The Geek Beat - Saluting George Lucas

A Yuletide Salute to the Maker of Myths: Thank You George Lucas

Welcome to a long overdue edition of The Geek Beat. With Christmas around the corner and The Force Awakens hitting cinemas everywhere, I decided that now seemed like the right time to look back and remember George Lucas - the man who started it all. Before we jump in, please allow me to point you in the direction of Indie Gravy's new YouTube channel; as well as writing regularly for Den of Geek, I will also soon be presenting one half of Indie Gravy's outstanding coverage of independent comics - hit up the trailer below and subscribe to follow. It's going to be wild!

 

Christmas can be a difficult time to be alone. Everybody celebrating and making merry whilst you nurse the pain of a broken heart. Logs on the fire and gifts on the tree (On the tree? Really Cliff?) but no will to rejoice in the good that you see. And you know what else? It’s especially lonely if you’ve just broken up with somebody; even more so if you have to watch her parading around with some younger guy, looking a lot more attractive than she has in a while. And what really hurts… what really feels like a stake of holly through the heart is that she… your beloved, the one to whom you’ve dedicated your entire adult life; poured your heart and soul into for what seems like decades now – she looks more like her old self again than she has for a long, long time. 

As The Force Awakens finally releases to feverish anticipation and positive early reviews, it’s easy to forget George Lucas’ role in bringing the movie to life; it’s also easy to forget how difficult the film’s release might be for the myth-maker himself. In spite of the attempts to preserve the secrecy of the film’s plot, Episode VII has endured a very public production and yet in all of the tumult, Lucas, the creator at the heart of the Star Wars saga has become an increasingly peripheral figure. When Disney first announced the buyout of Lucasfilm back in 2012, it was announced that Lucas would serve as a “creative consultant” – however, as the film rumbled closer to release it became apparent that Lucas’ involvement was little more than a courteous addition; the creative team behind the film eschewed all of Lucas’ original ideas for a fresh trilogy and the man himself has recently done a round of interviews where he expressed what could well be a modicum of resentment regarding Disney’s decision to walk down a path that he cannot follow:

"The issue was ultimately that they looked at the stories and they said ‘we want to make something for the fans. People don’t actually realise it’s actually a soap opera and it’s all about family problems – it’s not about spaceships. So they decided they didn’t want to use those stories, they decided they were going to do their own thing so I decided, ‘fine…. I’ll go my way and I let them go their way’’.

With Lucas’ name being conspicuously absent from The Force Awakens posters (Gene Roddenberry got a namecheck on the Abrams-directed Star Trek), one has to wonder if the decision to distance the franchise from its All-Father was indeed made for those very fans that Lucas referred to in his interview. Lucas’ famed tinkering with his original movies and the failure of the prequel trilogy to live up to the classic saga’s quality resulted in his relationship with the fans becoming toxic; they, justly or unjustly blamed him for everything from Jar Jar Binks to Han no longer shooting first; he in turn swore off the internet and spent the next decade grumbling about fan negativity. 

Let’s be clear: this article is in no way an attempt to reconcile fans with the prequels whilst we bask in the release of a new and hopefully better generation of Star Wars films. The prequels were nothing but a letdown, a Death Star-sized series of missed opportunities produced by a filmmaker divorced from the traits that once made him a visionary. Nor am I a Lucas apologist: having shelled out the vast majority of my hard-earned student loan back in ’99 to go watch The Phantom Menace stateside (there was a six-week gap between the U.S. and U.K. release dates - and I hate spoilers), I have more reason than most to feel irate with the guy. It’s not even because it’s Christmas and that means goodwill to all men - it’s simply this: 

Without George Lucas, there would be no Star Wars. 

Never mind that the guy managed to get A New Hope made despite studio stutters, budget cuts and set-destroying sandstorms; put a pin in the fact that in making the film he developed technology that revolutionised the way we view cinema; ignore even the idea that the innocent science-fantasy genre (hello Marvel!) would never have exploded without him and you’re still left with the fact that he created Star Wars! 

Of course, one can argue that he borrowed liberally from pulpy action serials and the films of Kurosawa but the facts remain: George Lucas changed the popular culture landscape forever and if you’re reading this website, then Star Wars fan or no, his contribution to genre entertainment in some way influenced whatever it is that you love. For many of us the association with Star Wars runs deeply, linking to our childhood; although the films may have traditionally been summer releases, there’s something harmonious about the marriage of Christmas and Star Wars that simply feels right - as a child, there was only one portly, bearded guy who brought Star Wars toys to my world and it sure wasn’t Santa. Opening up a Han Solo Kenner action figure or maybe even shredding the gift wrapping of a promising-sized box to reveal a glimpse of an X-wing fighter toy on Christmas morning was a moment that was nothing short of magical. Don’t believe me? Go back and watch the recent Sony PlayStation Star Wars: Battlefront advert to see just how closely the franchise trades off its relationship with our childhood by evoking the magic and wonder that we sometimes struggle to find as adults - and let’s face it: there’s nothing that conjures up magic and wonder quite like Christmas. 

