News

Size matters not, but numbers do!

‘Star Wars: The Old Republic’ loses 400,000 subscribers

"The Force is, well, a little tepid with Star Wars: The Old Republic.

Electronic Arts' much ballyhooed massively-multiplayer game set in George Lucas's celebrated universe is bleeding customers, losing some 400,000 in the fourth quarter -- a number much worse than anyone was expecting.

The news has sent EA stock plunging to a level it hasn't seen since 1999, but company executives tried to downplay the numbers in an earnings call with analysts Monday, saying the exodus was tied to casual and trial players canceling their subscriptions.

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Achtung!!!

Play legendary shooter ‘Wolfenstein 3D’ in your browser

 Twenty years after revolutionizing gaming, the iconic Wolfenstein 3D is back. 

And it won't cost you a dime to enjoy it. To celebrate the 20th anniversary of the first first-person shooter, id Software and its parent company Bethesda Softworks have released a free-to-play web version of the game that runs right out of your web browser. For folks who prefer their gaming on the go, the developer will also offer Wolfenstein 3D Classic Platinum free to iPhone, iPad, and iPod Touch owners for a limited time.

 

 

Skyrim in Thaw

Well, either Alduin's Apocalypse is upon us, or it's solar flares, or it's just plain ol' good luck, but we're experiencing an early spring this year. My little corner of Skyrim continues to melt.

Dragons don't attack you when you're in the river. They don't like their meals marinated.

Man, those abandoned cabins always have angry killer bears in them. I'm gonna just go around this one. I don't need grilled  leeks THAT badly.

Animal tracks - man... this undoubtedly means I'm going to have to buy YET another horse very shortly. Stupid horse is made of glass or something....

Early spring is great! Soon, the Jazbay grapes will be in season, although I'm going to really miss Snowberry pie. :/  Oh well! Winter is always just around the corner.

Literally. It's like.. right over there.

Actual Google Satellite Image of the area.
Brace yourselves... winter is a huge wall of terrifying whiteness. And it's comin'.

All Too Easy

I'm not a great gamer.
I mean, I'm okay, but not 'The Best'.
I don't have high scores. Sometimes, I can't even complete the game.
I don't know when those 'high score' boards lost fashion in games. Probably about the same time as games stopped keeping score, actually.
I remember usually being midway down on those ol' scoreboards. I was never #1. But I was okay with that. I had my place in life. It was midway. Neither winner nor loser. There was a balance in the force.

Somebody is good at Solitaire (and it ain't me).  (source)

Things are different now. I thought I knew where I stood, but no. The waters are muddy. The answers aren't clear. The world is askew.


I have been playing the cyberpunk themed "stealth/science fiction action role-playing video game" Deus Ex: Human Revolution. It's pretty beast. I'm enjoying it, and I should probably do a 'My Take' on it, even though there's volumes already written on the subject by better analysts than myself (I bet they're at the top of the scoreboards).

Knowing that I was a 'midway' gamer, I wanted to play the game on a normal difficulty setting. So..

WHOA there hoss! Not so fast. You have some choices to make here before you go selecting a difficulty! This ain't any ordinary game. This is modern! Hip! Dynamic!
You don't just PLAY this game, you 'experience it'! You don't PLAY ruggedly handsome Adam Jensen - you ARE ruggedly handsome Adam Jensen.

Intensity level: Hardcore  (source)

There's a phenomenon in the fashion industry known as 'vanity sizing'.  Basically, it's the idea that as the western world gets fatter, the clothing industry has to make clothes that are larger, but they realize that if they want to make the western consumer happy, they should label the clothes as smaller than they really measure to make us all feel good about ourselves and our outrageous avarice.
So some guy that was waist size 36" in high school can still boast that he wears a size 36" when he's in mid-life, not because he could actually ever squeeze back into his high school pants, but because the industry labels the now 38"-41" as a 36".  You liars flatterers, you, fashion industry!

And that was what I felt as I selected the difficulty level in Deus Ex: Human Revolution - that I was being pandered to (just a little) and patronized to (just a tad).

