Lorne Lanning's Oddworld Series

I was on PSN yesterday and saw that the first entry in the Oddworld series of games (Abe's Oddysee) was available for download (£3.99). Obviously I brought it on the spot. I love this series. The first two games (Abe's Oddysee and Abe's Exodus) were released on the PS1 (1997/99) and the gameplay was largely like that of games like Flashback or Another World. You got from static screen to static screen solving puzzles and avoiding enemies. They were difficult and funny and became famous for their great cutscenes. The last two games in the main Oddworld series (there are also three rubbish gameboy games) came out on X-Box.

Munch's Oddysee (2001) changed the gameplay into a 3D action-adventure, but with all the familiar Oddworld elements. It was full of puzzles, humour and attention to detail. It also boasted a new character (Munch) who added a whole new batch of skills into the mix, such as swimming. Finally, perhaps the best of the lot was Stranger's Wrath, which came out in 2005 to universal critical acclaim, but sold poorly. It saw you take control of "the Stranger", a Clint Eastwood cowboy figure who used local creatures to take out his enemies in various ingenius ways. This was the only game not to feature Abe and it makes no referance to the rest of the series. In terms of gameplay, it was more of a shooter with some open world elements.

Hopefully all the games will be given the same treatment as the first and might soon be readily available in some form again. If so, check them all out! Here are the opening intros of all four games, so you can get a sense of what these games are about (usually evil corporations trying to exploit and often eat their workers):

Abe's Oddysee intro


Abe's Exodus intro


Munch's Oddysee intro



Stranger's Wrath intro

Raiders of the Lost Arts - Monkey Island 2 and Perfect Dark re-released!

A few weeks ago I wrote a little bit about the point and click adventure games of old. Since then, I have been happy to discover that LucasArts are again raiding their (impressive) back catalogue in the form of a re-release of Monkey Island 2 (original pictured above), with the same additions as last year’s brilliant re-release of the first game (voice acting and a graphical overhaul). I (obviously) welcome this move!

I seem to spend a lot of time on this blog harping on about XBLA and PSN games, and this next few months promise to be no different, with Monkey Island 2 being joined by an XBLA version of the N64 classic, Perfect Dark, and by the release of Sonic 4 this summer. I will certainly be playing all three of those.

I am really looking forward to Perfect Dark because, although I was an N64 owner, I never played it. I was obsessed with Rare's own GoldenEye (Perfect Dark's predecessor), but Perfect Dark tried to get every last possible effect out of that old hardware and the result was a really blurry, hazy and (in my view) unplayable game. I am in the minority here, as it was really enthusiastically received upon release in 2000 (just realised that's 10 years ago now!), but I couldn't stand to look at it (a problem I now have with all N64 games). However, I find the idea of playing a new sharpened-up, HD version of that game very appealing indeed (it will certainly be better than Perfect Dark Zero, the over-hyped and underwhelming 360 launch title).

Below I've put a before/after videos of N64 Perfect Dark and the new graphical overhaul on XBLA (run them both at once... go on). Enjoy. The game is out on the 17th of March for 800 Microsoft Points, whilst Monkey Island 2 and Sonic 4 are just "summer 2010" releases for the moment.

Gameplay footage of the N64 original, Perfect Dark:


A trailer for the improved HD version running on XBLA:

Ode to the glory days...

When I were a lad, there were these brilliant things called ‘point n’ click’ adventure games, so called because you used a PC mouse to point at things, and then to click on them. You could click on things to look at them, to pick them up, to talk to them or to use them on other things. It was marvellous. Many of the best examples were British (Discworld - pictured - and Simon and the Sorcerer to name a couple), though most of the really good ones were being made by an ancient and forgotten American company known as “LucasArts”. Almost every game made by this innovative developer during the late 1980s up until the late 1990s was pure gold. But then sophisticated 3D graphics came along and rapidly every game was about a grizzled marine shooting the guts out of Nazis/aliens. It was a sad time.

