Before I direct you to some truly fantastic and hilarious games writing about the Madden video game series, let me spoil today’s Super Bowl for you.

Kris and I played the Super Bowl with Madden for Xbox 360 the other night. Kris played the Broncos, I played the Seahawks. Final score: Broncos 27, Seahawks 21. I fully believe this will be the outcome of today’s Super Bowl.

If our game does correctly predict the real Super Bowl, here are some highlights today’s actual game will include:

• The game will go into overtime as the result of nobody being able to score in the 4th quarter
• Four out of five field goals will be missed
• The winning quarterback will be Tim Tebow (we were playing Madden 2012)
• The Seahawks will replace their quarterback with their punter for two full quarters before the coach realizes his mistake
• This mistake will be considerately pointed out by the Bronco’s coach
• The aforementioned Seahawk punter will throw seven interceptions

I’m pretty sure all of those things will come true.

Anyway, I mainly wanted to point you to some outstanding video game writing about the Madden series. Jon Bois writes a column for SBNation.com, wherein he experiments with the settings of the Madden game with hilarious and interesting results. He’s also a fantastic writer, a skilled video editor, and a magnificent craftsman of animated GIFs. You should read/watch/enjoy this entire series and everything he ever writes from now on.

For instance, he simulates the Super Bowl using a team of seven-foot-tall, 400 pound Seahawks vs. a team of tiny, unskilled Broncos.

He plays a game with an entire offense comprised of Tom Brady clones.

He recreates the unstoppable Bo Jackson from Tecmo Bowl.

He tries to see if Colts punter Pat McAfee can win a game by himself.

Check out his stuff. Even if you don’t like football, you’ll like his columns.

I know it’s annoying when people want to tell you about their dreams, but this dream I had recently was very short and it caused me to abruptly wake up laughing.

In my dream, our veterinarian told me one of our cats was sick. In my dream, I also had the magic power from the book/movie The Green Mile, where a guy could suck the illness out of people, by sort of inhaling it from their lungs (the illness looked like a cloud of insects). So, I inhaled the sickness out of my cat’s mouth and into my own lungs.

Then I was walking around holding my breath, looking for somewhere to safely exhale the sickness. Actor DJ Qualls (pictured above) was standing nearby. I went over to him and exhaled my cat’s sickness into DJ Qualls’ mouth.

In my dream, we then JUMP CUT to DJ Qualls sitting in his doctor’s office.

The doctor says to DJ Qualls: “You have cat herpes.”

Fin.

Notes:

• The reason I dreamed our cat was sick was probably because I’ve had to take both our cats to the vet a couple times recently (they’re both fine).
• The reason DJ Qualls was in my dream, I think, is that I recently watched a couple old episodes of Breaking Bad, and he was in one.
• I don’t know why The Green Mile was in my dream: I have not thought about the book or movie in years.
• I do not know if jump cuts are common in my dreams. I can’t recall another instance of one. It was used to excellent comic effect, however.
• I do not know if “cat herpes” is a real thing.
• I can’t imagine how many tests poor DJ Qualls was subjected to before it was determined he had cat herpes. It’s probably not the first thing doctors look for in sick human patients.
• Kudos to the dream doctor’s delivery of his one line. It was completely deadpan.
• My deepest apologies to actor DJ Qualls for his unwitting involvement. I think he is a fine actor and I wish him only the best of success and continued good health.

Image credit: moviepins.com

I recently reviewed a horror game called Outlast for an upcoming issue of PC Gamer Magazine. While I’ve written for the magazine before, this is the first actual game review I’ve ever done.

Naturally, when reviews of Outlast started popping up online, I wanted to see what other reviewers thought of the game. While looking through the first handful of reviews, I noticed something that didn’t quite sit right. Many of the reviews — about two-thirds of them, in fact — used the same three or four screenshots. These were screenshots given to them by the developer (I got them as well, along with review code) as part of a PR media kit.

Using a developer’s screenshots for a PC game review seems… well, a bit misleading. The reviewer doesn’t know for a fact that these are genuine screenshots. They may have been embellished, or touched up, or Photoshopped, or specially rendered. Presumably, these developer screens have been carefully selected as part of the game’s promotion. Reviews, on the other hand, are not (or should not) serve as promotion. Reviews are an opportunity for a writer to describe his or her specific experience with the game. If a reviewer doesn’t use his or her own screenshots in the review, it seems (to me, at least) that they’re not accurately describing their own personal experience.

