A Windows Realization

Recently, as part of an effort to kick-start my PC gaming after a nice, long lull, I decided it was time to finally reinstall Windows on the iMac that serves as my meager but serviceable gaming computer.

Faced with the prospect of reinstalling and dealing with Windows XP again, I almost ended the project before it started.

Thankfully, I pressed onward.

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Gaming by Numbers

My to-do list is taunting me. 

It sits over there in the corner, confident and quiet. You can practically smell the pride seeping out from underneath its shiny whiteboard surface. 

It has nothing to fear. No reason to ever believe its puny human master could ever achieve the impossible and manage to wipe the slate clean, clearing it of all the burdens of the past and eliminating even the need for such a twisted list of all things incomplete. 

My to-do list has taken over my life. 

Well, my gaming life, at any rate. 

It's a strange phenomenon indeed when choosing which game to play becomes more a tactical choice as to which title would be easier to wipe off of that accursed list than which game would actually be the most fun to play. 

Yet I cannot simply give it up. 

I have spent a rather staggering amount of money on games this generation. If I am to keep this up, I feel it is healthy to, at the very least, make sure I get my money's worth out of that which I have bought. The list is a nice physical reminder of how much cash I have thrown away that has as yet provided no value to me. 

The other service the list provides is helping to keep my rubbery interests in check. My attention bounces from game to game like an overenthusiastic bouncy ball, constantly drawn to the next big thing. A quick glance at that board gives me the mental equivalent of a nice thump on the head, reminding me that I do, in fact, have fun stuff to play right at my fingertips. The grass is always greener in the next month of new releases, it is true. 

So while the list indeed serves a valuable function as a counterbalance to some of my natural gaming tendencies, I still can't help but loathe the thing and the power it holds over me. 

How I long for the day when I can be trusted to be fully in charge of my own play time again. I wish for a more normal gaming life, savouring only a game or two at a time until I have extracted all they have to offer and then, only then, moving on to new pastures. 

My progress toward this crazy vision of my future is slow, but steady. Unfortunately, I still face the monumental obstacles of Christmas and an unbelievably packed first quarter of 2010. 

I must remain vigilant. I must march forward with my goal always in mind. If I am ever to defeat my list, I must suffer under it's reign a little while longer yet. 

Here's hoping for a less cluttered gaming future.

Lazy Afternoon Gaming

It was early one lazy afternoon and I found myself picking up my iPhone for some light entertainment, as I am oft tempted to do on such days. This was primarily because my cat had also decided it was a lazy afternoon and settled down for a long sleep in my lap, trapping me in my rather uncomfortable chair with only the iPhone in reach. 

I swiped aimlessly left and right through my screens of apps, and it occurred to me that I had rather a large number of games on my phone. It prompted me to question whether this was a proper use of my time and money. After all, my to-do list is long indeed. Wasn't there something more important I should be doing instead?

I briefly became frightened by the idea that I had been chucking away valuable playing time on these worthless little time-wasting morsels. When did I decide it would be a good idea to purchase so many of these things? Aren't they just so much junk food cluttering up what should be the gourmet meal of my gaming feast?

After a little thinking, and a little gaming, I decided that my fears were unfounded. 

First off there's the argument that the iPhone is a perfectly legitimate gaming platform that really can do more than just provide mobile versions of trashy Internet Flash games. While this is certainly true, the game I was playing when the troubled thoughts began to cross my mind was not what one would call the height of iPhone gaming achievement, so this argument is a little beside the point. 

No, the real issue here is what gaming is truly all about: fun. 

It is remarkably easy to forget that sometimes. I frequently drown myself in conversations of games as art and storytelling through interactive media and other such nonsense and I develop an aversion to these simpler pleasures. 

Well, if not an aversion then at least a hefty sense of guilt when I allow myself to partake in them. 

But these little bite-sized chunks of gaming on the go have reminded me that it's healthy to let all that haughty stuff go every once in a while. No, of course I don't want them to devour all of my time, but the same can be said for heavier fare. Moderation is a virtue. 

Just because I'm guiding a rollercoaster around a track by tilting my phone instead of guiding my protagonist to his ultimate destiny by immersing myself in a vast fictional world doesn't mean I should feel bad about it.

It's true I won't even play some of these casual time-wasters more than once or twice. Forgettable? Perhaps. But so is a stick of gum and a pack of that costs just barely less than some of these games.

As for the more expensive ones, I'm sure I spent more than their price of admission on equally forgettable and useless arcade games, back in that magical time when those used to actually exist.  

