If I were I responsible blogger, I should have reported to you by now things like how my Christmas and New Year's was and what a lovely time I had, and so on, but why discuss boring things like that when we can instead discuss Doctor Who?

I saw most of the End of Time except for one tiny bit that didn't show up on Youtube. And it wasn't bad. Mind, I long ago gave up on RTD's ability to write a finale, so I went in expecting to be two hours or so of nonsensical hateful fanwanky stuff that wouldn't appear in the worst crack of crackfics. So my expectations were a bit low. While it was a bit nonsensical and fanwanky, it was also somehow a bit of fun, I found, and I liked the bits with the "Lord President" and the Master and Wilf. I especially liked the Master's "sacrifice" which was lovely and terribly in character. I don't know why, but I also liked the cactus people, even though they were entirely superfluous to the plot and looked like Dolph's demon form from Angel: the Series.

And below the cut we shall discuss my theory on who "The Woman" was, because everyone has to have one:

( My Theory on the Woman )

Also, I love the new logo. It is retro-shiny awesome.

In other news, I got the Doctor Who: Adventures in Time and Space RPG boxset yesterday. This is a player's guide and gamemaster's guide for playing RPGs in the Whoniverse, and it also comes with 6d6, very glossy shiny character sheets (including Ten and every major companion/ally of the Doctor in the new series, but also including templates and blanks), equipment cards, and tokens for "story points" which are a key part of the game's mechanics.

I haven't dug deeply into the rules yet, but at a glance it looks like the Buffy RPG mechanics meets d6 Star Wars -- d6 based, with lots of character traits and disadvantages to round out the feel for your character. You can use "story points" to help influence die rolls at key moments, and generally, the less powerful you are in traits and skills, the more story points you have ("It's serendipity, Doctor!"). Overall it seems rules-light, which is fine, although it leaves a lot of things like character advancement and anything not explicitly explained as entirely in the hands of the GM. Which can be great if you have a nice, cooperative GM, and horrible if your GM is a control freak or thinks that his story is more important than your fun or your own goals for your character.

Still it looks like an interesting system, and I look forward to running a one-shot or two maybe. Since it comes with a pre-written adventure and pre-written character sheets, it looks like it'd be easy to get started quickly for a brief campaign.

So, the Escapist and Destructoid, amongst others, are quoting Bioware co-founder Greg Zeschuk as saying,

"The fall of the JRPG in large part is due to a lack of evolution, a lack of progression. They kept delivering the same thing over and over. They make the dressing better, they look prettier, but it's still the same experience."

( I don't disagree, Mr. Zeschuk, but let's look at a certain Canadian company's RPGs by comparison: )

Now, mind you, I LOVE Bioware's games. I wouldn't be able to mock them for this if I wasn't familiar with their games in the first place, but they are the last people to criticize anyone for overusing the same tropes, themes, storytelling, and interface.

And the thing is, people love JRPGs for the same reasons--it might be the same thing over and over again, dressed prettier, but obviously, there's something people like about it. Assuming your brand of repetition is better than someone else's brand of repetition isn't really going to get you anywhere.

And I would be amazed if Bioware ever came up with something like the depth and diversity of gameplay along with epic wartime storytelling that, say, Konami's Suikoden series has. And for all the wonderful things Bioware has done, I sincerely doubt they could pull that kind of game off successfully. It's also a shame, because I'd love to see a Suikoden-like game where party-style combat was fun, and encounter rates were reasonable (the fun combat in Suikoden for me are all the tactical army combats).

( Bioware's elaboration on what they do better: )

It's not that I think JRPGs are better than Bioware's RPGs--I would rather sit down and play Baldur's Gate than Dragon Quest any day of the week. But that's because I like the particular style of combat and gameplay better--I enjoy the stories and writing in either subgenre equally (and when I don't like them, it's often for similar reasons).

Simply, the particular claims Zeschuk made are laughably hypocritical.

Bioware, you can do better. So quit talking and start living up to your own expectations, eh?

