Worth Reading: 09/07/12

(The above gif is from an excellent Gamasutra article on 2D animation published earlier this week.)

This is going up a few hours later because a good chunk of today was spent sketching out a rough draft of the Big Live Live Show Live 3, which will be yet another all-day set of complete nonsense.

Big shout out to everyone who said hi at PAX this year, and if you were one of those people that was too shy to say anything and then apologized on Twitter about it, make sure you fix that next year. That’s what we’re at PAX for, and why we come back every year.

(I have no idea if we will end up going to Australia, but who wouldn’t want to go to Australia?)

With the fall season upon us, I’m bummed my sidetracked summer means I didn’t get around to playing through Eternal Darkness and System Shock 2. Those are at the top of my to-do list, and hopefully a small chunk appears after the flood of the next two months. Eternal Darkness hurts the most, since I actually made it a few hours into that one before everything went haywire. I loved it, too.

Luckily, Halloween is coming up. I’ll find an excuse.

Hey, You Should Play This

• EXO (PC / Mac, Free) by Tabor Robak at www.e-x-o.com

If you’re someone who stresses over the definition of a “game,” maybe don’t download EXO. If you’re open to new experiences, interactive software that skirts the edges of what we consider a game, then consider giving EXO a shot. Described as a 35-minute adventure inspired by the music of Gatekeeper, EXO drops players into a variety of science fiction locations--yes, including flying around space--set to some head boppin’ tunes. There’s not much to do except sometimes go forward, back, left, and right, and I’m not sure what happens at the end, but it’s awfully pretty, sounds really good, and seems like the kind of thing that’d be awfully relaxing on a lazy Sunday morning.

And Maybe Read This, Too

• “The One Hundred Dollar Question” by Jonas Kyratzes

There’s hardly a consensus on whether Valve’s decision to institute a $100 requirement to list a game on Steam’s Greenlight service was the right move. Even within my own story from earlier this week, which featured opinions on both sides, creators largely, if reluctantly, agreed with Valve’s move. If you find yourself on that side of the argument, The Sea Will Claim Everything designer Jonas Kyratzes has a compelling rebuttal. Kyratzes is behind a critically acclaimed game, and yet, if he hadn’t pulled the trigger on Greenlight pre-fee, he’d have struggled to summon $100 for a maybe. The answers to these questions aren’t clear, and I’m sure--at least, I hope--Valve is listening closely.

To some people, $100 is not a lot of money. To me and my wife (who works two jobs), it’s a week’s worth of food or more. To others, it’s a month’s wages. Do we have absolutely no understanding of the fact that the internet is a global phenomenon and so is indie game development? Even ignoring the fact that developing games requires a great deal of time and effort, platitudes like “why don’t you get a job to finance your game development” don’t help much in countries where there are no jobs, or jobs pay next to nothing. Hell, have you read the statistics on poverty in the United States? Do you think these peoplewant to be poor? Do you think they deserve to be poor?

Maybe that’s the heart of the argument. People have so internalized the ideological myths of capitalism that they believe the poor deserve to be poor. If you don’t have $100, your game must suck, because if it didn’t, you’d already be rich (despite not having access to not only the biggest market, but also to a major source of legitimacy in the eyes of consumers and critics). More than that, you’re not even a game developer – like Calvinists or Social Darwinists, the entitled are certain that their entitlement means they are the chosen, superior few, and everyone else is doomed anyway.

If You Click This, It Will Play

I Don’t Know About This Kickstarter Thing, But These Projects Seem Pretty Cool

• Let's forget about a new Broken Sword and concentrate on Beneath a Steel Sky 2, folks.
• At PAX, I tried Zach Gage's oddball boardgame, Guts of Glory, and it's super fun.
• So long as we're on the physical games kick, why not make your refrigerator cooler, too?
• I know this isn't Kickstarter, but a biometric-enhanced horror game sounds...amazing.

