The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim

Save the land of Skyrim from being annihilated by dragons

Release: November 11, 2011 (PC, PlayStation 3, Xbox 360)

By Ian Coppock

Like a lot of gamers who have too much time and imagination on their hands, I love role-playing games. I love the massive worlds they more often than not encompass, and I also love the chance to take a silent character and create my own narrative. Such is the reason I love the Elder Scrolls series, and such is the reason I love Skyrim, its latest installment. Skyrim is a game made by Bethesda Softworks, who are well-known for creating massive worlds with dozens if not hundreds of quests. My friends and I denote Bethesda games as having their own scale and category, and I denote Skyrim as the best of these games I've played thus far.

The Story

Skyrim takes place in an epic fantasy world similar in many ways to J.R.R. Tolkien's Middle-Earth. The game focuses on the land of Skyrim, a Scandinavia-like realm of snowy mountains, lush tundras and mead halls. As with the previous Elder Scrolls games, you begin as a prisoner who has been incarcerated for an unspecified crime. In this case, your character has been arrested by the Tamrielic Empire, the governing body of Skyrim.

You create your character during his or her imprisonment. Players can pick from one of ten races, each of which have their own strengths and weaknesses, and can modify almost one hundred facial features.

Just as your character is about to be beheaded by an imperial headsman, a massive dragon comes out of nowhere and begins destroying the town you've been taken to. No dragon has been seen in Skyrim for centuries, creating true panic and giving you a window to escape. You can choose to escape the town with either the rebels you were arrested with or the soldiers who just tried to kill you, a choice I found to be blatantly obvious. 

Anyway, after escaping, your character is free to do as he or she sees fit in Skyrim. You can go your own way and do one of dozens of miscellaneous quests, or embark upon the main storyline. I opted for a combination of the two, but we'll stick to the main story for now.

Hey, dude? I'm not just saying this to distract you from decapitating me: you might want to look behind you...

A few missions after escaping, your character finds himself or herself helping the city of Whiterun against another dragon attack. Your character succeeds in slaying the beast and is to be Dragonborn, a person with the body of a mortal but the soul of an immortal dragon. Dragonborns are nothing if not prophecy fodder, and I was soon wound up in an epic quest to destroy the dragons and bring peace to Skyrim.

As a Dragonborn, your character can absorb the souls of dead dragons and use them to learn deadly magical powers called Shouts. Shouts allow you to do everything from slow down time to set towns on fire, though you have to learn the proper shouting words first.

Another crucial component to the main story is the civil war that has engulfed Skyrim. 200 years after the previous Elder Scrolls game, Oblivion, the empire has fallen on hard times. Whereas it once governed all nine provinces of Tamriel, it now only governs three, the other six having gone their own way or fallen under the control of hostile powers. You can choose to help the native rebels make Skyrim independent, or help the empire keep control, a choice that neither side can claim the moral or geopolitical high ground in, making for a more interesting story.

Just in case gigantic, fire-breathing dragons weren't enough of a problem...

As with all Bethesda games, Skyrim's main story is the largest in a pile of many, many jewels. The game features side quests that you can play for money, artifacts and powerful alliances. You can also join various factions, like the Thieves Guild or the Companions warriors' group, and play questlines that more often than not see you become the leader of those organizations. You can also do more mundane quests, like chopping firewood for money or killing the local bandit.

The amount of quests in this game is almost ludicrous.

If you're like me and you can't resist a good narrative, Skyrim gives you the chance to make your own. I constantly extrapolated my character's personality and motives through the missions I played. Since my character can't talk, I chose to express him through actions, outfits, allegiances and moral decisions. It made for a long and action-packed story, but not just because of my OCD. Skyrim's quests and main storyline are well-paced, though the latter felt a bit skeletal to me. I understand that the goal of Elder Scrolls games is to mess around in a big world, but the main story felt looser than Oblivion's tightly woven narrative.

Oh yes, and take my advice: download the Hearthfire DLC. This $5 pack lets you build your own house, allowing you to gather resources and have a place to stay without the cost of using inns. I also recommend your character get married, for no other reason than your digital spouse will give you free stuff, free food and lots of money (a commentary I'm sure is not lost upon my married readers).

Hearthfire lets you build your own house and is very user-friendly in its interface.

Hearthfire gives you surprising free reign in creating the house of your dreams. You can also adopt orphans and hire everything from bodyguards to bards, which I felt added to the richness of my character's narrative. The Dawnguard DLC, in which your character must stop a cult of vampires from destroying the sun, is also quite good, though rather pricey at $20. I haven't tried the Dragonborn DLC for similar cost reasons, though I hear it's also enjoyable.

The Dawnguard DLC adds much to the world of Skyrim.

Overall, Skyrim is a gem with a few flaws, but a gem nonetheless. I found it a worthy sequel to Oblivion and a strong game in its own right. There's not as much character development to be had with a silent protagonist, but perhaps that responsibility is supposed to fall upon the gamer. Your actions, decisions and quests all determine how others see your character just as much as how you see him or her.

