Friday, April 17, 2009

Jericho Review


[Warning: Possible spoilers.] About a year ago I read some reviews for the game Jericho that I was not happy about. I’m a big fan of this game and think it’s really quite a masterpiece (I suppose the game would fall into the “cult classic” category). So, if at times it sounds like I’m not so much praising the game’s features as I am defending them, it’s because I am. This is not so much a review as it is a rebuttal, but you can take it for what it’s worth.

Jericho is a first person “squad-based action horror game based on an original concept and story by acclaimed horror writer and filmmaker Clive Barker.” (official website) Your squad, Jericho, is a team of talented, skilled individuals trained in conventional and occult warfare, or, to put it plainly, “witches with guns”. As a secret division of the US Special Forces, Jericho has been sent to a city in the Middle East, Al-Khali, to perform Operation Godseal. The story, based closely on a Gnostic belief, is that, before man, God had created a perfect being, the Firstborn, but was so disturbed by His creation He forsook it and banished it to a prison known as the “box” or Pyxis (God = Frankenstein!). Throughout the time of man, the Firstborn had seduced many to try and release him—to open a breach into our world so that he could wreak havoc on all of God’s creation. But repeatedly the world was saved by a team of mystics who closed the breach. In the present, a man named Arnold Leech and his followers have committed terrible evil acts such as mass killings and suicides in order to create a “karma bomb” that would effectually reopen the breach. Despite Jericho’s mission, and the past teams of occultists who have saved the world, Jericho was not formed for this purpose; there’s a whole other backstory for that! This is all just a small piece of the intriguing, bold, and believable story in Jericho. What makes the game so believable, and what I love most about the background story, is that many things are taken from real life people, events, sculpture, etc, and are either taken to another level or put in a different context. If one knows a little bit about anthropology and the humanities it becomes very evident that the writers did their homework.

Not only is the story itself brilliant, but the characters are original and highly developed, having unique relationships with one another and characteristics specific to their personalities, although, unfortunately, this is not revealed very well in gameplay. It’s like when you see a movie that’s based on a book. It may be great as a movie alone but usually a lot of good information can be left out. Jericho tries to circumvent this by putting information about the characters in the extras, which can be unlocked with certain achievements (“get 50 headshots”, or “beat this level on hard”, etc). I think, considering the story might be better suited for a novel, Mercury Steam (the developer) has made it work rather terrifically as a game. And, luckily, some of the extras are unlocked simply by passing a level on any difficulty. What is interesting though is that reading some of the information in the extras can give the player more insight and a greater appreciation for the characters. For example, Father Rawlings is sometimes seen ingame as being particularly protective of Billie Church, and it's revealed in the extras that he spent a lot of time training Billie in particular and helping her overcome psychological traumas. It’s also revealed in the extras that Simone Cole had been diagnosed with autism at an early age. She was asked to join the Jericho squad because of her gifted ability with numbers (her skills the player can utilize all are technologically based). Interestingly, in the game, she is seen exhibiting obsessive compulsive habits and some other mild social traits common to those with autism. This is seen not only in an ingame cinematic but also is subtly evidenced even by her very appearance. She has intricate braids set in her hair and one can only imagine she probably counted each and every knot exactly, row by row. –Perfect, no other type of hair would have been more suitable for this character. The NPCs are also very well developed, each having its own history and reason for being. The boss enemies are among the most interesting, and are some of the most evil looking creatures you’ll have ever seen.

Now then, we’ve covered the plot and characters, let’s get onto the nitty gritty, starting with the visuals. The graphics are pretty good by today's standards. The game seems pretty well optimized too and shouldn't be too hard on your cpu. The bump mapping and specular show in just the right places; surfaces like sand have little specular, but blood and wet rock have a lot more. It can be easy to take this for granted but a lot of games, without naming names (despite the urge), have too much specular or bump mapping on everything, or not enough. And for a game like this, where there is a lot of blood and gore, it's necessary to get this right. Jericho offers a very dynamic POV. To some, the slight, constant movement of the screen might feel awkward at first but you get used to it to a point where it's no longer noticeable (the auto aim helps too though). And even if one finds it annoying it can't be denied that it gives it a very realistic and movie-like feel (as if your character is looking around while listening to others or talking).

With that said, I’d like to segue into gameplay. Some reviewers have complained about the load time—something I entirely disagree with (no one ever complained about the loading in games like Crysis—that’s hella longer than this—oh right, but that was published by EA, oops, sorry, I forgot). The loads are often, but take little time, and they even offer information on the load screens for the player to read to learn more about the story and perhaps feel more immersed in the game. As for the squad mechanic, let's face it, even if you've played other games that gave you the freedom to switch between characters in a squad, it's never had such a good reason as in Jericho; having a soul jump from body to body is a lot cooler and more immersive than simply having the camera change from person to person. Plus the characters don't all feel the same, and while you don't necessarily always need to be switching between them (wouldn't that be annoying?) I think the main reason for it is to give the player options and make him feel more comfortable and unique, not to mention to add to the story.

