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Is where you live a good place for your video game hobby?

Post author By Michelle B
Post date April 11, 2013
2 Comments on Is where you live a good place for your video game hobby?

Oliver and Phil get excited about a covered kit car.

It’s easy to forget with the popularity of the internet, but years ago we used to move mountains to play games with other people. We sought out someone to play multiplayer with, moved computers or consoles in trains and cars, even bought new hardware and software to increase the chances of playing with others.

Online gaming has eroded much of the need to do this now of course, but I still think where you live has an important bearing on how successfully you can enjoy your hobby.

My local area

I concluded pretty quickly in my teenage years that the area that I live in (Gloucestershire, UK) is not a great one for video games. This is my opinion of course, but the experience I’ve had of living here for the past two decades confirms that.

Meeting other like-minded people that play games, and being able to play with them locally is pretty simple in a very built up place or city, but in a rural of sub-urban place like where I live, I feel vastly outnumbered by people interested in other things.

When I briefly lived in a city – my ability to find other like-minded people was much easier, and there were better and more densely populated facilities for us to meet and play games. There were regular game nights at local pubs and bars, or retro days run by enthusiasts.

These days I struggle to find anyone with more than a passing interest in games in my immediate vicinity. This hasn’t proved a huge problem, it’s simply forced me to develop other interests and pursue the social channels of those, but sadly has meant that I too am forced to use the internet to wax lyrical about games in a way that isn’t going to bore the circle of people who live around me.

In fact when Game UK has its problems on the high street I was not (and am still not affected) by those store closures. I didn’t have a Game here in the first place, and seeing one means travelling to another city or town.

The consequence of not feeling welcome

While gaming isn’t a niche, it certainly feels like one around here, even though I know more than enough people that are willing to support video games retail and events in this area, no ones prepared to create or sustain anything.

There is one independent game shop in my town (there used to be two more, but they both closed long ago), and while it is good for pre-owned titles, getting hold of brand new games remains an ongoing problems. Truly, I have to travel further afield for a good independent shopping experience.

This is where the internet comes in again as a lack of decent video game retail in my town has forced me to do all of my games shopping online too – taking my money out of the local economy and perpetuating the problem.

Not only that but shopping online requires planning and care, if there’s a game I am likely to need on a certain day I have to pre-order to be certain that I will get it in time. Plenty of people will complain about pre-order but it’s a lifeline for me when a rare title is released.

I can travel to one of the many other independent games shops in another cities and towns around me, but that just repeats my desire for wanting a good one here, despite there not really being much of a market for it locally.

A in-game example: Ni No Kuni

In writing about my experiences of trying to enjoy games in a local area that doesn’t support it, I am reminded of the idea of two worlds in Ni No Kuni. Motorville (the quiet, peaceful almost bland suburbia) where the game originates, and it’s other, more fantastical world full of magic and intrigue.

Enjoying the settings of both worlds meant suspending your disbelief a little, and embracing the poetic licence of numerous RPG tropes; the young, pure-hearted hero on a journey, destined to combat all problems, a hidden magic power they were unaware of.

This example reminds me of my desire for a more enriched, video game-filled town, with thousands of other local gamers around me, yet I find myself stuck in an real-life equivalent of Motorville, as I crave a simplistic, yet busier gaming horizon. Ironically then, it is still the internet that adds that other needed dimension to my gaming world. The perfect gamers location doesn’t often exist, and forces me and many others to travel and mingle to find like-minded people in the most unusual of places.

I love where live, it’s a vibrant and eclectic place, but there’s no escaping the fact that it largely snubs my biggest passion and interest.

Currently playing

Has Monster Hunter finally shaken off its reputation for being tricky?

Post author By Michelle B
Post date April 5, 2013

My character from Monster Hunter Portable 3rd with her two felynes.

There’s been a bit of a resurgence in recent years of mastering difficult or incomprehensible games. Popularised by titles like Demon’s and Dark Souls. These sorts of experiences have taking some of us of a certain age back to the sorts of titanic struggles we had with games of our youth.

Back when I started gaming, every title was a little tricky. Most developers had a penchant for making you guess concepts or telling you very little. It encouraged us to experiment, share and spread rumours in a way that’s been totally fragmented by the rising popularity of the internet.

