knockknock.biz luggage tags. Photo courtesy of justinph.

I guess it's finally time for me to level up.

It was the summer of '99 when I convinced my then editor to send me on a tour of the U.S. videogame industry. When I finally returned three weeks later, my head was still spinning. I felt as though I'd seen the future of entertainment. It was then that I made it my mission to put NEWSWEEK's coverage of this growing medium on the map. I did that in print, with cover stories on the Japanese launch of the PlayStation 2 and the spread of online gaming. I did it online, with the debut of the blog N'Gai Croal's Level Up. I did it on television, with appearances on MSNBC and CNN. You all watched me push, prod, praise, scold, discuss and debate videogames across multiple media, both mainstream and enthusiast. That's because my editors were prescient enough to let me apply my talents and establish my reach beyond the magazine, from co-blogging with MTV News to writing a monthly column for Edge and more. For this, I say to them all, thank you.

Having achieved all of this, I can say without a shadow of a doubt that I've accomplished what I set out to do ten years ago. And now it's time for me to take that decade’s worth of accumulated knowledge and do something else with it. After Friday March 6th, my passions will take me beyond the world of journalism. I’ll be wearing many hats on this new journey: videogame design consultant, media strategist, consumer technology reporter, columnist, blogger and, as always, provocateur. You’ll be able to keep track of my various adventures at ngaicroal.com, and feel free to reach out to me via email at ncroalbiz@gmail.com. It’s been a pleasure conversing with all of you, and I look forward to continuing our dialogue in the years to come.

Cheers,

Grand Theft Auto IV, developed by Rockstar North and published by Rockstar Games

In Round 2 of our Vs. Mode exchange with MTV News reporter Stephen Totilo (also featured on Totilo's blog Multiplayer), he continued to insist that the soul of the Grand Theft Auto series is its sprawling possibility space, and that Grand Theft Auto IV's insistence on a richer main character and more consistent themes was taking the franchise too far from its roots. We countered by accusing Totilo of overlooking Rockstar North's "fitful achievement" of blending emotion and gameplay. In today's Final Round, both sides bring their loyal readers--those who previously posted comments on Level Up and Multiplayer--into the Vs. Mode dojo to spar with the experts. A sampling:

Jack Lothian, via Multiplayer: I'd love GTA games to genuinely introduce moral quandaries, just as I'd love to them to actively pursue a more open approach where mass slaughter isn't the usual answer to any problem. GTAIV isn't that game though--"Kill Mr A or Kill Mr B" ends up being more of a game choice than a moral one (which death will benefit my playing experience). A third option (kill neither, face the personal consequences) would have at least given some deeper scope.

Stephen Totilo responds: Jack just blew my mind. I've long complained of the binary choices games that are designed with morality systems provide players. That's why I'm happy that Spore will give players at least three ways to cultivate their in-game species, instead of just "good" or "bad," "Light Side" or "Dark Side," "kill the Little Sister" or "don't kill the Little Sister." What would I have done if I could have chosen to ignore Playboy X and Dwayne and killed neither? Some would say that offering three choices rather than two is no real improvement. But recalling that specific scenario, I'd have found it even more extraordinary and morally complex if I could have chosen that third path Jack described. Agree?

hage, via Level Up: I also found the story to be a fraudulent bill of goods, between the laughable artifice in some of the NPCs (Michelle after 10 seconds in the car: "I'd really like to get to know you better, Niko...") and every time the writers build up a little good will in terms of your emotional investment in Niko they squander it on something completely out of character in the name of a violent filler mission.

N'Gai Croal responds: I'm wondering whether the fault lies not with inconsistencies in the work of Rockstar's writing team, but with the credulity of all of us. Liberty City is filled with self-deluded characters like Playboy X, Manny and Brucie, who present themselves one way only to be exposed by their behavior. Why do we take Niko at face value? Is it just because he's our avatar? Remember, we never hear Niko's inner thoughts, we just listen to his dialogue and see his actions as we carry them out...Maybe possible that the lady  the gentleman doth protest too much. Maybe Niko is deceiving himself as much as do the rest of the lowlifes he runs with. Maybe as much as he believes he's fatigued with death and killing, he's actually drawn to it? Maybe we have all misunderstood Niko Bellic. What do you think, Stephen?

