Armchair Diplomat

He can never just walk somewhere, can he?

OK, so when last we parted Assassin’s Creed 2 and I weren’t on the best of terms.  This was mainly due to a rather disappointing little DLC addendum called Battle of Forli, a downloadable expansion that didn’t quite do justice to the game as a whole.  Words were said, feelings were hurt, low scores were awarded.  But even though it was terrible, or come to think of it maybe because it was terrible, I was left wanting more.  So sour-taste set aside, I unquestioningly coughed up the moon money Points to purchase the second DLC installment, Bonfire of the Vanities.

And I’m happy to say I enjoyed it.

To clarify before we begin, I picked up the pack that included the three pre-order Templar Tombs, and I can only suggest to everyone else that they do the same.  Even if you did pre-order you’ll get another two new areas to explore, along with Bonfire.  Added together, these make for a much more satisfying play length than was offered with Battle of Forli.  That is, of course, unless you purchased a Black Edition copy, in which case you can have another couple of hours to pet the Ezio figurine in your lap.

OK, to the plot: Bonfire of the Vanities picks up when Battle of Forli abruptly ended.  Ezio has lost the Apple of Eden to a mysterious, robed monk called Savonarola, who has fled to Florence and used the Apple’s power to take control of the city.  It’s up to Ezio to break Savonarola control and recover the Apple for the Assassins.

So what makes this installment worth the asking price compared to Forli? Read more

Coming soon: iKratos

This week’s batch of new releases is brought to you by Grog – now with 20% more acetone and all-natural red dye #2.  Also, keep an eye out for Grog Lite coming soon to a store near you.  It’s the same caustic taste, but the label says “low carb” and the pepperoni has definitely been removed.  So it’s pitched at the gullible then.

Anyhoo, coming to an Australian game store near you this week are the following actual products:

• Perfect Dark (March 17, XBLA)
• Combat of Giants: Mutant Insects (March 18, DS)
• Command and Conquer 4 (March 18, PC)
• Dragon Age: Origins – Awakening (March 18, 360 /  PC /  PS3)
• God of War III (March 18, PS3)
• Lips: Party Classics (March 18, 360)
• Metro 2033 (March 18, 360 / PC)
• Moto GP 09/10 (March 18, 360 / PS3)
• Rugby League 3 (March 18, Wii)

Nintendo must really want Michael Atkinson to publicly disavow his love for the Wii – last week they were releasing a title called Welcome to Violence and this week they’re giving us Rugby League 3 which, one assumes based on the actions of real-life rugby players, contains loads of debased sex and violence.  No Johnny, the Wii-mote doesn’t go there!

A little heads up for the readers, just in case you’re wondering why content is a little slow this week.  Myself and Mark are currently working on a redesign for the site to make things a little more streamlined.  And less reliant upon a shitload of images.

Although the colour scheme and general theme are going to remain the same, we will be tinkering with the layout a little, changing ad servers and adding some new little features to improve connectivity and customisation.

This will all be taking place over the next fortnight or so, so if you notice anything out of place or just straight up on fire, please feel free to blame either me or Mark for playing around with live code.

Tristan has also started designing avatars to go along with the update, which you can take a look at by clicking “Read More”.  Currently he’s got Moose and Jess sorted out, Stu is in preliminary and has started messing around with the original avatars too.

So while this all goes on the content might be a little slower than usual, but we’ll certainly still be updating!  And if you have any suggestions for changes you’d like to see on Armchair Diplomat, by all means drop me an email on matt@armchairdiplomat.com.  Unless of course you want to complain about the colour scheme, in which case sleep safe in the knowledge that Mark is on your side and got shot down by me …

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OK, I'll admit it, I came

Hot off the LucasArts Twitter feed today, most likely in conjunction with some variety of GDC announcement, comes the news that The Secret of Monkey Island 2: LeChuck’s Revenge will be undergoing the Special Edition treatment that we all drooled over previously.  There ain’t much to it, but here’s the word for word:

Oh yeah, another thing: LeChucks Revenge: Special Edition is official! New puzzles, new enemies, new hair!

-LucasArtsGames, just forewarning my wallet

So that’s another $15 or so that I’ll be giving LucasArts unquestioningly.

But there’s something that has me confused.  Maybe it’s just a poor choice of wording, but this tweet would appear to suggest that new puzzle elements are going to be included into the game, something I don’t think I’d be so keen on.  Part of the beauty of the original Monkey Islnds: Special Edition was that it was a straight port, preserving the original game for a newer generation.

They’ve also posted up a (somewhat blurry) photo of the game’s new cover art, feel free to ogle.  I guess we can all feel assured that in that photo we can clearly spy a (somewhat blurry) beard on Guybrush.

