To Zelda or Not to Zelda

Few franchises have such deep and strong roots as The Legend of Zelda. Ever since its first appearance in the NES it has been a standard in quality and interesting gameplay (except, of course, for some exceptions, you know what I mean). As E3 is now fading from our discussions and minds, the series has gotten new attention, accentuated by the long awaited Sequelitis episode that recently was uploaded in Youtube. On one hand we have an avid and quite perceptive gamer arguing the loss of exploration, the sense of awe and wonder as the series has progressed, on the other we have an explicit promise by the developers in Nintendo that the world will turn into an open world experience.

Exploring is usually synonymous to Zelda. The idea of finding a secret was always one of the thing we took for granted when playing the games. But then Egoraptor reminds us that it is not always what it seems. Specially the streamlining of dungeons shows us how using a basic structure we can eliminate the excitement of discovery in a game. I think this was one of the most interesting points made in his comment: instead of letting us wonder what to do with x item, we know it will be there to kill the corresponding boss of the dungeon. I have always been more a 2-D Zelda player, and this problem is part of even the best of those handheld games. The Oracle of Seasons/Ages, for example, are specially faulty in this regard (I still love them, though).

Then came A Link Between Worlds. Apart from this being the game that made me buy a 2DS, I pretty much thought the game had a nifty twist, part of which I already discussed in a previous article. The idea of the already looted items, all taken from their respective dungeons, eliminated the enslavement of the player to the dungeon-specific item. Only the first three dungeons require a specific item, which you can rent for a moment.
So why have all those other items then? Well, they serve to explore the world. If you noticed, a common complaint of some reviewers (one example here) is that the game was short, easy to finish. I feel this was on purpose. The dungeons themselves were short, easy to finish in less than half an hour. This had two functions: first to keep the game handheld friendly, since nobody wants to interrupt a dungeon and restart it later, since handheld’s focus has always been to quickly play and to be able to stop at any moment.
But the second main objective of short dungeons was to make the player explore the world, instead of focusing only on the cave you had to get to. I think that fact was missed by many gamers, who were so used to the usual “Zelda Formula”, that they forgot that there was life under the sun of Hyrule/Lorule. A completionist would see it all, but a regular gamer such as myself could have missed the heightened exploration factor of the game. And it gets even worse when suddenly you are dropped in a new world and you have eight lairs to get to, but you have not the usual numbers or limitations as in A Link to the Past and forward. I personally loved it: I was now free to skip the dungeon with the guards entirely, so I could do, what is to me, the busy work until the last. I loved the freedom, and more Zelda games should strive to this end.

There is still the question on how guided a game should be. I can agree that the latest Zeldas have this issue, in which they block your path until you get x item, and also tell you to do this first and then that, much like a chore. But then there is the issue of conveyance, something Egoraptor himself discusses at one point. My biggest gripe with the two NES Zeldas and why I think they don’t hold up anymore is that they don’t guide you, they are way to cryptic. A little guidance is necessary to know what is happening. Exploration should not be limited by too much hand holding, but at the same time it should not be too free, since this confuses the player more than making the game enjoyable. Again, A Link Between Worlds does this masterfully: yes, here are your eight dungeons, however, you have no order and you are free to explore each section as you like.

That’s where I think A Link to the Past and A Link Between Worlds represent the main theme of Zelda perfectly. Maybe in the first game you have a few numbers of the map, but they are for the most part open, and you can progress at your pace. There is no need to get a letter of play a song to make someone happy to progress. The latter one even omits numbers and almost every limitation, giving you the chance to really look into the “overworld” and sometimes even forget the main quest.

I think this is the kind of exploration most of us would like. Not hand holding, but neither total freedom and a loss of sense of direction. Some guidance is necessary, but not too restrictive as to keep you technically on a straight path with a little fork at the end, as Ocarina of Time did.

These are, at least, my two cents on this rich discussion that has erupted. I think there is much to be expected from the new game that will come up, specially on this new focus of letting the player regain control over his action and let him do what games best let us do: to determine our own actions and to live with the decisions made in game.

What do you think?

Nai ainur raituvar tietyanna!

