#oneaday, Day 319: Report This Post, It Contains Opinion

There is an increasingly popular—and increasingly worrying—tendency for games journalism and writing about games (which some people are keen to point out are two different things) to be judged as "broken" or "lame".

On paper, you can perhaps understand why this is. Gaming is one of the most popular subjects for wannabe writers to pebble-dash the Internet with, and there are so many people out there who want to do it "professionally" that a good 90% (I made that up) of gaming-focused sites out there can't even pay their writers, however awesome they are. As such, there is a lot of crap out there, but it's generally quite easy to spot, and there's certainly no need for sites like this.

Fellow #oneaday-er and all-round lovely grumpy chap Ian Dransfield of Play Magazine wrote an impassioned rant on this subject. I highly recommend you go and read it. Now. Go on.

I agree with the Dransfield. No kind of journalism should be homogenised, automaton-written garbage. It should have scope for individual opinion and comment, and certain outlets should have the opportunity to develop distinctive "voices" on the matter. It's worked for our newspapers for years, after all—for all the shit everyone gives the Daily Mail about their bizarre and often misguided opinions, at least they stick to their guns. Similarly, were the Daily Express ever to write about anything other than Princess Diana, the nation would be in uproar.

One of the things that bugs me most about today's games journalism is the plague that is N4G. For the uninitiated, N4G is a community-driven news-aggregation service. Community members may post articles to a "pending" queue, and they then have to get ten "approvals" in order to show up in the main news feed.

Fair enough, you might say. It separates the wheat from the chaff, surely. And surely the people who have approval rights must all be published professionals, right?

Wrong. Anyone can submit any page to N4G with no requirement that the article be your own. Get three articles approved by the community (a simple case of rounding up ten Twitter/Facebook friends to help you) and voila—approval rights. This then means that your opinion has as much weight as someone who's been doing the job for fifteen years.

This may still not sound unreasonable. So let me show you the drop-down menu of options available for "reporting" an article if you believe it to be "inappropriate":

Yes, you have read that correctly; one of the options for reporting an article as unworthy of appearing in the N4G news feed is that it is "lame".

N4G is seen as a primary means of promoting games-related articles, and sure enough, it does seem to generate a lot of hits for sites, so I can't fault those people who do take advantage of it to get more readers to their sites—fair play to you. I can say with some honesty, though, that I have never used it as a place to go to find out the latest news. The whole thing is too chaotic, too run by people who write comments after reading only the headline and not the article and—ugh—it makes me mad, I tellsya. I can't take it seriously in the slightest.

My main issue with it is one of the things Dransfield points out in his article: who are these people to say what is and is not "relevant"? What gives them the right to brand something as "lame" simply because it doesn't have "HALO IS A REALLY COOL GUY" in the headline? What gives them the right to ignore a supposed "duplicate article" on a subject which offers some opinion or additional facts over and above what has already been written first, in haste?

Absolutely nothing. Traditional news outlets and even longer-established specialist press (such as publications for music and films) aren't held to account in the same way. But games journalism, being a younger industry, seems to be held to entirely different standards, and judged unnecessarily harshly. There is a lot of negativity surrounding the games press, and not enough positivity. Trolling and flame wars are particularly prevalent on articles about games, and platform-specific articles seem to bring out the very worst in the community.

Here's food for thought then: in a world where we're so concerned about free speech a goodly proportion of the Twitter population in the UK (and beyond) is supporting the legal fees of someone they've never met, why are we so harsh on this particular breed of writers? Why shouldn't they be able to write what they feel, rather than what will "get hits"?

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#oneaday, Day 318: One Day in Gameland

In discussing Deadly… I mean DEADLY PREMONITION with a couple of others recently, we came to the conclusion that the universe of games has such a distinct logic, such a distinct culture, that you could probably write an entire treatise on the culture, physics, metaphysics and theology of Game-Land.

I will settle for one blog post.

When you wake up in the morning, any and all injuries, however serious, will be completely healed, unless you make your home in a post-apocalyptic wasteland, in which case you will either need to give yourself an injection in the affected limb or visit a doctor, who will be able to heal absolutely any injury and make you completely intact within a matter of minutes.
If there is food on a shelf, pick it up. No-one but you needs to eat.
By extension, eating food also heals injuries, unless you're in Greenvale.
If you're in Greenvale, no-one gives you a second glance if you're standing in the middle of the road chugging back a can of Hollandaise sauce followed by wolfing down a turkey sandwich which cost $75.
People only open doors if they absolutely have to and frequently just walk through them instead. This includes you. If you were planning on going outside, open the door, wait for 30 seconds, then step outside. Otherwise there will be nothing to walk into and you'll simply fall into the void, never to be heard from again.
You can survive approximately 1.5 point-blank shotgun blasts directly to your face without permanent disfigurement.
In fact, you can survive any injury without permanent disfigurement.
If something "really important" is about to happen, no-one will mind if you do something else—anything between popping out to shop for some groceries to going on holiday to the other side of the world. The "really important thing" will still be "about to happen" when you get back. Enjoy yourself for a while.
After completing a repetitive task such as stuffing envelopes or chopping onions, you will notice yourself getting noticeably better at said task at increasingly-longer but predictable intervals.
Chop 200 onions in a row without hurting yourself for a special prize!
Sometimes when you talk to people you will have to read something they've written on a piece of semi-transparent plastic while they flail their arms around like a Thunderbird.
Occasionally, people will sound like they are speaking Japanese at you, but the semi-transparent piece of plastic will have English writing on it.
All shops you visit will sell exactly four items in an extremely niche category, but will purchase anything you have in your pockets/backpack/suitcase/on the back of your pack mule.
On that note, you will own a backpack which is capable of holding twenty suits of armour, four hundred weapons of different varieties and up to 99 bottles of each and every liquid you find. This backpack is invisible.
You will never, ever need to go to the toilet, even if you have drunk all 99 bottles of one particular liquid, unless 1) you feel like you are being forced by a giant green diamond above your head to do things in your own home that you probably would have done anyway, 2) your son has been kidnapped or 3) you know, or are about to come into contact with, someone whose son has been kidnapped.
Anything red will heal all your injuries if you imbibe it somehow.
Anything blue will make you less tired if you imbibe it somehow.
People with long white hair are always evil, even if they seem to be quite nice chaps.
People with short white hair are often sullen, but good people.
People with spiky hair or who are bald are probably on the way to save the world, especially if they are carrying a sword and/or a gun. Be nice to them.
Be careful when stacking shelves: lining up three or more of the same thing in a row always causes them to disappear. Stack tins of soup in a checkerboard pattern to prevent this from happening.
Pick up every flower, bird feather, human-looking bone or flag that you see: there will be someone somewhere in your neighbourhood who will give you "something good" if you bring them enough.
Having a conversation with someone doesn't require any actual interaction on your part. Just bump into them and they'll tell you something about the nearby caves, forest and/or the local big corporation.
Talking to yourself is absolutely fine. You may either do this by voicing your internal monologue, especially when looking closely at inanimate objects, or keeping a semi-transparent piece of plastic and a marker pen in your invisible backpack at all times.

