Free Falling
So, having played Portal, Super Mario Galaxy, and Metroid Prime 3, I’m noticing a trend: fall damage appears to be going out of fashion. Those who are familiar with what I’ve written over the years will not be surprised when I say that this is a trend I wholeheartedly support. Fall damage is probably the foremost example of developers placing realism ahead of fun, and that’s especially true in a 3D world — as I’ve alluded to before, one of the most entertaining things to do in a 3D world is jump from really high places.
The otherwise completely wretched Goemon 64 was at least one up on Super Mario 64 in that respect — there was a part where you can literally jump off the peak of Mount Fuji and land on the ground at the base and not get hurt. Similarly, in Mario Galaxy, Nintendo has finally reversed its weird policy of making Mario jump preternaturally high but land not well at all, and he can take tremendous falls without more than a pained expression. And Portal? Portal is pretty much all about falling tremendous distances in all directions. Wouldn’t it just be perverse to penalise the player for falling?
In other news, Portal’s good, but you already know that. The one real negative I’ve been able to latch onto is that it’s desperately short, but that’s not as big a weakness as it may appear, for reasons I’ll explain in my forthcoming review, to be released in the dark, post-apocalyptic days of probably tomorrow. Having played it, it puts a new perspective on the bit I’m always hearing from my World of Warcraft buddies about how I sound like GLaDOS over vent — I’m now even more sure it’s a compliment. So, thanks, guys!
