March 2011

Interview: Arrowhead Studios on Magicka

March 24, 2011

Features / Interviews / by Graham Russell Make a comment! / Tweet it!

Arrowhead Studios and Paradox Interactive’s Magicka is a lot of things. It’s bizarre. It’s frantic. Mostly, it’s a lot of fun. Now, the team’s working on an expansion, Magicka: Vietnam. Yes, Vietnam. We got some answers from Arrowhead’s Patrik Lasota about the expansion, the team’s development process and their future plans.

(If you haven’t played Magicka, check out our review. If you haven’t seen the trailer for the expansion, check that out too.)

Snackbar Games: Okay, we have to start with this one: Magicka: Vietnam. How the heck did you come to the decision to make that?

Patrik Lasota, Arrowhead Game Studios: Well, it started with our sound guy playing around and making the sound for the M60. It wasn’t in the game at the time, but he made it anyway. When we heard the sound, we all said, “let’s put an M60 in the game.” And we did. It turned out to be so hilarious that we spent the entire day at the office that day just shooting goblins with the M60. Around the same time, DICE announced BFBC2: Vietnam, and we jokingly said, lets do Magicka: Vietnam, and then we realized, why not? So here we are, our first major DLC being Magicka: Vietnam.

SBG: Compared to the original release, how long is Magicka: Vietnam going to be?

PL: It is not as long as the original by far, but we are adding some new elements to it to make sure it has higher replayability. It is always important for us to make sure that our community feels like they get enough value from the DLC. It’s supposed to be worth it, not just a cheap way of making more money.

SBG: There are many nods to classic gaming in Magicka. Are there any games in particular that served as inspiration for the game, and in what way?

PL: Many, many games. We are all gamers, so in a way it was in our blood already, but some games, as you say, were bigger influences. Moonstone, for example, is an influence to why the game is so gory. The isometric view and the graphical style, well we ourselves want to attribute it to The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past. Then of course there are the combinations from the Tekken style of games that, in a way, inspired us for the spellcasting system.

SBG: 

The game makes many references and has lots of interesting elements stuck in here and there. What was the team’s philosophy when deciding what to include and not include?

PL: If someone has an idea, we introduce it to the rest of the team. If they agree, we try to put it in the game. It’s that simple, really. The reference humor is sort of our style of gaming. Our lead programmer, Anton Stenmark, mentioned in the developer playthrough we did recently that we all speak fluently in references. I think that the reference humor is simply the kind of humor you get when you reach a critical mass of nerds.

SBG: After putting tons of effort into development into Magicka, you release the game and find all these previously-unknown glitches and bugs. Now that everything’s patched, we were wondering: what was the team’s reaction when this happened?  

PL: Well I wouldn’t say that all bugs are gone yet. We still have some patching to do. But at the time of release, it was mixed feelings of joy (people loved our game), horror (all the bugs!) and a future feeling of hard work in the air. We realized very early when the forums started filling with bugs that this was a disaster. We had to do something immediately, and we made the commitment to patch every day for two weeks.

It was tough times. Fourteen-hour workdays every day, even weekends, but we felt like we owed it to the community to fix the game, that was, well let’s face it, pretty broken. We feel like we did a good job, though our inexperience as a studio was somewhat visible with a few patches. 

SBG: How much more new Magicka content can we expect? Any hints about future expansions?

PL: We have big plans for Magicka. What they are I cannot say at this time, but rest assured, there are some surprises up ahead. We will, of course, patch in the promised PvP. It is high on our priority list. Currently a member of our community, KreitoR, has taken it upon himself to arrange unofficial Magicka PvP tournaments using his own modded XML challenge. It is very fun to watch and it brings a lot of replayability, so that’s definitely coming up.

SBG: 

Has the team talked about what to do after Magicka? Any plans?

PL: We have some plans, but none that we are ready to share anytime soon. We have our hands full with Magicka at the moment, but it is clear to us that we don’t want to become “that studio that made Magicka”, even though we are very happy with how it all turned out.

 

We appreciate Patrik taking the time to answer our questions. We’ll have more on Magicka: Vietnam as its release approaches.

