This is the first post of what I am calling Delving With Devs, in which I interview developers about their games and find out a bit more about what makes them tick. The developers. Or the games? Both? Sure.

OBEY is a game I am following very closely, as it is not only highly enjoyable but also terrifying in a way that most games are not. It does not scare you by throwing frightening creatures at you, or isolating you in darkness. It scares you by giving you something very dangerous. And I don’t mean it gives your character something dangerous, it actually gives YOU, the player, something dangerous: power. The goal of this game is to be the one in power, and that doesn’t necessarily mean you control the eponymous gun-turret-Robot. It means you have influence over others, and the game shows you what you can do with that power. It holds a mirror up to your actions, especially when the actions you were committing are committed against you. And when you think about it too hard, it can be scary what you will do with power. And enlightening. So just what exactly happens in this game? I won't do it justice trying to explain it, so here. I'll be lazy and throw up the game's trailer.

I think if OBEY had box art, that last line would have to be one of the call out lines. You remember those? Back when games actually came in boxes and had artful containers? "I'll go back to this pillar of light and be a good bunny." 

I'm terrible at this game. I'm too trusting, I give people too much money when I'm in the Robot. I'm not devious enough to do well at this game. Maybe that's a good thing? Maybe?

I was able to contact the developer of this game, Dan Dez, and asked him a few questions about the game’s creation, the reasoning behind it, and what he has seen thus far in the game’s life.

Thank you so much for taking time to answer my questions. My first question is sort of vague, but I’m hoping you will take it and run. When someone clicks on the Story tab of the opening menu, a box of text pops up that offers not your typical story, but an explanation of power, and more importantly, the subversion of power. What prompted you to make the game with the concept as it is now, that of holding power over others and the choice to follow the system and OBEY or subvert the system and revolt?

Dez: 
Well, one thing that keeps hammering me as a human being as I am working is the following question:  Is what I am doing worth doing at all? Is making a video game worth the time that it takes to make? When I meditate on the question, the answer I come up with is that the vast majority of games are not worth making: they have either already been made before, and/or are frivolous.  Of course this is just in my own opinion, but if I am going to spend several years of my life on something, I want it to have value above entertainment.   Games like all art, are forms of communication.  The question must follow: As a dev, what are you trying to communicate?  The "story" and metaphorical aspects of OBEY are my answer to that question.  I think it's time for games to move past just trying to be 'fun'.  In this regard, I think calling these things 'games' at all is a limitation.  And it's unfortunate, but I think there are very few developers that ask themselves or think about such things.  Jason Rohrer, and Brenda Romero are two exceptions I can think of.

Why bunnies?

Dez: 
Baby bunnies were the most innocent and defenseless creatures I could think of, but it's not important that they are bunnies specifically.  Mainly, they are designed to contrast their (apparent) vulnerability with robo's (apparent) invincibility as much as possible.  Further, I wanted players who think about what's actually happening in the game to realize that it's pretty horrible to witness innocent creatures hurting each other... in fact, I even considered making them human babies committing atrocities against each other, but it would have been too distracting.  Still, the idea is to first cause at least a little bit of shock to see such creatures hurt each other, and then to be unable to draw the distinction between them and human adults:  yet here we are, as our countries starve each other with sanctions, bomb each other, steal from each other etc.... and even work to coerce or convince you to join a military or wave a flag to help it all along.  People are hoodwinked into taking part in what amounts to a mass scale tribalistic prisoner's dilemmas.

I was in a game once and you logged in to check the server, and one of the players mentioned that the placement of one of the buildings lent itself to a permanent hiding place for bunnies that made it extremely difficult for the robot, and you said you would rotate the building, basically an instant reaction to player feedback. How else has input from the OBEY community helped shape the development of the game?

Dez:
From the start, I knew this had to be a community centric project simply due to the fact of me being the only developer.  I can't even test the gameplay by myself!  So I try to make it easy for people to influence the game wherever I can:  that started by allowing custom maps, translations, and server settings.  But the community has had a ton of influence besides that: the introduction of auto-pay, the power plants and numerous game features in addition to the maps that players have made, and the wiki, which have been huge community contributions.  Right now a player is helping me write the leaderboard backend, which we are making open source.  OBEY is a social game, and I have always wanted it to belong to it's players.

