When It Rains, It Pours: Thoughts on Silent Hill: Downpour

While I will fully admit to enjoying most of the Silent Hill series (Silent Hill 2 being the exception of the main canon), I will have to admit that the series was long over due for a massive reboot, or an overhaul to say the least. Homecoming strayed far, focusing on combat over running, and Shattered Memories focused on changing the entire story. The less mentioned about that one, for me, the better, but that's a subject for another time. After Akira Yamaoka left Konami, and Vatra took over the development, I was, to say the least, anxious to see if Silent Hill: Downpour would even be up to par as a game, much less a Silent Hill title. And, I have to admit: I'm pleasantly surprised.

The weakest aspect of Downpour is the combat, and not because of the flailing attacks Murphy does. It's mainly because you can block only one attack, and cannot dodge. This leads to some aggravating moments later on in the game where you almost have to fight to survive. At the same time, the purpose is to run away from. There are also some technical issues, such as loading in certain areas that makes the game skip. While annoying at times, it's minor compared to what it could be.

The story follows prison inmate Murphy Pendleton after he murders a man in a prison shower. As he's being transferred, his bus crashes in Silent Hill, where he must escape. Among the monsters pursuing him is a police officer who seems to have a vendetta, and a mailman whose motives seem unclear. Murphy's journey through the city is expanded to a more open world, giving the player side quests with stories of their own. Much to the developer's credit, these side quests do not detract from the game's intricate story, and add to the city's rich atmosphere.

The side quests are part of the most interesting sections of the game, revolving around environmental puzzles. One such has the player rebuilding a gramophone, and using it to solve a murder in a unique and clever way.

The story itself is told both in present and in flashbacks, that, at first, are confusing, but become clear about halfway through. The player will never get all of the answers until the ending of the game, as the city shows the player constantly who is in control. The monsters, while few in variety, reinforce this, chasing you, and becoming more aggressive when it rains. You can go inside, but that doesn't mean you're actually safe. Certain monsters will never go outside, lingering in the shadows, lying in wait.

There are only a few monster varieties in the game, most of them anthropomorphic, which seems counter intuitive of Silent Hill's "faceless horror" premise. But, considering both that this is an unexplored part of town, and Murphy being a convict who has possibly depersonalized people to faceless beings, it still fits. The new monsters, relentless and cruel, often times take pleasure not only in the chase, but in hiding just out of view so you can't see them while you're being attacked.

The feeling in Silent Hill this time isn't one of dread, but of sorrow. This makes sense considering why Murphy was in prison in the first place. Without saying too much, there is a recurring theme in the city's issues. The game plays off the players emotions very well, especially in one area that left me needing to put the control down to keep from being overwhelmed. The game is truly disturbing, sorrowful, but downright good at letting you make Murphy as human as you want him to be with moral choices and the side quests.

All in all, I went in not thinking of this as a Silent Hill game, but as its own. While I'm glad I did, I can fully accept this as canon with the rest of the series. The roads are broken and blocked, but don't let that deter you from taking this much needed trip.

I'm Commander Shepard, and This... Nevermind

Here at HyperPixel (where I'm working), we write articles for developers and fans alike, ranging from reviews to full articles. These include the one I just did about video games being art. Some of our upcoming reviews as a magazine will be SSX, Silent Hill: Downpour (which I'm writing), and Syndicate. Mass Effect 3 may not be on that list. The reason is a very bizarre one; we can't find a writer who isn't calling for BioWare's collective heads to be paraded before us on pikes.

I'm not going to lie, emotions do play a large part in this. The emotions that Bioware have forged between player and characters are amazing, and seeing them die is heart wrenching. At least, it's supposed to be. The story in Mass Effect 3 is filled to the brim with moments that make me scratch my head and wonder, "They thought that was a good idea? X-Men: Destiny had more choices implemented than this! Hell, Call of Juarez: The Cartel was at least fun to make fun of!"

A slight warning: *ahem*

THERE BE SPOILERS AHEAD! AND HOW THEY BLEED

Joke fell flat, didn't it? Damn, no Clive Barker fans in the crowd.

Anyway, admittedly, I didn't play much of Mass Effect 3, because, at first, I hadn't had much of a chance. I played the game for three hours, or, what honestly equates to half an hour of gameplay and two and a half hours of movie. What I played of the game was very dull, and bared little resemblance to the previous games. It was more shooter based (I was playing on Role Playing Mode, and I felt like I was playing Gears of War with an occasional moral choice). As I didn't have my save from Mass Effect 2 on my PS3, I could not import my character, and much of the choices were made for me.

