Having read about the varied pre-order bonuses for Star Trek Online (a game I am excited about, but hesitant to embrace due to the overwhelmingly monotone space battle footage I’ve seen), I was surprised to receive an email from Cryptic Studios, the game’s developer. Cryptic was informing me of a pre-order bonus – the subject of the email is “Star Trek Online Pre-order Exlusives!” I glanced at it and nearly deleted it before I noticed the lack of plurality in the exclusives mentioned. There was no list of various pre-order locations and related bonsues, no comparison or information on the various (and very different) options available at different retailers. Instead, there was only this: “Pre-order Star Trek Online from GameStop and get your own limited edition Constitution class starship; a ship Captain James T. Kirk would be proud of!”

That’s a tempting offer – the Constitution class is, well, classic. Unfortunately, Cryptic seems to ignore their use of the plural “exclusives” in the subject, and doesn’t list these other great options:

• Best Buy: Pet Tribble or Targ (based on faction)
• Amazon: “Liberated Borg” Bridge Officer with “unique nanotechnology augmentations”
• Direct2Drive: Multi-Spatial Personal Shield (regenerates itself and player health)
• Wal-mart: Bonus Skill Points (bestows additional skill points)
• Target: TR-116 ground weapon (micro-transporter beams projectiles to target, no line of sight required)
• Steam: Chromodynamic Armor, improves critical hits and damage of energy weapons

Now I have no idea which of these is the best. I can tell you one thing – Cryptic seems to have ignored the very important fact that any player can get a Constitution class ship in the game. The only thing that makes the GameStop offer unique is it has blue lasers. But other than that, I of course have no idea what item is best. And I am sure I’m not the only person who is getting frustrated by the idea of offering different pre-order options at different retailers.

Many, if not all, players of an MMORPG will attempt to get the best items they can and create the best character they can. This requires learning about the various skills on offer and creating a build that is superior to all others. A good game will have enough balance to offer a variety of optimum builds. There are only two ways that I know of to learn about the skills and items and figure out what is the best path to pursue for your character’s development: doing it yourself, or learning from someone else. Either way, it takes time in game (by either you or someone willing to share their information) to get there. The most frustrating problem with pre-order bonuses to me is related to this issue. If I don’t yet know what the rules are, how I might want to develop my character, or what items are available or what their stats may be, I have no way of knowing what pre-order bonus is best. And given that I want to pick the best one but only have a 1-in-7 chance of doing so, I feel that I am leaving up a part of my character development to chance, rather than to information or skill.

Beyond the serious gamer’s min-max obsession, however, I fear that developers will not test the items they offer as pre-order bonuses. As a result, either they will be too powerful and skew the gameplay (even if that is a matter of unbalancing just early levels), or they will be pointless items that are used for 5 minutes before being replaced by something better. Of course, without inside information, it is impossible to know what will occur, and what to do. In the meantime, I hope I get something having, and don’t regret my purchase – a feeling I would hope the developer aims to ensure I don’t have.

For good and for bad, computers are complex machines with many hardware parts and numerous levels of software. Problems can and do occur anywhere, from overheated parts to failing hard discs to viruses to incompatible hardware/hardware, hardware/software or software/software combinations. Thanks to this complexity, the early 2000s saw many gamers go to console-only gaming. I believe that the ease-of-use and lower system cost for a console was then and is now an incredibly compelling argument for gaming only on a console. However, given recent reports of the exceptionally high fail-rate on an XBOX 360, it is apparent that there are plenty of problems with console hardware systems as well. What makes these problems forgivable for gamers is that the systems are all the same. A console owner that has a problem with his/her console knows what to do – try to get it fixed by its maker, or replace it. A PC owner can go to the maker of the pc, however there are numerous parts that could be causing the problem, and often warranties don’t last long enough or cover enough to get it fixed. Not to mention the hardware may not be the cause of the problem – it could be the software or other software getting in the way.

