Hat-trick! I haven’t been blogging much lately, but today it’s the third day in a row! And I have a very interesting topic to bring up: hidden object games, and why I hate them.

First things first: hidden object is a genre that give you a screen cluttered with items, and it’s up to you to find all the correct ones within a certain time limit. That’s it. Seriously, that’s it…and still, people love these games. A few days ago I tried a number of popular titles such as Cate West: Can’t Remember the Rest of the Name, and Big City Adventure: Sydney, Australia. I had tried a number of these games about a year ago, and expected that a lot had changed. But no, it’s still almost the exact same gameplay. The presentation was brilliant, but the gameplay didn’t fascinate me at all.

Okay, I have to admit that there have been some changes: today’s games often feature heaps and heaps of different kinds of minigames in between the find-the-object screens, and these minigames are often very fun and exciting. Unlike the main screens.

Back to my dislike of these find-the-object screens. At first I thought that it was a fluke that these games did well, but it seems pretty proven that people love this style of game; and the point was driven home to me just when I was getting fed up with Abra Academy: Returning Cast after 15 minutes. I’m paraphrasing the conversation that occurred:

“Sweet mother of f-ck! I’m so bored at this game! I’m uninstalling this right now!”
“Hey, what’re you playing? Let me see.”
*Click click*
“Okay, are you done now? Seen enough?”
“Wait a sec…”
*Click click click click*
“Come on! I’m bored! I want to do something else!”
“No, wait! I have to finish this level!”
*Click click click…*

To my amazement I saw someone get instantly hooked by the game I was bored to tears with!

I started thinking about why I don’t like the gameplay, and I think it can be summed up in two things:

1. I really really don’t like spending too much time just looking at a single screen.
2. Too linear. I get very annoyed when I have to find ten random objects for no apparent reason. Adding a thin story on top of the game doesn’t help; I don’t see a reason why I can’t pick up any other similar objects, or try different things to find out which objects I really need. I think it smells too much of someone ordering me what to do, when I want to decide the best path for myself.

Now, time for an interlude. My new game, with the working name Wildhollow, will be a sim/management/adventure game where the main goal is to breed exciting (and valuable) new breeds of animals that you can sell. However, in order to do so you need to bring new genetic material to your stock. That’s where the adventuring aspects enter.

At first I thought of something along the lines of Harvest Moon. You’d breed animals and, once you have young animals, you could bring them along to travel the world and expose them to various mutagens give them new characteristics by magical means. This would be how you evolve your stock and eventually breed the most valuable animals. But I soon dropped that idea; it sounds pretty far-fetched to carry around your animals, and it would cost a lot to make everything animated like that.

Instead, the current game design revolves around static screens. You have a world map where new locations will be revealed continuously; at first you may only see your farm where you can watch your animals run around and play, and a nearby town where you can buy new goods, talk to people, or find items that are lying around. Talking to people and finding the correct items will eventually lead to other places, and the world will expand to show more people and items and even more locations. This is quite obviously derived from adventure games.

But all of the sudden something struck me: one thing that you always do in an adventure game is to look for items half-hidden in the background. Just like in the hidden object games. It may be an obvious connection to you, but for me it was slight shock realizing that a genre I love share features with a genre I cannot stand.

And the irony grows even more: just the other week I was asked if I’m pondering a hidden object game for my next project. “Not at all!” I replied. ….But I probably will end up with some hidden objects in my game. It kind of annoys me to think that when Wildhollow is finished there’s bound to be people comparing it to hidden object games, even though the inspiration comes from completely different places.

Since I’ve issued yet another press release regarding Spandex Force I might as well show it here as well. This regards the awesome Spandex Force photo contest that I’ve announced!

The actual press release follows:

To celebrate the upcoming release of the superhero-themed puzzle RPG Spandex Force, independent game developer KarjaSoft have announced a heroic photo contest.