ADOM (Ancient Domains of Mystery) is a game that I officially declare TOO HARD. (Or rather TOO FRUSTRATING.)

It's a roguelike game, like... well, Rogue. Or Nethack. I've won Nethack three times.

I've won Nethack three times. And no, I don't mean in Xploremode or by savescumming. People who've played Nethack know what this means. As far as I'm concerned, this earns me enough sad-obsessive-nerd-with-no-life-credits for several lifetimes.

I've seen a lot of recommendations of ADOM, but I've tried many many times over the last week and most of my characters haven't survived past first level. Usually due to being ambushed by a random encounter before getting anywhere, when I have no decent equipment whatsoever and no means of escaping. It's one thing to make things challenging, but this game has no sense of danger scale. If the random generator throws 15 barbarians at you when you're level one and armed with a rock, you have to suck it up. I can tell it has a lot of interesting characters and items, but there's no point in trying to explore farther into the game when the next step will probably be your last, because it decides to throw several poisonous creatures before you've had a chance to deal with poison. And of course if you try to experiment with what items do, you'll probably kill yourself anyway.

It's a shame because it's got a quite innovative character creation system--but it's pointless to have an innovative character creation system in a "hardcore" style game where you can't save and reuse the character of your choice. What's the point of going through this lovely, complex system of birthsigns and background and questions when you step out the door and get slaughtered and then you lose the five minutes you spent creating that character forever? I did figure out a few tactics to try and stay alive longer, but the RNG is just too bent on your destruction.

So this is me, obsessive game nerd, telling you: do not play this game, unless you get off on being frustrated and seeing your hard work go up in smoke over and over again.

Oh well, back to Nethack.

Video games, Joss Whedon, comic books and more...

• If you like fantasy games or want to waste a little time, check out Dragon Age Journeys. This is an amazingly well-designed Flash game designed as a companion to Bioware's new Dragon Age: Origins (which I'll buy when I get a new computer later this year). As Bioware RPGs go, no it's not very deep, but it's a Flash game and certainly goes farther than one would expect in that medium. Easy to learn, difficult to master, great character leveling system and what dialogue there is is entertaining. The setting is nicely fleshed out too--you'll recognize some typical fantasy tropes, but some get turned on their head (elves are a slave race, for example).


• I started thinking about it, and there are some truly bizarre yet uncanny similarities between the plot of Planescape: Torment and Revolutionary Girl Utena (think thorny witches stealing the essence of a man's soul in the name of love, said stolen essence living in a castle in another realm, etc.). Also, both have that industrial theme in their soundtrack. But which is better, pet ChuChu or pet LimLim?


• I've been watching my Dollhouse Season One DVD set--as well as the new episodes of the second season as they come out. I think the show is still compelling, but I'm not sure what to make of its developments in the new season. Some I really like, some are even too creeptastic for me.
  
  But the Season One DVD commentaries finally have revealed to me, amongst many other insights, the answer to the greatest mystery of Dollhouse--why does that jackass Ballard have such a big (and increasingly larger) role when he really mostly ruins the entire show for me? (Because everyone is supposed to make television just for me, of course.)
  
  And the answer to that is that Joss Whedon has a big gay crush on Tamoh Penikett (I'm not saying this derogatorily. I mean, I think if Whedon read this, I don't know that he'd disagree). And that apparently Ballard is his fantasy of the kind of heroic guy Whedon wants to be when he grows up he thinks there should be in action stories. No wonder I've hated almost every male protagonist in every Whedon story ever. He has a truly fucked up idea of what a male hero should be like (Hint, Mr. Whedon, even though I know you're not actually reading this: IT'S BOYD. So kill Ballard--brutally and violently as he treats other people, preferably--and let the real fucking hero step up already. Well, as much as a hero-sidekick can step up).


• Speaking of Dollhouse/characters created by Joss Whedon, I've decided that the best show EVER would be about Adelle DeWitt and Lilah Morgan joining forces to take over evil corporatedom from within (and then subsequently the world, of course). That would be awesome on a nearly orgasmic level, IMO.