In the end, gaming on a pc is a generally more complicated and costly affair than on a console. The benefits, however, are exceptional; one in particular is worth noting: Games can be made like WoW, appealing to a relatively low-denominator of hardware requirements; or they can be made like Crysis, damning those with older or lower level rigs to much lower graphics than what the game can provide. While anyone playing on a console has the same experience as everyone else, the PC provides variety. And this is where its brilliance shines through all the blue screens of death, memory errors, and hard-drive crashes. Games on a PC exist across a gamut of technological requirements, ensuring that any PC bought within the last few years can play some great games, while always allowing for the cutting edge of gaming graphics to be pushed further and further. What this means is that there are games for everyone, no matter what system they have. Given the recognition of WoW’s money-making power despite its lack of graphics-power, there are many developers attempting to create games that can be playable on systems as basic as a netbook. Which means all the merrier for us PC Gamers.

Doom demonstrated the amazing simplicity of a first-person shooter. You don’t need a reason or a story, just some cool guns and something to shoot at. Years later, many shooters have added some semblance of story (though not necessarily a good one) and have invented various alternatives to healthpacks and an infinite array of guns, lasers, and explosives. The meat of those experiences, however, are relatively simple – you shoot things dead. Before they do that to you. You’re often a lone-gunman, whether it be superhero-type or just lucky scientist, out to save the world. First-person-shooters might as well be called “only-person” shooters.

In most video games, the perspective has a profound impact upon the player. It defines the relationship between what’s happening on screen and what the player is feeling. In a first-person game, the player is the avatar. What happens to the character is in fact displayed as happening to the player. As opposed to in a third-person game, where the player is controlling a character that is displayed as someone else, it is very easy for the player to think about the events in a FPS as happening to him or her. This is the problem that I have with shooters: I don’t like being shot at. Never have. Never will. And seeing the bullets wizzing at my head (as the screen is usually thought of as the character’s eyes) unnerves me. Often the result is rather disappointing: I am unable to think about responding to being shot at. I usually remember to shoot back, but rarely do I shoot accurately. It’s not that I can’t control the mouse – it’s rather that I am so overwhelmed with being shot that I can’t focus myself to respond quickly and efficiently enough. Especially in the instance where I’m playing solo and have only my own wits to follow, I find it incredibly difficult. Add to that the fact that some shooters love to scare players (Doom III, anyone?), and I very often just don’t play them. I’d much rather play a game with a third-person perspective, where I don’t take my character’s personal health nearly as personally.

All this led me to expect to not appreciate Crysis or Call of Duty IV: Modern Warfare (and yes, I am just getting around to both of these games). But amazingly, not only did I play both of them extensively, I keep wanting to go back and play more.

I rented and played the single player campaign of Modern Warfare. Aside from being a solid all-around experience, with great art, animation and generally good AI, what that game really brought to the table for me was a brillaint demonstration of how a first-person shooter can be a team-based game even in single-player mode. This especially rang true to me in the flash-back section where you’re sneaking around and following your commanding officer. I thought the story-arc and pacing of that mission was perfect. It was great to see a level that felt intense and pressure-filled without even shooting at anyone for minutes at a time. Having what was essentially a guide lead you around in this mission and in others was a great approach to dealing with the linear, on-rails nature of FPSers. By having someone barking orders and directing player actions, the linear nature slipped away as there was rarely a time that the player needed to forge his own path and figure out where the developers and level designers wanted the player to go. Rather the player was in the wonderful position of waterskiing behind the NPC boat – able to enjoy some jumps off the wake, but always connected and moving forward.