The Artwork

Skyrim's artwork will pull you in almost immediately. I've played plenty of games that had large and beautifully detailed environments, but Bethesda has created the most alive landscape I've ever seen with Skyrim. Tall, snowy mountains encapsulate lush vales full of deer, saber-toothed tigers, and many varieties of bees and butterflies. 

Skyrim gets creative with its wildlife.

Salmon jump up river rapids and glowing mushrooms adorn cavern walls. In the tundra region I was delighted to find herds of woolly mammoths, as well as fireflies, mountain flowers, geysers and flocks of brightly colored birds. Wind whispers through the pine needles of alpine forests, while deer, moose and elk stalk the glens for food. 

Skyrim is alive in a way most video games aren't.

In Skyrim's cities, people talk, laugh and carry their goods from place to place. Market stall owners call out to you while vending their wares, and priests give sermons from their A-frame temples. Mead halls featuring giant feasting tables can be found throughout Skyrim. Your character can collect mead, ale, salmon steaks, apple pie, cooked beef, cinnamon rolls, wine... (slobber).

NOM. Both for the food and for the amount of detail.

Anyway, my point is that Skyrim's environment is nothing if not living. It's one thing for an environment to be detailed, and quite another for those details to be alive and interacting with one another. I found such a world more in Skyrim than any other game I've played. You'll want to play it as much to explore this world as to do the actual quests and main storyline.

Should I get it?

Even if you're not that into RPG's, I urge you to consider Skyrim. The gameplay is fun and intuitive, and the world is massive. You're also getting a lot for your money. I found my copy of Skyrim for about $20 and it took me 80 hours to do the main story, faction quests and a lot of the side quests, though I've got a lot more to explore. There is a recurring glitch in Skyrim in which you may find people hovering a few feet in the air, but this makes more for laughter than gameplay issues. I guess there are poltergeists in this land. Bethesda is also releasing a legendary edition of Skyrim next month that encompasses the main game and its three DLC packs all for $60, which, considering that the DLCs altogether cost $45, is another deal you might consider. In any case, get Skyrim. It can become a time sink if you're not careful, but it's a very slow-burn fantasy game that I love.

My reaction to the Xbox One? Meh.

By Ian Coppock

The unveiling is over now, and I find myself feeling frustrated and slightly hungry. The hype for this event was at least ten times more compelling than the actual thing. Maybe that's just my fault, but in either case, here's why the Xbox One looked mediocre to me.

Where are the games?

For a full hour or so, these Microsoft guys stood up there talking about innovation and change. What they cast as the console's flagship feature was the ability to instantly switch between games, TV and social media. I laughed out loud when I saw that. Unless you're waiting for your Call of Duty match to start up, no one plays games and watches TV at the same time. Seriously, who does that? Gamers don't need all of this sexy switching between apps and social media and Internet. Call me crazy, but gamers play games to game, not multitask.

They made it sound really exhausting! "Play a game but also watch TV and check your fantasy league ratings and say hi to your buddy in Scotland and check Twitter and read other people's achievement stories and AAAAAAH!"

Steps Backward

The event began with a chronology of Xbox, and the unveiling itself. Microsoft has taken a step backward with the controller, making it even bulgier and more unwieldy than the original Xbox 360 colossus from 2006 or so. They then called up a dude who demonstrated that you can voice-command your way into the Xbox menu, and use vocal controls to switch between all of the aforementioned gimmicks. Then came an engineer to discuss computer architecture, and a slick corporate guy from EA to talk about the next lineup of sports games.

A Push for Motion Control

The next Xbox is really going to be pushing Kinect, a sub-mediocre motion control system that they've apparently improved, but I have no interest in. Again, gamers want their experiences to be simple. Motion controls work well when they've been cleverly implemented, as with The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword. However, that's the only example I can devise. Until motion controls implement some form of physical feedback, I'm not touching them with a ten-foot pole.

No...

After that, the event kind of collapsed into a bunch of trailers. There was something for a live-action Halo TV show and the next CoD clone, but the entire time I was waiting for confirmation on whether the Xbox One will require a constant Internet connection in order to run. Given its multiple media integration,  reliance on the cloud, achievement updating and social media, I'd say it's all but confirmed.

This conference was riddled with red flags. Constant social media updates. An alliance with notoriously consumer-unfriendly Electronic Arts. Pushing for gimmicky motion controls and media features that gamers don't need.

My advice? Get a PS4. Unless Microsoft is holding something amazing back for E3, like the Holy Grail, this event came off to me as Microsoft pushing a TV "synchronizer" rather than a gaming console. I don't care how many servers you have worldwide, Microsoft, there will be blood if you require an Internet connection for this thing to function. I'm angry because I'm completely astonished at the direction you think gamers are going in. With this device, you're appealing to a market of schizophrenic social media and entertainment addicts, not those of us simply looking for a good story without needless interference from the cloud and Internet.

Sorry Microsoft. I'm defecting to Sony.

Xbox One Unveiled

By Ian Coppock

My first thought was "holy crap, that thing is gigantic."

Built upon a philosophy of simplicity and instant entertainment, the Xbox One was unveiled on May 21st at Microsoft's campus. Microsoft officials stated that the Xbox One will harmonize all entertainment, including video games, television and Internet.

