It has been a few weeks since Mass Effect 3 has been released, and the controversies surrounding it have been going strong. People throughout the internet have discussed this issue to death. The fan backlash has been truly astounding. Bioware has reached George Lucas levels of hatred because of the way the ending played out. This week, I will weigh in on the issue myself and give you my own opinion regarding the fan outrage and how Bioware should respond.
But before that, I am going to make one thing clear. Like the vast majority of the internet, I also heavily disliked the ending. I thought that it was a betrayal of the series and its fans. However, I will not discuss exactly why people hated the ending unless it directly pertains to the point I am trying to make. I will not spoil specifics, but there will be general spoilers abound. The best part about discussing a topic a few weeks later is that there is already amountainofsourcesdescribing what exactly went wrong. People have a lot of opinions that ultimately boil down to whether or not the ending needs to be changed.
 
First, we will discuss the ways people are moving for a change of the game’s ending. One of the most well known of these is “Retake Mass Effect.” Retake Mass Effect is a group who opposed the ending and protested by donating to Child’s Play, one of the most renown video game charities out there. As of this writing, they were told to desist the charity drive because it was becoming unclear that the two were unaffiliated with each other. Before the charity drive was stopped, the group raised over $70,000. I admit, I was pleasantly surprised when I heard about this. It is a good way to channel fan rage and raise aware (whether or not this awareness needs to be raised can be debated, but that is an unrelated topic). However, I sincerely doubt this could amount to anything in the long run.
The next method that people used to express their outrage was by filing a complaint with the Federal Trade Commissionon the ground of “false advertising”. While this does at first seem to be extreme (and even with extenuating circumstances, still is to a degree), there is some merit to this course of action. The complaint comes from several press releases by Bioware. Among them were claims that the game would have sixteen distinct endings, that the player’s choices in all three games would affect the ending they received in many different ways, that this game would offer closure of the trilogy, and that there is an ending in which the protagonist, Commander Sheppard would lose to the main adversaries, the Reapers. While the latter two can be debated depending on what you consider to be “closure” and “losing to the Reapers”, the first two are impossible to refute. Neither condition was met. There are exactly three endings to Mass Effect 3 which are extremelysimilar to each other. And the choices you made really only affect whether or not the player gets a short ending clip if they choose one ending and whether another ending is available. Bioware did lie to their fans when making these claims, but it debatable if this is indeed false advertising. Quite frankly, I am glad that people are calling Bioware out for their blatant disrespect of their fans and this is a much more proactive form of protest, but my gut tells me that this will not affect EA and Bioware in any significant capacity.
But, not everybody wants the ending to change. People who simply liked it and argue against changing on that merit (or did not argue at all) are fine by me. That is their opinion and they are more than entitled to have it. I will not discuss this group farther. What I will discuss is the group of people, critics and consumers alike, who argue against changing the ending on the merits of “artistic integrity.” In my opinion, the people who make this claim are incorrect. Do not get me wrong, I am fine with games making an artistic statement. In fact, I would have been fine if the choices the player made did not matter in the end and that Shepard lost in a valiant last stand regardless. That would have been an artistic statement. However, one cannot argue “artistic integrity” in this case. In the case of Mass Effect 3, the ending does several things wrong. It throws out and even opposes several themes of the series and creates plot holes with the narrative devices it makes use of. Furthermore, it violates the most basic of narrative structures in a way that does not make it sense. It tries to introduce plot points at the very end of the plot, which is where the exact opposite is suppose to happen. The game uses these elements to explain the Reapers and their motives, something that did not need to be done since the whole point is that they are unknowable and beyond understanding. The ending is the wrapping up of the events. Instead of doing what it needs to do, which resolvingthe problem and the character arcswe have been introduced to, it opts to explain what did not need to be explained. It is difficult to defend Bioware’s artistic statement when either no statement or a very weak one is being made.
And before someone says it, I am aware of the popular fan theoryout there (and the significantly better fan fiction ending). While I do support the theory and have chosen to make it my canonical ending, I admit it too has the flaw of not providing closure and resolution to the events of game, perhaps more-so than the actual ending we were given. This is a side topic that needs to be brought up to preempt my audience.
So what is my opinion on the matter? Well, I might surprise people to learn that I do not support changing the ending. There is one critical reason for this, and while I harped on critics for saying this earlier, it has something to do with “artistic integrity.” In my personal opinion, if Bioware truly believed that the ending we were given should be the way the series comes to an end, then they should stand by it. They should inform the fans of why they went in that direction, the point they were trying to make, and the logic behind their choice. I could support Bioware doing this and would be open to it. However, if the change the ending, or if they dare to charge for an alternate ending, then something would be made clear. Something that I am beginning to suspect, but do not want to admit. It would reveal that Bioware knowingly and deliberately released a product that they knew they could not stand behind. That would be completely unacceptable. I would be disappointed and ashamed that I was a fan of Mass Effect if Bioware sold me a product they would not support. Since no writerhas come out in support of the ending, I have to presume that this is the case, but I would be open to being proven wrong.
All in all, I think this controversy surrounding the endings makes for an interesting case study. I wonder how people will think of this down the line. Without the benefit of precedence, it must be difficult for EA and Bioware to figure out how to react to this. I hope the game developers and publishers are watching this very closely, because there is a lesson to be learned here and the way this plays out has the potential to define how the business-side of video games is handled from here on out.

If there is one thing that my previous articles have made obvious, it is that I approve of games giving players choice with regards to how their own experience plays out. I love being able to impose my own morality on the world and its denizens. However, there is one particular type of “choice” in a game that always tends to chap my hide for one reason or another: That one would be moral choice in games. In theory, I should love this. I should enjoy being able to make decisions that have a noticeable impact. Yet it is often the case where games make missteps along the way that negatively impact my view of moral choice systems. This week, I will go through several games with moral choice systems and talk about why exactly I find them either bad or good.