Sounds like a simple life, doesn't it? Ah, if only we could apply game logic to the real world sometimes…

#oneaday, Day 316: Pity The Poor Shopkeeper

The poor shopkeeper doesn't have it easy, whatever form they take. If they're a retail monkey working for minimum wage in some sweaty hell-hole where chavs repeatedly come up and ask if the nearly-black garment they have in their hands is available in black, then they're probably losing the will to live by the second. If they're working in a, shall we say, "premium" retail environment they're probably having a better time but rapidly growing sick of the fixed grins they're forced to wear, not to mention the stock phrases that spew forth from their mouths like some form of verbal effluvia.

And then there's the poor, downtrodden RPG merchant, forced to sell all manner of crap, apparently only to adventurers, who then helpfully restock them with an endless supply of boar intestines, bits of wood, crystal chippings and used swords that they don't need any more. It must be a difficult life. And frequently a tedious one, as anyone who entered the online world of Ultima Online with lofty ambitions of owning a huge retail empire will attest.

It's this odd premise that quirky Japanese indie game Recettear: An Item Shop's Tale (available on Steam, as well as directly from the distributor's website) decides to explore in great depth. Playing the role of Recette, an adorable young girl with an absentee father, it's the player's job to help her run a successful RPG item store and make enough money to pay off the debt her father left her with. She's not in it alone, of course. She has a fairy assistant named Tear. Tear works for the financial institution with which Recette's father took out the loan, "because fairies are good at administration" and is there to help Recette pay off the debt she's been saddled with. The two become friends quickly, but should Recette be unable to make any of the weekly payments she's required to, Tear will quickly repossess her house and leave the poor girl living in a box.

So far, so Animal Crossing, you might say. And you'd kind of be right. Except not. There really isn't another game quite like Recettear out there. There are games which focus on individual elements of the game, sure. But none which blend together such peculiar and diverse elements with such successful results.

The game is split into three main sections. Firstly, there's the item shop itself. Recette can dump anything from her inventory onto the shelves in the store. Stuff in the window is likely to attract customers. If she chooses to open the shop, she has to deal with a flow of customers coming in and asking for things. If they're on display, all she has to do is agree a suitable price with the customer. If they agree, cha-ching. If they disagree, Recette has one chance to make a more reasonable offer before they leave.

Simple enough. As the game progresses, though, more elements are added to this formula. For starters, in true RPG tradition, people start selling stuff to Recette, too. This can be a good way for her to build up stock, as she can often get stuff for knock-down prices with a bit of shrewd haggling. Then people will place special orders, requesting that she deliver, say, three hats in two days' time. Recette has to not only make sure she has the hats in stock but also remember to have the store open when the customer plans to return. And finally, some customers will come in not quite sure of what they want, and Recette will have to make recommendations from the stock she has on display and in her inventory.

It's a straightforward mechanic, and you soon get to know how much certain customers are willing to pay over base prices. A few twists come in later with a news ticker informing Recette of increased or decreased prices in the market, but it's mostly a case of buy low, sell high.

If Recette chooses to leave the store, she can wander around town and occasionally bump into the people who frequent her store. These come in the form of random townsfolk and adventurers. Completing requests for adventurers will sometimes net her their Guild Card, which enables her to make use of them for expeditions to the local dungeons.

Yes, there are dungeons. Because sometimes the local markets just don't have the things people want to buy. When that's the case, Recette is free to pop down to the local Adventurers' Guild and hire one of the guildies she's made friends with. It's then into an action-RPG dungeon crawler to kick monster booty and gather lots of crap that people might want to buy.

It works, brilliantly well. The item shop stuff occurs quickly enough that it never gets tiresome. The storytelling scenes feature attractive artwork and a truly excellent localisation from the Japanese. And the dungeon-crawling, while simplistic, is fun and satisfying, broken up by regular boss battles and in-dungeon special events.

The whole game is distinctly adorable, but deceptive. The artwork, music and squeaky-voiced Japanese girls make it look like something which should be incredibly embarrassing and cringeworthy to play. But in fact, there's a distinctly acidic sense of humour underneath all the sweetness, and a large number of the dialogue exchanges are genuinely laugh-out-loud funny. The kawaii presentation coupled with fairly sophisticated, intelligent humour and a wonderfully self-aware nature reminds me a lot of the Disgaea series.

I'm probably about halfway through the game now, having made two of Recette's repayments successfully. There's the hints of a bigger plot at work, and a bunch of new characters have been introduced, most of whom will presumably end up being playable adventurers for the dungeoneering sections.

