The Walking Dead. The Show Vs. The Game

The Walking Dead premiered this past Sunday in spectacularly gruesome fashion (soylent greenburgers anyone?) and it is safe to say it got the strong reaction it was looking for.

Chaotic action sequences have always been Dead's forte and the latest episode, "No Sanctuary", was basically one whole episode of just that.  I have to admit, as someone that is not a fan of the show, when The Walking Dead does what it does best, it makes for compelling television.  It's the when it handles the people who survive those action sequences that the show falters.

Rick Grimes knows how to use a big gun, its when he has to use his words he runs into trouble.

The Walking Dead has more than one problem, but one of its biggest is the perpetual feeling that no matter what happens the group of heroes will survive.  Of the primary cast (cast members that have been given "star" billing) a mere seven out of twenty four - including major antagonist "The Governor" - have been killed off in four seasons.  Keep in mind, this is a show in which every single character is in near constant danger of being killed.

The Walking Dead loves killing people, just not people that the audience has any sort of emotional attachment with.  Case in point: the oh-so-convenient disease that swept through the prison community early in season four and killed just about every single character with the exception of anyone in the primary group.  I have trouble believing that in such a violent postapocalyptic world, there would be so much continuity.  It all feels highly contrived.

As Arya Stark said, "Anyone can be killed."  Unless apparently you've been with Rick Grimes for more than one season, then you're probably good.

An incarnation of The Walking Dead that actually takes Arya's words to heart is the TellTale Games series The Walking Dead.

The game, which takes place in the same universe as the show (and comics) but follows different characters, does an impeccable job of capturing the stress and danger of the world that is The Walking Dead.  Characters are constantly at each other's throats, there are no easy (or even good) solutions, and people die... lots of people.

After establishing what feels like a pretty solid group of survivors early on, the game immediately sets to dwindling the numbers.  Some people leave, some are left behind, most are killed.  It is in having the courage to do this - get rid of interesting characters just as you get to know them - that the game keeps the story moving.  It feels more true to the world of Walking Dead.

No one is safe.  This leads to a point about halfway through the story onwards where you really feel like things are getting dire.  Will anyone make it?  Then, just as you ask yourself... two more people die.

This is partly made possible by the fact that the game follows one character's struggle, rather than trying to have multiple lead characters that have to be the hero of their own story.  All of the characters are important, but they all move the story, not the other way around.

Lee keeps his shit together.

The game's hero, Lee Everett, shares a great many similarities with the show's primary hero, Rick.  Both are reluctant leaders, both have a child to care for, both are good men who have been forced to do terrible things, both struggle with the balance of doing the right thing and keeping everyone in line.  Where Lee surpasses Rick, is that he doesn't ever get bogged down in his self wallowing.  He struggles but he doesn't cry about it.  Even for this, he is constantly forced to doubt himself and his choices.  And even his survival is no guarantee.

This sense of constant peril really makes the experience all the more exciting.  Everything, happens with the conclusion in mind.  Just like in a game of chess, any and all pieces are expendable to achieve the final goal.

And the audience are the winners

Requiem for a Generation: the Greatest Games of the Last Console Generation

With the emergence of the PS4 and Xbox One last year the games of yesterday are now the games of yester-year.  Last week, we gave props to the greatest game series of the last console generation: Batman: Arkham Etc.  Today we tip our caps to the greatest individual games of the PS3/Xbox generation, the five greatest to be exact.

5. Call of Duty: Black Ops - Treyarch/Activision

This would not be much of a list if the FPS (first person shooter) to end all FPS's was not acknowledged in some way.  The Call of Duty series is arguably the most recognizable game series of the last 10 years, right up there with Halo and Madden.  The trouble is singling one out from the crowd.  The games make their money on a formula and they are so faithful to it things all start to look the same.  In the end it came down to which game in the series offered the most "perfected" incarnation of this formula.  That game is Black Ops.

The campaign is among the best in the series - being the first game in the series to utilize quick time events - and it boasts an impressive cast of voice actors including Gary Oldman, Sam Worthington, and Ed Harris.  The highly popular "Nazi Zombies" games from World at War are back (although with diminishing returns).  It's all pretty fun, but that's not why anyone plays CoD.

