Nick Plott and Korean Starcraft

It's hard to say whether or not professional Starcraft in Korea is indicative of future trends in the world of PC Gaming. Given that Starcraft has been huge in Korea for the last ten years, and nowhere else has there been such mainstream recognition for PC gaming skills, will this be a trend that fades away as Starcraft 2 nears its release? A one time PC game anomaly that will be remembered as a golden era, but not the beginning of something greater? Personally I hope this is not the case. I watched almost all of the matches in GOM TV's last Averatech-Intel Classic Tournament and thoroughly enjoyed the whole thing.

As much as I now love and appreciate the intricacies of build-orders and dragoon micromanagement, there was only one real reason why I kept tuning in. I kept coming back because of Nick Plott, aka Tasteless, the english commentator for the tournament. His enthusiasm and vast knowlege of the 'sport' were the solid foundations for an otherwise totally hilarious personality. I am aware of Nick's undying loyalty to Starcraft as the 'manliest game ever made,' but we need him, or at least others like him, to commentate on other games if PC gaming as a competitive spectacle is ever to get off the ground in North America or Europe.

Here's a couple of quick highlight vids of the best commentator of all time to come out of Aiur.



Much's 'Scarab Syndrome'



I think part of what makes his casts so entertaining is the culture clash. It often seems like the Koreans barely know that Nick exists. He is clearly out of the loop on a lot of the technical issues at GOM TV, for example he always misses the cues for when games start. Nick makes it fun to discover quirks of Korean culture because you feel like you are learning about it along with him.

Rock on, Tasteless!

WTFPwning in Quake Live

Ok, I was not pwning anybody who was not a noob. And I certainly was pwned trying to take some of these screenshots. However, in my first week of playing this game I managed to figure out a few tricks. I will pass along a couple to you for playing Capture the Flag.

First of all, if you find yourself in an arena playing CTF, and you end up wandering into the enemy's base picking off random people, and you're not quite sure where you are or where their flag is... You probably should not go for the flag cap. Let someone else who is on a circuit do it for you. If you don't know how to get into a good circuit, then perhaps my tips will help you. That way if you find yourself on a team with no one capping the enemy flag, you can get yourself on a good circuit and earn some large amount of points.

To start, get one of these:

That is your team Scout power up. Once you pick it up it gives you a speed advantage AND it prevents area effect weapons fired by yourself from hurting yourself. You cannot pick up an opposing team's Scout powerup, only your own. Once you have it, you have it until you're fragged.

Next, get one of these (whether doing this strat or not):

This is the rocket launcher. It is always good to have one of these on your avatar. It is also particularily useful in combination with the Scout powerup. Why? Because it is basically a liscense to rocket jump at will and indefinitely, provided your avatar has rocket ammunition. Rocket jumping is old-school Quake tricks, and is the only way to get meaningful vertical mobility in Quake Live. All you do is jump and simultaneously shoot a rocket under your feet such that the explosion propels you in the desired direction. With the Scout powerup and 30 rockets you can FLY. Don't get out of control though, it is easy to mess it up if you are not used to it, especially on maps with holes of death. With practice will come greater control. Then you can try rocket jumping off of walls, and other zany things (like giant annoying eye-balls with legs).

Basically map out the quickest route from their flag to yours and work on cutting down the time it takes you to do a lap. Shoot only imminent threats and try first to outrun your opponents... Chances are you will unless they are also Scout powered-up. You're not in it for the frags if you're capping the flag. If it won't take you too far out of your way, prefer routes with less visibility and less traffic. You can still rank top in the arena with points from caps, and the numerous flag recoveries and assists you will make.

With that, I will show two other screenshots I took during this session to demonstrate the visuals you can achieve with Firefox, or Internet Explorer (and an expanding list of other browsers).




And that will probably be it for Quake Live for a while, lest I deceive readers that this is a Quake Live blog. Undoubtedly it will return as a concrete example in other discussions of PC gaming to come.

Empire: Total Crack

Oh, those crafty pirates.

On my way home tonight I ran into a neighbour of mine and we began talking about Bioshock, which I recently repurchased to play on my new PC. Just as we were about to part ways, he offered to burn me a copy of Empire: Total War.


I found this shocking for a few reasons. Number one was the fact that I had just spent money on a PC game at a local store and here he was offering me a new game for free. Empire: Total War was released yesterday, and is retailing in Toronto for roughly $60.

I do not think less of this person for the fact that he has a pirated copy of a game that I really want to play. However, it really brought to mind the attitudes of an interview with a developer at Creative Assembly I had read recently. The inevitability and efficiency of piracy certainly seems to be unstoppable.

