Arcanum: A Not-So-Well-Oiled Machine

Most of the games on this list have been influential to me as a gamer because of the positive impact that they had on me. As such, many of the games I've discussed are in one way or another among my favorites of all time. There are, however, a number of games that I don't particularly revere as paragons of the medium that have had just as much of an impact upon me. Some of these, such as Knights of the Old Republic II and Xenosaga: Episode II, disappointed me on many levels for failing to live up to my expectations for the sequels of two of my favorite games. Perhaps the king of muddied expectations, however, is the freshman effort from the now defunct Troika Games: Arcanum: Of Steamworks and Magick Obscura. It's exceedingly difficult for me to stress just how much I anticipated playing this game, and ultimately how it frustrated me so badly that I did not finish it for the first time until nearly seven years after first starting it. It will suffice to say, then, that the game failed to live up to my (and many other people's) expectations for it.

It's really hard to understand just why this is the case, as the game has so many things going for it on paper. The game was the first from Troika, which was the then-new company of Tim Cain, Leonard Boyarsky, and Jason Anderson -- the primary developers of the original Fallout, quite possibly my favorite game of all time. It promised to deliver the same style of RPG goodness as its half-brother, with in-depth classless character creation and a robust turn-based combat system. Most importantly, the game presented what I still consider one of the most creative settings ever presented: a Victorian-era fantasy world undergoing an Industrial Revolution. There were dwarves with pistols clashing with magick-wielding elves, half-orcs staging strikes to protest their subhuman factory working conditions, and railroads connecting the major cities of the world of Arcanum. It is a world of conflict: philosophically, between the utilization of physical law (technology) and the bending of it (magick); socially, between the old feudal system and the new industrial republic; and of course morally, between the forces of good and evil. In typical Fallout style, the moral conflict is quite gray; it is never explicitly clear just who exactly represents which side, a refreshing departure from the typical fantasy-based role-playing world. I couldn't wait to delve into such an interesting campaign world, as I am particularly fond of "alt-fantasy" worlds (such as the Dark Sun campaign setting).

The setting's ingenuity, however, is muddied by its in-game implementation -- a fact that completely baffles me, given the game's pedigree. I suppose that Sierra, the game's publisher, is partly to blame, as it felt (somewhat correctly) that the game as it was would not be sufficiently marketable; as such, they suggested some changes that turned out to be for the worse. The most infamous change was the rather forced inclusion of a real-time combat system along with the original turn-based one. I assume that this inclusion was made due to the popularity of the Baldur's Gate games, which implemented a "real-time with pause" combat system (which I consider to be the weakest aspect of the Infinity Engine). Regardless of the reasoning, the change was detrimental to both systems, as both are little more than a pale imitation of their counterparts in Baldur's Gate and Fallout. As a result, combat is utterly banal, and detracts from the game more so than any other single element in the game.

Of course, Troika shares the blame, as there are numerous issues with game balance and stability that are just as detrimental. Characters tend to become too powerful much too quickly, which leads to the game becoming quite uninteresting beyond finishing the main quest. Towns tend to look alike and are especially difficult to navigate due to the combination of a lack of an adequate journaling system and a very Victorian-era system of addresses. (Where is Devonshire Way again, and in what city? Good luck finding it, because the map won't tell you.) Add in a number of troublesome bugs and a pesky tendency for broken scripting in dialogues -- NPCs reminding the player of events that never happened, dialogue options that should no longer be available based on previous in-game events, and so on -- and the lack of quality control in Arcanum becomes readily apparent.

Despite its technical failings, though, Arcanum is still oddly compelling to me, due in large part to the setting and its exceptionally engaging main quest. Topics such as racism, the nature of power (and the abuse thereof), environmental awareness, and tradition versus innovation are prevalent in the main plot. Unlike in many other fantasy RPGs, they are handled in a very mature and even-handed fashion. The world of Arcanum becomes one that is exciting to explore, and each mystery -- such as where the lost elven civilization is located -- clamors to be unraveled. It is in these elements that the heritage of Fallout shines through, and they more than counterbalance the great frustrations of the game's technical elements. In fact, they make the game worth playing when it otherwise would not be.