The first moral choice system to discuss is the one from inFamous. In inFamous, the player sees the world through the eyes of Cole McGrath, an average, everyday bike messenger who, after a massive explosion, finds himself with superhuman, electro-kinetic powers. At various points in the game, the player is forced to make choices that influence Cole’s morality, skewing it more towards good or evil. There are several problems with this. First, the player’s karma directly influences the powers he/she has access to. There is no bonus for maintaining a low/neutral karma and the best powers are only unlocked to those who are completely good or completely evil. This immediately removes any chance of having a nuanced approached and instead makes morality a binary decision that the player makes at the start of the game. Furthermore, the choices themselves tend to be bafflingly, cartoonishly stupid. For example, near the beginning of the game, the player encounters an electrician who refuses to let him/her through in order to get to his next objective because he is worried about his missing wife. The player has to a make a choice to either inform the man of his wife’s death and convince him to let him/her pass. Or, the player can instead opt to pump him full of electric and kill him. This is not a choice. This is whether or not Cole was raised by Hitler! No sane person, when faced with this situation, would kill an innocent man for the evulz!The player is choosing between having common sense or not. The game also has several other similar choices like this that do not make any sense. Moral choices like this are, in my opinion, the worst kind.
Better, but still really bad, are moral choice systems like the one from Mass Effect 2. Mass Effect 2 is a story about Commander Shepard going on various space adventures in order to stop an evil alien race from kidnapping and harvesting humans. Throughout the game, the player, as Commander Shepard, makes various choices that usually (but not always) fall into two categories: One category, Paragon, represents decisions that try to satisfy as many people as possible. These usually fall into the category of Lawful Good, but occasionally drift into Lawful Stupid. On the other side, we have Renegade choices. Renegade choices often favor expedience and getting the job done regardless of who the player pisses of in the process. These usually fall the Chaoticspectrum of morality, and occasionally drift into Chaotic Stupid.
This system is superior to the one in inFamousfor a few reasons. First, Paragon and Renegade points are tracked independentlyof the other. Increasing the Paragon score will do nothing for the Renegade score. This means that Shepard does not need to be completely one or the other and the player can better impart his/her own morality upon Commander Shepard. Another way this system is superior is that these decisions are more Lawful vs. Chaotic more than they are Good vs. Evil. Shepard is predefined in the sense that he (or she) will always be a hero who is out to save the galaxy. The player simply determines whether he (or she) will play nice-nice or go all out and save the shit out of the galaxy whether it wants to be saved or not. This has the added side-effect of not having the game judge the player on his/her actions. On the other hand, this system has a very critical flaw. In some dialogue scenes, certain Paragon/Renegade options will be completely locked unless the player has the prerequisite Paragon/Renegade score. This is bad because it means that, in order to get the best possible outcomes, it is often necessary for the player to generally stay on the Paragon or Renegade path almost completely. All of the potential nuance of the character is erased in order to create either a Lawful Stupid or Chaotic Stupid character.
(Author’s Note: Bioware responded to these criticisms in Mass Effect 3. Now Paragon and Renegade points feed into a general Reputation score that determines the player’s ability to make dialogue options. This is better because all that is really necessary to get options is to just go out and do stuff and the focus is not about being Paragon/Renegade. It is instead focused on what the player believes to be the best and the consequences of these actions.)
The best versions I have seen of moral choice in video games would be the ones from Fallout: New Vegasand Alpha Protocol. These systems are one of the best because they function in a way that makes sense. Instead of a karma system, these two games use Reputation with the various factionin each game to determine the player’s overall morality. Again, this makes sense. People in these games judge the player and give him/her options not based on how the world at large thinks of him/her, but rather on what that character thinks of the player. This means that the player’s actions are not judged by the game developer’s notion of morality and have direct consequences on the game world. And again, this allows for nuanced choices and for the player to display his/her own notion of morality through the player character. A reputation system allows more even more nuanced morality choices because the developers in each game give the player several different and varied characters or factions that represent different ideals and philosophies. These factions each react to the player’s decisions and these reactions affect the game world and, in turn, the player. This is a far better simulation of real life. Most choices are not binary (as in, a Good/Evil or Lawful/Chaotic choice). There are usually many broad and diverse options when approaching different situations. A reputation system best captures that because it enables the game to respond to these options in an equally diverse way.
Morality is a complicated subject, so when games portray it as binary, it tends to get under my skin. People do not consciously choose to be good or evil. Ideally, games would not even track morality. Rather, they would just give each action logical and rational consequences. It is crucial for games to evolve past morality gauges if they want to be grow as a medium, tell even better stories and explore more interesting themes/concepts.

This topic is a serious issue among the gaming community. Simply inserting the words “used games” into a forum post is bound to transform whatever, otherwise benign, discussion into a huge flame war. Nonetheless, it is an issue that needs to be discussed. Game publishers have been trying for a long while now to defeat used game sales. There are valid reasons for this, and there are valid reasons to oppose it. In this article, I will attempt of give you an overview of used games, the method used to combat them and the pros and cons behind this tactic. Lastly, I will share with you my own idea for fighting used games.
The issue of used game sales is one that can be approached from a couple of different angles. Used game sales are a slightly different animal than used books or movies. For books, the cost of publishing a book is relatively low compared to other mediums. Therefore, it takes and much lower sales margin in order to make a profit from books. Movies, while they have high production cost, are also different because they go through several phases of profit making. First, they go into theaters and get profits from both national and international releases. They are then sold later on as DVDs and lastly they are televised on various networks after that. This means that both movies and books can more than afford the hit they take with regards to profits lost through used game sales. On the other hand, video games do not have these advantages. Modern games have incredibly high production values. It cost several millions of dollars to make a AAA game. Furthermore, they have only one method of profiting: sales. Modern games need to sell millions of copies just to recoup their losses. You (like me) could argue that this is endemic to other problems in gaming like the incessant need to keep advancing graphically when there is no need to, but it is impossible to say that the need sell tons of copies does not exist. To this end, publishers have come up with many ways to try to stave off used sales intentionally propagated by gaming outlets, most notably Gamestop.
Perhaps the most prevalent means of combating used games sales is through online pass systems. Online passes are special codes included with new copies of video games. These codes are used to unlock various features of the game. This means that people who buy the game used will be locked out of the content unless they pony up ten dollars in order to purchase the missing content themselves. This means that the publisher can make up some of the income lost through used game sales. That would normally be considered a positive. However, there are many downsides to this system. For one, this has the distinct tendency to piss off the consumer base that publishers and developer depend on to make their money. Not many people admit this, but public relations can be a significant factor in how well companies do. Consumers who feel like they have been screwed over are less likely to continue to buy products from the company they feel screwed by. There is another issue with online passes that should be obvious, but something that not many companies seem to forget: Not everybody in the world has access to a stable internet connection. This is typically a non-issue because the content blocked by an online pass is usually an online feature, like multiplayer. However, there are documented cases of games that had online pass-blocked content that was in the single player portion of the game. The most notable case of this was the Catwoman content in Batman: Arkham City. There are people who bought that game new, who rightfully own that content. However, they are unable to access this content because it is blocked by a system that requires an internet connection to function properly. This is outrageous. This is a publisher screwing over a completely loyal customer and then openly insulting them for it. While this is certainly an egregious way to combat used game sales, it is not the only way they do so.
