Dust, an Elysian Tale: You speak to me. Please stop.

I don't tend to take much stock in things I hear from talking rabbits, and haven't been able or interested to follow the plot of a tale told in Japstrionics since Akira, but Dust was a rodent I could relate to.

For I, too, contain a rage capable of immolating all injustice with a thousand rapid blows.

For I, too, contain an empathy capable of effacing all efforts with duty and guilt.

And for I, too, am inseparable from a high-pitched chorus always buzzing in my ear.

Also we both wish we were Princess Gwendolyn.

thanks to Dosala1 for capturing the game's best moment so well.

Dust: an Elysian Tale

Skyrim: the world is not enough

67 hours, 35 minutes, 56 seconds, and absolutely no satisfaction or closure to speak of.

Yes, a lot of people put a lot of love in this game. Yes, it is broad and deep and finally brings the RPG genre full circle with Sandbox gaming. Yes, I could have sunk another 100 hours into it without seeing everything, stupid "radiant quest" gimmick notwithstanding.

But here's the thing:

I don't need another world. Dealing with my own is already more fun and frustration than I can handle. What I need are stories that inspire me, challenges that reward me, and something that actually qualifies as a game. Preferably without thirty seconds of loading for every minute of playing.

Unless I can steal cars. And get fat.

LostStar Tactics: picking your battles

The Death Frost Forest is passable, but death frosty.

5 to 11? Sounds fair to me.

 Great winners pick good losers, and knowing is half the battle.

LostStar Tactics is all about finding the fights you can walk away from, and going into them with the right equipment.
 
There is no fight worth fighting where you won't have less experience and/or less allies than the opposition, but the the particulars of every pawn are available before each battle, and it's your choice who to fight and when to fight them.



Attack too soon, and you'll waste precious time retreating, which cuts off access to certain opportunities. Wait too long, and results are the same.

The path is neither straight nor marked, but it does exist and can be found.

Dead Space 2: not alive

Smooth, unobjectionable Isaac Clarke...now with talking!

I remember thoroughly enjoying Dead Space, but nothing else about it. Playing through the sequel reminded me why.

This franchise is polished and playable, with a pleasing aesthetic, but entirely unremarkable.

The only thing I have to say about Dead Space is that there’s nothing to say about Dead Space. Which I guess is fine- I thoroughly enjoyed the Uncharted series as well, but couldn’t write anything worth the kilobytes there either.

At least the vomitous proliferation of sequel and spinoff keeps this creeping necromorphism contained within titles…

Dead Space Extraction: exhausting

Dear Electronic Arts, Since some unscalable providence has caused you to publish a franchise I can sit through, indulge me this unsolicited advice on how you’ll best monetize it:

Being constantly startled is not the same as being scared.

Hurtling forward is not the same as having momentum.

Running everywhere does not make you fast-paced, and causes you to miss things, like ammo, health, or plot.

Making dialogue unskippable does not make it compelling.

And the last time anyone was shaken by a rail shooter, it involved hydraulics…no, that doesn’t mean you should make a peripheral.

LA Noire: as fun as a black & white movie

Interviewing characters in LA Noire is so lifelike, it's almost like you're playing a real video game.

And for all the impact your choices of whom to pursue, and your performances to that effect have on future events, that video game, were it to be a video game (oh god let's hope no one ever makes it into a video game), would be The Wire.

Were it not for the immense respect I have for Rockstar, I would have quit this "game" in 20 minutes.

Don't get me wrong- I was raised on Touch & Clicks, and learned how to type from their predecessors, yelling the proof of age questions for Leisure Suit Larry 1-3 to my bachelor dad in the bath tub. LA Noire has just as much game as they do, but it doesn't have a hyperspeed button or enter key (or a hilarious text parser).

And fine, I get it, paying attention to the cutscenes and dialogue is essential to following the intricately unfolded plot and to catching people in their lies, and I should stop restarting every time I mess up and just live with the consequences, but what consequences are there to live with? Maybe if I'd known that none of it would ever matter I might not have tried so hard, but then I really doubt I could have kept playing. And if you really wanted to "immerse" me in detective grays, never truly knowing when what I did was wrong, then why'd you rub my face in it with every question and then slap me with a score?

  
Thank god I figured out that you can quit between interview questions without causing an auto-save, or else you'd have to call me a grudge gamer (apparently Sam Houser originally suggested Grudge Games as a name for their label...see Rockstar, I roll deep! ...David Kushner would do better writing for Seventeen, by the way...)

And back to that twisted yarn whose cinematics were too important to cut: don't kid yourself.

