Feature – Paint By Numbers: The Racer

A Guest Article by Jambo

To be successful, every console needs a great racer. Sony has Gran Turismo, Microsoft has Forza Motorsport and Project Gotham Racing while Nintendo… well, let’s move on, shall we? It’s not just the 1st and 2nd party developers either, there are of course the multiplatform titles such as the Burnouts and the Need For Speeds which always seem to sell well and achieve more than moderate success. Anyway, intro aside, here’s what to expect from your typical racer…

1. The Racing Type

There are generally two main types of the genre outside of the obvious two-wheel/four-wheel: the Arcade game and the Simulator game (or, as some prefer, the street racer and the track racer). The Sim games are likely to be very popular, even though everyone secretly finds their difficulty (aka “realism”) makes them unplayable. As a rule, Sim games include a ‘Garage’ in which to store your ‘fly wheels’ and make modifications to your vehicle. Most gamers will simply choose to try out different colours, add nitro options, place a huge spoiler on the back and try to make comical shapes out of the selection of self-design stickers available.

The second type is arguably more adored. Although Sims sell well, it is normally the Arcade racers that last longer. Triumphs of this type include both the Outrun and Burnout series. The arcade racer prefers not to place its head so far up its own backside that it needs a glass stomach to see out of, and instead offers innovation and above all: fun. Take the aforementioned Burnout series for example. A conventional Sim, such as Forza Motorsport, will reward the player for safe driving and maintaining a good driving line around the track. Burnout, on the other hand, rewards the player for causing huge pile-ups and forcing opposing drivers off the road in spectacular (slow-mo) fashion. As if that wasn’t enough they even felt the need to include a ‘Crash Mode’ to make the difference between the two types clear!

2. The Girls

Your typical mainstream racer will most likely try to entice you to purchase the game with pictures of scantily clad women adorning the box. The industry standard ‘Racing Babe’ has blond hair, wears hot pants and seems incapable of getting her bottom out of the way of photographs (especially when it comes to shooting the box art). The in-game role of this poor women is to calmly stand in front of a number of loud-engined vehicles and shoot a gun to signal the start of the race and then stand perfectly still as said vehicles proceed to go from nought to sixty merely inches past her. And her name doesn’t even get mentioned throughout the entire game! Talk about unsung heroes…

3. The Tracks

The Sim racer will pride itself on the true-to-life realism of the courses. Frequently used locations in Sim games are Edinburgh, Monte Carlo, Paris and London. The courses will often have surplus trees, one or two buildings and maybe a jump (if the developers are feeling audacious). This is in direct contrast to the mandatory dark grey streets of the Arcade racer, with the only light coming from the neon signs of seedy bars and clubs. The Arcade racer may use real locations but the developers will modify them slightly to allow for explosions and the lark (refer to Midtown Madness 3 for further research).

4. The Cars

Once again, the Sim will try to prove its worth by getting the official rights to use real cars such as Ferraris, Audis, Lamborghinis and Nissans, with the fan-favourite being a tie between the Nissan Skyline and the Enzo Ferrari. Of course, the downside to getting these official rights usually means that the cars can receive no damage in-game, leading to an criminally unrealistic experience in a genre that is supposed to be a simulator. The Arcade racer, on the other hand, will use its own brand of cars (sometimes only changing a letter in existing car manufacturers to create a new brand such as ‘Nossan’ or ‘Yotota’). By the end of the race your car will habitually only be recognisable by its license plate, and even then that has normally been lost somewhere by the second hair-pin.

5. The Racing

Again, the Sim is easily distinguishable from its Arcade cousin. A Sim type race is a straight forward tactical race to the finish line. The Arcade racer prefers to explore a different route by allowing the driver to destroy other vehicles or use items readily available on the track to give you an advantage. There will be countless occasions where you will be metres away from the finishing line only to be taken out by a well placed rocket. You are then forced to grudgingly sit in your chair and take the mocking from your smug friend like a man.

6. The AI

The artificial intelligence in racing games normally follows these basic rules:
1. No matter how well you race another vehicle will always be on your tail, ready to overtake the very moment you fractionally misjudge a corner.
2. As soon as you purchase/win a new car there will always be a driver with a better one that you will have to race.

7. The Soundtrack

Both types of racer tend to suffer here. The developers of Arcade racers believe that the gamer wants to listen to bland pop-punk and lyrically mundane hip-hop beats (I’m looking directly at you EA). The bands signed are usually ones that had huge one hit wonders then fell from grace. Alien Ant Farm, Ms. Dynamite and Feeder immediately spring to mind.

