Banhammer 40K: Modern Magic edition

I love Magic: The Gathering. Despite my attempts to separate myself from it after numerous bannings in Modern and various other stuff I still came back to it after Dragon's Maze. Despite how bad it was to play with Return to Ravnica and Gatecrash I still kept on going with it, that is the power of Magic. So when it comes to pro-Magic the format I love most is Modern. This being said I despise the modern ban list, and I've decided to go through it and try to explain the reason why I understand or dislike the bannings in modern magic. I'm only going to go through the one's I understand completely or completely dislike.

Ancient Den, Vault of Whispers, Tree of Tales, Great Furnace, Seat of the Synod, Skullclamp: I can understand what they want here. Wizards does't want Affinity to resurface, at least not in its original form. Now the current form of Affinity is still good, but the original was backbreaking. Back in the day you either played Affinity or dedicated Anti-Affinity. 

However there are other ways to get rid of it. One really great one is to get rid of Disciple of the Vault. He states that whenever an artifact dies on your side of the field that he drains an opponent for one. Getting rid of him gets rid of the biggest and easiest way that Affinity kills its opponents. 

Second Sunrise: This is the most recent banning, and while at first I was kind of pissed off because this is one of the few decks left in modern that had less than a $200 minimum price tag. But after a few moments to simmer down I got what they didn't want. You see one of the biggest things that Wizards wants is for Modern to not be Legacy. Now what this normally means is that they don't want decks that can combo on turn 5 or earlier. But it also simply extends to certain decks just not being fun.

Seething Song: Okay, so there is this theory that Wizards hates combo decks. I personally think that this rumor is untrue... in its current form. When you change it to, Wizards hates all non-Kiki-Jiki related combo, then it becomes true. Despite the fact that U/R Storm wasn't winning any tournaments, wasn't breaking any records, wasn't even all that amazing, they still banned it. Right after I had dropped 90+ dollars on most of the deck. Screw you Wizards.

Blazing Shaol: This one unfortunately makes a depressing amount of sense. At first the only place that was planning Blazing Shaol was a, interesting no-land combo deck that used free spells. But then Infect happened. Infect is pretty dangerous as a mechanic already, so add in free pump spells like Invigorate, and of course Blazing Shaol and you have a recipe for consistent turn-two kills. 

Bitterblossom: Wizards has been known to wonder, why aren't blue players making good control decks for modern. Well I would answer because you've banned all the cards that let them do anything. I know that you were scared that Jace would do to Modern what he did to Standard but without him Blue decks have to rely on really crummy game finishers and fishing materials. And without Bitterblossom and Faeries around to keep the control and combo players in check all that will happen is Modern will become Legacy. One really good deck that everyone plays, eventually requiring the printing of a card to defeat said deck, or a banning, which you don't want. 

Wild Nacatl/Cloudpost/Punishing Fire/Green Sun Zenith: These are all cards that were banned after debuting in Modern, much to the annoyance of everyone. First off the Nacatl, yes Zoo was kind of awesome in the format, but getting rid of it seems a touch nutty. Cloudpost's banning was also really dumb, it was the deck that everyone wanted to play. Just ban the sneak attack sorcery from Kamigawa and you fix all of the problems. Punishing Fire was quickly noticed to have a particularly good combo with a certain green-red land from Future Sight, and soon got the banhammer to avoid that deck becoming the only thing anyone played.

Green Sun on the other hand I can think of no defense for. They claimed that Green Sun was "preventing diversity in green decks in the format." This is bullcrap, it encourages diversity, by allowing you to play one copy of cards that you don't have the space to play a bunch of, and still cast them. Any search card does this, especially one as undercosted as this one.

  

Dread Return/Golgari Grave Troll: Ah dredge. How nobody likes you. It is kind of funny just how many people seem to hate dredge despite the amazing amount of hate that Wizards prints for it. Think about the contrast between cards that get printed for dredge versus cards that are made against it. Now personally whether or not dredge should be playable in modern is up in the air, since it hasn't been playable in the format ever. Personally I'd say unban these two for three months, see what happens decide from that. Yes if it turns out that its harrowing then people will have to deal with it, but then again Wizards people hate the modern format regardless you may as well improve it for those who still have some faith in you.

Conclusion

The modern format is slowly turning into the next extended. Its having the life crushed out of it slowly but effectively. Whenever a new deck gets popular it is almost immediately banned from existence, forcing a boring format. The ban list needs to be gone over by some fresh eyes, to have some life breathed into this format. Come on Wizards, do some unbanning, you probably won't regret it.

Equestria girls, they are forgettable (possibly)

Okay so this is the new trailer for the upcoming movie My Little Pony: Equestria Girls.

Okay so let's go over this in the style of my other blog, STOP/GO/GAME.

Animation: There is one worry that can be thrown out. When I first saw the designs of the human mane six I panicked. One of the best parts of MLP has always been the great animation, and the original posters for this new show didn't help to soothe my fears of a quick cash-in. Thankfully from this trailer we can at least see that the animation quality is on-par, if not better, than FiM which gives me some sense of positivity. Good thing too, cause the rest of the trailer does the polar opposite...

The Humor...: Okay now some of my younger fans may be blissfully unaware of this so allow me to ruin the late 80's/early 90's for you. See there was this trend, we called it "Earth fantasy" basically all you had to do was bring a character from a fantasy kingdom to modern earth, it was a popular genre for cheap films. You didn't have to make many costumes, the script basically wrote itself as you just had points where the main character points out stupid stuff about modern earth customs, it was quite popular with films like Beastmaster 2: Through the portal of time, Hercules in New York, and Lords of Magick. They also shared one other piece of common ground... THEY ALL FUCKING SUCKED!!! They were some of the worst fantasy movies of the two decades, they were played out, unfunny, insulting garbage. And guess what type of humor is most prominent in the trailer... go on guess.

The Guy: Oh God how I wished that this wouldn't happen. How many of you want to guess that this is some kind of love interest, go on guess. Because all the teenage crowd relates too is sex and Disney romances, got to have one or the other if you're appealing to teens. Hey wait, doesn't he look like...

AHHHHHHHHHH, CAN'T GET IMAGE OUT OF HEAD, AHHHHHHHHHHHH,

Possible Chrysalis return?: I say this mostly because of the big green column of fire in the trailer, but honestly I would pay good money to see Chrysalis as a member of the Mean Girls... What does that say about me?

