Impressions: my time with Duke Nuken Forever

Posted on by
Reply

For the first time in my several years as a professional gaming writer, I’m sitting on the fence about a game.

The game is Duke Nukem Forever and I just don’t know what to think of it: the cynical gamer in me feels that gaming has moved on and there’s no place for a dated hero in today’s gaming landscape.

Has there ever been a game that will come under so much scrutiny and has so much expectation resting on its shoulders as Duke Nukem Forever? I think not.

Gaming has changed since Duke Nukem last flexed his considerable muscles and growled, “Hail to the king, baby” and there’s a lot of expectation weighing down on the game that’s been 14 years in the making and until last year, when Gearbox Software announced that it was, indeed, finishing the game, was a game that many had written off as nothing but vaporware: a game that existed as an idea but would never see the light of day.

Well, it will see the light of day: June 10, apparently. That’s like three weeks away, maybe.

While graphically things look a lot better than when pixellated Duke appeared in Duke Nukem 3D, what hasn’t changed is the juvenile toilet humour that most of us used to chuckle about when we were 15. That’s still there – by the bucket load.

“… and I’m all outta gum”

The game opens with Nukem urinating in a urinal. Yes, you get a first person viewpoint of Nukem pissing in a urinal. You can even control the direction of the stream. In another toilet cubicle Duke can pick up a “floater” from the bowl, carry it around then toss it, landing on the ground with a brown splat. He can draw on a whiteboard – emblazoned with the words “Operation Cockblock” and crude drawings of aliens – with vivid markers and after an easy battle against a giant rocket-firing alien in a football stadium – ending with Nukem kicking the alien’s eyeball over a goalpost and Nukem muttering “It’s good” .

It’s then that we see that the opening moments have, in fact, been nothing but a video game itself, with Nukem playing a video game starring him. “Is it any good,” ask two identical twins who rise up from Nukem’s nether regions (the less said about this the better). “After 12 f***** years, it should be,” Nukem replies.

And that’s the tone throughout the entire demo, which was made up two parts: the game-within-a-game section and one where Nukem drives a monster truck through a desert which runs out of petrol. Here, Nukem faces off against pig guards using railguns, shotguns, the shrink ray and an RPG against an attacking alien ship. After smashing his way into an underground mine and shooting up some beetle-like things Nukem rides a mine cart – in a very Indiana Jones like sequence – on a rail way until he’s back at the monster truck, takes out some pig guards and refuels it.

2K says the game is littered with parody but I didn’t really see much evidence of that in the demo – unless the literally on-rails section at the very end of the demo was parodying Indiana Jones?

To be honest, Duke Nukem Forever has me scratching my head. It’s a game with a tone and humour that feels like it belongs in the ’90s but a graphical look that fits right in with today’s modern games (although games like Battlefield 3 have nothing to fear).

Sorry, but I’m just not sure how a game like Duke Nukem Forever will do: I think it’s going to appeal to nostalgic gamers who want to relive the glory days they had with Duke Nukem 3D  but  have they, like games, moved on? Or am I completely missing the point about Duke Nukem Forever?

I guess we’ll know sometime after June 10.

I’ll get my impressions of The Darkness 2 up tomorrow. Promise.

First impressions of L.A. Noire with Radio Wammo

Posted on by
Reply

Yep, it’s that time of the week again, where I discuss games with Glenn “Wammo” Williams at Kiwi FM.

This morning we chewed the fat about L.A. Noire, Rockstar’s latest game that uses a revolutionary head-scanning technique to give credible performances from the in-game actors. It’s pretty impressive, actually.

I’m only about an hour and a 1/4 into the game but I’m enjoying it so far, even if the first hour was a little formulaic and predictable. I think now that my character, cop Cole Phelps is now a detective, thinks will start to pick up and get interesting.

Enjoy. Oh, I saw Duke Nukem Forever and The Darkness 2 yesterday afternoon – I was in Auckland for a Microsoft Windows Phone 7 thing and an appointment with 2K came available. I’ll post on what I thought of those two games either tonight or tomorrow, but I think I like the look of The Darkness 2 more than Duke Nukem Forever.

Game Junkie 2.0 interviews Suda 51

Posted on by
Reply

If there is a game designer that fits the rock star tag, it’s definitely Japanese game designer, Goichi Suda.

