Red 5 Heads to GDC Austin

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The team will be there in force looking for talent to expand the tribe roster and help fill some gaps as we continue to work towards the completion of our first AAA massively multiplayer game.

E3: Gaming Zeitgeist

Yes, E3 finished a bit ago, but I’d like to post my thoughts on it.

This year’s E3 came with a handful of interesting announcements, primarily those of Super Mario Galaxy 2, The Last Guardian, and Metroid: Other M, but all in all, the convention only confirmed my long-held beliefs: video gaming is in a rut. More excellent-quality Mario is great, a Metroid by Team Ninja will certainly be unique (although I am slightly hesitant), and a new title by those artsy-types at Team Ico is cool, but nothing made me think, “this is why I play video games.”

Project Natal, the Wii Vitality Sensor, and Sony’s motion sensor controller are all proof to me that video games are becoming the two things I never wanted to see them become. The first is that of being gimmicky toys: yes, gaming is meant as a fun hobby, but it was always a hobby one could take somewhat seriously, like pursuing music; turning gaming into something for yuppies and kids to giggle at is insulting. The second is that of being virtual reality: now, many gamers probably love the idea of actually feeling like you’re in the game, but that was never what it was about to me. I can only say that playing video games meant playing video games, not “becoming your virtual self,” or “entering another world,” not even when I played EverQuest or WoW (I did enjoy the vast game spaces, but only as game spaces, not worlds). I never bought into the graphics and immersion facade. Give me some good games, not these toys, these attempts at virtual reality, these cookie-cutter shooters.

Now for some random games. Crysis 2: because the first one was so great, right?
The Beatles: Rock Band is a combination of music I hate (I may receive some flak for this) with an idea (instrument rhythm game) that looks like a waste compared to learning an actual musical instrument. I wonder how many would’ve learned to play guitar if it wasn’t for Guitar Hero and Rock Band?
Splinter Cell… another dark shooter that’s lost its edge.
Mass Effect 2 – I liked the first, I’ll probably like this one.
Left 4 Dead 2 – Seems to me that all these features ought to be have been included in the first game. I never got the first game and I still don’t have any interest in this one, but I sense poor decision-making on Valve’s behalf.
Halo 3: ODST and Halo: Reach – ODST will probably be good (the Bungie Halo games are all solid). However, I thought ODST was to be Bungie’s last Halo title? Confusing.
Modern Warfare 2 – How’s about the full title: “Call of Duty 6: Modern Warfare 2.” My mindtrip meter is going crazy. I need to see some multiplayer, but otherwise, it looks like more of the same (which may be good or bad depending on how one looks at it).
New Super Mario Bros. Wii – A more classic-looking title, but looks more like a party game than a core one.
Super Mario Galaxy 2 – Good.
Wii Fit Plus – I’ll just hit up the track and the pool, thanks.
Metroid: Other M – We’ll see if Team Ninja can handle it (I never liked the idea of injecting narrative story into Metroid).
Final Fantasy XIII – I’ve lost interest in JRPGs (save for the Persona games), but for those who still like them, this looks okay.
Uncharted 2 – Naughty Dog’s a solid developer, but I’m more a fan of the Jak series.
God of War III – I admit I’ve never played the other two, but this may be good (emphasis on “may”).
Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker – I thought the series was done. Well, Kojima’s essentially a one-trick pony, so this wasn’t that big a surprise.
Assassin’s Creed 2 – The first one felt too heavy to me, and this one looks no different.
The Last Guardian – Like Ico and Shadow of the Colossus before it, The Last Guardian looks like a good artsy (I do dislike using that term) game, although the characters scream for one of them dying in the end (my bet is placed on the beast).

I want to place emphasis on two particular titles as they are the most relevant to this blog’s focus.