Then, my girlfriend started to play. She loved the second, and was hesitant to pick up on this one. Even with the rave reviews that it has been getting, we were both hesitant. Especially when half of those reviews are connected to Jessica Chobot, who works for IGN and G4, and is married to one of the hosts for XPlay. If you don't see the problem with that, think about it this way; those news outlets are now connected to the development of the game. If Gene Siskel was in a movie in the '80's, and Roger Ebert gave it a nigh perfect review, would anyone take him seriously? It doesn't help matters when her employers knew that she was in the game, but said nothing until the cast announcement. The one redeeming factor is that she didn't review the game. No, she just previewed it, which can be seen as her not being an entertainer, but a journalist. Even then, it's borderline review. It's hard to not look biased when you pressure the people you work for by being in the game. Give the game a bad review, it looks bad for her. Obviously, we can't have that, now, can we?

Let's cut that rant short, and talk about the game proper. The main squad has been narrowed down to only a few: Garrus, Tali, Ashley/Kaiden, James "Jersey Shore" Vega, and EDI in a robot body. You also get a Prothean if you buy the DLC, or got it for free with the game. You have to spend $10 on DLC that is "story essential" for the game... yet it doesn't make sense. The Protheans are all dead, yet Cerberus knows of the last living Prothean. We played without him, obviously. We were stunned by what we saw.

Here comes the spoiler train:

Pretty much everyone dies. Jacob becomes a merc, you know, those things he hates. Mordin has an honorable death, curing the genophage, and allowing the Krogan to bolster their numbers. Thane either dies saving the counsel and Shepard, or dies a faceless death if you wait to do that mission. One of the most interesting characters dies off screen if you take a side quest.

Let me put it this way: Thane was my girlfriend's love interest in the second game. She saw his heroic death first, but restarted after a death that utterly pisses me off, that we'll get to in a moment. She wanted to save that character, but found out that Thane could die off screen, without the player having a chance to say goodbye. That's lazy writing, plain and simple. They build up the character to kill him off, either in a way that is respectable, or in a way that is a cheap shot at the player that negates all of the work they put into him.

This also goes for Jack. If you do not take the mission to the Grissom Academy right away, you never see her. Why? They all get kidnapped by Cerberus. Jack, the most powerful Biotic in the universe, who punched through a ship's hull, gets kidnapped by Cerberus. In other news, Superman is foiled by a feather. It's as if they forgot who exactly these characters even are. As far as I'm concerned, they aren't the worst offenders.

Tali's character is, though.If you do not have a high enough paragon score, or choose to side with the Quarians instead of the Geth, who are trying to make peace, Tali watches as the entire Quarian fleet dies. She then commits suicide, no matter if you tried to save her or not. Let me repeat that: She dies, even if you try to save her! The game gives you a choice, then turns around and tells you that it didn't matter. If you didn't try to make peace, or you chose to make the Geth peaceful, she dies. For no reason.

As a writer, I find this to be absolutely lazy. Having a character die off screen is extremely lazy, for starters. If you spend the time writing a character for the player to get to know, you had to care enough about the character to give them a meaningful death. Giving the player an option to miss that death, and killing the character off screen is punishing the player for something that they didn't even know. How can you say the player has a choice, when obviously one was wrong?

Which brings me back to the first two games. Udina will be counsel no matter who you chose in the first game. You have to free the Rachni again. If you didn't have a save from the first two games, you miss out on dialogue from characters that you were supposed to know before this game. Finally, any choice you make actually makes no difference. The endings are all pretty much the same, Shepard becomes a messiah (I wish I was joking), and your crew is stranded on a planet after the Mass Relays are destroyed. No matter what you do, you cannot win.

But, Bioware tells us to wait for DLC. So, once again, we got the incomplete story, and we have to pay more to see how it actually ends. Would you buy a blender one week, and then buy the missing blade a month later? Would you be happy if you saw a movie, only to have the soundtrack missing, but the theater tells you to keep the ticket for next week when they play the audio?

DLC is being abused. It's meant to add to a complete story. For example, Enslaved's DLC added a new story entirely to the game. Adding elements that are necessary for the story to even be complete reeks of lazy writing.

And that's when we hit the issue. Bioware's laziness doesn't stop at the writing. They used a stock image for Tali's face, seen in a photo in your room. That Photoshop had to take at most fifteen minutes. This image took four hours, and it still isn't perfect. The clouds aren't blended the way I wanted them to be, but it was a school project. I took the pictures used in this image, and made it. You mean to tell me that Bioware couldn't have done that?

The game probably cannot be reviewed, because the elements in the game's design make us biased against the game, to the point where we can't review it. And, no, making me the next Shepard will not help. I want nothing to do with Bioware unless they take the time to write a complete story. For all the characters involved, too, not just the audience.

