Sleeping Dogs Revisited: A love letter to... something

Yeah, Sleeping Dogs is a great game. I'm certainly not alone it noting it as the sleeper (ha! HAHAHAHAHAHAHA! HAHAHA! HAAA!) hit of 2012; many critics waxed on about it's elegant post-Arkham hand-to-hand combat and elephant post-Max-Payne shootouts and whatever driving. Need for Speed driving I guess, since it happens on roads but is also races. You know roads, right? The flat black thingies? Well, you'll learn. All things in time. It was like someone said, "let's make Grand Theft Auto, but this time around, we'll include gameplay". I haven't played the True Crime games*, but Sleepy Dogs might have sold me. I feel like I should at least play Shenmue now (hi Greg! agh who am I kidding he doesn't even read the blog that's half named after him).

Sometimes I feel like I don't completely 'get' the game, though. I've never much delved into that John Woo China-Crime action-drama filmic thing, because I don't typically get a ton out of crime movies. My reaction to The Godfather was like, eh, okay. What I have delved into (and need to delve more... into) is martial arts cinema, because hey, it's awesome. Enter the Dragon is one of my favorite movies ever (see my list of Netflix IQ movies for a few more I like). Jackie Chan is in my book like A++ greatest actor of all time. Supercop, lol. And what my cursory knowledge of this genre indicates to me is that Sleeping Dogs is posed as the gamic adaptation of about a hundred different movies. Which I think is pretty cool. I don't like adaptations, but I do like culture, and this game is brimming with it.

The most overt nod to cinema comes in a DLC called Zodiac Island. This campaign tells the story of Wei Shen's journey to an exotic island to participate in a mysterious martial arts tournament, where he his joined by other masters from around the continent. If this setup feels familiar, it's because it's the backdrop for Mortal Kombat: The Motion Picture. And if Mortal Kombat: The Motion Picture felt familiar, it's because it was based on Mortal Kombat: The Game. And if Mortal Kombat: The Game felt familiar, it's because it was heavily inspired by Enter the Dragon. And if Enter the Dragon felt familiar, it's because it was based on a Sleeping Dogs DLC called Zodiac Island. And if [...]. In case you don't get the reference, Sleeping Dogs goes the extra mile (perhaps one mile too many) in packaging the adventure as a corny '70s martial arts import film. The cut-scenes use a film-grain effect, the music is far too funky/disco-y for anyone's good, and there's even a lengthy opening credit montage using bold red faux-Asian typeface. It's a bit more of a bludgeon than a nod, but I still appreciated that credit was given to the game's roots.

A detour to make Sammo Hung proud

Even if the gangster parts are as heavy on references (that I wouldn't get) as the martial arts parts, this isn't some kind of Scod Pilgrum. Dogs has its own agenda - the game's raison d'etre is not simply to make references, and for the most part it's relatively straight-faced in its implementation of long-running tropes. This is a game that wants to embody the spirit that drove these movies, not recreate them in a different medium. It nails the action, the setting, and the pace, but falters when we look deeper, not doing a particularly strong job of translating the driving thematic material.