Every Rockstar plot boils down to an outsider anti-hero with a flexible moral code and unending patience overcoming adversity through being exponentially smarter and more capable than whoever is bossing them around, culminating in their inevitable A) long-foreshadowed betrayal by closest friends in a manner that satisfyingly portrays societal hypocrisies but often results in death, B) elevation to overlord of a vast and intricate world in which they meander free, with a curious whimsy and relative impunity, or C) all of the above.

I hate to criticize some of the only people in this industry who take risks with, and ownership of, their product, but there it is. All shit stinks, even when it comes from a rockstar.

Draw Something: Say Anything

There have been times when I've seen my life as a series of failures to communicate. My temptation is to turn inward, but at times like these the opposite is all the more important. We must flail, gyrate, and gesticulate, try anything to separate the truth from noise. Otherwise it's all just charades.

My cousin didn't get it...

A moment of clarity!

I know how you feel, Charlie Brown.

Dead Island: dead inside

 I wonder how he got up there...

Whenever I'm eating shit, I always try to pick out the most digestible clumps.

Like Dead Island, for instance, which seldom stretches out an excursion, or finds itself floating around after the moment has passed. Just straight onto the next fetch quest.

I can't think of any other games brave enough to let you run away from 85% of their challenges- unless you count Mirror's Edge, but who would do a thing like that to themselves?
 
On further reflection, "run past" is probably more accurate than "run away," seeing as how the amount of zombies on screen never nears the amount it would take to obstruct someone, let alone threaten them...Seriously, this game throws more F-bombs at you than zombies, and we're all immune to infection here anyway, right? Gosh that's so convenient!

But it wasn't this Tourettes-inspired dialogue or epic misunderstanding of what makes zombies any more compelling than subway panhandlers that bothered me...I wasn't even particularly put off wondering where all the straight-jacketed linebacker zombies came from...

What I never recovered from was how, even before your character learns that zombie apocalypse has struck, leaving wads of cash and candy bars in every conceivable corner and cabinet, they have no compunction against walking into the neighboring hotel room and looting it.

 Resigned Gamer Rule #6: Always pick the large black man.

Dark Souls: Bowling Alone

Okay, so I finally finished Dark Souls, and uncharacteristically enough, I did indeed start over again immediately.

I enjoyed revisiting old friends and foes, and knowing now what I didn't then, I enjoyed killing them. But it grew stale and I realized whatever fun was to be had on a second play-thru had to mostly be in multiplayer.

So I doubled down on being uncharacteristic and took a tour of the covenants, none of which I'd bothered with on my first play-thru.

I tried the Forest Hunters first, who are summoned to protect the Darkroot Garden from pesky snow-mobilers (incidentally: the idea of wilderness does not need defenders, just some crazy wolf trees and bad-ass mushroom people) but quickly found that going up against someone with at least 10 health potions while I was allowed none wouldn't exactly be a fair fight.

So then I tried the Blade of the Darkmoon, and was summoned to a room not even a third the size of the forest, where two people were standing around waiting to pound me, not three steps away.

So I figured I'd just play through a bit more, level up, see the sights, finally use all that humanity I'd saved, and along came a pantsless guy in a turban, waving what looked to be a gigantic red turd in my general vicinity. He smooshed it into the ground, and I guess I must have died from the sheer stink of it. He bowed.

I thought about jumping through the hoops required to join the Darkwraiths, where at least the invasion occurs at a time and place of my choosing, rather than asshole waiting to farm me, but then what? Spend ten minutes running around looking for them, for maybe a thirty second fight?

I'm sure I could have tried a bit harder and a bit longer, but my impression of the people playing PVP was that they were all running one scam or another. And sure, I could have evened the odds a bit, used a talisman to prevent them from healing, joined the Gravelord Servants to push others into invasions, or I could have walked The Path of the Dragon, but that path is just too damn long. Seriously, that shit is like going all the way to Queens for a cheap taco and a handjob.

I suppose, like the people who write stupid or misleading messages all over the floor, if you don't enjoy fucking with people, then there just isn't much fun in it. If anything, I got a chance to step outside my anti-social, bitter self and remember exactly why I don't play well with others...Because they aren't worth playing with.

Solomon's Boneyard: Until you are dead.

If I didn't know better, I'd think this game was some kind of sick joke. Locked in an ill-maintained cemetery after hours, scratching in the dirt for coins to unlock perks to help you find more coins to unlock perks to give you more rings to help you find more coins to unlock more perks to have better magic to prevent the ceaseless flood of undead from bumping-into-you-to-death for an extra 30 seconds this time. And then again.

No, the cemetery gate is not an unlockable perk.

Trying to remember the spell for jumping over fences...

Yes, I could have gotten all those perks sooner by paying a buck or two, but what fun would that have been? Seriously, who does that? A ceaseless horde of Walking Dead, you say? Thanks, I'll stay inside the gate.

