GIPhil Blog

A Look At Kid Icarus' 3DS Add-Ons

Phil Kollar — Mon, 06 Feb 2012 19:30:00 GMT

A few weeks ago I was able to go hands-on with one of the most anticipated Nintendo 3DS games, Kid Icarus: Uprising. You can check out my impressions of the game in my preview, but one thing that struck me in my hour of playtime was how many optional peripherals gamers will have to choose between while playing. I double-checked with Nintendo to make sure I had all of the facts straight. Here’s what I figured out:

The Nintendo 3DS Stand

As previously reported, this plastic stand will actually come packaged with all copies of Kid Icarus: Uprising. It looks a little goofy, but given the one-handed holding that the game’s control scheme requires, the stand actually makes playing quite a bit more comfortable. The Nintendo representatives I talked to suggested that there seemed to be a 50/50 split between those who enjoyed using the stand and those who preferred to play Kid Icarus without it.

The Nintendo 3DS Circle Pad Pro

The Circle Pad Pro is far from required for Kid Icarus: Uprising, but it is an important addition for gamers of a certain group that I belong to: lefties. The regular control scheme for Uprising – one that I had to accustom myself to during my hands-on demo – is using your left thumb to control movement with the regular analog pad while using the stylus to aim and shoot with your right hand. Attaching a Circle Pad Pro allows left-handed gamers to comfortably use the stylus with their left hand. Unfortunately, I didn’t have a chance to test this myself, and I’m a little concerned about the added weight that the circle pad attachment brings with it. So how about…

Both add-ons together?

According to the Nintendo rep Andrew Kelly, using the stand and the Circle Pad Pro together may "be more challenging" because of the shape of the Circle Pad Pro, but it is possible. With that many add-ons attached at once, I’m starting to get nightmarish visions of the Sega CD and 32X, but it’s possible this will be the best way to play for the subset of gamers that are both left-handed and prefer the 3DS stand.

So which add-ons will you be using when Kid Icarus: Uprising comes out in March?

I Completed 34 Games In 2011

Phil Kollar — Mon, 02 Jan 2012 21:00:00 GMT

Well, that’s another year! And…I somehow just realized that it’s actually been a year since I blogged on here. Whoops! Between tons of work trips, features, Replay and Reiner & Phil videos, and my first cover story, 2011 was an insanely busy year. But in-between all of that work, I still managed to finish a solid 34 games, up three from last year’s 31.

I decided to expand on my list a little bit this year. Below you’ll find each title followed by the primary platform I played it on, my score (what I would have given it on Game Informer’s scale if I didn't officially review it or with a link to the review if I did), and a few sentences of my thoughts.

Dragon Age: Origins
Platform: Xbox 360
My Score: 9.25

I kicked off 2011 with some serious RPGing, finally wrapping up my long-running playthrough of Dragon Age: Origins to prepare for the sequel. Despite some bugginess and a less-than-optimal console port, this really is BioWare at its fantasy finest. Interesting characters, difficult choices, and a complex, tactical combat system.

Dragon Age: Awakening
Platform: Xbox 360
My Score: 9

I actually enjoyed some of the characters and plot hooks in Awakening more than in Origins, but the whole package was definitely even more of a technical mess. Still, I’m really hoping they pick up on some of the plot threads from Awakening in the next Dragon Age game.

Golden Sun: Dark Dawn
Platform: Nintendo DS
My Score: 7.5 (Read my review)

When reviewing this in December, I got to the final boss but realized it was one of the only points in the game where I was actually going to have to grind out some levels before I could win. On one of my many plane trips this year, I did just that, grinding five or ten levels and wrapping the game up. The disappointing ending sets up for a sequel that I don’t exactly have high hopes for. Fun puzzles though!

Dead Space 2
Platform: Xbox 360
My Score: 8.75

I enjoyed the hell out of Dead Space 2, but I didn’t like it quite as much as the original. In particular, I feel like the game gets a little too action-heavy as it progresses, spilling out into some terribly frustrating parts near the end, and I also think the ending wrapped up a little too tidily. For a game that constantly toyed with the main character’s sanity, I would have preferred a more ambiguous ending or at least a cooler final boss.

Ghost Trick
Platform: Nintendo DS
My Score: 8.5

I know Joe didn’t like this game much, but I feel like if you go in with the right mindset, it’s a blast. Recalling old-school adventure games, you move through colorful environments attempting to solve a bizarre murder mystery by manipulating objects as a ghost. You will inevitably run into some puzzles where you have trouble figuring out the right order to manipulate things, and that will lead to replaying segments and fast-forwarding through dialogue. That’s definitely a deal-breaker for some people, but it barely touched this game’s charm for me.

I Completed 31 Games In 2010

Phil Kollar — Mon, 10 Jan 2011 21:20:00 GMT

Around the start of 2010, I noticed something: Several of my friends wrote blog posts covering all of the games that they completed the previous year. I thought this was a fantastic idea but have too horrible a memory (and play way too many games) to have even tried thinking back on everything I finished in 2009. Instead, I immediately started up a word document to keep track of every game I reached the end of (or some approximation thereof) for 2010. Having stuck with it for the whole year, now we all get to reap the benefits. Here’s a look at all 31 games that I saw credits roll on in 2010.

Darksiders (360)

An awesome, entertaining mix Zelda and God of War that got way too much backlash for sticking to those formulas so strongly. This one almost made my top 10 of the year.

No More Heroes (Wii)

A flawed but fun action game. The over-the-top writing was enough to propel me through the bland open world that was lacking in things to do and the annoying, mini-game grind to unlock new bosses.

Dante's Inferno (PS3)

Visceral also attempted a God of War-style game this year, but it suffered from some core design problems as well as an incredibly stupid story that crapped on its namesake. Read my second opinion review.

No More Heroes 2 (Wii)

A huge improvement over the original. Read my review.

Mass Effect 2 (360)

Not only my favorite game of 2010, but quite likely one of my favorite games ever. I was totally engrossed by the massive universe, polished action, and fascinating characters, and the final mission was one of my favorite in any game -- weird final boss aside.

BioShock 2 (360)

I’m one of a handful of GI editors who really enjoyed the hell out of BioShock 2. It wasn’t as ground-breaking as the original, but the addition of dual-wielding abilities added an interesting wrinkle to the gameplay, and I actually liked the focus on more defensive weapons and scenarios. Also, the conclusion was significantly more satisfying than the first game’s.

Heavy Rain (PS3)

I didn’t like Heavy Rain so much as I appreciated it. I have a lot of respect for Quantic Dream and their attempt to focus on story-heavy games. My problem with Heavy Rain was the twist. Like an M. Night Shyamalan movie, Quantic Dreams was more concerned with fooling the viewer than telling a coherent narrative, so they introduced elements that are never explained in a satisfactory manner just to throw us off the trail before the big reveal. Joe once scoffed at me because I said that Heavy Rain insulted my intelligence, but I still feel that way.

