Overwatched

"Name's McCree". The announcement is jawed and chewed, a cigar playing as much a part as the tongue. Eyes a-squint. Behind the gaze, nary a thought. His six shooter by the name of Peacekeeper is loaded with Justice in need of dispensing. Death brings peace, obviously and I get a sour aftertaste - a meal gone bad, rebelling in the pit of my stomach - in the back of my mouth. On the opposing red team the very same is happening. But nobody cares. Blue McCree steps into the limelight together with other enthusiasts from the cosplay convention. Next to him is Steve in angsty teenage powergarb. Clearly practicing for the upcoming stage show, taking on the most dramatic and threatening pose imaginable. The pose is meant to instill some fear into its beholder. Yet nobody cares. That's just Steve, he does it all the time. Steve dresses up like Darksiders and The Matrix. Steve's favourite class in D3 is the Demon Hunter. Steve is a bit of a prat.

_{Steve sure knows how to work the camera.}

Welcome to Overwatch. Pause for the dramatic musical interlude and late title card. So cool. The concept of Overwatch is quite solid. A team based, competitive, hero based shooter, with familiar game modes. Take inspiration from the rich history of ego shooters and model them onto likable, in some cases awe-inspiring, characters. Soldier 76 is a Call Of Duty facsimile, Mercy seems like the StarCraft addicted daughter of the Medic from Team Fortress 2. Tracer is your flanking, Run 'n Gun class. Widowmaker a Kerrigan inspired sniper. Reinhardt leads, Torbjörn does machines.

_{His name is McCree.}

As hinted at, Overwatch cannot escape comparison with Team Fortress 2. It also can't by proxy of Blizzard sibling Heroes of the Storm, to DOTA. Coincidentally: both of those are Valve games. Sadly for Blizzard, both of those are, as of now, still better games than Overwatch. From a gameplay perspective, and tonally, Overwatch falls closer to TF2. The former has a murder of static hero characters, the latter has a handfull of editable classes. These heroes are Overwatch's main drawing factor. Whereas gameplay surely is the main attraction for TF2. Well, next to the hats that is. The gargantuan divide between the two is their setting. TF2 left much to the imagination whereas Overwatch has a universe that is quite pronounced.
 
To say overwatch has excellent character design isn't a sleight against TF2's characters, because they are iconic and well thought-out. No, I'm not just talking about recognizability of the silhouettes. The actual character designs also show some sophistication. Watch some of the character specific shorts Valve made and you'll get the point instantly. The sniper is a bureaucrat with a sniper rifle. The honest Brawn of the heavy is the perfect counterpart for the sly intellect of the, Frankenstein-like medic. The Demoman design, a rambunctious Scotsman, sidesteps any racial stereotyping with some creativity.

_{Context matters.}

Less specific nature of characters, such as those of TF2, pushes them a bit into the direction of a blank slate - which makes them more approachable. In contrast, Blizzard wants to nail every stereotype as hard as it can. "Name's McCree", his diction is terse, there's no such thing as a chatty gunslinger. Gunslingers smolder menace in silence and need to have the linguistic effeciency of a telegram. Each hero spurts the one liners you'd expect. All of which are said in a vacuum. The characters aren't aware of their colleagues. By comparison Call of Duty: Black Ops 3's heroes, called specialists - yes they have them too - do party banter. So why can't Overwatch's?
These characters are similar to those in Capcom's Street Fighter, each has their own global origin. Yet they do not have the associated cultural link. indian Dhalsim is a yoga master. Japanese Ryu embodies a Ronin lifestyle, Chu-Li wears Chinese garb and does kung fu. Guile is the American family man. Overwatch's Pharah wears metroid armour avec arm-mounted rocket launcher, obviously she's from Egypt. I'm sure the link is clear... Uhm. The Chozo? Ah, Pharah-oh!
For fear of stating the obvious, Street Fighter has a Japanese perspective on the world, and Overwatch has an American perspective on the world. Yet Blizzard has many, many (international) world class creative talents. The flaw of Overwatch's setting is borne out of excess whereas it could have benefited from restraint. It needs some 'less is more'. Why? My real problem with Overwatch lies with the way how gameplay is completely severed from its setting.

_{The Overwatch Cinematic Trailer is full of nice little pictures.}

The game, not very clearly, has a host of less than good-aligned characters. Like Reaper and Widowmaker. But the game doesn't really acknowledge the absurdity that villains are fighting besides the, presumably, heroes. Said good guys are also killing other good guys. The teams themselves have no polarizing element that sets them apart on the battlefield, save for their differently coloured name and outline (UI fixing a problem character design doesn't). Other than that there's no real telling that these are rival factions. Their goals and motivations equally nebulous. Why is defending McCree shooting attacking McCree? Both are claiming justice as their motivation while fighting over a payload on its way from A to B. Presumably the organisation known as Overwatch was created to safeguard the world, like our real world UN, from terrorists like Reaper. So I think it it safe to assume that all these characters are just mercenaries and that, regardless of how lofty their motivations, they are all villains. Or maybe this is just another instance of American policy where it doesn't matter why you have the war.
Rumour has it that Overwatch is all that's left of Blizzard's aborted Titan project, which was rumoured to be another MMO concept. Could it be that faction based gameplay (say: horde vs alliance) was dropped and now anything goes? This also means that whatever reason for conflict there once was, is gone, yet conflict remains.

justice
ˈdʒʌstɪs/Submit
noun
 
1.
just behaviour or treatment.
"a concern for justice, peace, and genuine respect for people"
synonyms:     fairness, justness, fair play, fair-mindedness, equity, equitableness, even-handedness, egalitarianism, impartiality, impartialness, lack of bias, objectivity, neutrality, disinterestedness, lack of prejudice, open-mindedness, non-partisanship.
 