• And while we're on the topic of the Whedonverse, still, I think I'm going to drop Buffy Season Eight and start collecting in TPB. It ain't bad, but it's not holding my interest like it used to (OTOH, to give up on Jo Chen's monthly covers would be sad...). Same goes for Angel actually (although the Drusilla arc was kinda neat, if very different), and moreover that because I'm sick of IDW's generally lousy production values. OTOH, though it's just a mini series, the "Only Human" miniseries KICKS ASS. Illyria and Gunn are an awesome team. How come all my favorite characters are the sidekicks?


• Are you still reading? Are you reading at all? I've neglected my full on comic reviews of late. Should I start doing them again--I mean, does ANYONE actually read them? I realize I can always continue as this blog has always been my own sounding board, just to vent when I need to, but on the other hand, if someone else is actually finding value in when I review stuff or not, it would be nice to know as far as doing something in a timely/weekly/monthly fashion. Otherwise I'll continue to talk to myself as usual whenever I feel like it.


• Bones season 5 is really good so far. Just thought I'd mention. Better than 4, again, so far.


• Pathfinder RPG is REALLY REALLY GOOD and I'm getting really excited about running it. The Bestiary just came out, and it's lovely too. Their guidelines for leveling up monsters seem pretty well thought out too.


• Just finished watching the anime Madlax. It was decent, but not what I'd hoped for, especially after Noir (same creative team) was so good. The ending was very unsatisfying in some ways, and it seems like the writers had decided to go in one direction, and then changed their mind at the last minute. But that's forgivable... I think the really disappointing thing about it was that the primary villain was just a boring, ranty piece of cardboard. After Altena was so brilliantly twisted in Noir, Friday Monday was just bleh. All he ever did was repeat the same semi-incomprehensible speech about "the Essence of Humanity" and we never really learned why, or why he thought it was so important to do what he was doing. "I want to make everyone evil because I can!" is just not a good villain motive, and I know the writers could have done way better. Also, the two best characters in the show were Elenor and Vanessa, and their potential was never fully used or realized.

So, if you were an enormous nerd/geek and created a random house of six of your favorite companions (who despite your best efforts look almost nothing like their actual counterparts) in The Sims 3, such as perhaps this one:

http://www.angelfire.com/id/deathquaker/images/Screenshot-16.jpg

(Apologies, I will try to get a better one later)

Would you call it

a) Ian Chesterton's Secret Time Traveling Harem of Awesome
b) Romana and her Five Experimental Subjects
c) PMS DOOM and Ian
d) Those Who Dare to Argue with the Doctor (since most of them that I put in there just happen to)
e) Death Quaker is a Huge Nerd
f) Other

Also: Sims 3 clothes are nowhere near awesome or fabulous enough for Romana (but I did give her some fantastic boots). Its hairs are nowhere near awesome of fabulous enough for Mary Tamm, hence why there is Romana II there (I was thinking about including them both and seeing how they got along).

There are a lot of people in this household with some combination of "grumpy" or "hotheaded" or "over-emotional" plus one "neurotic" and one "snob"... it should be interesting.

I realized that if I spent much of last year ragging on EA and other companies' use of SecuROM and the consumer rights violation that was, then as a feminist* and a gamer, I should at least spend a moment to address the consumer and staff rights issues related to EA's "Sin-to-Win" contest at the San Diego Comic Con.