Deadly Premonition (360)

A weird, quirky mess of a game that ended up embedding itself in my psyche and sticking around as one of my favorites of the year (thanks in no small part to the unforgettable main character). Read my review.

Metro 2033 (360)

Another great surprise for me. This shooter is very linear, but like the Half-Life series that it so clearly pulls inspiration from, it uses that linear nature to build a fascinating world with action-packed set pieces. Read my review.

God of War III (PS3)

Probably one of my biggest disappointments of the year, although still a great game. I loved God of War III for the eye-popping graphics and insane scope of the battles, but the story left me cold. Even if the plot was limited in previous God of War games, it was enough to drive me forward and make me enjoy Kratos’ rage-filled antics. In his final (?) outing, his anger takes over to a degree that it's at first unlikable and then laughable. Still, you do get to rip a lot of dudes in half, and that’s fun.

Zeno Clash (360)

A strange melee-focused first-person game that left me intrigued and hoping for more. Read my review.

Alan Wake (360)

Though it didn’t quite live up to my expectations -- little can after over five years of build-up and hype -- I still thoroughly enjoyed my time with Alan Wake. I’m just hoping that Remedy is able to create a sequel that builds on this game and answers some of the million questions I had after finishing it.

Red Dead Redemption (360)

One of my top games of the year. Between the incredible ending and the mix of andrenaline-fueled action and mundane every-day tasks from the time period, no other game this year did such an amazing job of creating a world that felt alive.

Super Mario Galaxy 2 (Wii)

Essentially a level pack for the first Super Mario Galaxy, which is easily my favorite 3D platformer of all time. I couldn’t stop smiling while playing this, so I’d be insane not to list it as one of my top 10 of the year.

World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King (PC)

How did I "complete" an MMO, you’re wondering? Well, this year was the first time ever in my six-plus years of playing World of Warcraft that I got into raiding seriously enough to actually beat the "final boss" of an expansion -- in this case, the titular Lich King. It’ll be some time yet before I’m able to do the same for the new expansion, Cataclysm (partially because big bad Deathwing isn’t even in the game yet as a defeatable boss), but now that I’ve got a taste for the glory, you’d better believe I’ll be going for it.

So I Finished Final Fantasy XIII...

Phil Kollar — Wed, 28 Jul 2010 23:23:00 GMT

I have a long history with Final Fantasy games, and an even longer history with putting them off. Like any good RPG, entries in this seminal series from Square Enix tend to be very long. My problem is that I don’t like playing them in short chunks, so until I reach a few weeks-long period where I know I can devote multiple-hour-sessions every night, I often won’t pick up the controller at all.

This would explain why I have only now – four months after its release – finally completed Final Fantasy XIII. Aside from the boring MMO that was Final Fantasy XI, FF XIII is easily the most fascinating anomaly in the main series to me. It is at once the most unique and singular but also the biggest exercise in frustration that has ever carried the Final Fantasy name.

Because of its strangeness, the battle system in XIII takes some time to grow, but once it clicks, it feels amazing. For me, that moment was right around where most of the other elements of the game started feeling great as well: in Chapter 11. The problem? Chapter 11 is a good 30 hours into the game.

Much has been made of the fact that you’ll spend nearly 20 to 25 hours in FF XIII before you’ve finished every tutorial, opened up every battle system, and gained access to every party member and class. This is a serious problem with the game that dragged down my overall experience. I had to fight my own boredom and push through endless corridor after endless corridor for the first two-thirds of the game. It really cannot be stressed enough how much more entertaining things got in Chapter 11, though.

Once you hit this point, the world map opens up. No more being funneled from room to room and cutscene to cutscene. Instead, you’re free to explore a wide open, beautiful expanse and take on hunts similar to those found in Final Fantasy XII. More importantly, the battle system becomes infinitely more exciting, as you can change party members and class setups at will, and you begin to learn some of the most interesting, class-defining powers.

The more that I think about it, the more blown away I am by some of the courageous design choices Square Enix made here. MP is entirely gone. Buffs and debuffs are very necessary (to the point that there are two classes built entirely around them). Your HP is restored to full after every battle. These are major changes to the Final Fantasy formula, huge risks that they could have easily avoided for something safe, but they totally pay off.

FF XIII’s battle system revolves around a mechanic that I don’t believe I’ve seen anything similar to before: the stagger meter. You have two classes -- the commando and the ravager -- whose roles are to build an enemy’s stagger meter by dealing damage. Once the meter is full, the enemy becomes significantly weaker and easier to damage, and some foes can even be launched into the air and juggled so that they don’t even have the opportunity to attack while staggered.

It’s a clever twist on traditional RPG gameplay that, when mixed with the class system, makes for some incredibly fast-paced gameplay. Many of the boss battles become clever puzzles. Do I need to spend time buffing and debuffing in order to succeed? When do I need to switch to my medic/sentinel paradigm to recover? And can I heal up and switch back fast enough to stop the bad guy’s stagger meter from dropping? Experimentation is key, and since you resurrect right before a boss or pack of enemies when you die, annoying deaths that require backtracking are gone, leaving you free to test theories and figure out the right way to win.

When Music Attacks

Phil Kollar — Tue, 11 May 2010 23:30:00 GMT

From Guitar Hero to Space Channel 5, music games are often about the music first. They’re fun because they allow you to interact with established music tied to static, preset gameplay. Beat Hazard takes the opposite approach; though it’s undeniably a music game, it’s about music interacting with dynamic gameplay rather than vice versa. And it’s freaking awesome.

The obvious but almost prerequisite comparison with Beat Hazard is Geometry Wars. Like that modern classic, you use the regular two-stick shooter control method: left analog stick to move, right analog stick to shoot in any direction you point, and the bumper button sets off bombs. And like Geometry Wars, Beat Hazard features some simple but impressive visuals that will stun you just as much as they’ll occasionally obstruct your view. Some gamers might be annoyed by the colorful mess left behind by blown-up enemies and asteroids, but navigating it is all a part of the challenge.

Where does the music come in? In addition to a small selection of tracks that come with the game, you can pull in any audio track you have on your computer. Along with changing the background visualizer, the music you choose will affect when new enemies spawn in the world and even how powerful your weapons are. At a moment in the song where the music drops out entirely, your powerful beam of destruction might temporarily be replaced with the spaceship equivalent of a pea-shooter. When the noise comes crashing in again, you’ll be fully powered up and able to wreak havoc on your opponents.

As you destroy enemies or pull off impressive feats such as surviving for a set amount of time without dying or not shooting for a stretch, you’ll be able to increase your multiplier and see your score rocket into the millions. Blown-up enemies also drop two different power-ups: Power, which causes your bullets to spread out over a wider range, and Volume, which increases the song volume and, as such, the destructive potency of your weapons. You might be tempted to stick to songs that are consistently loud, and certainly this will make the game easier, but the loud/powerful, quiet/weak dynamic makes it more fun to find songs that leap back and forth between those two extremes, temporarily forcing you to survive by the skin of your teeth while you wait for a boost in power.

