Despite its steep learning curve, the original Supreme Commander was thought of as the successor to the great late 90s strategy classic Total Annihilation, with hundreds of giant robots battling for supremacy on a vast playground of destruction. Supreme Commander 2, on the other hand, has a far gentler learning curve, with many key game elements changed or abandoned. For example, there are, as before, two resources to worry about -- mass and energy -- but once you set up collectors for them, you don’t have to spend much time worrying about managing either. Don’t worry, though: Supreme Commander 2 may be easier to get in to, but it’s not easy to conquer.
Research! Research! Research!
One key part of the game is researching new technology, an element that has changed a lot from the original. All three factions have regular, advanced, and experimental technology that can be unlocked as the battle progresses. You’ll earn or find research points during a level, which you use to customize your research path. As the commander, you can choose to investigate ways to increase your intel, health, damage levels, armaments, defenses, and other general stats. One new research item leads to yet another more progressively powerful upgrade, and then the branching system lets you open up a wide variety of different abilities, units, and tactics.
The best parts of the new research queue are the experimentals. These massively powerful juggernaut units are visually impressive, creative, and immensely fun to use. Experimentals include Teleporters, massive squid-like submarines, huge rail guns, nukes, hulking land beasts, and many more are available, with each faction having very different styles of experimental units. Just like the original Supreme Commander, you’ll build scores of units at a time, and these special units can be completely game-changing when used properly.
Let Slip the Bots of War
In the single-player game, all these elements are added gradually in a story-driven, linear campaign. The story adds elements of humanity to otherwise robot-filled battlefields by telling the personal stories of the commanders. It’s an interesting way to push the 18 otherwise standard missions. Each of the three factions has six missions, and since many of them can take an hour or so to complete, there’s a lot of meat for your money. To get the most out of the creative gameplay, single players can individualize the skirmish mode, which lets you battle free of restrictions.
That said, most players will prefer the multiplayer, which is where Supreme Commander 2 exhibits its greatest strength. Where most traditional RTS games tend to force players to a specific build and attack pattern -- inevitably focusing on speed -- here the huge selection of custom research and tactical styles means no two games will be the same. You can focus on stealth and subterfuge, massive frontal assault, strength in defense, or anything in between. Experimental units are easier to build this time around, so you won’t be lacking for epic battles.
Since there are three factions and up to eight players in multiplayer games, the scale of the online battles is enormous. Happily, the maps are perfectly designed to accommodate both the immense fights and a variety of playing styles, as well as the strengths of each faction. Another positive change is the smoother multiplayer interface. Gas Powered Games ditched the less-than-stellar GPGNet matching service, making single and multiplayer games available from the main menu.
Missing Parts
One odd difference is that SC2’s visuals are actually a little downgraded. Supreme Commander was beautiful, but a complete hardware hog, which made it difficult to run on not quite top-of-the-line machines. In SC2, some of the advanced lighting and effects have been cut out, and the polygon count on units has been lowered. Those changes are worth it, because the end result is a game that still looks great, while running well on more computers.
Supreme Commander 2 does have some other small issues. Veteran players might not appreciate the simplified gameplay, although most other players will. Also, the enemy AI becomes rather predictable over several games. Unit pathfinding can sometimes be a pain as well, forcing players to babysit squads on the move. Your units may get caught on obstacles and waste time figuring out how to navigate the landscape. None of these are annoying enough to quit the game, but they’re still noticeable.
Absolutely Supreme
Some ardent fans of the first game might cry “blasphemy” at Gas Powered Games’ dramatic changes from the amazing 2007 original, but Supreme Commander 2 is both a great sequel and the best PC RTS game to hit in some time. It’s just huge on all fronts, from the number of available units to the size of the battles. Sure, the visuals have taken a hit to make it more accessible for more machines, but the improvements to the experience make up for the shortcomings that it suffers. Most importantly, the gameplay is fast-paced, action-packed fun. This sequel proves that sometimes, change is good.
Mass Effect was an act of great ambition that, amongst its myriad successes, was hampered with troublesome design elements: A confounding inventory system, irritating driving sequences and cookie-cutter side missions. Despite these issues, my appreciation for the game lay in the joy of what it got right: Exceptional storytelling, character development and squad combat. Sequels -- especially sequels so far into a console cycle -- don’t have the benefit of charm to carry the players through their design flaws and Mass Effect 2 finds itself in the position of having to reinvent many of its core elements without sacrificing those glimpses of greatness that distinguished its predecessor. Thankfully Bioware, the game’s developer, was apparently as aware as anyone of this challenge and Mass Effect 2 is an astonishing accomplishment that improves and streamlines on design, delivers even greater breadth and depth to the storytelling and offers up combat as satisfying as anything found in a contemporary shooter. For a game that asks so much of the player to invest in the experience, it delivers in dividends of satisfaction not seen since Fallout 3.
