So “why The Back Page?” you might ask yourself.

Let's open the news to the back page...

Simply put, ever morning our local paper features all its heterogeneous miscellany on its back page.  As what we wish to write about today are only loosely related, at least for today, we will have the same bent.

First up…Fallen Earth

We have noted a few concerns in the blogosphere lately regarding Fallen Earth and what the virtual residents of post apocalyptic Arizona know as “sector 3” (there are three sectors total).  Apparently, there are those among Fallen Earth’s high level residents who have felt a bit of a dearth of PvP activity.  There is, of course, a problem with those who manage to summit to the heights of any game’s level cap early in the game’s life cycle and this is it:

Fallen Earth hasn’t even been out for two months yet. As a result we will just bet “dollars to donuts” that the bulk of the participants are still making their way through S1 and S2, stopping to smell the virtual roses and cope with their virtual antagonists. This will not always be the case, of course – As the population ages you will surely find more pvp action in S3. 

This of course leaves the same question that always seems to arise in pvp orientated games or sectors of games that have pvp: That is why do players pvp? For what Richard Gariott calls “Inventory management”? (In other words the ability to gain better and better gear).  World of Warcraft has proven that concept works. As we have always said, never underestimate the staggering drawing power of materialism.   Do people pvp for the enjoyment of it? Julie does, but we think she is in the minority. What about artificially instilled allegiance to one faction or the other?  That didn’t work out so well for Warhammer Online, but perhaps if there had been more than two factions (as seems to be the case here) it will work out better.

The danger, of course, is that in comparing any newly developed game to a well established game you hold the new game to a higher standard than is its due.  Every game that comes out has a few rough spots as the devs continue to find out exactly what the community wants out of the game. That, of course, is a tough process to begin with, as many times what some players want out of a game is in direct contravention to what other players want out of a game.

Next up…

The Associated press recently featured a review of Call of Duty, Modern Warfare 2 (MW2) entitled “Who Needs Plot?” written by one “Lou Kesten”.  About half way through the review, the author bemoaned the lack of a better plot, saying the following:

“MW2 is filled with such mind-blowing settings, from the slums of Rio de Janeiro to the snowy mountains of Russia. It’s in getting from one set piece to the next that developer Infinity Ward stumbles.”

The author goes on to say the following…

“Granted, the plot isn’t much more ridiculous than typical season of ‘24’”

The reviewer’s comments put us here at the No Prisoners, No Mercy team in mind of some of the reviews of Transformer 2: Revenge of the Fallen.  One local critic, Dann Gire, described the movie thusly (see excerpt below):

“The plot, treated here as an optional element, involves the emergence of the evil The Fallen (voiced by Tony Todd), a Decepticon that can only be destroyed by one of the seven Autobot Primes, except that last one, Optimus Prime (voiced by Peter Cullen), sacrificed himself to save Sam’s life.” – Dann Gire

Film Director Michael Bay had the following response to some of the negative reviews, as reported by the Los Angeles Times.

“I think they reviewed the wrong movie. They just don’t understand the movie and its audience. It’s silly fun,” Bay said over the weekend of the many ‘Transformers’ critical detractors. ‘I am convinced that they are born with the anti-fun gene. The reviews are just so vicious. A lot of them are more personal than anything else.’” – Michael Bay

After a spate of negative reviews, the movie ended up being a box office hit, pulling in $400 million.  This is when critics tried to save face. Dann Gire responded (in part) with this:

“Our job is not to say if a movie will be a big box office hit and everyone should go see it because it’s a big box office hit. Our job is simple and direct: to assess the quality of a motion picture.” – Dann Gire (see online comments here)

Locally at least, Paramount Motion pictures responded by blocking “professional” motion picture critics from an advanced showing of “GI Joe” and only let in select bloggers.

Faulting Call of Duty Modern Warfare 2 for lack of a plot makes about as much sense as the same feeble attempt at faulting Transformers 2  for the same reason.  It’s like reading “The Bobbsey Twins at the Sea Shore” and faulting the author for not being Shakespeare. My response to author Lou Kesten is the same as my response to author Dann Gire: If you want depth, go rent an Ingmar Bergman movie.

So while Lou Kesten is waiting for the “Tell Me a Story” edition of Modern Warfare 2 and Dann Gire is busy renting an Ingmar  Bergman movie, pass us the popcorn, the videogame controller and the remote control: we’re going to have a little fun.

And last, but certainly not least…

Look, it's SUPER MARIO!

You may have noticed from the recent direction of this site, our show, or our recent guest (none other than Cryptic Studio’s own Bill Roper) that we have been playing a good deal of Champions Online lately. Yes, even dyed in the wool World of Warcraft devotee and No Prisoners, No Mercy co-host Sister Fran has been dipping her toe in the super hero water. But not all of our heroes wear spandex – some of them wear cover alls.

So while we are busy pointing out how unenlightened one Associated Press author is on one game, let us  pour praise on Ms. Barbara Ortutay (also of Associated Press) for her recent article on one of our favorite super heroes.

“You might call him the Mickey Mouse of video games. He’s reminiscent of a doughnut, round and sweet and comforting. He’s also a vessel, devoid of a real personality so you can live vicariously through him. Mario, the potbellied Italian plumber with a penchant for rescuing princesses, collecting golden coins and gobbling magic mushrooms, has been around for nearly three decades, And even though he hasn’t changed much, the latest game he stars in, the newly released, ‘The New Super Mario Bros. Wii” , is one of the holiday season’s top titles.” – Barbara Ortutay, Associated Press

In fact there are some members of the No Prisoners No Mercy team that will admit to being a fan of the little Italian plumber since his only nemesis was Donkey Kong. So we too would like to join (and thank) Ms. Ortutay in a shout out to our favorite plumber:

Look, up in the sky, it’s a bird, it’s a plane, it’s…

 SUPER MARIO

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