If you're after something that is both comfortably familiar and quite different to any JRPG you've ever played, then Recettear: An Item Shop's Tale is well worth checking out. I fully intend on posting a full review somewhere once I've beaten it.

#oneaday, Day 314: In Which I Spoil The Crap Out Of DEADLY PREMONITION

I beat DEADLY PREMONITION tonight and made the confident announcement that it was, barring any last-minute wonders, very much my Game of the Year for 2010. It won't be everyone's Game of the Year for 2010 by any means, for various reasons. But personally speaking, it's very much the most satisfying gaming experience I've had all year. Which is nice.

Throughout the course of this post, I am going to spoil the crap out of the game, so if you haven't beaten it and are intending to, you may wish to skip this one. If you have no intention of beating the game, feel free to stick around. And if you have beaten the game, you're probably in a similar position to me right now.

I can pin down DEADLY PREMONITION's appeal to me on a personal level very simply. It takes elements from two of my favourite game series of all time—Silent Hill and Persona—and blends them together to produce a game which skitters precariously along the boundary between madness and sanity and somehow doesn't ever completely fall into the trap of "indecipherable nonsense".

First, the Persona angle. DEADLY PREMONITION's world of the town of Greenvale is a well-realised one. As you progress through the game, you get to know the layout of the town and the routines of its residents. You also get to know each and every one of the residents throughout the course of the story. If you choose to take on the 50 "side missions", then you get to know many of the characters very well indeed. This is just like Persona's Social Link system: optional material which fleshes out the game world and its characters enormously. If you take your time to enjoy this material, then events which occur later in the story take on much greater emotional significance as you really "know" the people concerned. It also means that when the time finally comes to say goodbye to Greenvale at the end of the game, it's a difficult thing to do.

Next, the Silent Hill angle. It becomes very apparent early in the game that protagonist Francis York Morgan is not all he seems. For starters, he spends a huge amount of his time conversing with someone you can't see named Zach. For much of the game, it seems that "Zach" is a cypher through which York can communicate directly with the player. Indeed, it certainly seems that way when York asks a question of Zach and it's up to the player to choose Zach's response.

But the wonderful thing about DEADLY PREMONITION's story is that we get to know York very well as the narrative progresses. It becomes apparent that he is scarred mentally by something terrible which happened in his past—his father killing his mother, and then himself. As the investigation into the murders in Greenvale proceeds, it becomes apparent to York why this incident took place. He accepts why his father did it when he is put into the exact same situation—the person he loves is "soiled" with the red seeds the murderer is so obsessed with. With this acceptance, York also admits who he really is—he is Zach, and York is the dual personality he invented to deal with the situation, not the other way around.

York's mental scars show themselves in other ways, too—any time he begins profiling the killer and tracking down clues with which to determine what happened, he lapses into a dark "Other World", much like Dark Silent Hill. It's never explained exactly why this happens, but my belief upon beating the game is that the things seen as York and Zach aren't to be taken literally. We can tell this by the fact that Zach fights a giant, monstrous version of Kaysen at the end of the game as the town's iconic clock tower lies in ruins, yet when everything gets back to "normal", the clock tower is perfectly intact. Similarly, after fighting George as a giant, muscular "immortal" monster, he dies as a normal man. My guess is that York and Zach view these monstrous people simply as monsters, perhaps to distance him/themself from their "humanity". This is also borne out by the fact that when York visits Diane's art gallery with George and Emily and Greenvale apparently becomes "Other Greenvale", they don't comment on it at all—because they don't see it.

Of course, a question is raised when Emily has to rescue York from the clock tower—she sees the Other World and the creatures. Why? Is it because she has come to understand and love York and is seeing things the way he does? Perhaps. The fact that this isn't explained may be unsatisfying to some people, but I like the fact that there are some questions which are open to interpretation.

I could be wrong about all of this, of course. I'm sure there's plenty of interpretations all over the web by now—I haven't looked at them yet. But the fact that a game offers such scope for discussion and interpretation is admirable.

Deep part over. Let's also talk about some of the quirky things that make DEADLY PREMONITION such a memorable game. For one, the music. There are several points throughout the game where the only rational explanation for the choice of music is to be as inappropriate as possible. Take, for example, Emily following the dog Willie to track down the missing York. This sequence is accompanied by what can only be described as Latino J-hip-hop-electronica. Somehow it works.

By far the most striking use of bizarre music, though, is a flashback sequence where the player controls the Raincoat Killer, who is running through the town of Greenvale slaughtering anyone who gets in his way with a gigantic axe. The musical accompaniment to this scene? A really quite beautiful version of Amazing Grace. The juxtaposition between the music and the horrors taking place on screen actually ends up being profoundly emotional, and sets the tone for the last part of the game, which is a veritable rollercoaster of drama and emotion.

I think my favourite thing, though, is that despite the fact the game appears to be a horror/crime story, there's a convincing love story element to it, too. The growing feelings between York (or, specifically, Zach) and Emily throughout the course of the game is handled incredibly well. The love story reaches its peak just as Emily is killed, making what could have been a ridiculous scene—she pulls a whole tree out of her stomach, for heaven's sake—one with considerable impact and shock value, and one which spurs the player, York and Zach on to see the whole debacle through to its conclusion. It's also refreshing to see a game which isn't afraid to end some of its story threads in tragedy for principal characters.

I could rabbit on about this game for hours, but at a little over 1,000 words I'll end that there. Several members of The Squadron of Shame are interested in recording a special DEADLY PREMONITION podcast at some point. If you've beaten it and you're interested in joining us for some discussion (I'm looking at you, Raze, Schilling) then let me know and perhaps you can be a special guest. You can also drop by the Squawkbox and share your thoughts there, too.

