REVIEW: Might and Magic: Clash of Heroes

This review is long overdue, but for a time I wasn’t really sure where I came down, but now I am. I’ll be brief.

I guess I should start by expressing my fondness for being able to try things before purchasing them. I don’t think that’s ever going to get old. However, demos can give a faulty perspective: producing a slither of gameplay that perfectly encapsulates the entire experience of a game would be a fantastic thing. But what if a demo could actually do that? Well, said demo would either represent the pinnacle of fine-tuning, or the game itself would turn out to be rather shallow. I hope you can see where I’m going with this. I will give a mild hint: Clash of Heroes is not a long and complex experience.

Now I feel like I’ve lurched into a foregone conclusion. Notice I didn’t say the game was bad, though. Because it isn’t: I would simply like to move the less shiny parts out of the way first. The main issue I have stems from a mild frustration with the formula of the single-player: you go through the campaign one protagonist and realm at a time, shifting through a heavy-handed (but fun!) fantasy story all the while. You begin as a level one (of ten) character, with new units, items and abilities delivered at an enticing rate as you make your way through the stylised scenery to a conclusive, final encounter. Then you do that again, four times. Credits. Okay, that’s not fair: there’s a multiplayer mode, too.

Luckily the major highlights of this game jut forth into some extremely acute points. For one, it is a good price: a kind of ‘I can’t believe this is how much two tickets to the cinema costs’ kind of price. Also, the desire I felt for things to get kicked up a gear was the result of an already-solid system reiterating itself. So what is that system? The demo can show it better than I can explain, as it is practically a microcosm of the entire game. But that is an unsatisfying answer so I will quickly throw-up an explanation. It’s a turn-based strategy game that can easily trick a player into thinking it is a puzzle game. Maybe it is both. Your block of units faces the enemy’s; the player can either move a unit from the back of a given line to another, or use their move in deleting one of their own units. When three units of the same colour (there are three colours) and the same type (three basic types, too) are lined up they either form a permanent wall or an attack column. This is the simple base from which a promising sum of customisation is built, with obligatory RPG-elements thrown in for good measure.

I love that the story doesn’t take itself too seriously. Frankly, it was an enormous relief. Too many titles get sucked into a land where nothing is more important than whatever bland, generic arc has taken the fore. This doesn’t mean that titles can’t or shouldn’t be wholly serious. Fuck no. This title couldn’t (and shouldn’t) be wholly serious. The moments where the game indulges in its gratuitous personality were some of the best for me: the bright and soft art-style fits this path, far more than trying to make me care about some impending demonic invasion. The music, too, felt best at its most mirthful and playful moments. That said there is a consistent vibrancy on this front: I’m pretty easy on music with as much heart as this, though there could be (ahem) more of it. The demo manages—seemingly, anyway—to make most of this manifest.

I would be lying if I said I didn’t find the over-all experience a little simplistic. The items can change the flow of the game substantially, but by the third ‘starting area’ I just craved something sharper. I wanted some new hook to show up and kick my ass to the curb if I didn’t have the decency to comprehend it; I wanted the game itself to expand as far as it could, or else come to an end with deft concision. That was pretty greedy of me. I have no right to more: the sum of content provided for the price was far from inadequate. In this case I would appreciate more liberal use of scissors, by which I mean editing down. I’m sure it is common to feel an obligation to finish what’s been started. In the case of games this can take some time; even as you become painfully aware that the developers have ran out of tricks you push on, hoping there is something new around the next corner. There’s another feeling that accompanies this, though, and it happens as the credits roll. A little-spoken-of sentiment that I like to think finds form in a long, drawn-out sigh: the paradoxical mixture of relief, satisfaction and disappointment.

Silly Starcraft Streaming Standard

More Starcraft 2 things abound, but I can’t help that it’s a sweet community. Also, streaming live content is a thing now. Okay, so that is slightly obvious at this point. I struggle to come to grips with our growing means to be awesome sometimes. Here’s another one: did you know that, on average, it’s faster to download a CD than to simply rip the information from a disc? You probably did, but damn. The point, though! It’s a new avenue, and the diversity established so far is nothing short of impressive. So impressive, in fact, that scrambled-word-thoughts seem necessary. 

So, the breadth of streaming tools is wide:  it’s a standard of the internet now. And Team Liquid, dedicated folks that they are, aggregate a great deal of the talent around the Starcraft community. Their list of active players encompasses Brood War, MOBA (LoL, HoN, DotA) gamers, the occasional FPS and those seeking respite in other areas: the Skyrims and flirtatious beta builds of the day have a home here, too. So it’s not just a list of people playing (or casting) Starcraft 2. It is mostly that.