I’m still in the process of playing Crysis. I am enjoying it as well, though obviously for different reasons, as there is no guide walking you through each level. Rather, Crysis’s brilliant addition to the FPS genre comes from the power suit. As I mentioned, most shooters add new, interesting weapons. Borderlands is a game predicated almost entirely on the idea of getting cool new guns. So far, at least, the guns in Crysis are nothing to write home about. I’ve used a sniper rifle, shotgun, rocket launcher, some C4 and some different machine guns. Being able to alter the components on each gun (laser sight, flashlight, scopes, grenade launcher) is certainly fun, but not earth-shattering. No, the brilliant change is deceivingly simple – make the player super strong, super fast, invisible, or super armored – but only one at a time. This choice means that there are different ways of playing the game. You can sneak up to a bad guy and then hit him, or shoot him, or run really fast past him. It means that in a game that is still relatively linear, there are many more choices about how to get from A to B. That change is the world in a genre that is so often claustrophobically straightforward.

Unfortunately for me, Crysis had some issues running on my PC. Unclear if it’s anything I did (I’ve got an overclocked PC that I put together, I just added a second ATI radeon 4850 video card and recently played around with some voltages), but it’s a sad reminder of what can go wrong with gaming on the PC. Next time I’ll write more about the bad rep PC gaming gets, and what can be done about it.

Today I’d like to touch a bit on Crysis. I waited to buy it until I had the graphics power to be able to at least run it on decent settings. It’s amazing that 2 full years after release, it is still used as a metric for testing graphics cards and requires the best equipment currently available in order to be run at the highest settings. Unfortunately I’ve had numerous issues with the game freezing during play. It runs great for 20-30 minutes, and then freezes. I’m not sure the casue of this problem – it could be driver related, it’s not heat, but it could have something to do with crossfiring. Last week I even got a BSOD while playing, which was disturbing. It’s especially frustrating because of how enjoyable I’ve foung the gameplay. While I’m not great with first-person shooters and generally don’t prefer them, I was having a blast with the diversity of play that the power suit provides and especially enjoyed the opportunity to try out different strategies. I’ll write more on this in the future, hopefully after being able to play longer. In that post I’ll also talk about my frustration with the game crashing and what I think that says about game development and how ease-of-use connects directly to sales.

Unfortunately I got distracted from Bioshock (and still haven’t finished Half-Life 2) a few months ago, so there’s still plenty I already own that I need to play. But just last week I finally got my hands on a game I’d been wanting for a while – Empire: Total War.

I’m a big Total War fan. I’ve played Rome and Medieval 2, and I loved them. Growing up on Sid Meier games really lends itself to turn-based strategy, and aside from Civ4, the Total War games are about all that’s left of that genre. What’s more, there’s an element of RTS as well. And so when I finally got my hands on the newest of the series, I was excited – albeit a little concerned about become bored by a game all-too-familiar to the others.

Well, between my last post and this, about all that I’ve done is play Empire (yay for quitting work). It’s more than kept me entertained. Much better – it’s been a thrilling challenge.

At first I had all the fun just playing with the new units, getting a sense of the dynamics of sea trade and battle, and trying to dominate the world as usual. The “as usual” part is where I got concerned, and a bit bored. My general strategy in the previous Total War games involved rapid conquest, spurred on by sacking cities to get more gold which then fueled further army purchases or bribing the enemies’ armies. Add to that the ocassional assassination, and you have my old stand-by run-and-gun approach. I started off as anyone would, playing the game the same way. While enjoying winning, I was disappointed that the same approach seemed to work. Starting as France, I moved east and quickly picked up some territory. In the Americas I took some island nations from the pirates. Easy pickings, all.

It didn’t take long for me to regret going that route. Holding territories took a lot of troops; there was no easy route to cash; not having built up navies meant my trade routes got raided left and right; my armies had to sit tight to stop my newly conquered populaces from rebelling – it was hell. And I couldn’t be happier about that.

It didn’t take me long to realize that the changes from Medieval 2 to Empire are brilliant. Previously the old reason I built ships was to get my army across water. I never bothered with sea battles if I could avoid them. Now, not only is it a blast to be able to fight the battles, but having strength at sea is vital. Being able to impact the sea trade routes – rather than just seeing the little ships moving along trading lanes – makes it critical to defend your trading lanes, and a great weapon to be able to steal gold straight from your adversaries. The new “trading regions” are a great way to connect a global map that is missing half the world. The dynamics of controlling a region feel incredibly real. The shift from one major city in each region to having a capital city with numerous towns and ports makes controlling a large region both rewarding and challenging. Not having to “buy” agent units also adds to the sense of realism. The research aspect has a serious impact on how each game plays out. And the different government types – and not having to worry about the “family tree” adds a nice new twist.