Final Fantasy XIV – Game developers are awful at announcing MMOGs. Where are the gameplay demonstrations, the classes, all the things a MMOG announcement ought to have? MMOGs are typically fairly large commitments (in time and money), so give the customer as much information as possible. Honestly, Blizzard (and Red 5, I hope) will set these losers straight when they announce their MMOG (whatever it is): website, forums, gameplay, screenshots, art, information to the brink, etc.
Star Wars: The Old Republic – Several claims about this game bring my blood to a boil. The first: “BioWare has made great RPGs in the past.” BioWare Austin is not the BioWare that made Baldur’s Gate, Neverwinter Nights, Knights of the Old Republic, Mass Effect, etc. The second: “it’s the first MMOG with a focus on story and FULL VOICE-ACTING.” I have problems with the label “MMOG” being attributed to what looks like another Diablo or Guild Wars (except with much less of a PvP focus), but MMOGs aren’t supposed to focus on written story (they’re supposed to focus on player interaction and the stories that arise because of said interation). Additionally, EverQuest 2 had a great deal of voice-acting, and look at what a success that game is. The third: “the cinematic was better than Episodes I-III.” Cinematics are great for building hype, but when players get unreasonable expectations based on the cinematic (see: WAR), you know you’ve put emphasis on the wrong place. SW:TOR reminds me of WAR: an overhyped piece of mediocrity.

Thank you, E3, for actually making me interested in Blizzard again. Yes, I realize that a majority of Blizzard’s classic staff have moved on (some of whom are residing now at Red 5), but right now, they’re the only developer who looks like they’re making video games for video gamers. StarCraft II looks like a great single-player experience and a fantastic multi-player experience (if they can do the beta right). Diablo III, while a bit more saturated in its art than Diablos I and II, looks quick, visceral, and fun, adjectives that are often replaced with “immersive,” “innovative,” and “creative” (the last one can be replaced by any other New Agey idea for video gaming (Flower, anyone?)). Riot Games’ League of Legends (where previous Red 5 producer Tom Cadwell now resides) looks good, as well, but we’ll see if it gets the polish it needs before release.

These days, I mostly run through NES-thru-PS2 era games, occasionally playing things like Mass Effect and modded The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion, but for the most part, I long for the 90s/early 00s feel of gaming. I’m looking at a classic fan-made EverQuest server that’s in development which should be a fine way to get some MMOG action, but I desire something more.

I desire Red 5 Studios.

Oi, Fisk, if you still read this blog, let the suits (or khakis; whatever you people wear to work) know that I’m starving for more scraps.

– The Author

Red 5 to Focus Growth in US Office

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While we will no longer invest in a studio presence in China, the Asian market continues to be an important part of our publishing strategy for Red 5’s first title.

Epic Games Producer at Red 5

Jeff Morris, previously a Producer at Epic Games, has appeared on Red 5 Studios’ Tribe page.

Yes, news is slow.

Community Manager: TribalWar’s Colosus

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I was hired last week to be the Community Manager for the project.

Not Dead Yet

Red 5 Studios’ Community Manager position has been filled once again.

I don’t have much else to say. My hope is that Red 5 will announce their title soon (but when wasn’t that my hope?). With a Community Manager again, perhaps that will be fairly close. Until then, it’s back to more Counter-Strike, StarCraft, and Tetris.

Oh, so much Tetris.

[ARTWORK] Machine-Man

All works belong to Red 5 Studios unless specified otherwise.

Where Gaming Went

It’s been more than two months since my last opinion post. First off, I hope all have had a Merry Christmas and will have a Happy New Year. As one can see from the recent interviews from Ten Ton Hammer and Gamasutra, Red 5 will be announcing their project next year, something that makes me, shall we say, turbo-excited.

Now, this post is somewhat of a continuation of my last opinion post in that I will speak of common game ailments, but this post’s purpose has more to do with the present state of the video game.

I’m disappointed with 2008’s video games. Rather than go through a long-winded thing detailing why I’m upset with 2008’s video games, I’ll simply state that priorities are in the wrong places. With that said, I’ll go on to the gaming experiences I’m enjoying right now and what I’d like to see in the future.

I’ve been playing a lot of Counter-Strike 1.6 as of late. Perhaps my joy is being accented by other, poor gaming, but nonetheless, I enjoy everything about Counter-Strike: the clean UI, the simple and natural movement, the brains-and-brawn combat, the iconic and powerful-feeling weapons, the charming and nostalgic visuals, the ingenious maps (especially the player-made ones), and the simply complex game modes (including the player-made ones). When playing with players of similar skill level (as one should try to do with any competitive game), it is everything that is right with multiplayer gaming. That is to say, it bests all the Halos, the Call of Duties, the Gears of Wars, and the Battlefields.