Red Faction, Guerilla: putting the fun back in martyrdom

You know how in Sandbox games, no matter how much chaos you cause and people you kill, the cops lose interest once a mission is completed?

Red Faction Guerilla is no different when it comes to missions, but not during the aimless property destruction required to unlock those missions.

This leads the Mars occupiers to employ ruthless asymmetry against window smashers, and go to lunch while their barracks burn, but more importantly, committing acts of petty sedition produces the most accurate simulation of an insurgency campaign ever played:

You don't go into these attacks expecting to come out alive and seldom do. All that matters is hurting the target, and there is no shortage of (strangely similar looking) people who'll die to do it. Morale does not improve as control wanes, and after the army is forced to withdraw from an area it becomes overrun by truckloads of gibbering savages who'd been hiding out in the mountains.

Ooh, I wonder if he'll vote for the moderate party!

Demon's Souls: tough but fair

GOAT!

I'd hoped that Demon's Souls would be a goldmine for this blog, rife with metaphor about frustration, imbalance, and loss, and I suppose it could have been if I'd just never played it.

It turns out we've become so accustomed to the coddling of games designed to smoothly progress from point A to point B to point Buy the Sequel that a little bit of learning curve seems daunting.
The problem isn't Demon's Souls...It's us. If you still haven't played it, you really should.

Below are my responses to some common reasons people cite when in angst or awe of this game's supposed outrageous difficulty:


If you die, you lose all your souls (spent on leveling and as money)

Retrace your steps to the bloodstain which appears about 5 seconds from where you were standing and you can have them back.

Also, you don't lose any items including the "canned souls" strewn about the game.


Lots of guys can kill you with one or two hits

Good thing you've got infinite continues! Lesson learned? See above.


At any time, other people can come into your game and kill you

Only other people at comparable levels, only one at a time, only in certain areas, and only while you are "alive" and they are "in soul form," meaning their hit points are halved. And if they don't succeed, they'll go down a level.

Oh and that whole "alive" thing...yeah it doesn't happen too often.


But I don't want to be in soul form! I've only got half my health!

Cling ring.

Or volunteer to help someone else kill a boss. Or go kill a boss yourself. Just keep stuffing watercress in your mouth and you'll be fine. Or use one of those magic rocks! Rare and valuable resource, you say? Pah, I've got 30 in my Thomas!

But seriously. Cling ring.

You can't pause!

"oh honey, I would love to look at those baby pictures with you, but you know this crazy game I'm playing won't let me pause! I told you about that right? Isn't it crazy?!?"



I think that just about covers it. True, there are some dick moves the game will pull, like making you struggle to earn magic swords you're not strong enough to wield, or letting Yurt the Silent Chief kill all your Nexus pals, but he likely won't take out anyone that important, and would anyone really miss this prick?

harumph!

And on the flip side, how many games give you experience points when bad guys fall off a cliff?

Red Dead Redemption, Undead Nightmare: Occam's Gayzor

I’d really love to know what inspired Rockstar to make the jump from Western to Zombies in this DLC. It was ingenious how well it fit, and so complementary of their signature satirical humor.

Even though the amount of repetitiveness between missions was more than usual, I had to play through if only to learn what caused the dead to walk amongst us in a tableau of irrevocable pain, misery and fear. I know, I know, Rockstar isn’t generally known for their gripping storylines and it’s really not supposed to matter why…Zombie Apocalypse is an inevitable given; The important questions lie with how the living choose to live, morality, humanity, practicality, and such…But hell with all that, the reason I couldn’t put this game down was because I needed to know how it would end.

The simplest, most logical explanation always gives good odds though, and in hindsight I really could have guessed. It was those damned Mexicans again!

Alpha Protocol: Agency

Are we what we do, or doing what we are?

To what extent are we born blank slates, becoming only what we know?

Most doors never really close. Even at the end we can turn it all around,
but an asp must be an asp, and we remain, as ever, animals.

We like to think it is choice that sets us apart,
but we do what we must and despite the details, it always ends the same.
Nevertheless, it's those details that make our lives our own. Live well.

Colorful Goo: my new painting blog

I've been somewhat at a loss for words, recently. Most of what I've got has been siphoned off into writing Business School applications. I've started a new project, taking close-up photographs of my paintings, and would love you guys to check it out.

Colorful Goo on Blogspot
Colorful Goo on Flickr

Prototype: Is this why the real America hates us?

Personally, I'm less concerned about the military's lack of anti-insurgency skills than I am about the fact that I've assimilated over a third of the hearts and minds in this city and I still don't know how to drive a car. God damn it I hate New Yorkers!

