Battlefield V Reveal Trailer: Enticing while raising a lot of questions

Inappropriate content for children. Xbox. EA. DICE. Frostbite. Low, muffled tones of the countryside, birds chirping in the distance. An odd assortment of items, revealed to be strapped on the side of a tank. Tense sharpening, the loud sound of a body hitting metal. Then a yell: Find cover! A squad of British and American soldiers moves into heated close quarters combat against the enemy. A Cockney female fighter with a crude prosthetic arm. A commando with a katana. A man in need of a corpsman. Movement up to the second floor, tanks in the distance. The narrow setting then explodes into the wider battlefield, the tanks crash through the house, showcasing the game engine’s destructive capabilities. Destructible buildings, hulking vehicles, crashing planes, incessant gunfire and artillery, the familiar colorful orange flames and sparks contrasted with the soft, melancholic blue tones, a hallmark of the Battlefield series. The drone of a V1 rocket. Deafening explosion, the knockback. Suddenly, the face of an enemy, the viewer being choked, a brief struggle. Rescued by a comrade, “Hello, old friend.” The same Cockney lady, armed with a cricket bat lined with nails. Looking up, transport planes and paratroopers in the sky, the sirens of an air raid. Battlefield V.

but can they stop the progress of machines?

It’s a scripted, delightful, and exciting sprint through a chaotic and dazzling presentation of the latest upcoming game in the renowned shooter franchise. Admittedly, the trailer is rather confusing. The action is disjointed, ridiculous, and far from anything resembling an actual WWII battlefield. It doesn’t dawdle so much in context, perhaps because WWII is such an enshrined and familiar setting in the FPS genre, not to mention all the films we’ve all seen. Instead, the trailer spends time focusing on the spectacle of what players can expect, presenting the game less as an homage or tribute to WWII and more as an Inglorious Basterds style, fictionalized rendition of WWII set with Battlefield mechanics fans know and love. There’s a kind of tone deafness with so much happening and crammed into such a short reveal, but it certainly incites interest and curiosity as to how the whole game will pan out. What we have so far is a brief look into a journey through familiar territory with a no-holds-barred attitude exercising some big creative freedoms.

The official reveal trailer for Battlefield V on YouTube sits at 6.1 million views with a polarizing 50:50 split on likes and dislikes as of writing. Vocal fans have taken to online forums to express their dissatisfaction that stems from the game’s more unrealistic qualities, chief among them the presence of a female soldier in frontline combat. Although women served in the armed forces during WWII, they were generally barred from frontline combat in both the UK and US militaries. This generalized historical inaccuracy has prompted members of the Battlefield community to see an overt and unwanted exercise of political correctness, and just about everyone has something they want to say regarding the issue.

It’s amazing how a single trailer can rile up so much discussion and protest about gender politics and the gaming world. It’s not anything new by a long shot—remember when Call of Duty: WWII featured black female German soldiers? The Battlefield V trailer is short, but it does raise some questions. Does the inclusion of women in such a gung-ho, fictionalized manner dilute the actual contributions of women during WWII? Is it fair to rewrite historical moments to promote a modern sense of diversity and inclusion when doing so may mask the discrimination and injustices of the past?

I think what we have so far is promising of an exciting title, but of course, we only have a brief and narrow look at what the game will entail. DICE have stated that they want to focus on the untold stories of WWII, the less familiar aspects. It remains to be seen precisely what kind of game they’re able to ship and how they handle representation of women.

Persona 5

Before we get into more detail, I want to say that it has been a long time since I've played an RPG that was as charming, stylish, and fun as Persona 5. Developed by P-Studio, a subsidiary team within publishers Atlus, Persona 5 was released in September 2016 in Japan and April 2017 internationally. I've never played the previous titles or know anything about them, but Persona 5 got my attention with all the positive reviews and its distinct art direction. I knew it was a fusion of a daily life simulator and dungeon crawling featuring turn-based combat with JRPG elements. What I didn't know is that I would become totally absorbed by the world of Persona.

you'll never see it coming!

You'll play as a nameless, nearly mute main character as he tries to live an honest high schooler's life after being placed on probation for a falsely reported crime. At his new high school, rumors about the transfer student with a criminal record abound. A few spins on the wheel of fate plus some awakenings of the soul and, what do you know, our protagonist finds himself with the power to wield Personas, familiars conjured from the psyche, and the ability to dive into the Metaverse. In short, the Metaverse is the cognitive world, one that is formed by people's distorted perceptions of reality. By traveling through the minds of people and stealing the source of their distorted thoughts and desires, the protagonist and his recruited band of misfit friends seek to reform society through their newfound powers. There's a bit of a Psychonauts flavor to it all.

