I honestly felt that Dragon Age Origins is a lot a lot better and that Dragon Age 2 was a huge setback. I will still keep it around in case of further add-ons, but as vanilla, it's a huge disappointment.

Review: "Civilization 5"

I'll be frank: there's really nothing much to review about Civilization 5. That's why there isn't a review of it until now when I decided that it deserved one. When a sequel held on to the foundations that made it's predesessors good, it will end up just as good if not better...most of the time anyway. So this review will be rather short and will be a nice breather for me from my work and the painful upcoming review I'm still writing about Dragon Age 2.

Civ5 has changed quite a bit from 4. It seems less number crunchy, much more aggresive and more streamlined in general. Graphics were better but I think they are still using the read/write method to advance the game, causing end turn wait time to increase progressively. I guess it's asking too much from them to change their engine for future installments of the game.



The game is thankfully much more aggressive and combat is thankfully less nonsensical. You can no longer stack units in one grid so no more giant tower of doom or giant pillar of defense. Ultimately, this mechanic nerds both attackers and defenders, espacially defenders. It's not cool when your city with one unit is surrounded by 6 units.

The grids are also changed to being hexagonal. This make mug more sense from a designer point if view as square based grids can be problemetic when taking into consideration diagonals. Culture growth is also less nonsensical. Each growth now only gain one tile instead of one radius unit (which is an exponential increase). This also forces people to be more aggressive in expanding. Culture also give you points to spend on tech trees for your entire city. Call it biased or whatever but I loved the idea of skill trees so I obviously support this change.

There are other minor changes such as City-States which are basically neutral cities you can take over or persuade to aid you. The game also seemed more streamline now; no more missionaries to spread religion for example. Upkeep is also added to prevent nonsensical flooding of units if the city has nothing more to do.

Overall, I loved all the changes made to the game. What can I say? Sed Meier did it again. If you are a fan of previous civ games, I highly recommend this. It's lost a few things that made civ4 great but the new mechanics added do more than enough to compensate.