08.13.08
Posted in games at 7:11 pm by Rob Fahey
Quick personal life update. I just got back earlier this week from Amecon, which was a hugely enjoyable weekend. Anime conventions have transitioned over the years from being the preserve of a small sub-genus of bearded, sandalled science fiction nerds into being a bizarre melting pot of subcultures and groups, a process which I continue to find genuinely fascinating. Granted, they’re unified by the fact that to an outside observer, all of them look like they need to get out a bit more - but the sheer range of different interests and subcultures represented makes the events fascinating all the same.
Ayacon, a convention with which I was involved for many years, is probably going to run next Summer for the first time in three years. I made the announcement of this at Amecon - apparently despite having 14 committee members, none of them can actually speak, so I was chosen to go on stage despite having left the committee a couple of years ago. The last Ayacon, in 2005, remains to my mind pretty much the best attempt at embracing and expanding upon the subcultures and interest groups who have flocked to anime conventions in recent years (Amecon, for all that it’s a great event, has generally stuck to a more traditional line). I don’t know how (or even if) the present organisers plan to continue that evolution, but it’ll be really interesting to watch.
I also took the rather heavy-hearted decision this week to hang up my Paladin’s shield and quit World of Warcraft. The basic, underlying problem here is that the destination - the fabled “end-game” - simply isn’t as much fun as the journey, the narrative driven quest to reach level 70. More specifically, I essentially played from level 1 to 70 as a single-player game - and it was great, probably one of the best singleplayer RPGs I’ve played. At level 70, however, you don’t have any choice but to play with other people, so I joined a couple of guilds - first a relatively hardcore guild who wanted to burn through content and do really well, and second an ostensibly more friendly, unfocused guild.
My problem with “other people” in WoW stems from a basic, horrific failure of social skills and interaction in many of its players. Even those who are friendly and helpful can display shocking social immaturity when push comes to shove. In a virtual world where the consequences of your actions aren’t right in your face, and where authority often rests with the first person to click a button rather than being conferred by effort or merit, people feel free to act in a manner which they’d be terrified to assume in their day to day lives.
For me, the final straw came when a close friend was booted out of our guild for no good reason, other than that he’d rubbed someone up the wrong way. With no willingness to make a sincere apology or change things to prevent something like that happening again, I left - for fairly obvious reasons. Ironically, accusations were thrown pretty swiftly of “taking the game too seriously”; I say ironically, because to me, my placing of my real-life friendship ahead of the game in importance seems to suggest quite the opposite. I don’t care about WoW enough to have it impact on a real-world relationship in that manner, and after a couple of shit guild experiences, it’s become apparent to me that I don’t care about the game’s population enough to bother with it at all.
(Frankly, it was probably in danger of turning me into an anti-social git anyway, although it’s admittedly been bloody nice to have something to distract me from a litany of toothaches and chest infections for the past few weeks.)
All of which leaves me with a slightly bitter taste in my mouth, but which more than anything, makes me fascinated to know what research has been done into the difference into how people react to things in a virtual world compared to the real world. I know there was an odd experiment a while back in which someone viewed the world through a screen displaying an image from a camera mounted above and behind their head - effectively giving them a third person perspective on the real world - and it was found that they lost many basic social inhibitions, being more willing to invade people’s personal space, for example.
If such a simple change makes us ruder to one another, it’s no surprise that a consequence-free virtual world changes our interactions in ways that are not entirely positive - although one does wonder whether the next generation, who grow up with virtual worlds as simply another social tool, will end up developing their own social rules that encompass virtual worlds more thoroughly than our own conventions do.
In other news, my dentist did the most painful thing a dentist can possibly do to me today - she gave me an outline of the costs for the rest of my treatment. It’s going to be running close to £5000 by the end of the whole thing; needless to say, I’m not exactly happy, but what can you do?
Technorati Tags: Amecon, anime, Ayacon, dentist, MMORPG, anime conventions, videogames, World of Warcraft
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07.06.08
Posted in games, work, writing at 4:47 pm by Rob Fahey
Unsurprisingly, I produced a couple of Blizzard-related features this week along with the usual batch of reviews and whatnot. I previously alluded to my piece for The Times, which was my first published work with the paper - if you fancy having a read but didn’t pick up the paper, you can see it online here: The WoW Factor.