click to enlarge pictures

Persona 5 is a quintessential Japanese game not in the sense that it uses anime stylization or carries forward some JRPG tropes, but because it reflects on Japanese culture and society. Simply put, it is a game from Japan about Japan. That isn't to say the issues the game identifies are limited to Japan. Katsura Hashino, the director for the Persona series since Persona 3, views each Persona game as a way to "'address a problem... in society at that time, especially in Japan.'" Freedom and inner identity are some of the keywords I would place next to Persona 5. The game's themes juxtaposes the real world and the Metaverse, in which the real world is a place where societal and cultural norms rule and the Metaverse is a place for rebellion and inner expression to physically manifest in the form of the various Personas and enemies encountered within the cognitive world. What results is a supernatural fantasy story that is anchored in the real world—not just the real world in-game, but in our world as well.

welcome to the shadow realm, jimbo

The first societal issue Persona 5 brings up is also how the game is framed: Japan's criminal justice system. The game begins in media res with the protagonist, codenamed Joker while operating in the Metaverse, fleeing from a heist after being separated from his group of accomplices, the Phantom Thieves. You see, as the Phantom Thieves go around changing people's hearts through the Metaverse, the results are felt in the real world and have lead the Japanese government and public to think of the Phantom Thieves as threats. Think, "Who watches the Watchmen?" and you're about there. Anyways, Joker is captured as he makes his exit and is placed into police custody in the real world. The game then begins as a series of flashbacks that has the protagonist recollecting the events leading up to the formation of the Phantom Thieves and his eventual arrest.

combat is a badass, super animated version of pokemon

When the player is prompted to name their character, it is done through signing a confession in the interrogation room after being psychologically and physically tortured. The scene may look like something out of a police drama, but it is very much a reflection of how criminal cases are sometimes handled in Japan.

Japan has an unbelievable conviction rate, greater than 99%. Compare that to Britain's Crown Court in 2009 with 80%, America's 93% in 2012, and the Chinese Communist Party court's modest 98% [EDIT: That Chinese conviction rate figure was from 2013. China is now harmoniously up to par!] How is >99% conviction rate possible? After all, prosecutors are human and thus prone to error sometimes, right? J. Mark Ramseyer of Harvard Law School and Eric B. Rasumesen of IU Kelly School of Business authored a well-cited paper in 2000 examining this very question in depth. Confessions are a big part of handling a criminal case. Plea-bargaining isn't allowed in Japan, but confessions are pretty analogous to that. Japanese defendants are far less likely to contest prosecution and rather just confess. However, when you see how the protagonist is beaten and threatened behind closed doors with no record of the events inside the room, its hard not to wonder about the coercive tactics prosecutors may use to extract a confession regardless of the detainees innocence. It makes you wonder just how many innocent people have been arrested and made to confess, all for the sake of prosecuting in order to save face rather than for a sense of justice.

Then there's the game's depiction of issues Japanese women face in the professional workforce and as victims to a culture of harassment. Doctor Tae Takemi and prosecutor Sae Niijima are characters that depict the minority of women in their respective fields and how women struggle against conservative Japanese gender roles. As the story progresses, the player learns that Takemi was made a scapegoat to a failed medical trial by her superiors and Niijima is later similarly dismissed by her bosses, having her authority in the Phantom Thieves case removed and being sardonically told to use the down time to find a husband.

Women face tremendous social barriers in Japan. Of course, women have all the legal rights as men as per the Japanese constitution, but women in Japan will find a much harder time finding good economic opportunities in the workforce. According to Seeker Daily, Japanese women hold less than 10% of leadership positions in businesses. Only 66% of women are employed and and almost 60% of those working women aren't even in full-time positions. Women aren't afforded the same level of opportunities as men are because of the conservative, traditionalist values that have confined women in the domestic sphere.

comes with a killer soundtrack

The last thing I want to mention regards what the game has the player doing in between fighting monsters from within the minds of twisted people: going to high school. I think Japanese high schools have really become a cultural set piece of their own. You've got the uniforms, the school culture festivals, the variety of clubs, the senpais and kouhais, all wrapped and exported to the rest of the world in the form of anime, manga, and light novels. There's a focus on high school in the daily life simulator portion of the game because, as Hashino states, "'For good and bad reasons... the school-life experience deeply affects many Japanese people.'"

School is stressful anywhere, but Japan has really captured the attention of the mass media when it comes to just how tragically the stress can build up in students. The situation in Japan is so bad, 500 students under the age of twenty turn to suicide every year. In fact, the World Health Organization reported in 2014 that Japan's suicide rates are 60% higher than the global average. There is such a pressure not only to perform well academically, but to conform to social norms that students feel there is no escape, no out to their situation. Physical bullying, vicious rumors, and the terror of confronting such daunting aspects of school life absolutely cripples people, making them believe they somehow do not have any value or anything to offer society.

