Demon's Souls Review

The Sirens Are Calling


Whenever people talk about the action RPG Demon's Souls, the subject of difficulty inevitably makes its way into the discussion. Make no mistake about it, the game is difficult, but it is not difficult in terms of skill. No, Demon's Souls is difficult in a much more diabolical way: it is a test of willpower. The more one plays the game, the more pain and pleasure centers merge until the player has trouble distinguishing one from the other. If one does start to realize that much of that sensation is pain, Demon's Souls sings its Sirens' song, luring its prey back for more punishment.

What makes Demon's Souls so enticing is its dark and compelling setting. Upon entering the kingdom of Boletaria, the player is tasked with defeating a horde of demons that have entrenched themselves throughout its various regions. From the moment the player takes his first step in this fog-shrouded land, the game absolutely oozes with atmosphere. The dim corridors of a crumbling castle lead to parapets guarded by heavily-armored knights; in a prison fortress the moans of tortured criminals are punctuated by clear, haunting bells; elsewhere, gargoyles perch on spires connected by rail-less bridges suspended high over a murky swamp. These are but a few of the many locales, each as foreboding as the last, and each contributing to the coherency of the bleak world. I often found myself clinging to the tiny sphere of light surrounding my character, squinting in a futile effort to penetrate the blackness that threatened to swallow me whole.

The plausibility of the world is further augmented by clever level design. Even though the stages are linear overall, they will zig and zag, up and down staircases and through tight, winding cave tunnels that circle back on themselves, leaving a non-linear impression. It's easy to believe that once upon a time the massive structures had been built with purpose by the now wanton inhabitants. Some stages have one or two checkpoints that are created by traversing a loop to open a previously inaccessible path, such as unlocking a door from behind or lowering a bridge from one side.


Unfortunately, not all stages have checkpoints, and these instances exposed a major weakness in the game's design: Upon death, the player is set back at the beginning of the stage with all of the enemies re-spawned. The game throws down the gauntlet, and at first I welcomed this challenge. As I continued playing, however, this design became increasingly problematic, most notably when it came to the demon battles. Many of the encounters with these frightening bosses were creative, engaging, and extremely intense, as they can annihilate the player, sometimes with a single attack. Players will assuredly die numerous times while attempting to learn their patterns and weaknesses. There was nothing more frustrating than when a demon's sword clipped through a pillar and one-shotted me, forcing me to replay the entire stage again just to get another chance. It does not make sense to force the player to complete a task that he has already conquered as punishment for failing at a wholly separate challenge. That is like a parent forcing a kid who fails a homework assignment to clean his room even though he just finished cleaning it five minutes ago.

The variety of available classes and nice assortment of weapons and spells should have been plenty enough to keep things interesting, but the lack of enemy intelligence often destroyed the potential many scenarios had. To be blunt, most of the enemies are dumber than zombies. While this seems appropriate—after all, they are creatures that have been robbed of their souls and have gone insane—it does not justify their sub-par pathfinding and severe lack of awareness. Many times an enemy will, of his own accord, walk right off a ledge and plummet to his death. A few placed in some stages predictably did this every single time I encountered them. Flee from the fight and the vast majority of adversaries will give up chase and turn around, leaving themselves open to criticial strikes from behind. Worst of all was the fact that too many enemies could be easily dispatched from afar with a bow and arrows. This included the final boss, where I literally stood in one spot and fired dozens of arrows at it until it died; it never even got close enough for me to make out what it was!


My biggest disappointment came with the dragons. Without a doubt, these were some of the most majestic, awe-inspiring, and intimidating creatures I have ever seen in a video game. I initially imagined epic battles—dodging from battlement to battlement, slowly withering my foe down. These dreams were crushed upon rudimentary experimentation that revealed them to be nothing more than environmental fire hazards triggered by walking into specific areas. The culmination of my dismay was when I stood right underneath one of them and shot it with over 250 arrows while it did absolutely nothing to defend itself. What should have been a terrifying dragon was instead a silly giant frog sitting in a pot of water, completely unaware that it was slowly being boiled alive.