I’ve got another piece appearing in tomorrow’s Times, so they must have liked the first one.
Also on the topic of Blizzard, I wrote an editorial this week for Eurogamer and GamesIndustry.biz which explored how the company’s unique “confessional” approach to talking to its audience has played a major role in making them into such a successful developer. Pop over and have a read if you like: Blizzard’s Perfect Storm.
(Sorry, this blog has gone all work-related again. I’m sure I’ll have another political opinion to hold forth upon soon enough - especially as the by-election in Howden & Haltemprice approaches…)
Technorati Tags: Eurogamer, gaming, journalism, MMORPG, The Times, videogames, workblog, World of Warcraft
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07.02.08
Posted in games, work at 12:23 am by Rob Fahey
A quick work-related note - I’ve started writing for The Times, and the first of what will hopefully be many features is appearing in tommorow’s (Wednesday’s) times2 section in the paper. It’s a report from last weekend’s Blizzard Worldwide Invitational event in Paris, and is designed as a gentle and fairly positive introduction to the unique society and culture that has grown up around World of Warcraft.
It’s also, of course, an excuse for The Times to run lots of pictures of cosplayers, but the article text at least presents them in a positive way rather than “christ, look at the freaks”.
I don’t know how regularly The Times will be commissioning work from me - after all, if they hate this piece they might never commission anything again! - but if all goes well I’d hope to get pieces in there every month or so, if not more often. There’s a real enthusiasm at the paper for getting their coverage of videogames up to scratch with the rest of their (excellent) arts and culture coverage, which will mark a welcome departure from the lazy “what are these evil modern things doing to our kids!” scare stories which much of the British press falls back on for games coverage.
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05.30.08
Posted in games at 9:55 am by Rob Fahey
Anyone who has been moaning and crying about the UK pricing for Rock Band, please consider this. In a moment of madness, I’ve just spent 300 quid (including shipping and inevitable customs charge) on a single guitar, and about 60 tracks to play on it.
Yes, the arcade-perfect Guitar Freaks controller I’ve been ruminating over since I got back from Japan last week is on its way, courtesy of a stack of credit I had with Play-Asia (long story) and a quiet month that’s been easy on my pocket. Guitar Hero has never really grabbed me, but Guitar Freaks sucked away countless 100 yen coins in Japanese arcades on this trip out. Maybe by next time I go, I’ll even be able to play without attracting pitying glances from Japanese guys nodding sagely at the genetically impaired gaming skills of the unfortunate gaijin. Maybe.
Perrin is still talking about buying a good drum kit to hook up via an adaptor to DrumMania, too, which would give us the UK’s most ludicrously overblown (but fantastic) rhythm gaming setup. Eat that, Rock Band.
Technorati Tags: DrumMania, gaming???????? ????? ????????, GuitarFreaks, Rock Band, videogames
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05.21.08
Posted in games at 1:54 pm by Rob Fahey
This is not a post about politics. I promise.
Instead, it’s a brief post to note that if you’re starting out in Age of Conan this week (and rather a lot of people do seem to be), feel free to come along and say hi to my Cimmerian Guardian - Hachimaki, on the Crom server.
(Yes, PvE - I’m not making the mistake of rolling on a PvP server like I did with World of Warcraft. I’ve regretted that particular decision for a long time, because all the fun, consensual parts of PvP are still on the PvE servers, with ganking by sexually frustrated teenagers being the only aspect you miss out on. I’m happy to spare myself that aspect of the MMOG experience.)
Game seems pretty interesting so far - it’s certainly the first time I’ve been asked to disrupt a witch’s spell by, er, replacing her vestal virgin blood with blood from one of the town’s whores. Nice. There used to be a tankard around here somewhere, I might fill that with mead for the authentic Conan experience. Diet Coke out of a Guinness pint glass just isn’t cutting it for this game.
Technorati Tags: Age of Conan, Funcom, gaming, MMORPG, videogames, World of Warcraft
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05.19.08
Posted in games, work at 1:25 am by Rob Fahey
It’s been a bloody age since I updated this - sorry. Life has been busy. A couple of weeks in Japan surrounded by several hectic weeks of work here in the UK have seen to that, with the result that every time I’ve thought “gosh, I should really update my blog”, I’ve proceeded to groan audibly.