Going through the daily life portions of the game, both in and out of school, you'll meet some pretty ordinary people that each have remarkable stories. Much like real life, you can never guess what kinds of backstories characters have gone through just by looking at them. You begin with a small and unlikely grouping of friends which quickly branches out to people like Takemi and Niijima mentioned earlier. It's such a simple message, yet so solidly conveyed: everyone has their own story, everyone is unique. The hardships the characters go through are all different, but the way the characters end up as social outcasts is cast as a binding quality. Persona 5 features some of the most well-rounded characters that make it way too easy to cheer them on. Through their stories, the characters each uniquely show how individuality doesn't mean exile, that conformity to expectations is not the only measure of a person. In a twist of irony, the game shows how everyone is, in one way or another, a social outcast and that society is nothing more than a bunch of social outcasts that have come together.

Persona 5 gives us a taste of what it feels like to have the power to change the hearts and minds of people for good (plus the ability to romance any, ANY, girl with a few silent nods, soft grunts, and generic hand gestures).

It seems like an overly idealistic, opportunistic message, but maybe that's the kind of story we need most about these tumultuous and troubling times. Persona 5 may be set in modern Japan, but its themes championing determination against great odds are timeless. Symbolism and imagery within the Metaverse show how people think of the real world as a kind of prison, a seemingly safe place where all of your needs can be met so long as you never act up to attract trouble from the authorities despite adverse conditions. It's easy to think that so long as we do what we're told and don't try to change anything, life will get better. The Phantom Thieves, however, are the embodiment of a will to seek change in the world the best they can. The Personas each member of the Phantom Thieves wield are born from an inner sense of rebellion. Persona 5 reminds us that we are, every one of us, a part of the world ourselves. By realizing that we're not as helpless as we think, by realizing that we have the power to enact change in our own ways, we can begin to do great things.

some star wars kinect flashbacks

Persona 5 is riveting, heartwarming, surprising, funny, and all-around just charged with a great sense of life. The gameplay elements and narrative mesh seamlessly into a fluid experience. Starting with a high school scandal, the stakes will keep climbing to exciting, ludicrous levels as the player makes progress, all the while polishing the game's core focus without losing sight of the central themes at play. Persona 5 was an absolutely delightful experience, one that emulates the voice of a generation.

Further reading/viewing:

• The Whole Story on Japan's 99% Conviction Rate, and the Corruption that Follows (Sept. 2013)
• Japan's program to boost senior women in work is a dud (Sept. 2015)
• The mystery behind Japan's high suicide rates among kids (Oct. 2015)

Understanding video game addiction

After a decade of observations, the World Health Organization is adding gaming disorder to its list of recognized mental health condition starting in 2018. According to Daily Mail, the WHO draft defines gaming disorder as when gaming “takes precedence over other life interests... even when it leads to ‘negative consequences.’” In light of this recognition, I would like to go over some key points about the relationship between video games and personal health and well being.

Every once in awhile, there are news stories about how someone has played games until they died mid-game or have played so much they neglected responsibilities, sometimes to tragic consequences. There was a story, I remember, about how a couple in South Korea had neglected their baby to play games, resulting in the baby’s death. You don’t have to go far to find similar stories of people playing literally for days and dropping dead.

One of the first things that may pop into our minds when we see stories about people who game without sleeping or eating are the words “video game addiction.” The terminology immediately groups video games with things like drugs and alcohol, prompting worried parents to turn their heads whenever the words are mentioned. So the question is, are video games addictive?

First, we must understand what addiction is. Psychology Today defines addiction as “a condition that results when a person ingests a substance (e.g., alcohol, cocaine, nicotine) or engages in an activity (e.g., gambling, sex, shopping) that can be pleasurable but the continued use/act of which becomes compulsive and interferes with ordinary life responsibilities, such as work, relationships, or health.” Wikipedia and its string of citations define addiction as a “medical condition characterized by compulsive engagement in rewarding stimuli, despite adverse consequences.” Finally, there’s the American Society of Addiction Medicine and they say, “Addiction is characterized by inability to consistently abstain, impairment in behavioral control, craving, diminished recognition of significant problems with one’s behaviors and interpersonal relationships, and a dysfunctional emotional response.” The key aspects from all the definitions of addiction we’ve looked at characterize addiction as a condition when a prolonged activity hinders normal, everyday function.

When people say video games aren’t addictive, they’re right in the sense that video games don’t act like drugs or alcohol where there is a tolerance build up resulting in a physiological change in brain chemistry. After all, playing video games over a long period of time does not lead to dependence in the way that chronic smokers or drug users face. Video game addiction is on the side of behavioral addictions, which are covered by impulse control disorders, so it isn’t in the same grouping as chemically addictive substances. It isn’t uncommon for behavioral addiction to also be labeled as a disorder, as the terms are rather interchangeable. The addictive facet of games comes from compulsion, a heavy engagement. As Extra Credits put it, games aren’t addictive; they’re compulsive. There isn’t a physiological demand that is being met with excessive gaming and there isn’t a euphoric high that can only be found with increasing amounts of game time either. The compulsive aspect of gaming comes from an intense, irresistible interest or attention that cannot be ignored.