So with that, then, it's back to Fallout: New Vegas as the next entry in the Pile of Shame, I believe I said.

#oneaday, Day 313: The Pile of Shame, November 2010 Edition

We're coming up on holiday season. If you're American, it's already started with Thanksgiving. And you know what that means if you're a gamer: Steam sales.

Steam sales are terrible, awful things in the most wonderful way imaginable. Top quality games up to 90% off their regular price. Bundles of games a fraction of the cost of their individual components. And, of course, the resignation to the fact that your Pile of Shame will inevitably be getting bigger, because after all, you'd be stupid not to purchase these games while they're so cheap, right?

Right. Glad we're on the same page. With that in mind, and with my broke-and-unemployed status in mind, I thought I would attempt to list my current Pile(s) of Shame in an attempt to convince me that I don't really need Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood, despite the fact that I'd very much like to play the multiplayer with the Squadron of Shame.

All right. Here goes. Let's start with the least-depressing part of the list:

Games I'm Currently Playing And Intend To Finish Before Playing Or Buying Anything Else, Dammit

Deadly Premonition (Xbox 360) – fantastic game, and contender for Game of the Year 2010 in my eyes. Definite contender for "most memorable protagonist of all time" and "best ensemble cast". And "worst use of next-gen graphics technology", but that's really not the issue here.

Need for Speed: Hot Pursuit (Xbox 360) – one of the most entertaining driving games I've ever played, and looking likely to be the second driving game I ever beat, after Split/Second. I would beat this much quicker if the stupid Autolog "YOUR FRIEND BEAT YOU BY 0.02 SECONDS! DON'T YOU THINK YOU SHOULD GO AND BEAT THEM?!" thing wasn't in place… but that's part of the fun.

Pac-Man Championship Edition DX (Xbox 360) – You can't "finish" this, unless you give up on it after getting all the Achievements, which you will do after approximately 30 minutes of play. But it's worth noting that this is perhaps the perfect retro reimagining. It's Pac-Man, but not Pac-Man. It has the perfect blend of frantic gameplay coupled with some modes that actually force you to think quite a bit.

Games I Stopped Playing When I Got Deadly Premonition But Intend To Go Back To When I've Finished Deadly Premonition, Dammit

Fallout: New Vegas (Xbox 360) – Controversial to some, but I was enjoying this a bunch more than Fallout 3. I'm a particular fan of how much the main quest appears to branch.

Castlevania: Lords of Shadow (PS3) – Epic is not the word. A stunning soundtrack and the most gorgeous graphics I've seen since Uncharted 2. Looking forward to getting back into this one.

Games I Think I Should Probably Play At Some Point But Don't Own, Dammit

Assassin's Creed, Assassin's Creed II, Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood – I played a bit of the first one and enjoyed it, but traded it in when something better came out, as I recall. I'd like to go back to it and play through the whole series, up to and including Brotherhood. The multiplayer in Brotherhood is a lot of fun, for sure.

The Mario Galaxy series – I have not played a mainline Mario game since Sunshine, which I didn't like much. I hear the two Galaxies are rather good, though.

Games I'm Not Sure If I Want But Think I Might At Some Point, Maybe When They're A Bit Cheaper, Like After Christmas, Dammit

Gran Turismo 5 (PS3) – I said on Twitter yesterday that I probably wouldn't bother with this, but I've since watched a few videos and read a few bits and pieces and it sounds potentially interesting, if a bit flawed in its current state. I like cars, too, though I don't know anything about gear ratios and whatnot, apart from the fact my friend Woody and I once got some Mitsubishi thing up to over 300km/h in the original Gran Turismo by playing with gear ratios and not really knowing what we were doing.

Fable III (Xbox 360) – I really enjoyed Fable II, late to the party as I was, and I was impressed with Fable III's initial showing at the Eurogamer Expo. But reports of it have been far too mixed for my liking, coupled with the fact that you can exploit the game's main "moral dilemma" by simply leaving your console turned on overnight for a couple of days. Still, I like the voice cast, I like the concept and I do like the Fable world, so perhaps I'll come to this one very late like I did with Fable II.

And now, the main event(s). I'm going to split this into several lists to be less depressing.

Games I Own And Haven't Played At All Yet And Feel A Bit Bad About, Dammit

Steam

And Yet It Moves
Gish
HeXen II
Jade Empire
Jolly Rover
King's Bounty: The Legend
Multiwinia
Puzzle Agent
Recettear: An Item Shop's Tale
Sam & Max 105, 106, 201, 202, 203, 204, 205
Time Gentlemen, Please!
Unreal II
Unreal Tournament 2004
Unreal Tournament 3
X-COM: Terror from the Deep
X-COM: Apocalypse

Console

killer7 (PS2)
Resident Evil 4 (PS2)
Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater (PS2)

Games I Have Played Before (Maybe A Few Times) And Enjoyed, And Intend To Go Back And Finish Sometime (Probably Restarting From The Beginning… Again) Because They Were Rather Good, Really, Dammit

Steam/PC

Aquaria
Darwinia
The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind
King's Bounty: Armored Princess
Left 4 Dead
Left 4 Dead 2
Mount & Blade
Peggle Nights
Plants vs Zombies
Torchlight
TrackMania United
Trials 2
Unreal Gold
Vampire: Bloodlines
The Witcher
World of Goo
X-COM: UFO Defense
Baldur's Gate II
Icewind Dale
Ghost Master
Realms of Arkania
Myst
Riven
URU
Martian Memorandum
Mean Streets

Handhelds

Professor Layton and the Curious Village (DS)
Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories (GBA)
R-Type Command (PSP)
Ratchet and Clank: I Forgot The Subtitle (PSP)
Final Fantasy Tactics (PSP, though I have beaten the PS1 version)