I can think of a few reasons why PC game reviewers might want to use a developer’s screenshots. First, it’s easier. Taking your own screenshots can sometimes be a hassle. For instance, in Outlast, there’s a rather large, gruesome, angry fellow who sometimes chases you around, and upon catching you, tears off a sizable chunk of your body. The first time it happened to me, naturally, I was busy trying to make sure it didn’t happen to me. But, once it had happened, I thought it might be worth taking a picture of. So, when the game reloaded, I deliberately let him catch me so I could take some pictures of it. I had to do this a few times to get a decent shot of the brute throttling me.

At one point, I got a good screenshot of another psychopath, who had captured me, as he rubbed it in by showing me just how close I was to escaping:

I realized I could get a better one, however, as lightning was flashing intermittently outside. During a lightning strike, the passageway was fully illuminated, casting shadows on the floor, and you could see the pouring rain outside. So, I went back, replayed the sequence, and sat there hammering the screenshot key until I captured a lightning strike, and submitted that image along with my review. In what turned out to be about a five or six hour game, I probably spent an additional half-hour or so just trying to take good pictures.

Now, I realize staffers at sites and magazines don’t always have the time freelancers do (I am freelance). Playing and reviewing Outlast was one of only three writing commissions I had that week (unfortunately). A staffer might have multiple articles to write and games to play and interviews to conduct in a single day, and finding extra time to monkey around in a single game might not be the easiest thing to achieve. I totally get that, and I don’t have any kind of solution for a reviewer in a time crunch, except… I still think you should use your own screenshots, even if you don’t have extra time to go back, replay, and capture every image you’d like to snag.

Another possible reason for using PR screenshots: they can make your review look pretty damn spectacular, especially on websites with a lot of real estate for images. There’s one popular game site that features huge, gorgeous, edge-to-edge splash images as a major part of their eye-catching format. That’s cool. Those developer images look (gruesomely) lovely on that site. The thing is, is that what the game really looked like for the reviewer? I don’t know. I don’t know what their reviewer saw. I only know what the developer wanted us to see: the images they selected.

I should point out that the screenshots I personally took may not represent the game faithfully, either. I don’t have a top-of-the-line graphics card, and I don’t have a massively high-res monitor. For all I know, the average gamer’s experience with the game may look more like the PR screenshots than my own. The developers may be aghast when they see my screenshots in the magazine, and think, “This is terrible! Our game looks WAY better than that!” And, I can definitely understand them not being thrilled at the idea of someone reviewing their game in a magazine and not showing off the absolute best graphics the game can provide. BUT. Like I said, a review is a description of one reviewer’s experience. I can’t predict what another player’s time with the game will be like. I can’t speak for anyone but myself. My review will describe my experience: what I played, what I did, what I heard, and what I saw.

I hope I’m not coming off as holier-than-thou, or some kind of purist snob, especially considering, like I said, this was my first real review. I’m really not trying to shame anyone who uses PR screenshots, because I understand the reasons for it, or at least I think I do. I don’t think it’s a huge deal, and it certainly seems to be a commonly accepted practice (of the 25 reviews of Outlast I’ve seen, only about ten of them appear to be using original screenshots). I’d just like other reviewers of PC games to think about the practice of using PR material in their reviews, and maybe reconsider it.

I’ll refrain from calling anyone out specifically, but here’s a link to metacritic’s list of Outlast reviews, and if you start looking through them, you’ll start seeing the same handful of images in many of the reviews. Keep in mind, I’m only talking about PC game reviews. Previews are a different story (I assume, as I’ve never written one) as are console game reviews (Outlast, at the moment, is a PC-only title).

Well, the summer movie season is over and it’s time to tally our final scores in the Third Annual Summer Movie Fantasy League.

Long story short: Kris destroyed me.

It was pretty anti-climactic, really: even after my early lead, Kris didn’t even wind up needing her final three movies to beat me in the domestic opening box-office department. Almost every single movie I picked, with the exception of Still Very Fast And Quite Furious, underperformed. After Earth was a financial and critical dud. White House Down didn’t deliver. None of the kid’s movies I picked came close to Monsters University and Despicable Me 2. And, while The Wolverine did pretty well, it fell far short of the predictions for its opening weekend. Kris outplayed me to the tune of almost $70 million, even though she picked a few duds herself.

Even worse: it looked like I had the lowest RT score portion of the summer locked up, but this morning I went back to check all the scores again, as they tend to fluctuate throughout the summer. My best-worst pick was Hammer of the Gods, which had scored a zero! Unfortunately, a couple late reviews were added, and two of them were positive, meaning the film now scores at a 30%. Not good, but still enough to bump my total up over Kris’s, meaning she has the lowest combined RT score, meaning she wins that contest too. DAMN.

