(This is an entry for this).

First thing I did with my first few months of salary was to finally buy myself a gaming PC so you’d probably know, I love games :). And not your average junkie too: I really love them, have played many many games, and find it puzzling why people can spend Ks on a gaming rig, or a car, or handphones, but find the concept of actually buying an original game - prices have dropped a little because of the weak dollar - completely alien.

That’s a discussion for another day though, since I’m writing this to share my favourite game of all time. You’d think it’d be a recent whizzbang shooter like Call of Duty 4, Bioshock, or maybe Half Life 2 - all fantastic games in their own right. After all graphics have improved to such realistic levels titles even a few years back can sometimes look positively outdated.

But yet I feel the best game of all time is Baldur’s Gate 2 (and its expansion Throne of Bhaal ), released a full 8 years ago in 2000 by the now-defunct Black Isle studios.

Granted I’ve always leaned towards RPGs rather than FPS. The former tends to be more story-centric and involving, rather than a twitchfest - although the lines are beginning to blur nowadays. But I think BG2 was one of the few games to have a perfect combination of action, gameplay, story, setting, and even decent multiplayer.

The freedoms given in the game, set in the Dungeons and Dragons Forgotten Realms setting, still puts many later wannabes to shame. After an intriguing introduction where you fight your way out of a dungeon and watch as a childhood friend is kidnapped, you are free to explore Amn and its surroundings as you please, though the game reminds you about your main quest every now and then. And no mere Fed-ex side quests these; the game throws at you pirates, vampires, werewolves, djinni, liches, and even dragons! Indeed, it’s been observed that the second chapter of BG2 is practically as fleshed out as the entirety of some other games.

And when you finish with that, you find out that it’s just the beginning as you travel over the seas and into the Underdark.What completely separated BG2 from other games though was its gameplay - due mostly in part to its Infinity Engine. I still haven’t seen an engine, 3D or otherwise, that has been as able to capture epic, spellslinging battles as Baldur’s Gate did. And these battles were hard too, even on your second or third time through, which gave you all the more satisfaction as you finally downed that dragon or mind flayer.

It was also one of the few games - then and since - which had interesting companions, all of whom would change your party’s playstyle, and how you experienced the game. All had their own storylines and subquests and there were more enough combinations for multiple playthroughs.

In 2001 came the expansion Throne of Bhaal, and it brought the game to dizzying heights of epicness - up to that point most studios had never done a DnD game with characters levelled so high. And somehow it all still worked, timestops, comets, devas, fire giants and all, and it still captured the adventuring spirit of the series.

I’ve lost count of how many times I’ve played through BG2 (4? 5?) and I find that as I write this I’m tempted to pick it up and try a new character and party build :P. I’m not alone either: there’s still a thriving mod community centered around the game. If you like RPGs and have never played this, you aren’t a true RPG fan :).

That’s it for my favourite game of all time!

Popularity: 56% [?]

Bioshock’s forte is its breathtaking art direction, and it wastes no time in showing it off. You start as an anonymous passenger on a plane that crashes into the Atlantic Ocean. Water and fire are gloriously, fluidly rendered as you swim in the wreckage and eventually you spot the only land in sight: an island with a solitary, imposing lighthouse. The commanding use of light and shadow here set the tone for the rest of the game. It is also the last time you will be in an open space - Bioshock is set in the underwater city of Rapture, and uses clever, claustrophobic level design and a limited but expressive set of enemies to keep framerates smooth.

You soon descend by bathysphere into Rapture, a utopia envisioned by Andrew Ryan to be free of the failures and limitations of the surface. As Ryan’s iconic speech goes:

I am Andrew Ryan and I am here to ask you a question:
Is a man not entitled to the sweat of his own brow?

No, says the man in Washington. It belongs to the poor.
No, says the man in the Vatican. It belongs to God.
No, says the man in Moscow. It belongs to everyone.

I rejected those answers. Instead, I chose something
different. I chose the impossible. I chose… Rapture.

