Weekly Wrap Up: Gordon Freeman In The House?

...I swear if this is some kind of sick joke.

A Valve employee has been spotted wearing a Half-Life 3 t-shirt. Yes, apparently Chandana Ekanayak, an executive producer at Uber Entertainment (the guys behind Monday Night Combat), spotted a random valve employee wearing the shirt pictured above. Now, hold on a second here (prepare for your dreams to be deleted here, along with mine), before we get too carried away I'd like to point out that Random Valve Employee Man had absoluetly no problem having a a picture of the shirt taken by Ekanayak, who proceeded to stick it up on Twitter. If Valve were really close to a Half-Life 3 reveal they most certainly would be doing their gosh darnedest to keep it under wraps until the big reveal. Not to mention stuff like this can get someone fired. So unless Random Valve Employee Guy really disliked his job with one of the premier game developers, I think it unlikely he'd just let a picture be taken unless it meant very little for the time being.

That said we'll have to wait and see what Valve's inevitable response to this will be.

In the meantime, here's some more gaming news from the past week.

Sony Clarifies One Account Policy For PS Vita

NeoGaf discovered this weekend that the Playstation Vita will allow only one Playstation Network account per portable.

So what in blazes does that mean exactly?

At a recent hands-on event, Sony tried to clarify. "Only one account. If you want to use a different account you need to format the system to factory settings." Sony's Brad Douglas, Sony Japans Third-Party Relations guy clarified further by mentioning that the Playstation Portable also only allows one account. The only difference is that the Portable doesn't force you to do a factory reset to log in. The main reason players have two accounts is so they can play digital titles available in Japan, as well as their own country. The factory reset throws a wrench into that by forcing you to stay region locked essentially, unless you like jumping through very small hoops on fire draped over piranha tanks. 


EA Online Passes Can Expire 
A now, and understandably so, disgruntled NeoGaf member has learned that the online passes that EA requires for access to it's games online content expire after a certain amount of time after purchasing a brand new copy of Need For Speed: Hot Pursuit only to find the games online pass activation key had expired. Some other members looked through the EULA and did find a clause that states the codes can in fact expire. Joystiq followed up on the story and as it turns out some games passes are set to expire, according to a customer service advisor with EA. So essentially for these games even if you buy the game new you will still have to pay to access online features, a move initially made to combat used game sales.

Again, people are understandably upset with EA. I think it's absolutely unbelievable that they never really came out and notified anyone about this. Yes it's in their EULA agreement but this is the kind of thing people really need to know ahead of time.

XCOM Loses A Developing Team

2K games has announced that it's Canberra, Australia development team, which was helping to work on the upcoming XCOM reboot, would be shifted to help with development of Bioshock: Infinite instead.

Initially, this lead to speculation that XCOM might be on hold, or might have even been canceled. However, 2K Games told Kotaku that 2K Marin was still developing the game with the hope that the game would still be a strong title. However, when pressed for more information about the size of the development team, 2K declined to get more specific. "As a rule we do not comment on the size of our development team."

I don't view this as a setback for XCOM necessarily. Bioshock: Infinite is shaping up to be one of the premier titles for next year, and 2K probably recognizes that in order to get it out in time for it's tenative holiday 2012 release, they're going to need as many people working on it as possible.

GamePro Sails Away Into The Sunset

This news is not a good sign for the state of the printed gaming press.

One of the longest running magazines about video games, starting way back in 1988, GamePro announced that it will be ceasing it's publication as a standalone company as of today, December 5th. Both the site, and the magazine will be shutting down. In a statement on their site (which probably no longer exists) was this:

Thank you for your loyalty, support, and participation in the GamePro.com community. At noon on December 5, 2011, the U.S. version of GamePro online will shut down as an independent site. GamePro will become part of PCWorld.com (http://www.pcworld.com/gamepro) offering gaming news, reviews, and how-tos from the PCWorld team. Thank you to the entire GamePro staff for their hard work and dedication.

 GamePro was one helped to give the games industry a voice, especially as it began it's rise into the pop culture stratosphere. Handfuls of talented writers and journalists have written for the magazine. It's death is a significant blow to gaming journalism and really give us a sign of the times.

Dragon Age Getting Multiplayer

An insider has claimed that Dragon Age will be getting a multiplayer mode that has an arena-like style to it. The mode will cover Player versus Environment, Player versus Player, and Player versus Dragon play modes. Details on the PvE section are slim, but according to the source the mode is fairly far along in development. IT is apparently being developed using DICE's Frostbite 2.0 engine. What was not made clear is if this rumored multiplayer mode is going to be DLC of some kind for Dragon Age II, or if it will be in an upcoming game. Or perhaps a game on it's own entirely. 