***

Overall, the generic Racing game experience can be duplicated by placing an issue of Top Gear magazine, some paint, a ridiculously large spoiler and an old copy of Maxim in a blender on high setting. However, once every blue moon an innovative racer emerges out of relative obscurity offering diverse gameplay and sublime modes as it sits proudly atop the gaming charts for all to see. Be it Sim or Arcade, the gamer doesn’t really mind, so long as it has plenty of leg room and hasn’t done too much mileage, they’ll be happy.

Discuss this article on the forum.

Viva la Revolution?

A Guest Article by Frasier

The Wii, according to whom you talk to, is either a brilliant piece of kit that offers almost limitless fun, or a gimmick that lacks both games and potential. Setting aside these two irreconcilable viewpoints, I think it is important to answer one question about the Wii – namely, what, if anything has it changed?

The Wii’s codename was the Revolution. To its detractors this showed Nintendo as an arrogant corporation that was more interested in PR than making consoles. To its fanboys, it was an indication that the mighty Gods Reggie and Miyamoto were still as committed as ever to changing the games industry as they always have. This was, after all the company that made water, marmite and Jesus Christ all at the same time, wasn’t it?

When the Wii was unveiled, the idea definitely looked the real deal. Motion sensor technology was set to revolutionise the way we played games, and the mysterious Wii channels seemed to be the answer to the problem of impersonal consoles. Heck, the thing didn’t even have a hard drive.

But there’s something important to note here, and that was how the Wii was announced. Rather than focus on these potentially “change the industry forever (or at least until the next big thing comes out)” aspects, again and again the focus, certainly on the surface, was on the zany name (“I’m desperate for a Wii” cried millions of gamers), the Apple-lite looks, and some of the more casual games. With perhaps the exception of Zelda: Twilight Princess, more attention was put on Wii Sports than any other game. Some early commentators put this down to a lack of knowledge about the console; once it was released, they’d argue, we’ll stop talking about the ever so slightly erotically proportioned controller, and start talking about the games, and proper games as well.

It never quite happened. It’s true that Nintendo have released several games from their big franchises already. Metroid Prime 3, Mario Kart, Super Smash Bros, Mario Galaxy and the aforementioned Zelda: Twilight Princess all tick that box. But here’s the thing: these games have produced nothing like the reaction that more casual titles on the Wii have. Take Wii Fit; at £70 a pop it’s expensive, and in all honesty not exactly long lasting. And yet, despite this, it’s sold out, month after month since it was first released in April.

Who’s buying games? Personally, I have no idea. I’m probably one of the few people who knew more people who had a Gamecube than I know people who presently own a Wii. In fact, of all the people I know well enough to know their gaming habits, only two people own a Wii. One of them is me. I don’t own Wii Fit, the other person, who incidentally is not someone who has owned a console before, doesn’t play except with friends, and is a girl, does. As I lack analogical data, and games sales data available to me does not break down into demographs, I can only really make a (not very educated guess) about who’s buying Wii Fit. I’m thinking that the chief demograph for this game is represented much more closely by my female friend than by me. That’s not a criticism – if anything it’s more of a realisation. The most popular game of this year on the Wii has not been Super Smash Bros, Mario Kart, or even FIFA. It’s been Wii Fit.

For the first time ever, the mainstream media have been talking about games in another capacity than their ability, like movies and Kurt Cobain before them, to give angry teenagers an excuse to hurt themselves and others. They were talking about the Wii’s potential as a fitness trainer, its new control system and the families who were now buying it.

Does this show that the Wii has changed the industry forever? It would be a cop out to write it’s too early to say, but maybe it is. The Wii certainly has created a buzz around games, and is definitely getting new people to try them. This is all great news for the industry. But what follows the Wii? Will we see a console that will consolidate this new audience effectively? And what about Microsoft and Sony – has the Wii done enough to convince them that next time they’ll have to make comparable consoles to compete with Nintendo?

All this is for the future, but one thing is for sure; the Wii has changed, for the moment at least, the way people view games; it’s made them something that are perceived for everyone. The brand is incredibly strong, the look is sleek and efficient, and the wider media are talking about it. It is this, more than anything else, which makes the Wii, not the PS3, the spiritual successor to the PlayStation. Like it or not, the casual gaming family is here to stay.

Is Gaming a Man’s World?