What other forms of media did you draw/get inspiration from? What books, movies, video games, etc.?


Dez:
I can't point to other games as inspiration, but I would say a lot of writings on sociology, political science, and philosophy have definitely inspired and educated me to make the game the way it is.  The writings of Chomsky, Tolstoy, Dawkins. The work of psychologists Zimbardo and Milgram have influenced my thinking. The work and teachings of sociologist Larry Diamond. 'A Theory of Power' by Jeff Vail was also a direct inspiration in making OBEY the way it is. 

The game lends itself very well to zany situations popping up, desperate plans, the dreaded corpse banks. What is the craziest scenario you have seen in a game of OBEY?

Dez:
I think the craziest thing that happens, and it happens every so often is when the bunnies create situations where they strong-arm and coerce the robot player (who ostensibly has the power, but is actually quite vulnerable if the game state turns chaotic).  Where they blackmail the robot into paying them or doing something stupid in exchange for information, or weapons, or for protection from a non-existent danger.  Actually, one of my favorite plays was by a player named MaximumPower, where he had a battery near the feedbox and said to the robot "can I have extra money for this battery?"  The robot paid him, and then he hid it behind the feedbox (instead of loading it in), to again in a few minutes bring it out again to ask: "Do you pay extra for batteries?" and do the same to be paid once again by milking the same battery over and over.  Then, the robot would get subverted and the new robot would be none the wiser.  He pulled a ton of payments out of that battery - I think I was the only other player who caught onto the scheme since I was a spectator in that particular match.

Thank you so much for your time, and keep up the good work!


Dez:
I will! See you in the game.


OBEY is currently in Early Access on Steam here, or you can check out Dez's website for more information.

I want to start out by saying that, no matter what you read here in this review or in an article I will be doing shortly on this particular game, I really really do enjoy Invisible, Inc. It's got solid gameplay, amazing visuals, and some of the most well-integrated stealth elements in any modern game. But the ending for me is nearly a deal breaker. I despise this ending soooooo much, an opinion I suspect will be controversial and one that I will only defend to a certain extent in this review, as defending my view in its entirety would lead to spoilers, and since so many of us don't use the internet these days and never have things spoiled for us ever, that may frustrate some people, so I will refrain. Just please know that I do enjoy this game immensely. And you should buy it. Probably.

The thing that will most likely strike you when you begin a game is the visual style. It's a cel-shaded, almost comic book-like aesthetic that somehow manages to feel both retro and futuristic at the same time, which is exactly how the game is supposed to feel. One of the characters, in fact, directly throws back to the "good ol' days" of espionage by wearing a trench coat and fedora, much to the chagrin of his director. The opening cutscene does a fantastic job of setting the stakes for the game: you are small, the corporations are big, and a direct confrontation with them will end in utter defeat.

Corporations control this futuristic world. I know, it seems far-fetched that corporations could ever hold that much sway in our lives, but this is a work of fiction, so... bear with it. Your team has been a thorn in their side for too long, and they've tried to put a stop to you. On the run, with the power draining from your extremely over-powered AI INCOGNITA, you must perform hit and slink and run missions against the corporations to build up a team and arsenal for a last ditch effort to find a server to host your AI before she powers down for good which will mean the end of your little Unobservable, Business. Given how stacked the odds seem against you, it seems like a hopeless cause. Let's get started.

Everything in the game is procedurally-generated. Scratch that sentence, it should read "everything in the gaming industry is procedurally-generated these days" and the same holds true for Invisible, Inc. The level building is very solid. I never ran into any issues, and the levels always felt very cohesive, with many avenues of approach for both your team and the security forces. The levels vary in theme, from collecting a piece of equipment to make your team's arsenal more formidable to rescuing a detained member from a prison to increase your number of personnel, but the general gist of a level is as follows: get beamed in, sneak around avoiding/electrocuting/murdering the guards until you find the Grand Item Of Interest, and then get out alive. The single-mindedness of the objectives actually helps the game, as you don't have to worry so much about what you are trying to accomplish so much as how you accomplish it. Sure, you need to balance whether you are collecting too many agents and don't have enough hardware to fully equip them, but that's not what the game is fundamentally about. It is about sneakery.