The overall flaw with online passes is that it feels like the consumers are getting screwed out of their money. With that in mind, I have my own thought behind the best way to combat used game sales. I feel that the best way to stop used game sales is to reward consumers for buying new games instead of punishing consumers for getting used one. To do this, I would recommend giving consumers of new copies of games a discount on future DLC. This method engenders good will amongst the consumer base. People who buy used games will not feel screwed by the publishers. This might even inspire them to buy new when they buy future titles from the publisher in order to support them. People who buy new will also feel rewarded because even if they never actually use that discount, it shows that the developers care about their fans and support them. Lastly, Customers who lack an internet connection still have access to all the features they normally have. There is much to be said about positive PR. Publishers do better when they have the support of the fans who keep them in business. It is a flawed strategy, admittedly, but it is still a better alternate to online passes.
In the end, any method of fighting used games is nothing more than a bandage used to mask the overall problem of games being too expensive to make. The best possible decision is to stop trying to go for graphical fidelity, stick with decent, not not horrible, graphics, and focus more on making quality games. This graphics war is a huge issue when it inflates the cost of making games and of the games themselves. I do not know a single gamer who bought a game just because the graphics were good. The problem with online passes and used games is a symptom of an even greater problem. I hope the developers and publishers learn this soon, else the industry may be in for some tough times pretty soon.

(Major Spoilers for the Assassin’s Creed series and L.A. Noire abound.)
Last week, I discussed how games could be used as a storytelling medium. I talked about the benefits of using games to explore philosophies and scenarios in a free form way: That player choice was an important concept and that it is vital to show the consequences for those choices. After the article was posted, a friend of mine pointed out something to me. In hindsight, I may have unintentionally snubbed linearity in video games. It is absolutely possible to have a strong linear narrative using video games. I would argue that doing this well is much more difficult. It has to be done in a certain way. A developer must tailor the experience to the medium of video games in order to make it work.
Again, video games have strengths that can be played with. By default, video game players are more likely to sympathize with the protagonist because they are the protagonist, at least on a superficial level. The main character (at least a well-written one) has a good backstory and motivation for his/her actions. With that, they are allowed and encouraged to have preconceived notions of morality and ethics. A good way to help further define and flesh out the character would be to use the mechanics of the game. The original Assassin’s Creeddid this incredibly well. The player did not have a health bar, it instead had a “synchronization meter” which showed how much the player was in sync with Altair’s, the protagonist, memory of what happened. This mechanic allowed the game to inform the player of Altair’s moralitywithout bogging him/her down with exposition or allowing for Gameplay and Story Segregation. When the player kills an innocent person, the synchronization bar is immediately reduced by 33% of its maximum value. This shows while Altair is an assassin and known for killing people, he still has a degree of morality and was not a complete psychopath. It is also possible to increase the maximum synchronization by doing things in line with what Altair would do like analyze the city from high building or by saving people from corrupt guards. This avoids Gameplay and Story Segregation as well because in the story the events of Altair’s life occurred very long ago and the player is simply playing a simulation created using his memory.
In the case of Assassin’s Creed, the mechanics are more than a way for the player to get from point A to point B. They are used to reinforce the characters and the situations in which they find themselves. Assassin’s Creed: Brotherhoodalso did this in a particularly powerful scene at the end of the game. At the end of the game, the player character, Desmond, finds and ancient artifact called the Apple of Eden with the help of his friends. Someone from behind the scenes uses the Apple’s power to control Desmond’s body and freeze time for the other three people with him. The cutscene has Desmond extend his hidden wrist-blade and begin to move toward his love interest, a fellow assassin named Lucy. When the player regains control, he/she (if they are anything like me) will try to steer Desmond away from her. However, when the player moves, no matter which direction they point to, Desmond will move towards Lucy. When Desmond is close enough, then the player will be directed to press attack and he/she will have no choice but to comply. This is a powerful scene because it helps the player to empathize with Desmond. It demonstrates his complete powerlessness and inability to stop his body no matter how hard he tries to. This moment is made powerful because the mechanics in play support the narrative and brings the player into the story.
While a linear story can be significantly bolstered if in a video game, there are dangers to attempting to do so. If one does not keep the story and its central themes in mind, there is a strong chance of the gameplay weakening the story. A storyteller can risk undercutting the whole story with the mechanics of the game if they are not extremely careful. As much as I love the Unchartedgames, they are prime examples of this. Naughty Dog has constantly said that Nathan Drake, the protagonist of the series, is the everyman. He is the person that the player can relate to. This is very hard to take seriously. The reason for this is that the Unchartedseries is a third-person cover-based shooter. For the uninitiated, that means that the player, as Nathan Drake, is almost always slaughtering tons of nameless, faceless pirates/soldiers. Furthermore, he has the tendency to talk… and snark… a lot… during each engagement. The overall image of him (at least during gameplay, the actual story is significantly better) is one of a murdering psychopath who has no concept of mercy or remorse. This runs contrary to the kind of character Naughty Dog wished to make and the type of narrative they intended to weave. While they are fortunate that the overall story and gameplay hold up, many more like them have similar problems in their games and fall into this trap.
Other pitfall in making a good, linear narrative in a video game is that players will be inherently more critical of the plot. This is because the strength of having instant sympathy with a protagonist can also be a weakness. When the players feel like they are the character, there is the potential for a disconnect with the character if, at any time, the character begins to exhibit unreasonable or irrational behavior. I had a personal example of this when I was playing L.A. Noire. In L.A. Noire, the protagonist is a man named Cole Phelps, a marine recently returned from World War 2 who decided to join the LA police force and quickly ascended to the rank of detective. He is shown to be a happily married man with two daughters. The game introduced Cole to a German singer who escaped to America before the war started. In the second half of the game, Cole visits the singer in her apartment for an undisclosed period of time at night. I did not think much of it when I saw the scene (I was being pretty dense there, admittedly) until later, when Cole is accused of cheating on his wife and is demoted to Arson as a result. At first, I thought he was set up. I thought that there was no possible way that Cole would do that because it seemed out of character. As it turns out, Cole really did “pork that German whore.” I was stunned. I sat there and thought “Cole! What the f**k were you thinking!? I saw you at the beginning! You f**king kissed your wife that morning! Are you KIDDING ME!?”. This one scene completely broke the game for me. I could care no longer about the story or what happened to the characters because I felt that the game betrayed both me and any conceivable notion of common scene. Finishing the game became more of an endurance test. That is the power of interactivity. When the story makes sense, it can bring players closer to the characters and the world. When it does not, then the player can feel betrayed by the plot and disconnect from the whole mess.