To put it simply, I was so stupefied by Dogs' story that I found myself in perpetual anticipation of something, ANYTHING that would justify the moronic course of the tale. No such twist ever came. You play as an undercover cop, which provides the main source of confusion - outside of a few "cop missions" which have no ties to the main story, no police-work ever takes place. The idea is that our hero, "No" Wei Shen, is tasked with bringing down the Sun On Yee triad. So Wei joins at the bottom, making his way to the top and making friends (who soon die) along the wei. Seriously, everyone in this game dies - to the extent where in the final mission, when the writers go looking for a dramatic moment by killing off Wei's childhood bud, my emotional reaction was to roll my eyes. So the thing is, Wei gets all friendly with the people he's supposed to be taking down, and experiences the classic undercover cop dilemma: his loyalty is challenged. Should he be cop, or should he help criminal. The resolution Sleeping Dogs finds is downright hilarious: Wei always remains loyal to his most immediate triad friends (who are introduced by the mission since, like I said, they ALL die), but he is completely helpless/useless and they end up in a worse state than they started. Which, coincidentally, is a GOOD thing according to the police department. It becomes farcical - this could've been a Naked Gun movie. For instance, when the mission is to provide security for your triad buddy's wedding, Wei is thinking as a triad and intends to keep everyone safe. He fails miserably, leading to the death of the entire wedding party at the hands of a rival gang. Which, in turn, makes the police happy, because it rid the streets of a lot of criminals. So it's like, whoops, the player's mission was fruitless, but also, worked out anyway??? At the end of the game, when all Wei's friends are dead, the police are like "well done Wei. Mission complete. Also, one of the main cops was a traitor. It wasn't worth mentioning for the first 95% of the story.". While maybe this could hold some narrative intrigue - that the only way to complete one obligation is to screw over the other - Wei's sense of duty as a cop is never explored. As the story presents the character, ALL he cares about is his triad. He doesn't give a shit about the Mission Complete - he's never trying to fulfill BOTH roles, the triad and the cop - so there's no conflict. And when you take out his role as a cop, the whole thing seems like a pretty terrible tragedy. At the end of the game, the Sun On Yee is in ruins, and all of Wei's friends have been killed, often thanks directly to him.

It's like the developers said "wow... this is a really sad. But if we make him a cop, then it makes it look like he was the best cop ever! With lots of dead friends! Totally happy ending!"

So, yeah, Sleeping Dogs is more a popcorn flick than an epic journey, which does beg the question why it's so fucking long. As I mentioned earlier, it scrapes by on the skin of its teeth thanks to solid mechanics and rotating pacing, managing always just barely to keep the player coming back. Then again, not every movie needs to be Hard Boiled, and missteps in tone and all, Dogs is still a thrilling adventure that will keep both action and martial arts fans fed for a long time. If United Front can nail down a coherent narrative next time 'round, they'll find themselves at the forefront of the current action boom. Although, who am I kidding, it's not like anyone HAS really managed that total package, not since RE4 at least. So they pretty much are at the head of the pack. It's just that the head of the pack isn't quite where it thinks it is, not just yet.

*Dogs was originally advertised as the third True Crime game, TC: Hong Kong, though the series relation is dubious at best. Basic accepted truth at this point is that Dogs started as an original title, then due to its similarity to True Crime was publisher-rebranded as TC:HK, then due to a publisher change and rights issues, returned to being an original title. Still, many acknowledge that the games have a lot in common, and Dogs has inspired in me the hope that open-city games can actually be worthwhile. Lord knows it took the Incredible Hulk (Ultimate Destruction) and Prototype (its spiritual successor) to get me to have any fun mucking about a present-day city.

What I'm Playing, March '13 (Pt. 3)

In this feature, we commemorate games I have for the first time started and finished in the last few highly variable time units.

Finally we put March to rest. It was a busy gaming month, what with being out of work 'n all. This feature is going to be dramatically shorter in the coming months, not requiring weekly installments.

Games Started:

Kid Icarus: Of Myths and Monsters (GB / 3DS VC)

When did Kid Icarus become a classic? I think it was around the time Pit showed up for a Super Mash Bros. Brawl. At least, that's when it somehow jumped from the ranks of lesser Nintendo works like Pilotwings to being mentioned in the same breath as Super Mario Bros. and Mega Man. Leave that for another time though, perhaps my coverage of the 3DS game... what was it called... blanking here... my brain is saying Of Myths and Monsters and I know that's wrong... Uprising, that's right. Anyway, Myth-Mon is to Kidick as Metroid II is to Metroid: a full-fledged handheld sequel, same team, same story, expanded gameplay. Weird, right? Sequels shouldn't be on handhelds! But they were, and they did. Myth Sand Mo cleans up the formula of the NES game, instating all-directional scrolling, infinitely respawning enemies, and better balanced (fairer) dungeon gameplay. Downward scrolling alleviates the ridiculous oversight of the original which turned the bottom of the screen into a constantly rising deathtrap, and horizontal adds an element of exploration, hiding rewards beyond the player's direct line-of-sight. Infinite enemies creates potential for grinding, which may not sound like a good thing, but is at least in keeping with the game's demanding RPG elements. There is also more payoff to the role-playing/grinding, as this time around, upgrades stick around for dungeons.