The Xbox One uses powerful voice recognition technology to instantly log users into their accounts, and responds to commands for watching television and using the Internet, rather smoothly at that. The device can switch seamlessly between these media upon vocal command. Xbox One will feature Trending, which gives players a glance at what is popular. Apps, TV and movies will return to the console as well. The device will also feature Skype.

The Xbox One will also interact with the cloud and smart devices. It's powered by 8 gigs of RAM. and finally gave in to PlayStation by having a Blu-ray drive. So far they haven't mentioned anything game-related, so hopefully they'll get around to that.

I'll post more updates as the unveiling proceeds. No word on requiring an Internet connection in order to work, or on the watermarked discs rumor.

Super Amazing Wagon Adventure

Guide three heroes on a quest for glory and new beginnings

Release: Summer 2012 (PC)

By Ian Coppock

As I'm always quick to harp on, ridiculousness in video games is good when done well. I've also said more than once that a lot of innovation has come out of indie gaming in the past few years. Devoid of cash, a few wily designers conspire in their mothers' basements to produce something that can compete with the likes of big-budget studio games at a fraction of the cost. These games contain amusing or clever innovations to compensate for the lack of personnel and resources. Super Amazing Wagon Adventure accomplishes both of these things. It's fully self-aware of how outrageous it is, and is one of the most amusing games I've played in a while.

Yup. That wagon is in space.

Today's review is going to be a bit different. The game follows three characters whom you create and send off on the aforementioned retro-styled wagon adventure, so no two narratives are the same. With that in mind, I created my own team of all-star pioneers and set out to find fortune and glory on what only an LSD addict could call the trail out west. So without further ado, let's get into the epic saga that is Super Amazing Wagon Adventure.

Day One: The Unicorn Ambush

As the sun simmered atop the horizon, the pioneer team of Bogsworth, Theodore and Millicent gathered about their trusty Conestoga wagon. Being the oldest and grumpiest of the three, Bogsworth assumed command over the wiry-framed and dark-haired Theodore, and the lovely brunette Millicent. They climbed aboard and set out, only to be beset by a swarm of deer. Needing supplies, Bogsworth broke out his chain gun and set bloody fire to the herds, but not soon enough to stop Theodore from getting a face-full of skunk gas.

'Twas a dangerous and bloody hunt.

After slaughtering more wildlife than a redneck on cocaine, Bogsworth led the wagon into a glen, wherein a unicorn grazed. Opting to follow the pretty beast rather than shoot it, Bogsworth found himself the victim of a fast one. It was a unicorn ambush.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHH!

Bogsworth was immediately impaled upon a passing unicorn, his rapidly spilled guts leaving a glistening trail upon the wagon seat. Millicent took up the bloodsoaked reigns, only to be similarly disemboweled by the horn of another beast. Only Theodore remained to crest the charge, and so valiantly shot and dodged his way through the ambush.

Then a dragon attacked.

Oh my God what the hell is this?!?

Theodore stood no chance. His frame, fair and well-toned in life, was forever emblazoned into the canvas of his wagon like a sticky scab set aflame. The charred wagon husk that was once the hopes and dreams of a wayward trio trundled to a halt and burst into nuclear fire.

Day 2: The Asteroids

After restarting, I mean... um... reincarnating, the trio set out on a second attempt at riches and livelihood. They loaded their wagon high with the hides and meat of a passing deer swarm. Spotting such a bounty passing their way, a coven of outlaws descended upon the trio. Bogsworth shot and shot well, but could not stop his limbs from being severed by the cruel evisceration of outlaw gunfire. Millicent next took up the rifle while Theodore drove.

I guess this is better than being swarmed by an armada of unicorns.

Though pressed for bullets and speed, the duo was victorious, leaving behind them the crumpled and bloody bodies of the outlaws.

Only to be set upon by a dude with a goddamn Gatling gun.

GODDAMMIT!!!!!

Theodore drove valiantly and with skills worthy of Churchill Downs, but perished when a stray bullet caused him to fall from the wagon and immediately get trampled by the wagon wheels he'd varnished that very morning. Millicent, armed with gun and reigns, emerged triumphant over the would-be aggressors. Though, sadly, she was all that remained of the trio.

After picking some berries and replenishing her supplies, Millicent arrived to a roaring river. She realized that she could either ford the river or jump across. With both options equally feasible, she decided to jump it. A sudden gust of wind carried her into low orbit, and she found herself Earth's sole defendant against a massive belt of asteroids.

Oh my frickin' Lord...

Millicent was outmatched. Though she somehow survived the vacuum of space, the wagon was crushed quite spectacularly between two burly asteroids. Were it not for the cold of space, her entrails would have exploded from between the rocks like rogue toothpaste, rather than freeze instantaneously. So concluded the team's second attempt at glory.

What is this I don't even...

Day Three: The Woman in Red

After miraculously returning to life a second time, the trio decided to make one final attempt at reaching the old west. Similarly to before, they managed to gather food and get Theodore gas-blasted in the face by a skunk. They once again came upon the unicorn in the glen, but Bogsworth, now the wiser, Gatling-gunned that little bastard into the atoms of the soil.

