Dungeons & Dragons greatest Dungeon Master loses the ultimate battle - 3.4.2008.1

I have some very sad news to report today. While some of you may not recognize the name, others will be quite familiar with Gary Gygax. I hate to say it, but he has died at the age of 69.

Now I know gamers, most of us that are now a bit older and many are creating our own games, should be familiar with this man. For those that are not, he is one of the co-creators of the most popular gaming system possibly ever. Dungeons & Dragons. Along with JRR Tolkein he was responsible for sci-fantasy and RPG style gaming.

In fact I think you can draw a direct line from JRR Tolkein to Gary Gygax to Vampire: The Masquerade to The Witcher to MMO’s (Massively Multiplayer Online games). Without D&D there is no Everquest, or World of Warcraft. There is no Final Fantasy. There is no Resident Evil or any other game. And thus no movies either.

Some may think that D&D was simply a bad movie made by some Hollywood guy that was made into an MMO. In fact the universe of Dungeons & Dragons is enormous and highly profitable. From huge tomes regarding how to play in the 1980’s, a cartoon in the late 80’s, video games, trading cards, books, and movies the genre encompasses 3 decades and continuing.

The original game system was a real first. Before there were computers, groups of friends (yes some were a bit geeky, but it was hugely popular with the military too) would gather to pull out pieces of paper and become a Dwarven Thief or Elven Paladin or Human Mage for a few hours. Without the need of more than pencil paper and a set of 3-, 4-, 6-, 10-, and 20-sided dice entire worlds were created and enjoyed. Today those same types of worlds require years of programming and sometimes servers connected to the world.

The legacy of Gary Gygax is immense when you consider not only what he created for his friends to enjoy, but what became a multi-national conglomerate. You may not be a computer geek, but every time you play a FPS (First Person Shooter), RPG (Role Playing Game), or fantasy MMO you are living an extension of the mind of the greatest mage this side of Merlin.

Few are so creative, and touched so many. My condolences to his friends and family. He will be missed by this Dwarven Thief and many others I am sure.

Reviewing the Witcher and SimCities Societies - 12.12.2007.2

Now that it’s the prime selling season, and every nice mom and dad is running around looking for goodies to buy the kids, I wanted to add my 2 cents on 2 recent video games. They are both for the computer, and one I like, the other not so much. Let’s see if you can tell which is which.

The first game I want to mention is SimCity Societies. As the name implies this is based on the award-winning mid-1980’s game concept, SimCity. The concept for those that have never played this is simple. You start with a map of land, and on it you can build an assortment of buildings, streets, bridges, subways and so on. You start with limited money to start off your megopolis-to-be, and as you attract people and employ them your revenues increase. There are of course natural disasters, fires, floods and other events that can cause massive chaos. You can even create them if you are bored or love anarchy.

Those are the good points, and they are holdovers from the original game concept. But this new title takes the original game and waters it down. I presume that the game designers felt that the original game was too difficult, or required too much thought, for the youth of today and thus dumbed-down the game. It’s a shame.

Whereas previous versions made you have to plan each step of your grand design, little thought is needed here. You have multiple options for power generation that includes nuclear, hydrogen, and renewable sources. You can put them down ANYWHERE on the game map and you have power for all your buildings. No need to connect anything with power lines. The same goes for the subway system. Just put down a station and you have an instant metro system. And bus routes too. No planning needed. The trade off there is that you can’t modify the terrain (not a single control for that that I’ve seen). So you have to build around slopes and high grades.

And it gets worse. Societies has several ‘themes’ that you need to balance. This supposedly is to keep your Sims happy. It’s virtually impossible not to. Any value that might be low requires just another building and instantly you move that value up. It doesn’t matter if you drop it in the middle of a business district or residential. And if you keep the values relatively even, the money pours in so fast you will wonder what else to build.

While this might sound nice, it’s boring. The biggest question is where to put new buildings. In a matter of game days your surplus will be overflowing with tens of thousands of dollars. Zero challenge. Not even close to the thrill or intensity of the original game.

This might be a nice game for someone with a lot of time to kill, low expectations, and limited mental abilities, but I think even 5 year olds will bore with this in a day. It’s almost a decent tutorial for learning the original game, except that involves careful planning. At $50 it’s a waste of money, and reminds me of the failure that was SimTower.

On the other hand there is a game that is more interesting and involved. It’s called The Witcher. Now this is an engaging game. But definitely not for kids. It’s an adults RPG.

What you get in the Witcher is moral complexity or ambiguity if you prefer. The world is hardly idyllic, but firmly in the fantasy realm. Magic exists, not that you really use any. You do get potions instead, though your choices are severely limited in what you can make. Weapon options are similarly limited and generally useless beyond the main 2 weapons you start with.

The game is rendered quite well, looking very nice. Sadly you can’t really explore most of it. Don’t be confused, while there are side missions there is no comparison to NeverWinter or Morrowind. This is NOT open-ended.

But as I mentioned there is a level of complexity. No one is without some guilt or wrong-doing. You let one group get supplies, you enable an assassination. Need information, give a junkie his fix. Do someone a favor, you help a criminal. And it keeps going. Nothing is ever just a one way street. And your choices help one side or another more often than not.

And then there is the sex life. Your character is not above paying or saying whatever it takes to bed most every lass in the game. And you get cards to keep track of the notches you get. There are no sex scenes or nudity on the cards though (at least in the U.S. version).

Still don’t think this is a horrible place to have your character stroll through. He is far from a Paladin While not evil, he is up for hire for most any action. You can always say no, but where is the fun in that?

Expect a lot of foul language, adult situations, and immoral characters – minor and major. But the game is fun. It’s definitely a nice change for the morally high-handed hero most games in this genre take. And it’s interesting to see the outcomes of the choices you make.

So if you are not attached to taking the high road, can live with coarse language, and wonder what you can get away with as an infertile, infection-immune, ambivalent monster hunter with a grudge, this can be a fun game. Just don’t get to upset you can’t wander off the beaten path.