It's been awhile eh? Not much this time.

Sword Girls is Bad at Pandering

I was going to write a long technical list of Sword girls online's flaws such as high grind, boring economy, dungeons and slow gameplay. But, I realized, after writing about it, that it has a deep fundamental design flaw that is irreconcilable, while the others are just merely execution flaws.

Simply put, Sword Girls Online is bad at pandering to players.

Sure, its good at pandering to males, with an all female cast and cute 2D girls on almost every card. (Sentry's testimony, get out). However, it fails to pander to a specific player base.
What player base am I talking about? Why, the four fundamental MUD players!

Heres the link for those of you interested in a deeper insight into MUD text games, but suffice to say its a basic map to how to design an MMO. While the four player archetypes, achiever, explorer, socialiser, and killer aren't mutually exclusive, designing with a focus towards one playstyle can be. First, a quick rundown.

Achiever - your typical PvE player. Fastest leveler, hates PvP.
Socialiser - Guild leader, loves to interact and play in groups.
Explorer - Loves learning about the game and experimenting. Your game glitcher, and easter egg finder.
Killer - PvPer. Commonly a griefer, but can also be the one who fights only those who can fight back.

With this framework, we can easily see the problem Sword Girls has. Who does Sword girls pander to the most? Killers first, then Explorers, Achievers, and Socialiser. If you read the aforementioned link, you'll remember that a game populated with Killers is a very degenerative playerbase, which quickly drives out other players. However, even so, the game doesn't pander to even Killers that well, and even less to other players.

First off, lets look at the most basic of players, the Achiever. He gets to grind cards and look at them, and maybe even play them in his deck. However, his satisfaction is greatly diminished, with hours of grinding required for a deck, after which it takes a great deal of grinding (or money) to improve. Thus, Achievers are quickly burned out of the game, due to the level of grind and the relatively uninteresting PvE. Not to mention, that the Achiever has little to mark his progress by, not even a measly experience bar. Nor can he look to a stronger deck as proof of his progress, as higher advancement in a dungeon can actually provide worse farm.
And if you think about it, the cruel joke of Sword girls is that new dungeons are actually PvP events, which should normally attract Achievers, but also force them into PvP matches, making it actually more of a thinly veiled excuse for Killers. Yet these events are few and far between, making it hardly even a reliable distraction for Killers.

Now let's look at Explorers. While they have a nice playground to explore in, in the end, their ability to explore is hampered by vast amounts of grinding (or money) in order for them to experiement or explore content. The game is not designed through a robust set of rules, so Explorers are not rewarded for figuring out obscure game-breaking combos, or unusual and gimicky decks. Their only solace, is looking at new cards and theory crafting new decks (since experimenting can be quite cost prohibitive). If you were to put cards into a category of "strong", "weak" and "situational", you would find that the majority of Sword Girls cards fall either into "strong", or "weak", with very few in the "situational" category (most "weak" cards could be in the "situational" category, but the utility they provide are generally not strong enough). This is of course by design, in order to create an easy game and simple game, but at the detriment of explorers.
But, Explorers are probably the 2nd most pandered player, which would end up hurting the Killer playerbase, if all of the playerbase wasn't so badly appealed to.

Now onto Socialisers. They get more enjoyment out of sitting in the Sword Girls IRC channel than actually playing the game (Until they realize they could join any other IRC channel instead). 'Nuff said.

And finally Killers, the player this game should've been made for. Yet it even fails at that. Not mentioning that it fails to provide sufficient "prey" for Killers, but the PvP system as a whole, and the game design based around RNG, chance and grinding makes it a terrible environment for even Killers. The RNG makes it so that a less skilled player with a worse deck can sometimes luck out against a Killer. While skill does indeed play a major role in the game, you can see how random the game is when their "fairest" tournament is a ladder.

EDIT: Another important aspect I forgot to mention is that players can't progress their decks purely by "PvP" through "Fight". You need dungeon rewards (or money) to increase your deck power. Forcing Killers to participate more in PvE than PvP. Not to mention that opponents were so hard to find in "Fight" that an AI opponent was selected if it took too long to find an opponent. 

