Game Scrutiny #1 - The Legend of Zelda Master Quest and why it was utterly genius

Hello everybody! I'm Defective and I'm here to introduce to you the first of hopefully many columns where I look at certain video games and give my opinion as to why they were fantastic, horrible, unique, remembered for the wrong reasons, remembered for the right reasons, so on and so forth. The name of this endeavor? Game Scrutiny! Well, it's a working title and is subject to change.

As for who I am and my credentials of speaking about these sort of things, I have a post introducing myself (located here: Defective Introduction Post; however, I'll give a very small overview here. I'm a Veteran of the military and a (nobody) game developer. I have an Associate of Science Degree in Game Production from the Los Angeles Film School. I graduated with Honors and Valedictorian of my class back in November 2013. Here's photographic evidence of my degree ( located here: Associate Degree Photographic Evidence) Those are my credentials to show that I have some idea of what I'm talking about and that there is some merit to what I say. This does NOT mean my opinion outweighs yours or anyone else's whatsoever. I merely wanted to explain my background for the interest of full disclosure and so we're all on the same page.

Game Scrutiny - The Legend of Zelda: OoT Master Quest

At this point I'm assuming we've all seen the Completionist episode of The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time and Master Quest (if you haven't, it's located here: The Completionist Episode 80 - The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time Master Quest) and we're all familiar with the Legend of Zelda franchise. Basically, you play as Link the left-handed Hero of Time who wields the Master Sword and it's your duty to save Princess Zelda from the clutches of the evil Ganon and his minions. Same deal, different games, just as great now as it was then, you get the picture. The Triforce typically plays a role in this most of the time and its split amongst the trio - Link gets Courage, Zelda gets Wisdom, and Ganon gets Power. Nifty.

For many (including myself) The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time was their first foray into the LoZ franchise and was the inspiration for them to track down the other games in the series. It was one of the most brilliant and amazing games on the Nintendo 64 and really showed off what the system could do (which at the time was pretty amazing). For others it was just another entry in a long series of games in the franchise, but nevertheless there was one thing everyone who played these games had in common: we all had to adjust to the fact that Link is a left-handed hero and had to correct our swings and strikes for this fact. Seriously, everything you did in the game was course corrected in order to make the best possible use and get the bang for your buck whenever you attacked (okay maybe that's looking too deep into, but you get what I mean) an enemy.

So why is Master Quest so utterly genius? Simple. There's one word, one four letter word that explains it all and then some. There's one four letter word that sums it all up as majestically as possible while also conveying the true repercussions of this result.

That word?

PILF

Uhh...sorry! Sorry! Hold on...

FLIP

Flip. That's the word that sums it all up. For those of you who have played Master Quest (or watched the Completionist Episode), you know what I'm talking about. For those who haven't played it, allow me to explain. Now I don't have official information or legit resources to confirm what I'm saying here, but I'm willing to bet that when Nintendo decided to release the Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time on the Game Cube, they wanted to also give gamers something special, something that'll throw them for a loop and REALLY push their skills and ability to adapt to special circumstances. What they decided to do with Master Quest is so utterly genius because for years...YEARS...gamers who have played countless hours of Legend of Zelda games have always operated under the notion that the game they were playing and everything in that game's universe was based around the fact that Link was a left handed hero. As such it's been so ingrained into the minds of many that when Master Quest first hit Game Cubes, I'm willing to bet that everyone and their uncle's uncle were thrown for a loop because for the first time (and as far as I know the ONLY time) in the franchises history...Link was right handed.

That's right (pun intended), Link the left handed Hero of Time and Hyrule officially became right handed just for this occasion. To make matters better or worse, the ENTIRE game that was Ocarina of Time was also deppilf! Uh...sorry, sorry! Flipped! The entire world and everything in it was flipped! Chests that were on the left side of a room in a dungeon were now on the right, enemies who attacked from the right now attacked from the left, Stalfos who wielded their shields in their left hands now wielded in their right, so and so forth. Even Link shot his bow right handed! Towns, dungeons, even the main overworld map of Hyrule itself was depp...sorry...flipped, mirrored even. It literally threw everything you knew and understood about how to correct for Link's left-handedness out the window. Not to mention that dungeons were harder and took more than the usual effort to clear than the regular Ocarina of Time. Surprisingly enough, the Water Temple of all places didn't get a ramp up in difficulty...I dare say it got easier. Huh, I guess they really did flip everything around in Master Quest.

Anyway, the point of all this is to bring to light just how drastic a change a simple idea can bring to an entire game. Can you imagine Super Mario Bros 1 having to run right to left? Or if Pokemon battles were fought from a right-left perspective instead of a left-right? Or playing Starcraft, Warcraft, or any other RTS where everything was deppilf...sorry...flipped? It would wreak absolute havoc on the play style and orientation of said play style you are used to. Nintendo took a simple four letter word and allowed to bring total chaos to a slew of LoZ veterans and new players alike and you know what? I love them for doing that. I really wish we could see more games take a shot at this every once in a great while just to see what happens and how the games play out as a result.