There is also good voice acting, and this is yet another thing we often can easily take for granted. The shout outs (statements your allies speak when they perform an action or are idle) aren't annoying at all to me as it's not too often you'll hear the same line. I'd often keep my ears open to hear which character was injured; they do a good job at notifying the player of prudent information like that. It is true that they do give hints to the player far too soon, but not too often, so again, you won't be annoyed. Some reviewers, such as Gamespot, have said the script was corny, but I disagree. One thing Gamespot pointed out as corny is when Delgado (a member of the Jericho squad) threatened to eat someone’s soul. I can understand why one would see this as corny, but one needs to realize that the suspension of his disbelief is important in order make the game enjoyable, and this is true for any science fiction work. I mean, come on, the guy has a fire demon housed in his arm. How picky can you be about eating souls when actual demon spirits (and plenty of other paranormal things) exist in this fiction? And the last thing I’ll mention about the script is that the way the characters interact with each other can be funny, but it's not out of place, it serves well as comic relief; this can be appreciated because it’s evident that they are in fact serious when necessary. And hey, if you were battling horrific hellspawn and demons, wouldn’t you want to crack a joke every once in a while so you don’t go out of your mind?


Like most any game, it's not without it's flaws, but Jericho is a brilliant game and has been truly underappreciated by most critics. But if in games you appreciate a well written fantasy fiction with macabre religious and historic overtones, or are simply looking for an exciting fps, you’d definitely get your money’s worth with Jericho, and perhaps a new favorite.

Tuesday, April 14, 2009

Reassessment and Map Review

At GDC 2009 in San Francisco, the most valuable thing I got out of it this year was input from developers on my portfolio. There were some good sessions and super nice people, but, as so many more studios are only hiring experienced developers (a symptom of the economy I assume, as even experienced devs are having trouble finding work this time around) the thing I took most from GDC this year was that I simply need more experience, more work in my portfolio, and more recognition.

The best critique I got on my work was from Jim Hughes, one of Valve’s level designers who is credited for having worked on games like Quake 2, Half-Life 2: Ep1, Portal, Left 4 Dead, and more. I shared with him my completed sa_trainyard Team Fortress 2 map and some concept sketches for other maps I have planned. It was great having the opportunity to sit down with an accomplished developer and bounce ideas off of him. A lot of things he said really helped me, and it wouldn’t have been a critique if what he said didn’t make me think of new ways to improve my technique and better develop my portfolio. And so, without further tarry, I wanted to just briefly review some points that have been made about my sniper map in particular as it is crucial to personal development for one to review his mistakes and learn from them.

One of the first things Jim noticed in my map was a harsh, obvious divide between the Red and Blu bases. He is the first person to really point this out to me, and he noted that although it could be seen as “clever” by some, such a clear, straight divide is visually distracting and disrupts the continuity of the map’s design. He mentioned that Valve makes a point of avoiding such harsh edges or sudden changes in color when laying out their map designs, especially for TF2. Also, because of the way the source engine deals with edges, Valve’s level designers sometimes use things like models to break up the continuity and blandness in sharp, straight edges.

As far as gameplay, froggie, from FPSBanana, mentioned that sniping from the ground outside the bases seemed especially difficult because there aren’t as many angles to snipe from as there are on the upper levels of the buildings and because it’s simply hard to get “a clear shot”. I was a little surprised by this, although I did have an inkling about it. I’ve always sort of seen the outside ground area as, definitely, a less secure place to snipe from as there is not much directly available cover. Therefore I’ve seen it as a place most players would often not venture except to surprise their enemy with a new and unexpected location. At first I wasn’t entirely sure why froggie had trouble getting a clear shot. In development and play testing, I had actually gone through the trouble of building solid brushes inside some of the train models whose bounding boxes were too large, so that the players wouldn’t have their bullets stopping in mid-air. Although, what I figure is the problem is that the trains, used to divide the two bases, block a lot of the player’s line of sight. This is why, in reality, most snipers shoot from high windows and towers. But I notice that most TF2 maps have their ground areas open enough so that snipers can remain at ground level and still have little blocking their view of the incoming enemies. In fact, most sniper maps have the ground level open too. Oops.

A common criticism is the map’s class restriction. Despite the fact that some people do seek out maps such as this, the criticism is wholly valid. It may give players a safe environment to hone in their skills and perhaps learn from other snipers, but it’s ultimately very exclusive. I knew this when I decided to make the map. But I chose this map for two simple reasons: there were no attractive sniper maps (which really bugged me!), and, more importantly, I wanted something basic and small to work on so I could focus more on the visual aesthetic rather than on things like class balancing. But what I really didn’t think about was why this exclusivity was really such a bad thing. As Jim pointed out to me, it forces the map to stay in seclusion, away from a large percentage of players who simply couldn’t care less about sniping (and these players needs loves too). Maps that permit the use of all classes gain far more publicity because they’re simply more in demand and, for an aspiring video game artist, wide spread renown for your work is invaluable.

Therefore I think the best direction I could go in from here would be to begin work on a CTF map I have conceptualized for TF2. I will of course release more information as the project begins to take form. Until then, have a great week!