As a duo, Christmas and Star Wars made for quite the potent pairing; some of you out there will be lucky enough to experience it again this holiday season through the eyes of your children; whether watching wide-eyed in the enchanting darkness of your local cinema or sat under the tree amidst a sea of wrapping paper, marvelling at the exploits of a remote-controlled BB8 as it zooms around your living room, a whole new generation are about to feel the force. To feel the surge of excitement that you and I felt the first time we saw the Millennium Falcon blast through a gaggle of swarming TIE fighters; feel the same sense of breathless wonder that blasted through us the first time we watched a lightsaber ignite; to feel the same surge of hope and possibility that we experienced when with Luke, we gazed at Tatooine’s twin suns and beyond to a galaxy of infinite potential.   

It feels auspicious then, that Star Wars and the festive season are together once more and closely intertwined, more now than ever before. But whilst we are reunited this year with Han, Chewie, Leia and Luke, there’s one person that won’t be. At least, not in the way that perhaps he would like to be… and he’s closer to them than any of us. Because, although they’re ours, they’re also his. As the weaver of dreams, George Lucas birthed these characters into existence and watched as the world embraced them, claimed them as their own before turning their back on him. As if that wasn’t difficult enough to contend with, he then chose to part with his beloved creation to give the world the Star Wars movies it wanted; films that he realised he was no longer able to create. It was never about the money - in fact, he’s giving most the proceeds of the sale to Disney to charity. It must have been a terrible wrench for the former USC prodigy to admit, however privately, that he didn’t have another good Star Wars film left in him. In interviews this year, Lucas has gone on to compare leaving his films behind to experiencing a break-up, stating that to get past his connection with Star Wars, the first and most important rule is distance:

“When you break up with somebody, the first rule is no phone calls. The second rule, you don’t go over to their house and drive by to see what they’re doing. The third one is you don’t show up at their coffee shop and say you are going to burn it… You just say ‘Nope, gone, history, I’m moving forward.”   

Christmas can be a difficult time to be alone. So whether you were in line at the midnight premiere this week in your Kylo Ren cosplay, or maybe queueing this weekend with your children as they gleefully engage in mock-lightsaber battles; perhaps like me, you might be watching all six movies back to back before heading out to see The Force Awakens; however you share in the magic this week, spare a thought for the man who was behind it all. The dream weaver. The myth-maker - the man who was once Star Wars’s beating heart and now, hopefully is just a fan like you and I.

Thank you George. Merry Christmas. And May the Force be with You.

That's all from The Geek Beat this week folks. This has been a Vertigo production.

Head back this way next week (or maybe in a couple!) for something else... .

Until then be sure to follow me @VertigoDC but remember... i'm not locked in here with you, you're locked in here with me!  

Merry Christmas!

Star Wars: Uprising

Calling All Hives of Scum & Villainy!

Welcome to another edition of The Geek Beat. Most of my writing these days is over at

www.denofgeek.com but I'm back this week with a little nugget of goodness for you. Here we go with a review of Star Wars: Uprising, the new mobile free-to-play Star Wars title:

In its early stages at least, Star Wars: Uprising doesn't feature a great deal of the Rebel Alliance. (Apart from the same image of Tam Bastion, the fearless rebel leader that infuriatingly pops up on every loading screen for the game's first few hours, that is.)  In fact, it's because of the absence of Luke Skywalker and company from the game that the smugglers, pirates and bounty hunters of the Anoat sector have to band together to form the Uprising alluded to in the title. That being said then, it's quite ironic then that the game itself resembles the plucky young rebel upstarts in more ways than one. Like everyone's favourite fledgling freedom fighters, Star Wars: Uprising is clearly punching above its weight: launching on iOS and Android devices whilst making grand feature-laden promises, Uprising may be relatively limited by the power of  its launch platforms but that hasn't stifled the developer's ambitions. Promising a true RPG experience that allows players to 'create the kind of Star Wars hero they want to be' alongside 'large-scale, staged sector battles' that involve the entire Uprising player base, the game isn't short on endeavour. With the console and PC launch of Star Wars: Battlefront rumbling slowly into view, filling our thoughts like that Imperial Star Destroyer dominated the screen in the saga's first iconic shot, one wonders if there's any room for a small developer like Kabam to put their own stamp on the post-Jedi Star Wars universe.  

So how does the game fare? After all, if the Star Wars saga has taught us anything, it's that the little guy can score big: the Rebel Alliance were short on resources but big on ideas and they took out not one Death Star, but two. Sadly though, Star Wars: Uprising won't be painting a giant space-station on its fuselage anytime soon. Whilst ambitious in its design, Uprising fails to deliver on its promise and instead offers a lack of depth in almost every area. Whilst the central conceit of taking a fully customisable protagonist and developing them into a fully-realised rogue within the Star Wars universe is an admirable goal, the game doesn't really offer enough tools to differentiate your character from the next shady cantina-dweller. Differences in playable species are merely cosmetic and the ease with which most missions can be completed means that the few skill trees that are available are mainly redundant. Den of Geek often found itself spamming the first skill we acquired, a limited scatter-spray of blaster fire that was more than capable of dealing with almost every enemy encountered. Even bosses offer little challenge with the only difference being that running and gunning would become a necessity instead of aimlessly standing and trading fire with opponents.