Veiled, Co pulls off stealth in such a simple yet elegant way. No shadows to hide in, no light indicator to show you are too illuminated. Just simple line of sight and a bit of sound recognition, but again, this simplicity makes it all the better. Guards' and cameras' lines of sight are all spelled out for you, all you have to do is avoid them. Should be simple, right? And sometimes it is, don't get me wrong. Sometimes, it really is as simple as hiding behind a sofa and waiting for a guard to move to the other side while you circle around the opposite side, and that feels really good to so easily outsmart a guard. But sometimes it goes horribly wrong, because you didn't count on a guard emerging from another door behind you and spotting you. Once spotted, you are immediately targeted and have one space to get out of the sight of the guard that tagged you, or he will shoot. And if you attempt to move into a space that is still in his sight, he will shoot. And if you mention the fact that his tie is crooked, he will shoot. These guards have itchy trigger fingers. But fear not! Because, having anticipated/been paranoid, you have positioned your other team member out of sight, and you move numero two over and take that pesky guard, thus freeing up your other agent to continue her circle around the sofa dance with her own guard. These moments of a plan unraveling but turning into another great plan abound in Invisible, Inc and they make each level its own little story. The agents could sit around the water cooler and swap stories: "Remember that one time I totally tased that guy right as he was about to shoot you?" "Ha, that's nothing compared to the time I snuck past three guards and pickpocketed their key cards and the keys to their car!"

As you can imagine, it is usually best to just sneak past all opposition, ensuring that they never even knew you were there until you are gone. Sometimes, however, things don't go to plan. Then you have to take them out, so to speak. Even there, the game offers you choice. Do you knock them out or kill them? It might seem like an obvious choice if not for two small elements that really turn this game into a nail biting experience. The first is a heart monitor. Apparently these corporations have great health insurance plans, because all the guards are outfitted with a heart monitor that will increase the alarm level if they die. So, you can choose to knock the guard out, knowing that he will come to in a set number of turns and start searching for you, or you can kill him (if you have a lethal weapon), thereby increasing the alarm level and thus the difficulty. Why is raising the alarm level such a big deal? Ha. Noob.

The alarm level starts at 0. A very harmless looking number, but don't try to divide by it. Each turn it progresses one bar farther in its track. Once it reaches five bars, the security level increases, bringing with it some extra annoyance. It could be extra guards, it could be harder to hack electronics, it could be viruses that attack you when you hack into certain objects. With each extra security level, you feel success becoming more and more difficult. So the level naturally becomes harder, but killing guards makes it harder faster, and you need all the time you can get to complete the mission objective. This is a sort of organic moral choice system. Whereas many (read: most) moral choice systems resort to "Yes, that was the bad option, it is bad because I said so, you should feel bad" this moral choice, whether to kill a guard or simply knock him out, has immediate and direct consequences that you must weigh back and forth before making your choice.

This seems to be a good spot to deal with my one technical gripe with Unseen, Firm: space selection. In a game where precise movements can mean the difference between success and failure, pinpoint accuracy in your characters movements is essential. But there are a few very specific instances that work against Invisible, Inc in this regard. Rooms are filled with objects for you to hide behind, but sometimes, at rare points on a map where a door lines up with an object lines up with a wall, it can be tough to determine where the door is versus the wall or the object and which one will is facing which way and which side of you will end up being exposed when you move there. Yes, there is a special button you can push that removes all the objects and makes boundaries much clearer, but it is frustrating that we need a whole different view for what essentially amounts to a one time move. Not a huge gripe but it did frustrate me on more than one occasion. The other space selection issue I have is the automatic pathing that your characters take. When given a situation in which I wish to move to a square around to the other side of a guard without being spotted, and I hover over the space, the path my character will take is displayed. Why on Earth would my elite stealthy assassin think the best path would be to go through guard's line of sight when there is a perfectly good path behind the guard? It does not make sense to me that the default path would be one of loss when one of success is possible. This is, again, a minor gripe that did not seriously detract from my gaming experience.