SOCOM 4 Developer Call

March 23, 2011

News / by Chris Rasco Make a comment! / Tweet it!

Sony held a conference call today for the upcoming SOCOM 4 release from Zipper Interactive. On the call were:

  • Brian Soderberg, President and Co-Founder of Zipper Interactive
  • Travis Steiner, Lead Designer for SOCOM 4

Hit the jump to listen to the call.

READ MORE

Liight

March 23, 2011

Reviews / Wii / by Chris Ingersoll Make a comment! / Tweet it!

Studio WallJump’s elegant WiiWare offering Liight i

s an abstract puzzle game that tasks you with illuminating various colored posts with a selection of colored light cones. Since you only have the three primary colors of light (red, green, and blue) at your disposal, you will have to overlap the areas of illumination in order to satisfy the yellow (red + green), cyan (green + blue), magenta (blue + red), and white (all three) posts. Posts that are lit up by the wrong color(s) will let you know by giving off a halo of the offending color(s), while satisfied posts light up with a healthy glow. Further complicating matters is the fact that you can’t just place the cones anywhere; some spots of most maps lack a floor, and others have raised blocks that obstruct your glows. Finally, there are also black posts that must remain in the dark in order to successfully solve a given puzzle.

The main mode in Liight is “Solve” mode, which contains 100 puzzles broken down into four 25-puzzle difficulty levels. The beginner levels give you the basics, without too many complications. Medium levels introduce spinners that rotate certain posts until you have them where you need them to be as well as split posts that put out two colors in smaller arcs than the normal single-colored posts. Hard and Expert levels don’t introduce any new tricks, just devious post placements that will require you to place your light posts with pinpoint precision.

Controls to do so are simple. Placing the cursor over a cone and holding A allows you to drag it and put it where you want (more or less); this isn’t quite as accurate as it sometimes needs to be, which will result in some frustrating repetition as placements that were legal while you were holding the button suddenly become illegal when you release it. Holding B allows you to twist the Remote to turn the cone until it’s pointing in the desired direction; you will often need to “dial in” your beams carefully in order to solve puzzles. You can use the buttons separately or simultaneously, whichever is more convenient for your playing style, as there are no time limits in “Solve” mode.

Time is more pressing in the other main mode, “Endless”. In this mode you have one cone of each color and have to shine the correct light(s) on randomly-generated posts until they vanish; the posts have a visible timer on them that indicates how much longer they need to be lit up before they are scored. “Endless” mode suffers  from the somewhat imprecise controls and the incredibly precise limits on your cones’ areas of illumination, but since it isn’t the main attraction its flaws are mostly forgivable. The other modes are “Create” and “Send”; the former allows you to make you own “Solve” puzzles, and the latter lets you send them to Wii friends. 

The strategy in Liight is straightforward on most levels. You only get a certain number of cones, so the first order of business is often figuring out which ones must used to cover certain posts. Once you have that down the rest usually falls into place, but environmental hazards and/or particularly tricky posts will sometimes require rethinking. It’s not much of a brain-burner once you get used to it, but it’s still a pleasant challenge that will keep you busy for a few hours.

Visually, Liight puts all of its focus on the lighting effects, as one might expect. They’re nothing special, but they do what they have to do. Much more effort was put into the aural components, surprisingly. Every stage has nothing but the yawning sound of an endless void as background music initially; as posts are lit up, they emit additional layers of techno-like music that add up to a groovy beat once things get rolling. Amusingly, lit black posts emit a screeching feedback that will seriously put a damper on your groove until you correct the problem.

Liight will only set you back 500 Wii points ($5) for 100 premade “Solve” stages and the opportunity to make your own and trade them with friends (plus “Endless” mode, I guess). That makes it an easy recommendation. Puzzle fans should definitely pick it up, and anyone else who thinks the concept sounds interesting won’t be wasting too much money to give it a try. 

Pros: Simple but elegant puzzle design; groovy sound effects; bargain price

Cons: Cone placement can be finicky at times

The Committee: Portable debuts

March 23, 2011

Features / The Committee / by Graham Russell Make a comment! / Tweet it!

