While cleaning out my computer the other day I came across some TV recordings that have been sitting around for a year or two. One of the recordings just happened to contain one of my favorite episodes of Star Trek: The Next Generation (nerdy, I know). The premise of this particular episode, Tapestry, is as follows (spoilers ahead of course) - Back in the day Captain Picard got into a fight which resulted in him getting stabbed in the heart. Thankfully, artificial hearts are plentiful in the future so he was able to live normally and grow up to be the captain that everyone knows and loves. Fast forward to the present and we find that the artificial heart has malfunctioned, resulting in Picard's untimely death. In what appears to be the afterlife, Q, everyone's favorite omnipotent being, gives Picard a chance to go back in time to change the past so that he can live out his life with a real heart and not die the premature death that he suffered at the beginning of the episode. The alternative would be for the captain to spend eternity with Q. To Picard, that is a fate worse than death unacceptable so of course he chooses to make the necessary changes. Once the past has been altered, Q brings Picard back to the present where he can enjoy the rest of his life with his real heart. Unfortunately, along with a real heart, Picard got a completely different future than the one he remembers. Instead of being the captain of the Enterprise, he is now just a lieutenant junior grade whose day-to-day life consists of "running tests, making analyses, and carrying reports" to his superiors; he has been reduced from being the Captain of the flagship of the fleet to a "dreary man in a tedious job." Q defends the altered future by explaining that "I gave you something most mortals never experience... a second chance at life. And now all you can do is complain?" to which Picard answers - "I can't live out my days as that person. That man is bereft of passion and imagination. That's not who I am." This gives Q the chance to rub it in show Picard what's what - "Au contraire. He's the person you wanted to be... one who was less arrogant, and undisciplined as a youth. One who was less like me. The Jean-Luc Picard you wanted to be, the one who did not fight the Nausicaan, had quite a different career from the one you remember. That Picard never had a brush with death... never came face to face with his own mortality... never realized how fragile life is... how important each moment can be... so his life never came into focus. He drifted through much of his career, with no plan or agenda... going from one assignment to the next, never seizing the opportunities that presented themselves... He didn't lead the Away Team on Milika Three to save that ambassador... he didn't take charge of the Stargazer's Bridge when its Captain was killed... and no one ever offered him a command. He learned to play it safe. And he never, ever got noticed by anyone." Basically, one single change in his youth caused the life that Picard knew to unravel; the places he went, the people he met, the lessons he learned - all different (except for the fact that he just happened to end up on the Enterprise) thanks to that change.
Now I'm a little torn. I was going to go off on how I think that games, specifically RPGs, should have more divergent paths that matter. As they are now, the decisions that we make have little to no bearing on the endings of most games. There might be a slight variation depending on whether or not we happen finish the game fast enough or whether we do a sequence of events that require the assistance of a walkthrough or faq, but for the most part, everything is the same. It's not just the endings either. The journey remains the same no matter how many times we play through a particular game. Maybe there's an an extra stage here or slightly different dungeon there that was missed the first time around. It doesn't matter because in the end, the path is pretty much set. As long as the story progresses naturally and there's a definitive ending that's satisfying, I can usually live with it. It's clear that there are some endings that just shouldn't be changed. But sometimes I want my actions to matter. Like, what if I kill off an NPC or decide not to save a major character? I want to be able to do stuff like that. Maybe the result could be that some paths are closed off because those characters are needed to open them. Maybe one was the master of unlocking and since he or she is dead, a certain door will be unopenable so I'll have to take a different path which leads me to places that I wouldn't have gone to had I saved the lock picker. As far as the ending goes, maybe those dead characters won't show up or maybe the whole ending will be different because my mission was altered after taking the other path. Or how about if I only leveled up two or three characters and at the end the final boss unleashes some attack that kills off all of my under-powered characters? Wouldn't it be cool to have an ending that berates you for not taking teamwork into account? I'd like to think that developers are at the point where they can make games that can dynamically change based on the user's actions. I know that there are some games that kinda sorta give you the feeling that your actions make a difference, but most of the time our decisions don't mean squat. In some ways that's a good thing, though it would be nice to be in control every once in a while.
The news as I see it
Sometimes change is good
It has been announced that a sequel to Izuna: Legend of the Unemployed Ninja (or Goma Reifu Den Izuna / Devil-conquering Soul Badge Izuna in Japan) is currently in the works. The original was developed and published by Success last year. Atlus localized and released it in February. I was supposed to review it a loooong time ago, but I kinda lagged on it (I'll post it this week, I swear!). I'll save the long description for my review, but in essence, Izuna is a roguelike, short for "game that'll kick your ass and make you want to cry." While I enjoyed it, I'm pretty sure that a good 95-99% of all gamers out there will not be inclined to play it again after the first hour or so. It's the epitome of a niche game. That makes me sad as I liked the characters and I think that they deserve to be seen and known by people that aren't into roguelikes. Thankfully, a visit to the sequel's site (at least I think that's what it is) seems to show that the sequel will not be a roguelike. Instead, it will either be an SLG (SimuLation Game), a Tactical RPG, or a combination of both.