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Replays (SMRPG EP. 03) – A quickie

This session was played on Wednesday 11th of July. Run time: 1:12

Advancing further on, I have gone down in the caves of Mole Town. Although I have not beaten the boss yet, since I am still spelunking, I am advancing steadily. Interesting for me this time was the inclusion of certain characters from the Donkey Kong series, such as a brain-washed Donkey Kong. It is quite funny how many characters of other games tend to appear. I already encountered link sleeping in a bed next to me, but I also know Samus to be doing the same in some other city.

Not much else to critique, but it turns out there has been recently released a little review on the game. I may not concur with everything the guy says, but definitely it is worth a little look into it:

More will be commented next post!

Nai ainur raituvar tietyanna!

Replays (SMRPG EP. 02) – On Grinding

This session was played on Friday the 6th. Run time: 1:12.

The game goes on. I have last session finished the tutorial-like gameplay and have finally set out to my adventure, getting the first star back. The whole business with the shy-guys was quite funny. Before I entered that boss, though, I decided to grind. This is a magical word in the RPG genre, and it has been a very though point in the debate. Compared to normal platformers, the standard RPG is always riddled with the obligatory sections of killing enemies just for the sake of the experience and to get to a better level to eliminate the next boss. Some just don’t like the idea.

For me this mechanic has been a core experience when going into games. I prefer this grinding method, not because it makes me feel better, but because it permits me to relax the mind for a while. I usually end up thinking the most unimaginable thinks while pressing a few buttons and watching my character grow.

There is something to be said about grinding. There are times this can be exaggerated. While it is nice to have now and then a moment of respite and some time to think about the next great philosophy, others just want you to sit on the A button for an eternity to advance. I usually measure the greatness of an RPG depending on the times you will have to grind to unlock the next part of a story. We have to remember that we play those games because of the epic story lines that develop. In other words, an RPG acts often as a book, where you can travel along the story and do mini games, side quests and other things that do not follow the completion, to take a break, while we enjoy our capacity of decision-making that video games allow us to have. Something like a book with distractions for when we get bored of the story without exiting the world that has been so beautifully presented to us.

My general rule of thumb is around three to five great grinding sessions. Too many and the game will be frustrating and boring, showing us how the difficulty spikes are constant and require us to stay in the same areas for too long. My war cry at this moment is always: “Just let me go on with the %&@! story!”. On the other hand, fewer grinding sessions usually speak of an easy game, which flows. Those types of RPGs are fine, since they permit you to continue without stopping, but sometimes make you miss forced stops to appreciate the details around your normal storyline.

An example of a game that has too many grinding stops is Sword of Hope. When I found the second game on my 3DS’s virtual store, I was quite amazed. I only had played the first iteration, and it was quite bad, since I was the only party member who had to fight incredibly tough foes at every turn. It was easier to grind for three hours at each zone instead of being instantly poisoned, paralyzed and then killed of by a group of three enemies. I just downloaded the game to see if there had been some improvements on the formula. There were some, namely the capacity of having one more member with an occasional third from time to time. But the main frustrating elements were still there: grinding, grinding, grinding.

In SMRPG I have now engaged a little session of grinding, just to make sure I could beat the first boss, and it was not too bad. I enjoy the mechanic of paying constantly attention to the game, to get the criticals flowing, and the session did not last longer than ten minutes. Also, I got some new stuff, which made the little effort worth it. My general level is still low, but I think I can manage the game with two sessions of grinding, which is great for an RPG game, easy to follow.

The story is now rolling and Mallow has a “destiny” in front of him. Still, the isometric view drives me crazy. Next session I will have Geno standing on my side, so I am greatly looking forward to it!

Nai ainur raituvar tietyanna!

Replays (SMRPG EP. 01) – “Tutorialling”

This Replay was done on Monday the 6th of June. Total run time: 1:03

So here is the first hour of replaying Super Mario RPG. Basically this means that most of the game I have relived is the “tutorial”, in other words, the whole ‘teaching the player the mechanics of the game’. How this game handles it is quite interesting, since it is not only a text tutorial, but also an experienced tutorial, much like the Mega Man X game on the SNES. But later on that.