Over the course of the last year or so, I’ve been surprised by the players’ and commentators’ resourcefulness on these streams. Surprisingly few thrive on skill alone; it’s the most obvious and ubiquitous quality among featured streamers, so raw talent or cultivated skill (more often a mixture) is a strong, but non-differentiating, base.  Former Warcraft 3 professional Kim ‘SaSe’ Hammar garners an impressive amount of viewers with this approach: just a generic music playlist and razor sharp skill. Very simple, but living in Korea is a definite aid to the ‘razor sharp’ part.

Luckily Starcraft 2 gives skill a wide berth: some excel at a passive game, others will strike at any opening they see; players are necessarily reactive, but some prefer to force their enemy’s hand with deviations. There are all kinds.  But I’m going to go ahead and say that differences in style are only small factors when it comes to popularity. Infestors or Mutalisks are fun to see under good control, but these aren’t the things that gave Steve ‘Destiny’ Bonnell or Greg ‘Idra’ Fields their many fans. Tournament results are one simple factor, but I’m of the persuasion that the most popular figures will always ooze personality.

Idra is a good example to go with, though: his successes led to more coverage of his habit of, erm—I’ll say vociferous negativity.  The implications of the community’s indulgence don’t really concern me; to be able to jump on stream and average around ten-thousand viewers within an hour is simply impressive. But Greg is that rare conflux of results and deliciously bitter character. If there was a list of formulae to stream success, Idra’s paradigm would be somewhere near the top: years of practice, a high standing in tournaments, and the maintenance of a blunt, border-line-offensive attitude. He also streams a lot of dub-step playlists, which I guess doesn’t hurt against his overwhelmingly pop-centric peers.

In fact, music is a neat factor when it comes to simple un-narrated play. One caveat first: the reconciliation of musical artists with the services that are running ads (the ‘Twitch.tv’s and the ‘Justin.tv’s of the world) is a monstrous endeavour. I do not envy the people one day tasked with disentangling this realm. That said, as long as the music can’t be depended on (i.e. you aren’t able to rely on an individual artist or song being aired) there seems to be little liability for the moment. Or at least that’s how things work in my naïve head.

So for now, music is simply a nice thing that we are able to have. It isn’t a huge deal to some, but it can definitely make the difference.  Ilyes ‘Stephano’ Satouri makes for a good example; he’s a superb French player, maybe one of the best in the world. But when he streams his chat isn’t flooded with rapturous awe or dumb balance arguments. I mean, there’s some of that, of course. But the majority are expressing their surprise: a classic rock playlist. I’m biased, of course: others could think of Stephano in the same vein as SaSe and I wouldn’t be in any position to criticise them. Music is a golden thing for those who don’t want to put energy into a persona or any kind of narration.

Sean 'Day9' Plott is the opposite of this. Former Brood War player, commentator for Starcraft 2, and a damn fine analytical take. His highly structured (and animated) approach to putting on a stream show attracts an admirable amount of viewers, and the condensed format allows for episodic delivery. So it’s a style that fits both conventional pre-recorded video and a live audience: genius. The abundance of content is staggering. Somewhere in the early four-hundreds (each episode roughly an hour long) I feel like the word ‘practiced’ becomes grossly insufficient. But I could write swathes about just Day9’s achievements; suffice to say his energy and charisma is a huge asset to the community. And no one else really does it like Day9. That’s not to say that there aren’t any other structured, pre-planned streams; just none that focus on replay-analysis and simple story-telling.

I guess it occurs to me far too late that I can’t possibly do justice to this community without going into much more detail, but the depth really is part of the allure. Figures like Incntrol, TLO and Catz deliver such a widely differing set of experiences that it’s tough to zone in on what attracts a large viewership.  One thing seems certain: a player or a commentator needs a platform before they can gather momentum in this place. For every player generating decent ad revenue, a hundred skilled players toil in obscurity.

Ahh, Christmas. Now that that's over with, Sonic Generations and Donkey Kong Country Returns. Yes.