Very briefly, though, I thought I’d pop in a belated link to this rather handy new feature on Eurogamer - the ability to view the article archive filtered by author. Unfortunately, I appear to have a split personality as far as EG’s archive is concerned, so if for some odd reason you want to keep up with my latest output, you’ll need to click both here and here.
There’s no clever way of getting a “latest articles by this author” feed out of the thing at the moment, mind. You could probably do it if you’re really clever with Yahoo! Pipes or suchlike, but I’d start to think you were some kind of weird stalker at that stage.
In other news, this weekend I went to Argos, built flat-pack furniture and installed Windows Vista. I’m not really sure which of these experiences was most painful, but at least the Argos and flat-pack stuff means I now have a nice glass and chrome TV stand in the living room and a chest of drawers in my bedroom. The Vista install just means I have an expensive PC that’s partially broken. Great.
Technorati Tags: journalism, Eurogamer, Vista, workblog
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01.31.08
Posted in games, politics, writing at 1:44 am by Rob Fahey
A couple of weeks back, Britain’s embattled (and increasingly forlorn-looking, as fellow closeted BBC Parliament fans will have noted) Prime Minister, Gordon Brown, took up the standard of the battle against the single threat to our country’s youth. Not the erosion of their civil liberties, or the crumbling of the economy that’s meant to sustain them; not even drugs, or alcohol, or terrorism. This vile and pernicious threat is, of course, videogames.
Brown parroted elements of the spiel of his repellently false opponent, David Cameron, in calling for videogame makers to ban knives from their games - essentially saying that they should accept responsibility for the recent spate of highly-reported knife crime among youths in Britain’s cities, especially around London.
I wrote a fairly lengthy feature on the matter for GamesIndustry.biz, which pretty much sums up my own view on it. In the wake of that, I was contacted by the Evening Standard, who wanted me to write a short piece outlining my perspective on the debate.
Although I spent quite a while working the piece into the word counts they requested, they didn’t publish it in the end - and rather rudely, didn’t even bother dashing off a quick mail to apologise for wasting my time. Being that the Standard is an odious, biased and unpleasant rag at the best of times, I’m not entirely surprised - I got the impression that they had contacted me purely because I was one of the few game writers who made a point of seeing both sides to the whole Manhunt 2 banning story, and were disappointed to find that this doesn’t translate to being enough of a fool to think playing videogames is what’s making members of violent gangs stab one another in South London.
Anyway, in case anyone is interested, here’s what was going to be published. Shame, really - I was quite looking forward to slagging off old Gordy in the national press. Some other time, maybe.
It’s very disappointing that Gordon Brown would try to make videogames into a scapegoat for London’s youth crime. It’s a cheap political trick to point the finger at a soft target like videogames, instead of accepting responsibility for the difficult, complex roots of this problem.
I don’t think for a moment that a politician as experienced as Mr Brown really believes that we’re going to solve violent crime by taking some videogames off the shelves. He knows that what’s really needed is to tackle the thorny questions of deprivation, social integration, drug policy and policing - but videogames make for a nice, distracting soundbite and take the heat off for a few days.
There is definitely a debate to be had about violent videogames, but Mr Brown’s comments aren’t helpful. We need to look at the enforcement of age ratings, and make sure that retailers are sticking to them. We need to make sure that parents know what their children are playing, and can control their access to unsuitable material.
The research into the effect of violent games on people’s behaviour is very inconclusive - but even in the absence of a clear answer, I think most people, including those inside the games industry, agree that children’s access to violent media should be controlled. We already have a great age rating system, but there’s a lot of work to be done on that, and the Government needs to be working with the industry to ensure that children are protected, rather than just pointing fingers.
The tragedy of knife and gun crime among young people in London shouldn’t even be part of this debate. There’s no evidence of any kind of link with videogames - but plenty of evidence that links these crimes to social problems like drugs, underage drinking, poverty and poor social integration. London needs to hear Mr Brown’s plans to tackle those problems - not just empty allegations of blame and cheap soundbites.
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01.09.08
Posted in games, work at 3:15 pm by Rob Fahey
Quick work-related heads-up - my feature on Gran Turismo 5 Prologue is up on Eurogamer. (Avoid the comments thread, which has dissolved into idiocy as people who can barely count attempt to argue about sales figures.)
