Retro gaming: Who Dares Wins II

Forget about Dragon Age II, because today we'll talk about Who Dares Wins II, an old game by Steve Evans (credited in the C64 version as Tommy Atkins). Who Dares Wins was initially a shameless Commando clone which was released two weeks before the real Commando. Elite sued WDW developer Alligata, so the game was immediately pulled from distribution... until Evans rearranged the content and the game was re-released as Who Dares Wins II.

WDWII was one of the first games I ever played, renamed for Spain (in the cover art, not in the game) as "Mercenario". The 8-bit Commando was a much more visceral experience, and insanely enjoyable, but WDWII was a great piece of design. Let's see why:

Amstrad CPC version < --- The one I played back then

Commodore 64 version < --- It looks similar, but it had scroll!

At first glance it looks like another Ikari Warriors-type shooter. You push forward with your soldier shooting all the enemy soldiers and throwing some grenades. (You can't ride a tank here, though) But after a while you realize that you are expected to make some tactical thinking.

-Enemies are limited. No infinitely spawning baddies, which is actually good. You can memorize the enemy placement so you won't suffer a nasty death. That was great to get a little further each time you played.

-There are some special rules: trenches stop bullets, water and almost invisible quicksand (you can see how it looks here) will drown you, you can only shoot entrenched enemies while they are peeking out (like in a modern cover shooter!), soldiers behind barricades and tanks flee when you are close to them, and you have to clear the last screen of enemies before reaching a new stage. It feels fair and it motivates you to plan your advance. Staying for a couple of minutes in a single screen trying to get rid of a few strategically-placed enemy shooters is as Un-Commando as it gets.

-I love the extra touches like the possibility of saving prisoners who are about to be executed or destroying passing vehicles. That was completely optional, but at the time you had to do that to "play right" (also, the extra points were useful to get more lives). I don't care about that style of playing too much anymore, but back then it was really important, probably because games only offered gameplay and not much else.

WDWII was an unexpensive game (being released seemingly as a cheap Commando knock-off), but it was legitimately great, and I would play it again in a heartbeat. Maybe I should try the C64 version to check out the scroll!

Sources:
Retro Gamer Magazine
Retroview (Spanish)

Guess who's back?

No, I'm not back. I'm just taking off-time to deliberate on our choice for GOTY 2010 (yet!). But SuperViv is back from Australia! We hope she'll resume playing where she left one year ago so we can keep chatting about games.

And big bad EA is also back as a major villain. Last week I played lots and lots of Mirror's Edge and Dead Space (both amazing games) and I was thinking "I definitely liked where EA was going a couple of years ago". Now, I'm not so sure I even like them anymore, after the evident watering-down of Bioware's games (just look at the recycled rush job they did with Dragon Age II), the Call-of-Dutization of their shooters, etc. With Activision completely out of control and Ubisoft acting crazy like a videogame-world Charlie Sheen (why would you want to sell a sexless sex game?), I don't know who can deliver us from video-game evil now. Valve? The indie developers? We will see.

Alpha Protocol - A review (kind of)

WHAT I THINK (This review has two parts. Go to the end of this entry to jump straight to what players think)

This is not just a review. This is a defense.



Alpha Protocol is a great game. Professional troll Jim Sterling from Destructoid has decided to wage a war against it to see if the internet follows his lead. But he is wrong.

Let's be serious for a minute. Sterling claims that AP is a 2/10 game. Really?

If you read from an alleged former Obsidian worker that the game was mismanaged by Chris Parker, even if that happened to be true, it wouldn't mean that AP is a waste of your time. It may be just the opposite, depending on your tastes. This is not an AAA game that you have to like. This is a game that may interest you if your favourite games are Deus Ex and Vampire: Bloodlines.

What is wrong with this game, then? A lot of people say that AP doesn't offer great shooting and a great cover system. But, you know, GTA IV didn't either. It didn't matter because the game was cool. AP is not a shooting game. It's an RPG game with shooting.

Other people say that it's crippled with bugs (if "I don't like what they did here" or "sometimes the menu takes too long to appear" can be considered game-killing bugs). Well, in my two playthroughs I didn't find a single bug. My game never crashed, and I didn't find any weird stuff like the things that players around the world are finding in Red Dead Redemption (I'm sorry if I'm picking too much on Rockstar's stuff). I think they are prejudiced against Obsidian because of their previous games, and now "Obsidian = buggy games" is another internet meme.

About the mini-games? During the first hacking mini-game I was completely lost. But it was my fault. After that, the mini-games were fair enough. But, of course, you need to spend some points in your tech skill so they don't become a nightmare later. Same with the shooting: some reviewers/players automatically assumed the shooting was abysmal because it felt so imprecise at first. (Have you played Deus Ex lately? You couldn't hit anyone at first)

Maybe my positive opinion comes from the fact that I chose to play first the game without shooting anyone. Yes, it's possible to play this in that way. If you do that, it plays basically like Splinter Cell (why nobody hasn't declared this game a "Splinter Cell rip-off" yet?), . A couple of weeks ago I decided to try the "big" version of Splinter Cell: Double Agent (I had played the alternate "small" version using my Wii), and the whole thing is almost unplayable, either on PC or on PS3 (I own both versions). This isn't mentioned in most reviews (maybe because they played it on Xbox 360 and it didn't suck there?), but that was a mess. AP is alright.