Comparative analysis was always fun for me (I was a weird kid). I could never understand why it got such little use; so robust! In any case, I figured wheeling out the ‘side-by-side’ approach could be amusing (with the magical powers of editing I can say, in retrospect, that I may have been slightly over-optimistic). This kind of style has the advantage of being light on requisite experience: a vague familiarity with just a portion of a segment of a morsel of the series—either series—is all that’s needed for some concise (maybe slightly constricted?) points to emerge. And there was a smooth, even crisp, overlap of genre here. First, though: what are the threads that tie these two games together more than anything else? What is the unifying synergy? After a few minutes of thought, it struck me: rolling. Then, several minutes later, it struck me again: rolling is a stupid and arbitrary choice. So, instead, 2D platform games are happening.

I’ll go through some similarities first; differentiation is always better served in context. Despite variances in the end-products, the foundations bear more than a little resemblance. For one, Sonic Generations and Donkey Kong Country Returns—as far as throwbacks go—are executed with noticeable care. So you can expect an experience that is consistent with whatever demos or test-plays are available to you. It’s the kind of focus more often reserved for projects that push things forwards (or, at least, are trying to.) Make no mistake: these games do not do that. They are, for the most part, the antithesis of innovative. While this in no way means they’re bad, it is highly evident in the design choices that ‘How do we mix things up?’ was not at the top of either team’s agenda.

The fundamentals are simple: a combination of original content (updated visuals, all-new map designs, gameplay flairs) and highly refined mechanics. It’s the kind of gameplay that developers have had centuries to experiment with; over time the fundamental formula can, apparently, be twisted into a smoother and more idealised state. I guess it’s kind of obvious that most of what comes from this is dependent, not just on the taste of the player, but also the goals of the designers and what they have to work with. For me, both experiences delivered sustained entertainment. Sadly, the variance of user mileage is a thing that exists, so I’ll continue.

As I pushed through the campaigns here I grew more and more confident that they were each built on this consistent basis: a kind of ‘homage and sustenance’ thing. It’s a strong design goal. Drawing attention to sturdy conventions strikes as a worthy objective that money can get behind. That said, this should raise some warning flags if you hate things that aren’t new. I don’t know who this theoretical ultra-hipster is, but I think they would certainly hate the idea of these games. I would challenge even this hypothetical creature not to enjoy the products, though. This is where I need to differentiate a little.

With a simple framing device Sonic Team transforms the idea of a tribute into an actual functioning story. Our blue protagonist, the modern 3D Sonic, is thrown into time-travelling escapades with his non-talkative 2D self from the past. It’s the perfect excuse to split the gameplay into a clear dichotomy: the first act of every stage is played in the classic style, with the old guard of spin-dashing and platform negotiation taking the fore; the second act is a more mercurial beast. Ostensibly these levels are the 3D answer to the first stages, but to leave it there wouldn’t give the full picture. The fact is, there are depthless sections in every ‘Modern’ stage. If I had to pick one way this game stands out more than previous try-hard Sonic titles over the last decade, it would have to be this dimensional refrain.

Our 'Classic' protagonist, passing through some familiar territory. The Havok physics engine makes some of the older gameplay elements slightly off. Other than that, it handles very much like the Genesis/Megadrive titles.

Outwardly, Donkey Kong looks like the more original experience: it has an all-new set of banana-thieving antagonists in what I can only describe as Sentient Tiki Mask Guys; there is a vista of unique stages (which come with original enemy designs) and, promisingly, a revamped co-op mode. These facets aren’t out-and-out deceptive: they are new things. Still, I prefer to err on the side scepticism and say that the skeleton of this game resembles every other DKC game. In fact, there are several qualities which could easily provoke the idea that this is the least original title in the series yet. Some of the sections—the jungle area, the industrial area, the cave area—are more than a little familiar in concept; half of the music is lifted from the first entry in the series, imbued with smoother tones and mild remixes. The Donkey & Diddy Kong setup can’t really be faulted, but it seems relevant to this emulation theme that this was only used once before in the 'Country' titles, to begin the series. I know this may sound counter-intuitive, but the pronounced lack of risk-taking is kind of impressive. Maybe it’s the confidence that borders on swagger.

I take only a slither of joy in the irony that Generations—with a story that is singularly based on reliving the SEGA mascot’s past—looks to have a much fresher approach to progression. While DKC has a lot more levels than Generations, the tried and tested linear island-hub is not nearly as enticing as Sonic’s simple 2D time-scape. The freedom to choose between progressing through the conventional levels and tackling the many challenges that surround them was neat. And I mean that in the sense of economy and tidiness: no elements of the experience are ever more than a short sprint and a couple of jumps away.

