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Thursday, July 2, 2009 02:33 PM
If Deadwood were a game...
Call of Juarez: Bound in Blood (PS3, X360, PC), a prequel to Ubisoft and Techland’s 2007 first-person shooter Call of Juarez, is an example of how important creative roles can be in modern game development.
Bound in Blood has players shooting pistols and rifles, tossing dynamite grenades, riding stagecoaches and horses, taking cover behind barrels, and using emplaced weapons like cannons and Gatling guns to their advantage. In other words, there's little innovation. The mechanics are standard to the genre and have simply been adapted to the Western milieu. Its one semi-original feature—a “concentration” mode that lets players target several enemies in slow motion—is more nifty novelty than truly useful functionality.
What’s more, the technical aspects of the game’s visual presentation are actually below par. Textures are bland, weeds and rocks pop jarringly into existence as they draw closer, and facial animations are stiff and poorly synced with the dialogue. There’s little chance of Bound in Blood appeasing the graphics hound in anyone.
And yet it is a surprisingly compelling adventure.
Link to this postMonday, June 29, 2009 10:40 PM
A Conduit to better control
It’s been almost three years since the Wii’s launch, and studios that make shooters are still struggling to come up with a simple, responsive, and fun way to navigate 3-D game worlds from a first-person perspective using the system’s unique motion-sensitive and infrared controls.
Many gamers had their hopes set on The Conduit, a new sci-fi action game from High Voltage Software and Sega designed exclusively for Nintendo’s console. Early buzz suggested that it could be the first first-person shooter to crack the Wii control puzzle.
Now that it's out, I'm not sure the reality will live up to everyone's expectations.
Monday, June 29, 2009 07:19 PM
When art imitates (virtual) life
Just a quick post this morning to direct you to a video game artist’s web site.
No, I’m not talking about one of the talented folks that design the look and feel of your favourite games, but rather James Barnett, an American painter who carefully selects scenes from the games he plays, including Half-Life 2, Grand Theft Auto IV, and Fallout 3, and uses oil and brush to create vibrant—and surprisingly serene, given the subject matter—landscape paintings on wood panels.
James Barnett
"Magaton", a 48-by-32-inch oil painting rendered on a cradled wood panel. It's part of a series of paintings by American artist James Barnett, who is inspired by the virtual landscapes in the video games he plays.
Mr. Barnett writes on his site that “there's a whole spiel behind this, starting from frustration at 3-D games slavishly imitating real life (though this has been lessened thanks to Braid and others), but really, artists should shut up and make pictures.”
There are a dozen pieces in his video game landscape series, which he calls Fauxvism, and ten are still available for purchase. His site, which includes images of all of his Fauxvism paintings, is definitely worth a quick visit. Who knows, maybe one of his works will become your next living room conversation piece.
And stay tuned; my impressions of The Conduit for the Wii are coming later today...
Friday, June 26, 2009 05:38 PM
An interactive meditation on the meaning of insurgency
Words like “terrorist,” “insurgent,” “resistance fighter,” and “freedom fighter” are loaded. All of them could potentially be applied to the same person, but we choose the one we want based on its positive or negative connotation and our own viewpoints. Red Faction: Guerrilla, a new game from Volition Inc. and THQ, challenges players to re-evaluate their perception of these subjective descriptors.
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Wednesday, June 24, 2009 09:03 AM
Nintendo brings E3 to Toronto
Nintendo of Canada held an event in a downtown Toronto office building Tuesday that gave game journalists who didn’t attend E3 this year (like me) a chance to try a handful of Wii and DS games that were playable at this year’s show.
Tuesday, June 23, 2009 12:29 AM
No more Guitar Heroes for the PS3? Fat chance
There’s been plenty of chatter over the last few days about the supposed threat made by Activision honcho Bobby Kotick to stop making games for the PlayStation 3, so I thought I’d add my two cents, which amount to this: It will never happen.
In an interview with The Times last Friday Mr. Kotick said that the PlayStation 3 is too expensive, and that's keeping the console out of the hands of potential software consumers.
“They have to cut the price, because if they don't, the attach rates [the number of games each console owner buys] are likely to slow,” said Mr. Kotick. “If we are being realistic, we might have to stop supporting Sony.”
He’s right about one thing: A $200 PlayStation 3 would substantially increase hardware sales, thereby expanding the pool of people who might potentially purchase Activision games.
Monday, June 22, 2009 10:48 AM
Just click the plasma grenade to launch IE
Lifehacker recently posted a picture of a Halo 3-themed PC desktop created by one of its readers.
Using little more than a screenshot and a tool called Rainmeter that lets users create customized Windows resource meters, the ambitious game lover—who goes by the handle rykennedyan—turned the shooter’s heads-up display icons, such as the grenade and ammunition counters, into quick-launch buttons for commonly used applications and widgets for information like download traffic and unread messages.
Hit the jump to check it out.
Thursday, June 18, 2009 07:33 PM
Pixel Equity wants to give your old video games to needy kids
Thought this might be worth a quick post, given the discussion generated by the piece I wrote about getting rid of my old hardware and games a few weeks ago: A new organization in New York called Pixel Equity is asking for games and consoles you don’t use anymore so that they can distribute them to underprivileged kids.
Charities that give games to kids aren't new, but Pixel Equity's process is. Less fortunate children make requests for games they want to play, and you can choose to fill them by either donating the game or donating money to help purchase the game for them.
Wednesday, June 17, 2009 04:36 PM
The Sims made simple
I smelled the smoke at almost exactly the same time that I saw it on screen. No, I’m not talking about the video game equivalent of John Waters’ Smell-O-Vision. Rather, my avatar in The Sims 3 was burning a batch of waffles just as my morning sausages were becoming a little too well done on the stove behind me.
If there’s one thing I’ve always liked about the Sims games it’s the eerie accuracy with which they mimic real life. The way short-changing your sim on a good night’s sleep might help him get something done in the short term, but usually results in crankiness and decreased efficiency in the long run. The way unexpected expenses seem to come up just when he's managed to save enough money for that special item you wanted him to buy, forcing him to start scrimping all over again.
And the way he tends to burn his breakfast when he isn’t attending it as he should.
But if there’s one thing I’ve always loathed about the Sims games it’s their tendency toward micromanagement. Once I realize that I’ve been playing for seven or eight hours and my sim is still working a dead-end job and living in a dump because all of his time is spent tidying the house, going to the bathroom, preparing meals, sleeping, and taking baths, I usually log off and never return.
Happily, the third game in the world’s most popular PC gaming franchise changes all that.
Wednesday, June 17, 2009 10:29 AM
Want in on Uncharted 2’s closed multiplayer beta?
The current multiplayer beta for Uncharted 2: Among Thieves is closed to the public, which means this work-in-progress game is accessible to but a limited few. And you could be one of these lucky players—assuming you have a PlayStation 3, know the answer to the skill testing question at the bottom of this post, and are one of the first twelve to email me your answer.
But first a bit about what you can expect to see.
Controller Freak Contributors
Chad Sapieha
Chad Sapieha has been covering the video game industry in print and broadcast since 1997. He began writing about games for The Globe and Mail in 2004.