You can play songs individually or try to survive a whole album full of tracks with limited lives in Survival mode. Whichever game type you choose, your score is tallied at the end and added to an overarching ranking structure that adds a devious level of addictiveness to Beat Hazard. Each rank-up gives you a new bonus, such as more bombs or lives to start the level, or losing less power and volume when you die. These ranks add longevity and a goal to the game -- you need to hit rank 50 just to unlock the highest difficulty setting, where the game gets even better, and this will take most players at least five hours.

Assuming you’ve got a compelling enough discography on your computer, though, the game should stay fresh for that five hours and well beyond. I still love games like Rock Band and DJ Hero and how they teach me to have appreciation for music in a new way, but Beat Hazard offers up something totally different and unique: the ability to take the music I already love and have it influence a game that I’m having a blast with. It’s going to be hard to go back to pressing buttons on a track.

Though I wholeheartedly recommend Beat Hazard to any music enthusiasts who are also fans of Geometry Wars-style dual-stick shooters -- I'd easily give it a 9 if I were doing a proper review -- there are a couple of caveats. In addition to the downloadable PC version, Beat Hazard is available on Xbox Live Indie Games, but the PC version is recommended simply for ease of accessing your music collection. Likewise, though, if at all possible, you should stick to an Xbox 360 or similar dual analog gamepad rather than the mouse/keyboard setup that’s also available for the PC version. And be warned if your music collection mostly comes from iTunes: Beat Hazard supports several song formats, including MP3s, but the .M4A files you get from iTunes do not work at this time.

GI At The Movies: Life 2.0

Phil Kollar — Mon, 22 Mar 2010 14:54:00 GMT

I went into a screening of Life 2.0, a new documentary about the people who obsessively log in to the virtual world Second Life, expecting to laugh. These will be nerds, I reasoned, who are quantifiably nerdier than I am. Instead of laughter, I ended up sitting through the majority of the movie with a sort of quiet anxiety, a thoughtful nervousness at what was transpiring on-screen mixed with a growing desire to get out of the theater as quickly as possible. I found the source of these emotions about halfway through the film when I realized that I had a lot more in common with the people being chronicled on-screen than I wanted to admit.

At several points throughout the film, Second Life in its current state is compared to the Internet back in the early to mid-‘90s. I started using the Internet around 1995 -- just as my age hit double digits -- via a crappy public computer at the small library in my hometown. From the first time I signed on, I was addicted. I would walk to the library nearly every day after school and whenever I could on Saturdays, and I would sign up on a clipboard and be allowed one hour of Internet use before I had to give up the keyboard to someone else. Whenever possible, I would stretch that hour out, stealing extra minutes here and there to spend in a role-playing chatroom I had discovered.

Life 2.0 follows four main characters who have taken role-playing to a level 10-year-old Phil could barely have imagined. A man hides his identity from the camera due to the strangeness of his chosen role in Second Life: as a young girl. A business-savvy woman decides to turn her passion for gaming into a money-maker by creating a popular in-game clothing line. And a couple that finds love in the virtual world learn to deal with the consequences of emotional infidelity from their real-life partners.

That last pair produce some of the most conflicting moments in the film, snippets of a developing romance that are at once moving, hilarious, awkward, and painful. As I watched them play out an incredibly goofy virtual sex scene (complete with whispering sweet nothings that reminded me how stupid flirtation often sounds to a third party), I was able to forget that they are married and have children outside of the game. Like their online passion, though, the buzz cannot last. Much of the real-life portion of the film is devoted to the breakdown of their two families followed by their attempt to build a new life together. For anyone who has gone through a divorce or a difficult break-up or watched their parents do so, these parts of the film come across as brutal reminders of the reality that Second Life users theoretically want to avoid.

That’s the real trick of Life 2.0. I started watching the film believing that virtual reality was an escape from real life and was slowly convinced that, if anything, virtual reality becomes an enhancement for real life, brings out secrets you may not have even realized exist. The man who takes on the role of a young girl in Second Life slowly forces himself to remember trauma from his past. The entrepreneur finds her business struggling in rhythm with the real-world economy. Though I will not spoil the most heartbreaking moment of the film, I will say that it involves the illicit couple. Unsavory acts in real life betray sketchy actions in Second Life betray further questionable motivations in real life. The film leaves it to the viewers to decide if the ability certain people have to quickly change who they are is something inherent to them or something that virtual reality has brought out or at least refined.

The screening of Life 2.0 that I attended was at South by Southwest (SXSW), a huge film, music, and tech conference held yearly in Austin, TX. On my first night at the conference, I marveled at how tech-savvy the crowd was, at how even in the midst of a party, so many people were glued to their cell phones (myself included), constantly checking Twitter, e-mail, and text messages. Sure enough, after the film ended, I saw cell phones quickly begin to light up across the theater (again, myself included). Though the film never explicitly states this, it occurred to me that the dependence many of us have developed for our online identities has become its own kind of second life, one that we are now constantly tethered to via our mobile devices. For better or for worse, more and more people around the world are defined by their virtual interactions.

At one point in the movie, one of the main characters decides to leave Second Life for good, and we get to see reactions of sadness and anger from his online friends. A few months after I'd started visiting that chatroom as a kid, one of the people I'd grown attached to, a 13-year-old girl from across the country (or so she told me), decided she had outgrown the place. At the time, I was devastated by this choice. Though I would forget all about that chatroom and the time I'd spent there within a year, I was crushed to be losing someone I now considered a close friend.

Late in the film, they interview one of the heads of Linden Labs, the company behind Second Life. In discussing the success of their product, he notes how Second Life allows for interactions where people are not at risk of physical harm. If nothing else, the brilliantly-edited Life 2.0 serves as a crucial lesson for this digital age: Though people may only be at emotional risk online, the risk is still very real, and our virtual interactions truly do affect real life.

As of the screening that I attended last week, Life 2.0's creators have not found a distributor for wide release but are actively looking. If you're interested in seeing the film, you can keep up to date on the latest developments on the official Life 2.0 website.

Play BioShock 2 With GI Editors...Tonight!

Phil Kollar — Wed, 17 Feb 2010 23:09:00 GMT

Have you ever wanted to see just how terrible a full-time video game writer can be at online multiplay? Oh boy, am I ever ready to show you.

If you've got a copy of BioShock 2 for the Xbox 360, you can join me and Annette Gonzalez tonight for a multiplayer session. We're going to start around 9 P.M. Central, and we'll go for at least an hour. How do you join in? Watch my twitter account. Around 9 P.M. I'll send out a tweet with my Gamertag. The first 8 people to send me a message will get invited into our party, and we'll start things up.If any people leave, I'll do my best to continue inviting anyone who's waiting.