Go Humans!
Mass Effect 2 begins shortly after the first installment, with Commander Shepard chasing the sentient AI known as the Geth across the galaxy to finish the extermination begun at the conclusion of the original game. While many may know what happens next, I would be remiss to say any more as Mass Effect 2 delivers the drama and surprises from the first ten minutes on. The game involves Shepard’s new association with a pro-human organization called Cerberus, led by the enigmatic Illusive Man (voiced by Martin Sheen). The inhabitants of human colonies on the fringes of space are disappearing and a strange insectoid race called The Collectors may be behind it, although questions linger whether their actions may be in the service of more familiar evils. Rather than the battle coming to civilized space as in the original, here Shepard must build a team and take the battle to the bad guys, a mission that the game never lets you forget may end in death for all.
This main narrative thrust is served up with all the operatic grandeur one would expect and doles out revelations at just the right pace before committing the player to a very satisfying denouement, but Mass Effect 2 also takes its time with storylines that are more tangential to the end-of-humanity scenario that give the game a wonderful sense of breadth and intimacy. These tend to be in “Loyalty” missions that open up after assembling team members and revolve around resolving personal matters for the character that should prove them less distracted in the seemingly hopeless final mission. If the overall game is a massive sci-fi novel then these scenarios could be characterized as short stories that take their cue from classic sci-fi of the Asimov variety, posing moral dilemmas without the comfort of clear resolution. The members of your squad, many of whom in the original only stood out for the powers they brought to bear in combat, become more fully drawn through these missions and bring a greater emotional resonance to the game’s conclusion.
While story is always a key element in a Bioware game, their unique contribution to videogames is in the storytelling and the role they afford the player to shape the narrative’s course. This was the high point of the original and it only gets better in the sequel. Using the “Paragon/Renegade” split in character development (ME’s version of Good/Evil), the dialogue is punchier, more efficient and appears to build on earlier choices in the game more clearly with color-coded extreme dialogue options popping up with increasing frequency as the game progresses.
The player’s sense of ownership over Shepard is essential to making Mass Effect 2 work and is the crux of the game’s magic. Here it works beautifully and creates its own challenge as some decisions are discomforting but with payoffs as visceral as any combat sequence. This is most evident with the game’s new “interrupt” system. During a cutscene a prompt to pull a trigger for either a Renegade or Paragon action appears on the bottom of the screen, activating it unleashes a dramatic decision in the cutscene such as hitting someone during interrogation or pushing them out a window (yes, I played Renegade). The severity of these actions is nothing short of thrilling and giving such license to the player moves the “role-playing” from intermittent decision making to wholesale designing of the drama.
Happiness Is a Good Gun
To anyone that played the first Mass Effect, the strength of the storytelling should be the least of the surprises in ME2; it’s the gameplay that will shock anyone who had to look past several poorly-implemented aspects of the first game. The combat in the game is deigned to be played real-time, with far less management of the other two members of your squad. In fact, Mass Effect 2 could be played without once issuing any order or pausing the action to set up one of Shepard’s powers, but you would need to have a remarkable eye and steady dexterity. Your squadmates’ gun combat is fully automated and the AI never once failed me; if anything, they can be too good -- but not enough to remove enjoyment from the highly satisfying combat scenarios. Precise controls and region-specific damage replace ME’s less-than-thrilling aiming and shooting . The number of weapons in each class has been reduced significantly, which should be cause for celebration for anyone who endured the inventory screens of the first; moreover, when you do find a newer, better version of the weapon class, you feel it and it feels good.
The slightly more esoteric Biotic and Tech combat abilities return with new additions and overall improvements. Each skill has a clear benefit on the battlefield, even early on when their strengths are weaker. This time the use of any power precludes using any other until a cooling down period is completed (with the exception of latent power like incendiary ammo which stays active until turned off). This restriction adds strategy and highlights a greater emphasis on the use of “traditional” weaponry. Despite the restrictions, real-time powers are a thrill to use. There’s nothing like shooting enemies and then letting loose a devastating shockwave that knocks several bad guys off their feet, all without needing to pause the game. It’s a sublime exercise of power in Mass Effect 2 and only serves to heighten the excitement of battles by reducing the need to continually stop down to issue commands.