Then there's the ending. Sigh. I can't avoid it anymore. I loathe this ending. It did not take away from the enjoyment I had playing the game, that was bliss. But then the ending took that bliss, squished it into a ball, dipped it in glue and covered it in thumb tacks and told me to play basketball with it. It makes me not want to play through the game again. And I do not say that lightly, because I sincerely enjoyed the game itself. Perhaps I'm just too jaded, or grumpy, or whatever. But I don't think I am. I can't explain exactly why here because... well...

But I can say a few general things. I thought the ending felt like Thing from the Addams Family after he was diagnosed with Gigantism: heavy-handed. "This is the message we want to convey to you now, are you getting it yet?" Not only that, but it was severely hinted at, but not a very early hint, if that makes sense. It was only during the last mission that a particular event occurred, and as soon as I saw it, I knew exactly how this was all going to end, and by golly gee Batman I was right. Maybe I'm just a genius when it comes to inference, but I thought the ending was projected so obviously that it came as no surprise to me, but I also did not get to have an emotional build up to the ending that I knew was coming, as I would have had the ending been projected at an earlier point in the game.

And last but definitely not least is the theme of the ending. It did not match the overall object of the game, which is about as well as I can explain it without going into too much detail. But don't worry, I am going to write a SPOILER HEAVY article/rant in the near future dealing with this ending and why I think that while the developers may have had good intentions it ending up falling very very flat.

However as I said before, I imagine this will be a controversial subject. You may love the ending. If you do, let me know. I don't mind being told I'm wrong. I'm married. It happens all the time. Will the ending keep away from the game forever? Most likely not. The gameplay is that good. But for right now, I find it really hard to get up the desire to open it up and dive back into the world of Concealed, Occupation when I know what lurks at the end. But when I finally get over that little hump, a wonderful game awaits me that I fear will leave me with a bad after taste.

7.5/10 points from the Better Business Bureau.

Well, I suppose that, this being a blog primarily devoted to board games, with a smattering of other games thrown in for good measure, it's about time I reviewed a good old-fashioned board game. And by "old-fashioned" I mean very hip and new and by "good" I mean pick your jaw up off the floor you're starting to drool! Oops, spoiler alert.

Imagine a world in which every nerd trope came to life and then battled for world supremacy. Aliens are zapping ninjas, while pirates fight dinosaurs. Technology meets magic when clever robots battle perhaps even more clever wizards. Zombies, why don't you just stay dead? And you Tricksters, stop being so... tricky (trickish?)! As if that scenario weren't awesome enough in and of itself, now try imagining a world where two of those teamed up together to defeat their opponents. Aliens are teleporting in pirates, while ninjas ride dinosaurs into battle. Imagine no more, because you have just entered the world of Smash Up.

Smash Up is a deck-building card battler game, where 2 to 4 players take two of the aforementioned factions' decks and shuffle them together, creating a team up nerds can only dream of. You want Zombie Ninjas? Done. You want Robot Pirates? Say no more. You want the Aliens to return the Dinosaurs, you know, the ones they kidnapped from the Cretaceous Period? It's all here in this game.

Once a deck is built, players take it in turns to play minions from their hand on bases or to play actions that mess with their opponent's or their own cards. Each minion has Power, and once enough Power is present on a base, the base will "break" and points will be scored based on how much Power each player has present at the base. The first one to score 15 points wins.

And that's it. Review over.

Oh, you're still here? Alright... I guess I can talk a bit more...

Scoring 15 points may sound easy, but basically every card has some sort of text on it that messes with the game in some way. And all of the special abilities are unique and highly suited to a particular faction's deck. Ninjas, for example, have many cards and minions that allow them to sneak in just at the last minute and snatch victory from their opponents. Zombies keep coming back out of the discard pile to flood bases with minions you thought were long gone. Robots excel at laying down huge combos of minions at a time, while Wizards are masters of getting to play more cards than is normally allowed. Each deck has a specific strategy involved, and they all combine with each other beautifully. Robot Wizards, for example, would be able to take advantage of the Robot's ability to lay down a lot of minions at once. Couple that with the Wizard's ability to gain more actions and you've got a combo that will be throwing cards like a spastic magician.

