hearts_blood is spreading a little game that I jumped in on.  Using a bad impersonation of Locutus (if such things could be impersonated through text), I declared: Resistance is Futile!  Then she asked me five questions which I must answer.  Oh Noes!  My not-so-secrets are going to be revealed!

1. In your opinion, what makes the 'perfect' video game, and does it exist?
The "perfect video game" is the perfect symbiosys of art and science -- where writers, visual artists, musicians, and sound effect artists have achieved an amicable psychic link with computer scientists, mathemeticians, and engineers.  This specilaized group of developers will have unlimited funding, flexible 40 hour work weeks (with the option to work longer, if desired), and no deadline so that nothing will stop them from achieving true flawlessness.  There can be only one of two possible end results:

1) Something so amazing that everyone in the world will finally conclude that...

• Video games are both art and science.
• Video games are not bad for children or society
• Video games encourage thought and intellectualism.
• This particular game is the most butt-kickin' game anyone has ever and will ever see!

2) Vaporware that succumbs to development hell because in the endeavor to create the "perfect" video game, an infinite amount of time is required to correct all the flaws before going gold.

Does the perfect video game exist?  Hell no.  Still vaporware --  very, very vaporous.

2. What is the strangest thing your cats have ever done?
My cats will argue with me anytime I have to leave the house... One will vocally object to my leaving for any reason, even if I'm just taking out the trash.  One time, he was so insistent that I stay home, he tried to "talk" over me by meowing louder and louder.  The other tries to use more subtle suggestion with pouting and sad kitty-faces, and has also tried laying down right in front of the door.

3. If you could travel to any period in history, what would it be and why?
Fuedal Japan!  I find Japanese history and historical culture far more interesting than any other part of the world.

4. What is the worst anime you've ever seen and why?
As anime is a major media outlet in Japan, this question is analogous to asking, "what is the worst TV show I've ever seen and why?"  But alright, I'll bite.  What sticks in my mind is the English language version of Akira, specifically the version localized by Streamline Pictures.  Basically, Streamline Pictures "sanitized" all the Japanese out of it, and the result is a movie that makes absolutely no sense!  Seeing the movie in its original Japanese language with English subtitles is a much better viewing experience...  and why?  Akira is like a Japanese Buddhist parable.  For Streamline Pictures to wipe out the Japanese cultural inflections did not leave much of a movie left to watch.  In fact, I think this is a big problem for "English dubbed" anime, in general.  Taking the Japanese out of anime is like taking the British out of BBC.  Imagine if all the British were "sanitized" out of Monty Python...  Horrifying thought, isn't it?

5. When the zombie apocalypse comes, where will you be?
I'll be in my home, in the basement that has been renovated into a state-of-the-art technological "command center".  From there I will lead my faithful genetically engineered lawn of killer weeds in the defense of my home, my nutcase neighbor, and the whole free world...  and win!  Yes, I will stop the zombie apocolypse because that game (Plants vs. Zombies) is far too easy for a gamer who is also accomplished at subjugating all life across two planes of existence (Master of Magic), beating back alien invasion (Starcraft), saving the kingdom (Warcraft), beating the cult-like terrorists (C&C Tiberian Dawn), defeating Soviet Russia (C&C Red Alert), conquering the galaxy (Master of Orion, Imperium Galactica, Galactic Civilizations, Sins of a Solar Empire, et al), and finally banishing the heretic god from this universe (Populous).  What the hell can zombies bring against that?

Although, if some upstart warlord decides to challenge my supreme gamer authority, I just may start my own zombie apocalypse, supported by cybernetic ghouls, and all from within a secret, forbidden, air-conditioned and fully-computerized library of necromancy located in the middle of the earth.  It is only accessible through a deep, dark dungeon labyrinth, whose primary entrance is found in the Bermuda Triangle and patrolled by alien invaders that I have enslaved from previous campaigns.  The dungeon itself is guarded by a cadre of my most elite killer weeds from the fungus squad; a summoned dracolich from the netherworld named "Lucy"; and a bunch of angry, steam-powered, artificially intelligent machina that view me as a god because not only did I defeat their champion at Wii Bowling, but also for giving them an unending supply of geo-thermal energy.  All the while I am enjoying the comforts of a nice cozy rocking chair, a snuggie, a steaming cup of chai, and a bag of Ghirardelli dark-chocolate.