Bring out your halloween costume and submit a photo of yourself dressed up as a superhero! Five copies of Spandex Force will be given to the funniest, most original and overall best entries. Extra credit will be given for inventive superhero names and an amusing background story for the hero. For more information and a couple of inspirational example photos, go to:

http://www.spandexforce.com/contest.php

“I couldn’t find any disgustingly tight spandex for the example photos,” laments Miro Karjalainen, owner of KarjaSoft. “But you can see me pose as Prince Harming and the Dubious Desperado at least.”

The last day to submit an entry is February 14, and winners will be announced on February 16.

Spandex Force is a tongue-in-cheek puzzle game with RPG elements, available for Windows and Mac. For screenshots and downloads of the beta version of Spandex Force, visit:

http://www.spandexforce.com

Come on - send me a picture at contest@karjasoft.com!

I’m sure you’re dying to know how people have reacted to the Spandex Force beta which was released recently. I sure am, at least! Or, I would be if I didn’t already know.

Overall, I must say that I’m pleased with the reception. I’ve received positive feedback, and people do seem to enjoy the game. Sales from the game’s webpage are up to what Sheeplings sold during six months; granted, I poured more into this second game, but it’s still going better than I thought. I wonder what will happen when I announce the proper release in a little while, along with a photo contest! (Intrigued? You should be. Stay tuned for more information!)

Other positive notes include that the game is mentioned on Gamershell, IGN, Gamespy and other news sites. Still no whisper about it on Gamespot, despite a press release I sent there, but maybe that will change after the real release. Other places have also picked up news about the game; for example Lesbian Gamers and Gay Gamer. Hmm… I wonder if it has something to do with the spandex?

As for feedback, most of what I’ve received comes from forums and e-mails. I won’t toot my own horn, but the concept seems to work very well, and the variation in the minigames works its magic for most people. But – as always – there’s just no pleasing everybody. Here is a list of user reviews, and Spandex Force has received both praise and scorn. And speaking of more scorn, here’s a scathing review from Rock, Paper, Shotgun. I was initially crushed until I started analysing the complaints and compared them to the positive feedback I’ve received. I’m first to admit that my game isn’t as “good” (subjective term of course) as Puzzle Quest; I don’t have the budget or the time for that amount of polish. But I’m not competing directly against Puzzle Quest either - I’m targeting another set of customers. Sure, there’s some overlap – myself for example! I like both casual games and hardcore RPGs. But while Puzzle Quest is aimed at the RPG crowd, my intention is to bring something exciting to the casual crowd instead.

I doubt that this is obvious, though, so I think I’ll have to be prepared for some bad reviews coming up comparing Spandex Force unfavourably to Puzzle Quest.

Back to more positive things, I received a request for a Linux version of the game, and I figured that it shouldn’t be much of a problem. True enough, I’ve done some initial testing and I think I can get it to run on Ubuntu at least. I’ll probably only support Ubuntu, and then have a “see if it works for you – good if it does” clause for other distributions. There’s no way I’m going to offer support for multiple distributions – Linux is simply too problematic. I don’t think I’ll actually gain much from having a Linux version either, but it’s a good learning experience at least. Incidentally, the person asking for a Linux version also mentioned that this game would fit well on Nintendo DS, and even supplied a hint about a publisher working with DS. I’ll see how the game is received after the release, but hey – who knows. Thinking about playing my own game on a DS almost makes me come. Not that you wanted to know that. And not that it’ll happen. But it sure would be nice…

Anyway, I’m feeling positive about the upcoming release. I’ve optimized the game a little, sorted out a Mac bug, received many suggestions for improvements, and the game is slowly coming together properly. The biggest thing left is to playtest the game thoroughly and balance it even more. I really hope people will be pleased about the game’s length – I anticipate that it’s well over 8 hours game play in it, and quite possibly more along the lines of dozens of hours. That may sound cool to you, but for me it sounds like damn hard work, playing through the whole game….again….and again.

The title is from my press release announcing that Spandex Force is officially in beta stage now. It’s been noted that this press release seems slightly confused. “Okay, the game is in beta and they [that is, I] would like to hear comments and suggestions what to do before the final release… But the game itself doesn’t mention much about being in beta state, and you can buy the game! What’s up with this?”

