Uncharted is a year old, but I recently got my platinum trophy and I feel that enough time has passed that I can take an unhindered look at the game.

First the basics, Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune is about Nathan Drake, a supposed descendant of Sir Francis Drake in the search of a lost Spanish treasure they later find out is El Dorado. He has an elder partner Sullivan and female journalist/documentarian, Elena, following him around/chasing him with a camera. Unfortunately Sydney couldn’t keep his mouth shut and told Gabriel Roman, a man who he owed money to and who put a contract out on his life. He brought along a bunch of pirates and mercenaries to help in getting the treasure. This leads everyone to an uncharted island in the middle of the Pacific, thanks to a WWII Nazi map. Just run with it, it makes less sense explaining it than it does in game. I wont bother with a full plot summery, because one, that would be boring and two, I’m expecting that you have already played the game or have read it elsewhere.

If you read other articles of mine you may have noticed me gushing over this game a little. It is a phenomenal, well executed, tightly designed game. I mentioned it before in relation to how it merges story elements with its gameplay ones. Because of this, to look at Uncharted one has to look at the term cinematic gaming. Uncharted is the very definition of well-executed cinematic gaming.

I would rate the architecture of the game was one of the best I’ve seen in the last few generations let alone years. I played through the game numerous times and never once hit a glitch. The loading screen that happens during gameplay where I am warned not to turn off my machine during appears only once: at the beginning of the game. It is seamless throughout. I checked the game data next; this is where the disc downloads data from the disc to facilitate load times. The other great games of the PS3 have any where to half a gig of data to MGS4 incredible 4.5 gigs of downloaded data, which gets replaced after ever chapter. Uncharted has none. Everything runs off the disc. The 13megs are for when it was updated with trophy support.

On the gameplay aspects, everything within the game has been refined to a mirror shine and I don’t just mean the graphics. Few games respond like Uncharted do. The cover system works as well as it possible can and the shooting has certain nuances that I didn’t know about or take advantage of until I played through on high difficulties. The collision detection is far better than I’ve ever seen. Objects are recognized perfectly and there is no clipping between the models. Finally the platforming has been called reminiscent of Tomb Raider, but it flows much better so I would liken it more to Prince of Persia, minus the ability to wall run.

Graphically it is one of the best looking games in the present generation. The environments are vibrant and realistic and a wonderful change from the browns and grays of modern gaming. The animations are top notch as the development team put extra effort into facial animations and character movements. What’s even more amazing is the detail that goes into differentiating the enemy characters. Each one is different. Roman is sophisticated and calculated in his movements. Navarro is very hard and deliberated. Eddie Raja is like a man unhinged, flailing wildly all over the place. The mercenaries are very professional in the firefights and are tougher opponents because of it. The pirate characters on the other hand are more ambitious in their attacks. They take more risks than the mercenaries. One of the animations has the character jump out fast and fire wildly around. This makes them an easy target, but infuses a lot of personality into them. Another type of pirate will advance steadily and take hit time with his shots with a very powerful gun.

The heroes also have their own animations that personify them beyond just polygonal avatars. For instance, Drake is not a superhuman, he is a real person, a highly skilled person, being an adventurer, but among us mere mortals and his animations display this in the subtle small movements. Up until chapter 4 I was convinced Nathan was just another video game character Mary-Sue persona that can get up from just about anything (until the player takes control of course). Then the intro cutscene to chapter 4 has Nathan acting all heroic, making Elena get out first and he tried to take control of the plane, for like 2 seconds, after which he exclaims, “What am I doing?” and then proceeds to leap out of the plane, count at a rapid pace, of which I am almost positive he skips a number and pulls the cord a little too late and get caught on a statue. This reminds me of the good Indiana Jones movies where he would survive by the skin of his teeth. In the platforming sections where the grips Nathan is holding on are crumbling, you’ll hear him pleading “oh, no, no, no.” Which brings me to my next item, the voice acting.

The voice acting is top notch. In the first chapter, when the pirates are seen in the distance, Drake gives Elena a gun and asks her if she know how to use one. She nervously replies, “Yeah, sure. Just like a camera. You point and shoot.” The delivery is perfect with a nervous waver in her inflection. We know that this person can use a gun, but is rather nervous, if not frightened for what is about to happen. Sullivan gets his own little moment that separates him from being just another stock character. After the first firefight is over and the boat blows up, Sullivan is introduced and helps the Elena in and complete ignores Drake’s hand. It happens with such a sense of panache that it presents Sullivan’s character perfectly and the game continues with it every time he shows up.

