Why we must support Serious Games

by Anand Ramachandran



Let's face it, except within a few select demographics and a few specific geographic pockets, video games are widely regarded as a waste of time, meant mainly for kids or nerds. Cultured, intelligent, successful people don't play video games - so goes the perception. And nowhere is this perhaps truer than in India.



Nobody says the same thing about movies. Or music. Or books. Why?



I believe it's because, by way of being more evolved and mature media, they are no longer viewed as purely entertainment. Think about it. Movies (documentaries, newsreels, instructionals) are often used to educate, inform, provoke thought. Ditto books, obviously. Music is used in teaching tiny tots a range of things - who doesn't remember the A-B-C-D tune, or those nursery rhymes that taught us how to count? Even comics have bridged the gap better than games have managed to do - TINKLE and Amar Chitra Katha being shining examples of products parents would happily buy for their children.



People tend to devalue anything that is purely recreational. For the mainstream to embrace a medium, it must be perceived as something that can be used to actually help people grow as individuals. Become smarter. Or more cultured. Or wiser. Or healthier.



While there are stray instances (America's Army, Civilization) of games that can be held up as products that are designed to educate and instruct, an overwhelmingly large majority of commercially made games are principally entertainment-oriented. Fun is the mantra - and rightly so.



In fact, I'm a great believer in the ability of games to build skills, teach and educate - I'm talking about commercially available, regular games here, and not games built specifically for educational purposes. Playing games can enhance, among other things, skills like hand-eye coordination, decision making, strategic thinking and memory. However, the fact remains that all this learning is hidden under a layer of entertainment. Hence the lack of understanding among the general populace. You can't really expect them to understand the hidden, subtle benefits of a game that, to all outward appearances, is about shooting things with insanely overpowered weapons. It's not even reasonable to expect them to take the effort to connect - the effort must undoubtedly come from the gaming community. Namely gamers, developers, and the gaming press.



This is where Serious Games come in. Serious Games are, for the uninitiated, games that are designed for purposes other than just entertainment. These games use the medium as a vehicle to educate, train or inform. They're used in areas as diverse as military, healthcare, agriculture, politics, environment and education. America's Army is probably the one everyone knows.Darfur is Dying is another that has gained popularity.



It's an important movement, and it's gaining momentum. Which is good news for all of us.



Because once Serious Games break through and begin to get mainstream press, people will begin to look at gaming as a medium, and not simply as recreation. A medium that can be used for purposes other than filling the minds of children with violent thoughts. And, as we well know, perception is everything. The same reality suddenly begins to look different - and as a result, more people buy, play and talk about games. And yes, more people have fun playing them. Just like movies. And books. And all that other stuff. Yay!



For this very reason, more of us need to support the Serious Games movement. By participating in the community. By talking about Serious Games. By working on projects, however small.



Consider the possibilities in India - simply enormous in my opinion. Make a game that teaches children to use fireworks safely at Diwali. Or an RTS that promotes communal harmony where factions must work together to win. Or a game that demonstrates the effects of pollution in cities, and how citizens can help control it. I believe that the press will give you quite a bit of coverage - it's an interesting story angle for them as well. When a simplistic crap-mountain like 'Kargil' can appear on India Today . . . enough said.



So that all those sceptics will stop regarding us as some sort of cultish group of outsiders. Yes, even Roger Ebert.



More on Serious Games here.

Real Ghosts and Fake Heart Attacks

Shane Watson is the best ever. The Australian team's leading fraidy cat and worst sledger is at it again.

On cricinfo.

Next Gen? Here's a Wishlist.

by Anand Ramachandran



Ooooh – let's get all excited everyone! The Next-Gen is here. Yuvraj and Akshay are plugging 360s already. It's going to be in every village, they tell us. The PS3 and Wii will soon follow.



And what's the fuss all about? Of course, it's eye candy, mainly. Graphics. Ooooh – look at those orgasmic hi-polys. Aaaaah – look at those ultra-detailed textures. Prettier than all the girls. More realistic than your dad.



But wait – that's what's supposed to happen, innit? I love souped-up graphics just as much as the next gamer, but that's just par for the course for the Next-Gen consoles. What more can we expect from these bodacious machines? We know about the beauty, what will the brains be like?



Here's what I wish we could see?