Here's 'Modern' Sonic in the same place. As you can see his mere presence is, ahem, explosive.

Like most modern games, the creeping RPG influence makes itself no stranger here. Actually, all Donkey Kong has to answer for is the gathering of coins with which to procure throw-away items. While this system is open to ruthless and/or shameless abuse, it is not invasive. And its ease-of-access ends up making for a useful counter-balance to that most arcane of conventions: a limited number of lives. In Generations the need for a number which increases over time is sated by the passive acquisition of points as content is cleared. These points can subsequently be spent on extra lives and optional techniques that make the two Sonics even more savage. If you get a good rank, or simply complete a challenge, you’re gifted concept art and, our old friend, re-hashed music. It’s like a honey-comb of incentives: there are five ‘Red Star Rings’ hidden in every stage, too, that affect the aforementioned music, pictures and points; certain challenges will unlock new techniques to be bought from the shop, prompting you to gather yet more points. This kind of stuff almost pulled me away from the simple fun of rushing through some well-rendered scenery, but it’s all relatively auxiliary until the temptation of skill customisation takes over. Even though you’re not compelled to, I couldn't help but go through every challenge in order to gather more things. Extra music tracks, in particular, are irresistible to me. Choice aside, I think it is safe to say that some of the concepts to these challenges are half-assed. Perhaps even quarter-assed. 

I mentioned earlier that there is a lot more levels to Kong than Sonic. Part of the reason for this could stem from a greater effort on Sonic Team’s part to cut redundant content and keep the game concise, though I don’t entirely buy this. I’m sure design philosophy is a larger factor: as Sonic, speed is a thing you are conditioned to want. A density of visually stunning set-pieces flies past; twists into the fore and background are not uncommon, along with divergent routes and hidden paths. To contrast, the many stages of Country—while constructed smoothly and superbly—do not have any qualms with recycling their tricks, or following a linear path.

The speed element is seductive, to be sure, but it is also the main constriction of Generations. In short, inertia is a bitch. If you’re unfamiliar with a level, a suicidal jump is sometimes too easy. And I don’t think it was an unintended consequence of the fully-three dimensional areas that the speed is difficult to control; when it works (which is most of the time) the fluidity and power feels great. Sometimes it doesn’t work, though. While I’m talking about the new-age Sonic I should mention that camera failure is at an all-time low. It’s still a thing that happens, but in manageable doses.

The real issue with the new-found focus on the speed is that it limits the scope of gameplay: it sets a tone of necessary hurriedness. There is almost an audible clunk upon transitioning from blistering speed to careful platform-hopping. It's not that Generations can’t handle jumping sections, just seldom to a sophisticated or sustained degree. Again: inertia is a bitch. Donkey Kong Returns ends up feeling much more stable in this regard: the tenets of careful timing and patience root this game in place. The player is given the ability to move and change direction with rapidity and precision, and in this mode, much possibility is created.

I feel like this screen-shot is misleading. It gives absolutely no warning that giant waves will periodically crash into the foreground, and that said waves are more lethal than fire.

So, re-hashed music is another recurring element that I feel deserves some attention. Again, that pesky issue of unoriginality. In the case of Sonic Generations, its explicit emulation of past stages earns it much leverage with regards to re-mixing: it’s something that, given the story, anyone should reasonably expect. What follows is two distinct remixes per area: like the stages themselves, a ‘Classic’ and a ‘Modern’ version. It’s hard to pin down a predictable relationship between the two, though the strongest distinction seems to lie with the tones: the first act’s music makes heavy use of synth, while the second act reaches for more real sounds. ‘Rooftop Run’ makes for a good example of this. There’s a respectable variance in the styles Generations makes use of, and the over-all vibrancy is refreshing.

I found it harder to reconcile myself with Kong’s musical direction. Like the ‘Donkey & Diddy’ thing; none of the other Country games borrowed music from their predecessors. This is a reboot, though, so, we should be charitable? I don’t know. It is an overall strong soundtrack. More interestingly, it is very consistent in tone. The variance in Sonic’s music fits each disparate stage in turn, which itself serves the time-travelling theme; the over-all aesthetic is necessarily unfocussed. The tones of DKCR all fit an acoustic theme, and the layers of percussion, woodwind and synth here further feed into Retro’s model of consistence. Hell, the Evil Tiki Mask Guys are even shaped like instruments. It doesn’t stand out as much as the music of Generations, but it serves the synergy of the whole, which is probably a harder challenge for a composer.