Here’s a look at the final tallies:

That’s it until next summer… when I will have my revenge.

Doing a test here too.

Hi! Kris and I are deep into our 3rd annual Summer Movie Fantasy League, so I thought it might be time for an update.

With each of us having had seven of ten movies released and tallied for their opening weekend domestic earnings, here’s how the picture looks:

I came out of the gate strong, with Fast & Furious 6 nabbing almost $100K, but it was all downhill from there. World War Z did pretty well, but my poor choices of After Earth, Epic, White House Down, and Turbo did me no favors. Meanwhile, Kris picked the single biggest film, Man of Steel, plus got the two biggest kiddie flicks, Monsters U and Despicable Me 2. With three movies left for each of us, things are looking grim for the former champion (me).

However! All is not lost. With a string of crap and duds hitting the theaters over the past few weeks, and The Wolverine basically opening without any competition, I could cut a hefty chunk out of Kris’ $96 million lead this weekend. Unfortunately, I doubt it’ll be enough to win. She still has Elysium, which 1) has been advertised like crazy, 2) looks like it might be good, and 3) MATT DAMON. I’m not sure how 2 Guns will do, but it’s got Denzel Washington and Marky Mark, so I assume it’ll have a healthy opening. I think I’m still gonna get beat, but maybe it’ll be close.

Meanwhile, our three film picks for lowest Rotten Tomato score was close for a while! The Purge and The Internship were both basically the same degree of stinky. Kris looked like she might have run away with it by picking Syrup, which had zero positive reviews for WEEKS, but suddenly a positive one appeared, knocking it up to 17%. I managed a 0% pick too, with Hammer of the Gods, but we’ll have to keep an eye on it in case some tool decides to like it enough to give it a decent review. R.I.P.D. was much-hated, but not as much-hated as the most-hated Grown Ups 2. As with Syrup, these scores tend to fluctuate a bit as late reviews come in throughout the summer, but right now, I think I’ve got this portion of the summer league won.

This week I watched a few E3 presentations and tweeted annoyingly about them (sorry). For the most part, I saw a lot of vague information about new consoles I have no interest in buying and fancy, glossy, pre-rendered CG trailers for games I have no interest in playing. However, one game trailer caught my eye: Ubisoft’s multi-player third-person action RPG called The Division.

There were actually two trailers for The Division. The first contained the backstory for this Tom Clancy game: apparently, terrorists put some sort of super germs on all our money and on Black Friday, when everyone goes out to buy Christmas presents at two in the morning, they get sick from the terror-germs, which completely destroys the United States. It’s sort of a weird message– don’t go shopping on Black Friday or you’ll die from moneygerms– for a game made for two new game consoles that will probably be sold during Black Friday. Also, people still use cash to buy things? And people still go to stores? If you want to infect us, terrorist, put some germs on Amazon.com’s one-click button.

Anyway. The “everyone is infected” angle led me to initially think: zombie game. Another damn zombie game. Then Ubisoft aired about eight minutes of (what appeared to be) actual gameplay footage, and I found it entirely engrossing. The footage involves the exploits of four co-op human players: Bronson, Megan, Chris, and Nick (whose perspective we are watching from.) You can watch it right here, and I’d suggest doing it on the biggest screen you have, because there’s a lot of detail. Once you’ve seen it, check out my notes below!

The gameplay trailer begins a typical post-apocalyptic video game cutscene fakeout. A jolly Christmas song playing, a scene of a wintery New York City, and a slow reveal, as the song fades, that this is not actually a jolly Christmas, everyone! (Reminds me of teasers for Fallout 3 and the Bioshock games.) As the camera cranes down from the roof to the street, we get a glimpse of someone stumbling noisily in a trash-filled apartment, but don’t see his face. I took this as another sign that the game would be about crazy infected zombies the first time I saw it. But I was (apparently) wrong!

0:43 — As the camera moves down and away from the building, we get to take in some deep detail, and it’s great. Rats scurry across a distant rooftop, dogs bark and scavenge a full block away. You can see into the windows of many apartments. There’s also snow falling and birds flapping around.

Another detail, a welcome though slightly confusing one: the power is still on. Buildings are still lit up, even across the bridge in Manhattan. If everyone is dead or infected and there are no other services, how is the power still on? On the other hand, who cares? I’m glad I won’t spend the entire game trying to find gas for a generator to power an elevator.

