Blogging the experience of gameplayhttps://www.gamelog.cl/gamers/GamerPage.php?idgamer=315https://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=1468EDIT: I thought I had added this entry but apparently it didn't go through last time. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- After a more thorough playing of this game, it is inevitable that one comes upon the powerup system. The way they handled the power up system in this game is unique as far as I know. First and foremost, you must kill an entire group of enemies to earn a powerup. After acquiring the powerup the player must choose either to use it immediately, or to save up multiple powerups to gain different effects. In my opinion, this one little mechanic differentiated the game from other scrolling shooters. Although, in the time period that this game was released there probably wasn't a lot of competition and the expectation for a game was perhaps not quite so high. That said, the ability to choose when to use the powerup engages the player and introduces an emergent quality to the game. The player can then learn to recognize patterns and use the powerups correctly, thereby creating allowing the player to overcome challenges and create an enjoyable experience. Mon, 26 Feb 2007 02:30:08 CDThttps://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=1468&iddiary=3156https://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=1468After having played the likes of Kirby on the NES, the visual and audio levels of the Gradius game were dissapointing. I suppose we take for granted the work that some designer/programmers do to create a game which maximizes the capability of a system's hardware. That aside, the gameplay of Gradius seemed fairly straightforward as one would expect from a shmup. The game also introduces the familiar elements of enemies attacking in patterns as well as power ups. At the end of the first level, there is a volcano type boss which was somewhat original as most other shmups usually have giant enemy ships as the boss component.Fri, 23 Feb 2007 19:48:29 CDThttps://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=1468&iddiary=3089https://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=1184After getting some more playtime with the game, I am starting to regain some of my old skill. The game has evolved a bit obviously, the tactics people employ are a little different then when I used to play. Most of the old tricks still work fairly well but once in a while I found myself coming upon a player who uses a rapid strafing technique that one would not be suprised to find in Quake but seems a little out of place in Counterstrike. The strafe does cause weapons to lose accuracy but in my experience I had difficulty hitting the player and once my clip was empty the other player was able to shoot at me more or less with impunity. As I mentioned in my first entry, sound plays an integral part in the game. One element that I forgot to mention in my first log is the directional mechanics of the sound. For example, while hiding behind cover, the enemy can sneak behind around you and flank you. Your defense against this is of course to listen carefully for the sound of footsteps approaching. If you listen carefully enough you can actually tell from which direction the footsteps are approaching and how close they are to you. One of the distinguishing gameplay elements of the game is of course the different characteristic of each weapon. Factor in the financial management, i.e. you have to purchase your equipment and depending on your resources your equipment and consequently your tactics for that round change, and you have some of the elements which make this game a fun. Of course there is also the objective based gameplay, i.e. the terrorist have to bomb the target on certain maps and counterterrorist have to rescue the hostages on another. While other first person shooters have tried to implement this sort of objective based gameplay, CS:S is the one who has managed to implement it most successfully in my opinion. The final major point of design in this game is the level design. Each level looks and play differently, the environment majorly influences the gameplay. FOr instance any object you see on a map that you think you can use for cover, you can really use for cover. Hiding just around the corner, quietly waiting for an unsuspecting enemy to pass by is a very successful tactic. Other tactics like briefly popping out of the window to fire off a few shots before passing back into cover, and pretty much anything else you can think of can be successful. That is probably another thing that makes the game enjoyable, it challenges the player to make a plan of action and it's fruits can be almost immediately seen by the player. If it fails, the player can think of something else, if it is successful the player feels a sense of accomplishment; either way the result is revealed quickly.Fri, 09 Feb 2007 00:04:50 CDThttps://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=1184&iddiary=2538https://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=1184Preface: I used to play the original Counterstrike a few years ago. I got in right before the time the game itself went retail and played it for a while. Shortly after the flood of new players came in, I quit the game for various reasons. Today, I decided to give CS: Source a shot. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- From a designer's standpoint there aren't too many differences between the last Counterstrike version I played and Counterstrike: Source. Obviously, there was a graphical update taking advantage of new hardware common in PCs today. Visually, the player and weapon models have seen improvements. Along with the environment, all the models benefit from higher resolution textures. The flashbang grenade actually creates a ringing effect for a nice touch. All these elements no doubt, work together to create a superior sense of immersion. The game from it's earliest incarnations clearly put a lot of emphasis on sound; each of the weapons have a distinct sound. BEyond an immersion standpoint this serves a gameplay purpose as well, as being shot at by different weapons would require the player to use different tactics. It goes without saying that in a multiplayer game like this with practically no single player qualities, this is purely a game of emergency.Thu, 08 Feb 2007 23:30:58 CDThttps://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=1184&iddiary=2533https://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=955I have logged some more time with this game now and the initial feeling of shock at the game's "weirdness" has begun to fade. Actually, it hasn't so much faded as it has blended into the background. The character design in this game is, for lack of a better word, eccentric. From the King of all the Universe with his rainbow spewing mouth to the protangonist with a cylinder shaped head, these characters reflect every bit the strange atmosphere intended to be conveyed by this game. The dialogue in the game is also verbose and to a small degree doesn't make sense. The level design in this game is interesting primarily for the reason that a game of this type has, to my knowledge, not been tried before. There would more or less be nothing to