Posted by pookzilla on March 4, 2010
Okay, so. Heavy Rain. Best game I’ve played in a really long time. In fact, if I had to sum it up, it’d be the game I’ve been hoping for … well, forever. I love murder mysteries, and I love puzzlers, and I got my fair share of both from it. I found the controls ideal for the experience they were trying to convey with the exception of the movement controls which could be somewhat frustrating (and reminiscent of Resident Evil <4).
That’s not to say it doesn’t have it’s faults, however. First, right off the top, is the voice acting. The accents of the voice actors were not well disguised at all, and I found them incredibly distracting. Most of the main characters were okay but the secondary characters were really off. I suppose this is a very North American complaint and I bet a lot of Europeans feel the same way when North American developers butcher their accents.
Second, eh… there are plot elements that really bother me. I can’t really get into them in a lot of detail, but the biggest problem I have is the identity killer. I didn’t find the choice of killer made a lot of sense. There wasn’t nearly enough foreshadowing to allow you to figure him out earlier without a lot of leaps of logic. There were several places where they could have dropped clues to at least hint at their identity but instead it all came together rather fast. Beyond that, I just didn’t LIKE the choice of killer although I realize that’s an aesthetics choice.
I hope this game is a financial success so that we might see more experiments like it in the future. I would play nothing but games like this if I had the choice.
Posted by pookzilla on December 26, 2009
Some time ago Lexy asked me to download the Fat Princess demo. I objected for reasons I alluded to before but she really wanted to give it a try so I did. It sat forgotten for almost a month until the Christmas Eve when she decided to give it a try. She put about three hours into it and declared that she loved it and I can’t begrudge her that – it’s actually a really fun and well made little CTF game. She enjoyed it enough to buy it and has been playing every chance she gets. I can’t help but think, however, how much more I’d like it if it had some other mechanic at its base. The fat princess part of Fat Princess adds nothing to the game and only serves to alienate customers like myself.
Posted by pookzilla on October 8, 2009
Truth be told, Demon’s Souls flew entirely under my radar. In fact, were it not for the strange endorsement from Tycho of Penny Arcade I probably would have skipped it entirely. I’m glad that I didn’t though because I would have missed out on a really unique experience.
To say this game is difficult is an understatement. I don’t recall a more difficult gaming experience in recent memory. Not only is it difficult, it’s malicious in how it punishes you for your failures. Being forced to redo hours of gameplay upon death is just plain cruel. I’m usually turned off by extreme difficulty but in this case the game itself is compelling enough to keep me coming back for more. In fact, I’ve put in 3-4 hours already and I’ve yet to get past the first level. There has to be something special there to keep me going.
Also, I have to comment on the online play although I’m not entirely clear on the particulars. I understand one form takes the ability to enter other peoples games and torment them as ghosts. It’s only fitting that a game that exhibits monumental cruelty would find a way to codify, enable, and ENCOURAGE griefing.
Posted by pookzilla on December 30, 2008
Rock Band. It is good. It could be better, however. For starters, the following:
- Queen. Any Queen will do. Lots of Queen would be better
- Flathead by the Fratellis
- the entirety of the Silversun Pickups album Carnavas
- Grinderman or some crunchier Nick Cave
- pre-Purge Bif Naked
- Flogging Molly or Dropkick Murpheys
- a best-of Talking Heads album
- Peruvian Skies by Dream Theatre – the drums in this are so fantastic
- The New Pornographers, particularly something with Neko on vocals. All For Swinging You Around comes to mind
I wonder if it wouldn’t be better if they could provide some tool that would allow artists to provide their own tracks. Really open the store up for any artist to participate, perhaps with some fee for vetting and classifying the track. This game has a lot of life in it – a lot more than the original Guitar Hero held for me at any rate – but I’m finding the selection of music a bit disappointing. As the difficulty increases the songs that are unlocked increasingly move towards the screaming metal affair which I just don’t have any use for.
Posted by pookzilla on December 28, 2008
Lexy and I decided to create a new Rock Band band today so that we might each try different instruments. A side project, if you will. In creating our band, we came up with what we felt was the perfect name.
The Muffin Tops.
However, the Rock Band language police declared that the name was unsatisfactory and we couldn’t use it in online play. Scrambling, we chose another name. This one, surprisingly, did pass the censors:
Meth, Guns, and Viagra.
Ahem.
Posted by pookzilla on November 7, 2008
The title says it all. I’ve hit several bugs up until this point but none of them have been a game ender until now. I cannot complete a main-story quest. I’ve been hit by this bug, which seems rather common by the number of Google hits it gets.
I’m torn. I want to keep playing, but I also don’t want to invest a bunch of time into a saved game that will never be fixed. I’m not sure what to do here. Blech.