2.
a judge or magistrate, in particular a judge of the Supreme Court of a country or state.

Overwatch has a universe that is really only useful for a trailer. TF2 has could be seen as what happens, or happened, during cold war times where 2 sides of a conflict would be doing very similar things aimed towards the other. Expending gigantic efforts to prolong a stalemate. A zero-sum game of two perfectly balanced parties where neither can get the upper hand - and so the game is played indefinitely - which explains why the game is allowed (do not read as 'granted by an authority') to be played/happens again and again. A more cartoonish take of Orson Welles' '1984'. A capture the flag game mode revolves around "the intel" without ever naming what the intel actually is. Valve could have gone ahead and explain that the intel are the plans of the deathstar, but the game is served just as well by just "the intel", the characters also acknowledge this. All they know is that it needs to be kept. There's only one of them and the enemy can't have it. Grunts as tools, in this instance the players, they are kept unaware because it simply doesn't matter. All the game needs is something to fight over. It's the notion of just because that links it to the often absurd nature of armed conflict. Particularly fitting as the setting of TF2. Its characters are just one amongst many. None of them make any special claim to fame, none of them goes beyond the call of duty.
But Overwatch plays with none of the concepts at its premise. The game seems like it just wants fancy characters to shoot at each other. They could as well not have bothered thinking up a universe for them.
Black Ops 3 has the same problem: factionless characters fighting each other in opposing teams, but solves it by framing death matches as simulated training programs. The game is presented as a video game, which makes it pretty honest.

_{His name is McCree!}

Overwatch adheres to the Big Bang Theory style of funny, where funny isn't actually intellectually stimulating.

One of the most severe shortcomings of Overwatch is that it isn't self aware. Funny though the character designs may have been intended. Each of them only hit one note. His name is McCree. See how that's funny? He's a gun-slinging cowboy, just like in those movies where they all sound like that. She needs to raise her APM... because she's Korean. See how that's hilarious? She repeats it every 2 minutes. Maybe even just to make sure you get the joke. Overwatch adheres to the Big Bang Theory style of funny, where funny isn't actually intellectually stimulating, but just an out of the blue reference that is supposed to contrast or compliment with the current context (I had to strain to come up with that explanation - because there very well may be none). But It usually needs the support of a laugh track to signal when the funny bit happens. His name is McCree, and "justice won't dispense itself". Ha... What justice is that again? The only conflict I can see between characters is because they aren't on the same side for some reason. Is difference of opinion (come to think of it, not even that) a crime that requires justice? I think McCree has seen a few too many westerns and is imitating Clint Eastwood while high on psilocybin and sarsaparilla.

The characters themselves don't care either. His name is McCree... and that's all he has to say on the matter. That's all anyone on the team has to say about it. Other than hitting all the cliché one-liners you'd expect: "it's high noon", "much obliged". I didn't hear "this town isn't big enough for the two of us" yet, but I suspect the line is recorded with cleched jaw seriousness and is archived on a secure server somewhere. In fairness, I'm picking on McCree because he's such an easy target, but every characters received the same treatment. There's no true comic relief, yet it's desperately needed because its subject matter is absolutely gruesome. Unfortunately this game has no wit to it. It just has cool art design.

What it also lacks is good level design. Granted this is a beta but the maps lack sophistication. Sight lines, sniping spots, flanking routes, all these may come with future maps, but the ones I played were very basic. What's makes the maps even worse are their bottlenecks. Fights often result in a prolonged stalemate while everyone is cornercreeping to take potshots till someone forces a breakthrough by activating an ultimate skill.

_{A rough approximation of what Reaper's Death Blossom skill looks like.}

Reapers ultimate skill is called 'Death Blossom'. Where he does The Matrix and people fall down in a series of one-hit-kills. Many ultimate skills resemble hacks or cheats from other FPS games. Reaper pronounces "Die, Die, Die", like the dirty terrorist he is. If you play Overwatch you'll probably hear it more than a few times each match. In no way will it ever become repetitive, boring, dull and trite. Not even after playing the game for one whole hour straight, I know because I tested it. His name is McCree. Who cares.

Each match is ended with the once-in-a-lifetime bookmark moment in Overwatch history. Nobody cares. I'm sure it won't lose its luster.