The story is told though a variety of ways. Cutscenes are the most obvious means, but the game also uses in-game conversations, environmental and quick button clues that shift the camera to look at certain points. Even the animations in the gameplay are telling about the characters. And none of these elements are really intrusive on the experience. The cutscenes are short. The longest one couldn’t have been more than a minute or two long. The conversations take place during lulls in the fighting or other action-oriented sequences, like travel time or puzzle elements of the game so you aren’t distracted. There are a few points when the game will flash the R2 button in the corner. If you hit it Drake will look to the point of interest, but it isn’t necessary to push it, but if you do, it adds to the experience. The time that sticks out the most was during the complex hiding the treasure. In the second section, before opening the gate the R2 icon will appear. If hit, it will make Drake look into the corner and see a figure scamper away on a different stairway in the distance. This is foreshadowing to a future plot development. After you hear Drake comment, “What was that?” you move on. It isn’t necessary, but is fun and remakes a useful literary device into the language of video games.

I’ve heard the allegation that the story is cliché and that its filled with stock characters and a lot of the story falls flat. I don’t think that’s true. Does the story have elements from over half a dozen different movies and adventure serials? Can the characters be boiled down into archetypes? Yes on both counts, there is no way to deny it, but there are enough nuances in the story and the characters that it doesn’t matter. The characters feel alive and the story compels you to want to continue with the adventure, not just for the gold. There is a good section of the game where they give up on that in favor of getting out alive, until they realize all the boats are with the bad guys…who are looking for the gold.

Uncharted has been likened to the Indiana Jones movies, but those in turn were based off of the old adventure serials of the 1930s. The pacing of the story follows that model instead of a movie and it shows. That model is much more suited to the medium of a video game. Games that are based off of movies always seem to have the need to add levels or stretch out certain plot points just so it will be a worthwhile gameplay experience. That is all well and good from the gameplay side of things, but it suffers in the story telling department. However, serials are much more suited to this type of medium. There are set backs, new twists or rather further developments whose scope is not limited to a two-hour time frame.

The game is tight in every sense of the word. Not once did the game hiccup on a glitch or bug. The story elements all mesh together. You may think I will put far too much thought into the game in the next segment, that I am reading too much into it, but I think of it more as a natural occurrence of great design with a compelling story all polished to a mirror shine. When a great design team brings on a writer at the start, one who has credentials on previous games something wonderful comes out of it. The following is a result from the compilation of all the quality work I detail above.

A major theme running through Uncharted is greed. I’m sure that seem pretty obvious given that the characters are searching for El Dorado and I was willing to leave it at that, until I thought about it a little further. The story revolves around El Dorado and everyone wants some piece of it, but each character’s motivations as to why they are after it are different.

The bad guys are almost uniformly motivated by greed. They want their stake in the treasure. Navarro is slightly more nuance in wanting the dangerous, mystical dust inside the golden statue. The good guys are also after the gold, with Elena more interested in the story of finding it than the material worth itself, but you cannot really call them greedy. They don’t throw away everything else for their avarice. In fact it’s this difference that makes them more relatable and puts you on their side despite the fact you are killing legions of human beings.

The true display of greed for the characters comes in what the characters are willing to give up and how far they are willing to go in their search of El Dorado. (I’m sure there is a Heart of Darkness reference I could make here.) Eddie Raja and his men sacrifice their lives for the gold in the face of their fears and common sense of what has been happening to them the entire time they were on the island. The one time Eddie wants to abandon the search, he is threatened to be cut out. Navarro sacrifices everything, his men, any semblance of honor, and the life of his employer; he holds the price of his ‘weapon’ above all else. Gabriel Roman is behind all the bad guys and is financing the whole thing, but he’s only going so far so that he’ll get a sizable return. Money is his only objective and foolishly sacrifices his life and literally humanity for it. The Spaniards are the ultimate representation of greed consuming them. Much like as described in Dante’s Inferno, they have succumbed to their sin and have become the embodiment of that sin. They are slavering humanoids only interested in killing and feasting on their prey. They consume others in a metaphorical fashion of how greed had consumed them. The entire island itself is a further display of the effects of greed in its almost angel of vengeance like repercussions, from the crumbling fortress, to the sunken city, to unholy cathedral.

