#118: The Dangerous "Lessons" of Far Cry 5

I make no secret of the fact that Ubisoft and I have an on-again, off-again relationship. Every now and then they create a game like Assassin's Creed: Origins, that I can easily sink 50+ hours into without thinking -- sure, it may have its flaws, but there's clearly a level of love and care imbued into the final product. Other times, they are liable to produce content like Watch_Dogs, which paints itself as a typical, by-the-numbers open-world revenge story that left me sour and disappointed. From my previous experiences with 3, 4, and Primal, I was expecting the fifth entry in the Far Cry franchise to be dumb but otherwise milquetoast: A decent open-world shooter with a story that brought up some interesting ideas that ultimately go nowhere.

Instead, what I received was one of the worst stories I had ever seen in an Ubisoft game. Even more than the villainous Aiden Pearce in Watch_Dogs, Far Cry 5 left me contemptuous and ultimately resentful of the direction the developers chose to go. There are some very dangerous implications behind the story, particularly the ending, and they need to be discussed. (Though it goes without saying, there are spoilers abound, so read at your own risk.)

#117: What Can the Dominaria Leak Teach Game Publishers?

The game industry is notorious for a number of problems, one of them being an almost complete unwillingness to let any information slip out even a second before schedule. But almost paradoxically, despite this level of secrecy, leaks are commonplace. Gaming journalists like Jason Schreier and Laura Kate Dale over at Kotaku have broken stories of upcoming projects, games, and announcements with great accuracy, and before the publishers in question wanted the leaked knowledge to go public.

That said, video games are not the only source of entertainment with such unscheduled reveals. Early last month, one of the oldest collectible card games around had a premature disclosure. Before the leak, it was widely known that Magic: The Gathering's next set of cards would take place in the plane of Dominaria, but one of their offices in China erroneously sent out specifics on what cards would be contained in this set, along with mechanical or verbiage changes that would be in effect going forward. I'm not interested in discussing the leak itself in any significant detail. Instead, I want to discuss the response from the company that makes Magic, Wizards of the Coast(WotC), and how they provide a stark contrast to how the game industry handles similar events.

Yet before we do, it's important to understand how the game industry tends to act when details are revealed to the public before their intended date. When leaks happen, the first thing publishers almost always do is deny it in very specific terms, or go radio silent. Before her current job at Kotaku UK, Laura Dale was a journalist working for Destructoid UK, where she disclosed that a new DLC project, titled Rush of Blood, was coming to Until Dawn for the PlayStation 4's VR headset. The developers, Supermassive Games, hosted an AMA on Reddit shortly thereafter, where they both declined to comment on the story and specifically stated that there was “no DLC” in the works.

To most people, that reads as if the story Laura Dale reported had no basis in reality, but that would've been a misconception. Until Dawn: Rush of Blood was absolutely being developed for PlayStation VR. The difference is that it was never going to be a DLC for the base game: It was a stand-alone. Technically, no lie was ever spoken, as the claim that “no DLC” was being developed was completely true. Still, rather than just reveal that game's existence, both Sony and Supermassive Games deliberately tried to obfuscate the truth of the matter. In the similar case of premature release of the PS4 Slim, Sony took the less egregious path of just declining comment.

Denying the story isn't the only thing publishers are viable to do in response. Occasionally, punitive actions are taken against the outlet who released the information. Historically, this comes in the form of blacklisting said source, refusing to answer inquiries from them and/or give them pre-release product for the purpose of review. Kotaku has famously been the victim of several such orders, with Bethesda as a result of their Fallout 4 leak and Ubisoft after Assassin's Creed: Victory (later Syndicate) details were disclosed prior to the game's official announcement. Laura Dale faced similar stonewalling from Nintendo after uncovering the existence of the Switch. While these companies are obviously within their rights to refuse requests for comment, deny rumors, or to hand out review copies, it frequently comes across as needlessly combative.

Which brings us back to Wizards. Shortly after the Dominaria spoilers came to light, translated within days after its release, WotC wrote a blog post on their website about it. Rather than pretend it didn’t happen and sweep it under the rug, they publicly acknowledged the existence of the information. In order to avoid potential confusion, mistranslation, and idle speculation, their team opted to provide official copies of the leak's contents in various languages. This isn't to say that they were happy it happened, and even in their acknowledgment WotC says they are disappointed in how this information came out, but they were able to roll with the punches. There were even plans to accelerate the pace of the reveal until the fans themselves said that while they were excited: They still wanted something similar to the “usual” hype that surrounds a new set being released.

Admittedly, I and many of my friends who play Magic would not have heard about these leaks without Wizards official acknowledgment of them. That said, most of us had our own separate reactions to it. Scouring through list of new cards, I was already starting to plan new decks, and modifications to decks I had already built. I and one of my co-workers began to talk about how some of the new rule changes could impact the games we play over lunch. Some of my gender-nonconformist friends latched onto the fact that “he or she” would be replaced with “they”, both reducing the wordiness of card text and subtly acknowledging the existence of the gender spectrum. There was a lot to talk about, and almost all of it was positive. Despite the way it came out, it was still cool to have the “hype train” start a little early, and all of us were excited to see what else would come.