Entertainment for Art’s Sake; or Countless Tears Shed for Aeris’ Sake

The Commander was sent on a mission to destroy a sentient computer, only for the technology in her suit to get taken over. She fought through the hallucinations, destroyed the computer’s avatar, and watched as reality came flooding back. She saw an autistic man, David, hooked up to a machine, and his brother, a scientist, walk in. “It all seemed so harmless,” he started. He describes using his brother to communicate to with machines. The Commander called for her crew to pick David up, but the scientist protests. She punched him in the face, telling him that she’s taking his savant brother where he will be safe from experiments. As the Commander went to release David from the machine, he did his favorite mind-clearing activity: complex square roots. “The square root of 912.04 is 30.2.” He paused, though, adding, “It all seemed so harmless.” He repeated this over and over, tears flowing, until the screen went black (Bioware).

This was taken from Science-Fiction, but it was neither from a book, nor a movie. It was from the video game Mass Effect 2 from Bioware and Electronic Arts. If you asked anyone 40 years ago if this type of story-telling in video games would be possible, chances are that they would say that it would not. There are still people who deny that video games can be more than just a method of telling stories, as well as entertainment. The stigma of having the title “video game” does more than just hinder the true objective of what the designers, writers, and concept artists behind the scenes are achieving. But, what of the emotional responses the players have from forming a bond with their character? What of the philosophy and psychology involved in making a game that, for better or for worse, stands out in the minds of both player and audience? What of the art work and scripts that go into making the game? All of these gather to form only one simple conclusion: Video games are an art form, and do contain a meaning.

As of late especially, comparisons of video game stories to those of films have been drawn heavily. Roger Ebert has gone on the record to state that giving the player the power to make a main character’s decisions harms any artistic aspect of a game (Ebert). Game reviewer and writer Anthony Burch agrees with him, using the game Heavy Rain as a reference. In Heavy Rain, the player controls four characters, all of which are chasing a serial killer (Burch). The player can make several choices that change the story of the game. According to both Mr. Ebert and Mr. Burch, the fact that the player can make these choices change the characters entirely too much for the game to be art (Ebert, Burch). Mr. Ebert also adds that the interactivity of games diminishes them as an art form, as well as the fact that more than one person creates a game, therefore creating a mixed vision based on a group analysis.

How well does this line of thinking work for the players? There are people who play games solely for entertainment, but the same could be said about people going to the movies and books. Yet, movies and books are considered art. What’s more is that a group of people work on movies, to create the director’s vision. That does not render the work of the actors, writers, grips, and countless other behind the scenes workers invalid. They are the artists that bring the movie to existence as the director is the artist who brings them together. In terms of video games, you have the publisher that publishes and releases the game that a developer makes. The developer contains the core pieces of the game: the writer(s), concept artists, designers, texture artists, actors, musicians, etc. Most of these positions are found in the credits reel for movies as well. Individually, they would be thought of as artists. Why should it be different because they are in a group?

The advancements in cinema technology go hand in hand with those of game creation. Rockstar Games’ L.A. Noire was released in 2011, with a ground breaking technology that allowed players to actively judge whether a character was telling the truth or lying. The developers, Team Bondi, took this one step further by having certain characters act in an unusual manner. One such character, who is implied to be clinically insane, only tells the truth once when questioned, but acts the opposite way one would. He poses like a superhero, overly proud that he told the truth. Similar advancements are seen in movies to this day, including Pixar Entertainment’s (Bondi).

What of the choices though? In L.A. Noire, you have the choice to accuse the right or wrong person, be it intentionally or not. Those do not change the outcome of the entire game. The choices in Heavy Rain, on the other hand, do. The player can choose to have the father cut off his finger in order to get the clue to save his son, or walk out of the room (Quantic Dream). This can lead to the player getting a different ending in the game. Mr. Burch states that having the father walk out of the room is uncharacteristic of what he has done so far to save his son (Burch). From what little we know of him, he lost one son due to an accident, his second is kidnapped, and he is willing to jump through hoops to save him. But, how do we know for sure that he would cut off his finger instead of finding a different way? Ultimately, the player has known him for a small amount of time, and has been seen through the player’s eyes as more than just a person, but an extension to the player.

Even with the choices changing the ending of the game, as well as certain aspects, the core story stays the same. The same person will always be the killer, and the same scenes will play out in their order, only done differently depending on the player or play through. The character is still written to respond to these in a character specific manner, i.e. the father will see his inability to do what he can to save his son as failure, sinking him into a deep depression (Quantic Dream). In this sense, the game does not loose artistic merit as a whole, but each play through gains a different meaning.

To say that adding story changing choices to video games makes it not artistic means that the game would have to be devoid of those choices. In the case of Bioshcok, there are no blatant moral choices. The player character is guided by a voice over a radio, politely asked to grab a radio, help find his wife, and kill the creator of the underwater city of Rapture. Once the player reaches him, it is revealed that the choice was false all along, and the player was a toll to someone else’s means (2K). But, the game has another choice for the player to make that isn’t seen as changing the character.

