As is our solemn vow, we have produced another strip.
I can say without reservation that the box for Steel Battalion is very large. It is so large because it must house the completely custom control yoke, which comes to you in three large chunks - each with the surface area of Australia. Indeed, once we had it together, a tiny group of surveyors could be seen trudging its proud slopes, their voices small but distinct. They had, by consensus vote, decided to call it Mount Big.
Gabe put fifty bucks down to guarantee our preorder, though when it actually hit the store we paid largely in trade-in credit. I got the balance on it, about sixty bucks, which makes me feel like the whole enterprise was fairly economical on an individual level. You might be wondering if the game itself is worth it, worth that kind of money. I tell you with conviction that it is.
First of all, it comes with a beautiful, large-format manual that never breaks character and is loaded with lucid illustrations. It covers absolutely everything you’ll need to know, which is a lot. Understand this up front: if you’re thinking that the whole thing is kind of a gimmick, as we did, you will be completely shocked. We were simply not prepared. The game and the controller are not two separate things, which you’ll see right away. One could not exist without the other. They have gone for a photorealistic approach to the robots themselves, which is uncanny at first. It looks like a video feed from some place in the world where huge machines do all the fighting.
I figured that it would be changed for the American market, but I was wrong - if your Vertical Tank goes down, you’d better get the fuck out of that mech if you don’t want to die and lose your save game. That shit will put the fear of God in you. The game is not safe, it does not feel safe to play it, and it deliberately creates tension throughout. Your assorted HUD elements take up a truly vast proportion of your viewpoint - every mission begins as though you have climbed up a ladder into the cockpit, and the start-up sequence (all manual - it requires no less than eight interactions with your console) closes and seals you into this thing. I may be easily led, but it is sobering when the sky goes away and you are clamped into a dark machine.
It has many of the things people want from their mech games - some configuration, though on the whole the configuration options are on a lesser scale than a Mechwarrior game. One element that I appreciate quite a bit is the Supply Points system, another tension-producing mechanism. For completing missions successfully, you earn Supply Points which are used to purchase new robots as they become available, things like Boom Boxes, mission supplies that can be airlifted in, they’re essentially your currency. Let’s say you fail a mission, which is going to happen. You eject safely, so you can start that mission over. You certainly can’t do it on foot, so you’ll have to requisition a new VT from base - using supply points. If you run out of supply points, the game is over. How well you do on a mission literally determines your chances of success on future missions, so each conflict is connected to the next in a way that feels more like a genuine campaign.
How does it play? It’s a lot like learning to drive at first, and the bank of three pedals helps make that point. Don’t get discouraged, experiment with acceleration, turning, and braking at different speeds until you get the hang of it. The Slide pedal is probably the most fun to use, pushing the left stick in a direction and slamming that pedal down lets you pull quick strafing moves to avoid missiles and is fairly natural once you get the hang of it. Being quick with it will also help you recover from falls, too - when your VT starts to tip over, just sliding in the opposite direction can stabilize you. Once you get comfy with it - it took us about an hour - you’ll be able to appreciate the game on a different level. The game is just so fanciful, I can’t imagine how a project like this got the green light - although I would imagine that Green had something to do with it.
It’s been a good couple weeks for the Xbox, huh? It went from something I could mostly do without to something I use every day in the space of like eight days.
(CW)TB out.
