The Republic of Thoronia

Little is known about the origins of the stories that are featured in the First Book of the Republic of Thoronia. What is known is that the book was compiled in 1973 by Sir Athanasius Altair, a monk in Eastern Uzkani. From what we have seen and read up until this point it is understood and accepted that the monk believed that these texts were a collection by the Prophet Roland.

Even less is known of Roland’s life, other than the fact that he devoted all of it to the preaching and studying the Republic. He was the driving factor behind the Good King Thor’s popularity in the early 10th century. From this, we the modern reader and believer in the King’s abundant glory and wisdom, can critique and assess the books of Thoronia with a critical eye, not for hatred of the Republic or the King, but rather to further understand the texts and what they mean in a modern context.

For the purpose of this study, we’ll be breaking the book into more manageable sections. Here, we’ll take a look at the “In the Beginning” section. I am well aware that there is text that comes before this, but it is the belief of this particular critic that these were meant mostly as filler, and were actually written by Athanasius as a means to insert himself into the stories. That being said, these beginnings are still a vital part of the history, and should be studied by those who believe in the Good King and his wisdom. We, however, won’t.

One would think that to begin with “In the Beginning” is to begin with the creation of the universe. It is clear that Roland could never have been there, and it is likely that the Good King spoke to him when he was transcribing the universe’s origins. However, none of that happens “In the Beginning” it all happens before. You’ll notice that “In the Beginning” is not actually a beginning at all, it is, for lack of better words, a trivial and useless meandering across subjects that are clearly beyond the grasp of the Prophet Roland. For instance, the line, “He placed these people next to animals that were like them.” The Prophet Roland believes that the Good King Thor set up the lands of Thoronia by a means of comparison, so that the animals on any given continent would be similar to the humans. The two then, would feed and learn from each other. This is clear in some ways, however, the assumption that the animals were actually present on the planet first is contradicting a statement earlier in the book , “Dear sir, I am King Thor, the one who has created you. I have created a galaxy and universe and dinosaurs and dolphins along with you.” The key word here is “along.” This denotes and assumes that we, the human race were created at the same time as the other animals and were in fact, not placed on the continents in a manner that corresponded with the animals whom were already there.

I would like to offer a new reading to the The First Book of the Republic of Thoronia. It is my belief that the monk, Athanasius, actually has inserted himself up until this point, and perhaps beyond. I have read the original scrolls, and is clear that many, if not all are forgeries based upon how Athanasius had chosen to understand the universe. From the Introduction up until Capitols, the text feels deeply rooted in the slang of the ’70s. It attempts to use humor and banter to push its motives. The business with the tote is still highly suspect, as no other mentions of the tote can be found in any of the other history books, with the exception of the traditional song, “March of the Tote.”

However, these revelations do not negatively affect the words and teachings. On the contrary, the monk was likely a good candidate to continue the teachings of the Good King Thor. Yet I worry that perhaps we, the audience of believers, may lose sight of the Republic’s goals if we accept all these things at face value. We must look closely to better understand not only ourselves, but those around us. Next time we’ll be looking at Capitols. Until then, for the Good King Thor, we move.

The art of telling a story is a simple one. That is, it’s simple as an idea, and if you have the means to get that idea onto paper, you are set to go. As a person who strives for the ability to call himself a writer, I tend to look at things from a narrative viewpoint. This causes a strange breakage in thought when it comes to video games. No, not because video games lack story, but because a video game’s narrative isn’t as simple as say, a movie, or a story. The word “narrative” encompasses so much more here. It is the universe, the world, the flora, the fauna, the shrubbery, the characters, the plot, the camera, the lighting, etc. Video games do not operate like movies, nor like books, they are their own entity, and unfortunately are often ridiculed, underused systems of storytelling. This is often because of a writers perception of a “gamer” as an underaged or underdeveloped human who is looking, perhaps at the most to interact or be immersed in a world, but isn’t looking for a complex story. This is quite wrong, as a number of very intelligent people will point out. That being said, that doesn’t mean that designers or writers believe in their audiences enough.

