Finally! Best games of 2008 (Part 5)

Biggest Gaping Hole in My Library: LittleBigPlanet

It was hard for the hype to be any bigger for Media Molecule’s impossibly cute platformer. Although the adventures of the game’s knitted hero, Sackboy, didn’t get Sony back in the console race, LittleBigPlanet was unquestionably one of the most original — did I mention cute? — titles in 2008.

LittleBigPlanet’s hyper-realistic environments differed from other A-list titles in one dramatic fashion: instead of lush forests or gritty urban landscapes, the game is set among structures built from every day materials such as cardboard, cloth and paper. Resembling nothing so much as a grade-school art project, the game nonetheless sported sophisticated level design that challenges and rewards.

I almost can’t believe I haven’t picked this one up yet. It’s simply because I still (still!) haven’t finished games like Fallout 3 or Dead Space, so how can I justify dropping another $60 on this? I did see, however, that Amazon had LBP on sale for about $46. A great bargain for consumers, but probably a blow to Sony’s expectations that they could maintain premium pricing for longer.

Best Game That I Will Almost Certainly Never Finish: Grand Theft Auto IV

I have a problem finishing games. Most games I will top out at about 20 hours before moving on to other diversions. Games like Halo 3, Gears of War, Fable 2, Call of Duty 4 and Mirror’s Edge all fall comfortably within that range. I prefer quality over quantity. Give me 10 amazing hours and I will consider my money better spent than if you give me 30 or 40 good hours. The biggest exception to this rule was Oblivion, which I played for more than 40 hours and still didn’t finish.

So right away, the sheer size of Grand Theft Auto IV, which is said to take about 40 hours to complete the main storyline, stacks the odds against me ever completing the game. But apart from that, GTA IV has one flaw that is crippling for modestly talented gamers like me. That flaw is the lack of a mid-mission save system.

You see, some of the missions in GTA IV are quite long, requiring significant set up and travel before you get to the action parts. If you’re not completely prepared, pretty skilled, and a bit lucky, you will die. And when you die, you start that mission all over again. I’ve recently picked up the game again and completed a couple missions that had vexed me months ago, but if I was bent on completing it, I wouldn’t play anything else for months.

Best Game of 2008

And here it is. The moment you’ve been waiting two months for. What was the best game of 2008? Was it Fallout 3, with its deep character-building system infused with a Road Warrior vibe? Was it Fable 2, with its open-armed world that combined an expansive fantasy world with the charming social nuances of The Sims? Was it LittleBigPlanet, with all its cuteness and inventiveness and creative tools for users? All of these are worthy titles, to be sure. But one game stood above everything else, wowing everyone with its breathtaking detail, sparkling writing and sheer variety. That game, of course, was Grand Theft Auto IV.

Despite its flaws, and there are several, Grand Theft Auto IV represented the best of gaming. The stunning visuals took the soul of New York and reincarnated it in the body of Liberty City. Even now, almost a year later, one of my favorite things to do in the game is stop and watch the sun set. In keeping with its noir inspiration, the character of Niko Bellic at once fascinates and repulses. We revel in his aptitude for violence while sympathizing with his desire to find more in life. You see this in a hundred little moments and contrasts throughout the game. One moment you’ll be making shy chit-chat with a potential girlfriend or e-mailing mom back in the old country, the next you’ll be pushing some poor guy off a ledge or helping a junkie score her next hit.

Here was what I wrote about the game when it launched last April:

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) – Video gamers geared up on Monday for the midnight launch of “Grand Theft Auto 4,” as early reviews hailed the criminal action title as a brutal and satirical “masterpiece” equal to films like “The Godfather.”

For a time, Grand Theft Auto IV was the only game to score a perfect 100 on Metacritic. Even today, it boasts an incredible 98, the highest-rated game since The Legend of Zelda: The Ocarina of Time came out in 1998 and received a 99.

The GTA series has of course been the target of serious controversy. But audiences have longed lived the criminal life vicariously through movies like novels like The Godfather, movies like The Killing, and now games like GTA. As I read somewhere recently, books let us imagine the impossible, movies let us see the impossible, games let us do the impossible. Few of can imagine doing the dirty deeds committed by Niko and his associates. The success of the GTA series has hinged on letting people break the rules. You can’t believe this game is letting you get away with this stuff! GTA IV took that simple idea and slathered on a rich layer of storytelling, wit, and social commentary. It’s an artistic achievement that was unrivaled in the industry last year, and it’s why Grand Theft Auto IV was game of the year.  