Another event you'll grow painfully accustomed to is the "play of the game" replay. During which a feat of strength, judged by the algorithm, is displayed to all participants of the game. The feat is set to a really heroic sounding score which indicates that something once-in-a-lifetime has occurred. When I say heroic, I really mean it, it's so heroic that the next Medal Of Honor game will only be able to top it by having Nazi soldiers pause in their combat to salute the player character whenever The Star-Spangled Banner plays on the soundtrack. Masterfully paced, it has both the weight of the unstoppable giant and the speed of greased lighting - which is so vividly evocated on the screen that you'll want to find your graphics card's warranty.
But after a few matches you realize each match is ended with the once-in-a-lifetime bookmark moment in Overwatch history. They are all the same. His name is McCree. Each match is ended with the once-in-a-lifetime bookmark moment in Overwatch history. Nobody cares. i'm sure it won't lose its luster. Make them all the same because otherwise some kids will feel left out when they also do not get the good ending. In a game I played the heroic ending was a killing spree of 2. Which instantly undermines the effect and made it seem much more like mommy enthusiastically clapping. It also made me feel like I was riding a tame theme park ride that assumes it's your first time riding it. Isn't this fantastic? While in reality, you've rode it the entire weekend and you're on it because of the view on Widowmaker's ass.
Play of the game also signifies the discrepancy between its team play concept and its ego-feeding rewards. The PotG makes it seem as though the player on display did something special. But in reality the algorithm only seems to detects spectacular kill streaks. Yet the objective of the game is not to score lots and lots of kills, but to get the payload to its destination. What's even worse is that the defeated team may also receive the PotG. Which alerts players that the game isn't even about playing the objective at all. Yet another sign that this game is only really about fancy characters shooting each other.

Overwatch feels light, loose, flashy and fast. On the scale of sugar rush it feels properly Nintendo.

Overwatch is another Blizzard anime game that tries to appear happy Go-lucky but takes itself way too serious. A bit like Starcraft 2 did. Sure it's expertly crafted: the characters, though cliches, do feel really unique and the range of gameplay the game has on offer is pretty impressive. The game feels like it aught to in all it's arcade-like glory. It doesn't have that heavy movement feeling you'd expect from a serious shooter, nothing really hits hard - but it feels light, loose, flashy and fast. On the scale of sugar rush it feels properly Nintendo. But it doesn't offer the statistical depth, the player customization, gameplay modifiers progression horizon of other games. Yet.
I realize I'm critiquing a beta. The amount of room for improvement is substantial and gives a big hint at the game's potential. If it'll live up to that potential is another matter. I'm sure it'll get a ton of progress bars. I also get the feeling Overwatch has been added much sugar, colours and attitude to make it palpable to the widest possible audience, coating the bitter pill that is team play and has done it up to the point where it's mostly sugar. After playing Overwatch, like the latest binge of sweets I had, I felt really quite bad.

A wider point of view, the inverted Y-axis.

My first foray into PC gaming was called "Falcon" on an Amstrad 8086. It wasn't really a game as such but an F-16 combat flight simulator. At the time, and at the mere age of 7, I wanted to be a fighter pilot. Being so young a pilot, some of the flying had to be done for me. So taking off was done on auto-pilot. So was navigating, engaging and landing. All I mostly did in between was steer the plane with the joystick. Whenever things got a bit too hot for comfort, I would press the "a"-button and the game would take care of business.
A while later I got a new PC, a 386, and was given MS Flight Simulator by a relative. Soon hours would be spend in a Cessna zipping around the Detroit city skyline, making a game out of flying between the skyscrapers at breakneck speeds without crashing. This time though, all of the flying was done by me. The sim had an auto pilot but it was too complex for me to configure.
Another PC upgrade to a 486 brought with it another flightsim: Falcon 3. This is the game that would seal my fate: I was going to be a military pilot, because the sim trained the player to be one. I got the game in the deluxe edition, which added an F/A-18 and a MIG-29 sim using the same engine. It had a very thick booklet on how the F-16 works. It had a booklet about how the air force works. It had a booklet about how weapon systems work. I doubt anything like it could be printed today without looking like a wikileaks publication and being treated like one. The box containing all the books and CDs was a treasure trove to my eyes and felt like it too - I could barely lift it. Hope and destiny carried most of the weigth all the way to my father, who was waiting for me at the cash register. The treasure cost accordingly, but my father was somewhat of a flight buff himself and he must have seen a great pilot through my trembling arms and the tears welling up in my eyes. So he bought it for me. In short, yes, the game sealed my fate. As a PC gamer.

Later, my flying carreer came up to speed when I also got Chuck Yeager's Air Combat, and when Pentium came around, expanded with EF2OOO and even later with F22 Air Dominance Fighter from the same company. Flightsims were my thing and I strove to know everything about air combat and fighter jets.
I knew all about navigating airspace using pitch, yaw and banking. And I would use them to great effect in barrelroll, Immelmann, Split-S, and cobra turn manoeuvres. I was in perfect control.

Control is what this post is really about. Control is crucial.
When one plays flightsims one controls aeroplanes like this: push forward on the stick to move the nose downwards, pull back on the stick to pull the nose upwards.
Translated to mouse controls means that pushing the mouse forward, which is perceived as an upward motion when you look at the mouse from the top down, results into the nose going down - not up. This reverse effect along the Y-axis is what lends inverted controls its name. The mechanics of a plane make the controls inverted by their very nature. Knowing about these makes inversion very logical.

You should watch the following clip if you want more info.

After the flight sims came the shooters. Doom revolutionised gaming and introduced the first person shooter genre in a big way. In those early days mice weren't as common as you might think, it was the joystick that accompanied every gaming PC. Gaming in those days was mainly done in arcades the PCs were trying to emulate. Not to mention mouse support in software was almost as rare as the hardware.