Who loves retreads?: One of the biggest problems that I have with this trailer is the way that it establishes no differences between itself and the main continuity aside from being set in High School, which sucks, and having them as humans. Pinkie Pie is still Pinkie Pie, which I guess was inevitable although I would've liked to see the character in a different direction. Spike is a dog, which sucks. Seriously does Hasbro hate Spike now? Like with Just for Sidekicks they turned him into a lying asshole, then 'The Episode which must not be named' happened doing further damage. Like does one of the higher-ups have something against Cathy Waseluck, because how could you, she has such a cute voice. Oh yes, and implied conflict about Twilight not having magic and having to solve a problem without it... gee haven't heard that one before now have we? (Winter-Wrap-up)

Conclusion: I was originally going to give this the benefit of the doubt. I thought that it couldn't suck, at least not completely. If there is one thing that Hasbro knows how to do its marketing, it was the only thing that they were good at in the 80's, and they haven't gotten any worse. So the only conclusion that I can draw is that the finished product resembles the trailer, which isn't very good. I want to be excited for this, and I want to be proven wrong. So come on Hasbro, work the magic that the first episode worked, make me eat my words goddammit.

Why I hate MLP:FiM season 3

Once again I will begin this by sounding apologetic, I am a huge brony, if I must use that word. I own several shirts of ponies, as well as the season 1 DVD, which somehow features cheaper menus than the ones that I made on downloaded anime back in the day. Seriously Hasbro, do you need a free copy of Vista? Because that is what I used and I have more animated main menus. Like you seriously couldn't add the opening in the middle or something? Maybe some assorted clips if you were feeling really fancy? I did pay thirty bucks for this damned thing at my local MovieStop, you could at least validate me by making the main menu not look like badly made bootlegs that I would have found in a van behind the convention center. Where was I? Oh yeah, season three.

The really good: Sleepless in Ponyville

I am going to separate this into four categories, really good, kinda good, kinda bad, really bad. With that in mind I find it pretty awful that there is only ONE classic episode this season. Now some may call that heightened expectations, but I would argue that they have managed to meet these expectations before. Season 1 gave us Stare Master, Party of One, Suited for Success, and Best night ever. Season two had Return of Harmony, Lesson Zero, and my favorite MLP episode of all time, Ponyville Confidential. Even though the third season was dealing with only half of the episode count of the previous seasons I still would've expected at least two episodes worthy of more than one watch, or at least for all the truly awful episodes to also be cut in half, but we'll get to that.

That being said, this episode is really good. It's probably in my top five of all time, and that is saying something considering the episodes that I listed above. The 'hook' of the episode is that it finally fills out the Cutie Mark Crusaders, as it gives Scootaloo, the only crusader that hadn't had her own episode yet, an episode. But the really fun part were the references to classic animation and humor, the reworking of classic horror iconography into pony, and a heartwarming story. All in all I am looking forward to more from this writer, you have given me hope good sir, please continue. 

The sorta good: Mystery Cure, Apple Family Reunion, Bad Apple, Crystal Empire 1+2

Now with every season there are the episodes that could've been awesome favorites, but just didn't go all the way for some reason. Whether it be the weird pseudo-psychology of the Cutie Mark that is explored in Mystery Cure. The sort of boring and badly paced, but still heartfelt and surprisingly rewatchable Apple Family Reunion. The genuine laughs coming from the generic plot of Bad Apple. Or the utterly failed potential and garbage villain, but surprisingly tense and well-done finale of the two Crystal Empire episodes. There were quite a few episodes that, while I don't actively seek them out, if it comes on at six in the morning before I go to work, I'l watch for a while. But then there were the disappointments.

The sorta bad: Wonderbolts Academy, The Equestria games, Just for Sidekicks, Too many Pinkies, Keep Calm and Flutter On

Ladies and gentlemen welcome to Wasted Potential theater! The problem with these five episodes is that they could've been pumped up to 'pretty good' or 'excellent' in a heartbeat, with just a little more effort. Wonderbolts Academy had kind of a hokey premise, "Hey guys what if we did an extended parody of Top Gun, but with ponies!" But that doesn't exempt it from being good, what does is a moral thats plastered in with very little subtlety, and an antagonist that barely registers. I mean yeah Sombra was pretty boring, but I can remember his name. 

The problem with Too many Pinkies is easy to decipher, it isn't funny. In a show based around comedy not being funny is pretty bad. Just for Sidekicks is one of two episodes that turned Spike from one of my favorite characters to one of my least. I mean yes you can still do the "Liar revealed" trope well, Oz: the great and powerful, but you have to work at it. And Equestria games was just confused about what it wanted to be. Did it want to be a painfully unfunny series of misunderstanding gags, did it want to be an exploration of the Crystal Empire, did it want to reveal more about Rainbow Dash and give her a few moments of actual character development? No, it wanted to do all of them in 22 minutes, and it gave no example that it could.

The really bad (Horribifuckus [tm The Nostalgia Critic]): Magic Duel, Spike at your Service

I have watched some awful stuff in my time, and yes there are quite a few episodes of this show that I would rather not watch again. But somehow, both the pandering Magic Duel, and the atrocious Spike at your Service managed to get onto my Top 5 Worst MLP:FiM episodes list. Magic Duel just struck too many wrong chords with me. Most of the humor was reliant on either attempting to create memes, which they unfortunately succeeded with, or referring to memes that already exist. Now some people, Saberspark, would probably say that its silly to worry about them trying to make us bronies happy, but I would say that is missing the point. I didn't become a brony because of the memes, I didn't become a brony because of the community that I'm now a part of, I became one because I loved the show. I didn't love the show because of what fans did with it, I loved it for being a smartly written TV show. And if they could pander to fans without losing that then I would have no problems with it. But if Magic Duel is a showcase, then we have to pick one, fan tributes, or good writing. I know what side I'm on, I don't know about you.