Throughout the game, the player encounters “Little Sisters,” mutated children who are protected by monsters in wetsuits called “Big Daddies.” The player can choose to “harvest” the chemicals from the Little Sisters, leading to their deaths, or save them, at the sacrifice of the chemical (2K). These choices are to aid the player while still offering a slight moral choice. This choice changes the ending of the game, but nothing else. The difference is that in Bioshock, the character is a blank slate, whereas in Heavy Rain, they are established from the beginning. But, again, we only know what the game has shown us, not the true nature of the whole character. Ultimately, despite how established a character is in a game, the player molds them.

Bioshock as whole stands out as a philosophical argument of both politics and video games as an art form. The game is in a similar style to an Ayn Rand novel, speaking against government and religion in the form of Andrew Ryan’s utopia of Rapture (Tavinor, 91). It was meant to be a utopia for those who wish to be free of the government taking the fruit of their labor, as well as religion. Ultimately, it fell due to both the people’s need for control, and Ryan becoming what he despised the most: a dictator. These parts of the story are told within the game, via audio logs collected. In the case of Bioshock, the game is art in and of itself, not art placed into a game, because the story is told as the game.

L.A. Noire takes a different approach by having the player control Detective Cole Phelps on his cases, and showing in cut scenes why he is the over achiever that he is. Players see his cowardice in World War II, turning sympathy to betrayal (Bondi). Yet, the manipulation that is forced upon him still makes the player sympathize with him, thus making the ending even more tragic than it would be if he was just a straight shooter stereotype of a police officer. Again, the player has no choice in who the character is, nor the choices he makes, but they still form an emotional response to him.

But, what about a game where the character is a blank slate for the player to mold? In Mass Effect 2, the player can create their own individual character, or import the one they created in the first game. While certain sections of the story are prewritten, they player ultimately has choices to make throughout the game to alter the universe as well as the player-character. The player can have a romantic relationship with a team member, gain their loyalty, or have them die on the final mission. The player-character can even die in the final mission, and still win the game (Bioware). This creates not just a story that is a piece of art for an audience, but one that has an individual meaning for the player. That meaning can be one of selfless service, or one of martyrdom, or even one of betrayal. In that case, Mass Effect 2 creates a piece of storytelling not just on par with modern cinema, but a story that holds a potential individual meaning for the player that can change from player to player.

This obviously does not apply for all games, as the writers often times are telling a story in the way they want it to be told. “Winning” the game used to be a completely different concept, meaning an end to a game with a blurb that tells the player what happened to finish a story. At this time, the story was made only to motivate the player to play, i.e. save the princess. In our current generation of gaming, the story is much more than that. Characters have the essence of real people, allowing the player to form an emotional bond, not just with the main character, but with a non-playable character. Many a story has been written about the tragic death of Aerith Gainsborough in Final Fantasy VII, where players have admitted to crying at her death. Aerith’s character is both non-playable, and only in a small portion of the game, yet that much of an emotional response is now expected (Gale).

While seen as one of the most tragic deaths in gaming, Aerith’s is only skimming the surface of a larger, emotional vision in games. Games have reached a period where they can make statements on our world of the past, present, and possible future. But, they have also reached a point where they contain characters who elicit emotions, both by visually having them, and being voiced with emotions. The choices within the games create an individual meaning for the player, as well as on overall meaning for the mass audience.

A final example to point out is one an audience must see for themselves. A website contains an “experimental” game entitled Today I Die. Instead of manipulating the character per se, the player manipulates objects in the world to make words to replace the “dark” words with until the sentence changes to a positive sentence. The world changes with each word that is swapped. There are no choices, no modern graphics, and no voices to manipulate the player’s emotions; only the game and the computer. Yet, changing a sentence from a dead character to a free, living character can cause an emotional response, and leave a meaning with the player. To top it off, only one person made the game. If people are hesitant to deny that as art, why should mainstream games be any different?

Benmergui, Daniel “Today I Die” http://www.ludomancy.com/games/today.php?lang=en

Bioshock v 1.1 2K Games 2007

Burch, Anthony. “Why Heavy Rain Proves Ebert Right” http://www.destructoid.com/why-heavy-rain-proves-ebert-right-165034.phtml. February 26, 2010

Ebert, Roger. “Video Games Can Never Be Art” http://blogs.suntimes.com/ebert/2010/04/video_games_can_never_be_art.html. April 16, 2010

Gale, Paul. “Aerith’s Death is Still the Most Significant Death in Gaming” http://paulgalenetwork.com/home/2010/12/23/aeriths-death-from-final-fantasy-vii-is-still-the-most-significant-death-in-gaming/. December 23, 2010

L.A. Noire v1.1.2406.1 Team Bondi: Rockstar Games, 2011

Mass Effect 2 V 1.02 Bioware: EA Games 2010

Tavinor, Grant. “Bioshock and the Art of Rapture” Philosophy and Literature April 2009, Vol. 33 Issue 1. p91-106 16p

Brain Junkfood: Painkiller Blowout Part Three: Dreamkiller

It was once said that George Washington had holes drilled in his skull to relieve the pressure in his head. I never used to believe that. Then I played Dreamkiller. Let me put this in perspective: I just compared the stress of the first American President to playing a video game, and I'm completely serious. After playing this game, I feel like I need wooden teeth, and a shotgun while riding a cheeseburger eating robot wolverine. Only something that epic can redeem this mess of a shitty game.