As you can imagine, the deck's minions and abilities are all perfectly themed. Pirate minions have names like First Mate and Buccaneer, while Aliens are of course armed with their infamous Probe. I'll leave you to guess what kind it is. And the artwork on each card is absolutely phenomenal. Sometimes I forget to play just because I'm staring at the gorgeous hand I have in front of me. Oh, and also because of how gorgeous the cards in that hand are as well. I use a lot of lotion to make my hands so gorgeous. I mean, just look at these cards!

LOOK AT THEM MORE!

Because I simply can't win at that game. There was a Settlers of Catan tournament that I decided to take part in today, a qualifier for Gen-Con in Indianapolis. I thought, oh I know how to play Catan, that's the one where you trade sheep for wheat and roll dice and stuff. A little more complex than that, but... I've definitely played before, and I've definitely won handily before. I'd like to think I'm pretty good at Catan. I'd like to make one thing clear to you that only became clear to me today:

I AM NOT GOOD AT CATAN.

Everybody there played two games. My first game, I scored a total of two points. Two points! And you always score at least two points because you start the game with two points! I did as poorly as any player can possibly do in Catan. As I lay in the corner of the game store, weeping softly into my dice bag (I don't know why I brought my dice bag, Catan comes with its own dice; I was probably trying to strut my nerd stuff) I remembered there was still one more game to play. Perhaps my credibility could be redeemed, my image restored. Let me make one thing clear:

I AM STILL NOT GOOD AT CATAN.

I lost my second game, though I did score six points. So, an increase by 300%. When you look at it by the numbers, it's not so bad. But I did not only learn today just how paltry my Catan skills are compared to apparently the rest of the gaming world, but I also learned just how technical these tournaments are. I expected to go in, play a round of games, and then those winners would play each other and someone would be crowned a winner, elimination style.

I AM NOT GOOD AT PREDICTIONS.

It was way more intense than that. Everyone's win/loss record was tracked, and that was the first determination of who won the tournament. In the event of a time between number of wins, it would then be broken down to how badly each player beat the rest of the team. Someone who won by five points would be ranked higher than someone who only won by two. This would allow someone who perhaps lost one of their games to still be in the running if they won they game by a larger margin than the other. Very interesting.

I have to applaud the store that hosted the tournament, The Game Shoppe of Bellevue. Not only did they set aside space for the tournament, but they handled all the bracketing, rules, set up, etc. In addition, they were hosting a WarMachine game day as well (I actually don't know much about that game, it's some sort of miniature army game, and those intimidate both me and my wallet), so their attention was technically split, but it didn't feel like it was, as they ensured everything went smoothly and everyone was, above all, having fun. There was even time in between the rounds for a game of Ticket To Ride, which I have never played before but actually thoroughly enjoyed.

That's why I love these local stores; they know their stuff, they are passionate about what they do, and they love to share that passion with their customers.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go play the app version of Catan against some Easy computer opponents to build my self-esteem.

From what I have gathered, the aesthetic design I chose did not work very well. Though I enjoy a good white text on black background, some of you have pointed out it can be a little hard on the eyes. And I wouldn't want to be hard on your eyes! You might end up looking like this guy.

Let me know what you think! Or don't. Whichever.

So I'm a silly little first time blogger. I went right into posting about stuff without telling you anything about myself, or why you should be reading what I am writing. Or even my name. Silly little blogger. Can I convince you that I was just so excited to share the story of my wife's conversion to gaming that I forgot to introduce myself? Yes, that'll score points with her. Let's go with that.

My name is Tom. I like long walks on the beach and getting caught in the rain. But not pina coladas. Ok, so I actually do like pina coladas, I just didn't want to be stereotypical. And I live in Omaha, so I guess there are no beaches here I can walk on... but I like the idea of walking on beaches. Hm. This paragraph kind of got away from me. Let's start over.

My name is Tom. I went to the University of Iowa where I studied theater and played a LOT of games with my friends. My first real taste was a Dungeons and Dragons campaign that my RA started. I had no idea what I was doing; I was completely confused. Roses. Purple bunnies. See, I'm still confused. Let's start over.