A Guest Article by Krystal

I don’t pretend to know the answer to this question, but as a female myself, I would hope that I would have at least a brief insight into why girls don’t tend to play games. Personally, I am an avid gamer and will play anything from a gritty FPS to an RPG with a cutesy story, (see Eternal Sonata). However, I think it is fair to say that the majority of women/girls will only play games for limited reasons. These reasons can include playing with their boyfriends, which I think can be a good starting point in making a female gamer. In this situation, girls can be introduced to games they never knew existed, and it can often be the case that they are pleasantly surprised with what they find and are eager to pursue gaming more. Personally I can trace my love for gaming back to when I was very young, watching my brother play on his Atari ST. I think it is common for younger siblings to look up to older brothers and sisters and I was no exception. Also, I always had a lot of male friends. This was how I got my hands on a PS1, as I was shown the delights of FFVII and Resident Evil, and wanted to check them out for myself. So a girl gamer was born, but as I say, it can happen in all kinds of different ways.

Now, with the Wii and DS, gaming is attracting a new audience with games for all the family being pushed more and more. You do see a lot of girls playing these consoles in particular because they are marketed so that nobody is intimidated by them and are not known for their overly ‘manly’ games. However, I find a lot of Nintendo’s marketing rather insulting to female audiences, but I’m not sure how non-gaming females feel about them. One advert is the ‘Girls for Games’ trailer that Nintendo produced a while ago.

Wii advertisements – Just right or just wrong?

The trailer starts off quite well with the woman playing Phantom Hourglass, but then she just grins like a loon while playing through the various games, and when it gets to Nintendogs it just becomes embarrassing. However, I think the one part of the advert that should have got it right was the Animal Crossing one. Instead, it ends up playing on the stereotype of girls too much and the hairdresser is so patronising. “Aw he’s cute in’ee!?”. But then, I guess The Sims didn’t sell millions because of hardcore male gamers did it? I do think that for many girls, the transition to gamer will never happen. The same way that women will never join the army in large numbers, and women’s football will never be as popular as men’s football.

But why is this? What makes girls so put off by games? Obviously I don’t have the answer, but I think from a female perspective I can have a good go at analysing the possible reasons. I think firstly, girls are intimidated by games. Many people I know give up before they’ve even began and think the control schemes are too complicated or they don’t really understand game physics and the like because they’ve never been exposed. I guess Nintendo are on the right track with the Smash Bros. Brawl advert which shows that the controls are actually quite simple. (I do however, think that advert is terrible). This goes back to what I was saying about boyfriends or in my case, big brothers. I think you do need someone to show you what to do sometimes so you can gain confidence. In the same vein, I think that girls can be put off because often they are thrown into multiplayer games with seasoned gamers who have probably been playing the game for months. Losing is a real confidence shatterer and I think some girls will lose the will to keep trying. Another thing is that yes, many games are quite ‘manly’ and you don’t often see a female lead, unless she has huge breasts, (see Lara Croft). However, watching Giant Bomb’s recent video review of Soul Calibur IV, even Jeff Gerstmann, who is careful to clarify that he does like breasts, thinks that characters like Ivy, cross the line. Things are changing though, and games like Mass Effect do a brilliant job of creating a female lead who is really likeable and believable in her role. I don’t have a problem with games being aimed at men, because lets face it, they make up a significant majority of the market. Some games can try a bit too hard to be manly though. Assassin’s Creed comes to mind here, if Altair so much as lifts a finger, he does the manliest grunt in the history of manly grunts.

Lara Croft – female icon or your next fantasy?

I do think that gaming will always be a man’s world, but for what exact reasons I don’t know. The same reasons that women don’t join the army and don’t play football are obviously relevant here. As I’ve mentioned in the article, I think Nintendo are on the right track when it comes to attracting females as a new audience. However, personally I don’t think they have it quite right and I think if a girl wants to play games she will, and if she doesn’t, it will be difficult to persuade her otherwise. Games like Mario Kart Wii and various DS games are a step in the right direction in terms of breaking newcomers in gently to the world of gaming. However, making the jump to something like Half Life 2 or PGR4 requires more than just clever marketing. It requires patience and passion. If girls don’t have the passion for gaming, then that’s fair enough. Nobody says that girls have to be gamers, but I think for some men it would be nice if their wives/girlfriends understood their hobby.

Spreading the ‘Net Thin

A Guest Article by Ronan the Librarian

Gears of War arrived in the murky depths of November 2006 to a grand fanfare on the Xbox 360. Before this, the console was merely an easier way to manage online Halo 2 matches with the added bonus of being able to play a select few other games to boost your Gamerscore. Apart from Call of Duty 2, the machine played host to very few online games that managed to capture the public’s attention. When Gears arrived, the hype train stopped at the station and you got on to ride it to Fun Junction.

