Silver Bit @ Fan Expo 2014

On Friday, August 29th, yours truly made the trek down to the Metro Toronto Convention Centre in the heart of Canada's largest city for this year's Fan Expo Canada.  Fan Expo Canada is a multi-day event annually held at the very August.  Originally the convention was made to bring together fans of multiple genres, mainly comic books, science fiction, fantasy and film, Fan Expo has gone on to include a vast range of popular media such as video games, anime, manga and horror.  Over the years, the convention has grown to fill four whole days with panels, workshops, special screenings, tournaments, meet and greets, after parties, signings and photo ops among a plethora of other attractions.  Fan Expo Canada is easily the largest convention in all of Canada as it fills both buildings of the Toronto Convention Centre to capacity.

It has been four long years since I last went to Fan Expo Canada and a whole lot has changed since then.  I was astounded on how the convention has grown in size especially video game portion of the convention.  Back in 2010, the entire convention was held in the North Building of the Toronto Convention Centre with less than five percent of that space being dedicated to video games.  This year, the video game portion of the convention took up a whole quarter of the South Building and a large area of the North Building.  The video game industry was more than well represented at Fan Expo 2014 and a lot of the thanks has to go to EB Games Canada and their Gamer Zone.  EB Games Canada brought in the likes of Ubisoft, Sony, Microsoft, Bethesda, Disney, WB Games and 2K Games to demo some of the most anticipated games coming out in the next year.  There were well over 30 games on the show floor to demo including Evolve, Destiny, Far Cry 4, Sunset Overdrive, The Evil Within, Mortal Kombat X and Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare.  Personally, I spent the majority of my time in this section playing all the upcoming games I could get my hands on.  Considering I went for the one day, I only got to play about a third of the games available, but it was well worth all the kilometres traveled and the time spent waiting in lines.  I look forward to sharing my impressions on the demos I played in the coming weeks.  So stay tuned.

I did not spend my entire Friday in the video game section of Fan Expo.  There were tons of vendors selling video games, comics, art books, t-shirts, framed artwork, action figures, plush toys and anything you can think of.  Out of thousands of items available to buy, I picked up two Official Nintendo Legend of Zelda shirts for 40 dollars.  A lot of time outside of the games section was spent taking pictures of all the incredible statues set up on the floor such as giant Lego statues of the Shedder and Lord Business, and life-sized models of Prowl from Transfromers G1 and the Batmobile from Batman: Arkham Knight.  I also got to watch the very first episode of Star Wars: Rebels, the new Star Wars animated TV show set between Episodes III and IV, in the John Bassett Theatre with tons of excited fans both young and old.  It was a completely different experience watching a show with hundreds of other people as you got to hear live reactions from everybody in the audience, not just yourself.  While Rebels is geared towards a young audience, I found it to be very enjoyable for Star Wars fans of all ages.  It will definitely worth a viewing when it premieres on Disney XD this October.

Last but not least, I got to meet the cast of Reviews on the Run and Electric Playground along with famous video game composer and founder of Video Games Live, Tommy Tallarico.  Even though I met most of these gaming celebrities before, I was incredibly starstruck in front of all of them.  Some people idolize athletes, film stars or musicians, I idolize people in the video games industry including the developers, journalists and game analysts.  While I may have awkwardly stumbled over my words while talking to them, they all made me feel welcomed and appreciated.  I would like to thank Victor Lucas, Ben Silverman, Jose Sanchez, Marissa Roberto, Steve Tilley, Raju Mudhar and Tommy Tallarico for making a great Fan Expo even more special for me.  It was an excellent day and I cannot wait to go again next year.

Looking Past the Surface: The Pros & Cons of CG Trailers

The biggest news to come out of this past week was the announcement of Batman: Arkham Knight.  As the final Batman game in Rocksteady's trilogy, Arkham Knight is being hyped to be more expansive and epic than the previous two entries in the series (one of them being easily the best superhero game of all-time).  Scheduled to release this October, WB Games decided to release a trailer for the game.  Considering the game is less than year away, it would have been nice to see how exactly Arkham Knight would run on the next generation systems with a gameplay trailer.  What we got was a computer-generated (CG) trailer that did a decent job of showing what the game would be about, but did little to impress this writer.  In fact, this trailer got me thinking about the video game industry's love of pre-rendered CG trailers.  There are pros and cons to CG trailers which I would like to discuss in this article.  Personally, I lean more towards the con side of this debate, but I can see the pluses of CG trailers as well.