All that’s left to comment on is the visuals, and, well, that's tall order. There are very few snags or ambiguities here that I can mercilessly attack with red-pen. Important visual cues are intuitive yet non-invasive, while vibrancy and variety fill the rest of the screen.  The size of your avatars and their position in front of the camera are traits one could predict, and with great accuracy. For the sake of these particular games, the developers couldn't move away from their roots: everything about the construction and appeal demands adherence to the formula. It's hardly surprising, then, that visual innovation is marginalised—like other aspects of these games—in favour of a mirror-shine. That sprinkling of new is nice, though. The example that sticks in my mind the strongest would lie with Kong. A few of his stages utilise a smooth, almost monochromatic, colouring style that ended up playing out far more handsomely than I had expected. Nothing so simple or suave for Sonic’s outing, but the clarity of viable paths and the variety of fantastic locations are sweet enough.

Simple, vibrant, mechanically synergistic and surprisingly relaxing, too. It could be the accompanying jazz remix of 'Jungle Hijinx'.

So, there we have it. The puzzles may not wrack the mind so much, but that doesn't matter: the main attraction—to both of these games—are the delicious mechanics. Also, I am a sucker for these kinds of reboot-spectacles. As much as I fear that this imbues me with overt bias, I know that this also corresponds with a pretty wide experience of analogous titles. The likes of Yoshi's Island DS and New Super Mario Bros. are the first that come to mind: Sonic Generations and DKCR laugh at them. As I said earlier: the kind of care taken on these two is not the norm.

Oh, one more caveat: DK was not marketed well. At all. These games match each other's quality (with their own unique grotesqueries), but Nintendo did themselves no favours with only a limited release. Generations was in  the Steam sale a couple of days ago, a service I would recommend to anyone who enjoys games on their PC. It was pushed to about seven pounds (so eleven to twelve dollars, I suppose.) On the other hand DKCR, a game that came out a year ago, is difficult to find and, when you do, somehow much more expensive than Generations. Words lose me at this. It's a sad thing, but they are still there. It is my hope that lessons have already been learned, and all we are left with now is good product.

A Dubious Marketing Technique

I don’t know if this phenomenon applies to other countries, but retail pricing of games is a strange thing in the UK. Or, at least, it has been for the last couple of years. Amid a tough economy Nintendo pushed Donkey Kong Country Returns upon us, and it hit the markets at £45 in November of last year. I found, over a good few months, that this was the case in every game shop I visited: I decided to ask an employee why. Apparently it was much more popular than expected, and few copies were distributed. Flash forward to a year later and new copies are still extremely rare in public, with pre-owned boxes marked around £40. Online sellers seem to be maintaining a high price, too, with a £35 tag on Amazon.

The reason this whole situation re-kindled in my imagination (other than the fact that I was able to borrow DKCR from a friend a couple of weeks ago) is that Nintendo recently registered a loss in excess of £500m. I’m not going to draw a line from the Kong title to Nintendo’s apparent failure (not with the piece of fail that is the one-trick-3DS in the picture), but there is something deeply unsettling about this: such an obviously well-polished title being pushed so gently into the market. Competing games at the time (with similarly high praise from critics) were experiencing cuts at a shocking rate: Assassin’s Creed 2 and then, about a year later, Bioshock 2, dropped £10 from their respective tags within a fortnight. They can now each be bought new for less than £10. I think the thing to take away from this is that Nintendo has maintained a very… interesting business model, at least when viewed against their competitors’ approaches. They produce quality games, and then try to not sell them.

That quality can be assured, though. At least in the case of DKCR. The term ‘solid platformer’ isn’t solid enough to convey this thing’s solidity. It’s dense, even: the kind of re-play value that the older Country games could only dream of. It’s like it was finished, and then Retro decided to finish it again. And perhaps a third time. But that would be it. I do need to level one complaint, though, and considering the cavalcade of issues that can crop up when a platformer is just off, think of the lack of further grievances as proof of a robust product. That said this is a very fundamental issue. I’m not talking about how there are no longer those certain bonus stages where you collect swathes of bananas as a rhino, ostrich or swordfish (though I’m sure this is a disappointing fact for some.) The control scheme leaves a purposeful vacuum. There is no support for the classic pad; no way to re-map controls; and flat-out shoe-horned waggle-tech.