0:53 — In the upper left, a shadowy figure in a hoodie is visible through the window, and he or she mysteriously ducks out of view a moment later. Just behind the truck, on the sidewalk, we see two more people on the sidewalk. One is hunched over, maybe infected or perhaps just rummaging for something. Also, there’s graffiti on the pharmacy sign. “KEEP AWAY, *something* ONLY,” it reads. I can’t make out the something. The point is, in video games, people can’t wait for the world to end so they can write all over everything. Terrorists, if you want to wipe out the survivors of your first germ attack, put more terrorgerms on spray-paint cans.

1:04 — At street level, we meet Nick, specifically, Nick’s back, which we’ll be staring at for most of this demo. The streets are filled with slush puddles, uncollected garbage, disabled vehicles, but happily, no piles of corpses. So, I’m pretty sure this game is zombie-free. I hope. I’m just really tired of shooting zombies.

Nick’s got a fairly unobtrustive HUD that sort of floats next to him. We can see a health bar, his ammo count (in-clip and total remaining), and his currently selected skills. We can also see info on his co-op partners, Bronson and Megan, and their skills, health level, and status (Chris is AFK). As Nick walks through an intersection, the names of the streets also appear on his ghostly HUD.

1:36 – Nick is joined by Bronson, who has been searching through a store for supplies. They’ve both heard distant gunfire (Nick could even see some muzzle-flashes reflecting off buildings a block away) so Nick checks his map, which creates a holographic display on the ground around him. Cool and lovely: I enjoy maps that you can look at in real-time without leaving the game for a separate screen (like in Far Cry 2). Also, he can listen to radio feed from the various map locations as he cycles through them. It appears that Bronson can also see Nick’s map being projected on the ground, because he says: “That police station is going critical” as Nick selects that location. Also shown on the map is another co-op player, Megan, who is a few blocks away.

The area they’re in appears to be called the Dark Zone, which is odd because, like I said, the power is still on. The map also shows the locations of several vendors, and blue squares noted as “Events.” The map is also tracking the path of a helicopter flying near the Manhattan Bridge, but there’s no indication if it’s something you can call in as support or otherwise contact. I’m assuming it’s friendly.

1:54 – As Bronson and Nick walk toward the police station, two civilians walk by on the sidewalk in the opposite direction. Nick scans them: the woman is infected and contagious. Bronson says: “She’s gone red. I’m low on packs, though. We have to leave it.” Sounds like, maybe, rather than the typical video game practice of shooting infected people in the face, you may actually get to cure them with some sort of meds. That’s a nice change! I want to heal people who got sick from dollargerms. That is a thing I want to do.

There’s ton’s of detail in the street scene. A pack of scavenging dogs, steam rising from manholes (more signs the power is on), tattered flags flapping in the breeze, and gosh, this game is quite lovely looking. By far, the most next-gen looking game I’ve seen (next-gen means it could only be played on upcoming consoles. Or current PCs. Burn.)

2:25 — After walking down the street (more graffiti on a truck reads FIGHT IMPURITY), they come across a construction site. A giant tunnel leads to “The Underground,” which appears to be an instance level (the display reads “Group Mission” and has a difficulty level of 3 attached to it. Very MMO-like.)

Shots ring out from the police station. A few citizens on the street immediately start running the hell away, as they no doubt would. It’s annoying when NPCs are slow to react to danger in games (or sometimes don’t react at all), but these dudes just haul ass in the other direction. Smart. Meanwhile, Bronson, Nick, and Megan, who has joined them, run toward the police station.

Something to note: Bronson is wearing a gas mask, and Megan and Nick are not. I don’t know if the gas mask is just an aesthetic choice or if it serves as actual protection or not, but in a game about a deadly infection, it might have an actual use.

Nick runs a scan, showing the heat signatures from several people inside the police station (he also scans a dead police officer lying outside the station, whose cause of death reads “Head Trauma.” Bronson runs inside to try to lure out the enemies.

Megan has a group heal spell, er, I mean, skill, ready to use, and we get to see Nick flick through some of his abilities, which include Pulse (which he just used to scan for enemies), a Distraction Device, which draws enemies to its location (maybe it’s a device you plant or throw), Indomitable, which is a buff that prevents the player from dropping below 1 health point for three seconds, and Adrenaline Boost, which can be used to recover a friend’s health and stamina. He finally selects a Seeker Mine, which we’ll get to see during the upcoming fight: it’s a rolling grenade that chases its target for ten seconds.

We also get a glimpse of a few other purchasable skills. Just guessing at their attributes based on how their icons look: one might let you fire bullets through solid walls, one might be some sort of cluster grenade, one looks like it might allow you call in support (the icon is someone shouting), perhaps that helicopter that was shown on the map.

