Site discussion Game On Video Game Exhibition - Melbourne [discussion] [games] (Read 726 times)

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Full credit goes to PTizzle for this article!

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Contrary to what is most probably a common belief, Australia actually has a somewhat rich and interesting videogame history. While not being a powerhouse as such, we’ve managed to create one of the longest surviving videogame companies in the world (Melbourne House, now Krome Studios Melbourne), host an annual conference and awards show (the Australian Game Developer Awards/Conference) and give the world some popular (and occasionally critically acclaimed) games such as Transformers: Armada, Destroy All Humans, The Hobbit, Puzzle Quest, the KKND series, later Spyro titles and a personal favourite, Shadowrun for the SNES. A subsidiary of Irrational/2k games also assisted in the production of games like Bioshock and Swat 4. It might not sound like a lot, but for a country with a relatively small population with a contingent of dedicated (and heavy spending) gamers anything that’s produced is somewhat a point of pride.

As you can imagine, when the Game On exhibition (previously held in London at the Barbican Art Gallery in a slightly different form) was announced for a four month run at the Australian Centre for the Moving Image I was very keen. Sadly work, study and layabout friends meant I only got to head over there last weekend. Still, it was worth the wait and for those of you who aren’t lucky enough to live in Melbourne (or London) then hopefully this report will satisfy any interest you may have. We weren’t meant to take pictures but me and a friend still snapped a few for the GWers and I’ll put them throughout.



The ACMI is in the heart of Melbourne, next to Federation Square. Me and two friends (L and H for use in the report) set off at about lunch time. There was a Wii competition being held in Federation Square where they were handing out Wii backpacks, games and Wii’s to the winner. We stood around watching Wii Tennis for a while until we realised the current leader had won twenty games in a row and didn’t look like stopping (they eventually gave him a Wii and took him off the stage). I’d never actually been to the ACMI before but it was easy to find and it’s a lovely place, modern but not overbearing. They were fairly thorough with checking us before we went in, no food/drinks, bags, cameras and so on. I didn’t realise the no picture policy at the time and had my camera in my pocket so it got in fine. We headed down and the first thing I noticed was really the look and feel of the place. I’d expected a somewhat reserved setting (the connotations of the word ‘exhibition’ shining through) but it was loud, bright and all around pretty great. The exhibition was split into a bunch of sections so I’ll continue on in that fashion (I’ll be combining some similar ones so the article doesn’t drag on forever).

Early Arcade/Retro Games

This was the first place we walked into and definitely one of the most interesting. It spanned the first two decades of game design, from labs in America to arcades around the world. Some things of note included a playable copy of Spacewar! (1962) which was intriguing if not a lot else, a 1972 Pong machine which was surprisingly a lot of fun (me and H had a ten minute rally at one stage) and of course all the classic machines such as Space Invaders, Donkey Kong, Ms Pac Man, Dig Dug and so on. There was a consistent crowd around here all day and it was pretty cool seeing these quite archaic machines of old being played by all the youngins at the event.



Game Consoles

A pretty broad section, this one - can’t say I remember a heap of specifics about it. Things on show included playable Atari systems, Commodore 64’s, all of Nintendo’s systems (bar the portables), Sega’s, all the modern ones and even an original Magnavox Odyssey. The best thing of this section for me was getting to play Adventure on the Atari 2600, the first incarnation of the action RPG. It was glitchy as hell but still surprisingly smooth for an Atari game and I definitely got a glimpse of how it could’ve been compelling thirty years ago. At least having the main character as nothing more than a square was honest about the quality of characterization. There were quite a few frames on the wall about early video games and how they’ve evolved and so on, which was cool. The only thing suspect about the section was their ‘important events in video game history’ timeline which pushed out things like the video game crash and replaced it with things like ‘Tomb Raider released!’ Ah well, can’t win ‘em all.