As the video game industry has evolved, trailers have been given much more prominence than in the past.  Video game trailers are so prominent nowadays that websites dedicate obscene amounts of time dissecting each frame and highlight every big trailers on the front page.  There is even a website which focuses solely on highlighting game trailers in GameTrailers.  With a lot more importance put on game trailers nowadays, game publishers want their trailers to be the best even if the game is not ready to be shown yet.  These publishers employ animation houses to make a trailer that best captures the ideas of the game.  When the game is early development, a CG trailer works as an appetizing teaser for gamers.  It gets gamers excited for the upcoming game as they see all the grand possibilities which they can eventually play.  These trailers work as a great way of eliciting gamers to pre-order the game well in advance.   As a money making machine, CG trailers serve their purpose well.  Another pro of CG trailers is the quality as most of them can easily rival that of Hollywood's best.  The quality of these trailers can produce great amount of hype no matter the actually quality of the game.  The CG trailer for Dead Island is an excellent example of this type of situation.  It easily produced enough hype to put Dead Island as one of the most sought after games of 2011.  CG trailers are a very profitable business for game developers and serve as a form of entertainment for gamers.  They will definitely be the norm of the video game industry well into the future.

While there are plenty of pluses to the use of CG trailers, they are not all that they seem to be.  With CG trailers, the quality can serve as a double-edged sword which many a game have fallen to.  Sometimes, the CG trailer is too good that it overshadows the quality of the game when it finally releases.  Dead Island fell into that trap as the game was marred with numerous glitches, some that even halted gamer's progress indefinitely.  Another example is Killzone 2.  The infamous trailer shown at E3 2005 had such amazing graphical fidelity that Guerilla's game could never achieve those great heights.  The expectations brought on from Killzone 2's first trailer caused many gamers to feel betrayed by Sony and Guerilla Games.  As these CG trailers are created by animation houses outside of the actual developers, it is easy for these trailers to include certain aspects such as supposed mechanics or weapons that are not even in the main game.  This mixed messaging can deceive gamers into believing that exactly what they see in the CG trailer will be in the actual game and most of the time that is not true.  As much as CG trailers can help boost the hype and possibly sales of the game, they can be just as damaging if games rely too much on them.  As game graphics continue to advance, an argument can be made that in-engine graphics can be used without hurting the quality of video game trailers.  Already there have been many games that use in-engine graphics for their trailers to great success.  Every trailer for Grand Theft Auto V including the very first one from 2011 was produced with in-engine graphics.  Mass Effect 2 and 3 used in-game graphics for both of their launch trailers and produced some of the best video game trailers in years.  The Mass Effect 2 launch trailer was the sole reason I hunted down a Collector's Edition of the game the weekend after launch.  Using in-engine graphics for trailers might not always be a possibility especially earlier in development, but they can alleviate some of the trappings of relying on CG trailers to convey the concept of the game.

 Although this writer would love to see in-engine gameplay trailers become the norm, CG trailers are not going anywhere.  In the early years of this new console generation, CG trailers will become more prominent as publishers build hype for games that are years away from completion.  As CG trailers become more prominent, gamers need to become more critical of these trailers rather than taking them at surface value.  Gamers need to stop blindly getting excited for a game because it had a great CG trailer.  Instead, they need to start taking them as they are, just proofs of concept, and waiting on gameplay footage, previews and possibly demos before making a definitive decision on how these CG trailers represent the game they are promoting.

Launch Station: Lego Batman 2: DC Super Heroes

Ever since the original Lego Star Wars came out in 2005, the Lego gaming franchise has had incredible success with every entry.  From Star Wars to Harry Potter to Indiana Jones to eventually Lord of the Rings, Traveller's Tales has legofied many great franchises.  The first Lego Batman was the best selling Lego game in the series so Traveller's Tales has created one of their most ambitious games in Lego Batman 2: DC Super Heroes.

Lego Batman 2: DC Super Heroes begins with Joker breaking out of Arkham Asylum to join forces with the nefarious Lex Luthor.  Batman and Robin must team up with Superman and the Justice League to take down Joker and Lex Luthor.  Lego Batman 2 has many similarities to other Lego games such as collecting studs to buy new characters and items or constructing objects in order to solve puzzles.  Lego Batman 2 does have some different aspects that make it stand out from other Lego games.  Lego Batman 2 is the first fully voiced Lego game in the series.  No more mime acting and grunts that all the other Lego games used to convey their story.  Also in the audio department, Lego Batman 2 uses of Danny Elfman's score for Batman and Batman Returns and John William's score for Superman along with some original music to make up the game's soundtrack.  Outside of the linear story missions, Lego Batman 2 allows you to explore Gotham City to your heart's content as any character you have unlocked while playing the game.  Lego Batman 2 includes new gadgets for Batman and Robin to use and new vehicles to drive around in.  Lego Batman 2 also features the two player dynamic split-screen co-op that was introduced in Lego Star Wars III where the more you move away from each other the more the screen splits.

