A portion of an interview with Jim Ward, president of LucasArts and LucasFilm advertising alludes to revisiting the Indiana Jones brand for some new games. This should come as no surprise for Indy fans, knowing that development on Indy 4 is well underway. I find it a little amusing that Ward would comment on the quality of recent Star Wars games, basically admitting that the company’s reliance on one franchise to make money has severely damaged the overall reputation of LucasArts as a brand.

Remember when the name “LucasArts” used to mean something in the adventure game genre? By canceling two adventure projects in the last few years with recognizable IP that were almost certain to do well, they’ve essentially severed all ties with that heritage. I have my doubts that the company will be able to restore faith in adventure gamers, because issuing another Tomb Raider clone is not the solution. LucasArts needs to look farther than that. Back to when they were making games with the same engine, but still presenting highly unique adventures that actually told a story, and had an excellent sense of humour.

On most days I can easily call Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis the greatest game of all time. In fact, for the same reasons I re-installed Sim City 4 I began to play Fate of Atlantis again with the help of SCUMMVM. I know the puzzles like the back of my hand, and the dialogue trees are no surprise. But as I said about Half Life 2, playing a favorite game again is a lot like watching a favorite movie. If you leave it on the shelf long enough, it seems the magic is always there waiting when you return.

SWAT 4 successfully integrates a fluid interface, real time tactics and a completely believable simulation. And like its predecessor, it’s a welcome change from the tactical shooters that typically let you shoot first and ask questions later.

The SWAT series has changed form three times since its first release as Daryl F. Gates Police Quest: SWAT, a spin-off of Sierra’s recognized adventure brand. Tacking on Gates’ name to the title would add credibility, as the former Los Angeles police chief basically invented the whole SWAT (special weapons and tactics) concept and had a hand in the game’s design – though it ended up as some kind of one-man FMV adventure. SWAT 2 would take an isometric real-time strategy approach, introducing more of an action element to the game but also allowing you to control an entire squad. Finally, SWAT 3: Close Quarters Battle would arrive after Rainbow Six established a new genre: the tactical first person shooter. Sharing similar design elements, SWAT 3 would still hold its own as a fairly realistic interpretation of these elite police units.

I played SWAT 3 shortly after I completed Eagle Watch, the first expansion for Rainbow Six. The inability to completely plan a mission beforehand made me extra cautious in my approach to the gameplay, because in SWAT you were dropped into a mission and had to deal with tactical situations as they happened – you were never informed of how many adversaries you were facing or their last known locations. The situations were often chaotic, and the civilians weren’t always being held at gunpoint – they would sometimes be running around just trying to get to safety, creating a highly distracting battlefield.

I liked that you were able communicate directly with the aggressors: yelling such things as “drop your weapon!”, “Stay down!” or “hands in the air”, sometimes causing them to open fire. Though they would occasionally comply, allowing you or one of your squad mates to approach and restrain them. It was an obvious movie-like interpretation of this kind of police work, but it allowed every mission to unfold in a believable manner, where not every guy with a gun in his hand was necessarily a threatening target.

Along with a new engine adapted from Irrational’s Tribes Vengeance, all of these elements are back in SWAT 4. Though where the game really impresses me is the interface. It fosters a completely seamless experience where the novice can issue “default” commands as the situation applies, or the experienced can delve deeper into the on-screen context sensitive drop down menu and issue a particular command to be executed. Moreover, the interface seems to be designed to let you sit back and let your team do all the work, allowing the player to effectively become the leader. The team AI is very adept in this regard – the only time a team member was incapacitated was because of my carelessness, after I asked them to run into a room without using proper breach and clear tactics. The enemy AI is also unpredictable – rarely will they immediately open fire, and this causes you to approach each possible hostile with caution instead of running nonchalantly through the mission, finger poised on the “Fire” button.