However, just because games aren’t addictive from a physiological perspective doesn’t mean video game addiction or disorder isn’t a real condition. Video games are compulsive and that very compulsion can potentially develop into video game addiction. In truth, anything can be “addictive” in the sense that any deep compulsion can potentially develop into an addiction—video games are no different. Dr. Mark Griffiths, in a BBC article titled “Why anything can be addictive,” puts it very nicely: “In a nutshell, the fundamental difference between excessive enthusiasm and addiction is that healthy enthusiasms add to life whereas addiction takes away from it.”

It’s uncertain how many people may be affected by gaming disorder. The estimate given by the Daily Mail article gives a range from anywhere between 0.2% to, I kid you not, 20% of all gamers. The formal guidelines for a diagnosis haven’t been written yet, but I think gaming disorder is something you’d definitely know if you saw it. For example, it’s one thing to skip a college class to play a newly released video game, but it’s an entirely different matter when it becomes a recurring event and grades become negatively affected. It’s one thing to go home after work and play six hours of video games and another to just continuously play, not bothering to go to work.

So far we’ve mostly discussed gaming disorder in the context of older gamers with greater life responsibilities than kids. Where do kids fall in with our definition of video game addiction? What does “normal, everyday function” mean for kids? Are kids even diagnosable with gaming disorder? How should parenting style factor into a potential diagnosis? Is it fair to be diagnosing kids with gaming disorder when so much of their lives is out of their hands? There are still many questions that need answers to fully understand the scope of gaming disorder.

I can’t speak to what treatments work or don’t because there are so many stories out there about what’s effective or not. Everybody is different and one method may work for someone but not another. So let’s instead talk about a question that resides at the essence of gaming: Why do we play games? You might think that was a dramatic setup for such a mundane question, but gaming means different things to a variety of people and how people see gaming tells us something about themselves and the society we live in. Maybe we just play because it’s in good fun and we want to relax. Maybe it’s because games offer a challenge that we want to see ourselves overcome, to get to the next level or beat that boss monster that has us gnashing our teeth and swearing in frustration. Maybe we play because gaming offers a space with absolute rules and we know our roles and everything that comes with it. Perhaps we view gaming as a space for creative expression, a place where we can play within set rules and still be able to create and innovate. Games also offer a virtual space to hang out with old friends and make new ones. This list goes on and on, but in short, maybe games offer some people things they can’t find anywhere else.

When we look at gaming disorder, we can’t look at the video games alone as a sole cause. Demonizing video games as some harbinger of mental disease is counterproductive and acts as a distraction to the real underlying social issues that have created a space in which gaming disorder can exist. As a community of gamers, we need to begin to discuss why we play games in the first place, what is it about games that make them so compelling and interesting to play. We need to begin to look at what games offer that other mediums don’t. By bringing up discussion and exploring the heart of why we game, we can begin to better understand what people with gaming disorder go through on an internal level.

Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays. I wish you all the best for 2018.

I’ll see you in the next one.

Nier: Automata

Where do you even begin with a game like Nier: Automata? Do you mention its relatively obscure pedigree, the Drakengard series? Yeah, you must be fun at parties. Well, you'll be happy to hear that you don't actually need to have played the previous games to really understand what's going on in Automata. If you were to start with categorizing the game, Automata is an RPG hack-and-slash, bullet hell hybrid with some novelty in its narrative delivery. In less technical language, the game is about androids made out of congealed sex-appeal that wear maid outfits and use katanas and lasers and shit to blow up everything around them.

You know, the characters aren't a bad place to start in seeing just what kind of game Automata is. To that end, let's go to Yoko Taro, the director himself, for some insight into the characters. Mr. Taro, why is a battle robot in high heels and a French maid outfit? "I just love women. There's no particular reason for it." That's it, really. There's no discussion about that and, really, I applaud Yoko Taro for that kind of answer. It's a simple and honest response that pretty much asks us, "Why not?" I feel like that's the defining core of Automata, the moment you experience something and say, "Yeah, sure, why not," for better or for worse.

I'll be honest with you: the game gets away with a lot of things. Nier: Automata is certainly Yoko Taro's masterpiece, but it's a stretch to be singing praise from the comfort of every 2B body pillow out there (you know who you are). The game is beyond technically competent (except for the tragic PC port) and the overall experience is fresh, but one has to be honest with a game like Automata. The gameplay is flashy and repetitive, the art-style is blandly minimalistic, and the philosophical stuff suffers from an underdeveloped cast of characters that have been tasked to carry out the story's message. It isn't the gameplay, artistic delivery, nor the half-baked philosophical musings that makes up the spirit of the game. As a whole, Nier: Automata is really an exercise of the medium, a simple yet elusive one that celebrates the ability of video games to deliver an experience you couldn't find in any other form. So let's get into it.