Being not only a person whom would one day like to call myself a professional writer (or at least a pseudo-professional paid jibber-jabber master) but also one whom plays video games and attends a school that breads experimental fiction, I tend to wonder about these things. Why have writers stayed away from the medium? Are they afraid? More afraid then having there works butchered by a Hollywood film exec? Are they not wanted? Not needed? This doesn’t ring true throughout the magical game developer kingdom, there are plenty of forward thinking people out there churning out great games that combine all the aspects of narrative design. There are designers who believe in storytelling and designers who believe in massive set pieces, there are games that stay on one path and games that give the player a sense of freedom, there are even games that leave the storytelling up to the player. You don’t play Sims, you weave a world, Far Cry 2 doesn’t tell you a story you have to find it; all of these combine different narrative elements to achieve the challenge of player immersion and control. However, few games are willing to challenge this challenge. Few people are willing to play a game that challenges their minds and their hands, and even fewer players are willing to play an experimental game… or, at least that’s what we’d like to think.

If you were to find and talk to Robert Coover or Italo Calvino and ask them a question like, “What would you think about being able to tell a story with branching dialogue in which the reader is allowed to respond, thus branching a new set of dialogue and changing the story?” Both writers, and likely many more would be on board. Look at all the hyperlink fiction of the ’90s, the copious amounts of footnotes in modern novels, or the fourth wall breaking meta-excursions of nearly every modern author. This digital medium should be there playground. But instead we get a far less interesting set of worlds, a science fiction war epic, a science fiction horror story, a fantasy lovecraft, a post apocalyptic wasteland… it’s genre fiction. As with all arguments there are many exceptions, some of which even keep within the restraints of financial success, Fallout 3 is a massive game driven by the player’s motive’s, Bioshock is a science fiction epic, Braid a bizarre dream, Grand Theft Auto IV an immigrants struggle… but by remaining in these genre staples, relying on the conventions, the designers are given a freebie–the world is already accepted, it’s acknowledged, there are rules and regulations. Video games will never step off the grocery store shelf of paperback fiction unless designers believe in their players. A twist doesn’t make a good story, convolution doesn’t make a good story, freedom of choice doesn’t make a good story, stereotypes don’t make a good story… what makes a story special is the interaction that the text has with the reader, the writers trust in a readers intelligence, video games are missing this interaction. Sure, it’s easy to draw you in, “immersion” is the industries hottest catchphrase right now, but that isn’t what makes a story memorable. You can be drawn into a John Grisham novel, but that doesn’t make it good. Learning something about a new world, yourself, others, being made to laugh, cry, wonder, think, interact… that’s a good story.

Of course, if every game tried to do this it won’t work, and there will always be a place for genre-games. Whether its survival-horror or a fantasy RPG, these things will always be staples, they can and will be excellent, and they can and will be played and purchased. Experimental narratives cannot and should not be applied to all games–but they ought to be applied to some. Video games do not have to be solely about challenging a players dexterity, or puzzling their mind with parlor tricks, sometimes it can be more. It doesn’t always have to be escapism or immersion, it doesn’t always have to be multiplayer or filled with war. A narrative is a world, it’s a dynamic system, it’s the control scheme, it’s the flora, it’s the camera angle, it’s the characters, it’s the story–all of these aspects working together are what make video games interesting, it’s what has brought them out of the basement and into the forefront of the entertainment industry. Now there’s a chance to play with them a bit more, push them around, experiment. Sure, not all the experiments are going to work. Not all of them will be successfull, but as long as new ideas are consistantly being put on the table the industry will be in good shape.

This isn’t a new argument, and it’s possible it’s an argument that will never be solved, but to those that say video games can’t tell a good story and have good gameplay: that sounds more like a challenge than a statement.

Resistance: Fall of Man and Resistance 2 are two action-shooter games that were released on the PS3. Generally speaking, action games have razor thin plotlines and thin voice acting, but Resistance: Fall of Man, attempted to expand on their universe creation by using History Channel-esque World War II montages with a voice over.  The first game was immersive and interesting, and the documentary style storytelling worked surprisingly well. However, the second game, which continues the story of the main protagonist, manages to drop the ball on the narrative, and more importantly, fail to live up to what was potentially a very interesting character development.

Often games will take pieces of history or other fiction to help generate an immediate response from the player. In Bioshock we were not only given a story that closely mimicked Atlas Shrugged, we were also given a character named Atlas, it was a nod that made the overarching world grounded in our reality, and helped push the player into the game even further. In Resistance, we get the same thing. Other than the game taking place in a alternate-post-war world, we also have a main character whose namesake not only predetermines the story’s ending, but grounds it into a reality that we can familiarize with.