With its absorbing world and realistic class role-playing, Demon's Souls had so much going for it. I would have loved to play through the game again with a variety of character classes, but my desire to do so has been completely snuffed out by the feeling as though I have finished the game several times over already. Obviously the archaic "restart the level" design choice was a huge contributor, but perhaps the class I chose and the manner in which I played was also a factor. Whatever the reasons, the result was that Demon's Souls ended up being one of those games that I wanted to like more than I actually did. Despite this—and because of it—I will be keeping an eye on From Software's next project, hoping for a spiritual successor.

Rating: 7 out of 10.

Disclosures: This game was obtained via retail store and reviewed on the PS3. Approximately 50 hours of play were devoted to the single-player mode (completed 1 time).

Update: December 21, 2010 - This review was published on Gamecritics.com through their community user review process.

Flower Review

A Rose by Any Other Game


Philosophers as old as Aristotle believed that the primary purpose of art is mimesis, or the imitation of nature. As Chi Kong Lui of Gamecritics pointed out in his review, this function has served artists well throughout history. Flower absolutely excels in this respect. From sun-filled fields to rainy canyons, the gorgeous vistas are breathtaking. The fluidity of the motion-sensitive controls is a perfect fit for guiding the wind across the rolling landscape. Rarely has a game been so convincing of motion that at times my heart actually leaped in my chest as the wind swept me up into the sky and gently ushered me back down again. The melodic tones that play at uneven intervals—whenever a flower is picked up—evoked images of a child learning the piano.

Despite all of these strengths, I came away from Flower a bit disappointed. On one hand, it succeeds as a piece of traditional art, where the primary function of the audience is to interpret the story, understanding the events and deciphering their meaning. Games, on the other hand, require active audience participation to configure the story. Players decide which events occur by choosing from or creating some options and eliminating others. As a result, the story will vary from player to player and from session to session. It is this unique characteristic of games that I found lacking.

A look at Flower's narrative illustrates the point. The game tells a thought-provoking tale with themes ranging from solitude to environmental rejuvenation. Yes, the story will differ from player to player, but this difference is due to the abstract nature of the narrative, which permits multiple interpretations. It is unfortunately not due to the gameplay, which at its core can be summarized as Pac-Man without the ghosts.


Even though I disagree with film critic Roger Ebert on the overall issue of whether or not games are art, he is spot-on when he says that a game without rules

...ceases to be a game and becomes a representation of a story, a novel, a play, dance, a film. Those are things you cannot win; you can only experience them.

This begs the question: Is Flower primarily a game or is it something else altogether? If it could only be watched and not played, I'm not convinced that it would be a significantly worse experience. When viewing the documentary Seasons at an IMAX over a decade ago, I had similar sensations as I did during my Flower play-through: my heart leaped in my chest as an airplane soared across rolling flower fields.

It's conceivable that Flower would actually be better off without forcing the player to complete its mundane gameplay tasks. During play I often had to stop abruptly to avoid missing flowers, killing my momentum and much of the sense of flow that I had developed. Occasionally I even became bored, as when I was forced to loop through the same areas multiple times in order to collect a few missed flower petals in order to progress. These instances hampered the game's ability to stimulate my senses or let me contemplate the narrative.

In the games-as-art debate, Flower is frequently brought up as a supreme example of a game being art. I have no qualms with the game being considered art, or even great art. I do question if it is much of a game.

Rating: 6 out of 10

Disclosures: This game was obtained via paid download and reviewed on the PS3. Approximately 4 hours of play were devoted to the single-player mode (completed 1 time).

Starve the Beast

While filling out my official voting ballot for Washington state this past weekend, I came upon Senate Joint Resolution 8225, a proposed amendment to the state's Constitution concerning calculation of the state debt. Of all the initiatives and referendums on the ballot this year, this particular measure is probably one of the least controversial and will likely be approved by a large margin.

But should it be?

Article VIII, section 1 of the Washington Constitution establishes a limit on the debt that the state government may contract. The limit is based on the average revenue the state has collected for the past three years. This is a very wise part of the state constitution because it prevents the state from getting in over its head. Just as American citizens must work within the confines of a family budget and be careful not to borrow more money than they can pay back, so must the government be fiscally responsible. As we have seen recently with the federal government and with numerous state governments, politicians are all too eager to borrow and spend money with little regard to how that money will be paid back.