What I find interesting though is how players are using their patience and experience from one difficult title to return back to another series they’ve previous written off. Using the knowledge patiently gathered from other titles has been seemingly useful for returning to a game like Monster Hunter, which has developed a bit of a legacy for being hard to start and tricky to master.

I don’t see Monster Hunter as a particularly difficult game, but it certainly becomes one in its later stages. What’s interesting then is that it’s the introductory stages of the game that puts most of its intended new audience off the series.

One of gamings best kept secrets

On the face of it Monster Hunter has a bit of a PR problem. On the one hand many people think that it’s comparable to Pokemon. Upon further exploration since it’s PSP days, it’s developed a bit of a reputation for being difficult to play, hard to get into and slow to start.

This idea in particular can be hard for the existing Monster Hunter community to relate to. Capcom can be notoriously bad at explaining how the game works to new audiences, because it understands that the target group for the game understands it completely and doesn’t need to be troubled by tutorials for an engine they know inside out.

This is where games like Dark Souls come in. That game (and it’s predecessor) was the best explanation of the sentiment that Monster Hunter started many years prior. The concept of experience and failure within a game teaching you lessons about how to progress. Problems and enemies around every corner. Maps to be memorised, NPCs to figure out.

It’s a very old school chapter of game design that many subsequent developers are trying to emulate. Yet for many of us Monster Hunter remains one of gamings best kept secrets. It’s been preaching these design decisions chapter and verse since its launch on the PS2 back in 2004. It’s obviously popular in Japan, but still regarded as somewhat of a niche title in the West.

For some reason it’s a title not performing quite as well as it could be, simply because of a misguided reputation alongside rumours and intrigue about what it contains. These are very concepts that drew so many new Demon’s and Dark Souls players in, and perhaps what’s ignited a surge in Monster Hunters popularity this time around.

What you learn now will stay with you forever

So just as many Demon’s Souls players found they could digest Dark Souls more easily due to their knowledge of Demon’s, much of this same audience is experiencing Monster Hunter with that understanding of what this type of game is trying to accomplish, inspiring many to continue progressing through a title that seemed too impossible before.

The design decisions made by Monster Hunter seem quite obtuse and garish at first. The combat seems slow and unresponsive, the animations that your character is forced into in order to heal seems drawn out. Hopefully the gaming communities refined knowledge of these very purposeful choices in game design will come to fruition this time around.

Monster Hunter turns its back on the conventions settled on by so many other adventure or role-playing games. Instead it settles on a “what you learn now will stay with you forever” mantra. Learn how to play Monster Hunter and you take on each new title in the series with added confidence. You’ll best a tricky foe with the same equipment as someone starting fresh and beat it faster and more competently. You’ll even learn to challenge new foes by observation, patience and time, and not with health bars.

Perhaps the burgeoning Monster Hunter community has encouraged more new hunters this time around too. Seemingly the launch of the newest title is the best time to start and I’m pleased by the numbers of new hunters who are stepping forward and finally get what Monster Hunter is trying to do. Interestingly many gamers are inspired by the idea that they can progress through Monster Hunters occasionally impenetrable starting hours by tackling it together. This is the same sentiment that created the almost viral spread of Demon’s Souls import success, and the news that copies of the game on both 3DS and Wii U are subject to shortages is promising. Whether or not Monster Hunter can continue to captivate my immediate gaming circle in the way that it has in the past few weeks remains to be seen.

Monster Hunter’s future

It’s hard not to get excited by the positive reception that Monster Hunter is receiving of late, but I’ve seen it many times before, first with Monster Hunter Tri’s launch (supported by a genuinely concerted effort on Capcom’s part to properly market the game) and with Monster Hunter Freedom Unite‘s run for its money as the most complete Monster Hunter to date.

What will really distinguish if Monster Hunter has truly shaken off the misconceptions people have about it is if this momentum continues past it’s launch window and into the quieter summer months and beyond. Part of this may be fuelled by the series finally supporting cross region play in American and European regions properly for the first time. As a long-time hunter however, the ongoing strength of the community is how I will continue to mark its success.

I wish new hunters fresh to Monster Hunter 3 Ultimate every success, and as somewhat of a veteran of the series now I hope it continues to capture the imagination of many more new hunters. After all there’s no better time to start.