Game Genres

For this exhibit they chose an interesting route, following the classifications from the French book L’Univers des Jeux Video. The games were divided into ‘thought games’ (puzzle and adventure), ‘action games’ (racing, shooting, fighting, platform) and ‘simulation games’ (sports, simulations, open-ended). In the thought section there was a few puzzle games and a Monkey Island section which was really interesting. The action section was probably the best game wise, as we got to play some Pitfall, Street Fighter and shoot ‘em ups like R-Type and a really old one of which the name escapes me (it was a NES vertical scrolling shooter and it was surprisingly good). The simulation section had its charms as well, the most alluring of which being Elite for the NES which I’m sad to say I’d never really played. They had a couple of Animal Crossing incarnations as well which H went apeshit over.



Characters

This section was a Sonic/Mario fanboy’s wet dream. Original illustrations from Shiggy and Yuji Naka (some pictured above), character profiles and so on. Lucky there were no intelligent thieves on hand as I imagine those signed Mario drawings would make a killing on Ebay. There were a bunch of games from the series here to play as well. Along with this there was some stuff on Pac-Man and a few others, as well as the kids section nearby, which was mostly uninteresting apart from the awesome handheld display which is pictured below.



Film/Sound

Usually I wouldn’t like to combine something like sound with something like film, but they were next to each other and were both quite small so I think it’ll pay to do them together. The film section not only covered and discussed film to game transitions, but also how games are influenced by films and the evolution to a more cinematic style over the years. The game choices weren’t half bad either - Tron, Goldeneye, Star Wars (the old, hard, arcade one) and the first videogame cash-in, a system based on a shark looking a lot like the one from Jaws called ‘Killer Shark’. I had a look around to see if they also had Atari’s Shark JAWS but it wasn’t to be found.

The sound section had a few profiles including one on Koichi Sugiyama, Dragon Quest composer. It was pretty cool they didn’t just go the Nobuo route, I thought. There was also a section on UK composer Richard Jacques (Headhunter, Mass Effect, Jet Set Radio, Smash Bros Brawl, The Club, Daytona USA) which was interesting as I didn’t know a whole lot about him and he’s quite prolific for an Englishman. There were also profiles on artists like the Gorillaz and Prodigy who’ve provided music for video games. Rhythm games were also represented, every time I walked past there were people spazzing about on DDR mats. Apart from DDR, it was nice to see games like Rez and Beat Mania getting their due. No Parappa though.

Games Culture - USA/Europe, Japan and Australia

These three sections were some more of the better ones. In the US/Europe sections there were profiles of key developers as well as some interesting sections on violence in video games, the influence of locations and sports and a cool section on independent developers and the history of indie game production. I was hoping they’d go more in depth with the independent section but there were just a few pieces of writing and no playable games. Still a good read.

The Japanese section was probably the most interesting of the three as it discussed Japan’s unique influence on the gaming world, displays on anime/manga in games and their influence on the culture (including games like Dragonball Z based on anime). The part I enjoyed most was a fully playable set up of the semi-insane, $200 (US) Steel Battalion. For the price the controls are actually somewhat flimsy - notices had been put up to not jerk the joysticks or move the left one at hard vertical angles. They felt a bit weak in my hands, to be honest. It’s hard to feel like you’re piloting a mech if you’re worried the movement controls might snap at any second. Still, that being said, it was surprisingly cool. There are a crapload of buttons so it’s a little daunting at first but the mech (or ‘VT’) controls smoothly and shooting stuff was good fun (as it usually is). The best part was flipping the eject case open and slamming the switch when I was about to be killed, which resulted in a cool noise and a quick game over (I’m sure there’s some actual use for it but it wasn’t to be found in my short playtime). I highly doubt it’s worth $200, but if you’re into mechs it’s about the closest you’re going to get to piloting one in the next few years.

After that we moved on to the much less exciting dating game section complete with a game named ‘Tokimeki Memorial’ at the helm (I’d never heard of it but I was assured it was well-known). I appreciated they included this oft overlooked part of Japanese gaming at least. The Australian section was just about most of the stuff I mentioned at the beginning with some playable games. It was small and not really all that interesting, but suitable enough.