Through a new federal program called Build America Bonds, the federal government actually pays a portion of the interest on certain types of state bonds. In response to this, SJR 8225 wants to modify how the state's debt is calculated by adding the following sentence to subsection (d):

In addition, for the purpose of computing the amount required for payment of interest on outstanding debt under subsection (b) of this section and this subsection, "interest" shall be reduced by subtracting the amount scheduled to be received by the state as payments from the federal government in each year in respect of bonds, notes, or other evidences of indebtedness subject to this section.

The effect of this change, as explained in the state voter's guide, would be to lower the amount of debt the state thinks it has, thereby allowing it to take on even more debt, despite the fact that the constitutional debt limit would not change.

Proponents, such as the official Statement For and this Seattle Times editorial, seem to suggest that this amendment will yield substantial "savings" or that the state will receive "free money". These arguments are misleading for couple of reasons.

First, the state will receive money from the federal government regardless of whether or not this amendment is approved. In order for the amendment to allow the state to receive more money from the federal government, the state would have to issue more bonds. More bonds means more interest owed, which means more money from the federal government. But it also means more debt! What happens if the scheduled payments from the federal government don't materialize? There have already been instances where states assumed the federal government would give them money but it never actually happened. Granted, this situation is a bit different in that a law was already passed. Still, if you are in debt, and someone offers to pay a portion of what you owe, the responsible thing to do is to be grateful and take what they are giving you. You don't go out and spend even more money in the hope that they will cover you further and then call that "savings".

Second, money from the federal government is not free! Perhaps from a naive state government's point of view it is "free". However, federal money is taken from federal tax receipts, and the last time I checked, Washington state residents pay federal taxes. Whether the money is handed over with the left hand or the right hand, it still comes out of your wallet. Or to be more precise, it comes from your wallet and your children's and grandchildren's wallets.

And that's really what the amendment is all about: Adding more debt that has to be repaid by someone else in the future. Hopefully the people of Washington state will see past the accounting gimmickry and realize that there is no such thing as a free lunch.

Update: November 3, 2010 - Looking at the election results for Washington state measures shows that SJR 8225 passed by a very narrow margin with 51% to 49%. I have to admit I thought it would be a blowout approval, but perhaps this shows that people can be more perceptive than I gave them credit for. It's still too bad the measure was approved.

Obamacare's Flawed Assumption

With the midterm elections coming up next month, I want to take a look at one of the issues that received heavy focus during the last two years, namely health care. You have probably heard the numbers so many times you can recite them with me: 47 million Americans are without health insurance. The U.S. population is just over 300 million, so about 1 in every 6 people does not have health insurance. In March of this year President Obama signed the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (a.k.a. Obamacare) in order to address this apparent crisis.

Let's back up to October of 2008. During the second presidential debate Tom Brokaw asked the candidates the question "Is health care in America a privilege, a right, or a responsibility?" Barack Obama's answer:

Well, I think it should be a right for every American. In a country as wealthy as ours, for us to have people who are going bankrupt because they can't pay their medical bills -- for my mother to die of cancer at the age of 53 and have to spend the last months of her life in the hospital room arguing with insurance companies because they're saying that this may be a pre-existing condition and they don't have to pay her treatment, there's something fundamentally wrong about that.

My question is: Why is health care a right? Is health care a right because it is expensive? Waterfront homes are expensive, but they are not a right. Is health care a right because we think it would be wonderful if everyone had it? It would be wonderful if everyone had a home, three meals a day, a Ferrari, and a 52-inch plasma TV, but none of those are rights.

Some would argue that it is the Constitution that grants us the right to health care – that health care falls under the “right to life”.

My first response to that argument is that the Fifth Amendment to the Constitution says that “No person … shall be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law”. This statement means that the government cannot take away life, liberty, or property. It does not mean that it is the government’s responsibility to give these things to its citizens. It is government’s responsibility to protect our rights from being taken away by other people. It is not government’s responsibility to take from other people in order to give to us. This includes taking from medical care providers, because if health care is a right, then the government must compel them to provide services to the rest of us.

