Mindless Fun At The Wheel

Let's get something out of the way: if you enjoy Vin Diesel movies, I very much doubt that you consider picking up The Wheelman for its...cultural value. I for one sure did not.

This is fast driving, impossibly jumping, using-your-car-as-a-weapon, how-can-it-possibly-be-exploding kind of game. Fun? You bet!

The graphics are beautiful (similar to NFS: ProStreet but less shiny than NFS: Undercover) and the cars acquire (more or less) realistic dents, scrapes and damages when hit. There are objectives marked on the map and cops giving chase. There are beautiful women giving orders, getting double-crossed and relying on your driving skills to drive through everything and see them right. Need I say more?

Keep in mind that The Wheelman was released during UbiSoft's sane days of releasing DRM-free games. So, you can not only greatly enjoy this game and do so with peace of mind that your computer will come to no harm but the game also becomes yours to keep.

And The Outliers Shall Inherit The Earth

Outliers and oddities are the signs of any healthy group or population. And by healthy I mean fit-to-survive. Because when change comes (and it inevitably comes), there will be blood but there will also be options. What was considered strange will now prove invaluable, and what was scorned will now be coveted.

The Gaming Industry is run by a small number of people at the top. They are no better or worse than the average Joe. They too have instances of brilliance and weeks of mental slumber; they too rely on luck and intimidation and connections to jump ahead; they too get scared and frustrated and greedy. Petty competition breeds fear and fear is not the best consul for one's character. The problem is that, because of the power they yield in the industry, their flaws get amplified and their bad decisions have a far greater impact. And nothing can take ways the bad aftertaste of been treated like cattle, to be herded in and milked again and again.

By buying out (and closing up) numerous gaming studios they have managed to consolidate their market share and lay the tracks towards their pay-per-play vision of the future. It all seems uniform and homogenized and inescapable. But, we only think there are no alternative options. There are plenty. And the experience they can offer far surpasses the miserly pay-for-as-long-as-our-servers-will-tolerate-you. Indie developers and independent studios are like grass and wild flowers: no matter how much ferroconcrete and weedkiller is applied, life and human creativity will find a way to break trough and thrive. 

A great example is CD PROJEKT RED, a small gaming studio from Poland. These guys came out of nowhere to bring us, so far, two of the greatest cRPG games ever produced, The Witcher and The Witcher II: Assassins of Kings. And that is not all. They proved to both stand behind their product and to show respect to their customers. Each game got a totally redesigned edition a year following its release. They gave it away to their customers for free. The did the same thing with every single DLC that was released: their customers received them for free as well.

This added value to their product, convincing more people to buy it. And when we do, we feel like valued friends. 

It is game developers and gaming studios like that we need to keep supporting. They are the hope that when it hits the fan (and it always does at the end!), there will be a robust PC gaming community to carry on.

Some days ago The Witcher III was announced. It is to be the last of the Geralt of Rivia Trilogy. I think it is the only game that can persuade me to switch from my trusted WindowsXP to Win7. And that is saying a lot. 

The Latest OnLine DRM Fiasco

Einstein defined idiocy as doing the same thing over and over and yet expecting a different outcome. A definition I was reminded of after the latest Must-be-OnLine-to-play disaster. If there ever were an attempt to prove that there is, indeed, bad publicity,  the release of SimCity 2013 sure was it.

Mega-publishers are repeatedly trying to turn the beautiful artform of gaming into a utility, where "gaming content" will be streaming to your TV or PC or phone - and you will be charged by the second for it. Monopolistic issues aside for the moment, are they even remotely ready for such a model? It matter because their every attempt is (involuntarily!) financed by the customers they manage to scam in paying for games that do not deliver the gaming experience advertised. Paying for a product or a service that you do not receive because the seller planed it this way is the definition of a scam. So calling it an idiocy is in fact generous. 

Let's count the number of times the same idiocy was repeated, shall we? BioShock, Spore, Prince of Persia, Splinter Cell (or any UbiSoft game at this point), Command & Conquer IV (was that a stinker!), Diablo III, SimCity 2013 (and every single EA game requiring Origin). The list is long and it could go on.

The problem with gaming today is not the hard-working and creative people working in game studios but the executives at the top of game publishing houses, the likes of EA, ActiVision/Blizzard and 2K.

They do not love, comprehend or even care about the product they are marketing. They might as well be peddling sacks of potatoes. And they clearly do not care about the game developers who provide them with games to market. They only care about one thing: their annual bonuses. And their bonuses depend solely on last trimester's profits.

