Tim Brown on the Washington Nationals
A new ballpark and all that D.C. muscle the payroll hasn’t done much for the payroll.
This is the dawning of the age of Aquarius and also dragons
So I finished Dragon Age: Origins. It was okay. Combat is stupidly unbalanced; it’s lame and boring for the first half of the game, when you have no skills and no stamina and basically just autoswing everything to death, and then by the end of the game you have so many skills (and for some reason it starts pitching you hordes of low-level mobs all the time) that you just dominate every fight. There’s a small window of time in the middle where it evens out a bit — where you have enough skills and enough stamina that you have meaningful strategic choices in battle, but you’re not yet completely overpowered — and that’s fun for a little while, but even then it gets repetitive really quickly.
The skills are also boring. Apart from the Combat Training skill (which warriors and rogues need to put points in to get their actual abilities) and the Coercion skill (which enables the Persuade and Intimidate options), I often found myself just putting points wherever because I didn’t care about them.
Talents are fun, but they’re a very mixed bag. Some are great and some are lousy, and it can be hard to tell which is which before buying them. This problem is helped not at all by some of the descriptions being inaccurate — Cleansing Aura in particular sounds incredibly badass if you just read the tooltip, but that’s because it has a Dark Secret that the game doesn’t want to tell you.
The game often creates phony tension just by not giving you the right dialogue option; that’s really frustrating. Sometimes you’ll be forced into making a choice you don’t want to make simply because the option you want wasn’t provided to you. It’s also sometimes ambiguous exactly what your choices are; it provides you with the words, but not the tone of voice, and sometimes what you think is a totally innocuous question will turn out to have been sarcastic or rude or in some other way obnoxious. It also often "railroads" you by causing the mob you’re interacting with to assume you mean something you didn’t say.
The final battle is kind of lame. I’m not going to spoil anything here, but it sort of seems like a big dumb gimmick fight. Not as bad as the final battle in Shadows of Undrentide, mind you, but pretty bad. And it’s really easy. There were several earlier boss fights that were a whole lot harder than this.
The game’s plotting is pretty straightforward; this one won’t be winning any prestigious internet awards for having an awesome plot twist. The plot is, if anything, less twisty than you think it is; you’ll probably be expecting complications that just never arise.
It seems to my Designer’s Eye ™ as though the Bioware crew really put their hearts and souls into Orzammar. It’s a much more complex and nuanced area than anywhere else in the game, it’s absolutely packed with things to do, and it’s definitely the most intricately plotted. This is the closest the game comes to having plot twists, and there’s stuff near the end of the main quest that’s positively unsettling. It’s very well done on the whole.
In contrast to that, the Brecillian Forest mainly seems like it was thrown in because somebody was like "oh shit, we need an elf level." It’s short and simple and direct, it has very few quests or NPCs, and there’s a very easy resolution to the complications, which isn’t often the case. It also doesn’t seem to know what it’s about, since it gave me a HACHIEVE for "siding with the elves" when I’m fairly sure I did no such thing. But, hey, what are you going to do?
There are two major binary choices right near the end of the game, and they illustrate beautifully what I was talking about in this post about The Witcher. The first one seems forced, since there are clearly alternatives that could be explored except that the dialogue options won’t let you. That’s the kind of frustrating binary choice that leaves the player arguing with the game. The second one, though, works brilliantly — it’s a difficult, meaningful choice with no potential third option.
I liked the henchmen much better in Mass Effect, but I kind of think I was supposed to. Mass Effect is basically a hero story, where the good guys are super noble and flawless and shiny. Dragon Age is a darker story, and all the characters are supposed to seem fatally flawed. For myself, I prefer the Mass Effect-style noble hero characters, but it’s down to preference.
Now, just for fun, here’s a brief screenshot tour of the awesomeness that is me. No significant spoilers.
This is me. I’m a rakish sonuvabitch, hey? I’m even dramatically off the side of the frame like it’s Dragon Ball Z.
This is me with my woman. I’m giving her a little bit of the sweet lovin’. Hey baby, is it getting hot in here, or is that just my flaming sword? Hmm? Oh, it is the sword? Hey, watch out for — shit. Dammit! Wait, I’ll get some water. Here, hang on — dammit. Well, they’ll grow back. No, you look fine that way! Really! You’re still coming to bed with me, right?