Suda, or Suda51 is he is more well known to gamers, is the CEO of Grasshopper Manufacture and the brain behind the No More Heroes series and killer7.

He was in Australia last week to promote his latest game, Shadows of the Damned, a game he jointly made with another famed Japanese game designer, Shinji Mikami.

Shadows of the Damned takes place in the realms of Hell, with the game’s hero Garcia Hotspur having to save his girlfriend, Paula, after she was kidnapped by the game’s villain, Fleming, and taken to Hell.

Thanks to EA, I was able to spend 15 minutes chatting to Suda over the phone last Thursday afternoon. He was a delight to talk to.

Here’s the interview:

GC: Suda, it’s a great pleasure to talk to you. I guess firstly, could you tell me how Shadows of the Damned differs from the earlier works you’ve done.

Suda: A: Thank you for having us for the interview. Well, there are a lot of differences. We developed games for the Wii for a very long time and this is really the first HD title that we’ve done using Unreal (engine) so we definitely had to change the development environment, and also this was the first collaboration with EA, which was to create a game for a worldwide audience. This game was definitely difficult and challenging for us, but at the same time, in a creative sense, we had marvellous support from EA and we remained the same throughout the course (of development).

Q: How did EA react when you first pitched Shadows of the Damned? What was its reaction?

A: It was really surprising. We had a representative meeting with EA’s top members and their immediate reaction was that it (the game) was really different and new and something that EA didn’t have. They wanted to start development very quickly so I was really surprised at how quickly they could actually decide on something and move.

Q: Suda, so do you like to be revolutionary in your games? Do you like to push the video game medium as far as you can?

A: Definitely. I think that it is our job as a game designer to offer something new, always, so I definitely keep that in mind, being revolutionary

Q: How does your design process work? How do you come up with the ideas for your games?

A: OK, first of all, normally my style is to go to the bathroom, get rid of things, and come up with new ideas – that was my style. For Shadows of the Damned I thought my style would change, but actually it didn’t, so …  bathroom (everyone laughs)

Q: I’ve heard Shadows of The Damned described as a punk rock take on grindhouse. Is that how you would describe it?

A: Yep, I think that is very accurate.

Q: With Shadows of the Damned it looks like it has lot of light and dark and parallels with good and evil. Would that be a good description?

A: Actually this game focuses on Hell and you basically kill enemies throughout the world but when you venture through this world you actually encounter this darkness and also the enemies are wearing this darkness around them. In that state, Hotspur (the hero) cannot kill them so you need to use the forces of light to get rid of the darkness – and that’s the logic behind the game.

Q: Has this been the most challenging game you’ve worked on so far?

A: Actually, this wasn’t exactly the hardest game to develop. Of course, yes, it’s taken a long time and it was challenging, but the length of the development and the product testing doesn’t necessarily equate to how hard it is to develop. I think the challenge is always to come up with something new and revolutionary. It’s really hard to say but I wouldn’t say this was really the hardest one.

Q: Suda, is it hard to constantly come up with revolutionary ideas for your games?

A: Ah, I’m OK. I’m doing OK. I still have like 40 other ideas that I want to do but I think the challenge is to really achieve what is in my head as an idea.

<EA’s PR person cuts in telling me I have two questions left>

Q: Suda, you collaborated with Shinji Mikami on this game. How was that process for you?

A:  We got along really, really well and in fact some people think that we could be gay, but of course this really was the second time we had worked together and so we know exactly what’s expected from each other and so we understood each other completely, so it really was a perfect match.

Q: Last question, Suda, your games seem really popular in the west but what do you think it is about them appeals to western gamers?

A: Well I’m really glad that they are popular in the western market, actually more than in the Japanese market, but I’m not really sure. I guess when I was young I really liked a lot of different things and I tried out things and saw and listened to different things. Of course, I like a lot of things from the western world.

Q: Suda, thank you for your time.

I’ll get the American McGee interview done tomorrow night. I promise.

Who I interviewed today: Suda 51 and American McGee

Posted on by
1

A short posting tonight, but it’s an oh, so cool one.

I interviewed one of the true rock stars of video games this afternoon, Japanese game maker Goichi Suda – or Suda 51 as he more commonly known to gamers.

Although I only had 15 minutes to talk to him over the phone from (I think) Sydney, he was an absolute delight to talk to (through an interpreter). The only downside is that the 15 minutes went by too quickly and I could have spoken to him for a couple of hours.