My second response to the argument is that if health care somehow falls under the right to life and if somehow the government should provide everyone with health care, then what about the numerous other things without which we cannot live? We cannot live without food, water, or shelter. Should not these things fall under the “right to life” as well? Where does it end? A lot of people might claim that we cannot live without love. Should the government provide love to everyone as well?

Though Obama's ideology makes people feel good, it is fraught with peril. The implication in Obama's response is that we as a country have enough money to pay for everyone's health care. As much as I would like it to be true, experience tells us that solving problems is more than just throwing more money at them. At the very least, we know that it depends on how that money is spent. And when money is spent, the one doing the spending is usually the one deciding what is done with it. This means that government, not the person, makes the decision about what the best treatment is for a given condition.


Just what is the "best" medical care? There is no universal answer to the question, and there is certainly no single set of standards that applies to everyone equally well. Which combinations of various treatments are "best" for a given set of health problems? For which of dozens of drugs should the government pay in order to treat a given condition? Which treatments are "valid" treatments and which are not? Should the government pay for Treatment A that is likely to eliminate Condition X, possibly exacerbating Condition Y, or should it seek out a lower cost alternate Treatment B that has a lower chance of success? Should other taxpayers be forced to pay for someone's acupuncture treatment or psychotherapy sessions? Should the government pay for therapeutic massages as a component of "preventative health care" because someone claims to be too stressed? Should not someone with a terminal illness be able to seek out unorthodox or “unproven” treatments? The human body is extremely complex, and health care equally so.

What is really "fundamentally wrong" is that Obama's statements ignore the true cost of medical care in terms of basic economics:

From the standpoint of society as a whole, the COST of anything is the value that it has as in alternative uses.

~ Thomas Sowell

The real cost of medical care is the alternative uses of the resources that it requires. Probably the most important of those resources is people. In order to have more doctors, nurses, and other medical professionals, there must be fewer teachers, policemen, and janitors. Another resource is land. In order to have more hospitals and clinics we have to have fewer houses, schools, and commercial offices. Other items needed for medical care are food, drugs, and equipment, all of which are made from resources that have other uses.

The point here is that despite the fact that we can all claim that everyone deserves health care, and despite the fact that we truly live in a "wealthy" country, we still cannot get around the fact that there are not enough resources to meet all of our needs. Thinking otherwise is a flawed assumption. Money is just a tool for exchanging real goods and services, and health care does not exist in a vacuum.

We should not leave it up to the government to tell us what resources are more important than others. We should not accept, for instance, that doctors and hospitals are more important than farmers and farmland, simply because the government says so. After all, people will die if they don't get food. A small group of "experts" cannot possibly come up with a set of rules that efficiently makes these kinds of decisions for everyone. In reality, you are more likely to find yourself in the best situation if you get to make all these decisions for yourself.

Why Game Programming?

Recently I was having a beer with a co-worker of mine named Bradley and he asked how long I had been in the games industry. I answered that I had been in the industry for three years and then explained how I had gotten into it.


Several years ago I was working for the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, in the Solar and Stellar X-Ray Group. In order to further my career in physics research I needed to pursue a graduate degree, and I was in the process of applying to physics graduate schools. Although I would have been capable of having a successful career as a research scientist, I had doubts about whether or not I would enjoy doing it.

Bradley pressed me as to why, and I explained that, while I firmly believe in the scientific method and the value of science to humanity, I did not get the feeling that I was discovering anything new. I had the distinct impression that the senior scientists thought that they already knew the answers to the questions they were asking and that they just needed to sufficiently show it. Bradley was rightly confused. He stated that what I described sounded like the scientific method - the scientists had a hypothesis and that they were trying to prove it.

This was an excellent point, and one that I did not address sufficiently at the time. What I meant was that the scientists seemed to assume that certain behaviors which had been observed in the Sun could be sufficiently explained by physical rules that were already known. They may have been correct, and the answers could potentially be useful to humanity. However, what I wanted to do personally was to discover fundamentally new laws of the universe, and I was not convinced that the course I was on would allow me to do that.