To view the Final Round of Vs. Mode in its entirety, click on the link below. And once you've finished reading it, we encourage you to share your reactions and observations in the comments section. After all, our new and improved Final Round is nothing without your participation, Dear Reader. Enjoy.

 Grand Theft Auto IV, developed by Rockstar North and published by Rockstar Games

In Round 1 of our Vs. Mode exchange with MTV News reporter Stephen Totilo (also featured on Totilo's blog Multiplayer), he expressed concern over the direction in which Grand Theft IV has taken the franchise, which narrower and more restrained than its wilder, freer predecessors. We accused him of damning developers for running in place (The Legend of Zelda series) and damning them for walking a new path (GTA IV). In today's Round 2, Totilo reveals his favorite GTA title and explains why he believes that Rockstar North should have preserved player "liberation" as the spine of its gameplay, while we advocate forcefully for "emotion" as the broader focus which explains why the developer has taken a left turn. Some excerpts:

Stephen Totilo: Everyone I've spoken to who has played GTA IV can tell me a moment when their manipulation of Niko through gameplay made Niko seem like a different character than the one portrayed in the cut-scenes. Friends cite moments when the cut-scene Niko--cautious about causing wanton violence--didn't seem like the guy they had gunning down everyone in sight at the behest of either the player or, more oddly, in order to fulfill a mission scripted by the developers. What do you make of that? I see the game developers writing Niko one way in cutscenes and requiring him to conform to a very different script in some missions. You see Rockstar maturing. I see Rockstar creating a game that sometimes works against itself. San Andreas didn't have these problems, I think, because it resounded with the tones of cartoon criminality and non-seriousness that the gameplay of a GTA almost demands of its story-writers. Jetpack-riding and rhyme-book-stealing were zany examples of the sprawl of possibility. Anything could happen and anyone could be around in the game to be part of it.

N'Gai Croal: On the radar, I could see that the drug dealer and two other people were inside. Now, whether it was the tension that had built up over the lengthy, deliberate pursuit of my target or a strange aversion to failing and restarting a mission, I can't be sure. But I nevertheless stood outside the door for what seemed like an eternity, Micro-SMG in hand, steeling myself for the firefight to come. Then I burst into the room and kept squeezing both triggers until I absolutely, positively killed every motherf---er in the room. It was over in what seemed like the blink of an eye, and immediately afterwards, as I came down from the adrenaline rush, all I could remember was the echoing gunfire and motion blurred visuals that accompanied my frantic switching from target to target to make sure that I got them before they got me. The pacing of that mission; its rising and falling tension; the juxtaposition of the tempo and duration of its constituent parts; its blend of driving, walking and shooting--all of that was memorable for putting me in a stunned, shaken, disquieted and finally relieved state of mind.

Please be sure to note that spoilers can and do abound. To read Round 2 of our exchange in full, click on the link below. 

 Grand Theft Auto IV, developed by Rockstar North and published by Rockstar Games

In our last, egregiously truncated Vs. Mode exchange on the PlayStation Portable game Patapon, the Level Up staff, our regular opponent Stephen Totilo and our commenters got into a spirited debate about the nature of the grind in videogames (click here to see for yourself, as it's well worth reading). This week, as we revealed yesterday, we're tackling Rockstar North and Rockstar Games' Grand Theft Auto IV, in a back and forth discussion that will also featured be featured on Totilo's blog Multiplayer. Totilo kicks off the debate by singling out his favorite moment in the game--a long drive with a woman who ought to go, go, go to rehab--before examining whether Rockstar North may have taken a wrong turn with this newer, more stately GTA. For our part, we defend the developer's refusal to be all things to all people with GTA IV and suggest that Rockstar North's planned downloadable content might be the best vehicle for delivering the wilder ride that a number of GTA fans are still looking for. Some excerpts:

