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STEVEN VALERO
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"ple that try to spin this movie as a warning for what's happening to actual gamers are just dramatic, desperate, ignorant fools. The movie is obviously depicting a very fucked up future, where things have gotten far out of hand. If something like a video game where you control actual people to kill each other ever came about, I would think that you should be less worried with that event and more worried that society even accepted the [i]idea[/i] of something like that. I play games, and yeah, I kill in them. That doesn't mean I enjoy killing, though. In fact, I'll try to avoid it in most of my games. Only if I'm pressed in a corner and it's a choice between virtual characters dying, and my virtual character dying.
And if someone does enjoy it, so what? To an extent, we CAN still use the line "It's just a game." It is a fake virtual space. Like movies and books, it is certainly possible and likely to take away a wide range of emotions and thoughts from a video game, but the actions we commit in them are fake. They're not real. And it's for that reason that we can commit them. We don't take a game like MAD WORLD on the Wii seriously because it's not meant to be taken seriously. It's a ridiculous setting, with false killings made to be stimulating. Look in any other form of entertainment, and you will find similar things.
This shit's nothing new, and all the "crusaders" trying to convince us otherwise are"
Friday, August 14, 2009
"t video is fucking awesome, Tecmo is stupid, men are made to look just as ridiculous as women are in video games, and I would have loved to be the person filming"
Sunday, August 09, 2009
"h sizes are too big for me, but I want the shirt anyways! XL or L, whichever will make me look more gangsta. Well...
1. L
2. XL
But again, I really don't mind eith"
Thursday, July 30, 2009
"deal, man. I've got the Ocarina of Time inside my night stand. Say the word, and I'll do any of the songs from that game. I'll send a video and every"
Wednesday, July 29, 2009
". MW2 actually looks stunningly better than I remember CoD4 looking. That's cool. I'm also digging the amount of options and customization that it appears we'll have. =) Looks good! Just fix the other"
Tuesday, July 28, 2009
"e you on the 1up boards yesterday? Because maybe this is all crazy coincidence, but I started some conversations there again, and suddenly you're posting an interesting article on the very same topic.
Admit it! Also, if you were on the 1up boards, head back there so we can talk. Once their site is back up, I"
Tuesday, July 28, 2009
"sure they hear this all the time, but man, I'd love to do a podcast. Audio or video would be cool. Next time you guys get the chance, why not ask them how people can get started in trying to do their own take on audio and video?
What equipment do they need? Where and how can we teach ourselves? Advice? Stuff like"
Thursday, July 23, 2009
"aven't listened to this one yet, but after going through the past 10 episodes of the Mobcast, I've got one burning question to ask:
[b]Who the [i]hell[/i] keeps farting in the podcasts?[/b]
I don't mind it, but after listening to Rebel FM for so long, I've become used to the perpetrator stepping forward and admitting guilt. I demand that this gas master comes forth and reveals himself"
Friday, July 17, 2009
I think an absolutely critical thing in a platform game is to make the controls feel as responsive as possible. You need to feel like you are in absolute direct control. Dying always sucks, but there's a difference betwee dying and feeling like, "Oh, God, I almost had it! I was so close!" or feeling like, "What the hell was that? How did I miss?!" Personally, I'm fine with dying in ME. I liked that when you were running smooth, you felt alive AND skilled. It didn't just feel neat, it felt like you had accomplished something. You're doing something incredible and you're actually good at it. When I died, I felt okay when I knew it was my fault. It was disappointing, sure, but it was a learnig experience. Unfortunately, playing it again, I'm realizing there are a lot more "What the hell?" moments than I remembered. The good news is that I think I've figured out why.
See, implementing multiple levels would actually address this problem to a certain degree, but just in more of a round-about way. It would make it so that it didn't super matter if it was your fault you fell or not, because you're still alive. To really fix this issue, though, you can't try to pin it on dying. You've gotta pay attention to HOW you're dying. The answer? Automated movements. In ME, you have to press the button RIGHT when she's at a certain point so that she can run up the wall properly or run up the stair-like sandbags left around. There is a second there where she is glued into an action that is not directly in your control. She WILL run up those bags at a very precise speed no matter what you do once that has started. She WILL run across that wall at a very precise speed once you've started. It's like there's a specific point where she sticks to an object. Unfortuantely, it's not always clear when that point is.
There are times where I'm dying and it's hard for me to understand why. I pressed the button at the same time I always do, but instead she runs into the wall and I fall to my death. I press the button at the same time I always do, and instead she jumps in between the sandbags and the giant sewer door closes before I can make it because I can't get the run-and-climb animation to trigger. This doesn't feel like a learning experience, it just feels very frustrating and confusing.
To be fair, this isn't the only games this happens in. It's a common, albeit fairly minor, complaint in Assassin's Creed games. "I didn't want you to run THAT far, dammit!" is something I'll hear in passing. It's an issue everywhere, and the only solution is to either ease up on the limited space/time where that action can successfully take place, or to make a subtle audio/visual cue that lets you know it's time to react. "