Doom was no exception and was played mainly with just the keyboard, in the game there was no actual use for looking up or down. Aiming was done only on the rotation of the player and shooting would result in a hit regardless of the target's height, as long as the shot was neatly lined up.
When online gaming finally swooped me up I got into playing Dark Forces 2: Jedi Knight. The game was often showcased as the game to play while using a force feedback joystick. Of course, I had to make do with the stick I already had. Through the power of imagination the flight stick became the handle of a lightsaber. But it wasn't very long before I realized there might be a better way. The gun play was too slow to be competitive, because with a stick you need to steer your aim. So I switched to a mouse, which offered the needed speed and precision.
Ever since, I have been pulling back on the mouse to point the camera upwards in the virtual space of a shooter. Just like I always had with the stick and still was in the new flightsims.

Some of you will like a mechanical explanation, so I'll give it a shot. Just to make the point even clearer. More proof, I hope, that inverting the Y-axis has a working, logical explanation. You're steering the virtual camera as if it was your virtual head. A real life comparison would be if you would replace the mouse with the top of your virtual soldier's head and you were pulling his head backwards to make him look up. I threw together an animation to show just what I mean:

In contrast the non inverted control works as if one is pointing the cursor in a 2D environment like windows. If one was to translate this to a 3D space you'd be pointing towards your target on a 2D pane or a windshield. The emphasis is on the pointing. As in a lightgun game or a shooter on the Wii or PS Move. Perhaps this control scheme comes more natural if you have a background with these.
Simply put, you're steering the virtual camera by pointing towards targets.

As it stands today games offer both control schemes, and if the people designing them are capable this will remain to be the case. But gamers shouldn't take the abuse of uneducated people calling them crazy for inverting the Y-axis. The fact that this is happening at all, where it used to be common practice to invert, is a sign of the times. And that many, mostly younger gamers, have no connection to how things used to be. Or in other words, are unincumbered by old ways. Either way, one shouldn't remain ignorant about why the option is there in the first place. But in the rare case of games that feature fighter jets with un-inverted controls, we're dealing with a decision informed by either popular opinion or by ignorance that degrades both every game maker in the industry and the intelligence of the players. And that would be truly crazy. As crazy to me as having a car go left when steering right.

A wider point of view, part one.

I may or may not have mentioned the end of civilization recently, which may or may not be coming our way soon. But just in case of a global meltdown, I'm preparing for extreme violence. Luckily as a Belgian I'm not far away from one of the world's most renowned weapons manufacturers. So when I go online and equip a FN F2000, like the ones delivered to the Libyan special forces, to headshot teenagers in Battlefield, I'm actually celebrating our great Belgian Culture. How our Minister of War, Pieter De Crem, would swell with pride and joy upon reading this post. If only he knew how to read. Yet all of that pales in comparison when compared to the way the man can pre flight check a Lockheed C-130 by patting the side of the fuselage as if congratulating it after winning the Ostend Derby. Sadly, the last great Belgian military victory dates back to when horses were high tech in the year 1302, when we kicked the French all the way back to France. We haven't had a French related problem ever since, proving the value of armed conflict once more. But let's not dwell on political games.

Suffice to say, I've been playing a lot of games. Mostly shooters. My most recent stint started about half a year ago with the release of the Medal Of Honor reboot. But even before that the market has been flooded with big budget hardcore first person shooter (fps) games. One remarkable trend among these titles: most of them are multi-platform. Console popularity is on an all time high with developers because of the large user base. So the leading versions are often for console and then get ported over to the PC. A process that almost always leads to an inferior PC title compared to pure PC games. Developers porting from console to PC usually leave out a lot of functionality or options the hardcore PC community is used to. Such as mod tools and dedicated servers. But the lack of one often ignored option has been irking me to no end: A configurable Field Of View variable.
The field of view determines what the viewing angle (in degrees) of a game is according to the old 4:3 aspect ratio. So a 65 FoV gives the player a 65 degrees viewing angle. This same variable, 65, will result in a somewhat wider view in 16:10 and 16:9 widescreen aspect rations.. Maybe it's not quite as ignored as I think though, but I am getting the idea that many devs just don't care. Which leads people who actually are passionate about this topic to write about how devs just don't care.

The following blog posts require a bit of gaming history to really be understood. This first post sets the scene for what is to follow.
I will talk about first person shooters on both PC and consoles. The differences, the design choices and the consequences. To some this might be sliced bread, but I'll highlight the necessary info just in case. And this chronological summary will provide some perspective on the genre today. This is by no means a complete list though, but it highlights the big hitters.

The game that popularized the "modern war" setting was Call Of Duty 4. Current generation CoD games were made with a very heavily modified Quake3 engine by Infinity Ward. The game has a fully moddable FoV in the .cfg file, which could be modified with a simple text editor. The game was smash hit and instant classic on consoles first and PC second. Which led to the sequel Call Of Duty Modern Warfare 2.

A big console shift happened with this game. All variables were locked away, including the FoV. While still having a somewhat usable FoV even for PC, other neglected options, the biggest of which were dedicated servers and the access to an ingame console, made this game into the most hated Call Of Duty for the hardcore PC community. The outstanding production values made things worse as Infinity Ward dropped out of favor. Not supporting the game beyond a few simple bug fixes and exploits added insult to injury.