the robots wear hats later on

The premise of the game follows a war between machines that have been built by an alien invasion and human built androids. Supposedly, humans lost the war and have fled to the Moon while androids continue their master's proxy war. The androids' base of operations is a space station in orbit and every once in awhile the androids will receive suspiciously pre-recorded sounding propaganda messages from the last remnants of humans who are totally alive and well on the Moon. Keep it up, we're totally alive and, gosh, we don't have Earth yet but we sure will soon! Keep at it boys and girls. Anyways, you'll get to play as various characters while you muck around in the whole "machine consciousness" thing. Think Terminator 2, thumbs-up-in-lava. Good? Good.

in the apocalypse, everything is coated in dust from exploded concrete

Let's have some fun this time around, starting the the game's Premium Girl, 2B:

There's one android called 2B,

2B or not to be, you see?

She's got big thighs,

She's cold towards allies,

You know, that's about it, really.

You have 9S whose name is a combination of his age and size of clothes he wears:

Adolescent boy

2B, a cherry blossom

Shitty minigame

Then there's A2 who's basically 2B but with longer hair and further down the scale of traumatic experiences lived through. Oh, she cuts her hair eventually so consider her your 2B replacement:

[Chorus - Snoop Dogg]

When the pimp's in the crib ma

Drop it like it's hot

Drop it like it's hot

Drop it like it's hot

robot with a hat, i can get behind that

If at any point during the game you think to yourself or out loud to your lonesome self if you're one of those people, "Wow, the machines are trying to be like humans and the androids, too, are weirdly human-like despite their constant denial of emotions and interpersonal relations. The machines and androids are adversaries on the eternal battlefield yet they have so much in common with one another. What does it really mean to be human and how does consciousness fit into our ideas of what constitutes life?," give yourself a big certificate with WordArt that reads I DO MY BEST and shower yourself with gold star stickers next to your nameplate at work because you just grasped the handle of the game's complex and thought-provoking philosophical quandaries. If you got the exact wording of the thought, I ask you to please leave my room and fix the window on the way out.

The philosophical undertone in Automata doesn't rise up beyond just that. The game is spectacle driven for the most part and whatever difficult philosophies it muddles around in are just the various highway roadsigns that get less and less entertaining as the friend next to you read them out to you over and over again. The only way it could get worse is if the highway sign falls and smashes through your windshield so you can get a better look at the sign you've seen six times before.

its a claritin d commercial

Then again, subtlety is far from Automata's strong point, except when you're talking about the environments. The game world is beautiful in the sense that a desolate landscape is beautiful in a melancholy kind of way. It's like your screen has a permanent grey filter on it and it gives everything in the world a washed out after effect. In retrospect, even the carnival level worked within a single color grade and was too afraid to work with any kind of contrasting hues. The grey filter seemed to just be replaced by a purple-red one in what was supposedly the most colorful zone in the game. Every zone seems to suffer from this innate blandness once the honeymoon period is over. The first time you look across an expansive, encroaching desert, there is a sense of reverence or majesty for the forces of nature. As you begin to repeatedly plod through the game's artistically bland landscapes, however, you're going to begin to wish that natural forces were a little more creative with how they destroyed and reclaimed the world. You're going to really wish for anything to stare at. To that end, I suppose it gives you more time to ogle at 2B's revealing acrobatics—well played, Yoko Taro.

can you tell why people like this game yet

Earlier I noted that Nier: Automata features repetitive gameplay and I realized how lazy a complaint that sounded. You can't fault a hack-and-slash game for making you, you know, hack and slash stuff over and over again—it's like blaming a shooter game for making you pick up a shooty thing to shoot at things. In essence, complaints about repetitive gameplay stem from unrewarding gameplay, the sense that you're doing something for no gain. In Automata, it won't be long until you're swimming in money and health restoration items and upgrades to the point where combat really isn't a threat. Weapon upgrades all serve to simply increase damage and you don't even need to get to the maximum level to do well. Enemy variety is sorely lacking outside of boss fights and they're hardly worth the time that I ended up just running past every enemy encounter between where I was and where I needed to go to advance the story. Sidequests are generally pointless in the rewards they give and are mostly there to placate the OCD collectors that scour the game for every little hidden thing. Be prepared for fetch quests and backtracking in these sidequests, the ultimate killers of pacing and sense of fun. Harder difficulties are scaled from the School of Frustration as Challenge and the only diploma you get in the end is a piece of tissue paper that has the words "Bragging Rights" written on it. There isn't a sense that you as a player are doing better or becoming stronger as you progress through the story.

is my screen just dirty

Nier: Automata touts itself as an open-world experience but it takes little to no advantage of the fact. Invisible walls, linear stage progression, and boxed in mission zones litter the game. Was the open-world aspect to avoid loading screens? Well, you're going to be using the fast travel system anyway. Does it promote a sense of exploration? Exploration isn't really rewarded as much as you'd think and many of the zones are recycled anyways. It's not like you can interact with the world in any meaningful way, either. You can ride animals and fish, but those features don't add anything. I mean, they don't detract anything either but then it only leads you to question why its even in the game. The world may be large, but eventually you begin to see all the limitations that have been set in place. The open-world aspect of the game only serves to make navigation between story moments as tedious as possible. You'll be scrolling through the same zones that are devoid of anything interesting just to progress the story.

pull up, porkins!