This is of course not even mentioning the utter horror of existence that is Spike at your Service. Now I have actually watched all of the different incarnations of My Little Pony. I watched the original 80's show, I watched Tales, and yes, I watched all of the G3 specials. This is the worst thing My Little Pony related in existence. Worse than the baby G3 stuff, worse than Rarity/Rainbow Dash from G3, worse than the My Little Pony movie, worse than all of the songs about boys from G2. Worse than it all. I despise this episode more than anything with the My Little Pony name on it that I've ever seen. It is the Michael Bays Transformers trilogy of the My Little Pony universe, only made worse by the knowledge that its by the original creators.

Conclusion

Now this isn't some "I'm leaving the fandom" rant, this is a critique. When you really love something then you have to occasionally be hard on it. When a shows creators start to dip in quality, you don't ignore it, you call them out so that they can improve. Why? Because if you really love a show then you want it to be the very best that it can be, I know that I do, what about you?

Mii + U = Wii

The WiiU is not nearly as bad as people make it out to be. Yes, it does have a rather glaring deficiency of actual games. Yes, more and more companies are avoiding releasing games on the system, even going so far as to not even attempt to come up with reasons for shunning the console anymore. But despite this I do think that the WiiU deserves more credit that. So I'm going to attempt to give a few reasons why upgrading to the WiiU might be a better idea than you'd think.

Fight the crash!

As much as most gamers would like to say otherwise we are most likely approaching another games crash. I don't think that this one will be nearly as devastating as the crash of 83' but there is always a distinct possibility. Anyways, if we want current-gen gaming to survive the coming crash then we need to support the industry, while not supporting the terrible behavior that is endemic to it. In terms of the new console generation the only console that seems to be worth picking is the WiiU. The PS4 doesn't seem to have any real improvements over the previous console, and not just in the graphics department. I'm no stickler about graphics, but really, if the improvements are completely unnoticeable then why would I spend $500 on a new console? And that isn't even getting into the horror that is the new XBOX. 

So already the WiiU is winning by default. But I do genuinely think that if anyone can survive the coming crash in their current form then it is Nintendo. As they are the one of the major three whose bottom line comes almost entirely from games, as much as I'm sure that merchandise also plays a role, Nintendo is the only one who will probably want to fight for their survival. Sony and Microsoft would take a hit from completely ditching their game-making sections but would eventually recover and stabilize, Nintendo, as they need it more, would probably stick through the hard stuff and come out okay.

History repeats itself

In recent years Nintendo consoles are treated by hardcore gamers with immediate derision upon announcement and subsequent release. This is usually regardless of overall quality, and its because of this that I find it difficult to believe when people call the WiiU "the worst thing evarrrr."When the Wii was first announced it faced a similar degree of angry consumers, and eventually that gained a decent amount of respect over the years. Besides I think that whether or not consumers are happy with Nintendo this week matters a touch less than...

Anti-Nintendoism, from developers

I am aware that this sounds relatively conspiracy theoryesque but hear me out. Imagine for a minute that you are a third-party developer, living the high life as your market is almost exclusively dominated by the PS3 and XBOX 360. You only have to make two versions of you game, one for each console, before launch. Then Nintendo comes along and wants your games on its system. The first thought that floods your mind is the uncomfortable thought of more work for you to do, which is then supplanted with thoughts of what things used to be like under prior Nintendo-ruled eras. The fact that the version of your game that goes on their console will NOT be identical to the other version, memories of their proprietary controls and disks, their higher standards for third-party involvement in the past... So what do you do? Do you accept them back into the fold, or do you essentially boycott their system? You know, make up some crap about it being 'underpowered', about how the control system won't work, about how you don't know what to do with the screen on the controller. Which of course leads me pithily to my next point...

Innovation is nice... games still matter more though

This is the long and short of it, Nintendo is probably going to be the only immediate console-maker to survive the crash. And while I will enjoy companies that I already despise like Ubisoft and EA come crawling to Nintendo wanting to be let back into the fold, and I would enjoy it more if these companies dissolved and their former members went off to form new companies, like the crash of 83'. The problem is that Nintendo cannot sustain an entire console off of first-party exclusives. So at the moment we need games for it, reasons for people besides the already converted to buy them.

Basically what I'm saying is that while forcing developers to come up with actually interesting uses of the WiiU's unique screen interface is eventually a good idea we need to start by having a game library on it. You can't just ask people to upgrade Nintendo, you need to prove to them that they are actually signing on for the next generation of consoles. And admittedly this isn't your fault, this time, to my knowledge, but it is something that needs fixing before you can consider yourselves back in the game.

Conclusion

The WiiU is a good system, currently being let down by an apathetic public and a (seemingly) hateful group of developers. These are all problems that NEED to be solved. If the we have any hope whatsoever of avoiding the next games crash then we need Nintendo. They are the only ones who treat their consumers like the ones that matter, like us having good experiences is important to them. And frankly in these times, that is more important than ever.    

Viva la Vita

I love the PlayStation Vita. I think that it is currently the best handheld gaming system out there. Now this isn't to say that I don't like the Nintendo 3DS, I do love my 3DS, I just love my PSV more. Now there are many reasons for my love of the Vita, and I'll detail that love in the coming paragraphs.

The advantages of the second analog stick

One of the main problems that plagued the original PSP was the lack of a second analog stick. The second analog stick in most games is used for camera control, so that meant that all PSP games had to either have fixed cameras, or weird camera controls. The best example for the awkward controls example is God of War: Chains of Olympus. In the original God of War the right analog stick wasn't used for camera, but was used as a dodge function. So without the right analog stick the game had you hold the L and R buttons and then use the left analog stick. This is particularly annoying since holding the L button is used to lock on, and holding the R is used for magic. This meant many a time when you dodged in random directions, or even towards a boss, when you wanted to cast magic. Or even casting magic accidentally when you just meant to dodge. 

So the return of the second analog stick is already a great thing, but it also sees the return of the second L and R buttons. The PSV has both a touch screen in front, used to cycle through menus and occasionally in gameplay, and a touch pad in the back. The touch pas acts as both L2 and R2, meaning that you can play a wider variety of Playstation Network games that require both. This also means that you can play PS1 games without having to constantly bring up the menu to change the LR buttons to the L2R2 buttons. There is also an options menu that you open by pressing a finger to the front touch screen and swiping down, which allows you to change all of the key bindings.