I can't tell if Izuna is the main character since she only shows up in a few of the screenshots. Cotton also shows up on the page so maybe Success is pooling all of its IP into one big game. Either way, I like it when companies bring back lesser known characters, even if they have to change genres to do it. People are always complaining about the lack of new IP, but I believe that there are a lot of older untapped characters and worlds that still need to be explored. Of course, bringing something back is useless if the final product isn't good. There's no point in killing something off twice. I hope that whatever Success is doing with Izuna pays off. It'd be a shame if it didn't.
Credit: Insert Credit
You don't have to play alone
Bungie just confirmed that four player co-op campaigns will soon be enjoyed by millions via Xbox Live and System Link. Two would have been good enough, but FOUR? That is just all shades of cool. Not being able to join a game in progress is a bummer, but being able to start from any of my saved checkpoints pretty much makes up for that (except for the inconvenience of course). Only one person can play as Master Chief, so expect petty fights and dropping for the first few weeks.
It has nothing to do with the PS3's price drop
Scans of Walmart, Toys R Us, and Circuit City ads indicating a price drop for the 360 have been circulating on the nets. According to the ads, Premiums will drop in price to $350 during the first half of August. The Circuit City add indicates that the Core and Elite systems will drop in price by $20 and $30 respectively. Was this one of those planned-in-advance price drops that Peter Moore talked about in one of his last interviews as a Microsoft employee? It's kinda hard to say unless you work there, but I'll venture that this is either a reaction to the recent PS3 "temporary" price drop, or they are preparing for the release of Halo 3. At least, those were my first thoughts. But, being the cynical guy that I am, I'll venture a third possibility - Microsoft is trying to get rid of all of the defective systems that are on the shelves before they start to roll out the newer, less red-ring-prone systems.
Credit: Engadget and Cheap Ass Gamer
Accent Core Wii controls really suck
As expected, waggle controls for Guilty Gear Accent Core are as bad as I knew they would be. Arcade Renaissance does a great job in breaking down how the system works, so check them out if you want to see what horrors await us once the game is released here. Thankfully, the Classic Controller helps to alleviate the control problems. I wonder if we'll ever see Wii games that explicitly require the Classic Controller to function...
The Week In Releases
Goku Makai-Mura Kai / Ultimate Ghosts n' Goblins Kai (PSP Japan)
An update for an update to an arcade game? It's Capcom so what do you expect? This version has been tweaked to give it the arcade feel that it's predecessor lacked. Double jumping is available from the start and you are now required to play each level in order. Also, as in the original arcade version, you are required to beat the game twice in order to see the ending. I'm a sucker for hard sidescrollers so if this newer version never shows up over here, I'd consider importing it.
Brave Story: New Traveler (PSP)
I can't say that I dig the cover since it goes against everything we've come to expect from PSP covers. Change is bad, right? Cover aside, this'll most likely be known as one of the best RPGs for the PSP whose name does not have "Final" and "Fantasy" in the title. How do I know? I'm psychic of course! Plus, this game got an 8/8/8/9 in Famitsu, which is pretty good for a PSP game.
Mario Strikers Charged (Wii)
I'm still waiting for Technos' Nintendo World Cub to show up on the Virtual Console. I guess that this'll do for now. Plus, at this point, playing anything online on the Wii is nice...
This week's background wallpaper
The Color of Ree
by Endling
The artist doesn't give a lot of clues as to what he or she is trying to convey with this piece. The two interpretations that I came up with are -
1. The girl is so into the DS game that in her mind she is in it. Who cares about bodily functions? I'm in another world right now!
2. The girl is so into the DS game that she does not realize that she has stumbled into a haunted house. The evil entities that want to devour her soul are waiting patiently for her to notice. Victims are tastier when they're scared. She will never notice them.
What do you see?
The Iron Mario
by GreenMage
No interpretation needed here. This one just reeks of cool.
To be continued...
I'm going to stop saying what I'm planning on doing in future columns. I never seem to be able to follow through. That being said, whatever I said I was gonna do this week will probably be done next week...
That's it for this week. DELTA-7 is making my computer do things it isn't supposed to do. If I can shut it down before all hell breaks loose, I'll be back next week.