Every new game in the CoD series features a slightly different multiplayer experience.  Players never seem to struggle to find things to complain about with each new version.  None are perfect, but the Black Ops multiplayer is the closest the series gets.  The game is slowed down compared to other versions letting players move away from a strictly "reactionary" style of play in favor of a more strategic one, in which map lay-outs, coordinated attacks, and vantage points all hold double the importance of any other game.  Sadly, as with all formulaic game series, Black Ops has been history for a few years already having been set aside for sharper, faster, sleeker games.  The new versions may be fun, but everything after Black Ops is just an imitation.

4. Dark Souls  - From Software/Bandai

"Prepare to Die".  That is the tagline for the #4 game on the list, Dark Souls, and believe me when I say it tells no lies.  The game that takes fan favorite Skyrim to the mat, Dark Souls is an open world, role playing, dungeon crawler that fans love for its replayability, highly original multiplay dynamics, and incredible difficulty.  

A game with a rich mythology that you have to search to discover, Dark Souls goes far out of its way to reward players willing to put the time in to, not only win, but explore.  The lore of this game is so rich that you can log 100 hours and not even home close to unearthing it all (trust me, I speak from experience).  The difficulty of the game will have you turning off your system a few times in blind rage, but give it an hour, and you'll come back for more.  You will curse, you will groan, you will say "C'mon!", you will die, and you will have fun.

3. Portal 2 - Valve

Sorry, Tetris, but Portal 2 is the greatest puzzle game of all time.  Innovative, beautifully designed and challenging, Portal 2 would be a great game if it was just room after room of puzzles.  But it is so much more.

You'd never expect it when you first start to play it's seemingly innocuous predecessor, Portal: Still Alive, but the Portal universe is one of the most fascinating and lush of any game series.  That is what makes this game so great.  It isn't just the story, but the way it is revealed to the player.  Everything builds from darkness to enlightenment, like a light bulb slowly turning on to reveal the wold around you (which, in the case of Portal, is quite a terrifying place).

Portal 2 plays out like a black comedy noir.  Fantastic voice acting turns by Stephen Merchant and J.K. Simmons bring the perfect balance of terror (what they say) and hilarity (how they say it) to the game.  The ambient/electronic soundtrack along with the haunting imagery of the game gives everything a properly eerie feel.  Then, of course, there is GlaDOS.

GlaDOS, the passive-aggressive and darkly sinister super-computer that is a lot like HAL9000, if HAL9000 had the personality of a psychotic girlfriend that decided she was going to methodically ruin your life because you forgot to take out the trash one too many times.  Chosen by IGN and GameInformer as the greatest video game villain OF ALL TIME, GlaDOS returns from the dead in Portal 2 to take vengeance and dole out some serious psychological warfare (in the form of scathing sarcasm) on her nemesis Chell, the heroine of the series.

Portal 2 challenges you, not just to solve puzzles, but to solve a mystery.  The results are a hell of a good time.

The Last of Us - Naughty Dog/Sony

I already went deeply in depth into what makes this game so fantastic during last year's Year In Review series when I rated in the Game of The Year, but it was so good it deems repeating.  Gorgeously rendered, expertly told, and a joy to play, The Last of Us was a single console release (PS3) and the last great game its generation.

The game mechanics and style of play are fantastic, allowing for players to have a varied number of game play experiences.  Want to play a stealth/hunter game?  You can.  Want to just run around unloading a shotgun on bad guys? you can do that too.

The game play is enough to make it memorable, but the story of The Last of Us is what makes it special (notice a theme?).  In any serious game with voice actors there comes a moment of groan inducing hoaky-ness that gives birth to the phrase "Great story, for a video game".  Resident Evil, Call of Duty, Assassins Creed they all have their moments of weakness (Final Fantasy is full of them).  The Last of Us is one of those truly few games that has the story and script that will draw you in as effectively as any movie or television show.  It is simply excellent story telling.

1. Bioshock - Irrational Games/2K

Dark, exciting, nerve wracking, beautiful, I could go on for days with adjectives that make Bioshock the greatest game of the last console generation.  Also mentioned in last year's Year in Review, this is a game that I will never tire of playing.