Though my very strongly mixed feelings about Arcanum are obvious, my experience with it has been an overall positive one. I feel like I have grown as a gamer due to my experiences with this game, despite the fact that it is not even close to one of my favorite games. (Favorite settings? Sure. Favorite games? Nope.) Arcanum has helped me to tune my critical eye toward games, showing me that a little patience and care can reveal the greatness in what appears to be an altogether lackluster title. Furthermore, it is a prime example of the danger of hype -- games seldom live up to ridiculous levels of hype, be it from the media or self-induced.

Check out my MobyGames review of Arcanum here.

Final Fantasy: How Many Until It's Truly "Final?"

I really have to hand it to the Final Fantasy series for having the most contradictory title in all of gaming. Despite the fact that it's been going on for well over twenty years now, the series simply will not end -- despite some horrible trends that have irrevocably changed the series, mostly for the worst.

Yes, I know all about the story of the original title's development: It was supposed to be the "final" game that the fledgling development house SquareSoft was going to make before going broke, and it was a "fantasy" game heavily inspired by Dungeons and Dragons. (Don't believe me? Take one good look at the character classes and bestiary.) That first game -- much like its contemporary, Dragon Quest -- feels incredibly archaic by today's standards. Again, like Dragon Quest, Final Fantasy's basic style of play involves little more than grinding levels until the party is strong enough to advance to the next area of the world, then repeating the process until eventually confronting the end boss. There was little to no story of which to speak, the characters were generic and generally devoid of any sort of personality beyond that implied by their huge sprites, and combat was largely repetitive (not to mention the fact that the characters apparently couldn't differentiate between living and dead targets, causing characters to have to waste an action if their target was slain before their turn).

However unplayable it may be today, though, the original title was a huge success that laid the foundation for the series that would eventually become synonymous with "role-playing games" for a great number of console gamers. For instance, the Super NES's RPG Renaissance yielded such beloved entries as Final Fantasies II and III (IV and VI for the Japanophiles), which took the series beyond its humble beginnings into the realm of greatness. The characters still adhered to specific classes to some degree -- though III did not really label them as such -- but they were so much more than their skill sets. These characters had personalities that were well-developed and believable (well, except for II's Kain -- how many times can one person betray allegiances?), which really allowed the player to develop a special connection with certain characters. The additional flexibility accorded in III to customize the four member adventuring party only enhanced this aspect -- players were able to bring along their favorite characters and develop them as they saw fit. This emphasis on characters and their relation to the player allowed for some very sweeping and moving plots -- without a doubt the shining point of the series. Add in high production values and some of the best music of the 16-bit era, and you've got a recipe for success.

However, it was not until the behemoth Final Fantasy VII was released that the series became the flagship title for console RPGs. Ironically enough, it was also the beginning of the series's descent into inanity -- what I like to refer to as "Nomura-itis." I won't elaborate too much on this point, as GameSpite.net's Jeremy Parish has already hit the nail on the head in his excellent article, but it will suffice to say that the emphasis shifted to overly broody amnesiac heroes portrayed in all their full and poorly-articulated glory by way too many cutscenes. The PlayStation-era entries in the series are the prime culprits of this infraction, as their stories are jumbled messes (even more so than Xenogears -- quite an accomplishment), and the characters are largely uninteresting and above all interchangeable. VII's Materia system and VIII's Junction system, in their attempts to bring limitless customization to players, instead made the characters themselves largely worthless. VII's characters, for example, were defined not by their character traits (however based on blatant stereotypes they might have been), but rather by the equipment and Materia they carried. Likewise, characters in VIII were defined by how many spells they had junctioned to their equipment, as well as which Guardian Forces they had equipped. Despite their popularity and the fact that these two games are largely responsible for the massive following that the series has, these two games are my least favorite of the series for all of the things that they did wrong. It is particularly telling that Final Fantasy IX, the final PlayStation entry, took three steps backwards as far as story and character customization is concerned, yet holds up much better than its two immediate predecessors.