Stephen Totilo: In playing GTA IV I was reminded that GTA is at its most fun when it's tweaking, when it has the shakes, when it can't abandon the violence, the transgressions, the subversions of its own rules. The other style of GTA --the one that bottlenecks its story, that keeps Niko moving forward and lands him with a bunch of mobsters, that picks your vehicle for you sometimes, that tries to keep characters consistent and deliver a moral over the course of 30 hours, this classy, more respectable, more constrained, more cleaned up, rehabilitated GTA--doesn't feel like the GTA I've known. Or at least the one I like telling friends about. That GTA has always been there, but it's been subdued. With GTA IV, though, it may be on the rise. Is this the new GTA and one that we want?

N'Gai Croal: I'm a little surprised at your response to the game. After all, you're Mr. Innovation Bias. Shouldn't you be wildly applauding the shock of Rockstar North's new vibe rather than expressing your conservative longing for past Grand Theft gameplay, masked as a call for the subversive over the sublime? Eiji Aonuma does the same ol', same ol' with Phantom Hourglass; you say you're getting bored. Rockstar North attempts something novel; you say you miss the way things used to be. The only thing left for you to do is urge them to remake the previous GTAs using the latest tech, amirite? Besides, weren't you the one who advanced the theory that multiplayer was where we would find the bulk of the sandbox-y pleasures of GTA IV? You want Rockstar North to roll it for you, when perhaps what they've done is given you the Philly and the Purple Haze so that you can roll it yourself.

To read Round 1 of our exchange in its entirety, click on the link below.

Note: This email exchange with MTV News reporter Stephen Totilo originally ran on N'Gai Croal's Level Up and MTV's Multiplayer blog, in two separate installments, from March 24th-April 2nd 2008. We now present it here in its entirety, under a single permalink, for easier printing, emailing and archival purposes.

 Grand Theft Auto IV, developed by Rockstar North and published by Rockstar Games

Whoever said that you can't improve perfection never met the staffs of Level Up and Multiplayer. For the newest installment of Vs. Mode, in which we spar over Grand Theft Auto IV, we're doing something different. Because as much as we enjoy the clack-clack of our own deep thoughts being typed out for your edification, we like mixing it up in the comments with you, our Dear Readers, even more. So to help make Vs. Mode less dueling monologues and more of an open dialogue, here's how we're tweaking the formula.

Rather than just throw you into the deep end of mine and Stephen's opening exchange, we're kicking off this series with today's brief introductory post to both preview our debate of Grand Theft Auto IV and solicit some comments and questions from you. Then, on the final day of our debate, Stephen and I will not only engage each other, but we'll also tackle any statements or questions that you've posted on our respective blogs. Today's topic is "Who Moved My Sandbox?" in which we discuss whether GTA IV has gotten too far away from the series' sandbox roots. Some excerpts of what you'll see in full on Tuesday:

Stephen Totilo: This new GTA was made to be more sophisticated, more grown up, I think. It introduces moral choice. It skips rainbow afros and giant sex-toy weapons for a story that, initially, is a barely violent exploration of the eyes-just-shut start of the American dream. It's a more mature GTA. Yet there's a guy at work here at MTV who is inconsolable over the exclusion of planes and tanks in GTA IV. He wants to wreak mayhem. He sees a GTA as the sandbox it was once hyped to be. He wants unhinged GTA.

N'Gai Croal: I want Rockstar to take the possibility space that is Liberty City and keep building on it. They can experiment with tone: one expansion pack could be primarily comic; another tragic; another brutal; another frothy. They can set one in the 1970s; another in 2020. I said that Rockstar is showing its maturity by realizing that it doesn't have to be all things to all gamers, but let me revise that statement: it doesn't have to be all things to all gamers at all times.