I have decided that my protagonist isn't going anywhere. I can get back to him later. Right now I have some people that would very much like to go around a loop really fast.    

iPhone Game Review: iDracula

iDracula - Undead Awakening, aside from being an example of a game with a totally nonsensical name, is also an example of a game that shouldn’t work nearly as well on a platform like the iPhone as it does. For the price of $2.99 it’s currently selling for, it’s an absolute no-brainer purchase for any iPhone owning gamer who happens to like to shoot things.

According to the game’s description, you play as a vampire hunter that is himself being hunted by a slew of fantastical (not to mention cool-looking) creatures, including the fearsome Dracula himself.

None of that matters.

You’re a dude with a bunch of awesome weapons and your goal is to kill as many moving things as possible. That’s all you need to know, but it’s enough to propel the game into seriously addicting status.

The premise of iDracula, like many of the games best suited for the iPhone, is dead simple, but contains enough depth to keep you constantly coming back for more small chunks of exciting gameplay. It’s essentially what would be called a dual stick shooter on a console, only stuffed onto the diminutive iPhone.

There are two virtual dials on screen. One controls your movement while the other controls aiming and firing by holding in the direction of the thing you want to kill. There is a small learning curve to the controls due to the lack of physical feedback, but especially due to the large amount of screen real-estate given to the control dials, it doesn’t take long before you’re blasting things with ease.

The biggest problem with the controls isn’t actually controlling your character, it’s the fact that the dials (and your thumbs rested upon them) take up a decent amount of space on screen and monsters are not afraid to sneak under your digits and attack you when you can’t see them. This isn’t a constant problem or a game-killer by a long shot, but it will be an occasional frustration.

Another small point worth noting is that switching among your large number of weapons (assuming you survive long enough to collect a large number of weapons) can be a little tricky. A bar at the bottom of the screen allows you to slide back and forth between weapon icons, but it’s both a little hard to access and not always as responsive as it should be. It’s more of an annoyance than a true hindrance though.

Still, the shooting will definitely keep you coming back for more. There are a wide variety of creatures to shoot, many of which act differently and require slightly different strategies to dispatch. Aiding you in this is a sizable number of cool weapons, from traditional fare like pistols and shotguns to more exciting armaments like flame throwers, machine guns, and grenade launchers.

There are four modes of play which are admittedly not substantially different from one another, but they do provide just enough variety to allow you to change things up often enough so you never get bored.

Survival and Super Survival are variations on the classic concept of seeing how long you can survive against never ending waves of enemies. Ammo, new weapons, and even powerups can drop from defeated foes, so you must constantly keep on your toes and collect these items while not being surrounded or overwhelmed by the quickly escalating number of enemies.

Rush is similar, but instead of starting out with a pistol and a small number of enemies, you choose one of three top-tier weapons with unlimited ammo and are immediately dropped into terrifyingly large numbers of enemies coming at you from all sides. It’s truly tough to survive very long here, but it’s surely addicting to try.

Finally, Wave Attack (which was added in a post-release update, along with one of the other modes, new weapons, items, enemies, levels, and other tweaks) sets you against waves of enemies, each with a beginning and an end. The enemies drop gold which you can then spend between rounds on ammo, new weapons, or health. Deciding how to spend this money to best survive what’s next adds a satisfying touch of strategy to the proceedings.

In all of these modes, killing enemies gains you access to perks, which are essentially level up bonuses like increased health, faster reload times, or greater damage. Some of them are even riskier and more creative, such as armor that slows you down or an immortality perk that gives you 30 seconds of unlimited health followed by instant death. Choosing which one you want out of the four random choices every time you gain access to a new perk adds another small dose of strategy to the game and definitely increases replay value as each time you play will be ever so slightly different.

iDracula’s description promises “the most intense game in the App Store”. I can’t vouch for the entirety of the App Store, but I can say that after spending many hours playing this supremely addictive game, it is certainly the most intense iPhone game I have played yet and one of the best deals out there for iPhone gamers at its low price.

No action game loving iPhone fan should be without this game.

iPhone Game Review: Eliss

If you have approximately an infinite amount of patience, Eliss will be one of the most original, unique, and addicting games you can add to your iPhone game library.

If you have anything less than an infinite amount of patience, Eliss will be the most sadistically frustrating game that you ever really, really wanted to like.

Sadly, I fall into the latter camp.