I'm not falling for your monkey business a second time, unicorn.

With their rations boosted by magical unicorn meat, the team was in high spirits. Millicent left the wagon to scrounge for food and came upon some tasty mushrooms. After eating them, she decided to return to the wagon, but began feeling strange. With little choice, she slipped into an awesome high and battled her inner demons within a ripoff of Purgatory. How bloody the fight was, though she regained her senses and strolled back to her comrades.

The group decided to jump the nearby river. They launched their wagon and oxen into the sky, and landed successfully upon the other side! Hoorah! They set off into the desert with songs in their hearts and came upon a herd of bison! Another successful day for the team.

MOAR FOODS!!!!

Or so it was, until the bison stampeded.

HOLY SWEET MOTHER OF GOD!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Millicent was the first to perish, her neck snapped when a bison lept adopt the wagon and gored her esophagus. Theodore once again fell off the wagon and was once again pounded into a bloody pulp by the wagon's frenzied wheels. Only Bogsworth, faithful Bogsworth, remained.

And he survived.

Is this real? Did I actually get past all those bison?

Tired, hungry and wounded, Bogsworth pressed on. He saw a beautiful woman in a red dress beholding the desert sunset, and dismounted his wagon to inquire after her presence, and whether she needed assistance. As he approached the delicate, gorgeous creature before him, she turned around and shot him in the liver, killing him instantly. 

It was not, as some may think, the gunshot that did him in. The sheer amount of alcohol Bogsworth consumed on a daily basis instantaneously ovveran his system without the liver to regulate it. He died. The woman summoned a nearby posse of bandits, and the gang feasted upon his remains, stripped the wagon for parts and rode merrily into the night.

So ends the tale of Bogsworth, Theodore and Millicent.

Should I get this game?

You've read the story, only you can answer that question. Will you turn away a chance at glory, or lead your own epic trio on an awesome and amazing journey to inner acceptance and riches?

I may have taken some creative liberties with the death descriptors, but all of those events actually happened.

Download Super Amazing Wagon Adventure

Yeah... see you next week :D

Mass Effect 3

Save the galaxy from being annihilated by a merciless race of machines

Release: March 6, 2012 (PC, PlayStation 3, Xbox 360)

By Ian Coppock

Epicness is a matter of spectacle vs. substance. In order for something epic to truly be epic, it has to speak to us on a fundamental level, and use that link to communicate how high the stakes are. This is the key difference between something being epic and merely looking epic. This is why movies like the Fast & Furious series and the Star Wars prequels come off as awkwardly flashy rather than something truly moving. Thankfully, there are certain games that can overcome this speed bump and comprise spectacle as well as substance. Mass Effect 3 is one of these chosen few. For this and other reasons, it is also my favorite installment of the Mass Effect trilogy.

The Story

I must once again fawn over the savegame transfer feature that was present in Mass Effect 2. As with the preceding installment, players can transport their Commander Shepards straight into Mass Effect 3. With two games' worth of experience and choices under his or her belt, your Shepard will once again be faced with characters, dilemmas and consequences that branched off from the first two games. In addition, characters that appeared in the first game but not the second may return in Mass Effect 3.

As with Mass Effect 2, you can teleport your custom Shepard character right into a new game.

The story picks up six months after the events of Mass Effect 2, in which Commander Shepard joined the sketchy human survivalist organization known as Cerberus and went toe-to-toe with an army of laser gun-wielding bugs. He or she is arrested for [SPOILER REDACTED] and sent to Earth to stand trial before the Human Systems Alliance, the human government he or she served in the first game.

As Shepard is escorted to the tribunal, Alliance commanders face sudden communication blackouts from across the globe, and the Reapers, a terrifying race of giant machines, arrives. Having masterminded everything from Saren's downfall in Mass Effect to the scheme to kidnap humans in Mass Effect 2, the nemesis Shepard has been fighting so hard to repel has come.

Court adjourned.

Each Reaper is a 2-kilometer-long colossus. As Shepard learned in the first game, these monstrosities want to harvest all life in the galaxy for their own, enigmatic reasons. Starting with Earth.

After leaving their mentor David Anderson behind to resist the invaders, Shepard must escape Earth to rally the other civilizations of the galaxy for a desperate fight for survival. The alternative is being harvested by giant robotic space squids.

As if a galaxy-wide invasion of sinister, near-invincible machine monsters wasn't enough of a suck salad, Shepard is also betrayed by Cerberus, the organization he worked for in Mass Effect 2. Our old pal the Illusive Man returns with a very different idea about the Reapers. He's come to believe that the Reapers should be controlled, rather than destroyed, and used to put humanity on the very top of the galactic food chain. He sees Shepard's mission to destroy the Reapers as a threat to human survival, and orders his zealous forces to stop Shepard at any cost.

Though initially supportive of Shepard in Mass Effect 2, the Illusive Man returns as one of Mass Effect 3's primary antagonists.