Xbox LIVE Arcade

Castle Crashers
Lode Runner
Peggle
Perfect Dark
Puzzle Quest
Rocket Riot
Shadow Complex
Splosion Man
Super Meat Boy

Consoles

ICO (PS2)
Shadow of the Colossus (PS2)
Project Zero (aka Fatal Frame, PS2)
Psi-Ops: The Mindgate Conspiracy (PS2)
Persona 3: FES (PS2)
Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas (PS2)
Final Fantasy XII (PS2)
Darksiders (PS3)
Final Fantasy XIII (PS3)
3D Dot Game Heroes (PS3)
Silent Hill: Shattered Memories (Wii)
Zak and Wiki Make A Porno… wait, that's not right, whatever it was called (Wii)
Demon's Souls (PS3)
Disgaea 3 (aka The Game I Always Forget I Actually Own, PS3)

Games I Own But Will Probably Never Finish Even If I Kept Playing Them Non-Stop Until The End Of Time, Either Because Of Immense Difficulty Or Sheer Volume Of Content Therein But I'm Still Glad I Played Them, Dammit

Alien Hominid HD (XBLA, difficulty)
Braid (XBLA, difficulty, overratedness)
Forza 3 (Xbox 360, volume of content)
Trials 2: SE (Steam, difficulty)

Games I Own And Have Finished But Would Like To Go Back And Replay Or 100% Or Achievement Whore Them, Dammit

Dragon Age: Origins (Xbox 360, would like to play Awakening too)
Bayonetta (Xbox 360)
Canis Canem Edit/Bully (PS2, though I'd like to try the Xbox 360 version)
Persona 4 (PS2)
Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic (Steam)
Gabriel Knight: Sins of the Fathers (PC)

Sooo… maybe I don't need to play the Assassin's Creed series just yet, huh.

#oneaday, Day 312: Quest Complete: C25K

I've been somewhat short of what one might call "victories" recently. In fact, most of my endeavours for the last I-don't-know-how-long-now have ended in what could politely be called failure. As such, I've been in a bit of a funk recently, getting very tired of… well, everything, really.

So when an actual, genuine, bona fide victory-slash-achievement rears its head, by golly I'm going to celebrate it.

Tonight I completed the nine week Couch 2 5K running programme, introduced to me by one Mr Calin Grajko, who is a really cool guy and, I have it on good authority, doesn't afraid of anything. I've mentioned this a few times previously, but for those of you who can't be bothered to look back a few entries, have joined me recently or who are having trouble finding exactly what you want using the search box (which is fine by me), let me explain.

Over the course of nine weeks, you go from being someone who "can't run" to someone who, well, can. The first week begins with you running for a minute at a time, then walking for 90 seconds, then repeating this process several times. Each week ups the ante somewhat until you reach the final week when, in theory, you should be able to run for 30 minutes at a time without stopping.

When I started the programme, I seriously doubted that I'd ever be able to do more than a couple of minutes at a time. I deliberately hadn't looked at what horrors the end of the programme had to offer because I figured the system shock would just put me off and demotivate me. So it was a genuine surprise each week to find out what I'd be doing. It was a big surprise in the last few weeks when the jumps started getting bigger.

But I'm pleased to announce that I can now run for 30 minutes without stopping. It's not easy, sure, and I'm not quite at that elusive 5K distance just yet (not far off, though—my best distance in 30 minutes is 2.99 miles, just under the 3.1 miles that roughly equates to a 5K) but I figure I can get there with a bit more training. Tonight, I felt a noticeable increase in my speed, for example, though that disappeared with the hilly bits towards the end of tonight's run.

The important thing with any exercise regime is motivation, and making sure you keep this motivation flowing in both the short and long term. By "short term", I mean "while you're doing your exercise", and by "long term" I mean "the duration of the programme and beyond".

Through this programme, I think I've got both of those things pretty comfortably sorted. The long-term motivation is handled nicely by the programme itself—making constant, regular, measurable progress is motivation in and of itself. Plus telling friends that you've completed week whatever-it-is is something you can genuinely take pride in, particularly if your friends are appreciative of what you've been trying to do.

The short-term motivation—keeping going while in the middle of a session—can be harder. If you run out of energy, you run out of energy. Part of this is about pacing yourself, but it's also about not getting too bored of what you're doing as well.

As such, I have made sure to have some banging playlists on my iPhone while out on my running sessions, matched reasonably well-ish with the timings of each session. Me being me, these songs have mostly fallen into the video game soundtrack category. Conveniently, though, the generally regular tempo and "inspiring" nature of a lot of game music makes it entirely appropriate for use in exercising. So without further pontificating on the philosophy of exercise (there are plenty of people out there who can comment on it with much more authority than I) I will share with you my playlist for tonight's run. iPhone users, tap the song titles to play the tunes. Everyone else, you should have a fancy-pants Flash player to play each song with.

Warm-Up: The Elite (from Split/Second)

The Split/Second soundtrack was a fixture on my playlists. For the first few weeks, my playlist consisted solely of the Split/Second soundtrack. Because it's awesome. And free. But this song in particular was an excellent warm-up track because it builds up a bit at a time. There's also a spooky bit in the middle with jangly guitars that is great when you're going out at night-time. During this piece, I was doing my 5-minute walk as a warmup for the main event.

Get Ready: Operation Briefing (from Trauma Center: Second Opinion)

The sole reason this song is in there is so that the woman on the GetRunning app which gives verbal coaching for the C25K programme has something unnecessarily dramatic to talk over while she's briefing you about how long you'll be running for. Timing the start of playback perfectly will mean that you start running with the next piece, which is…

Go!: Friend (from Bayonetta)

If you've never played Bayonetta, know that it's a study in glorious excess. SPOILER: There is a bit where you ride a motorbike up a rocket into space in order to go and rescue the titular Bayonetta, who has gotten herself trapped in the crystalline eye of God, who happens to be a large female statue that is more than a bit pissed off. This music is from that bit. And it's awesome. It's also perfect music to get you pumped up and moving. The tempo is a good pace for running to.