The PlayStation 2 entries, X and XII, were largely creative and original though, despite failing in one of the two areas of character customization (XII's license grid, which basically results in a party of über-clones) or story (X's sub-par effort despite interesting characters and an excellent gameplay system). XII in particular was a huge leap forward for the series, moving away from some long outdated abstractions such as random battles and separate battle screens. Everything in XII takes place seamlessly, thanks to a (mostly) well thought out Gambit system. To be fair, X also did away with the abstraction of a world map, and XII continued in that vein. XII's amazingly detailed world of Ivalice stands as perhaps the most vibrant and engaging world in the entire series.

Unfortunately, Nomura-itis appears to be the forecast for the franchise's foreseeable future. Final Fantasy XIII appears to be headed back down the dark and detestable road of ruin. Perhaps it's a sign that the series truly should live up to its title, but many gamers weaned on the stylings of VII are eagerly awaiting their next venomous dose of Nomura. The series will not be ending anytime soon, that's for certain -- an old dog living well beyond its prime.

Psychonauts and Beyond Good and Evil: The Underdogs That Could, But Didn't

The video game market really makes me upset at times. Several of the games on this blog tanked horribly at retail, their praises sung upon high by the critics while piles of copies sat on store shelves collecting dust, weathering price drop after price drop. Though most of these games became cult classics (EarthBound in particular), two of the games that I truly appreciate have faded into relative obscurity despite their excellence. Part of the problem, though, is that these games were underdogs from the start; they never really had a fighting chance, despite their actual quality.

I'm talking, of course, about Psychonauts and Beyond Good and Evil.

These two games' status as underdogs might come as a bit of a surprise when their pedigree is considered. Psychonauts was the brainchild of Tim Schafer, who is known for creating top-notch games such as Monkey Island and Grim Fandango. Though some of his previous games also recorded fairly dismal sales, they were innovative, creative, and oozing with personality. These were games that would last, that would stick with those who played them. Likewise, Beyond Good and Evil's mastermind was Michel Ancel, the French developer who is known for games such as the Rayman series. Both of the games had the reputation of their respective “evil geniuses” behind them, so it was a good bet that they would be wonderful examples of the medium as well.

They most definitely delivered, pulling players into unique and realistic worlds... realistic in the sense that you were immersed in the game, which is always an indicator of a great game. Psychonauts put players in the role of Raz, a young psychic who sneaks away from the circus in order to attend a summer camp for young psychics and train to become a Psychonaut. The setting oozes with flavor, as it truly feels like a summer camp--except with Tim Burton-esque children as the campers. When things start getting odd at the camp and people start losing their minds (literally), it's up to Raz to save the day. Of course, he does this by jumping into people's minds in order to get clues, solve their problems, and so on--all in pure platforming glory. This leads to some truly unique worlds: a weird Escher-like version of suburbia where everyone is paranoid about “the milkman,” a wargame between the ancestral memory of Napoleon Bonaparte and his descendant, and a Tokyo-like city inhabited by fish people who are trying to defeat the Godzilla-inspired “Gogglor” (a giant Raz). The milkman area is one of the funniest and strangest video game levels I have ever played, and the same level of humor persists throughout the whole game. What other game allows you to summon your wise (albeit not quite sane) mentor by luring him out of your head with a strip of bacon?


Beyond Good and Evil was equally immersive. It paints the vibrant world of Hillys, where a war against alien invaders is raging. These aliens, the DomZ, are being held off by the Alpha Sections, a sort of military police faction. Not all is as it seems, however, as the protagonist, a young freelance photographer named Jade, becomes entangled in a quest to uncover the truth about the DomZ, the Alpha Sections, and just what is really happening on Hillys. The quest proceeds in a believable, logical fashion, and there is a good reason for every mission that is undertaken. Of course, most of the missions have a heavy focus on stealth, but this is understandable given the enormity of the task which Jade must accomplish: uncover evidence of the truth behind the conflict, take pictures, and distribute them among the people of Hillys. Hillys itself is explored in a vaguely Zelda-like fashion, but though many critics constantly referred to the game as “PS2's answer to Zelda,” there is only a passing resemblance. There is a lot to find, a lot to explore, and although the game itself is short, it is rich in experience.


