What I've Been Up To (Games I've Played)
It's been a while since I made a post like this, mostly because video games are one of the things that I can go on and on about forever. I really should write out a formatted review of some kind, just to see if I can do it, but I'll do this in my typical ranty format. I've been playing many, many games recently and it's been a nice change of pace from the amount of WoW I've been playing the past several years.
Speaking of WoW, I think I'll start there with the expansion, Wrath of the Lich King.
Wrath of the Lich King-
Sure, it's been out for a few months now, but I've had enough time to digest an enormous portion of the content they've put out, so I feel that it's still a good time to talk about it. My experience with the expansion starts shortly after I got back to the apartment and creating my Death Knight, Tuberculosis. I played that game for about 24 hours straight (I realize how pathetic that is) in the hopes that by the end of the weekend I'd be caught up with the majority of players who decided to go straight to the new continent. I was successful. The quest line starting out as a Death Knight is one of the best experiences I have ever had in an MMO. Blizzard has proven with this expansion that it is possible to have a changing environment in a static world with their new "phasing" technology. The basic idea behind this technology is that layers of the exact same location exist in the world, such as the place in Eastern Plaguelands where Death Knights start out. When you accomplish certain goals, usually triggered by completing a quest or using certain items, you enter a new layer. An simple example is one of the first quests. You need to go to an alternate "shadow" dimension to obtain your horse. You enter a darker version of the land you were already in (keeping in mind that there are no load times between these transitions) and hunt down your new mount. Another more awesome example is near the end of the line when you come back out of the necropolis to find that the Lich King has come outside to a newly constructed platform where he orders you to fly out on a frost wyrm to annihilate a crusading army that has taken the city you were just fighting in.
My new experiences didn't continue until I finished power-leveling my Death Knight to the appropriate level for Northrend, about 68. The visuals in Northrend are a huge upgrade from the last expansion. New models seem to have much higher polygon-count and look smoother. The new landscapes are beautifully crafted and there is a lot of variety between zones from the green northern forests of Howling Fjord, to the jungle of Sholozar Basin, to the gorgeous, wintery mountains of the Storm Peaks. The music in most zones is equally outstanding. In fact, the visuals have gotten so much better that the character models of the players look ugly by comparison. I'm hoping Blizzard can address this problem eventually.
Other than the audio-visual side of things, the quests in Northrend, at least at first, run more organically. I found myself running around aimlessly a lot less than in previous areas. The hubs flow very well and there's always a clear direction of where you could go next with NPCs offering quests to other zones if you happen to out-level the one you're in. I found myself hanging out in zones that had story lines I liked even after I could gain more experience and gear elsewhere because many of the stories, I feel, have improved also.
So why did I stop playing when there was so much awesomeness leveling? Simple: the endgame was boring and easy. Within a few weeks of hitting level 80, I had already cleared one of two raids in the game, the other being a single boss that I just never could bring myself to even care about doing. The challenge of the raiding game, something I loved in the past, was simply not there. I didn't even do it with an organized group. We were 25 mostly random people that just breezed right through it. So I stopped. I got back onto my Mage last night on Cenarion Circle, a server I haven't been on in about a year. It was nice seeing people on there again and I may even stick around for a while, but until the challenge of endgame is ramped up to something I can care about, I really don't know. Maybe I could learn to enjoy PvP as more than a novelty of the game? Then again, if I want PvP, I'll go play Warhammer Online or the next game on my list...
Left 4 Dead-
The concept behind this game is simple and ingenious. You play one of four survivors in the Zompacolypse. Your mission, in one of four campaigns currently, is to get the hell out of whatever location you're in. That's it. All other story is written on the walls. Seriously. It is designed as a cooperative game for four players and it does very well as that. You move through the campaigns over five stages, each harder than the last, culminating in a "last stand" as you wait to be rescued. Zombies are pretty easy to kill, but there are a lot of them. The AI "director" of the "film" you're in will also add tension and excitement at-will by throwing in special "infected" (it's a disease causing the zombification; the survivors are immune) that have special abilities or by summoning a horde that suddenly and swiftly attack from everywhere at once. You are scored at the end of the round for many things including infected killed, damage taken, etc.
The real fun of the game is in the versus matches. The game suddenly becomes one of 4v4, with teams alternating playing the survivors and the special infected. As a zombie, you'll use your special powers like leaping, grabbing from range with your tongue, or vomiting zombie-attracting ooze to stop the survivors from making it to the next safe room. The versus match plays out the whole campaign with the goal being to score more points than the other team. It's a game that highly values teamwork and so unity is necessary to come out on top.
The graphics are an updated version of the Half-Life 2 engine, which isn't bad by any stretch. It's not the best, but the environments are pretty impressive at times. The sound is really what sets the game apart. There are a multitude of sound cues that you'll be watching out for, so playing with the sound off is a huge handicap. Sounds warn you when special infected are near, when there is a Witch (crazy female zombie that can and will instantly kill you if you upset it), when zombies are near, or when your rescue has arrived.
Overall I think the game is very fun, but overpriced. It needs more content at that price, but more than just campaigns wouldn't fit into the game well. Really, I think this is an awesome game for $30, but not $50. I got it discounted on Steam, so I feel good about that. The teamwork is fun, but it's more fun if you know the people you're playing with. Playing a zombie feels very rewarding when you actually manage to divide the team and catch one of them off-guard. Killing a survivor can be a real accomplishment and each one that dies makes the others easier to kill. Of course, if someone spawns as the Tank, killing off the whole team can be pretty easy. Players tend to panic when faced with one, so that ironically makes them easier to kill. I've enjoyed the game very much so far and it is my favorite shooter at the moment. Hopefully I'll see some mod tools for it soon on Steam so I can start crafting levels.
