Tolkien has long been the foundation on which nearly all subsequent fantasy works have been built. Elves, Dwarves, Orcs and many other fantasy staples were codified by Tolkien in his various stories about Middle-Earth.  How often do you see an Elf described in a fantasy novel that doesn’t bear some resemblance to the Tolkien archetype? And for that matter, how many fantasy realms do you see without Elves? There are some, but they are fewer in number than those that stick to the Tolkien formula.

Tolkien clearly influenced the design of Dungeons and Dragons in the late 70s and 80s which in turn went on to influence a great many fantasy novels set in the D&D multiverse from the 80s through the present.  Some of these were good reads, others not so much, but they all served as a pool of fiction that inspired the minds of the fantasy-inclined and reinforced the Tolkien ideal.  While every new fantasy series that came along created a new setting, world rules and menagerie, they were consciously or subconsciously carving out their own territory in a landscape created by Tolkien.

Enter China Mieville.  Earning a B.A. in social anthropology from Cambridge and a Masters and PhD in International Relations from the London School of Economics, Mieville has set out to sweep aside the conventions that Tolkien has established.  His disdain for what he calls Tolkien’s “article of policy that a fantasy writer should mollycoddle the reader” is apparent in his statement that, “Tolkien is the wen on the arse of fantasy literature.”

Mieville’s style is that of contemporary literary fiction fused with the fantastical.  His work plays well to intelligent adults, and never once feels like it is dipping into the valley of young-adult writing where things are fast, glossy and shallow.  He and a few other writers have been said to be pioneering the ‘New Weird’ style of fiction, a sort of anti-authoritarian response to the Tolkien-esque dictatorship over the fantasy genre, but while that description might conjure the image of teenage rebellion, Mieville simply walks past tradition and sets up shop a long way down the street.  You won’t find a new coat of paint on an old set of conventions here.

His new book Kraken takes place in contemporary London, complete with references to everything from Google, to the singer MIA, to Star Trek and more.  Mieville’s London is our London, but with some additions that become apparent to those Londoners who know which message boards to read.  Religious cults dedicated to old and forgotten Gods (which actually exist)?  Check.  Demonic Duos?  Check.  Entities spawned from collective memory?  Check.  Sentient Tattoos?  Check.  Familiars?  Check (but don’t try to hire one, they’re on strike, and the union leader doesn’t take scabbing lightly).  Magic?  Sort of.  See, in Mieville’s world you won’t find sorcerers blasting away at each other with pyrotechnic displays of force or secreting themselves away in a tower in the pursuit of ever more wisdom, instead those endowed with the gift simply have a ‘knack’ for doing certain things.  Need something big made smaller?  Find someone with the knack for folding.  They can take your object and fold it down like origami.

Kraken is unique in the way that the setting is just as interesting as the story.  It never feels like Mieville has a staff of interns holding up cardboard facades on wooden sticks as the main characters trundle past on their way to complete their journey.  And while there are a few minor holes here and there Kraken is always coherent and believable.

If you enjoy fantasy, or contemporary literary fiction, Kraken is well worth your time.

The Pride festival is this weekend and those who count themselves among the gay, or the gay friendly are getting excited.  The tents and fencing around the City/County building festival grounds started going up a few days ago and friends are already making plans to celebrate.  Its been nothing but Pride weekend event advertising on Facebook for the last 2 weeks and the local a(A)lternative press have been running ads for all sorts of ancillary parties, club nights and events for a month.  And while there are many unofficial events, the festival proper has a deep schedule of things to see and do throughout the weekend.

I’ve heard from some people that the Salt Lake Pride is one of the biggest in the country.  Having never been to one outside of the state of Utah I wouldn’t know.  What I do know is that we have an amazing gay community in this city, and one that has been reflected here at XMission stretching back nearly to the dawn of the company in 1993.  I’d like to thank Pete Ashdown for cultivating such an accepting and diverse workplace at XMission (a ‘proud’ sponsor of Pride!), and I’d like to thank my gay coworkers and friends – Harley, Roger, Matt, Jeff, Chris and Mikey especially – for making Salt Lake City a much more vibrant place to work and live!