Suda 51 is the CEO of Grasshopper Manufacture and is behind such games as killer7 and the No More Heroes series. He was visiting Australia to promote his newest game, Shadows of the Damned (EA). Sorry I can’t actually remember any of the cool things he said at the moment as I’m so freaken tired.

I’ll get the interview transcribed and written up shortly (tomorrow, hopefully) then post it here.

I also spoke to American McGee, also in Australia to promote his new game for EA, Alice: Madness Returns, the sequel to the 2000’s Alice. He, too, was charming and talkative, which is always nice in an interview subject.

I’ll try and get that interview transcribed and posted as soon as possible too.

Good night.

On the wireless: Game Junkie chats with Radio Wammo

Posted on by
Reply

Today is Tuesday.  All day.

Tuesday means my regular gaming segment with Glenn “Wammo” Williams on the Radio Wammo breakfast on Kiwi FM (although sometimes when I’m away or Glenn is away we do the segment on a Wednesday or sometimes a Thursday. We like to mix it up).

Although I’ve strongly argued that I don’t have a face for TV or a voice for radio, which is  part of the reason why I love working for print and online (plus I’ve heard myself during playback of interviews and it ain’t pretty), Wammo has, for a while, streamed all his content online using Skype. So, unfortunately,  not only do you have to put up with my voice when you listen to the Radio Wammo segment with me, you also have to see my mug in action.

Today, we chatted about the Gears of War 3 beta, which finished up yesterday. I played a bit of it. I sucked pretty much but it was fun. When I wasn’t dying or being beaten to death with my own arm, that is.

Enjoy.

PlayStation Network is up … oh, no it’s not .. oh, yes, it is … oh, no …

Posted on by
Reply

UPDATE: Despite saying I’d probably wait a day or two, I’ve caved in and have just turned on my PlayStation and am now downloading the 3.61 firmware. I’ll update you later on my progress – 8 per cent downloaded so far (the update will probably be  after my wife has finished watching Criminal Minds, or something, so bear with me.)

UPDATE 2: 16 per cent downloaded. Go you good thing.

UPDATE 3: OK, the firmware has finished updating, I’ve just signed into PSN but now prompted to change my password (I’ll do that in the next ad break of Criminal Minds once I’ve finished doing gaming-related stuff).

UPDATE 4: … and that’s all done. Password changed, then reentered, email sent to my nominated email account and PSN is up and running again. Congrats Sony that was a pain free experience which took much quicker than I expected. It was actually less painful that watching Criminal Minds.

Sony starts PSN rollout

ORIGINAL POST: So, the PSN was apparently rolled out in in New Zealand today, as part of the staggered worldwide rollout – but it seems there have been so many people logging onto the system that it’s been a little intermittent. According to Sony’s blog, the rollout started in the Americas, Europe, Australia, New Zealand and the Middle East.

You’ll all recall that the PSN has been offline for almost a month after a severe hacking attack that accessed personal information on 77 million PlayStation Network and Qriocity accounts, 90 per cent of which are in North America and Europe, and may have stolen credit card information.

Sony says it hopes to have the service fully operational by May 31, and in a video statement on the Sony blog today, Sony’s Kaz Hirai said, “I can’t thank you enough for your patience and support during this time. We are taking aggressive action at all levels to address the concerns that were raised by this incident, and are making consumer data protection a fulltime, companywide commitment.”

When you do manage to get onto the PSN, there’s new 3.61 firmware that you have to install and then a mandatory password reset. You can also change your password by visiting https://store.playstation.com/login.gvm on your PC.

I haven’t checked whether PSN is up and running again tonight – Twitter followers tell me it’s up one minute, then down the next  – but I might get around to it sometime tonight. Probably not, though, as with millions of people around the world trying to access it all at once,  I might just leave it a day or two until things settle down.

That’s fine with me: I’m not hanging out to play Black Ops like many people are.

Things you discover once you’ve finished a game

Posted on by
1

<Warning, this post contains some spoilers in the third paragraph>

I finished Portal 2 up last week. It was fun. A lot of fun, in fact,  voice work that is second to none and put a lot of other so-called AAA games to shame.

