Fixing online Idiocy: a second look at Douchebaggery

I am going to save us all some time and assume that everyone that has ever played a game online has at some point come across some form of douchebaggery. Be it a guy who uses some form of a map or play mechanic exploit to just dealing with overall immaturity on voice chat. The only real difference between an online gamer and someone who dabbled and decided it’s not his cup of tea is the player’s level of tolerance for such dicks.

Bill Fulton’s recent Article in Gamasutra grabbed my interest but seems only to scratch the surface of an inherent flaw in online gaming. His most important point being that with the rise of casual games or rather the popularity of games in general the responsibility creating an environment that is friendly to new players as well as the “hardcore” audience falls on the developers.

“why do I care? Because the online behavior of our customers is dramatically reducing our sales, and continues to stunt the growth of our industry.”
-Bill Fulton

But why should this be important to a developer? The answer to this is very simple, because it matters to their audience. This issue has been minimalized if not right out ignored for far too long. The idea that dickheads will be dickheads is just wrong. People who ascribe to this philosophy are really just making excuses for not trying to create impediments for such behavior. A more accurate analogy is the fake sport created in the sketch comedy show “The Upright Citizens Brigade” called Thunderball, a fantastical version of baseball which has a “Gun Circle.” Where a loaded hand gun is placed within a clearly marked circle placed ten yards behind second base. Under no circumstances is the gun to be touched at any point during the game. The rational behind this:

"We'd rather have a gun in the outfield, than under a mattress where a child could get to it."
-Joe Auxiliary, UCB Director of Health Services

The fact is if a game mechanic can be exploited it will be, if it can be used to grief someone it will be. Every time someone says “this is how this should work” someone should also interject with “yea, but how could someone exploit this.” But what can a developer do to reduce if not stop this type of behavior? First, more resources need to be allocated to play testing and more importantly to the social functions of online games/online modes of games. Developers should assign some personnel to embed themselves within the community of their games for an indeterminate time to work with them in the patching process. Now that almost every major platform has the ability to patch their games due to in model hard drives patching needs to happen to correct issues. These activities should be factored into the development cycle of a game, now granted this is from an outside perspective but at this time it seems that it is not. Working with the playing community is essential, these people can be utilized to be one of the greatest tools to post production.

Just changing basic mechanics can have a profound effect upon how a game is played thus reducing some aspects of asshatery. Lets look at what has worked in the past such as in the team-based FPS Counter-strike. Previously in CS the only way to improve your personal score was to kill the opposing team members. So ignoring the objectives each team are assigned was commonplace due to its very limited personal advantage of just more funds to buy weapons. This was changed in Source so that if an objective is accomplished the player that did so was rewarded with 3 kills and conversely with defending. This simple action drastically reduced this kill “farming” mentality. Rewarding players for working as a team is essential for games such as this to work as intended.

But the fault does not fall solely on the shoulders of developers for online idiocy. Other then the obvious douchebags themselves the platforms themselves have done very little to alleviate them. Nintendo’s stance seems to be one of restriction, such as removing features that at least western audiences have come to expect from online gaming. People being annoying or assholeish on voice chat? Don’t give it to em, BAM problem solved. This approach is simply lazy and hinders progression of the medium. Simple actions could be taken to ensure that a more civil experience could be had online. If Say Sony decided to overhaul their multi-player online gaming experience on their console by enacting a standard for all games available on their system this could take some much needed pressure off the developers. In this standard allow easy access for muting players, both the ability to find a game via a server list or match-making functionality. Create a log in function before joining a game online much like gamertags where you choose which tag is going to be used. This could be equipped with password protection, and an option to upgrade it to an adult tag. There would have to be some way of verifying that the tag is in fact owned by a real adult. Now this adult upgrade could then allow you to join adult only servers online. This simple mechanic would ensure that everyone who is playing with you is adult and looking for an adult gaming experience, or one that is at least less grief based. Thinking about using some form of punishment should also be looked into. If there are repercussions for being an ass other then having to find a new server, people might be more inclined to moderate their actions.

Now granted there will be advances on the anti-dickhead front with such things as Sony’s “Home” as well as newer iterations of X-box “Live.” But my only real message with this editorial is this: think about what new features or mechanics you are adding to the online experience and make sure that you have thought of the social implications of them before craping them out to pad your product with shiny functionality back blurbs.