I finally sat down to play the first hour of the game, beer in hand and some leftover potato chips from Domino’s, ready to tackle the first memories. It was quite funny for the first moments to see the intro, which tells us the basic story: Bowser kidnaps that dumb princess again, Mario after them. This is quite a misleading intro though, since once you start the game, the real bad guy is this big sword part of the “Smith Gang”.

The real use of this intro sequence is thus, take us into familiar territory. Once I started the game, it replayed the intro, unskippable by the way. It may be a few seconds long, but if this is in the preview video, why not make it skippable? Anyway, it turns out that between the start screen and that video, there is a piece of story, which takes you into familiar territory: rescue the princess. This time around, you get to experiment a bit with the new style of the game, finding some smaller Hammer Bros blocking your way. Then an epic battle with Bowser on two chandeliers, which, as far as I know, is not that normal. Also, to add to the familiarity in this weirdly changed format, Bowser arrives in the clown mobile, or whatever that thing in Super Mario World was. For my play-through, it seemed like a quite natural thing, since I already knew the dynamics, but I must imagine how many people must have felt. The weirdness of the situation, in which the familiar mashes with what will become the predominant way of playing is just unfathomable now, after a few iterations of the RPG-styled Mario.

Quite funny are the graphics. Although not as impressive as they had been a few years back, they still hold this funny charm. Seeing Mario constantly break the laws of physics to silently tell what we already know does lead to some smile inducing scenes, and Bowser’s crying is just to epically funny! The characters acquire here a funny 3D modelling that I kinda miss today, which makes them look pudgy. Yep, definitely a good bunch of nostalgia built up during the first half hour.

After tutorialling (I know it’s not a word!) my way through the first battles, I finally get to advance the story and meet the first character, what I suppose will be the wizard class of my group. Mallow, the not so froggy frog, was forgotten in my first appraisal of the game. Immediately I am on the brink of deciding what each of the characters is supposed to be in an RPG. Is this Mallow, the cloud person, supposed to be my spell caster and Mario my fighter? I definitely am here on a crossroad at the moment. And no, I am not picking up a guide for that. The first time I played it I did not have one, but I got through the game fine enough, even being able to beat the hardest enemy of the game. So why not do it again? Plus, there are a lot of hints on the function of each character.

Mario is the hammer wielding hero, who jumps on the enemies, so he is most probably the fighter. Mallow presents himself by conjuring up storms while crying, which makes him most definitely a wizard in my standards. This is exactly what I like about this tutorial. Yes, there are the boring scripted parts, where Toad teaches you the mechanics in an seemingly unending text, like the timed critical hit and the use of items, but at the same time much is taught to you through the story through subtle hints and association. I have no manual, since I bought the game in a loose cartridge, so I don’t know if there are further hints. But until now the game has been teaching me the basics sometimes screaming in my face, other times just silently letting me watch the details. Besides, I think I never noticed this until now, with a few years extra of playing. Quite ingenious!

Also, the jokes tend to blend in with the story pretty good. The chancellor of the Mushroom Kingdom, a toad himself, bellows “Spores alive!” and one of the powers the big Hammer Bro uses against me is “Hammer Time” which just brings me back memories of baggy pants and constant affirmations of me being able not to touch someone.

The only thing I have found off-putting up to now is the isometric view, which is conjuring up some images of platforming issues, but I think I will comment this later, when the issues arise.

Also, a lot more things have come into my mind, but I diligently made some notes on these and I will bring them up as I progress on the story, so I don’t run out of ideas during the next parts. There is really a lot of gold in this game, which makes my nostalgic factor feel heightened, even after all those years I had not played the game. I am really looking forward for the next hours!

Nai ainur raituvar tietyanna!

Replays SMRPG Ep. 00

Games come and go. Some just appear. Then others stay in our years for decades to come. Nostalgia is something that plagues many of us. And how many times does not this blind us and even sometimes, when we return to that classic game, disappoint us. Some games just don’t survive the passing of time. Mario 64 is one of those that comes to my mind immediately. Yes, it was a great game back in the day, but today the camera alone kills me so much that part of the fun is gone.