 "300 patapon," by canecodesign on deviantART

In Round 1 of our Vs. Mode exchange with MTV News reporter Stephen Totilo (also featured on his blog Multiplayer) on Patapon, the Level Up staff struck first with our championing of the value of indirect control, feel and iconic design. Totilo largely sidestepped our talking points, preferring to focus on gamer guilt and control versus orchestration in games. For our second and final round, things get a bit more personal. We belligerently extol our superior taste in games; attack Patapon's leveling grind; and vociferously dispute Totilo's metaphoric interpretation of the PSP title's gameplay. Totilo, for his part, responds with a deceptively polite evisceration of our anti-grinding position--before charging that the last two Vs. Modes have been too chummy. Is he correct, or just dead wrong, as usual? Only you, Dear Reader, can make that call. Some excerpts:

N'Gai Croal: Back to Patapon: is the grind an imperfection? I say yes. It seems like an easy way to pad out a game that otherwise, as designed, isn't very long. Now, it's true that I could go back to any open area to mine it for the resources I needed, but it was still grinding nonetheless. And I'm not as forgiving as you on this point because while the songs are pleasant and memorable, they weren't so good that I would let it slide....A much better solution would have been to let me "sell" my warriors back recover part or all of the ka-ching that I spent on them so that I could use spend it on  a better warrior. But in fairness to the designers--and to return to the suspension of disbelief point I just raised--they seem to want to make a point about the value of your individual troops. Each class of warrior can only contain so many troops; when you get the ingredients to make a better soldier, you first have to clear a slot in its respective class. And when you clear that slot, the Patapon warrior in it dies, in a manner suggesting that the air was removed from its body. (Not to mention that with the death of your warrior goes all the ka-ching and experience points you put into it.)

Stephen Totilo: When we curse a grind, we're cursing a game for forcing repetitive gameplay, to block advancement without this repetition. But aren't all games, by their very nature, rife with repetition? Isn't Super Mario Bros. just a lot of repeated hops. Isn't Halo just a few specific styles of engagement repeated and remixed for hours on end? Sure. The grind, however, earns scorn because it forces too much repetition. It crosses a line. It registers an excess. The repetition often becomes too much and turns into a grind once the game has forced the gamer to go backward, to perpetrate the game's initially un-offensively repetitive gameplay in levels they've already run through. Gameplay repetition is changed to gameplay grinding. And that's when it's time to get angry. Except: it's all subjective, isn't it? Where is that line between fun repetition and grinding? Why don't God of War games get accused of forcing a grind? Because they don't? Oh, surely, they do. They require collecting orbs to get powers, some of which you need to advance. Does God of War get off because they just don't do it forcefully enough that it's bothersome?

To read the Final Round of our exchange in its entirety, click on the link below.

 Patapon, developed by Pyramid and published by Sony Computer Entertainment

When you last tuned in to our monthly feature, it was only appropriate that sparks were flying fast and furious as we sparred with MTV News reporter Stephen Totilo over the racing game Burnout Paradise in Vs. Mode (also featured on his blog Multiplayer). Right now, it's too early to tell whether tensions will similarly rise as we discuss the strange, sublime Patapon, a "side-scrolling rhythm-based real-time strategy game for the PSP," as we describe it below. Why? For the simple reason that both sides very much enjoyed the game. But rest assured, we'll look for honest points of contention as this installment of the series goes on.

In today's, Round one, we raise three points for discussion: the power of indirect control; the importance of feel; and the thrill of iconic design. For Totilo's part, he addresses the topic of gamer guilt and considers the difference between games that you control and games that you orchestrate. Some excerpts:

N'Gai Croal: There's a mistaken belief that permeates much of the industry, which is that "realistic" graphics will enable videogames to break on through to truly mainstream audiences. But when we consider the success of Bejewelled, Peggle, Guitar Hero, Rock Band and Wii Sports, it's clearly not the case. As graphics technology improves, the exploration of non-photorealistic rendering techniques should go hand in hand with the quest for verisimilitude. Unfortunately, too many developers and publishers would rather focus on the latter, even on the PSP, a platform whose titles could use a complete deign rethink. Thank goodness Sony, at least, is motivated to do so, with games like Loco Roco and the forthcoming Echochrome. Just because it's roughly the power of a PS2 in a handheld doesn't mean that we should be playing PS2 games on the go.