Admist the towering monuments to the greatness of Rapture, something becomes clear: there is trouble in paradise. Genetic advancements have gone awry, turning its citizens into scavenging mutants with only twisted memories of their past lives. They all crave ADAM - stem cells which power genetic abilities - and will gladly kill you for it. Also roaming the corridors of Rapture are Little Sisters, eerie children who harvest ADAM from dead bodies, and the hulking Big Daddies, who protect them.

Gameplay: Well designed, user friendly

Genetic modification is a thinly veiled replacement for what magic and spells are in other games, of course. Througout the game, you use ADAM to purchase plasmids and genetic enhancements which grant you special abilities, as well as more slots to equip these abilities simultaneously. Your abilities are complemented with “conventional” weapons, from the standard-issue pistol, shotgun, and SMG; to the more exotic flamethrower and crossbow. There are three ammunition types for every weapon. There was an innovation I liked: the research camera, which is used to “shoot” enemies, giving you research points depending on how good the photograph was, which leads to combat advantages against that enemy type, or information about their weaknesses.

Combat is unavoidable and plentiful (this is an FPS after all). There is enough variety to keep it fresh, and ample opportunities to use the environment to your advantage. You can use Telekinesis to throw gas canisters at your enemies, Incinerate on oil spills to set your enemies aflame, Electricity on enemies in water to electrocute them, etc. Unlike in Deus Ex, your genetic implants can be swapped out whenever you find the correct machine, leaving you with the abilities for every situation.

Sound: simply masterful

Voice acting, dialogue, and sound direction is impeccable in this game, from the objectivist monologues of Andrew Ryan to the demented screams of the splicers, and the rumbling grunts of the Big Daddies. An one memorable instance I came across a phonograph, turned it on, and the lilting melody of Patti Page’s (How Much is) That Doggie in the Window filled the air. It was a testament to Bioshock’s ability to immerse that I didn’t hear a cute cover of a nursery rhyme, but a haunting remnant of an attempt to invoke memories of the surface world and loved ones left behind:

I must take a trip to California
And leave my poor sweetheart alone
If he has a dog, he won’t be lonesome
And the doggie will have a good home.

But not perfect

That said, Bishock isn’t without its flaws. There is an over-reliance on audio journals to reveal backstory and advance the plot. Granted, the voice acting is absolutely superb, but it still detracts a little from the immersion - what are the odds that *every* inhabitant in Rapture happens to go around recording key points in their lives for you to pick up?

Security-related minigames seem to be the “in” thing in recent games, but most of them miss the mark - the only two games I can remember having decent implementations were Deus Ex, where your skill level determined how long a terminal would stay open and determine how much time you had to fiddle with controls and read classified information; and Oblivion’s lockpicking minigame, which tried for *some* realism. Bioshock’s hacking minigame sadly, falls short of the bar. It’s essentially an adaptation of the puzzle game Pipe Dream. The minigame itself is ok (even though it doesn’t make much sense) - but after about twenty times, it gets old. In theory, hacking is optional, but in practice, since you have very limited ammo and even cash capacity, you’ll find yourself having to hack everything that can be hacked, which spoils the immersion.

Bioshock is also nearly completely linear, which can be a turn-off. There is only one decision you need to make in the game: whether or not to harvest Little Sisters for ADAM, which enables you to purchase genetic upgrades; or to save them, which only grants half as much ADAM. And no, I don’t consider this a spoiler since this aspect of the game was trumpeted in every preview. I found the “decision” to harvest or save the Sisters moot - for one thing, you get “gifts” of ADAM as you save the Sisters, which lessens the penalty. You don’t actually need that much ADAM to get through the game, especially if you have played many shooters. Excepting your first few Big Daddy battles, the game is pretty straightforward otherwise. You know that a game isn’t presenting enough of a challenge when you actually down the final boss on Hard in your first try (and I’m not even very good at shooters, ask my friends!).