I was certainly considering shifting from Solar Physics to Cosmology or to something like Nuclear Physics, but I was not positive that those would ultimately appeal to me, either. For starters, there are precious few people who make a living being a Cosmologist. There's only one Stephen Hawking. Moreover, I was not keen on working on some huge experiment such as a particle accelerator where I was a single cog in a machine of hundreds of people and it would take years to complete. That reasoning is somewhat ironic considering the fact that Dark Void, my only completed game project at this point, easily topped a hundred people and a few years of development when all was said and done.

In order to complete the picture, I'd like to draw from the book I'm currently reading: Flow, by psychologist Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi. The book explores what the author calls "optimal experience", or "flow". A person experiences the state of flow when all of his attention is completely focused on a single activity. Typically, the activity has clear goals, rules, and feedback; the participant has a sense of control and a chance of completing it; there are no distractions; and one's sense of time distorts. Athletes might know this state as "being in the zone". The author claims that these experiences are enjoyable because they allows us to grow and become more complex persons. There is a slight self-help vibe, as the book suggests that one can find happiness by finding flow. I'm definitely buying into the theory.


I mention Flow because it helps explain why I did not enjoy research science as much as I would have liked. There were few opportunities for flow experiences. There were certainly clear goals and rules, but the feedback was not timely and it was easy to get distracted. I honestly spent too much time waiting and twiddling my thumbs.

In contrast, I frequently experience flow when programming. Game programming provides ample opportunity to challenge my problem-solving skills, and I can readily find a zone when tackling a programming task. There's a huge sense of control because the computer does exactly what I tell it to do. I am creating a tiny universe all to itself, and instead of discovering the rules I'm making them up. Feedback is also clear and immediate - all I have to do is compile and run the game!

I also experience flow while playing video games. Anyone who has ever seen The Nutcracker ballet and thought that "Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy" was "the Tetris song"; stayed up until 4 a.m. for "just one more match" in Street Fighter II; or killed monsters for hours on end in an MMORPG can attest to this.

Naturally, combining programming with video games was a big win. I know first-hand that by making a video game I am creating something that will enable other people experience enjoyment, and that is no small thing.

Who Cares About Narrative Meaning in Games?

A few months ago my friend Hyperion pointed me to an article in Slate magazine by Farhad Manjoo, whom he described as "one of the best popular-tech writers out there". The article, Are Video Games a Massive Waste of Time?, discusses the book Extra Lives: Why Video Games Matter by Tom Bissell, and how its theme jives with Manjoo's personal feelings of guilt and embarrassment when he plays video games. He asks

How can I explain and defend—both to myself and to others—my affection for and continued investment of time in a form of entertainment that ultimately seems empty and ephemeral?

As someone whose career centers on creating video games, this question resonated with me. In the distant past I frequently felt the same guilt and embarrassment. I certainly had my doubts when I decided to attend DigiPen Institute of Technology instead of a physics graduate school, and it wasn't easy explaining my decision to others. However, after several years of study and work I have grown far more confident in my decision. So much so, in fact, that I emphatically do not share Manjoo's pessimism when it comes to finding lasting meaning in games.

In the article the comparison is drawn between narcotics and video games, suggesting that they are both addicting and can lead to destructive behavior. While valid points, these kinds of comparisons are only peripherally important. People usually say those kinds of things to spark reaction. Pretty much anything can be addictive—books, movies, sex, food, etc.—we just have to be careful how we spend our time.

The really important questions deal with the sentence

When he looks at video games from a critical distance, Bissell is concerned mainly with their lack of narrative meaning.

To that I say, Who cares about narrative meaning in games! That's not to say meaning is not important, but games inherently are not narratives. A narrative is when the audience is told what happens. In games, however, the audience gets to control what happens, and that is a monumental difference. Games have a state, rules, and inputs. They have inputs from the author which have narrative elements—for example, cut-scenes, symbols, and text. However, it is the rules and the player input that lead to a different "story". That is what differentiates games from other art forms. The purpose of the narrative portions is not to convey deep meaning, but to communicate the state of the game to the player. This enables the player to make informed decisions. The player ultimately derives lasting meaning from how his decisions affect the game state.