I’ve only played about 15 turns into the campaign (albeit a few times to try different strategies) so far, but I’m loving it. An underappreciated genre though it may be, I couldn’t be happier about finally getting my hands on Empire. It’ll be fun conquering the world.

Gaming took a serious shift when the XBox debuted. Starting with the N64, a legitimate social dimension was added with games Mario Kart 64 and Goldeneye. A lot more people I know who would never’ve thought of themselves as gamers started playing. Thanks to Halo, the sports-obsessed jocks who once made fun of gamers were finally brought into the video game marketplace. I mention the market, because this shift not only changed gaming culture, but also had a profound effect on how company’s began to make and market games. The early 2000′s is when we saw gaming become a seriously popular past-time across a much larger population.

Unfortunately for those of us who still preferred to game on the PC, that greater population played on consoles. With the additional time required to program for multiple platforms, many games that might have been a blast on the PC never got there – or came late – because of the greater revenue-base available in the console market.

Unfortunately for me, the early-2000′s is when I was  poor, starving college student. While I had a new computer at the end of high school, with the speed of technological change, I wasn’t able to keep up with requirements for new games. So I broke down, and bought a PS2. 4 years later, I bought a 360.For a while, it seemed that my PC-gaming days were behind me.

I am now happy to say that I’m back up-and-running, sporting a nice new computer I put together last summer, eying my first upgrade and loving how alive PC gaming is. It’s hard for me to believe that any stories could still run on the “death of PC gaming.” It seems to me that my favorite entertainment medium has reached a peaceful and happy place where great games are made available on all platforms. Game companies rather quickly moved past exclusives, having finally done the math and recognized that the potential profit from a great game on all possible platforms far outweighs that from only one. Add to that the wonder of digital distribution, and here we are: dare-I-say, a new golden age of gaming.

What makes me happiest right now in thinking about how I’ve been playing games over the past few months is how long my 360 has gone silent. I just turned it on now, for perhaps the first time since April. I don’t even have any new games to play on it – I just figured I’d try some demos. But on my PC, I’ve got a ton of great games, I got almost all of them on sale, and I didn’t have to leave my seat to do it. I just picked up Braid for $5 from Steam. I had played the demo, maybe last year, on my 360. Seemed great. But I refuse to have anything to do with buying “Microsoft Points” or whatever their ridiculous system requires for me to buy something. But as soon as I saw Steam tweet about the sale, I was all over it.

Which leads me to my last point: PC gaming is where it’s at. It doesn’t get any better. Mouse-and-keyboard = great controls. And when they don’t work, just plug in a controller (yay USB!). The ability of game services to reach me where I am means I might be buying a game at any time – there’s no need to go to any store, or even to go to Amazon.com to find a console game. Digital distribution is king, and the PC is leading the charge. And lastly, PC gaming is where the mature audience is – for what that’s worth. It’s where gamers who grew up playing Doom and Civ2 are. And its’ definitely my gaming home.

Except when I didn’t. Just like my gaming, I got distracted. My mind drifted. Blogging went from afterthought to no-thought. And so just like the video games that I start, love, then stop playing halfway through, this little corner of the internet went silent.

Sadly it wasn’t because I was focusing on other writing. Again, the same with gaming. Rarely do I stop playing one video game halfway through simply because I’m playing another. No, rather something comes up that keeps me from these side-passions. Work gets busy for a few days. A friend comes to town for a weekend. I go on a vacation. Two, three, four plus days of not playing/writing or thinking about it. And then, when I once again have the time to get back to it, somehow I don’t quite feel motivated anymore. The game has lost its appeal. My blog can wait until tomorrow.