That is why they operate on a very short-sighted basis.

Sell the most popular games for over $150 by portioning them in thin DLC slices? Sure!

Release games before they are completed to catch the Summer or Christmas market? Why not?

Exploit and truncate a beloved franchise in order to promote the new Digital Distribution DRM? Go ahead!

Ruin the experience of most paying customers by forcing them to log on to servers that do not exist? Who is to stop us?

They do not care about the company they are running (and the bigger it is, the easier to dissociate) because this time next year they may be running a company selling hardware or health care insurance or weed control. So, they do not care whether they insult, make angry and chase away customers the company they are now running enjoyed for years. It takes almost a decade for a game studio to acquire a loyal fan base. Yet it only takes a couple of months to chase them away never to come back.

But the bozos at the top do not care. They will have grabbed their fat bonuses and run.Who is there to stop them?

Well, we all are. I, for one, have stopped buying EA and UbiSoft games for some time now.

We are the Gandalfs standing in the bridge they want to cross. And THEY. SHALL NOT. PASS.

The Moment They Cemented It In DRM, It Is Not Business. It Is Personal

Puzo's & Coppola's The Godfather may be the I-Ching of western men but this installment, like Sollozzo the Turk's proposal, is an infamita.

With The Godfather II, EA's pezzonovante, they come not in respect. They come not asking to be our friends. Not once. Even though we keep financing their very existence. They only ask greedily for more.

In a sneaky Hyman Roth fashion, EA tries once more to infect our domains with SecuROM RootKits and make us pay again and again for the same game by Limiting its installations. By claiming to fight piracy (ironic from day one...) EA wants to keeps squeezing its own customers. And they are ready to badmouth and brand as "pirates" anyone who might stand up to their rule.

But, just like Don Fanucci, behind the white suit of an ever-menacing EULA hides nothing. Forced to accept an agreement under pain of suffering the financial loss of a worthless non-refundable product nullifies any stipulation in said agreement before any court of law. They only rule on our fear.

But we shall fear no more. Because this is cosa nostra. We have been in PC gaming long before these accountants ruined this beautiful artform.

Make them an offer they can't refuse: let this horses' head soil the silk sheets as EA is slumbering. Eventually they will wake up. And they will do so screaming.

Gamers, I salut!

Three Times The Fun

These are the years of PC gaming that will be known as the Underdog Era: full of indie masterpieces and megapublishers flops. World Of Goo, iFluid,Crayon Physics, Defense Grid: The Awakening, all released by small independent companies, were rewarded by much better financial returns than overhyped behemoths of the likes of Red Alert 3, Anno 1404 and Spore. It was not unexpected; after all, just like Limited Installations, greed only pays for a limited number of turns.

Trine is an excellent physics action/arcade game. You control three interchangeable characters (a thief, a wizard and a warrior). Each has his/hers special abilities, from shooting griping hooks to levitating objects and smashing things up. At any point, you can select which one suits you best. Obstacles have to be turned, balanced, jumped over or simply smashed. Enemies have to be wiped out. And vials have to be discovered and collected before reaching the goal.

Between levels there are checkpoints but, annoyingly, no regular saving is possible (hence the star withheld). If a character dies you are only left with the other(s) to finish off the level. If it is impossible without the missing character(s)' abilities you can always revert to the last checkpoint.

The graphics are just beautiful! PhysX is required however, so nVIDIA gamers rejoice. The sounds and voices are nicely done and clearly add to the enjoyment of the game. Overall, I have been playing this gem for almost a week now and apart for the checkpoint saves I can only say good things about it.

Trine comes with STEAM (in fact it was released first on that platform) and you will need to be online to post accomplishments - but there are neither limits on the number of installations nor any RootKits of the likes of SecuROM.

A Chest Of Gems. Some Polished, Others Raw

I have a confession to make: when the first IceWind Dale came out I bought maybe the first copy and rushed home to immerse into it. It was summer of 2000 and I had just polished off the excellent Baldur's Gate and the incomparable Planescape: Torment. A day into IceWind Dale and I absolutely hated it!

The graphics were comparable (all three games share the same engine) and the gameplay was almost identical. The music was excellent and certain tunes stayed with me ever since. The storyline was nothing to complain about - after all, any story set in "the spine of the world" can hardly go wrong! What I did not appreciate was the rushed feeling of a job on an impossible deadline.

