BOOM SHAKA LAKA! JAM Returns!

In the field of video games there's very few sports titles that actually manage to appeal to me. I was unexpectedly swept away by the SSX series and captivated by the early installments of the Blitz series. However one of my earliest and fondest memories of sports games which blurred the reality line was the NBA Jam series.

Featuring real players and real teams in an arcade 2 on 2 setting, Jam brought flavor, action and odd commentator exclamations delivering a very different basketball experience. Sure Jam had a very loose interpretation of the actual rules of basketball, had this game not featured superhumanly awesome flaming dunks or backboard shattering slams, attention to the rules may have been more important.

Today I was fortunate enough to bear witness to the EA Sports revival of this excellent cartridge era game. If the debut trailer is any indication, Jam 2010 will feature the same over-the-top dunking and silly commentating its primitive predecessors had, the update will be a much-needed addition to the Wii's severely lacking game catalog.

Let's just hope the folks at EA don't turn this revival into another endless string of slightly different but overall similar sequels like what's happened to the Call of Duty series...

See the video here: http://www.gametrailers.com/video/exclusive-debut-nba-jam/63073

Heavy Rain - The Taxidermist and lasting impressions

Last week an add-on chapter to Heavy Rain was made available for those who received a pre-order voucher or saw it on the Playstation Store. Supposedly picking up where the main game ends, the new chapter features the sexploited, insomniac reporter Madison Paige who is investigating – one assumes since this is never made clear – a lead implicating a local taxidermist as the mysterious figure in Madison’s ending.

The Taxidermist adds an element of gameplay Quantic Dream seemed to feel was lacking from the main game: stealth. This new dynamic doesn’t so much add to the overall experience of Heavy Rain as it does add to the list of persisting problems. Serving as a median between the exploration and action sequences of the chapter, the stealth aspect accomplishes the opposite of Quantic Dream’s intent and puts an even larger spotlight on the game’s unrefined controls. During this segment I had more trouble navigating Madison through the house (see my review on Heavy Rain) let alone to a safe hiding location. In the end I decided wrestling with the controller to move Madison was a pointless endeavor and opted to forgo stealth by running directly into the antagonist’s field of view. Speaking of which, the Taxidermist must be the dumbest criminal mastermind in the history of serial killers. I hoped this extremely thick serial killer would notice every door in his house had been opened in order to speed up the horrible stealth segment, but the only differences he seemed to notice were disturbed items on the storefront counters. Even the door to the room with the rotting corpse being ajar didn’t phase his determination to ignore my presence in his house, making the absence of quality control painfully obvious yet again.

Once again the action proved to be a matter of deciding between survival or failure, press the button or don’t, and just like the main game these QTE choices determine the final outcome of the chapter. Due to my quick reflexes I was able to subdue and eliminate my opponent thanks to a conveniently gassed up chainsaw in the garage. The ending that followed conveniently ignored the fact that Madison broke into this house and killed a person with no witnesses, yet she’s revered as a hero once her story breaks. This was only one of about six to eight endings, as far as I was concerned I had received the full gaming experience from just playing through one ending.

Playing this new chapter put a sour taste in my mouth with regard to the Heavy Rain experience as a whole. All of the elements I found compelling and worth exploring in the main game were curiously absent from the add-on chapter: compelling storyline, a plot no error in gameplay can falter and a colorful cast of characters. The Taxidermist chooses to ignore all of these strengths in favor of everything I hated about the main game. Honestly I was hopeful this new chapter would be an improvement on any of the list of problems which plagued Heavy Rain, instead I was forced to endure more of the same without the creativity which made the main game a great experience.

Brave and the Bold VS. J. Michael Straczynski

Heralding from the Silver Age of comics, The Brave and the Bold classically featured two heroes joining forces to stop a threat neither would be able to tackle alone. Following a lengthy absence Mark Waid and George Perez resurrected the series which channeled the tongue and cheek feel of classic B&B comics with all new story and art. Although this relaunch mainly served as background for the DC summer event of the time, each issue was readable by itself yet connected to a greater overall storyline if read in sequence. Once Waid and Perez said farewell to this latest incarnation, Scott Kolins took the reigns for a series of oddball single issue stories unconnected to a story arc. These interpretations of modern DC characters were a treat to read and anticipating another wacky team-up kept me waiting for each month's installment, life was good.

The higher-ups at DC decided the Brave and the Bold needed a superstar creator to fuel the book's popularity amidst a somewhat likely drop in sales following the Waid/Perez departure. Out of every writer currently working in comics my last choice for Brave and the Bold would have been J. Michael Straczynski, a writer known for writing for the story arc and not the single issue.

I gave Straczynski's run a couple issues to see how he was settling into this new style of writing but my fears had become reality. Both issues I read seemed to be groundwork for a much larger story, similar to Mark Waid's stint. However this groundwork was completely ignored by the following issue and was instead followed by another story arc first issue. Even utilizing some of the DCU's wackiest and most forgotten characters, it seemed Straczynski was unsure how to resolve these awesome team-ups issues within 22 pages. In these initial issues too much time was devoted to irrelevant character monologues, slowly paced storytelling and an overall detachment between the two headline characters. In the Batman/Dial H for Hero issue the pair don't even physically meet until nearly the end of the comic.

Hopeful again it would just take him a few issues to get used to this new style of storytelling, I picked up the latest oddball team-up of The Atom and the Joker, mainly due to the amazing artwork of Justiniano. This story was NOT A TEAM-UP! The Atom shrinks down to enter the Joker's brain in order to deliver medicine which will save the Joker's life. Once inside, the Atom is continually thrust into memories of the Joker, all of which reek of Heath Ledger Joker fandom (there's even a scene from The Dark Knight recapped in a panel), compiling a Heath Ledger-esque origin story. Instead of using the Atom to his full potential, he's merely used as a device to direct the reader through the story.

I implore Mr. Straczynski, please ask DC for some classic Brave and the Bold stories to read or pick up the very inexpensive Showcase edition, because you need to learn how to write for this book. I'm still hopeful JMS will come around but it probably won't be until two issues before he's pulled off the book.