Update: LucasArts have also opened the game’s official website, which sports some great looking in-game screenshots.

Also also, apparently I’m not the only person to start bitching and moaning raising genuine concern about the “new puzzles” phrase.  Since the announcement above they’ve fielded a flurry of questions and decided to put all of us at ease:

[New puzzles?] … not new for Monkey 2, I just know how all of you reacted to the first Special Editons Hair

Good to hear, because any change to Monkey Island 2 would be like callously beating my childhood with a frozen cactus.

… Metaphorically I mean.

… Probably.

Mad Moxxi, the ... titular character

Amongst it’s many other accomplishments (well, depending who you ask I guess), Gears of War 2 can be lauded for the popularisation of the “Horde” style of multiplayer.  Allowing players to team up against a superior-numbered AI controlled enemy force managed to hit a real chord with shooter fans everywhere, and has since spawned many similar modes amongst the FPS genre.

Borderlands: Mad Moxxi’s Underdome Riot puts it’s hand up and declares “us too”, by adding a completely new area based upon wave-style arena combat.

As the story goes, Mad Moxxi (the Underdome’s well-endowed, carnival-themed owner) has made her way through three husbands, all of whom didn’t seem to survive the relationship.  In the search for a suitable suitor for her fourth wedlock, Moxxi has constructed the Underdome, three huge arenas based upon different areas of Pandora.  There adventurers pit themselves against hordes of enemies, while the crowd watches on in the happy knowledge that, win or lose, violence will be plentiful.

The back-story sounds entertaining enough, but truth be told there’s surprisingly little Mad Moxxi to be had in Underdome.  After her introduction, she’s basically consigned to her role as announcer.  And although much of her commentary is amusing enough, it can grow old quite quickly for reasons I’ll explain shortly. Read more

Welcome to our new running series where we keep you, our beloved readers, up to date with the games that are due out in Australia in the coming week.

Our inaugural edition is brought to you by the Gamer’s Buddy range of couch protectors.  They’re manufactured from durable PVC and come in a range of sizes so that your couch can be protected from any unintentional spillage or seepage that may occur when you’re playing, say, survival horror games or something from the Dead or Alive series.

Anywho, on with the releases!

• Final Fantasy XIII (March 9 – 360 / PS3)
• Tony Hawk: RIDE (March 10 – 360 / PS3 / Wii)
• Battlefield: Bad Company 2 (March 11 – PS3)
• Boot Camp Academy (March 11 – Wii)
• Chronicles of Mystery – Curse of the Ancient Temple (March 11 – DS)
• Sonic Classic Collection (March 11 – DS)
• Welcome to Violence* box set (March 11 – Wii)
• Yakuza 3 (March 11 – PS3)

Also due out on March 11 is the Black Wii.  Say that aloud and out of context and see what kind of looks you get!  It’s the same as a regular Wii, just black, and has been available in overseas markets for a few months.  I hear EB Games are offering some VERY fair deals on trading in your operationally identical white Wii towards the purchase too.

And if that sounds like a good idea, then I’ve got this tiger warding rock you might be interested in buying too.

* Nobody tell Michael Atkinson, kthx

Announced in the hush of early morning here in Oz, but broadcast loudly to the lands of the awake is the oft-discussed news of Portal 2’s release! Set for October 26 in the USA, it’s been a weird ride just getting to this point.

Layer upon layer of clues have been left over the last 6 months or so, but it all started jumping again with a patch that altered the ending of the original game, which came out on March 3 from Steam.

Good to know Chelle assumes the ‘Party Escort Submission Position’, because who knows how awkward that could be if she opened up a portal in whatever freaky robot drone just started dragging her off. After the patch, came the press release:

Valve, creators of best-selling game franchises (such as Left 4 Dead, Counter-Strike and Half-Life) and leading technologies (such as Steam and Source), today announced Portal 2 for shipment this coming holiday season.

Portal 2 is the sequel to 2007’s Portal, which won 70 industry achievement awards.

Randomly underlined things! Which spell out… dreattmannh0nee.

Then there are the bizarre ASCII files and clues which can be found over at Kotaku. There was some seriously hard work done to just get and decode this information, which includes pictures of GLaDOS and what looks like still shots from inside Aperture Science. If you scroll to the bottom of the page, some clever cookie has provided some deciphering. There’s also some interesting tidbits from Aperture Science’s founder Cave Johnson. My favourite?

“…remind you that Aperture Science is built on three pillars. Pillar one: Science without results is just witchcraft. Pillar two: Get results or you’re fired. Pillar three: if you suspect a coworker of bin’ a witch, report them immediately. I cannot stress that enough. Witchcraft will not be tolerated.”