I have to admit, I wasn’t always a fan of soccer (football!).  Growing up I wasn’t the most in shape kid in the neighborhood so when my parents signed me up for a local city league it was like torture.  I dreaded practice and I hated games… all that running!  Later I played indoor soccer, but our teams weren’t ever very good (probably because I sucked) and so soccer never clicked with me.  Based on these early experiences I carried a passive indifference to the sport with me all the way through my twenties.

Years later while working here at XMission, I had seen several of my coworkers crowded around the big screen in the break room avidly watching various European matches of teams I’d never heard of and considered them with bewilderment.   I’m also pretty sure I openly mocked them for their dedication to the sport on a few occasions.  But then something happened.  I found out XMission was sponsoring the newly formed Real Salt Lake team.  Part of the package included tickets to every home game that were up for grabs for those employees who were interested.  As it turned out, the diehards here already had seasons which decreased the ratio of employees to tickets down to a manageable level.  Never one to turn down a free anything (I previously had spent several boring Sundays watching Buzz games while we were sponsoring that team.  Never underestimate the entertainment value of cheering on the first base coach when the action of Triple A baseball fails to impress!) I signed up for a couple of games.

Because I had no clue about the rules of the MLS, I brought along a friend who had played and enjoyed way more soccer than I had and was glad to come along and babysit me through my first live match.  I honestly didn’t think I was going to enjoy it, outside of the ‘hey its something to do on a Saturday afternoon’, but by the end of the first half I was hooked.  I started to see why this sport was so addictive.  I won’t bore you with the interim details but by the end of that season I was watching away games at bars, following other teams and I had even gone so far as to purchase the Sega game ‘Football Manager‘ so I could get my fix during the week between games.

Even though now I was enjoying soccer I still hadn’t gotten into the European leagues, and the concept of callups, national teams U-21 and U-17 was still a foreign (cough) concept to me.  Feeling the World Cup buzz though, I decided to sign up for FoxSoccer.tv to start to educate myself on the teams and players the US National team would be facing in South Africa this June.  One of the first matches I decided to watch was a Semi-Final (I think) UEFA Champions League game between Manchester United and Bayern München.  Manchester United dominated in the first half, scoring three times to Bayern München’s single goal.  After the half though Bayern was a team on a mission.  Tightly focused, they turned the momentum of the game around and kept Manchester on the defense for the rest of the game.  Although they were pressing the attack they only converted that momentum into a single goal and at the buzzer the score was Manchester United 3, Bayern München 2.

And this is where things got weird.  Manchester United walked off the field with their heads down, dejected, frustrated and upset, while Bayern München was dancing in the field and participating in group cheers with the small section of away fans that had taken up residence in the upper stadium.  Had I misjudged which team was which the entire match?  I felt a little embarrassed, even though nobody could even have been aware of my confusion.  Why was the winning team sad and the losing team obviously celebrating a grand victory?  I decided to check out the uniform patches and sure enough they matched up.  I was reading the score correctly.  Clearly more research was required.

I headed over to the ufea.com site and started poking around.  After a couple of minutes I found this page http://www.uefa.com/uefachampionsleague/matches/index.html which contained a sidebar explaining the rules of the tournament.  As it turns out, the matches were decided by most goals scored in a 2 game set.  Apparently Bayern had scored more goals in their previous meeting and had come out on top, even with the loss.  Suddenly I understood:  I was in unexplored territory, the rules of the MLS completely failing to prepare for the new world of international soccer (football!) that lay before me.

The final match in the UEFA Champions League tournament is this Saturday 5-19-2010 at 12:30 MST and you can bet I will be watching it live.  The soccer bug has bitten again.  The World Cup is coming up quick and I will be taking in as many games as I can.  You might even see me at a pub cheering for the US National team, or simply enjoying a high-caliber game of the worlds most popular sport.  I’ll be the guy in the jersey having a blast.

Last year around this time I wrote an article for our blog mentioning several of the stellar titles that were shipping in time for the holidays.  Some of them ended up being awesome, and some not quite as much, but it’s clear that last Christmas was fantastic in terms of new games being released.