Putting the Cart back on the horse

Now one thing that initially drew controversy about the PSV was the lack of backwards compatibility. And trust me, I was right there with everyone, backwards compatibility is an important aspect of modern gaming, as it helps to soothe the initial lack of games at launch. This is the reason was upgrading to the Wii was easier for a lot of die hards to achieve. You could just replay all of your old GamCube games until the new installments of your favorite series was released.

Now Sony did themselves a disservice by not explaining that the reason was that the new console wouldn't be using the old UMD format. Let's just put this out there, UMD sucked. There wasn't a lot of storage space, and the damn things were to easy to break. The slightest push in the wrong place could brick a game beyond repair, something that is just inexcusable in today's market. But now Sony went back to a cartridge format, with little SD cards that hold the games. Firstly this is good because it doesn't cost a lot of memory to store a game save anymore. But this also makes them harder to break and longer lasting. Now this combined with the use of the touch screen brings the comparison to something that Nintendo would've produced, but with one small caveat...

Effective use of its potential 

Now don't get me wrong, I love my WiiU, I plan to have the next installment of this defend Nintendo's latest. But the PSV has a touch more grasp on what it can be used to do, rather than having its potential being its selling point. The WiiU gamepad could be used to revolutionize the way that game's are developed, or it could just be used as a port machine, which frankly I would prefer at this stage so that I don't have to purchase the incoming disasters of MyBox or PS4, or to use their other names $$$$. But right now no one is doing anything that wouldn't have been doable without the Game Pad.

The PSV is doing slightly more in terms of capturing its potential. Most recently the game Soul Sacrifice used the PSV touch screen to cycle through menus and the pages of the in game tome. Assassins Creed 3: Liberation uses the touch screen to change weapons. Disgaea 3 uses the back screen as another form of camera control. Basically what I'm getting at is that the developers that are playing with the PSV aren't simply doing the same thing over and over. They are using it for different purposes depending on the game.

Greater possibilities on the horizon

Considering the outstanding graphics quality as well it could be used to break the stigmas on portable ports of console games. It could actually have a similar experience to the original console port, which Sony is trying to make possible. The number of exclusives that have PS3 to PSV cross-play options is actually pretty large considering how recent the announcement that it was something the company wanted to focus on was. With a little more tweaking Sony may even be able to make it so that if you purchase the console version you can play it on both, with some kind of streaming service.

Obviously some are going to say that this is kind of naive thinking, but I believe that I have a solution. If you cross-play the game, some of the content is only available on the console port of the game. This encourages purchase of the more expensive console version but allows play on both. This also encourages online play, since it could allow people to play online regardless of which version they bought. I would love to buy a portable Blazblue, if I could also play online against the larger console player base.  

Conclusion, and preview...

Basically I think that the PSV is a fantastic piece of hardware, that I love to death. But more importantly the system represents the 'good' future of the industry. Where the social aspects of the games are there, but they ultimately serve the games. Not the games serving the social aspects, that's the wrong way. And on that note next time I would like to refer you all to the only next-generation game console that seems to want to actually be a games console.

  

Why Dishonored is not very good.

Yep, I'm going there. Now Dishonored is one of the most praised games of the past year. It was on a lot of peoples Top Five lists, and then it won game of the year at the BAFTAs and at another recent UK awards gig. Now this isn't to say that I think that Dishonored is bad, per say, just that it sure as hell ain't 'game of the year', especially not in the year that gave us XCOM, and Spec Ops: The Line. Now this isn't to say that critics haven't spotted and talked about some of the game's faults. The terrible voice-acting/dialogue, the binary moral choices, the fact that most of the upgrades are only useful for killing enemies. So, as always, I will attempt to refrain from the obvious complaints.

Linearity disguised as non-linearity

One of the supposed selling points for Dishonored was the idea of an open-world stealth game, in the vein of Thief. Games such as these are generally best with large open maps that allow multiple routes to the target, allowing for a generally more interesting and diverse play experience. However there are a few things that kneecap this aspect of the gameplay, and as is often the case, they come in threes.

1. Side-quests: While complaining about a game having more content seems strange, particularly with a game that barely squeaks in at 6-8 hours with that extra content included, hear me out. You see it isn't that the side-quests give to much content, its that they don't have much diversity and actually hamper the idea that if you put seven gamers in a room that they'd have played the level differently. Because the side-quests give the all important power-ups you are going to want to complete them all.
2. Map, more like Mini-Map: Yeah I think the maps are kind of small. And before someone starts complaining that bigger isn't always better, I would like to preemptively rebut you. One of the most recent examples of this little sub genre, Hitman: Blood Money. Now the better maps from that game, and series, are the ones that genuinely have multiple routes and options. So that players could potentially get the same score. The maps in Dishonored are small and rather claustrophobic, most of the important stuff is all in the same place. 
3. Power-up, unless you don't like killing: This is the real big problem, almost all of the upgrades in the game are related to combat. There are a couple of non-combat power-ups, such as the blink upgrades, and the eye-thing. But there are no real good upgrades for non-combatants. Combine this with the fact that the combat upgrades are actually pretty cool, like who doesn't want to summon a swarm of killer plague rats? And the game constrains the player even further, by encouraging one play style over the other.

"Blah, blah, blah", between stabbing.

This isn't me criticizing the terrible dialogue, I said that I wasn't going to go for the generic criticisms and I meant it. No, my problem is how boring these in between scenes are. Between your stabbing grounds you'll be forced to make tracks back to the revolutionary town in order to talk with the locals and be given the opportunity to hunt for more collectible doodads, before you can have fun again. This isn't to say that I dislike slowing the game down to try and build the world in which we are hunting, I love that idea. In fact in Deus Ex: Human Revolution when they did that I loved it. But in that game the acting and the dialogue were actually good, and so it was easier to immerse myself in the world. 

One of the worst things that a video game can be is boring. Even offensively bad is a better fate than being boring. After all, which do you remember more, for better or for worse, Haze, or Metroid: Other M? Now both of these games are pretty bad, but one of them is remembered, albeit mostly as a "how not to" guide, and one of them most of you forgot existed until just now. And that is the real crime that Dishonored is guilty of, it's boring. 

The stabbing gameplay is mostly fun. Partially due to the incredible shortness of the campaign. But at the same time it just goes to show how little Dishonored does above competently. If the game was longer it probably wouldn't have been as loved, as it probably would've suffered Borderlands 2 syndrome and become so long and arduous that the good bits turn bad from repetition. 