Linear storytelling is a perfectly valid form of narrative in video games. It relies much more on the writer’s skill than free-form games do. The key is once again to use the mechanics to reinforce the narrative. Developers and writers need to get together and stay on the same page throughout development. It is difficulty simply because it requires a great deal of synergy between all departments of a game development studio. While an amazing story is difficult to pull off, when it is, it is extremely gratifying, both to the player and the developer. I would hope developers, either in the present or future, would take a minute to think about how a narrative can be woven into and reinforced by a great game.

This is a topic that I have touched on in the past, but recently, I have been given the opportunity to talk about it. A couple of weeks back, David Jaffe, creator of Twisted Metal and God of War, said, regarding to storytelling in video games, “If you’ve really got something inside of you that’s so powerful, like a story you’ve got to share or a philosophy about man’s place in the universe, why in the fuck would you choose the medium that has historically, continually been the worst medium to express philosophy, story and narrative?”While that sentence is taken only slightly out of context, and the underlying point that developers should focus more on gameplay is sound, I would have to partially disagree with Mr. Jaffe. If a developer wants to have a tightly woven, complex, extremely linear narrative, then I would agree that said developer would be significantly better off by writing a book or making a movie instead. However, if the developer wishes to explore a particular philosophy or a “What if?” scenario, then a video game would be the perfect method of expression, and here is why.
The main reason that a linear narrative does not work so well is also one of the main reasons that games continue to flourish: Games are interactive by their very nature. People who play games always make decisions and affect the game world, even in linear games. What type of weapons will I use? What is the best way to defeat all of these enemies? Should I play it safe or go all out? These decisions are constant being made, consciously or not. Games thrive on ability to thrust players into situations they are not used to and force them into the actions. Linear stories are the antithesis of this. Linearity suggests that there is only one, proper way to go through a player’s journey and every other possibility is incorrect. Some games even have sections where there is a trap in the room that is dead obvious, but the player is forced to trigger it in order to advance the story. In an environment where interactivity and decisions are everything, this is the kiss of death of any serious story. Movies and books can get away with this because the readers/viewers are not insert themselves into the situation: They are passive observers watching a story play out. In a video game, this is not the case. Players of video games are active participants, affecting the outcome of events through their inputs. It is easy for a video game player to project their own emotions onto the protagonist of the game because, in a way, they are. The character becomes a culmination of the decisions and actions a player has made to that point. When somebody asks a reader of book how far into the book they are, they respond with “I’m at the part where the protagonist does X.” However, a gamer would respond to the same question about a video game with “I just did X, and I’m about to do Y.” For an interactive narrative that takes player choice into account, this is a huge boon and be taken advantage of to great effect. For a linear story, this can spell doom if, at any time, the player is forced to do anything that runs directly contrary to their logic or beliefs. There is a term for this: Railroading. It can even get worse when a story directly contradicts what is happening in the gameplay. Either of these circumstances can break immersion with the game and bring the player back into the real world. While I cannot be sure, I would imagine this is why Mr. Jaffe suggests that writers with sprawling narratives in mind should visit another medium.
Does this mean that I think video games should never have stories? NO! However, a game’s story does need to keep the nature of the medium in mind. The most important thing to consider is that players will want to have a sense of agency. That is, they want to be a part of the world, they want to have their actions affect the world, and they want the world to respond to the effects of these actions. Again, if at any point a player loses his/her sense of agency on the events of the game, they go from active participants to passive observers, losing the one advantage the writer has: The fact that the player will care about the protagonist because the protagonist is an extension of the player and the ability of the player to assert his/her own will. The key is to use this concept of player choice and player influence to encourage the player to explore. I will use Fallout: New Vegasas an example.
While I have a few criticisms of New Vegas (chief among them how Caesar’s Legion a little too evil and hard to sympathize with), this is one thing it did very well. In the game’s first half, the player travels to New Vegas. Along the way, the player is introduced to all the major factions of the game at one point or another. The New California Republic(NCR) is the stand in for old school American politics, with all it pros and cons. Its leaders are shown to want the best for the people, yet they are incompetent on many levels and often do not understand the plight of the common folk. The opposition of the NCR, Caesar’s Legion, has opposing ideals. The Legion subjugates tribes under its rule. The tribes lose all their heritage, the men forced to become soldiers, the women and children forced to become slaves. (The boys are conscripted when the come of age.) Furthermore, they reject all kinds of advanced technology, in favor of old school “Roman” ideals. However, they are all united and a sense of order can be found in the Legion. Between these two factions is Mr. House, the enigmatic leader of New Vegas. After the player has been given a chance to meet and learn about all three major factions, they are given a choice. He/she can choose to side with any of the three major factions, or reject all three ideals in favor of a completely independent New Vegas, overseen by the player character. The game and the ending radically change depending on both which of the major factions the player works with/against and how he/she deals with the other sub-factions in the game.
While it is far from perfect, this is an excellent example of how video games can tell good stories. Inform players of different ideologies and let them learn about and explore them. Once they feel like they know enough, allow them the chance to pass judgment. Let them say “I believe that X is the best choice, and as such I will support them.” It does not even have to be the grand, arching narrative. Even on a small-scale, such as with a side quest, this ability to choose is what makes games unique as a medium for storytelling. This is why so many people still laud Deus Exas an excellent accomplishment in gaming, even though it was made all the way back in 2000. The main crux of the game was that it encouraged the player to make choices, both in the way the story unfolded and in the way they play the game. The game explores transhumanism, both in gameplay and in story. It the story, it talks about the positives of transhumanism, like how augmentations could drastically improve people’s lives. However, it also explores the negatives, such as the fact that it can essentially render certain people obsolete when newer, better augments get released. The game ends by having multiple factions give you their opinion on what to do and having the player decide which is best. This sense of exploration and choice extends to the gameplay, allowing the player to go through the game as an expert in combat, stealth, hacking, conversation, or some combination of the four, and beat the game his/her own way.