LucasArts continued making adventure games with the new 3D graphics for a couple of years (making Grim Fandango and Escape from Monkey Island), before they realised that they would make more money whoring around the Star Wars license instead. They had always made a lot of highly rated Star Wars games, but for the last ten years they have been just about all LucasArts have made (and to a terrifyingly low standard). So adventure games died along with the reputation of their biggest advocate.

However, there are a few reasons to be cheerful, as in the last few years the genre has had something of a minor resurgence. A company of ex-LucasArts employees called Telltale Games has released new games in the old Sam & Max and Monkey Island franchises (as well as a number of new series), whilst the brilliant 1996 game Broken Sword has been re-released on everything from the Wii to the iPhone (pictured below) in recent times. The iPhone platform has also seen the re-release of Beneath a Steel Sky, an even older game also made by Broken Sword’s creator, Charles Cecil. Valve’s Steam service on PC has (in the last year) seen LucasArts cashing in on their former glory by re-releasing a bunch of the old classics including: Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis; The Dig; and Loom, as well as a remake of the original Monkey Island.



With the iPhone and small downloadable games (like those on XBLA or PSN) becoming increasingly popular, perhaps this once proud genre can find a new home and thrive once again. I certainly hope so. I leave you with some footage of a few of my favourites:

By far the best original point and click of the last half-decade, Capcom's largely unloved 2007 adventure Zack and Wiki: The Quest for Barbaros' Treasure, may not have the dialogue and story of most the classic adventure games of yesteryear, but it's every bit as good:



One of the most stylish and well-designed games ever made in any genre, 1998's Grim Fandango, published by LucasArts and created by the legendary Tim Schafer (Full Throttle, Day of the Tentacle, Monkey Island). I remember when my PC wasn't good enough for this:



My personal favourite Monkey Island game had nothing to do with the original creators (Ron Gilbert and Tim Schafer). The third game in the series, The Curse of Monkey Island, introduced the voice cast now associated with the franchise (with Dominic Armato as Guybrush) as well as giving the game a major graphical facelift. The Curse of Monkey Island maybe my favourite point-and-click game simply because it feels like you're playing a detailed cartoon (whereas its 3D successor has aged less gracefully):



Check out the LucasArts Classic Adventure pack on Steam. It's £6.99 and includes four great adventure games (The Dig, Loom and two Indiana Jones adventures).

Games used to come on shiny, silver discs...

It is well known that a couple of things really scare the games industry these days. One is pre-owned games, which undercut publishers and provide zero profits for anyone but the retailer. The other is the internet and all the high-speed piracy it has introduced - pretty much crippling the PC games market all together (with the exception of The Sims and Football Manager), whilst consoles like the DS have also seen their software sales take a hit thanks to illegal downloading.

But as Valve have proven with the success of Steam on the PC (pictured), internet downloading can be a friend to Games publishers (and developers themselves), who are looking seriously at cutting out the middle man on the high street and selling directly to the consumer. By doing this, publishers can better dictate the price of games, can cut out pre-owned and can provide a legal alternative for those who prefer to download their media. This sounds like a good solution for everyone (but the high street retailer).

Although we maybe a few years off a total download-only games industry, the first signs of this change can be seen happening within this console generation. The PS3 already has full retail games like Burnout: Paradise available in digital form on its PSN store. Similarly the 360 has launched its own Games on Demand service, allowing gamers to buy a whole range of older titles using their Microsoft points. None of the titles offered by these services have, as of yet, been new releases, with Sony and Microsoft seemingly content to dip their toes in the water, but it is a sign of things to come.

Another good indicator of this trend is the online-exclusive download games available on all three major consoles, via XBLA, PSN (pictured) and WiiWare. Whilst a few years ago the output in this domain was limited to retro arcade titles or HD renditions of simplistic mobile-phone quality games, they now in some cases rival full-retail products, having become increasingly sophisticated. Games like Epic’s Shadow Complex on the XBLA are now pushing at the boundaries between download-only and retail product, whilst a number of PSN titles have since become retail products (Pain, WipeOut HD, Quest for Booty, Siren: Blood Curse). Fable 2, a full 360 retail game, has also been converted into an episodic XBLA game, available in small instalments, another move which could indicate future changes to the way we receive this medium.