Fire Emblem: Awakening (3DS)

This never once happens in game - these characters are allies, best friends, and [spoiler]

I kinda already did a first impressions on this when I played the demo. After 25+ hours, I feel vindicated in my prediction that this would be the most interesting Fire Emblem in years. One interesting mechanic that doesn't reveal itself until hours into the experience is marriage/child-having. I don't think I'm spoiling too much by saying that the game involves time travel - this allows for parents and children to co-exist at the same age in the same time, skipping those BORING "growin' up" years. "Boring" in the RPG sense. Pairing off characters to get hitched is a game unto itself, allowing for skill and (mild) plot variance. Each arriving child opens up a new mission, and these missions provide more opportunities to cupidize your soldiers, creating more children and more child-missions. If you're anything like me, about two-thirds of the way through you'll get completely side-tracked and leave the plot for like ten hours to get all your gal-soldiers knocked up. This provides further incentive to utilize as many characters as possible, as there are only so many potential parents, and each pair only gets one child. The only complaint I have with this system is that it's a bit more rigid than it leads you to believe - the child and their story arc is entirely determined by the mother - the father only determines the hair color (a fact winkingly mentioned in one of the father/son conversations, wherein the father asks "did you get anything from me but your hair color?!"). I realize it would have been a shitload of work to program a unique child for each unique pairing, but it also would've inspired me to replay the game just to see all the different kiddies. Gotta catch a mall! As is, the only limitation on which ones you see is how many characters you manage to betroth. I don't know if that word can be used that way, and franklin, I don't care.

DmC: Devil May Cry (Xbox 360)

Even by fanboy standards, the four-game Devil May Cry series is extremely hit-or-miss. The only opinion that seems to bear any general consensus is that DMC3 is the best. So before saying anything about  the fifth and newest, DmC, I should mention that the only one I've played at any length is 3 (note: DMC is not the same as DmC - the former is the first game, the latter the fifth). The only real point of comparison I'm going to make is that DmC is probably better. Dante's moveset is more expansive than it's ever been, probably more expansive than any combat character I've played outside of fighting games. He probably ranks in the same tier as BlazBlue in terms of sheer input variety. This provides a lot of combo options, and a less technical feel to it all - once you get used to the controls (and they will take some getting used to), you'll feel like you have a dozen choices for the next attack in each string. On the flip-side, the only way DmC makes you feel the need for these moves is the score counter. The basic X, X, X, X, X combo will usually clear the path if you're feeling lazy, even on the highest difficulty (the highest available from the start - there are three or four more that unlock after beating the game). So there's a lot of cool stuff to do, but the motivation to do it needs to be internal. It has to come from your heart.

Games Finished:

Contra III: The Alien Wars (SNES / Wii VC)

Another Virtual Console game I've had for ages, this one I've near-completed many times, but never felt was worth the time to conquer. Golem helped me make it through the final boss on a co-op run (and by "helped", I mean "stole a bunch of my lives"), though as with Strania, we didn't get to see the True End-Boss since we played in Normal difficulty. Alien Wars is near-universally touted as the best Contra, but it doesn't really butter my bread. It's over far too quickly, and only three of the six stages are actual side-scrollers. Two are top-down - a style of shooter I like, except when reliant upon the ridiculous world-spinning controls found here. Most of the bosses are good, but the final impression was "it's over already?" More on this in an upcoming duologue comparing it to Hard Corps: A Contra Adventure, III's Sega Genesis counterpart.

Sleeping Dogs (Xbox 360)

This was quite the Herculean labor. Sleeping Dogs is one of the longest games I've finished in the past few years, clocking in above 30 hours. If that doesn't sound impressive, you don't know my opinion on long games. The last RPG I beat probably happened in the '90s. I suppose I always finish my Zeldas, so there's that. Still, it's unusual that I stuck this one out. What it came down to is that I loved the melee combat, the gunplay was half-decent, and the pacing was just right to keep it all fresh. You know how the Arkham games worked so well by alternating stealth and brawling? Sleeping Dogs works exactly the same, though it has about five types of mission instead of just two (though the focus certainly lies on driving, shooting, and punching). This one's got a full post to come. I'm still working on the major DLCs.