Sadly, this news seems to confirm somewhat the rumors that EA is requiring all of it's games to have some kind of online multiplayer. And unlike the Mass Effect co-op mode, so far this mode sounds somewhat unrelated to anything in Dragon Age as of now. Then again we didn't know exactly what Mass Effect's multiplayer was exactly until it was announced/leaked. Still given the success of recent RPG's like Skyrim and Skyward Sword, one has to wonder if requiring games that have previously been single player to have multiplayer is a good idea or not. 


Okay so maybe this past week wasn't all happy news. Hopefully this coming week will be a bit happier. And, with a bit of luck, maybe some Gordon Freeman too.  

Mass Effect 3 - Why Multiplayer Is and Is Not a Big Deal

...Once you co-op.

While the news seemed unsure at first, Casey Hudson put the doubts to rest once and for all with a simple tweet:

Yes, co-op MP missions for #ME3: they're real, and they're spectacular. Rest assured it's nothing of what you've feared. More soon...

So, now we know the truth. The very thing some of us were dreading has become reality.

And it is nowhere near as big a deal as we think it is.

Don't get me wrong now, as Mass Effect and Bioware diehard, I'm a bit concerned about what this co-op will be like exactly, but I'm not nearly as concerned as some are. Maybe it's because I trust Bioware to do the series justice, just as they usually do. Reguardless of what EA may say or have in store for Bioware's development plans, Bioware has almost never stumbled, and is always listening to fans reactions and opinions.But there's more to it than that.

When the initial rumors of multiplayer started spawning a few months back a lot of people thought immediately that we were dealing with something along the lines of Call of Duty or Gears or something similar to that. Very few people thought the rumors might mean co-op. It's important to not the difference because this means that, while it will take plenty of work to do right, it won't take nearly as much as a full on multiplayer mode. In fact, depending on how they do it (it won't take anything away from singleplayer we've been told) , it could open up new stories or moments. At the very least, we can see it as just another feature, and instead of taking something away from the game, it instead adds to an already incredible experience.

However, as I said, I have my concerns.

The biggest one with me is why they're introducing something like this in the final game of the Mass Effect trilogy. Bioware has said before they plan for Mass Effect to continue long after ME3's final credits role. So why add this in now? Why not wait until the next game to do something like this? In a series that has been all singleplayer, all the time up to this point it seems a somewhat fairly sized risk to me. It might even lend evidence to the rumors that EA has started demanding there to be some kind of multiplayer mode in all it's games.These are all questions that will be answered as we move along I'm sure but I almost feel like I was lied to by Bioware in a way. They said time and time again that Mass Effect 3 would not deviate very far from Mass Effect 2. This co-op mode seems like a pretty big step away from what Mass Effect 2 was.

Yet, the one reassuring thing for me, that allows me to remain cautiously optomistic about the co-op mode, is how the changes from Mass Effect to Mass Effect 2 went. Story wise, there were some slight steps backwards, but gameplay wise I felt the game was much smoother and much more fun. Every moment of the combat felt active and tension mounted several times for me during key firefights, whereas in Mass Effect some fights felt kind of dull and uninspired in retrospect. Bioware boldly made changes to the Mass Effect formula, knowing that they could have played it safe instead, and while not everything went over so smooth (I.E. fewer RPG elements), the game as a whole felt much stronger than the first title.

As long as Bioware keeps their word that the co-op and singleplayer won't mix, I see no reason why we can't wait and see on how this turns out. Who knows? Maybe it will be even more of the awesomeness that is Mass Effect.

One side note here:

Extra Life is almost here! I have managed to raise some money, but time is nearly up and I could still use help. I'd really love to see a lot of last minute donations from you people out there, even if it's small amounts. I'm super excited for this, and I can't wait to get to work!

One last thing! Marshmallow Fluff! has a facebook page now, so go like it, and you can get direct links to this blog, as well as links to interesting stories, info, and pictures about all things gaming.
Marshamllow Fluff! Facebook Page

And with that, I will bow out until next time...

Why Multiplayer Today Sucks (Don't Lie to Me, You Know It Does)

...And don't lie to yourself either. Thats not nice to you.

This is gonna be a long one, so if you want the tl;dr version, just scroll to the bottom now. It will save you about ten minutes of reading. (Just past the bold big letter section should be alright.)


I often have the following discussion with my friends when I am frustrated with whatever game I happen to be playing online:

"Man this game sucks. I don't remember it being this bad before..."
"Yeah I know what you mean. It's probably all the camping little kids."
"Maybe, but it's probably is just all the noobish tactics they use."

Up until today I usually thought that was the reason exactly. That people had just started using cheap ways to win, and I was trying to "play fair" (whatever that might mean is anyone's guess) and that made me feel frustrated. But today I was looking at all my games, particularly the ones that had multiplayer modes and it suddenly dawned on me that all these games multiplayer modes had a leveling system.