I doubt I’m the only one who experiences this strange phenomenon. There’s some magical ability that games have to occupy our spare time and thoughts. But once that magical bubble is burst, if we lose focus for just long enough to put obsessing with that game-world not just to the back of, but out of our minds completely, it seems nearly impossible to recast the spell.

And so there lay dozens of half-played games in my past, like mangled corpses on the battlefield left to rot, their lives cut short in a horrific act of violence, an injustice to their beautiful existence.

Overstating it, perhaps. But I do feel a sense of guilt whenever I don’t finish a game. Not just for the fact that I spent money on something that I did not get the most out of. No, it’s more for the sense of having betrayed those who toiled to create something I enjoyed. It’s perplexing how something that I can’t get enough of, something that can be so fun, can suddenly not hold my interest.

The good news for this space is how simple it can be to start writing again. I don’t need to relearn the controls, remember what quest I was on or where I had been, or reconnect with the character and story. I’ll do most of the same before – some freeform writing, loosely coalescing into a vague idea or question. This post seems to have something to do with the fact that I get distracted by shiny objects. I’ve definitely got some ideas to cover in the future. Perhaps I’ll list them out now, lest I forget:

• morality in games
• the differing importance of various aspects of game design, with a focus on the role of story, voice acting, animations, music and sound, and feedback
• politics in games
• multiplayer
• my fear of fps
• a look back at some of my favorite games
• the dread “games as art”

I’m sure there’s lots of other stuff to write about, and I’m sure some of what I will write may bore. This remains a barely-edited, off-the-cusp work. Assuming, of course, I remember to write anything at all.

• I have no idea what to make of this claim by EA.
• Love Halo? Love Zelda? Finally, both in one game(map)
• Gameplayer has a list of their top 10 anticipated PC game titles for 2010.

That’s all for now. Stay tuned for more.

In this case, however, I tend to agree with Wedbush Morgan game analyst Michael Pachter, who (in the same article linked above) points out that Apple doesn’t own any entertainment content and would be better suited going after a company like Warner Music. My respone to Pachter would be this: Why need Apple go after content to get into gaming?

Apple’s strength for quite some time has been the complete package of hardware and software, with exceptionally brilliant usability, great user-interfaces and smart-looking designs. While this may be a long-shot, it would fit Apple’s previous lines of thinking for them to be working on a piece of hardware to push into the video game space. However, this need not mean a console from Steve Jobs’s crew. Perhaps the rumors of a HD, large-screen iPod Touch are tied in here. In addition to offering all the amazing features the Touch has already, it could be accelerated as a gaming platform with some focus on titles and a better gaming interface. Currently the Touch is a great piece of hardware, but for some is still just an iPhone without the real portability of an iPhone – and means still carrying around a phone in addition to an iPod, a dilemma that the oh-so-similar iPhone was meant to cure. If the Touch is marketed as a gaming device, Apple might have a suddenly huge advantage of any other portable gaming platform, given the other features the Touch can offer. Suddenly it becomes not an iPhone minus the phone, but rather a perfect gaming device that also offers the flexibility of countless iPhone apps. Not a bad sales pitch, really.

• For those longing for the good old days, Myst is now available on the iPhone for $5.99 (727 MB download)
• The Guild will return for a third season. For anyone unfamiliar, I highly recommend watching
• GTA: Chinatown Wars inspired some sweet art (better than the game’s graphics, perhaps). Some for GTA IV: The Lost and the Damned, as well.
• DemiGod issues should clear up soon - and for being a good sport, anyone who bought it before May 10 gets half off a second copy (birthday present for a friend?)
• Following releases on the iPhone, Top Gun and Days of Thunder to be released for XBox Live Arcade and Playstation Network
• Is Apple really thinking about buying Electronic Arts?

That’s all for now. Stay tuned for more.

No new posts for today – hopefully more time tomorrow.