Not long after Battlefield Bad Company 2 was released. The name "Bad Company" denotes the console offshoot of the Battlefield series. Made by European developer DICE, the original had no PC version but the sequel did. Surprisingly it was quite configurable via an editable config file which allowed PC gamers to change the FoV, among other things. One year after release, the game still has quite an active PC community. While not a steamworks game it still makes the steam top 10 most played games list almost every day. Yet it can't get close to the popularity of CoD.

The 2010 release of Medal Of Honor marked the reboot of the series with a modern combat setting. Not surprisingly it was heavily influenced by the succes of MW2. It had a troubled development though and the game was ultimately split into two separate pieces with two different engines. Resulting in two quite distinct games. The Single Player campaign used Epic's Unreal Engine 3. Which has encrypted configuration files, making it impossible to adjust the FoV. Producer EA pushed the game primarily for the console market to compete with CoD but got absolutely destroyed in sales.
The multiplayer side of the game was done by DICE. They used their proprietary Frostbite engine giving players the same options as Bad Company 2. Making it quite configurable.

The current king of the market is Call Of Duty Black Ops. Made by Treyarch, it has been well supported across all platforms. Needed indeed because the release version of the game was very buggy for PC and PS3. The lead PC programmer (@pcdev) made a promise to make this a genuine PC title. A statement that was bound to come back to haunt him. Yet as a result this CoD game is much more configurable and enjoyable than MW2, its biggest rival. The games options menu has a built-in FoV slider. It and many more variables can be edited with a text editor just as before too. A remarkable and commendable return to form. As were dedicated servers. Mod tools are promised with a future patch.

Not a cross platform game but still important is Guerrilla's Killzone 3, as it is intended to be the flagship FPS game on Playstation 3. It's backed by Sony and presumably the answer to Microsoft's Halo before CoD took over the market. Rightly lauded for it's superb visual design but despite all effort has failed to catch on and hasn't even come close to competing with CoD.

Bulletstorm was made in response to the "serious" military shooters of the last year. This over-the-top arcade shooter was ported to PC and uses the Unreal3 engine. Many PC options were left out in the release version and the config files encrypted, which sent forums alight with rage. To soften the blow a bit for PC gamers, a decrypter was posted on the Bulletstorm forums so they could edit the config file.

Homefront is made by Kaos Studios. A spiritual successor to the developer's earlier game Frontlines. They develop games using Unreal3, not a very promising sign if we look at its history. However, Kaos has been wooing PC gamers with exclusive features, dedicated servers and the promise of editable config files. The game was recently released with moderate success. Undoubtedly it will get stiff competition from existing and upcoming games. But the success of Counter Strike has shown that a PC shooter doesn't necessarily needs to be a looker to be a darling. If it keeps getting support.

Speaking of lookers, Crysis 2 is developed by Crytek. Responsible for the exquisite Far Cry & Crysis 1. Crytek will now foray into the console market with this sequel. Now suddenly skeptical PC gamers are promised the same great Crysis style support and features. Crytek have a lot to live up to as the first Crysis had and still has the most impressive game engine to date. Just about every variable was editable. The game had dedicated servers and modding tools. It was pretty much exactly what the PC community wanted from a FPS game. Gameplay footage from Crysis 2 has been very promising so far. The demo, released on 4/03/2011, was not. Gamers all over the internet were predicting doom and gloom because the demo lacked just about every configurable setting while carrying over a few key console features, such as the now infamous "press start to play" opening screen and aim assist for gamepad users. A demo isn't representative however, so here's hoping Crytek remembers its promises.

Brink is being developed by ID software protegé Splash Damage. Like Bulletstorm a reaction to current "realistic" shooters and like Team Fortress 2 is very stylized. The game uses the ID4 engine, known from Doom3, which was also used in Splash Damage's Enemy Territory Quake Wars. They seem to be very aggressive in their stance on the genre, and very confident of the game's success. They also have the material to back up their claim as the game seems to be in great shape. The PC legacy of the ID4 engine is telling, the game is promised to be fully configurable with an ingame console, FoV modification and dedicated servers on PC. If the game is a success it could spell the end for Call Of Duty clones.

Speaking of ID software. It is also cooking up a new game, with a new engine. It's called Rage and will appear on consoles and PC. Curiously, it seems to be the only one breaking new ground with its engine. As the FoV seems very wide compared to other console shooters. Which is good news for everyone. Perhaps the venerable giant, I'm talking about ID, can come back to compete in style.

Battlefield 3 is the upcoming DICE blockbuster. Using an upgraded frostbite engine, it was originally a PC exclusive and will be using the latest DX11 technology. Meaning the PC version is the one to be downgraded to the DX9 generation consoles. Couple this with DICE's excellent PC support and it should be in great shape.

And then there's Valve. They release few new games, but instead opt to support their games long after release. Counter Strike, Left For Dead and Team Fortress 2 are prime examples. Updated almost every other day, fully modable, dedicated servers and more have made these games fan favorites.
Valve had their own FoV incident when Half-Life 2 was first released on PC in 2004. Many of people were complaining about getting motion sick while playing the game. The standard FoV was set at 75. Shortly after, a patch addressed the problem by adding a feature to modify the FoV to 90. Keep in mind that the Call of Duty standard anno 2011 is 65. You can read more about this historic event here and here and even here.
Most likely the game was configured as such because at the time Valve didn't want their brand new engine to run slowly. So they probably narrowed the FoV to boost performance. Which is key to my next post.