Excitement is key to Mass Effect 2’s battles and their composition demonstrates how much attention was focused on this aspect of the game. Within each battle is a careful pacing that ups the ante and challenges the decision making and new powers such as the Vanguard skill (which propels Shepard at a particular enemy, knocking him on his feet and leaving him prone) open up a much needed variety and sense of accomplishment with each success. While the combat environments themselves are somewhat pedestrian when gazed upon coolly, such issues fall by the wayside with the openness of the combat options. While death was infrequent, I never tired of getting back in the fray, as Mass Effect 2’s combat is easily one of the most profound revamps of gameplay from one game to the next in a franchise; bearing witness to the havoc I wrought with my personally-designed Shepard will stand out at year’s end as one of my highlights.
The path you walk to create your agent of destruction is yet another of Mass Effect 2’s aspects that were dissected under the microscope and came out much better than before. While all aspects of Shepard and his squad can be upgraded, a variety of currencies regulate these areas of improvement. The most traditional upgrade comes from leveling up Shepard and his squad, which elicits a couple of points that improve Biotic and Tech powers as well as a catch-all category that encompasses Health, Shields and improved points towards your Renegade/Paragon disposition. This much-simplified skill tree makes life much easier to plan out growth with only 4 upgrade slots for each power with each improvement showing immediately noticeable effects. Even better is a mid-game option to reallocate the points, allowing for a jack-of-all-trade approach initially with specialization occurring later on, when one’s predilections have taken shape.
Weapon and armor enhancements are facilitated through research which comes from scanning particular objects in the game or purchasing the knowledge at several outlets throughout the universe. To actualize the majority of these upgrades requires metals that are mined from the multitude of planets scattered throughout the universe and occasionally found in missions. The final currency in Mass Effect 2 is money, or credits, which purchase some improvements right off the shelf and is earned by completing missions and looting. In the single greatest improvement in ME2 the conversion of loot into currency is automatic; if you don’t need it, the resource immediately goes into your bank account as cash. The end result is a tightly-knit economy in Mass Effect 2; no one currency is in abundance and decision about improvements should be carefully thought through -- just about everything in the game can be acquired but prioritization is key. The intent of such a regulated upgrade system in Mass Effect 2 is clear: Power-leveling and grinding, a major distraction in many an RPG, have no hold here.
Grindhouse
With one exception: Mining. The primary means by which you find valuable metals is by scanning planets which pick up readings for deposits and using a probe to extract it from the ground (or gas). The scanning process requires keeping the left trigger depressed and delicately moving the scanning reticule with the right analog stick. To call the process tedious is an understatement. The amount of mining required to satisfy all the upgrades of value (which are most) is extensive. While I take issue with the procedure in the game I am sympathetic to its apparent implementation; in order to keep the economy in balance, the mining cannot be too pleasurable or players will frontload with minerals and upgrade too fast. Having said that, there are better strategies to keep player advancement in check without being so onerous. In fact, if the process of mining could have utilized a toggle to scan, rather than forcing the player to hold in the trigger, which causes incessant hand-cramping, the experience would have been decidedly more tolerable.
In light of the myriad accomplishments in Mass Effect 2 the mining is a small blemish that fades from memory once you reengage with the rest of the game. The awe from the very beginning never lets up as you are sped along on an adventure that takes on the indulgent glory of a multi-course meal, where every stage is worthy of careful savoring and the entire affair is one to recount long after it has passed. I can’t help but feel that am doing Mass Effect 2 a disservice. It’s essential to break the game apart into it various components for evaluation, but its magnificence truly emanates from how well these factors work together in harmony. Bioware has long been on the road to make a game like Mass Effect 2. Each new title has demonstrated a move in a new direction, some more effective than others; this game feels like the creative culmination of those efforts and the team has pulled it off masterfully. Dismiss preconceptions born of the first Mass Effect or what you think the game is supposed to be and succumb to one of the most impressive feats in gaming.
Nobody does war like Infinity Ward. Its Call of Duty titles have evolved from excellent examples of the first-person shooter genre to a redefinition of what gamers expect from a war title. With Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2, Infinity Ward takes the already solid foundation laid in Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare and polishes it to a jaw-dropping shine.
There are three distinct components to Modern Warfare 2: The single player campaign continues the story that began in COD4, Spec Ops offers co-op versions of most of the action setpieces from the single player campaign plus some extras, and multiplayer is a highly refined version of what so many of us have already poured hundreds of hours into. The most impressive thing about all three modes is that Infinity Ward has not been content to rest on its laurels and simply churn out a clone of its already successful game. The stakes have been raised in almost every aspect of Modern Warfare 2.