In order to prolong the duration of the game, much smaller maps were stuffed with a far greater number of powerful foes - and almost nothing could be solved without combat. As a result, what was expected to be an enjoyable experience turned into a chore of endless autopausing, retargeting and constant battling.

Having said the above, I must admit that, in hindsight, my complains seem trivial. Little did I know at the time how far into hell greed would drive the gaming industry. Compared to 3-4 hour games, extra charges for essential content, Limited Installations and RootKits (of the likes of StarFORCE and SecuROM), well, games such as the IceWind Dale saga stand out as landmarks in PC-gaming history.

The expansion (The Heart of Winter) improved things somewhat but the series did not find its stride until the very good IceWind Dale II. I remember spending endless hours with the sequel and can compare it to the original Baldur's Gate.

Inside The Mind Of A Great Auteur

David Lynch's talent transcends movie making. He is an accomplished video artist, photographer, painter and poet. And this book, based on a number of interviews with the Renaissance Man of Arts himself, offers more than an amble glimpse into his psyche.

Lynch on Lynch leaves little out. Starting from his birth in Missoula, Montana and his upbringing in Sandpoint,Idaho - and a string of different cities where his family moved due to his father transfers, Lynch's growing up is a series of mesmerizing snapshots. And then, from the success of The Elephant Man and the financial fiasco of Dune to the penultimate TV series, Twin Peaks and the hypnotic Mulholland Drive.

Lynch is holding nothing back. From his inspirations, obsessions and creative process to the inner workings of Hollywood studios and the synergic balance of picture, story and music, this book is a sine qua non for either his fans or, more importantly, for aspiring movie makers.

Traveling Into The Life Of Michael Crichton

Travels is the only book of Michael Crichton that I was missing and so I bought it to complete my library. I knew not to expect a book of fiction because it is not one. What I did not expect was how much I was to enjoy it!

Besides small side-remarks, there is nothing about his childhood or his upbringing. These stories are the memoirs of an aspiring writer trapped into an Ivy League arc that was to land him an MD. But he got away. Well, maybe too far away...

The first stories describe his ever growing disillusionment with both medicine and its practitioners. Later on Crichton goes into his personal journeys in life, both around the world and professionally. From inside Hollywood trivia to scuba diving tips; from exotic culture shocks to the benefits of meditation; and from escaping mortal danger in Jamaica to having his ...aura fluffed, no corner of Michael Crichton's mind remains obscured.

Crichton's insights may not always be easy to share but one has to appreciate his candor. Because of his untimely death, this book is a major part of his legacy.

Veritas Ex Machina?

Writing is a lonely endeavor, yet Preston is one of those rare writers who thrive in collaboration but straggle when writing alone. When writing in tandem with Lincoln Child more often than not lightening strikes (The Relic, The Reliquary, The Ice Limit to name a few). In contrast, his previous solo efforts (The Codex, Tyrannosaur Canyon) fall just short of their mark. Blasphemy goes a bit further.

Isabella is the supercollider that American particle and high-energy physicists dreamed about (but Congress killed in 1993 - why waste money on Science when we will be going at war to help our oil companies make even more billions, right? ). Anyway, in this novel it is actually built, not in Texas but in Arizona. In an abandoned coal mine, under a Native American burial grounds. And if these were not ominous enough, when it is run at full power, all heavens seem to break loose.

Navajo medicine men and frothing tele-evangelists; a lonely pastor driven over the edge and a cynic ex-monk turned deniable-PI for the government; a president risking riots only to protect his legacy and a Nobel-prize winner scientist with a severe Messianic fixation. The science may be half-baked and the characters underdeveloped and monochromatic but the story will keep you turning pages well into the night.

A particle beam worth a ride.

A Good Old Soul Can Only Learn A Few New Tricks

The original Fate was the PG version of Diablo: cartoonish graphics, simplified quests, very limited gore and a cute child/hero running, fighting (and fishing!) in armor. The dungeons were endlessly random, the beasts well deserving their fate and the weapons and trinkets imaginative (and surprisingly expensive!). Overall, very fun to play!

Its first sequel, Fate: Undiscovered Realms, offered more of the same in a second set of dungeons. And now the second sequel improves little beyond offering yet another set.

Very few things are new in Fate: The Traitor Soul, this new standalone incarnation. True, you can now choose amongst four races (Human, Shadow Elf, Half-Orc and Cogger). The best one is still Human, a true Jack-of-all-trades: Elves are agile but have a very hard time defending themselves; Orcs are clumsy tanks, strong but with low dexterity; whereas Coggers are strong geeks but with no magical abilities.