While I say that games can be used as storytelling devices, that is a little misleading. What I really mean is that games can be used to explore philosophies and concepts and give the player an environment in which he/she can discover the pros and cons of particular ideologies without causing any sort of real-world harm. If a game developer wished to do this, I would advise them to go for it, but to do his/her best to not insert their own biases into the game. The point is to let the players form their own opinions, not to feed them opinions. It is important to avoid veering into the unfortunate category of “propaganda”. For better or worse, games can be used as tools to learn and explore.

There is one thing that my gamer friends complain about over and over again. Since I now have a bit of a lull in regards to things I want to talk about, I might as well address it this week. Are games too easy nowadays? The answer is not nearly as simple as you probably think. A game’s difficulty is affected by several different, overlapping factors. Furthermore, easier games and harder games each have their own benefits and drawbacks that must be considered. I will attempt to touch on all of these topics, but this will not be comprehensive by any means.
First off, it is important to discuss the factors that affect how difficult a game is. One of the biggest of these factors is the experience level of the player. If you own a gaming console/PC and play it often, I want you to either look at your controller/keyboard for a moment or visualize it in your head. You know everything about that controller, do you not? That controller feels comfortable in your hands and you know the layout of it. What gamers often forget is that for those who either do not play games or do so very rarely, that controller is much more complex than we realize. Take a PS3 controller for example (because it is the one I use): There are four buttons on either side of the controller for various inputs. Another four button on the top, two on each side. There are 3 buttons in the middle for out-of-game inputs like pausing or turning off the system. Lastly, there are 2 analog sticks towards the bottom, with buttons built into them as well. This adds up to a grand total of 19 possible inputs. To the unfamiliar, that is both a staggering and intimidating number. We take this for granted because we grew up with them, but those who want to join in and play games have to not only learn the layout, but then learn what each button does and then re-learn them when they play another game. Again, we can do this because we have been conditioned to expect certain control schemes with certain genres/types of games. The shoot button is almost always R1. The Jump button is almost always X. New players are devoid of this conditioning and have to figure it out, giving them a harder time than gaming veterans.
This is where adjustable difficulty comes into play. One of the major reasons games include adjustable difficulty is because they cannot be sure of the level of experience the player will have. Inexperienced players or those who do not want much of a challenge are encouraged to play on easier difficulties in order to get the best experience for them. On the other hand, the experienced and the challenge-lovers within the target demographic are encouraged to play higher level difficulties. This feature is intended to insure that the player can get the most out of a game, no matter what level of experience. That being said, some games do not always get this right by either making varying levels too easy or too hard (which is more a QA issue, so I will not discuss it) or they do get the difficulty balance right but get the implementation of difficulty wrong. Something that I have seen a lot of games do is lock the difficulty choice in at the start of the game after the player chooses it. This is a stupid move and there is no reason for that. If a player initially chooses to play a game on Hard mode, and then realizes several hours in that he/she may have gone in way over his/her head, why should he/she be punished for this? Why should the player have to choose between sucking it up and trying to proceed, quitting the game, or starting a brand new playthrough on another difficulty, losing hours of progress? The answer is that there is no reason for that. If a game is going to have adjustable difficulty, then it better allow the player to change it at any time throughout the game.
One of the last factors of difficulty in games, and I believe one of the most noticeable ones, is the player reward versus player punishment ratio. What do I mean by that? Well, in old games, if the player died or otherwise lost, it would be customary to set them back a considerable distance and force them to redo a good several minutes or so of progression in the game. No other skill-based activity does this and this is a considerable barrier of entry. For example, if someone were to want practice swinging a baseball bat, they can swing over and over, with only a little time between each swing to give the ball back to the pitcher (or to reload the machine in a batting cage). If it were a video game, the batter would be teleported out of the area and be forced to walk all the way back, relocating the baseball bat before getting another shot at swinging. This would hinder the ability to practice and improve. It sounds ridiculous, but gamers do it all the time. For new players, it can be discouraging be forced to redo entire sections just to get another shot at trying to get past the part that gave them trouble. A lot of modern games have done away with this principle by throwing in more checkpoints and more mechanics that help the player get back into the action faster. This creates an illusion that games are easier than they were in the past, but it may actually be the case that we just notice difficulty less because it does not cost us as much time to go back and redo one part of a section as it does to redo an entire section.
Now that I have discussed the factors that contribute to difficulty, it is now important to consider the pros and cons of both games being easy and games being hard to discern why games might tone down the difficulty. There are significant benefits to games being easy. One of the most obvious benefits is that an easier game has a greater potential to appeal to a broader audience. Think about it: A game that 60% of the population is able to play through is obviously much more likely to sell than a game that only 20% of the population is able to play through. This also appeals to those guys who are playing games for the first time. This is NOT a bad thing. When game developers reign these people in with easier games, then we are able to transition them into playing more difficult games, help them learn the controls, and eventually bring them up so that they can play and enjoy games as much as average gamers do. “Gateway games” are important if we want the medium to grow, mature, and expand. Another benefit in having lower difficulty in games is narrative cohesion. Games are much more than the series of “beeps”, “boops”, and pixels that they were 20 years ago. In modern times, games have grown to be full-fledged narrative mediums like books and movies. Most games have some sort of story or campaign that they want the player to go through and serves as more than just a reason to go out and blow things up. If a game becomes too difficult, then the player will take several times to go through a section. This breaks narrative flow and the player may forget details in the story or even stop bothering with the story if a game becomes too tough. Books and movies do not have this barrier. It takes no effort to turn a page in a book or stay in place to watch a movie. It takes effort and active engagement on the audiences part in order for the story to play out. This is a good thing because the player will engage more the world and the characters and empathize with them, but bad because a high difficulty will immediately shut people out of enjoying the story. Difficulty can be played with to help immersion or to hit home the themes or morals of the game, but it can never be so hard that the consumers are turned off by it.
On the other hand, there are advantages to games being difficult. The prime advantage of a hard game is that there is appeal to seeing a challenge, facing it, and then overcoming it. There are tons of thrill-lovers out there that embrace challenge and derive pleasure from success after repeated failure. Appealing to this audience can be just as rewarding as appealing to the mass market. While these people do not outnumber the masses, they are far more loyal. They will often stick with a developer if they continue to produce quality products (or even if the do not. Am I right Sonic Team?). Furthermore, a difficult game brings a feeling of excitement and tension with it. Think about it. Would you not agree that a fight where you ended with low health, few bullets left, and you got by with the skin of your teeth much more exciting than one where you launched a mini-nuke at the enemy and killed 80% of them in one shot? Players love the feeling of overcoming obstacles and figuring out the best way of proceeding through meticulous planning and strategy. This is part of why gamers decry the notion of games being “dumbed down” for the broader audience.