Frustratingly, the game does offer higher levels of difficulty that presumably pose a greater challenge to the player but these options seem to be locked behind a paywall. Because they offer better gear and other rewards for completion, these higher difficulty missions require a higher player rating to access them. One improves their player rating simply by equipping better gear but when accessing the higher level-kit is only accessible by having higher-level kit you begin to see the paradox within the system. The developers would probably argue that this is where players need to embrace the grind and complete mission after mission to slowly inch their way towards better gear and perhaps this is true; the sense of achievement that I gained from finally upgrading our BlasTech DL-44 blaster pistol (as favoured by Han Solo) from its 'Polished' Level 3 state to its 'Rechambered' Level 4 status was substantial: slowly amassing the XP and the materials and the credits to see the gun's appearance change from its original Episode IV aesthetic into something resembling its look in Jedi was satisfying... but the gameplay journey to achieve this? Not so much.

Ultimately, that's where Star Wars: Uprising (or indeed any game that asks you to spend countless hours replaying the same missions over and over for slowly-improving loot) lives or dies: the gameplay. Unfortunately, Uprising doesn't offer enough challenge or diversity to make the grind worthwhile. Whilst firing your little pew-pew cannon at foes is initially engaging, eventually the repetitive levels and enemies, not to mention the lack of challenge begin to slowly grate upon you. This isn't to say the game isn't without its charms: the soundtrack is both atmospheric and dynamic and the graphics aren't bad but the plot, certainly across the opening stages is paper-thin. The game's chief antagonist, Governor Adelhard, the Imperial dictator who rules with an iron fist, brutally suppresses the growing rumour of Emperor Palpatine's death and orders a sector-wide blockade, preventing the Rebel Alliance from gaining a foothold in the region. However, despite slight allusions to this (such as being asked to run a mission past the blockade at one point) the plot seems to serve more as a background to simply set the scene instead of driving any semblance of a story. This is particularly evident with Governor Adelhard whose supposedly dictatorial regime is undermined by his total absence from the game's opening stages. My first visit to the icy wastes of Hoth was similarly unimpressive; the former rebel base is an iconic location from the original trilogy and returning to an Echo Base that had fallen into ruin seemed like an intriguing proposition, but once more was better in promise than in execution. Even the loading screens that offer simple opportunities to increase the game's lore seem very limited; as mentioned previously, our first few hours with the game offered only one!

The same can be said of the vaunted sector-wide battles that will allow the titular uprising to reclaim the Anoat region through co-operative play. Whilst this is certainly a cool prospect in theory, the reality is simply more of the same. Although the rewards on offer during these segments can be more promising, the intensity of the grind needed to attain them spikes considerably. In this sense, the game is reminiscent of another sci-fi shooter: Destiny, Activision's RPG-shooter promised much but ultimately fell foul of its own ambitions, launching as a well-polished, entertaining shooter that was terribly repetitive with an unforgiving loot grind and a non-existent storyline. Coming from a much smaller developer with an infinitely smaller budget, Star Wars: Uprising can be forgiven perhaps for falling short of its lofty aspirations. With its recent game expansion, The Taken King, Destiny has begun to address some of the criticisms fired at it and it's quite possible that Kabam will do the same but with the fickle nature of mobile gamers being a constant challenge for developers and Battlefront looming on the horizon, one wonders if being a servicable yet uninspiring shooter will be enough. With larger titles on the way, it's possible that many of the game's initial fanbase may soon be seeking their Star Wars fix somewhere Far, Far Away.

That's all from The Geek Beat this week folks. This has been a Vertigo production.

Head back this way next week (or maybe in a couple!) for something else... maybe even an update on the fabled ANA Project.

Until then be sure to follow me @VertigoDC but remember... Man, I won but I didn't beat him! 

Later 'Gators.

The Geek Beat: Witcher III

Lengthening Beards and Shortening blogs: Witcher III

Welcome Beatites to this week's edition of The Geek Beat, your somewhat irregular slice of geek goodness - a bit like that weirdly-shaped gherkin that everyone leaves in the fridge until one day, starved to the point of malnutrition, you gingerly bite into it and attain taste nirvana, this blog brings that kooky tang cerebrally via the taste buds of your mind...

If you're a regular reader you'll be aware that the blog isn't so clockwork anymore because my writing duties have expanded to include some bits and pieces for the stellar Den of Geek, perhaps the only bastion of geekness with greater geek credentials than this here blog; if The Geek Beat is a Castle Grayskull playset then DoG is the actual Helm's Deep. If you haven't already, go check it out along with my articles published in the last couple of weeks. I've got more in the pipeline too... The Geek Beat regular retro feature, The RetrObituary will also be appearing over there soon, albeit in a slightly different form. I'm also continuing to work on the new up and coming site, Indie Gravy with a few regular collaborators. That'll be launching in a month or so along with a YouTube channel so if you fancy an aural assault (that wasn't a come-on, don't worry) then look for that soon.