There's another layer of politics going on though. I've mentioned developers so far but it's the publishers who're really competing for the market. The big players are Activision with everything Call Of Duty, EA with Battlefield, Medal Of Honor and Crysis, THQ with Homefront and Bethesda with Brink and Rage.
At present, everyone on the market is trying to knock Activision of its throne, with little success. In my next post I'll explain just why this is and why it's probably not going to change anytime soon while this battle is fought on the consoles. Which in a way has consequences for our PC gaming freedom.

Don't forget to also read part two of A wider point of view.

The Humanism of Mass Effect 2

 

Ne nos inducas in tentationem, sed libera nos a Malo

If there's one thing we can thank the bible for it's the way it has made literary archetypes and memes. At first glance Mass Effect seems to borrow quite a bit of them. Project Lazarus, a club called Afterlife, ascension... Could there be something more going on? In my previous posts I've spotted a very engaged humanist vision in the stories and characters of their games. So I kept my eyes peeled while playing Mass Effect 2. In this post I want to explore how far the bible analogy goes and where it breaks down. Are there any differences? Can it tell us something about our human condition today - which is for some, if not a lot of, people a big part of what defines art.

Mass Effect 2 doesn't seem to be as epic as its predecessor. It's more intimate. The game is much more focused on its characters, interaction and dialogue. The events less grand in scope. Shepard needs to build a team to take out the Collectors. Emphasis is laid on the team building. The taking out is done in, what is presumed, a suicide mission behind enemy lines. Because of this, you end up fighting primarily to save your team, saving the galaxy seems like a secondary objective.

I should say that this post will potentially be one big crackpot theory. As the rather pretentious title of this post might suggest. It's a continuation of my own series started with my Dragon Age post. In which I said that Bioware has a very strong humanist viewpoint. Christians might call it anti-christian. But besides the fact that any religion will feel picked on no matter what, there might something to be said for those feelings, given the biblical names and themes in the game. Also keep in mind that this is what I'm reading from the game and isn't said to be the outspoken opinion of the company.

Religion in Mass Effect is rather curious. Because no alien race in the Mass Effect Universe is religious. That is to say, truly religious in so far as the player would have to believe that there is a "true religion" within the fiction. When Ashley admits she and her family are very religious, Shepard would rather believe her dead father to be a zombie than believe he's watching from heaven. "Wherever that is" she adds, a logical comment to make when you're born in a space-faring civilization. Heaven was supposed to be a sky kingdom in the clouds, as evident in classical paintings, and space doesn't have quite the same kind of clouds nor anything we could naively call "the sky". As Shepard you can confess to Ashley that he is religious, just as she is. It is considered a Paragon choice. However, Bioware has made the Renegade Shepard canon. So they have made Shepard, de facto, an anti-religious Atheist (ruling out even Agnosticism).

The most outspoken religious race in ME are the Hannar. They are a Jellyfish-like race, soft spoken but a bit naive. And because of it, often the butt of jokes. And mostly referred to as "the Jellys".They revere "the inkindlers". A superior race who bestowed knowledge upon them. The inkindlers turn out the be the Protheans. They turn out to be an extinct alien race. Then there's the Asari. A spiritual race. They often speak of "the Goddess". Not an odd choice for a race of females. A further comment on our human beliefs where no deity could be female in a society dominated by men. The game is very positive about the Asari point of view. Yet the faith is dispelled as soon as the Novaria mission in the first Mass Effect. Where Benezia bemoans the lack of a "promised white light, they said there would be..." with her dying breath. It isn't said that the Goddess is an actual deity or a spiritual unconsciousness, but by Benezia's comment there is at least some deception going on. A portion of the Geth, a sapient machine race, worship the Reapers. Because they are supreme mechanical synthetic lifeforms. That they do not fit the picture of an ideal God needs no explanation. Or does it? They are powerful, eternal, or so they say, have worshipers, and promise ascension. Ascension is the term Harbinger, the main antagonist, uses in Mass Effect 2 during the collectors' harvest of human colonies. This because their actual physical biomass will be used to construct a "human reaper". A god in the image of man. Man made god. Or plainly put, a god made out of Human bodies. Bioware is painting quite a cynical picture of what a god is.

The central figure in the series is Shepard. Gathering disciples of all walks of life of many worlds. He's a born leader. His name is Shepard. It's pretty clear that the closest resemblance is Jesus. More so in Mass Effect 2, where he dies and is resurrected with project Lazarus. Lazarus, not Jesus. Indeed not, but imagine what game this would have been if the project had been called "Project Jesus". It would hit the player over the head with symbolism that isn't really necessary. It would change the tone of the game dramatically and would probably offend a portion of the lucrative American audience. And anyway, 'Lazarus' is also often used to denote a situation where one is presumed dead but ultimately isn't.

The meaning of the Illusive man becomes a bit more complicated. He's got godlike qualities, like the Reapers. He's seemingly all-knowing. Apparently lives forever. Doesn't give a sod about his health. Does whatever he deems necessary. Raises Shepard from the dead and like the god of the bit monotheistic faiths: cares about his own people (humans) first and foremost and at the expense of all other. A position that's bound to be problematic in a universe with a variety of sentient species.