And you thought I'd make a Resident Evil reference, didn't'chya?  :D

Arclayn MoonSword

I had recently observed that Quake 2 was not functional on a Windows PC bearing a Nvidia Geforce 9x00 series video card.  When I tried to start the game in OpenGL mode, the game outright crashed.  Software rendering mode works ok, but who would want to play without 3D acceleration?  Quake 2 is a very old game, more than 10 years old.  Just about any PC out there today should be able to play it with no trouble, but no more.  What is truly ironic is that Nvidia built their foundation for business success around the Quake series.  Way back when, Nvidia video cards played Quake games better than 3DFX and ATI and got tons of publicity for it.  Today...  Quake 2 in OpenGL doesn't even work at all with a newer Nvidia video card.  It's got to be the video card because Quake 2 hasn't changed in 10 years, and this problem appears to have surfaced less than a couple years ago.  Bad Nvidia!

I found this forum on Steam which confirmed that the problem is not isolated.  What's worse is that Geforce 8x00 series cards were also affected and about as far back as November 2008!  There is talk that using much older 170 series Nvidia drivers work just fine, but that is very counterproductive for playing new PC games.  EGL (a Quake 2 graphics mod) was also mentioned as a good fix, but the idea was also met with some confusion by some other people.  Aside from EGL, I also found a good solution.

First, pay a visit to R1ch's OpenGL Renderer website:  http://www.r1ch.net/stuff/r1gl/  This guy created an updated OpenGL renderer for Quake 2.  While his intention was to allow newer graphics tricks for Quake 2, his renderer has the added benefit of fixing the incompatibility with Quake 2 and newer Nvidia video cards.  In part, we can also thank Id Software for opening Quake 2's source code under the GNU Public License, which allowed "R1ch" to create this new OpenGL renderer.

So go to R1ch's website at the link above, download his updated OpenGL renderer r1gl-0.1.5.zip, and follow his instructions to use it.  Or to make things less complicated... 

1. Find the file ref_gl.dll within the Quake 2 game and move it or rename it.
2. Open the zip file, copy R1ch's newer file ref_r1gl.dll into Quake 2, and rename it to ref_gl.dll.  This is effectively replacing Id's original OpenGL renderer DLL.

That way, you don't have to manually modify any configuration files or install any mods.  In a brief test, this worked beautifully.  I have not tried it out with multiplayer, but as this is related to graphics drawing and not network communications, I cannot imagine there is a problem.

Quake 2 will now play okay, but the problem isn't all gone.  All of Id Tech 2 appears to be affected.  My copy of Heretic 2 is similarly broken with newer Nvidia video cards.  What's worse is that R1ch's updated OpenGL renderer doesn't work with Heretic 2, so I expect it doesn't work with anything else besides Quake 2.  Since Ravensoft never opened Heretic 2's source code, it is unlikely that there will ever be a fix.  Bad Nvidia!  At least GLQuake and Quake 3: Arena still appear to work okay.

Arclayn MoonSword

P.S. I have seen other anomalous problems with later Nvidia cards and really old games, although nothing quite so broken as Id Tech 2.  i.e. Warcraft 3 has missing textures.  BAD NVIDIA!!!  This is crap.  I'm seriously considering buying an ATI video card next time.

Cross posted to Late To The Party.

I present an epic tale of conflict and sorrow where great men and women do battle against their misguided rulers for freedom and principles!

Sounds like a cheesy pitch to promote the latest RPG, eh?  Hehehe...  read on.

A buddy of mine who lives in California USA was recently telling me about a new game called Torchlight, which is made in the tradition of Diablo.  For me, this is intriguing as the Diablo series has been and continues to be (despite its ancientness) the best hack-and-slash video games ever.  What's even more intriguing is that this new game is made by "ex-Blizzard employees".  As the Diablo series was created by Blizzard's subsidiary studio, Blizzard North, that note caught my attention.

A few weeks later, I download a demo of Torchlight just to see if it lives up to all the fuss.  The short and simple is: no it doesn't.  Before I move on, I want to make one thing absolutely clear:  Torchlight is a decent game, despite my upcoming scathing summary.  That scathe starts out noting Torchlight's complete lack of originality.  Torchlight would be borderline plagiarizism of the Diablo series if not for the key fact that the development team is largely comprised of people who did work for Blizzard North, and thusly had created Diablo!  Despite the developers' best recycling efforts, the game is lacking a few things.  It lacks originality (can't stress this enough!), it lacks multiplayer, it lacks some polish, and except for veteran voice actress Lani Minella -- it lacks good voice acting.  Torchlight is very lacking in comparison to what placed the Diablo series at the pinnacle of awesomeness.  But with all its flaws, Torchlight is not a bad game.  It is not awesome, but it is competent.  I suspect that Torchlight's mere competent outcome was held back by lack of project funding and time, not lack of talent.  I'll get back to this soon.

