The Path is a “horror adventure” game by developer Tale of Tales that acts as a retelling of Little Red Riding Hood set in modern times.  With absolutely no combat and a plethora of exploration this game definitely caries the indie torch.  But while there’s a lot to be admired about The Path, it occasionally sink into old video game cliches.

I’ve been looking forward to this game’s release for a little while now, but I can’t whole-heartedly say that it’s completely met my expectations.  This is mostly because The Path is trying harder than previous Tale of Tales entries to be like all the other games.  Item collection and a grade at the end for “how well you did” are typical cliches in the video gaming world, and definitely two of my least favorite.  While trying to gain a larger audience the developers of The Path have sunk to this level from their non-traditional origins.

I don’t use this lightly, because it’s a dirty word that should almost never be uttered, but The Path is (cover your children’s ears) pretentious.  The first sign is the game’s main objective “Don’t wander from the path.”  Well, you have to wander from the path or else you “fail.”  Because of that dumb grading system the only way you can actually “succeed” is by frolicking off into the wilderness, meeting a stranger, letting your little girl get raped, and then shuffling to granny’s pad a dramatized wreck.  The aforementioned pretension comes from The Path’s attempt to send out some sort of message about “forging your own path” or “making your own rules,” but I’m not sure that’s really what it’s about, because if I get raped in the end I’d be happier not wandering too far off.  The letter grade at the end of a play through is a tell-tail sign of generic, unoriginal thinking.  To put it another way, The Path tries hard to be smarter than it actually is.

A slow moving gameplay should alienate all but the most patient players, but there’s nothing wrong with patience.  The incredibly slow pace of the little girls can be exchanged for running while the camera shifts to an awkward overhead view, so the game really does want player’s to take things slow.  The environment is dark and mysterious, and fairly interesting to explore.  Music is creepy, making one dread every step they take away from grandma’s house.  So exploring the scary woods has just the right atmosphere to keep the player looking around nervously, while still intrigued.

The two biggest highlights of The Path are grandma’s house and the “wolves.”  The wolves are the people you’ll run into out in the forest, and at least every time I’ve met one it ended badly.  They’re intriguing, scary, and sometimes a little bit too creepy (i.e. don’t take cigarettes from that nice, handsome boy).  That stupid grade at the end of the game aside, the fun really does come from frolicking off into the wilderness, meeting a stranger, letting your little girl get raped and then shuffling to granny’s pad a dramatized wreck.  Then inside of grandma’s house the camera moves to first person and no matter what you press you’ll keep going forward.  This gives a fantastic feeling of helplessness.  And whatever fate you meet decides what grandma’s house will look like on the inside, and sometimes where you’ll go inside the house.

While The Path is an interesting concept and a unique play, it feels like Tale of Tales’ sell-out game.  So hopefully their next release will be a first person shooter with bullet time (OH BOY!).  But, even with all it’s weaknesses The Path is a lot more compelling than 90% of what’s out there.

Ten dollars on Steam is all it takes to get a copy of this game, and I think whether it’s worth buying is largely up to the kind of person you are.  If you love video games as a potential art form and have a lot of patience, I’m going to most certainly recommend it.  If you are the kind of person that just wants to have fun blasting the heads of baddies, please oh please do not buy.

A Final Thought: I would like to see more games trying to be daring and different, instead of seeing a company known for being daring and different trying to make something more like all the other games.

Oh, and Final Final Thought: You don’t always get raped.  Just sometimes…

Konami – Silent Hill – Tears Of…

Wow… opinions were quite varied on this game.. And while I’ve been told that I’m the only one in the entire free world that could have a shred of doubt when it comes to this huge release, I’m gonna have to stick to my guns. So here you have it, both Keith Stidham, and I, Tom Webster duke it out over what RE5 is and could have been. Seriously people, blood is everywhere from the fist to cuffs!
Tom:
Resident Evil… when the first game came out, it revitalized and changed the way people looked at Survival Horror games, essentially breathing life into this gigantic genre that we all know and love. What Capcom did with this amazing game is recreate it. Not to say it wasn’t enjoyable, I liked RE2, I played through it, it was enjoyable. But it was basically an expansion pack for Resident Evil. Same graphics, animations, concept. This happens more often than not in this industry. Well, that game was remade and released countless times under various numbers and subtitles until that one glorious day: Resident Evil 4. At one time a true Gamecube exclusive, Capcom took up their sword to retrieve their fallen kingdom. They once again reigned as champions of a genre, truly recreating what “Survival Horror” meant to video games. Sadly enough, though, it seems this once righteous king has slipped back into his old ways.
Capcom has once again capitalized on their huge success with Resident Evil 4 and we all should have seen it coming. I was worried when I first saw the trailers of RE5, noticing that Capcom chose to use the exact same animations that were in RE4 for this new game. I threw these worries away thinking, “Ok… its just a trailer, a tech demo, a teaser, they used the same content from 4 just to show off what they have been working on… they’ll change it by release.” Needless to say, I was completely wrong. Not only have they recycled animations, but they’ve recycled all of Resident Evil 4. I’m not saying this is a crime against humanity, I loved Resident Evil 4. I love Leon kicking ass and not bothering to take names, I liked the new creatures and how everything was very do or die, but when I see “Resident Evil 5″, I expect something different. Sure, take the same concept, the amazing balls-to-the-wall run and gun action, take the terrifying “Fast Zombies”, but do something different with it. Capcom has instead chosen to re-skin Leon and make an expansion pack that adds co-op. Now I love co-op as much as the next guy, and its quite a nice change to have a computer-controlled partner behave intelligently, but the game is just Resident Evil 4 with a makeover. I don’t mind the core gameplay being the same, I think they really hit on something good with 4, but I do have a problem with reusing the same animations, voice clips, and enemy AI as the previous game in the series. It seems lazy to me. If you’re going to call this game Resident Evil 5, it should be more than a cosmetic change, there should be something fundamentally better about RE5 than RE4. Capcom should give me a reason to buy this game other than “Umm.. its in Africa (among other place), looks, smells, plays, and feels like RE4.. and LOOK OVER HERE CO-OP!”
With this demo, and that’s just what it is, a DEMO, Capcom has once again let me down. Granted: Its not a finished product. The current release date for this game is March 26, 2009. Other than basic bug testing, the game is done, they can’t change the game enough to differentiate itself from RE4 by that date. Unless Capcom pulls a Nintendo and pushes the release back another six months, don’t expect another Resident Evil game, expect an expansion pack, because that’s exactly what it is.

PS- I’m a little bitch and I take it in the butt everyday, but I use Vaseline so I only have a small rash.

Keith:

That time again: Listen!

We do have a ton of new content in here, and on Wednesday, we will be doing a live video stream of the podcast! Stay tuned for updates!

72 Pin Connector Podcast: Episode 021 – Horror Games Part 2