Difficulty is the kind of thing that takes a lot of effort to fine tune property. And sadly, even if a developer does, people are not going to be happy about. It is also something that developers cannot turn to any precedent in order to figure out. Difficulty has to be analyzed and determined on a case by case basis: A never-ending juggling act that is constant in flux. The next time you play a game that you find too easy or hard, do not immediately accuse the developer. Instead, think about why you find it too easy/hard and try to figure out what the developers intentions were. The answer you arrive at might surprise or even impress you.

(Spoiler Warning: I discuss Final Fantasy XIII-2‘s plot.)

Time travel is one of many in a list of often utilized science-fiction tropes. It is easy to understand why that would be. Most people are fascinated by the concept of going back and forth through time for a variety of reasons. Some people would love to travel to the distant past to observe how folks from olden times really led their lives with their own eyes. Others have the distant future in mind for their destination. These members of society are interested in the growth of humanity and desire to see how our actions in the present affect the what happens afterward. Still more people see time travel as a means of escapism. They look at the lives they are currently leading with disgust and repulsion. They dream of going back to the past and fixing their lives so that they no longer feel miserable. The concept of venturing across time and space permeates books, movies, and other media and video games no different. This week’s article will analyze the mechanic of time travel and video games using Final Fantasy XIII-2as the basis for discussion.
The first, I have to fill you in on the premise of XIII-2. As you have probably already figured out Final Fantasy XIII-2takes places after the events of Final Fantasy XIII. In the game, the protagonist of the previous game, Lightning, has mysteriously disappeared from the timeline after saving the world. Everybody, except her sister Serah, remembers her fighting a bunch of monsters and getting killed in action. Serah remembers the Lightning was at her side one minute and gone the next. After three years of self-doubt, she meets a young man named Noel who claims to be from the future, a world where he is the only human left. He says that was pulled out of that timeline by Lightning and instructed to bring Serah to her. Together, they go on an adventure through time to search for a way to find Lightning and (inevitably) fix the timelineso that Noel’s future does not happen.
 
Final Fantasy XIII-2uses time travel both effectively and ineffectively. For one, its system of time travel does allow it to explain away a few of the plot holes that are typical of a time travel story. The protagonists of the game are not allowed to just go to any time period they desire. First, they have to find a gate in whatever era they are in or have been to previously. Then, the have to find an “artifact” that opens up the gate. This explains why it is impossible for the heroes to just go to the time period when and where all the shenanigans involving mucking up the timeline were originally thought up and kill the villain of the game or convince him that his plan is incredibly stupid (which it is, but that will not be touched on in this article). There is no gate that allows them to travel to that period before everything started. It also explains why the events of the first game remain intact. No time gate appears before three years after the events of the first game. The time travel mechanic also helps bring the player into the world and makes the player begin to care about the people in it. It is interesting and fun to go to different time periods of the same place to see how the world advances. Every area has at least a few interesting characters or developments that bring the player closer to the story and make him/her want to save this world. Lastly, do something that alleviates a problem that I have seen many time travel stories. In many stories, all the time travel weirdness occurs without anyone giving so much as a backwards glance, except for the protagonists. In XIII-2, the people in this world of paradoxes and time manipulation do what would be expected: They send teams on scientists and researchers to go out and investigate them to try to figure out why these paradoxes occur and fix them. Later on in the future, it is implied through an optional quiz game that time travel and paradoxesbecome part of a standard education. In a unique take on time/space manipulation, citizens of this world become used to paradoxes and other oddities as a such are not surprised by it. All these little details are done well and help to add a bit of logic to the world.
However, while XIII-2does many things right with its time travel narrative, it also does many things wrong. One of the main problems with the narrative of the game is that the writers are all to eager to use the word “paradox” to explain away every and all problems that occur. While this makes sense in a time travel narrative, it is often the case where the effect of a paradox does not make any sense at all. For example, in one optional area in the game, the effect of a paradox cause a whole team of researchers to disappear, presumably to a different time period. This somehow causes red spheres filled with all of the regrets of those affected by the paradox to materialize in their place. Wait, what? How did that happen? What possible explanation could explain that? While that is only a side-story and can be easily ignored, the main quest is also filled with plotholes. When Lightning disappeared, she was sent to place outside of space/time called Valhalla, ruled by the goddess Etro. In Valhalla, it is possible to see all places and periods of time at once. Furthermore, Etro is the one who can control space/time and open up time gates. The problem with an area like this is that it basically breaks the plot. If it is possible to see every era at once and create gates to places in time, then there really should be no narrative tension. The conclusion of the game should be obvious well in advance and all of the events would be simultaneously playing out while at the same time have already been played out. It does not end there. The story constantly reminds the player of something that does not make sense: “Change the future, and you change the past.” At first, I thought this was referring to the paradoxes. I thought that meant that if a paradox began in the future and sent something into the past was resolved, then the past would change because it was no longer be affected. This made sense to me. However, a datalog, the in-game database, entry says that if the future gets changed for whatever reason, then the past will auto-correct itself so that the future will have the best possible chance of happening. Think about it for a second. How would that make any sense? I am legitimately wondering that. Anyone who can explain that to me, please post a comment. I would be eager to learn.
 
Final Fantasy XIII-2is an interesting takes on the usual time traveling tale. It has both its good points and it bad points. Be warned, while I personally enjoyed Final Fantasy XIII-2, it is not a game for everybody. Old fans of the Final Fantasyseries or JRPGs in general will find themselves right at home here. Others should borrow or rent the game first before considering a purchase. I complained a lot about the story as it heavily relies on “A goddess did it.”, but the gameplay of XIII-2really works.

Most gamers are already aware of what a quicktime event is. A quicktime event is a cutscene in a game where the player is required to correctly input a series of button prompts. From that base, quicktime events can vary in how they are executed. Some require different sets and types of inputs. Some restrict themselves to certain parts of the controller. Some restart the entire event if a player fails an input. Some place the player at the point they lost, possibly with some penalty like health damage. Some even continue on despite failure, going with the flow of the event. This weeks article is a discussion of the quicktime event: where they work, where they can fail, and an example from a recent game that might reveal untapped potential for the mechanic.