DLC... with Achievements! A brief duologue

Random email convo.

Yourself: I finished Sleeping Dogs last week and I'm taking a look at the DLC. Not that I desperately need more of the game, but it did have a stellar combat system that I never mind time into. It has an obscene number of tiny two-mission DLC packs, it's so stupid. There are so many that there isn't even a single collected-for-a-discount package. So I decided to check out reviews to see if any were particularly good or bad, since I'll probably get one or two (they're only $3 a pop). 

I found it inconceivably amusing that a major criticism one reviewer leveled at a certain pack was "it doesn't have achievements". So achievements now have monetary value? That's... literally everything that's wrong with the state of gaming today.

Golem: That got me thinking. I dunno why, but I'm looking forward to New Super Luigi U. If you haven't heard, Nintendo's developing a whole new campaign for NSMBU: same world map, all new levels. Part of it is probably that it's an exciting and forward-thinking idea (...in terms of what Nintendo normally does), but there's also some excitement just for new Mario levels. It sucks when you buy a whole new game that feels the same as the one from four years ago, but DLC is, well, not a whole new game. I'm just crossing my fingers that New Super Luigi U isn't $60 or something crazy.

It won't have any achievements.

Yourself: It seems like what DLC was once envisioned to be. Versus selling Fire Emblem maps for $3 a piece. A replacement for iterative sequels, rather than a micro-transaction marketplace.

Wii U doesn't have any kind of Achievement/Trophy system, right? I know some developers just build that stuff into their game (e.g. Bit.Trip Runner and Shank 2) and some have their own proprietary achievements (the ridiculous Ubisoft Uplay system). What may blow the minds of America at large is that Shank 2 actually ties unlockables to its Achievements. Unlockables? WHAT DOES THAT WORD MEAN? You mean like that new costume you can "unlock" for Ryu for $2.99?

Killing time - not what games are for, revisited

To make an example here, I'm going to describe an in-game scenario from two different player perspectives. You can guess the identity of the player - it might even be one of your favorite celebrities! The game in question is Sleeping Dogs.

Player 1 says: The world of Sleeping Dogs is rambunctiously engaging, full of micro-challenges that make every second extend and keep me coming back for more. Whether it's street-racing, cock-fighting, drug-busting, or hypen-ating, there's always some objective to drive away to, and while I'm driving, test my own speed-run!

Player 2 says: Sleeping Dogs is full of filler content to pad the game length, milking each gameplay variant to the last drop to keep me occupied with anything but moving forward. Where are the interactive cutscenes and huge boss battles?

Time for the big reveal. Take off those blindfolds! Player 1 is a teenager or someone who is paid to play games for a living; player 2 is every single other person in the world.

Okay, I'm being a drama queen here to make a point. It's not that bad, and Sleeping Dogs is nowhere near the original sinner. The point is that there are two kinds of games. Or actually there's a wide spectrum of games, a spectrum with some identifiable focal points. These can somewhat vaguely be qualified as games for playing and games for experiencing.

Games for playing are like toys, sports, or hobbies. It's almost unnecessary to mention that sports games, party games, competitive FPSs (Modern Warfare) and RTSs (StarCraft), and MMOs fall into this category. I'm not maliciously trivializing those genres - I'm just not going to talk about them here. So what ELSE is a game for playing? Dark Souls is, that's for sure. Skyrim too. Mario, right? And even Zelda.

Wait on a second there, we're moving to fast. You've taken almost every game ever and thrown it into a category. Categories aren't good. They suggest predictability, inflexibility. If all those games are just for playing, are you gonna try to tell me that only story-driven games are for experiencing? That's totally lame. Not only is that not a new observation, but it's siding dangerously close to the "video games aren't art" crowd.

No, story isn't the element of the game you experience - or at least it isn't always. The distinguishing characteristic we're talking about here is still gameplay. Something about Ninja Gaiden teaching you about the fragility of life and Mega Man X exploring how a one expands oneself. OOOOOOOOOOOOOhhhhhhhh that reminds me that I didn't do the #1 platformer. Alright, I'll get back to this discussion later. Remember when I revisited Will Smith?