In the meantime then, that doesn't leave me a lot of room for blogging so today I'm trying something different. Short-form blogging. Having seen it all over the web but never really being inclined to it myself (presumably because I suffer from some serious insecurities and love to waffle on to an audience that can't answer back) - I've never really tried it... but different times call for different approaches and I never seem to have the hours to commit to a longer blog at the mo. So here goes... I've been playing Witcher III for what seems like forever now, but kind of like a good forever, a bit like what Heaven is supposed to be like I imagine. Blogging about games a lot doesn't always leave you that much time to play the freaking things so it's been a long road for Geralt and I (and thanks to my good buddy and RetrObituary co-creator, Mr Gilbert for sending it my way on what seems like loan perpetua) but now we're nearly at the end, after hundreds of hours of play, I'm going to commemorate this masterpiece of a game by listing my favourite five things about it:

1. The Lore:  

Not really sure if it's the game that should be taking the credit for this one - after all, the Witcher universe is originally based on a series of novels by Polish author Andrzej Sapowski. What I do commend the game for heartily is its approach to implementing that game lore so effectively. In Witcher III it feels like CD Projekt RED (the game's developers) really found the balance of introducing the game's world state, history, laws and customs in ways that didn't feel onerous or nausea -inducing. Codexes are good and there are a lot of geeks out there that love to comb them endlessly whereas others prefer to read as little as possible, letting cutscenes or in-game dialogue do the bulk of the world-building. Witcher III gets the balance right but goes beyond this... the physicality of the world around you; the atmosphere that permeates every torched village or war-ravaged hillock; the sullen defiance of the outsider-hating villagers or the sheer desperation of those affected by the clash of kings mean that the game drips with more atmosphere and meaning than simple words on a page can ever achieve. The universe feels lived-in and weathered in a way that the original Star Wars movies did before Lucas exploded his Special Edition Sauce all over them... and that's the highest praise I can give the game...

2. The Storytelling:

For me, this is always what makes or breaks a great roleplaying game. A superb narrative that I'm invested in; characters that I care about; a resolution which forces me to make compromises that mean something; these are the elements of a great story. In my humble opinion, this is where Dragon Age: Inquisition fell down badly. The Big Bad was just a paint-by-numbers rehash of a villain compared to The Wild Hunt in Witcher III; sure you could argue that the Wild Hunt were equally undeveloped as characters but the euhemeristic approach taken by the Witcher games means that the building blocks of characterisation are already in place. The Wild Hunt are an actual medieval myth so the fear and discord that they sow is already fully realised before the game begins. Standing on the shoulders of giants (or indeed, lopping their heads off those shoulders if you're Geralt) gives you a great headstart in the story stakes.

3. The Roleplaying:

There's a section of this game when Geralt returns to Kaer Morhen, the ancient fortress that is home to some of his order and where he himself was raised. There are several roleplaying moments during this portion of the game that destroy anything offered by DA; Inquisition. (Sorry to rag on Dragon Age so much but for the purposes of illustration, the contrast is important.) I won't spoiler them in case you're still playing the game... but one sequence when you finally kick back with your Witcher brethren is both hilarious and poignant all at the same time. When you take the combat out of the game then your ability to connect with the character is key - perhaps the decision to use a pre-created, fully-realised character like Geralt simply works better than an anonymous creare-your-own hero like in the DA series. The game developers retain creative control over the character and are therefore able to create more immersive roleplaying opportunities given that the protagonist has a fully fleshed out backstory and predefined relationships.

4. The Monsters:

They're simply awesome. And sometimes scary. But i'm over the twenty minutes I allowed myself for this blog so...

5. Geralt's Beard:

When I was trying to convince a dear friend of mine to play Witcher III I told him that the fact tht Geralt grows a beard in real-time was the coolest thing about the game. He of course greeted this with a degree of scepticism as one would when being faced with such an idiotic-sounding proclamation. This of course was down to my inability to articulate what I really meant: it's the attention to detail in the game; the fact that as you're roaming the badlands atop Roach, your faithful steed, a beard begins to gradually form on your character's chin. Witcher III (as I explained in point 1, already does a wonderful job of creating a sense of place, but this seemingly cosmetic game mechanic adds a sense of time too. And it just looks cool. Time and Place? Get those right and you've hit the motherlode. 

Cue one direct hit for Witcher III then. I'm off to go finish that sucker. Don't forget to check out my recent Den of Geek articles here - with millions of readers you don't want to be the only preson round the water-cooler on Monday who... actually, I'm not going to even finish that self-aggrandising, propaganda-laden statement. Just go read them.

Until Next time. Be tight Beatites.

That's all from The Geek Beat this week folks. This has been a Vertigo production.

Head back this way next week (or maybe in a couple!) for something else... maybe even an update on the fabled ANA Project.

Until then be sure to follow me @VertigoDC but remember... life's but a walking shadow.  

Later 'Gators.