Though this is all seen through the eyes of a fan of SWAT 3; I would hardly call the mission selected for the demo exciting. This may be detrimental for prospective newcomers, and that’s a damn shame. In SWAT 3 and the first two Rainbow Six games, reconaissance and non-deadly force missions were always part of the package, conveying the message that to “win” doesn’t mean putting a bullet in the enemy. Though sound in their presentation of tactics, games like Full Spectrum Warrior and Close Combat: First to Fight are putting less of an emphasis on enemy apprehension or de-armament and instead opt for simple neutralization – adapting the aforementioned mentality of shooting first and asking questions later. It’s nice to know SWAT 4 is taking a more civilized approach, even though the game essentially revolves around the same “player versus the bad guy” model. I’m fully aware of what’s happening to the Rainbow Six series, so I’m glad that Irrational has taken care in trying to reproduce what made SWAT 3 so enjoyable. I’m looking forward to getting my hands on the full version this April.

“I fell asleep in my shithole apartment and wake up in an actual shithole.” – Adam

So begins Saw, a modern horror/thriller that tried so hard to be Seven, but ends up being diversionary entertainment. The premise is mysterious: two men wake up on opposites sides of a dingy bathroom with their legs cuffed to pipes while a blood-drenched body lies motionless in the middle of the room, quickly setting the tone for the entire film. Like Seven, dingy setpieces and rumpled characters are the norm. Adam (Leigh Whannell, the screenwriter) is an angst filled twentysomething that appears to be innocent. Lawrence Gordon (Cary Elwes) is a self absorbed doctor that has an idea who might have put them there. They each receive a hacksaw, obviously too dull to saw through the heavy chains. The mind begins wandering into dark places.

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Another friend entered the inescapable vortex of World of Warcraft on the weekend, and I’ve been doing everything in my power to resist for reasons unknown even to me at this point. To that end I reinstalled Sim City 4, which in my mind is just as addictive, though not exactly an experience that can be shared by all.

Our new apartment has a great view of the city, and during a short break in play I took a look out of the window and felt like I was gazing into a thousand mirrors reflecting back on each other. Indeed, the burgeoning metropolis sprawled out on my monitor was not entirely different from the houses and buildings around me, and for an instant I had one of those episodes where reality and gamespace were indistinguishable.

Last week a forum post announcing the liquidation of Troika’s former offices made an appearance. Many (myself included) thought this was some kind of joke, but in the back of my mind I knew that the financial and critical success of Vampire the Masquerade: Bloodlines was dubious at best. Based on confirmation by the lead programmer of Bloodlines, Troika has all but been dissolved with many of its team members having joined other studios. This would explain the lengthy response for a patch for Bloodlines, as well as its focus on only critical bug fixes. Gamespot picked up on the rumour late last week, with Troika co-CEO Leonard Boyarksky performing damage control with the words “we wish that post hadn’t gotten out”. Though an official announcement about the studio’s status is due at the end of the month, I’ve since surrendered to these accounts as truth.

Born out of members from the team that developed Fallout, Troika’s first published game was the cautiously received RPG Arcanum. Set in a kind of gaslight or “steampunk” setting that mixed traditional fantasy with the industrial, Arcanum had a detailed and unique character creation system, and a refreshingly original world to adventure in. Temple of Elemental Evil, though a poor game, contained the most rigorous interpretation of the Dungeons and Dragons ruleset I’d ever played. But like those whimsical tabletop sessions of yesteryear where memories of that one player constantly banging his fist on the tattered copy of the Player’s Handbook keep interfering, you easily lose sight of what made it fun in the first place. Plus the voice acting was fucking terrible.

I’ll readily admit that Vampire: The Masquerade: Bloodlines was completely covered in weeping sores, but underneath that slippery exterior is the best game I played last year. Combat may have been flawed, but the adventure presented within was something I will hold close as one of my most favourite gaming experiences. To think that Troika had been developing their own post-apocolyptic game, that now along with Van Buren will probably sink to the bottom of the ocean of unfinished games.

I’ll miss Troika. I’ll miss them because I know that CRPGs are slowly drifting towards action-oriented affairs; the stuff is guaranteed to sell. Troika was never known for delivering a polished product, but I’ll always stand fast to the belief that they had some of the best ideas for roleplaying games. The games industry can be very unforgiving when you expect them to accept an unfinished product in stride. Maybe if they had a little room to breathe, we would have seen Troika mature into a Blizzard or a Firaxis – genre leaders in an industry full of copycats and publisher focus groups. But given where this industry is headed, I think we all knew Troika’s demise was inevitable.

one more song to slay this earth