Weblog // Games
Eve online, the flying in circles simulator
During a bout of insomnia the other night, I decided to take a look at eve online. For, you know, research purposes. I didn’t have much fun though because, unfortunately, somewhere during the process of creating their massively multi-player online sci-fi universe, the game designers forgot to add any video game into it. As far as I can tell, the game consists of:
- Fighting; watching your ship fly in circles while shooting at another ship with your blaster ray
- Mining; watching your ship fly in circles while shooting at a massive rock with your mining ray
- Salvaging; watching your ship fly in circles while shooting at a shipwreck with your salvage ray
- Computer hacking; watching your ship fly in circles while shooting at a computer with your computer hacking ray
- Deliveries; watching your ship fly itself while… actually this one doesn’t involve ray guns
The game does have a couple of things going for it. Firstly, in the future everyone will apparently use Icelandic Króna as the galactic currency, which is cool. Secondly, it looks quite nice.
Meta narrative
We’re making a video game this year, but it’s a bit secret at the moment. Don’t worry, it’s got spies in it and it’s going to be awesome. At the moment, I’m trying to sort out some sort of narrative for our game to give players a reason to do what they’re doing (whatever that may be; it’s a secret, remember).
I am ‘the editor’ and I am responsible for words.
In our lecture today, we were told that most narratives — including video games — follow the same basic structure that has existed since the Ancient Greeks, for the amusement of peasants (apparently):
- Intro
- Rise
- Climax
- Fall
- Catastrophe
That sounds about right, but I think it’s missing something; resolution. You know; the happy ending, the hero saving the day at the last minute, Mr. Spock reversing something the polarity of the fusion cannon and saving the ship… you get the idea. And with that in mind, I’ve got some stories to be writing.
Electroplankton
I love Electroplankton on the Nintendo DS, it’s great for whiling away the insomniac hours (also, is you say ‘Adam’ into it, and play it backwards; it sounds like ‘murder’). Is it a game though?
Electroplankton has been described as a ‘toy’ rather than a game because there is no conflict, no time limit and no particular goal. I suppose it depends on how you define ‘game’. It’s dictionary time:
Game: A pursuit or activity with rules performed either alone or with others, for the purpose of entertainment.
By that definition, which sounds reasonable to me, I would say that Electroplankton is a game. It definitely counts as an activity, it certainly has rules / constraints and it is entertaining. Personally, my definition of a game is something you play for fun.
Shotcode
I know Dan’s already blogged about Shotcodes, so I’ve been thinking about a bit more about them. Ultra-quick version: it’s a little blob that takes you to a website if you point a mobile phone at it. Here’s one I appropriated (I love using that word) from Dan’s blog that will send you to his website.
Dan’s idea for getting the shotcode up and around the town was to make stencils and spray it onto to stuff. Well now, that’s just plain illegal, and it’s not like we could just say sorry and wipe it off. My cunning plan, is to get them printed up onto little vinyl stickers and stick them onto everything we can. That’s still illegal, but at least they’d be easier to clean up.
Game adverts that don’t show the game
The advert for Halo 3 doesn’t show any footage from the game at all, the entire thing is a diorama of figurine soldiers. Which is interesting. Motiongrapher have an article about the video that explains it better than I ever could (or using a lot more words, anyway).
Back in the day, games avoided showing the graphics too much because, well, they were rubbish (but we had imagination, so it was ok). Currently, in the ‘next generation’ the games are looking pretty spiffy and so the decision not to show the game itself must be based on something else. I’m not going to join in with the ‘games as art’ discussion, but I’d say we’re definitely into ‘games as a valid and worthwhile form of entertainment’ territory. Anyway, read the Motiongrapher article; they know that they’re talking about.
Shift
Shift is a game by MLAers for the games module a few years ago. It’s a point-and-click flash game that takes a few pointers (boom-tish) from Myst and the Lucasarts games, like Monkey Island. It reminds me a little bit of Samarost. It’s not that original — it’s a point-and-click game — but the production is great; the artwork is really nice and the soundtrack adds to the chilled out feel of the game.
It’s lovely, but we’re going to make something better (sorry Han)!