Both of these games play just as well as they are presented. Psychonauts is a well-designed platformer, and most of the powers that Raz earns as the game goes along have a practical and intuitive use. Likewise, Jade's ability to sneak around in the Alpha Sections' bases and take pictures feels intense, but never frustrating. Part of the immersion is that the characters really feel like an extension of the player: you ARE that character, and their world and task are yours. Sure, both of the games suffer from a tricky and somewhat frustrating endgame, but these are minor flaws when viewed in comparison to the magnificent whole.

So why did these games fail so miserably? I can only speculate, but I strongly feel that their status as original intellectual properties really turned a lot of gamers away. You know what to expect if you buy a Madden game or a Mega Man game; buying something that you've never heard of before can be a bit scary and more of a gamble. Compounding the problem is the fact that neither game received much in the way of advertising, so a lot of people didn't even know that the games existed in the first place. These two things sent the two underdogs to a quick bargain-bin death.

It's a real shame, though, that so many people missed out on two such wonderful games. Anybody that complains about the lack of originality or charm in current games should ask themselves whether or not they played Psychonauts and Beyond Good and Evil. If the answer is no, then they should track down a copy of each immediately; they will quickly realize that there are indeed some creative, innovative games being produced, even if nobody really recognizes them.

God of War: An Overrated, Overhyped Mess

There's no other way to say it, so I'll just be blunt: God of War is not a good game. It starts off well, with a first level that is quite memorable and gets the player's attention in a big way. Unfortunately, the game pretty much peaks a little bit before the halfway point -- from there it gets really old really fast. You fight the same repetitive variations of the game's three or four base enemy types a bajillion times, with some areas that feature nearly infinite respawning. The last few levels of the game, instead of featuring intuitive and challenging puzzles, regress into mere exercises in "thinking like the developers," often requiring highly arbitrary "objectives" in order to pass to the next area. (These objectives are often something like clearing a level of every enemy, as well as the hundred times each one respawns.)

There are definitely several things in the game that seem really cool at first glance, but upon closer inspection simply don't make much logical sense. For example, in Poseidon's "challenge" in Pandora's Temple, a generic god that claims to be Poseidon requires the "ultimate sacrifice" of a human life in exchange for passage. Putting aside the fact that for Kratos -- little more than a soulless killing machine of the gods -- taking a single human life is not even close to a meaningful sacrifice, it is hard to explain just why exactly there were a dozen or so Greeks hanging in cages in the room immediately before. How did they get there if it was supposedly so difficult to get into the temple in the first place? They are rather conveniently just there so that Kratos can sacrifice them. Furthermore, why is the brilliant Rob Paulsen (Morte from Planescape: Torment and Raphael from Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, among other roles) so criminally underutilized in such a meaningless role as the voice of this arbitrarily-placed sacrificial sod?


Speaking of meaningless, what was the point of utilizing Greek mythology if it was only going to be used in name only for such a lacking, generic story? Call me crazy (and numerous rabid God of War fan legions most certainly will), but does merely using some very basic names and titles of certain Greek gods and monsters actually count as being based upon Greek mythology? Pretty much every Western work of literature could be considered to be based upon Greek myth in that case. Just because there are characters called Ares and Zeus, and just because there are monsters that only in the most liberal sense resemble the minotaur and Medusa, does not mean that the game is based on Greek mythology. To be fair, though, the tone -- bloodthirsty amorality and childish, vengeful deities -- is pretty well done.

The game's art direction is certainly of a high caliber. If nothing else, the game features beautiful character and location designs that are excellently presented in what is one of the best looking games for the PlayStation 2. The characters remind me a lot of Gerald Brom's work for the Dark Sun campaign setting, and some of the areas -- such as the Hydra's sea, the game's first level -- are pretty breathtaking.