War…War Never Changes
Five years after the events of COD4, a cabal--loyal to the terrorists you previously dispatched--has set forth a series of machinations that lead to unthinkable consequences. America is invaded by a foreign power, and the campaign hops back and forth between the men defending U.S. soil and those attempting to bring the true culprits to justice before it’s too late. The campaign in Modern Warfare 2 is a bit easier than Call of Duty 4’s campaign and while there are places that seem to utilize the infinitely spawning enemies COD4 was infamous for, it’s hidden far better in Modern Warfare 2. Your allies are always ready and willing to move up, help check the corners, and even prompt you to keep going forward so the bottleneck moments that frustrated some no longer exist.
The variety in the single player is frankly stunning. On many occasions, Infinity Ward has stated their ambition to capture the excitement and intensity of a blockbuster action film in its games and Modern Warfare 2 is their greatest success thus far. Over the course of the story, you’ll infiltrate arctic bases, race to safety on stolen snowmobiles, sprint for your life over the slum rooftops of Rio, hold down fast food restaurants against invading armies, and liberate the White House from enemy hands. Every level in Modern Warfare 2’s campaign could be the standout moment in just about any other shooter.
Of course, there’s one other thing you do that has already become somewhat infamous. Yes, at one point you do participate in what is best described as a terrorist action against innocent civilians. In context of the story, the scene makes sense and is the catalyst for most of the events in the game. You are given the option to skip the level when you start up Modern Warfare 2 for the first time, although there is no summary or alternate cutscene that replaces it. You’re also not required to actually fire on civilians. You can simply watch until the armed reinforcements arrive, at which time you must fight or die. While it may offend some, it’s a risk that was boldly taken by Infinity Ward and the story is better for it.
The solo campaign is noticeably more balanced than COD4’s single player campaign. Modern Warfare 2 avoids the choke points that could become problems in COD4. Even on Veteran difficulty, which in previous Call of Duty games has traditionally been a brutal slog used by expert players to test their patience levels, is a much more carefully tuned experience. If you have the skills to handle the opponents thrown at you, playing Modern Warfare 2 on Veteran difficulty is fun to play, and is yet another example of the attention to detail present in the campaign.
You Can Be My Wingman Any Time
In response to the huge demand for co-op gameplay, Modern Warfare 2 includes Spec Ops mode, a collection of increasingly difficult missions designed for two players. Spec Ops covers most of the major action setpieces of the solo campaign, as well as giving players glimpses of what was happening elsewhere during the events of the main game. Also included in Spec Ops are a few favorite moments that evoke COD4’s highlights, such as the “AC-130 Overwatch” mission and the nerve-wracking “Hidden” mission, which sends you up against ghillie-suited enemy snipers that are extraordinarily hard to spot in the tall grass.
A wide variety of mission types, from races to Horde mode-style defense to timed bomb disposal runs, will keep you and a friend playing long after the campaign is complete. More and more missions are unlocked as you earn stars by tackling higher difficulties with your buddy. Spec Ops can be played online or splitscreen, and either way offers a fantastic way to extend the life of the finely-crafted single player sequences. Perhaps best of all, these missions are no pushovers, and only the best COD players will earn all 69 Spec Ops stars.
Give ‘Em Hell, Soldiers
Finally, the third component of Modern Warfare 2 is the competitive multiplayer. Call of Duty 4’s addictive and streamlined online experience has been given a healthy tweaking, in all ways for the better. The perk system has been fully rebalanced, creating interesting new class builds as well as eliminating some irritations. In particular, the removal of the bonus grenade perks has made the multiplayer mode much more of a gun-oriented game. It’s tough to spam grenades when everyone only has one to begin with, and the game is greatly improved as a result.
Kill streak rewards have been given a major overhaul as well. There are now rewards for up to 25 kills, including a tactical nuke that automatically ends the game. Players can choose their preferred kill streak rewards from emergency air drops, air support from Predator missile drones and hovering Pave Low gunships, or they can even hop into the gunner’s seat of an AC-130 or helicopter and mow down the opposition from on high. You have to earn your kill streaks with your own gun now, as the heavy hardware you summon no longer adds to your streak total. Luckily, even if your team is getting hammered, a four-kill streak nets you a care package drop that can contain anything from a simple ammo re-supply to much-needed air support. If you’re really good, you can even steal your enemies’ package drops, a tactic that can become a major game changer. As a result, the battlefield in Modern Warfare 2 is far more active.