Well… I think the terminology has gotten a bit confused, and I’ve been forced to apply the beta label without much thought. First of all, I was only releasing test builds up to 0.4; people tested it and gave feedback. Not much more to that. But after 0.4 I decided to set up the order page, since a few people had expressed interest in purchasing the game. But lo and behold! It appears that when I accepted affiliates for Sheeplings I’d unthinkingly allowed some people to be affiliates for all my games – which meant that Spandex Force became available for them to sell as well!

One thing led to another, and before I knew it I was receiving traffic from a few sites; quite a few downloads in fact. That’s when I decided to release 0.5 – an in-between release that’s fully playable and corrects most issues - and decided to call it the official beta. I didn’t want people to believe that 0.4 or 0.5 was the final version of the game, so I decided to make a press release to state that there will come a newer version later. But of course, the game itself doesn’t care much about what label I’ve put on it – it just happily states its version number.

So I guess people who expected the game to be more opaque about being in “alpha,” “beta” or “final” are a tad confused.

Either way, the game is both in beta and for sale; I don’t see a conflict there. It’s playable and enjoyable to the end as it is, and those who buy the game now get the current full version as well as the final release once it’s done!

Game design is a strange beast. Yesterday I made build v0.4 of Spandex Force, my new puzzle/RPG/adventure game; it’s coming along very nicely, and with this release all main functionality is present. But after I’d finished the build I had a look at my notes from half a year ago, and early screenshots. The game is very much the same in spirit, but many design choices differ between my original drafts and the soon-to-be-finished product.

One important thing that differs is the scope. In the finished design, the player’s hero has just gotten a job as superhero of Vigilance Valley – a city troubled by minor crime and wacky super villains. In the original design I had planned a more involved process where the hero would start out as “city hero” and eventually graduate to “world hero.” This shift would be very visible: the city screen would feature minor villains and citizens in need, and the world globe would feature global threats and major super villains. This would have been interesting…but totally unnecessary. The game’s budget would’ve increased by a magnitude (well, maybe not; but it would have doubled at least) and the game would have taken months more to develop. I doubt that the benefits would have outweighed those consequences.

And speaking of scope, another thing that I was planning from the beginning was a more involved story inspired by Bildungromans. It would tell the story of how the hero grows from fledgling whippersnapper to responsible self-sacrificing hero. I had planned a structure where the first three episodes would be stand-alone, but then a subtle plot involving a villain trying to frame the hero would emerge. The hero would try to find out information through the following episodes, and eventually meet the ultimate villain in the next-to-last episode. Inspired by Watchmen, after our hero had beaten the villain he would explain to the hero that it’s too late anyway – the Evil Plan(TM) was already set into motion a long time ago. Our hero would race to stop the Evil Destructive Device(TM), only to discover that it’s too late to stop it. Panic! What to do! He would sacrifice himself to protect the city…and everything would go black.

…And had I had my own way, that would have been the end of the game. But, of course, I had to think of a happy ending. So I pondered a final episode after this, where the hero wakes up weak and sore, and supervillains whom he have already beaten have teamed up to take revenge on him in his weakened state. Almost like the fight-all-the-bosses-before-the-final-boss in the Mega Man games. It all would end in a heartwarming scene where the people of the city aid the hero and he defeats everyone. Yay!

But that’s not how things turned out. Instead, I chose a format where every episode is stand-alone, and there’s no on-going storyline in the game. “How dull,” you exclaim now, “that totally sucks!” From an artistic point of view: yes, this is the worse choice. But I think it will work better from a gaming point of view! The game focuses on easily accessible minigames, humour, and instant-get-in-the-game-ness. That approach conflicts with a deeper storyline; if nothing else, it becomes difficult to jump into the game if you’ve had a break for a few weeks. Instead I chose episodes that you can finish in about an hour (depending on the episode) and clearly defined sub-tasks within each episode. Each subtask only takes 15 minutes (or something like that), so you get constant updates on the episode’s plot.

Old concept showing the early city screen and some dialogue.