My point isn't that game publishers necessarily have to go public and admit the full details of every project that gets leaked. WotC didn't even do that. They kept more than a few details, like the art for the cards, secret so they still had something to surprise their audience with. That said, this incident clearly shows that there is room to handle these kinds of disclosures tactfully. What Wizards did that the game industry rarely does is seamlessly transformed it into part of their marketing. It didn't even require them to make any actual changes to their official release schedule. As someone who watches the game industry struggle to deny and rebuke information that is so obvious to the rest of us, it was more than a little refreshing to have a major corporation go “Yeah, it's a real leak, and it sucks. That said, it could be worse.” Leaks happen, and the industry at large could learn a thing or two from WotC about how to handle themselves when they do.

#108: How Watch_Dogs 2 Made a Monster Out of Me

(Spoiler Alert: Major spoilers for the plot to Watch_Dogs 2)

Marcus Holloway is a good kid. Through circumstances out of his control, he was pegged by ctOS's predictive crime algorithm as the likely suspect in crimes he was in no way responsible for. Though scarred by this incident, and left with a certain rage against the machine, he has never once lost his glib charisma and sense of morality. Armed with naught but a Stun Gun and a billiard ball attached to a rope, Marcus is on a mission not to punish, not to kill, but to expose. Rather than blindly take his anger out on others, like a certain someone before him, he seeks to show people the faults and risks with relying on surveillance technologies to keep the streets safe.

I am Marcus Holloway, and this is the lens from which I view the world.

#104: Far Cry Primal: Back to Basics

I have long bemoaned the “standard Ubisoft open-world game” that we've seen in most of the Assassin's Creed games, Watch_Dogs, and even The Crew. Far Cry is no exception to this pervasiveness, with Far Cry 3 and Far Cry 4 acting as prime examples. Too often, the vast number of petty tasks and collectibles fight for attention against whatever story these games are desperately trying to tell. On top of that, the sheer length and frequency of these beasts, left me with genre exhaustion. That's when I heard about Far Cry: Primal.

To me, the idea of Far Cry (which has traditionally been about first-person, mildly-stealthy shooters) quite literally going back to the Stone Age was very intriguing. I thought that it would make for a great Blood Dragon-esque $15 stand-alone. Then I learned that it was going to be a $60 game, and suddenly got very nervous. The idea of another full-fledged Ubisoft open-world game so soon was just not appealing to me. Since I remain part of the problem, I went ahead and -- despite my misgivings -- bought it anyway. As I played, my fears of another tired, drab, paint-by-numbers Far Cry experience were allayed. While there's no doubt that Far Cry: Primal is a tried and true Far Cry game, it demonstrates that there is merit to Ubisoft's signature open-world that has been overlooked until now.

The story of Far Cry: Primal almost hearkens back to the days where the plot to a video game was merely an excuse to go through the levels. The player character is a warrior from a tribe from 10,000 BCE. His clan is at war with the other two tribes in the region, a Northern cannibal clan that utilizes poison, and a group in the South that specializes in the use of fire. As the leader, the player character needs to strengthen his tribe and himself so that he can take out the leaders of the other two clans and claim the land of Oros, and its resources, for his people. In terms of the main story, that's it. Once the beginning tutorial sections are complete, the world opens up. At that point, by completing only a few mandatory missions, the player could, if they choose, almost immediately take out the other leaders and complete the main story. That said, doing so is extremely difficult, and most players won't be able to beat them with the equipment and skills they start out with. They must first grow stronger, and get to the point where they can comfortably defeat these chieftains. By participating in the open-world, players can acquire the experience, resources, and friends necessary to completing their ultimate objective.

Naturally, as a Far Cry game, the moment the world opens up, the map and UI reveal a ton of optional quests and objectives. By completing them, players earn experience and skill points. By spending skill points, they acquire new perks and skills and grow that much more capable. Though aside from the first few skill trees, most are locked from the start.

Among the many quests and events in the world are fellow tribesman who have been separated from the main group. Each of these tribesman specialize in a specific area, like hunting and craftsmanship. Once the player finds them and solves whatever problem they have, these specialists will relocate to the player's village. At that point, they will train the player in their talents, unlocking their skill tree in the upgrade menu.

More than skills, they also teach the player how to craft tools and weapons. Of course, knowing how to build them is one thing, but having the materials to do so is another. Building these items requires the player to scavenge and hunt for items like wood, stone, clay, and animal hides.

Those who have play previous Far Cry games are probably not surprised by this. Ubisoft has been using variants on these same mechanics for several years now. What separates Far Cry: Primal from the rest of their catalog is not the mechanics themselves. Rather, it is how they interact with each other and come together.

In other Ubisoft games, every element of the game is fighting for an ounce of attention. The story, the side quests, and the collectibles are all wholly distinct entities. None of them come together and they all demand that the player takes time away from the other elements to devote to them. As much as I praised it, Assassin's Creed: Unity had that problem in spades. There were so many objectives on the map that it was often hard to spot the architecture underneath the symbols.

This isn't the case in Far Cry: Primal. Rather than compete with the other elements, the story frames them. By presenting these two bosses as the ultimate end-game opponents, Primal immediately encourages players to acquire the skills to defeat them. Since these skills and are locked behind the specialists and reconstruction of the village, the first instinct will be to gather resources and recruit these experts. It is by allowing the story to exist largely in the background for most of the game, as this looming challenge to undertake, that the open world and the tasks within it are actually given their chance to shine.