 After fleeing Earth, Shepard arrives on Mars, where the team discovers Cerberus soldiers executing Alliance personnel. Shepard finds Liara T'Soni, the Asari scientist from Mass Effect, who's found blueprints for an ancient superweapon that she thinks can destroy the Reapers. After Cerberus steals a crucial piece of the data, Shepard must embark upon a two-pronged quest to build the device and gather the galaxy around his war banner.

Liara returns as a squadmate in Mass Effect 3.

Mass Effect 3 is nothing if not Commander Shepard rewriting history with the barrel of his or her gun. As Shepard travels around the galaxy to convince alien species to help retake Earth, the character must right ancient wrongs between the various civilizations and play diplomat in order to get them aboard. 

Without some serious diplomatic shrewdness, players may find themselves forced to choose between one civilization's aid or another. I found that solving the beefs between these aliens was as much of a challenge as killing Reaper forces on the field.

Some of the aliens Shepard encounters share centuries-old rivalries that he or she must resolve if the galaxy is to survive.

In Mass Effect 3, players are given a metric that measures how ready they are to retake Earth at the end of the game. Points are added to that score via War Assets, which represent various fleets, soldiers and supplies that Shepard has accrued to that end. The Crucible, the aforementioned superweapon, is also accounted for here.

Shepard's gathered fleets and resources are presented as War Assets. You collect them by exploring star systems and completing story missions. The more assets you have, the better a chance you'll stand against the Reapers in the final confrontation.

I think my favorite part of Mass Effect 3 is the characters. Bioware's character creation and development really shines in this installment of the series, more than any other. A lot of established characters return to the game, including Jeff "Joker" Moreau, your sarcastic pilot, the artificially intelligent EDI, Garrus Vakarian, and other series regulars.

The crew of the revamped Normandy, now flying Alliance colors, is also joined by several completely new characters, including new squadmate James Vega, shuttle pilot Steve Cortez, and germophobic but totally awesome communication specialist Samantha Traynor. For $10, I downloaded a bonus character named Javik, a gruff Prothean soldier awakened after 50,000 years of stasis-sleep.

James Vega was one of my favorite new characters. I thought he was particularly well-written

 Remember up top when I mentioned that epicness comes from a sense of connection? Mass Effect 3 provides that. The game's most moving and tragic moments connected me to this fictional war. Shepard watches in agony as an 8-year-old boy is shot out of the sky by a massive Reaper, and must also contend with Cerberus' abductions and experiments. The connection was also forged through displaying the horrors of war upon civilians. Shepard explores refugee camps rife with traumatized, crying refugees and entire planets set ablaze by the Reapers' relentless campaign. Mothers search for sons who haven't reported in from their theaters, and nurses suffer emotional breakdowns from the gruesome injuries their charges sustain. 

Bioware is to be commended for displaying war's effects on the nameless masses that Shepard encounters. It made the Reaper war feel much closer a threat, which made the game much more compelling. Shepard's squadmates face similar inner turmoil over the war, and it's up to the player to keep their morale high enough so that the galaxy might see a day free of the Reaper threat.

The encounters with Cerberus reminded me that some of the worst atrocities imaginable are committed with the best intentions.

I have one large complaint about Mass Effect 3; I wasn't sure whether the main enemy was the Reapers or Cerberus. Sure, the Reapers' destruction abounds, but the sheer number of Cerberus encounters made me feel like the game was yelling "oh look, that organization you worked for betrayed you! The Illusive Man is a tragic villain, how sad!"

Yeah, the betrayal of Cerberus sucks, but I've encountered these dudes six missions in a row and have had only two encounters against Reaper forces. Shouldn't there be more Reapers, and less Cerberus?

Controversy over Mass Effect 3's ending being unsatisfying or flat-out bad

As I'm sure the regular gamers in my audience are aware, Bioware faced a bit of a crapstorm when a lot of players complained that Mass Effect 3's ending was underwhelming, or flat-out bad. One dude even brought it up as a failure of quality assurance to the Federal Trade Commission. 

I went into the game well aware of the giant stink over the ending. Yeah, the ending isn't super perfect, but neither is any other ending. I don't blame Bioware for the controversy over Mass Effect 3's ending. Not at all. I think we need to remember that the games we play are not the ones we designed ourselves. We shouldn't throw hissy fits if a story doesn't end the way we like, because we didn't write it. It's a different story if the game's ending had suffered technical difficulties, and you're perfectly welcome to disagree with a design decision, but don't declare Bioware the end of the universe and devote who knows how much time complaining about a relatively minor flaw. 

Sure, we can civilly disagree with certain design choices, but game designers should be free to bring their visions to life the way they'd like to, not according to the whims of an overemotional fan. If it doesn't meet our expectations, oh f***ing well. Get a life, anti-Bioware troll. The ending certainly could have been a lot worse. Stop holding game designers accountable for your discrepancies in taste. They can't read minds. If you don't like it, fine, but the overwhelming amount of griping was something I found disgraceful.

So, the ending? Whatever. It's like the last two minutes of the game anyway. The rest might as well sneeze friendship and flower petals for how well it was designed. And in all honesty, the ending is not super-bad. I certainly thought it was good enough for me.