And then there’s the April cover of GameInformer. I feel like I should be saying ‘Good news everyone!’, but we never did discover if the cake was indeed a lie. Also, that looks suspiciously like a reformed GLaDOS…

WITCHCRAFT!

Jesus face-palm

I know I use the term “facepalm” a lot, but there’s really no other way succinct way to sum up the ongoing debate over R18+ games in Australia.

The newest meeting of hand and forehead comes courtesy of a story published today over at news.com.au, which revealed that everybody’s favourite state attorney Michael Atkinson has donated large sums of money to the Australian Council on Children and the Media.

The Australian Council on Children and the Media, also known as Young Media Australia, are the fun-loving sorts who claimed earlier in the week that video games are more closely linked to youth crime than smoking is to lung cancer.  Even though their own written submission states the connection is tenuous, unlikely to cause harm in any case and is based on a study that examined all media, not just games.

For what it’s worth though, this same group also believes that Bananas in Pyjamas is too violent for small children to watch because slapstick comedy is bad, m’kay?  Atkinson has made donations (reportedly in excess of $30,000) to the council’s “Know Before You Go” campaign, which seeks to inform parents of the dangers of letting their children watch G-rated movies like Finding Nemo*, Alvin and the Chipmunks** and The Tale of Desperaux.

What’s a little odd about all this is it’s usually groups like the Council giving money to politicians, not the other way around.  I don’t think it’s anything we need to be too concerned about, it’s just interesting that the two stupidest things ever said in this debate are linked by a five-figure donation.

* They also warn against letting small chilren watch the G-rated Ponyo.  I’m smelling a bias against cute animated fish here…

** The Council and I are actually in agreement on this one, though likely not for the same reasons.

Surprisingly few rats!

Let me preface this review: I’m not really a fan of this kind of game. In fact, frequent readers have probably heard/read about my flailing hatred of the RPG genre in general. Having watched Matt and various others walk through mindnumbingly boring landscapes, interact with dull voiced peasants while constantly being ’surprise attacked’ by various rats/mutant rats while searching for armour made out of a glass, for what seems like days on end, I have nursed extreme prejudice against all games of their ilk. I’ve tried playing them, but I can never get more than a couple of hours past character creation.

The one exception was Knights of the Old Republic, and even then I ended up quitting half way through because it was easier to watch Matt play than slog through leveling up and grinding. All I wanted to know was who the main character was, whether Bastilla was good or not and if you could hook up with Carth. This lead to my standard game playing trick of ’set it to baby-easy, play through, auto level up’. Weak as piss, right?

That’s probably what kills me. These games are meant to be immersing you in an interactive storyline that compels you to keep playing to find out what happens next. Nothing is more tedious to me than three seconds of storyline followed by twelve hours of collecting the hides from seventeen rats to make a rat blanket to warm a peasant who turns out to be a rat god with acne. Fucking … I don’t know. I just can’t justify putting in time into such a fruitless exercise. How does this help the story? It doesn’t, so I’m not interested. But obviously that doesn’t mean it’s a bad game. I’ve seen Matt play Elder Scrolls: Morrowind for thirteen hours straight, with very little idea of what is going on around him, so it must be engaging on some level. There’s some kind of ‘hook’ that allows days worth of time to be squandered on finding every candle in the map and putting it in your house.*

Finally, with Dragon Age: Origins, I think I’ve found what that hook is.

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Every copy of Imagine Horsez is doing a completely different kind of damage

Just when you thought this debate couldn’t get any fucking sillier…

First it was gamers being more dangerous than outlaw bikie gangs.  That was pretty hard to believe, right?  Well steel yourselves, because (a drumroll please) apparently the link between gaming and youth crime is even stronger than the link between smoking and lung cancer.

The abovementioned claim is made by Dr Wayne Warburton of the Council on Children and the Media in this news story aired on Channel 10 last night after he addressed a parliamentary inquiry on street violence.  He quotes a study claiming that “the average child in their childhood sees 16,000 murders and 200,000 acts of violence”.  From this, we’re apparently meant to make the leap that games are more strongly linked to youth crime than smoking is to lung cancer.

If you go digging for a bit and pull out the Council on Children and the Media’s actual submission to the inquiry, however, you’ll find that the “gaming is worse than smoking claim” comes from one study done by an Amercian researcher that refers to violence in all media (TV, movies and music), not just games.  In fact pretty much every source Council references in their submission talks about television or the media as a whole, not games.

We also find that the claim about children “seeing 16,000 simulated murders and 200,000 acts of violence” is from another American study which refers specifically to television, not games.

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