Multiplayer/Online

Mostly playable games in the multiplayer section, not a lot else of note. H waited for quite a while for a Brawl game but the crowd was huge. The case was the same over at the Halo 3 linkup (four TV’s and four 360’s in a circular pattern). While H aimlessly wandered around the Brawl station me and L had a game of a multiplayer breakout style game which I can’t remember the exact name of (something like Emperor). Using the ‘dial’ to control the boards was maddening but the twists (such as players having bases guarded by walls which you had to destroy rather than just blocks) made it worthwhile.



The Making and Marketing of Games

I really enjoyed this section and snapped a couple of pictures as it was undoubtedly one of the best forays into the development of a game on show. Rockstar’s storyboards for Grand Theft Auto 3 were very broad and tongue in cheek, but it’s easy to see how these basic ideas evolved into the final missions that shipped with the game. There was also a lot of Pokemon design and concept art which looked incredibly similar to the final product, as well as a concise history of the series and the phenomenon which has surrounded it. In the profile section there was a profile of Satoshi Tajiri (responsible for Pokemon) and Sims mastermind Will Wright. Alongside this was a really interesting set up showing the process of game-making, from design documents and concept art to play testing and shipping. I’d wager this attention to detail is something all amateur game makers should take heed of when looking at design.



Future Technology

Thankfully this section wasn’t just about motion controls (the Wiimote), body movement recognition (Eyetoy) and things of that nature, it also included things that were ‘future technology’ in the past. Awesome stuff such as the Vectrex Imager (a game from which is pictured below - think Virtual Boy if you want an idea of what it’s like), the Nintendo Powerglove and even an attempt at a Virtual Reality headset that some poor company invested money into. I was glad they included these (and a long list of more) failures, as it was interesting to see the way these supposed ‘revolutionary technologies’ evolved into something that many gamers would use every day as an enjoyable addition. These devices took up the lion’s share of the section but there was also an interesting read on the direction that the content of games are taking - showing the evolution from things like Custer’s Revenge to the less tongue in cheek (comparatively) content of games like Grand Theft Auto, along with pointing towards possible avenues that censorship and parental concerns will push games through.

Mobile Games

I didn’t spend much time here (as you can imagine), but for what it is they did a pretty good job. There was a profile on Snake and how it started the mobile gaming industry (as well as a playable version, yowzer!), some information on phones rapidly increasing processing capabilities and a few other playable games (Star Wars - The Force Unleashed and Bomberman 3D).

Online Communities: MMOs and Machinima

This section was well done, containing a lot of history about multiplayer online games. They profiled all the way back to the MUDs (multi-user dungeons) of the late 70s and continued on until the most recent MMOs. They also had a four computer set up of Pirates of the Burning Sea which I hadn’t played (and I wasn’t overwhelmed, but I’m not at all an MMO fan) and quite a bit of information about its development process, which was interesting as the work involved is quite different in many aspects from a more traditional project.

Next to this there was a small cinema playing machinima films from many different games and time periods. If you’re not aware of what machinima is, basically think of a CGI film using a game engine’s rendered images/models instead of original ones. Some of them are horrible (a lot of them, actually) but some aren’t so bad and they showed quite a few cool ones. My personal favourite was one done in the UT2004 engine - it was a noir styled short and barely had any look of where it originally came from. Very well done as far as what I’ve seen goes.



All in all I had a great time at this exhibition. It wasn’t just a boring, generic run through as you can see - there was a lot of work put into this and it showed. Considering the crowds that were there for a lot of it I’d say it’s not a stretch to imagine there could be similar events in the future. It has now finished its runs in Australia and London but I’m hoping that other people around the world get a chance to see things here that they might not see anywhere else as I did.
Last Edit: October 17, 2008, 03:32:55 am by PTizzle
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Wow.......... sugoi desu ne......

I'm digging the Shiggy drawing.
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Yeah, the conceptual stuff and shiggy art is really cool. This is really interesting to read through. Goodjob PTizzle. Must have been really fun.
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Thanks for putting this up HL!

It was a lot better than I thought it'd be, to be honest. I was pretty impressed.
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God...
The GO3 expo that comes to Perth gets destroyed by this...
Like, it's bare as in comparison to what you've just shown here, I probably learned more from this topic than I will when I go there this weekend but only time will tell.

I want to move over east now, you clearly have better EVERYTHINGs over there.