HEAD BLOG

After 60+ hours of game play I came to the end of Dragon Age: Origins (DA:O) on the Xbox360 by Bioware. As with most games I have greatly enjoyed I was left with a slight sense of disappointment that it was over, but this game also left me with an emotion that game endings have not elicited in me before – excitement. Let me explain…

DA:O is a game based in European myth and fantasy but is really a game about choice. It is the game that Fable 2 promised to be and failed to deliver but perhaps with less whimsy. From the beginning you are presented with a large range of customisable options for your main character. You have freedom to define your specialist class (warrior, mage, etc.) and the appearance of your character is pretty much up to you (as an aside on this, I noticed that you were free to choose from a range of skintones for your character, but most NPC’s in the game were white – it would have been nice to see some more diversity within the game itself). There are six different origin stories for your character to begin the game from – each of these origins will significantly influence the choices available to you during the game.

Now, here is the thing about choice. Many video games (like Fable 2) have said they would offer it, but it very rarely has an impact on the game itself. In video games choices are limited to the extremes of morality – would you like to care for these orphan kittens or would you like to throw them in a river to drown? You are hardly ever presented with options that inhabit a morally grey area. More than that, these choices often have very little impact on the story narrative itself. You can be as evil or as good as you want and there are no direct consequences apart from perhaps a change in NPC dialogue. The choices do not influence the gameplay and you are still playing a linear narrative. Choices are meant to make games feel as if we are creating our own adventure instead of playing out a predetermined path. I had not yet played a game that makes me feel like that until I played DA:O.

DA:O offers the feeling of genuine choice when traveling through the lands of Ferelden. Of  course, there are times when I am stuck to the story path but I was not limited to having only 2 ways of moving the game forward (good vs. evil). I was presented with moral dilemmas that actually made me pause to think. Sometimes, all the options I was presented had persuasive good points and points and I really had to decide what I thought would be best either for myself, my companions or the world my characters inhabited. This also applied to conversations I had with many of the world’s NPC’s. These choices would then change the world of the game around me. Conversations may become closed off if I pissed someone off, new quests might open if I made a decision in favour of one person over another and companion characters might leave my party for good if I made certain decisions. Sometimes, I couldn’t even guess what the outcome may be so I was forced to rely on what I thought was the best thing to do, rather than try to second guess the game to make sure things went in my favour. Because of this I really felt like I was carving my own path through the game and the adventure was unique to me.

All this relates to the end of the game. The epilogue quite clearly shows you how your actions and decisions have changed the world of Ferelden for good. Depending on how you play the game there is a diverse set of outcomes that will likely vary from player to player. Now, this is what excited me. Bioware has another game called Mass Effect that is also based on these principles of choice but in a sci-fi rather than fantasy setting. Mass Effect 2 is due to be released in 2010 and will use the players Mass Effect save in order to continue the story. I can already see that the DA:O epilogue will have a significant impact on the sequel I am sure Bioware are planning to make. This is why the game made me feel like I was left on a cliffhanger – the story, MY story is not yet over. It will continue and my previous decisions will impact on what happens. I am left to wonder if that demon I let go in exchange for 25 soverighns will come back to haunt me (I needed the money at the time!) or if it really was a good idea to get romantically involved with a certain character. I want to know!

DA:O has not promised me choice but then denied me the ability to shape my own story. It made me feel like I was having an adventure. I am sure that in 20 years (maybe even 5 years!) the choices presented by Bioware in DA:O will look limited and trite in comparison to the games being produced, but I really think that this game is one of the first to understand what choice really means. If you look closely, sure, DA:O still moved my character down a pre-planned narrative but it was up to me how I got there. I think this is where the future lies. I could go back and replay DA:O with a different character and different choices to see where I end up, but I don’t want to. I played this game by deciding to do what I thought was best. I look forward to finding out the consequences to that.

The launch trailer for The Mysteries of Little Riddle is now live on the internet so I thought I could share it with everyone via the HeadBlog.

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This project has been one of the most interesting of the year, not because of the game (which looks fabulous) but because of what it represents.

Video games, generally speaking, are written by “developers” and then published by “publishers” in much the same way as authors and publishers generally work. Big publishers such as THQ, Capcom, EA etc are great at bringing games to market. They provide an expertise of marketing but also they provide the funds necessary to get it, well, published. It takes a lot of money to fund games these days. A lot of money to keep the developer going, a lot to pay out to the makers of the console and then a lot to market it to as wide an audience as possible.

But things are changing.

The easiest example of this taking place can be seen on the App Store (Apple’s online store for it’s iPhone applications). These are beginning to be created and released by tiny teams with virtually no marketing budget. They have a willing audience who are looking to purchase and, for the most part, rely on the brilliance of their design as their best advertisement.

The technology involved means that this approach, for now, is possible.

And it is being followed by other consoles such as XBox Marketplace and PlayStation Network. Increasing numbers of people are opting to buy direct via digital download rather than through traditional retails.