If you don't make it in, don't get too mad! I'm sure we'll be doing more online sessions for other games in the near future. Hope to see some of you tonight!

Hey, Kids! Comics! Vol. 1: Marvel's Siege Event

Phil Kollar — Wed, 03 Feb 2010 22:26:00 GMT

As one of the handful of Game Informer editors who reads comics seriously -- I'm talking weekly trips to the comic shop seriously -- I've taken it upon myself to start doing some blog posts about comics. No promises about doing this weekly or anything, but whenever I want to geek out about comic stuff, I'll try to get one of these posts up.

First, to give a bit of background: I got into comics in college when I took a part-time job at a local comic shop. This blossomed into a love for the genre to the point where I was ordering tons of comics online and spending hundreds of dollars on comics every week. Then last year after an unfortunate layoff, I had to cut down my spending and, to my great distress, comics were the first thing to go. Thankfully, things have settled down, and I'm now diving back into comics with great enthusiasm.

Except I've hit that problem that anyone who's ever tried to get into comics has: Where the hell do I begin?

Luckily, my timing has coincided perfectly with the launch of Marvel's next big event, Siege, which has proven to be a surprisingly great jumping-on point.

Siege is primarily focused on Norman Osborn (the dude in the middle above), who you may know better as the Green Goblin. Though still struggling with his grip on sanity, Osborn has cast aside the Goblin persona and become a major player in the Marvel universe, single-handedly stopping an alien invasion and being handed leadership of a new band of shady Avengers.

If you're wondering how someone with a record for craziness like Osborn could maintain power without cracking...well, that's where Siege comes in. Now that Osborn's spent about a year's worth of Marvel comics wreaking havoc at the top, it's time for him to come crashing down.

To begin catching up, I purchased the helpful Siege: Prelude trade paperback that was published the same week as Siege #1. This includes issues of Thor, Dark Avengers, New Avengers and more, and by the time I'd read it cover to cover, I felt like I had all the info I needed to understand what has led to this big event.

What's the big event in question? Well, in Siege #1 and Siege: The Cabal, Osborn (under the subtle influence of trickster god Loki) decides to stage a massive tragedy and use it as the motivation for an attack on Asgard. Yes, the very same Asgard that is home to the Norse gods in mythology and home to Thor in the Marvel universe. As you can imagine, this probably won't go over quite so well with the thunder god that we all know and love.

In January, I nabbed the first issue of Siege as well as tie-ins to the New Avengers, Dark Avengers, and Avengers: The Initiative books. Things are just getting started for the four-issue event, but already the battle for Asgard is raging, with Osborn and his Dark Avengers attacking Thor directly with explosive consequences. Even more exciting, the final page of issue 1 hints that the recently returned-from-the-dead Captain America is about to jump into the battle. Siege #2 just hit today, and I can't wait to dig in after work tonight.

Just in case big events aren't your thing, I also got some recommendations from Marvel's own Ryan Penagos. Here's some of the stuff he recommended that I'll be checking out soon:

Ultimate Comics Spider-Man by Brian Michael Bendis - After the Ultimate universe went through some difficult times with the Ultimatum event, Bendis has brought Spider-Man to a new, entertaining status quo, managing to maintain the mix of superhero action and high school drama that made the original Ultimate Spider-Man series so likable.
Invincible Iron Man by Matt Fraction - This second Iron Man ongoing originally launched around the same time as the hit film to capitalize on the movie's success. Fraction, brilliant writer that he is, has given the book a feel all its own, turning Tony Stark away from the annoying, pro-establishment figurehead that he became in Civil War and into a much more complex character.
Wolverine: Weapon X by Jason Aaron - Okay, yes, it's another Wolverine series, but don't hang up the phone just yet. Jason Aaron is one of the most promising comic writers today, and he is working hard to set up Weapon X as more of a stand-alone book with lots of new characters and villains.

I'll let you know my opinions and those and any other comics I happen to check out as I jump into them in the near future. In the mean time, let me know your thoughts on Siege in the comments. I also sat in as a special guest of the Between the Panels podcast this weekend during a special Siege-only episode. Unfortunately, said episode isn't quite out yet, but stay tuned to the Between the Panels Twitter feed for info on when it's released.

Oh, and for the DC fanboys in the audience, I'm also in the midst of trying to catch up on their current big event, Blackest Night. Unfortunately, they're in the latter half of their event right now, whereas Siege is just starting, so it's taking a bit more work to catch up. I'll let you know what I think if/when I do!

Phil Kollar's Personal Top 10 Of 2009

Phil Kollar — Mon, 25 Jan 2010 21:44:00 GMT

So I realize I’m incredibly late to be doing a “Best of 2009” post, but I blame a month of crazy deadlines. With the March issue of the magazine wrapping up production, I’ve finally got a free moment to breathe. Instead of doing that, though, I’m going to take a look at my personal Top 10 of 2009, which was featured in our February issue on “The Editors’ Top 10 Picks” page. As a bonus, I’ve included a couple of honorable mentions that came VERY CLOSE to making my list.

Honorable Mention: Demon’s Souls

I actually feel genuinely bad that Demon’s Souls didn’t quite make the cut for my list. I was a huge supporter of this game both on the staff and in the media in general. But the fact that it missed my top 10 is not a judgment on the game; it’s simply a sign of how many incredible gaming experiences 2009 had. If you’ve ever ached for a Japan-developed RPG that tries something truly unique and if the difficulty doesn’t scare you off, Demon’s Souls is absolutely a must-play game.

Honorable Mention: Retro Game Challenge

A few editors managed to cram Retro Game Challenge onto their top 10s, which made me happy. Behind Dragon Quest V (see below), this is easily the handheld game I spent the most time with in 2009. It managed to totally capture the feeling I had while hiding in the basement as a kid and playing NES games late into the night. Anyone with similar memories owes it to themselves to check out Retro Game Challenge. I’m looking forward to the sequel.

Honorable Mention: Shadow Complex

At E3 2009, I called this "the best new Metroid game announced at E3." With all due respect to the upcoming Metroid: Other M (which I'm still very excited to see more of), I still stand by this statement. Here's hoping that Chair Entertainment's stunning homage leads to more of this style of meaty downloadable game on Xbox Live Arcade, PlayStation Network, and WiiWare.

10. Flower

For as much crap as gamers can talk about Sony -- and believe me, there's plenty -- there are a couple ways in which they unarguably rise above the competition as a console manufacturer. Flower is the perfect representation of Sony's surprising willingness to take chances on games that are more art-house than mainstream, more of a pop experiment than a guaranteed hit. This isn't just limited to downloadables either; for every sure-fire system seller like God of War, there's an intriguing attempt to move the medium forward that could fall flat on its face, like Heavy Rain or The Last Guardian.

