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PAX: Today was the last day of PAX Prime 2012, and as such,
this is my final writeup covering the event.
I don’t know about anyone else, but this year seemed a
little weird to me. The crowds seemed a
little harder to push through, people seemed a little crankier and a little
more rude… It wasn’t terrible by any
means, but the vibe felt a little off.
Maybe it was just me, but there you go.
Weird vibes aside, PAX offered the same set of problems that
it usually does. Even with three full days, there’s not enough time to see and
play all of the games, and there’s definitely not enough time to sit down and
have a cup of coffee or a meal with all of the people that I wanted to see. Although I did manage to catch up with a good
number of people and I coincidentally bumped into many that I knew on the
floor, it’s still depressing to think that there were plenty of folks that I
couldn’t successfully connect with, and that I likely won’t get a chance again
for at least a year.
In any event, enough sentimentality and on with the coverage!
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My first event of the day was one of my most anticipated -
Dishonored, from Bethesda. When I sat
down with the game, I asked Seth Shain, one of the developers, to show me all
the highlights and details that I might miss walking into the game cold. He was happy to oblige, and I hit him with every
question I could think of.
Without getting into too much detail, I was most concerned
with whether Dishonored was really as open-ended and flexible as has been
advertised. After all, some games let
players make minor choices (blow up the enemy/strangle the enemy/snipe the
enemy) while still funneling them down the same basic paths.
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| Dishonored |
The short answer?
From what I could tell, the game lets the player do what they want, how
they want, when they want. Of course, there are certain limits since the
developers can only include so much content, but the demo level that I played
through was quite impressive. Within a
few minutes, Seth showed me no fewer than six different ways to enter the
building where my target was located, and none was “right” or” wrong”. It was all about how stealthy a player wanted
to be, and what skills they chose to use. (once inside the building, there were
a slew of different ways to accomplish the objective, but that’s a different
discussion.)
Over the course of the discussion, he mentioned that Thief
and Deus Ex had been sources of inspiration for Dishonored, and in fact,
several members of the Dishonored team had actually worked on Deus Ex. For fans of free-form play and stealth, I can’t
think of anything that would inspire more confidence than that.
A couple of factoids:
>The game features multiple endings. Two main branches, with multiple variations
of each.
>It’s possible to complete the entire game without
killing a single character.
>It’s possible to complete the entire game without being
seen by anyone.
>The world reacts, alters and adjusts in response to each
person’s playstyle.
>In addition to missions, the player can steal various
valuable loot items.
I was already excited going into this hands-on, and after
seeing it for myself and finding out even more information, this game has
secured a place for itself at the top of my PLAY ASAP list.
*
Speaking of stealthy, free-form games, it just so happened
that my next appointment was at Squeenix to see Hitman: Absolution. I’ve been a huge fan of the series since
Silent Assassin, but in all honesty, it feels like franchise has been in a bit
of trouble lately. Blood Money wasn’t quite to my liking, and with all the talk
of the changes made to the formula (run and gun as a valid option?!?) I was
more than a little concerned. Thankfully,
Hitman developer Tore Blystad was available to give me an insider’s peek at the
demo level, and I’m happy to say that he calmed all of my fears.
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| Hitman: Absolution |
The section that was available to play featured an important
person of some sort wandering a crowded Asian town square. I requested that Tore show me as many ways to
complete the level as possible, but we only had time for four: sniper rifle, bomb,
poisoned drugs, and the most direct route – a bullet straight to the face at
pointblank range. That was just the tip
of the iceberg, though. He told me that
the dev team counts 12 “official” ways to complete the level, and that’s not
including several of the unexpected, “unofficial” ways that playtesters have
found.
Hearing this? Music
to my ears.
After being satisfied that the game has embraced a less-structured
designed than the previous installment, I then asked if they were serious about
run & gunning as a sound strategy for success. He laughed at this for a bit, and said that
although it was possible, the team had never intended for players to get the
idea that a full frontal assault was just as do-able as being stealthy. I asked him to demonstrate for me, and he was
happy to oblige.