Jenova Returns (from Final Fantasy VII, OCRemix album)

And so begins a set of Final Fantasy VII pieces, or more specifically some awesome remixes by the immensely talented community at OCRemix. When this piece gets all dramatic in the middle, I was just hitting my stride tonight. Which was good.

Beginning of the End (from Final Fantasy VII, OCRemix album)

This is one of my favourite pieces from FFVII. The original version always used to get my pulse racing as the final battle with Sephiroth began. Used at this point in the playlist, I was just starting to feel the proverbial "burn" a bit, and the overdramatic nature of it helped push me through.

Black Wing Metamorphosis (from Final Fantasy VII, OCRemix album)

This is a great, creative remix of the song that everyone knows from FFVII—the final boss theme, One Winged Angel. Bad-ass choirs and screaming guitars? That sounds like motivation to me.

Final Battle: Opportunity (from Skies of Arcadia)

You may be spotting something of a pattern with these pieces. Since it was my last run, I figured I'd make it something of an "occasion" with some ridiculously overdramatic music. The Skies of Arcadia final boss theme is neat because it starts ominous, threatening and dramatic and turns triumphant and victorious by the end. In-game, these changes happened according to how well the battle was going, so you could tell aurally when you were winning. Knowing this sent me subconscious signals that I was on the home straight.

Possibly.

Panic Attack (by Dream Theater)

I loved this song ever since I first encountered it in Rock Band 2, where it gave my fingers something of a workout. And cramp. It's also, like, deep and stuff, cause I can, like, totally relate to the lyrics and whatnot, yeah?

In an exercise sense, it's fast, gets the adrenaline flowing and has the line "rapid heartbeat pounding in my chest" in the middle of it. So it's, like, appropriate.

Of course, it also has the line "I am terrified, so afraid to die" in it. Which, depending on your fitness level, may also be appropriate.

Navras (from The Matrix Revolutions)

Ever since I first heard this piece, I thought it would be an awesome accompaniment to some sort of final battle. In fact, a variation on this piece called Neodämmerung is used in the final battle with Mr Smith in The Matrix Revolutions. This piece, to my mind, though, is superior and is only used in the end credits.

So why not have this piece as the grand finale to the nine-week push? Why not indeed. Conveniently, my 30 minutes were up just as it got to the slow bit in the middle, so I got to cool down to some trippy floaty ethnic-sounding warbling. Which was nice.

So, in summary, then? Keep your motivation up (possibly through the use of some banging tunes) and you can achieve whatever goal you want. I've achieved one, which is something of a relief after so many things that have gone wrong over the last couple of years.

Now, just another 50-something posts to go to achieve another goal…

#oneaday, Day 311: Monstrosities of the Indie Marketplace

As I have mentioned once or twice previously, the Xbox LIVE Indie Games Marketplace is a veritable treasure-trove of unappreciated hidden gems of gaming.

It's also an uncleaned litter tray of some of the worst fecal matter you'll ever have the misfortune to play. Still, all credit to those developers for actually finishing a project and getting out there for the public to at least try out. And if they sell just one "pity copy", then they can call themselves a professional game developer.

Even if their game is one of the following, which I have exhaustively researched (well, played the trials of) in order to bring you today's blog post, featuring the very worst the Indie Marketplace has to offer.

Well, perhaps not the very worst. I was highly scientific in the games I chose: I picked the ones with the ugliest or cheesiest cover art on the marketplace or, in one case, the most hilarious title. And here are my results.

Spring Break in Zombie USA

This game promises "action" and "driving". In practice, it's a twin-stick shooter where you have to press a fire button as well as move the right-stick, and occasionally you jump into a car and drive up a vertically-scrolling road that is completely straight with no obstacles on it whatsoever.

The concept is that you are racing down to Spring Break to rescue your sister, who has, as these things tend to go, got stuck in a zombie apocalypse. It's up to you, as either a long-haired rocker dude or a pimped-out black guy with a bitchin' hat (presumably it's an adoptive sister to one or both of them) to shoot lots of MS Paint zombies that take entirely too many bullets to take down and move too fast for you to be able to escape or kill them before they "get" you.

Oh well. At least the soundtrack is actually reasonably good, at least on the title screen.

Pie Collect

The title of this one is extremely literal. You play a small orb known as a "sweeper", whose job it is to collect pies, which are inexplicably floating in space. Collecting a pie releases an evil orb, which moves back and forth or up and down across the screen. There are a few powerups, but you only have one life.

It has a certain Crystal Quest-esque charm about it, but any challenge in the game is entirely negated by the "safe zone" at the bottom of the screen, represented by a picnic blanked that is also inexplicably floating in space, and allows you to safely navigate around all the orbs, putting you at minimal risk.

A Game you can't BEAT!!

Erratic capitalisation is as the game represents itself on the Marketplace. This is essentially one of those Impossible Game-style things where you control some sort of inanimate object/shape and have to jump and not die. In this case, you control one of three different balls, and there is a simultaneous two-player mode.

It's extremely difficult but there is little to no incentive to try again, though there are a few quasi-Achievement medals to chase in the full version. But when the "Easy course" repeatedly kills you after approximately eight seconds every time, that's just taking difficulty a little too far.

Valet Parking, Inc.

This one wins the "cheesiest artwork" award, with a girl in a "sexy parking attendant" costume on the cover art who clearly has nothing to do with the game whatsoever beside a rough association with the theme of the game, which is parking cars.