What Sword Girls forgets is the basics of creating an MMO. While it's a master of human psychology, utilizing a variety of Skinner box tricks (ala Zynga), it ends up like any other casual clone, a shallow soulless game bereft of any enduring appeal.

I wrote this post so that many of you out there that might be interested in this game can stay away, or if you've already been a victim of this game (like I have) that you can come to terms why this game is bad and you shouldn't play it. It took me quite awhile to understand why I realized the game was bad, and it's hard to put into words until I took some time to think about it. Hopefully I've  provided a voice to the frustration of other players.

Hisao Nakai is a Jerk

in Rin's route. And here's why. (slight spoilers? but its okay the route is bad don't do it)

1. He's not endearing. He basically hangs around the art club because Rin is there, has no talent, and doesn't even make any other friends. He accomplishes nothing, except maybe encourage Rin to try to go for an exhibit. Contrast this to the other routes, where he helps Emi reconciliate with her dad (and has a plan for university), or Shizune get closer to her brother, by teaching him sign language. So he becomes generic, even to himself, and the route never resolves this problem.

2. He yells at Rin. Because she's bad at communicating. Which she tells him about earlier. So not only does he not "get" a large portion of Rin's character, he gets angry at her for it. Not only is this grade A jerk material, he also does it to Rin, who's probably the most stable of all the characters. He has the least reason to be angry with her, but also ends up doing it, to one of the more vulnerable girls in the game (Hanako being arguably slightly more vulnerable).
If at any point, he decided to get advice for his romantic troubles from someone in the game, they would've set him straight. But he doesn't, because to get the route to become contentious, he would've had to dismiss that advice. Because he's a jerk.

3. He never gets punished, for being a jerk, or making bad decisions. It's okay if people are jerks sometimes. As long as they realize they were wrong and there's penance. Hisao doesn't end up with any of that. He suffers no consequences for his actions, and as a result never seems to learn from his mistakes. He might've gotten better at understanding Rin, but he didn't become a better person. And since he was a jerk before, this means he get's away with being a jerk. Which doesn't help his case at all.

With all things considered, I feel sorry for Rin. Isolated from society, and the only person that's able to get close to her is Hisao, who is a jerk. The bad end almost seems better, if only that Rin might have a better chance at finding happiness in college, because it's pretty clear that Hisao's not able to be happy for her, or try to chase after her. He comes off as selfish, or self-centered, and never really lucid (in either ending) on what has transpired.
Still, the game's released, and there's no fixing the route. Rihoko friend-zone was pretty bad, but at least she has hope. For Rin, all I can see is tragedy. Fuck you, Hisao Nakai.

Edit: added tags

an MMO, an FPS, and an ARPG walk into a Tower....

So recently, there were 2 more tower defenses were released, to add to the growing list of FPStower defense games: Orcs Must Die! and Dungeon Defenders. However, I feel both these games fall short of Sanctum, one of the first FPS tower defense games released. Why's that? Well let's begin.

First let's talk about beginning set up of each game. Sanctum and Orcs Must Die both have you choose a loadout in the beginning, showing what weapons/towers/traps you may build, (and for Orcs Must Die!, also a talent specialization) whereas Dungeon Defenders has you create a character from four classes, complete with color customizations. You end up leveling your Dungeon Defender characters, which increases their power, and unlocks new spells, abilities etc.

From the getgo, you can start to see what each game is going for. Dungeon Defenders wants you to think its an MMO, Orcs Must Die! an action RPG, and Sanctum as a shooter in the vein of Battlefield/Modern Warfare. As a result gameplay for each will evoke the feeling of their respective genres, while sometimes also showing their weaknesses.

For Dungeon Defenders, its the "trash mobs". Spawning waves and waves of trash mobs, and with little thought to your shooting/hacking other than "keep up the pew pew", the only break in the action is when a piece of gear drops and you or your allies rush to pick it up. Nor does it help that your money for each level spawns at 4 separate corners of the map during the build phase, which ends up with you or your allies making a mad dash towards the closest spawn to prevent other players from taking your money. To make matters worse, the money gained to create towers for each level, can also be sent directly to your "mana bank" to be used as upgrades for yourself, and others. Due to the leveling and gearing system, this practically encourages players to sneak as much money to their own bank, instead of trying to finish the level. While players are under no obligation to play in this manner, it is still what the mechanics of the game encourage. There is a point where lower level players are no longer able to upgrade towers (due to a cap on how much money he hold at Y level) and unable to create new towers (due to a shared tower cap) so they become essentially dead weight. You can hardly blame them if they begin hoarding their money here, as they have nothing else to do.