“GTA4″: “awful” and “garbage”

The activist and writer Susan Estrich penned a column about Grand Theft Auto 4. Let’s take a look at what she thinks:

“I write for a living and still have difficulty finding the words to describe it. Awful doesn’t begin…

“Imagine gratuitous violence. Then imagine people with more imagination than you or I making it more graphic and awful than we could ever dream…

“It’s the genius that is being distorted into creating more and worse violence. There’s no question that great minds are behind these games, in terms of creative and technological skill. But think of what else they could be doing. And aren’t…

“It’s a shame and a waste, and it portends a generation going down the tubes. “Rockstar” my you-know-what. Shame on you. You owe the kids who worship you — and line your coffers — better than this garbage.”

It’s hard to imagine someone of Estrich’s sophistication writing something like this about Martin Scorsese or David Chase. Right away she falls into the trap of pigeonholing all games as designed only for kids.

I’ve played about 7 hours of Grand Theft Auto 4’s story so far and I can tell you the violence isn’t nearly as graphic as recent horror movies like Saw, or even The Passion of the Christ. Probably by an order of magnitude.

What disturbs Estrich and many other critics is the aspect of agency in video games. You are an active participant, tasked with carrying out these horrific actions. Watching a movie at least gives you some detachment or distance from the on-screen action, but in GTA you pull the trigger yourself.

But look at any thoughtful review of GTA4. The choices, often between two equally bad evils, are creating lots of discomfited gamers. Watching movies like Good Fellas or Colors, we’ve all probably thought about what we would if placed in those situations. Well, GTA4 gives you that opportunity. I’m just really surprised that Estrich, who has watched enough of the game to see key turning points that provide context for these choices, hasn’t picked up on this.

There are two half-points, however, on which I sort of agree with her.

“But think of what else they could be doing. And aren’t…”

Let me pre-emptively say that I realize a huge part of the attraction for GTA is that it lets you try out the criminal lifestyle with no real-world consequence. Rockstar thrives on pushing the bounds of taste. It’s a key part of what has made the series so popular. So what follows is just some brainstorming, and is not in any way meant to say, “GTA would have been better if…”

But anyway, a few days ago I was wondering if there would have been any way to make GTA more socially acceptable. Or something that would retain the edginess without casting you, the player, as an actual criminal. What if the game cast you as a police officer caught between trying to clean up both the city and your own department? That could allow for equally gritty and disturbing scenarios: go take down such and such drug dealer, only to find that one of your superior officers is in on the deal. Go undercover and be forced to choose between proving your loyalty to the mafia by killing a fellow cop, or following your conscience. It could still retain the total freedom to beat up passers-by and pick up hookers, only this time you’d be a Harvey Keitel-style Bad Lieutenant.

The other half-point for Estrich is that she at least refrains from calling for legislation to ban games like GTA. She has the common-sense attitude that personal responsibility matters. Despite her reservations, she lets her son play because she knows he’s a good kid with a low risk of picking up any bad behavior that could be potentially imparted by the game.

While I happen to disagree with Estrich’s main points, I can accept her column as reasonable criticism of the game’s themes, or of Rockstar’s objectives in general. Just because Rockstar has the right to make any game they want doesn’t mean they can’t be called out for doing so. I can understand the argument that even though something is allowed to happen doesn’t mean it should happen. We employ that reasoning every day in hundreds of little choices. I could smoke, but I don’t. A friend of mine could eat meat but she doesn’t. Those kind of choices are the way a free society is supposed to work.

Oh, I do have one last bone to pick with Estrich. Rockstar doesn’t just make GTA games. They have also made the biting school satire Bully, Western adventure Red Dead Revolver and the Midnight Run street racing games. Oh, and Rockstar Games Presents Table Tennis, known far and wide as the most realistic ping-pong simulator ever created. So there.

Games that evoke

So I was walking around downtown San Francisco today when I was struck how it reminded me of Liberty City. Not the specifics, of course, seeing how Liberty City is modeled on New York and not San Francisco, but in the general feel of the place. I was enjoying the spring sunshine and lacework of shadows cast by local buildings and other structures, and it was very similar to the feeling I have in Grand Theft Auto IV when I just cruise around admiring the handiwork of the creators.

That led to the realization that this was just the latest example of game experiences closely paralleling real-world ones. Here are two other examples:

Game: Oblivion. One of my favorite things to do in Oblivion was just to head off into the wilderness and wander around the empire, exploring for ruins, castles and temples marked on no map. I particularly liked the glow of the early evening sun on the forests and foliage.