compare or draw reference from. The large variety of objects the katamari can pick up is in fact a large part of the fun of the game. I found myself being motivated to keep playing and make my katamari bigger if for no other reason than to get big enough to be able to pick up some ridiculous objects as a cow. Wed, 31 Jan 2007 14:37:23 CDThttps://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=955&iddiary=2259https://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=955The first thing that comes to mind when playing this gsme is the sheer amount of, for lack of a better word, "weirdness." From the moment you boot up the game, you are immediately greeted with imagery and sound that introduces the player to the game's unusual atmosphere. The core gameplay of the game is fairly original, at least to the extent that nothing like it has been released in recent times. The story matches the gameplay with that expected amount of absurdity. I think the designers of the game did an excellent job with the control scheme for this game. Instead of the standard left analog stick for movement and buttons for actions that is dominant in most of today's games, this one opts to use both analog sticks together to control the player's character. At the end of my first experience with this game, I find myself a little unsure about whether or not I enjoyed it, but I'm leaning towards yes. More than anything, however, is that I find myself asking the question of exactly how the designers came up with a game like this.Tue, 30 Jan 2007 17:16:37 CDThttps://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=955&iddiary=2086https://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=713------------------------------------------------------------------------------- EDIT: Apparently GameLog has some issue with longer entries. This is part 2 of 2. The last paragraph was posted as a separate entry in order to get around the problem. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- One very aspect of the game that I personally found very enjoyable was that the game rewards the player for careful attention to detail and for innovating solutions. A puzzle may have more than one solution depending on what the player noticed was in the previous rooms or what was on the wall. The combat system in the game is a lot like the puzzle system in that it is designed for a wide variety of audiences. The combat in the game is designed to be simple enough that even young players can defeat enemies without too much difficulty. The caveat is that some enemies have a certain behavior to them which makes them vulnerable only during certain times or against certain tactics. This, like the puzzle system was designed to challenge the player just enough so that success would reward the player with a sense of achievement. Unfortunately, unlike the puzzle system, the combat in this game is often times too simple; though I must admit that this particular opinion may be influenced by the abundance of combat oriented games with more complex options and higher difficulty that people are used to playing. (This entry has been edited2 times. It was last edited on Fri, 19 Jan 2007 16:29:15.)Fri, 19 Jan 2007 16:23:24 CDThttps://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=713&iddiary=1830https://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=713------------------------------------------------------------------------------- EDIT: Apparently GameLog has some issue with longer entries. This is part 1 of 2. The last paragraph was posted as a separate entry in order to get around the problem. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- I've gotten some more play time with this game and have come to notice some of the elaborate details involved in the design. Continuing from my last entry, this was the Zelda franchise's first vemture into three dimensions and I believe an often underestimated obstacle in making this transition is the control scheme. The control scheme for this game is such that it doesn't take long to pick up and is fairly intuitive. The designers decided not to give the player the ability to "free jump" and instead focused on an environment dependent system to determine whether or not the player should jump. This design choice was probably made to enabled the level designers to have more control over how they wanted to player to procceed in walking and in finding solutions to the game's many puzzles. The puzzles are an integral part of this game as they actively engage the player; controlling the player's progression through the game. The puzzles for the most part are not terribly difficult to solve but are hard enough to cause most players to stop and think for a few minutes before arriving at the solution. This greatly adds to the enjoyment of the game, giving the player a sense of accomplishment for solving the puzzle. The puzzle design was probably very difficult considering they had to cater to a wide audience but being that they could expect a certain amount of people to have played the own Zelda games they could probably put in a few hints. (This entry has been edited5 times. It was last edited on Fri, 19 Jan 2007 16:29:02.)Fri, 19 Jan 2007 16:21:29 CDThttps://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=713&iddiary=1828https://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=713This is my first time with a Zelda game where I actually properly sat down and started the game from the beginning. Visually I was a little bit shocked at the dated graphics. In our current generation of consoles impressive graphics are so commonplace I believe we have become a bit insensitized to them and take for granted the huge leaps we have made these past few years. Limited hardware aside, one can easily see that even before playing very far into the game, the level designers put a lot of effort into making the game world feel organic. It's easy to imagine when the game was released with it's peers with similar hardware limitations, how the environments in this game would stand out. I believe this is the first time an attempt was made to transform Zelda into the world of three dimensions. While there are some growing pains(awkward camera angles) they are few and far in between.Thu, 18 Jan 2007 16:38:09 CDThttps://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=713&iddiary=1600https://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=592Having played the game a bit more now I have made some progress. I have earned enough money to buy the first set for parts for my bot. It provides a very modest appearance change and an appropriately modest improvement in combat performance. I have yet to experience two out of the three game types, which are as far as I can tell, deathmatch and some sort of base destruction. Both of these gametypes involve player versus player gameplay whereas the gametype I am playing, Sector, is a cooperative effort by a band of players against computer controlled adversaries. I am fairly sure that I am not anywhere near well equipped or well leveled enough to do well in the Player versus Player gametype. I also assume that an element of skill will show itself in the more experienced players.Fri, 12 Jan 2007 14:47:00 CDThttps://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=592&iddiary=1413