Invalid characterset or character set not supported Stuff I played in March





Stuff I played in March
April 11, 2015

WARNING! Nonsensical sentimentality ahead!
So, Terry Pratchett died last month, which struck me as a bit of a big deal. I won’t drone on about dribbling fanboyishness and the like, but I will use this time to note that Pratchett’s work did help me cement the way in which I like to write. Back when I was younger I spent most of my writing efforts dicking around in fiction, which is something I wish I put more time aside for now to do. It’s hard to put down in words now that I’m making the effort to do so, but I guess there’s always been a goofy attempt of humour in what I write that’s been hard to turn off and because of this I just assumed that penning anything serious was a waste of time. Even before Discworld became the massive thing it is now, Pratchett threw that assumed theory into a wood chipper then stood back and looked smug about it. In my own clumsy way, I tried to follow that. Just, now, I use it to write about video games. ….. yeah, living the dream.

So, I spent ages fiddling around with compatibility programs and smashed through Discworld Noir in a couple of days. The Discworld games have been a part of my reviewing bucket list – the rapidly reducing list of games I want to cover before I pack this nonsense in – since I drafted the bloody thing and now seemed a good enough time to do it. I guess in the scheme of things writing a review on an ancient video game he didn’t write but only had some input in isn’t much of a tribute, but I wanted to do something. I mentioned that I planned to do this to DE who brilliantly gazumped me with a review of the original produced a full day before I finally spat mine out.

Noir’s a pretty great game that was, in a lot of ways, ahead of its time and will never collect the props it deserves. That’s my annual slice of sentimentality out of the way – Thank you, Terry.



We return you to the regular slightly bitter month recounting

So, tell me if this sounds fair: over the years I have purchased for my good pal DE almost a dozen games. Among them are such defining gems as Spec Ops: The Line, Banner Saga, Cat Lady, I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream, Aeon Command – not going to lie, it’s a big list of awesome. What has he got me in return? I’ll tell you, nameless reader – Goat Simulator, Hatoful Boyfriend and ...

DE: I have bought you Pregnancy. It’s a game about a 14-year-old Hungarian girl who gets pregnant.
DE: That sounds like the arty rubbish you seem to like.
DE: Why are you not playing it right now? That review won’t write itself.
Me: I’m not reviewing that. It’s a massive can of worms.

Pregnancy drips with Gone Home Stigmata™, where if you dare criticize the game a bit what you’re really doing is attacking the source material. Don’t like Gone Home? Spoiler alert -- Homophobe! Have a dig about Pregnancy? Why do you hate pre-teen pregnancies and Hungarians? Ha, only an idiot would review that.

...

Here is a link to my review



My plans to sink more time into War of the Human Tanks - ALTeR have, predictably come to absolutely nothing thanks to free time being at a premium. What happens when I do get some free time? Jason does! Enter Tormentum – Dark Sorrow; a game not inspired by H.G. Griger but by that other guy instead. That one that exists and people have heard of and people are inspired by. Tormentum is a bit weird; some of that in a good way. Some of it in a “it is 2015: why do developers still think sliding block puzzles are a good idea!” way.

Whacked through the second chapter of Dreamfall, which I completely forgot was a thing and provided a very welcome relief. Red Thread is nailing their world building which is impressive considering they’re juggling two vastly different worlds and surviving mainly with hubs. Fetch questing is starting to sneak in, which is a concern, but I expect a lot of people to have their expectations of episodic games redefined by this series.



Dicked around with a few other things I’m not confident will go anywhere. Bloodnet is an old cyberpunk/horror adventure game I’ve wanted to play for a long time (mainly because I always get it mixed up with Dreamweb, which is excellent). Now I’ve gotten around to it, I wish I’d never bothered. It’s so counter-productively made I have honestly no idea how anyone would think the mess of unlabelled sub-sub menus was a good way to design a game. It also doesn’t help that you need to delve a good hour or so into the game before you start actually playing the game; a lot of it is wandering around with no set destination chatting to people who dump an ocean of text on your lap just to say hi. It also shares with Chrono Cross the awful, awful idea to give supporting cast personality solely through stupid speech quirks like gimmicky traits or ludicrous accents.

Been fiddling around with Ultratron, a retro-ish neon-y 2D arena shooter that I can’t decide if I’m endeared to or not, and a bit of Infinite Crisis, because DE says that the fact I’ve only played Awsomenauts as my obligatory MOBA makes him sad. He sadder still now I have to carry him and his mopey Batman through games, though the fact that he’s a relentless kill thief cheers him up no end. The month ended on Gurumin, because I wanted to play it back in 2007 when it came out on the PSP and now it has a PC release, I guess I’ve run out of excuses to do so.

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honestgamer honestgamer - April 11, 2015 (10:43 AM)
Just so you know, EmP, I ordered and received "The Color of Magic" in paperback. I had always meant to give Pratchett a proper try, so I will probably read that sometime in the coming few months.
overdrive overdrive - April 11, 2015 (01:43 PM)
Yeah, I want to read Pritchett's stuff, too. Just that I just started Malazan Book of the Fallen and I think that'll take a good bit of time. 10 books with the shortest at about 650 pages and most in the vicinity of 1000. Timesink. Just like all the 456734057646 RPGs I'm always playing at any given time.
jerec jerec - April 12, 2015 (03:15 AM)
I got a wall of Pratchett books on my shelf. Just scoured through Book Depository to order the few I didn't have.
EmP EmP - April 12, 2015 (05:33 AM)
I had every book for the longest time, but when I moved I seem to have lost a couple of boxes of books along the way. I've been slowly rebuilding the collection over time and resisting the urge just to download them all to ebook.

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