Like all Bioware games, there's a lot to do about morals. As with religion. Both have a prominent place in everyday live. They seem linked even to the extent that it's generally, and wrongfully, believed that religion is where morals originated. I noticed that ethics in this story come from the characters themselves, not ever from some dogma or handbook. I could say these characters are a mouthpiece for the writers of the story, schooling the player in modern philosophy.

A prime example is Mordin, a Salarian scientist. It may be a stretch to call it an archetype. But perhaps accurate in this case. He's a genius who's considered a devil by some but does good work regardless. He's got his own set of morals that seem to work well enough. You can't call him an evil character because he's forced to act and tries to make the most of it. He's content to know that no one but himself could have done a better job. Mordin comments on the responsibilities of aiding foreign species and the dangers of bypassing any true need of technology and knowledge. In the context of our history, this is a comment on how irresponsible Humans have been in founding, or rather annexing, colonies. How native Americans were used against each other. How missionaries brought civilization to the "primitive" indigenous people of South America. Or how industrial Europe carved Africa into pieces for its own needs. And with that brought modern weapons into African tribal wars. Wars originating in no small way from the colonization. The Krogan are the analogy.

There are more biblical analogies. Miranda has been made out of the rib of her "father". Tali is a cloaked virgin, untouched, aloof, naive - though Shepard gets a chance to change all that. Garrus is John the Baptist, not quite a failed messiah but a precursor to Shepard. Jacob is symbolic of humanity standing alone. He's been separated from his father and has done just fine in constructing his life. In the story he discovers the faux-paradise his father has landed himself into, confronts the man and finds a repulsive, immoral, self-appointed hedonist King. He's a caricature of an evil, self-centered god. Jacob is disgusted and turns his back on him.

I consider myself to be somewhat of a humanist. I also consider the Mass Effect games to be one of the best games I've played these last few years. The cross-pollination between these make it extra interesting for me. Mass Effect is furthering the case that we have to see some games not only as consumer products but as carriers of information and points of view. Congratulations to the talent at Bioware for raising the bar once again. I can't wait to see where Mass Effect 3 will take us.

World War 2: The movie: Inglourious Basterds

A little word up front to my readership that might not be interested in the usual game rambling that is the norm around here. This post deals mostly with popular culture AND LOTS OF SPOILERS.

It's impossible to ignore the impact the second world war had on the world we know today. It was also quite a long time ago. And indeed our first hand source of information is slowly drying up. Even so, Hitler and his Nazis are still very popular. Popular boogeymen that is. Given the time that has past since that gruesome event, the world has had time to acclimate to the hard, cold facts, and has learned to live with it. What humans are capable of. This new-found freedom has allowed us to get a little more creative with the whole notion of a world at war. Break up the protagonists of the war into cartoonish achetypes. And Nazis have become a literary archetype. Comparable to the undead or vampires. In which case Adolf Hitler becomes a modern day Count Dracula. Now, these archetypes are coming from their dark sub-cultural recesses, such as games and comics, into the mainstream.

I recently saw the new Tarantino Movie Inglourious Basterds. This movie is a stylish expression. If you'd compare this movie to the likes of Saving Private Ryan or Band of Brothers. The difference is immediately clear. This is a creative interpretation. And presents an interesting point of view.

Adolf Hitler, who looks nothing like his real life counterpart for good reason, in this movie has been portrayed as a deranged German Bonaparte wannabe, simple minded, psychotic and bent on the destruction of every Jew on the globe. He bursts in saliva spitting laughter when watching the movie National pride. The film (in a film) is basically about the typical rambo-esque spraying of bullets (from a bolt action rifle no less) and people hitting the floor. It's the heroic tale of a sniper sitting in a bell tower killing a cohort of allied soldiers in Italy. The allied stupidity shown through a brief conversation between an allied soldier and his commanding officer: "Commander, we must destroy that tower!" upon which the commander replies in stoic fashion "Not a chance.". Followed by the camera cutting to more allies getting shot or falling from windows. With his combat knife, our hero sniper carves a swastika with impressive shading into the floorboard of his bell tower as a reprise from the killing. This is, of course, hailed with loud cheering and applause from the Nazi Brass in the theater. It's a boneheaded piece of propaganda. A power trip. It's what we could call gun porn. Hitler exclaims to Goebbels "This is your best movie yet!". Goebbels is moved to tears by the complement. A condemnation perhaps on the director's behalf. Tarantino is comparing people who enjoy the gun porn movies to this caricature of Hitler. And I guess this would also count towards people who play first person shooter games as well. If they are played for the simple reason of shooting people and marvel at the carnage in sadistic enjoyment. It might also be a wake-up call to every person in the audience who was laughing at the fact that Nazis were getting brutally murdered or mutilated on screen. These said Nazis were in many cases presented as normal people with morals, principles and dreams. Like the sergeant that meets his demise at the hands of the so-called Jew Bear. The latter points at the Sergeant's Iron Cross and asks him "Did you get that for killing Jews?" at which he gets an honest reply "For courage". Implying that he did not fight this war to kill Jews, but rather to protect his homeland. And of course, it's rather absurd to believe that all German soldiers were psychopaths. The reply falls on deaf ears, it is not the version of reality a determined person on a quest for revenge wants to hear.

