(Earlier this week, I posted a review of Metal Gear Solid V in which I avoided spoilers. Here, I’ll discuss the story and it’s surprises in far more depth. This post will contain significant spoilers for the game, and is recommended only for people who are aware of its secrets)

Metal Gear Solid V’s story is a complete mess of disparate plotlines. Series director Hideo Kojima was likely well-aware that this would be his final Metal Gear title, so he engaged with every major idea he could. The power of language, English as a symbol of assimilation, the formation of private military forces, the origin of the Les Enfants Terrible project (the one that birthed Solid and Liquid Snake), early Metal Gears, the dilemma of what to do with child soldiers, the futility of revenge; all are focuses of Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain, yet rarely do they cross over into anything coherent.

Cassette tapes try to make sense of how selling remote-triggered nuclear warheads to foreign nations has anything to do with a planned attack on cultural assimilation via a plague of English-language attacking lung parasites, but try as the writers might, they never truly make the ideas come together into a cohesive plan. Nor does Skullface’s existence have anything to do with child soldier Eli, or how he’s a clone of player character Big Boss (or IS he?…more on that below), or the psychokinetic Third Child, or the reanimated fiery corpse of Metal Gear Solid 3 antagonist Volgin, or the ridiculous twist ending.

Continue reading A Deep Dive Into the Story of Metal Gear Solid V →

At the end of this week, I will be attending TwitchCon, a convention which exists to bring together people who stream themselves playing video games for online audiences. When I was growing up, I wasn’t aware that this could even be a profession, or that there would be any interest whatsoever in watching other people play games. I wouldn’t have understood it, and I’m not certain that I understand it now. However, I’ve been doing it for the better part of this year in some form or another, so it certainly intrigues me.

The conclusion that I’ve come to is that the success of Twitch and game-streaming, particularly live-streaming, is actually a strong reflection of the medium. When you look at other popular mediums, such as film, television, print, and music, there are always fans and critics who adore and consume media with a voraciousness and complexity that supercedes the average consumer. These are the diehards, the ones who meet in coffee houses, or in book clubs, or on internet forums to discuss in-depth how a piece of art or entertainment made them think or feel.

Continue reading TwitchCon and the Rise of a More Interactive Fan Community →

As I write this, I am in the middle of watching Gamescom coverage, tracking all of the huge announcements coming out of Germany this week. With the proliferation of live streaming video and the endless cycle of user-generated hype, major game publishers are beginning to realize that just focusing on one major event each year (E3) is a missed opportunity. Microsoft, in particular, has subscribed fully to this belief by saving some of its biggest 2016 titles, like Quantum Break and Scalebound, for Gamescom. This lets them keep the hype-train running months after E3’s momentum has died down, leading right into the holiday season.

For now, this seems like an excellent strategy. Microsoft’s Gamescom conference was packed wall-to-wall with great-looking game demos and exciting announcements, building up fan anticipation that should lead right into the holiday season. This year seems to be the sweet spot for this strategy; after all, Sony has to stay competitive. Xbox fans will be dominating the online conversation for some time, acting as an echo chamber, building on the hype that Microsoft generated earlier this week. Sony can’t stay away from that next year.

Continue reading Gamescom and the Industry of Hype →

When Sony moved to make Playstation Plus mandatory for Playstation 4 online play, they knew it was going to be an unpopular move. The way they broke the information in the middle of their legendary 2013 E3 presentation was pure industry slight of hand. Playstation fans were too excited about Sony’s big announcements, including the PS4 price point and Sony’s commitment to physical game trading, to pay much attention to a single bullet-point listing “Online Play” as a benefit of Playstation Plus. But after a few days, the fanbase began to catch on, and not everybody was happy that the Playstation Network was now modeling itself off of Microsoft’s Xbox Live.

However, as Microsoft started giving free games to its Xbox Live Gold subscribers and Sony made their free-game service an online subscription, a funny thing happened to both platforms: their communities became stronger. On the Playstation 3, the Plus members were a small subset of the community, and many of the games that were given away for free had been available for years before. But on PS4, where most owners were subscribers out of necessity and the titles given away each month were new, many players found themselves playing the same new games on a monthly basis.

Continue reading Rocket League, or How I Learned To Stop Worrying and Love Mandatory Subscription Services →