Retro gaming

The narrative landscape of Panzer Dragoon Saga

Post author By Michelle B
Post date February 21, 2013
1 Comment on The narrative landscape of Panzer Dragoon Saga

An illustration of Azel as she is found in the ruins.

If I ever needed a reminder of the indelible quality of video games, then Panzer Dragoon Saga served nicely.

I have started Panzer Dragoon Saga at least once before this occasion where I actually completed it – this time the nostalgia from a mere two years ago was enough to propel me through the game.

Ironically, I last time I attempted to play Saga was in a period of recovery following surgery, my recollection then was that it was compelling game, worthy of the praise I had seen piled on it for many years, but something was missing. Tired from surgery, wracked with pain, it wasn’t the game I needed, it was too subtle, too gentle in persuading me to continue.

Understatement as power

The real message of Panzer Dragoon Saga is nuance, that is perhaps why it is so difficult to really appreciate over a decade after it’s original release. Unlike it’s contemporaries (such as Final Fantasy VII) Saga is a game of understatement, and that’s no bad thing.

Most of the game is spent exploring the game world on the back of your dragon. The gameworld is quiet and brooding, mottled with splashes of pale colour, and dotted with surrealist landscapes, all complimented by the game’s quietly powerful soundtrack.

One thing you notice immediately is the apparent lack of people. As such the game feels very lonely, and this is a deliberate choice on the part of Team Andromeda. The sense of excitement you experience when discovering another person in Saga’s beautiful but painfully barren world is palpable. This experience really lends itself to this RPG experience only lent to Panzer Dragoon once. So each NPC feels more important, more necessary to the story. I found myself hanging on their every word unlike any other RPG.

Gentle pacing

Panzer Dragoon Saga’s theme of isolation, combined with this rarity strikes the perfect tone. Playing it all these years after its release at a time when everyone was focused on the New Year period felt as though I had walked far off the beaten track. That I had a link with all the people that has sought this game out like myself and stuck with it far past it’s quiet opening, far past its moments of visual grandeur, which does still have the power to impress.

Saga sets a deliberate pace that might be too slow for some, but this is only so it can catch you out with the payoff towards the end of the game. I haven’t enjoyed an ending so thoroughly since completing Xenoblade Chronicles. The very best gaming endings aren’t just the pay off of the story, but actually linger with you weeks after the game has been completed, and it tinges me with sadness that many people won’t be able to experience Saga’s spectacular finish.

Saga’s powerful themes

It’s rare that I find the inspiration to continue with a RPG that still employs a random battle system. This is one of the moments (other than moments when Edge is on foot) that hints at the games age. However the battle system goes immediately changes from competent to endlessly enjoyable, as you experiment with completing battles quickly for better ratings, experience and items, and determining the best position for your dragon to move in real time around your enemies.

The bond that you build up with your dragon is worth a mention too. As your longest companion through the game (starting with your ability to name him). This games starts as a story of friendship, but belies something more powerful.

The sense that this is something you have experienced before – particularly if you have played the two previous Saturn Panzer Dragoon games is palpable. This is folded into the narrative by the indelible dream-like quality of the game, a sort of hazy sentiment that carries through each carefully crafted scene and landscape. The pacing of this game also nods of a lucid dream particularly through the freedom of flight.

This is supported by the ending of the game too, which reveals a richer thread to the narrative that makes your subsequent memory of the game more humbling as you spin through each exciting realisation in turn.

Gliding over landscapes

So is Panzer Dragoon Saga deserving of all the high praise it has received in the years following its release? In all probability yes – if viewed through the careful lens of the time it was made. Looking back it is an extremely revolutionary game, it left an impression on me for another reason though.

I am now five years into a chronic illness. The optimism from that promising surgery back when I last attempted Saga is mere vapour. I am more tired than ever, and the fatigue has an odd effect on my brain.

Each time I sit down to play or write about a game, I left its finishing screen feeling empty-headed. Sometimes games can take us back to a moment in time, through their gameplay, their music. Their quality. And Saga did this, it took me back to that moment of recovery back in 2010, when I still had hope about my illness.

As such it has been my immense pleasure to play, despite all the pomp and noise from other games, it was this quiet, almost sombre experience that reminded me exactly why I was so inspired to start discussing video games back in 2009 upon completing this website.