Okay, so that sounds bad. I can’t imagine that Retro made this decision by themselves, because it’s pretty stupid. But which is the dumber thing to perceive: when one of the best titles on a machine makes absolutely no use of that machine’s specific abilities, or if said title ignores a superior control-scheme to facilitate said abilities? In my head it’s a no-brainer. I’m biased by the fact that I had the latter option include the words ‘ignores’ and ‘superior’ in close proximity, though. What I don’t understand is how Nintendo thought this design choice was beneficial: how could limiting player control options possibly result in more sold units? Or is it about obfuscating the fact that this, some of the best gaming the Wii has to offer, could be done better on the competitors’ machines? Like I said before, though: this game is strong. I let a lot of these outward flaws push me away from getting it, but some very poor marketing decisions shouldn’t keep us from games that are awesome.

With particular regards to Starcraft 2.

So MLG happened and, by the end, I was happy with the result: an un-seeded player beat the odds and smashed the conventional ‘Koreans vs. Everyone Else’ story. Between this event’s popularity, Blizzard’s own well-attended convention and the numerous other successful organisations around competitive gaming, it's a bit much to take stock of. I end up with the paradoxical feeling that the blockades to further growth are either wildly exaggerated or just extremely difficult for insiders to actually perceive. But I’ve skipped ahead a little.

This scene didn’t exist as a living thing to me for years. To contextualise, I was simultaneously consuming its richness piecemeal. It was a place where I could see the best strategy, tactics and mechanics, and take stock of what made certain games sharp enough to sustain a strong player base. In short, I was interested in the gameplay. Everything that surrounded it—the thrum of small-time sponsors, the unique logos, the numerous gathering places—just patiently sat there, waiting for me to pick up on their legitimacy.

But something happened (or rather, didn’t happen) as my interest grew, and I browsed Replayers years ago. It also didn’t happen when I stopped to admire the Counter-Strike talent at London Expo. Then, a year later, it continued to not happen while I perused Team Liquid’s live streams and investigated YouTube commentaries. What I’m talking about is the voice of dissent: the people who just want to criticise things because others are enjoying them and, apparently, they’re not supposed to. Each community that forms around the games we find truly strong doesn’t care about this unless you are talking to them specifically about growth. And rightfully so: the internet affords the opportunity, not just to pay no attention to such people, but to be in a place that is definitively away from them. The problem is that this is almost wilful obscurity.

I feel like just the act of ignoring vapid sentiments, or understanding that there is a potential for them in a given environment, constitutes a decision that affects how we go about sharing the scene with others. Our discourse will always pre-suppose a certain level of interest and knowledge. This makes for deliciously organic communities: we can spark up a theory-craft conversation in just about any live-stream chat. We can enter any given channel dedicated to our games of choice and know that the people there share our fascination. As soon as we feel like broaching the topic to a newcomer, though, our lexicon suddenly sinks to comedic levels of uselessness and verbosity. Words like ‘Baneling’ become meaningless in the time between choosing what to say and identifying who you’re speaking to. Moments later something akin to ‘acid landmine bug’ can (and will!) fall from your mouth. There’s a strange kind of barrier there.

Competitive gaming has grown a dramatic amount in the past year. That is, if you consider a factor like ‘Sheer Numbers’ anything to go by. Commentary figures have pointed to the drawing power that simple, human stories will need to play in the future, with regards to further growth. In a sense, though, I feel like these stories will exist in perpetuity, so long as there are people that care about the game. Appreciation of complex mechanics—even simple mechanics—enhances understanding (and enjoyment) of every game and/or sport, but it has to be voluntary. For now, think of the simple joy many kids get from watching a sport like Football, with barely (if) any grasp of strategy or tactics. Remember that old trope? The one where a bunch of guys, hanging out in front of a TV, start bitching about a player’s decision, or a coach/manager’s choice? That cliché exists for a reason: some fans (or viewers) do not care about high level analysis, or the weighing of tactical risks. They’re not trying to see it through the eyes of professionals, or for every intricacy available. People, quite simply, want the game to entertain them: acid landmine bugs are entertaining.