If you're not aware of what the issue was, it was that EA was trying to promote their game Dante's Inferno through marketing the different "circles of hell." For the "circle of lust," they had a contest where entrants were encouraged to photograph themselves with Comic-Con Booth Babes. They described this as "committing acts of lust" with the Booth Babes in order to win "a night of lust" with two Booth Babes. They opened the contest to photograph all Booth Babes at the Con (not just EA's, and EA doubtless did not get the permission from other stall holders to "use"), and to cap it all off, printed the contest ad on an image of the top of a woman's chest, with "win booty" printed directly over her decolletage. Strangely enough, there was a backlash. A summary of complaints include, but are not limited to:

- The wording of the contest ads implied it was okay to sexually harass Booth Babes
- The wording of the contest ads implied EA was using their Booth Babes as prostitutes (they weren't, but the wording is very skeevy)
- EA's contest rules also extended to "whoring out" other stallholders' Booth Babes
- The contest completely overlooks straight female gamers, gay male gamers and generally anyone with a sufficiently advanced frontal lobe to understand the concept of mutual respect for fellow human beings.
- The wording of the contest ads imply that EA considers its target demographic are a bunch of horny geeks who can't control themselves and probably couldn't get a date otherwise.

I am too late to go into extensive detail, but if you need to know more, here's a massive collection of reports and responses to the contest:

http://whilenotfinished.theirisnetwork.org/2009/07/24/eafail-link-roundup

I got this link courtesy of corrinalaw's GeekDad article over at Wired, which is also both a good discussion of the issue and a positive look at girl geek activities elsewhere:

http://www.wired.com/geekdad/2009/07/eas-big-success-at-comic-con-this-year-alienating-women-gamers

There was of course a backlash to the backlash; I originally heard about this at the Escapist, where of course a certain portion of that community--actually testosterone-enhanced orangutans who somehow figured out how to use an X-Box controller--made sure to point out repeatedly how Booth Babes, by signing up for the job, are "asking for it" (where "it" means generally grabbing, harassment, mistreatment, and abuse). I amongst some others post something along the lines of "What part of 'look but don't touch' do you not understand?" to which there were few replies. (I didn't directly pick an argument with those jerks, because they've made up their what-passes-for-minds, and there'd be little point except starting a flame war with no resolution).

But anyway, rant about my dismay at the beliefs and behavior of some of my fellow gamers aside, the real point of this post is to ask, what next?

EA issued something of an apology, though it's a little half-hearted and apparently only via twitter, which someone captured here:

http://twitpic.com/bityg

There is nothing about the issue on their Website that I could find in their Press Releases or their main page for the game. The apology appears to be somewhat, therefore, unofficial.

EA therefore needs to publish--via press release and loudly--a better and more complete apology. Additional remuneration to their Booth Babes might also be in order (maybe from the $240 the Gay Gamer refused when he won runner-up).

Also, game marketers, why are you about 20 years late in noticing that 18 year old, behaviorally stunted, heterosexual males are not the only people who play video games? There is an increasing number of a diversity of gamers, and it only makes sense to make contests and other marketing gimmicks to appeal to as broad a demographic as possible (and without encouraging illegal, disrespectful, and abusive behavior, thanks). It seems like we could be able to find a way to pitch something without pissing half of your potential userbase off.

Though indeed, what makes me feel sickest about all this is that the backlash was expected and desired; there being "no such thing as bad publicity" and all that. Even with a large number of
people angry at EA for this, I am disturbed by the idea that EA is exactly where it wants to be at the end of the day.

How do we as gamers respond to this, if anything? Can we even unite over something like this? (Internet response to the issue suggests no, not when it's too enjoyable to be a jerkass about something like this.)

So that leads to the final question--then how do I, myself, respond to this? I've done the "angry post on my blog" thing as of now. That'll reach one reader, who will probably disagree.

When I protested EA's use of SecuROM, I decided to boycott all of EA's products. It was a difficult decision--I've been buying EA games since I was 12 years old (I think my first might have been Might and Magic II from 1988 or thereabouts). But I did it, and apparently so did a lot of other people. (Five lawsuits probably also helped.) When EA announced that they'd put no SecuROM and no DRM on The Sims 3 (something verified reliably by the good folks at Reclaim Your Game) we knew we'd won something important, and I felt like I could buy their products again (and promptly ran out and got a SimCity game).