There are new armor sets, new weapons and spells and new pets. On the other hand, I could discern no change in the graphics and sounds compared to the previous installments.

Finally, the two previous dungeons each get twenty extra levels to explore and plunder. This is a steal because for the price I remember paying for the first game you now get both the original game and its first expansion. On the other hand, you may find exploring all three dungeons and completing one run-and-fetch quest after another a bit tedious. Nevertheless, it is still good casual fun.

The Brand New PostApocalyptic Dawn Is Now Complete

I am old enough to have played the original game when it first came out in 1997. I was a great fan of the series that followed and, thus, was very eager to get my hands on this latest installment. In a short sentence: Fallout 3 is a dream come true! And now the dream is complete.

It is a cRPG game in which the player can alternate between the First and Third person perspective roaming a world comparable in size with Oblivion. The action has moved from Vault 13 and Southern California to Vault 101 and Washington, D.C. and the story brakes away from the previous bloodlines. However, the atmosphere of the original has been maintained and its scents sharpened: veterans will find it fitting like and old glove - whereas the new gamers are in store for a bag of pleasant surprises.

The graphics are wonderful, the guns detailed and the environments highly interactive. Short of a screenshot, imagine what would HalfLife 2 would look if released today. And similar to HL2, Fallout 3 does not require an...ubercomputer to run smoothly. Once you see a NPC move though, you understand where the corners were cut.

Character customization is carried out in great style using the new and improved PIP-BOY at the beginning. You exit the vault and the harsh reality of a world that barely survived annihilation slaps you on the face. Adapt or perish.

The main storyline is there to be followed but Fallout 3 offers the greatest number of alternative choices I have ever encountered in a game! There is always a great number of paths to follow in order to achieve any goal - but every choice comes with a consequences tag. This is common feature of most classic cRPGs but in Fallout 3 I saw it implemented like never before. If nothing else, this sends replayability through the roof.

Side-quests offer little besides distraction and experience points (XP) to be spend on character improvement. XP are gained solely by completing quests, emerging victorious from fights, finding locations, picking locks and hacking terminals - and they are not limited by the action they were earned. Leveling up is based on 7 basic attributes [Strength, Perception, Endurance, Charisma, Intelligence, Agility & Luck - acronym?;)] that, in turn, affect your (13) specific skills. Leveling up used to be capped at Level-20 (increased to 30 by installing the DLCs), as the game designers wanted to encourage replaying the game. However, with this increase, now your character can realize its full potential. Replaying the game is still a joy though.

The game is violent and gory but well within tasteful limits. Not so with the language - but it is trade off with realism. In a radioactive world, Sunday-school niceties are bound to go out the window.

What deserves a special mention is V.A.T.S. (:Vault-Tec Assisted Targeting System) which opens new vistas in cRPG design. It is an ingenious system which lets you pause the game and target specific body parts of your opponents. The success of your attack still depends on your skills but the end effect is cinematic and amazing (remember Swordfish?).

This GOTY edition includes all 5 DLCs released so far: Operation: Anchorage, The Pitt, Broken Steel, Point Lookout and Mothership Zeta. Compared to the basic Fallout 3  applying the above improves the experience immensely! As mentioned above, since one used to reach the Level 20 cap long before the endgame, increasing this by 10 levels will give you a brand new ballgame.

Augmented weapons, new territories, novel foes and unexpected story branching - all for the price of the original game. I own the original game and coveted after these DLCs in the past months, waiting for a complete edition such as this GOTY one. When it became available I jumped at the opportunity to get them all. And did not regret it for a moment.

After the nuclear summer of 2008 (with all the Limited-Installation/defective EA releases), this seems like a post-apocalyptic dawn indeed! Bethesda decided to listen to the gaming community and did not cripple this beautiful game with any idiotic DRM scheme. Inputting a serial number and a DVD-check is more than reasonable.

The publishers of Fallout 3 understand that there is a fine balance between "protecting the product" and..."insulting your own customers". And they obviously view respect as the two way street that it is - and for this they deserve our support: buy this game, today.

Voting with our wallets is the only argument the gaming industry cannot afford to ignore. And it is about time to cast some well deserved positive votes.