The Geek Beat: Out of Time

The Geek Beat: Out of Time

By DC

Welcome fellow geeks to an edition of The Geek Beat that isn't simply late; this is one of those blogs that's way, way beyond late - it's so incredibly wide of where it should be in fact, this ol' blog may as well have been rerouted and forced to make an emergency landing. Why? Probably because there was an unruly passenger on board refusing to sit down as the guy next to him smelled like piss. You only have to glance at the screen-that-used-to-be-your-newspaper for references to 'civil disobedience' around the world today to see how outrage is responded to by the powers that be: out with the out, let's simply treat it as rage, and deal with it accordingly... and if that means labelling a frustrated customer as a 'terrorist' or finally getting to use those water cannons to hose down the great unwashed with a pressurised blast of hydro-justice, then bingo for saving western civilisation and double bingo for job satisfaction.

Wow. Not sure how I got onto that point. Or maybe I am. More on that later. The title of this week's Geek Beat is Out of Time - and that's apt for a couple of reasons. Firstly, apologies regular readers for the horrible lateness of this blog. I always strive to keep it weekly but sometimes that rhythm becomes more and more difficult to maintain and I find myself blogging once a fortnight or even less frequently than that... so The Geek Beat is officially Out of Time to the hopefully cheery tune that is your life. My blog is a bit like one of those dads dancing, awkwardly bopping around, terribly and self-consciously aware that the languid, rhythmic movements that once allowed him to glide around the dance floor like a sex magnet have gone, leaving him instead throwing shapes with all the coolness and grace of an old Action Man figure gaffer taped to a burning cat.

We're Out of Time in another way too, you and I. The purpose of this blog was always four-fold. To sharpen my skills as a novice writer; to entertain you, my dear reader; to act as a platform and get my words out there into the incalculable vastness of cyberspace and to give me an excuse to get out of the washing up. And just like Frodo's little Fellowship, The Geek Beat has fulfilled its purpose. Apart from maybe the entertainment part - that's for you to decide meine freunde (did I spell it right this time MK?) - over five thousand of you have clocked in since I opened up shop back in January; on top of that, writing regularly has helped me to find my voice and develop my style too. I'm not dying - I should probably point that out right away because I've just scanned the last paragraph and it reads like I'm about to say a final farewell before I kick the breathing habit and head for the great steakhouse in the sky. Nor is the blog breathing its last: it's been comatose for a few weeks but it's not done yet... when The Geek Beat finally does bite the big one it'll go down in a blaze of glory - like a chimpanzee piloting a rocket car into a firework factory... not meekly into the night like some introvert sheep. 

So get to the point already, I hear you cry. How exactly are you Out of Time and when are you going to start talking about comics or Star Wars or video games or something? Truth be told dear reader, this week... I'm not. The reason The Geek Beat has been dormant these last few weeks isn't because I've been lying on my sofa in my underwear playing Witcher III and barking at the postman when he dares to enter my territory (well, that is partly what I've been doing) but rather because I've been writing. A lot. The point of The Geek Beat was always to act as a kind of crutch, a literary version of a support group  where I could play with words, free from trolls and judgement. A safe place, if you will. And it worked. My writing has improved and because of that, it's moving to different places. My fine friends over at soon-to-launch startup site Indie Gravy have engaged my services and as well as publishing regular blogs over there, I'll also be popping up on their forthcoming YouTube channel, discussing all manner of indie-flavoured goodness. I'd especially love to hear from you if you're an indie comics creator... Chances are we can do some good things for you in terms of exposure so hit me up via Twitter if that's the case... or (as of about two seconds ago) we suddenly grew a Facebook page so head over there and get in touch.

And that's not all: some of my stuff will be making an appearance on one of the UK's biggest and most beloved geek sites... That's right... yours truly is the latest writer for Den of Geek, the beating heart of global geek culture. With a couple of million registered users and way more beyond that, it really is the the spiritual home of Geekdom. My first article went up today and you can find it here but keep 'em peeled for more to come in the coming weeks.

So where does that leave The Geek Beat? Is this goodbye? Are we really Out of Time?

Of course not dear reader! Things are just going to change a little. I'll endeavour to keep posting on The Geek Beat as regularly as possible but if you want to follow my writing regularly then you need to follow me on Twitter @VertigoDC - from there, I'll be pointing you in the direction of all of my latest efforts be they Indie Gravy, Geek Beat, Den of Geek, YouTube or other countless other bastions of geek lore.  

And what of my early anti-powers-that-be rant in this edition? I told you I'd come back to it. Like a lot of people this week I rocked up to Banksy's bemusement park, Dismaland to get a taste of entry-level anarchism... and maybe just a little rubbed off on me?  

Aside from the surly stormtroopers and water-polluted Little Mermaids, I saw a lot to talk about... and talk about it I will. Next week on The Geek Beat. 

Or maybe the week after.

Or you might have to wait three weeks or so.

Or find it on Indie Gravy?

On reflection, it's probably just quicker if you go visit the place yourself. It might be quicker.

Until next time. Now go follow me on Twitter dear reader, otherwise who knows when we'll meet again?