Lego Batman 2: DC Super Heroes looks like another good Batman game.  While I personally enjoy Rocksteady's Arkham series to the Lego Batman games, Lego Batman 2 looks to further evolve the Lego game series to keep up with modern gamers.  Lego Batman 2 is a perfect way of introducing the younger generation to one of the most popular super heroes of all-time compared to the more mature Christopher Nolan movies and Arkham series of games.

Launch Station: Lollipop Chainsaw

Suda 51 is well-known among the video game faithful to bringing some of the most bizarre and extremely mature games on the market.  Starting with Killer 7 back in 2005 for the Gamecube and PS2, Suda 51 and Grasshopper Manufacture target niche audiences with their games.  In turn, many of Grasshoppers' games are not extremely profitable, but have become cult classics in their own right.  The newest game from the minds of Suda 51 and his team at Grasshopper Manufacture juxtaposes the dark grungy zombie movie aesthetic with colourful sparkles and stars of a bubbly high school cheerleader.  This game is Lollipop Chainsaw.

In Lollipop Chainsaw, you play as Juliet Starling, a cheerleader and zombie hunter.  San Romero High School, the high school Juliet formerly attended, is under attack by a zombie horde.  It is up to Juliet and the severed yet still living head of her boyfriend Nick to push back the zombie horde and defeat their rock and roll zombie leaders.  At certain points in the game, Juliet will also be assisted by her sisters Cordelia and Rosalind Starling, who are zombie hunters as well.  Lollipop is a hack and slash game, which plays a little similar to No More Heroes, also made by Suda 51 and Grasshopper.  Juliet is able to use light and heavy attacks.  Light attacks are meant to herd zombies together so you are able to finish them off with heavy attacks.  Killing enemies and saving classmates builds Juliet's star meter, which can be used to execute super attacks once filled.  Nick can be used to extend combos by kicking him at enemies or he can even control zombies when placed on top of a decapitated zombie.

Out of all the games made by Suda 51 and Grasshopper Manufacture, Lollipop Chainsaw has seamed to have gotten a good response from average gamers not just the hardest of hardcore, which is nice to see.  While I personally wait for the reviews, Lollipop Chainsaw looks pretty cool.  A fun little hack and slash game with an incredible amount of charisma and spunk that really exudes from all of its pores.  It should be a very enjoyable game and I really hope it does very well sales-wise.  If you looking for a new game to pick up this week, Lollipop Chainsaw is definitely your best choice.

E3 2012: Nintendo E3 Press Conference Impressions

Monday was a big day filled to the brim of press conferences.  While Tuesday only has one press conference to speak of, it does mark the first day of show floor is open.  To start the day is Nintendo with their big E3 press conference.  As all eyes were on the Big N, it was their time to deliver and give gamers a reason to buy a Wii U over PS3 or Xbox 360.