Stephen Totilo: Let me tell you my favorite memory of playing Patapon. I was on the subway, my troops marching to the right, throwing spears and slashing swords against their enemies of war. I kept them fighting by tapping out a rhythm that I could hear in my headphones. I tapped it consistently and repeatedly enough that they became super-charged with "fever." A complex, lovely mix of drums and whistles swirled as I stamped my fingers. I kept tapping the rhythm. They kept fighting. And my subway screeched into my home station. Without breaking the rhythm of my button taps, I stood up. I took my eyes off the game and I walked onto the subway platform. I looked down on the game again, but for just a few seconds, maybe two loops of the four-note Patapon rhythm, my little troops were fighting without me seeing them. I had given them charge, swept them up with music. They acted away from me.

To read Round 1 of our exchange in its entirety, click on the link below.

 

Note: This email exchange with MTV News reporter Stephen Totilo originally ran on N'Gai Croal's Level Up and MTV's Multiplayer blog, in four separate installments, from January 28th-February 1st 2008. We now present it here in its entirety, under a single permalink, for easier printing, emailing and archival purposes.

Note: This email exchange with MTV News reporter Stephen Totilo originally ran on N'Gai Croal's Level Up and MTV's Multiplayer blog, in four separate installments, from November 12th-November 19th 2007. We now present it here in its entirety, under a single permalink, for easier printing, emailing and archival purposes.

In Round 2 of our Vs. Mode exchange with MTV News reporter Stephen Totilo (also featured on his blog Multiplayer) on Burnout Paradise, Totilo bravely challenged Nintendo fan orthodoxy to assert that Burnout Paradise had--apologies to Alex Ward for our terminology--beaten Animal Crossing at its own asynchronous multiplayer game. We took that ball and ran with it, inventing on the fly such acronyms as SOS (Shared Open Spaces), MMSS (Minimally Multiplayer Sandbox Simulators) or SSAOWG (Simultaneously Synchronous and Asynchronous Open World Games) to describe the genius of Paradise. In today's Final Round, Totilo challenges our distortion of one of his pet theories, then partially smacks down our idea that Burnout Paradise could or should lead to a One Game Future; we concede the point on satirical grounds, but issue a full-throated defense of our belief that Criterion's racer represents a design approach best described as the Everlasting Gobstopper of Interactive Entertainment. And if you have no idea what the heck any of this means, just read this post and let us enlighten you. Some excerpts:

Stephen Totilo: You did acknowledge that you were contorting my original theory. I'd like to re-iterate it, so that we can build off it or contort it again. My big idea, which you've never agreed with before, is that the only games to cross over to a mainstream audience and become cultural phenomenon are the ones that were made to be played--or could be played--in satisfying short periods of time. You could knock through a game of Pac-Man or get a thrill causing mayhem in GTA 3 in five minutes flat. You can feel like you've actually experienced the essence of Tetris, Wii Sports and Guitar Hero in just as short a span--which isn't to say you won't get hooked for much longer. But that's why I don't think Final Fantasy, as popular as it is, has ever crossed over to the point where it gets mentioned on CNN when a new one comes out. It's why I think, while Zelda games are beloved, they do not matter to the world the way Mario games do. Almost all of Mario's adventures can be fun and satisfying in short bursts, which gives them a crossover appeal that can attract the attention of people who only play games in that casual way.

N'Gai Croal: The Everlasting Gobstopper of Interactive Entertainment, however, is the logical outgrowth of the dialogue we've been having in this Vs. Mode exchange....You wrote a post earlier today about Halo 3 and its content expanding features like Forge and Arcade scoring. What if Criterion and EA not only released a downloadable file establishing circuit races, but also let you create your own circuit races simply by driving through the city, automatically blocking off the surrounding streets, as if two "Tron" lightcycles were tearing side-by-side through Paradise City? What if Aftertouch and Pursuit were one of many modes that you could turn or off, like the game-modifying skulls in Halo 3? What if Criterion added a car customization mode, letting you swap out not only Boost Types, but also paint jobs and decals--or design them yourself, as in Rock Band? What if they--gasp--brought back classic Crash Mode? That's what I mean by the Everlasting Gobstopper approach to game design.