Less 'Artificial', More 'Intelligence'


Here's to developers who try to make NPCs more interesting, believable and complex. I'd like to meet opponents who feel fear, become enraged, make mistakes and surprise me. Developers who finally realize that 'improved AI' doesn't just mean bad guys who can sidestep, take cover or toss grenades. Games with an adventure element, especially RPGs, could do with a more complex emotional layer that controls NPC actions, to replace the rather lame 'hostility level' or equivalent that most of them use currently. Things that NPCs could do on the fly, depending on the game situation : Lie. Make, and break promises. Go insane. Fall ill.



Controller Innovation.


Sure, I'm excited about the Wii-mote (but not quite so much about Sixaxis – it seems like an afterthought, shoehorned into a design. Prove me wrong, Sony, please.). But why stop there? If Eye Toy, Guitar Hero and Dance Dance Revolution were such big hits, it perhaps says something about intelligent controller innovation being an important tool in breaking through to new gamers. How about a controller accessory that can measure heart rate or blood pressure, and interpret it into the game, altering the player's abilities in some way? How about an oxygen mask like thing, which can check if players are holding their breath (Think Kabaddi. Think underwater sequences. Think stealth sequences) ?



A good cricket game


Okay. It's time. I've had it with playing second fiddle to football, tennis, golf, basketball and sundry other sports. I WANT a good cricket game – a true simulation. Brian Lara is fun, but it's nowehere near the quality of experience games like Pro Evolution Soccer and Top Spin deliver to fans of their respective sports. Go on, ICC cretins. Fund this one. We'll buy. Hell, we even buy EA's crappy game, even though we know it's not cricket!



Stuff I don't want


I hope no-one's working on bringing a real 'smell' component to the gaming experience. I don't want to smell rotting corpses and fresh blood. I don't want to smell sewers. Thank you very much. I sincerely hope there are no efforts on to extend 'force feedback' to include things like electric shocks and real burns. I don't want a role-playing game based on Jack Thompson. No, wait . . .

25 Years a Gamer

by Anand Ramachandran

Just realized that I've been gaming for quarter of a century! That's longer than many of my gamer friends have been alive! Grumpy. OLD. Man.

So perhaps I'll rather self-indulgently go off on a stroll down the old lane, and try to pick up some of the best gaming memories in all that time. Younger gamers, perhaps you can mine the following micro-memoir and try some of the oldies mentioned – you'll certainly be glad you did. Fellow dinosaurs, you may find something that has you nodding in agreement, while your eyes mist over. You have been warned.

Earliest memories of gaming


The world-famous Nintendo Game and Watch handhelds. Mickey Mouse. Parachute. Fire. Popeye. Old pong machines – I had a poppy TVG-4, which was a black and white unit, and a SOUNDIC TVSPORTS, which featured four brilliant colours. Tennis, soccer (I hate that word), basketball. Wheeee! And of course, the inevitable ATARI VCS (later known as the 2600). Not the nooB silver version. The true-blue, wood finish beauty. Oh, and before I forget – the coin-op Pac-Man at sleazy burger joints all over the US highways. When I was about seven.

Addiction Alert


Game and Watch titles such as Fire, Octopus and Parachute were pretty much unputdownable. Diablo. Baldur's Gate 2. The Sims. Halo. Tetris. Civilization (your version number here). KOTOR. The Minish Cap. I think these were probably the worst.

Adrenaline Rush


Turning up the speed to 'high' on the SOUNDIC, and then playing an impossible furious basketball game against a friend. The final, tense scramble as Master Chief tries to escape from Halo. Taking down a dragon for the first time in Shadows of Amn. Drunken Soul Calibur 2 parties. A headshot with the Ripper in Unreal Tournament.

Moments of WOW!


Exploring a huge (for the time) gameworld in 'Raiders of the Lost Ark', on the ATARI 2600. My first view of DOOM. Every single moment of 'Shadow of the Colossus'. Typing 'kiss alien' into Space Quest 2, and discovering that Al Lowe had actually programmed a response : 'You have a dirty mind'. Katamari Damacy. Oblivion.

Adventures in Adventure


All early Sierra games – Space Quest 2 was the first. Sam and Max hit the road. Monkey Island. Grim Fandango. The MYST series – yes, I really DO think they're great games. Out of Order.

Dirty Little Secret


I LOVE the N-Gage QD. I count Pathway to Glory, Mile High Pinball, High Seize, Colin McRae, Rifts:Promise of Power among some of the most satisfying and fun games I've played. And I've played. A lot. My sympathies to biased gamers who bad-mouth a product based simply on hearsay or limited experience and knowledge. A poke in the eye to NOKIA, who was chiefly responsible for shoddy initial design and moronic marketing.