Flower, thankfully, does not falter at all. Many have called it the video game equivalent of a poem, the message that creator Jenova Chen drove home during demos. The description fits, but I fear that people are missing the significance of that. Yes, it's short and beautiful and breathtaking, like any good poem should be, but it also has meaning like any good poem. Flower carries a message about nature and its relationship to modern culture, and it does so through some of the most impressive tech we've yet to see in any game.

9. Red Faction: Guerrilla

Now that I think about it, it's kind of depressing that the deep, artistic choice in Flower fell just behind the big dumb summer action game, but...maybe it's not so strange. Like Flower, Red Faction: Guerrilla is a game that knows exactly what it's trying to achieve and goes for it whole-heartedly. It's just that in Flower's case, that point is a serene meditation on nature, and for Guerrilla it's an intense reminder of how awesome it feels to blow stuff up. I was psyched that the first time you drop a building in Guerrilla made our Top 10 Moments of 2009 list, because there really wasn't a more fantastic gaming moment for me all summer.

It's also worth noting the against-the-odds nature of the game's origin. The Red Faction series wasn't an abject failure last generation, but it definitely wasn't triple-A by any means. Still, Volition managed to breathe an amazing amount of life back into the franchise, enough so that I'm really looking forward to seeing what they do with the sequel. This release also cemented my growing respect for THQ as a more serious publisher, something that seems to be continuing into 2010 with games like Darksiders.

8. Dragon Quest V: Hand of the Heavenly Bride

I believe this is the only choice on my list that made no other editor's top 10. The simple reason for this is that the rest of GI's staff are heathens. I'm as tired of JRPG conventions as anyone -- probably more so, since I play so many -- so you can imagine my surprise at a game originally released in 1992 showing me how much joy can still be found within those conventions.

The core combat of DQV is nothing special; it's more or less the norm for the series with some Pokemon-esque monster-collecting thrown in to add a bit of depth. But the plot manages to play with expectations and throw in numerous unbelievable twists and turns while remaining simple and charming. Few games with massive next-gen budgets and a fully-voiced cast can come close to the brilliant storytelling techniques used in Hand of the Heavenly Bride.

7. Borderlands

Borderlands is one of two entries on my top 10 that I actually have not completed yet. However, I have played enough to know how much I completely freakin' love it. This addictive loot-fest from Gearbox continues a trend I've started to notice of developers borrowing liberally from World of Warcraft's design philosophy. From the three-tiered talent tree to the color-coded weapon drops to the just-one-more-then-I'll-quit questing system, Borderlands has plenty. To be honest, that's a brilliant idea, and it paid off. The game sold far better than expected, and a sequel is almost certainly on the way. I expect to see many more games taking similar notes from Blizzard's runaway MMO success in the coming years.

6. Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2

Though I never doubted that it would be in my top 10, Modern Warfare 2 jumped around my list more than any other game. At one point, it was at the top. At another point, it was the very tail end. Eventually I had to settle for a middle spot before I drove myself crazy. All the pre-release controversy aside, the latest Call of Duty brought exactly what the series has become synonymous with: a new batch of some of the most intense, mind-boggling shooter set pieces we've ever seen. Unfortunately, in their attempt to one-up every level from the first Modern Warfare, Infinity Ward crafted a nonsensical plot that seems clearly made solely to justify the big set pieces. That's not necessarily a bad thing, but the faint glimmers of promise hidden in the story segments, the hints that they might have had bigger and smarter ideas in mind, left me a bit disappointed.

But then you throw in an unrivaled multiplayer experience and an extremely difficult but extremely fun co-op mode? That's not even fair. Infinity Ward has once again proven themselves at the head of the class amongst shooter developers. I'm just hoping next time they'll bring in some writing to match their extreme talent at level design, set piece creation, and pure gameplay.

5. Dragon Age: Origins

And here's the second game on my list that I haven't yet completed, but I feel like I have a totally fair excuse: Dragon Age is really damned long! In all sincerity, I feel like between this coming out in November of 2009 and Mass Effect 2 hitting this week in 2010, it's enough to make me question if there is such a thing as too much BioWare. (The answer, of course, is no, but you understand where I'm coming from, I hope.)

My biggest surprise with Dragon Age was just how popular it was. When I heard that BioWare was doing a spiritual successor to the Baldur's Gate games, I knew that I would be really into it, but it also struck me as a very niche title, something that the average mainstream gamer would probably shy away from. Well, thank you, average mainstream gamer, for proving me wrong! BioWare's dark fantasy epic sold strongly, leaving the developer as the most likely choice for best studio at EA in 2010.

4. Assassin’s Creed II

There are an overwhelming number of great features in Assassin's Creed II: the vast recreated cities of Italy, the sheer number of things to do at any one time, the Dan Brown-worthy conspiracy-laden meta-plot that ties everything together, and more. But what truly impressed me was Assassin's Creed II's commitment to improving the problems so many people had with the first game. Ubisoft very well could have simply released a second game that iterated on the first rather than actually building it up. In fact, given Ubi's track record with sequels this generation -- see GRAW to GRAW 2 and Rainbow Six: Vegas to Vegas 2 -- that's absolutely what I expected. And as someone who enjoyed Assassin's Creed 1, I would have been fine with that.

Instead, Ubisoft Montreal took the time and care to get rid of the required repetitive side missions, to make the combat much more complex, and to add in more assassinations, more awe-inspiring set pieces, and more clues to move forward the overall fiction of the Assassin's Creed universe. This wise choice skyrocketed the franchise from a so-so success to the realm of generation-defining must-plays. Now let's hope they don't mess that up by rushing into whatever this new Assassin's Creed with multiplayer is.

3. Uncharted 2: Among Thieves

Now here's a sequel that really was mostly just iteration...but what sweet iteration it was. Naughty Dog, one of my all-time favorite developers, took the Gears of War-inspired shooting and Tomb Raider-inspired platforming and ruin-diving from the first Uncharted and ratcheted up the cinematic awesomeness by approximately 500%. With Uncharted 2's smooth camera and top-of-the-line graphics, there are numerous moments where friends passing by the television might believe you're just watching the latest Indiana Jones flick.

Oh, except it would be a new Indiana Jones flick where the plot doesn't suck. Uncharted's cast of intriguing characters grows in Among Thieves, introducing a couple new likable sidekicks, one British *** that you'll love to hate, and a kind-of-forgettable but workmanlike bad guy. The plot flies all across the world to some insane set pieces -- will anyone ever forget the train chapters? -- at a pace that's comparable to Modern Warfare 2, except that it actually makes sense.

2. Batman: Arkham Asylum

Someone actually made a good Batman game. After letting the shock of that revelation sink in, the next thought hit me even harder: Someone actually made a great Batman game. Rocksteady rose from the depths of obscurity to create what is hands-down the best licensed superhero game I’ve ever played. Taking cues from the Metroid and Zelda games, Arkham Asylum allowed players to step into the black leather boots of Bruce Wayne and explore an island full of secrets and riddles.