I don't know where to begin talking about it. I could say that the developers tried, but I can't make that statement without cowering in a corner. The one seemingly redeeming factor is the mental asylum that shows that maybe, just maybe, Mindware can do their own game. You start on Scrabble tiles and end up fighting patients in bear traps. The walls have eyes that follow you, but don't, cats eating children, and little boys ready to stab puppies. You then end up in a castle, and the level goes to shit.

The big problem that Dreamkiller has is simple: It's Painkiller with a female character who can only carry two weapons, and makes "witty" remarks. By witty remarks, I mean obvious shit that would be found in only the dumbest horror movies. After killer hundreds of spiders, giant ones, no less, she starts fighting a giant-giant spider, and says, "Something's not right." Really? Tell me more! I mean, seriously, what the fuck was your first clue? It couldn't possibly be the giant spiders, could it? Or the fact that you're living in Someone Else's Dream? Hell, for that matter, someone else's game?

Even the weapons are the same. Freezing shotguns, miniguns with rocket launchers... all the same weapons from Painkiller. They even use the damned dogs. In speaking of enemies, why am I fighting the same giant spiders from the arachnophobia dream in the frigiophobia dream? are spider's Alice's biggest annoyance? I might as well address right now that spiders and "monkey-dogs" will follow you throughout the game.

As for the story, you play as a Suicide Girl turned psychologist named Alice Drake, who has the power to go into people's dreams, and rid them of their phobias. She finds that the Dream Killers are making the phobia's stronger, which means she has to face her past. She was a government experiment as a child.

She was... a government... experiment...

Are you FUCKING kidding me?!

That's the big twist? I went from rip-off to cliche in less than one game. Do you realize the talent it takes to do that? That amount of jackassery and kniveling fuckery is more impressive than the bullshit that most game developers who release the same title every year with different characters (if that) and manage keep their fanbase, if not increase it pull. The only way that's possible is if they actually put effort into the game, and that can't be true! That really can't!

What you don't understand is how bad this game is. I couldn't finish it because the game ramps up the nonsense physics to the point where you can't move. Enemies blast through walls like the fucking Kool-Aid man, and about as destructive. I got stuck under a filing cabinet. A doctor pushed it on top of me, and I couldn't push it off. Not even with a rocket launcher could move it, but a fat-ass doctor could by meandering into it.

If I talk about this anymore, I may explode. This is the one game that numbs my brain faster than eating a bucket of ice cream at breakneck speed. I need something that will make me feel a little more sane. I think I need to check out some Yard Sales.

Why am I in a circus tent...? Oh, God! Sodomizing clown!

Non-Linear Path: Sequelitis

I know that was going to talk about bad games from hell, but I decided to do something different, while still talking about Call of Juarez: The Cartel and Saw II: Flesh and Blood. I'm sure that I'm going to be stirring up a hornet's nest with this topic figuring that some of the games I'm going to mention are getting good reviews, and honestly, I don't know why. For simplicity, let's start with the worst offender.

Call of Juarez was never an overwhelmingly popular game like Halo, but it was well received, spawning a sequel that explored the past of Reverend Ray. The theme of the Wild West was surprisingly unexplored for the first person genre, with a few exceptions which I may touch upon in a later article. Ray was well written character, one who was an outlaw set on a path to redemption through faith in God, to eventually being drawn back into killing for justice. I love that clip. While all of the characters are criminals you couldn't help but like them, even a little bit.

Then, The Cartel came, and ruined all of our fun. For starters, they ditched the western theme, and made a modern times shooter. You played as one of three cops, all of them not only dirty, but without any redeeming qualities. They also made it co-op first, single player second. This is an issue when you consider this: games created for single player primarily generally suffer from lackluster campaigns once multiplayer is added. Take a look Bioshock 2, a game that made multiplayer-centric, and changed the feeling of the game series by taking away all that was intriguing from the first game making the sequel nothing but a standard shooter, complete with boss battles.

