PAX is basically done (there must be parties tonight, but god knows we're done, we have families), so it's time to reflect on the life lessons we learned. Chief among them: The Indie Megabooth may have supplanted even the PAX 10 as the mecca for discerning gamers. We hope (beyond hope) that it will have more space next year to support the dense throngs it attracts, and we can't imagine that the quality on display will decline. Surely something powerful is at work, as the Megabooth continues what the PAX 10 started, shifting the center of gravity of the show to the indies. This area is essential for anyone who cares about games.
What else? Bring trail mix. Hydrate. Bring your sponsor to the Wizards party. Get your merch earlyâor look for crazy deals as the show comes to a close. Play games with strangers (we had a particularly engaging session of The Resistance with five new friends who came from hundreds of miles away). Call your mom. It gets better.
- We played a demo of Beat Buddy almost despite ourselves, but we're so glad we did. It looks cutesy and kind of platform-y, but once you get into it and immerse yourself in the sound, it's like a blind date that suddenly gets really hot. Its deep structure is an action puzzle game, but it uses music in interesting waysâby which we mean doing more than forcing you to tap buttons rhythmically. For all we know, there may be rhythm components in later levels (we forgot to ask because we are dumb), but the music is part ambience, part directive, and part puzzle component. It's been in progress for four years, and it shows: The art and music are sweet, the controls click near-perfectly, and we canât wait to get our review copies. ***SPECIAL ALL-CAPS ALERT***We've got 10 codes for 50% off Beat Buddy on Steam, which we'll give to the first 10 folks to email us at std@thestranger.com. Do not delay.
- It's pretty common for the media and politicians to suggest that video games cause (or at least contribute to) youth violence. Dr. Tyler Black and Ben Kuchera discussed this at the right length in their panel Shooters and Shooters: Exploring the Connection between Video Games and Mass Shootings. Check out the presentation on Black's website, but the takeaway was that the correlation is massively overblown and based largely on poor science and "moral panic." We've seen moral panic instill fear of jazz, rock 'n' roll, and comic books, just to name a few cultural staples, but now it seems quaint that anyone would fear this shizâand the panel agreed that eventually video games would enter the same category. Youth violence has actually been declining since the advent of video game console ubiquity, and school shootings have not been steadily increasing. The studies supporting the gaming/violence causation often suffer from question-begging: the same small group of researchers tailor their studies to reach the conclusions they expect. The studies also end up with citation bias, all quoting each other's poor research, and they tend to cite their own mass of research as authority on the subject. Not a pretty picture, and certainly not evidence to support further controlling sales of video games.
In the second half of the presentation, Ben Kuchera addressed the way violence is reported in the media. Sandy Hook reporting often focused on Adam Lanza's game playing, as opposed to his access to firearms, the lack of mental health support for his spectrum disorder, the fact that his mother handled his behavior by taking him to the shooting range, or any other problematic issues. According to Kuchera, this sort of reporting perpetuates the bias against video games instead of addressing other, more complex, and potentially controversial contributing factors. Put simply, it's easier to blame video games than guns. - We checked out Dead State from local indie devs DoubleBear Productions, and were much more impressed than we had been at first glance. We saw a lot of turn-based tactical zombie combat, which looks pretty neat but not unique in and of itself, but when one of the staff asked us if we liked Fallout, our hearts skipped a collective beat. Dead State blends deep story-based RPG into their zombie apocalypse (yes, you get to fight other living people), and that makes it a must-see when it comes out this December on PC, with other platforms to come.
- We were big fans of the (now ancient) weirdo platformer And Yet It Moves, so it's fun to see that Austrian team's latest creation, Secrets of Raetikon, an "aerial single player exploration game." The open 2D gameplay is playful and organic, with abstracted art that gives the whole thing a storybook feel. We've never played Chasing Aurora (their previous title, trapped on the WiiU), but apparently in some ways this is a more fully realized reboot of that game. Whatever the case, it looks and plays great. (And it was a relaxing change of pace from the relentless flak-hammering of the also-great Luftrausers, a few booths down.) Watch for an open alpha of Secrets in fall 2013, with release on PC, Mac, and Linux.