The leveling system and various unlocks have returned, but now the level cap has been boosted to 70. Modern Warfare 2 awards points for just about anything you do now, up to and including snapping a series of scoreless deaths. Also, there are new titles and icons you can use to personalize your online appearance, much like those used in Street Fighter IV. These are unlocked similarly to achievements or trophies and are awarded for doing pedestrian things such as racking up numerous headshots, but also include more subtle accomplishments like watching a large number of killcam replays to their conclusions. All in all, you’re given some kind of goodie during or at the end of almost every match you play. The game presses that little reward button in your brain so often that even when you’re doing badly, it’s hard to become frustrated; however, it’s still easy to lose hours trying to rank up or unlock that next gun attachment.
Numerous playlists of the various gameplay types can be selected for ranked matches and social matches allow more finely customized settings. New to the mix is Demolition, a variant of the Search and Destroy game type that allows respawns and leads to incredibly heated battles over preset bomb sites. This game type is perhaps best suited to showing off the larger and more vertically-oriented maps Modern Warfare 2 has to offer. The sheer number of routes, hiding places, nooks and crannies to be discovered in the 16 multiplayer maps is truly impressive. You’ll quickly learn to look up a lot more than in any previous COD games.
Also new is third-person gameplay in specifically designated playlists. These play pretty much like the regular game, except that you can see your character onscreen. It’s a nice novelty, but it feels strange and exposes some of the animation quirks of the game, which aren’t nearly as noticeable in first-person mode. It feels like something most players will try once or twice before settling comfortably back into Team Deathmatch.
Hooah!
At this point, it’s probably fair to compare Infinity Ward’s evolution to Bungie’s trajectory. Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 is to COD4 what Halo 3 was to Halo 2. COD4 was a tremendous shift in ambition, setting and feature sets, but the developer’s sequel, Modern Warfare 2, is a refinement and near-perfecting of what was already pretty darn good to begin with. Modern Warfare 2 could have just been a retread of what we’ve already played, offering up another spoonful of reheated content, and it would have suffered no dip in sales. Instead, Infinity Ward has delivered a follow-up that feels pleasantly familiar, yet still surprises, delights and innovates in ways that few sequels to best-selling entertainment properties have dared to in the past.
-Matt Kiel
Last Updated on Friday, 20 November 2009 00:00
Assassin's Creed II
Written by Andrew Pfister
Monday, 30 November 2009 20:08
The Pros
Massive Improvements from First Game
Engrossing Past and Present Plotlines
Outstanding Soundtrack
The Cons
Ezio Has Movement Issues
In-game Economy Becomes Meaningless
Noticeably Glitchy In Areas
Everyone likes to say there’s no such thing as a wrong opinion, but, if you were a fervent defender of the first Assassin's Creed, Ubisoft Montreal has just put you in an uncomfortable situation. Praised for its beautiful recreation of the Crusades-era Middle East and juxtaposing it with a sci-fi story concept, yet maligned for its repetitive structure and sputtering conclusion, AC divided popular opinion like few games before it. It's not uncommon for a developer to take criticism to heart and incorporate changes in ensuing games, but the structural overhaul done to Assassin's Creed II exposes the indefensible flaws of the first game. Some older things didn't get fixed, and some new things were broken in the process, but the Montreal studio is definitely sending the message that this is what they’ve wanted to do from the beginning. It shows.
Previously On Assassin’s Creed...
The sequel starts immediately following the events of the first game. Desmond Miles is now aware of his role in the centuries-old battle between the Knights Templar and the Assassins. AC II kicks off with Desmond and Lucy, an Assassin mole who worked as an office assistant in the first game, escaping Abstergo Labs (the Templar's modern-day facility) in favor of more Assassin-friendly confines. It's from here that Desmond dives deeper into his blood-stained heritage.
Bella Italia
The memory vehicle this time is Ezio Auditore da Firenze, who is pursuing the Templars of Renaissance Italy. The cities of Florence and Venice are obviously different than Jerusalem and Acre, but are just as beautifully realized in the game. The open hub world of the first game has been deemed unnecessary and is replaced by the Auditore family villa, which is the cornerstone of a smaller walled city. There are five regions to explore in total, with Venice being particularly massive, and the feeling of living in the Italian Renaissance is wonderfully actualized. It's incredibly easy to move between areas using the travel stations scattered about, so downtime is minimal and you have quick access to your base of operations.
Views To A Kill
Assassinations in the first game were a very defined process: gather information, locate the target, perform the kill, then escape. The problem was that this seemed to put artificial rules on a character and gameplay mechanic that were driven by creativity and improvisation. It also advanced the plot in an unflattering way, as it shoehorned much of the story into preset mission types (i.e. "beat up this guy for information"). Ubisoft did away with that structure, but rolled the investigative and story elements into something that more resembles the traditional missions of the Grand Theft Auto series. Instead of beating up random henchman for information, you're tailing them through the city streets as they reveal their intentions through natural conversation. Or, you're eliminating rooftop archers in preparation for a coordinated attack you'll be attempting two steps down the mission line. The basic pieces are all still there: enemies, hiding spots, assassination targets, helper characters...everything just flows together in a more natural manner.