Conclusion

So if I was a publisher-approved game critic that measured everything with numeric ratings that undermine the concept of complex subjective opinions, what would I give Dishonored? Probably a 3/5 on a good day. Not atrocious, not overly good either. Most of my real issues with this game come from the lavish praise that was layered on it by games journalists. As always, if you disagree, think that I missed something, or don't think that I was hard enough on it, please comment. 

Why I don't like Injustice: Gods among us

One of the games that has been getting the most press in the past few months has been Injustice: Gods among us. As someone who has a friend that is really into comics I can say that this isn't surprising. DC is far more focused on marketing their books that making actual good stories, so it's no surprise that they would push the upcoming game this hard. But the game itself looks awful, hilariously bad in almost every way. And I wouldn't be the critic I occasionally like to pretend that I am without nitpicking the hell out of it.

Enough with the damn gritty reboots already!

I may have mentioned this before but I really am getting sick of every single AAA release being some kind of gritty, Image Comics reboot. I know that there is a place for it, and yes quite a few times it works like a damn charm. But does it have to apply to everything? Do comics especially have to return to the dark ages, is it really necessary for the cause of games being taken seriously? 

But aside from my normal disdain at this genre, there is another reason that I find this idea especially to be sub-par. That reason is as follows; a fighting game based around a story isn't a terrible idea in theory, but that doesn't mean that this is the story to make it work.

The story is stupid

This is the real terrible secret to the game, the story is awful. DC recently released a prequel comic to the game that was meant to explain what happens that leads into Injustice. Now setting aside the question of why you need a thirteen issue comic series to explain the backstory, and doesn't that just mean that you are poor storytellers? The other issue is that the story is really bad.

The story starts off with the Joker setting off a nuke in Metropolis, because he wanted "to play on Easy for a while" (I'm not even kidding, that is a quote from the damn comic). Superman kills him, no really, and demands that the world stop being mean to each other or he will force them to play nice, no really again. So Aquaman starts a war with the entire human race because of Japanese whalers, I swear I'm not making any of this up, and Superman, without even attempting diplomacy, lifts the entirety of Atlantis, I couldn't even begin to dream this up, and deposits it in the Sahara desert. This leads into the game, with the heroes divided between supporting Superman or Batman.

Now this is obviously heavily summarized, as there are thirteen issues of this damned thing, but that is the overall story. So lets just make a list of all the ways that this is stupid.

1. Superman kills: Now obviously in the hands of a talented writer, almost anyone else, this could actually be pretty good. An exploration of Superman acting in a moment of emotional anguish, haunted by his actions, forced to face the question of whether or not he can be redeemed. All of this is really interesting stuff, that the story doesn't seem to want to do anything with. Instead Superman, paragon of goodness, becomes a totalitarian nut. 
2. Wonder Woman wants to ride Superman: No. Just No. This is a storyline that basically just screams Elseworld title. Many bad writers try to incur character development and conflict through having two established heroes want to bone one another. It's an atrociously overused crutch to give the illusion of a character arc. Particularly with this pairing, enough of it, MLP:FiM shippers have more creativity than you guys.
3. Aquaman declares war, for no good reason: Yeah whaling sucks, but is it really worth declaring war against the entire world for? Because i'm not kidding here, in the comic, that is what he does! He starts by attacking a group of whalers, understandable, then expanding his attack to Japan, less-understandable, and then a whole bunch of major cities, despicable and stupid. I'm not an Aquaman fan, but I'm sure that his fans will say in the comics that he doesn't normally declare war for no good damn reason.

Conclusion

Now obviously this is all tentative speculation. Now that the game is out I'm sure that fans of the game or its characters will argue for it in the comments, so that I'm inevitably forced to buy it for the WiiU... right?

Post your opinions on my opinions in the comments below. Agree or Disagree, this blog is meant to encourage discussion. The next article will be my sort-of review of one of the most talked about games of the year...

 

Why I don't like Tomb Raider (2012)

I don't like the look of the new Tomb Raider. I didn't from the moment that I saw the "gritty" atmosphere that the game was trying to build. This was before the whole, "defend her from rapists" thing, I just didn't like it. And this isn't to say that I'm some kind of Tomb Raider purist, I've enjoyed them occasionally, never to the point that I was a huge fan or anything, but occasionally enjoyed. And no it isn't because I'm offended by the absurd level of violence, some of which is sexual, aimed at Lara, although I know many who are. No my reason for disliking it is very simple, and yet sort of complex...

The death of "Fun"

The reason that I put fun in quotation marks is because I don't mean fun in an overall sense, you can still have fun when going through a hostile atmosphere of ultra-realistic violence and misery, like in survival horror games, I mean fun as a theme. The old Tomb Raider games weren't about storytelling, they weren't about character development, they were about having fun. The game wanted the player to enjoy themselves, some story and character developing may have happened, but it wasn't framed like this. Yes, Lara wasn't exactly a well-defined character, she was treated and marketed like a pair of breasts with guns, and it was fairly simplistic. But that doesn't have to be a negative, not at all.

For example, lets say that I write a Zelda game, in canon of course, that is a prequel explaining Link's origin story. Now let's say that as a part of that origin story I have him raped by a Gerudo, and then he took up a sword and slaughtered all of that Gerudo's family violently. You would all probably hate me, and you'd have every right to. That isn't to say that the above premise couldn't be done well, but the question is why does it have to be done to this character, and why does a previously light-hearted series have to go all dark. The simple reason is that it doesn't, the character of the new Tomb Raider game doesn't have to be Lara, it doesn't have to bear that name, it can be good without a brand to recognize. Speaking of which...

Re-Branded

The simple fact is that when you go so far in the opposite direction like this, you re-brand the property. And I'm sure that some are arguing that this is a good thing, that they don't like the original Tomb Raider brand and it should be changed. Well aside from the fact that changing something that drastically and alienating your entire original fanbase is something that Square Enix already did, and its part of the reason that most of their original fans Hate them right now, I will approach this from a different perspective, a question. How long can they keep this new image up? It's a simple question, how many times can they create a Tomb Raider game involving Lara being faced with the human heart at its ugliest? Maybe one more? Perhaps? And they really can't go back to the old way can they? Because the two characters are entirely different, so they can't just go back to making Tomb Raider the way that they used to, because then they alienate their new fanbase.