Verdict: Instant Classic

Quibbles aside, Bioshock is a game that is destined to be a classic for its immersiveness and artistry, as well as its unique steampunk-noir theme. If there were a reason to go out and buy a good graphic and sound card, this would be it. I liken it to one of those art films which you go “wow!” at, and rave about to all your friends; but know you may never watch again.

Rating: 85
+5 if you really love good graphics and sound
-5 if non-linearity puts you off

Postscript: Technical Issues

When first released, Bioshock featured a fairly restrictive DRM which limited every purchase to two “activations”. This limit was subsequently increased to five, and recently abolished altogether. There were also issues relating to how widescreen FOV was being implemented, but that’s fixed in the latest patch (Turn “FOV locking” off in Options).

Screenshots:

Popularity: 46% [?]

Diablo III! You have to love Blizzard, when they do promos they sure do it right. Rather than leave us hanging with initial announcements, then drag on the PR campaign with the odd screenshot, concept art, staff interviews, etc, they usually already have working footage of the game - which is what the fans really want to see.

Kotaku has the links. It looks like it will  be in 3D, but it’ll retain the isometric perspective. Plenty of footage up already.

[Update] Here’s an interview from IGN as well.

Any guesses when the game will be out? I’m betting on a Q4 2009 release :).

Popularity: 46% [?]

Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull

Indiana Jones is one of the best movie franchises ever! It’s a rare blend of action and humour and doesn’t miss any opportunity to poke fun at itself. It has one of the best, most recognizable theme songs of all time. And it stars Harrison Ford!

My introduction to Indy wasn’t actually the movies though; it was 1992’s Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis, an adventure game by the magnificent but now-defunct LucasArts games division. It’s a rare, very rare example of a successful game-movie crossover that retained the qualities of its original, along with a magnificent storyline and memorable characters. It still stands up to any adventure game you’d find on the market today.

If you have been deprived all these years or are in need of nostalgia, here’s the introduction sequence :) :-

I’ve played all the Indiana Jones games and watched the movies more times than I can remember, and I’ve been looking forward to Indy IV for months!Detractors say that Harrison Ford is now too old to play Indy, or that Lucas is just milking an old franchise for money. Well the latter might be true, but Ford will always be Indy like how he will always be Han Solo and the president of the United States. He already has the fedora, the whip, and the Scowl down pat:

Now here’s waiting for May 22, 2008 to see if he has the rest of it still! :).
[Link to 720p Trailer torrent]

Fallout III

Fallout (1997) and its sequel Fallout II are universally considered among the best computer RPGs of all time (I preferred Arcanum, but it was less polished ). In the retro-futuristic Fallout universe, a nuclear war has laid waste to the earth, with the only survivors being the people who took refuge in government-built Vaults. In the original, you are sent out to scour the wasteland and your sister Vaults for a replacement “water chip” for your Vault. Interplay ( I’m so sorry I couldn’t afford non-pirated games back then  :(( ) did a phenomenal job in fleshing out a world of humans dealing with the fallout of nuclear war, as well as implementing a solid game system and an open-ended storyline. The ending of the first game is especially memorable:
If you want to know what it is ▼

The concern everyone is having is that Bethesda Softworks, who bought over the rights to the series, are well-known for focusing more on eye-candy than a solid story ( *ahem* Oblivion ). I’m actually a bit worried for them because there are a large number of scary Fallout fanbois out there!

Whatever the case, we’ll know soon - they are apparently on track (shock) for release in fall 2008.

Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince

My Pottermania has pretty much died down by now, but I’m still looking forward to the sixth movie - the main reason being that I’m very curious how they are going to handle the romance that Harry is supposed to have with Ginny. With all the focus on the big Three, she’s been little more than a wallflower in the movies. Not exactly the spunky, vivacious Ginny from the books.

Context for this still:

[Returning from the village after the DA meets for the first time]

Hermionie: Anyway, at least we know one positive thing that came from today…
Harry: What’s that?
Hermionie: Cho couldn’t take her eyes off you, could she?
Harry: *smirk*
Ginny: *emo*

Popularity: 73% [?]