Now, in my review of Portal 2, which is going in The Press’ Box tabloid next week, I said the game wasn’t a masterpiece,  despite the wonderful tones of Stephen Merchant as nice-but-dim AI Wheatley and the star turn by American actor J.K . Simmons as the voice of Aperture Science CEO Cave Johnson – but after replaying through some of the levels via the developers commentary option, I’m starting to reconsider that I might be wrong about the game, at least in some respects.

Not that I’m an achievement whore or anything (I played Portal 2 on Xbox 360 BTW) but there were a few achievements in the single player campaign that I didn’t manage to get on my first play through: the one with the vitrified doors, the Borealis one, the Lady in the Portrait one – and another one  <SPOILER ALERT> that features a whole lot of singing turrets <SPOILER ENDS> so I started working on some of those today. And you know what? Portal 2 is actually a much deeper game than I first thought: there’s some great little easter eggs hidden around the halls of the Aperture Science Enrichment Centre.

There’s been a lot of debate online over the value for money argument with Portal 2: the boxed PC version is about $100, the console versions about $120 and on Steam it’s around $US65 (what’s that? $NZ90?), and many gamers are complaining that they’ve finished the game in six hours. I can’t tell someone whether $120 is worth it for Portal 2 – you’ll have to make that decision for yourself – but the single player game took me somewhere between eight to nine hours. I haven’t finished the single player campaign but I hear that’s another six to seven hours, making it 14 to 15 hours all up. Is that value for money?

I always use the argument when it comes to value for money that I’d rather play a nine hour game that gave me enjoyment from start to finish than a 30 hours game that lagged in the middle and was padded out with repetitive content and fluff. Just my opinion, though.

Portal 2 is a great game with some flaws – the main one being that its  replay value is limited given that once you’ve completed the story campaign you know how to solve all the test chambers – but the game is fun from start to finish, mainly thanks to the excellent voice acting and the wonderful dialogue.

At the end of the day, isn’t that what gaming is all about, though? Having fun? I think it is.

Baldy’s return is a welcome one

Posted on by
Reply

Agent 47, who is obviously the main character in the Hitman games,  has always come across to me as a complete badarse. I mean, he’s got a barcode tattooed on the back of his head for god’s sake. That’s not the sort of thing that someone who goes to bed early during the weekend and has toast for breakfast does. Really, it’s not.

He’s genetically engineered, too. which obviously makes for a good assassin-type person and this week, Square Enix announced that he’s coming back in a new Hitman game called (drum roll please) Hitman Absolution.

I’m quite excited by this, actually. I’ve played two Hitman games in my gaming life: Hitman: Silent Assassin (PC) and Hitman: Blood Money (PS2): both are bloody good games but Silent Assassin is starting to show its age a little. I’ve reinstalled it and I can’t help laughing when I see Agent 47 dragging a naked corpse along the ground, the arm he’s dragging them from sticking out in a funny angle.

According to the blurb that’s on the Hitman YouTube channel, Agent 47 faces his most dangerous contract yet in Absolution: “Betrayed by those he trusted and hunted by the police, he finds himself at the centre of a dark conspiracy and must embark on a personal journey through a corrupt and twisted world, in his search for the truth.” So I guess that means he’s going to garotte people then steal there clothes.

The trailer is tantalysingly brief and while it reveals very little about the game itself, there could well be some information hidden within it that points to when we’ll find out more information.

There’s  a snake wrapped around what appear to be Agent 47’s favoured silver baller pistol (is it entwined in the shape of the hitman logo?) and a simple barcode. But wait? Are they just random numbers at the bottom of the barcode or are they some clever code? The numbers are: 110706, seemingly random if read left to right, but read them right to left and you get: 06/07/11 – June 7, 2011 (if read the American format which is month/date/year) – which is the week of this year’s E3 Expo in Los Angeles. Has Square Enix hidden the date for more information in the barcode itself? Yes, I think they have.

If Hitman Absolution has brilliant moments like Blood Money’s sequences where Agent 47 had to make his way through the throng of people in New Orleans (I said throng, not thong) then the game’s already a winner in my book.  I love that part of Blood Money.

Should Sam Fisher, another hardarse stealthy type,  have anything to fear from Agent 47? I bloody think he does.

What I’m reading at the moment: May edition of Edge magazine

Posted on by
4

Max Payne 3: the hair's gone and the belly's got a little rounder but Max Payne is still out for vengence.