The Cartel had a separate issue. We'll call it the "Dark as Cow's Guts" issue. The subtitles for the game suggest that it was written to be a Western, but was changed to keep up with other shooters, i.e. Call of Duty. This cost The Cartel more than just the series identity, it cost it the series' fan base. People saw just another modern shooter, and, let's face it, a terrible one at that. The rush showed everywhere from writing to AI to graphics. I really wish I had a picture of the rock that only had three textured sides to it. The game was loaded with glitches, as well.

Another issue I've seen is games that are attempts to improve on the last by trying something new. This isn't a bad thing, normally, but in one case, it killed the series. Yes, I'm talking about Saw II: Flesh and Blood. Zombie Studios attempted to fix the laggy combat controls by making combat a minigame. The issue with this is that the minigame's controls were unresponsive as well, namely due to a separate issue involved in programming. Needless to say, the fix didn't work, and served to draw the player away from the game.

There were also several issues with planning, including a puzzle that was supposed to have its solution located in a different room, but it wasn't. Again, the game was rushed to meet a deadline, namely to hit around the same time as the last movie. While that doesn't help matters, sometimes, it just isn't an excuse. They could've actually examined the combat system from the first game, and fixed it while keeping a combat system. This would've been easier than programming a completely different segment all together.

Despite these games, I have one that disappoints more than either of them. Save the flames for when I'm done, because I'm giving this game credit for improving its combat. Unfortunately, the rest of it isn't that good.

The Darkness II does a few things very wrong in comparison to the first game. I had a difficult time pinning down what exactly rubbed me the wrong way the most. Was it the fact that the free roaming and side missions were taken out of the game? They weren't that important to the first game in the first place, but you were rewarded by collectables and funny phone calls. Not to mention that you felt both like a mafia hitman and a good guy, instead of just being a killer.

Was it the controls that moved slowly when you tried to aim quickly? Sure it hurts the game, but does it hurt it enough to make it worth selling back less than a week later? How about the short single player campaign (I beat it in five hours), meant to make room for the multiplayer, which is only a hair more enjoyable than the actual game? Or the enemies with cheap tactics blinding you, stealing your weapons, and then moving just as you hit the trigger?

It hit me in the last hour of the game what left that bad taste in my mouth. It wasn't just all of the above, it was the story. The first game set itself away from the comic by making a more down to earth story, without supernatural enemies. You were the monster, but you had a heart. You were what people were afraid of, but there was a reason. You wanted them to fear you, especially after what the bad guys did. By the end, you're in control of the mob, and no one knows how other than you killed your uncle.

Somehow, though, your powers are no longer a secret. The mob knows you have them, and even comments about them. To make matters worse, a cult with your powers is trying to kill you. You have to rebuild your powers from scratch, no less, meaning you're vastly weaker than your enemies. This is an absolute contrast to the purpose of the Darkness. You're overwhelmed until the last hour of the game, changing what the meaning was.

The Darkness was about power corrupting and how to overcome it. Jackie was able to overcome the corruption and control it, while still being powerful. Yes, he had the Angelus trying to kill him, but she suffered much of the same issues. Jackie had to use his abilities to keep from being overthrown, and defend himself. Very few people lived if he was attacked, and even fewer if his friends were. But, most of all, he kept his technique secret.

All of a sudden, in the game, you're weaker than your enemies, and the world know about the Darkness. What's more is that more people than you have it, which doesn't make sense. Even in the first game, they mention only one person can have the Darkness at one time. Why does this cult have the powers, if I'm the host? I understand the need for balance, but the lack of it makes the game nearly unapproachable, even to watch it, if you know the source or played the first game.

This is a big issue with sequels. Often times, no one is aware of what the story is supposed to lead up to, its themes, or even its characters. Even good sequels have this issue. Silent Hill is a good example. After the development went from Japan to America, the psychological themes were less focused on than the combat. This could be a cultural change, as well as a change between an individual's vision of the series. It doesn't mean one is better or worse than the other, normally. This changes when the game is based on something that is established, it may be a different story.

That's all the time I have right now. Stay tuned for next time when I talk about Guilty Pleasures in gaming.

Non-Linear Path: Good Games Gone Bad

I've attempted to write humorously about bad games, even its difficult. Allow me to talk seriously here in the edition of a new series of articles. Granted, these won't just be about bad games, but, this one will be. And they're not just any bad games, either, but games that either had a clever premise, or games that could have been good, only to fall flat. We're not talking about games like Painkiller Overdose, which are terrible, but sequels. These have to be the first in their series, even if they may be complete ripoffs of other games.