The Committee is in session. We’re taking on various issues in gaming, and our word is final. In this installment, we rank the launches of portables, just in time for the 3DS’ debut.

Staff picks for best launch games for each system are in bold.

Launch titles: Centipede, Game and Watch Gallery 2, Tetris DX

Justin Last: You can’t argue with a classic, and Tetris DX is exactly that. The original Game Boy launched with the classic puzzler as a pack-in and was well-served by it. The GBC followed suit and featured an updated version. Two new game modes and a few new music choices layered on top of classic Tetris gameplay make the GBC launch a good one. You’ve also got another classic to play in Centipede, but I’ve yet to meet a person that can’t be captivated by Tetris and keep playing just once more until it is well past bedtime.

Shawn Vermette: It’s hard to recommend a handheld launch as a good one when it launches with just three games. Though, it’s even harder when those three games consist of 2 remakes and a collection. As great as Tetris was, it just can’t carry two different system launches on its own. The lack of any games worth even looking at for purchase dooms the Game Boy Color to the obscurity, as far as handheld launches go.

 

Launch titles: Blue Lightning, Electrocop, Gates of Zendocon, California Games

Graham Russell: You have to give the Lynx this: the launch wasn’t boring. It clearly could have launched with early-’80s Atari arcade classics, but it didn’t. California Games is the clear standout, but you should really check out Blue Lightning. The team at Epyx pulled off a full-color 3D shooter in the Starfox vein, and they did it on a handheld in 1989. If Atari had a creative force like Miyamoto and a better business plan, this system would be a milestone rather than a footnote.

Justin Last: Platform launches need to be strong and hopefully include a system seller. Atari doesn’t have a mascot series to push units, it didn’t launch with a puzzler that appeals to players of all ages, and one of our two favorites from the lineup was California Games. There’s nothing wrong with California Games, but anybody who wanted to play it could do so on a number of other platforms. Nobody rushes out to buy a new platform for the hottest new game they can play on something else.

 

Launch titles: Galactic Pinball, Mario’s Tennis, Red Alarm, Teleroboxer

Graham Russell: You can make a joke about the Virtual Boy. It’s okay, it really is. That doesn’t mean it wasn’t a somewhat enjoyable joke. While the system’s gems (Mario Clash and V-Tetris) didn’t make the U.S. launch (or, in the case of the latter, the U.S. at all, though the system’s region-free), Mario’s Tennis was a more-than-capable showpiece. Red Alarm‘s dual-digital control scheme worked great for 3D action. (It arguably led to the dual-analog setup we use today.)

Gerry Pagan: Ah, the Virtual Boy. Even a gem like Red Alarm couldn’t salvage a launch for a system that was ill-concieved from the start.  That leaves Pinball, a terrible Punch-Out! clone and tennis. And while Mario’s Tennis was fun, in the end you paid money for 15-minute chunks of eye-hurting Pong. A terrible launch for a completely flawed “handheld”.

 

Launch titles: Tomb Raider: Scion, Pandemonium, Sonic, Super Monkey Ball, Puzzle Bobble VS, Puyo Pop, Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater

Andrew Passafiume: The N-Gage has been a running joke ever since it launched. It’s practically forgotten now, but it did have a decent selection of games. The games weren’t amazing, but those who actually decided to buy the system at launch were shown that Nokia at least tried to get some old favorites together. Like the GBA, it offered a decent variety of games that would fit every gamer’s needs.

Graham Russell: Oh, N-Gage. On paper, the system made sense, and with support from Sega, Eidos and Activision, it should have gained some traction. The horrible hardware decision to make you remove the battery to change the game? It was fixed in the second iteration, but by that time the system had lost its chance at success. It’s too bad, because no one was around for a rather-fun portable version of Civilization years before the release of Civ Rev, as well as some other late-life gems.