But this epic tale or cheesy pitch isn't really about Torchlight.  Rather, Torchlight intrigued me to read about where this story has its beginnings -- the "ex-Blizzard" employees.  Seems at around the year 2003, key people within Blizzard North (a subsidiary studio of Blizzard Entertainment) had a difference of opinion with the beancounters and MBA stiff-suits within Blizzard's parent company, Vivendi.  The nature of this disagreement eludes me, but it is clear that the differences were significant and the two parties couldn't find enough common ground in whatever the dispute was.  My significant other suspects it was some labor contract dispute.  I suspect the disagreement stems from the philosophical differences and cultural divide common between workers and business managers in the USA.  Or perhaps both.  Regardless, that is all speculation.  What is not speculation is that many people who were key to Blizzard's success resigned and went different ways.

At my time providing IT tech support at a General Electric manufacturing plant, one thing I observed about American business culture is that stiff-suit managers often fail to understand that workers are the lifeblood of the company.  No workers equals no product.  No product equals no business.  It is pretty simple concept, really.  In the case of Blizzard, that paradigm gets even worse as video game developers (the workers) are highly educated and talented people.  They are visual artists, musicians, writers, mathematicians, computer scientists and engineers, etc.  These are not your "warm-body" work-drones.  No no!  Video game developers are a unique and rare breed!  Angering this kind of workforce is a potentially bad idea!

I have read that the numerous resignations forced the cancellation of a "Blizzard North kind of game" and the closure of the entire Blizzard North studio.  Here we have proof of what I just said: "No workers equals no product.  No product equals no business."  Therefore, Blizzard North becomes defunct.  But where did all those people go?

Some of the people who left Blizzard North wound up forming ArenaNet and created a new game called Guild Wars.  My buddy in California played this game for some time, but I felt the game amounted to very shiny rubbish.  Technologically speaking, the game was marvelous.  As for game design, I had no use for it.  It is a clear case that "shiny" alone does not make a good game.  Despite my negative opinion, Guild Wars became a popular phenomenon known for large scale multiplayer play without subscription fees.  Seems today, though, that most of the bluster surrounding Guild Wars has died off, and although a Guild Wars sequel was announced two years ago... it is still missing in action.

I list Bill Roper among my most favorite video game developers ever.  He is the man responsible for the success of Warcraft, Starcraft, and Diablo, and he was among the "key people" who left Blizzard North.  After leaving Blizzard North, Mr. Roper founded Flagship Studios and created Hellgate London.  I haven't played Hellgate so I cannot comment on how good or bad the game is.  I have read that Hellgate has a metacritic average of 70%.  That's not great, but that's not bad.  Unfortunately, Hellgate ended up a commercial failure and as a result, Flagship Studios dissolved and the Hellgate intellectual property now lies in the hands of Korean game publisher, Hanbitsoft.

These days, Mr. Roper works for Cryptic Studios.  He is overseeing the production of Champions Online, an upcoming MMO game based on the Champions paper-and-pencil hobby game.  Supposedly, Bill Roper loved playing Champions as a child, so in the end he winds up doing what is likely a really nice job for him.  Kudos!

And now we come to Torchlight's origins.  Other "key people" who left Blizzard North helped to found Runic Games.  Runic Games is also, in part, a studio built upon the ashes of Flagship Studios, although without Bill Roper.  Runic Games was founded in 2008, and a year later they published Torchlight.  A single year is pretty quick development time!  And considering that Torchlight is a decent game, it says something about the talent of these developers: They know what they are doing.  Given more time and funding, I expect that Torchlight would have climbed to the summit of Mount Awesome.  However, considering the development tools they used, it becomes obvious that funding and time were not on their side. 

Torchlight is built with a kludge variety of free-and-open-source technologes (OGRE 3D and CEGUI) and inexpensively licensed technologies (Particle Universe and FMOD).  Certainly this selection of tools is not state-of-the-art like Unreal Engine 3 or Blizzard's own custom in-house development suite.  The end result is a lightweight game that would have been very impressive maybe four or five years ago.  However, for what Runic Games had, Torchlight does play slick and smooth and the visuals are good enough.  To start with something substantially less and still come out with something competent is the work of true talent, and Torchlight is existing proof, when one looks deep down, that these guys have talent.

As for Blizzard Entertainment, the loss of Blizzard North means they are lacking many of the original talents that made them awesome in the first place.  I can't say, but I want to think that the stiff-suits in Vivendi learned something from this experience as they had a lot of talented and experienced people to replace in order to keep Blizzard Entertainment successful.  Afterall, game developers can't be plucked from a tree.  Even so, Blizzard's main office managed to keep their momentum in the realm of awesome.  Since the collapse of Blizzard North, World of Warcraft became an instant success the following year.  Plus, Blizzard now has two more games on the horizon: Starcraft 2 and Diablo 3.  Despite not being backed by the original talents, both games still look like they will be outstanding when they go gold!