Oh, And This Other Stuff

• Killscreen interviews the developers of the erotic game that kicked off Steam's big content changes.
• Apparently The Pirate Bay is moving into promoting video games now. First up, McPixel.
• I'm going to blame a slower Summer of Arcade on crappier Summer of Arcade games, actually.
• Yes, there is an entire community dedicated to the video game Babyz.
• If you aren't aware of the gross incident that happened at the Minecraft party, here's a refresher.
• Edge has filed a bunch of great retrospective interviews about Psygnosis.
• With a new Double Dragon on the horizon, Matt Leone tracks down the creator of the series.
• The full Rock Paper Shotgun interview about Ubisoft's DRM reversal is finally online.

I think the $100 fee is fine. Though I think maybe some kind of "free for all" section could be added.

My agreement with the 100$ steam green light fee is not one of entitlement. I still say it's not that bad, realizing (having a terrible paying job myself) the pros of it outweigh the cons. 
 
That's my opinion though. I'll read more of that article after work though. 

I was like 5 seconds from getting the first comment. I mad.

I am saving this for Sunday morning before football starts. Thanks, Patrick.

Instantly recognized that first .gif as the work of Paul Roberston. He has such a distinctive style.

So a Slender Man reference is enough to get into Worth Reading territory?

I'd rather have a $100 entry fee to Green Light and not have to wade through a tone of poorly made copies and the odd racist game to find the good stuff.

If it kept a genuinely good developer and game from making it, they can show what they got online. Maybe even Kickstart it. There's a lot of ways around this, but at the core, it keeps Green Light from being a cesspool of the crap I saw on it for the short time it was free.

Also about developers with personal stories about $100: http://www.merseyremakes.co.uk/gibber/2012/09/inconcievable/

Alright... I tried to finnish Amnesia. But altough I didn't think the game was all that scary, the night terrors were horrifying. Damned horror games.

@Video_Game_King: Neither tall nor slender.

@ThePaleKing:

But still terrifying in an other worldly sort of way.

Am I the only one who spent way too long just staring at that gif?

Next year when I go for the first time ever I'll fist bump you guys!

@CatsAkimbo: Specifically it's from the Scott Pilgrim XBL game right?

SOMETHING WORTH GRIEVING

Great list of end of week reading material as always. And another small shoutout =) Hope everyone has a nice weekend~ I know I will!

As Tales of Symphonia predates the invention of the Slender Man, and the "Gentleman" is a recurring monster in the series, this is a coincidence, on the level of the cover of Die Hard depicting 9/11. :P

The fact that it's a Slenderman reference is not what makes that Symphonia video interesting. It's the fact that Symphonia came out on 2004, yet Slenderman wasn't "invented" until 2009.

Perhaps what they say is true. That Slendy is an otherworldly being who has simply manipulated people into believing he is a man-made creation...

Everyone who can manage to play System Shock 2 , please play it . I almost missed this game , basically did. And was floored how great it was . It's basically Bioshock in space , with more RPG elements .The atmosphere is off the charts good... Best 1st person game I've ever played next to Metroid Prime .

Tried out EXO. Man, that was cool as shit. Barely any interactivity at all, but the music was really good, and the eye-candy-packed environments ranged from serene, to downright apocalyptic. Definitely worth a download.

Man, that Minecraft party story is seriously fucked up.

@Nigthguy: no. lol. shit is awesome

Someone probably already mentioned this, but that .gif is from Scott Pilgrim Vs. The World: The Game, Tricky. It has some amazing art by Paul Robertson.

I mean, I feel for the guys who are in the "inconceivable" situation, but is Steam really under some obligation to make its system accessible to everyone, no matter how edge a case it is? And are people really required to wade through dozens of shitty games so that everyone gets a chance to put up their game for free?

We're far more likely to miss out on good games that get lost in the murk that exists now then we are to miss out on some amazing game sitting on a hard drive made by a developer without the ability to put $100 together.

Playing EXO makes me feel like we need to get rid of this conception that interactive software has to be a game. I think I might actually hate games. Which is weird. I like stories that are presented in the medium an awful lot, though. Not really sure why, but I find them way more engaging than television and film.

Man. I just figured out that I hate video games. That's kind of an alarming realization.