Silent Hill: Origins Review

It’s 1:15 on a Monday and I am busy thumb tacking blankets, thick towels, dark sheets and anything available over my windows to deprave myself of any sense that it happens to be the early afternoon at the beginning of the workweek. Why am I doing this? Why when most of the working world at this time are busy drowning in a sea of triple grande skinny latte’s? Why don’t I care that my neighbor across the street finally has his definitive proof that I’m complete batshit as I stand in my window hammer in hand, sick desperation in my eyes. The answer is simple,:a new Silent Hill has come out.
Origins follows Travis Grady a Trucker by trade who, suffers from nightmares he can’t remember as well as a shrouded past. On a routine trip to Brahms decides to take a shortcut that takes him by Silent Hill, when a little girl seems to appear in front of his cab causing him to slam the breaks. The story then starts its ever popular downward spiral into the depths of not only the events previous to the Silent Hill for Playstation but to Travis’s own psyche. Which you must overcome as your fate becomes interlinked with that of Alessa Gillespie.
As soon as the game opens with Akira Yamaoka’s signature music and the cinematic style camera hit you forget that this is a PSP game at all. Even when CG cut scenes are introduced you just might start believing Sony when they said that its like a PS2 handheld, but just might. Though it does look nice throughout the game with effects that seem early PS2 era such as the monsters having a look of wetness to them or that once in a while it seems like your playing through an old 88mm camera. The Camera taken from strange vantage points and angles do quite well at making you feel off balanced, claustrophobic and downright dramatic. but also suffers from the same control issues that this causes such as confusion while moving, which can be irritating when in combat. Though I believe that removing these would greatly reduce the impact of the experience you would agree something must be done. Silent Hill does amazing things with sound in this game not just with the soundtrack which as always is top notch but to screw with you when you think or don’t think your safe. Such as at one point when reading a memo left by god knows what psychopathic bastard describing a triangle head eseque monster who lives in his motel simply named “the Butcher” after finishing this memo a shriek is heard and blood flies onto the wall in front of you. Or threatening music starting up as you enter a new area only to find that as you slowly creep forward meat hook at the ready and there isn’t even some lesser creature meandering around. It’s the little things like this that Silent Hill fans such as myself love.
Though Don’t be too scared my little masochists Travis is a little tougher then your previous heroes. I mean come on dude is a trucker. Even without a weapon you can go into combat stance and duke it out with the denizens of Silent Hill, and even hold down the attack button for a more brutal attack. Now this works with every melee weapon in the game for which there are no lie a metic shit ton. Everything from a sharp bit of wood, tire iron to one time use weapons such as a portable TV to a damn toaster. The downside to having all these weapons are that they have durability and break all the damn time. While this is a cheap and insensible addition, that only deters from immersion with thoughts of “how the hell am I lugging around 4 T.V’s let alone why does my Katana break after 5 swings?” But once again they are everywhere and almost everything is a weapon in Travis’s hands..Though when a weapon breaks mid combat you can push select and get a new one or do this by pushing down on the D-pad but every time I did that I would get some weapon I didn’t feel was appropriate for the situation and would end up doing it the hard way which breaks the mood a little. But this method is still preferable due to the slight lag, inability to run and quick select these weapons which can let some unspeakable creature nibble on my nethers. Also introduced in Origins is the new “grapple” system which isn’t so much for grappling as it is for not getting a syringe of “I’m sure it’s not Red Bull” stuck in your neck or avoiding some other such horrible fate. All in all grappling is cool but I feel like there should be some way to deal damage as well.
Speaking of Enemies and their questionable medical habits the baddies of Silent Hill this time around seemed lack luster for me. As you might have deciphered from my previous comments the Nurses are back along with some of your other old friends with slightly different tweaks. And that while cool for fan service, they seem kinda tired, excluding nurses which for some reason with their spastic shuffle never get old. The new monsters; Giant Crippled Dog Things or Shadow Nutters as I call em don’t seem all that frightening and can be almost always easily avoided by turning off your flashlight and strolling past em.which kinda sucks cause the Shadow Nutters look really cool with the flashlight on. The reason these fiends are so scary is that they are physical representations of either psychological problems with the main character or in this case Travis and Alessa’s. But we get giant crippled dogs, what did he run over a dog or some other living roadside hazard? I just think that with the rich amount of perverse story that is included in this universe they could have gave us something a bit better then that.
In your 7ish hour stint in Silent Hill your gonna see some old locations like the ever popular Hospital and some new areas such as the town Theater and Sanatarium. These locales also exist in the “normal” world as well as the “other” world and you switch between them but the way it happens is much different then your used to. Mirrors allow the player to freely decide when and where they make this switch. While this removes the moments in the old games where all of sudden the sirens will go off and your just like......(expletive deleted) adding to the sense of you spiraling towards some psychic oblivion. It does add quiet a bit to game play where you have to think about direction in two dimensions. Looking through the mirror also shows a glimpse of what the same room looks like in the opposite world relaying a sense of either dread or relief depending on the direction your headed. They use this for a very cool event in the Theater area. Puzzles are still a mainstay in Origins, everything from prescribing little deranged dolls their medication to collecting body parts for a medical dummy only to find that in the other world a dissected body resides their now. Solving them allows the character to get some key or some other debased object of importance.
Let me be forward when I say that before playing this game I was worried, doing a Origin story to a Silent Hill game is like walking through a fat camp with a hamburger tied to your face and expecting not to be crippled by the back exit, it ain’t no easy task. Explain too much or not enough and fans will tear you limb from bloody limb I mean if any fan is gonna do it Silent Hill fans would be on some top 1 list of most likely to. But let me say that I am one of these fans and It doesn’t ruin anything, it only delivers. With the time honored multiple endings, and with secret costumes, weapons and gear depending on a long list of criteria displayed after a clear, give this game re-playability. With a 30 dollar price point for either PSP or PS2 you really can’t go wrong with picking up this one, but follow my advice never mind the negative press you might receive from roommates or neighbors about you nailing blankets to the windows. Play in the dark with the volume way up(on headphones if your on the PSP). Oh and try not to crap your pants it’s a bitch to clean.


Egm style score: A-
out of ten: 8.3