Will Ooi

The worlds of games, as seen in Turkey

Will Ooi — Fri, 17 May 2013 15:58:37 +0000

Out of all the thousands of hours spent in open world games this generation, loving every minute of the escapism and the wonderful feelings of awe and discovery, never would I have thought that travelling through Turkey with a sweaty back and layers of sunscreen on would bring back that same sense of digital wanderlust. For [...]

Beloved Memories of 1up: An observation + contest…

Will Ooi — Mon, 04 Mar 2013 00:39:07 +0000

With the announcement that 1up is shutting down, I’m just reposting here, in case it disappears, one of my favourite memories of the community. An observation out of nowhere turned into a fun contest which received a fantastic response. Thank you everyone for making the site as wonderful as it was. ~Original Link~ ~~ [...]

In Memoriam: How The Sims Made Real Life A Bit Less Awkward

Will Ooi — Thu, 28 Feb 2013 02:25:02 +0000

The new Sim City is on the way, revitalised and as graphically updated as you could imagine on current PCs but also lugging along with it other modern day features such as the always-online DRM system. I can't help but think back to simpler times, when I used to come home from school to play the classic Sim City 200 on my first ever computer (a Pentium 586 133Mhz), marvelling at all the possibilities at one's mouse cursor tips and stressing out over dropping approval ratings amongst the general populace as I contemplated raising taxes to garner funds for our soon-to-be-exploding power plant. Well, it was either that or selling off nice old houses with backyards and replace them with soulless glass-windowed sky-rise apartments, and cutting the road maintenance budget so as to make rush hour traffic conditions appalling (in which case, welcome to Sydney Australia!). The game marvelled with its detail and flexibility, teaching me more about renewal energy sources than any class at school ever did, and it was all done with 32 mb of RAM back when such a requirement may have meant a big deal - never mind always having to be online, we didn't even have the friggin' internet back then. ~ Just when it seemed as if Sim City was the ultimate game allowing you to yield tyrannical power over an entire city of your own creation, destroying everything with natural disasters or alien invasions and building it all up from scratch again just for kicks, along came The Sims in the late 90's which put you in charge of the lives of individuals and hence, granting players an incredible package capable of architectural and interior design, family relations and social interaction, regulation over intestinal function and even an insight into psychology - all via a voyeuristic telescope of sorts that tapped into everyone's curious (and very, very evil) little imaginations.

Thoughts on animals in Far Cry 3, and an idea for a Dead Space prequel

Will Ooi — Tue, 29 Jan 2013 01:12:50 +0000

What's with all the animal killing in the latest Far Cry? You could understand being able to do so in Red Dead Redemption given the context, with it being set back in the old west where hunters had to make a living; it was a cold and harsh time, so you needed animal hide to make yourself a nice coat or a rug. Sure, having a stuffed bear placed on display in the living room was perhaps taking things a bit too far, but again, context. Far Cry 3, on the other hand, is set in a tropical paradise in modern, and let's face it, much more consumeristic times, which perhaps does in itself go some way to explain why we'd even need so many friggin' wallets and pouches in the first place. The only thing the game required in order to be completely true to its time would be the ability to Tweet about or Facebook update our animal slaughter every waking minute.

"Just made myself a sick pair of mittens out of a tiger cub YOLO #TastesLikeChicken", etc.

In Memoriam: Rainbow Six Vegas 2 – the last great tactical shooter of our generation?

Will Ooi — Tue, 22 Jan 2013 03:18:49 +0000

Traditionally a producer of hardcore tactical shooters on the PC, Ubisoft had to make several changes to their game design philosophy in order to cater to the audience on current gen consoles. The original Ghost Recon and the Rainbow Six games tasked players with firstly thinking through their plan of attack and selecting their personnel according to mission objectives, before then playing through the next step of actually implementing that plan by switching control of their units as each level progressed. Playing as the sniper would mean finding a vantage spot to identify enemies and provide cover as you moved your assault team in for a close range attack. Cycling through each member of the team made you both the central commander and the footsoldier, opening up all aspects of the battlefield via the eyes of everyone, and giving players a true sense of control.

Primitive to look at now, the first Rainbow Six games offered revolutionary gameplay

Oh the humanity! The online interactions of Dark Souls

Will Ooi — Thu, 13 Dec 2012 09:19:16 +0000

The infamous difficulty of From Software's acclaimed Dark Souls has evoked a spectrum of emotions ranging from crippling fear and self-doubt, through to fist-pumping success and unbridled elation as hardcore fans and new players alike shared those same feelings of heartache and, quite possibly, controller-throwing fits of rage.