seventy-two in a minute
If you read News.com you may have seen the article they did on Tuesday entitled “Xbox Live not for everyone.” Apparently a bunch of hacker types took a break from giggling with each other about the irony of installing Linux on their M$ Xbox and noticed they can’t connect to Live. David Beck actually wrote an article sympathizing with these poor souls who took it upon themselves to totally fuck over the insides of their Xboxes. David reports that “Numerous owners of modified Xbox units reported in forums at the Xbox Hacker site that they were locked out of Xbox Live.” I’m sorry, tell me again why I am supposed to care that a bunch of thieves and jackholes can’t use their modified systems to fuck up my online games with cheats and hacks? The article goes on to quote one of these winners as saying “All I know is I have two machines—one modded, and the other not. The one that’s modded can’t connect at all, and the unmodded one works perfectly.” DUN DUN DUN! Holy shit this is like an episode of fucking Murder She Wrote. Someone call Matlock so he can solve this mind bending puzzle! News flash Hacker Bob, Microsoft announced months ago that modded systems would not work with Live. Here’s an idea for all you poor saps with $200.00 coffee tables now. How about in the future you don’t crack open every piece of electronics you get and fill it with illegal hardware. At the very least how about you don’t bitch to me when your soldering iron escapades leave you high and dry.
Safety Monkey commented on the article from a slightly different perspective over at his site. Check it out here.
Oh and a quick shout out to my MechAssault buddies from last night. Borf, Bane, Snacks, Grunt, good games as always guys. You can’t coach that.
-Gabe out
Seriously, wouldn’t you guys get bored if I wasn’t here to piss you off every now and then;)
A few people have mailed me telling me that whether I like it or not these hackers being banned does affect me. They sent me links to this site which claims that there is a way to change the serial number of your system and get around the Live lockout. People are telling me that since MS is banning these guys they are forced to change their serial numbers and in so doing may inadvertently take my serial number thereby getting my account banned. The jist is that they should just be allowed to connect to Live in the first place. I am sorry but that is bullshit. That is like saying drunk drivers shouldn’t get their cars towed off because then they will just have to steal another car and they may steal yours! Bullshit. What they need to do is suck it up and get a new system or not fuck around with theirs to begin with. You are more than welcome to Mod your Xbox all you want, you paid for it and it’s yours to do with as you please. However, if that’s what you want to do then you should have two machines. It’s that simple. I applaud MS for keeping these kinds of hackers off of Live. If it wasn’t for these restrictions, Live would have the same problems with cheaters and hackers that we see in PC multiplayer games. Sure there are lots of you locked out who have tinkered with your systems or just use them to play imports but have no intention of cheating. That is a risk you took when you cracked the case on your machine though. Like I said suck it up and buy a regular one to use on Live and keep the other around to play with. Don’t tell me it’s to expensive either, you dug this hole yourslef. I’m not having any problems at all with MY Xbox.
-Gabe out
Q: “Wouldn’t you be bummed if you now discovered that modification now prevented you from accessing some new special feature of that console?”
A: No. That is a risk you take when you Mod a system.
Q: (How about in the future you don’t crack open every piece of electronics you get and fill it with illegal hardware.)
Now why on earth not? If they buy a piece of hardware, they should be able to do whatever they want to it. They’re not renting it. It’s like the bookstore telling me I can’t use the books I buy as toilet paper. Sure some people might think I’m weird for doing that, but that doesn’t make it wrong.
If Microsoft decides not to support those hacked Xboxes on their Live network, then that’s well within their rights, but it’s ridiculous to imply that it’s wrong or even illegal just to tinker with some hardware you own.
A: I agree! I was saying that if you want to avoid this kind of situation in the future then you shouldn’t fuck with your hardware. It’s certainly their right to do it, but they shouldn’t get mad when the system they fucked with doesn’t work right anymore.
-Gabe out
And he always puts me in these situations where I have to apologize to the neighbors.
(CW)TB
I was going to respond to Tycho’s comment but I think this e-mail from Ken says it much better than I ever could:
“Tell Tycho he shouldn’t be apologizing to his crack dealer neighbors because you told them they shouldn’t be dealing:)”
Thanks for all the positive mail you guys are sending my way. This comment from Dave seems to sum it all up pretty well:
“Mod your console face the music…”
-Gabe out
Reading Evil Avatar this morning I noticed that Gamespot tossed up a review of Steel Battalion. Obviously, we did not agree on many points. It seemed worthwhile to give you another perspective on the game, however.
(CW)TB
