Randomly Mine #3

Click, Click, No Real Boom

I’ve fired a lot of guns in games. From the past, future, and present, I’ve used enough weaponry to surpass a Texan billionaire, and it’s from this experience, a nagging issue rears its ugly head…

Destiny is a future fixed in war, against aliens who can only be stopped by pumping their flesh with enough led, energy, and fire to send them straight to hell; and its guns sound about as powerful as my BB PPK.

Firearms deafen those without ear-protection, and understandably, games that cause physical harm aren’t legal, so games will never be an exact recreation, nor should they be. But this is not about replication, it’s about satisfaction.

Bang, bang, pew, pew is all one needs when their playing cops and robbers at the playground, but in shooters where guns are sometimes literally front and center, it seems odd at a first glance that a developer wouldn’t make their creations capable of scaring away the crows.

In previous generations, it was a matter of technology and budget but neither of those are a reality today. With bigger budgeted titles just recording real weapons.

Weak gunshots are in so many games, that it can’t be out of ignorance, there needs to be a purpose, and well, an answer can be found weirdly, from Top Gear.

When the show’s presenters drive an Aston Martin V8 Vantage, its incredible howl only leads to disappointment with the vehicle’s actual lack of speed.

Making a weapon sound powerful but is actually weak is worse than a weapon sounding like the pathetic pea shooter it truly is.

Bring the Noise

From HEALTH on Max Payne 3, to Combichrist/Noisia on DMC: Devil May Cry, and Tangerine Dreams with Grand Theft Auto 5, established artists and bands who’ve scored video games have extraordinary successes in contrast to their rarity.

Understandably, composers are much more practical. They’re not typically touring, and/or producing a record when asked if they’d like to score a video-game. So that’s why games don’t just contact an underground group when they need some tunes.

But how do these guys create such remarkable work compared to more directly experienced composers and professionals?

One word.

Presence.

Taking a stage, blasting sounds, and making a crowd of people enjoy it, is something a composer doesn’t need to worry about.

I don’t mean to diminish the challenges and talent of composers, many of my favorite pieces of music come from these geniuses.

But a band needs a level of presence and charisma to have a sliver of a hope at notoriety. In that world, there’s no concern of being too overt.

So when these groups come to score a video-game, they’ve already dodged over one of the biggest hurdles swarming music composition, being hidden.

An obnoxious score can be painful, but one that’s never registered may be even worse for the creator.

Authors don’t want their books to go unread. Directors don’t want their films to go unseen. So why would composers want their music to be unheard? 

Thankfully, people like Mick Gordon, Disasterpeace, Power Glove, and more have helped to buck this trend, but in the meantime, I would love to see more bands take their chances with Video Game OSTs. They’ve got much more opportunity for both creativity and exposure than film or television that seems content in their generic trumpet wails and synthetic symphony’s.

Kicking the Line

When I wrote for COGconnected, I’d intentionally craft sentences that I knew wouldn’t fly with my editors. Why? Because when you push the line far beyond what’s expected, after backing up, you’ll find yourself further than where the line used to be when you started.

I very much enjoyed pulling this, despite its selfishness.

Now that publishers are starting to do this with video-games, it’s not as much fun.

There’s many disheartening effects microtransactions have but this is one that sticks out to me. When games are particularly egregious – Battlefront II, NBA 2K18, etc – it pushes the line of what’s considered acceptable by the hardcore gaming market.

So when another title, that’s less overt is introduced, it flies under the radar and may even be defended.

When doing this, the only way it can be stopped is if the opposition consistently maintains their barriers, no matter the distance you go past them.

I don’t feel guilty for doing what I did on COG. I believe it made the articles I felt strongly about better. But I do feel uneasy when such an action can be employed by a corporate entity, with a much different goal.

Copy and Paste

Today, as I write this, someone brought to my attention someone on Steam who’s posted hundreds of reviews that consist entirely of plagiarized material, including paragraphs from yours truly.

His current alias is “ownosourus”.

This is his Steam page. 

http://steamcommunity.com/id/ownosourus/recommended/?p=1

I would end it there, but this also speaks to an inherent issue with reviewing video games.

That this individual was able to copy and paste sentences from multiple reviews and organize them in a way that comes across as a well written, well researched article, highlights an issue with game reviews to begin with.

They follow a nearly identical format.

You begin with a brief one paragraph history about the game, you loosely talk about the graphics, a few mechanics, maybe a few issues you’ve had, perhaps with one or two examples, and then you give the game a score.

Imagine novels being this uniformly written, twelve paragraphs from twelve different authors that could read like it came from a single person.

That’s the state game’s coverage has been in for years, and it’s frankly why I don’t follow gaming websites these days. Not because of corruption, opinions, or information.

It’s just boring.

Twatter

After unfollowing those who spammed every minute of everyday, I rather enjoy Twitter now. It’s fun to scroll through the list of news, shitposts, debate, and discussion with friends, colleagues, and those involved with the gaming industry.

Something I can’t unfollow though is posts that are constructed in a way that’s purely for getting likes and retweets. This to me is no different than a publisher retooling games to extract the maximum income. 

It creates a tunnel vision that potentially derails an innocent comment, but experiencing said vision, may honestly be a good thing in the long run.

Why?

Well, many people feel a desire to… “adjust” their comments to be sharper, more direct, for likes on social media. 

Not money, fame, or fortune. 

Likes.

It serves as a reminder that there’s a very good reason people and companies fall for greed. Social media’s got millions of all genders, races, and upbringings, chasing something that on 95% of occasions, is completely, and utterly, worthless. It isn’t that much of a stretch to imagine how many more would fall, when there’s money attached.