But there are other design issues on a lower level that differs between then and now. For one thing, at first I intended to make Spandex Force into a game that would have been much more of a Puzzle Quest clone. The current implementation has many strictly different puzzle mechanics: Catch ‘n Match, Slide ‘n Match, Shoot ‘n Match, Click ‘n Drag, mini-minigames…and last but not least, the two types of puzzle battles. But in my original notes I only planned on doing the puzzle battles – nothing else! I had thought of a system with slightly different game modes: standard, simultaneous, and so on, and the type of villain you fought against would decide which game mode it would be. Supervillains would have a very special mode; the villains would have the simultaneous mode; and the henchmen would have classic modes. But after some prototyping I quickly abandoned this game design. It wouldn’t have given enough variation, and the simultaneous mode was…too chaotic. Play Spandex Force and, when you come to a battle, imagine that you both perform your actions simultaneously instead of turn-based. Sure, it opens up to great things like stealing your opponent’s cascading matches…but it would be too action-oriented, and impossible to have a clear overview.

Old prototype of the puzzle battle game. Can you see which game I received inspiration from?

If things go well with the first game I just might implement a better simultaneous version in Spandex Force 2, though. And speaking of Spandex Force 2, here’s another thing I had to consider:

• If I made the game with a very large scope I would put all my eggs into one basket. If the game fails I will have lost a lot.
• However, if I choose restraint and lessen the scope, I can see how the game fares. If it does awfully and it’s because of the game design or the theme…then it’s not worth making a sequel. But if it does well I’ll gain a lot of feedback that I can use to implement an even better sequel.
• This sequel can then use many of the discarded options from the original design. For example, it can revolve around a global hero instead of a city-based one, and experiment with innovations to the minigames.
• Also, if the first game does well enough, I can implement something that I didn’t dare in the first game… Multiplayer! Puzzle battles online, where you can defeat other heroes and villains! I think this would be absolutely brilliant but I don’t have the resources to pull it off unless Spandex Force does reasonably well.

So, here’s to hoping that I can make Spandex Force 2 soon!

The stranger parts of the blogosphere is ablaze with anticipation for Ron Gilbert’s new game project: DeathSpank: Episode One: Orphans of Justice. You should be too. Why? Let me present the evidence…

• Ron Gilbert is the man behind Maniac Mansion and the first two Monkey Island games. Maniac Mansion and Monkey Island were utterly brilliant in every way. Thus, we can deduce that anything Ron Gilbert touches will be instantly turned into solid gold. Unless it’s fluids, in which case it might be turned into liquid gold. And, of course, as we know from the story of Midas, this means that Mr. Gilbert must be amazingly tough to survive despite all his food and drink turning into gold.
• If you read Gilbert’s announcement you’ll notice that he describes DeathSpank as “the perfect melding of a Monkey Island style adventure game with the wicked RPG game play of Diablo.” Sweet mother of fuck; this is going to better than the day I won the Nobel prize and saved the Olsen twins from a collapsing building!
• I have nothing else, but all good things come in three.

Seriously, I think this could be an amazing game. The combination of witty humour, old-style adventure gameplay, and Diablo RPG-ishness sounds better than anything I could possibly imagine. It all sounds so obvious when you look at it in hindsight: what can one do to make the addictive gameplay of Diablo even better? Add humour and adventure puzzles!

The only concern I have is whether or not this will be a successful venture, commercially. I’d love to see DeathSpank become a great success; then we might see more adventure-Diablo clones…but I feel pretty sceptical that the General Public(TM) will want a game like that in this day and age where gamers tend to move to either of the extremes: hardcore and casual games. I hope my fears are unfounded though, and that a game that mixes the best of both worlds will be well received.

…And I’m all out of ass. Go watch the Duke Nukem Forever trailer. Do it right now!

http://kotaku.com/335793/duke-nukem-forever-teaser-trailer

If the game ever comes out it won’t be the best game ever, and it won’t be worth the 10 year wait, but I have a feeling it’s gonna be a complete riot to play. One of the comments on Kotaku says it best:

Who cares if its not the best looking game around, or doesn’t have feature X or feature Y. Its fucking Duke Nukem.

Amen.