I knew Batman would make the upper regions of my top 10 of 2009 when I realized that it was one of the few games that demanded my attention long enough to hunt down and unlock 100% of the game’s secrets. Sure, there were a couple lame boss fights, but hopefully that’s an issue Rocksteady can resolve in the sequel.

1. Infamous

If Batman: Arkham Asylum is the best licensed superhero game ever made, Infamous is without a doubt the best original superhero game ever made. With a fascinating tragic origin story that would fit in perfectly amongst Marvel’s best, protagonist Cole MacGrath and his small band of friends brought a unique and exciting twist to the normal superhero formula. The plot flagged at points, but overall there were just enough twists to keep me hooked, and the M. Night Shyamalan-style WTF ending fully guaranteed my investment in the game’s world.

So why is it number one? As with Arkham Asylum, there was a telltale sign that this was going to be high on my list: Unlike any other open-world game, Infamous compelled me to complete every single side mission possible. And to play through it twice (once as good, once as evil). And to play through on the Hard difficulty setting. If you knew my play patterns, you’d know that this is extremely rare. Infamous is the only game in all of 2009 that I played multiple times and with a focus on getting everything possible out of it. It was just that good.

Game-A-Thon Wrap-Up: Final Fantasy XII

Phil Kollar — Fri, 08 Jan 2010 18:35:00 GMT

As planned in my New Year's resolution blog post, I spent most of last weekend playing through Final Fantasy XII non-stop along with a friend of mine who was visiting and a ton of cool people on Twitter. Although we didn't come close to finishing the game, I definitely mark the experience as a huge success.

Part of the not-finishing problem came from the fact that I kept finding myself easily distracted. I love Final Fantasy games, but I'm not the kind of guy who does every single sidequest. If the FF games had a quest log or something, then I'm sure I'd be obsessive about it, but since it's usually tiny stuff that you need to remember on your own, I ignore them. In FFXII, though, they introduced the Hunt system, which does come with its own handy quest log. So basically, I'm screwed.

I found myself jumping into every Hunt that I could as they opened up to me. If a mark was too powerful at the time I tried to tackle it, I'd just keep throwing myself at it again and again until I figured out a trick to defeating the beast. The only Hunts I was able to set aside (FOR NOW) were the special marks handed out by the clan. Those guys clearly require a level of preparation and grinding that I wasn't quite ready for. But I will be back for them.

These Hunts are well-serviced by the incredibly massive landscapes present in Final Fantasy XII. The game doesn't have an overworld like most Final Fantasy games, but it also manages to avoid FFX's linear feeling. I've heard from others who are bothered by the openness and lack of direction in some of the game's huge zones, but I totally loved it. The large open areas provide both an interesting space for these bonus activities to take place and a sense of a huge world that's not just there for your grand adventure.

At the end point of the game-a-thon on Sunday night, I had logged just under 15 hours. Not bad for two days! For those familiar with the game's area progression, I'm currently in the Nam-Yensa Sandsea. I'm hoping to hold onto this momentum and ride it to completion before March (when Final Fantasy XIII comes out), but it's going to be a challenge considering how many incredible games are releasing in January and February. I'll just need to keep reminding myself of my resolution.

One thing is certain though: I definitely want to do more of these weekend gaming events. Playing along with a bunch of people through Twitter was an amazing experience. We all exchanged thoughts about the game, gave each other tips on where to go and what to do next, and just generally had a fun time discussing and sharing our experiences. I want to make that happen again, and I'll definitely be planning some stuff for the future with my pkollar_live account.

Until then, I want to send out a huge thanks to the following Twitter-folk who played or commented along using the #ff12live hashtag: @delerat, @Jeremy_Lamont, @KyleHorner, @V_Ben, @John_Carson, @EbbFlowe, @ververdan, @neurotech, @cselogy, @defteats, @Albedo12, @Coltonio, and @NikkiAndrews. You were a blast, and I hope you'll join me for whatever the next game-a-thon is!

My New Year's Gaming Resolution: Filling In The Gaps

Phil Kollar — Mon, 28 Dec 2009 22:00:00 GMT

Most everyone is familiar with the idea of a New Year’s resolution, but for the last few years I’ve tried to create very specific gaming resolutions to attempt to live up to. For example, two years ago my resolution was to have purchased every current-gen console and handheld by the time 2009 rolled around (and I succeeded!). This past year I vowed to actually open and play a significant portion of every game I purchased (uh…not so successful with this one). Over the last week, as I relaxed with family for the holidays, I racked my brain to come up with a worthy resolution to kick off a new decade.

Last night, as I finally got around to playing Left 4 Dead -- a series I had sadly mostly missed out on until now -- I stumbled onto the perfect New Year’s gaming resolution. In 2010, I am going to devote a steady portion of my gaming energy into catching up on games and series that are woefully lacking in personal play time.

That there is such an overabundance of amazing games to play is both the gift and curse of being a gamer. As somebody who writes about games for a living, it’s extremely easy to get caught in a cycle of only playing the latest titles and pretty much ignoring any game that I don’t get to within the first month of release. If I’m not seeing a game months in advance, I’m reviewing it. And if I’m not reviewing it, I’m probably trying to play whatever everybody in the office and online is talking about. It’s a vicious cycle that often leaves little time to fill in those troublesome gaps in my gaming knowledge.

But when I read our top 200 games of all time list in issue 200, I felt that familiar desire to expand my “games completed” list. It happened again when I helped work on our top 50 games of 2009 (which you’ll be able to check out in issue 202). Finally being able to devote some time to Left 4 Dead and the original Banjo Kazooie on XBLA this past week cemented in my realization: I need to find more time to play games that I’ve missed.

So how will I find the time for this addition to my already gaming-heavy lifestyle? That’s a good question that I’ll probably spend a nice chunk of 2010 trying to answer. I can say this for sure though: I’m going to get started right away!

Which brings me to: The First Annual Phil Kollar New Year’s Weekend Game-a-thon.

Of all the games I’ve started and never finished, the most shameful for me is Final Fantasy XII. The thing is, I completely loved FFXII for the 10 or 15 hours that I played it in the month after it was released back in 2006. The story was mature, the battle system was interesting, and the huge open world and quest system reminded me of the things I love about MMOs melded into everything I want from a Final Fantasy. In fact, I loved the game so much…that I stopped playing it.

See, FFXII was released right when I’d started writing about games more seriously, and with so much other stuff on my plate at the time, I decided to set it aside until I could really devote some time to it. It was a game I wanted to appreciate on every level, for all it could offer, and that meant playing FFXII solely for at least a couple of weeks. Maybe that would happen during my winter break from college that year? Or the coming summer? Or…

Yeah, it never happened. So despite being an adamant defender of Final Fantasy XII, I’ve yet to actually complete the game. That will change starting this weekend.