Unfortunately, a lot of those areas -- especially Hades, as its name might imply -- are nightmarish for all the wrong reasons. There are numerous parts that are various combinations of ridiculous, cheap, and ridiculously cheap, such as Hades's eternal spinning column of pointy things. Such areas feel unfair and designed for no other purpose than to look cool and to brutally frustrate the player. Combine this propensity for insta-kill areas with a horribly static camera and the "point-o'-one-thousand-respawns" in every other room, and you've got a recipe for terrible.

Again, most of these problems are in the latter half to two-thirds of the game. The first few levels are brilliantly done, albeit with an ulterior motive, I fear: addiction. Like a crack dealer giving a free hit in order to get his client hopelessly hooked, God of War tries to hook players with a heavily appealing intro -- I still feel that the opening level is one of the better lead-ins to a game in a long while -- before devolving into base crap.

If only God of War could maintain its momentum for the entirety of the experience -- as well as lose the shoddy, half-assed Greek mythology angle -- it'd be a hell of a game, and perhaps even the game that it was hyped up to be. Instead, it's a terrible letdown that comes nowhere near that level of alleged greatness, and easily stands as perhaps the most overhyped and overrated game of the past decade.

Xenogears: An Ambitious Failure

Ah, Xenogears: the game whose content was considered so offensive and so overly religiously-themed that it almost did not even see the light of day in the US. Of course, this was the aftermath of Final Fantasy VII making Square one of the most powerful companies in terms of pushing units in the US, and after Electronic Arts agreed to help Square distribute some of their games, Xenogears was finally released stateside. It was highly critically acclaimed (then again, what Square RPGs weren't in those days? SaGa Frontier, anyone?), but for most gamers it was a “love it or hate it” affair. Obviously, the game's appearance on this list is indicative of which side of the fence I staked my claim on, but there is truth to the notion that the game failed miserably on many levels. It's the few successes that it achieved that made this game stick out to me; the things that it did right, it did very well.

The sheer ambition of Tetsuya Takahashi is perhaps to blame for some of the failures of Xenogears. After all, the story is MASSIVE, and relates the tale of the entire history of mankind in the game world. What starts off as a standard, run-of-the-mill story of two nations at war and the related political intrigue blossoms into something much greater and more sinister. The way the story is told is masterfully layered; every time a question is answered, two more questions take its place. I remember being completely enthralled, and I was completely hooked well before I got to the conclusion of the first disc some thirty hours in.


If you listen closely enough, you can STILL hear echoes of the complaints about the second disc of Xenogears, which became more of a “tell the story, go to a dungeon, tell more story, repeat” endeavor than anything else. Granted, this was a design choice necessitated by encroaching deadlines, but the difference was still very stark. Personally, I was not bothered by the second disc because, as I said, the story had me in its clutches. Yes, the game would have potentially been better had the second disc been more like the first, but that would have made the game perhaps a hundred plus hours long.

No, the flaws that I find with the game stem from relatively minor things such as the smorgasboard of anime references, the textbook philosophy, and the terrible translation. Giant robots are one thing, but having a team of females whose robots combine like Voltron is a bit much. Sure, terrible translations were the norm in those days (think Final Fantasy Tactics), but the sheer amount of dialogue in Xenogears made it even more problematic than other RPGs of the time.


The combat system was also problematic for me for a couple of reasons. First of all, boss battles ended up boiling down to the strategy of “charge your action points to 25, then unleash a large combo and repeat.” There was really not that much variety to them. Secondly, though the gear battles started out being pretty fun, they were inevitably a straightforward affair as well later in the game.

But oh, the story! There is no doubt that storylines were the focus of Square's RPGs in the PlayStation era -- which is kind of scary to think about considering how many of the games had a jumbled train wreck passing as a story (think Final Fantasy VII). Xenogears had its jumbled moments as well, but I didn't seem to object to accepting them in light of the larger picture. I actually cared about what was happening to Fei and company. I wanted to know the secrets behind Solaris and the Ethos. Just who was this Grahf guy, anyway? (Of course, it's blatantly obvious now, but at the time I didn't catch on.) The answers to those questions were for the most part satisfying, which is perhaps even more difficult to pull off.