Real world: I live in Albany, a little burb just north of Berkeley whose main geographic feature is a hill called, appropriately enough, Albany Hill. The southern and eastern flanks of Albany Hill were built up many years ago, but at some point the city turned the rest of the hill into a park. Our apartment building is at the western foot of Albany Hill, and after a solid session with Oblivion, I would emerge, blinking, into the sun, which turned the hill’s blanket of eucalyptus trees into the exact same shade of greenish-gold seen throughout the game. I almost felt that if I charged into the brush, I would be sure to stumble across some ancient ruins and perhaps a dungeon to explore. Alas, the closest thing I have to a broadsword is a decent set of four steakknives I bought at Target a while back.

Game: Crackdown. Like everyone else, I loved how this crime-fighting game took an open-world setting and went vertical. I thrilled with vertiginous wonder as my genetically enhanced character put Spider-man to shame with his gravity-defying climbing and Matrix-style rooftop leaps.

Real world: I vividly recall going into work the day after playing the game for the first time. Downtown San Francisco looked totally different, the buildings imbued with new significance. I now found myself automatically picking out handholds and ledges that would allow me to ascend to the ceiling of the city. It really was a powerful sensation and had become second nature overnight.

My initial thought is that this sense of changing or enhancing perception of the real world is something that is seen more in games than movies. It’s not exclusive: The Matrixbascially altered my perception of the world for three or four days, a sensation that was only enhanced by listening to the soundtrack as I wandered around downtown Los Angeles. I’m trying to think of other movie examples but can’t. Certainly movies can leave deep impressions. There Will Be Blood and The Darjeeling Limited are two films I saw recently whose imagery and atmosphere lingered with me for days.

I’m guessing that any special evocativeness that games possess would stem from the fact that games (the good ones anyway) tend to engage you for longer and require conscious effort to carry out tasks. After all, you play games, whereas you watch movies.

“GTA4″ reviews start rolling in

The early reviews of Grand Theft Auto IV are trickling in, and all indications are that not only did Rockstar hit a home run, they knocked the freakin’ ball into orbit.

Metacritic so far has the Xbox 360 version scoring a perfect 100 based on 13 reviews. If that holds, it will finally knock BioShock (which “only” scored a 96) to second place. I’m not quite sure how Metacritic is getting the perfect 100 since two reviews gave GTA4 a 98 and one came through with a mere 95. It proabably has to do with Marc Doyle’s weighted system that has the views of more influential outlets count for more.

I will say that the circumstances surrounding the reviews are certainly odd. Typically, embargoed reviews are lifted all at the same time. Such was the case with Halo 3, the game that probably most parallels GTA4 in terms of hype and gamer reaction.

But Rockstar seems to have assigned staggered embargo times for various outlets. IGN was the first out of the gate with its “exclusive review” earlier this weekend. Kotaku told readers it would post its review at 9am Pacific on Sunday, and stuck to that (posting an hour later, even) despite that IGN’s piece was already out. Tonight I see GameSpy, but not GameSpot, has a review out, and The New York Times has its review.

Variety’s Ben Fritz calls the ethics of the whole enterprise into question. While I’ll leave that topic to in-person discussions over a mug or two of beer, I will echo his sentiment that if someone else is already running with news you have agreed to hold until a later time, then any embargo is effectively broken and you should be clear to run your story. In most cases this does require a phone call to be placed to the source of the news, first to ask about the circumstances of the early report, and second as a courtesy to inform them that you now plan to run your story. The only situation I can envision in which you might hold back is if the terms of the embargo you agreed to explicitly stated that other outlets may be running reviews earlier than you, but you must hold yours until the agreed-upon time anyway. 

The other major implication of all these positive reviews is that I may be compelled to go to my local GameStop tomorrow at midnight to procure my copy. I am seriously contemplating buying it, coming home, and playing it for 7 hours or so until I have to get back to the office. Grand Theft Auto? More like Grand Theft Good Night’s Rest. 

Because everyone loves carjacking

The week in review

Wow. What a busy week. I’m going to just do sort of a link dump here, with additional comment exclusive to you Command-K subscribers. Premium stuff, and worth every penny you pay for it. This should also mark the resumption of regular blogging, now that I have a couple days to breathe and collect my thoughts.

There is this little companythat makes these cute little digital music players. And computers. And something called the iPhone. Everyone was wondering how they had held up amid the worsening economy. Pretty well, as it turns out.