In terms of the combat, the game seamlessly moves between classic bullet hell segments and third-person hack-and-slash, which also incorporates elements of bullet hell. You'll be mashing your dodge button into oblivion as the camera moves around to give you a 2D side-scroller or top-down shooter perspective for no real effect other than to make sure you're still awake. The hack-and-slash is your standard fare light/heavy attack combos, dodge, counter, special move, etc. The fluid animation and controls really come across here and carries the game on its back. The bullet hell segments are actually less developed than I would've liked and manifest more in 9S's annoying-as-fuck hacking minigame that easily overstays its welcome. The combat gameplay experience, as a whole, is smooth and will make you say "Oh, that's cool" every now and then, but is ultimately low on content and relies on visuals more than anything to keep you engaged.

just pile on the symbolism

Okay, so if the story and characters were underdeveloped and mediocre at best and the gameplay was mostly unrewarding, what are we left with?

Well, Nier: Automata certainly had its fair share of spectacular and unexpected moments interspersed within its slogging gameplay. The game made bold, convention defying narrative moves, even if they did feel disjointed and awkward at times. Automata is all about spectacle without relying on purpose and celebrates the ability of game developers to manifest their insane ideas and give them life. In the face of why, Automata pushes back and asks why not. I can't put my finger on it, but despite all the flaws there is a warm feeling of passion and care that emanates from the game. It's like a curious kid who wants to try everything out in all new ways, makes a mess, but comes out of it proud knowing he tried something different and new. If anything, Yoko Taro's Nier: Automata is certainly an unforgettable experience.

its okay

Thanks for reading.

Horizon Zero Dawn

Here's a game where I took one look at the cover art and thought, "How are you going to justify Mecha-Godzillas in a post-apocalyptic setting." In retrospect, the answer seem simple. If humanity ever did invent Mecha-Godzillas for whatever reason, it wouldn't take much smarts to determine the cause of why humanity is locked in a battle against rogue Mecha-Godzillas. There is a powerful narrative drive in Horizon Zero Dawn that sees players taking on the role of Aloy, an outcast of her tribe due to the mysterious events surrounding her birth. Why exactly is Aloy an outcast? What happened to the old world? Where did the Mecha-Godzillas come from? What role does Aloy play in all of this? Starting in a small village, the search for answers begins with small steps into a wider world teeming with beauties and dangers alike.

skyline one sunset is a planned sequel

Horizon is traditional fare as far as open-world games go. Players will have access to the definitive open-world gameplay procedure: a big sandbox world, main quests, side quests, a variety of points-of-interests, distractions/diversions, towers to reveal the map with, collectibles, OCD inducing material gathering, crafting supplies, fast-travel, mounts, etc. Combat against machine and human enemies consist of melee and ranged options. The melee combat is solely comprised of a light attack and a heavy attack without anything else to go with it. Ranged combat sees a variety of weapons, however. Aloy can use short bows, longbows, slings that shoot bombs, tripwires, a "ropecaster" that can immobilize foes, and a "rattler" that can shoot multiple bolts in quick succession. These tools are complimented by traps and a rudimentary stealth system that aids Aloy in hunting down her prey.

In the cage fight between Aloy and Mecha-Godzilla, any sensible person would bet on Mecha-Godzilla. Bows and spears don't exactly match up to tons of metal and plasma beams, that is unless you know where to hit Mecha-Godzilla. Aloy has the ability to pin-point weaknesses in enemies that will tell her where to hit and what to hit it with. This divides the combat into two effective phases: stalking/preparing and springing the trap. The machines, especially on harder difficulties, can easily flatten Aloy in several hits. It's a great deal of fun and tension as you study the machine's movements, mark its weaknesses, and prepare your traps, all to gain the maximum advantage as you inevitably come out of stealth and begin running and dodging like a headless chicken. My favorite tactic for taking down machines that could instantly mulch me was to lay a system of tripwires attached to explosive traps, spook the beast, and lure it through all of them.