We'll start off there, as a matter of fact, with Mindware's Dreamkiller. Many of you have guessed that it'll be the special finale to the Brain Junkfood Painkiller Blow-Out. Many of you may have guessed that it's a rip-off of Painkiller. Same mechanics, same weapons (designed differently), even some of the same monsters. But it isn't that that makes it a bad game. No, Dreamkiller is a mess to begin with due to bad writing, bad level design, and, well, an overwhelming lackluster presentation. Instead of embracing the theme of being in dreams, they designed levels that loosely fit a phobia, designed a few enemies, and tossed them into the game. You'll fight the same spiders in the arachnophobe's dream as in the dream of the guy afraid of work. Yes, you fight guys in suits with robot arms, but they are in smaller numbers than the spiders.

At the same time, there are hints that Mindware can come up with clever ideas. In the mental asylum, you start the level on Scrabble pieces, then travel through the halls, with eyes hidden in the walls that seem to follow you. Children are drawn hugging dogs, threatening to stab them, or being eaten by anthropomorphic cats. It's creepy, even if it is bright and hygienic looking. In fact, that adds to the creepiness, as you'd expect it to look like every other horror game, being grimy and bloody. Then, it's ruined by your character's "witty" remarks. After fighting several hundred monsters, you should all ready know something is wrong. You shouldn't have just figured it out. The argument can be made that she didn't need any taunts, but the developers were going for a Serious Sam style game, and they did have taunts.

The case can be made that the unoriginality of Dreamkiller, literally stealing Painkiller's core, leads to its downfall. It had an original idea of the subconscious. Certain enemies can only be killed by taking yourself deeper into the dreamer's dream. If you stay in the deep subconscious too long, you'll get hurt. This is made into a broken mechanic when entire battles require you to stay in the subconscious for an extended period of time, often killing you in the process. This renders the big difference of the game nothing more than a deterrent from playing the game.

Then we come to Konami's newest published game, NeverDead. Where do I start with this? The stand-out mechanic is that you can't die, but you can be dismembered. You can do this to yourself to solve puzzles. Most of the time, though, you'll be knocked down, rolling as a head, to find your body, then your limbs, hopefully in time to save your AI partner who is able to die. The clunky controls don't aid you, nor does the fact that your head can be eaten, ending the game. The premise was interesting to say the most, and different to say the least. There was potential in the idea. So, what happened?

The developers seem (I may be wrong) to have had too many ideas at once. Your character gets hit by trains, digested in a boss, and tumbled around, among other things, all of which dismember you. They took advantage of the concept, but took it too far, especially by making your character too fragile. This handicaps your movement, often times, making you too slow to get back to your body before your partner dies. You can regenerate over time, but you can only regenerate on part at a time. You can also find vials that allow you to regenerate completely, but in the midst of fighting, your head may get eaten in the process.

Imagine playing this game without the immortality aspect. You wouldn't be able to beat it, at least not for a long time. Chances are, after the tenth time of having your head knocked off after just regenerating, you won't care enough about it to stay in the game. This is only made even worse by the bad writing. The characters are unlikable, and try too hard to be funny. Like finding out that souls taste like chicken, you'll hear Bryce complaining about rolling ruining his hair no more than every ten seconds.

Taste is subjective of course. Someone may like NeverDead and Dreamkiller. Just because a game is bad, doesn't mean that there aren't good ideas, or that the developers didn't have their intentions well placed. That's our subject for next time when we talk about Bad Games From Hell. Believe me, The Cartel, and Saw II Flesh and Blood are on that. See you next time!

Brain Junkfood: Painkiller Blowout Part Two: Battle Out Of Hell & Overdose

You know, sometimes I really don't know what I'm getting myself into with these articles. I mean, sure, I knew that I was going to kill clowns in an amusement park, but, how was I supposed to know that the plot of Painkiller would change completely.


Yes, in Battle Out of Hell, you fight clowns. And orphans. And children in burlap sacks. I know this may not make sense to you now, but...

Oh, fuck it, I still can't make sense of it. The point is, in Battle Out of Hell, you kill shit. A lot of shit. Shit that looks like clowns, shit that looks like Russian Soldiers, and shit that looks like an armored demon. A lot of shit. But, it's not the list of enemies that makes no sense. No, something makes fighting anthropomorphic popcorn demons seem sane.

What is that, you may ask? Well, reader, it's simple. It's the dumbest plot twist ever written: The person helping you is trying to take over Hell. Yes, Eve, as in Garden of Eden Eve, helps you kill the devil, then, kill Alastor, who steals the devil's power, so she can become the devil. This makes less sense when you consider why she does this. There are three reasons:

1: God chose her destiny, so she had no choice to bite the apple, thus creating sin on the world. Therefore, she wants revenge on Heaven, by destroying it.
2: Samael trusts Eve, and he's a servant of God. Despite this, Eve hates both angels and demons, because they both made her sin.
3: She's convinced that Daniel (who looks even more like Butthead) loves her, despite him killing the devil so he can be at his wife's side. I'll excuse this, mainly because he does go to save Eve.

