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              <p><font color="#0000FF"><b><font face="Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" color="#0000CC">volume 
                1, issue 29</font></b></font></p>
              <p><font color="#0000FF"><b><font face="Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" color="#0000CC"> 
                </font></b></font></p>
              <p>  <p><font face="Courier New, Courier, mono"><b><font color="#339900" face="Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif">Today 
                in loonygames:</font></b></font></p>

<P><font color="#000000" face="Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="-1">New!!</font><font face="Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2"> The Archives have been cleaned up, fead links fixed, and printable versions restored! Also, don't miss the new comments <a href="../../../index.html">on the front page</a>!</font></p>
              
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        <p align="LEFT"><font face="Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" color="#0022A8"><b><a target="" href="../../columns.1"><font size="-1">Pad 
          Happy</font></a><font size="-1">:</font></b></font><font face="Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="+3" color="#0022A8"><br>
          Out of Control</font><font face="Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="+1" color="#0022A8"></font></p>
        <p align="RIGHT"><font color="#804000"><b><font face="Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif">By 
          </font></b><font face="Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif"> <a href="mailto:nickf@saqnet.co.uk">Nick 
          Ferguson</a></font></font></p>
        <p align="right">&nbsp;</p>
        <p><font face="Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif">For those of you who have 
          taken to turning your nose up at anything 2D, I beg you to think again. 
          It was absolutely delightful to play a game and not have to wonder about 
          camera mess-ups, looking up and down, baddies that might be hiding just 
          out of sight, and all the other wonderful things that go hand-in-hand 
          with 3D adventuring. Returning to a land of pixel-perfect jumps, suitably 
          predictable bad guys and relaxing left-right, up-down scrolling gameplay 
          was a most refreshing experience. In fact, it felt like a gaming holiday! 
          Not to mention the fact that the range and invention that you’ll find 
          among the superior 2D platformers and shoot-em ups far outweighs the 
          range of today’s 3D equivalents – there are valuable lessons to be learned 
          from the classics of the past. So you were impressed with some of <b>Quake</b>’s 
          gravity-bending environments? Pah – <b>Strider</b> was doing all that 