But for as many incompetent German officers the movie has, there are competent Nazis, you could call them villains if not for the fact the movie portraits them simply as officers on duty. These characters radiate an air of tension, their friendly face the impenetrable facade for the calculating detective inside. Such is the Gestapo Officer in the cellar meeting. And such is Hans Landa, played by Christoph Waltz, who is arguably the most enjoyable character in this story. And arguably the most impressive villain since Heath Ledger's Joker. The very opening part of the movie is as tense as the it gets. And is one among a series of unbearable, deafening, tense and discomforting moments. All of these come to a loud, abrupt and somewhat violent end. At first glance a likable character, bearing a big bright smile, speaking kind words in a multitude of languages. He is shrewd however, seems to know just about everything and acts with deadly precision. The war seems to be a game to him, played by rules and a mutual respect between prey and predator. This almost childlike trust in these rules are eventually his folly. His professional mercenary logic is quite sound however. Unfortunantly for him though, some characters carry a grudge that is rather unprofessional.

You might have noticed I'm glossing over the story and possible meaning of the Inglourious Basterds squad. But then, what's to say? These characters are rather simple and honest in many possible ways. They're out for revenge, and get it. Aldo Raine, the squad sergeant played by Brad Pitt is an uncomplicated ruffian. And it's amazing how many times the Basterds serve as comic relief. Most noticeably when they present themselves to be Italians. Perhaps the most interesting fact about the Basterds is that they are Jews killing Nazis, in it self this isn't anything special, but in the context of the film, and add to that the characters of Shosanna and Marcel, it leads to a remarkable reversal, namely that, from a Nazi's point of view, the übermensch is undone by the hands of the undermensch.

I did not feel good as I walked out of the movie theater. This piece of cinema is rough, like the screeching of a fork on a blackboard. And contradictionary as it might sound, I enjoyed it thoroughly. That's because I had a lot to think about. And because I could, this blog post exists.

Consider Battlefield Heroes

I recently got my beta code for Battlefield Heroes, DICE's free to play cartoon shooter. Being intrigued by this game from the get-go, I was finally able to take it for a spin. On first looks, DICE succeeds in creating a whimsical "casual" third person shooting game. But looks can be deceiving.

First of all, this is a beta I'm talking about so the game is still a work in progress. However. There's already a store in place for you to go spend real money on battlefield bucks, called Battlefunds. These are used to buy in-game items, such as fancy uniforms. I knew character customization would be on a to-buy basis, but it was sobering to see that just about everything in the virtual wardrobe is on sale. Of course there's some freebies in there which you can buy with valor points. These are the points you get from just playing the game. Logic would tell you that enough accumulated valor points (which boil down to "time played") would beget you some better customization options, or at least some form of visible markings of veterancy. But no dice. Because of this I think the game is lacking a basic form of feedback, namely that of character growth. The one constant is your hero and his Hero Points, In MMO-speak, this would be your character's level and skill bar. But there's no way of reading either.

To add insult to injury, the items you get in the game disappear after a week or a month, depending on how much you are willing to spend. The problem here is that DICE can slack off in making new items, since you'll never accumulate a lot of them anyway. Adding a time limit also adds pressure of "having to play the game, or I have paid for nothing". I can understand why you would apply this to weapons and power-ups because they give you an advantage in the game. Even if those weapons are considered balanced. If you play better with them, there's still an advantage. But I don't quite get why you would have clothing an accessories disappear. This goes against some MMO conventions, where you "win" gear, and once you do it's yours forever, or until you sell or replace it. People might find it disheartening if they have to rebuy their outfits time and time again. But the special gear is more of a hook rather than a gameplay defining element.

I'm unsure as to how well it will score with the casual audience. Maybe the concept of a shooter isn't that well suited to casual play either - even if it is from a third person perspective. We can make the case that casual players play games for killing time and having some easy fun. It's hard to match this with a shooter, which operates in a competitive, hostile environment. Sure, the game is easy enough to dive into, but from there you need to really work your way up the roster. The game is said to find matches according to your skill level so maybe this won't be as much of an issue as I think. Still, the people I played against were often on voice comms, really organized and put up a very good fight.

This game feels like a reskinned, hardcore battlefield game. Where all the character models are replaced by cartoons and some of the sound effects were swapped with the ones you hear on a Sunday morning. To some ears this might sound like a bad idea. But for me, this game looks and feels better then the older battlefield games. Of course, "realistic" shooters are a dime a dozen nowadays, which makes Heroes stand out as being quite unique. The closest comparison I could make are to Batallion Wars and Team Fortress 2. With Heroes sitting somewhere in between those extreme ends of the spectrum. It's not an imitation of either, mind. To add some contrast, Batallion Wars is a third person shooter RTS and Team Fortress 2 is Quake to Battlefield heroes' Battlefield.

So will it all work? I think so. But not with the casual audience, because I don't think this is a casual game. If this is marketed right, and (content) updates keep coming, DICE may be sitting on a goldmine. But they will get competition from other shooters. Many are aiming for the same audience. It's easy to see how someone might become invested in this game however. Spending real money on digital items. I bet some people on Ventrillo will agree with me, given the fact they have already spent some of their earnings on peg legs and sailor uniforms.