Represent!

Ha ha ha! Absolutely. I still haven't finished it.

For anyone who doesn't get it, watch the opening to Tales of the Abyss:

Horror games -- good horror games -- go out of their way to make yu feel like you're a/ always being watched and b/ there is always something just behind you. It's supposed to make you feel uneasy at all times. Silent Hill: The Room knows that, but does not know how to employ a subtle touch. So:



..... yeah.

Remind me what this is from?

I started reviewing it tonight. If I had off tomorrow, I would just push myself to finish, but I've got to run an orientation for students that goes from 8am-4pm, so I'm headed to bed. I want to have this done by Sunday night.

The short version is that I'm giving it an 8/10, with potential for that to be a 9/10 before I'm done. It really is a fantastic game and an incredibly addictive multiplayer experience. My only problem comes from the overabundance of cutscenes (a disturbing trend in modern gaming) which too often breaks the flow of the amazing action.

I thought I'd crap out my thoughts on this game while they are still somewhat fresh. I hope that Journey lovers don't take this as a personal attack, because it's not.

I understand that my personal aesthetic may make me a poor candidate for appreciating games like Journey; indeed, I am so bored by this kind of stuff that I can't get far enough in the game to warrant writing a proper review.

But I have to ask to nobody in particular... what's the appeal? Bear in mind that I am the same hater of all things beautiful and stripped down who doesn't have much love for Ico and Shadow of the Colossus either.

But getting back to Journey: it's a very simplistic game. I may be wrong (again, I only passed 3 or 4 'levels') but here is a title where you can really make do with one button.

The good old Sonic the Hedgehog games only made use of one button function too. But those games offered some semblance of challenge and there was lots to see and do.

Not Journey though. This 'game' is a bland beige tour through a wasteland with cyclopean structures jutting out here and there, involving hopping about and riding carpets to no worthwhile end.

On some occasions, I can pierce the heavy veil of pretentious praise from supporters and see that they love the game because it offers something 'different and beautiful in its simplicity.'

I think back to Out of This World, which was a game that was different and offered a simple, yet beautifully told story of friendship. But that game also had sick puzzles and hard as hell shooting elements. That game killed you a lot.

I imagine OoTW in an alternate universe, where Lester and the big alien just hold hands and run and jump to the end. That would have been something else.

Good luck, man. Every now and then, something comes along that takes priority over reviewing video games online, and I suppose this just about registers as such.

It's months later, I know, but I'm finally setting the first words to paper in a review of this unique running game. I don't want to spill my opinion too soon, but it's one of the more conflicted opinions I've had about a "game." And yes, those quotes are intentional.

Hey, congrats! The kid sounds really cute. :)

It's a shame you put this in your blog. I don't think people read these anymore, so that's probably why you didn't get any responses. I'm glad I checked, though! I was wondering when this day would come.

Good luck with raising the little guy. If we happen to see any activity from you in the next few weeks / months, then great. But if not, that's fine, too. You have a whole new chapter in your life now, and I hope you enjoy it.

I actually composed a top fifty list for albums, but I only posted it on Facebook. There are a few adjustments I'd probably make (having since seen them live, Kasabian and Bombay would both be higher), but here it is:

50. The Go! Team – Rolling Blackouts
49. Kasabian – Velociraptor!
48. Mother Mother – Eureka
47. Austra – Feel It Break
46. Bon Iver – s/t
45. TV on the Radio – Nine Types of Light
44. I Break Horses – Hearts
43. The Rural Alberta Advantage – Departing
42. Cold Cave – Cherish the Light Years
41. Boris – Attention Please
40. Lykke Li – Wounded Rhymes
39. Little Scream – The Golden Record
38. Yelle – Safari Disco Club
37. Cults – s/t
36. Moonface – Organ Music Not Vibraphone Like I’d Hoped
35. Jessica 6 – See the Light
34. Patrick Wolf – Lupercalia
33. Arctic Monkeys – Suck It and See
32. This Will Destroy You – Tunnel Blanket
31. Hooray for Earth – True Loves
30. The World/Inferno Friendship Society – The Anarchy and the Ecstasy
29. Asobi Seksu – Fluorescence
28. Yuck – s/t
27. Friendly Fires – Pala
26. Florence + the Machine – Ceremonials
25. Zola Jesus – Conatus
24. Is Tropical – Native to
23. Radiohead – The King of Limbs
22. Bombay Bicycle Club – A Different Kind of Fix
21. The Decemberists – The King Is Dead
20. Explosions in the Sky – Take Care, Take Care, Take Care
19. MUTEMATH – Odd Soul
18. Battles – Gloss Drop
17. Holy Ghost! – s/t
16. Handsome Furs – Sound Kapital
15. Iron & Wine – Kiss Each Other Clean
14. The Black Keys – El Camino
13. VHS or Beta – Diamonds and Death
12. The Rapture – In the Grace of Your Love
11. Starfucker – Reptilians
10. Junior Boys – It’s All True
9. Justice – Audio, Video, Disco
8. Wilco – The Whole Love
7. The Joy Formidable – The Big Roar
6. St. Vincent – Strange Mercy
5. Feist – Metals
4. The Dodos – No Colors
3. The Antlers – Burst Apart
2. Cut Copy – Zonoscope
1. M83 – Hurry Up, We’re Dreaming

It's a round number, so I'm noting it as a milestone of sorts. Which gives me an excuse to celebrate heavily today. CHEERS!

Last night I was programming some super-elementary pathfinding into the game prototype I'm working on and I noticed enemies were getting stuck on corners when following the player. They don't yet have the brains to try moving a few more pixels forward so that they can round the corner and continue the pursuit.

Here's a demo video (152kb). The pink/red rectangle is the player. The bottom-left blue rectangle is the enemy ploddingly following him. (And the things that look like a trail of turds are player footsteps… In case I have a level set in dust or snow)

Googling for information on path-finding, I came across this nice webpage called The Pac-Man Dossier which explains the workings of Pac-Man in extreme but user-friendly detail. It didn't solve my problem but it's more interesting than my problem and you may enjoy having a look at it.

Lol...you might be right. Since, while CC was a long review, it wasn't 350K words long.

This morning I attended the 2011 XYZZY Awards Ceremony on IFMud. The XYZZYs are best quickly described as the Oscars of Interactive Fiction, voted for by any interested players over two rounds.

My game Six was a finalist in a lot of categories:

Best Game
Best Setting
Best NPCs
Best Supplemental Materials
Best Implementation

In the end I won Best Implementation. And I think that was a good win, as I do believe in the strength of the game's implementation. The game that really mopped up, and ultimately won Best Game, was Cryptozookeeper.

I don't know if its just because I've had a lot to say about certain games like FF XIII and Chrono Cross, but I've been more in the 8-9 MB realm than the 5-6 MB realm recently. Might have to do a couple short-n-sweet reviews just in case I'm just getting overly verbose.

OD's Thought for the Day

Yeah. It's one of those that got quite a lot of mixed reviews but remained popular enough for Hideo Koshima to continue the franchise. Unlike Legend of Dragoon.

In any case, I gave the game an 8 after playing it for the first time ten years or so after it first came out, and I still thought it was pretty good. Not so confident about the other games in the series, but since I haven't played all of them yet (only played MGS2 so far), either.

So hopefully I'll get some time to clock some hours and get a review out there before the bounty on it closes.