The MOBA Muffin

So, Defence of the Ancients. It always struck me as odd that the territory carved out by DotA didn’t have a genre with which to define itself for a period of time best measured in the decay of Carbon-14 isotopes. It lacked a box in which we might place (and judge) it, and people love placing things. DotA’s weighty legacy is almost clear by this point, save for a few minor ambiguities. For one, folks can’t seem to decide what to call the follow-ups. There are only three prevalent genre-titles, but that’s enough to draw confusion as to whether there are actually any fundamental differences that come with the tag. There aren’t, by the way. The first I encountered was ‘Action Real-Time Strategy’, which sounds like Command & Conquer with Bruce Willis and a generous helping of quick-time events. The worst thing about ARTS (other than the fact that at first glance it looks like I’m talking about some kind of Humanities pressure group) is that a key part of this genre is that it has removed almost every conventional aspect of RTS games: the ‘A’ may as well stand for ‘Antithetical’ in this scenario. It’s completely unintuitive.

Another tag used for these games (I’ll save the best for last) might actually be the laziest label I’ve ever seen. It is, simply, the Dota genre. That’s right: the name of the game that brought attention to this genre is this genre. Talk about dicey positions to occupy: all I need to do to irk a fan is imply that Dota represents its own genre like Halo games aren’t really FPSs. That is, imply DotA’s attraction amounts to bells and whistles. Not that I think that this is true (although prolonged exposure to Warcraft 3’s ladder will induce this sentiment), but this kind of low-hanging categorisation invites incredulity.

And I come to an abrupt rest with the suddenly-not-so-silly-seeming moniker ‘Multiplayer Online Battle Arena’ (MOBA): simple, to the point and, as an added bonus, kind of rhymes with ‘DotA’. It’s always a good thing for people to be able to say ‘I want to play more games like this’, with the correlation in mind that they can then punch that genre acronym into Steam and go nuts. Even with this convenience at my finger-tips (and ignoring the fact that there’s a certain degree of ambiguity surrounding the genre’s name) I still feel that there’s a slight futility in it all. Like the best one can hope for is a tag that isn’t too obtuse, deliberately euphemistic or outright vague. These tags come to mean far more to people who have experienced a genre than they could possibly mean to the curious newcomer, and that isn’t really the case for more traditional media. The fact is, ‘MOBA’ could stand for almost anything and still be more useful than say, ‘JRPG’, whose highly informative components advise us that these are indeed Japanese Games in which you Play Roles. Okay, so this is a kind of shaky analogy, but the point is there: JRPGs have many common themes. There are conventions which familiar players will pick up on and expect, but they lie ruthlessly unapparent to the new. MOBA games are just like that.

I realised a little while ago that I was around at the dawn of this stuff. It sounds kind of clichéd, but I couldn’t believe what Defense of the Ancients turned into. This was due in large part to the fact that I backed a losing competitor, Tides of Blood, and bore DotA a special kind of hate. It wasn’t just that its popularity gobbled up Warcraft 3’s custom games lobby, but that it held onto some philosophical premises that were pretty harsh to me: choice and capability superseded simplicity and balance, and the general community struck me as somewhat insular. It was equal parts prejudice and calculated self-dissuasion on my part, but I’ve since come full-circle to find a rekindled interest in MOBAs. In any case, this kind of digression deserves its own space. For now, on with story-time!

Back when Warcraft 3 was my game of choice I hit the custom games a lot, trying out new or familiar maps on-and-off for half a decade. The idea of League of Legends, Heroes of Newarth or million dollar tournaments coming from this was not insanity to me, because ‘insanity’ implies that I had given this outcome any thought. There are only so many permutations for how things can unfold—factors go in, results come out: never a missed communication. (relevant)—and the branch where the originally-awkward, chaotic Hero Arenas eventually coalesce into an actual genre was unexplored.

When you take away the tech trees, the production timing and the unit placement of traditional RTS games, you’re left with the Heroes of Warcraft 3. Hero Arenas were the earliest manifestation of this sentiment, pretty much as I just put it: stripped down, pick a Hero, go crazy. This all came from Blizzard’s ideal of special units you may equip, can gain EXP, but are not some form of deity to whom the player-camera offers eternal tribute. Shit’s happening elsewhere. This general principal was rinsed and repeated by map-makers for years, while the consuming public would allow the superior products to shine and the inferior to fall by the way-side. As I mentioned before: the idea of a genre growing from this was beyond my conception. The scale for success for a custom game on Warcraft 3 (or the one I would conventionally ascribe, anyway) was that I saw people hosting it with frequency. Genre-creating wasn’t on my scale.