 So this is the idea of this series on this blog. I will replay, little by little old games that were part of my childhood, maybe one day one I never played, giving my thoughts on the game while I finish it. the idea is to play an hour of the game and gather my thoughts on it, trying to think not only how this game has changed, but also some random things. Take it as a constant rambling while enjoying an oldie, but goodie.

For this first time I will tike one of my favorites. Super Mario RPG was one of the last (if not the last) game developed by Square back in the days of the Super Nintendo, very well at the end of the console’s life cycle. What followed after that was a painful, yet fruitful departure of the master of RPGs into other consoles. Super Mario RPG in itself was also a departure of the normal game-play style that was normally the meat and bones of Mario Bros., which is the platformer.

I will have to concede here that I played this game much later than originally intended, since It was well at the end of the N64 era that I got hold of a copy of that game and a SNES, since my parents were not big fans of me playing games. But the effect it had in me was great. Back then I was already a big fan of the RPG genre and I had already played a few good ones and a few bad ones, Sword of Hope being one of my strongest memories. The game, even in the light of the new console, looked quite amazing to me. The game itself just was grand. I remember that it was littered with jokes and some interesting references, such as cameos by Link, Samus (whom I did not know back then) and even a Final Fantasy Boss. I got to fight him and beat him, making it one of the few games I had completed. After that I looked forward to playing other Mario RPG installments, being the Game Boy Advance one (Mario and Luigi) the most prominent one.

What do I remember from this game?

Not much really. There was this new character, everyone seemed to love, a wooden figure. Then there was this weird, yet epic alliance between Mario and Bowser, to gain back the castle. One thing that had bothered me though was the level cap that, if my memory serves me correctly, was somewhere around the 30, pretty low for what I was used for. There was also a team of Power Ranger look-alikes. For a teen that hated the Power Rangers like me, every time I beat them it was the source of some satisfaction.

So, yes, the game had a lot to offer and a lot to remember. I even put the game as one of my most nostalgic memories, which is why I got excited when I found a copy at my local retro store. Now that I can replay it, I am just thinking on how much I am going to enjoy it. In any case, I want to share those thoughts, maybe you can agree on this. I hope this review/Let’s play mixture of game will tell me if the game is still good after those many years.

I am expecting to be able to put out at least one article on my replay every week, since my work time swallows up a lot of my play time. Let’s also see how much time it will take me to finish it. lastly, let’s hope you will enjoy those thoughts too!

Nai ainur raituvar tyetyanna!

VR Craze

Excitement is building up again in the community, as Occulus Rift is appearing, project Morpheus was announced and somehow Microsoft will bud in. It is this new, hyper modern technology, called VR that seems to set the tone of our new expectations of this age. And why not? There has always been this dream of being part of the game instead of being just the external controller…

…or is it?

Many opinions have been circulating around these notions and some ha e been expectant, others quite skeptical. To be part of this discussion, I have listened to these opinions and tried to find some neutral ground on this. Thus I will first analyze the two main camps on this new technology, then move on to some more current perspectives, to then analyze: is this VR and this helmet really for the gaming of the future? So, let us break this down first:

1. The con: this has been tried!

We already had these tries before. The great fail was Nintendo’s Virtual Boy, which not only tried to make VR a reality, but also portable. If you watch AVGN’s review of this though, the flaws were incredible. The pain-inducing red even made watching the review unbearable, and the sheer impractical design just made a generation wait one more day.

This was clearly due to poor technology. Back then VR was a dream of Tron and other Sci-Fi movies, and I feel Nintendo and other companies just rushed to look novel. Some people thus predict it will crash and burn again, not only because of the technology, but because of the practicality; now gaming will require you to wear a helmet for this deeper experience, making a fun afternoon in an adventure, instead of sitting down to relax. I can understand if some people will be against it.

Also, it is being called out as a gimmick, such as the 3D effect in current TVs and the 3DS. While it may be nice, many people end up turning off the effect, since the hassle or just the sickness makes the experience suffer. Development costs will try to create effective and enjoyable titles, but this effect may soon wear off, some reckon.