Here’s an elf who doesn’t understand pronoun usage. Normally I wouldn’t call him out just for fucking up who/whom, but this case is particularly egregious. Same verb, same sentence, and yet he doesn’t seem to understand that he needs the same pronoun. Fucking elves. This is why we keep putting your kind down.
Here’s a door with the texture applied wrong. Don’t forget to test all the areas, guys! While you’re QAing that door texture, maybe you could also adjust the doorways that large characters — like my Great Bear — can’t fit through? That’s kind of a pain.
Last stop on the tour. This one I only published because I didn’t take it; this is one of the shots the game’s automatic significant-moment screenshot grabber pulled all by itself. Well done!
Offseason trade prediction craziness
Outfielder Brad Hawpe likely will not be traded because he has more value to the Rockies than anybody else
So spaketh Steve Henson in an otherwise sort-of kind-of fine article about what NL West teams are looking to do this offseason. I don’t know what Steve’s definition of "value" is, but Hawpe isn’t leading the Rockies in any significant offensive category (and, as near as I can tell, isn’t leading in any insignificant category either except for doubles), makes a medium-large amount of money ($5.5M in 2009), and is an absolute ridiculous butcher in the field (-13 FRAA for 2009; notoriously awful outfielder Manny Ramirez was at -4).
In other news, here’s a list of players Fangraphs says were more valuable to the Rockies in 2009 than Brad Hawpe:
• Troy Tulowitzki (awesome)
• Todd Helton (awesome)
• Seth Smith (also an outfielder)
• Carlos Gonzalez (also an outfielder)
• Chris Iannetta (part-time catcher)
• Clint Barmes (!)
Also the following pitchers:
• Ubaldo Jimenez (looks like the president)
• Jason Marquis (awful)
• Jason Hammel (who?)
• Jorge De La Rosa (got hurt at a rotten time)
• Aaron Cook (was hurt most of the year)
So, hey Steve, what does "value" mean in your world? And why does your projected starting outfield contain Hawpe, Gonzalez, and the fairly-terrible Dexter Fowler, and not the utterly awesome Seth Smith, whose salary will once again be in the hundreds of thousands of dollars? Is it because you are a crazy person?
Everything you want your closer to be
According to Braves GM Frank Wren, there are your priorities when considering a closer:
• Is fearless
• Has quality stuff
This explains why they traded for Billy Wagner; last year’s co-closer platoon was sorely lacking in these important categories, as Rafael Soriano was deathly afraid of spiders and Mike Gonzalez’ car was "sort of shit."
Baseball? In December?
Hey guys, I found a baseball article! It’s by Tim Brown, and it’s not terrible. It’s about how the Dodgers didn’t offer mediocre 32-year-old Randy Wolf arbitration. It’s here if you want to read the whole thing, but it’s not really outrageously bad. There’s just one little section of crazy in the middle:
Running the comparables, they apparently came up with pitchers such as Ryan Dempster ($12.5 million in 2010), Oliver Perez ($12 million) and Derek Lowe ($15 million), and they couldn’t have that, not after paying Wolf $5 million in ’09.
Yes, that makes sense. All of those pitchers are massively overpaid. That seems like smarter general managing than I’m used to from Ned Colletti, who likes nothing more than overpaying for mediocre veterans.
Thing is, Wolf was their best pitcher, on a staff that was far better than the sum of its parts.
No he sure damn wasn’t. He wasn’t even their best pitcher if you’re only talking about starters, and, hey, here’s a hint: the reason the Dodgers’ staff seemed, to you, to be "better than the sum of its parts" is mainly because you’ve forgotten about the bullpen. The Dodgers had an incredible bullpen this year, which definitely helped them weather some poor outings from their above-average-but-not-amazing rotation. Do you see? God damn, George Sherrill’s ERA+ with the Dodgers was 606. The Dodgers had an unreal bullpen.
At worst, he was their second-best pitcher to Clayton Kershaw, but threw 40-some more innings than Kershaw.
Again, you’re forgetting the bullpen. But, yes, Wolf was the Dodgers’ second-best starter, after Kershaw. BP puts Wolf’s DERA at 3.88 (only a little bit better than average), whereas Kershaw is at 3.34 (meaningfully better than average). Fangraphs’ FIP concurs, with Wolf at 3.96 and Kershaw at 3.08. Kershaw was a lot better. Wolf threw 43.1 innings more, which is definitely important, and you could claim he was more valuable as a result (BP would agree, giving him the edge, 4.6 to 4.5, though Fangraphs disagrees sharply and picks Kershaw, 4.2 to 3.0), but it’s pretty clear that Kershaw was better at actually pitching, but they’re easing him in due to his age, and he didn’t throw as many innings. He will throw more innings next year.