These all look like purchasable items, bought with points that may be earned by gaining XP. However, there’s another tab called Talents that look more like RPG elements. The icons shown hint at weapon proficiencies and health boosts. One shows a set of lungs next to an icon showing crosshairs, which probably signifies the ability to hold your breath while sniping to give you a more stable shot. Another shows a heart and a running icon, which has something to do with extended sprinting, I’d guess. Another shows a brain, a stack of something, and a machine gun — possibly due to added perception, you find more ammo in stashes, or find more stashes overall? Dunno! But probably something like that.

3:15 — The fight begins, using pretty standard cover mechanics. Bronson is using a shotgun, Megan is apparently sniping from further away (she calls out a headshot), Nick has a machine gun thingie (I don’t know from guns). Bronson also uses one of his skill toys: a turret, which he places on the hood of a car and which auto-fires at enemies. The enemies are AI-controlled bandits, and four or five of them pour out of the police station. Two throw Molotovs, the others use automatic weapons. The enemies are pretty mobile: after taking out Bronson’s turret, they flank both left and right, moving behind cover and never staying still for long. Their health bars are shown, however, at all times, making it easy to see where they are even if they’re behind cover.

The animated gif above displays my favorite bit of the entire trailer, and I can’t say exactly why. During the gunfight, Nick is crouching behind a police car. The rear door of the car is ajar. He scoots toward the rear, encountering the open door on the way, which he closes as he shuffles past. Lovely bit of detail and animation. I love it! It’s what you would do without thinking in real life, and Nick does it without thinking in the game. I’ve watched this tiny moment a million times and now you can too!

Another player, Chris, joins the game, controlling a small drone. Nick’s UI indicates that Chris is connecting through the game via a tablet, which I guess the thing that we are all supposed to do now. Play on your Xbox! Play on your tablet! Play on your smart phone! Play anything, from everywhere, all the time! If you’re in line at the post office, you can still drop into a game and then ditch everyone three minutes later when you have to get our your germ-covered cash to buy stamps! I don’t know. I’d rather play with people who are going to carve out some time to actually focus on the game for a while than someone who is stopped at a red light and has sixteen seconds to pop into the game, but maybe that’s just me.

Chris, via drone, contributes a group buff of some sort, though I can’t see any change in Nick’s stats so I’m not sure what kind of buff he’s providing. [In the comments, mAk points out that everyone gets a +20 damage buff.] Nick also uses his seeker mine to chase down a bandit who has flanked him and is hiding behind a car. The mine rolls after the guy and detonates. I look forward to having such a grenade, as I am crap at throwing them.

Chris The Helpful Drone also “paints” a target for everyone, highlighting an enemy who is on the roof hiding behind a police station sign (Megan notes that the enemy is an “elite,” so apparently there are “boss” enemies, or at least specialized, harder to kill baddies). The battle over, the three humans walk into the police station and Chris buzzes away in his drone because his microwave popcorn is finally ready or he’s done pooping or whatever it was he was waiting for that allowed him to join the game for only thirty seconds.

Graffiti on the exterior wall of the police station: “I’ll huff & I’ll puff.” And inside “And I’ll blow your house in” is painted on some open doors. Yeah, not the scariest graffiti from a gang member who is fond of nursery rhymes. But at least he had a theme. Good for him.

Megan frees some trapped AI policemen by shooting the lock off the door (we’ll have to see if you can shoot open locked doors in general, or just special ones). Nick and Bronson gather supplies: a Med Kit and some bottled water. There is also food. So, eating and drinking is involved in the game, but it’s not clear if it’s something related to healing injuries, or if there’s actual food/water meters that need to be filled to remain generally healthy.

5:24 — Nick walks to a map on a wall, which is covered with notations. By scanning it, it updates his own map (and presumably the maps of his friends). The items that are updated are Evac Alpha and Bravo (missions shown as completed), a CDC quarantine (a safe area, perhaps?), and what looks like an optional bounty hunting mission named “Wanted: Oskar,” which I imagine are similar to Red Dead Redemption & Far Cry 3 bounty missions: hunt down a boss thug and his thugettes for a reward.

As Nick follows Broson and Megan down the corridor to the armory, he turns and spots something down another hallway. It looks like a dog, but this being a video game about a world-destroying infection, I initially thought OH MY GOD GIANT INFECTED WARG-DOG-WOLF-MONSTER! But upon closer inspection, I think it’s just a dog. If I were Nick, I’d have gone back, gotten the food, and tried to give it to the dog, because making a dog happy in a video game is relevant to my interests. There’s also some sort of tremor that shakes the building and dislodges some overhead lights, but it’s not explained. Nearby artillery, maybe?