Trivia of the day: did you know that – unlike many think – the line “it’s time to kick ass and chew bubblegum, and I’m all out of gum” is not from Army of Darkness…and that it isn’t an exact quote? The correct line is “I have come here to kick ass and chew bubblegum, and I’m all out of gum”, and it’s from the movie They Live. Go watch that one as well.

Does anyone remember the Gizmondo; a handheld system that was launched in 2005, and claimed to be the best thing since sliced bread and Jesus combined. (Sliced Jesus?) Gizmondo wasn’t exactly what you would call a hit, and if I were thus inclined this is where I would make a pun about the word “hit.” See, Gizmondo was brought to life by Carl Freer and Stefan Eriksson, and the latter one’s claim to fame comes from totalling an Enzo.

You were too pretty to die so young!

Anyway, to make a short story shorter, Gizmondo died and no one cared (except for all the investors who lost millions). Read more about it all here. But now things are changing; it’s time to care again.

The Gizmondo actually wasn’t that much of a joke, hardware-wise. It had a decent 400 MHz ARM CPU, 320×240 resolution, NVIDIA 128-bit GoForce (not a misspelling) 3D 4500 GPU…and some cool things like a GPS and GPRS connectivity. Essentially, the device was good enough to play some games, and was tailor-suited for connectivity applications. (Car GPS, check. SMS services, check. Social gaming possibilities, check. Etc etc.) Apparently, Carl Freer also thought that the Gizmondo was a pretty nifty piece of hardware, ’cause he’s bringing back the Gizmondo. (Warning, Swedish article.)

The plan is to release the old version of the Gizmondo in May 2008, and a new improved one in time for Christmas 2008. With my non-existing psychic powers I foresee that the second coming of the Gizmondo will end in tears, and it’s doubtful that we’ll even see the May launch. A console launch needs funding, and Freer is not likely to get much of that after what happened the last time. So, he’s trying to make the Gizmondo cheap(ly) and work with Open Source to cut down on costs. In addition, he’s producing the hardware on credit – a Chinese company in Shenzhen is offering to produce the Gizmondo in exchange for exclusive rights on sales in China. If Freer manages to pull this off I’ll be in awe; it just seems too improbable that anything good will come of all these schemes!

However, it’s hard to deny that if he manages to get the console out to the public, and if there’s funding for a PR campaign, and if the claimed 35 available game titles really are available at launch, things might look brighter. The name Gizmondo may be a joke right now, but it’s hard to laugh at the connectivity possibilities the device has; there’s a slight chance that it might find a niche for itself after all.

If nothing else, it might become another homebrew favourite like the GP2X. It might not be what Carl Freer wants, but he should be thankful even if it just comes to that.

I’m feeling extremely silly today: just a few minutes ago I put up erroneous name stickers on empty cubicles to confuse potential visitors. (I.e., if “Tim Fisher” is the name of a person working here I put up stickers saying “Tom Fosher,” “Timmy Fash” and “Tim Flounder” on various non-occupied places.) Why? Because I’m in a silly mood – I already told you. And I’ll get a good laugh if someone really comes looking for “Tim Fisher.” And my outgoing SMTP server is down, so I can’t spam people with inane e-mails.

After that little exposition I’m ready to get to the point. Right now I was reading some stray blogs, and one happened to refer to a Slate article called World of Borecraft. Quity punny title. The article is a good read; it discusses how “newsgames” fail in their main objective: getting gamers more aware of political/social/whatnot issues. By offering the players a dull and boring game filled with educational content, they’re basically preaching to the choir – the persons who plays such games are the ones who are already enlightened and aware of the issues. Normal gamers perfer to play…oh…maybe something like fun games?

Anyway, that was just a footnote. Uncouth barbarian that I am, what really fascinated me and got my imagination spinning was rather the title of the piece itself: World of Borecraft. It paints a very vivid mental image: a WoW gamer slowly becoming disillusioned by the game, realizing that it’s just the same thing over and over again. Eventually he quits playing and starts trolling WoW boards telling everyone how stupid and repetetive WoW is.