To read the Final Round of our exchange in its entirety, click on the link below. 

 The Burnout Paradise city map

In Round 1 of our Vs. Mode exchange with MTV News reporter Stephen Totilo (also featured on his blog Multiplayer) on Burnout Paradise, he graciously admitted, after much to-ing and fro-ing about his assorted experiences with the game, that in the end we were right and he was wrong about the quality of the title. We thanked him for recognizing the wisdom of his elders, but in truth, we had long suspected that Burnout's radical reinvention would be the source of much consternation among gamers. In today's Round 2, Totilo risks the wrath of Nintendo fanboys the world over by daring to suggest that Burnout Paradise is a better Animal Crossing than, well, Animal Crossing itself. (We've never played it, so we'll just offer up a quick "no comment" and leave Totilo to stand alone in the line of fire.) For our part, we ran with his suggestion that the next big trend in games might lie in ditching the medium's historically goal-oriented focus, coining such sure-to-be-industry-standard terms as SOS, MMSS and SSAOWG in the process of exploring the power of online-connected open worlds. Some excerpts:

Stephen Totilo: Burnout: Paradise could be my own Animal Crossing. Paradise City is huge. There are lots of things to do, mostly involving smashing thing--cars, gates, signs, etc. There's also just interesting terrain, good lines to race through--across bridges, through railroad tunnels, up and down big staircases, down the beach, in the hidden circuit race track (I found it!) in the southwest part of the city. And like Animal Crossing, I can welcome other people into my city or hop into there's and play together, mostly an improvised fashion. Better for my tastes, though, I can play against them without them, knocking off their high scores while they're asleep. As I said in my Round 1, I don't even care that much about the races in the game anymore. I just like driving around, wandering digitally. I guess it's the difference between going to a specific website or just surfing the web to alleviate boredom. We all know which of those activities is actually more fun.

N'Gai Croal: I wonder though, if die hard, old school, goal-oriented players will wag their fingers at gaming delinquents like ourselves who reject the idea that winning isn't everything, but the only thing, for whom beating the game--or other people--is their entire raison de jeu. As I become increasingly hardcasual in my gaming tastes, I need games to stop boxing me into one way to have fun, one way to progress, one way to entertain myself. I don't want the proclivities of 12-24-year-old males, who have unlimited amounts of time to grind through a developer's set path, to prevent me from having a good time. As Brad Pitt said of Project Mayhem in "Fight Club," "You decide your level of involvement." (Would this be Vs. Mode without a "Fight Club" or Metal Gear Solid reference? I think not.) The more developers that follow in Criterion's footsteps, the more teams that choose to achieve their hours of gameplay by expanding their games along the twin axes of density and variety to accommodate a wider range of gaming desires rather than along the narrow path that satisfies the same old hardcore joypad-twiddler, the more fun I'll be having.

To read Round 2 of our exchange in its entirety, click on the link below. 

 Burnout Paradise, developed by Criterion Games and published by Electronic Arts

Another year, another set of games to incite email warfare between MTV and Newsweek. Yes, Vs. Mode is back once again, after a brief hiatus which saw the principals take their battle to the pages of Slate. The subject of our newest Vs. Mode discussion with MTV News reporter Stephen Totilo (also featured on his blog Multiplayer) is Criterion Games' and Electronic Arts' racing game Burnout Paradise. In Round 1 of our exchange, Totilo explains why "It's complicated" is the best way to describe his relationship with the latest Burnout, while we describe how we fell hard, fast and almost completely without reservations in love with Criterion's refreshing new take on its aging franchise. Some excerpts:

Stephen Totilo: EA sends me a review build in December. I play it in my PlayStation 3. My wife and I love Burnout 3: Takedown, me for the racing, she for the crashes. I drive through a few intersection-triggered events in my first sitting, winning enough of them to unlock the crash mode so that I can let me wife give it a try. But I give crash--Showtime--a go before her and it all falls apart. It seems too easy. I tumble my car farther and farther down a road, causing massive property damage and waiting for the mode to get hard. Surely there must a time limit I'm going to have trouble with or a score threshold I can't easily meet. Not really. It's easy. It reminds me of how Lumines got on the PSP, too easy for too long before any challenge emerged. This is happening in my first un-supervised session. I want out of Showtime mode and put the controller down so that my car goes still and, at last, the mode does time out. This seems wrong, even broken.