6:08 — In the armory, Nick opens a box and there’s a big gun and I guess we’re all supposed to get a boner over it. Look, it’s a Tom Clancy game, there’s gonna be gunporn. Scanning the Mk17 SR, which Wikipedia tells me is a heavy SCAR, whatever the hell that is (again, I don’t know from guns) we see how much damage it does, its range, and that it has three mod slots: one looks like it can be fitted with a scope, another possibly an extended magazine, and one more points to the stock, but I don’t know what you can add to a stock. Unicorn stickers?

One thing we don’t see is how easily Nick could compare it to a gun he already has, which is sometimes a problem in these games where you’re constantly finding new weapons and having to choose which to keep and which to ditch. I didn’t play much of Borderlands, but at least 98% of my time was squinting at a bunch of numbers relating to which gun was marginally better than which. That’s not one of my favorite things about MMO-style games.

6:40 — Back outside, after Bronson closes the armory door (considerate of him), they get a look at Manhattan, timed nicely with the bridge lights turning off along the Brooklyn Bridge. The lights aren’t going off because it’s the morning (the bridge is West of them, and the sun is behind it, so it’s early evening) so maybe power outages are a thing that happens in the game from time to time. Anyway, Megan shoots off a flare for extraction, which I assume spirits you back to a safe-zone or group base or something.

Then, a bunch of other players attack them. Not AI enemies, but human controlled players. Hey! Other people in this game! It’s not just co-op RPG PVE, it’s multi-MMO-RPG-co-op-PVP! Does that mean Megan could just turn around and shoot Bronson for being too bossy? I dunno. But she should consider it. We can see the names of the new players, their health bars, and the weapon they’re currently wielding.

06:53 – The trailer ends the way many game trailers ended at E3: with a big pullback up to heaven to show a massive, sprawling map the size of the entire country and thousands of human players all playing at once! Actually, in this case, it shows maybe a couple dozen players, and frankly, the map isn’t even that big. Still, pretty neat!

Also, both bridges now are labeled “Blackout”, another hint that the city’s power going on and off intermittently is a feature of the game. (I don’t know why I’m so fixated on the power situation in post-moneygerm New York, but I am.)

No idea if I’ll ever get to play this game. I have no plan or even much interest in buying a new console (also, no money, and also, money will germ you to death), and this game hasn’t yet been announced for PC. I hope it is eventually, though, because it looks pretty neat.

If you follow me on Twitter, you probably know that when I get bent out of shape about a video game, it’s usually over something minor. Bioshock Infinite, for example, doesn’t allow players to manually save their games, which I groused about at length (well, at a length of 140 characters, at least). Far Cry 3 cluttered my screen with huge reminders to stay on-mission, despite being an open-world game where missions are the last thing I wanted to be doing. (They later patched this out due to gamer complaints.)

It’s not that these little details are game-ruiners, but when something minor is overlooked it makes me wonder if game developers actually ever play games. Like, did it not occur to the makers of Bioshock Infinite that I might want to save my game and quit, rather than run around for five or ten minutes trying to trigger the autosave function?

That’s why it’s so exciting when I realize that a game’s developer has actually thought about their game from the viewpoint of someone playing it. Dishonored’s comprehensive user interface settings is a great example: you can toggle and adjust just about everything on your screen, from quest markers to health bars to mission notifications. This sort of attention to the finer details says: “Hey, we make games, but we’re gamers too.”

Gunpoint is a new 2-D stealth puzzle game created by writer Tom Francis. In it, you infiltrate secure facilities, elude (or leap, tackle and punch) guards, and rewire electrical systems to help you navigate through buildings. Full disclosure here: I’ve never personally met Tom but I consider him a friend, I’m a huge fan of his writing, and he was integral in getting me started freelancing for PC Gamer. I’m not reviewing the game itself here, (though I think it’s excellent: fun, funny, and highly replayable, with charming art and music:  you should check out the game’s launch trailer to see what’s in store for you).

Instead, I want to point out a few examples of some design choices Tom made, and how they show he genuinely kept gamers in mind while creating his game.

1) Try Before You Buy (In the Game)

As you complete jobs and earn money in Gunpoint, you can spend your virtual cash on new gadgets to help with your heists. This is nothing new in games, except for two distinct differences. You can try the gadgets out on a mini-level before you buy them, which is great. It sucks when you buy an upgrade in a game and wind up hating it, or worse, finding out that it doesn’t suit your playstyle, and you end up wishing you hadn’t bought it. Gunpoint gives you a chance to put your new gadgets through the paces to see if it’s something you want before you spend your precious heistbux on it.