For the fans who love Blizzard games (such as myself), things are looking up.  For Bill Roper, things were shaky for a while but it looks to me that he's got a good gig now.  I hope that Torchlight, despite its complete lack of originality, does well enough so that Runic Games can properly fund a real project and show the world just how good they really are.  And finally, time will tell if this cheesy, epic tale has a happy ending for all.

Arclayn MoonSword

Warning: Today's post is comprised of conceited opinions with a forecast to incite fanboyism with a possible side-order of trolls. However, as trolls will be blocked, there will be no feeding of trolls on this blog. Fanboys are welcome to discuss, provided they put the flame-throwers away! Flame-throwers will be locked away with the trolls to decide dominance: while trolls are vulnerable to fire-based attacks, they are also insatiably famished all the time and are known to consume anything! Everyone has been warned.

Before I get into this post, I want to make a few things clear about myself:

• I favored Nintendo during the 3rd (8-bit) and 4th (16-bit) console generations. I was less enthusiastic about the N64 following in the 5th generation. 
• I do not believe... because I KNOW that "blast processing" was a load of crap. Those who don't believe me can kiss my computer science degree backside. I can even explain blast processing another time, if anyone even cares as I have come to understand that most gamers today really don't.
• I believe that Shigeru Miyamoto is a god (figuratively speaking) and Yu Suzuki is not. Their comparative levels of success speak for themselves.
• Yes, I do own a Sega Genesis, Sega CD, Sega Saturn, and Sega Dreamcast consoles. Plus, they all still work.
• I actually like the Sega Saturn. Seriously! I do! Panzer Dragoon Saga FTW!
• I scorn those players who "had to have a Playstation 2" during Christmas 2000. YOU are a primary reason the Dreamcast fell on its bum the following year despite it being more readily available at a lower price with better first run games.

This is not like me to be so... forthright, eh? Fact is, divisive fanboysim was sparked in the early 90s between Nintendo and Sega players and it still sticks with some gamers today. There is no way I can avoid it, so I'm not gonna dance around it, either. But when you look at my positions surrounding Sega, it becomes clear they had a warm place in my gamer's heart.  A few of my cherished gaming memories exist with Sega. My favorites among Sega (in-house creations) are Phantasy Star, Panzer Dragoon, Nights Into Dreams, and Skies of Arcadia. Sorry Sonic, you were trumped by better ideas and less abusive advertising.

In Brian's review of Sonic Chronicles: The Dark Brotherhood at Late to the Party (Part 1, Part 2), he noted that Sonic, as a video game icon, is declining. I have to concur. What was the last Sonic game that seemed relevant to masses? Sonic Adventures on the Dreamcast? Sega Genesis? Old and classic for sure, but it shows that Sonic is best remembered for what he used to be, not for what he has become. In response to the review, I noted that much of the original creative talent behind Sonic has left Sega. The people behind Sonic, today, are just a shadow of the original team. Honestly, that extends to much of Sega as a whole, not just Sonic.

Sonic's creation is generally credited to three people: Naoto Oushima, Hirokazu Yasuhara, and Yuji Naka.  Oushima-san and Naka-san also were integral to creating Nights Into Dreams. Unfortunately, Oushima-san and Naka-san have left Sega to form their own studios. Also, Yasuhara-san left Sega to work for Naughty Dog and since has had a hand in the creation of a few Jak and Daxter games as well as Uncharted: Drake's Fortune.

Rieko Kodama (a.k.a. "Phoenix Rie") was integral to Phantasy Star and Skies of Arcadia. Fortunately, she still works for Sega. Unfortunately, the last few years have had her working on remakes of her classic games. Her most recent game, 7th Dragon, is a brand new title for Nintendo DS and has scored quite well with Japanese critics. However, it is also a Japanese exclusive -- sad panda and even sadder American gamer.

The Panzer Dragoon series was originally created by Team Andromeda (Yukio Futatsugi as director). However, the team was dissolved in 1998 and people have split up and moved on. Some stayed within Sega, although moved to other teams such as Smilebit. Others left Sega for other employment. The Panzer Dragoon series is composed of distilled awesome, so it is shame that such great talent ended up being separated.

Any discussion involving Sega's talent must include Yu Suzuki. Yu Suzuki has been described as Sega's answer to Nintendo's Shigeru Miyamoto. The problem with such a comparison is that Yu Suzuki is primarily an arcade game developer, even today.  Miyamoto-san, on the other hand, has transcended game development to become Nintendo's #1 R&D man.