On the other side of the fence are the three ‘heroes.’ Let’s go with protagonists. They all start out with aspirations to get the treasure before the other guy, though Elena is more interested in the search itself. They do not remain solely focused on El Dorado as other factor change their priorities. Drake wants to save his skin, valuing his own life over the gold and later the lives of Elena and Sully, once he learns he is still alive. Elena’s moment comes at the rickety bridge, when she fall through the wood and is clutching the camera with one hand and Drake with the other, in a situation more than slightly reminiscent of the end of Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade. Elena makes the better choice in those two situations. Finally, Sully, like Drake, just wants to get out of this alive. The treasure becomes secondary and they are only still hinting it because their ride off the cursed island are still hunting the treasure and later is revealed that the treasure is a danger to the whole world and so they act altruistically for the last chapter and half of the game.

Maybe I did over think a game that’s aspiration was to be like the old adventure serials of the 30s and 40s and only provide a source of entertainment. Maybe I did, but what is also evident is that my analysis of the game holds up when you think about it. Was it the designer’s intent to have thematic resonance in the game? I don’t know, but I doubt that much literary thought was put into it. It just occurred naturally as the team tightened up every other aspect of the game.

If on the other hand you like this type of analysis applied to video game you can check out my new site dedicated to this sort of thing. See it at www.thegamecritique.com. I will continue to give design related analysis, for what its worth, here on Creative Fluff.

The story goes like this: As time went on at Creative Fluff and I was found to be the main contributor for the game design section I was eventually made into that section’s content editor. We were looking into how we could expand the examinations of games. The first point we looked to was how were we going to handle reviews. Our esteemed Editor-in-Chief, Megalongcat, decided it should be on a five point scale and left the task up to me on what criteria would constitute our scores. We are a design web site after all, not a game review site. As I thought and worked on it, I realized that we either have to look solely at the mechanical functions of a game’s programming or as its effectiveness as a whole as a work of artistic expression. The problem with the first was, we are not entirely qualified to speak intelligently on that subject. The issue with the second is the fundamental idea that you can rate a piece of artwork quality by its cultural significance with a numerical score. Trust me I tried. Instead of numbers I assigned a concept to each number related to its effect. It makes more sense when fully explained, but not by much.

Then I thought, what if I turned it around. The review score is a conclusion reached from the text evidence of the written part where the reviewer relates his experience of his time with the game. What if I had the review score at the beginning of the concept and used it as a thesis rather than a representation of its worth. Of course after more consideration and discussion, if that is where we are moving with the idea of examining specific titles, then why would we need a score at all? Sufficed to say, the entire idea fell through. But it spawned a new one. I was still interested in exploring video games critically. That is when another of our contributors, Katharine O’Brien, stepped in with the question: why don’t we set up a sister site for the specific purpose of doing just what I had envisioned?

And so we are. From the writer of such articles as “The Portal Effect” and the “Single Player Game: Story vs. Gameplay” series, a new website devoted to the idea that games are an art form and that they should be examined critically.

TheGameCritique.com is up and running.

This here is a little interesting indie game that I came across a while ago. It’s not finished without any plans for a release date as of yet. So why show it to you? From what we’ve seen, the game does something very unusual in games. Like Portal and Fracture it looks into design space that I loosely call special manipulation. Unlike the previous two game where they change the area or level design around them, this game reveals it.

Unlike most first person shooters that have a gun used to kill enemies to allow you, the player, to move on through the level, here the paintball gun is used to reveal the level so you can move through it. I suppose you could do the whole level blind, but where would the fun in that be. Instead of describing it further, why don’t you just watch the video.

The Unfinished Swan - Tech Demo 9/2008 from Ian Dallas on Vimeo.

The paintball gun aspect means that there are no enemies per say, instead the world could be called the enemy. It is a puzzle game, reminiscent of Portal. You have to figure out how to get from one end to the other. That much is evident. It is unique in its approach.