WTF moments


Finally finding the Lost Ark, playing the game on a 2600 emulator, some 22 years after my first attempt!

Multiplayer Gems


Soul Calibur 2. Burnout 3. Pro Evolution Soccer (I hate that word). Unreal Tournament. But the games I enjoy most playing with friends – Worms 2, and Outlaw on the ATARI 2600.

Holes in the Resume


Very little gametime on Nintendo systems (apart from the Game and Watch and GBA). No SNES. No N64. No Gamecube. Will plug the gaps, though.

Next Gen


Don't know. I am excited about all the systems – but the Wii-mote has possibilities for swashbuckler-style swordplay. Bring it on – that's what I want to see. Grrarrrhhh. Maybe a Hellbrandt Grimm game. Shhlunk!

The other Next Gen


My four year old son knows the entire Halo weapon set and creature list by heart. He knows which weapons are UNSC and which are Covenant. He knows how to snipe enemies from afar. I'm SO proud of him. I'm going to be arrested for ESRB violation.

Resolutions


Now that I've greatly reduced my design consultancy work to focus on game design and comic-book writing, more time to keep this blog alive. And to play more games – never again shall my Xbox see a 6-month idle period. Shudder.

Advice to gamers


Play everything. Try out MYST. Have a go at the Sims. Check out the N-Gage (if you can get your hands on one, that is). Prejudices and biases are for wimps and losers. Tell your children to stay away from cheat codes.

Okay, time to go. Have to plan my 25-years-of-gaming party. If you're in Chennai, you'll be welcome. I'll post details on this blog once I'm ready.

P.S. - Other old-timers out there - pitch in and comment. Would love to hear your voices.

Has a comic book made you cry?

 

Do you cry when you read comics? Have you? Ever?

I've just completed reading the last chapter of the legendary 'Lone Wolf and Cub', created by the revered Japanese Manga masters Kazuo Koike and Goseki Kojima. And I've gone all misty-eyed.

THIS is the joy of comics. The long, arduous redemption journey undertaken by super-assassin Itto Ogami and his baby son Daigoro is an emotional roller-coaster that will amuse, delight, anger and move you like perhaps no other long-running comic series in memory. It's astonishing how writer and artist combine magically to create some of the most gripping and thought provoking sequences ever to grace the pages of popular comics - they combine so well it's almost impossible to believe that two separate people worked on the series. Indeed, sometimes you forget that you're reading a book at all - so powerful is the storytelling that it drags you right into the pages - you walk with Itto, witness his duels, feel the icy wind, want to pinch little Daigoro's cheeks.

And if you, like many readers in India, are used only to American comics, then the experience will perhaps be even more moving. Think of this as the first time for a Manga virgin, if you will. Pages of contemplative, delicately paced sequences suddenly tumble into a mad flurry of bloody, furious combat. Scenes depicting complex human emotions and delicately crafted conversations slowly melt into long sections without a single spoken word. Breathtaking stuff.

And the finale! Let it be enough to say it stands alongside the most powerful, poignant and heart-rending climaxes I've come across in ANY entertainment medium. If you're a comics fan, a fan of Japanese martial arts stories, or simply someone who delights in good fiction, you can't go wrong with 'Lone Wolf and Cub'.

 

The success of the Indian Gaming Industry

I write this on a lazy Sunday morning while I’m cooking lunch for my wife. Yeah – it’s a man’s world they said. I have a rum and coke in one hand and I’m listening to Big Bad Bill by Van Halen while David Lee Roth was still singing for them. I’m also trying to figure out why onions and tomatoes don’t get along when they are thrown in the cooker at the same time. How times have changed!











This morning I started up my 360 and did my dutiful checking online to see what’s new. I see Frogger has just been re-released as an arcade game on XBOX Live Arcade. It’s now available at 720p and is displayed in a whopping 16:9 wide screen ratio. I found myself playing a game that I played more than 20 years ago. How times have changed!









I also have the IGDA Indian chapter open in a browser and I’m reading what seems to be such an eclectic mix of views. You see developers getting utopian in their exchanges with how graphics should actually work. You see game designers talking about inspiration for their work. You see project managers and producers trying to convince the world that they actually mean well. You see the budding student that wants to become an ace programmer by just asking questions or talking l33t. You see recruiters putting up posts for employment underestimating how savvy or educated today’s employee is. What an amazing mix. What’s so outstanding about this is the fact that there is a certain amount of order within the chaos that sometimes ensues. In my opinion, it’s called discovery.