Also seen on Gamasutra

In Memoriam: The Nightmares of Max Payne

Will Ooi — Wed, 12 Dec 2012 04:12:08 +0000

Max Payne stories always start with a glimpse of the end; the final firefight having been concluded, the eponymous character shares his realisations on all the bloodshed via the voice-over narration of James McCaffrey as violin strings play the series' forlorn theme music before the game jumps back to the very beginning for players to piece together how that conclusion had been reached. The formula has remained unchanged from Remedy's original tale of a renegade cop seeking vengeance for his murdered family and its sequel's more concentrated noir-aesthetic love story, through to Rockstar Games' third installment that reinvented the character as a depressed and alcoholic bodyguard in Brazil. Yet despite these constant bookends in narrative, it was a moment found in the middle of the original Max Payne that helped to define the atmosphere of the series as a 'different kind of shooter'; a level immediately familiar to and unforgettable for longstanding fans.

Unmasking the Gamers: Matthew H Mason – Writer, Nintendo Fan, and Family Man

Will Ooi — Tue, 18 Sep 2012 01:04:07 +0000

The latest part of an interview series, “Unmasking the Gamers,” humanising the people who play video games: the real character controlling that fictional character; the person behind that First Person Genre. Previous interviewees can all be found here.

WillOoi: Hi Matt, would you care to tell us a bit about yourself? Where you’re from, where you grew up…and what your family’s like? MH Mason: Hi, my name is Matt. I’m a would-be author, sometimes game blogger who also happens to be a consummate family man. When I’m not moonlighting with writing, I play a pharmacy tech in real life. I was born in the exotic land known as Germany, but have been raised and live in middle America. I grew up in a ghost town in South Dakota known as Rochford and now live with my beautiful wife and my precocious boys in Rapid City. Although “city” is something of a misnomer as the population is something like 70,000. But that’s big for these parts, I guess. As for the family life? It’s…interesting. Both the wife and the kids keep me on my toes. As nutty as all the extracurricular activities, outings and even meals can get, I don’t know that I’d get along well without the zaniness. It’s the happy kind of insanity, really.

Unmasking the Gamers: Mike Torres – Native Floridan, Artist/Cook, and Rising Gaming Blog Star

Will Ooi — Wed, 27 Jun 2012 02:15:21 +0000

WillOoi: Hi Michael, thank you for agreeing to take part in this series. Please tell us about yourself, what you do, and what you're up to at the moment. MikeTorres: I'm a native Floridan (there aren't many of us) , artist, writer, cook, PC tech and perpetual goofball. I spend my days working at an independently owned print and graphic design shop along with running a small independent gaming blog (Galaxynextdoor.com). I've been writing, ranting and joking about video games and gaming culture at various places throughout the years. Starting out at the now defunct Netjak and TooCubed and then finding my way to 1UP.com's wonderful blogging community. It’s there that I slowly found myself writing reviews and eventually becoming news editor at the long running Deeko.com; which sadly closed its virtual doors 2 years ago. ~

In Memoriam: a Dead Rising retrospective – Part 2

Will Ooi — Wed, 30 May 2012 04:42:59 +0000

This is the second part of In Memoriam: a Dead Rising retrospective, looking back on the game's influence on the reinvigorated popularity of the zombie genre, and the controversial design decisions that defined its core identity. Having examined the title's roots in Capcom's first foray into Survival Horror and its thematic inspirations from George A. Romero's Dead films in Part 1, this time we'll assess closer the game design and mechanics that made, but for others, broke, Dead Rising, along with the incredible demands of the unlockable, pretty-much-as-crazy-as-it-sounds, Infinity Mode. Players would get used to that awkward image of Frank West's back as he stood at the urinal overwriting that one save file of theirs, yet another potentially last pee being performed for the umpteenth time prior to heading back out into the expanses of Willamette Mall in a combined state of fear and curiosity. Players would also become overly familiar with that annoying walky-talky ringtone whenever the mall's security officer, Otis, would phone in at the most inopportune moments with more 'Scoops' on what strife some other poor sods had gotten themselves into on the other side of the mall, phoning back in anger if Frank had the nerve to hang up on him as he balanced his very survival with a large bottle of orange juice and an electric guitar in each hand, perhaps also whilst running away feverishly from some pyromaniac throwing molotovs and driving explosive remote-controlled toy race cars in his general direction. As a general rule, these ringtones signified impending doom. Dead Rising fans would even get used to seeing those same story cutscenes playing over and over again after being forced to restart from the very beginning, probably catching themselves mouthing lines of dialogue as if it were a favourite movie. And despite all of these annoyances, for those who still chose to persevere by drawing inspiration from some remarkable source of inner strength, seeing their improved progress get utterly destroyed thanks to either another mistimed save or a horrendously unexpected and unprepared-for boss battle as the game mockingly asked whether they'd like to give it another go, from scratch, players would definitely get used to that Groundhog Day sensation of End of the World proportions: sick to death of this horrible, ceaseless purgatory and wishing that all these problems, these zombies, this...nightmare... would just go away forever.~