Beyond just the design aspect of being a really innovative idea, but it is also creates a artistic design that creates an ominous atmosphere, both ‘inside and outside.’ I’ll explore that meaning when it comes out on my new site. So see it there. (*hint hint*) Any possible story could be chilling, if this is any evidence.

I can’t wait to see where the designers go with this. The man responsible for it has also worked on The Misadventures of P. B. Winterbottom, another indie design gem yet to be released.

Find out more here on his blog: http://iandallas.com/

And the game: http://iandallas.com/games/swan/

I was lucky enough to be a part of the closed beta for Home and I haven’t written up on it before, because, frankly, I was worried I would be violating some non disclosure agreement if I did. I was too busy to look it up anyway. Since it’s being released today and I don’t care anymore, I’ll give a quick rundown of my impressions.

1. Everything it does, it does very well, the program works smoothly and without many hiccups. If you really try with other people there are a few clipping issues.

2. There is not a whole lot to do in the closed beta. The stores only had minor amount of stock in the last few days. The bowling alley had a few arcade games, which is really meta if you think about it, pool and bowling, which I never got to play because the lanes were always full.

3. The movie theather is nice, though once again a very meta expirien, watching a movie on a screen within a tv screen. Though there was only one movie and not a very interesting one at that.

4. There is spots for advertising and its used very sparingly. But it does mean it will remain a free experience.

5. Character customization is very deep, wit the face anyway. Wish there were more ways to create different skin and hair colors.

6. It is always sunny. No matter what time of day it is. I suppose that is a good thing, but kind of weird when you’re in the winter lodge you can buy and the fire is roaring at high noon.

Really it works. You can find people on your friends list easily, communicate, much easier to do if you have a USB keyboard or headset. My issue is a lack on content, which will be fixed now that the beta is open. Many companies have offered not only billboard advertising, but activities and rooms of their own. Which shifts me nicely into my next complaint.

I have no idea how to get to the special locations. I can find my way in the world and via menu to the 5 main areas: common square, your room, bowling alley, movie theater, mall. Beyond that I am at a loss. There were supposedly three special room devoted to Playstation releases, but I couldn’t even begin to know where to look. Maybe they were just closed off when I joined and will be changed when the beta goes open tonight.

Final word: this is not a game. Don’t think of it as such. This a much more interesting way to get people connected on the PSN. you can get games going, watch movies together and generally hang out, though I find AIM easier to work with, but it does give a nice visual to whom your talking to.

Playstation Home goes into Open beta December 11th, downloadable on the Playstation Network.

The first game I’m going to focus on it Fable 2, an exclusive coming out for the X-box 360. The promise of the game is many folds. Like the last game, Fable 2 makes the promise of choice that will change how you look and the how the world looks. An early choice released to us, was one of do you let a little girl get scarred for life or do you take one for the team. Though if you do, people, including your children, will recoil in disgust. There will be effects to the choices you make. These choices also affect how people view you and feel about you. You can influence their reactions with your own actions and be able to build relationships with the NPCs, up to and including marriage. There is also a system of law in the game world where you actions can be dealt with. If you kill someone in town and are spotted, you’ll have to deal with the law. Actions in the game will have consequences. If you aren’t seen you get away with it, but it will still affect your character’s soul. As with the last game, your personality also affects your appearance.

The game offers a lot of choice to the player. That has been its moniker since it was introduced. Here Fable 2 promises to live up to the expectations of Fable 1 by allowing that choice to have an effect on your character and play experience.

(Update: Since I started this article, Fable 2 has actually been released. I have not played it, so I do know first hand, but from what I have been told in regard to the subject I am talking about, it falls short. All of the above is in the game. The problem is that mechanically it set to a bunch of sliders that determine your characters personality and is then matched to the sliders of a given NPC. This is all well and good; until it becomes apparent the player can manipulate those sliders until he gets the reaction he wants from them. You can do some of the dastardliest deeds possible, like sacrifice your children in some ritual for power and the slider will turn you evil, but do enough heroic deeds and the slider will go to the other extreme, like you hadn’t done what you’ve done. So morality, instead of being a choice or character building, becomes a momentary inconvenience. There are no lasting consequences. I suppose this takes effort on the part of the player and if you play the character as that, a character, the game will obliged just fine.)