The Artwork

Mass Effect 3's artwork features a graphical upgrade and a few scenery changes. Whereas the first game focused on clean-cut, stately visuals and the second a darker, more underground feel, Mass Effect 3 portrays more destruction, craters, and shuttle crashes than I cared to count. The game also includes a handful of pristine environments that I really liked, like Sur'kesh, the Salarian homeworld.

Sur'kesh is so pretty and peaceful. Ignore that fire.

There isn't a whole lot to say about Mass Effect 3's artwork that I didn't say in my review of Mass Effect 2. The gameplay is smart and intuitive, the levels are well-designed and the environments have a sense of scale that I found very enticing. For the most part, what was pioneered or refined in 2 is further revamped in 3. 

The game's war zones are massive. The sheer amount of destruction reinforces Shepard's urgency to end the Reaper threat.

The game features a new soundtrack by artists previously unaffiliated with the series, who captured the nerdy awesomeness of the series with a lively blend of conventional orchestra and the layers of synths Mass Effect fans are known for loving. Some of the tracks from the first game appear in the third, reinforcing the sense of nostalgia.

Should I get it?

Mass Effect 3 is a great game. It's more about substance than spectacle, and is therefore a true epic. It's difficult to pull off a good conclusion to a long-running series, and I think Bioware did a good enough job with this game.

Thanks for bearing with me on this over-feature-length review. Anyone who's good with a digital gun and looking for a masterfully-crafted narrative with continually developing characters and convincing performances from the voice cast should pick this up. Of course, if you haven't yet concluded the story of your own Commander Shepard, this game will give you just that opportunity. For reviews of the first two Mass Effect games, check the Archives panel on the right.

And now, mini-reviews of the three $10 downloadable content packs for Mass Effect 3's single-player campaign. I'm not giving From Ashes the dignity of a review because I think it was an obvious last-minute cash-grab by EA.

Mass Effect 3: Leviathan

This DLC explores the ancient and unknown origins of the Reapers. Following a shocking psychotic episode, Shepard learns of a creature that is capable of killing reapers, and must follow a bloody trail to find it. This pack was my personal favorite for how detailed it got about the Reapers, and had a bit of a survival horror element. It adds a lot to the main game, making for a definite recommendation.

Mass Effect 3: Omega

Cerberus has captured Omega, haven of galactic pirate queen Aria T'loak, and she intends to take it back with Shepard's help. Having met Aria in Mass Effect 2, Shepard is a likely choice for an anti-Cerberus operation. This DLC returns to the grit and gore of Omega, and favors a gameplay mix that's light on story and heavy on grind. We also finally meet a female Turian. This pack is interesting, but not that essential to the main story. I recommend getting it, though, if you want to see Omega again or are aching for some extra War Assets.

Mass Effect 3: Citadel
The game's farewell DLC sees Shepard become the victim of assassination attempts and scandals across the Citadel space station. Shepard teams up with squadmates new and old to find whoever's messing with him and bring them to justice. The game has some cringing attempts at humor and some flat-out ridiculous fights, but perhaps that was the point of a farewell DLC; to shake out some ridiculousness the staff held back during the main game. I personally enjoyed the pack despite its narrative pitfalls, because it provided a chance for me to see all of my crewmates, new and old, interact with one another. You might also enjoy that experience. At least, if you were nice to them.

Dear Esther

Search for inner closure on a depopulated Scottish island

Release: February 14, 2012 (PC)

                May 15, 2012 (Mac)

By Ian Coppock

In a lot of games, exploration is the fun goo that binds a package of features together. It's the framing device for uncovering the truth in the Deus Ex series, and the binding force behind Myst's soul-crushingly difficult puzzles. Never before have I played a video game solely driven by exploration, where the sole means of progress is just to look under rocks and stare blankly at a virtual sky. Such is the case with Dear Esther, a 2012 indie game that sparked a fierce debate on what comprises a game. I can assure you that Dear Esther is very much a game, and very much a good one.

The Story

Though Dear Esther's aesthetic and premise suggested a horror theme to me, the game is no such thing. You are an unnamed man who arrived to a remote Hebridean island off of Scotland's coast, though his reason for doing so remains vague. He arrives on a windswept shore facing an old lighthouse, and immediately begins walking towards a distant radio tower.

The unnamed island you arrive to is bleak, but hardly dull. Looks chilly, too.

As the man progresses along the shoreline, he begins reading a series of letters addressed to a woman named Esther. The player must progress towards the radio tower for more letters to be read. From his letters I gleaned that the man is probably Esther's widower, left alone after his wife was killed in a car crash. In the letters, the man says that he attempted reconciliation with his wife's killer, an alcoholic named Paul, but was unable to do so. He also mentions trying, and failing, to find the exact location of the car crash, despite having all the reports and testimonies.

In addition to recounting the crash, the man also muses on the history of the island. He references a hermit named Donnelly, who lived on the island in the 19th century. He also discusses Jakobson, a Scandinavian shepherd who left behind the abandoned shacks and cottages the player occasionally bumps into. It is also implied that the man visited or lived on the island, hence his presence here.

The man journeys through eerie ruins and shipwrecks on his way to the radio tower.