Suddenly the collective LIVE community migrated to this gaming pasture new. The all-out balls of Halo 2 and the tactics of Call of Duty 2 merged, to create a something in-between that felt so fresh. Everyone on your friends list owned Gears of War, eventually, which guaranteed not only a game, but one with eight players you know and love. The game itself was so incredibly simple – and indeed flawed – but that was excused by the raw playability of it. After all, Gears of War only shipped with three multiplayer modes that were merely varying types of deathmatch, and when the lag got tough, the logic got going. Players would find themselves reloading the Hammer of Dawn (a targeting weapon that doesn’t even have ammo to reload) or they would experience the thrill of skydiving (as they plummet through the map’s floor). However, despite these malfunctions, people had fun; a distinct type of fun that can only be had fooling around with friends – chainsawing them in half and having a good giggle about it.

In the year to follow, more games were released and players got their jollies elsewhere. But when the thrill wore off, Gears still wandered up to you, clambering over the quivering pile of new releases and handed to you your slippers with a knowing smile. Your proverbial feet were not to go cold due to Epic’s baby until late September of 2007, when gaming behemoth Halo had another child. Here is where the LIVE community made that second collective migration – this time to Halo 3. Yet something wasn’t right. People packed off their copies of Gears to the Old Games Retirement Home in return for money. But some of those friends you made with Marcus Fenix didn’t follow you to Master Chief’s house party. They were definitely playing the game as your Friends List seemed to stutter “Playing Halo 3” at you with every entry down the directory. So what happened? Everyone seemed to form specific groups of who they played with in Halo, which were not apparent with Gears. You played with everyone before. Why is your party an exclusive guest list now?

Halo 3’s reign didn’t last as long as Gears of War, probably due to the partitions it created in your list of friends. Within a month or two, players were finding new games. The difference with these though is that the community does not make a collective migration anymore. The new games just serve to dilute the amount of players on your Friends List of whom you can play with. They want to play their new game and if you don’t have it, you’re stuck playing Halo 3 or Gears with the only other people on your friends list who don’t have it. There needs to be a new game to cause the next migration. There needs to be a new Gears; there needs to be a Gears of War 2…

An Open Letter to the Outside World

A Guest Article by Mr Party Hat

Ten years ago, videogames were not the force they are today. Telling someone that you were a gamer garnered a similar response as telling them that you were a paedophile with TB. The PlayStation was doing its best to attract the after pub crowd, but stopped short of true mass market penetration. We wanted people to play with. We wanted our mums and dads to play Mario Kart with us, our partners to sit and watch as we plodded through Resident Evil. We wanted to share our hobby. Videogames had been big business for quite some time, and were beginning to rival Hollywood when it came to entertainment market share, but we didn’t care about that. We wanted to be able to bring a girl home without her seeing the N64 and assuming that we used 8 sided dice to decide which Lord of the Rings character we were going to masturbate over. We wanted acceptance.

On Christmas morning, 2006, I unwrapped my Wii console and played a game of Wii Tennis. It was to be the last time that it would be my Wii console. Soon, my parents were playing doubles matches with my cousins. My uncles were beating the shit out of each other on Boxing. On Christmas morning 2006, Nintendo gave gaming to the masses. We were happy because we had finally been able to share our hobby with our loved ones, they were happy because swinging the white plastic thing was a bit like real tennis, and Nintendo were happy because each console pocketed them an obscene amount of profit.

By the dawn of 2007, most gamers were still trying to coax Grandma away from Wii Play so that they could get some quality time with Twilight Princess. Twelve months later and the family had moved on to Carnival and Ninjabread Man, leaving most of us holding Mario Galaxy, wondering when it would be our turn. July 2008, and E3 confirms the worst – the casuals have taken over. Sony outlines its plan to turn the PS3 into Facebook 2 with the help of Home; Microsoft completely redesign the 360 with the family in mind, touting Miis and quiz shows over Fallout exclusivity. Nintendo announce Wii Sports 2.

Partners, family members, the outside world. We’re glad you have finally been able to peer into our world and understand a little of why we find games so captivating. We appreciate the social acceptance that now comes from owning a Wii. We’re pleased that, for the best part of 20 months, we have been able to share our hobby with you.

Now kindly give it back to us and fuck off. Don’t let the Balance Board hit you on the way out.