Beginning on Saturday, January 2 and continuing through Sunday and Monday (with breaks for sleep and work), a friend and I will begin a marathon session of Final Fantasy XII. It’s unlikely that we’ll finish the whole game over the weekend, but I’m hoping it will give me the momentum I need to propel me toward completing it before the looming behemoth of Final Fantasy XIII drops in March.

Do you also need to complete FFXII? Want to join in? You should! I’ll be live-tweeting the Game-a-thon on my pkollar_live Twitter account. I’ll be using the hashtag #ff12live for all posts related to the game, and I’d love to have others joining in as well!

What are your gaming resolutions for 2010? What games or series that I might have missed should I make sure to catch up on over the course of the next year?

How Blizzard Has Made World Of Warcraft Better Than Ever

Phil Kollar — Tue, 15 Dec 2009 21:58:00 GMT

Last week, on the day that Blizzard launched patch 3.3 for World of Warcraft, I spoke with their lead world designer, Alex Afrasiabi, about some of the major changes coming to the game from the patch. Of all these huge additions, though -- three new linked five-man dungeons, a new 10- or 25-man raid, the chance to finally fight and defeat the eponymous Lich King -- one feature came out of nowhere as the stand-out improvement that everyone is talking about: the Dungeon Finder.

I'm going to try my best to explain this to non-World of Warcraft fans, but first it's necessary to have an understanding of how dungeons work in the game. Yes, World of Warcraft is a massive open world teeming with Blizzard's huge fanbase of loyal subscribers, but you won't find those masses of player-controlled Blood Elves and Orcs in dungeons. Instead, the game's dungeons are instanced; when you and your party enter, you get to fight the dungeon's bosses and get their loot all by yourselves.Of course, these dungeons also have beefed-up opponents, so it's generally a requirement that you get together at least five people if you want to be successful.

Before patch 3.3, gathering that group of players was kind of a pain. If you happened to be in a fairly sizable guild, that made things easier, as you could just recruit fellow guild members who you know and trust. However, if you weren't in a guild or no one else was online when you wanted to do a dungeon, you'd have to go to a capital city (usually located nowhere near the dungeon itself) and begin shouting in public chat that you were looking for a group. After yelling for 5 minutes to find three damage dealers and a good 15-20 minutes to find a tank and a healer (essential to any group but quite a bit more rare), you'd finally trudge to the dungeon, only to find out half of the time by the first boss fight that this group sucks.

The annoyances of this process have been nearly completely eliminated with the Dungeon Finder. Now you simply choose what dungeon you want to run (or a random dungeon) and what role you'll play (damage dealer, healer, or tank). You're instantly added to a queue that pulls players from across multiple servers to help decrease the amount of time it takes. If you're a damage dealer, you'll usually find a full party within five minutes; as a healer or tank, it's often instant. And once your party is full, you're automatically teleported into the dungeon, so even if you discover that they're awful, you can abandon ship and get another group going as quickly as it takes to click a few buttons and sit in the queue again.

So essentially, World of Warcraft now has a PvE matchmaking system to go alongside its PvP matchmaking system. Your party even gets a buff to damage and healing when you use the Dungeon Finder, helping to ensure the best possible results.

How has the Dungeon Finder feature been received by WOW players? It seems like both critics and the community in general are very happy. As WOW.com reports, there are a handful of minor bugs and complaints that Blizzard can use to improve the service in the future, but thus far everyone seems pleased.

Personally, I'm downright giddy. My guild is rather small, so a lot of times when I log on hoping to run a quick dungeon, I won't have any friends available to join me. Now I have a guarantee that I can log on for 30 or 40 minutes and get a dungeon finished, collect some badges, and be done for the night. I know several friends who had canceled their accounts who are resubscribing in part because of this new feature, and though I had not stopped playing, I can already tell I'm going to be playing a lot more in the coming months thanks to the Dungeon Finder's ease of use.

Have we ever had a developer so unbelievably tuned in to the community and the small features they can create that will keep people playing (and having fun) with their games?

That Modern Warfare 2 Video And The Insanity Of Social Media

Phil Kollar — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 00:13:41 GMT

It's been a strange weekend.

I'm certainly familiar with the power of Twitter. After all, as my bio on the site states, I hooked up with the fine men and women of Game Informer via Twitter. In some ways, I very much owe my current job to that 140-character-focused site, so its reach and ability to actually affect things should not surprise me.

Still, I use Twitter the way most people do: to spout off my opinions on whatever games I've been playing, movies I've been watching, books or articles I've been reading, or on whatever else the hot news of the moment is. I try to make those opinions entertaining and well-informed, but they are still opinions.

On Friday night, Infinity Ward posted a humorous video on their official YouTube channel as part of the push toward the release of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2. I arrived home late Friday evening and noticed the video via a few Twitter posts that linked to a Kotaku story about it. I clicked through and watched.

My initial reaction to the video was as such: I found the use of "pussies" as an insult lame but shrugged it off. Most of the video was pretty funny. The concept -- a popular sports star speaking out against grenade spam in the game -- is actually excellent and ripe for comedy. And I laughed as he got tagged by a barrel-full of grenades and blew up. Then came the voice at the end: "This ad brought to you by Fight Against Grenade Spam." Many people commenting on YouTube and Kotaku quickly picked up on the carefully accented reading of the name that highlighted this organization's offensive acronym.

Before I get into why this specific instance irked me, I want to clarify that I do not at all consider myself a proponent of political correctness. Most people who know me personally would burst into laughter if you suggested such a thing. I think it's possible to take even the most seemingly awful words and phrases and, with the right context, turn them into comedy. But context is extremely important, and context is why I was not amused by this video.

The context for Infinity Ward is that online multiplayer is a huge focus for their Modern Warfare series. They have been extremely successful with building a huge community of avid players. But that community, as with Xbox Live and many other multiplayer experiences in general, contains a lot of assholes. While I firmly believe (and hope) that those players are not the majority of the community, they are certainly the loudest, and the acronym from that video is one of their most frequently-used rallying cries.

One common argument is that "f--s" is somehow no longer hate-speech because when people online use it, they're just using it as a replacement for idiot or moron or a million other interchangeable words. While I certainly respect the ability of the English language to morph and change, I disagree with this assessment. The unfortunate truth is that we still live in an America where this word is commonly used as hate-speech. Using it as a replacement for calling someone an idiot just heightens that hate-speech.

Gaygamer.net writer VorpalBunny has a far more suitable and poignant write-up on the power of this word for some people than I could hope to provide. Check it out on his blog. There's also a fantastic blog post on the topic from my fellow Game Informer editor Meagan VanBurkleo. Another friend gave me her opinion on the matter in a conversation on Saturday: "I am so over the homophobia. It's what keeps me away from shooters. I loved Counter-Strike for a month or two when I was 16, but finally gave the f--k up because of this s--t."