Suzuki-san was integral to Sega's early success as their early success was primarily in the arcades. For anyone who loves Sega for their classic arcade games, Yu Suzuki is like a god. I am not among them, however. Very, very few of my favorite classic arcade games were made by Sega. For me, Sega's best creative strengths lay elsewhere and Yu Suzuki was not involved in any of them. Heck, Suzuki-san was not involved with Sonic the Hedgehog, either. Considering the rapid decline of the arcade business (it is now all but extinct in upstate NY), Suzuki-san's role in Sega is probably less important than it used to be.

I must point out, though, that Suzuki-san did have one very ambitious project for the Dreamcast: Shenmue. I can only describe Shenmue as a genre-bending game ahead of its time and something quite unique in video game storytelling. It is not a RPG or adventure game in the traditional sense, but incorporates elements of both while also mixing in elements from fighting games, and more classic story-telling games. In some respects, Shenmue is an example of an early sandbox game, before sandbox games were popularized by Grand Theft Auto III. In other respects, Shenmue is simply unique. Yu Suzuki wanted to make an eleven episode series out of Shenmue, but the project was probably too ambitious as it is the 2nd most expensive video game ever made at $70 million.  While the game was a strong seller on the Dreamcast, the Dreamcast userbase was simply to small for Sega to turn any profit on such a monstrous investment.  As such, Shenmue saw just one sequel published that ended on a cliffhanger before the whole series was cancelled.  It all is too bad.  Had Suzuki-san's gargantuan ambition saw commercial success, there is no doubt in my mind that he would be elevated to developer godhood and remembered for creating a whole new genre of video game storytelling that would have inevitably been copied by others.  However, history shows that was not to be.

The largest indicator I find for Sega's march towards irrelevance is the declining quality of in-house productions and increased reliance on outsourcing. When was the last time I saw a new game bearing the Sega brand, actually created by Sega, that seemed any good? Neither The Conduit or Bayonetta are actually created by Sega. Sonic's latest games typically fall within the realm of "why bother?", with the exception of Sonic Chronicles... which is a decent game not created by Sega. The Wii re-imagining of Nights: Journey of Dreams was done in-house, but it is a stunning disappointment in comparison to the brilliance of the Saturn original.

Sega is placing more resources into remakes of their older games (as I noted that Kodama-san has had to focus on in recent years). And certainly Sega is not shy about re-releasing their classic Genesis and Master System games for the Wii Virtual Console. But while a lot of these games are good... they are classics that do not truly reflect the current talent employed at Sega today.

I'm sad to say, but it seems to me that Sega has lost too much of their original talent, and also lost focus on their creativity. I'm not so conceited as to proclaim their impending doom. Indeed, I expect Sega, as a company, will probably live on for time to come. However, it is becoming more and more obvious that the Sega that gamers love and remember is not the same company that exists today. Their efforts are becoming increasingly mediocre and with that, increasingly irrelevant. Their glory days of the 1990s are over. Long over.

Arclayn MoonSword

Do you listen to internet radio? I do at times. There is a lot of variety of music that simply isn't played on the local radio and with little to no commercials. My favorite radio stations are through "Shoutcast", which can be directly played through Winamp or iTunes. Linux people can supposedly tune in with XMMS. If you cannot use these players (perhaps it's a work PC?), the shoutcast website also has a web-based radio player. They even claim to have an iPhone app now, as well.

One of my favorite stations is Radio Rivendell. From Sweden, they broadcast a wide variety of "fantasy" themed music pieces, mostly musical scores used in movies and video games. The music ranges among classical Celtic, ambient, and epic styles. Some movie soundtracks I have recognized include Peter Jackson's adaption of Lord of the Rings, Harry Potter, and Conan the Barbarian. Among video games, I have also recognized a wide variety of tracks by Jeremy Soule (Guildwars and The Elder Scrolls: Oblivion), Michael Hoenig (Baldur's Gate PC series), Inon Zur (Champions of Norrath and Lineage II), Russel Shaw (Fable), and Tracy Bush (Warcraft series). I have also heard some interesting original musical scores by groups out of Europe, such as a compilation from Sweden called, "A Tribute to Uglakh."

As someone who couldn't care less about "popular" music, this is a nice alternative. There are more dedicated video game internet radio stations out there, but the ones I have recently sampled did not have a good mix of music. However, Radio Rivendell is something I can have playing in my living room for hours. If you think I am strange for admitting so, I will remind you that I am a gamer.

Arclayn MoonSword