Still, with that said, I would recommend giving the game a try (especially as it seems to be on sale for $0.99 for a short time as of this writing - making this, frustrations aside, an absolute steal). I will now attempt to explain these contradicting emotions of mine.

The actual gameplay in Eliss is remarkably hard to describe. Nothing short of playing it for yourself will really tell you what’s going on (and there is, thankfully, a Lite version so you can try it before you purchase). Stated simply, however, the game is set in a stylized universe where you guide differently colored planets around the screen with your finger. Touching similarly colored planets to one another combines them into a bigger planet, while touching differently colored planets makes you lose health (quickly).

The goal is to match these planets to similarly sized receptacles, called squeesars, in order to form supernovas which make the planets disappear. You must form a certain number of supernovas in order to finish each level. Combining planets to form bigger ones and splitting them apart with a pinching motion is key to matching planet size with that of the squeesars.

The challenge, and I must again stress that there is a lot of it, comes from juggling supernova creation with elements like adding more colors of planets, a faster rate of new planets appearing on the screen, vortexes that pull planets toward them forcing you to hold your planets in place lest you lose them, and black holes that erode your health when planets collide with them.

Upon clicking Eliss’s icon on your iPhone and watching the game start up, you can often hear the game sigh with contempt at having to actually interface with the user. You get the distinct feeling it would rather be hanging on the wall in an art gallery with a pretentious tour guide explaining to eager visitors what statement it makes about humanity.

Eliss makes absolutely no attempt at user friendliness in any aspect of its design. The “how-to” section is almost comically cryptic and useless. There is no sort of tutorial whatsoever, and nothing short of trial and error will introduce you to the game’s concepts. Once you get acclimated, the difficulty curve will kick you to the curb within an alarmingly short number of levels unless you have a truly respectable amount of patience.

As I understand it, an update released before I purchased the game gave it a gentler difficulty curve than it had originally. I don’t even want to fathom what that must have been like.

All that said, if you go into the experience with an open mind and a willingness to put up with the game’s shortcomings and maddening difficulty, you will experience a game unlike anything else you’ve ever played and one that is only possible on the iPhone platform, making it a terrific showcase for what Apple’s device is truly capable of bringing to the gaming scene.

If you can put up with it, that is.

The most striking thing about the game initially is its visuals. They are highly stylized and minimalist, unlike anything else on the App Store (or elsewhere, for that matter). The planets and vortexes and black holes aren’t exactly what you’d call visually stunning, but they’re both pleasing and creative. Coupled with a great, soothing soundtrack (that makes for a suitably ironic backdrop to the absolutely frantic, challenging gameplay) and the presentation is decidedly one of the game’s strengths.

Once you’ve actually managed to figure out what’s going on, however, the thing that will keep you coming back despite the frustration is the multi-touch gameplay. Only eight or so levels in and you’ll be placing your iPhone on a flat stable surface and controlling the game using at least four fingers at once if you want to stand any hope of surviving. You’ll be flicking the planets all over, holding them in place, and trying to keep track of a whole lot at once and it really is absolutely frantic and fun. At least, until you’ve lost for the hundredth time.

It is, yet again, a frighteningly challenging experience, but one that just might keep you coming back because of how truly original it is. Eliss could literally not exist on any other gaming platform to date because of these multi-touch controls, not to mention that its niche nature means commercial failure on any more “mainstream” platform would be all but guaranteed.

The 25 levels included with the game may seem like a low number, but length probably won’t be an issue here as the sheer challenge will keep you occupied for many an hour unless you’re truly skilled. For reference, I got stuck, and hard, on the eighth level after only twenty or thirty minutes of play.

I desperately wish that Eliss were easier because I would love to add it to my list of must have games for iPhone gamers. Its pure originality almost gets it there even now. As it stands though, I simply can’t recommend Eliss to a general audience because the difficulty curve is far too much of a barrier for most.

For the hardcore set, for those that love a challenge, or for those that are simply willing to shell out what is still a relatively small fee (only $3.99 even after it goes back up to its regular price - still a steal) to experience one of the best showpieces of a truly iPhone-exclusive experience, Eliss might still be worth a look.

Despite my harsh criticism of the difficulty, however, I do want to stress that I did keep coming back to the game. The game has a draw, an addictive quality, due to its unique nature that might just hook you even if you’re normally not the challenge-seeking type. So download the Lite version and if it intrigues you at all and you’ve got a few dollars to spare, give it a shot. Even if it’s too hard for you, you’ve at least gotten a taste of the qualities only an iPhone can bring to gaming and you’ve supported a truly unique title while you’re at it.