After sufficiently arming himself, he went about shooting
every hostile enemy in the area. He was
quickly overpowered (this was on normal difficulty) and was not able to
complete the section. He apologized for
not being able to finish, but I told him that I couldn’t be happier. I don’t know about you, but there are plenty
of games out there that satisfy any gun-crazy cravings I may have. With so few quality stealth games available,
I certainly don’t need Hitman to compromise in that area.
As the demo ended, I felt a hell of a lot better about the
game than I did going into it. It seems clear that the developers are fully
aware of what the core Hitman fans want, while still trying to make the game
more approachable for newcomers, or for those who don’t want a “realistic”
level of difficulty. It’s looking really,
really good.
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Although it wasn’t on my agenda to check out Borderlands 2,
I had a little bit of time and there was some space available, so I figured “why
not?”
The short presentation given ran through the DLC
Mechromancer character, and showed a bit of her skill trees. (The person speaking was very careful to
avoid using anything resembling “girlfriend mode” language.) He also showed the
improved gun turret for the soldier class, and then moved on to give us a taste
of an endgame boss, Terramorphus.
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| Borderlands 2 |
This huge creature drops specific rare items, so there’s
some incentive to take him down. On the
other hand, the developers had only chipped away about an eighth of its life after
several minutes of four characters equipped with top-class gear blasting away
at it, nonstop. I gather that it’s
somewhat tough to kill. Also, that may
be an incredible understatement.
After the talk wrapped, we were let out to get a hands-on
with the game itself. Brief impressions:
it’s more Borderlands. Of course, it’s
impossible to get a feeling for the true scope of the project after just a few
minutes of a demo level, but as someone who wasn’t really a fan of the first
game, I didn’t see anything here to convince me to give the sequel a shot.
YM, of course, MV.
(Fun fact: the developers ordered 160 pizzas to feed fans
attending the panel later that day!)
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In last year’s PAX rundown, I had made some brief comments
about a game called Antichamber, and how it seemed quite impenetrable from the
perspective of someone watching over a player’s shoulder. The developer, Alexander Bruce, reached out
to me and invited me back to take a closer look and get a better idea of what
it was really about. I was happy to
accept.
Sitting down with the game without really knowing
anything about it, my feeling was that I needed the tiniest bit of info before
playing in order to get myself in the frame of mind to properly interact with
it. I didn’t need a story mode or
cutscenes, but I had no idea what to expect, and to say that Antichamber is a
cryptic game is putting it mildly. After I put a few minutes in, Alex and I had
an intriguing discussion about some of the meta-issues surrounding experimental
or indie games.
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| Antichamber |
I don’t mean to put words in his mouth but if I understood
him correctly, his basic concept for Antichamber was to challenge a player’s
expectations by introducing puzzles which require various degrees of perception
and thought. I think it’s a great aim,
and I fully support such works.
On the other hand, I think there’s a lot to pick apart with this
particular title in regard to player engagement, the importance of context-setting
in any game, and whether or not genre conventions can be played with, bent, or
broken if the player is not aware or keyed into which conventions they are. Another issue that came up was aiming games
at an appropriate target audience, and how to define who that audience was.
It was fascinating stuff to chew on, and Alex is certainly a
bright guy full of ideas. It was an illuminating,
thought-provoking chat, to be sure.
*
At this point, I was nearing the end of the day and I could
feel that time was running short before people would start packing up their
equipment and heading home. I kicked
things into rush mode and tried to see as much as I could before the doors
closed. I certainly don’t mean to give
short shrift to any of the following titles, but I didn’t have nearly enough
time to spend with each of them. I hope to sit down with every one for a longer
period of time in the future.
>Flying Frog
is a local creator of board games, and they
had quite an array on display at the show.
I’ve heard great things about one of their titles,
Last Night on Earth,
and one of the staff at the booth was happy to play a quick session with me. Essentially, it’s about a group of survivors
fending off zombies in a small town, and it seemed like it would be a lot of
fun at a dinner table with some friends.
>Klei Entertainment was showing
Don’t Starve. It’s an experimental title currently being
built via an iteration process incorporating substantial feedback from players
on the Klei forums. In its current state,
and the game begins with the main character being dropped into a strange land
and being forced to figure out what’s going on, while scrounging for the means
of survival. It looks a little like it
was drawn by Edward Gorey, and it strongly reminded me of the survival mode in
Minecraft, even though the game currently does not offer the ability to create
structures.