That's all from The Geek Beat this week folks. This has been a Vertigo production.

Head back this way next week (or maybe in a couple!) for something else... the Dismaland review or maybe even an update on the fabled ANA Project.

Until then be sure to follow me @VertigoDC but remember... Life Moves Pretty Fast. If You Don't Stop And Look Around Once In A While, You Could Miss It.  

Later Potatoes.

The Geek Beat: RETRObituary - July 2015

Welcome to the RETRObituary - July Edition

Welcome one and all to this week's edition of The Geek Beat, your weekly dose of chartreuse-green, intravenous geek gold: just like the liquid Venom bubbling through Bane's veins, a single hit of this will leave you feeling ready to take on the world, break a Batman or two, maybe even take on the immortal might of Rowdy Rhonda Rousey (although I wouldn't recommend it).

In truth, Sean Bean's chances of surviving any encounter are always pretty slim.

Seriously though, (I know that combat sports aren't necessarily geek-related but bear with me) did you see the way she decimated Bethe Correia in front of the poor girl's hometown crowd on Saturday? Owch. Rousey is looking like she could be the most dominant champ in MMA history. Speaking of champs, this week sees the return of retrogaming's pound for pound, best of the best: The RETRObituary. Looking back at true classics from the days of yore; tipping a hat to video games' astounding legacy whilst tipping the scales as the undisputed baddest blog on the planet. For new readers, we look at games celebrating birthdays this month, working our way back in five year increments. This month also sees the welcome return of RETRObituary regular and occasional Dark Lord of the Sith, Shaune Gilbert. Let's do it!

2010: Game Dev Story (iOS)

Beautiful.

So, this is new. As far as I'm aware, this is the first time in RETRObituary's long and storied history (seven whole months!  Or in Ubisoft years, eighty-six new Assassin's Creed titles!) that we've featured a mobile game. History being made right here! Game Dev Story isn't just any old mobile game either. It launched to rave reviews, introduced a wave of systems and aesthetics that have been mercilessly aped by lesser games since (the surest form of flattery) and was one of the first games to really demonstrate how a device like the iPhone could be used to create a deep and satisfying gaming experience.

The premise was excellent: take your fledgling software company, staffed solely by a couple of bedroom programmers to the very top of the gaming industry. Bank hundreds of millions of dollars then use it to train or hire staff, sink it back into R&D or simply go to sleep on the world's biggest pile of money just like Scrooge McDuck; release budget titles put together on a shoestring before slowly working your way up to huge-budget triple-A titles that top the global sales charts and vie for the prestigious annual Game of the Year awards; you can even get in on the hardware game by ploughing cash into the development of new systems such as the Sonny PlayStatus or the Intendro Whoops. Between you and I dear readers, I've always been a sucker for games that didn't bother to pay the license for a character or celebrity then just went ahead, laughed in the face of lawsuits and used their names or likeness anyway... it showcases an impressive amount of gumption; the right degree of pluck or a whole boatload of 'I don't give a damn', exactly the sort of morals that video games should be espousing, right?

Sensible World of Soccer and International Superstar Soccer both did this sublimely (I can still name the ISS '98 faux-England squad in my head now... Ehalia, Gagham, Inche), Wrestle War on the Sega Mega Drive did the same thing for wrestlers and then there was 1989's The Revenge of Shinobi which took things to the next level by having the titular heroic ninja face off against none other than the Dark Knight himself.

Shinobi faces Demon King Batman. Only in crazy ol' Japan could Batman become a bigger dick.

  Game Dev Story carries on this proud tradition by using bastardised game and console titles that are sure to bring a smile to your face and it doesn't stop there; even some of your potential employees resemble real life programming gurus! That's right, ace coders like Stephen Jobson and Gilly Bates are available for you to employ in some sort of coding supergroup - an Avengers Assemble for nerds everywhere.

   

 Might wanna put this dude on tech design and development. Call it a hunch.

The nice touches don't stop there either. Retro-style pixelated graphics have been done before (that's why they're called retro, duh!) but this was one of the first iOS games to do so. The style has been aped mercilessly since; the aesthetics of the inferior Star Command spring to mind for one, but in the case of Game Dev Story, the visuals perfectly match the game's style and tone. It's still available on the App Store today for the bargain price of £3.99 - I'm pretty sure that it used to be £2.39 which either tells you all you need to know about inflation these days or in some weird, meta-textual fashion, the game developers of the game about game development and making profits are raising the price of the aforementioned game to make more profits. Clear? Of course not.

Honourable Mentions: Crackdown 2 (Xbox 360)

2005: Global Defence Force (PS2)

 Wowsers. We've already alluded to the craziness of Japan earlier in this blog but then you get to play games like this and you realise that their collective insanity is simply some kind of wacky warped genius. It has to be to produce gems like this. The Global Defence Force series (Also known as Earth Defence Force in some regions) offers alien invasion-style carnage and city-wide destruction on an unprecedented scale and it all started right here with Global Defence Force. Taking control of a single grunt within the GDF forces you are charged with pretty much single-handedly stemming the alien invasion of Earth from countless bugs, flying saucers, bugs, giant Japanese-style monsters and more bugs. Did I mention that there were bugs?   