Why is that important? Because it means that if your a new player, or a player who doesn't play often, you are at a significant disadvantage compared to other players who play religiously or bought the game on launch day.

Then I thought some more. Take Call of Duty for instance. At the start of the game you have very limited choices in what you can use for weaponry and equipment (you don't even have the ability to create a customized class until about level 5). If your brand new to the game, then you have to use a preset class, usually containing a somewhat okay gun and some interesting perks. Thats not so bad right? No maybe not if everyone else was using the same five pre-made classes. Instead most people playing have their own custom class, and the players who (like me) have reached level 50 have access to just about everything in the multiplayer. If I'm not liking the way my game is going, I can simply whip out the create a class menu and choice from a multitude of death dealing weapons. Hell, while I'm at it, how about I equip some C4 charges or a claymore.

I can already see the argument of, "It's not that bad to level up. Stop complaining."
Alright, thats a nice sentiment. If you play ten hours a day maybe you can get to level 50 in a few days. The reality is, most people do not have that kind of time. I have friends who are on for an hour or two and then are done. They have lives and can't sit there and level and grind their way up to get the coolest weapons and perks. One friend of mine took a week just to make it to fifteen, and the leveling progress gets slower and harder the further on you go.

It's no better in any other games. Except maybe Halo.

There is a reason Halo is considered a harder game to play, and why gamers who play MLG or other professional level type leagues take Halo over any other game. It is all about how skilled you are. There are no perks to buy, no guns to unlock. The only thing leveling serves a purpose for in Halo: Reach is as a sign of progress and a why to shoehorn in a credit system and armor customization system. Say what you will about  Halo, if your not very good, you will not do well most of the time.

I don't consider myself to be a great Halo player, but among my friends right now, I'm probably the fourth, maybe fifth best. I can hold my own, I know some of the things that you should and shouldn't do. I know what guns are right for what situations, and I know where players tend to hang out on just about every map. On a good night, against players in my skill level, I can average a pretty solid twelve to twenty kills per match in slayer. Against a group of professional's I would be lucky beyond compare if I happened to get one kill.

But maybe that is what makes Call of Duty so appealing to casual players. It is a game where you have a better chance, once you can unlock some cool weapons anyway. Halo is daunting to new players because there is a huge gap between a player like me, and someone like Tom Taylor.

I know what I just started...no I'm not happy about it....

It may appear I'm rambling, but hold on. I have a point here (somewhere...)

Back in the day before you had leveling in multiplayer, you had only one way to beat someone in multiplayer. Through superior skill. Those old fighting games that used to be in the arcades fifteen years ago or so had no unlockable abilites or special moves. You won by simply being better. And if you wanted to win, then you had to practice and get better. Today, at level fifty in Call of Duty, you can set up a class where you could possibly spend half the match in the same place, and end up ruling the match, and if something's not working, you just buy a solution (or equip the tubes....)

Perhaps now I understand why I hate Call of Duty now. Maybe this is why I dislike it and everything it stands for. I apologize for what I am about to say here, but this needs to be said.

It Takes Much Less Skill to Win at Call of Duty than ANY OTHER GAME TODAY. 


I don't like saying it. I used to enjoy playing this series, but truth is, somewhere around Modern Warfare, skill went out the window to a degree. And the way the game is set up now, it almost encourages you to camp it out. Killstreaks have a lot to do with it too. And yeah, it does take more skill to win a round in Bad Company 2 or Halo, or any other game really, probably because of the serious tip of balance killstreaks can have. They aren't quite so bad in Black Ops, and the fact that you have to get your hands dirty to earn them all makes it a little better, but the game would still probably be better without them there at all.

And don't think that any other games that are guilty of this are any better. Battlefield: Bad Company 2 feels a bit more balanced to me because it requires more teamwork, and there are no perks or killstreaks, but players with better weapons usually come out on top more often than not. Especially true of the snipers in that game.

It's now clear why multiplayer sucks these days. To me anyway...

We've forgotten what made the old fighting games, or the old Call of Duty games even, truly fun and challenging. The fact that you could only win through superior skill and knowledge of the game. Nowadays, being better sometimes boils down to having the best gun in the lobby, or the best way to camp and earn killstreaks. Teamwork can sometimes affect the outcome, but more often than not (in team dethmatch modes especially) one person can just annihilate the other team and come out with the win because he had some bizarre gun and attachment combo.

Things probably aren't going to change anytime soon either. This is an era of gaming when people want customization and choice. Leveling systems provide that, and it also keeps players coming back for more.

And thats a little upsetting to me...

I promise next update will be much shorter and much much much less serious.

(Oh and just to note, I never said Call of Duty takes no ability or skill to play. Just less than other games. And no, I will not take it back.)