2. Tomorrow is today: the pros.

On the other hand many people could argue that these problems, especially the dizzy feeling, will subside with more use in time. And this could be true, since the jump to 3D gaming had a similar issue. Today only a few still suffer from ‘motion sickness’, and this is due to the people not getting used to it. A similar effect had happened with the first movie: people ran terrified when they first saw a grainy, black & white train charging towards them. Today, we are barely affected by the grandeur of the Hollywood blockbusters.

Also, the technology is definitely better. Although not totally ripened out, motion control has had a big impact on the market, and 20 years ago we could only dream of that. As an example we have the Power Glove, again from Nintendo, that was terribly inaccurate and difficult to use.

The people just get giddy with the idea of finally participating inside the game, which can revolutionize the way we play games. It has been already called the new way of carrying on the console war. And it definitely is an experiment worth trying.

3. I am too fat to play games.

A comedian (I can not remember who) already said that once when the Wii was released. The idea was to create a new way of approaching games, more proactive and participative instead of sitting passively in the couch. The thing is, it never caught on. Let us analyze it by the results. Even though the motion controls have been around us for years, the preferred method is still sitting down. I remember when Zelda’s Twilight Princess had the option to swing the sword or to just use the controller. My friends just sat down. Even I had to get a Game Cube controller to make my experience with said game more enjoyable. The fact is: most people that play games with a regularity different than for party purposes or the casual fun time usually prefer to sit down, taking the second set of controls.

Second is the space issue. Motion gaming failed also because you had to create a space to be able to play. Even I had trouble playing with a Wii when I had to move the sofa and the living room table to be able to play. Now, this may not seem to be an issue to play a game in VR, since for now it is only a visor, but I have already heard the discussion on how to make the game more real, many times portrayed with the treadmill base, as well as other extras that are not only space consuming, but also seemingly very expensive, no matter how much you mass produce it. Even this little joke by College Humor shows how problematic can an apparatus as complicated as the projected VR future be (not safe for work!).

Not only that, it will require much more movement than before. I can not imagine a person preparing himself half an hour to be connected to the apparatus to enjoy a game, especially after a hard day of work. This would be too complicated and not only obese people would suffer it, but also people on the wheelchair and with other kind of capacity problems. This makes gaming thus less playable, or at least less practical form even more public.

The we have to take into account the labels. Have you seen the labels on a 3DS box? Here, let me quote it:

WARNING Viewing of 3D images by children 6 and under may cause vision damage.

Now, I am trying to be an alarmist, but the fact that we have such a label already tells us that the perception of a developing mind is actually affected by the staring at the 3D screens. I can’t imagine what perception issues the VR visor could cause to children, something that remains to be seen. I really hope for it to be harmless, no more than the occasional epilepsy thing, but then again, this new, untested ground.

I see VR as a reality, but not as a game. If we ever get to that exciting technology, I see it most probably as an experience, much of the like of laser gun fights that existed before, or as Paintball nowadays. Another area it could be perfectly used is for training, a thing that happens today with all the flight simulators.

What do I make of this newest craze? I think it will be fun for a while, and sadly some of the production costs will be sunk in games based on the system. But at the end, when the phone rings or the cat topples over the decorations, you will have to learn to play without the new gimmick. The charm of games, especially console gaming, is in its capacity to immerse yourself in a world as quick as you can turn off the machine, to enjoy 10 minutes to hours of game play and being able to drop the game for a quick toilet break, going for popcorn or just a glass of water. The VR will stay a nice extra to gaming, but I don’t think it will replace the experience, since its impracticalities are just too many, and if you don’t see it now, wait until the experience happens. And much like motion control, it will fade for the more practical way, which seems old, but is even today functional.

We may love and buy in into the new technology, but in the end of the day, when the helmet/visor rests heavy on our head, we will remove it and take the controller like always in our hands, enjoying what we have always done: relaxing on the sofa or on the floor and enjoying the virtual world on a screen.

Unless I am wrong.

Nai ainur raituvar tietyannë!

