Versus Software

I like playing games and listening to music at the same time. I think most people do too.
However, I have the habit of when finding a song or band I like just listening to it over and over and over again.

The funny thing is that it creates in my mind a sort of union between the band I was hearing and the game I played. Also, since I traveled a lot due to my father’s career, these games and songs also marked the place where I stayed.

So whenever I listen to that band or play the game or hear a conversation about a place I visited I remember the other two. It’s gives me a good nostalgia sensation that I love. Here’s a list that I managed to remember:

Middle school in Rio

• Lufia 2 — Queens Greates Hits Vol. 1 and 2.

• Final Fantasy 7 — Queen Live at Wembley

• Chronno Trigger — The Cranberries Bury the Hatchet

Falls church in Washington D.C.

• Day of Defeat (Half Life Mod) — Pink Floyd Echoes

• Halo — Pearl Jam’s ten

College years in São Carlos

• Gradius V and Breath of Fire 3 — ExtraLife Radio Podcast

• Okami — The Doors discography

Because my father was in the navy I lived all over the world. I grew up meeting hundreds of different people, different cultures, different habits. As a way to blend in, meet people and generally make friends in these conditions, it was video games that allowed me to have a common background with people.

I would go to a new school and usually the topic of games would come up. We talked, played it for hours and generally had a good time. Games have been my companions since early on and they served me as a way to become accustomed to the new place I found myself at.

Now, usually one thing that struck me is that people, no matter where I go, would generally have the same game preferences and the same emotions and experiences as they played the same games. I did to. Every gamer remembers the first time they played a Mario game, beat a Final Fantasy, saw Ryu’s haduken and so on. These are all common experiences we have and shared.

However there are a few that pretty much everyone I know has had except me. These are my video game moments of shame. So without further ado, here is the list :

• I never finished Final Fantasy 6 nor Chronno Trigger. Only got half way in FF6 and to the final lavos battle in CT.



• Never finished Street Fighter without using a continue or resorting to using a very easy level.



• I never won a Stracraft  multiplayer match.



• I cannot for the life of me beat a Heroes of Might and Magic 3 map. I always get my ass kicked.



• Never killed a person in Counter Strike with an AWP. Ok, I hated using the weapon and everyone that used it, but still.



• Never beat a Megaman game without save states.



• I love all the point & click adventure games by Lucas Arts but I am still yet to play Grim Fandango.



• It took me almost a decade, with the same save state on the NES cartridge, to beat Dragon Warrior. I played that game to death when I was 11, maxed out my character but got stuck in the story. When I was 21 I dusted of the cartridge, got a FAQ and finished the fucker.



• I actually enjoyed playing Star Wars Shadows of the Empire.



• I own a original copy of Daikatana. Didn’t buy it but I still managed to get  copy, for free at least.

I guess that’s it for now. Quite shame full. Triple face palm.

I’m proud to announce that the game I developed last year, World Train Royale, is being sold by anothe portal! It’s called Yawma.net

More sales, more money. More money, more hobbies.

Today I’m going to talk about a game you should have played but didn’t. I’m talking about Planescape:Torment

Why I’m talking about Torment? Simple because that’s one of the few games that changed things for me. I used to think RPGs where about running around, with a sword, slashing shit, being a hero, yatta yatta. I thought these elements were important to make a player engaged in the story, a feeling of greatness that would compel him to keep playing. I was wrong.

Planescape has none of that crap, it’s a game that is all about story. And what a story it is. I won’t say much about it so not to give away any spoilers, but Torment does something that’s just brilliant in my book, and does it well:

It ties the story with the gameplay.

You see there are moments of revelation on the story, be it background info on one of the characters, a special item or a place you visit that gives you  an actual choice on what to do. You can return that item if yo want, leave that character  or even go somewhere else.

The secret here is choice. You can take your own path in the games decisions. Sure it’s a linear path as the story progresses, but how you as a character progress in that linear path is up to you. And it makes all the difference in the world.

After playing this game I look back at games I admired like Final Fantasy and see that they’re nothing but child’s play when it comes to interaction. It’s a really good game, and I suggest anyone check it out.

Today I’ll review another book I read, Software Engineering for Game Developers.

As a book that concerns itself with software engineering I say it does the job. It’s an 800 page beast covering topics from UML, resource management, project risks, stipulations and damage control. More interestingly enough it tries to tie that with actual game development. It goes quite in-depth in each of it’s topics and gives plenty of further references if any particular one interests you. Overall it’s a good book.

But that’s not really what I want to discuss about.

You see, the book comes with a game a small team of developers made using a variety of software engineering techniques. This serves to show how one can apply them into game development. The game is quite stable, performing well given the myriad of things attached to it (3d mesh loading, textures, events, GUI, scripts, etc). However there”s just one problem with it:

It’s not really any fun.

Now I’m sure the goal of the book  is to teach software developers techniques they can use in their own development, with the game being fun not a pre-requisite in this scenario. It had to be functional, not fun.

That’s one of the things game development as a software differs from others. If a program manager assumes that a project will take:

• w hours of development
• take y developers to develop it
• cost z dollars
• have k use cases

And it ends up taking exactly that, most likely that was a successful project.

The problem with game development is that even if you manage to make a game with all your estimates correct, if the game in the end is not fun than you still have an unsuccessful project. Sure it can still sell well, but it’ll probably take tons of marketing to make up for it.

Some could say that fun is a non-functional requirement, which is true. However it undermines it’s importance into the actual game development process. Sucesfull game companies have long realized this and build entire systems of software enginnering whose sole goal is to enhance and facilitate adding ‘fun’ to a game.

Valve software uses their CABAL system, ID software with their endless internal engine prototypes, Blizzard with their QA tests, and so on.

Which leads me to conclude:

Sometimes the most important aspect of a project cannot be expressed in a process or in a form. That is still not a justification to leave it out off processes and forms.