No New Tricks For El Presidente - But Still Great Fun

Every regime turns old and stale. Every banana-republic runs out of national resources to sell-out for kickbacks. And every dictator can hide only so many populist aces up his sleeve. So in the end he calls for ...degenerate capitalist image-makers to reinvent his persona and make the beard hip again. It's the same old story.

Power corrupts - and absolute power corrupts absolutely. True - but aren't you tempted? Not even a little?

The original Tropico and its expansions were of those rare RTS games that manage to blend absurd stereotypes with classic gaming genres and reinvent them with humor. From the old Dungeon Keeper to the unsurpassed Evil Genius most of these games are hard to fail. And how could they - what is there not to like?

In Tropico 3 the economy must be tended to: from agriculture, fisheries and tourism, to oil and mining, you must decide on how to keep your regime solvent and well into the black. On the other hand, neglect the well-being of your citizens at your own risk. Both superpowers as well as brewing guerrillas are always at your heels, ready to dispose of you and install their puppet in your boots.

So make sure to strut around and let your subjects take a good hard look at their leader. If that is not enough to discourage dissidents, making a long-winded populist speech surely will. Push come to shove, you can always rig the elections of course...

This installment's sin is that it offers little new besides improved graphics and minor gameplay touch-ups. However, this is not necessarily a bad thing.

If new to the series, buy all means buy it! Not only will you greatly enjoy the gameplay but you will also experience it in its best incarnation. If you already have experienced the previous installments of Tropico, I know you have to see what the original game looks and feel like in 3D and Shader Model 3 graphics.

The game comes free for any intrusive DRM nonsense. Neither online activation nor any limit on installations, just a serial key. What you know, even ruthless tyrants have more sense than game publishing executives...

Thwart those insolent revolutionaries before they gain traction!

Send them for cultural re-education to the banana fields.

A Map Without A Treasure

This book is not what I will remember the late Michael Crichton by. He was an excellent writer, excelling in popularized science techno-thrillers but also fully capable of producing period dramas of high quality, such as The Great Train Robbery. Having read that gem recently, I can attest that Pirate Latitudes was either not written by Michael Crichton or was only a rough script - and was then polished and hastily packaged as a novel.

True, Michael Crichton's main focus had always been the story, often at the expense of his characters. However, the characters here are so crudely and halfheartedly developed that I could not find myself caring for any of them, including Cpt. Hunter, the main hero. The story goes from one cliffhanger to the next (in a James Rollins fashion) and it will keep you turning pages. Nevertheless, it is writing-an-action-novel-by-numbers: the story never managed to get a hold on me.

Where is Crichton's signature obsessive research that used to turn long-held misconceptions on their head? Where is his attention to obscure details and little-known scientific facts with big impact? Where is his ability to entertain and educate at the same time?

After the sad cases of Frank Herbert and Robert Ludlum, Crichton's heirs are attempting to exploit his fans as well. He did not deserve this.

Let this act of piracy hang from the yardarm.

Risen From The Dead

The Gothic series had more bugs than a soft-drink spill in a hot summer day. These games had great potential as First/Third-Person RPGs but the quality control problems was what prevented the series from ever becoming Morrowind. And what is worse, the game developer (Piranha Bytes) did not learn from its mistakes: as the series progressed, the problems only got worse.

So notorious had the Gothic series become that the name itself was all but abandoned. Risen is what Gothic III was supposed to be (a Gothic 3.5 if you will) and Gothic IV will actually be named..."ArcaniA: A Gothic Tale"!. Although it was not completely able to escape its pedigree, and it may not be at the cutting edge of developments, Risen is a good game and it is (mostly) fun to play.

You start off a castaway with no history but endless potential. There is some wreckage loot but do not get too greedy: veering off to far into the sea will bring a sea monster upon you.

The progress is slow at the beginning and your character's initial weakness will tax your patience: expect quite a few deaths early on. However, if you weather out the initial steep incline you will be rewarded with a great cRPG that unfolds as you go on.

The graphics are not top drawer but the environments are very tastefully made. And the game designers at least tried to avoid endless repetitions: most environments are original, with a lot of effort put into them.

Like The Witcher, combat can be very engaging (but without the timed-clicking skill requirements). Where RISEN shines is the quality of its quests, the number and gravity of the choices offered and its story. And any true gamer will attest that those are the aspects that matter most for any cRPG game. After all, the greatest cRPG ever, Baldur's Gate, hardly had graphics to phone home about.

I bought this on the strength of its demo and the mostly positive reviews it received at Amazon (downloading and trying out the Demo is always a good idea). I was not disappointed.