 

Launch titles: Castle of Illusion Starring Mickey Mouse, Columns, G-Loc, Psychic World, Revenge of Drancon, Super Monaco GP

Shawn Vermette: All it really takes for a successful system launch is one or two good games, and the Game Gear had that. Castle of Illusion was a great Mario-style game, something badly needed on a non-Nintendo platform, and Columns is a Tetris-like game that is addictive enough to compare to Tetris without being a clone of it.

Graham Russell: A solid puzzler can salvage almost any lineup. Columns is about the best Sega’s ever done in the genre, and the colors in the game showed off the system’s main selling point over the venerable Game Boy. Unfortunately, an addictive game like that also shows off the system’s biggest weakness: its battery life.

 

Launch titles: Biomotor Unitron, Metal Slug 1st Mission, Pac-Man

Justin Last: Launch with guaranteed sellers – it’ll move units. Everybody knows Pac-Man and how to play it, and every kid that frequented an arcade at the time knew Metal Slug. Arcade games at home was big business and being able to take these two classics on a car trip was great. I can’t think of a single platform that shouldn’t launch with games like Pac-Man and Metal Slug. I’m still buying both series today on whatever platform they show up on, and seeing them in a modern launch lineup would certainly pique my interest, and I traditionally wait for a hardware revision.

Andrew Passafiume: NGPC’s launch is the perfect definition of barebones. Sure, it had a couple of decent games, but they are not games that get people running out to the store to buy the system. A launch either needs a variety of solid titles or a couple of strong games that are must-haves for any gamer. The NGPC was clearly lacking in both of these areas. Launching with only three games, it’s pretty obvious why the NGPC has become one of the many handhelds that are long-since forgotten by most.

 

Launch titles: Metroid Prime Hunters: First Hunt, Asphalt Urban GT, Ridge Racer DS, Mr. Driller: Drill Spirits, Spider-Man 2, Super Mario 64 DS, The Urbz: Sims in the City, Tiger Woods PGA Tour, Madden NFL 2005, Sprung, Ping Pals, Feel the Magic: XY/XX

Gerry Pagan: The DS had one of my favorite launch releases, if just due to the variety of fun games available. Super Mario 64 DS and Metroid Prime Hunters would later go down in infamy as mediocre games, but they, along with Spider Man 2 provided something for the action gamers to look forward to. Mr. Driller would fulfill the puzzle niche, as well as other groups with sports games and racing games. It was a launch that covered all the bases, and a strong start for the best-selling handheld in history.

Shawn Vermette: The Nintendo DS had a fairly robust launch lineup… in terms of sheer number of games. Unfortunately, it was a solid example of quantity not being equal to quality. The standout title of the launch was Super Mario 64 DS, followed by Mr. Driller, two sub-par racing games, two stripped-down sports games, two somewhat creepy ‘dating’ sims, a movie game, a port of a bad Sims game and, well, an IM client.

 

Launch titles: Ape Escape: On the Loose, Darkstalkers Chronicle: The Chaos Tower, Dynasty Warriors, Gretzky NHL, Lumines, Metal Gear Acid, NBA, Need for Speed Underground: Rivals, NFL Street 2: Unleashed, Ridge Racer, Spider-Man 2, Tony Hawk’s Underground 2: Remix, Twisted Metal: Head-On, Untold Legends: Brotherhood of the Blade, Wipeout Pure, World Tour Soccer

Graham Russell: The PSP launch was robust by design; the system’s architecture was meant for PS2 ports, and the day one lineup included over a dozen games that used that to its advantage. The best game at launch, though, was an original gem: Lumines. You could pick up Twisted Metal and Underground to show off the system’s graphical capability, but Lumines kept going back in the UMD tray. Why? It was the most addictive portable puzzler since the genre’s revered grandfather, Tetris.

Justin Last: The PSP launch suffered from the same thing the portable has suffered from since – many (if not most) of the games feel like they could be done better elsewhere. The GBA didn’t have this problem because 3D went to the console while 2D thrived on the handheld. With the PSP, though, we got games that felt like stripped-down versions of their console big-brothers. It’s also heavy in sports titles which isn’t guaranteed to contribute to a bad launch, but sports titles were already complicated enough and invested enough in multiplayer that I want them on a console.