Ezio's story is one of revenge, so the culmination of these missions is the marquee kill, and like the first game, most of them are designed in a way that provides for multiple strategies. Depending on the context of the story, sometimes the mission will require you to choose either to kill with blunt force or to quietly kill and escape undetected. But there are elements of both required throughout the game.
The direct approach is to attack the target head-on with no regard to subtlety. This is a combat-heavy method, and, because his guards have received a boost in power, defense, and intelligence, you need to be in command of the combat system. Parrying still plays a role when taking on a large group of enemies, but several key improvements have been made so that battles don't turn into boring stand-offs while you wait for an attack. For one, you'll run into guards with differing speed, armor, and weapons. Parrying won't work against pikes or spears, and blocking won't work against maces and hammers, so it's necessary to identify who's attacking with what before deciding to parry or dodge. And, if you do find yourself standing around a group of timid opponents, you can taunt them into attacking. As a result of these new tactics, different weapon types, and the returning stylistic kill animations, combat remains a fresh experience throughout.
For the cerebral murderer, there are new tools as well. Courtesans, mercenaries, and thieves populate the city streets, and each group can be hired to help you create different diversions. Say a cadre of guards stands between you and the target. The courtesans will use their feminine wiles to distract the guards, mercenaries will launch an attack, and thieves will lure them out of position. You don't even need to hire anyone specific. By throwing spare change on the ground, the townspeople (and the greedier of the guards) will scramble to pick it up and cause a commotion. A poisoned blade can also be used to kill discreetly. To slip in, make the kill, and slip out completely undetected is the essence of this game, and you can be much more creative with it this time around.
What's My Motivation?
There were 100 flags to collect in Assassin's Creed. There are 100 feathers to collect in Assassin's Creed II. The difference here is that the feathers actually mean something, in terms of both plot and the incentive to collect them. That, in a nutshell, symbolizes Ubisoft's approach to the secondary activities. There’s a real purpose to them. Ezio’s optional assassination missions relate to the events at hand, put extra cash in the coffers, and they keep you actively exploring the cities. Your own villa and its associated populace can be upgraded to generate income, with which you can purchase better armor and weapons (you can even dye your assassin’s robes). The races and courier missions are still straightforward, but they have financial rewards, too. Collecting 30 Codex pages for Leonardo da Vinci is required to fully complete the game, but finding the optional 20 mysterious glyphs and solving their puzzles contributes an incredible amount to the conspiratorial atmosphere. In short, ACII is one of those games that constantly distracts you with something to do between the primary missions, and it keeps you engaged in the time period and the story.
The highlight of the optional objectives almost should have been mandatory: the six Assassin Tombs. These are obstacle courses populated by environmental puzzles and hostile guards. Get to the end of all six and you'll get a worthwhile reward. You'll also get a nice action-oriented break from all the sneaking around.
Free Falling
Ezio's agility is simultaneously the game's biggest strength and the biggest source of its frustration. When everything's clicking -- when you've found a running line from the street level, bounding up boxes onto an ivy-covered balcony, climbing up to the rooftops and leaping across gaps until you see the pigeons that mark a leap of faith -- it's a thrilling experience. But it often doesn't go as perfectly as described. There's something askew with the combination of climbable architecture, analog sensitivity, a misbehaving camera, and Ezio's difficulty with diagonal movement that leads to way too many misdirected movements, unwanted jumps, and blown missions. Much of the problem can be attributed to having both "sprint" and "free run" live on the same button. There are times in the game (races, for example) where you'll want to sprint through areas but not necessarily grab on to the closest chimney stack/ladder or hop on the nearest ledge. Ezio loses a lot of fluidity in his movement and becomes too "sticky" -- not something you want to happen when running from guards or trying to beat a countdown clock.
The camera can be bothersome as well, making inopportune pans to the left and right and throwing off your directional line of sight while you're running or climbing. The natural tendency is to force the camera back and correct your route, but it's easy to overcorrect, and what started out as running a simple straight line ends up as a free fall. There's a perfect example of this in a later Assassin's Tomb mission. Balancing on a narrow beam, Ezio needs to run down it lengthwise and hop across to the next beam. But the camera inexplicably swoops to a side view while this is happening, making it a blind jump. Cinematic, yes. Helpful? Not at all. The problem is rarely that severe, but the smaller instances add up quickly. The more you encounter these issues throughout the game, the more you distrust your own abilities, to the point where simply sprinting through the streets becomes far less aggravating than hopping across the rooftops. It certainly doesn't feel as cool, but you'll probably get there faster.