And that does it for the first installment of Game Scrutiny! The format is still being toyed with and I placed pictures in because no one wants to read a wall of text! Hopefully the pictures helped break up the monotony a bit and I really hope for those who read this thing that they thoroughly enjoyed it. There is a plan for me to do other games and other installments, but I am open to feedback, constructive criticism (I'm not a writer by trade, so please don't be too harsh in that regard), suggestions and ideas. Should I do bullet points? More pictures? Less words? Link to more videos, etc? Let me know!

Thanks a lot guys and remember: Stay being awesome.

- Defective

Candy Kingdom FINAL

Candy Kingdom FINAL Version

Sound Booth Extravaganza

Yesterday Team Gordon Freeman went into the sound booth to record some sounds for Candy Kingdom. No point in having a digital experience that has no sound! 

The various sounds we came up with were running and walking on various surfaces, boulders rolling, objects falling from a distance to the ground, and several breaking noises. We had issues trying to get a chomping noise, but that's nothing audio design and engineering can't fix or help out with.

I will be updating this post with sounds that we capture from future sessions as well as from the session we did yesterday.

Boulder Sound

Lollipop Smack Pendulum

Candy Kingdom Alpha

Webplayer:

Candy Kingdom

Candy Kingdom

Direct link to dropbox:

Direct Dropbox Link (right click folder and click download. File name is Test3.exe. Open that in order to play the alpha build)

CONTROLS:

W,A,S,D or Arrow Keys = Movement

Mouse = Camera Control

Left Shift = Sprint

Spacebar = Jump

Level 1 - Bounce on the gum drops and make it to the other side. Careful of the syrup (first puddle) and the chocolate (second puddle)!

Level 2 - Run like hell through the cave to avoid having candy corn drop on your head! Work your way through the dark cavern (it's really dark, we're working on that) and make it to the end!

Level 3 - Avoid the jawbreakers that roll down after you and make it to the exit of the level.

Level 4 - Avoid the pendulums in order to make it across the chocolate bridge. If you fall down or make it across, that's it! There's not much to the level yet and it's just a first build to show off.

What is Game Theory?

What is Game Theory

     A definition of what Game Theory is according to Investopedia, "A model of optimality taking into consideration not only benefits less costs, but also the interaction between participants." Additionally also from that same segment on Investopedia, "Game theory attempts to look at the relationships between participants in a particular model and predict their optimal decisions." What this means is that not only does it look at the outcoems of a certain "game" so to speak, but it also looks at how the participants interact with one another. It's a table and formula of how people may interact with one another and a system of possible predicting what the outcome might be. The most famous example used in conjuction of Game Theory is the Prisoner's Dilemma.

            The Prisoner's Dilemma works as follows: two people are accused of a crime and are being interrogated separately and have no idea what the other is saying. Obviously both parties want to minimize the amount of time spent in jail and herein lies the dilemma. The sentences vary as follows:

1) If Person A pleads not guilty and Person B confesses, Person B will receive the minimum sentence of one year, and Person A will have to stay in jail for the maximum sentence of five years.

2) If nobody makes any implications they will both receive a sentence of two years.

3) If both decide to plead guilty and implicate their partner, they will both receive a sentence of three years.

4) If Person B pleads not guilty and Person A confesses, Person A will receive the minimum sentence of one year, and Person B will have to stay in jail for the maximum five years.

            Pleading guilty obviously is the most attractive offer, but only if the other party pleads not guilty since the sentence is the least amount compared to the other sentences possible. If both parties plead guilty, they will both end up serving three years. Another outcome if they both plead not guilty they'll each serve two years in jail whereas the risk of pleading not guilty is a five year sentence should the other member decide to confess to the crime.

            The Prisoner's Dilemma is the most popular example as it can highlight the true nature of people and can be applied to a multitude of scenarios and not just one where two people might be facing jail time. Now according to GameTheory.net, "Game theory is the study of how people interact and make decisions. This broad definition applies to most of the social sciences, but game theory applies mathematical models to this interaction under the assumption that each person's behavior impacts the well-being of all other participants in the game. These models are often quite simplified abstractions of real-world interactions but offer a tractable way of predicting likely outcomes" Basically what this means is that it is entirely possible to use a formula to determine possible outcomes of a certain scenario. For a real world scenario, look at what President Truman had to struggle with - whether or not to drop the atomic bomb on the Japanese people to put an end to one of the fronts of the war his country was fighting. If he didn't, then not only would Japan continue to fight back, but countless American lives would have been lost. If he did greenlight the operation, then thousands if not millions of innocent human life would be annihilated as a result of his decision. So you can see the struggle that President Truman had and the weight of the decision he had to make, but the Game Theory can apply to that just as well as two people facing jail time.

Sources

http://www.investopedia.com/terms/g/gametheory.asp

http://www.gametheory.net/about/FAQ.html

Final Render of Prop

Final Render of Prop:

Completed Textured Prop

Side View

Three Quarter View

Top view