Kill Screen Magazine's Blog, page 199

Getting Trapped in Metal Gear Solid V's War Economy

Debt, industrialism, and the systems of modern war.

Unless your name's James Bond, the Cold War is still the topic of the day

In the interest of accuracy, I must attribute “Christ, I miss the Cold War” to Judi Dench’s M in Casino Royale, because she actually uttered those words. But M never had a monopoly on this sentiment. Here, for instance, is international relations bigwig John J. Mearsheimer’s “Why We Will Soon Miss The Cold War.” Would you prefer your Cold War nostalgia in listicle form? Good news! Here’s historian Jon Wiener’s “Eight Things I Miss About the Cold War.” Clearly the academe edges M when it comes to clickbait titles.

This is the point in an “if only the Cold War wasn’t over”-piece where the author notes that obviously avoiding the nuclear apocalypse is a Good Thing. Having done that, we can now move on to discuss all the wonderful Cold War things that were not the nuclear apocalypse but totally a product of the fear thereof.

Cold War nostalgia survives  

Alekhine’s Gun is an upcoming title from Maximum Games that promises to deliver the “paranoia and thrill of Cold War espionage.” So only the good bits, basically. You play as a KGB spy who has been turned by the CIA and now finds himself caught in everyone’s crosshairs. The story spans much of the world, because there was no hiding from the Cold War, and allows for death by just about every method conceivable.

Why might one miss all this? Is the prospect of death by gun, garrote, or nuclear gambit really that appealing? In a gaming sense, all of those risks do serve a certain narrative purpose, and that’s what Alekhine’s Gun is seeking to tap into. But in a broader sense, Cold War nostalgia survives because at least the period offered a certain measure of structure. There were excesses, sure, but they balanced themselves. Or at least that was the theory, and theories can be seductive. As such, a certain longing for the Cold War lives on international relations, and in the thinking of fictional cold warriors, for that matter. See, for instance: M.

But there is one thing we really can miss. As Edwin Heathcote points out in Icon, the architecture of the James Bond franchise is no more:

The grand HQ has gone. Bond is now back on the streets of London in his Aston Martin. In a way it’s a fine metaphor, coming as the police axe the huge, modernist New Scotland Yard. The infrastructure doesn’t matter any more – the more anonymous the better. Farrell’s building was the last gasp of the oxymoronic notion of an architectural expression for a secret service. Now the spies are underground, online and all around us. All we need to do is pick up a phone, turn on the location services or send an email. Architecture is irrelevant. 

Where might one turn to experience these onetime pleasures? Cultural consumption, obviously. Alekhine’s Gun is one possible avenue. It covers the earlier portions of the Cold War—from the end of World War II to the years following JFK’s assassination—but even the more recent past now counts as a period piece. FX’s The Americans, for instance, lacks the architectural flair of Mad Men but is equally steeped in the past. Ultimately, it’s all just history.

You can find out more about Alekhine's Gun on its website.

Nova-111 defies our obsession with genre

The head-spinning time-turning workings of Nova-111

Somber will explore post-WW2 chaos and cults in small-town Argentina

I need more historical games in my life that aren’t pure strategy games or Assassin’s Creed, so when I heard of Somber, a game set during the political turmoil of mid-50s small-town Argentina, I was immediately interested.

That’s primarily because Somber isn’t a game directly about war, which seems like the only thing most historical games are interested in. It’s set in the years following World War 2, and uses the country of Argentina and its recent coup as the backdrop for a rather strange tale: as the residents of a small city called Dale, you and a few friends will be tasked with foiling the plans of a local cult attempting to summon an ancient god.

Characters may be left incapacitated by terrifying events 

With only a few screenshots to work with, it’s unclear what form Somber will take. It's described on Facebook as a "4-player co-op, third-person suspense game," featuring eight playable characters of varying skills and abilities, and set across a “huge map” with “dynamically generated missions.”

If the slightly gothic tone hinted at by its screenshots wasn’t enough to give it away, Somber may contain some elements of horror as well. Characters may be left incapacitated by terrifying events that have yet to be detailed, or even develop phobias. Too many failures and the morale of your town could decrease, causing townsfolk to flee.

If it sounds similiar to any game so far, it’s Darkest Dungeon, the Lovecraftian roguelike that takes each adventurer’s sanity, fear, and morale into consideration when sending them off to quest in the most hellish regions of the earth.

But in Somber, you’re not in a dungeon and you’re not an adventurer. You’re just a “brave resident” in your hometown of Dale, Argentina, trying to stop an unruly force from taking over. Will the cult simply be a metaphor for something larger in Argentina’s post-WW2 history, or will there actually be some supernatural elements at play in Somber? It’s hard to say yet.

Until we get more information, check out these gorgeous screenshots over on the Unreal Engine forums. Somber is developed by Lost Cause Games, a small independent studio based in Salta, Argentina.

You can follow Somber on Twitter and Facebook.

This photo series captures the sublime horror of nuclear disaster

Despite—or perhaps because of—the horrifying nature of nuclear disaster, something of the sublime tends to emerge from out of the plumes and ashes. Creators have been trying to make sense of this ungodly power that we've wielded ever since the nuclear bomb was first invented, only to lay waste to its first unsuspecting target shortly thereafter. In fact, in the 70s, survivors of America's 1945 attack on Nagasaki and Hiroshima took to creating art in mass about the horrors that befell them.

a nation still trying to grapple with the fear of city-wide apocalypse 

Of course, the atom bomb wasn't the only nuclear disaster Japan has had to endure throughout the decades. Most recently, the 2011 Fukushima earthquake and power plant accident left thousands dead, injured, and ill. More than any other country, Japan intimately understands the unending horror of radiation exposure. Some even theorize that famous Japanese media and art like Godzilla is evidence of a nation still trying to grapple with the fear of city-wide apocalypse.