In this age where e-readers are popular with just about everyone, and gaming content is consumed online,  I still love reading Edge magazine every month. There’s just something about it’s visual style and art direction that I love.

The thing I like about Edge magazine is that it doesn’t try to compete with the online blogs and gaming sites – although the magazine’s publisher has its own online portal for up-to-date news  – and this month’s edition is particularly enticing, featuring a much older and more angst riddled Max Payne on its cover, psychotic eyes glaring out at the reader.

I take my time when I read a good magazine. I don’t flick through it like it’s tabloid trash then toss it aside but my magazine reading process goes something like this: pick up the magazine, scan the cover, flick through it, pausing on pages that grab my attention, then I start reading, starting with feature stories that have piqued my interest and am engrossed from there.

I still have the original Max Payne games for PC, and it was one of the first series to utilise bullet-time mechanics where the player could slow down time and have Payne performing weapon acrobatics as he pumped lead into the hapless foes. In the original, Max Payne was a New York cop on the edge, out for revenge. In Max Payne 2, a love interest came along but Payne was still a man fighting against the system. An angry man fighting against the system.

When in 2009 Rockstar announced that there would be a third Max Payne game, details were thin on the ground but Payne will be a few years older, more world wary and more cynical – as if he could be more cynical. It’s eight years on from Max Payne 2, too, and our anti-hero is no longer in the NYPD, instead working as a private security contractor in Sao Paulo, Brazil. In some images, Payne is balding and noticeably fatter than when he was in the NYPD. In a nice touch, actor James McCaffrey, who voiced Payne in the first two games, is returning to portray Payne – this time in a full acting role.

The rest of the current issue of Edge contains a feature about Prey 2, the sequel to 2006’s Prey, and a feature about why gamers are so transfixed by video game violence. I’m looking forward to poring over the contents in the coming weeks.

Who said print magazine’s were dead?

Save game … what I’m playing right now

Posted on by
2

I loved the original Portal, the game that came out of nowhere and was the star of Valve’s Orange Box compilation.

Here was this game that was almost like “Here’s this little game as a thank you for buying Orange Box” and, personally, it turned out to be the star of the whole package. Almost better than Half Life 2 and Episodes One and Two and certainly better than Team Fortress 2.

So, I’ve been playing Portal 2 for most of this week. I finished it last night (Wednesday about midnight)  and it’s hard to describe how it compares to such a powerful game like Portal. It’s a brilliant, brilliant game. Perhaps not a masterpiece but one of the best games I’ve played for a long, long time and could well be a serious contender for Game of the Year when that time rolls around later in the year.

Portal 2’s concept is the same as Porta’s – solve a series of increasingly difficult tests by firing entry and exit portals from a special gun – but the story is much, much more interesting this time around and does a much better job of creating empathy for the game’s characters, except for mute Chell who isn’t developed much at all. The sections of the game that featured the voice of Cave Johnson, the founder of Aperture Science), are especially wonderful, too. Portal 2 is a brilliant, brilliant game that you all must play if you get the chance.

“It’s less of a death trap, more of a death option” – Wheatley, Portal 2

One of the highlights of Portal 2 for me was the voice acting, especially that of Stephen Merchant, the British comedian who voices new character Wheatley, and Ellen McLain, who reprises her role as the psychotic computer GLaDOS. The dialogue is just wonderful, and Merchant displays the typical trademark British humour delivery that makes such comedies as The Office, which he co-wrote with Ricky Gervais, so great.  I’ve heard some reviews complain that Merchant’s delivery grates at times (mostly American complaining, by the way) but not for me.  Not once. I thought he was delightful and the dialogue some of the best I’ve heard in a very long time.

While for me the game seemed to sag a little near the end, almost as if Valve was trying to pad things out with more puzzles, and the final boss battle was incredibly easy (despite the fact that I died a couple of times through my own stupidity), I enjoyed everything about Portal 2: the story, the voice acting, the concept and the feel, although once you’ve played through it I can’t see much replay value, unless Valve add speed runs via DLC or updates.

There are some nice achievements/trophies, too, especially one that harks back to the events of the Half Life series.

That’s all I’ve got to say about Portal 2  at the moment as I’m planning to give the co-op mode a crack over the weekend. Anyone else played Portal 2? What do you think?