Zelda and Meta-History

I love The Legend of Zelda. I may not have played each one of its iterations, I may not have completed them all 100%. But every time I have a second on my busy life, I just play them. I enjoy the mechanics, the bosses and sometimes even the silly stories. Heck, I even bought a 2DS just to play the most recent title, A Link Between Worlds.

How has it fared for me? In my opinion it was fantastic. In some friends’ opinion it was just a “meh”. But here I am a bit more biased, not because of my fandom, since my friends are fans too, but due to my attention to the story. Because the designers, inadvertently or not, have included an interesting facet into the game mechanics.

I once complained about the fact that in many sequels, the super powered player by some unexplained chance had become dwarfed, losing all the items he had at disposition, as well as power-ups and other neat stuff. In TLoZ this was often avoided by creating so called “sequels” where the hero was a reborn form of some ancestor. Thus a loophole was averted effectively. Not a big one, but a nitpick nonetheless.

When I heard that LBW was a sequel to probably the best Zelda ever, I was a bit dubious about how it would work out. But the world was familiar, but different, which I took much enjoyment in.

There was the issue of the items, which were technically all at disposition since the beginning of the game. Many found that a bit off putting, but for me it was a great stroke of genius. It was not the game mechanic that fascinated me here, but the “meta-history” behind this concept.

But what is meta history? Unlike meta story, which is technically a secondary story that runs in the background of a game to set the tone and the mood of the general game, meta-history refers to the history that runs from one sequel to another, as in how the change across the years/decades/centuries run by in the fictional game world or even the history that affects how we can relate to the game/work of fiction. There are many examples of this in fiction.

Let’s take, for example Tolkien’s books to explain the concept. The Hobbit as we know it today is not the original version. The 1937 edition told the chapter of “Riddles in the Dark” totally different: Gollum offered the Ring as a gift and, upon discovering that Bilbo already had it, offered him to guide him out of the mountain. When the author took the time to make the sequel, he had to create link to the Lord of the Rings. He decided to make the Ring that link and rewrote the story to match, more or less, the moods.

How did he excuse this change? He simply determined that the first version was old corrupted Bilbo’s point of view. Frodo wrote the second, more “correct”, version after the events of Lord of the Rings. That Red Book was taken to Gondor, while Bilbo’s Red Book stayed safely in Rivendell.  In other words, there were two versions in different libraries, and all Tolkien did was translate those books, discovering two points of view on the same story, as it happens with many historic events. Thus we have now two editions, the old one being Bilbo’s book and the new one being Frodo’s.

This is a prime example of meta-history. When there was something that contradicted in the editions of the books, instead of accepting it as a mistake, the author invented a historical reason within the framework of his fictitious world for the apparent mistake, integrating them thus in a much more creative evolution of the books and giving them a fake history.

How does the new Zelda accomplish this? The Hyrule we play at in LBW is the same as the one in Link to the Past. This means that the previous Link, who lived centuries ago, had already looted the dungeons, thus rendering them empty of legendary artifacts. The fact that Ravio has all the items in his possession could thus mean (this is purely conjectural) that he bought them all from collectors or found them in ancient graves and other places outside the dungeons. Granted, some objects, like the blue suit, are still in dungeons, but they are in another dimension, which does not contradict the idea of the emptied dungeons.

In other words, there is a historic reason for the new mechanic. I don’t know if the designers at Nintendo did it on purpose, but the mere idea that the treasure was now obtainable without the need to enter a dungeon was incredible. I liked the game because of this. Now all I had to do was to rent/buy the items from a greedy salesman and I felt there had been really a previous Link who had taken out all treasures and inherited (or maybe even sold) them to other people.

This is a minor detail in the grand total of a great game, but definitely one that gives more life to the fictional world provided. This again shifted the whole idea on how you approach dungeons, making thus Dark Hyrule even more open ended, since we did not need to scavenge for the treasure anymore.

Now that specific Hyrule had an history, and now the sequel felt even more like one. It is just that little detail, the meta-historic detail, that gives us a deeper world to explore and imagine – had this particular thing been on purpose or not.

May they smile upon your way!