It's actually a moderately-interesting idea for a game. Cars show up, you park them wherever you like, keep an eye on the clock and give them back to appropriately-coloured customers when they return. You also have "hunger" and "stamina" meters that gradually deplete as you run around and spend time doing your job, so you have to take a break every so often.

Trouble is, the cars handle really weirdly. They seem to rotate around their back wheels, which makes controlling them somewhat troublesome. They also have a weird acceleration curve that goes "slow… slow… slow… SUDDENLY FAST"

The graphics are entertainingly mid-90s pre-rendered, too. And the in-game clock can't handle times that have "00" as the minutes value, so the clock moves from "12:59" straight to "13:01", for example.

Still, with a bit of polish this could actually be a moderately fun "time management" game. You can tell it's the best by the fact I've written more than two paragraphs on it.

Super Janitoroid

Obviously intended to be some sort of Super Metroid spoof, this game stars an Aussie janitor represented by a crudely-drawn body with a digitised head atop it. He is armed with a badly-drawn mop which can attack horizontally and vertically, and there's a large map to explore in a Metroid stylee.

It also has one of the most horrendously awful frame rates I've ever seen on an Xbox 360 game, which makes your eyes go squiffy after a while. Assuming they haven't already gone squiffy from the bizarre graphics.

Techno Kitten Adventure

Save the best for last. Techno Kitten Adventure is a single-button game in which you control a kitten with a jetpack as it attempts to fly around a series of box-shaped obstacles.

The twist with this game is the horrendously awful Euro-dance soundtrack which is annoyingly catchy. This fact is made even worse by the titter-inducing fact that the background animates according to the lyrics of the song, featuring rainbows flowing past, falling stars, throbbing techno laser light shows and lots and lots of flashing lights.

This game is worth playing purely to see its hilarious "interactive music video" nature. Thankfully, you don't actually have to play it, as the song and background animation continue even while you're waiting at the "press A to start" screen, meaning you can watch the whole thing without having to purchase the game. Which is probably for the best.

—

So there you go. I've played those games so you don't have to. I hope you appreciate the sacrifices that I've made for you. And you really should play Techno Kitten Adventure to appreciate its horrendous…ness.

I'm trying not to be too harsh on these games, though. Because the thing is, I couldn't make something half as good as Techno Kitten Adventure. I wouldn't know where to start with programming for the 360. So, as bizarre and, in some cases, awful as these games are, you should at least give the developers some props for getting out there, trying to make something and having the guts to release it to the world so people like me can rip them to shreds on blogs they'll never read.

So fair play, guys. I'm sure it's all good practice.

#oneaday, Day 306: Need for Speed

My brother was good enough to send me a copy of the new Need for Speed: Hot Pursuit. It arrived this morning and I've spent a fair amount of time putting it through its paces today. I shall now share my thoughts for the benefit of those of you considering it.

In very simple terms, it can be described as "Burnout with real cars". This is not in the slightest bit surprising, given developer Criterion's history. But this is through-and-through a Burnout game, right down to the ways you earn boost and the cinematic "crash camera". And not a Burnout Paradise interpretation of Burnout, either. Because although I loved that game, as did some of my friends, there are plenty of people out there who didn't like it much, either, for various reasons.

Hot Pursuit returns to the roots of both the Need for Speed and the Burnout series, in that it is about driving impossibly-expensive and shiny cars through a variety of circuits in an effort to Be The Fastest Mo-Fo In The World. There's no tacked-on story (besides the fact that the cops have outfitted themselves with some seriously heavy-duty automotive hardware) and no unnecessary fluff—it's just a map screen, a series of events and a bunch of cars to unlock gradually according to your progress. Those who did enjoy the free-roaming nature of past Need for Speed games as well as Burnout Paradise are free to drive around the sprawling game world as they please to find events, but those who prefer kicking it old-school can just select events from a map. Best of both worlds. You have to wonder why this hasn't been thought of previously.

The shining light in Hot Pursuit's arsenal of, err, light-emitting weapons (abandon metaphor!) is the Autolog system. Essentially an in-game social network, it sets out to do what Blur did, but better, and succeeds admirably. While racing any event, you have not only the single-player targets to beat, but also an "Autolog Recommends" target to beat, too. This way, when you do beat all the single-player events (and you will, eventually, because they're not that difficult, at least to begin with) you have plenty of incentive to go back and beat your friends. This incentive is made even better by the fact that you have a Facebook-style "wall" on which you can brag about your Achievements and even write your own custom messages and comments. There's a fairly heavy-duty naughty word filter in place, though, which inexplicably censored the post "This game is awesome. Time to take a break, now, though." in its entirety. I haven't seen bizarre censorship of this nature since Phantasy Star Online censored the words "shoes" and "Saturday" for having rude words in the middle of them.

Overzealous censorship aside, though, the Autolog feature is an excellent one. Every time you log in, assuming you have friends playing the game, you'll have a new set of challenges to beat. Autolog even recommends friends of friends that are playing the game whom you may want to add to your Xbox friends lists. This is a smart idea—again, why hasn't anyone thought to do this before?

Possibly my favourite thing, though, is the return of one of the best things about Need for Speed: Most Wanted. The cinematic "chase music" when you're being chased by cops. While the licensed soundtrack that plays in cop-free events is solid enough, though fairly forgettable, the orchestral, cinematic music that plays in Hot Pursuit events gets the pulse pounding and adds a sense of urgency to these races. I'm glad to see the return of it.

I haven't tried playing as a cop yet, though I'm anticipating an experience akin to a modern-day remake of Chase HQ. This is very much a Good Thing. Further reports as events warrant.

In summary, then: You like arcade racing? You gonna love this.

#oneaday, Day 297: Read This Or I'll Punch You In The Balls/Face

The latest episode of The Squadron of Shame SquadCast is currently uploading. In it, we discuss the ever-present topic of video game violence. Is it really destroying our children and turning them into violent assholes?