Despite the game's flaws in gameplay (I won't even get into the jumping puzzles), the blatant copying of WAY too many anime clichés, and a scope that was way too ambitious for a PlayStation game, Xenogears was a spectacular experience for me. I realize now that it failed in many areas, but it still holds a special place in my gaming heart. The sheer wonder I felt from piecing together the puzzle (except for the all-too-obvious Id scenario) has seldom been matched.

Planescape Torment: What Can Change the Nature of a Man?

Chalk this one up as another unfortunate casualty of the video game market.

There is absolutely no reason that this game should have tanked at retail. That is exactly what happened, though. The game did go relatively unnoticed when it released in late 1999, despite the ravings of critics across the board. Maybe everyone was hustling to protect their computers against the dreaded Y2K bug. Then again, maybe the really intimidating "he's not QUITE dead" guy on the game's box turned a lot of consumers away from the game.

Whatever the reason, I can't really say that I blame the gaming public, though, as I really don't recall having very high expectations for Torment either. After having purchased Baldur's Gate on a whim about a year earlier and being completely surprised, there was no doubt that I was going to get the next D&D-licensed RPG from Black Isle. I mean, what was there not to love? It was going to be like Baldur's Gate, but in the Planescape Campaign Setting, wasn't it?

Well, yes and no... but that is definitely a good thing. Being set in the Planescape setting, which was itself a very off-the-wall and original D&D property, set the tone for the game itself to carve its own path in the world of PC RPGs. Baldur's Gate it most definitely was not, although there were some similarities. They ran on the same Infinity engine, and as such played in a very similar manner. The interface was a bit different, but otherwise things were about identical gameplay-wise. Torment, however, had a much tighter camera, getting in very close to the characters instead of the more overhead view of Baldur's Gate.

That closeness to the characters represents the game as a whole. The focus was on The Nameless One and the odd crew of cohorts that he gathered on his quest to find out who he really was. The characters are not cardboard RPG cutouts either, breaking away from typical clichés of the genre: a wisecracking floating skull, a chaste succubus, and a rogue modron (imagine a talking microwave with wings, limbs, and a crossbow) that operates off of sheer computational logic (voiced brilliantly by Homer Simpson himself, Dan Castellaneta). The characters banter with each other in witty and often hilarious ways, and you literally could spend an hour of play having a discussion with a party member and come away happy. Despite their absurd natures, all of the characters felt real.


Following the trend of several other RPGs that have been influential to me, Torment provides these characters with a rich and unique setting thanks to the Planescape license. Some truly bizarre things can be seen, experienced, and fought against in Sigil and some of the planes that are visited throughout the course of the game. I mean, what other games allow you to venture into the first layer of The Nine Hells (err, Baator... lovely 2nd Edition D&D) in order to visit a Pillar of Skulls that can provide the answers you so desperately seek? I really can't think of any at all that provide the same sort of bizarre setting in such a masterful package. The fact that the Planescape setting was implemented so incredibly well just makes the game that much more of a masterpiece.

The opportunities for actual role-playing, though, were even greater than in any other game I had played before (or after) it. Granted, you did not get to make your own character like in Fallout, but in effect you could make the Nameless One into whatever kind of character you chose. Perhaps even more importantly, however, the three “cerebral” statistics--Intelligence, Wisdom, and Charisma--actually served a purpose. There was great fun to be had by playing an exceptionally intelligent and insightful smooth-talker. Torment resembled Fallout in this capacity, as there were few battles that were required in order to finish the game. In fact, much like in Fallout, you could defeat the final boss without even raising your sword (metaphorically, of course, as, due to a developer's in-joke, there were almost no swords in the game--apart from the Sword of Trias, usable only by Lawful Good characters at the end of the game), provided you had come upon certain information or items prior to the confrontation.