Even though Assassin’s Creed II represents a massive improvement in almost every area, there are still signs that Ubisoft's ambition is one step ahead of their execution. Grabbing dropped weapons from the ground doesn't work very well, leaving you exposed and defenseless in battle. The economy is off-balance, so if you upgrade the town bank early and frequently collect funds, there'll be more than enough money to buy anything you want in the latter half of the game. Ezio is impervious to water, yet it is instantly fatal to NPCs. In one humorous yet disappointing sequence in Venice, a bad jump intended to be a killing blow resulted in Ezio hanging on to the side of a ship. Before he could climb back up, the two assassination targets both randomly fell off the dock and died instantly in the water, making for perhaps the least impressive assassination in history. ACII is bigger and better, but it's still rough around the edges. You take the bad with the good, perhaps epitomized best by the erratic (yet ultimately satisfying) conclusion to the game.
The Big Apple
The good news is that there's still room for the series to grow, and judging by how far they've advanced the Templar vs. Assassin battle, the merging of the past and present, and the mystical/religious/scientific brew that is the overarching plot, we're going to go in some very interesting directions. If you saw past Assassin’s Creed's flaws, you'll love this one even more. If not, Assassin’s Creed II proves that Ubisoft Montreal deserves the opportunity to win you back.
Among RPG fanatics, the name BioWare carries a weight unmatched by nearly any other developer. From the classic Baldur's Gate series to Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic to the sci-fi epic Mass Effect, every new release from the company has been a major gaming event. So it is with Dragon Age: Origins, a brilliant if slightly predictable addition to BioWare's stable of RPG classics. It suffers from a few problems with plotting and world building but ultimately triumphs, offering a classic RPG experience that can hold its head high with any of BioWare's previous games.
The Age of Dragons
The land of Ferelden has a problem. It seems the Darkspawn, a plague of monstrous humanoids usually confined to underground kingdom of the Dwarves, have found themselves an arch-demon to lead them and have boiled out of the ground in one of their periodic Blights that threaten to destroy the world. Unfortunately, the races that usually band together to fight against the Darkspawn are too mired in their own political differences (including an internal civil war) to do it this time. The world is counting on a hero with a mysterious past, the last of a mystical band of all-but-extinct warrior-knights, to unite the squabbling factions of the world in time to stop the Darkspawn threat.
If that sounds familiar, that's because it is. It's pretty much the plot for every BioWare title since the days of Baldur's Gate and is the single weakest link in what is otherwise an exceptional title. As the hero of the story, you'll get a chance to create a unique hero that fits into the classic warrior/rogue/wizard archetype with a number of interesting variants and subclasses on offer. You'll gather a collection of ragtag travel companions, each of whom have their own psychological traumas to overcome and character related side-quests to pursue all in the service of eventually gathering an army that can defeat the Darkspawn. It's all been done before and doesn’t present a whole lot of surprises for anyone who has played a BioWare RPG in the last ten years.
The brilliance of Dragon Age is in the execution of what's otherwise a bog-standard plotline and the depth of exploration available for the player who really wants to dig into the world. Put simply, there's no one better at stringing together and crossing over role-playing plots and quests and creating fascinating worlds to explore. The problem with BioWare's talent is that it makes Dragon Age the very definition of a “slow burn” title. Bull your way through the 40-50 hour main plot, fail to explore the well-designed settings or re-explore them after major plot points and you're guaranteed to miss much of what makes Dragon Age so good – the incredible depth of characterization in both the people you deal with and the societies you explore.
Take your companions. They’re incredibly compelling, endearing and frustrating by turns because they’re all believable, psychologically complex personalities with multi-layered motivations and well-written dialogue. Depending on your choices and your personal tastes, you may find that they join you, love you, hate you, leave you in disgust or simply wait in your camp forever, never being used until they stab you in the back when you least expect it.
The decision to drop any sort of “morality meter” (comparable to Dungeons & Dragons’s alignment or the Knights of the Old Republic Light Side/Dark side measurement) really works to the game’s advantage. Throughout Dragon Age, the player and his companions will be asked to make difficult, morally ambiguous choices that don’t have a clear right or wrong answer. Even better, these choices often have interesting and scary backlashes, such as when a “good” choice invites unintended consequences or a “bad” one turns out to have been be the right one.