How long does it take to learn math? How long does it take to learn how to cycle? How long did it take you to figure out that you cannot walk on the sand in Half Life 2? Discovery – It’s a wonderful experience. More so, when the results are so extremely rewarding.









Let me explain:









Fact: India Games released Yoddha in 2002. Was it good? Maybe not - but the discovery there was how to finish developing a game. Granted, it was a rather short game, but it still had a beginning and an end which indicates that it did get completed. India Games has now gone onto being the most successful game development companies within India with an almost global presence in Mobile game development; a true testament to their pioneering efforts.



Fact: Game Masti released Chakravyuh in 2002. Was it good? That's not important - but it was officially India's first full feature game spanning ten whole levels. That alone was almost biblical in impact. Thinking about a game is tough, making a demo is tougher, and finishing a game is nothing short of Olympian in nature. I know, I finished making a version of Pong and it was one of the hardest things I’ve ever done. This effort had just signalled the arrival of full fledged game development in India. Before this, people were just testing the waters.







Fact: Lumenphon released Bhagat Singh. Was it good? Maybe not – but it was the second game released in India. I remember how excited I was at the fact that India had now developed two games. They may not have been the most polished or the most advanced, but they were two whole games nonetheless.









Fact: Dhruva Interactive won a deal to create art assets for Mission Impossible. Was the game good? Maybe not – but it established and confirmed the bandwidth that led up to the biggest game development outsourcing company in India who ever since has worked on Mission: Impossible 2, Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines, Geoff Grammond’s Grand Prix 4, and the critically acclaimed TOCA Pro Race Driver series. Not too mention they worked on the incredible Forza Motorsport.









Fact: Kawabonka creates an online gaming community site that allows PvP multiplayer gaming leveraging the advent of high speed internet connectivity and it blows up into being the most successful online gaming community in India.









Fact: Milestone Interactive gets approved to by Sony Computer Entertainment Europe to develop a PS2 game. Was it a major accomplishment? No – but the amount of people that the effort had touched was huge. That single handedly was worth it – and that’s discovery, right there.









Fact: Paradox squeezes the A5 Conitec Engine to the max and releases BattleDust. Was it good? – Maybe not the greatest, but it was a beat ‘em up, it was similar yet different in nature and it was complete. Once again, hats off to the team at Paradox for going completely above and beyond.









Let’s not forget Lakshaya Digital and their patented GPO (Games Process Outsourcing) strategy, Raptor Entertainment’s proprietary RTS engine, Gameloft opening up shop in Hyderabad, ATI, Microsoft and now the cerebral explosion of casual game development in India.









How things have changed; and all this in just about five years!









I don’t know about you but I think that’s a pretty impressive portfolio for a country that had its highest selling game sell a measly 25,000 + copies. Even more impressive, considering how attractive the “brain drain” methodology has been for talented employees who might have left the country in search of more established and educated lands.









What am I trying to say here? Things change. People change. Countries change and heck, I’ve seen Doordarshan change. While we have certain folks on one hand pretty much dictating how the Indian game development will never improve, I see an extremely bright future for all of us. I see a visible, clear learning curve; I see maturity evolving; I see another five years for us to learn and discover how we can effectively contribute to an industry that we feel so passionately about. After all – Discovery leads to innovation. Innovation leads to leadership. Leadership leads to success.









I applaud everyone that has contributed so far in their own little way as it has unknowingly created a seemingly self aware and sentient industry. Thanks to their efforts, India has reached a position where it can now begin to turn discovery into invention.









Until next time…

Lessons from Casual Games

How often do game designers look to casual games for inspiration for design ideas? It's amazing how a simple arcade game can throw up valuable insights.

Take the wonderfully chaotic, whimsical Insaniquarium. You can get it here. A must-play for anyone involved in game development, and for lovers of gaming in general. It's a delightful little game that demonstrates the effectiveness of two core design values – simplicity and context-sensitive control.

The objective of Insaniquarium is simple – you need to buy little fish, feed them until they become big fish, after which they drop money. By collecting enough money, you can save up and buy pieces of egg – complete the egg and you complete a level. Sound simplistic? Somehow, almost impossibly, the designers manage to throw in food upgrades, carnivores that feed on little fish and drop diamonds, evil, scary aliens that attack the fish, weapons upgrades, oysters, swordfish, and more. By the third level, your screen is a psychedelic, swirling mix of fast moving, brightly coloured objects, to the backdrop of cutesy-pie music and classic arcade woo-bop-bing-bop sounds.