Now EA shows it has no interest in not only customer rights, but the rights of their own hired staff (i.e., the "costumed representatives" they hire to pass out pamphlets at cons).

It seems like another boycott would be appropriate (and here's me not yet having bought the Sims 3 for various reasons, but I definitely had wanted to), but would it send the same message? Would people be in on this with me, like they were with SecuROM (it's sad that I have to ask this, but I know I do)? Would something else be appropriate--maybe raising funds for Booth Babes to seek legal protection from sexual harassment? How do we get that going?

And how can we put a positive spin on this, something that will result in better respect and inclusiveness for gamers and game representatives?

Or am I thinking too big? Am I overblowing a small issue? Am I underblowing a large issue?

And what will YOU do?


---
* Yes, I'm one of those scary, horrible, oppressive people who think women should have human rights.

From someone named magellan over at Giant in the Playground:

If a contemporary game company would make chess today there would be a first edition with only pawns, and then the special "knights and rooks" expansion pack a few months later.

When D&D players discuss optimizing a character or monster at message boards, they often refer to it as "pimping it up." Normally, I don't think about the origins of the phraseology. However, when someone just asked the board to "Help me Pimp my Warforged" I got an immediate image in my mind of Alphonse Elric spraypainted shiny red with spinning gold hubcaps affixed to his arms and legs.

It is a bad image. Make it stop.

J&A took me out to dinner on Friday as a belated birthday gift, and then we went to see Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen.

( Oh, and I guess you might like a cut to spare your f-list )

( And then I went to the Symphony to Listen to Final Fantasy Music )

( And then I played video games and watched The Invasion )

As some of you may know, the game The Sims 3 was released earlier this month. ( Explanation of 'The Sims' for people who live under rocks )

Most people create Sims with whacky personality combos for various forms of amusement.

But apparently, the Sims 3 AI is good enough to simulate some fascinating--if quite harsh--social experiments.

A game design student named Robin Burkinshaw has created a Sim experiment in homelessness. She's put two Sims (a father and daughter) in a lot filled only with weeds and a pair of park benches, taken away their money, and see how they try to survive. The father is abusive and mentally ill, the daughter is kind-hearted but constantly down on her luck. The end result is an absolutely captivating, heart wrenching story--and largely made from screen captures made from the Sims acting on their own free will, as the AI directs them. You can read it here:

http://aliceandkev.wordpress.com/2009/06/09/alice-and-kev

Burkinshaw, I am certain, did not make this simulation for fun and giggles (the way some people like to wall in their Sims and make them starve to death) but to test the limits of the AI, understand human behavior a little better, and to raise awareness of a very real life situation (in a game that people often use to escape the harshness of reality). If you click on the link above, you will see a link at the top of the page to "donate to charity" -- to assist real organizations that assist the underserved and homeless.

I do wonder about some of her choices and the way the game played out, though. The Sims has an in-built feature to have a social worker "take away" any children who are usually regularly in a starving or other needs-crisis state (so you can't intentionally abuse children in the game). I wonder if she disabled that, or if she somehow managed to keep the child-version of the daughter just well cared for enough that the social worker never came (I'm sure if this is the case, this is probably far too true to life). I also kinda feel off about the daughter being saddled with the traits "Unlucky," "Loser," and "Clumsy." Seems a little bit overkill for a "realistic" experiment, though perhaps not, considering the life someone like that lives. I do know when she hits her teen years, what she goes through is also more true than most want to think about.

I appreciate the effort to be creative with gameplay and test the limits of software, but I also appreciate the "social awareness" aspect of the experiment. I hope you will too.

(Me? I don't have the Sims 3 yet. I do meet the system requirements, but I don't know how well it will run on my computer, and I am trying to hold onto enough willpower to wait another year, when a few expansion packs and possibly a package deal will be out. But obviously, there's quite a lot to try out just in core.... I did try the game at a friend's house and it is a truly well-designed piece of software. The mad scientist I created, however, is probably not going to teach anyone any kind of ethics.)