I understand why game developers use quicktime events. One of the positives of using a quicktime event is that it allows the developer to forge a carefully choreographed and “cinematic” sequence without completely removing the player from the game, even in the middle of a combat scenario. Games like God of Warhave become well-known for this. The takedowns that Kratos performs during a quicktime event immerse the player into the world and give them a sense of the brutality of Kratos’s character. In this case, the quicktime event functions in service to the game and the world that the game takes place in. A quicktime event can also act as a good way to give the player a brief reprieve from standard gameplay and breakup sections of combat. A brief, easy to pass quicktime event can allow the player to catch his/her breath and relax for a second to prepare themselves for the next gameplay sequence.
On the other hand, from the perspective of the player, the quicktime event can be one of the most irritating forms of artificial gameplay. Picture the following in your head: The player has just gone through a level of gameplay and finally arrived at a cutscene, giving him/her a time to relax. The cutscene depicts the player character talking with the villain while the villain has the hero in precarious position (Because they do that instead of just killing him outright, but I digress). After this conversation goes on for a minute or two, then the villain takes a knife and throws it at the player character and the game goes “Press X to not die!”. The player, controller set on the table, scrambles to grab it before he fails the randomly inserted quicktime event. Too late: The knife hits the protagonist in the head and the player has to sit through the entire conversation from the very beginning! While this type of game play is certainly on its way out, it has been done in far too many games. I am sure that most gamers reading this can think of a game that has done something like that to the player. There is no excuse for that kind of poor design. This is not the only bad things about quicktime events. That same reprieve that I mentioned in the above paragraph could easily have a regular, non-playable cutscene take place instead of a quicktime event and the player would not be any worse for wear. Another failing of the quicktime event is that it often takes the reins away from the player in order to highlight an action that the player cannot perform in standard gameplay. Instead of making characters perform super-cool in a quicktime events, why not just give that move to the player in standard gameplay. While there are admittedly times where this could be difficult, it is by no means impossible. Going back to God of War, no one complains that they do not get to perform amazing and visceral actions in gameplay because the entire game is visceral and exiting action. Furthermore, any action done in a quicktime event is often ignored because the player has to keep looking for button prompts. In that case, a regular cutscene would be a better choice.
But despite my criticisms, I think there is an untapped potential in quicktime events that a game released very recently made me realize. As some of you who read this might be aware, one of new “features” included in Final Fantasy XIII-2was “Cinematic Action”, aka quicktime events. While they are mostly just used as coup de graces for all the boss fights (Which I hate. I already defeated the boss. I do not need a quicktime event to show how they canonically defeated the boss. I know how it died because I killed it! But again, I digress.), the first quicktime event did something interesting that I did not expect. While it was a small thing, it had a profound impact on me and made me alter (if only slightly) my negative opinion of quicktime events. At the beginning of the game, the player fights the obvious big bad of the game (anyone who wields a weapon that looks like Soul Edge is evil) as Lightning, the hero from Final Fantasy XIII. Towards the end, a “Cinematic Action” sequence begins. Instead of saying “Press X to not die!”, the games gives the player the choice of two prompts: One button initiates a physical attack and another cause Lightning to cast Ruin. The event gives the player two more choices of attacks before it ends in a styleish and admittedly cool looking sequence. This is an interesting mechanic. I would love to see a game where the quicktime events is not the player going through a scripted sequence, but rather them going through an actual battle, making split second decisions and actually affecting the outcome of the event by what they are pressing as opposed to having a reflex test. The scene would change to show who is winning and who is losing. It could help to bring the player into the frame of mind of the protagonist and help immerse the player into the experience. I am extremely disappointed that, twenty hours in and after several more “Cinematic Action” sequences, they do not do anything similar to that again. This could have potentially revolutionized the quicktime event and made it fresh and interesting.
Quicktime events do not have to be stupid and annoying. They are like any other tool in a game designers arsenal. Used well, they can be a splendid addition to the experience and add to the immersion of the game. It is a shame that very few games ever use them well.

I have been spending a good chunk of time lately playing games made by Bethesda, like The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim and Fallout 3. While they are generally great games that I would recommend, they do have their weaknesses. Bethesda games are notorious for being buggy and the bastardization of the Gamebryo engine they use is nearly broken. Also, the stories of these games tend to be fairly weak upon analysis. However, they do excel at two things, the latter of which is the subject of this week’s article: Bethesda games tend to have interesting gameplay and character development, but more importantly, they are great at telling stories and informing the player about the world and the characters that inhabit it without bogging the player down with text and unnecessary dialogue.
One example of what I am referring to comes from The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim. For the uninformed, Skyrim is a game that was released last November. In takes place in a medieval fantasy setting very heavily inspired by Norse mythology. There are nine holds in Skyrim, each with a capital city of its own. Each capital, and each hold by extension, is ruled independently by their own ruler and each ruler is assisted by a knight captain, a court wizard, a political adviser, etc. The court wizard of the city of Solitude in particular is a pretty interesting character to those who pay special attention to her. Small conversations the player can overhear suggest the wizard is particular skilled at magic and possesses training that her rather young appearance would suggest she would not be able to have. When the player talks to her, she gives him/her a typical quest to go into a cave and kill vampires. She says that she hates vampires and considers them monsters who need to die. The interesting part will not be visible to the player unless he/she took the time to train and invest in Alteration magic. When casting the “Detect Life” spell, she does not exhibit the glow that all the other characters do. However, when the player uses the “Detect Dead” spell, a spell used to highlight undead enemies, like vampires, she lights up like a Christmas tree. Put this all together, and the player gets the picture of either a self-loathing vampire trying to hide or deny her true identity or a vampire trying to avoid being caught by abstaining from feeding on humans and pretending to be a vampire hunter. Either interpretation adds depth to her character that could have been ruined if the game had explicitly made it obvious to the player through dialogue.