Nathan Hale was an officer during the Revolutionary War and considered America’s first spy. He is most famous for the line “I only regret that I have but one life to give for my country,” which he muttered before he was hanged by the British. Hale was well known to infiltrate enemy lines, disguise himself as a British soldier and would convey back to the American’s the British troop movements.

Lt. Nathan Hale is the protagonist from Resistance and Resistance 2. He is charged with infiltrating enemy lines to gather the information needed to take down an invading alien force known as the Chimera (another nod to fiction, the mythological beast, Chimera was said to be made out of several different animal parts. This plays into the story with a few allusions to the Chimera possibly being the first inhabitants of Earth and therefore being a mix of human and alien. Unfortunately this is never fully explained or detailed in any way). In his efforts he is infected with an alien virus. The alien virus will eventually take over his body and turn him into an alien himself, however, in the second game a doctor has found a way to inhibit the virus from overtaking him. Despite the suggestions from his officers, Hale decides to push on into the alien forces, refusing to break back to base to get his shots, effectively sacrificing himself to shut down the invading forces.

The Revolutionary War Nathan Hale is often cited as a martyr, Lt. Nathan Hale could be as well, (*SPOILER*) considering that he is killed by a fellow soldier at the end of the second game. This is a very straightforward story and it’s remarkable how Resistance 2 manages to lose ground on it. Namely, we are never given Hale’s back story, so we really don’t know why he’s even fighting in the military, he’s considered a mysterious hero throughout both games, which actually just means that the writer’s never bothered to pen a reasonable past. This makes the case for martyrdom all the more complicated if you do not care for an individual, if you cannot sympathize with their losses, it is difficult to care about their death. Hale obviously choses early on that he is going to sacrifice himself to stop the Chimera, and the writers and developers did as well, otherwise they wouldn’t have named him after a historic martyr. Knowing this, the developer’s still didn’t take the time to give Hale a sense of place or virtue. We don’t need a life story out of him, but any sign of emotion would have been nice. Even in his dying moments he is so crazed by the virus that we aren’t offered a look of worry or doubt from him, but by his killer, who seems, perhaps, to remorse slightly in his choice.

There are narrative follies abound throughout Resistance 2, like a first-time director with tons of new cameras and tricks, the game never seems to figure out how it wants to tell its story. It jumps from first-person to montage to third person so often that you’re constantly forced to reconsider whose viewpoint your seeing the story through, who the narrator is, and more often than not, what the characters are supposed to symbolize. Often in action games we’re given a series of archetype’s, and even here Resistance fails. Sure, we get the scientist that accidentally destroyed the world and is now trying to fix it, the big-mouthed fellow soldier that eventually does the right thing, and our protagonist, who, well, doesn’t fit an archetype. In the first game Hale rarely spoke, simply just fighting his way though the story as someone else narrated the events. Here, Hale won’t shut up, he has questions, complaints and directs the other troops around. But his purpose is just that, barking orders, being a badass, but never fully becoming any of these things.

Generally speaking, when writers pull from history to tell a story, they do so in a way that means something. Unfortunately, Hale’s story doesn’t mean much in Resistance and it’s too bad. It’s a classic action script that wouldn’t have taken much to make it great but in the end is unispired and sadly, uninspiring.

2008 was  a year of missed opportunities. Companies, as usual, rushed to the holiday storefronts and delivered lackluster products in order to keep them timely. One company did this more than any other: Ubisoft is the winner of the year for Best Games That Were Almost Perfect Yet Still Managed To Have One or Two Fatal Flaws That Ruined the Whole Game for Many People award. Some of these games were released with regular old bugs, some with game play flaws, some with graphic flaws, and one game was released with no flaws whatsoever, but being the type of game that it is didn’t garner that much hype behind it. Either way, here we go, the rest of the best of whatever it was I got my hands on this year!

