Review: Dishonored: The Knife of Dunwall

I write for Save/Continue now. Be a rad dude and read my stuff there so I can become a superhero.

http://www.savecontinue.com/2013/07/review-dishonored-the-knife-of-dunwall/

That is the greatest review ever written ladies and gentlemen.

Is Linearity Really a Sin? || A Choose-Your-Own-Adventure Novel

Call of Duty is terrible. Call of Duty‘s design is exclusively aimed at brain-dead dudebros and your little cousin’s shitty friends who call you a “tryhard faggot” between Monster Energy swigs. Call of Duty represents the greatest threat to gaming since ET.

If you Agree, advance to section 5E. If you Disagree, advance to section 3C.

—1A—

The strength of your conviction is admirable, if not regretfully misplaced.

Call of Duty is not a bad series by even the most elitist stretch of the imagination; I genuinely wish more FPS developers would ape the controls and weapon handling that CoD has nearly perfected (we can talk recoil later). But do not mistake certain mechanical competencies as an endorsement of quality.

That is, however, another talk for another time. You do not buy into the prevailing notion that hyper-linearity is bad bad very bad and no good at all. For that, you have my thanks.

GAME OVER – PARIAH END

—2B—

Is Resident Evil 4 a bad game?

If you say Yes, advance to section —4D—. If you say No, advance to section —6F—.

—3C—

Congratulations, the gaming community zeitgeist has not yet robbed you of the ability to think for yourself! Round of applause. But let’s be honest, Mr. or Mrs. Heroic Contrarian, is this really the hill you want to die on? Do you truly wish to be the Edward John Smith of the RMS Cauwdudy?

If you truly wish to be the Edward John Smith of the RMS Cauwdudy, advance to section —1A—. Otherwise, advance to section —5E—.

—4D—

There is really nothing left to say — no more sharp quips, no more condescending interrogation. Yours is a lost vessel, floating listlessly though the infinite, foggy sea of gaming purgatory. May God have mercy on your soul.

GAME OVER –  YOU’RE SMALL TIME END

—5E—

Hardly a day goes by where someone, somewhere, doesn’t rain down furious indignation on the popularity and perceived industry influence of the Call of Duty series, indignation that is almost uniformly devoid of salient points or any degree of critical thought. Amidst the spittle and sneering, the same tired point is dragged up again and again like some sort of gaming keel haul:

“It’s hyper-linear garbage!”

How incisive, full marks!

But is that all there is? Has linearity in gaming reached the point where it should be considered an inherent evil?

If you say Yes, advance to section —2B—. If you say No, advance to section —6F—.

—6F—

Good, because it damn well isn’t.

Non-linearity is not some magic wand that turns every game it touches into a pretty dress and sparkling stilettos. It is a deliberate design decision that comes with some nice benefits and serious shortcomings. It feels almost condescending to write such a thing but, well, apparently some people have a hard time grasping why Skyrim catches so much heat these days.

In a nutshell, the primary give-and-take is between pacing and agency. It is a zero-sum game — the more agency you grant the player, the less control you as a developer will have over the pacing, and vice versa. Imagine for a moment an open-world Half-Life, or a hyper-linear Morrowind. These thoughts should trigger an unpleasant gastrointestinal response. Half-Life is great in no small part due to some of the tightest pacing in gaming, while Morrowind unfurls a massive and unique before you and says “Go”. They couldn’t work, as constituted, any other way.

Putting a leash around the player’s neck allows the designers to guide them along as desired. When poorly executed — often the case — the player will feel bored and constricted as they would when watching a bad movie or riding a child’s breezer at the local fair. And this is where I believe the misguided notion of non-linear superiority is borne from; it is a hell of a lot easier to let the player make their own fun than to craft a sustained, one-track experience that remains fun for the duration.

Think of it like this: Everyone agrees Morrowind‘s combat is dross, yet it is widely regarded as a gaming classic. Do you think Resident Evil 4 could get away with that?

So let us collectively refocus our sights as gamers. The failures of the modern Call of Duty series are legion: Shitty pacing, shitty story, and quattroshitty encounter design. But to reduce those criticisms down to linearity alone not only fails to be instructive, it can be downright dangerous.

Unless of course you wish for an exclusively open-world future, in which case advance to section  –4D–.