So far, these titles have subtly served to introduce gamers to the idea of downloading games directly to their consoles, as well as to the idea of paying for something without receiving a hard copy. Now all that remains is for the majority of people to have high-speed internet access and then we can expect to see this form of games distribution become the mainstream.

Of course, there are already download-only platforms on the market, in the form of the PSP Go and the iPhone (and now the iPad). There is also the OnLive platform, which was announced last year and plans to cut out retail through live streaming of games over the internet (think of it as being like YouTube, but for games). Digital Foundry’s Richard Leadbetter has already written an interesting piece questioning its viability, which I won’t go into here. But whether or not OnLive works, it is yet another example of a burgeoning trend in video game distribution.

Here are some download-only games I highly recommend:

Oh, the hours I've spent on this! A brilliant re-vamp of an arcade classic, Pac Man Championship Edition on XBLA (also available at retail in the Namco Museum compilation):



The highly-rated World of Goo, available on WiiWare (and through Steam on PC):



And of course, as mentioned before on this blog, the amazing Flower on PSN:

The ol' games as art debate...

It's a subject that often appears in the games press: are video games art? Certainly there are artists involved in the making of video games, literally in the case of graphic artists or story boarders to give just two examples. But can a game “say” anything about the human spirit? Can it make you question something or make you cry? Games have been overtly attempting to ape another art form (the movies) since their inception. But cinema has had its own troubled history in terms of gaining serious critical recognition and the story of cinema, of course, mirrors the story of games. Both mediums started out as science and became a novelty entertainment, eventually both adopted ideas of narrative and have both undergone similarly epochal technological changes: sound and colour in film and the move to polygons in games. Both began life outside the home, in theatres and arcades, before being consumed in the average living room and both face similar challenges when it comes to digital distribution in the future. In terms of content games like last year’s splendid Uncharted 2 have already equalled Hollywood’s best in delivering set pieces and action movie style plotlines, even if they haven’t yet resonated on any deeper level. Now, as graphics become more sophisticated so the potential to tell recognisably human stories increases: one of this year’s biggest releases, another Playstation 3 exclusive Heavy Rain (pictured), is promising to be one of the most cinematic yet and is aiming to come closer than any game has yet to telling a story that will resonate with gamers on an emotional level. Whether the game achieves that aim is something I will surely come back to once it is released in late February. But are games that successfully mimic films a laudable achievement? Can’t video games find some way to stand alone as a form of artistic expression?

You could argue that a game like Tetris or Space Invaders is already art. They certainly feature iconic design, often referenced in popular culture or even in fashion (I have seen a fair few retro Atari clothes in Brighton clothes shop windows), but they are also perfectly designed, superior examples of their medium. Likewise, Mario 64 or Jet Set Radio may not be telling a heart-rending tale, but both are arguably succeeding in every way in which they set out to succeed: both master the art of game design.

In a really odd twist it has been game which isn’t “filmic” that has resonated with me the strongest in terms of emotional reaction in the last year. The Playstation Network download title, Flower, is not only painfully beautiful to look at and perfectly simple in terms of its gameplay (you control a gust of wind and collect petals off flowers. Once each area is cleared of petals you move onto another and repeat until the level is completed) but it made me joyously happy and, at one key moment, it creates a very real sense of melancholy and tangible dread. What is impressive is that it did this without trying too hard or pushing any obvious buttons. In an age where more and more games will be shouting “look at me I’m a serious game for grownups: I’m about a cop with a crack addiction who has lost his kid” or whatever, Flower (refreshingly) isn’t edgy. It exists as a marvellous piece game design where a combination of music and lighting create a really compelling and thought provoking atmosphere. For me Flower is a real work of art.