Now the truth is that Infinity Ward can't do much about this part of their community. It's a pretty impossible task to monitor this behavior in such a huge game, and they don't necessarily need to. However -- and this is why I think the video was such a bad idea -- I think it would be extremely stupid for Infinity Ward to condone that part of the community. I was not upset just because the word was used in a humor video; as I said above, I think it's possible for any word or phrase to be used in comedy if handled correctly. But this video's handling was not terribly funny, and more importantly, by Infinity Ward using that word in an "official" video, they were more or less giving the rogue elements of their community a thumbs up, a sort of "Yeah, we get that joke too! Keep it up!" I very much doubt that was Infinity Ward's intention, but with the way the joke was handled in the video, it was certainly how a lot of viewers and commenters on YouTube and other sites were interpreting it.

So with all of that in mind, I posted my opinion on Twitter: "F--S? Pussies? Seriously, Infinity Ward? This makes me want to not purchase MW2 way more than any other controversy." Later I posted a link to the Sarcastic Gamer write-up of the video as well, since that story's writer, Lono, is one of the least PC-concerned guys I know, and he still thought the video was a terrible idea. I spent a couple hours debating back and forth with some of my Twitter followers, and then I went to bed.

On Saturday evening, after Halloween festivities, I found out that the video had been pulled. Infinity Ward creative strategist Robert Bowling had replied to my concerns on Twitter: "I think it was more of a social commentary joke of that stereotype than it was a fist-bump of acceptance to it."

I responded: "I respect it if that's what you were going for, but it totally didn't come off as such." His next post was his decision to pull the video.

Here's an important point of distinction I'd like to make: While I stated my distaste for the video very clearly, and I was happy to hear Bowling's response, I did not once ask for the video to be taken down. That was a decision Bowling and Infinity Ward made entirely on their own. I have no interest in censoring people or telling them what they can or cannot say. I just also don't plan to censor myself when I have a negative opinion of something someone has said.

After the video was pulled, Destructoid and Kotaku posted write-ups wherein they pointed to me and my friend Mitchell Dyer as two of the primary voices that got the video taken down. We were singled out both for having clearly-stated opinions and because Bowling had responded to our tweets specifically. While both of these news posts were well-written and covered the topic well, it was a bit frustrating to realize that they didn't make it clear that I had not in any way asked for Infinity Ward to remove the video. This meant my Sunday was a flood of hate mail/hate-Tweets from people who seem to believe that I single-handedly crawled into the bowels of YouTube and removed the video myself.

An excellent post on The Brainy Gamer about the video sums up the situation from Infinity Ward's point of view: "Infinity Ward (owned by Activision) is plugging into a real and widespread cultural pushback occurring among young American men. It's cool at the moment to be an insensitive jerk. Empathy and understanding are out. Tough guys with smirks on their faces are in. Infinity Ward knows this because it's their business to know. " He's absolutely right. However that insensitive jerk thing isn't me, so if I'm being oversensitive just by stating my opinion, then so be it. I'd rather be honest about thinking something is stupid than hold back out of fear that some random Xbox Live idiots will be angry with me.

To his own credit, Robert Bowling provided the following explanation for the video in an e-mail to me:

"There is a production group that is working on a new series that is part live action and part taking place 'inside' Modern Warfare 2. The project, while containing Modern Warfare 2 assets and partially being created in-game for certain scenes, is actually unrelated to Infinity Ward or the game directly. Most importantly, this video was not intended as an official trailer or advertisement for the game, hence no branding, logos, or even mention of the game. A confusion I take blame for as it WAS posted on the Official Infinity Ward YouTube which made it seem that way. However, I endorsed the video via my Twitter and therefore endorse the content of the video, so any criticism justly rests on me for that and why I pulled the video.

"This specific clip, which isn't part of the upcoming series, but was more of a proof of concept for the in-game portion of the series that they sent over for us to check out. The premise was hilarious, Cole Hamels speaks out against random grenades, and how they're a cheap tactic. Something a lot of players in our community can appreciate. The concept was hilarious, which is why I decided to share it with our fans and community via Twitter. Regretfully, by doing so, it came off as an endorsement of derogatory statements which was not the intent of the video or my intentions in sharing it."

So I posted an opinion on a developer-endorsed video without expecting or necessarily wanting any action to be taken, that opinion was a minor part of the video being taken down, and then I got credited with it and a bunch of people think I demanded it get taken down. The web of social media becomes more intricate and difficult to unravel every day.

But despite the stream of vitriol from some people, I've also had some genuinely positive interactions come from all of this. Several people who disagree with my opinion on the video actually took the time to ask me about it instead of just hurling insults. I went back and forth with one cool guy on Twitter until we agreed to disagree but had come to a mutual respect for each other. Likewise, a Game Informer community member sent me a private message on the site and gave me the chance to explain my point of view rather than just writing me off. And, yes, my interactions with Robert Bowling both on and off Twitter have been very pleasant.

For as much confusion as modern-day technology-infused interactions can cause, there's clearly also a lot of room for real connection. If we can all step back from calling each other unnecessary names and spamming grenades for a moment, at least.

Closing note: For what it's worth, I am still planning to buy Modern Warfare 2. I've managed to mostly avoid spoilers for the game and look forward to experiencing it for myself. The online part? Eh...we'll see.

What I've Been Watching: Let's Play Cat Mario

Phil Kollar — Tue, 13 Oct 2009 18:48:49 GMT

TV shows about video games -- heck, video programming about games in general -- have always struggled to find an audience. The common argument goes something like this: Gamers would rather be playing games than watching stuff about them or watching other people play. It makes sense. Actually wrapping our hands around a controller and jumping into the action is the sensation the whole medium is based around.

That said, I disagree entirely. It's totally possibly that I'm in the very small minority here (and let me know in the comments if you think I am!), but I find a weird inherent pleasure in watching someone else play a game, in getting to see them learn and make mistakes and overcome obstacles the same way I would. Maybe it's just a sense of connection, a feeling that yes, this person too understands the joy in the experience of stretching your virtual imagination, of encountering digital problems and conquering them. Or maybe I'm just a sick voyeur.

Whatever it is, I find myself getting into moods where I really enjoy watching other people play. Thankfully there's a niche YouTube sensation that caters just to me: the Let's Play series of videos, which apparently started a few years ago on the Something Awful forums (according to Wikipedia, at least). This series, which is done by a ton of different posters, is basically just videos of people doing playthroughs of game with voiceover commentary as they play. And I freakin' love it.

Here's a six-part Let's Play that I watched today on what the poster calls "Cat Mario" (although I don't think that's the actual title), a super-brutal Mario clone that toys with expectations that have been drilled into gamers' brains since the NES days. Try to forgive the dude's heavy accent -- I think he's Swiss -- and just sit back and enjoy a gamer dealing with frustration and learning the rules of a very messed up game.

Part 1: The Cruelness Begins

(Please visit the site to view this media)

Part 2: Raped By A Goal