Now this isn't to say that these things cannot go together, but it is very difficult to pull off. And the idea that Square Enix, undoubtedly one of the worst companies in recent memory, thought that they could do it baffles me. Now I also hate to sound like an old man here, but I also just hate the trend of a remake that names itself after the original without change, or by taking off one word that wasn't important to begin with.

Conclusion

So obviously I am going to have to actually play the game to see for myself if any of these complaints are founded. And I plan to, the game is in my GameFly list, up at the top, and its listed as High availability. Again I don't mean to insult everyone's tastes, yet, but I can't help but be skeptical. And considering the financial issues that Square is facing, it may actually be the swan song of the series, whether that is a good or bad thing we will soon see.   

Why Logic doesn't matter pt2

So if everyone remembers I recently wrote a post about the problems plaguing the game industry, but today I'm taking aim at a different beast... game criticism. You see I stopped caring about game criticism, like IGN, OPM, or even Escapist Magazine, a long time ago. And the reason is actually quite simple.

"Awesome" has been devalued.

I want you to engage in a little thought experiment here, I want you to go to a major game criticism/news site, like one of the ones I listed above. Check through ten reviews of AAA game titles at random, and count how many times you see 4/5, 5/5, 10/10, 9/10 8/10. You'll probably end up with at least 70% of them falling into this "Awesome" category. Now in any other society this would be because all of these games really are game-changers, or pieces of game history. But in this world, it isn't because of quality, not even close. Now while this is obviously subjective to taste, I'm fairly certain that you'll find that you disagree with at least 2 of the games you found. Now I have a few reasons why this might be... and no I will not be mentioning the possibility, though it is possible because it can't be easily disproven, of reviews being bought by publishers, I like to challenge myself. 

1.) Fanboy Fear

Now this is quite possible that regardless of whether the critics dislike something they give it a good score because they don't want fans of the game to be upset. The effects of which can be seen in the numerous occasions where reviewers like Yahtzee of Zero Punctuation, don't give great reviews to games that have a lot of fans. Now while it may seem silly for critics to be afraid of fans, with one bad review fans can go from people who really like a game, to trolls that will clutter up your message box with hate mail, or more distressingly to those that run the websites, they'll stop visiting them. This is why, for example, it would be a rare sight to see a critic dislike Uncharted. Even if they don't like the latest installment if they say it then they'll run the risk of pissing off fans who may stop visiting the site and bring down overall traffic.

2.) They have to play nice with publishers

Again, I'm not talking about critics being bought here, I'm talking about per-release copies. You see let's say, for example, that you give a terrible score to a new game from EA. Now the game in question may suck, but let's say that EA doesn't like the fact that you gave their game a bad score. Now let's say, mostly because its a certainty nowadays, that they have another game coming out this year, that they decide not to give you a copy of before release. Now you're in deep crap, because your review of this new, assuredly also AAA release, will go out quite a bit after everyone else. Now this isn't too terrible if for example you're The Escapist, and you have a bunch of video producers that provide you with all of the traffic that you need, but if you aren't you may have just screwed yourself. Review copies, and the swag that goes with them, are little reminders from the industry that if you don't play nice that they'll stop playing with you. But these aren't the only problems...

Bad for everyone, especially the little guy

Now one of the reasons that getting a new Intellectual Property off the ground in modern gaming is the fact people like what's familiar to them. But this is a well-worn excuse that I think doesn't give the human race enough credit. For one thing, and I know its strange to say, you have to give people a little more credit. Some people will go out on a limb and buy new things, they will try to have new experiences, but not blindly. I'm going to give you all an example here, let's say that we have three games in front of us, God of War: Ascension, The Walking Dead: Survival Instinct, and Asura's Wrath. Now I would rate these games all between 6-7, depending on how fair I'm being forced to be, but if the average consumer were going by reviews, the only choice is the one that, In My Opinion, is the worst of the bunch, Ascension.

Now this isn't some hipster, you should always support something just because its not a franchise thing. While I would say that Wrath is the game that the player should pick up, its mostly because while at the end of the day it's not great combat wise, it is an unusual experience. The story, the writing, pacing, and even visual style want to be an interactive anime, and it succeeds at doing so. Which isn't to say that Survival Instinct isn't also okay. In this day and age of quick-time-events and scripted cinematic action Survival Instinct is a breath of fresh air, a short, unchallenging, repetitive, breath of fresh air. But neither of these games got the 8's and 9's of GoW's latest outing. Now one might say that this is because of personal preference on the part of the critic themselves, but if that's the case then where are the critics who value innovation, improvised gameplay, or anything of those sorts, do they exist outside of TGWTG.com or are they and Yahtzee it?

Conclusion

Now obviously all of these problems are things that aren't easy for consumers to fix, but it's good to be aware of the issues growing in the industry, and what they may affect. It's difficult to gauge what everyone's response to these ideas will be, so I'll just say this. I don't have know what really goes on behind those closed doors, I don't know if my theories are true. So I'd like to encourage you to leave comments with your own ideas on what may be wrong in the games industry and in game criticism. Because, as cliche as it is, knowing the problem is the first step in combating it. 

Heart of the Swarm (followup)

Now I mentioned back in my first post that I was a huge fan of Heart of the Swarm correct? Of course I did, rhetorical question. And I mentioned that I had already prepared to buy it. Well I have been planning this little follow-up for a little bit, but wanted to wait until I had played some matches online so as to experience the full game. So now with all of my new knowledge I would like to start by saying that not all of the problems I thought it would have were there.

The story was awesome

Now the biggest thing that I was worried about was the storyline, as Heart is the middle entry in a series, and it has to find a way to turn a villain into a hero, while setting up a new villain and bringing closure to two character's stories. Heart does this surprisingly well, Kerrigan goes from being a restored human back to being a zerg of her own choice, but more importantly is that the games new villain, while unseen, is still interesting. 

The new villain is the Xel'Naga, or rather a Xel'Naga named Amon, who the game actually does a pretty good job of introducing, giving a backstory and motivation, and making him sound like a real badass dude. It managed an even more impressive version of Wings story by giving Kerrigan an arc, but also expanding the mythos and everything else.