Thus, I think Manjoo is missing the point when he wants to know why the character in the game is doing what he is doing. He should be asking why he—Farhad Manjoo—is doing what he is doing. Manjoo says that Bissell's account of his experiences make him feel sad, but personally I feel sorry for Manjoo when he says

I can't recall a single moment in which Red Dead Redemption (nor any other game) has moved me, emotionally and lastingly, in the way I've been moved by the best music, movies, and TV shows.

Manjoo is approaching games with the wrong mindset and as a result he is playing the wrong games. Certainly some games, such as Super Mario Galaxy, are just for the pure fun, but others can provide the meaning he's looking for. Instead of playing Grand Theft Auto, he should be playing Heavy Rain or Sim City and asking questions like "Why am I willing to drink poison?" or "Why do I choose to expand the airport instead of building new railroads?" The answers would say something about his values.

To his credit Manjoo seems aware that something is amiss, asking

is the video game, as a form, simply incompatible with traditional concepts of narrative, and must game designers instead find other ways to invest their creations with lasting meaning?

I think I've already given my answer to this question, but in case I wasn't clear: YES!

Finally, I should point out that games can—and should—get a lot from traditional narratives. Right now most games revolve around spatial puzzles and physics, which developers know how to implement pretty well. I think we'll start to see the kind of things many people would describe as "artistic" when game developers start thinking about how to simulate character's personalities, or start making it so that the player can really talk to game characters. They could learn a lot from books and movies about what makes an interesting and believable character, and start trying to simulate that, instead of bullets and explosions.

Heavy Rain Review

Where Does the Road Not Taken Lead?


In Robert Frost's famous poem "The Road Not Taken", the narrator walks through the woods and encounters a fork in the road. The fork is a metaphor for an important life decision. Once the decision is made, the path is chosen and the narrator will not be able to return and explore the other route. Near the end of the poem the narrator speaks of a sigh—presumably an expression of regret at his choice. A key observation is that the narrator would not feel regret unless he truly believed that he would have reached a different outcome had he chosen the other path.

Heavy Rain, the latest game from developer Quantic Dream, bills itself as an interactive drama, and that is an apt description. The player takes the role of four different characters in an attempt to prevent a serial killer from claiming the next victim. In the vast majority of games, player choice is exhibited through spatial movement and physical action—running, jumping, shooting, etc. Heavy Rain, on the other hand, eschews these standard options in favor of letting the player directly affect how the drama develops. This includes how characters react emotionally to various situations as well as the moral choices they make.

As with Frost's traveler, these choices are final and the player must bear the consequences. In theory you could quickly reset the game every time you changed your mind (hoping to beat the auto-save), but that would cheapen the entire experience. Heavy Rain is refreshing in that the player never has to play the same "level" twice. Furthermore, the criteria for winning and losing are often blurred and player-defined. If you make a mistake, then you live with it, learn from it, and move on—just like in real life. Ultimately, Heavy Rain's success as a game depends on whether the player's actions have a meaningful impact on the final outcome, or if they are merely illusions of choice that lead to the same destination regardless of the path taken. The reality lies somewhere in between.

Heavy Rain's style is cinematic film noir and the overall presentation is generally high quality. The visuals are crisp and realistic, with gritty urban settings that range from crowded subway stations and run-down apartment buildings to abandoned warehouses and seedy motels. For the most part the dialogue and voice acting are goo d, and the animations are fluid and believable. The music helps set the mood of each scene quite well.

All of that is necessary to set up the story and draw in the player, but where Heavy Rain sets itself apart as a game is when the narrative creatively gives the player meaningful and consequential choices. Big or small, the results are often personal and rewarding. For example, during a pretend sword fight with my son Jason, my gamer instinct initially led me to start winning the fight. After a couple of times hitting Jason, I thought "You know, this is a kid. I should let him win." Then I intentionally started missing buttons. Jason slashed me in the leg, then he stabbed me in the stomach, and finally my character collapsed to the ground in a fake death. When Jason cheered in victory, I could not help but smile. I loved the inversion of the traditional QTE.