Next is Fallout 3. Like Fable 2, Fallout 3 has a system where your actions have effects in the world. The actions of NPC will depend on your actions and dialogue choices when speaking with them. One noted example is you can miss an entire side quest if you tell a boy who comes up to you to get lost, because he then wont ask for your help in rescuing his father. The effect on the story makes perfect sense in response to your actions. Further more there are real world consequences to your actions that will also change which on the touted 120 different endings you might get. The most extreme example of choice has to do with an unexploded nuclear bomb in a town. Should you detonate it, the town is gone. Anything that might have related to that town is gone. Any further effects on the story that town might have had are gone. We are told there are many choices like this, not all big, but they will all have an impact on your playing experience.

(Update mark 2: Fallout 3 has also been released. I have really been slow on this. And for the most part of what I’ve heard is that the game executes this very well. The world is so expansive that it would take multiple play throughs to see everything anyway that being able to do things differently is practically built into the game. Of course, while action matching up with consequence is great it is only one aspect of the gameplay. Now that we have an example of a game that can do this, we can focus on improving other aspects of the game.)

Another title, this one exclusive for the Playstation 3, which seems to be taking measure to mix the two elements. Infamous starts you at ground zero of a cataclysm that has some how given you electrical powers. Though the game you can either make yourself famous or infamous, hence the title. The story offered is you playing Cole must figure out what happened at that cataclysm. The world is open and you are free to either subdue enemies or kill them that will have an effect on how the world views you and will craft a reputation through your actions. Beyond that, the story is rather open in that the main thread seems to involve a mystery rather than an opposition, from what we know at this time. Some of the abilities you can gain and level up have effects on the game, like the ability to peer into a person’s memories post mortem using an ability called Post Cognition. This give you information. I can only suppose that this avenue of information gathering would not be available without the ability. I do not know for sure.

Prince of Persia comes out much later this year and unlike the past titles is not a linear experience. The world will be open offering choice to the player of what to do and where to go first. And after they finish freeing the land of corruption in that location. They have the choice to go somewhere else. The player wont be forced to go anywhere. That is all well and good, but the actual gameplay mechanics will offer something to the story as well. The little details like Eleka never being in your way when platforming. She will always be behind you, even should you turn around she makes her way to your other side. Plus Prince of Persia has a double jump thanks to Eleka’s magic, which allows her to give you another boost in midair. There are ways mechanics fit the story. Like the fighting system, and how every enemy is fought like a boss battle, making how a fight is fought more realistic. One neat addition, or I should say omission, is the continue screen. You never die in the game. This may sound like a cop out, until you see how it is pulled off. For instance, if you fall to your death, the game goes to a short cinematic of Eleka pulling you back safely to the last checkpoint using a magical ability. If you fall into corruption, she will pull you out. It acts like a continue screen in that it signifies when you mess up, but never pulls you out of the experience. This step forward is unique and powerful step in merging the two elements of video games.

Finally, the game that inspired this look into the future possibilities that games are offering, the PS3 exclusive: Heavy Rain. At the Germen Games Convention the demo showed was prefaced with these comments by stating that Heavy Rain will be an adult/mature emotional thriller with five overriding points involved within the design. First, it will be a story-driven experience that is provided not necessarily through cutscenes but through player action. Second, players’ actions will have serious consequences. Third, the experience will be emotionally driven and will invoke a dramatic response in the player. Fourth, the story and subject matter are very much adult in nature. And finally, the game will be broadly accessible to a wide variety of players. The challenge will play out in the player’s mind, not on the controller.

The demo shown was not part of the game itself, but was instead there to show what the game would be capable of. The game is entirely contextual based. White outlines will appear on objects that can be interacted with, when you walk near them. The outlines correspond to the button on the controller needed to interact with it, triangle, circle, square or X. It plays like an adventure game, but so much more visceral. In the sequence when confronted with a serial killer in his own house you have to run around avoiding him and the button images appearing on screen for only flashes as the player quickly moved through the rooms. Sometimes he pushed them, which caused the character to interact with the object in a way that made sense the context of the scene. One point before when the character came near a mailbox, they were allowed to open it, using the directional cue that appeared on screen for the Sixaxis control. Depending on how fast you moved it, would determine the speed the character would open it. It all looks like a cutscene, but you are in full control.