What’s more, you can return your gadget to the in-game store for a refund. What’s even more: it’s a full refund. Whoever the unseen gadget vendor is in Gunpoint, he’s better than any other vendor in video games EVER. Vendors in video games are notorious for buying back your gear at far less than you paid. Not Gunpoint. Dude gives you a full refund. He is my hero. I think I’ll call him Clark. I love you, Clark.

2) Try Before You Buy (In Real Life)

There’s a demo version of Gunpoint, so you can try out a handful of levels and see what the game is all about (you should do this now). Most game demos let you play for a while and then end with a splash screen, listing a bunch of features about the game, or maybe a link to where you can buy it, almost as an afterthought: “We’ve given you a taste of the game, and here’s a static list of features for you to stare at for ten seconds while you hammer on the Escape key. We’re done here.”

Tom actually created an interactive conversation between two of the game’s characters to let you know the demo is complete and suggest that you now buy the full game. It’s witty, it’s meta, it’s clever, and, hilariously, it lets you actually participate in Tom’s efforts to convince you to buy the game. I’ve never really seen anyone do something quite like that before. Most of all, it shows he didn’t just slice off a chunk of the game, stuff it into an executable, and theatrically dust off his hands. He gave this demo some custom content and personal attention.

3) Failure Is an Option

In the spirit of games like Spelunky or Trials, screwing up in Gunpoint is usually funny and isn’t always a huge setback: the simple tap of a key gets you right back into the game. Gunpoint does this especially well by giving you some choices on reloading your game, as shown above. Do you want to erase the most recent stupid move you made? Maybe the last two? Or three? You can restart from scratch, load your last manual save, or rewind by several steps. The point is, you have options, where in many games, you don’t. ATTENTION EVERY OTHER GAME: DO THIS THING.

4) You’re Not Slow, You’re Just “Thoughtful”

Like many games, Gunpoint tracks how much time you’re spending in a level. Games are notorious for pointing our your shortcomings, but when you’ve spent perhaps too much time solving a puzzle, Gunpoint gives you a speed rating of “Thoughtful.” This is nice. I mean, I know I suck, but Gunpoint is at least being considerate of my feelings. I appreciate it.

5) Music Volume

This is totally minor, but I still noticed it. In any game with a constant soundtrack, I’m going to reach a point where I have to go into the options and turn the music down. This is especially true in puzzle games, where I need to concentrate. Even if it’s good music (and Gunpoint’s music is good), I just can’t think properly if the music is too loud. (I have the same problem while driving and trying to find an address: I have to turn my radio off). By default, Gunpoint’s soundtrack is set to 40% volume by default, saving me the trouble. The trouble, by the way, consists of me having to open a menu and move a slider, which is not even remotely trouble. But the idea that Tom knew players might need to do it is the point I’m trying to make.

6) Story? What story?

Tom’s a writer, so I’m not surprised to find some great, snappy dialogue in Gunpoint. Of course, no matter how well a game is written, it’s unlikely you’re going to want to have to experience the story in full every single time you play. Once you’ve had enough of the story you can skip past the dialogue and just get right into the puzzles. I think Tom even knows you might not want to read everything on your first time through the game: as you can see above, even the character we’re playing doesn’t seem truly interested in the finer details. He just wants to break into some buildings and slap guards around.

7) Commentary & Prototype Versions

If you buy the Special or Exclusive Edition of Gunpoint, you gain access to extras like developer commentary and prototype versions from earlier stages of development. MORE GAMES NEED THIS. Some of Valve’s games have commentary, one of the Riddick games does too, I think, and maybe a handful of others. Not nearly enough, though, and I think it’s something gamers would like to see more of.

The commentary mode plants little figures of Tom and his development team in the maps so you can listen to their thoughts on the game while you play. I did try to tackle and punch Tom (in the game), but it doesn’t work, sadly (I only wanted to do so because his avatar suggested there were eight different ways to solve a certain puzzle, and I had only come up with two).

At any rate, a lot of gamers are interested in how games are made, and there’s really something great about playing a game while listening to developers talk to you about how they made it. The prototype levels are neat, too, because you can play with the game at its earliest stages, and see firsthand how it has developed and changed over the years.

ANYWAY. GOOD JOB, TOM. Gunpoint is available on Steam (as is its demo) and you can find more details here at the Gunpoint site.

It’s summer! There are movies! My wife and I are bored! That means it must be time for the Third Annual Livingston Summer Movie Fantasy League! Each summer, Kris and I each choose the ten summer movies we think will have the best domestic opening weekend earnings, and see who combines for the highest total. We also each pick three films we think will combine for the lowest Rotten Tomatoes review score.