Just look at what these games brought to the shooter genre: Halo brought accessible, online shooting to the consoles (the best achievement of those titles); Call of Duty introduced more realistic combat, something that could be considered neither inherently good nor bad; Gears of War brought a polished third-person-shooter experience; and Battlefield brought unpolished complexity. We are eight years ahead of Counter-Strike yet still behind it.

I view the 90’s as the strongest years for video games. We received the strongest, most revolutionary games in those years, from Super Mario World to Doom to The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time to Starsiege: Tribes to Half-Life to EverQuest to StarCraft… the list goes on. And one of the things that made the PC games of these years so special was the player-base. Player-created content, from game modes to maps to communities to technologies to graphic alterations, made Half-Life, Tribes, Doom, EverQuest, and StarCraft among the greatest game experiences of all time.

From 2000 to the present day, communities of the same vitality have been scarcer. Certainly, Warcraft 3 and World of Warcraft have had their creative player-bases, but nothing of the same drastic nature (save for perhaps the Warcraft 3 mod, Defense of the Ancients) as the 90’s. So there is something missing in modern gaming that existed before, and thus I can come only to one conclusion: gaming has been sold out.

Gaming has been sold out to those who never cared about gaming. Gaming has been sold out to the jocks, to the yuppies, to the underachievers, to the egoists; to be broad, gaming as been sold out to the casuals.

We have drowned ourselves in accessibility. Of course, a degree of accessibility is needed if one wants to even get an audience in the first place, but we have completely forsaken depth and have packed our lungs and veins with the idea of ease. You see, the ideal gaming mix is to make the unnecessarily hard things easier and to make the unnecessarily easy things harder; so, a UI should be easy to interpret, but perhaps a combat situation shouldn’t be.

I’m not saying that gaming should punish the player; I’m saying that gaming should challenge the player. I always believed that to be the purpose of gaming: being presented with a challenge, learning to overcome that challenge, and then conquering that challenge. In a sense, I always thought gaming represented life. But now there are no challenges, there is no need to learn to overcome any challenge, and we never conquer any thing at all: we become immobile, and perhaps this actually represents our lazy, modern humanity.

I want developers to make strong cores, challenge the players, “Do better than us,” then give the players the ability to do better than them. Then we’d see a less empirical gaming industry; in fact, we would have a sort of gaming republic.

The only game released in 2008 that even slightly sates this desire is LittleBigPlanet, but unfortunately, that core is not particularly strong.

This is the one place I find myself in allegiance with indie game developers. I desire for more games made for the purpose of gaming. To make an insensitive comment, I liked video gaming when it wasn’t lucrative, when it was run more by developers, not businessmen. Although we cannot return to those times, we can rise up against the cold cogs of the economist machine, and replace product with art.

I don’t mean to say that money should never be a concern for game developers: such a thing would be imprudent. I only mean to say that money shouldn’t be the only concern, and that money can be found in almost reverse manners (that is, a non-focus on money can result in high income).

To relate this to Red 5 Studios, let’s look at what has been said about their creative and financial focuses. Mark Kern has stated that have given the business side of things to Webzen to handle so that Red 5 can focus on its game; Mark Kern has stated that the things that Red 5 crafts reflect the things that the developers, as gamers, want (at least a very large majority of Red 5 appears to be of core gamers); and various interviews have stated that the players will control important aspects of Red 5’s game. I believe Red 5 Studios to be one of the few studios that realizes how different the video gaming medium is from, say, the movie or music industries, that realizes the lost magic of video gaming, and that realizes what it must do to bring video games back to life. Here’s hoping.

– The Author

EDIT: The Community Manager position is open again.

Interview: Red 5’s Stealthy Plans, Upcoming MMO | Gamasutra

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It’s pretty much on the face. We want players to actually change the state of the game over time. Time is a very important concept to our game. We play with it in any number of ways. It is probably our key form of persistence, more than, say, geography, which kind of ties back into your content question. It’s more about how this world evolves over time, versus how big your world might be. I think, it’s all about what you do with it.

In that way, it’s a little bit more information about what we’re talking about, but we really can’t be more specific until the announcement.

Exclusive Red 5 Studios Interview with Chief Creative Officer Mark Kern | Ten Ton Hammer

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“It does mean we’re close [to making an announcement],” Mark said. “We’re still in discussions about the timeframe of the announcement and the nature of the announcement, but the team is chomping at the bit to tell the world about what we’ve been working on. When that moment comes, we’ll make sure Ten Ton Hammer is on the list.”