Resistance 2 — Action games are usually pretty easy to execute, run kill run kill run kill story run kill run kill. Resistance 2 tries to be something more with absolutely horrid results. The game misses a giant, easy to hop onto barge when it comes to it’s story. *SPOILER ALERT* The plot follows the continued adventures of Nathan Hale, a soldier infected with an alien virus. Yeah, it’s stupid, but being the second game we’ve gotten used to the premise and even might have gotten close to Hale. Quickly that closeness is removed with shotty storytelling and phoned-in voice acting (literally, the voice acting sounds like it was recorded on a analog tapedeck, run through a washer, put out to dry and then played over a phone line to a Radioshack microphone). What’s worse is the fact that the story is so easy to tell that you’re constantly slapping your forehead as you play: Man sacrifices self to save humanity. Easy-peasy yeah? You’d think that Sony, a gigantic company could’ve hired at least one writer for this script right? A script about a man that is willing to die for his country, that, in fact DOES DIE FOR HIS COUNTRY. And how did I feel when I got shot in the face and the game ended? Happy. Thank goodness they killed me, I thought, happy days, I thought, but, why? I was just shot and I don’t care at all. Okay, okay, some of you are screaming that action games don’t need plots, you don’t need to care about your character… my only response is that if action games don’t want plots then don’t tack them on, don’t decide early in the game to kill your main character at the end if you don’t want to attempt to illicit an emotional responce from the player. So, the story was bland and uninspired, big deal. But the game was an action-game, and action games are no-nonsense fun right? Not with Resistance 2, apparently. The game doesn’t reward you for learning its mechanics or trying out new methods, it rewards you for dying. It’s this type of trial and error game play that, although interesting and fun in the 16-bit era, isn’t really interesting or fun now. Sure, it’ll get the job done, but isn’t advanced AI, player choice and a sense of intelligence and accomplishment where the industry should be heading by now?

Dead Space — Ah, survival horror, the genre that seems to be lost and confused and unable to rescue itself. Dead Space promised to revitalize the genre, give us back something, something new and exciting, a story, a universe a world a theory a blast. It was so damn close — but lacking in some major ways. The world that we get is created through out of the box movies, comics and shorts, the world exists around the game, but fails inside of it. Unfortunately, Dead Space’s biggest flaw comes from its ambition. It really wants the player to buy into the world with an inventive HUD, System Shock-esque storytelling and in game cutscenes. Unfortunately, they forgot to make the ship that you spend the entire game on believable as a living habitat. I’ll take the world, I’ll accept the twisted Scientology-esque plot line, I’ll even accept the girlfriend-gone-missing-turned-ghost part, but could we get a little bit of trash on the spaceship? Maybe some bathrooms? A kitchen? I wanted to believe in this game, to inhabit its world, but EA failed on one of the simplest parts. Dead Space 2? Trash? Bathrooms? Ducking?

NHL 09 – I love hockey, but hockey games aren’t really a yearly necessity for me. I’ll pick one up every few years, or even as rarely as once a generation. However, NHL 09 isn’t just another sports game — and regardless of your thoughts on the sport or sports games in general, it’s difficult not to love NHL 09 for what it accomplishes. Not only are the animations, physics, game play, modes and controls all superior to prior versions, it also introduces the closest thing to an MMO for sports nuts ever seen in sports game. Full online leagues, 6 player co-op, experience points, tournaments — this is the WoW for people with a crush on Mike Modano, Warhammer for those of us who dance in glee when a game is actually broadcast in HD. Simply put, NHL 09 is the best sports game in recent history.

Prince of Persia — Wow, I haven’t seen a game get hated on, loved on, and talked about this much in a while. For a game so polarizing you’d think people would have more concrete ideas, but even some of the best critics still seem to be a bit confused about whether or not they actually enjoyed themselves while playing. Personally, I just bought the thing yesterday for less than $30 which means that my expectations for the game are a bit lower than people people that paid $60. If I enjoy the game for 6 hours I’d say that I’d have gotten my money’s worth. PoP is one of the examples of Ubisoft missing it’s mark again, regardless of my own playthrough reactions (the other times being Far Cry 2 this year, and Assassin’s Creed last year). The company is getting damn close to a great game, but keeps on falling short. You can read what many, many others have said about Prince of Persia by following these links:

• Brainy Gamer’s 4 Part Take on the Game
• Graduate School Gamer
• Variety
• Game Critique

And that’s pretty much it for me. A few DS games popped onto my screens, some downloadable’s, small stuff that I don’t really feel like going to in-depth about. 2008 was, for the most part, a good year, one that showcased the release of a few games with startlingly large ambitions. It’s those ambitions that make 2009 and beyond so exciting. So what do we in Thoronia want to see in the future? Well…