This year I’m going to do something a little different.  I’ll still be talking about some new releases but they’ll mainly be focused on titles that have already shipped and that I’ve had a chance to play.  And rather than try to analyze them critically and attach a numerical score to their merits I’ll simply endeavor to point out interesting aspects of the game and overall experience.   What this means is there’s going to be an emphasis placed on PS3 games, since thats the platform I use most often.  And now, on to the games!

First up is Uncharted 2.  This is the sequel to a game that I never played when it was released.  It looked too much like Tomb Raider for my taste and I never bothered to try it.  So, going into Uncharted 2, I didn’t have many expectations other than to see what everyone was so giddy over.  I picked it up to play for an hour and call it good but became so engrossed that I played it at every opportunity over the course of the next 3 weeks until I had finished it.  This alone says something about the game because I play so many that I rarely have the interest or time to complete one from start to finish.

The gameplay itself is a sort of mashup of stealth action in the style of Metal Gear, cover-based gunplay in the style of Gears of War and hand to hand fighting similar to many 3rd person beat-em-ups.   None of the various elements on their own are very standout, but they work well enough together to give you a variety of (fun) options in completing a level.

Where this game really shines (and shines and shines) is in its story and presentation.  The levels are designed so that big things can happen to you while you play and you’ll still be able to retain full control of your character during the event.  Things that are relegated to cinematics in other games remain fully playable in Uncharted 2.   The story is something because, while it borrows conventions from nearly every action adventure movie in existence, it never felt snooze-inducingly derivative and had enough twists and turns to keep me wanting to play more to see how it progressed.  The writing is well done and the voice acting is head and shoulders above nearly every game I’ve played before.

The easiest way to describe this game would be to call it an interactive cinematic adventure.  Much like a great TV series such as Battlestar Galactica or the first season of Heroes, Uncharted 2 kept me coming back for more.

The next game on deck is Demons Souls.  This game pretty much came out of nowhere and I didn’t even hear about it until the day of its release.  I’m glad I did though because this game is amazing.  From top to bottom this game has been crafted meticulously and it really shows.

Demons Souls is a clumsily titled action RPG that has passing similarities to many games in its genre.  You control your avatar, get loot, level up and slay demons.  What sets this game apart from the rest is its masterfully crafted atmosphere and insane difficulty.  The game is designed in a manner that if you just go in swinging you’ll be dead at the first demon.  Combat feels weighty but never slow and the animations really convey the feeling that swinging a sword is difficult.  You also discover that swinging a sword without getting stabbed in the ribs is also difficult.  And while combat is tough, it’s not unfair, and soon you learn the timing of your weapons as well as all the dark corners where nasty things are hiding to murder you.  Expect to die and die and die, but also expect to have a lot of fun doing it.

The atmosphere is also top-notch.  Environments range from the ramparts and halls of a castle the size of a small city, to claustrophobic mines and creepy asylums as well as several others.  The level designs are well thought out and do a great job of selling the feeling that this is a maximalist interpretation of dark heroic fantasy.  In the levels you rarely meet other humans, even as enemies, and when you do they are corrupted husks or gruffly annoyed with your presence.  This really helps give you a feeling of loneliness as you play.  The game has a quasi online mode where you can see the ghosts of other people who are playing the game at the same time as you, but they fade in and out, lasting only a few moments at a time.   You can’t interact with these ghosts but they are a great addition.

Be warned:  this game is super tough, but the difficulty is very rewarding.  My recommendation?  Play it alone with the lights off.

I’ve played quite a few of the games I listed in the earlier post, but a few have been taking up more time than others while a single title really dominated my time.  A quick recap of each follows:

Fable 2 – Much much better than the first Fable.  Pay little attention to the storyline, the real fun here is amassing a fortune in order to buy out all the real estate, marrying as many spouses as you can get away with and just generally existing in the world.  Biggest complaint?  The weapons system sucks.  Without hardly trying you can have the best weapons by mid-game.  When you’re raking in money hand over fist from your real estate investments it would be nice to have something to spend it on.

Force Unleashed – Not the greatest Star Wars title ever to grace a screen, but a very fun game none-the-less.  The moves system is pretty deep, and the character upgrades system is fun.  Even if your budget can’t fit this title in it’s definitely worth a rent for the weekend.