Posted by pookzilla on November 5, 2008
I’m enjoying it more and more. In fact, I’m enjoying it considerably more than Oblivion for two reasons from the top of my head. One, the radio. I love how the DJ on Galaxy radio keeps talking about the stuff I’ve been doing. I really appreciate that, particularly how he talks about the side quests. They’re much more memorable now because of it. Second, the tension. In Oblivon I would wade through the game like I was invincible except for those times I wanted to enjoy stealth (which were numerous, I admit). However, with Fallout, I feel I HAVE to be stealthy or I’m going to get my ass handed to me. I’m playing the game very cautiously, moving from cover to cover, always sneaking. When I enter a room I immediately panic that there could be something behind the door. I jump at everything. I accidentally killed a friendly target because I was afraid he got the drop on me. Incidentally, that friendly target was carrying some awesome loot. I should try and forget that… I’m trying to be good, honest.
I had my ass handed to my by a Super Mutant Behemoth right outside of the Galaxy Radio headquarters. That guy scared the crap out of me. A rocket to the face, two grenades, and a shotgun to the head and I still didn’t bring him down. In the end he crushed me with what I think was a lamp post. Sigh.
Posted by pookzilla on November 1, 2008
Okay, I’ve managed to get about 3 hours into the game and I think it’s exactly what I expected it to be. It is Oblivion with guns and a very cool new combat system.
If I got exactly what I wanted, why am I a little disappointed? I think it partially comes down to unjustifiably rosy memories of Oblivion. Oblivion was a game that kept my interests far longer than most, but it was deeply flawed. The characters were indistinguishable, due largely to repetitive and campy voice acting. This led to the game feeling bland at best and confusing at worst. Adding to this was the problem of character animations and models. Perhaps for their time they were good, but they look incredibly dated by todays standards, and the movement (facial and body) and AI were often SO BAD that they destroyed whatever sense of immersion the environments managed to create. Also, item management was a chore particularly for someone like me who has some degree of obsessive compulsiveness. When you can pick up (and sell) just about anything I can’t help but pick up everything. This usually means that half the time my Oblivion character has an inventory full of silver cutlery.
The characters in Fallout, despite having unique voice actors (as far as I can tell) still seem to be bland and indistinguishable. Thinking back on it as I write this, the only one I can remember is the Sheriff of Megaton and I think I only remember him for his fine hat. Character models/animation/AI still seem like a relic of 2006 and they’re still incredibly distracting. Itemitis is still a problem for me, although silver forks and goblets have been replaced with empty cola bottles. For instance I spent a good 30 minutes exploring the Super Mart near Megaton and all I ended up finding were some cans of food.
All the same, I put about 100 hours into Oblivion and I enjoyed it a great deal. Despite my complaints about Fallout I still look forward to playing it some more. The sense of freedom more than compensates for its shortcomings.
On the topic of the collectors edition, I’m really quite happy with it. The extra stuff they give you for $20 seems like a really good deal. I look froward to using the lunch box, the bobble head is cute, and the art book is very nice.
Posted by pookzilla on
The game has not ceased to entertain us. It’s consumed our evenings since purchase to the point where our PVR is getting close to capacity.
Last night after Lexy went to sleep I sat down with a goal of putting the skeleton of a level I wanted to make together. Previously I had gone into the “Create” mode only to see that it was there – no real effort was made. Well, after an hour and a half of hacking last night… I still basically have nothing. I have some better idea of what it is I need to do but executing them with those tools is pretty painful. The carving in particular is quite difficult… I find it hard to imagine that they put this game together with those tools.
My copy of Fallout 3 still hasn’t shipped from Amazon. The new delivery estimate is the end of November. What’s up with Amazon lately? Virtually everything I order is inevitably delayed. I can’t remember the last item I ordered that was delivered on time. I called the local EB and they have 7 copies of the collectors edition that I wanted so I just canceled the order. I’ll go fetch it the old fashioned way, by hand.
Posted by pookzilla on October 28, 2008
I skipped out at lunch yesterday to fetch my copy from EB Games. Staying at work was incredibly difficult, but made easier due to the fact that we had a PS3 in the basement which I sampled the game on. After work both Lexy and I raced home to play it and did so until we managed to pry it from our hands so that we might go to sleep. I write this now under great duress – the time I spend typing here means time I’m not playing Little Big Planet.
It’s not perfect. In fact, as a platformer, it suffers from some pretty serious flaws (jumping distance, skittishness, difficult Z axis maneuvering for starters). Despite these flaws it’s an absolute blast to play. It’s gorgeous – better looking than any other console game I can think of – and fresh. So very fresh. Guh. I want to gush. But if I do, that’ll take too much time away from LBP.
I feel like I should also mention World of Goo. We picked this up over the weekend and it really is an excellent game. I should say more about it… but I can’t. The timing is so wrong. I’ll need to revisit it in a month or so. Maybe.
Heavy Rain