Great supporting cast

One thing that elevated Wings of Liberty was its cast. The characters were interesting and relatable, yeah sure they weren't exactly perfect, some arcs ended too early, but overall it was pretty good. The interesting thing about many of the supporting cast was how they played off of Raynor, the hero from Wings. Tosh, a rogue ghost/specter, considered him and Raynor to be very similar because of how many people that they had killed in order to achieve their goals. And this clashed with Matt Horner, Raynor's second in command, who was a standup guy who was very selfless and believed in Raynor, even when he was motivated solely by revenge. 

Since Heart focuses on the Zerg, who we've seen to be very simple-minded, you'd think that the supporting cast would suffer because of it, which is certainly how things look for the first half. The new version of the Adjutant is stupid, the new version of Swann is basically a less annoying fairy from Skyward Sword, and the guy that you pick up on Zerus has a really irritating voice. 

But the two that I really like were Zegara and Alexei. Alexei was actually a character from Brood Wars, he was the head of the Earth Defense Force. Here he's been turned into a Zerg, and enlists Kerrigan's help in shutting down Mengsk. This is mostly because I like Brood Wars and always dig phony accents, but Alexei was really fun. Zegara actually serves as the emotional heart of the story after Kerrigans initial arc is complete. I won't say anymore for fear of spoilers, but she's my new favorite character in the universe of Starcraft. 

But just because I liked some stuff, didn't negate the parts that don't work, and there are quite a few things that annoy me about the new units and additions to the story.

New unit balance issues

First one major thing has been altered that I do like, changing Reapers into non-tech units without an anti-building bonus. Aside from that, all of the new multiplayer units irritate me, either because they are too good, or because they suck. First of all, the really boring guys...

Hellbat, Viper = suck 

The Hellbat is just boring.

The Viper can't attack air units. It can in story mode, but not in multiplayer. Dumb.

Swarm Host, and Oracle are way too good.

At first when I played with the Swarm Host in single-player I thought that they sucked. They are basically a bad Lurker. But in multiplayer they are amazingly good, and because of their range they can basically take out an entire non-Siege tank defended base without having to adjust themselves more than once.

I mentioned that Oracles were probably too good, well as it turns out I was correct. It takes them 2 shots to kill 1 probe, and can reduce a group of 27 probes to 11 before you get your Stalkers over there to defend your minerals.

Conclusion

The game is really good, but the multiplayer element needs a bit of balancing. The range of the Swarm Hosts could use some reducing, or at least program marines, after killing the locusts that were spawned, to try and take down the Swarm Hosts, even if they aren't in visible range. The Oracle is far too strong, especially combined with the fact that it flies, if the damage is reduced to... 4 shots to down one probe then I'll consider it balanced.  

Why Logic doesn't matter (pt1)

Okay, today we're going to be looking at something different but similar. The reason I say that it's different than what I want to build as the normal MO for The Devil's Gamer, is that it doesn't involve me looking at a mostly maligned/praised individual product and trying to encourage open discussion by looking at it from the opposite side. Instead this is me looking at certain practices and mindsets that disgust me in modern game making/criticism/calculating, but I will be taking the opposite opinions of the majority anyway, so I guess that it's kind of similar. So without further ado...

Simcity 5 sells 1.1 million, despite launch issues

Now obviously I'm not saying that this is untrue, what I am saying is that this number doesn't matter. Now there could be many reasons why this number doesn't matter, it could be a useless number because the only reason that this would be heralded by its developer is to try and raise sales even higher. Which can't work when the problems that the game has faced have been so heavily publicized! Despite coming out within months of Aliens: Colonial Marines this game has faced more bad press than any other game in recent memory, it just flat doesn't work. 

Now yes, Maxis has been working to try and fix the game's numerous issues (which I would argue doesn't matter because they still shipped the damn thing broken) but that still isn't going to repair the damage that the game's bad PR has wrought. The game's lack of an offline feature, the smaller map size, certain aspects of the game being shut off when it was released, the various articles that document this still exist. Or maybe EA, who published the game, is trying to use this as a backhanded way of saying that despite the games faults, it still sold and therefore everyone needs to get off of their case. Well this isn't a useable metric of the games success for one term...

Pre-Orders.

The articles that say that Simcity 5 sold 1.1 million don't tell us how many of those were pre-orders. Now yes, some companies like to brag about their pre-order success as well, but in this case it could be used as a way of trying to stem the tides. "Look!" EA could say, "despite its problems the game still sold, so some people must have liked it!" A kind of way of saying "you should buy our game, because the market has spoken!" speaking of which...

"The Market has spoken" is bullshit!

I hate when I hear this on game forums, whenever someone talks about why we can't have non-hypersexualized female protagonists, or why shooter games have to stay grounded in the CoD mindset, or why certain series like Metal Gear Solid can't have a new protagonist. The stupid reflexive argument is always, "The market has spoken" and just leaving it at that. Guys, if you want Video Games to be taken as an art form, which I know that I want, you need to accept something.

IF "THE MARKET" WANTS SOMETHING, THEY ARE USUALLY WRONG!!!

"The Market" wants more of the same. "The Market" wants Solid Snake's story to continue, even though it was finished. "The Market" wants more Star Wars movies. "The Market" doesn't want Spec Ops: The Line, they don't want XCOM: Enemy Unknown, they don't want Skullgirls, they don't want FTL, they don't want Dishonored, they don't want "new. "The Market" wants Stagnation.

Now yes, sequels, continuations, side-stories, prequels, midquels, expansion packs, DLC, etc. have their place, but if "The Market" was all that mattered, it would be all that we have. Sometimes you have to accept that "The Market" is wrong. For example, Solid Snake should not have another game. His story is Finished. We've seen Big Boss, we've seen Snake fight Liquid, and we may not have seen it onscreen, but we know that he died. Another game makes his story worse, not better. I can certainly understand not wanting Raiden to be the continuation, but then it should just be a new protagonist, not the one who's story is finished. Sometimes "The Market" is wrong, you can't pander to them all the time, because that isn't Art.

To be continued

I've already gone on for far too long today, but I will finish this, either next post or the post after. Where we'll take a look at the numerous issues with game criticism.