Oh, and in the meantime, they boughta microchip design firm. That sort of threw everyone for a loop. The initial reaction was along the lines of “WTF does Apple want with a semi design shop?” Some of the speculation was that P.A. Semi’s low-power microprocessors could be modified for the iPhone or iPod. As it happens, I was briefed by these guys more than two years ago in my former life as semiconductor beat reporter. Ironically, their chips are based on IBM’s Power architecture, which Apple dumped from the Macs a while back in favor of Intel’s x86 chips. P.A. Semi’s products are aimed at hi-po computing: servers and supercomputers and the like. Not too likely that those will end up in an iPhone any time soon. But apparently, Apple does employ a number of chip designers who work with partners to tweak features to meet certain capabilities Apple’s product engineers have in mind. Still, it’s a curious play since if they wanted a bunch of chip designers, why not just hire them from the job market. Why pay a couple million per headcount to buy a whole company?

As if Apple wasn’t enough to handle, there’s a little game coming out next week that might just be, oh, only the biggest single entertainment property of the year. The Halo 3 launch last year opened the eyes of many reporters and editors to how big A-list video-game properties can be. Not only is Grand Theft Auto IV big business, it’s a game that has as much cultural relevance as The Matrix or Harry Potter.

My main preview story of the game is posted below, but before I get to that, I want to highlight two other pieces.

First is my Gameworld column on Sony’s Gran Turismo 5 Prologue. It’s a gorgeously realistic driving title, but only a fraction of what is promised when the full game comes out next year. Racing fans will love it, but I’m sure many consumers will see the $40 price tag as too high. 

What really interested me about my interview with Taku Imasaki, the U.S. producer on the game, was the vision that the title would become a platform for all things automotive: a driving game at the core, but augmented with videos of races and information about cars. 

Sony plans to add more features and pipe a steady stream of video content into “Prologue” in hopes that gamers’ interest will be redlining by the time the full game is released.

“Our goal is to become another medium for car companies, like magazines and TVs. We’re the perfect game for that and ideally we could become the MySpace or Facebook for auto enthusiasts,” Imasaki said.

Along with Rock Band and possibly Guitar Hero, it’s an example of how these connected consoles with gobs of processing power and storage are enabling games to become destinations/portals/aggregators for certain topics. Rock Band and GH do it for music, GT5 is doing it for cars. I’m sure there are other areas where it makes sense. Sports comes to mind. Take Madden football as an example. They already have a scrolling sports news ticker in Madden, why not buff that up to include highlights of the week’s games, interviews with athletes, and tutorials that show you how to use the video game to enhance your appreciation of the actual sport (I would love, for example, some breakdown of defensive schemes, which I only dimly understand).

The second piece I’ll highlight is an analysis of GTA4. Everybody knows this game is going to sell a buttload. The only question is it going to be serious buttload or just a regular buttload? Estimates from several Wall Street analysts range from 9 million to 12.5 million units by the end of this year, with most looking at about 10 million units. At that scale, analyzing the game’s sales is a little like speculating on how many angels can dance on the head of a pin. Let’s just call it “a lot” and leave it at that.

What I found more interesting was the question of what effect the game will have on console sales, and which console stands to benefit more, the Xbox 360 or the PlayStation 3? My expectation was that most people would say the Xbox 360. After all, Microsoft having locked in the exclusive downloadable content for later this year, combined with the superior implementation of online capabilities in Xbox Live, makes a pretty compelling argument for the machine.

It turns out that most people, from Wall Street analysts to industry observers who know far more about this stuff than me, figure the PS3 will get the biggest hardware sales boost. It basically boils down to two reasons: the hardcore gamers who dig GTA4probably already have an Xbox; those who aren’t hardcore gamers but love the GTA series probably got into it on the PlayStation 2, and are likely to stay loyal to Sony.

If you’ve made it this far, bless you. Hopefully it’s been worth it. I’ll leave you with my preview of Grand Theft Auto IV. Hit the link or go below the fold for the whole thing. It was a fun story to research and write.

By Scott Hillis

SAN FRANCISCO, April 25 (Reuters) – Beatings, carjackings, drive-by shootings, drunk driving and hookers. For video game fans, it can only mean one thing: “Grand Theft Auto 4″ is here, arrving with all the subtlety of a shotgun blast.

The latest chapter in the wildly popular and controversial criminal action franchise from Take-Two Interactive Software Inc is poised to be the biggest entertainment product of the year, with expected first-week sales of up to $400 million — dwarfing Hollywood’s biggest box-office openings.

The handiwork of Take-Two’s Rockstar game studio headed by British brothers Sam and Dan Houser, “Grand Theft Auto 4,” which will be launched next Tuesday, promises to crank up the thuggish drama that made previous installments the equivalent of “The Godfather” for Generation PlayStation.

“We also felt over the last few years there hadn’t been a great standout gangster movie. Maybe we could do something ourselves that would live alongside that stuff,” Rockstar’s Dan Houser told Variety magazine in a recent interview.