There were many maps that applied the basic principal of Warcraft 3’s Heroes to their design, with extremely diverse sets of circumstances, and equally varying degrees of success. As a simple example of the tool being pushed in a very different direction to MOBAs, there was the popular Enfo’s Team Survival, which held—other than a couple of key oversights in its earlier builds—a sound principal in equipping your Hero to defend from waves of monsters which would eventually over-run you. The meat of the competition here was the ability to either cast supporting skills to bolster a failing defence, or to hurl annoyance at the enemy team’s heroes in an attempt to throw off their survival. The very controlled and limited nature of the human element in competitive gameplay meant that it was possible to plan out what you would do for the majority of the game. Sadly it also sapped at the map’s lasting appeal.

Defence of the Ancients emerged as the dominant map for a number of reasons. For one, it had an impeccable support community; new versions were frequent, adding Heroes, options, items and bug-fixes. But if I had to guess why it really stuck, it would have to be the game’s encompassing focus. As I mentioned before, the MOBA genre is essentially the concentrated innovation of Warcraft 3, minus every conventional RTS aspect: it needed a similar appeal to stick. The way you micromanage your Hero and distribute ability-points mirrors that of Warcraft 3; the optimisation of limited inventory space; the importance of choosing when and where to engage—all rooted in this genre’s make-up, just as they were indispensible pieces of Warcraft 3’s standard game. It seems stupidly obvious, in retrospect, but if you’re using an RTS interface for something that is fundamentally not an RTS (and what you are playing is certifiably Not Dumb) then it must be something else.

So, Warcraft 3. If DotA represents a stylised version of Warcraft's innovation, was its creation and refinement—or something very much like it—inevitable? After all, if DotA hadn't accrued its enormous fan-base, another custom map would have. The hooks, the map-editing tools, the potential fans: they were always going to be there. Maybe I'm passively handing over too much credit to Blizzard, but it's not every day a game gives life to a new genre.

In the next post of, er, PLB? Ahem. Why e-sports is ruining e-sports, and why sensationalist previews produce a narcotic-like effect upon their writers.

De-Netting and Generational Issues with Blue Hedgehogs

Far be it for me to impose my mortal wants on the technology-spirits. Their swirling whim decided a couple of weeks ago that I should be severed from the inter-realms. And, well, losing the internet sucks. Okay, so I guess it's hard to get more concise than that last statement, so I'll just head in the opposite direction and elaborate. I don't know the exact point at which TV became obsolete. There wasn’t a polite pop-up message when Internet 2.0 came out, advising that users may find TV slightly underwhelming within X amount of days. Still, it wouldn’t hurt thinking about some form of courteous reminder, as nothing draws a more jagged line under a useful service than its sudden removal. For one thing, news channels are woefully under-equipped to cater for viewers who would like to hear news. Unintuitive, I know, but there's enough stupidity on display to fashion a kind of rudimentary stress-test for your sanity. The repetition of ‘The Top Story', in particular, gets old very fast, especially when you know other things are happening. I noticed this before losing the internet, but lack of immediate alternatives makes the situation roughly fifty times more painful.

In the spirit of fairness—and since plain truths are apparently on the agenda—the internet could be considered humanity’s most robust model yet for an actual ‘Time Vampire’. But I want to contest this as a simple, negative truth on a couple of grounds, mostly the mind-bending dichotomy of the internet. It’s the same tools that enable us to whittle away an hour on F7U12 that give us the ability to gather swaths of information and communicate with peers. The theories of the best texts of history are bundled up with the most juvenile humour imaginable in the internet; pornography on one page, feminist discourse on another. It’s a kind of a big place.

For every task I was freer to follow without the assistance of a series of tubes, I was prevented from pursuing another. It becomes commonplace to, say, want to write about or look into something, only to come across a research block which hadn’t previously existed. That being said—and I understand this rant has reached evolutionary-levels of obviousness by this point—it is fucking sweet to perceive that difference in technology. After finite media and the narrow lane of TV's out-put, well, it's like turning on a fountain of Everything.

In any case, rant-concluded. Video games. This video review feels like some kind of mirage. You'll know what I mean when you see. Did you see? Good, now I can explain myself. Sonic games have not been good in a long time. I don't think there's a more concise way to put it. Simple truths are fun. The ten-year-old Sonic aficionado in me is trying desperately to make me check myself: perhaps there's some way I could couch the slimy spin-offs and disappointing lack of refinement more favourably? Sadly no. I draw the line at Hedgehogs on Motorcycles. I don't mean to so sound premature as something to the effect of 'This changes everything!' But seriously, this changes everything. Or at the very least cashes in on it in a pleasing way. Coming up: MOBAs. Why people should probably try them or, y'know. Something.