The last few Nintendo Press Conferences have been pretty strong.  With the first big unveiling, you would think Nintendo would pull all the stops in order to steal all the thunder away from Microsoft and Sony once again.  Sadly this press conference did not live up the incredible expectations fans and the media put on it.  By all means, it was a decent conference on par with Sony's Press Conference and better than EA's and Microsoft's showings.  While the focus, other than one little segment, was on the Wii U, Nintendo did not do much to give a sole reason for gamers to pick up their newest console over the PS3 or Xbox 360, which will most likely seeing price drops to compete with the Wii U.  The show did start off strong with Mr. Miyamoto and the very first look at Pikmin 3.  Pikmin 3 looked great with all the new features like four new playable characters, a new class of Pikmin and the two different control styles.  The Pikmin 3 showcase was easily the best thing about Nintendo's Press Conference.  Reggie Fils-Aime followed Pikmin 3 by quickly summarizing features of the Wii U controller and the Miiverse, which both had in-depth showcases during the Nintendo Direct video from this past Sunday, before showing off New Super Mario Bros. U.  Super Mario Bros. U was very interesting with a few tidbits at the connection with Miiverse and the asynchronous gameplay use of the Wii U Gamepad like creating platforms that other players can use to get to unreachable areas.  Nintendo then introduced their renewed focus on third-party partnerships with two WB Games for Wii U, Batman: Arkham City Armored Edition and Scribblenauts Unlimited.  Batman: Arkham City did have some cool exclusive features for Wii, but the Scribblenauts Unlimited footage really took centre stage.  We got a set of trailers, one for Wii Fit U and another for a new music game called SiNG, which was one of the low points of the show.  Later in the show, we got some more third-party games now from Ubisoft.  The Just Dance 4 demo was horrid while the ZombiU had an interesting trailer to say the least.  That was followed by Lego City: Undercover, which looked like a very cool mix between the Lego franchise and the open world formula of a GTA, but a lot less violent and graphic.  We also got a quick little rundown of three first-party games for 3DS (New Super Mario Bros. 2, Papar Mario: Sticker Star and Luigi's Mansion: Dark Moon) that could of easily been cut out of the conference to make room for more Wii U demos/reveals since there will be a hour long conference dedicated just to 3DS tomorrow evening.  Nintendo ended off the show with Nintendo Land, a virtual Nintendo theme park that integrates with Miiverse and has 12 mini-games based on Nintendo's biggest franchises.  Nintendo Land looks to do for Wii U what Wii Sports did for Wii.  It is meant to get gamers accustomed to the Wii U's new features and controller and would be a great game to pack-in with the Wii U, Nintendo.  The Nintendo Land demo was just okay, but in no way should it have been the final game Nintendo had to show off.  Nintendo needed to end their conference with a bang.  Be it a teaser of a new first-party game or a demo of whatever Retro Studios was rumoured to be working on.  It was a huge missed opportunity and made this conference come out a little flat when everything was said and done.

Overall, Nintendo's E3 Press Conference was an okay showing.  While it did fall flat with no real surprises, what Nintendo did offer was an enjoyable conference nonetheless.  Just Dance 4, SiNG, Wii Fit U and Zombie Reggie were the only real low points of this conference and they did not drag on longer than a minute or two.

Grade:  C+

On the Download: Harley Quinn's Revenge Review

For this edition of On the Download, I want to do something different.  Instead of highlighting the biggest downloads of the week, I am going to review the biggest download of the week as I picked up the Harley Quinn's Revenge DLC for Batman: Arkham City and subsequently beat it.  I thought long and hard about how I would rate DLC as this will be my first review of any DLC whatsoever.  If I would rate it on the number scale or a completely different more simple scale like thumbs up or thumbs down approval rating.  After debating it long and hard, I came to the consensus that I will be reviewing all DLC like I review games on a scale out of 10.   Without any further ado, let us get to my first DLC review.

Harley Quinn’s Revenge serves as an epilogue for Batman:  Arkham City.  It is a standalone adventure that allows players to experience the aftermath of Arkham City’s incredible and controversial climax.  Harley Quinn’s Revenge is an excuse to play more Batman: Arkham City, which is always a good thing, but at the end of this two hour story mission you are left with a little more to be desired.

Set a couple weeks after the events of Batman: Arkham City, Harley Quinn has escaped the psychiatric ward of Arkham and has kidnapped a few Gotham City Policemen as well.  Batman returns to Joker’s steel mill in Arkham City to save the kidnapped policemen only to be trapped by the rather insane Harley Quinn.  Now it is up to Robin to infiltrate Harley’s secret base in order to save Gotham’s Dark Knight from the clutches of Joker’s insane girlfriend.

Harley Quinn’s Revenge features the same incredible gameplay featured in Batman: Arkham City.  The biggest addition comes from being able to play as Robin.  Robin plays a little differently than both Batman and Catwoman.  Robin has a bo staff, which he uses for combat, and other unique gadgets such as the Snap Flash and Shield.  If you did not pick up the Robin Challenge Map DLC, it will take little bit of time to get used to how Robin plays.  After a little time, Robin is just as satisfying to play as Batman and Catwoman are.  You play as Robin for the majority of Harley Quinn’s Revenge, but at two points you will be able to take control of the Dark Knight himself.

The main pull in Harley Quinn’s Revenge is the story.  With great acting and fun moments, there are glimpses of the greatness found in Arkham City’s story, but Harley Quinn’s Revenge ultimately falls a little short.  There are some nice hints at Batman facing some depression and who Batman really carried out of the opera house at the end of Arkham City, but nothing more.  Personally it felt like a missed opportunity as I believed this DLC will be the bridge between Arkham City and Rocksteady’s next Batman game.  Also not being able to freely roam Arkham City as Robin after beating Harley Quinn’s Revenge feels like another missed opportunity that could have added more lasting value to this piece of DLC.