Another excellent example comes from Fallout 3. For those of you who do not regularly read my articles, Fallout 3 takes place in post-apocalyptic Washington, DC, lovingly(?) referred to by the local populace as “The Capital Wasteland”. This particular example comes from the village of Andale, located in the southernmost part of the Capital Wasteland. When the player first arrives to Andale, they are greeted by an unassuming and rather innocent-looking town. When the player talks to the people there, that is the first indicator that something about this town is slightly “off”. When talking to the husbands of the two families, they talk about how they “work to feed their families”. Considering there is no official institution of jobs and wages in wasteland (at least on the East Coast, but that is another conversation for a different article), the player is confused as to what the characters are talking about. Talking with the wives is even more unsettling. The wives go on about how they take care of the house and that “Andale was voted as the best town in the US for 150 years in a row.” Just like with the husbands, the player already knows the no such contest exists in the wasteland because most people are more interested in everyday survival and no form of nation(or even state)-wide communication exists, so this statement does not make a much sense. The player can go even further and talk to one of the kids, who says something interesting that can potentially be missed if the player is not paying attention. He says that he has liked the other kid (who belongs to the other family) “since before Mr. Wilson (who is the neighbor) stopped being my dad’s brother”. This sheds light on the fact that they are severely inbred. While this fact is creepy and disgusting to think about, it is understandable given the nature of the wasteland and does not quite explain why the town is “off”. The creepy part can only be seen if the player decides to stick around and investigate. If the player steals a key and enters either the basement or the backyard shack of one of the houses, he/she will see the true horror of Andale. Both of these rooms have deceased wastelanders on operating tables with bonesaws and chainsaws around them. Refrigerators around the room are filled with a unique food item called “Strange Meat”. After exiting the room, the player is confronted by the adults in the village. The player can either speech them, convincing them that he/she is also a cannibal (this speech check can be bypassed with the Cannibal perk). They could also shoot, maim, or otherwise slaughter the adults in the village to stop them and gain good karma. This is one of the most interesting areas in the game and a pretty good short story in the compilation of stories that is Fallout 3.
Telling a good story without forcing endless exposition upon the player is a feat and Bethesda is a developer who excels at this. It is important to note that neither one of my two examples are forced upon the player. Both stories are completely optional fluff that Bethesda put in the game to make the world feel like an area that is inhabited by people instead of robots (even though Fallout 3 actually has robots). Most players probably will not see these little nuggets of content. It is the little details in a game like these two that immerse the player in the experience. Future game designers should take this into account when developing games. While an excellent story is also important, it is more important to have a fully envisioned and realized world than an excellent story.

Horror is a unique beast amongst entertainment genres like movies and especially games. Everything has to be perfected in order for it to succeed. The visuals have to be compelling while simultaneously disturbing the viewer. The audio has to be suitably creepy. Any slight disturbances in sound can throw the viewer out of the experience and remind him/her that he/she is safe in secure in their chosen venue. Without either of these properties, a horror movie cannot succeed. For horror games, there is an added element: the gameplay must convey the feeling of helplessness and danger while at the same time keep the player immersed in the experience. Two semi-recent RPGs attempted to add horror to their game in the form of downloadable content: Mass Effect 2 with Project Overlord and Fallout 3 with Point Lookout. These two experiences conveyed one thing to me: It is impossible for RPGs to be compelling horror games by their very nature.
Before explaining why, I feel compelled to explain the overall premises of the stories in these two pieces if downloadable content that I am referring to. Mass Effect 2 is a hard science space opera revolving around Commander Sheppard’s struggle to save the galaxy. In the Project Overlord DLC, Sheppard lands on a planet where a rogue AI has taken over a base, after an experiment went horribly wrong, and threatens to expand even further. The commander then has to stop the AI before bad things happen. On the other hand, Fallout 3 takes place in the Capital Wasteland, a post-apocalyptic Washington, D.C. that exists two-hundred years after a global thermonuclear war between the United States and China. The player character has spent his formative years in an underground vault and, due to events out of his/her control, had to leave. Point Lookout takes the player character to Point Lookout, Maryland. The land is filled with radioactive swamps, mutated and inbred citizens out for blood, and loads of other spooks. Both DLCs seek to add horror elements to their respective games, but both fail for differing reasons.
The reasons that Project Overlord failed were the due to the player character and the setting of the DLC. As previously stated, the player takes control of Commander Sheppard, as he/she does throughout the main game. The problem with this is that Commander Sheppard, no matter what the player does or what paths the player chooses, is a badass who regularly murders thousands of evil, corrupt aliens or mercenaries on a semi-regular basis. This kind of character is extremely difficult to pull off horror with. A player will go through the DLC unafraid because he/she knows that Sheppard will be able to easily trounce whatever enemies that impede his/her progress. But even if the player was not playing as an awesome space marine, the setting also detracts from the feeling of horror. Throughout the DLC, the rogue AI takes control of computers and watches you as you proceed through the levels. He often yells at you through the screen with an unintelligible squeal. While this seems like it would be scary, I was never even remotely frightened by him. In fact, I grew irritated because the squeals were so much louder than any other sound in the game. All it made me do is turn down the volume so that I would stop hearing it over and over again. The minute that a big scary villain becomes annoying, scary ceases to be part of the equation.
 
Point Lookout has similar reasons as to why the horror did not work at all. To begin, odds are that the player will begin the DLC after they hit level 20 or so. This means that the player has accumulated tons of skill points and equipment at that point. Most enemies, at this level, will be felled quickly by a semi-competent player. By the time I played Point Lookout, I was equipped with indestructible power armor, a sword that is covered by gasoline and on fire, and several high-powered energy weapons. Even if the player came into the DLC with bad equipment, the enemies drop their own powerful weapons. The level-action rifle from the DLC might be one of the most powerful small guns in the game. It also takes cheap and plentiful 10mm ammo, so odds are the player will have thousands of rounds for the weapon. So if the player entered weak and under-leveled, they will be extremely strong by the end of it. Another way they break the horror is by making the world extremely open for exploration. The player is allowed to roam freely, giving them leave to retreat if they need to and look for items they can use. All of this ruins any feeling of powerless and inability the player might experience. Helplessness is the key to creating compelling horror. The games own systems are what prevent Point Lookout from being truly scary.
Horror requires a high degree of subtlety and skill to successfully pull it off. RPGs, by their very nature, undermine any kind of horror. The ability to develop and strengthen the player character gives the player a sense of safety, which is counter-intuitive to horror. To clarify, I would not recommend Project Overlord even as an enhancement to Mass Effect 2. While the plot behind it and the end choice are both interesting, the gameplay was sub-par and the DLC became extremely boring by the mid-point of it. On the other hand, while Point Lookout fails at being scary at all, yet it was still an excellent expansion of Fallout 3 and probably one of my favorites. It has an interesting plot, new and interesting equipment, and while the open-world does not make it scary, it is conducive to Fallout 3 gameplay and strengthens the experience. I would recommend it to any fans of the vanilla game.
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