This was fortunate, as combat in Torment was definitely a step backward from that of Baldur's Gate. Battles ended up being little more than a glorified click and watch affair, with little to no strategy to speak of. It really didn't matter, however, because the battles were a mere side note to the meaty, robust storyline. Torment is as close to literary as an RPG can be, and it succeeded in achieving what Xenogears tried and failed to do (and without the annoying anime clichés). The story unfolded in layers, and each revelation led to a new chain of events that eventually led to a startling conclusion. The only problem, though, is that since it was presented in a fairly free-form manner, you could easily miss an important bit of information if you forgot about something or were unable to utilize certain items (I'm talking about you, Bronze Sphere).

It definitely had some flaws, but Planescape: Torment was a masterpiece ahead of its time. No game that I have ever played has matched the storytelling capability of Black Isle's creation, and only Fallout has provided a similar ability to freely role-play in a unique and interesting environment. It is a shame that it sold so poorly, although that seems to be a common theme among many of my all-time favorite titles. It wasn't just Baldur's Gate dressed in Planescape clothing as I had originally expected, but that ended up being a very good thing indeed.

Fallout: Roam the Wastes at Your Own Pace

If I loved EarthBound because of its charming quirkiness and parodic nature, then I loved Fallout for its grittiness and depth. It is no secret that I am biased toward PC RPGs; I just feel that the PC variety has traditionally provided more opportunity to role play and focused less on a linear plot (though both sub-genres do have their merits). In Fallout, the focus was more on interacting with the game world -- and what a world it was.

Admittedly, I got in on Fallout about a year and a half after it was released; even then, I played Fallout 2 first. I saw the game's box and read the back and, after having already heard some buzz about this “gritty post-apocalyptic RPG,” I decided to purchase it. Though the game engine was refined in its sequel, fixing things like a clunky inventory interface and iffy relations with NPCs in the party, the original Fallout did a better job of presenting a truly believable pulp-styled post-apocalyptic setting. (Also, the amount of in-jokes was kept to a minimum, instead of the “heap 'em on because we can” mentality of Fallout 2.) The sheer playability of Fallout, though, amazed me then and continues to amaze me.

Though much is made of the SPECIAL chracter creation system, all of the praise is really warranted: the system was truly original and, more importantly, effective. If I wanted to create a small, highly-intelligent weakling, then I was free to do so; likewise, if I wanted to create an ogre of a character that could barely speak in complete sentences, I also had that option. What made it even better, though, was that the type of character that I created actually had an impact on how I could get along in the world. A highly charismatic and intelligent character could talk his way out of pretty much anything, whereas a stupid brute would end up having to fight his way out of a lot more situations. Every situation was solvable by any kind of character, for the most part.


That freedom extended to the game world in many ways, and is perhaps the best thing about Fallout from a design standpoint. I could really do anything that I wanted to, whether it be saving Shady Sands from raiders or stealing from an old woman. I could be a hero if I wanted to, but I didn't have to be. That freedom was really unrivaled until Grand Theft Auto III came along four years later; in many ways, it still is unrivaled in terms of how very well-implemented it was. If a role-playing game is supposed to be about actually playing a role, then Fallout succeeds on many levels: not only does it allow you to actually choose your role, but it provides ample opportunity to play it however you see fit.

Of course, the grittiness and violence of the game did appeal to me as well, but it just seemed like a natural extension of the game's setting: in a world gone to hell, only the strongest will survive. It just seemed fitting that I could take a semi-automatic gun and, in meticulous turn-based fashion, unleash a spray of lead into my opponent's head and cause it to burst messily. Of course, the guy would scream in agony as I inflicted much more damage than he could handle... and when plasma weapons got thrown into the mix later in the game, melted foes were plentiful.

The combat system is still my favorite of all-time in any RPG, period. I don't care what publishers or the current gaming public have to say on the issue: turn-based combat is vastly superior to real-time. Maybe it's my background in D&D that leads me to love turn-based combat systems, but there is just something really appealing and, well, tactical about being able to make my move and prepare for my next turn, watching each move unfold on my screen. It makes combat involved and actually interesting, as opposed to other games such as SSI's Ravenloft games (speaking of D&D), Might and Magic VI, or (shudder) Oblivion, where combat consists of “approach enemy, click mouse until dead, repeat.” Even the wildly popular Black Isle D&D role-playing games--Baldur's Gate, Planescape: Torment, etc.--suffered from this drawback. Yes, there were some definite flaws to Fallout's system, but it was far and away the best approximation of combat that I have ever had the joy of experiencing in a video game. (Also, who didn't giggle with juvenile glee the first time they figured out you could target an enemy's groin?)