I never posted the results from last year’s SMFL, because after that psychopath killed twelve people at The Dark Knight Rises premiere in Aurora, Colorado, writing about box office totals just seemed completely inappropriate (particularly since we have family in Aurora). Still, you can see the final totals here, as well as the RT score.

Anyway, we’re back for a third go-round! We started with Memorial Day weekend this year, meaning we missed out on Iron Man 3 and the new Star Trek, but here’s a look at our 2013 picks, in release date order:

I think my biggest mistake was picking After Earth (which is getting horrible reviews) in the third round, which left the door open for Kris to grab Pacific Rim. I also somehow let Kris snag the two kids movies that will be both good and make money (Monsters University and Despicable Me 2) while I wound up with four that open later in the summer and will probably all stink. So, I’m not too hopeful at my chances of a three-peat this year, though Fast and Furious 6′s big opening weekend gave me a great start.

Anyway, I’ll post some updates at the summer progresses, and Kris is going to be writing about it this year too:

Kris here: I’ve lost two years out of two. Not spectacular. Last year, I passed on the Avengers and went with the Dark Knight as my first pick. Many of the people I love live in Aurora (or A-town as my brother calls it), and my niece’s husband is a huge Batman fan. I checked with my brother, and was very relieved to hear that my family was okay.  After the shootings, we didn’t really have much fun with the league. The trash talking didn’t feel right.

This year will be different. A few days before our draft, I was stuck in the jury duty waiting room. I had eight hours to do my homework thanks to the free wifi. I mapped out the possibilities, and think I did pretty well this time. I picked a lot of late summer movies again. Not sure how that keeps happening. At the moment, I’ve got two more weeks before I can even get a single dollar on the board. Some thoughts on my picks (in order):

“Man of Steel” – Most of the trailers have been pretty dull for this one. Plus, another superhero movie to start didn’t seem like the way to go. That is, until I finally saw an awesome trailer for this movie the night before the draft that made picking it seem like a no-brainer. Michael Shannon as General Zod in a voice-over, demanding Superman to come forward. They never show that one. Why do they never show that one? Seriously, they need to get on that.

“Despicable Me 2″ – To be honest, I never saw part one. I don’t even know what those little yellow things are, but they seem irritating. Learning from the past: what is irritating to me, is box office gold. Plus, it’s due out over the 4th of July weekend.

“Monsters University” – I saw a bit of the first movie, and it was a cute and sentimental. I like cute and sentimental, plus Disney/Pixar will surely market the heck out of this one. Try to avoid this one! I dare you!

“Pacific Rim” – I was on the fence on this one. I wanted to go with “Fast and Furious 6″ – I really did. It hadn’t been picked as yet, and I knew people were going to go see the hell out of it. However, Pacific Rim has giant robots, it’s coming out in IMAX, will involve cities getting smashed up, has that “WHOOOOOMP” noise in the trailer that everyone loves, is directed by Guillermo del Toro, and did I mention GIANT ROBOTS?

“The Heat” – Had to toss in an “R” rated movie, because adults see movies too. Melissa McCarthy and Paul Feig are back together, and Sandra Bullock is back on screen. I’m rooting for this one.

“Elysium” – I loved, loved, loved “District 9″, and this one seems like that movie on steroids. Plus, Matt Damon is part machine. I recently watched “Behind the Candelabra”, and if Mr. Damon plays this one half as earnestly as he played Scott Thorson, we’re all in for a treat. I’m thinking he won’t be wearing any glittery speedos in this one, but he’ll likely smash a guy through a wall while wearing high-tech body armor. I’m in!

“World’s End” – Likely that this one won’t make too much money. However, my favorite movie of all time is “Shaun of the Dead” and I had to show it some faith and love. It’s really the only movie I’m excited to see this summer. Hopefully, I’m not alone in that.

“Lone Ranger” – At this point in the draft, the pickings were getting slim. I really don’t know about this one. It kept showing up on the Summer duds list, and it’s a western. I’m not nuts about westerns, myself. Think I may have thrown a wild pitch here, kids.

“2 Guns” – Sometimes, when you start throwing wild… you can’t stop. However, ladies (and quite a few dudes) seem to love Mark Wahlberg and Denzel Washington, and dudes (and quite a few ladies) seem to love guns. Let’s hope these hold true. It’s not due out until August. Perhaps it will be very hot out in August, and people will want to sit in an air conditioned movie theater?

“This is the End” – Pretty much ended the game with a balk. I know it, you know it.

For worst Rotten Tomatoes score, I went with “R.I.P.D”, “The Purge” and “Syrup”. All based on trailers alone. Couldn’t even get through the trailer for the Syrup movie.