While hunting the larger machines is the hallmark of Horizon's gameplay, the game falters in its smaller enemies. From the starting portion of the game, Aloy has access to an ability that lures enemies closer. Combining this ability with stealth take-downs trivializes many of the fights in which the enemy group is composed entirely of humans or smaller machines. Here's what I would do against a pack of small machines: find tall grass to hide in, lure-call one of them over, perform a stealth takedown, repeat. The enemies don't actually see Aloy as she's performing the takedown so long as you're in the tall grass so the procedure always works. Enemies will be alerted by corpses, but it does not blow your cover instantly. Rather, the alerted enemy will simply wander around the corpse for awhile, allowing you to lure-call the enemy to the same fate as his friend. Aloy can sit in one spot and take down an entire group of enemies with this method. Horizon's real gameplay prowess becomes apparent during tense moments in which larger enemies are surrounded by a group of smaller enemies that act as lookouts, but engaging against groups composed entirely of small enemies shows off the tedium of a crude and over-simplified stealth mechanic.

pinnacle of stealth technology 

In addition to head-on and stealth combat, Aloy also gains the ability to perform overrides on machine enemies, briefly flipping their allegiance to Aloy's side. Aloy won't be able to override every machine and only learns to do so against specific machines after exploring map points called Cauldrons. Sometimes fights can be decided with a single override against a larger machine. However, overrides have a long cool-down period so you're unlikely to get more than one enemy to your side in one encounter. Moreover, overrides also forfeit the experience rewards you would otherwise gain from defeating the machine once you upgrade the control state to be indefinite. It's a fun little mechanic that can lead to amazing machine vs. machine spectacles, but it's usually faster and more rewarding from a gameplay standpoint to just take on the machines yourself.

Horizon's primary forte is in its world development that parallels Aloy's development, both as a character and in terms of player progression. Aloy is unsure of her role in the world at large as strange and devastating events seem to focus around her. Her self-doubt diminishes and she journeys across the world, gradually revealing the secrets of the old world and the machines in a manner that reflects the player's own growth in the ability to take down larger and more powerful foes in increasingly complex scenarios. The narrative is not unlike a rolling boulder that gradually picks up momentum. By the time you've experienced your first piece of the puzzle, it becomes a powerful motivator to seek more of the story to unveil the mystery of Project Zero Dawn and reach the satisfactory conclusion to why Mecha-Godzillas are running around the world.

Guerrilla Games, the developers of Horizon, may not be particularly innovative as far as open-world gameplay goes, but they certainly make up for it by focusing and polishing what it has to be enjoyable and rewarding. This polished gameplay is upheld by an engaging narrative and a beautifully presented world. The machines of the world are characters deserving of respect in the challenges and majesty they present to Aloy and the player. Horizon Zero Dawn successfully distinguishes itself from other open-world games with its unique world brought to life by a powerful presentation of its mechanics and engaging sci-fi plot.

The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild

The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild is to the Nintendo Switch what Halo: Combat Evolved was to the XBox 15 years ago: a critically acclaimed, console defining debut of a title. Much like how Halo has left its mark in the first-person shooter canon, Breath of the Wild rightfully belongs in the pantheon of great open-world adventure games. The people at Nintendo set out to reshape the tried-and-true Zelda formula into something that would properly usher the Legend of Zelda franchise into the Switch generation and they have succeeded. The open-world style allows players to experience the world of Zelda like never before. 

If I had to summarize Breath of the Wild's gameplay design philosophy, I'd put it something like this: varied mechanics, simple interactions. Hyrule is full of interactive elements that makes the game world dynamic and seemingly organic. These interactions range from visual spectacles (ex. grass and tree branches swaying in the wind) to useful gameplay mechanics (ex. flammable game objects can be burned to create an updraft for gliding). Monsters and critters will interact with one another in small ways, simulating an ecosystem full of mysteries to discern and behaviors to study. Link also has access to tools never before seen in previous Zelda games. With various abilities to manipulate game objects and influence monsters and animals, the player has a great selection of mechanics to experiment with. This gives the player many options to choose from in approaching the game's challenges. The simplicity of the mechanics make them easy to utilize. As a result, interactions between objects and the player are intuitive and consistent.

With the number of near-perfect to perfect scores the game has received from review sites, Breath of the Wild seems infallible. The game has certainly earned its critical and commercial success, but I want to point out that many of these reviews don't capture the game in a representative manner. Call it hype, nostalgia, whatever—it's important that we take the time in examining the game not solely as a remodeling of a legendary franchise, but by how well it stands on its own. To that end, here are a couple of my own thoughts about the game.

The first third of the game is the golden time for Breath of the Wild. The game really emphasizes using all of the tools available to you when Link is weak and most vulnerable. Weak early weapons and a plethora of world objects subtly pushes the player to experiment with the different interactions. This becomes phased out as Link becomes stronger and finds better weapons. Damage from dropping a metal box on a monster, for example, just doesn't compare to the direct damage of hitting a monster. While the interactions still have a place in puzzles, they become less and less relevant in combat when the simplest solution becomes bashing monsters with stuff. The effort to impact ratio is too large for the world interactions to really hold up in the later portions of the game.

everything the light touches can be yours... if you have enough stamina elixirs

Weapon durability did not give me any problems whatsoever. I've read reviews that have gone both ways regarding the issue, but it was never a deal breaker of any sort. I also think reports of needing to carefully manage weapon usage are exaggerated. On the contrary, I always had weapons on Link and was constantly finding better ones. There isn't really a need to save weapons for anything so you might as well just use them, with the only exception being keeping one or two ancient weapons around in the event you come across a stray guardian. Finding the Master Sword is relatively easy and comes with natural progression and paying attention to hints from NPCs. The unbreakable weapon renders the problem of weapon durability moot for the most part. 