That example is lighthearted, but there is no shortage of intense moral decisions in the game. In one scene, I was resolved to handle an awful moral dilemma in a particular way. Through clever writing, the game threw a sequence of curveballs at me in an attempt to justify backing down from my position. Each new revelation forced me to reconsider my values while under pressure. In the end I steeled myself and continued on the path I had chosen, feeling extremely satisfied that I had resisted temptation. Heavy Rain is at its best during these moments, when the decisions clearly have consequences and the "correct" one is debatable.

In contrast, the game's weakest moments occur when there is no choice. There are some scenes where it is obvious that the player exists simply to propel the action forward through button presses. For instance, there was a scene in which I thought I was being presented with the opportunity to sever a relationship with a particular character, only to discover that was not an option. I was forced to play out the scene, watching two characters reconcile their differences when I would have preferred that they go their separate ways. If I had been allowed to make the choice that I had desired then the outcome of the story would have been far different. In such cases, the game is reduced to a movie and the player’s connection to the story is diminished.

Therein lies the rub with Heavy Rain: The game is structured in such a way that none of the narrative is generated by the program itself. As a result, it requires the developers to explicitly create all the narrative nodes that the player can experience (in this sense it a descendant of “Choose Your Own Adventure” books and games like Dragon's Lair). This is a daunting task because the possibilities are as limitless as there are players. Inevitably, players will encounter some plot holes, hand-waving, and occasions where the characters' behaviors conflict with the manner in which they have been controlled.

Fortunately, in the end I discovered that my actions had a profound effect on the final outcome. All four character threads intertwined to determine not only who lived and who died, but where the characters were headed in the future. Heavy Rain's narrative did not branch quite as much as I would have preferred, but I have not spoken to anyone who has completed the game and had the exact same outcome, so that speaks to the relative uniqueness of my involvement. Accordingly, I found Heavy Rain to be a refreshing, satisfying experience that defies traditional notions of what video games should be. Though I am skeptical that its underlying structure is viable for narratives with larger scope, I hope more developers explore these less traveled roads to see where they might lead.

Rating: 8 out of 10

Disclosures: This game was obtained via retail store and reviewed on the PS3. Approximately 10 hours of play were devoted to the single-player mode (completed 1 time).

The Sum of All Choices

Life is the sum of all your choices.

~ Albert Camus

Writing is not something that I do on a regular basis. I was never keen to keep a diary, for example. However, I have reached a point in my life where I feel like I have a lot of ideas that I would like to record, so I decided to create a blog. The hardest part, of course, is getting started. Luckily, I'm already a paragraph deep!

The big question that came up was "What will be the title of the blog?" The title, of course, should be relevant to the various topics about which I will write. I want the blog to be somewhat focused. The title does not need to encapsulate every possible subject, but I feel that it needs to serve as a common thread - something that ties most of it together and gives it some cohesion. That is where choice comes into play.

Choice - the ability to select freely from among alternatives and act accordingly - has become a core value for me. Choice is empowering. It is what gives us control of our lives and enables us to steer our fates towards the destination that we want. Without it, we are slaves to the wills of other beings or to chance.

Once choice had been settled on as a theme for the blog, I starting digging around for a suitable name. That's when I came across the Albert Camus quote above, which I thought it fit quite nicely.

Decisions permeate our daily lives. We are constantly making decisions, consciously and subconsciously. From what we eat to how we spend our free time and with whom we build relationships, these decisions determine how we pursue our goals and how we set those goals in the first place.

We all start out in different places (even if you're an identical twin, as I am), and there are a lot of things that we cannot control. Nevertheless, our lives are ultimately directed by the choices we make. Every one of the millions of choices leads us down a path toward a different future. Our current state of being is the net result of all those choices.

Over the past several years I have become increasingly influenced by ideas from various philosophies, including game design and development, libertarianism, and objectivism. Along the way I have had to make some significant choices involving family, friends, and work. I hope to write about some of these ideas and experiences.