 If you're sensing that I'm having trouble coming up with relevant story points, it's because a lot of the narrative is intentionally vague. Towards the end of the story, the man sometimes combines the four persons he talks about into Esther Donnelly and Paul Jakobsen, so it's unclear whether some of the characters are real or imagined. 

I played Dear Esther twice, and the letters the man read changed each time, which made me think of someone ripping up a choose-your-own-adventure book and then tossing the fragments into a lottery machine. I like the concept of a vague narrative, especially in this instance, but I feel like jumbling up the letters into whatever story the game sees fit to tell is a little lazy. Overall, I got the impression that the story is supposed to be poetry readings that provide background noise to the exploration, and maybe that's okay.

In Dear Esther, the story definitely takes a back seat to exploration.

 Though the story of Dear Esther is vaporous and riddled only with the implied, the actual writing is beautiful. The man seems to wax poetic in his reading, combining simple words together into lines that denote the gravity of his loss without becoming too specific. I'm a sucker for British accents anyway, but I think the voice actor they picked for the protagonist did a particularly excellent job. Indie games aren't known for stellar voice acting, but he put a lot of emotion and gravity into his words.

The Artwork

The environments of Dear Esther are dark and foreboding, but hardly repulsive. Your character carries a flashlight for exploring the numerous wrecks and ruins you're bound to stumble across. At the beginning of the game, you're prompted to explore an old lighthouse, which initially set my hairs on end. The interior environments are detailed with the debris of habitation and damage from storms.

Though they carry the chill of a horror game, Dear Esther's environments are simply abandoned.

The exterior environments similarly hint at past habitation. You walk past minutely detailed scenes, such as a pile of barnacle-encrusted lobster traps, as well as rows of old fence lines and ancient pasture walls.

Dear Esther is nothing if not wide open.

Throughout the game, the player encounters messages written in a teal, phosphorescent paint that allude to Biblical passages. The character himself makes frequent reference to "Damascus lost" while talking about the loss of Esther. My favorite part of the game was the third chapter, in which the man must explore a series of brilliantly lit caverns that are ridiculously detailed. One cavern contained hundreds of stalactites, and another was a massive waterfall cave. To me, this was the most contemplative part of the journey. When visuals can reinforce that feeling, they shore up a leaky narrative or add to a strong one.

Exploring the caverns was my favorite part of Dear Esther.

Jessica Curry, who is perhaps the gaming world's best-known indie composer, scored a haunting and solitary game with complementary sounds. Slow, sharp violins and wistful piano ballads abound, while the cavern sections carried the sound of wind as well as low, mournful singing. She is to be commended for so excellently matching a game's soundtrack to its appearance and premise.

Though the visuals are beautiful and well-done, the level design isn't great. I got turned around about five times throughout Dear Esther and spent a half-hour looking for a cleverly-disguised staircase or a little passage I'd missed. The path construction in this game felt a little jumbled and confusing. I think this was the level designer's attempt at creating a truly open world, but in some places it felt too excited and all over the place.

That is the sneakiest staircase I have ever seen.

But, I'm willing to be merciful. Dear Esther was a therapeutic piece of artwork that stirred me as moving pieces of music or books do. When it was first released, the gaming world debated whether pure exploration can carry an entire game, and I argue that it can. I think that an interactive artwork with a visuals and story, never mind how said visuals and story are represented, is a game. Besides, action sequences wouldn't have worked for a contemplative, exploratory game such as this. Dear Esther is a game. A good game.

Should I get it?

Dear Esther is not for those of you with five-millisecond boredom thresholds, but I recommend it for anyone interested in a poetic narrative. The only skills you need to play this game are some aptitude with the WASD keyboard configuration and the ability to hold down the Q button, so it's quite open to anyone. I found Dear Esther on Steam for $10 and it took me about two hours to complete the first time around. I know I complained about the interchangeable story, but in retrospect such a feature ups its replay value. Dear Esther is not a perfect game, but it's a strong argument for video games being art.

Brink

Fight for the fate of an oceanic metropolis

Release: May 10, 2011 (PC, PlayStation 3, Xbox 360)

By Ian Coppock

Until now I've reviewed games based on the suggestions of others or because I think they deserve attention, the same way an Iraq war veteran who walked into my favorite restaurant the other night deserved (and got) a roaring applause and free food. That all changed over the weekend when a friend of mine told me they were contemplating buying Brink (or BRINK?), a first-person shooter. As a matter of public health and personal safety, I have decided to take screenshots and write this review all to push one sentiment: Brink is the worst game in the entire world, and no one should play it. Ever.

The "Story"

Brink's pathetic excuse for a plot takes place a few decades into the future, when humankind couldn't cease their love affair with global warming and drove the entire planet underwater. The game takes place on the Ark (or ARK? Loading screens used both spellings), a floating metropolis that was built as an experiment in living green, en masse. Though the city fared well enough, it received a flood of immigrants (haha, flood) from the now-submerged nations of the world.

Like many tragedies, Brink begins with an alright premise, which swiftly descends into chaos.