' More than that, you’re not even a game developer – like Calvinists or Social Darwinists, the entitled are certain that their entitlement means they are the chosen, superior few, and everyone else is doomed anyway.'

If the dream of submitting a game for major distribution means that much to you, you'll make it work. Maybe it takes you a year to save the $100 dollars to get your game out there, but those are the breaks to getting a pretty amazing opportunity. The fact that we don't live in a perfect world, or that we're not game developers doesn't necessarily mean we're entitled assholes.

Gateways is a great game. I played it back when the developer released it on his website and I enjoyed it a lot. I'd recommend it to anybody who enjoys Metroidvania games.

@patrickklepek Yes, let's forget about the best series of the adventure game history. (that's Broken Sword, by the way)

The only person I didn't get a picture with of the participating Bomb crew was you Patrick. Quite unfortunate too. I will be sure to fix that next year.

If you don't have the 100 bucks to get your game onto Steam I'm pretty sure there are better things for you to spend your time on than working on an indie videogame that will in all probability never make you any money to begin with.

This reminds me, I really need to play The Sea Will Claim Everything.

Has anyone given it a go?

@Winternet said:

@patrickklepek Yes, let's forget about the best series of the adventure game history. (that's Broken Sword, by the way)

Don't worry, The Goat has got this covered...

Wow, reading the comments on the one hundred dollar question makes me really afraid for the state of reading comprehension. How can a blog entry that specifically states, "...I did not get angry at [Steam], and I'm still not angry at them," have so many long, angry comments about him being angry at steam.

@allodude: Yeah, too bad the game wasn't very fun to play :(

He's working on a new project that's about to be funded on kickstarter: http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/322438897/mercenary-kings

Let's see how many Gamasutra articles get linked this week... Just kidding Patrick, we still love you.

Not that I'm surprised in the slightest, but maybe you could toss a duder a warning when one of your trailers is unadorned gameplay from a super creepy horror game? Not all of us are super into reliving specific childhood nightmares :P

Hey Patrick Klepek, have you heard about the Homestuck Kickstarter? It's a game based on the universe created in a webcomic, and nobody's giving it much attention, even though the kickstarter has raised over 800,000 dollars.

Ryan is m.o.d.o.k. it's all coming together.

I loved the Double Dragon read linked to here. This game was there for me, both at home and in arcades as I was growing up. Always happy to take my money in exchange for a few moments of beat'em up ecstasy.

@TheGlitchmaster: If its already raised 870k as of this post (170k over the original goal) I'm not sure how much more attention it really needs.

Interesting Interesting...*reads minecreaft party story...what the fuck.

For anyone interested in space exploration i highly recommend Space Engine. Its a program made by a some amazing person in Russia that lets you explore our own Milky Way or other galaxies, real or randomly generated and manipulate time. Soundtrack: your own. Ambient music works well with it.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b_yRslpZLqM Its completely free.

@patrickklepek Thank you very much for that, great reads (readings?) !

Welp, time to start the yearly playthrough of Tales of Symphonia. Thaaaaaaaaaaaaanks Patrick.

Jonas Kyratzes has a very compelling argument. $100 is nothing to most people in America, but to those outside the US.

As someone who grew up in America and moved to a different country, I see this on a daily basis. $100 takes on a whole different meaning outside the US.

This article reminds me that Tales of Symphonia fucking rules. Can someone re-release that on modern consoles please?

If you don't have enough money to get onto Greenlight, how is that any different from before when the service wasn't there at all? Did these same critics of the fee sit around going "Why hasn't Valve offered us a free way to promote our game..."?

EXO looks pretty cool

I have a hard time feeling sorry for people with jobs who don't have money since i have a minimum wage job, it sucks sure, but i live a healthy lifestyle. If i felt the need to develop my own game i'd have 8 hours a day after work + weekends to spend on it, and paying that $100 isn't a huge ask but there's another question.
 
Why would you put your small unknown game on Steam to be voted for if nobody knows what it is? Isn't your time and money better spent trying to build a fanbase for it?
I can't vote for it if i don't know it exists.