Atmosphere, gameplay, and above all else, freedom to play however I want. There are a scant few games that can readily claim that they have all of these things in abundance, but Fallout is part of that echelon of games. For that, it is just as important to me as EarthBound on the scale of video game greatness.

Check out my MobyGames review of Fallout here.

EarthBound: Breaking the Fourth Wall

Perhaps it would be best to start this blog with a brief discussion of EarthBound. The fact that I have played through this game numerous times (around 13 or 14 probably) since its release in 1995 is particularly telling--the only game that I have played anywhere close to as many times through is Fallout. It is no stretch of the imagination to state firmly that this is probably my favorite game of all time; it holds a place in my heart that is reserved for only a select few games.

What is it about EarthBound that I love so much, though? Admittedly, the game is not very pretty to look at, so it isn't the graphics. EarthBound's graphics are very simple and, especially considering some of the other games coming out at the same time near the end of the 16-bit era, very low-tech. They do not really push the limits of the Super NES hardware in even the smallest way.

Is it the “quirkiness” or the “trippy battle backgrounds” that were spouted on about ad nauseum during the game's marketing campaign? Well, sort of, but not really the way that they were marketed. Yes, EarthBound is definitely quirky, but as Tim Rogers pointed out in his excellent article, these elements of the game were marketed so heavily because the advertisers really didn't have any idea how to sell the game to the gaming public. Granted, the trippy music and backgrounds were quite good, and the battle system changes to the traditional Dragon Quest formula--the rolling HP counter, the ability to see enemies on the overhead map, etc.--were quite a welcome change of pace from the more mainstream console RPGs of the day (a fact that Chrono Trigger also used to its own advantage). These things alone, however, do not make EarthBound what it is to me.

No, what really sold me on EarthBound was something that, as a 12-year-old seventh grader, I could only feel, but not really articulate. The game was quite simply hilarious. There was always some weird joke or spin on an RPG convention that would at least make me smile, if not laugh out loud. From Picky Minch trying to “cast a magic spell” early in the game, to all of the moles in the desert mine claiming to be “the third strongest,” to rummaging through trash cans to find hamburgers, EarthBound was full of funny and/or strange moments that gave it personality and a unique charm.

That charm, however, lies distinctly in its existence as a parody of the traditional console RPG. The simple graphics take on an added meaning when viewed as an intentional parody of the then-simplistic nature of RPG graphics compared to action or adventure games. (This was, of course, before Final Fantasy VII came along and made FMVs and shiny graphics mandatory for RPGs.) There were a lot of instances where the game made it explicitly clear that it was aware of its own existence as a video game. The most obvious example of this is when, after crossing to the port in Summers, the game stops to ask the player's name. That player later gets another chance to confirm his or her name in the Tenda Village. Also, when Ness first gets the Town Map from the library, the librarian is sure to remind him to push “You know, the X button... near the top, haha.” While the game puts on an air of being serious, you know it is never taking itself too seriously.

And that is, for all intents and purposes, what makes EarthBound so great overall. The game is just plain fun to play, and is an excellent take on the traditional console RPG. There are just enough differences to make it unique, but the game's content is what truly sets it head and shoulders above the rest in my mind. Parody and satire have a great impact on me, and EarthBound is one of the finest examples of RPG parody that has ever been made. It is a shame, then, that more people did not get in on the joke when it was readily available. I just count myself among the lucky ones; thanks to one of my last issues of Nintendo Power providing a really interesting preview of the game, I was able to get in on a game that has provided countless hours of enjoyment... and one that, no matter how many times I play through it, always seems to have some new joke or twist that I never noticed before.

That staying power is the sign of a truly great game, and is to me reason enough to count EarthBound as perhaps my favorite game of all time.

Check out my MobyGames review of EarthBound here.