• New IP Price drops — Games like Dead Space, Mirror’s Edge and Little Big Planet would have been better received had they plopped into the marketplace at $40. Game companies need to remember that games, like all medium benefit highly from word of mouth, and if we all chip in to talk about new titles they’ll eventually sell well. Every other media-industry is willing to give early-adopters a price break, why not video games?
• Reviewers need to judge games based on what they do – It seems like the 20-something nerdballs that have become game-reviewers for the major online sites have got the pretension stick so far up their ass that they’ve forgotten that there are hundreds of different types of gamers out there. We all can’t be fit into the two main categories of hardcore and casual. Reviews need to look at a game and what it is supposed to accomplish and judge accordingly. Oh, and online-centric games like Left 4 Dead or Socom need to be reviewed AFTER the launch. I mean, c’mon, how can you review a game without actually playing it? Oh, and on the same topic, reviewers need to finish the games they review. Too many this year have fessed up after the fact that, “well, I’m only on the third level, but I really like it so far…”
• Games need to find their place — We the community and we the gamers need to let developers figure out what they’re doing this year. We need to give them a bit of lee-way as each director and producer learns their place in video game creation. Not all games are going to fit easily into a category and subsequently not all categories are going to hold all the games. In order to expand the medium into something truly special, gamers need to stop crying foul when a developer tries something new. Actually, gamers and fanboys really just need to shut their mouths when it comes to things they don’t understand. I haven’t chimed in on the goofiness of Gears of War 2 for a very distinct reason — I don’t care. So if you don’t, then don’t say anything. The internet is unforgiving, and trust me, when you’re older, and you google your name and find the stupid things you’ve said, you’ll feel, well, stupid.
• DLC needs to go away, patches need to come quicker — Microsoft, don’t be a bunch of dicks. If a game, especially an online based game launches and needs some patching, let the developer do it quickly. And developers (Bethesda, I’m looking at you), don’t charge us the price of another game for expansion packs. Look, Fallout 3 was great, but I already paid $60 for it. Now you want me to spend another $30 on your expansion packs? The ones that easily could have been included on the disc if you weren’t so keen on getting it out for Christmas? No. No. No. This market isn’t going to sustain you’re stupid additions and you need to look at companies like Valve to understand what keeps gamers happy and ready to come back for more. Free upgrades, map packs and patches.
• Trust us, developer’s we’re smart — Game companies and developer’s need to realize that a growing majority of gamers are intelligent and willing to let a game challenge their mind as well as their ethics. We are well read and understand complex concepts, you don’t need to dumb down, or worse, remove idea’s from games because you think we won’t get it.
• Rereleases and sequels — You know how the movie industry is always made fun of for doing stupid things like My Bloody Valentine 3D? Or Spiderman 3? Well, you’re doing that too. Stop. Come up with new ideas or take a cue from a series like Final Fantasy where a game might just exist in a world, or format — we don’t need to continued versions of your already despicable plot lines. Spiritual successors are all well and fine with us.
• Social Components — Not all games have to be online. Not all games need to shared. We, in an era where games are loved for their multi-player to the point of a lack thereof takes points away from a score, need to remember that playing with yourself can be just as fun and relaxing.
• Downloadable Titles — Which is different than DLC, mind you. The three console networks have at their fingertips the picture perfect distribution system (look at Steam console makers). Unfortunately, this has so far been wasted on titles that would be better suited for an arcade than a living room (or again, back to the rereleases: emulation, Dreamcast games, HD upgrades (wherein they make the game kind of blurry and put some artistic bars on the sides of the screen), and a surprisingly large amount of SCHMUPS on the 360). Of course, there are exceptions, but games like Everyday Shooter and Braid proved that a single person could make an amazing game and get it out to hundreds of thousands of people. Sony , now is your chance to showcase your innovation by latching onto more innovative developers. Quick, while Microsoft is busy trying to update Bad Boys to play on the 360, find a help release more games like Flower and Nobi Nobi Boy. Show PS3 users, even if it’s for pretend, that you’re all about the little guys.
• The Cross-Platform Multiplayer Pipedream – It’s 2009, there are three main consoles and PCs. Most games are developed for at least three of these major four. Add onto that we’re also in a recession were few people own multiple systems. Now, I’m not a huge online guy, I prefer a good single player experience. But games like Call of Duty 4 and Left 4 Dead were great life-distractions (if I didn’t have Call of Duty 4 while I was unemployed I don’t know what I would have done with myself). Unfortunetly, I’m a one console person, and it’s difficult to talk friends into buying the PS3 version of games due to the stigma attached to PSN. Now, if PC games can run on a number of systems I don’t see why I wouldn’t be able to play COD4 with a XBOX, I realize Microsoft is money hungry and loves charging for all of their services, but I’d be willing  to sacrifice a little bit of cash for some cross-platform play, and I’m sure others would as well. But then again, maybe that’s why I’m not working in the marketing department anywhere.