 Rico's Roughnecks, HooaH!!

If you're one of those sensitive souls who has an aversion to things that skitter and crawl then this probably isn't the game for you. Playing out like some quasi-sequel to Paul Verhoeven's Starship Troopers where the bugs invade Earth, you find yourself transported to far-flung continents to save the inhabitants of iconic cities by razing them and their alien invaders to the ground.

Wait, what?

That's right: Taking a page out of Man of Steel's playbook, you mete out punishment to the alien invaders by destroying entire cities full of innocent people. Almost all of the environments within each level are destructible; couple that with some of the high-explosive weaponry that you can get your sticky mitts on and suddenly (and not for the first time in its history) London is burning. In fairness to GDF, the massive amounts of enemies onscreen, (not to mention across each level as a whole) really do sell the idea that this is a full scale invasion: Big Ben's looming clock tower crawls with giant bugs; they festoon Westminster Bridge and blot out the iconic London skyline. In short, there's a lot of them so taking out huge swathes of the city to annihilate them seems like reasonable collateral damage. Superman on the other hand had far less alien invaders to deal with and he still took out most of Metropolis. And he's Superman! (Note to self: Get off soapbox get off soapbox now, this isn't a Man of Steel rant, it's a retrogames blog, sit down, that's right, sit yourself down, slowly put down the hammer and continue typing. Nobody has to get hurt today.) 

"Millions dead, billions in property damage. Is it too soon to start swapping saliva?"

I first got into the series with the follow up game, Earth Defence Force 2017 and its direct sequel Earth Defence Force 2025 on the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3. There's a new-generation rework of 2025 coming to PS4 at some point this year with giant skyscraper-sized mech vs.monster battles added to the mix. At the moment however, there don't seem to be any immediate plans to release the game in Europe. Probably a good thing; I'm no shrinking violet when it comes to bugs, I love spiders ( although my wife made me get rid of a giant moth from our bathroom last night - when it unfurled its wings I thought I was being attacked by Batman) but even I struggled to suppress a shudder when being overrun by a horde of giant ants in the Earth Defence titles. Seeing them rendered in even greater detail might just be a step too far.

   

Cue the insectophobia I never knew I had.

Honourable Mentions: Killer 7 (Gamecube, PS2), Sid Meier's Pirates! (Xbox), Brian Lara International Cricket (PS2)

Not a great deal on tap for 2000 I'm afraid. Over to regular RETRObituary collaborator Shaune Gilbert for a look at 1995! 

1995: Castlevania: Dracula X (SNES)

Well, I was looking forward to this review, as I’m a big fan of Castlevania: Symphony of the Night on the PS1 but unlike that true classic, this instalment in the long-running series was sorely lacking. I only played this game briefly before putting a stake through its heart so its resurrection in this review will be equally brief. As for the plot, I’ll hold up my hands up and admit that I haven't got a clue. It’s supposedly a port of Castlevania: Rondo of Blood which was a PC release - it’s the usual basic Castlevania set up: you play as one of the vampire-killer extraordinaire Belmont  clan as they resume their noble quest to kill Dracula; you must also rescue Annette your girlfriend (so pretty much just a normal Saturday night for the Belmont family then, home in time for The Voice I imagine).

Let’s start with the good points:

The music in the game I thought was pretty good: it starts with a great guitar riff and some beats that seem to accentuate the urgency of progressing quickly through the level as you slay endless hordes of zombies and monsters. Graphically, it’s not the most impressive game and fails to really harness the power of the SNES but having said that, some of the characters are decent-looking, boldly designed and brightly coloured. When you come across the larger enemies they’re actually quite impressive when compared to the standard sprites, giving them the crucial distinction they need to keep you interested. I also liked some of the larger power animations when using special abilities but as special attacks go, they’ll never be as good as the Golden Axe dragon magic though. Imagine how awesome it would be to be able to summon a dragon from thin air to vanquish your foes?

Ah, Golden Axe fiery dragon revenge death magic. Why hasn't someone used this in a movie?

Oh. Right. I forgot about you.

As for the backgrounds, they could do with improvement and usually lacked detail or depth, although I did kind of like the heat waves distorting the background early on in the game. Level design itself was pretty lazy and formulaic which seems like a good time to talk about...

The bad points:

Let’s start off with the playable character: the first thing you notice is the restricted movements of your standard weapon, the ball and chain. You are limited to vertical and horizontal attacks only, no diagonal attacks at all. That's right, like a few games of this era it uses the Denial of Diagonal Attack to cheap kill your ass. So if your enemy is just above the line of attack you have to jump and time your strikes, this is kind of restrictive and slows down the enjoyment and flow of the game, especially when it comes to confronting an enemy, which leads onto to the more frustrating point below...

You can't miss, right? WRONG!