A fast paced FPS, Bioshock, takes familiar game mechanics gives them a tweak here and there and throws it into a wholly original world and lets you have at it.

Inspired by the musings of novelist, champion of objectivism, and tea party patron saint, Ayn Rand, Bioshock takes Rand's paradise city of Galt's Gulch from Atlas Shrugged and dives deep to see what life may have been like in such a paradise had it existed.

Man alone is responsible for the world of Rapture, and Man alone suffers in it.

Of course, by the time the events of the game transpire, the underwater city of Rapture is no paradise.  It is a bombed out hellscape where drug addicts fight viciously under the banner of warring megalomaniacs, Andrew Ryan and Frank Fontaine.  The Orwellian world that Bioshock brings the player to is rich with fascinating characters and dark history, all in front of a majestically designed 1940s style art deco backdrop in a city under the sea.

Sander Cohen, Rapture's Phantom of the Opera.

When it isn't turning your knuckles white, this game is delighting you some fantastically original characters and sending shivers down your spine with disturbing imagery.  GlaDOS might be the biggest and baddest, but Andrew Ryan and Frank Fontaine (also known as Atlas) are two of the most complex villains ever to be pixelated.  Part noir, part science fiction, Bioshock is a gripping game experience that not only makes you think but might even get you to read something.

Requiem for a Generation: The Greatest Games of the Last Console Generation

Greatest Series:  Batman, The Arkham Series.

Christopher Nolan wishes.  He may have fooled the popcorn stuffing masses, but he couldn’t fool me, and he couldn’t fool himself.  He lies in bed at night crying, just praying he’ll dream of a world in which his movies were as good as the Arkham series.

At least that’s what I like to think.

My first experience with the Arkham Series (Batman: Arkham Asylum, Batman: Arkham City, and Batman: Arkham Origins) occurred one day when I came home from some place and my brother had gotten a new Batman game I hadn’t heard of called Batman: Arkham Asylum.

I remember being very impressed by the graphics and game mechanics watching him play it.  When I played through the game myself, I was sucked in by the open world aspect and fun story.

The game play was varied and fresh.  You don’t simply grind through a dungeon – fight a boss – repeat.  You explore, fight some bad guys, complete tasks, explore, fight, and when you do face a boss the format of the showdown is different depending on the enemy.

Arkham Asylum was an imagining of the Batman universe that felt authentic while also happening to be a really fun game with oodles of replay value.  The game makers took the time to create an interesting and deep world of characters and it shows.  By itself it was one of the best games of the last console generation.  Looking at is as part of a series and it is just the beginning.

The Arkham series not only gives fans the Batman they deserve but the villains to go with him.  The Joker of course, but the villain that shines especially bright in the series is Bane.  No longer is he some stocky Englishman with a mask and a speech impediment.  He is reborn in the Arkham series as the hulking, Mexican, criminal genius leading a group of fanatical mercenaries on quest to destroy Bruce Wayne.  He also has a totally badass soundtrack.

Where the games distinguish themselves as a series is there ability to keep the characters and open world spirit of the game intact while introducing enough knew aspects to keep it from feeling too familiar or growing tiresome.  Each game has a distinct storyline but is also able to keep an overarching plot and conflict (Batman and the Joker) to keep things relevant.

(This scene is awesome)

In every game, the mechanics improve, the world expands, and the story supplies plenty of new thrills and twists.  Arkham Origins wasn’t just one of the best looking games of the last generation, it was also one of the best sounding.

The best game in the series is probably the second installation, Arkham City.  A flood of new characters are introduced in front of the backdrop of a world that is easily three times the size of Asylum’s.  The leap forward is just astounding.

These games are really, really good looking.

Arkham City also gives fans another thrill by having a multi-story campaign in which the player splits time between Batman and Catwoman (who never looked as good as she does in this game, eat it, Anne Hathaway).  It effectively turns the game into two for one.

Where other series fall victim to redundancy (Call of Duty), or are unable to hold the story together (Mass Effect), or both (Bioshock), Arkham remains strong throughout.

The Arkham series hits everywhere you want it to and leaves you excited to see where it is going to go next.  Christopher Nolan should be so lucky.