Batman Arkham Asylum: Batman Lives the Vida Loca

When it came to picking a favorite superhero, my choice was always clear. There's nothing badass about saving the day when your only weakness is for shiny green gemstones, or when your tights are full of spooj. Bruce Wayne is just a regular super-genius ninja billionaire detective. Like you and me.

Batman is Everyman. He loves great books, long walks on the beach, and prostitutes...
But constantly climbing through ventilation shafts to spy on celebrity villains is just a little too commoner for how I like to envision the Dark Knight...

READ THIS OR ELSE THE VIDEO WON'T MAKE ANY SENSE...



Special thanks to my the YouTubers linked below, for stealing that which I stole from them:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=exhNT2_bHs8

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZQd4eQ6Hby8&playnext=1&list=PL05F73D9C2F2B3B40

Resonance of Fate: nothing is written in stone

2.75 days of my life, only including the spent time saved, and I can't say what this game was about. I'm not even sure why I stuck with it.



I know I've promised myself I'd stop before. Every time, in fact...But each chapter in this epic allegory made me think it was all about to come together; The moment was just out of my grasp, so I stretched. And stretched. And stretched.

The game had great things going for it, no doubt. The combat system was forward-thinking and unique, with a steep enough learning curve and difficulty to keep me interested; The mandatory Japstrionic battle animations comparatively short enough to keep me engaged; The fruits of laboriously tiling Basel's twelve story bathroom incentive enough to keep me on my knees, in search of corner pieces and Bezel Shards. The threads just never seemed to meet, the punches to connect.

But I didn't throw in the towel. Everything eventually ends, or at least presents an opportunity for exit, so it's really a question of closure, or continuity. I didn't get either, but I did get out, with clean hands and a head held high. I found none of my fears came true, the sky was blue, and the sun was shining.

It took me 5 years, 5 months, and 17 days to take my life back. So what's a couple days?

Sand Slides: My Slippery Slope

So it's come to this.

Employing an exhaustive workaround of intersecting lines and buckets so we might safely pour our precious material down the drain, I never asked why we didn't just rig the overhead vats to rotate. I knew every hair was numbered, and was happy to pass a hat.


It didn't matter that success only spread me thin until it slipped through my hands- I had potential once. I was ranked the 2,548th best employee in the button factory, and reached new heights of homogeneity every night shift.

And then one day it wasn't fun anymore. I still went through the motions, sorting cyan from cerulean, green from gold, saving what I could and letting the rest slip away. I kept my weary fingers in the dike, but knew eventually everything reached the sea, and Monday always came. My scores began to drop like rain.

Eventually I could no longer resist the urge to turn this bubble gum and twine assembly line into an arts and crafts project. My contribution was less than appreciated, but what it lacked in score it made up for in satisfaction.

R-Type Command: Don't Look Back

WARNING! This review contains spoilers...As if you were really gonna play R-Type Command...

Halfway through it, all I'd intended to write about this game was that it's a polished and perfectly competent turn-based strategy that made one glaring omission:


In the mission pictured above, you start at the top of a column and work your way down. Those ships are not running away from that wormy monster- they're about to fight it. Poorly...

And we're not talking about some constantly-walking japanese icons that are just going to swing a sword in any direction and jabber on anyway. Combat in this game is driven by charging big blast weapons, originating from the nose of one's ship.

But after playing through the whole game, this excessive linearity actually seems quite intentional and, I have to admit, rather clever.

The premise of the game is that a young commander is sent on a journey across the galaxy to find and destroy the source of the Bydo, an alien race (originally created by man, to serve man, blahblahblah) whose fleets are approaching Earth in a seemingly endless stream. All previous attempts to stop them have failed.

After 30 missions of mind-numbing Japanese exposition, the commander reaches the Bydo Core, and his entire armada is promptly mutated into Bydo. Somehow they don't notice. They just want to go home.

And thus starts another 27 missions as the other side, going right back the way you came, and every mission not understanding why all the other humans are trying to kill you. I've got to say it got old after the 10th pre-mission monologue, but it was compelling enough that I had to see what happened at the end of the loop.

Yeah, actually you've got about another 12 missions to go...

To make a painfully long story bearable: you finally get back to Earth, blow up a couple buildings, figure out you've become the Bydo, get sad, fly around all depressed while the credits roll, and then run away.

They could have gotten to the point much faster, but so could my mother...Granted, Commander Cucumber could have just picked up a mirror, but how much of ourselves do we ever truly see the way that others do? How often do we acknowledge that we're part of the problem, and do we ever get outside the glass house?

...Also, yes, that picture really does say "Untouchable Sergeant Cucumber's Residual Sanity."