Here’s an interesting concept. Currently being crafted by Defiant Development of Australia, WARCO is a first person shooter video game where, instead of toting an M-16 assault rifle, you’re running through heated war zones with your trusty… wait for it… video camera! Think Call Of Duty meets BBC News.
Your name is Jesse DeMarco and you are a hard-core, highly decorated, expertly trained, take-no-bullshit, 8th degree black belt journalist. Your mission is to follow allied forces and record footage of battles in some of the world’s most hostile environments. But wait there’s more. After you’re done shooting, you don’t get to drop off your memory cards or tapes to an editor. You get to sit down on your MacBook Pro Game Console and cut it yourself for the evening news. Sounds awesome right?! Yawwwwn. Here’s why you won’t be entertained by this game for more than a couple hours.
Been There, Done That
Call of Duty: Black Ops has been on sale for almost a year now. Every online match you play in COD:BO is instantly cached in a vector-based manor. What this means is that after the game, you can play it back from your own perspective, as well as an infinite array of virtual camera angles that you can mix and match to create something truly cinematic. You can choose to have swooping crane shots or low, wide angle perspectives. You can shoot over the shoulder of the match’s hero, just as he delivers a deadly head shot from half a klick away with a handgun saves the day. You can be Michael Bay. You don’t have to settle for Jesse DeMarco and her one-trick pony. Yea, I said “her”. Oh yea, I forgot to mention, Jesse is a “she”.
Dude, The Graphics Are Totally Lame
Based on just the Video promo above, I can confidently say that the rendering or physics of this game do not seem cutting-edge or awe inspiring. In fact they look very 2006 to me. Unless Defiant plans to market this game to blind people and infants, I’m not sure it will seem that aesthetically pleasing to the rest of us seasoned gamers.
No Hero Factor
For those of us who live with indoor plumbing, supermarkets, “adult” responsibilities and weekend brunch with annoying in-laws, movies and video games are what allow us to escape for a couple hours during our week and pretend to be someone we’re not. I wont get into gender-specific escapist preferences, be we can safely assume that the majority of little boys (and big boys like myself) like play-fighting, cars, guns and stuff that blows up.
The whole point of first person shooters is to kill [virtual] people. Be it story-mode AI or online 12-year old. The reason great FPS games like Call of Duty, Gears of War, Halo, etc, do so well is because they tap into that very carnal part of the human psyche. Kill or be killed! Survival of the fittest! We may live in a society where violence is kept at bay, but there’s no harm in cutting someone’s digital throat from time to time. If you haven’t tried it, I can tell you it’s very satisfying. Especially when you get to watch the replay in slow motion and gloat with your team members on your headset.
WARCO doesn’t have any of that diabolical satisfaction. You’re not the guy directly blowing stuff up. You’re not the guy saving the day. You’re not the guy killing the entire enemy team and then talking smack to them, effectively establishing your role as the supreme alpha male of the day on Playstation 3. Nope. Instead you get to play a submissive role. You’re the poor gal who runs around almost helplessly, trying to stay alive. You’re the artsy photojournalist who’s making a difference in the world by revealing its crimes and atrocities. I got news for you. You can do this in real life with a Flip Video camera, an afternoon walk around Manhattan and pirated editing software all for less than this game will likely cost when it’s released. You can then upload your masterpiece to YouTube for real people to see. Heck, you might even get noticed and start a career out of it.
So.
If any of your friends are foolish enough to plunk down the cash for this game when it is released, I recommend going to their house to play it for an evening. You’ll likely enjoy the novelty for a couple hours, and once you’re bored of it, you’ll be happy to still have $59.99 plus tax in your pocket.
PR:
Australia-based games partnership Defiant Development, ManiatyMedia and Arenamedia have unveiled their ‘proof of concept playable’ prototype for WARCO – redefining the action genre with cinematic standards of drama and suspense, and challenging players’ strategic and creative skills with scenarios that parallel the revolutionary struggles now sweeping Africa and the Middle East. Development funded by Screen Australia and Screen New South Wales, WARCO takes gaming to a new level of real-world interaction and authenticity.
WARCO lets players shoot and record what they see ‘through the lens’ – framing shots, panning and zooming, grabbing powerful images of combatants and civilians caught up in war. They’ve got AK-47s and rocket-propelled grenades – you’ve got a flak jacket, a video camera, and a burning desire to get the story. Every game space is embedded with multiple objectives and story leads for journalist Jesse DeMarco to find – a scoop if she’s smart, mortal danger if she drops her guard…
Record dramatic images of war, save them in-game, then edit the results into a compelling frontline TV news story. Beam the results to global audiences on the web. No two WARCO stories will ever be alike. It’s an edge-of-seat gaming experience – and a powerful entry-level training tool for future combat reporters. WARCO is perfectly timed to take advantage of the convergence of games and movies, journalism and online communities, in a world undergoing massive social, geo-political and technological change.
[WARCO via PetaPixel via Ars Technica]