More importantly, every element comes back together with the others at some point. By recruiting each expert, players unlock skills to purchase and items to craft. Unlocking new skill trees gives an incentive to travel the world and earn experience, and crafting gives a similar incentive to gather materials. The items and skills acquired then enable the player to tackle tougher challenger, until they are finally able to take down both rival tribes and end the game. Instead of fighting for the player's attention, each element of the game reinforces the desire and need for the player to engage with the other elements. This sense of design cohesion makes Far Cry: Primal a much stronger game than the previous two entries in the franchise.

The importance of all these elements coming together only occurred to me about 10 hours into my playthrough. At this point, I had finally worked up the courage to journey North and defeat the cannibal leader. That’s when I realized that this boss fight was the first genuine piece of main story content I had encountered since the beginning of the game.

If this was some other Ubisoft game, like Watch_Dogs, I would have been livid. Even though the side content exists for players to experience it, spending that much time without making forward progress would feel like a waste to me. That’s why in most of these open world games, I usually skip most of the side content, choosing to mainline the campaign. If I do optional objectives, it’s almost always in service of making my trek through the very next story beat easier, usually by revealing part of the map.

But I wasn’t angry. In fact, I looked back on those 8 or so hours of wandering Oros fondly. Everything I did felt like it had some purpose in preparing me for this, one of my 2 ultimate foes. And not only did I enjoy my time doing all of these tasks, but I was more engaged with them then I ever was in previous Ubisoft games. Before, I was actively avoiding the Shangri La hallucinations and stoner missions in Far Cry 4, or those accursed Eagle Feathers in Assassin’s Creed 2. Here, I was looking, actually looking, for animals to hunt, people to recruit, and things to do. This might not sounds like a big deal, but it’s more than I’ve gotten out most of the needless, pointless crap that litters so much square mileage of Far Cry: Primal’s ancestors.

I don't expect, or even necessarily desire, for Ubisoft to do what they did in Far Cry: Primal very often. Having an overarching story that frames the gameplay more than it stands out on its own works well in the context of primitive man fighting over resources in the Stone Age, but not so much other eras with more complicated themes and people. Having said that, Far Cry: Primal feels much more like a coherent whole than many other Ubisoft games. My final playtime was roughly 19.5 hours according to my save file, but that time was more fruitful and interesting than many of the 40-50 hours experiences I have had in the likes of Assassin's Creed, Watch_Dogs, and other Far Crys. Ironically, this caveman game is the most developed Ubisoft open world I've seen in a long time.

#100: Burgers and Fryes: The Protagonists of Assassin's Creed Syndicate

Long-time readers of my blog know that I routinely talk about Assassin's Creed games. Whenever a new one gets released, it rises to the top of my to-play list. And for good reason. Regardless of the quality of any one installment, each entry has something, a feature or a flaw, worth discussing. The latest game in Ubisoft's long-running alternate history franchise is no different.

Unlike past games, Syndicate features two lead characters, twins named Jacob and Evie Frye, who take London by storm. This use of two protagonists allows Assassin's Creed: Syndicate to do a number of interesting things with both its play and its plot. The most obvious being that it allowed Ubisoft to contrast and cater to the two major playstyles that players can generally be sorted into when playing Assassin's Creed.

As the more athletic of the two, Jacob loves a good brawl. He's more than content with attracting the attention of large groups of enemies and beating his targets, and anyone who looks like they might try to stop him, into a bloody pavement pulp. If ranged combat is needed, Jacob will just bring out a pistol and go in loud. Meanwhile, his sister takes a more silent approach. Though she can handle herself in a fight, Evie prefers to sneak around undetected. She isolates enemies and takes them out one-at-a-time, being careful not to attract too much detention. Rather than rely too heavily on her gun, she takes wields throwing knives that can kill ranged enemies quietly. While either character technically can perform in combat or stealth, they have clear preferences towards one or the other.

This neatly maps to the two common Assassin’s Creed player archetypes. Some people are just fine with rushing to a mission objective, killing everyone in sight, and completing their assigned task. Stealth or finesse isn't important. What matters is only that the mission is done at the end of the day. Others would willing redo the same mission over and over until they've “perfected” it by completing all the optional objectives and avoiding detection. It's not just about completing the mission. It's about keeping mistakes to an absolute minimum. Though these descriptions are more representatives of extremes on a sliding scale, and less hard-and-fast alternatives, it can be broadly said that most will gravitate towards one or the other.

By having Jacob and Evie together, both extremes can be catered to and defended in the game. Even in the story, both characters represent these playstyles through their conversations. Being the more detail-oriented of the two, Evie constantly admonishes her brother by pointing out the sloppiness of his work and the unexpected consequences of his actions, especially in comparison to how she carries out her assignments. But Jacob gets just as much opportunity to defend himself by pointing out that he gets things done, often faster and more efficiently than his sister. The game doesn't preach in favor of one style or the other. Rather, through these contrasting characters, it acknowledges that both extremes, and everything in between, are valid ways of doing what needs doing.

As a pair, the Frye twins also allowed Assassin's Creed: Syndicate to explore the same story through multiple viewpoints. Because he tends to be the go-getter of the two twins, Jacob performs most of the tasks often associated with a typical Assassin's Creed protagonist. He’s the one who goes after most the high-ranking Templars, by discovering who they are, sabotaging their operations, and ultimately assassinating them. In many ways, his missions offer the “typical” Assassin's Creed experience. While Evie gets in on the action with her own separate story-missions, Jacob takes the lion's share of these assassinations.

This frees Evie up to do something fairly unique in the context of the series. Usually, after the mission in which the main character kills one of the Templars, that target's influence on the world is suddenly rendered null and void. They no longer matter, and we can safely move on to the next target without exploring the potential effects of their removal. In Syndicate, in the next sequence following an assassination, Evie gets a moment where she revisits the scene of Jacob's crime, exploring the aftermath.

One early sequence has Jacob target a corrupt doctor who was brewing and distributing an hazardous and addictive “tonic” to the people of Victorian-era London. When Evie enters the situation later, she agrees that killing him and cutting off the supply of tonic is a good thing. However, Jacob failed to note that doing so only solves part of the problem, and creates others. This doctor wasn’t only responsible for the distribution of the tonic, but also for providing other, beneficial medicine needed by the poorer citizens. By removing him, Jacob has inadvertently made it possible for gangs to swoop in and take over both the distribution of medicine and the creation of tonic for people those still addicted. Though Evie does what she can to help in this mission, it is ultimately up to other characters, who aren't involved in the Assassin/Templar meta-narrative, to start setting up the infrastructure needed to truly solve the problem.

Through these post-assassination missions, Ubisoft appears to launch a subtle critique of their very own stock storyline. In almost every other Assassin's Creed game, assassinating every major Templar magically fixes every problem. By using Jacob and Evie to explore these assassinations from different perspectives (one before and during the kill, and the other afterwards) Syndicate posits that the actual kill is only the start of fixing the problem at best, and at worst makes it harder to come to a permanent solution. It's not enough to take down the existing economic and logistical frameworks without taking steps to replace them afterward. Otherwise, the situation can only get worse. Without Evie, it would be much more difficult to make this point in an elegant manner.

On their own merits, neither Jacob nor Evie would be particularly interesting characters. What makes them worth noting is what they allow Ubisoft to do in the context of an Assassin's Creed game. By throwing together two characters with different personalities, and making them work towards the same ends, there styles forced to clash with each other. Using their interactions, Assassin's Creed: Syndicate explores some of the franchises central gameplay and story tenets with an uncharacteristic self-analysis. Hopefully, with this insight, the series can continue to improve itself.

Interactive Friction: Watch_Dogs: Episode 23: Season *Finally*!

And so it ends. This is the final mission of the game, and it's one of the dumbest things I've seen. In a different context, this ending could be fine. If we were slowly building to an antagonist that had all of your Ct_OS hacks, and was fighting you with them on equal footing, this could be a good finale. However, aside from Defalt, we don't really discuss that as a possibility.

I suppose that the game needed to tie-up the loose ends of Damien, Ded-Sec, and T-Bone, but to come to this after having such a good scene with Lucky Quinn earlier is just heartbreaking. It's even more crushing since these groups and characters were never really important in the context of our revenge story. The real meat of the story rests between Aiden Pearce, Clara, and Lucky Quinn. This mission just highlights how unimportant the rest of the cast was.

I'm really glad that despite all of the criticisms, all of the filler and the bat-shit bonkers ending, we were still able to end this series on a relatively high note. At some point, even I got sick of listening to myself complain about this game. One thing Ubisoft seems to be pretty good at is responding to criticisms and correcting course in future entries of a given franchise. I'd love to see what they did if they were given a clean slate to start over with the central Ct_OS premise. It's a great hook, with tons of excellent gameplay opportunities. Watch_Dogs might not have done it justice, but I still see potential here.

Even though Watch_Dogs has expended both Sam's stamina and my own, this is not the end of Interactive Friction. Far from it. We'll be taking a hiatus for a still as-of-yet undetermined period of time, but we will be back. The two of us have even already decided on our next season. There is even the possibility of having a few one-off episodes here and there until we get our mojo back.

So, until next time, cheers!

Interactive Friction: Watch_Dogs: Episode 22: The Uncanny Valley Of Evil

The scene between Aiden Pearce and Lucky Quinn is by far the best scene in the game, aside from those between Aiden and Jordy. There's a fair degree of subtext and subtlety in their back-and-forth that it's surprising that the same people who created this scene also made the parts with Bedbug, Iraq, the prostitutes, and every other section of the story.

This is also the one of the few kills where Aiden Pearce may not necessarily be in the wrong. Even if you discount the revenge motivation here (and we have), it's clear that Chicago would be an objectively better, less awful city should Lucky Quinn and his Chicago South Club fall.
At the same time, one could make an argument that killing anymore is morally wrong, no matter how evil that person may be. It may not make Aiden Pearce out to be the paragon of justice, at least an argument could be made that it's morally acceptable to kill Quinn.

We have a couple of problems with it in the episode, but that's less a problem with the scene and more an issue with the context that it was provided in. If the writing is this game was a little tighter, and there was less filler, this would've been a fantastic payoff.

This also happens to be the part where the game finally makes the decision to say something. Even if it's a simple "Information is power" message, that's more than the rest of the game has been willing to give. Exploring how much someone can do if they know all of your dark little secrets, if they can expose you at the blink of a button: That's some very interesting stuff. On top of that, it ties back into the central premise nicely.

If the game ended at that point, I would've considered it a pretty strong finish to a pretty weak game. Unfortunately, we're not done yet. Rather than use this point to wrap things up, we still need to deal with Damien. Even worse, we deal in this dumbest way possible.

And that makes me sad.

#97: Game Invaders: Dark Souls vs. Watch_Dogs

As many of you know, I have been working on a Let's Play series with my friend, Sam Callahan. Together, we have been trudging through Watch_Dogs. One of the more heavily advertised features in Watch_Dogs was the ability for players to invade the game of another in order to sabotage them. Fans of the Dark Souls games might recognize this feature, since it also uses player invasion as a game mechanic. Having played both Watch_Dogs and Dark Souls, I realized that I was extremely annoyed by the invasions in Watch_Dogs. On the other hand, that same general idea worked for me in Dark Souls, adding to the game. This is when I began to ponder why this might be the case.

One of the fundamental reasons why player invasions irritated me in Watch_Dogs was that they were almost divorced from the rest of the game. As a player wanders about the city of Chicago, outside of a mission or side-activity, another player may choose to enter their game at any time. Until the outsider is either dealt with or succeeds in their mission to hack the host player, the host is unable to continue the main story or do any side-quests. Even if the host dies while being invaded, the event continues uninterrupted and the invader is able to continue with their objective. In other words, to someone who is looking to complete the game's story and/or side missions, an invasion is just a needless distraction, rather than a core part of the game. They have to put their game on hold in order to deal with this new problem. Sam and I encountered this ourselves a few times in our Let's Play. Though we eventually remember that we could turn off player invasions, that further speaks to how separate they are from everything else. With invasions turned off, the game is improved because players can get to the rest of the content without wasting time killing an invader.

This is in stark contrast to Dark Souls, where the invasions are more nicely integrated into the whole experience. Normally, players won't be in danger of invasions. However, in order to invite other people to join their game and help them take down many of the game's bosses, they also have to spend a Humanity point and open themselves up to invasions in exchange. Invasions aren't so much a dedicated feature as much as they are a necessary drawback in order to balance out the act of asking for help. Even if the player is offline, there are NPCs in the world that can take the place of both co-op companions and invaders. In other words, this feature is so core to the game's fundamental design that From Software saw fit to include an NPC equivalent for those who, for whatever reason, cannot or will not play online. Opening oneself up to the aid of others will in turn open up the possibility that others will attack.

The difference between allowing oneself to be invaded in Dark Souls and the incidental invasion in Watch_Dogs is a very important one. Whenever I was invaded in Watch_Dogs, it was almost always at an inopportune time. Often, I would be about to accept a story mission, when the game informed me that someone had stepped into my play session, locking me out of the mission. It was an irritation that I had no interest in and gained nothing from. While an invasion in Dark Souls can be inconvenient, players must make a deliberate choice to spend Humanity and make them possible. This opting-in subtly prepares the player for the potential threat, which means they aren't surprised if and when it happens. In Watch_Dogs, player invasions are always surprising because they can happen at anytime. As a result, they will always mess up the player's plan and cause undue irritation.

Not only are the invasions in Watch_Dogs separate from the other gameplay elements, but they are also removed from the normal character progression. As players complete missions in Watch_Dogs, they acquire skill points which can be spent on skills in the various categories, like Hacking, Driving, and Combat. There is also another category called "Notoriety". Unlike the other skill trees, players can't use skill points to advance it. Instead, they accumulate "Notoriety" through strong performances in the various online multiplayer activities, including the invasions. Out of the 6 available skills in this tree, only two could be considered useful to players who don't play with others. The other 4 skills only affect elements of the online component, by raising the rewards or making it easier to detect an invading player. To put it plainly, almost nothing the player unlocks in the online mode affects them in the main story.

Dark Souls works differently. In order to gain Humanity points, players can enter another's game and help them defeat an area boss. Even if they fail in the attempt, they can still keep the Souls that they earned while in working with the host. Alternatively, the enter invade another player's game, gaining Humanity and souls by killing the host. Since they do not lose Souls in the attempt, they are incentivized to take advantage of this ability to gain Humanity. In turn, this Humanity can be spend to allow other players to join their game and hopefully gain an advantage in fighting many of the game's bosses. Both the aid of other players and the Souls obtained in these multiplayer events have a direct, positive influence on one's progression in the game.

Again, observe the difference between these two games. To the player who is only looking to complete the main story of the game, the invasions in Watch_Dogs are a waste of time. If they perform well, the rewards they provide won't help them in their ultimate goal, designed only to be used in online challenges. Dark Souls goes in a different direction. Even if a player only wants to beat the game, there is still a strong incentive to partake in the online invasions, or at least make oneself open to them. The aid of cooperative partners can greatly increase one's odds of successfully defeating a boss. Furthermore, there is a chance to earn more Souls and Humanity, which are used to further tip the odds in their favor. As someone who rarely participates in a game's online component, I still found myself making use of it in my journey through Lordran.

When Watch_Dogs was in development, Ubisoft said that while players could disable the option for others to invade their game, they considered leaving them on to be the "best" way to play. Unfortunately, the facts aren't in their favor. Without a way to prepare for them, or a strong reason to keep them enabled in the first place, it makes more sense for players to not even bother. As Dark Souls demonstrates, it didn't have to be this way. As rudimentary as they are, if Ubisoft had been a little smarter about the implementation, they could have been a seamlessly integrated and enjoyable aspect of the final product.

Interactive Friction: Watch_Dogs: Episode 21: Family Ties

This is the point where all of the many criticisms we've be directed at Watch_Dogs that to coalesce. Like the game, we start to tie up all of our loose-ends as we head towards the final stretch.

It's amazing that even after forcing his family to evacuate the city, because his revenge has made them into massive targets, Ubisoft still doesn't acknowledge how awful Aiden Pearce is as a person. That's really all I needed. All Ubisoft had to do was show that they were aware of the monster they had created.

I have to applaud Nikki in this scene. As Sam said, she's a saint for not blowing up at what happened in her life. She did nothing that would justify the need to be evacuated from an otherwise normal city. If Aiden Pearce has just stopped, like Nikki pleaded for him to do, she could just sit back in her house and deal with normal-people problems.

That tragedy is caused by our hero, ladies and gentleman. Enjoy.

Interactive Friction: Watch_Dogs: Episode 20: Where in the World in Joseph DeMarco?

It's interesting to compare the mission in the club here versus what they showed off at the original E3 reveal.

I can see what they were going for in the E3 reveal trailer, even watching it back now. There's this very clear sense of progression from the club infiltration, to baiting a staffer into calling the boss, to sending a message by killing the owner, making sure to save civilians along the way.

It's obvious that at some point the script was rewritten and Joseph DeMarco was no longer an important character. There's nothing wrong with that. However, this mission makes it seem like Defalt only exists so that we can make use of this club in the final game. His first mention is in Act 3, where he is mentioned in passing. He presents himself as an obstacle at the end of Act 3, but we then defeat him very early into Act 4. Defalt exits the story about as quickly as he entered it.

I get the feeling that this game suffered the Uncharted 3 problem. They had developed all of the missions and level layouts first, and then wrote the story around those missions. It's the only way I can explain all of the filler we see in the middle of the game. It's why I almost forgot about the revenge story halfway through when I first played Watch_Dogs.

I dislike filler, and I dislike how it really hurt this game.

Interactive Friction: Watch_Dogs: Episode 19: That's So Watch_Dogs

I really can't stress enough how absolutely silly it is for Damien to out Aiden Pearce as The Vigilante at the beginning of the episode. There are two big reasons for this:

1.) Aiden Pearce's identity as The Vigilante is public knowledge.
As we've seen repeatedly over the course of this Let's Play, countless news reports have referred to Aiden Pearce by name when speaking of The Vigilante. I would guess that one draft of the script had it where nobody except for his closest allies knew who we was. However, this is no longer the case. Even discounting the incidental, background radio and news reports as not part of the story, T-Bone knows who Aiden Pearce because of the news reports, which is why he didn't trust Pearce at first. When Damien tells the world who The Vigilante is, the world should shrug with indifference, because they already had a face and a name.

2.) Damien has no reason to oust Aiden Pearce.
As Aiden Pearce correctly deduced, Damien's deal with Blume means that he's reliant of Pearce to give him the data. Otherwise, he's royally screwed out of the CTOS hacks, and could possibly get a hit taken out on him. If Aiden got arrested because of what Damien did, Damien would be in arguably a worse position than Aiden Pearce. Aiden Pearce will eventually break out of jail, and Damien will have several people coming after him from all sides.
Even if Damien doesn't like Aiden Pearce (and to be fair, who would?), he'd still need him out and about in order to stay afloat.

Next time, I get to complain about Defalt.

Interactive Friction: Watch_Dogs: Episode 18: Inaccuracies

We've gotten to the point where neither Sam nor I care about this game anymore. As a result, we paid less and less attention to the story. You can probably spot some of the times when that happened, like our surprise at the electronic door, despite T-Bone literally just saying that he was hacking in for that express reason. I'll own up to the fact that parts of this episode were phoned in, but I'd argue that it's the game's fault for wearing us down so heavily.

I want to point out that we really didn't need to storm Iraq's compound. It wasn't important to our objective. When we made our first hack, Carla and Aiden were already able to figure out that it was blackmail data (despite not being able to read it because it's encrypted). From there, it would have simple to deduce that the hacker, likely Iraq, was after blackmail information. Then, we could have skipped most of the game and gotten that much closer to the true culprit behind the accidental death of Aiden Pearce's niece.

Next week, this game shows that it is not done with the filler content. You've only gotten a short glimpse of the irritation that is "Defalt". There's not much left of the game at this point, which Sam and I are both pretty happy about.

Interactive Friction: Watch_Dogs: Episode 17: Choo-Choo Fuck

Apparently I was wrong again. Forensic Technologist is an actual title.

This episode just makes me wonder what the hell Damien's deal is. They never explain what his motivation is for wanting the CTOS hacks. It seems like he's only doing it because he's one of the designated villains of the story. In that sense, he's almost like a cartoon character.

Despite his leg injury, and his inability to be reasonable in any circumstance, he's appears to be pretty successful given steady employment with a great salary. By all accounts he's doing alright. That's not to say that I don't understand why he's going after the second hacker: He wants revenge over his broken leg. That's basically what Aiden Pearce is doing, so it's par for the course.

But they didn't really establish why he desires the CTOS access. He's a good hacker, from what we see in the story. If he wanted to, he could probably get in without any deals whatsoever. You'd think that a hacker like Damien would appreciate that kind of challenge. Instead, we see him pointlessly selling us out for no real reason.

I just don't get it.

I hate this game.

Interactive Friction: Watch_Dogs: Episode 16: The Titular Words Are Hard

First off, I actually made a mistake in this episode. "Titular" is a word meaning "in the title". For example, Garrett the Master Thief is the titular "Thief" of that franchise. However, "eponymous" is the other way around. It is used to describe a thing named after an individual. For example, "Tony Hawk's Pro Skater" is Tony Hawk's eponymous game franchise.

What that cleared up, this episode is another one where neither Sam nor I have much to say about Watch_Dogs. This is where we basically give up and do a podcast in the middle of our Let's Play series.

Lastly, since one of my favorite pass-times is pointing out how far down the rabbit hole this filler crap goes:

• Aiden Pearce's main objective is to find the person who ordered the hit that resulted in the death of his niece. He has already deduced that it has something to do with his last big heist: The Merlaut job.
• To that end, he traced the IP address of the other person who hacked into the hotel's systems that day. It led him to Iraq's compound.
• Aiden Pearce hacks server in Iraq's compound and partially downloads the data that was stolen, because that will apparently help us track the person who ordered the hit?
• Clara gets the data, but can't hack it because it's encrypted. Instead of relying on her friends at Anonymous HQ, she figures that the only person who can break the encryption is Raymond Kenney, who created it.
• Aiden Pearce goes out to the middle of nowhere to find Kenney, and gets beat up in a bar. :)
• Kenney, now T-Bone, will only break the encryption if we do him a solid and hack into Blume's systems.
• We have to acquire the materials and the access codes to break into Blume, to help Kenney, so that he will decrypt the data, so that we can read the data, and HOPEFULLY get one step closer to the man who ordered the hit on Aiden Pearce that accidentally killed his niece.

We are so far down the rabbit hole that we can't even the opening we fell through. These missions are so far separated from our main objective that Aiden Pearce might as well be on a tropical vacation for all the good this is doing him.

I hate pointless wastes of time, and I hate this game.

Interactive Friction: Watch_Dogs: Episode 15: Hope Is A Sad Thing

Now that I'm watching Sam play through this game again, I'm only now realizing just how much pointless fluff is in this story.

At this point in the story, we have acquired a part of the data located in Iraq's compound. Unfortunately, it's encrypted with a special encryption that can only be broken by the person who developed it: A former Blume employee named Raymond Kenney. (Blume is the company that made CTOS. Since this rarely comes up, you can be forgiven for not knowing that.)

Ignoring the fact that this data really isn't that important to our overall objective of figuring out who killed our dead nice, and further ignoring the fact that Clara should be able to get her hacker friends in on breaking the encryption, Aiden Pearce decides he needs to recruit Raymond Kenney to the cause in order to crack it.

At least the prostitution filler had the absolute mercy of being short. This is a entire act, consisting of 6 missions, dedicated to recruiting this guy to crack a code that doesn't need to be cracked, when should already have the resources required to do it ourselves.

I hate this game.

But on a more positive note, since we mention each of these guys early in the episode, it's worth linking to them here for your viewing pleasure.
John Green's Moral Story Through Grand Theft Auto 5
GoldVision's Grand Theft Auto Pacifist Series

The Texture Pop: Watch_Dogs: Episode 14: Puzzle Quest

I like the scene at the start of this episode, where Jacks watches Aiden Pearce slaughter several groups of armed men. It pretty subtle compared to many of the other scenes in game, yet that's what gives it power. Jacks doesn't need to say anything, just the simple act of pulling away from his Uncle Aiden is enough to convey everything that needs to be said. The psychologist's threat was just icing on the cake.

And then we get to Bedbug. I strongly suspect that the conversation between Bedbug and Aiden Pearce is meant to humanize Pearce a little bit. However, I personally found that it added more to Bedbug's character than Aiden Pearce's. He's not a bad person. He's just caught in a very bad situation. It's very telling that even after Aiden Pearce led Bedbug into a death trap, he still gave Pearce the information that he needed.

Unfortunately, neither of these people are the protagonist. Aiden Pearce is, much to my dismay.

I hate this game.

Interactive Friction: Watch_Dogs: Episode 13: Detour

Here it is, ladies and gentlemen. I present to you the most uncomfortable part of the game.

I still don't honestly know why this needed to be a part of the game. There's nothing wrong with video games trying to make some sort of point about sex trafficking. However, Watch_Dogs doesn't really say anything about it beyond "sex trafficking is wrong." Of course sex trafficking is wrong. What else do you have to say?

This scene didn't have the power for me that it clearly had on Sam. I thought it was a cheap way to make Lucky Quinn out to be unambiguously evil (and Iraq, by association).

There's also the fact that it's just so segregated from the rest of the plot. Remember, this story is about finding out who killed Aiden Pearce's niece and taking revenge. We know that it is likely the Merlaut job that gave this person motivation to assign the hit. Damien "gave" us the IP of the second hacker present during the Merlaut job, so we traced it to Iraq's compound.

And now, he need to corner Iraq at this slave auction, because of reasons that still never got explained. Since this part is to tertiary to the experience, we don't have time to delve into it. In terms of Aiden Pearce's story, it's not important. It's filler.

To me, the fact that someone so heavy and relevant is just relegated to filler content is unacceptable. If you want to include this kind of stuff, make it important. Make it a more core part of the narrative. If there's nothing to say about it, then why is it being brought up in the first place?

Evidently, whatever they had to say wasn't important to them, because it's relegated to a mere side-quest once this mission is over.

Sex trafficking: The Side Quest

I hate this game.

Interactive Friction: Watch_Dogs: Episode 12: Something Deeply Wrong

In this episode, we delve head-long into the sex trafficking side-plot. As I've said in previous posts, I find this to be one of the most disturbing arcs in the game.

I'm not necessarily against having a video game comment on heavy topics like sex trafficking. My issue with this subplot is that Watch_Dogs wants to use this topic, but doesn't want to provide any commentary for it. Yes, of course it's disgusting that women are bought, transported, and sold against their will for a profit. Nobody in their right mind would argue otherwise. However, the apolitical nature of the story leaves makes this segment milquetoast.

We'll get into more detail about this in the next episode, but I have the same problem with Watch_Dogs that I do about many of the sex-trafficking episodes of crime-serials like CSI. It's only purpose is to be used as a shorthand for "Yes, this obviously evil bad-guy is evil." In fact, Watch_Dogs is even worse than those shows. Most of those episodes take the time to follow the personal story of one of the victims so that we can somewhat understand how a young woman could find themselves in that situation. It's rarely ever a great attempt, but it's something. As you'll soon see, Watch_Dogs doesn't really put in a token effort. Given that the game is about this world where everyone and everything is monitored and connected, that's such a wasted opportunity.

I hate this game.

Interactive Friction: Watch_Dogs: Episode 11: Copyright Ruins Everything Around Me

This episode was supposed to go up yesterday. However, when I went to view it and start writing the post for it, we found that there was a copyright claim on our Unlisted video. The reason for this is that a segment of the game uses "C.R.E.A.M" by the Wu Tang Clan. Considering the theme of that song, there is some deep irony.

Having said that:



There is a large section of this video where both Sam and myself are legitimately unsure of what the point of this plot is. Now that I've had the luxury of watching the episodes, let me summarize what happened.

• Aiden Pearce needs to get into the Viceroy compound in order to identify the second hacker during the Merlaut job.
• Aiden Pearce identifies Bedbug as a weak-link in the gang's chain-of-command, and decides to use him as his way in.
• Aiden Pearce follows Bedbug in order to find some sort of blackmail evidence, and records him making deals behind Iraq's back.
• Meanwhile, Iraq is getting sick of Bedbug costing him business due to his ineptitude. Because he is a basket-case, he opts to have his cousin killed instead of just kicking him out of the gang.
• Aiden Pearce deduces that Iraq will have Bedbug killed, because he is apparently psychic. This magical foresight extends to the conclusion that if Bedbug can survive the assassination attempt, Iraq will welcome him back with open arms to save face.
• Armed with these deductions, Aiden Pearce kills off the Viceroys assigned to the hit job: All of them. This will help him move Bedbug into a position where he can aid Aiden Pearce.
• Back in a position of power, Bedbug walks the park peacefully until Aiden Pearce shatters his world in an instant, promising to being him low if he doesn't do exactly as Aiden Pearce says.
• Extracting information from Bedbug, we learn that Iraq will be at a "private" auction run by Lucky Quinn. We need to infiltrate the auction in order to get close to Iraq, for reason that nobody adequately explains.

This is one of those plot-driven doors Shamus Young talks about frequently. We have deviated so far from the original goal of finding out who the second hacker is that it seems like it would be easier to do an old-fashioned stealth mission in the compound. This is such a roundabout way to solve an otherwise simple problem.

In other words, this is the worst part of the game, and it's all filler.

I hate this game.

And I hate YouTube's copyright bullshit.

Interactive Friction: Watch_Dogs: Episode 10: Ultimate Cyber-Vigilante

And now we've gotten to it. Goddamn Iraq and Bedbug. This is easily one of the worst parts of the game. Not the worst, (Dear god. It gets much worse from here.), but it demonstrates how the writers took all of these elements and melded them together without really understanding the subtext and implications behind that particular combination.

Again, I know that people like Iraq do exist out there. There are gang members who go join the army for the sole purpose of learning their tactics and bringing them back home. However, that still raises the question of why the writers made the choice to use these tropes. Perhaps they simply wanted to justify having military-grade enemies to fight, but we already have no-face fixers for that. If they were trying to make some commentary about gangs and/or poor sections of the city, then that was gutted out at some point in a misguided attempt to be apolitical.

Bedbug is another problem, but for a completely different reason. He is a criminal, sure. But I get the distinct impression that he's only that way because Iraq is that way. As uncomfortable as it sounds, he seems to be like Lenny from Of Mice and Men. And that's on top of the fact that he's clearly in the lower-income level. In different circumstances, he could've been a good kid. Knowing that these same circumstances make Bedbug very easy to manipulate, Aiden Pearce decides that he needs to get blackmail him in order to get access to the Viceroy compound.

Aiden Pearce has not been someone I'd like to root for since the very start of the game, but this is a real low. Remember, Ubisoft wants us to root for this guy. Despite spending all of this time beating up criminals (an enterprise funded by theft), and having no redeeming qualities whatsoever, we're supposed to treat him as a hero.

I hate this game.