And the other thing is, every time they give up on Wolf they wish they had him back.
Every time? You mean literally every single one time? Since they’ve let him go one time.
They let him walk after ’07 and he killed it with Houston down the stretch in ’08.
That badass killed it with Houston to the tune of a 3.57 ERA, 1.302 WHIP, 2.38 K/BB, and 118 ERA+. What Tim doesn’t mention is how he killed it with San Diego for the first half of that season, which was: 4.74 ERA, 1.421 WHIP, 2.23 K/BB, and 80 ERA+, which was very similar to the numbers he put up for the Dodgers in 2007. 2007 was also the only year he pitched for the Dodgers. I can’t believe they gave up on him after such a long and distinguished service! Jim Tracy would never give up on Clint Barmes after that amount of time.
They rode him through ’09, then pushed him to the back of the NLCS rotation, which didn’t turn out to be a great idea.
Randy Wolf, NLCS: 5.1 IP, 4 H, 1 HR, 2 BB, 2 K. You’re right: that wasn’t a great idea. They should have played Sherrill instead.
They’re going to need starting pitching. And there was nothing wrong with paying Randy Wolf. Or taking the chance of paying Randy Wolf.
There is something wrong with paying Randy Wolf $12-15 million for one year. His ERA+ from 2005-2008: 84, 94, 92. Career: 103. The one thing the Dodgers’ front office does well is not pay dudes tons of money for career years; they like old, broken-down veterans better.
That’s it. Not great, I know, but the best I can do in December. When the hot stove really gets going I’m sure I’ll get some awesome piece about how well Eric Byrnes will fit in on the Cubs due to his leadership and mouth, and I can write six thousand words about that and then kill myself.
Things that bug me about Dragon Age: Origins
Come on. You knew it was coming. Dragon Age: Origins, like all Bioware games, has some really fun stuff and some desperately lame stuff. So here’s a list, in no particular order, of some of the lame stuff.
First, the title. "Dragon Age: Origins" is a lousy title. Yeah, I get that they’re trying to position this as the first game in some epic Dragon Age arc, but still. A title like that will make people think there’s some other game out there called just "Dragon Age" that this is a prequel to, much like with this other game. Probably the better choice for the first game in the series would be just "Dragon Age," which is snappier and what people are calling it anyhow. Or maybe "Dragonage" with no space, so people could be all "whoa, that’s some bitchin’ Dragonage you got there, elfbrah!"
Combat is hilariously bad. I mean really, desperately unfun. It follows the lead of award-winning RPG of the decade Final Fantasy 12 in requiring you to program your henchmen before battle, which is a giant pain in the ass, though at least you don’t have to collect the stupid tactics like you do in FF12. The AI is still, however, bone-stupid, and no amount of fucking with the tactics menu will get your dudes not to stand in AOE damage until they die, even if you explicitly choose a tactics mode that says it moves them out of AOE. The stamina system is also very unfun; it’s very much like the rogue energy mechanic from World of Warcraft, except that the regen rate is hilariously low. So, just like a WOW rogue, you do two attacks and that pretty much empties your meter. But, much unlike a WOW rogue, you then stand around for about a minute before you regen enough energy to attack a third time. Combat sucks so much that I really suggest you just set the game to easy so you can minimise the amount you need to care about it.
No matter what difficulty level you choose, the big seige battle in Redcliffe sucks balls. It goes on way too long, and you spend most of the time really wishing you could taunt the mobs that just showed up so they won’t murder your rogue and all those NPCs, only you can’t, because taunt is on a cooldown way longer than the mob spawn timer and you have no stamina anyhow. It reminded me of nothing so much as the bit in Kingdom Hearts 2 where you have to kill a thousand nobodies (this number, unlike almost all numbers I ever use, is actually literally true: it is one thousand mobs), and it goes on goddamn forever, and you’re thinking "man, will this ever actually be over?" And, no, it never will.