With a population much too large for the cityscape, the Ark's government builds a series of shantytowns to house the refugees. This creates a startling divide between the cozily settled founders, and... everyone else. Brink opens as tensions between both sides rise to a boiling point, threatening an outbreak of war in a once-pristine city.

So far, this isn't so painful, right? In fact, it could be construed as an interesting commentary on immigration, or the struggles mankind will face in the 21st century due to dwindling resources.

Brink could have been a thought-provoking look at how our world might change in the  next few decades.

But no. All of this is encapsulated in a brief three-minute intro video, after which players are asked to side with the Security faction to save the Ark, or with the immigrant Resistance faction to find a way off of it, which seems about as difficult as finding a decent boat.

Why are they fighting for the right to leave the overpopulated city? I guess someone put something in the water.

So wait, why are these factions fighting? The Resistance could just leave and this would make Security's job easier, thus reducing tensions and... oh, don't try to question it.

Though it claims otherwise, Brink consists of about 12 missions, split into 24, I guess, sub-missions? Anyway, each campaign takes place in the same 12 or so maps and just features you fighting for one side or the other. That's pretty much the whole story, and the outcome changes depending on which faction you fight for, making for a pointless story in an equally pointless war.

Again, why is there a war? Security wants to expel the immigrants, and the immigrants want to leave. I'm no detective, but...

There are no named characters and no character development, leaving us completely unattached to either side's cause. Brink's narrative descends into a series of melodramatic five-second cutscenes before each mission. The spoken dialogue is drowned out by the music and sound effects (even with both of those bars toned all the way down in the audio menu), leaving us even less familiar with who these people are or why we should care. Each mission is pretty much the same. You have an item to rub against a door or computer, thus creating success. Also, you shoot things.

Brink's gameplay is extremely repetitive. I got bored about halfway through the second mission.

Normally I don't discuss gameplay unless it has problems, and Brink has more flaws than a gem that's been beaten into pieces and then fed into a blasting furnace. The AI is so broken that it defies description. You have numerous squadmates, but their sole goal in life is to capture these stupid little supply post things, AND NOTHING ELSE. Nothing, not even getting shot at, stops them from running their dumb little hearts out toward the nearest command post and invariably getting killed. This left me alone against a horde of baddies, trying to complete the objective and getting massacred.

"Maybe you can help me complete the mission?" I asked my intrepid commandos.

"No, Ian, that's stupid," they replied as one. "We have to capture the command post so that we can change classes and get extra lunchboxes!"

Your AI buddies live for these stupid things. Without them, Brink might have been at least pseudo-decent.

The gun controls are similarly morose. Each mission is more repetitive than a flight of stairs, and less entertaining. Enemies are so ludicrously numerous that the battle becomes even more unfair.

"But we have to get those command posts," say my squadmates.

And then they all ran off and died like the sheep they were. I got shot because I had no backup, then fell to the floor, only able to yell "run, Forrest, run!" as a conga line of medics got shot on their way to a command post instead of me, and GAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!!!!!!!! ($%&$()&)(&$#)(!@*%^#*#@$&(#&@(@()!(*#)&#$!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

(huff, puff), okay we're back. I just had an aneurysm but the doctor says that the blood should stop shooting out of my nose soon.

On another note, I found it weird that you could only create and play a male character. I'd expect that from Call of Duty, but the lack of female characters was the cherry atop an icing made from poo.  I refuse to believe that no one on the development team saw Brink as anywhere near ready for publishing, because it wasn't. This game is more broken and dysfunctional than Congress.

The developers didn't even think to put in some slutty female characters to try to bolster sales. That's the oldest trick in the industry!

The Artwork

Before releasing this abomination, developer Splash Damage (as in this game will splash damaging concoctions of anger-inducing chemicals around your brain) toted a sexy, awesome parkour system called SMART. This system would allow players to effortlessly wall-run and jump over obstacles. I'm sure this would have been cool... if there'd actually been any walls or obstacles to jump on. The environments in this game are flat and boring, and riddled with innumerable invisible walls. I played Brink for about six hours and didn't use parkour at all. Perhaps more importantly, I didn't need to use parkour. I even used the skinniest character body type, the other two being normal body type and too-fat-to-be-of-any-use-body type, so there's THAT commentary.

Brink's environments are samey and unremarkable.

Brink's opening cinematic and menus are of reasonable visual quality, but the in-game environments are fuzzy and uninteresting. There's a level that takes place in an abandoned aquarium that reminded me of graphics from the frickin' Dreamcast. Everything is so fuzzy that the game coalesces into what looks like snot that's been dunked into Easter egg coloring kits.

Brink's graphics are sub-mediocre. It looks like a really good original Xbox game.

The worst thing about Brink is that it could have been great. It had an interesting premise and opening storyline, which were the only things that drew me to it in the first place. This all gets lost in bad gameplay that is to good game design what communism was to the Third Reich. The "story" if you can call it that, is murkier than a Scottish peat bog, and even less clear than the in-game visuals. Before you consider it, don't even get this game for something to laugh at with a group of friends. The only brink this game ever brought me to was the brink of beating my TV into a fine powder.

Should I get it?

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

(gaaaaasp)

OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO.