Saturday, November 2, 2019
Modern Warfare 2019
By: Patrick "TheLaw" Morris
Call of Duty is one
of the video game industries most polarizing series. The games are played by
both the extremely hardcore competitive gamer type and the most casual "I
only play COD and Madden" frat bro type. For that reason Call of Duty holds
a truly unique and nearly bulletproof position in the video game industry
having only been toppled from the best selling game of the year twice since
2009: in 2013 by Grand Theft Auto 5, and 2018 by Red Dead Redemption 2. But
like every other icon of pop culture it seems as though the best days of Call
of Duty are in the rear view mirror. Call of Duty has been an annualized
franchise longer than most; and in the past few years the campaign offerings
have begun to lean on nostalgia. Modern Warfare 2019 attempts to ride the
audiences nostalgia for its namesakes trilogy in the same way 2017's World War
2 did with the world war 2 shooter genre, but the combination of the
familiarity of its gameplay and proximity to its predecessor makes for an
aggressively mediocre COD experience.
Welcome welcome
welcome everyone welcome back to LegalSpeak a ColdNorth Production. I'm
TheLawMorris and this is the video essay series in which I get to talk about
the games I've been playing and what I think of the medium as a whole. I was
supposed to be talking about Gears 5 this week but then someone told me to
check out the new Modern Warfare game because the campaign was "the best
campaign since the original Modern Warfare trilogy" so here we are.
Another year and another Call of Duty, let's talk about Modern Warfare.
Spoiler alert: I
will be discussing what some might consider some major spoilers for Modern
Warfare 2019 so if you haven't played it and you're going to you should mute
the video but make sure to leave it playing so that my watch time goes up. Also
a quick disclaimer: this video is about the Call of Duty campaign. I don’t play
Call of Duty for the multiplayer so hopefully that’s not what you came here for
or else you should prepare yourself for disappointment. Let's get to it.
To be clear: I
absolutely don’t think Modern Warfare 2019 is a bad game. It's perfectly
competent in some areas and down right good in others. I don’t want to sound to
negative on the game so lets get started with what this game does right.
Weapons are fantastic, there are so many different weapons and different
combinations that can be used to completely change the way a combat scenario is
approached. If you want to hang back and pick your enemies off one by one
that’s great you can use Hadir's Sniper Rifle for that. If running in guns
blazing Terminator style is more your thing pick up the mini gun and go to
town. Both of these approaches can be applied to the exact same scenario. And
if you're just looking for the most brutal challenge the game has to offer then
crank up the difficulty and choose a well measured and reliable mid range
weapon. Every different gun type looks, sounds, and feels wholly unique making
the game feel more customizable to the individual players play style. Never in
any other game have I so thoroughly enjoyed using so many different AK-47's in
so many different ways. Guns are punchy, offer a wide variety, and incredibly
well realized. Weaponry is definitely at an all time high for my experience
with the series.
While some levels
throughout the game struggled a lot (one in particular but we'll get to that
later) the levels that I was always looking forward to were those of the
stealth variety. Infinity Ward's focus on one to one real world scaling makes
the stealth raid and infiltration levels of the game feel incredibly real and
claustrophobic. One shot one kill sequences full of enemies bursting out of
hiding places, utilizing creative vantage points like under a bed or behind a
toilet, and waiting to hear your footsteps to try to shoot through a door make
for some of the most memorable and enjoyable Call of Duty gameplay I've had in
years. Combine all that with graphics and animations so stunning that under the
cover of night vision I genuinely believe a person could be tricked into
thinking it were actual combat footage and what you’ve got is the best levels
in the game. It's just to bad there are only a handful of these levels.
Along with the
weapons, graphics, and stealth sequences one of the main stand outs of the game
were a few of the characters. Farah, Hadir, and Kyle were all fine and of
course Captain Price was just as charming and badass as he ever is, but the
real stand out character in the game was Alex. Alex was charming, loyal,
humble, handsome, and most importantly believable. It's been since Soap
Mctavish that I've looked forward this much to getting to play as a Call of
Duty character. Alex's contribution to the story through his loyalty to Price
and by proxy Farah and Hadir makes him exactly what a playable character in a
game like Call of Duty should be: a badass soldier with an infectious
personality for the player to inhabit for five to eight hours. It's amazing but
there is finally another Call of Duty character that's as likable if not more
so than Captain Price.
Don’t mistake my
praise for these aspects of the game as a ringing endorsement of its overall
quality though. After all was said and done I was left with the feeling of
having just finished what I could generously describe as a just okay game.
While there were some stand out features throughout, the rest of the game felt
like a standard paint by numbers Call of Duty experience. Not that that’s an
inherently bad game just one without any feeling of heart or soul put into it,
one lacking that tender love and care found in earlier titles like COD 2, the
first two Modern Warfare games, and World at War.
When I wasn’t
raiding a house in a perfectly curated stealth level the game was essentially
the standard Call of Duty tunnel shaped shooting gallery. Not that that’s a bad
thing but in 2019 competing with the likes of Control, Resident Evil 2, and
even Gears 5 it just comes off as uninspired. Level design feels derivative of
previous COD games, so much so in some cases that the only way I would be able
to pick out which levels came from this game in a line up would be the
graphical prowess. The attempts at variation in gameplay are well paced but
when it comes to having the player do anything other than the classic Call of
Duty run and gun nearly every single sequence fell flat. Painting targets for a
drone strike didn’t feel as awesome and powerful as it should have, sniping
from a very long range was degraded by small flags right next to every single
enemy apparently being the only way to convey wind direction and speed, and
thank god there was only one instance of guiding a prohibitively stupid AI through
an office via CCTV cameras. And to top this all off the check point system was
so overbearing it nearly led to me having to restart a level from scratch on
multiple occasions.
Putting it frankly I
would be shocked if I ever found out that Activision had even for one second
been holding their breath waiting for a Call of Duty game to win an award for
best writing or story telling. When it comes to stories the best that can be asked
for from a COD game is something like the personal emotion of WW2 or the
intrigue and thrill of Black Ops…neither of which can be found in Modern
Warfare. The games story becomes a convoluted mess of vague double crossing and
even triple crossing all in an ill defined attempt at adding some sort of moral
compass aspect into the narrative. Like Tom Clancy stories Call of Duty should
focus on simply refining what they are: a military thriller, and leave the
drama and sub textual messaging to other games.
So we've covered the
good, the just okay, and the even somewhat bad. But unfortunately for Modern
Warfare 2019 the writers seemed to think that episode of Happy Days featuring
Fonzi jumping over a shark was wicked cool so naturally they decided to jump the
shark themselves. An entire level of the game is played from the perspective of
Farah when she was a child. In theory I actually really liked this idea and I
think from the right developer given the proper story build this could have
been a really cool sequence but instead it came off as something akin to Tommy
Wiseau setting out to write Oscar bait. The story beats explored in this
particular level feel rushed. The fantastic one to one scaling I was praising
from earlier in the game is either temporarily completely abandoned or the
developers have never even seen a child in their lives as Farah should be at
the very youngest 5 years old and she appears to be at most two feet tall and
can compact her body to be literally just a head sitting in a corner when the
gameplay calls for her to hide. And apparently prying the lock held to the door
with what is clearly a flathead screw off the door frame with a flathead screw
driver is much more realistically possible for a five year old than simply
unscrewing it. The Farah level takes what was up to that point an okay game and
changes course directly into bad game territory only to be salvaged in nearly
the final hour by the fantastic "Going Dark" level.
As a sub series
Modern Warfare has somewhat made a name for itself through the utilization of
disturbing imagery. This trend began in Modern Warfare 2 with the infamous
"No Russian" level and was continued in Modern Warfare 3 in both the
opening fight on Wall Street and the car bombing in Paris. While these scenes
and levels were disturbing and in the case of "No Russian" caused
quite a bit of controversy they did contribute to the story in a meaningful and
well thought out way. Modern Warfare 2019 attempts to follow this trend early
in the game with the attack on Piccadilly Circus seeing the extremely
recognizable landmark location come under fire by terrorists and watching
civilians run for safety as they are gunned down in the street. This so close
to home imagery seems to be included for nothing but shock value. I'm not
opposed to disturbing imagery in video games but where Modern Warfare 2019
differs from Modern Warfare 2 and 3 is in its feeling of being earned. Not
earned as in the developers earning the right to use imagery like this in their
game but more in the way that they had written a story in which the airport
scene was a pivotal story beat and the wall street and Paris invasion scenes
were the result of a slow crescendo spanning two games. Modern Warfare 2019
slapping the player in the face with the Piccadilly Circus moment in the second
level isn't earned through writing or build it's just a means of advertising
through controversy. And given the revelation that this game is a prequel to
the original Modern Warfare this scene makes even less sense as it devalues
those moments of terror and uncertainty as people are attacked in places they
would never have expected and have always been presumed safe.
Though it provided
some major highs and a seriously low low at the end of the day Modern Warfare
was counting on nostalgia. WW2 succeeded in entertaining me by bringing me back
to the early 2000's when World War 2 shooters were a dime a dozen and every year
there was a new game trying to bring that Spielberg magic into a new medium.
But what WW2 had going for it that Modern Warfare 2019 does not is time. The
World War 2 shooter genre died in 2006 compared to the most recent game in the
Modern Warfare series having been released in 2011 just eight years ago. This
year's Call of Duty campaign was fine but leaned a bit to heavily on the clout
granted by its namesake and as a result in my opinion wound up being a mediocre
game not worthy of the Modern Warfare name.
Which Call of Duty
campaign is your favorite and if you played this years what did you think of
it? Let me know in the comments down below. Don’t forget to subscribe and click
that bell icon for notifications of when our video essays and podcasts are posted
every week! You can see everything we do all in one spot over at
ColdNorthPro.com, I'll be back next week talking about Gears 5 for real this
time so until then just go play some games!
Wednesday, October 23, 2019
Sega The Pioneer
By: Patrick "TheLaw" Morris
Innovators are
almost never the market leaders and often times are unable to capitalize on
their own innovations at all. This happens in every industry, ideas and
concepts are introduced by one party then iterated on by almost everyone else
until naturally one or two market leaders rise. It's a natural occurrence in a
capitalist market and a direct result of competition but very rarely does
lightning strike twice. Sega was a titan when it came to innovation in the
hardware space, foreseeing the forthcoming of the connected video game
experience and the lucrative subscription service model; but just like most
other innovators Sega was to much to soon and despite their ingenuity were
forced out of the hardware market entirely.
Welcome welcome
welcome everyone welcome back to LegalSpeak a ColdNorth Production. I'm
TheLawMorris and this is the video essay series in which I get to talk about
the games I've been playing and what I think of the medium as a whole. Don’t
forget to check out everything we do including both of our podcasts all in one
spot over at ColdNorthPro.com. This week we'll be discussing two separate times
that Sega introduced something that can easily be called a game changer to the
video game industry before it was ready. Lets talk about Sega Channel and
Seganet.
For almost two
decades internet connectivity has been an integral part of almost every single
video game to come to market. Whether those be multiplayer games in which
players use the internet to connect to other players and play together or
single player games where developers can patch out bugs and deliver new content
an internet connection has become an absolute must for owning a console in
2019. PC players were connected to the internet and using these features long
before console players but that was in a time when the two markets were so
separated that people still widely referred to console games as video games and
PC games as computer games. Sega saw the two markets converging and becoming
much more competitive platforms before most people did and as a result with the
introduction of the Dreamcast in 1999 they sought to bring the connected nature
of a PC to the console market.
Seganet was Sega's
online service that connected Dreamcast players to one another over the
internet. Through an optional modem add on for the Dreamcast players had the
capability to connect to Seganet and play games head to head or cooperatively
online. Popular games like NFL 2K, Jet Set Radio, and Phantasy Star Online are
fondly remembered as the pinnacle of Seganet. In the years since its demise and
Sega's exiting the hardware space the Dreamcast has become somewhat of a cult
classic console with many people still swearing by it as the best console of
all time, even today. And in a sense those people are right. Despite being
discontinued in March of 2001 the Dreamcast was extremely forward thinking and
later that year Microsoft would enter the market with the original Xbox
sporting a built in modem for internet connectivity.
A connected console
is something that is so commonplace in today's market that the vast majority of
the consumer base doesn’t even think of it as a feature its become something
that's simply expected. When pressed to tell you who started the connected console
movement that vast majority of consumers would probably respond with Microsoft
for their Xbox live service that launched in 2002, or maybe they're one of the
two dozen or so people that played Socom online and they would tell you the PS2
was the first connected console. While both Sony and Microsoft have gone on to
refine the idea and benefits of a connected console it was Sega that paved the
way for their success. Sega brought an internet service for console gaming to
market in the mid 90's on the Saturn and made it much more widely accessible in
1999 with the Dreamcast but even then it was still just ahead of it's time and
while Sega was preparing for and building the console of the future the
consumers were more interested in the console of right now and both the Saturn
and Dreamcast lacked games and major third party support when compared to Sony
and Nintendo.
While the connected
console is something Sega saw coming a couple years ahead of the rest of the
market there was something else that we have all hailed as a monumental
achievement in pushing the delivery of video games to new heights that Sega
predicted not only years but decades before it would take the world by storm.
Sega Channel was a
very strange concept that starting in 1994 allowed users to order the
capability to download as many games as they wanted from the list of games
included with the service and play those games for as long as they wanted. The
service was delivered through cable TV providers who would send a tech to
customers houses with a specialized Genesis cartridge that sported a coaxial
input to connect to the cable provider. Sega Channel was operational from 1994
to 1998 for $13 per month and when adjusted for inflation that comes out to
about $22 per month in 2019. A bit more than two times $9.99…
The potential of
unlimited access to games from a set list for a flat monthly fee has been a
holy grail of sorts that the industry has been chasing for decades now and it
all started with Sega Channel. The idea has ben attempted by many others
including third parties that aren't in the video game industry but the retail
industry. The closest any company has ever gotten to realizing that vision
prior to 2017 for me personally was actually Blockbuster. In 2003 Blockbuster,
rest in peace, introduced in what is undoubtedly the worst bit of branding of
all time the Unlimited Game Rental Freedom Pass for $14.99 per month or $20.87
per month in 2019 dollars. The freedom pass allowed subscribers to hold one
game out for as long as they wanted and swap it out for any other game as many
times as they liked, effectively making the only limiting factor be what
blockbuster happened to have in stock at the time. In 2017 Microsoft announced
their new program called Gamepass, at the start of the eighth generation of consoles
Sony acquired Gaikai for their streaming technology and now offer PSnow, EA
offers EA access, and Ubisoft just announced Uplay+. Starting in 2017 a whole
23 years after Sega Channel the idea of an all you can play subscription buffet
is a wildly popular one, another part of the gaming industry pioneered by Sega.
When most people
(myself included prior to writing this) look back on Sega's time as a hardware
developer they picture the glory days of the Genesis and the tailspin that was
the Saturn. But Sega is almost never remembered for the incredible innovations they
brought to market before the market was ready for said innovations. In a very
strange way without Sega we definitely would have gotten to the connected
console world and the subscription service model we have today but it could
have potentially taken much longer than it did. Sega opened the door on two of
the biggest most revolutionary concepts in video game history and while they're
still out there publishing software like Alien Isolation (great game) and Sonic
Forces (a less than great game) I think we should all take a moment to pour one
out for their hardware division.
What are some of the
major game changers that you think changed the industry either for better or
for worse? Let me know in the comments down below. And if you had any
experience with either Seganet or Sega Channel please let me know about it
while you're down there!
If you liked what
you heard don’t forget to subscribe for new videos and two new podcasts every
week. Just one more reminder that you can see everything we do all in one spot
over at ColdNorthPro.com. I will be back next week talking about Gears 3 so until
then just go play some games.
Link's Awakening
By: Patrick "TheLaw" Morris
There was something
magical about the Gameboy Advance. Of the many handhelds that I've owned over
the years it's the one with which
I've spent by far the least amount of
time and yet it's one that nears the top of my list when it comes to naming my
all time favorites. Links Awakening was originally a Gameboy game that was
later enhanced on the Gameboy color and then laid dormant for nearly 21 years.
But now Link's Awakening has been remade for Switch and released alongside the
new miniaturized Switch Lite and despite having never been officially made for
the GBA the combination of Link's Awakening and the Switch Lite has ripped me
back to my days of angling my GBA just right in the third row of my parent's
Land Cruiser to be able to see those nearly Super Nintendo graphics on that
terrible screen. Conceptually I adore Links Awakening, its unique deviation
from the Zelda formula and obviously catered for handheld design language
combined with the nostalgic form factor of the
Switch Lite makes for the best Gameboy experience I've ever had and it's
not even on a Gameboy.
Welcome welcome
welcome everyone welcome back to LegalSpeak a ColdNorth Production. I'm
TheLawMorris and this is the video essay series in which I get to talk about
the game that I've been playing and what I think of the medium as a whole. I've
been playing a new to me Zelda adventure over the past couple weeks so lets
talk about that.
The Zelda series
started as a top down 2D adventure game in 1987 and for the first four entries
it would remain that way. In 1998 Zelda broke into the third dimension with
Ocarina of Time to massive critical acclaim, but just three years later the
franchise would go back to its 2D roots and contrary to traditional thinking
Nintendo has kept Zelda alive in both the second and third dimensions as
distinctly different but equally good variations of the same series. With well
over a dozen entries behind them Nintendo has continued to iterate and improve
upon the gameplay featured in both the 2D and 3D Zelda's. And after playing
though Link's Awakening on Switch It is easy to say that this is as good as 2D
Zelda has ever been.
Movement across
Koholint Island is pleasant and intricate with puzzles and item gates along the
way that lead to portions of the island being blocked off for the majority of
the game. There are secrets to be discovered almost everywhere and in many
cases even secrets within secrets offering even more to explore. Combat is
responsive and has finally overcome that silly feeling of having to offset Link
from his attackers in order to ensure contact with the swing of the sword in
all but the most extreme scenarios. The items that Link uses are enjoyable and
satisfying but a bit limited in number and scope. Where the hookshot is often
used as an option for stunning most enemies in other games it feels extremely
contextual in Link's Awakening offering the same functionality the Zelda
audience has come to expect but in a much more limited capacity. The Bow and
Arrow is really only utilized in a combat scenario in the ancient ruins and a
puzzle scenario in the face shrine whereas in other entries it’s a staple for
players to lean on heavily in ranged combat situations. The actual combat and
movement are an all time high for the 2D games but the game having been
designed originally for a two button interface feels as though it was designed
to not utilize items to nearly the same extent as A Link to the Past before it
and almost all subsequent games.
Overall the design
of the game is excellent. The overworld is charming and enthralling, while the
dungeons feel well plotted and for the most part logical. Koholint Island isnt
the biggest overworld of any Zelda game ever and in fact it's almost certainly
one of the smallest but where Koholint shines is in its density and complexity.