Rock Band 2 – Meh.  More of the same I guess.  While there are some truly epic and fun songs on this outing overall I liked the track selection of Rock Band 1 better.  Depending on your musical tastes your milage may vary widely from mine.

Left 4 Dead – Haven’t picked this up, but the demo was pretty fun.  Its next on my list of purchases.

Warhammer Online – This game is a real blast. The PVP scenarios are super fun, and regardless of what anyone says the Witch Hunter class is awesome.  I’d imagine it would be harder to consistently place in the top 5 with a class that was really actually broken.  If you’re looking for a new MMO and you’re sick of WoW like I am, give this one a go.  I’m sure you’ll like it.

Fallout 3 – WHOAH.  This game has sucked more hours out of me than any game in recent memory.  In fact, I can’t remember spending as much time just exploring since I played Morrowind.  Fallout 3 does away with all of the problems I had with Oblivion, namely the terrible interface, quick travel and scaling enemies.  This is a true 100/100 game; placing Bioshock and Fallout 3 side by side makes Bioshock look like an 85/100 by comparison.  If you only have the budget for one game this season make it Fallout 3.  Let me repeat that.  Buy Fallout 3 right now.  Its that good, I promise.

Left 4 Dead, November 20th – Multiplayer zombie battles!  This game promises to be one of the biggest multiplayer online shooters since Counterstrike made you miss your birthday party, graduation, wedding and birth of your first child oh so many years ago.  Pitting you and 3 other human-flavored zombie snax against hordes of animated rotting corpses, Left 4 Dead incorporates an AI ‘director’ that dynamically alters the action, sounds and music depending on how your team is doing.  Hopefully this feature is actually cool, and not just marketing box-speak for stuff that games have been doing since 2005.

Warhammer Online, Sept 18th – I’ve been in the beta for this for a couple months and I have to say it’s the most fun I’ve had in pvp since Unreal Tournament 3.  The rewards system is highly developed, earning you loot, xp and money for pvp kills, as well as renown points that increase your pvp rank, give you access to pvp vendor loot and provide a way to add permanent (and noticeable) bonuses to your stats.  Another cool feature is that your guild is an entity in the game world and levels up with its members, providing access to a guilds-only tavern, standard bearers and guild specific buffs.  This idea is VERY cool.  Not to mention that the atmosphere and background story is outstanding.  Some of those people new to Warhammer might complain that some of the setting elements are too similar to WoW, and I have to agree.  Warhammer has been around as a table top wargame for over 20 years.  Where do you think the Warcraft devs got most of their ideas?  It wasn’t from playing My Little Pony Horse Princess Adventures, I can assure you.

Endwar, November 14th – It’s been a while since I’ve played a good RTS, and Tom Clancy’s Endwar is shaping up to be something interesting.  The biggest difference between this and your garden variety Command and Conquer clone is that you control your forces with voice activated commands via headset.  Most of the previews give this mechanic a thumbs up, so we’ll see if it turns out to be a revolution for RTS games, or merely a gimmick to push a few copies at Christmas.

Red Alert 3, October 27th – Red Alert was always my favorite Command and Conquer game, and now there’s a new once coming out using the CnC3 engine.  And the best part?  This time The Empire of the Rising Sun is stepping up to take on America and the Soviets for total world domination.

Wrath of the Lich King, November 13th – Just kidding, I hate WoW! 

So there you have it.  Enough games to keep you occupied into the wee hours of the morning for the next several months.  Try not to fail your classes!

This go-around I’m going to talk about the games that I’m excited to play.  This isn’t a list of what’s going to be hot, and I’m sure most of you will think, “But what about Super Ultra PS3 Game X Part 2: The Sequeling??”  First of all, there’s no such game, and second, if it’s not interesting to me it’s not going on the list.  I’m also only going to talk about games for platforms that I own, because getting all worked up for a game I can’t even play is kinda silly, don’t you think?  Fear not though, because my collection includes all 3 current-gen platforms, a PC, DS and PSP.

First up is the 360.  Why?  Because it was the first of the current round of consoles that I procured.  Thats why.