But, the first two? She sinned because she couldn't help it? Really? According to her logic, we're all destined to not have free will. I've heard this before, and it still sounds as insane as Scientology's beliefs. This would mean that we had no choice in anything in our lives, thus all evil would be destined to exist. No one would have a choice. We'll be so much a fictional universe as this game. How would you feel if at any given moment, you felt you could stop reading this article, but I told you that you had to read on? Guess what? You have to read on!

If you're actually still here, then I should probably tell you that this ends exactly like the first game, Daniel fighting legions of demons. If you're wondering why I'm not talking anymore about Battle Out of Hell, let this be your answer: Painkiller: Overdose. Yes, I actually played through this game, and let me tell you, the title was apt. I actually think the only thing that can cure the headache that game gave me is a painkiller overdose.

I never knew I could hate a game more than Call of Juarez: The Cartel. And it's not just because it's bad. It's because Overdose had the potential to be a good game. It just falls flat because of quite a few aspects, the first being that it's just Painkiller with more linear levels. I'm hard pressed to think of more than two levels where you don't walk in a straight line, kill everything, then walk in a straight line. Can you see how annoying that would get? The levels where it isn't a straight line are the good levels, too. Those are the Slaughterhouse and the Movie Studio.

Those of you who played the game, yes, I'm skipping the Amusement Park as an example of a good level. Mainly because it's the same level as the Amusement Park in Battle Out of Hell, only with a pirate ship in the end instead of a roller coaster ride. Seriously, that's the only difference. Did I mention that the guys who made the original didn't make this one? Yeah, Mindware made this game, and they sure as fuck don't know what the hell they're doing game design wise.

I say that in specific because the character design isn't bad. Of the characters not used in the original game, I fought cops, graffiti artists, geisha girls, burning demons, Cerebus, butchers with cow's heads, movie cut outs (that spawn from film strips), and lighting guys. Oh, and... Frankenstein? What the fuck am I fighting Frankenstein for? Did he steal my Girl Scout Cookies? Figuring that this time around, you're playing as Belial, the half-demon/half-angel child of HATE (which he reminds you of every chance he gets), that may be possible.

Let's talk about Belial. He's a terrible character thanks to the creative teams lacking of creativity. Here's Belial's top ten one liners.

10: Kiss my shiny half demon butt.
9: Kiss my half angel ass
8: Another one bites the dust
7: Taste like chicken
6: I'm a regular Johnny Appleseed
5: ?
4:?
3:?
2:?
1:?

He only has five taunts. He says the same five things over and over until you want to shove your head into a wall. What's more is "I'm a regular Johnny Appleseed," is said when he kills someone. How the fuck does that make sense? Did Johnny Appleseed run around with a shotgun and kill 66 people so he could turn into a demon? Where was this in history class? No, in fact, he was a missionary. Which makes this make even less sense. Was Sylvester Stallone copyrighted? How about "I'm a regular Chuck Norris?"

Even the decorations can be creepy. In the slaughterhouse, phrases like "I'll join PETA, I promise!" and "I'm sorry! I'll never eat meat again!" are scrawled in blood on the walls. The enemies can range here from butchers to pig carcasses made into scarecrows with human heads placed upside down. Also, there are henhouses that spit out demon chickens. What's with the games I'm playing lately and demon chickens?

The story of the game is boring to say the least. Belial is half demon and half angel. Both sides hate him, so Samael locks him away after Cerebus eats his wings. Now, he's free and he wants to kill Samael, presumably by taunting him to death. After he beats Samael, he goes to find Daniel, setting up for the sequel.

The journey, though is puzzling. Did you know that there are aliens in hell? How about Cthulhu demons? Why exactly am I fighting everyone in a riot? Why are cops shooting at graffiti artists? Why does Belial keep telling me that souls taste like chicken?

Most importantly, why does this game exist? I know this is ranting at this point, but quite literally, this game has nothing to do with anything previously seen in the series. I know it was originally a mod, but why did Dreamcatcher feel the need to make this an expansion? They had to have played the thing, and had to have seen that it sucked more than a Clinton Intern and the porn industry combined. I mean, for fuck's sake, 99.9% of the game is going in a line. There's no level design, period. Even when the game has an idea that is somewhat clever, it's ruined by the fact that it's in this game. The game's presence is enough to ruin the few good ideas it has.

Oh, the weapons, too, while I'm ranting. They're "new and improved." They're reskins of the original game's weapons. Instead of a stakegun, you get a... goo launcher? How the fuck does goo become a steak? How does one suck a fuck? How DOES THIS GAME

Sorry. I needed to take my happy pills. Now, you can see why this game makes me want to have an aneurysm. It's the most painful game I've ever had to play, because it ruins the series. But, we have more to come. Stay tuned as I show you what unoriginal fucks Mindware is as they ripoff the game they expanded. Oh yeah, my nightmare's just begun.