Time to get sidetracked again before I continue my thought. I’m currently reading the excellent Gödel, Escher, Bach and in the foreword the author mentions how, after finishing the novel, he became aware of his subconscious sexism (all the book’s characters are male). I don’t agree with all ideas in the book, and I don’t approve of the author’s attempts to apologize for his sexism. There’s no reason for it! Sexism is natural and perfectly fine, in my not-so-humble opinion – I always use he as the neutral pronoun for a generic person. I’m male! It would make no sense for me to talk about a generic female. And I definitely won’t try to avoid mentioning the gender; it just cramps the style. Literally. So screw that.

Now, after I had conjured up this little story about the WoW player, I thought of what other stories might be hidden within other variations of the title.

World of Sorecraft
“Oh no! I sat up all night playing WoW and now I can’t feel my ass anymore! It’s completely numb. And my wrist is sore. And my eyes are sore. And my back is sore. Goddamn World of Sorecraft!”

World of Surecraft
“Honey! I’m going out for a bit. Could you do the dishes?”
“Mm, sure…”
“And don’t forget to pick Danny up from school.”
“Mm, sure…”
“…My hovercraft is full of eels..”
“Mm, sure…”
“Dammit, you’re playing that damn game again!”
“Mm, sure…”

World of Lorecraft
“I know everything about WoW! Ask me anything! I’ve memorized all statistics about spawn points and quests and geography and… What’s that? You want to know if the game is fun? What do I know – I’m too busy gathering data!”

World of Vorecraft
“Mmm… /pizza.”

Alternative World of Vorecraft
“Soooo… Could you tell me once again why you’ve made a mod that allows a dwarf to physically get inside a Tauren?”

(Hint: look up vorarephilia.)

World of Whorecraft
Nope, not going there. Too easy.

Now for some reader excercises. It’s not that I’m too lazy to come up with stuff of my own, but I’ve never played WoW so I have a really hard time coming up with plausible comic situations. Feel free to leave a comment if you think of something funny, and I’ll pop it in here!

World of Gorecraft
…

World of Snorecraft
…

World of Corecraft
…

World of Al Gore-Craft
Nah, just kidding about this one.

World of Storecraft
…

World of Poorcraft
…

And on and on and on…

I rarely try out a new AAA game these days, but I felt compelled to try out Sherlock Holmes – The Awakened. And I have rarely been so disappointed. The concept is brilliant: a combination of Lovecraft’s Cthulhu mythos, and Doyle’s marvellous detective character. Where did it all go wrong?

In the very beginning, that’s where: there’s a non-skippable prologue.

I sat fuming for the minutes it took the game to finally give me control, and I was not in a pleasant mood by then. Things did not improve after that. Every single dialogue is un-skippable. You have to sit and listen to every single piece of dialogue delivered. I seriously don’t care in the least how important this may be for the story – I want to play fast and get right to the action. (Well, action isn’t the word; you’re mainly running around looking for clues.) If I miss something I can read it later in the journal. You see, there’s a journal in the game where every bit of information is recorded. So WHY THE BLOODY HELL can’t I skip the dialogue – I can read faster than they can speak anyway, so I much prefer to read it in the journal!

The game looks decent enough (and quite pleasant many times); the voice acting is okay; the concept is awesome; the gameplay is interestingly fresh. But I will not accept a game that won’t let me skip cut scenes. All cut scenes. There is not a single case where I accept non-skippable cut scenes or dialogue. Well, to be frank there is one case where it is acceptable: if the game can be run in windowed mode, I can do other things while I listen to the dialogue.

I’ll let you guess twice whether or not The Awakened can be run in windowed mode.

I’m thoroughly disgusted by this lack of attention by the developers; I feel personally insulted that they’ve presented a game I would have loved to play, but made it impossible to endure. One part of me would like to honour their innovativity by playing along – but the biggest part of me wants to chastise their awful design decision. So instead of playing this game I’ll be reading some Neil Gaiman; to be precise I’ll be reading Fragile Things. A short-story collection that – as a coincidence – contains a story named A Study in Emerald that just happens to be an intriguing twist on Sherlock Holmes that includes references to the Cthulhu mythos.

Support Mr. Gaiman today – buy Fragile Things instead of Sherlock Holmes – The Awakened!