Why Heart of the Swarm might suck

Nobody wants to be the one that brings up the possibility of a game sucking. Partly due to the fact that fanboys will rip your throat out and feed you to the hounds, address you in an intelligent way and politely disagree on your opinions. So that's why I'm here! Yes I'll be your "but wait" man of the hour, the man who isn't afraid to receive the death threats and bile that comes with being someone who hates something game related on the internet who isn't Yahtzee. And to begin, I will show how fair and balanced I really am, by tackling a game I preordered and am looking forward to.

Picture of game because I don't want to get sued over fair use.

Yes, Starcraft 2: Heart of the Swarm, why it might suck.

Reason #1: Blizzard's focus on online

One of the reasons that being a fan of Blizzard, the company that makes Starcraft, is becoming difficult is that they are slowly becoming kind of evil. One thing that had tipped my already waning opinion of Ubisoft into the reds was their UPlay system. I just don't like systems that force, or forcefully encourage, you to play online. No matter what the imbeciles of the industry might say, single-player is still important. Hence why I don't like having to be online for a single-player experience. 

One example of this from Blizzard was Diablo 3, which forced you to play online, even if you didn't want to. This can lead to latency issues, drop-out, and numerous other issues that come from your connection. I live in a household of 4-5 people, all of whom are steeped in online culture. I can barely get a 4 minute YouTube video to load and play at the speed I want, let alone Diablo 3. 

The other big problem is one directly related to Starcraft 2. Recently Blizzard changed how free games in Starcraft 2 worked. Free games are my little term for playing against a computer opponent, not a storyline game, not online. These are important to learning to play Starcraft 2 well, because it allows you to test different build strategies without other better players killing you immediately. But now it has to be done on Battlenet, their online service.

Reason #2: Storyline

One of the most unexpectedly good aspects of Starcraft 2 was it's story. The overall story that would be told by all three games was simplistic, but still it's strangely compelling. And the more personal story, Jim Raynor's quest to bring down the series bad guy Arcturus Mengsk, and eventually him leading a force to the Zerg home planet of Char to beat the Zerg back, proving himself a real hero to both himself and the rest of the human race. This may sound trite and boring, but it was well done because of how detailed the characters and the setting were. Even a simple story can be really interesting when told in an interesting universe.

This isn't to say that the story of Heart of the Swarm doesn't have a good baseline to work with. The story will follow Sarah Kerrigan, former human turned Zerg leader known as the Queen of Blades, who was turned back into a human at the end of the first Starcraft 2. Now, in order to kill Mengsk, who she has a personal grudge against, and stop the reemergence of the Xel'Naga, hinted at in the previous game, she must become a Zerg again. But the first time she became the Queen it was against her will. She was left in the midst of a Zerg ambush by Mengsk, so this time she must become a Zerg again, willfully. And there were also rumors that the game's story would include the Zerg having undergone a Civil War since her absence. As now that the Overlord, the Brood Leaders, and the Queen are all gone they have no one to follow. But this may sound familiar to some people. It sounds a lot like...

This.

Yes the plot seems quite a lot like Brood Wars. The central theme of the game seems to be Kerrigan obtaining independence, in Brood it was from the Broods, forming all of the Zerg under her command, in Heart it's from her humanity so that she can kill Mengsk as she wishes with no regrets. Yes it probably contains a subplot of another Zerg civil war. But that isn't my big problem with the story.

Reason #2.5: It's the middle entry

With the exception of Mass Effect 2 when a trilogy is planned from the beginning to tell one story, the middle usually suffers. The reason for this, in most cases, is that it being the middle there isn't really a beginning and no real ending. But in this case I think its more complicated than that. You see Heart isn't JUST about Kerrigan's story. It's also about the Xel'Naga. This game has to bring us through Kerrigan's story, hopefully to it's conclusion where we'll finally be able to kill Mengsk, and bring the Xel'Naga subplot from the first game into the main story. Any game would have trouble fleshing that out, let alone an RTS, very rarely known for their great storytelling tradition, Command and Conquer 3 and it's sequel/expansion being the rare exception. But of course that's not what most people who are still playing their copy of Starcraft 2 are thinking about. No, they are thinking about...

Reason #3: Massive changes to Units/Build Strategies

Whenever you have a game franchise designed around a multiplayer component you have to keep things balanced, and for the most part this is something that Blizzard does really well. There are constant updates that change minor things about the various units in the game. Slight changes in damage output and build time help to balance the gameplay, and the changes are so small that you won't really notice them. But with a full-fledged sequel/expansion you need to change things up significantly. Adding new units and unit abilities is the primary method of doing so, but then that obviously will unbalance everything again if left unchecked. So you have two options. One, you can simply add new units and fix everything as time goes on, or...

Change All That You Can.

Now obviously I'm not going to post all of the changes that they've made, but needless to say that a few of them strike me as odd to say the least. Though I will bitch about some of the more glaring oddities, to demonstrate my point. Both Protoss and Zerg have gained units that seem like they are just there to make games easier for the obsessives while making it harder to make new players want to play the game. Vipers, a Zerg unit, have the ability to spawn a cloud that reduces all enemy attack ranges within it to one. Basically meaning that the unit needs to be right in front of the enemy to attack them. Now obviously this is rarely going to mean that an enemy CAN'T attack back, but it can be used differently. If, for example, you were an obsessive than reasonably you could try and create a mostly long-range force, wait for your enemies attack to start, and then hit them with the cloud. This essentially gives you a two more precious seconds with which to get free shots in. 

The Oracle is the one that really gets me though. In Starcraft 2 you use workers to get materials to build units. So one option is of course, attack your opponents workers. The issues with this are that the workers are often in the farthest back of the base, and two, if you are playing anyone but Terran, you don't have the splash damage to attack all or even most of them at once, making it more difficult. But the Oracle is apparently a unit designed for destroying workers, how this will impact things I don't know, but it don't sound good. 

Closing

This isn't meant to piss people off, mostly. I'm not trying to bring anyone down, nor am I trying to hurt anyone's feelings. What I want is to steer, forcefully if necessary, discussions about certain games in a different direction. If it's something that has only had bad press, and no one wants to talk about the good, or whether it only gets good press lavishing praise on it without a shred of critical thought. Whatever it may be, that's what I'm here for, I'm "the other guy".

I'm The Devil's Gamer, stay Chaotic Neutral my friends.