And what controls must you master to play this game that includes strategy, action, resource management and an economic model? Just the simple mouse click. That's it.

Click anywhere on the aquarium, and you drop food for the fishies. Click on an alien, and you shoot it. Click on treasure, and you collect it. Click on buttons to buy upgrades and more fish. It's deliciously simple, and insanely addictive.

The power of context sensitive control. By using this elegant solution, the designers have managed to reduce a reasonably complex set of activities the gamer must perform into a single control – the left click. This makes the game beautifully accessible – no need to figure out / remember a control set – just jump in and play. What a blast!

More power to games like this.

WoW plagued by mystery disease

Check this out.

These are the kind of things that get me all excited about the future of gaming - especially persistent MMOGs.

But it also begs the question - just HOW much reality do gamers want in their games?

The mind boggles.

We're too sexy! Muhahahahahaha!

Try typing 'chennai sex men cell number' into the search field on msn.com and see what happens!!

We turn up at number four. Brilliant!!!

This is what happens when you get Vinay Nilakantan involved in a project. The human Viagra.

Indian Gaming Industry - Lessons from Bollywood?

by Anand Ramachandran

With the game development industry in India seemingly in a growth phase (albeit in fits and starts), it is time for developers to think ahead and look for ways to achieve global acceptance for their products. With a reasonable Indian market still years away, most developers seem to be focused on making games that western ( and perhaps Japanese and other Asian) audiences will buy, and they’re quite justified in this outlook.

The question is, just what kind of games from India will global audiences like? Perhaps there are important clues in the route taken by the Indian Film and Music industries.

Of late, we have seen several instances of Indian films making their presence felt in UK and US movie charts. Indian music also seems to be slowly but surely gaining a following in global markets. Importantly, though the growth was initially driven by the expatriates or diaspora, this is a market that increasingly comprises honest-to-goodness locals. The John and Jane Does.

“It is surprising and encouraging that other audiences are showing some interest. Mainstream newspapers are showing interest in reviewing films.”, said Tanuj Garg of UTV Motion Pictures, in an article in Screen International a leading trade publication abroad.

What seems to be common among products that do well abroad is that they are without exception extremely Indian in character – offering audiences glimpses into Indian Culture, Aesthetics and Value Systems. We’re talking those family and romantic dramas with Indian morals and song-and-dance routines. Horror, action or thriller titles don’t work. Karan Johar or Yash Chopra will outsell Ram Gopal Verma.

Even the Japanese are, unbelievably, tripping on Rajni films. You can do a double take now.

Consider the top grossing Bollywood films in the UK :

Kabhi Khushi Kabhi Gham	4.5 million USD
Veer Zara	3.6 million
Kuch Kuch Hota Hai	3.17 million
Devdas	3.16 million
Kal Ho Na Ho	3.12 million

Among the films currently doing great business are ‘Bunty Aur Babli’, ‘Parineeta’ and ‘Paheli’, which have all crossed 2 million.

From even a cursory glance at this list, it becomes clear that overtly, unabashedly Indian films do far better business than Bollywood films which try to be more ‘western’ in garb and content. No ‘James’. No ‘Dhoom’. No ‘Kaante’.

Even if you consider the music industry, it’s not the early ‘Rock Machine’ type bands that are getting western feet tapping, it’s Bhangra Pop, which manages to bridge the east-west divide better than most other art forms I’ve seen.

These are all products that are undisputably Indian, not just in appearance, but in soul. They offer the global movie-goer or music fan something that is at once unique, distinctive and interesting beyond mere novelty value. Of course, they all have production values on par with world standards.

It certainly looks like Bollywood has made world audiences sit up and take notice by being true to its roots, making quality ‘Indian’ products, and using global Indian audiences as a channel to reach out to the international mainstream. It didn’t happen overnight, but it’s happening now.

A message there for game developers?

I would like to see an industry that has the vision and confidence to take the route of making original, Indian content as opposed to churning out job work or me-too products that are Indian purely by virtue of being made here. I am convinced that the talent and ability abound – it’s only a question of taking the leap of faith.

Yes, it’s risky. Job work certainly pays off much better in the short run – and I’m certainly not suggesting that companies drop lucrative contracts to chase vague ideals. What I’m trying to say is that companies who manage to find the resources and will to make high quality products free of preconceived and rigid notions of what will work internationally and what won’t, will be rewarded with much larger long-term profits and respect from the global industry.