Quake lives!

I know I opened with a lofty and intellectual post, but the first thing that came to my mind afterward was Quake Live.



I do not know if John Carmack was trying to tease Microsoft with the title of the game (Ha! You do not own the word Live, Mr. Gates!), but I do believe that this game does represent, in more ways than one, the future of PC gaming. This should hardly be surprising given the history of Carmack and id Software, who have a proven track record of innovation.

Reasons why the web browser is where PC games will go in the future:

• Where else will they go?

With PC game publishers and developers all but panicked about DRM and lost revenues due to piracy, many have jumped ship and sold their souls to the console-kiddies (I like to call them Panther Moderns). Many still make money from their efforts, but the world of media remains in a daze from the several unanswered blows to the head from P2P networks and direct download services such as UseNeXT. Well, John Carmack is not one to whine and get litigious. Rather than get bogged down and discouraged like the carebears over at RIAA, Carmack and friends decided to adapt the medium to a not entirely new, but newly polished format: Deliver a quality game for free, on demand and make your money from advertising.

On top of this, PC games on discs inside real cardboard boxes seem to be a dying breed in most of the gaming stores I frequent. On top of browser based games, I see PC game sales/revenues of the future coming from online services such as Steam and Direct2Drive. But that will be a whole other article...

• Runescape sucks. Quake Live does not.

This browser-based 3D experience is not new (there are many examples), but it has never been done like this before. Just like Ultima Online made the MMORPG but WoW made the MMORPG a serious prospect, now id Software takes the first-person shooter flash game and puts some real production muscle (and a bit of legacy) behind it. Presto! You get a slick presentation and good community support wrapped around one helluva fun game to play, all in the comfort of any web browser. Expect emulation and imitation of this format on a massive scale sometime in the near future.

• Quake Live is FREE! Therefore, perhaps piracy-proof...

Perhaps I shouldn't say that too loudly. Some work around may be attempted to get an ubermodded client that covers up the advertisements somehow. To me that seems like a lot of work and trouble to get a free product. The advertisements actually kind of fit into the whole dystopian, urban hell zone quite well. And hey, did I say it's free?

• PC Games and Web Browsers have been neighbours for a while now...

They have lived side-by-side on your PC for a long time, but they have never teamed up to great effect in the past. I used to play Laser Squad Nemesis, but apart from that game I always found it frustrating and/or annoying when games linked to webpages or vice-versa. I never used services like GameSpy or XFire, I preferred games that had their own built-in lobbies and game finders. Maybe it is just me, but Quake Live works. It is the perfect union of web browsing and gaming. On top of this, it is one definite advantage that PCs have over consoles: PCs are multipurpose machines that offer a lot of services that consoles do not. Sure, I know there is online functionality in pretty much every console of this generation, but their functionality is Internet Lite. The internet remains a largely PC thing, and Quake Live is something that would not work on consoles, but may work exceptionally well on the PC.

I intentionally say "may work" because Quake Live has only been live for about a week now, and there is no way to be certain that it will work as brilliantly as I hope. It is still in open beta testing, and not all of the community features are functional yet. Nevertheless, Quake Live reeks of professionalism and thoughtful planning and already thousands of people have signed up. All of these are encouraging signs that id has done it again.

Overture

Greetings to teh Interweb. This blog is officially started with Zero fanfare, and without anyone knowing but me. Time will tell if I ever get anyone to actually read this thing.

So what is this all about? Well, the reasons for my starting this blog are mostly selfish. I have come to realize lately that I spend (waste?) a lot of my time playing various games on my PC. This is all fine and good, but I also came to realize that I have nothing to show for the countless hours I have put into this hobby of mine. Emotions have been left unexpressed, opinions have been debated internally, and ultimately my random thoughts about the medium of computer games could die along with my mortal flesh on any given day. This will no longer be the case.

For quite some time now, playing video games has largely been thought to be an immature and escapist past-time. I am not afraid to confront and discuss these accusations, nor am I fully prepared to deny them. Part of my reason for starting this blog is to get questions like this out in the open. Occasionally I will review games as I play them, but only if I feel they are monumental achievements in game design or presentation (be warned: I play new games, but I also occasionally get a little retro). I will try to make the philosophy of gaming and the progression of the industry the focus.

I know I am not alone in trying to wrestle with the intellectual questions raised by gaming. I will do my best to link to others who also take this subject seriously. Gaming is slowly but surely growing up and I want to participate in its flowering and pruning.

Now on to a real post...