Artist Yoshimitsu Umekawa has joined the ranks, with a photo series he is calling "Incarnations." Capturing beautiful plumes of smoke billowing into mushroom-like clouds, Umekawa communicates the simultaneous terror and grandeur of nuclear disaster. As Hi-Fructose magazine points out, Umekawa uses a similar process to photographer Kim Keever, "creating images inside of a fish tank and then coloring them digitally."

"I am trying to convert some problems happening on a daily basis, including social problems that I feel in Japan,” Umekawa tells Hi-Fructose in an email. “The reason why I chose the series is because I feel strongly that my inspiration, based on my spiritual experience, sympathized with the ‘murky’ elements of Japan.”

The movement in each photo captures a duality: the smoke is fluid, while the negative space around it is stagnant and unmoving. The colorization adds a layer of the modern to the classic mushroom cloud images, communicating the ever-present threat nuclear power presents to the country.

But, as Umekawa says, despite the fact that these images call destruction to mind, meaning is still in the eye of the beholder. Each photo “has a character, good or evil, which may change.” 

Checkout the full album on Yoshimitsu Umekawa's website.

This virtual reality forest experience is the perfect rebuttal to Avatar

Technology and nature don’t always have to be opposed

When tech and nature become one

See through the eyes of an animal through virtual reality

This videogame gets its art style from 15th century woodcuts

The danse macabre finds a new host.

Africa is not a country, unless you're a videogame developer, apparently

Here’s an idea: If your blog post announcing a game set in ‘Africa’ doesn’t name a single country, it probably needs another edit.

To wit, here’s a choice passage from Positech Games’ announcement for Democracy 3: Africa:

In the west, we tend to think of Africa as either the target of charity fund-raising concerts, or somewhere to go on a safari. We never think about the African economies, or African industry or exports. Lets not forget Africa is home to a billion people…

The problems, opportunities and characteristics of many African countries make for a fascinating experiment in political strategy. 

Name a country! Come on, just one!

Let’s read on:

Plus… When do you ever see Africa in a video game? I have no memories of it ever being anything but a destination where pirate bases or criminal gangs roam. Gaming seems to have a very distorted view of Africa, just like Hollywood does. I am under no illusions that this game will sell many copies in Africa, the gaming market is tiny, but I think it still makes sense because its such an interesting setting for a strategy game. 

To be fair, Positech’s Cliff Harris is not entirely wrong here. Videogames, like most western cultural products, have certain cultural blind spots. The Central African state in Far Cry 2 is home to little more than zebra and the extraction of diamonds. In case you’re wondering where Ubisoft’s priorities lie: the state doesn’t have a name, but it is known to be a failure. Resident Evil 5 also takes place in an unnamed African state, because even deigning to throw a dart at a map is hard work. Which is to say nothing of its plot: white man goes to Africa to shoot black zombies. So, yes, videogames do have a tendency to use “Africa” as a setting while ignoring any local details. 

western politicos have often treated development as an expansion pack 

Yet the “when do you ever see Africa in video games?” argument can easily go too far. There are games set on the continent that are not about crime, but they tend to be made by African developers. Coincidence? I think not. Aurion, for instance, is a fantasy RPG made by Kiro Games in Yaoundé, Cameroon. If you’re looking for more of an ‘issue game,’ take a gander at Mosquito Hood by Kenya’s Momentum Core. Kanso Ogbolu has also used the visual tics of videogames in his satirical videos about Nigerian politics. In this regard, videogame discourse about Africa often tracks broader Western discourse about Africa: Much more time is spent debating blind spots than seeking out African voices.

There is no reason to doubt that Positech’s intentions are good. The game's placeholder sites does list the specific countries that appear in the game. Sure, each country listed links to its Wikipedia page, but at least they are listed. But much of the rhetoric at play here is symptomatic of the broader challenges—and possible failings—of Western allyship. Talk about democracy and representation becomes detached from the act of working towards these reforms or empowering others to do so.

The irony to all this is that western politicos have often treated development as an expansion pack of sorts. Just send Tony Blair to set ‘em straight. When Harris writes of not wanting to treat Democracy 3: Africa as just another DLC, he is (inadvertently?) calling out decades of Anglo-European foreign policy. The main takeaway from these policies is that one ought not treat the governance of other countries as extensions of your own paradigms. South Africa is not Rwanda is not Algeria is not France. I hope Democracy 3: Africa proves this point and that its success in doing so helps to address the real blind spots of videogame discourse. But in the immediate term, maybe we need to stop talking about games in ‘Africa’ and start seeking out the work of developers from Mali, Morocco, and Senegal, to name but three of the continent’s 54 sovereign states, which, again, are not all the same. 

Lead image via OpenDemocracy

Halo 5���s Warzone mode is a glorious clusterf*ck

Never change, Halo 5’s absolutely bonkers Warzone mode

Crow money, crow problems

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Crowtel (PC) 
BY Sinks

Imagine this: you're just another crow hotel manager, living their simple life and minding their own business. You don't want to be the next Ritz Carlton or anything—your aspirations are much more laid back than that. You just want to keep your business afloat without much effort. But, one day, some fat cats from the health department come in for an inspection, threatening the livelihood of your Crowtel. Now you're finally forced to face all those niggling death traps you've been avoiding. From leaky nuclear sewage waste dripping from the ceiling to piles of laundry obscuring the path forward, you must overcome every obstacle the Crowtel throws your way. By helping guests with their mostly toilet-related problems, you can start to make this hotel passably livable if not hospitable. Chirp your way through seven levels of bizarre platforming, your bird song soaring beyond all health and safety laws. 

Perfect for: Birds, hospitality experts, motel lovers

Playtime: About an hour