Yesterday I watched the first episode of "The Walking Dead". I have always been a fan of zombies (although they are getting quite overused these days) but I'm also very wary of recent American dramas. When I watched "The Walking Dead", and suddenly found myself hurling heavy and sharp objects at my TV, screaming at the writers and cursing the series to hell, I finally realized why: It's inconceivable for any American Series, be it period-piece, modern drama, science fiction or fantasy, to be centered around ANYTHING except people cheating on their spouse.
They can't help it. It has to come to the forefront. "I am a high-ranked publicity firm director in the '50s? Of course I cheat on my wife." "Cylons everywhere? Well I'll cheat on my super hot wife and/or husband." "Zombie apocalypse? Let's blow my husband's best friend. After all, I haven't seen my husband in a few days, so fuck it." Is it even remotely possible for them to not have this as the main plot point? Is it a marketing thing? "The female demographic we try to reach needs this gossip/cheating mechanism to get hooked. You have to throw this in. Also, it has to be in the first episode. Chop! chop!".
It sucks, because if used properly, it can become a very powerful element of a well thought-out series. Captain Sheridan's wife in Babylon 5, for example. How that works out. Very mature, very human.
Now it's just part of a marketing checklist. These current-generation characters are supposed to be more real because they're flawed. But once the way flaws are inserted becomes so obvious, they become as fake as the over-the-top heroes of the golden days.
And don't get me started on how this pattern is poisonous for real life human relations. Because if all TV characters cheat on their spouse, what do you think YOUR mate is doing when he or she spends more than 5 minutes away from your sight?
Fuck it. I'll just watch Life on Mars, Ashes to Ashes or Fullmetal Alchemist again.
Showing posts with label rant. Show all posts
Showing posts with label rant. Show all posts
2010/11/28
2010/07/24
Supreme Commander II: Final Thoughts
So despite my previous post I ended up finishing Supreme Commander II. The thing about modern RTS is that they assume you're playing the campaign as a sort of training for your eventual online multiplayer annihilation. A completely false assumption in many cases, but nonetheless it means the single-player campaign is relatively short. So I played through it.
I don't hate Supreme Commander II as much as I did originally. It still has some of the ingredients that made Total Annihilation a classic and Supreme Commander I the last great RTS.
The physics-based movement and combat of Total, which even in 1997 made Starcraft look completely obsolete and even puts the as-of-yet-unreleased Starcraft II to shame, is still present.
The story is another positive. Although not as deep and intriguing as Total Annihilation: Kingdoms, is still leagues beyond the previous Supreme and Total before them.
Still, so many efforts were put to dumb down this series. Efforts like unit type reduction and the removal of the crucial factory automation process. Efforts that do nothing to deepen or streamline the experience, but just serve to increase the clicks-per-minute numbers to a pathetic Starcraftesque level.
Final thoughts? You can't win against Starcraft, as bad as that game was and as bad as the second one will be. The crowds will flock to it, buy it, love it. So why change course to match this mundane-magnet? You want their endless supply of money? You ain't getting it. And you're turning your niche against you.
I don't hate Supreme Commander II as much as I did originally. It still has some of the ingredients that made Total Annihilation a classic and Supreme Commander I the last great RTS.
The physics-based movement and combat of Total, which even in 1997 made Starcraft look completely obsolete and even puts the as-of-yet-unreleased Starcraft II to shame, is still present.
The story is another positive. Although not as deep and intriguing as Total Annihilation: Kingdoms, is still leagues beyond the previous Supreme and Total before them.
Still, so many efforts were put to dumb down this series. Efforts like unit type reduction and the removal of the crucial factory automation process. Efforts that do nothing to deepen or streamline the experience, but just serve to increase the clicks-per-minute numbers to a pathetic Starcraftesque level.
Final thoughts? You can't win against Starcraft, as bad as that game was and as bad as the second one will be. The crowds will flock to it, buy it, love it. So why change course to match this mundane-magnet? You want their endless supply of money? You ain't getting it. And you're turning your niche against you.
2010/06/27
Rant: Supreme Commander II killed Total Annihilation.
When Total Annihilation came out, it made me look away from every other RTS games for good. Many reasons for that, not the least of which was killed by Supreme Commander 2.