Everything established in Batman: Arkham City such as the excellent environment, atmosphere, puzzles and combat, all carryover to Harley Quinn’s Revenge.  At the end of the day, it does feel like Rocksteady could have done a little more to take Harley Quinn’s Revenge from good to an incredible addition to Arkham City.  For what it is worth, Harley Quinn’s Revenge is good two hour, possibly three if you search for all the hidden balloons, romp back into Arkham City.  There is just enough content here to justify the 10 dollar price.  Harley Quinn’s Revenge is a worthy adventure for those who love Arkham City.

Batman: Arkham City Review

Arkham City starts not in the tights of the Caped Crusader of Gotham City, but in the pristine suit of Bruce Wayne as he holds a press conference to announce his opposition of the Arkham City prison.  Immediately following Wayne’s announcement, TYGER mercenaries arrest Mr. Wayne.  Wayne wakes up chained up.  Bruce tips over the chair and tries to escape, but the guard hears him.  The guard goes to kick Wayne, but he counters thus breaking the guard’s leg.  Another guard hits Bruce with the butt of his gun and pushes him out into the processing center as other inmates ridicule him and Hugo Strange’s voice booms over the intercom.  As Bruce Wayne enters Arkham City, Penguin and his thugs jump the millionaire and knock him out.  You wake up kneeling in front of the Penguin.  The diminutive crook starts wailing on Wayne with brass knuckles.  A well-timed counter and Wayne breaks the Penguin’s hand.  With the Penguin hurt, his goons jump into take Wayne out, but to no avail as the millionaire playboy of Gotham City takes them down with ease.  This series of events just described is the opening minutes of Arkham City.  In this opening, Rocksteady introduces the player to the story, the main villain, the core mechanics and the atmosphere of this new Arkham prison in one neat package.  It makes for one of the best openings for any video game as Rocksteady puts you in the shoes of the vulnerable Bruce Wayne before letting the player loose as Mr. Wayne’s alter-ego, Batman.

Once you get a hold of Batman’s suit and gadgets, you are dropped right in the thick of Arkham City.  Given the reins to do what you want when you want in this expansive setting with lots to do.  This amount of freedom is extremely refreshing considering how linear Arkham Asylum was even with the openness of Arkham Island.  You are free to go complete story missions, find side quests, collect Riddler Trophies (which you need to collect all of them to complete one of the side quests) or just beat up some inmates.  You can easily lose hours upon hours just exploring this incredibly rich setting without even touching the main story.  Speaking of Arkham City’s story, it is better paced and put together than Arkham Asylum’s plot.  Rocksteady has seamlessly woven a large gallery of iconic Batman villains like the Joker, Mr. Freeze Two-Face and many more into a one epic plot worthy of the Caped Crusader.

Along with fixing the flaws with Arkham Asylum, Rocksteady also made some improvements with the combat and upgrade system and one big addition in a playable Catwomen. Rocksteady did an incredible job making the combat in Arkham City more satisfying than its predecessor.  It is much easier to chain together strikes, counters, special takedowns and gadgets into one crazy combo, which makes even fighting lowly inmates that much more rewarding.  The upgrade system has been totally revamped.  Instead of just being long line of upgrades, you can choose from upgrading Batman’s batsuit, combat or gadgets.  The upgrade system gives players a little more freedom to build the Batman they want.  The biggest addition in Arkham City is Catwomen.  At certain points in the main story, you will get to play as Selina Kyle.  These segments are pretty short, but act as refreshing breathers from the World’s Greatest Detective.  Catwomen is much more agile than her burly counterpart allowing her to traverse corners of Arkham City that Batman just cannot reach.  After beating the main story, players are able to switch between Batman and Catwomen at certain locations around Arkham City.

With an epic story, excellent gameplay and a fully faceted open world setting, Arkham City is the ultimate superhero and ultimate Batman game.  Any gamer no matter if they are hardcore fans of the Dark Knight or know nothing about the Caped Crusader will enjoy the amazing experience Arkham City offers.  It puts you in the shoes of a superhero like no other game has ever done before and few could possibly do after.  In Arkham City, you are Batman.  You are the Dark Knight.  You are the World’s Greatest Detective.  You are a superhero.