My name is Tom. I'm married with two young kids who I can't wait to play all my favorite games with. I've already planned out how on road trips we are going to play DnD instead of bury our faces in our iPhones. Or UPhones or whatever they have in the future. I'm still waiting for us to have hover boards and self-tying sneakers like that completely inaccurate documentary Back to the Future. Oh boy, this is going nowhere fast, isn't it? That's a funny expression, going nowhere. If you're going, you have to be going somewhere.

Sigh. Let's just stick with the basics. My name is Tom. I love games, and I hope to share some of my favorite moments of gaming, some advice, maybe a review or two, and just simply have a good time writing about some of things I love.

I have now been married for a little over four years. My wife, we'll just call her Dearie, and I did not live in the same zip code until we were married, as she went to college in Kansas while I was at the University of Iowa. We did not share a "gaming" relationship. I talked with her every night, and I played board games with my friends. As a lot of gaming takes place at night, these two things often conflicted, and I could tell on more than one occasion that Dearie was a little miffed that I was off to "play with those Dungeons or Dragons or whatever" with my friends. I had no idea how I was going to marry (pun of course intended) my love for her and my love for nerdy board games that might not appeal to everyone, including, apparently, my future bride.

When we got engaged, she was able to move to Marion, which was much closer to Iowa City and allowed us time to spend together. But we still did not game together, as she did not understand how it could be fun, how "those kind of games" worked, etc. One day I hesitantly invited her to play Munchkin with us. I don't know how that idea got into my head. Maybe I thought the comedic tone of the game would be helpful in acclimating her to the nerd side of games. Maybe it was that the game is played solely with cards, no board in sight. Regardless, I wanted this to work. This was the woman I would spend the rest of my life (the rest of my turns) with. I wanted to share this with her. Up to this point, our gaming experience together was restricted to games of the Risk or Apples to Apples variety. The standard fare, so to speak. And Dearie hated Risk.

We gathered around a table in my friends' apartment and dealt the cards. The confused look in Dearie's eyes as she surveyed her hand did not bode well. "What do I do with these?" she asked incredulously. We explained, we gave examples, we played a few practice hands, and finally she understood what she was supposed to do with her cards: they were supposed to be played. In front of her.

I sort of got lost in the game, as one does when playing Munckin. It's sort of like a drunken haze, but fueled by cardboard and ink rather than alcohol and bad choices. I remember looking at Dearie to check on her status, to see how much she hated me, how much she was reconsidering marrying this card carrying, certified lunatic. What I saw, however, was something completely different.

She was glancing from her cards to me, cards, then me. And there wasn't a look of confusion, or hatred. There was the glint of mischief in her eyes. And then she hit me with a Wandering Monster, a Bullrog, and then with a smirk she laid down another card to make it an Intelligent Bullrog. My fate was sealed, and as my character died I couldn't be happier because at that moment I knew that my future wife would also be my future player two.

Now Dearie participates in all of my board game escapades, including Talisman and Small World, among others. She has even (just recently) agreed to take part in a Dungeons and Dragons campaign I will be creating. Games have become one of our favorite past times and despite the inherent competitive, sometimes even cutthroat, nature of these games (e.g. Munchkin, a real home wrecker) they have made our relationship stronger. Perhaps it is because they allow us to take out our frustrations with the other person in a non-harmful way. Perhaps it allows us a momentary block of the difficulties we are experiencing that day. But more importantly I think, it allows us to share time that is care-free and just have pure, unadulterated fun together as the family that we have become. And I know that we will continue to carry that fun into the family that we will be.

Alright! It has begun! I started this blog because I love games. Games brought me some of the greatest experiences of my college career (I know, education schmeducation, right), have been a key part of my marriage, and I know they will play a vital role in the way I raise and relate to my children. That being said, I wanted to share that love of gaming with anyone who will listen, and who better to listen than the millions of people who will no doubt flock to this site as soon as it is live. *cricket noise... *cricket noise...

Anyway, welcome! Post, leave a comment, send me a message. Whatever! I don't know how this is all gonna turn out, so let's find out together!