 

Launch titles: Alleyway, Baseball, Super Mario Land, Tennis, Tetris

Graham Russell: Tetris. The Game Boy’s launch was somewhat small (though not by standards of the time), but if you have one magnificent game that shows off the system’s advantages, that’s really all you need. (Not that Super Mario Land wasn’t fun, and I found Breakout-clone Alleyway a substantial timesink.) It could be played a little at a time, it was simple to understand, and it was there when you had downtime. If modern mobile and phone gaming has a blueprint for success, it’s Pajitnov’s masterwork.

Gerry Pagan: While Nintendo’s first offering of a handheld console went on to release a myriad of great games, it’s launch offerings weren’t exactly grandiose. Super Mario Land and Tetris can only hold you for so long, and the other games aren’t exactly impressive. A rocky start for the Game Boy, but it at least later picked up with better games. 

 

Launch titles: Army Men Advance, Castlevania: Circle of the Moon, ChuChu Rocket!, Earthworm Jim, F-Zero: Maximum Velocity, Fire Pro Wrestling, GT Advance Championship Racing, Iridion 3D, Konami Krazy Racers, Namco Museum, Pinobee: Wings of Adventure, Pitfall: The Mayan Adventure, Rayman Advance, Ready 2 Rumble Boxing: Round 2, Super Dodge Ball Advance, Super Mario Advance, Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 2

Andrew Passafiume: What the GBA lacked in an amazing launch title it more than made up for in several solid games. A lot of handheld launches rely on just one (maybe two) big games, but the GBA relied on several. A handheld Super Mario, a new F-Zero, a new Castlevania, and a few solid ports make up an impressive lineup. Above all else, it supplies the buyer with something most handheld launches lack: variety.

Graham Russell: I can’t say the GBA launch was a bad one. In fact, we’re generally in agreement that it hasn’t been equaled. The only way in which it’s a bit weak? Very few of the games are worth playing now. Most were ports, though very good ports and fun ones to play. Looking back, though, most have been completely outclassed by their successors. Which is how it’s supposed to be, I guess: after all, when a launch lineup is the highlight of a system’s life, something went very, very wrong.

 

What do you think? Agree? Disagree? Let us know in the comments!

PixelJunk Shooter 2

March 22, 2011

PS3 / Reviews / by Graham Russell Make a comment! / Tweet it!

Sequels can take many paths. There’s the refining, fixing-the-problems approach most take. There’s the kitchen-sink option, throwing in everything you can think of. Then there’s what we call the Lost Levels approach. Like the Japanese Super Mario Bros. 2 (released in the U.S. as part of Super Mario All-Stars and called The Lost Levels), some games just take the first game and give you another, somewhat more challenging version. Though PixelJunk Shooter added a battle mode (and we’ll get to that later), for most of the game, the team took this latter approach. 

(Warning: spoilers of the first game ahead. Go play that one if you haven’t yet.)

You start where you ended the last game: in the belly of a giant beast. This explains the major gameplay additions from the original: new substances to manipulate and deal with. There’s acid, which essentially poisons you and kills you if you don’t quickly find water; eggs, which multiply and block paths (and hatch if wet); and light and darkness, which is practically life and death in certain levels. You venture back out of the beast and into a variety of levels, some of which are similar to the original and others which take the experience to unexplored areas.

Things play like you remember: controls are identical, though little-used moves like spins are given more significance with the new elements. Special suits change up gameplay, though now even more so with the addition of suits like the Hungry Suit that changes the game’s mechanics completely. Did you want to play Dig Dug in the middle of a PixelJunk game? Well now that’s basically what you can do. And, as with the original, you can take on the entire campaign with a friend.

As for that battle mode? Yeah, you can challenge friends to battles, fighting to rescue more scientists and using unlockable weapons against them. This certainly takes the gameplay and turns it on its head, changing things from a ship-based adventure title to a heated arena, but for something the system clearly wasn’t designed for, it’s surprisingly fun.

If you didn’t like the original PixelJunk Shooter, there’s nothing here to change your mind. If you did like it, there are many reasons in Shooter 2 to make you like it even more.

 

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