N'Gai Croal: It would have been so tempting for Criterion to have made the open world optional and layered a structured event system on top of the game as it exists today. Everyone wins, right? Especially since I'm a fan of developers providing players with as many options as possible so that we can customize the experience to be exactly what we want it to be. At the same time, I can't help feeling that we've all benefited from Alex and his team fully committing to making Burnout Paradise an open world racing title. They've embraced it in ways large, small and highly instructive for anyone who follows in their footsteps. Driving through gas stations to replenish your boost; through auto repair shops to fix your car; and through junkyards to switch vehicles. Taking out cars to add them to your collection. Anywhere, anytime Showtime mode for your destructive delight. Having three different burnout systems--Stunt, Speed and Aggression--which both harkens back to Burnouts past and lets players drive the way they want to drive.

To read Round 1 of our exchange in its entirety, click on the link below.

Note: This email exchange with MTV News reporter Stephen Totilo originally ran on N'Gai Croal's Level Up and MTV's Multiplayer blog, in four separate installments, from October 29th-November 2nd 2007. We now present it here in its entirety, under a single permalink, for easier printing, emailing and archival purposes.

In Round 1 of our Vs. Mode exchange with MTV News reporter Stephen Totilo (also featured on his blog Multiplayer) on Valve Software's Portal, Totilo explored the business that might prevent other Portal-alikes from making it to market while making the creative for why developers should persevere nonetheless. We praised Portal's minimalism. In Round 2, things got more heated as Totilo insisted that Portal had characters and story; we kept it minimal and said no. In today's Final Round, the discussion goes haute middlebrow as Totilo makes his case more forcefully and we rebut his argument with dictionary definitions, category lists and a little help from our friends. Excerpts:

Stephen Totilo: I couldn't cast I/Chell in a movie, that's for sure. But I can tell you some things: she's a she; she's a test subject; she's willing to follow orders only to a point; she doesn't get tired when she runs; she has 20/20 vision; she cared about a companion cube; she was willing to kill her boss/captor. Were these all traits programmed into her by Valve? Were some of these brought into the equation by me? Well, sort of. Did I really bring my concern for the companion cube to the game myself? Or did Valve cull that out of me, essentially grafting certain actions and reactions onto me, puppeteer-ing me? Where exactly, in the spectrum between "Chell"-ness and Stephen-ness, is the character I control defined? And if it's somewhere in the middle, is that not possibly a proof of how a character in a video game is defined differently than one written about in a page or displayed on a TV screen?

N'Gai Croal: The thinness of Chell's characterization is mirrored in Portal's narrative, a word I've been deliberately using instead of "story" to describe the events in Portal. My choice of words prompted reader tilt3daxis to write in my comments section, "I'm slightly confused, N'Gai, about your distinction between story and narrative. Is it simply a matter of semantics or is there something deeper that I'm missing?" As I see it, a narrative is a series of events, one after the other, as in, "this happened, then this happened, and then this happened." A story contextualizes the events in a narrative by including perspective, context, point of view, backstory, etc. Now GLaDOS could be said to provide all of those things...but by her own admission, she lies, so the only events we can trust are the ones we see through Chell's eyes. In other words, all we can trust is the gameplay. We don't even know if we can trust the "facts" described by GLaDOS on the lyrics to "Still Alive." Are there people who are still alive? Is she experimenting on them? We didn't see any other people--even if we want to believe Portal's embedded narrative of the person(s) who scrawled notes and messages and posted photos on walls inside of Aperture Science, how can we be sure that GLaDOS didn't plant that graffiti herself--so how do we know that they in fact exist. Portal, then, is "The Usual Suspects" of videogames, with GLaDOS as its Keyser Sose.

To read the Final Round of our Vs. Mode exchange in its entirety, click on the link beloe.