I’ve finally had a chance to delve into COD4, and rather like it. Perhaps because I played Counter-Strike until I was blue in the face (well, until I got fired from my job for absenteeism and sleeping in the office, anyway - true story), it doesn’t feel quite as fresh and interesting to me as it seems to everyone else, and I’m continually pissed off by the absolutely, shockingly awful multiplayer lobby system. But it’s a damned good game nonetheless, and most of my Live friends are playing it, which makes it all worthwhile.
Hating the levelling grind mechanic, though. I’ve played enough MMORPGs to be sick to the back teeth of this mechanism in games - it doesn’t feel like a reward system to me any more, it feels like stealing all my toys and then rationing them back to me. MMOGs like Tabula Rasa are finally managing to break out of this model, only for action games to dive right into it? God, I hope not.
Technorati Tags: Eurogamer, journalism, COD4, Call of Duty, videogames, Xbox 360, Xbox Live
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12.11.07
Posted in games, work at 1:24 pm by Rob Fahey
A quick update; I’ve moved house somewhat successfully, and although the new place is only about a kilometre away from the old place, I’m enjoying it here a lot more. It’s a nicer house, on a much quieter street, and closer to transport links into town. It’s also got a kitten in it, which is a good thing except when I go to the toilet at night and she stands outside the door mewling loudly at me the whole time. That aspect is just weird.
No Internet yet, though. I’m connecting on a HSDPA wireless broadband modem in the interim. Sadly, “the interim” turns out to be longer than expected due to a complication with the phoneline; as a result I suspect I’m waaaay over my 3GB monthly limit, and my only hope for avoiding bankruptcy is that the rumours of Three’s inability to bill for over-allocation usage at present is true.
Work related stuff…
I was asked to moderate the Xfire Debate Club event last week, which was an online discussion between a number of journalists - topic, “Best In Gaming 2007″. It was more fun than I expected, actually; I was slightly dreading the 10pm GMT start (it’s a US-centric thing), but the chatter flowed quite nicely and it was interesting to see a broad sweep of opinion about the last year’s games. There’s a transcript (the “Main Floor” one - the other one is an open chat room transcript) and a mugshot of me that makes me look like a nightclub bouncer on the Xfire website.
(On a similar note, I’m rather looking forward to Eurogamer’s annual institution, the end-of-year top 50. Those are always a bucket of fun both to read and to participate in.)
A topic that arises a few times in the Xfire debate is the whole Jeff Gerstmann thing. In all honesty, I’ve never been a big fan of Gerstmann’s writing, and even less so his presenting style - but I still hate seeing stuff like this happen, because it erodes trust in the entire videogames media and makes life more difficult for everyone else working in it. I wrote a piece for GamesIndustry.biz on the topic, which sums up the events to date and why they’re such a big deal for a sector that’s already widely mistrusted by consumers.
A few EG reviews for your delectation as well, if you fancy them - selected highlights being a second look at MMOG title Vanguard: Saga of Heroes, which now actually works thanks to nine months of patching (shame they didn’t think to spend an extra nine months in development rather than leaving it half-finished, eh?), a review of surprisingly bloody good Canadian-developed anime tie-in Naruto: Rise of a Ninja, and an absolute hatchet-job on the single worst game I’ve played this year, Fury.
By the way - I don’t know how long it hangs around in stores for, but the issue of Neo with my Gundam cover feature in it appeared a few weeks back. If anyone’s read it, I’d love to hear some feedback on the piece - good, bad or indifferent.
Heading off, before my bandwidth bill threatens to exceed the GDP of Chile…
Technorati Tags: anime, Eurogamer, games industry, Gerstmann, journalism, magazines, Neo Magazine, Xfire, videogames
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09.24.07
Posted in games, work at 11:31 pm by Rob Fahey
Early morning start tomorrow - if you’re having serious trouble sleeping, I’ll be on BBC World’s World Business Report show at 5.30am, talking about Halo 3 and what it means for Microsoft and the Xbox. I think it’s repeated throughout the morning on BBC World, and also on BBC1 (which runs a BBC World feed until programming begins at a more sensible hour).
Spare a thought, though; I do these analysis spots for BBC World on a semi-regular basis, and while they used to want to interview me at 9 or 10 in the evening, they’re increasingly frequently asking me to come in for the 5.30am slot. Owch.
Technorati Tags: BBC, Halo 3, journalism, media whoring, TV, videogames
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