          years ago. Similarly, the thrilling level in <b>Jedi Knight</b>, where 
          you were trapped on board a crashing Corvette and the whole ship was 
          being turned upside down, can be linked back to the opening of <b>Super 
          Metroid</b>!</font></p>
        <p><font face="Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif">The game mechanics of the 
          average shooter and fighter have become increasingly complex. Too often, 
          a barrage of spectacular power-ups are used to mask the inherent lack 
          of substance (a criticism that can also be leveled at many of Capcom’s 
          later beat-em ups). The player is often confronted with complex options 
          screens, multiple arrays of power-ups and too many choices. The gameplay 
          is not clean – it’s messy and ill-conceived. Playing the excellent PlayStation 
          emu title <b>R-Types</b>, I was struck initially by the first game’s 
          comparative simplicity, but also (as in the best games, such as the 
          <b>Zelda</b> series and <b>Metal Gear Solid</b>) how every type and 
          line of enemy, each stage, and every power-up item forces the player 
          to reassess their playing strategy. Even though I must have plugged 
          the local coin-op with enough lunch money to buy my own cabinet, <b>R-Type</b> 
          still manages to surprise and delight me - eleven years on.</font></p>
        <p><font face="Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif">Now, I’m not one of those 
          dull old crones who harps on about how &quot;games were better in the 
          old days&quot;. They weren’t, but they sure were different. I have to 
          make space for an hour or two before I let myself play <b>Zelda</b> 
          – otherwise I won’t have the time to do anything worthwhile (like an 
          entire dungeon) in one go. A similar criticism can be applied to <b>Turok 
          2</b>, or DMA’s <b>Body Harvest</b>, which necessitate a mind-boggling 
          hour to an hour-and-a-half between saving your game. What the hell were 
          they thinking? The atmosphere of so many titles these days (<b>Silent 
          Hill</b>, <b>Resident Evil</b> series, <b>Metal Gear</b>) is weakened 
          considerably if you try and play these games for stretches of less than 
          an hour or more at a time. The joy of the Genesis games I’ve been playing 
          this weekend is that I can pick one up, play it for 20 minutes, try 
          something else, do something else, and come back to it later. There’s 
          also a lot less to keep in my mind – I’ve found that <b>Zelda 64</b> 
          requires me to do a helluva lot of memorizing and trying to remember 
          what I did where – not a bad thing in itself, but it sure would have 
          been nice to be able to make some log or something in the game. Imagine 
          if a semi-automatic &quot;Link’s Diary&quot; was kept by the game, noting 
          down the hints and tips of interest, but not core to beating the game 
          – wouldn’t that have been a helpful addition? Alright, so I can get 
          pen and paper out, <b>Ultima</b>-style, to note details down, but if 
          I have to do that why not get straight to it and bring out a 100-sided 
          die while we’re at it? Grrr.</font></p>
        <p><font face="Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif">Maybe I’m getting old and 
          decrepit (at 22? God help us all!) but I don’t think so; one other thing 
          all these games are showing me is just how much better a gamer I am 
          now. I remember taking hours to complete missions in <b>Desert Strike</b>, 
          and struggling with the &quot;caverns&quot; section of <b>Another World</b>, 
          but they’re much easier than I remember. I can now appreciate how much 
          &quot;baggage&quot; I bring with me to every game I play; it’s a bit 
          like how mastering <b>Quake</b> with the mouse means you’re capable 
          of playing pretty much every other FPS with minimum hassle (except <b>Thief</b> 
          – for some reason I find myself struggling with the many keys). Playing 
          <b>Abe’s Exoddus</b> I can’t help but trace the basics of the game back 
          through <b>Flashback</b> and <b>Another World</b> to <b>Prince of Persia</b>.</font></p>
        <p><font face="Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif">I find myself wondering what 
          so many games must seem like to people that never played the earlier 
          games, who have no concept of gaming ‘pedigree’? I wonder what it must 
          be like to be 11 years old right now and never have owned anything other 
          than a PlayStation? What do games say to these kids? Maybe they’re just 
          like I was - looking forward to the next development, rather than trying 
          to trace a line back through history like I do now. Or maybe by tracing 
          that line back we can get some idea of where we’re heading (it sure 
          as hell ain’t MPEG-2 quality FMV) with the awesome next generation of 
          hardware. If Sony really can produce what they say they will with the 
          PlayStation 2, gaming looks like it might be in for a quantum leap (when 
          I read the announcement, I was <i>sooo</i> glad I decided on a career 
          in this industry). For once, that might not be hype.</font></p>
        <p><font face="Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif">I used to scoff at notions 
          that &quot;gameplay&quot; was better in older games. Now I’m not so 
          sure. It seems that before we had awesome graphics and near-limitless 
          storage capacity, games had to be playable because there wasn’t any 
          other reason to play them. I’ve always enjoyed new games, but this weekend 
          they just seemed so <i>complicated</i>. A few times I decided I’d get 
          back to <b>Zelda</b> on my N64, but then opted for another shot at <b>Strider</b> 
          instead. Maybe I’m just having a temporary love affair with the games 
          of my past, but my experience this weekend has been one of the most 
          interesting in my gaming career. Maybe you should try it, too.</font></p>
        <p align="RIGHT"><font face="Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif"><i><font size="-1">- 
          Before he discovered <b>loonygames</b>, Nick Ferguson was happy with 
          the 8-bit games of his youth. Who needs this newfangled ‘Emotion Engine’ 
          nonsense, anyway?</font></i></font></p>
        <p>&nbsp; </p>
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      <p><i><font face="Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="-2"> </font></i><i><font face="Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="-2"><b>Credits:</b> 
        Pad Happy logo illustrated and is &copy; 1999 Dan Zalkus. Pad Happy is 
        &copy; 1999 Nick Ferguson. All other content is &copy; 1999 <a target="_self" href="http://www.loonyboi.com">loonyboi 
        productions</a>. Unauthorized reproduction is strictly prohibited, so 
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