But the rush to digital marketplaces and the compartive ease by which products can be created means that there is now an awful lot of products are being released.

Apple make this a bragging point – something like 100,000 apps are now available through them.

But turn it around and say you have one of the 100,000 apps. You are faced with a problem.

You need to make your product stand out.

Because increasingly we are seeing the big brands make it to the front page. So Jamie Oliver’s cooking app is up there and it’s there not because it’s the best cooking app in the world but because it is easily recognised. It’s a brand.

Which leaves lots of cooking apps, like the one my Mum might write, going cold. Not because they are worse, but because we live in a world where big brands are pushed over better products.

So my Mum now needs to make her cooking app which will actually stir your sauce for you*, stand out.

Which means, well, marketing.

And those one person developer teams might be able to do that on their own or they might need create a streamlined marketing process.

Relentless Software are doing this with Blue Toad Murder Files and Head First have been proud to work on it with them. For us it shows what a knowledgeable agency can do to help make a point of difference because, unlike in the days where all you had to do was place a print ad in a specialist magazine, now you have different issues. Bringing games to market in the era of digital downloads is just as challenging as it was in the days of those old fashioned things called shops.

These days you might not know where your consumer is. They might not be browsing the sites you think they are browsing. They might be watching TV whilst texting. They might be using Messenger whilst listening to the radio.

So you need to be clever. Or cleverer. You need to create advertising which can be passed on. Which is fun and entertaining in its own right and which has a message which can be adapted to suit the medium.

It’s an old-fashioned idea really.

And it still works.

*not even remotely true.

We are helping to redefine the relationship between video game developer and video game fan…

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Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 is a big hit. I’d wager that it has high visibility in the general populace and that you’d be hard pressed to find a “gamer” who hadn’t heard of it – regardless of whether they would consider buying it or not.

The PR on this game has been extraordinary.

It was only whilst walking past the billboard that I wondered about the game’s advertising strategy. What is the big idea behind it? Does it, in fact, need one when it’s clearly going to sell (and has sold) millions?

It made me ask around and do a quick survey on what makes people want to buy the game and here is a selection of the comments I received back:

* because i love CoD

* I bought it to be a social animal as my friends list are all on it and I missed the boat on MW1

* I’ll almost certainly get it at the weekend when I know I’ll have the time to play it properly.

* nope can’t say I’ve heard of it.  seen the tv ads for some war games but couldn’t name them – look cool though.

* yes, it was in the free paper I read on the train the other day

Those comments come from a range of people (all men, incidentally) who are a mixed bunch of gamers, ex-gamers, very casual gamers and non-gamers. Not surprisingly the gamers had all heard of MW2 and all expressed a desire to own it. Some were keen to get it as quickly as possible (some had bought it on pre-order) and others, whilst keen, were happy to hold off the purchase until it suited them.

The casual and ex-gamers had registered the fuss and, at best, acknowledged its good looks. They were’t moved to buy it especially if that meant having to buy the console to go with it. For them, this wasn’t the game that would drag them into the joys of modern gaming.

So that made me even more curious. The game is fabulous. It’s selling by the bucketload. It’s being launched into a climate where interest in modern warfare is high and it has a budget behind it that brings video game marketing in line with film marketing.

That’s when I began to look at the advertising in a little more detail and found very little in the way of sophisticated communication or strategy. I felt the PR and so had my core sampling of casual gamers but the advertising was something else altogether.

It was, at best, a clear example of support strategy. It’s role, as far as I can tell, is to remind us that the game is out there and that it is big enough to warrant an outdoor spend. On TV the visuals are stunning – to the gamer who, as we know from my detailed research (ahem) were sold early on by the strength of the brand and the advance word generated by PR.

Activision won’t be grumbling over the sales of course. It made over $300 million in 24 hours (take THAT film industry) – who would grumble with that?

But I’m drawn back to the advertising because it could have done more. Actually, it could have done something. It talks to the initiated leaving the unintiated to stare at the image of a soldier. This could be for any war game. The cover art is lovely – moody and violent and beautifully realised by the design agency (or perhaps by Infinity Ward themselves).

But packaging is not advertising and this could have been a marvellous opportunity. There is no big idea, no added value to the advertising. Essentially it is a picture and a logo and why pay an agency for that?

And then all this leaves me wondering about something. If another publisher had pushed out a cheaper, similarly packaged game at the same time how would it have fared? Would it have benefitted from Modern Warfare’s generic advertising strategy?

It seems appropriate, somehow, to be talking up this game in our tenth year. The Ben10 license is one rich in imagery and a great example of how Head First works within style guides to create something that adds energy and va va voom to video game marketing. Read more…

Yesterday I was sent a link to a video based on the new Crysis game from Crytek. I’m sure it will be awesome and I’m sure the concept of a nano suit capable of being worn might be explained satisfactorily. But what really struck me was the approach and design which seemed reminiscent of Bionic Commando.

That, in turn, prompted me to wonder whether I’d even posted one of our ads for the game. And I hadn’t.

So, sit back and enjoy this:

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