If you miss your enemy with the limited strike action you could well be hit, this causes you to lose energy which is fine, but it also has the extra effect of making you jump backwards a few spaces, often resulting in your helpless sprite falling a great distance to their death or perhaps being pushed into another enemy so you get pinballed to death. This is extremely frustrating as along with the poor level designs, if hit once you will fall to your death or for some reason fall through the stairs until you hit solid flooring.
  

As I have only played it briefly, the second level seems to stress the poor design choices to an even greater degree. Your character not only has their weapon movement restricted but also seems restricted in the sense that he seems to be severely weighed down. (By what, I wonder? How much can holy water and a few stakes weigh?) On this level, the floor gives way, meaning you have to keep moving and jump onto the next crumbling platform. Now, if you’re not near the edge you won’t make the leap (okay, no problem) but combining that with the numerous enemies in your way and your limited attack plus the knock back you get once hit, makes this a total pain in the… well, let’s just say I turned the game off in frustration a few times.

On the plus side, it does have Dracula firing flames from his crotch.

It's not just hard. It's Nintendo Hard and uses just a few too many 'Classic Video Game Screw You' tactics rather than simply creating challenge through great design. 

So my honest opinion is that it’s a poor game, lacking in many places. If you want to play all the Castlevania titles then play it and enjoy some of the creature designs and power ups but be warned you may have to buy a new controller or TV or possibly even apologise to the lonely graves of the ones you loved for murdering them once the frustration caused by this title comes pouring out of you.

This is not a good game to relax to.

Honourable Mentions: King of Fighters '95 (Arcade)

Back to DC for this month's final game then - the mighty ESWAT:

1990: ESWAT (Sega Mega Drive)

Another side-scrolling platformer without diagonal attacks, ESWAT put you in the shoes of a fresh-faced hero cop, trying to clean up the city of Liberty (watch out for Nico Bellic, man!) by gunning down a horde of identikit enemies. Despite the arcade version of Robocop utilising diagonal attacks and being released a year prior to ESWAT, your cop doesn't have the huge wealth of skills afforded by cybernetic enhancements (at least, not straight away!)

Robocop FTW.

So, unlike Detroit's feared'n'famed cyborg law enforcer, our hero in ESWAT is only a puny human so he's reduced to aiming and shooting in right angles only. (Note to all humans reading this: I think Shaune and I may have inadvertently stumbled across our race's weakness when The Machines inevitably rise up against us: retro video game lore dictates that any attacks that come in from an angle that isn't directly horizontal or vertical are impossible to defend against. Spread the word! Death to SkyNet! Victory for Zion!)

"ESWAT One reporting. No ethnic minorities to engage." "ESWAT Two, is he Hispanic?" "Roger. Homeless too." "Copy that. Powering up weapons systems."

This drawback doesn't mean that our hero is completely defenceless though. Although he doesn't have two player backup like the arcade version pictured above either, our hero has at least been issued with a sidearm and he can jump (insert joke about cops and donuts here). You start out as a Lieutenant but pretty soon, after you've murdered enough criminals by doling out your own brand of lethal justice on the streets, you get promoted to Captain, then Chief and finally, the ESWAT division. Becoming ESWAT basically means you gradually get access to more and more high-tech kit until ultimately, your cop is encased in a walking tank-suit, all threats and human empathy are securely locked out and you're left to power up and polish your weapons and stew inside your own paranoid juices, refusing to take the damn suit off because it's just become a metaphor for post-Cold War America.

Come to think of it, Sega's nineties console titles did a pretty good of prophesising the dark, dystopian and frankly depressing times in which we now live. Sonic the Hedgehog did a great job of showing how humans would continue to hunt endangered species into extinction (he's a blue hedgehog; that makes him pretty rare by my standards) which has been all over the media lately with the sad story of Cedric the Lion; on the other hand, ESWAT foreshadows the shoot-first-ask-questions-later mentality that seems to have pervaded American policing of late (you're especially likely to fall foul of this if you're of a certain racial persuasion) but more than that, the idea that the ESWAT division rank above the Chief of Police within the organisation's structure of command hints at the frightening reality of public security services being commandeered by right-wing paramilitary forces for nefarious purposes.

Captain. Chief. ESWAT?  

But this is just a gaming blog, right? We don't need to worry about frightening environmental and political realities here... so let's talk about the game! It's very similar in feel and structure to Sega's Shinobi, from the boss briefing at each level's opening to the boss fight at the level's close. In fact, the first stage climaxes with a helicopter boss that is hugely reminiscent of a similar battle in the ninja-themed side-scroller. Getting your hands on the cybernetic ESWAT suit is pretty cool, although as previously mentioned, it gets trumped by the Robocop video game on pretty much all fronts. If you've never played the arcade version of Robocop, then you really must live in a dull world of muted colours and diminished experiences. In fact, here you go - a gift from me. Be sure you aren't breaking the law by playing it though. You don't want this guy on your case:

I am the law. No, really. 

 That's all from The Geek Beat this week folks. This has been a Vertigo production.

Head back this way next week for something else... maybe an update on The ANA Project.

Until then be sure to follow me @VertigoDC but remember the First Rule of Blog Club. In a while crocodiles.