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| Super Time Force |
>Capybara Games was running
Super Time Force, and it was
pretty awesome. Graphically, it
resembled an old-school 16-bit sidescrolling shooter, but the hook is that the
player can “rewind” time every time they die, and that dead clone remains in
the world. It’s a little hard to
describe without seeing it in action, but dying and leaving these copies behind
is almost like giving yourself backup in difficult sections. It’s heading to XBLA next year, and this is
one I’m going to pop for on the spot.
>
Splice was an elegant, ingenious puzzle game featured in
the PAX 10. In this one, the player
takes a chain of genes and can cut it anyplace where two genes join. The goal is to rearrange the structures into
a predetermined shape, but everything shifts and moves when cuts are made… It seems incredibly easy, but can be quite
confounding past the initial levels. Thankfully,
the graphics and music were quite mellow and relaxing. A smart move!
>
Deity was another PAX 10 entry. The gist was that the player controls a
demonic spirit trying to reclaim its land from invaders. Since it’s a spirit, it’s able to jump from
body to body and object to object for various results. It played swiftly from an isometric
perspective, and looked like nothing else I saw on the floor. Unfortunately, this one was created by a team
at DigiPen, and half of the team has already been hired by big-time studios in
the industry. Deity looks like a
one-and-done in this case, but hey, at least you can download it for free.
>Dokuro is a Vita title that (I hope) will be getting a
translation and become available sooner, rather than later. The build on display was Japanese code, but
it didn’t seem like a lot of work would be required to localize it. The gist is that the player is a skeleton who
must guide a princess through various trap-filled levels in order to prevent
her from coming to harm. It’s cute and
fairly simple, and looks like a perfect fit for a handheld which is currently
starving for original content.
>
Guacamelee was the only other Vita game I saw worth
mentioning. Coming from Drinkbox Studios
(the developers of the excellent
Mutant Blob games) this one stars a
platforming luchador who brawls and combos his way through artistically
stylized levels that incorporate Mexican mythology. According to developer
Chris McQuinn, players
should also be able to choose the much cooler female character Tostada, if they
prefer her to the hulking beefcake. Yes, please!
>
Skulls of the Shogun has been in the works for quite a
while, but this much-anticipated title from local developer 17-bit Sudios has
finally gotten a release date of sometime in October. I’ve been following this one for a couple of
years, so the thought of actually getting a final version has got me giddy. She’s
gonna be good.
>
My Giants is a child-oriented multiplayer game that aims
to satisfy both little gamers and big ones.
It’s still quite early in development, but for parents on the hunt for
games suitable for family co-op, this is one to watch.
>The Unfinished Swan is an art-house PSN title coming
soon to the service. It’s a little tough
to describe, but the player tosses blobs of ink into blank space, and when
those blobs hit something, it kind of “fills in” the world as you go. If that sounds a little dry, trust me, it’s
much more interesting in person… Looking
into a blank white screen, tossing a blob, and then seeing animals and shapes
materialize is a unique experience.
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Like I said at the beginning of this article, there was no
way I had enough time to play every game and talk to every developer to the degree
that they deserve, but I’m just one game writer trying the best I can. I’m sure there were a dozen more titles worth
talking about that I didn’t get to cover, so if you were at the show and know
something that I overlooked, please feel free to drop me a line and clue me in!
(No need to tell me about Quadrilateral Cowboy, though.
EVERYBODY told me about that.)
At this point, I have a couple of pieces of swag that I’d
like to give away as a small gesture of thanks to everyone who read my PAX
breakdown. Here’s what I snagged:
>Batman: Arkham City artbook. This is the hardback collector’s edition art
book that was only available with preorders of the game. It’s definitely one of the nicer giveaways I’ve
seen, and feels like an extremely high-quality product. There’s even a space in the back of the book
to house a game disc!
>Borderlands 2 T-shirt. Orangey. XL.
>An Injustice: Gods Among Us headband. Red, stretchy, and
built to take abuse.
>A PAX-exclusive Artemis skin for Smite (PC).
What do you have to do to win? Just post a comment here. Say anything, and you’ll be entered. Winners will be picked at the end of the week, and one lucky duck will get all the stuff pictured here!
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