Saga’s patient, impassive glides over landscapes, water and its breathtaking technicality reminded me to walk off the beaten track a little more often, to find joy from experiences that many others have moved on from. To enjoy the rich tapestry of our gaming history rather than just our gaming present.

Video games

A plea for more online cross region play

Post author By Michelle B
Post date February 14, 2013
1 Comment on A plea for more online cross region play

I am an advocate of local co-operative gaming. I’ve talked about how important it is numerous times before. Ironically it is this way to play multiplayer games that has undoubtedly led to the decisions surrounding Monster Hunter 3 Ultimate’s online play being region locked.

This is because the primary audience for Monster Hunter in Japan play plays completes most of their hunting sessions locally. I’d agree that is the optimum way to play that particular game, but not everyone gets that opportunity.

Online play was touted on the Wii U version as a bit of an afterthought, a concession to a Western audience who had become used to playing the series online since the popularity of Monster Hunter Tri (and the original Monster Hunter on the PS2 long before that).

My hopes were not high about Monster Hunter 3 Ultimate having region-free online play (particularly since Monster Hunter Tri didn’t), but it has led me to question the culture of region-locked online play when it’s considered an industry standard on any other hardware.

Supposed technical limitations

No reasons have been given about why cross-region play has been avoided for this version of Monster Hunter, but I suspect the following it’s due to a combination of connection speed and the culture of communication.

Monster Hunter is a game requiring precise movement and reaction, timing is indeed key, and particularly at higher levels can mean life or death. A good connection is important but certainly not the to the degree needed for a competitive FPS game. Contrary to some hunters I have spent an extensive amount of time playing Monster Hunter Portable 3rd with the Japanese Monster Hunter community, connection speed has seldom been a problem.

I propose then that this decision may have been made to make the issue of communication between different regions that much easier.

Not only would cross-region play need more robust servers able to make numerous connections from hundreds of different locations, but this sort of online play would need some communication tools. Auto translate features that a Japanese audience wouldn’t need and wouldn’t be considered for their local version.

Incorporating these features would mean localisation for several different languages needed to be inherent in all versions of the game, in order to allow people to collaborate easily. This is before looking at the issue of voice chat, which is increasingly common.

If auto translate and communication between regions is to be taken seriously, it needs to be considered from the ground up as part of a games inception. Sounds too much like hard work? I’d like to propose another option.

How global play games can work without communication

Being a gamer in Europe, many of the games I have played online over the years have been with people I cannot understand. Be it in French, German, Spanish, Italian or Japanese. Has this hampered my gaming experience? If anything experiencing a game with a completely different audience has broadened it.

The closest sensation I can equate it to is playing Journey – when normal communication methods are removed, people find other ways to display or describe what they want to say. Be it singing notes in a pattern or drawing hearts in the snow.

Gamers generally in my experience don’t mind someone who cannot communicate or understand their language. This is overpowered by the intrinsic need to play. People only mind if you are competent at your chosen game, and if you make an effort to gesture to thank someone or praise them at the right time, and most of these concepts can be covered by in-game gestures, simple English or emoticons.

Play a game you love with someone else you cannot speak a word to and gamers find a way to use their own in-built knowledge of the game to make anyone who cannot speak their native tongue feel included.

Isn’t the entire point of the internet to connect people? Boxing us into historical gaming regions breaks up those of us who have connected with people outside of our own country. Perversely we find ourselves in situations where we can talk together entirely freely online, but cannot experience certain video games together.

Cross region collaborative games can work

I’ve spent a good amount of time experiencing the very best examples of cross-region and auto translate support. Phantasy Star Online is the yardstick by which all my other collaborative games are judged against and sadly for Capcom it managed cross-region support, collaborative play and auto-translate back in 2000 and on dial-up no less.

Crucially it’s symbol chat experience allowed people to create their own ways to celebrate or warn people by using cards and sounds to display concepts or help. Interestingly it also had optional region-based servers for people who preferred to play with people from their country, or in their own language.

For the most part though people mingled, for the short time the Dreamcast and later Gamecube versions were really alive it really felt like a universal game, a melting pot of language and play.