This multi-layered texture is what makes the world of Dragon Age such a fascinating place to explore. What initially seems like a weakness -- having a fairly standard Tolkeinesque fantasy universe -- actually turns out to be a strength because of the realistic way the various societies in the game are portrayed. While never straying outside of one’s clichéd expectations -- elves are nature-lovers, Dwarves are avaricious miners, the oversized Qunari are simplistic brutes -- all of them manage to defy expectations by acting from an extremely believable set of motivations. Except for the Darkspawn, no one in Dragon Age is truly good or evil -- they’re a great mix of both and much of the storyline boils down to the importance of personal choice in the face of circumstances as the definition of morality.
The Age of Battle
Of course it wouldn’t be a traditional electronic RPG without oodles and oodles of combat. Here, too, BioWare doesn’t stray too far from their comfort zone. Combat is controlled via the “order-while-paused” system and governed behind the scenes by a dice-rolling system not too dissimilar to classic Dungeons & Dragons. What makes it special this time around, again, is execution. After so many games and so many iterations of this system, Dragon Age is the title where they finally get the whole combat thing right. It’s perfectly balanced, interesting throughout the whole process and just a joy to play with.
Partial credit for this master stroke goes to the simple but well-designed class system. Regardless of whether you choose to play as a monosyllabic mace-wielder, a stealthy assassin or a spell-slinging mage, there’s a ton of interesting powers and abilities to use for every class type. As you can only take three characters along with your main, it makes for some interesting choices as you level up. If you’re specializing a character as a fragile damage-dealer, it pays to keep an eye on the emotional health of the ally you’re using as a meat shield.
Most of the joy in combat comes from how well-crafted the battlefield challenges are and how well they scale with your character. Put simply, Dragon Age is not a game for those looking to just power through tons of disposable henchmen on the way to a boss fight. Each and every battle in the game has the potential to kill you if you just run in with your characters on autopilot. That makes even minor battles a fascinating strategic challenge and offers a genuine sense of triumph when you overcome the really well-designed (and very difficult) boss fights. By the end of the game, when you’ve gone from a raw recruit taking on poorly trained bandits to a seasoned veteran leading armies against disciplined hordes of Darkspawn, you will feel every inch the battle-scarred soldier. Dragon Age isn’t an easy game to play, but it’s worth it.
The Age of Beauty
Visually, the game is a triumph of art design over graphical horsepower. The game certainly looks good technically. Animations, particularly character faces, spell effects and combat moves are beautifully implemented. Artistically, though, it takes time to realize just what BioWare has done. There are no real jaw-dropping images that you can point to. In fact, the beauty of Dragon Age's world lies within its subtlety. The world players will explore feels old -- heavy with the weight of history and legends and littered with the ruins of old empires and past glories. It’s a place that feels “real” (or as real as a fantasy universe can) because it treats its architecture and landscaping as characters with their own history and personality and not just as an opportunity for the art department to show off.
The game’s sound also deserves special mention. It’s exceptional – everything from the meaty smack of a sword striking flesh, to the whispers of ghosts in a haunted building, to the fiery wind generated by a powerful spell works to pull you into the game. Credit must also go to a talented ensemble of voice-actors, some famous names, some unknown, who work to bring the rich and diverse cast to life. Particular standouts include the player’s witch companion Morrigan, whose dulcet tones mask very deep secrets and Loghain Mac Tir, a tragic hero badly hurt by the choices he makes and his own prejudices.
There are a few technical niggles that stand out, especially in light of how good the rest of the game is. First, while the game seems to be very stable, players should prepare for some unreasonably long load times that seemed to get longer the deeper I got into the game. Some special combat moves available to characters seem to throw the whole world into slow motion without warning, even if the character you’re currently controlling isn’t the one doing the move. The game also experiences slowdowns when there are a lot of enemies onscreen or during particularly spectacular spell effects.
Also, the inventory control screens could use some work. The item categories offered aren’t adequate to properly order all the stuff you’ll need to organize. Finally, there’s the baffling decision to bar you from controlling your companion’s inventory unless they’re in your current party, forcing you to endure endless loading screens just to manage your stuff. None of these things are remotely fatal; they’re just particularly noticeable given how good the rest of the game is.
The Age of Wonder
In the end, Dragon Age: Origins is a triumph of RPG design for BioWare -- albeit one that takes some work to truly appreciate. What at first glance seems like a standard-issue fantasy universe with a typical save-the-villagers-from-the-horde plotline eventually morphs into an amazingly deep RPG experience that invites the player to explore and re-explore this rich and incredibly well-drawn alternative reality. You’ll come for the sword-fighting and spell-slinging but you’ll stay because of characters you care about and an amazing world that rewards patient exploration.