Orcs Must Die! is probably the most action packed of the group, for better or worse. With limited time between waves, it forces you to quickly decide what traps and where, or which upgrades and when. There's a few untimed sections, but few and far between, and nonexistent in nightmare mode. The traps are interesting, and so are the various talent specs. The problem is a lot of the stages are designed to be beaten a certain way, instead of offering a wide variety of options. The upgrade system is also nice, although you rarely know which upgrades to purchase, due to each stage forcing a certain strategy revolved around a specific trap. It's also probably the hardest among the three games, requiring the most concentration. Which may be a good thing for those interested in a challenge. The orcs actively try to kill you, which enables you to buy time by distracting the orcs, and also makes the combat a lot more dynamic. The biggest issue holding it back, is the lack of a co-op mode, which makes the overall experience lacking after beating the campaign. Still, its undoubtely the strongest single player game of the bunch, and quite rewarding.

And finally, we come to Sanctum, which in my opinion is the strongest title. It is closest to being a casual shooter, similar to TF2 (minus hats and drops), with a mix of Modern Warfare and Battlefield. Many weapons are easy to use at close to maximum effectiveness, and the predictability of the enemies (and the invincibility of the player) creates almost a skeet shooting experience. The weapons have a great feel to them; the sniper is accurate to a dot, explosive and freezing grenades arc lazily to a target, the shotgun has a meating recoil which can sometimes throw you backwards. Also, this game has rocket jumping (well, grenade jumping) and bunny hopping. However, in keeping things simple, the variety of towers is limited, and only a small (but diverse) selection of levels to play. The lack of unlocks (except for singleplayer levels) is also notable, though it further cements its focus on casual play.

Now that I think about it, I've come to understand what each game is going for, and why I liked Sanctum over the others. Dungeon Defenders is meant for Diablo 2 fans, who wanted more tower defense, Orcs Must Die! is designed to appeal to the Devil May Cry/ 3rd person action gamer, and Sanctum is designed for those lovers of shooters. In any case, we've been blessed with a splurge of high quality tower defense games, infused with elements from a diverse list of genres. And if you hurry, you might still be able to get Sanctum at half price today!

fairy tail anime

erza x erza. hnnnngh

Hanasaku Iroha is over, it's finally (about to be) over!

Hm, so at this point, hating Hanasaku Iroha kind of makes me feel guilty. It's like calling someone a retard online, then realising, that they actually are retarded due to a medical condition. The anime is nearing the end and at this point and they are just sprinting towards the ending as if they just want the story to end. It feels almost as if they were going for 25 episodes but realized halfway through the series that they only had time for 13.

So what makes me feel this way? First off, side characters do nothing. If the writer, son or Beanman were replaced, would anyone notice? Would it change the story? Not really. If they're just background characters, then why did we spend so much time with them?
Which brings another complicated part about the writer's arc. It showed that Ohana had some skills in cheering people up, yet later on in the story she forgets she has it and even has to have others cheer her up. Multiple times. It's kind of ironic in that when she was thrown into a hostile environment where should didn't understand anything, Ohana was able to inspire others, yet when she ends up as finally picking up her stride is when she falls apart.

However, even the main characters are pretty much bipolar. Tohru falls in love with Hana for no reason (other than checking her temperature; damn I better not do that!), the grandmother starts liking Hana for no reason, and the mother becomes a normal person for no reason at all. Now, suspension of disbelief, I can understand them doing this, its realistic and its interesting. But it pains me when all this interesting stuff happened OFF SCREEN. Why would you hide the most interesting parts of your show? This makes it seem like they were making it up as they went along, and never had a clear goal from the beginning.

And then the plot hole. Why doesn't Ohana live with her mother now that she's back? Sigh.