(A brief aside (mild spoilers): It's possible to finish the game without killing anyone, with two exceptions: you throw somebody off a bridge in a cutscene and he's ran over -this is listed as "death by collateral damage" in your statistics-, and there's a boss battle against a main character who is placed in a tower that you can't reach to subdue him with martial arts. This is intended by design, because if you follow the story closely you will hear about his father, a senator, who is probably intended as a future villain if a sequel is made.)

Before you say "oh, but I want to shoot people!" I'll say that after finishing the game I started another playthrough allowing myself to shoot just everybody, and it still feels OK. The shooting in all the Splinter Cell games previous to SC Conviction was worse! I can only assume that in 2010 players are now expecting Call of Duty production values in every single game.

The music is OK but nothing special. The main theme is a blatant "James Bond Theme" rip-off, so bad that it makes you wonder how it got approved (maybe Chris Parker really liked it). Shockingly enough, there are no themes by Alexander Brandon (main composer from Deus Ex) listed in the credits, though he allegedly contributed music and audio. He left Obsidian after working in this project, like Allen Kerry, the lead character artist. (Was Parker as unreasonable as that anonymous guy said?).

Now, for the good stuff. Despite all the criticism directed at the graphics because they could look much better, the character design is actually great (every main character is instantly identifiable), and unusually for a game made with the Unreal Engine, here people don't look like action figures.

And then, the story. Well, even Jeff Gertsmann, not a forgiving reviewer, admits that the story is so good that it makes up for the less-than-stellar shooting: "There are parts of Alpha Protocol that I feel are totally amazing and absolutely worth seeing, but you'll have to trudge through a lot of very disappointing stuff just to see it."

While it's true that Mike Thorton is a bit on the bland side and not a classic character (even the name -or alias- doesn't have a ring to it), other characters are. Mina Tang is very likeable as your main 'handler', and Nolan North, usually overused as a Nathan Drake sound-alike, breathes life in the likeably psycho Steven "Don't call me Steve" Heck.

And the freedom. Oh, the freedom. There's no other game like this. When you play it a second game, you see how every decision changes everything. Other games make the script ambiguous to avoid facing the consequences of what you did, but here it's taken to its full extent, with voice over recorded for any possibility. And the game is not linear! You can visit any of the three main locations in any order, so if you go to China after you go to the two previous locations your character complains because the two previous safehouses were really nice and now you are supposed to live in a dirty apartment. In my second playthrough, I went to China first, so he just said "This place is a dump!".

You really feel like you can shape what happens around you. It will not be the same at all if you try to say something flirty to a girl when she likes you and when she hates you. Your reputation is not just a statistic: it really changes how other people treat you. This is just amazing, and you wonder why other games don't do it.

And then you realize why: because people will tear you apart if you use up your resources trying to let you be free instead of having great shooting.


If what I said make it sound at least interesting, go play this game. If you still aren't convinced, keep reading and listen to what other players thought.


WHAT PLAYERS THINK


I recommend to go to this post in Rock, Paper, Shotgun and read the comments left by users. Many of them acknowledge that the game grows on you and that it's a great experience. Here's a sample of what some players think:


"The Sombrero Kid": "if this had come out before Dragon Age and Heavy Rain it'd've been universally praised and a masterpiece of non-linearity despite it's lack of polish."

"Ihzr": "Alpha Protocol is amazing. If you'd put it next to Mass Effect, it would be the same sort of comparison like between Stalker and Crysis: big budget polished shiny sparkly mainstream mediocrity versus... something else. A pretty amazing something else."

"Mitza": "It's a strange game, but it's really enjoyable. All the extremely negative reviews I've read are an absolute shame. This is the kind of game that deserves a sequel, because they could fix the major flaws and refine&improve the rest of the game."


"jaheira": "Just played AP for another three hours and it's getting better and better. Stealth works great. Amazing silenced pistol action. Some of the best dialogues I've experienced. Might be game of the year so far for me."

"Javier-de-Ass": "loved this game. (...) I've read some impressions from across the net, especially Americans seem to despise this game, and I simply can't relate to any of the criticisms. Not to the shotting [sic] complaints, not to AI complaints, not to general jank complaints (...). I didn't come across any big bugs in the game."

"Mercurial": "By modern standards to a modern audience this game is flawed.

However, look past all that and it's a real gem. The comparisons to Deus Ex and Bloodlines (sans bugs for me at least) aren't blowing smoke, the more I play it the more I see the similarities."