I thought TA, and later SC, was putting the strategy in RTS, while Starcraft and others focused on quick-clicking micro-management. I call typical RTS games "clickfests". It's not so much about having a good strategy, as it is about clicking on the right unit with the right timing to unleash the right power. You're not the general of a competent army, but the mom of a bunch of 2 year-old who won't do a god damn thing unless you tell them to.
Where TA and SC shined was in production management. Factories had orders: Build this, deploy there. All of that packed in a nice queue, which could become endless in SC with queue looping. Once a factory is set, you can forget it for the rest of the game, and focus on strategy instead. As is it in real life, nothing is prepaid. You must supply as units are built. If supply is insufficient, production pauses and then resumes automatically as resources become available. It's very streamlined, very realistic and very good.
Now Supreme Commander 2 comes along, and all of a sudden I'm staring at a generic RTS which I thankfully bought on sales on Steam and not full-priced. I will most likely not play it again after mission 3. In SC2, everything must be prepaid. So if, for example, I want my air factory to make 5 fighters, then 1 bomber, then loop, I have to pay for all 5 fighters and 1 bomber IN ADVANCE. But it's ok right? Once you can afford 1 iteration of the loop, you can loop it and it's set for the rest of the game right? Nope. If at any time you run out of resources, the factory will shut itself down, never to resume production again unless you get off your general's chair and start wearing your industry leader hat, personally walking into the factory and flip the fucking on-off switch yourself.
TA and SC, contrary to all other RTS, made me focus on strategy and planning instead of constant click-festing and micromanaging a bunch of children. It was about shifting battle lines. Now all of that is gone.
And when the enemy punctures through your eastern front and leaves you scratching your head as to how they could have succeeded, you'll realise with horror all your factories have been shut down for 10 minutes and you're sitting on the biggest pile of money in the universe. All useless. Because you were busy taking care of your western front (the actual strategic warfare portion of the game, the fun part), and because the factory heads are complete retards now, you lose.
I don't know if it's the bad influence of Square Enix, but it appears in trying to bow down to pressures to go mainstream, the franchise has killed what made it special.
I thought TA, and later SC, was putting the strategy in RTS, while Starcraft and others focused on quick-clicking micro-management. I call typical RTS games "clickfests". It's not so much about having a good strategy, as it is about clicking on the right unit with the right timing to unleash the right power. You're not the general of a competent army, but the mom of a bunch of 2 year-old who won't do a god damn thing unless you tell them to.
Where TA and SC shined was in production management. Factories had orders: Build this, deploy there. All of that packed in a nice queue, which could become endless in SC with queue looping. Once a factory is set, you can forget it for the rest of the game, and focus on strategy instead. As is it in real life, nothing is prepaid. You must supply as units are built. If supply is insufficient, production pauses and then resumes automatically as resources become available. It's very streamlined, very realistic and very good.
Now Supreme Commander 2 comes along, and all of a sudden I'm staring at a generic RTS which I thankfully bought on sales on Steam and not full-priced. I will most likely not play it again after mission 3. In SC2, everything must be prepaid. So if, for example, I want my air factory to make 5 fighters, then 1 bomber, then loop, I have to pay for all 5 fighters and 1 bomber IN ADVANCE. But it's ok right? Once you can afford 1 iteration of the loop, you can loop it and it's set for the rest of the game right? Nope. If at any time you run out of resources, the factory will shut itself down, never to resume production again unless you get off your general's chair and start wearing your industry leader hat, personally walking into the factory and flip the fucking on-off switch yourself.
TA and SC, contrary to all other RTS, made me focus on strategy and planning instead of constant click-festing and micromanaging a bunch of children. It was about shifting battle lines. Now all of that is gone.
And when the enemy punctures through your eastern front and leaves you scratching your head as to how they could have succeeded, you'll realise with horror all your factories have been shut down for 10 minutes and you're sitting on the biggest pile of money in the universe. All useless. Because you were busy taking care of your western front (the actual strategic warfare portion of the game, the fun part), and because the factory heads are complete retards now, you lose.
I don't know if it's the bad influence of Square Enix, but it appears in trying to bow down to pressures to go mainstream, the franchise has killed what made it special.
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