They have one episode left to finish this. I hope they break even. But for me, I'm glad its finally about to be over.




Also would someone explain to me what the hell "Fest it up" (Bonbori?) even means?



And offtopic,  Amagami SS OVA was....of dubious quality. They didn't even animate half the scenes (I'm not kidding about this) Then again, the only way they can redeem themselves is if they make a TRUE Rihoko ending. (Even if its not canon)

Amnesia: OnLive

So recently I just beat Amnesia: The Dark Descent. It's a scary game with good atmosphere, with a mediocre story (with gigantic plot holes) and questionable gameplay. However, I played it on OnLive, a new game streaming service. Like Netflix, but for games. You buy games (or rent them) and play them through their client, on their server. This basically means that anything that can watch youtube in 720p can play these games. At first, I was skeptical of the service, and wouldn't have paid much attention, but when they offered Amnesia for free, I signed up. After my playthrough with it, I'd say I'm optimistic, but it's still bad.


My first impression was that it LAGS. When I have a pointer, the mouse feels significantly unresponsive, giving a slight delay before it moves. There seems to be some kind of prediction for your mouse, the longer you push in a direction, the faster it moves, which only adds to the laggy response. If this had been on a console, I don't think I would've noticed as much, (Then again, HDTVs lag more compared to my LCD screen) but it was a bad start.

The next thing I noticed was the stream quality. The stream is definitely a HD stream, but at the end of the day, its a stream. Every once in awhile the stream will break up, and leave the player sitting there waiting for the lag to settle down. And then there were the disconnects during prime time. Expect to get disconnected during prime time once. Good thing though, is that OnLive will recognize the disconnect and pause your game. OnLive can even lag when browsing through the menu, which is understandable given the architecture, but still somewhat disconcerting. However, at the end of the day it did not heavily affect my gameplay in Amnesia, as most of the game is spent exploring. Had it been any type of FPS or action oriented game, this could have been rage-inducing. And its hard to say whether it would have been unplayable or not.

I did however go and try the Dirt 2 demo. I could not turn accurately, so the game handled like driving on ice. with a grease spill. The game is basically unplayable in my opinion. Now maybe this was due to my incompetence, or maybe the game's unforgiving mechanics, so I tried to watch some other people play on OnLive through their spectator system but no one seemed to have a good grasp on the system and the lag.

Speaking of which, the one aspect of OnLive that really stands out is the spectator system. At any time, you can watch someone else playing the game, and cheer/jeer them. You can also friend them if you like their game play. You can speak to the player, through their beta voicechat system, but in noisier parts of the game, it was hard to hear the spectators. This creates an experience similar to an arcade (Or more closely to Tech Rec) where people can help you through the game. Or in the case of Amnesia, try to troll the hell out of you. (Although the cheers really helped me continue through the game) This is the best part of OnLive, and I really wish they would fix their technical issues (or rather, business/server speed issues), because it really is a fun way to play. Of course if you can handle the lag that is...

So at the end of the day, the question is whether OnLive is worth it or not. Is it worth it to be able to play triple A games from your netbook? Is it worth it to be able to watch/and be viewed by random strangers? The experience is undeniably a few steps below a true console or gaming rig, but what of the budget gamer? Is it better to pay for OnLive games or build your own PC? If OnLive games are as cheap as steam sales, then I would say sure, go for it. It is quite an impressive technical feat, but its still somewhat lacking. However, if this service were to become popular, maybe ISPs will work towards improving their services, with the rise of Netflix, and the move towards internet-based services, which would be a great thing for everyone.

At this point though, I'd say there are 2 factors to determine whether to purchase an OnLive game. A) Is the game suitable for OnLive with its lag, but "Let's Play" features? and B) Do you have a good gaming rig? If the answer to those is maybe, go ahead, make an account on OnLive. The client is small (Like 2 megs), the account is free, then play the demos, and spectate. If you find it to your liking, go for it. (And add me!)

PS - Also, OnLive requires a >3 Mbps connection, with recommended 5Mbps. Get good internet.

Edit: Memorial Day sale at the moment, with games being slightly cheaper.