The game’s dialogue doesn’t always appear to agree with what’s happening. The most egregious example would be in Tapster’s Tavern, where you can get a drink from the bartender. She tells you that a mug of ale will cost you three silvers. If you accept, the actual amount you pay is two copper. That’s… a pretty big disconnect there, game. Sure, it would be worse if it were in the other direction, but it’s kind of weird that it happens at all.
It’s weird how, if you’re ever like playfully flirtatious with another party member at any point ever, it sets you on-track for a romance angle with that party member. Which, yes, leads to complications if you flirt with more than one. Ever. This seems very weird to me, because I, in real life, am the biggest flirt of all time. I flirt with everybody, all the time, and I have never had this issue with everybody around falling madly in love with me. Maybe everybody in Dragon Age is just really desperate? Or maybe I’m just oblivious? Or maybe I’m just ugly. Actually, yeah, that’s probably it.
Dragon Age has more sex than Mass Effect did, but the quality of the sex scenes is lower. Apparently, in the realm of Dragon Age, people have sex with their underwear still on, which seems weird to me. Does that make any sense to anybody? I mean, for Mass Effect, they made special sex-scene skins with no underwear and just, like, didn’t point the camera at the AO bits. I guess that was too much work to bother with for Dragon Age, so they left everybody’s underwear on, which combines with the rather badly-done facial expressions to make the scenes a little weird. Hey, why are the facial expressions so wack in this game, Bioware? Everybody’s sad face has like this weird, pinched-together, M-shaped kind of look. It’s just bizarre — kind of looks like a zombie face (!). What was I talking about? Ah yes — the sex. Unlike Mass Effect, there are multiple opportunities per playthrough. And, unlike Neverwinter Nights, you can go to the whorehouse without getting a lecture about women’s lib. Also there’s gay sex if that’s your thing.
Dragon Age has a lot of really, really obvious plot twists. Plot twists even more obvious than those of award-winning bestest plot-twistiest game of the decade Bioshock. There’s a big plot twist in the human noble origin story that I saw coming as soon as the character in question was introduced. There’s another one as Ostagar that went pretty much the same way. Just a hint here that might help you in the future, Bioware: if a character’s going to turn out to be a traitor, probably don’t have him speak in a slimy bad-guy voice. And don’t give him sunken eyes or arching grey eyebrows. Those are like the quintessential warning signs of impending betrayal.
Quest items take up bag space, and you’ll get a damn lot of them. I spent a good portion of the early midgame struggling to fit anything in my bags, since I hadn’t bought so many backpacks yet and I was loaded up with like 20 quest items. That’s a little rough, since there isn’t even any way that I can find to get rid of a quest or its item other than completing it.
I have to hand it to Bioware on this one: so far I haven’t gotten an unprovoked lecture about racism, but I’m assuming there’s one waiting for me in the alienage in Denerim, or possibly in the elfy forest I can’t remember the name of. I have, of course, gotten unprovoked lectures about sexism and ageism, and also a lecture about stereotyping people in general.
Hey, Bioware? If you’re going to base your game on Le Morte d’Arthur, that’s fine — it’s an awesome story that doesn’t really get enough play in video games — but it’s a little bit hacky to name the witch in the woods "Morrigan." And also, hey, let’s call a grail a grail, shall we? "Urn of Sacred Ashes" my aching ass.
Also, here’s a neat thing: remember when Castlevania: Lament of Innocence came out, and there was that business about how it was inspired by Devil May Cry, which was itself a Castlevania ripoff? The same thing happens in Dragon Age, which owes a damn lot to The Witcher, which was itself a Neverwinter Nights knockoff. Good times!
Anybody else get the feeling that Bioware was trying to make some kind of statement with the emphasis on matriarchal culture? Every three steps you take there’s somebody explicitly telling you about how all priests are female, and such-and-such dwarven paragon is a woman, and, hell, even Jesus was a woman in Dragon Age. I just hope she doesn’t turn out to be a demon like the transparent Jesus figure in some other game.
Where I am in the game right now, it actually seems like the church might not be corrupt and evil, which would make this the very first video game ever with an organised church that isn’t. There’s still time, though, and like it keeps telling me: nobody knows where the archdemon of this blight is! Except that I think I know perfectly damn well where the archdemon is, and that location is not: Val Royeaux. But we shall see.
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This site supports killing Hitler if you ever find yourself traveling back in time to when Hitler wasn’t already dead.