Further more, of the information I have gathered, is that there is no continue screen for death. The game will continue from beginning to end without pause. Should your character die, you will switch perspective to a new one. There are so many stories to be told using this method. There is a beginning and an end, but the journey in the middle is the true story. I spoke last time of the holy grail of gaming when it came to merging story and gameplay. A short time later, I think I may have found it. Let us hope.

The effort of designers in this aspect of game development has recently been focused on choice. Give the players more choice and freedom to impact the story and make the experience their own. The designers at the moment are doing this from the outside in. The branching pathways are from the big decision in quests or mission, rather than the small action of a player. This is fine. Get the process down first, but it seems they are getting a handle on it. This is what makes Heavy Rain very unique. Smaller decisions in the game supposedly will have an impact on the unfolding of the story. Who knows where this will bring us down the line.

A little background first. The game will be shipped in North America in Europe in a few days, while the localized version for Japan will be released in mid-December. Give that and the images it has been said that the Faith’s design has been skewed to western tastes of an exotic look. Torokun, the creator of the second images points out, “There is always a huge complaint from Asian gamers whenever Western developers design Asian female characters…this is mainly because many Westerners’ definition of what is considered as ‘Asian’ beauty is very different from what Asians consider beautiful.”

Here are the images side by side.

The most obvious difference between the two is the missing tattoo below Faith’s left eye. Personally I found it a rather odd choice for Character design, but I let it go. The next notable difference is the chin in the facial structure. In EA’s design the jaw is more pronounced, much more in line with a westerner’s chin that gives Faith a harder look, while the fan’s drawing has a smoother jaw that is softer and younger looking. The face also becomes more rounded in the changes. Also there is the matter of Faith’s eyes. In EA’s design they are little more than slits with the makeup/tattoo emphasizing their sharpness. In Torokun’s version they eyes are wider and what I noticed is the iris are given actual color, in this case green, rather than having what looks like overly large pupils.

The final change, which had to be pointed out to me, is bust size. When I first saw the official design I was happy that Faith’s figure looked more realistic than what is usually accepted as normal in video game action heroines. The fan version did up her cup size, but is still better representation than is average.

The original story can be read here: http://kotaku.com/5062933/faith-from-mirrors-edge-fan+designed-for-asian-tastes

The cover shows a parked bicycle, that looks like its made for transportation of goods, with a large basket on the back. Guns N’ Roses can be seen spray painted on the wall next to the bike. The entire image is sepia toned that gives it an old, classic feel. The location pictured is dingy enough to give a 3^rd world vibe or at least a one of a developing nation like the one depicted in the title. The title of the album and name of the band is sideways and pushed to the dark mauve colored boarder off to the right.

The overall feel the cover gives me is that this is trying to say it is a classic album. Thematically it fits the title and we’ll see if it fits the music as well. Either way it looks great.

Chinese Democracy will be sold exclusively at Best Buy on November 23^rd for $11.99 on CD and $19.99 on vinyl. You can pre-order now.

Once last time: About f*#king time.

I talked about the role the metal band Metallica has with the rhythm games as they were releasing a big track pack that week. Now its another great High Voltage band’s turn in the spotlight.

AC/DC has long been wanted in the likes of Guitar Hero and Rock Band, but has only recently made the transition in Rock Band 2 with “Let There Be Rock.” On November 2nd for the PS3 and Xbox360 and November 16th for Wii, AC/DC will be releasing AC/DC Live: Rock Band Track Pack. As with their upcoming new album Black Ice, this disc based track pack will only be sold at Wal-Mart locations and their Sam Club subsidiary. Hell, It Ain’t a Bad Place to Be. If you want to play the tracks in Rock Band 1 and 2, they will come with an authentication code that will allow the tracks to be played in PS3 and Xbox 360. There are no plans to make these songs available for download at this time.