Cooking was needlessly elaborate. The crafting system involved is simple: throw in up to five ingredients and see what you get. The number of unique recipes that produced specific foods kind of surprised me. Cooking is divided into two categories: food and elixirs, both of which pretty much perform the same functions. Foods come from foodstuffs and elixirs are derived from monster parts; the two ingredients categories should never mix else Link cooks up something useless. You can experiment with different ingredients but ultimately boils down to this: You need a fire resistance elixir; find anything in your inventory that lists fire resistance as a property; throw five of those things into the pot. The simplest method of throwing five of the same thing usually provides the best results. The different food recipes for cakes and soups are elaborate, but ultimately just pointless flavor.

five mushrooms for dinner again

Enemy variety was sorely lacking. The developers might have stuck to the Zelda formula a little too much here. For an open-world as large as the one we get in Breath of the Wild, I was expecting more region unique enemies. The enemies are for the most part recolored, power-upped versions of weaker templates. Variability comes in the form of size and elemental attribute, but that doesn't really count in my opinion. The same attack patterns persist through similar enemy types, so the only additional challenge afforded is the increase in health and damage that the enemies have. I would've liked to see enemies that required the use of Sheikah Slate abilities to defeat, for example, or enemies that had access to their own versions of Sheikah Slate abilities that they could use on Link.

you're really the bad guy- they were just enjoying themselves

On-demand healing was a questionable mechanics design choice. It allows the player to open their inventory at any point, freeze the game world, to eat food and heal. Whether you just pick up things that come across your way or exhibit symptoms of kleptomania, you will end up with enough food and healing items to cook with. With a cornucopia in Link's pockets and on-demand healing, the only thing that will really give you a Game Over screen is being defeated in one hit from a monster far above your weight class. Players and reviewers have pointed out that Breath of the Wild is a more difficult game, but I cannot agree with their statement when on-demand healing is present without any counterbalance. There is no penalty to scarfing down foods whenever you want and the world is packed with meats, fruits, mushrooms, and vegetables. I would've liked to see a system that limited the amount of food/elixirs Link could consume in a set period of time, or at least during a state of combat. The availability of food combined with Being able to tank everything removes the agency of a difficult fight.

speaking of on-demand healing

A lackluster ending kind of hangs in the air for me. The purpose of Link's journey is to gain strength and gather allies for the upcoming fight against Calamity Ganon, so I really shouldn't be complaining when I say the final battle is really nothing special. Breaching Hyrule Castle, however, was a great deal of fun. Previously, the shrines and the four Divine Beast dungeons made extensive use of Sheikah Slate abilities which factored into my surprise that there are very few moments in Hyrule Castle that made use of the Sheikah Slate in any great capacity. For the most part, Hyrule Castle is a straight A to B with hidden side rooms. The most direct path to Calamity Ganon can miss many of the secrets and unique items along the way, so it's still worth exploring the various rooms of the castle. Aside from finding hidden rooms, though, the Sheikah Slate is largely forgotten.

breath of the wild II will feature a sheikah fit-bit and sheikah vr goggles

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Despite a few missteps here and there, Breath of the Wild successfully captures the spirit of the Legend of Zelda franchise in its open-world presentation. For me, the story and characters weren't as memorable as some of the past Zelda games, but the world itself may as well be its own character. With its painterly landscapes. mysterious ruins, and hidden treasures, the world itself provides an interesting sandbox for the player to create their own journey.

As far as open-world games go, Breath of the Wild isn't really that unique. I didn't feel an air of open-world innovation, but that's probably because it's still a Zelda game at heart and the open-world formula has hit a stagnant point as far as game mechanics go. On that, you still have narrative design and world presentation. Again, narrative design isn't quite there with Breath of the Wild, but world presentation carries Breath of the Wild into the new generation of gaming consoles.

they're not that bad

A more cynical part of me thinks Breath of the Wild  is still just banking on 80s gaming nostalgia for its praise. Besides, the game's mechanics begin to taper off after about a third of the way through while some of them simply become obsolete once you figure things out. However, I had to ask myself, "Did I have fun with the game" and the answer to that is a resounding yes. The reviews exaggerate the success of the game's design decisions, but that doesn't get in the way of a fun gaming experience. Breath of the Wild speaks to both older and newer generations of gamers in its journey to recreate the world of Zelda like never before.