- In fairness, after four days of pounding the halls, we'll go to any demo that has Chairs in the Dark. Fortunately, our love for CitD coincided with our affection for XCOM Enemy Unknown, the turn-based strategy game darling of last year's PAX. Firaxis Games is back with an XCOM expansion, Enemy Within, and it was fun to see some new aliens and a couple of new soldier types, bionic "Gene Mods" and big, brawling mechs ("MEC," which stands for something or other but means, you know, mech). Watch for it on 11/12/13 (a marketing person has been waiting a very long time for that) on Xbox 360, PS3, and Steamâwith a $40 console "Commander Edition" that includes all previous DLC. (iOS is out of luck for Enemy Within, as we were told that XCOM is already pushing "the screaming limits" of iOS and the iPad, so that's yet another reason to play on a console or Steam. We're all for the iPad version of XCOMâand the theoretical viability of $20 mobile gamesâbut it's not the best platform for this game right now if you have a choice.)
- We had some good fun playing Duels of the Planeswalkers 2014 at the Magic booth today, despite getting pantsed by Ajani's "Guardians of Light" thanks to our too-slow zombies. We're watching for the expansion coming out on 9/18.
- The Wolf Among Us is a lovely adaptation of Bill Willingham's terrific comic series Fables. The game is a prequel to the comics narrative and will add to the canonâWillingham worked closely with the devs. Fans of The Walking Dead game series from the same dev will be delighted with the improved control system and richer graphics. We're looking forward to reviewing this when it comes out this fall on a ton of platforms.
- The late-Monday panel "Playing Across Boundaries" was a thoughtful look at the exploration of deep psychological issues of identity and deviance (with all the diversity and emotional weight that word conveys) through tabletop RPGs. The panelists focused on intimate dramatic narrative games like the sweet Monsterhearts and the hot-button slavery-era RPG Steal Away Jordan that explicitly offer space to delve into these issues and explore the dark corners of empathy, but they laid down some rules that would work for any game. (Chiefly "Check in often" and "You can stop at any time.") Some choice quotes: "I want to feel these bad feelings for just a half hour more," "If people who have been there say you're doing it wrong, pay attention," and "It's okay for people to say 'I'm just eating lunchâcan I deal with these issues later?'"
- While still finding time to see and play games, we've also tried to get to as many panels as we can about inclusivity in gaming (and it's kind of heart-warming that there are so many). The last one we got to was one of the best, Gender Diversity in Games: Where Are All The Believable Female Characters?. In addition to having great speakers and good moderation, they managed to cover a lot of theoretical ground (making us think about things we hadn't) while also digging into some practical issues (which hopefully will be of use to people working in games).
Re: the title of the panel, the phrase that kept coming up was "write a human." Believable characters are relatively rare in games, regardless of gender, and a lot can be accomplished just by doing your research and including diverse backgrounds in your team. But an excellent contrarian point was made by Susan O'Connor, who said games are fantasy and it's okay sometimes to have even stereotypical simplicity ("okay, 'space marine,' got it, I'm off to the races!"), but that male stereotypes of males are a lot more fun to play than male stereotypes of women. Sometimes even women want to play a busty melee powerhouse, but those shouldn't be the only or even primary way that women are characterized in a game. Basically: more optionsâand more human optionsâare better.
One of the best stories came from Naughty Dog creative director Neil Druckmann, behind the amazing postapocalyptic adventure Last of Us. He talked about how the dev team constantly pressed to have Joel and Ellie shown in an equal light in every single piece of marketingâso that if the game was successful, they could point back to that and argue with marketing for more prominent women in future games.
Many of the issues were summed up in an anecdote about how Jodi Foster chooses her roles: she has her agents look for scripts with good characters, even if they're men, and if she likes the role, she has it rewritten to be a woman.
- Finally, as always: Enforcers rule.
The Stranger Testing Department is Rob Lightner, Paul Hughes, and Mary Traverse.