That took a lot longer than I expected for two games, so I'm going to stop for now. I'll continue later today or this week with a few more.
Speaking of WoW, I think I'll start there with the expansion, Wrath of the Lich King.
Wrath of the Lich King-
Sure, it's been out for a few months now, but I've had enough time to digest an enormous portion of the content they've put out, so I feel that it's still a good time to talk about it. My experience with the expansion starts shortly after I got back to the apartment and creating my Death Knight, Tuberculosis. I played that game for about 24 hours straight (I realize how pathetic that is) in the hopes that by the end of the weekend I'd be caught up with the majority of players who decided to go straight to the new continent. I was successful. The quest line starting out as a Death Knight is one of the best experiences I have ever had in an MMO. Blizzard has proven with this expansion that it is possible to have a changing environment in a static world with their new "phasing" technology. The basic idea behind this technology is that layers of the exact same location exist in the world, such as the place in Eastern Plaguelands where Death Knights start out. When you accomplish certain goals, usually triggered by completing a quest or using certain items, you enter a new layer. An simple example is one of the first quests. You need to go to an alternate "shadow" dimension to obtain your horse. You enter a darker version of the land you were already in (keeping in mind that there are no load times between these transitions) and hunt down your new mount. Another more awesome example is near the end of the line when you come back out of the necropolis to find that the Lich King has come outside to a newly constructed platform where he orders you to fly out on a frost wyrm to annihilate a crusading army that has taken the city you were just fighting in.
My new experiences didn't continue until I finished power-leveling my Death Knight to the appropriate level for Northrend, about 68. The visuals in Northrend are a huge upgrade from the last expansion. New models seem to have much higher polygon-count and look smoother. The new landscapes are beautifully crafted and there is a lot of variety between zones from the green northern forests of Howling Fjord, to the jungle of Sholozar Basin, to the gorgeous, wintery mountains of the Storm Peaks. The music in most zones is equally outstanding. In fact, the visuals have gotten so much better that the character models of the players look ugly by comparison. I'm hoping Blizzard can address this problem eventually.
Other than the audio-visual side of things, the quests in Northrend, at least at first, run more organically. I found myself running around aimlessly a lot less than in previous areas. The hubs flow very well and there's always a clear direction of where you could go next with NPCs offering quests to other zones if you happen to out-level the one you're in. I found myself hanging out in zones that had story lines I liked even after I could gain more experience and gear elsewhere because many of the stories, I feel, have improved also.
So why did I stop playing when there was so much awesomeness leveling? Simple: the endgame was boring and easy. Within a few weeks of hitting level 80, I had already cleared one of two raids in the game, the other being a single boss that I just never could bring myself to even care about doing. The challenge of the raiding game, something I loved in the past, was simply not there. I didn't even do it with an organized group. We were 25 mostly random people that just breezed right through it. So I stopped. I got back onto my Mage last night on Cenarion Circle, a server I haven't been on in about a year. It was nice seeing people on there again and I may even stick around for a while, but until the challenge of endgame is ramped up to something I can care about, I really don't know. Maybe I could learn to enjoy PvP as more than a novelty of the game? Then again, if I want PvP, I'll go play Warhammer Online or the next game on my list...
Left 4 Dead-
The concept behind this game is simple and ingenious. You play one of four survivors in the Zompacolypse. Your mission, in one of four campaigns currently, is to get the hell out of whatever location you're in. That's it. All other story is written on the walls. Seriously. It is designed as a cooperative game for four players and it does very well as that. You move through the campaigns over five stages, each harder than the last, culminating in a "last stand" as you wait to be rescued. Zombies are pretty easy to kill, but there are a lot of them. The AI "director" of the "film" you're in will also add tension and excitement at-will by throwing in special "infected" (it's a disease causing the zombification; the survivors are immune) that have special abilities or by summoning a horde that suddenly and swiftly attack from everywhere at once. You are scored at the end of the round for many things including infected killed, damage taken, etc.
The real fun of the game is in the versus matches. The game suddenly becomes one of 4v4, with teams alternating playing the survivors and the special infected. As a zombie, you'll use your special powers like leaping, grabbing from range with your tongue, or vomiting zombie-attracting ooze to stop the survivors from making it to the next safe room. The versus match plays out the whole campaign with the goal being to score more points than the other team. It's a game that highly values teamwork and so unity is necessary to come out on top.
The graphics are an updated version of the Half-Life 2 engine, which isn't bad by any stretch. It's not the best, but the environments are pretty impressive at times. The sound is really what sets the game apart. There are a multitude of sound cues that you'll be watching out for, so playing with the sound off is a huge handicap. Sounds warn you when special infected are near, when there is a Witch (crazy female zombie that can and will instantly kill you if you upset it), when zombies are near, or when your rescue has arrived.
Overall I think the game is very fun, but overpriced. It needs more content at that price, but more than just campaigns wouldn't fit into the game well. Really, I think this is an awesome game for $30, but not $50. I got it discounted on Steam, so I feel good about that. The teamwork is fun, but it's more fun if you know the people you're playing with. Playing a zombie feels very rewarding when you actually manage to divide the team and catch one of them off-guard. Killing a survivor can be a real accomplishment and each one that dies makes the others easier to kill. Of course, if someone spawns as the Tank, killing off the whole team can be pretty easy. Players tend to panic when faced with one, so that ironically makes them easier to kill. I've enjoyed the game very much so far and it is my favorite shooter at the moment. Hopefully I'll see some mod tools for it soon on Steam so I can start crafting levels.
That took a lot longer than I expected for two games, so I'm going to stop for now. I'll continue later today or this week with a few more.