The developers used a winding path and varying levels of verticality to make
the world feel much larger than it actually is. Through clever map design the
player can both see where they need to go and be a three to four minute journey
from that point as they have to wind their way around the labyrinth that is
Koholint island to reach their destination. The island itself is a gigantic
puzzle that continues to leave the player wondering until after hours of play
time it can be completely mastered. From a design standpoint alone Koholint
Island is one of the biggest assets the game has to offer. Dungeon designs are
a bit less satisfying. Early on the dungeons are fine but as the game
progresses and the difficulty curve ramps up the developers leaned more and
more heavily on frustratingly unintuitive design choices to create an illusion
of difficulty.
Some particularly
frustrating points in the game occurred when the player is left not knowing
what to do with almost no hint pushing them in the right direction. As the game
continues this becomes increasingly common and left me with little choice than
to look up where to go just to be able to continue. Typically I try to not use
a guide as I think it makes for a fundamentally different experience than
figuring it out for yourself, not worse or any less valid just different. But
I'm also not willing to beat my head against a wall trying to figure something
out that I may have just missed or may be a result of a simple lapse in
cohesive game design so I am willing to turn to a guide when necessary. I've
played plenty of Zelda games and am well versed in their puzzle mechanics but
as I got further into the game I found myself having to refer to a guide more
frequently and when seeing the next step was left wondering how I was supposed
to know that. Essentially it feels as though for the sake of longevity the devs
created something that began to feel artificially long and not fully realized;
into the later dungeons and overworld exploration Link's Awakening starts to
feel distinctly like a Gameboy game in a bad way.
But while it may not
be the best designed Zelda game in the the last 30 plus years it is definitely
one of the best Zelda stories. As the player is forced to repeatedly back track
across the world and speak with all the inhabitants of the world learning about
them personally and seeing them in their own home environments they cant help
but fall in love with not only the people but their environment. Koholint
island is shockingly alive feeling compared to other Gameboy games and even
home console games of the era. There are constantly things happening across the
island that have nothing to do with the main story which contributes to the
feeling of this being a world that exists and raises the stakes of the main
quest. From the outset of the game Link and the player alike aren't given much
context as to why they're doing what they're doing but they press forward
regardless.
Early in the game
there are different things hinting at the twist ending but towards the end the
dungeon bosses blatantly tell both Link and the player that this is all just a
dream and if Link wakes the Wind Fish it will all be over. Having known the ending
of the game prior to playing this version every time one of the bosses warned
me about this it was a bit more heart breaking. Here I was moving throughout
these dungeons as though this was any other Zelda game but for the first time
in the series Link's actions have significant negative consequences. Operating
under the assumption that we are doing the right thing without taking the time
to look around at what we are doing can lead to grave mistakes and that’s what
Link's Awakening seemed to be and should have been all about. Link and the
player are the villain of this story and it just goes to show that even an
ignorant villain is still a villain regardless. Where I felt the story went off
the rails a bit was in trying to vilify the nightmares at the end. That story
beat wasn’t earned and just devalued the masterful story telling the game had
setup previously at the last minute in a feeble attempt to present Link as the
hero.
Conceptually I love
Link's Awakening. It’s a great 2D Zelda and the remake continues to shine an
already excellent gameplay experience. For better of worse it is undeniably and
unapologetically a remake of a Gameboy game from more than 20 years ago and that
shows. But despite its flaws the Switch version of this game offers up a
complete and enjoyable Zelda experience. Link's Awakening's deviation from the
typical Zelda story arc helps it stand out in my opinion as the second best
Zelda story with just a minor hiccup that is easily ignored at the end. It's
not my favorite Zelda in fact I'm not sure where it lands on the spectrum of
Zelda games for me but I can definitely see a case being made for it being in
the top five.
What are your
thoughts on this new old Zelda and which old Zelda would you like to see be new
next? Let me know in the comments down below. Also shout out to Bounty Hunter
115 thanks for your support I'd be glad to have you on the podcast sometime.
Don’t forget to
check out everything we do all in one spot over at ColdNorthPro.com. Ill be
back next week talking about something else…maybe sega but maybe something
Gears of War related I'm not sure yet so until then just go play some games!
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