"BL": "Probably the best in any action-RPG ever made, in the history of videogames, so that should get some recognition I think. But as a shooter, it's below average."


About bugs and control:

"jaheira" again: "It's not buggy. One incident of getting stuck on the scenery is the only problem I've had in 11 hours."





"jti": "I'm playing the game with keyboard+mouse and am having no trouble at all. Nothing to complane [sic] about them."


And as a summary, a guy called Wulf summarizes my opinion about the general reception for this game. Just go and read it.

DRM insanity: The lifetime limit

The DRM nightmare is just starting. You just can't buy games anymore: you rent them. Last week I was going to buy the nice downloadable Final Fight port, but I found a disturbing message in the game description offered through the Spanish Playstation Store: You are limited to download this game in 5 PS3 systems. WHAAAT?!! So there's a limit imposed on me. I call that "renting", not buying, folks. So I had to buy the game using my USA PSN account, because they didn't show any message saying that (or I hope I haven't missed it). But then I found out: it's crippled anyway. (UPDATE: Since I bought the game, they updated the description to let you know that the same stupid limitations apply in the good old USA. Just be amazed at how complicated it is: "One time fee for download or use solely by the purchasing PSN account on up to five PS3 units, with no more than one activated PS3 unit within a 24 hour period. Content may not be used by any other account. If you do not wish to accept all those terms, do not purchase this item.")

And with the same really stupid DRM that made a lot of people hate Ubisoft, no less! So you thought you were safe because you owned a console? Think again! At this point in history, April 2010, no internet connection is constant . Is it that difficult to understand?

So, OK, let's say that I go with that stupidity. As you say, I'll "buy" my games for 5 consoles or computers. Let's say I buy now another console and I start buying games with a 5 system limit, I don't care. What would happen if Sony decided that I'm not allowed to buy any additional PS3 consoles? That would be absurd, right?

Well, think again. Apple is doing exactly that.

You probably are wondering, "why would anyone want to buy six iPads, or even just one?". Well, consumers are free to do whatever they want. Or, I should say, they were. Do you realize that paying customers are being manhandled in a way never seen before? We are going down a road that ends with us getting screwed.

Someone has to put a stop to that. So, I say, please stop buying anything with any form of DRM. There are alternatives to everything. If you want to play Assassin's Creed II, buy the console version. If you want to buy Final Fight... Well, why would Capcom even want to protect Final Fight from pirates now? Just everybody has been playing it for free using MAME for years!!!

Seriously, companies putting DRM in their products are just screwing everybody, themselves included. Please stop that. Please.

It didn't take long, did it?

Only 3 days after the European PC release date, the strange/stupid DRM imposed by Ubisoft has already screwed the users, who can't play the game. I guess they didn't expect so many people to buy the game or something (the Ubisoft rep said something about "excepcional demand"), as some people were saying on the forums that they really didn't mind about this form of DRM and that they would buy this great game (one of the best from 2009, that's for sure!) anyway. Well, I wouldn't be surprised if those same users are saying right now "This is the last Ubisoft game I buy!"

Let me tell you a little story. I always have some hot chocolate and toast for breakfast. And my toast used to have some "Philadelphia" cheese on it for a really long, long time. A few months ago, my supermarket stopped carrying the old boxy Philadelphia and started selling a new format. It looks like they also fiddled with the recipe, because only a few days after opening it, the cheese started getting mouldy. Was it a bad batch? Well, I bought a different type of Philadelphia (probably the diet version, or maybe one of the bizarre variations you can find in Germany), and I had the same problem.

You know what? I haven't eaten any Philadelphia cheese since then. I haven't put anything else over my toast for ten years, and now they lost me because they fiddled with the product for reasons that are not clear to me.

See what I am getting at? Ubisoft wanted to re-invent PC gaming to offer... nothing but a half-baked, big-brothery DRM scheme. Which nobody asked for. So yes, Ubisoft still offers some of the best games around, but we are not going to pay for something that is liable to stop working at any time while offering me nothing in return but some cloud-saving that I don't really need. I haven't played Far Cry 2 yet because of the 5 computers activation limit, and I won't play Splinter Cell: Conviction because of this mess.

Ubisoft, don't be stupid and don't fight Activision for the #1 Baddie spot.

Activision's overkill

Activision, WHAT the hell are you doing?

I've been mean to those companies that consistently make a string of mediocre or bad games and then they go bankrupt. This is a tough business, and nobody has money to buy bad games. If your game is bad, we will know it as soon as the first review hits the internet.

But sometimes it's just not fair. You make great and successful strategy games, but then you are shut down by Microsoft. Or you create the Guitar Hero series, you are bought out by Activision and forced to churn out game after game until the market says "Stop!" because we are sick and tired of plastic instrument games, and then Activision shutters the studio .

I agree that if you release a piece of crap like Haze you deserve to go under. But if you make a good game like Prototype... is that fair? NO, IT ISN'T.

Activision, stop. Just stop.