Final Fantasy XI took things a step further, as a party of six adventurers were always needed to complete missions or defeat monsters. Auto translate in this game was robust enough for you to have simple conversations with someone, highlighted to show you were using this option, and automatically translated into the language of all the other players around you. It was this system that allowed me to not only party, but understand and thank the numerous Japanese players I partied with over the years in the game.

Perhaps next time?

With Capcom working with Nintendo to host the online play for this game, either party could have made the decision to allow cross region play in Monster Hunter for the first time, they could have done this easily by setting aside a few ships specifically for multi region play, but for whatever reason they didn’t. I only hope this is a mistake they don’t make again.

Retro gaming

The impact of my first experiences with gaming

Post author By Michelle B
Post date November 16, 2012

I was very young when I first played a video game – around two or three years old. It remains one of my oldest memories, one of my first, formative thoughts of the world.

Many children my age had favourite toys, or imaginary friends. Things they adored, that came alive with their own unique understanding.

As a girl growing up with rapidly emerging technology in the 80s, video games were mine.

Those early days

Games back then required more than a little imagination. Those hazy shapes on the screen that were meant to represent people, or vast buildings, or the tiniest item. Not everything was particularly clear. You bought lots of second hand games, you traded games with friends, you didn’t always have the manual or the context for the game you were playing. Picking up a video game then required a little lateral thinking, as few things were obvious.

The only thing that was verbatim was the sense to experiment and discover, to share, compare and learn by doing. These old, almost nostalgic gaming traits are the biggest gift that gaming has given me. They are the tools I have carried with me into adulthood. As a child I saw a beautiful magic in gaming, as I got older I wanted to understand how my consoles and computers worked, how they were made. Video games were the first things to ignite a spark of imagination in my very young mind. Many things came after, but it was that first, very powerful feeling that forged me through the years to come.

Even back then I remember being enraptured by the interactively gaming posed, the promise of what would only improve and get better. I became even more fascinated when I realised that not everyone shared this view – that my parents and siblings found the process confusing or bewildering. This same galvanising feeling of inspiration protected me each time my love of video games was misunderstood, or each time I failed in a game. Video games did look basic back then, but they were also much more difficult. Both of these concepts developed my youthful patience.

I have and always will find it liberating for this reason. As a child video games were profoundly personal experience, a puzzle, an oddity, a secret. It was always seen in that way by others, but never by me.

Gaming and how it’s shaped my identity

What’s telling then is how little has changed from my origins with gaming. I face many of the game prejudices from my peers about my decision to play games. Back then this a moral panic about a young child playing games that might be violent or deemed a waste of time. Secondarily I faced criticism for spending time on what was deemed to be very much a male past-time, rather than the more obvious activities expected from my gender.

These are still subjects I am grappling to improve awareness and understanding of as an adult.

Crucially back then gaming was relegated very much to those young minds who has the patience and energy to bear with this new interactive medium. My parents and other adults complained back then that gaming was too hard for them to understand, the barriers to entry too high. They still use this same argument many years later. Interestingly it was with a young, and open mind that I first turned to gaming. Free from the worries and prejudices of those around me. No one taught me, I found a way because I wanted to.

As such I’ll never really understand the argument that gaming is hard, and it really isn’t that much easier for young mind to learn, it was just easier for my younger self to be engaged by video games as a medium rather than terrified by it. I now find myself with the means and knowledge to verbalise that epiphany I had all those years ago. Something new isn’t something to be afraid of, and that certainly applies to video games.

Gaming gave me confidence

So gaming inspired a life-long turn against the tide. The streak of my personality that asked questions. It encouraged a young mind not to rot, but to think more creatively and experiment.

Ultimately it was gaming that inspired a life-long love of computing and technology and my career in web development. Gaming helped me to appreciate that it was a hobby every bit as valid as any other way to spend time. A progressive and social medium. It’s not perfect and we certainly have a long way to go as a community, but it’s helped me to develop a way of thinking and adapting to change that few other hobbies could have.

Above all though it’s made me happy. Gaming has given me more pleasure and joy than anything else I have tried, and all from a flippant decision all those years ago to try out something society had told my young mind I wasn’t allowed, or wasn’t for me.

This post was written for the Critical Distance Blogs of the Round Table. This months theme was origins.