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Croal vs. Totilo - Metroid Prime 3 vs. BioShock
Another round of considered commentary from two game journalism luminaries is now completed, and ready for your consumption. Newsweek's Croal and MTV's Totilo go back and forth on the merits of those 'other' console shooters, the ones without Halo in the title. What follows is a fascinating conversation focused on the titles BioShock and Metroid 3, with a wide-range of topics explored. They touch on the importance of a memorable opening, the sense of empowerment required for a good game, and a few words on what may have been lost in the move to 3D in the Metroid series. 'There's a very real argument to be made that something was lost in the transition from 2D to 3D, which is what the Wii's backers have been happy to talk about. While it's worth exploring why the transition ruined things for some gamers, I think little has been discussed about why other gamers didn't lose touch and what kind of tastes may have developed in those of us who stayed hardcore on both sides of the break. What do such gamers have to add to a discussion that so often deals only with the lapsed 2D gamers and the children of the 3D era, to say nothing of the outsider casuals?'"
Indeed, a memorable opening is important.
Unfortunately, what was most memorable to me about the opening of BioShock was that, as soon as you gain control of the player, the water splashing up in your face as you swim in the sea leaves drips on the screen, as if it were hitting the glass lens of a camera. There's my sense of immersion destroyed in the first few seconds!
In fact, "Something splashing on the lens, such as water or mud" is listed on Wikipedia's page on breaking the fourth wall as a "technical limitation" that can remind the viewer that what they are seeing is [a film, and] not real life!
Otherwise, the opening was quite good :)
I have all my old consoles still, and I play them about 25% of the time I'd say, but only a select few games that I just absolutely love playing, like Megaman 2, Metroid, LoZ, Lolo, and a couple others. There's something so attractive and moving about the simplicity of them visually, combined with the superb level design that just touches me in an extremely meaningful way. The music is also something that I love, it's so pure, no overtones and no human elements to make it imperfect, simple sounds juxtaposed against extremely complex musical arrangements; I actually ripped all my favorite NES music into .wav and listen to it in my car on a regular basis (Maniac Mansion gets me pumped when I'm driving). So the original 2D has this dichotomy of simplicity and complexity that makes it extremely unique and highly enjoyable, but the 3D games like Metroid Prime and Ocarina of Time just have so much depth to both the gameplay and the visuals that they just work for me. Obviously it's not the same type of enjoyment as the old ones, but that's why I keep them around. The 3D ones, I feel, have the same attention to detail and reflect just as much effort as the 2Ds, the only difference is that the incredible effort put into them can be directed into more areas of design and with greater depth than before. It's like eating a meal from the best chef in the world made from only 6 ingredients as opposed to a meal made by the best chef in the world with 20 ingredients; they'll both be the best meals you've ever had, but of course they'll be different.
A Bioshock review.