All of the 18 songs are live versions from various shows throughout their Highway to Hell carrier. Here’s the track list:

-Thunderstruck

-Shoot to Thrill
-Back in Black
-Hell Ain’t a Bad Place to Be
-Heatseeker
-Fire Your Guns
-Jailbreak
-The Jack
-Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap
-Moneytalks
-Hell’s Bells
-High Voltage
-Whole Lotta Rosie
-You Shook Me All Night Long
-T.N.T.
-Let There Be Rock
-Highway to Hell
-For Those About to Rock (We Salute You)

This is a demo, but its short, really short. It’s only a little longer than Heavenly Sword’s demo. There is a lot to go over in the demo. I’ll start with the most touted part of the game, the new environment changing weaponry. The main question that has been raised is, can this mechanic sustain an entire game? The detractors say it’s a bit too gimmicky and only one tool, while other cite Portal as a game that did that sort of thing well. After going through the demo a number of times, I say no. Not on its own. Portal was a masterpiece success not because of its mechanic, but how it used it and the world it formed around it. That and the game was only six hours long. I’ll explain what I mean.

The main weapon in Fracture is a machine gun with two extra functions. You can’t swap out this gun for one lying around. You have a second slot for that purpose. The extra functions are connected to the left and right trigger buttons (L1 and R1). When shot into the dirt one will raise the level of the ground, the other will cause it to lower. These allow for some basic puzzle solving of the run and gun variety. See a sewer pipe filled with dirt, shoot it out of the way by lower it. Can’t jump over a wall; raise the dirt in front of it to get some height. Raising the ground also can create a shield in an otherwise open section of the level. Doing it under an enemy throws them into the air. There are two sets of grenades that serve the same function. The lowering ones act as normal grenades in the absence of dirt. The only other landscape-using weapon in the game shown is something like a bomb tunneler. It travels under ground and blows up either when you hit the detonate button or it hits a wall.

Those are the functions and from what I’ve seen this is a clear example of the Portal Effect that went over in my previous article. The idea is that this is an end result and not a new source of design space. Portal as great as it was could not support new ideas or expand the concept further than it had. I believe that Fracture is the same way, though this maybe because the designer decided to go the shooter route. Really the two games take up the same kind of design space of exploring new ways to distort/change the landscape around the player.

In Fracture there are plenty of other weapons, rocket launcher, sticky grenade launcher, sniper rifle, machine gun. A few others are shown in the loading screen at the beginning, but are not in the game as shown. From other previews around the net there are even more guns that can terraform, but they didn’t show up here. Other than the gimmick there is really nothing else new here. The gimmick is fun, especially when they added real gravity physics to running up and down surfaces does give an additional sense of strategy of how you can use the landscaping tools, but honestly the way the shootouts are, I doubt you’ll have the time or the reason to use any of them. Now come the most dreaded part of this preview.

Stop me if you’ve heard this before. The character is also a gruff, grizzled supposedly brown haired marine in a suit of armor with regenerative shielding with a HUD that is explained as seen by the character through an ocular implant. The story is about fighting a general who was gone off and declared war or something. It’s your job to take him down, except he has an army at his back full of genetically enhanced soldiers. This is all we get from the demo, though I suspect that there isn’t much else there.

Overall the sound is good, the visuals are a little sub par and there are times when the game has to freeze for a second or two to load. Honestly this seems like another run of the mill shooter. The idea of terra formation and deformation sounds interesting, but did they have to put it into a shooter. That’s an idea that sounds like it could have been a great platformer or game based on exploration.

Fracture is a third person shooter by the developer Day 1 Studios set to be released on the Playstation 3 and Xbox 360 on October 7^th.

On September 20th to 21st, exactly a month before the game hits store shelves, Sony Computer Entertainment of America will bring the highly anticipated game to Parsons The New School for Design. The purpose is to let a large number of design students get down and busy with the creation toolset for a marathon 24-hour design off. Are you all getting excited yet?

More than 120 students will be broken up into teams of 5 people to design a level. Afterwards each team will present their level to a panel of video game designers from Media Molecule, the creators of Little Big Planet, Parson’s faculty, and media representatives. They will judge them and award the winner levels with a special section of the game, the “City of Parsons” if you will. Are you all salivating yet?

Wipe the drool off and wait until I’m finished. As you may or may not know, depending if you’ve read the About Us page or not, some of our contributors come from that prestigious institution. Best part is that our very own Fred McCoy, aka Megalongcat will be participating in the event and afterwards will be able to give an in-depth view into Little Big Planet a month before the rest of us unwashed peasants can touch the game. Stay tuned.