Rock Band 2, September 14th: What needs to be said about this game?  The only way you could NOT have heard of it is if you’ve been sleeping under a rock on Mars for the last few years.  This year’s go around features a bunch of new songs, the most interesting of which is Eye of the Tiger, by Survivor.  That’s right, the inspirational rock epic from Rocky III is here to get you fired up to take on the challenge of your rival.  You’ll need it, especially if your rival is either XM staffer <rook> or <moebius> (I know I do).

Fable 2, October 21st: I want this game because it promises to be one or to things that Fable 1 promised to be.  Maybe I should be getting excited for Fable 3 instead…

Gears of War 2, November 7th: Mainly because I’d like to see the ending of the first Gears of War.

On to the Wii!  Wait.  There’s nothing awesome coming out for this console if you’re older than say, 9.  There are some must-haves for this system though, so let’s recap.  If you have a Wii, and you don’t already own these my recommendation is the following: sell it to someone who actually enjoys playing video games.

• Super Smash Bros Brawl
• Legend of Zelda Twilight Princess
• Super Mario Galaxy
• Metroid Prime 3

The PS3 has a pretty shallow catalog, which makes me kinda sad.  The last big release was Metal Gear Solid 4, and the rest of big titles for Christmas are all cross-platform 360/PC games.  Nevertheless I love the PS3 menu system, and the DualShock 3 controller is way better than anything else out there, so xplat as these games may be, I’ll be getting them for the PS3.

Star Wars: The Force Unleashed, September 16th: I played the demo of this, and while not as jaw droppingly revolutionary as all the hype would have me believe, I actually had a good time playing it.  The Star Wars atmosphere and feel of the game is second only to the original Knights of the Old Republic.  Should be a fun play, but I doubt it will be one I find myself talking about with friends 5 years from now.

Dead Space, September 14th: I love horror.  I love science fiction, and I absolutely love science fiction horror (I’m looking at you Alien) so this should be the perfect thing for me.  Assuming the game is actually fun to play of course.

Fallout 3, October 28th: Fallout 1 and 2 are some of my most favorite games of all time.  I was even fortunate enough to be able to attend the Fallout 2 launch party in California in 1998.  Then the Fallout franchise was sold to Bethesda.  Bethesda rocked my socks off with Elder Scrolls: Arena, Daggerfall and Morrowind, and then they released the atrocious Oblivion.  Raped of any sense of progression or accomplishment, and bereft of any real reward for exploration, Oblivion was a boring slog from start to finish.  Pretty landscapes though!  So this game could go either way.  I’m buying it in the hopes Bethesda can return to the greatness of their earlier works and produce a Fallout sequel worthy of its predecessors.

Stay tuned for PC games later in the week!

If you have a DSL router with a DHCP server that is on by default (Actiontec 1524/GT701/GT704/M1000, 2Wire 2701HG), getting your PS3 online is a simple matter of plugging in an ethernet cable and firing up your PS3.

Once you’re at the XMB (Xross Media Bar – Sony loves crazy acronyms!) navigate over to the settings icon, then down to ‘Network Settings’, which should be at the bottom of the list.  Hit X and scroll down to ‘Internet Connection Settings’.  Select ‘Easy’ and press right on the D-pad.  The PS3 will attempt to automatically discover the network settings.  If successful, a Settings List will be displayed.  Review this if you like, then press X.  After you do this you will be prompted to test the settings.  Hit X again to start the test.  If ‘Obtain an IP Address’ and ‘Internet Connection’ both show ‘Succeeded’ then you’re ready to start using your PS3 online!

If you have a Cisco 675/678 router you will need to manually configure the PS3 settings.  From the Internet Connection Settings menu select Custom > Wired Connection > Manual Settings > Auto-Detect > Manual.  At this screen you are presented with 5 settings.  Enter the following addresses in the corresponding field:

• IP Address: 10.0.0.10 (or any unused number between .10 and .255)
• Subnet Mask: Leave at 255.255.255.0
• Default Router: 10.0.0.1
• Primary DNS: 198.60.22.2
• Secondary DNS: 198.60.22.22

After you’ve entered these settings keep pressing right until you get to the settings list.  Review it to be sure there are no errors then press the X button to save your settings.

Voilà, your PS3 is now ready to connect to the network.  Once connected, be sure to stop by the PlayStation Store to check out new demos, free themes (the Metal Gear Solid 4 theme is especially nice) and more!