People have incredibly strong feelings in regards to the Metal Gear Solid Series. It’s one of those “love it or hate it” franchises that sparks massive debates by bloggers and critics — yet in a critical score generally receives high marks. The video game community has poured over this title like no other this year, with exception perhaps to Little Big Planet and Grand Theft Auto IV. It was marketed as not only a PS3 seller, but a perfect conclusion to one of the most cinematic and confusing stories to ever hit the consoles. You won’t be hard pressed to  find information about the game on the internet, so if you’re interested feel free to do so. What I want to talk about here however, is the metagaming that Metal Gear incorporates so well.

Metafiction, much like MGS, is a love it or hate it genre of fiction. It’s often called experimental, cheap, or on several occasions, childish. It has been used as a technique for storytelling in countless books and films ranging from The Neverending Story to House of Leaves, from If On a Winter’s Night a Traveler to  The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. By definition, it is fiction that is self-aware.

Few games are willing to break the fourth wall, and while many tinker with it (say Super Paper Mario), few dive in completely. This year we had two titles that used the technique to varying degree’s, No More Heroes on the Wii, which used super-stylized metagameness to create a bizarre world in which having a character named Travis Touchdown become an assassin who uses a lightsaber to hit baseballs back at pitchers, and Metal Gear Solid 4, which used meta-gaming techniques to break immersion then subsequently to create a new kind of game experience. While No More Heroes was all in good fun, the literary equivalent of Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy or Breakfast of Champions, Metal Gear Solid 4 takes the House of Leaves approach (with about as many characters and plot points to keep track of as well).

Metal Gear Solid 4 has its quirky moments, from jokes about the Xbox 360’s storage capacity to player-triggered flashback sequences, but some of the game’s best experiences come when the game reminds you that is is just that, a game. Take one of the games ending sequences in which the aged and near death Old Snake is forced to crawl through a microwave to get to computer server in hopes of shutting it down. Everything at this point in the game is falling apart, friends are getting shot, cut, slapped down, shot at, Snake’s gear is falling apart, the world seems on the brink of destruction. What one would expect from a game of this nature is a big, catostrophic cutscene that moves the story along. That is, essentially what you get, however instead of the game letting you sit back and watch it all happen, you are forced to push the triangle button to get Snake to proceed. At first this is a simple task, but as he gets further and further into the microwave, he begins to collapse to the floor and the player has to keep pushing the triangle button. For what seems like several minutes, with your hands getting numb, Snake crawls across the floor, and you continue pounding on triangle, scene’s cut through across the screen of everyone else in your party going down, and you continue to press the triangle button. This does absolutely nothing in regards to breaking any illusion to the fact that you’re playing a game, but it does make you feel the torment that Snake feels, you are tired, weary and sick of doing this whole thing until, finally, with carpal tunnel setting in, you make it. Triumphant isn’t generally a word associated with a single button press, but here it is one of the most relieving and self-aware moments in gaming history.

There are several more events throughout the game, but it’s up to you to find them. The point here is that Metal Gear Solid 4 enjoys breaking the fourth wall, it relishes in it, and somehow, regardless of the constant reminder of its medium, the player feels a solid connection to Snake. A connection that would be impossible if we were just given a set of hands holding a gun, or even feet that we can see while running. In the end, it proves that immersion doesn’t have to always mean the same thing, and for that Metal Gear Solid 4 is a rewarding and intelligent experience that, although bloated at points, silly in others, is one of the best video game experiences of the last decade.