Well, you'll have to listen to the podcast for our group conclusions, but here's my take on the whole thing. Video game violence has now been around for some time. In fact, it's been around for quite a bit longer than some people realise. A couple of the guys brought up Forbidden Forest on the Commodore 64, a game which, while laughable now, was pretty shocking and gory for the time. I know that certainly five-year old me would have been freaked out by the big-ass spiders.

One side-effect of the violence issue being around for so long is that it's now somewhat taken for granted. Whether or not this is "desensitisation" per se is a matter of opinion. But the fact is, violence in video games is very rarely shocking these days. Shoot someone in Call of Duty and it doesn't carry much in the way of emotional impact, because you do it so much. Shoot someone in Heavy Rain, though, and it carries much more gravitas due to the context, and the fact it happens less.

But desensitisation to violence in the video games medium doesn't mean that we as a culture are desensitised to violence as a whole. I've played a ton of games that involve ultra-violence, dismemberment, heads exploding, that sort of thing. One of my favourite games in recent memory was Bayonetta, which features a huge range of over-the-top violence and implements of extreme torture. But if I saw something like that happening in real life, I would be horrified and disgusted. I see a photograph of something violent and I feel sick. And anything involving eyes—even if it's just on a TV show or a movie—ugh, count me out.

So it's clear, then, that video games haven't desensitised me, personally, to anything except video game violence, which is something much more akin to cartoon violence than anyone else. I doubt there's anything that can adequately prepare you for real-world violence and gore, save being immersed in it for some time by being either a psychopath or a soldier on active duty. And neither of those things are particularly desirable.

What I have observed, though, is a knock-on effect from some of these games, and it's not necessarily the violence itself that is to blame. Back where I used to live, a lot of kids used to play in the streets rather noisily. Nothing unusual, you might say, until you heard the language they were coming out with. It became abundantly clear to me from listening to them, and the fact I had played through Modern Warfare 2 relatively recently, that they were re-enacting something they'd seen in a video game. And the parents didn't seem to care that their kids—aged between about 5 and 10, I'd wager—were out in the street, yelling "MOTHERFUCKER!" at each other and threatening to blow each others' legs off.

"Kids will be kids," is the easy response, of course. But these kids picked up on this material from somewhere, and obviously hadn't had a discussion with their parent(s) about what was appropriate to be shouting in the street, and what wasn't.

I don't envy the task that parents have these days. There is so much crap out there that kids can access easily. So the challenge is not to stop them from seeing it at all—that's an impossible mission that grows more impossible by the day—but to help them understand what is and isn't "appropriate" in certain contexts. And some parents, it seems, just can't be bothered to have those conversations. And, as a result, assholes beget assholes.

It's a big topic, far more than just one blog post can cover. Want to hear more? Then check out the latest episode of the SquadCast, which will be up online very soon. Head over to the Squadron of Shame Squawkbox in the meantime to debate the issue.

#oneaday, Day 296: DEADLY PREMONITION Must Always Be In Capslock

Ahh, all you people out there playing Call of Duty: Black Ops. I hope you're having a good time. I seriously doubt you're having as good a time as me. Because I'm playing DEADLY PREMONITION, a game so remarkable it insists on its title being in capitals whenever it announced you're playing it on Xbox LIVE.

Here in Europe, we're late to the DEADLY PREMONITION party, of course, but at least the game finally made it over here. And at a knock-down price of £24.99, too. This is very much a Good Thing, though I'm concerned that within a few weeks the game will have disappeared without trace, never to be seen again. As such, I decided that I should probably pick up a copy before that happened. I did the same with 3D Dot Game Heroes a while back, and still haven't got around to finishing that. One day.

DEADLY PREMONITION, though, I decided to make a start on tonight after Fallout: New Vegas decided to throw a wobbly earlier on. So here, then, are my first impressions of a game I knew pretty much nothing about prior to tonight, save the fact that it's supposedly "so bad it's good" territory.

The first thing that will strike you upon firing up Deadly… I mean DEADLY PREMONITION is that it looks like ass. Coming off a game with sparkly hi-definition graphics like Fallout: New Vegas, or Vanquish (which I reviewed this week for The Big Pixels… go check it out) it's a jarring change to see muddy textures and that weird "sparkly texture" effect that we used to see all the time on previous-gen consoles. But after a few short moments it ceases to matter. And if anything, so far I am feeling that the shoddy graphics are, in fact, part of this game's charm.

The second thing which is striking about the game is that it is genuinely atmospheric. Some good use of creepy sounds, reminiscent of Silent Hill, coupled with some ugly, horrifying enemies that remind me somewhat of Fatal Frame (aka Project Zero) make for a nerve-wracking walk into town. I haven't got very far yet, so I couldn't say for certain if this atmosphere continues throughout. But I'm certainly impressed with the feeling of dread which the game is producing so far.

Controls are initially clunky but you soon adjust to them when you remember that this isn't supposed to be a fast-action shooter. Yes, being rooted to the spot while aiming a gun is a pain. But it forces you to think a little bit more carefully about getting into a suitable position to fire rather than spraying bullet fire around randomly. I'm certainly fine with it, though it would be understandable for some people to hate it.

In fact, that last statement pretty much sums up what I'm expecting from DEADLY PREMONITION as a whole: something which I'm going to enjoy a huge amount, which other people will probably hate, loathe and despise for various reasons. Some may be immediately turned off by the graphics (whores that you are). Some may be put off by the control scheme (which is easier for me to sympathise with). And others simply would probably rather play something like Call of Duty. Which, as I said yesterday, is absolutely fine by me.

Me? I'll be exploring Greenvale and trying not to get chopped up by the "Raincort Killer" [sic], as the European box would have it. And I wouldn't have it any other way.