A clever person wrote:

Most video games have adjustable Difficulty Levels so as to provide more of a challenge to good players while allowing poor players the satisfaction of finishing and finding out how the story ends. Traditionally, they would just be called Easy, Medium, and Hard (and possibly Expert). However, a recurring clever idea is to name them in a way reflecting of your game's style or plot.
Of course, if you use more than one word, everyone will call them "Easy", "Medium" and "Hard", but it does help establish continuity...

There are three difficulty settings in Deus Ex: Human Revolution:

"Tell Me A Story", "Give Me A Challenge", "Give Me Deus Ex".


I must have hovered my mouse over the three selections for a good 10 minutes.
Tell me a story? What, like a bed-time story? Are you calling me a baby? Is this sissy setting? Should I be ashamed of this one? PASS.
Give me a challenge? Of course I want to be challenged. Why else would I play a game? Is this going to be a challenge like finding two matching socks in the morning? Like talking to women? Or like actually winning the QWOP race? Challenging how?
Give me Deus Ex? I bought the game. Give it to me. I paid good money for it. You want a breach-of-contract suit? Hand the damn game over.

I figured the three descriptions meant, in effect, Easy, Normal, and Hard, but they surely don't say that. As surely as that guy isn't going to fit into his highschool bellbottoms, the fatty.
Why did they vanity size the game?

We all KNOW what the three settings represent, but I felt a little condescended to while deciding. I KNOW that "Tell Me a Story" means I'm on the 'easiest' setting - so just call it 'easy'. Don't pretend I'm still hardcore, but just need some alone time, and perhaps a bubble bath.
On this setting, I'm not hardcore. I'm a pansy.

In ancient times, games were straight up. They let you KNOW you were a pussy:

Wolfenstein 3D  (source)

DOOM   (source)

In all, I felt the difficulty setting descriptions in Human Revolution were a little too vague, flowery, and not mutually exclusive. When playing this much-anticipated game I wanted not only to be told a story, and to be challenged, but also to get the real 'Deus Ex' that was promised.
If this complaint seems nit-picky, it's because it is.
But, my argument is that if you're trying to establish continuity or reflect your plot, using vague, inclusive, placating, soft language in a game where you're supposed to cripple, injure, maim, gouge, chop, slice, and potentially massacre human beings, I think you've erred somewhere.
Why not make the choices as gritty as Adam's voice?

'Tell me a story'. JEEZ.

---


PS: If one wants to know what exactly the different selections really represent, one should go here. 
PPS: The settings themselves varied the gameplay to a satisfying and sensible degree. It is the descriptions that are the fail, to me.

Ancient Greece? Abandon All Hope!

Never before has such an historical pairing of ancient Greek mythology and retro-style video gaming come together in such a clash of titans!
Until now...

(source)

Revisit the infamous torment meted out to the unlucky by the fickle and vain gods.
Struggle fruitlessly! Labour endlessly! Learn something!

Let's Play: Ancient Greek Punishment

Gamer Cliques

Hardcore? Casual? FPS Twitch Kiddy? PC? Console?

"How is anyone supposed to know whose “gang” they belong to or who they’re going to be jovially disparaging towards on any given day? What about if you’re given a label by the industry (or the community) which you dislike or don’t really feel encompasses everything about gaming you love? Take heart dear friend. At least you’re not a “female gamer”."

(By Pippa Hall)

Read the full article here....

(source)

Project KARA - Quantum Dream

"Kara, a disturbing short film about a self-aware robot, was made by games studio Quantic Dream to demonstrate the "expressive power" of the PS3's graphics. In order to sidestep the limitations of animating human characters (the so-called, contentious "uncanny valley"), the creators made a story about a newborn, intelligent robot -- a character that is supposed to be subtly unconvincing in its humanity." (BoingBoing.net)

Wow.

My Take: Rise of Nightmares

(source)

"Rise of Nightmares is a survival horror video game developed and published by Sega for the Xbox 360  [...] and is designed specifically for Kinect. It is the first M-rated Kinect game released."
(link)

I was gifted Rise of Nightmares for Christmas (after demanding it loudly and greedily) and have only now gotten around to playing it.

I actually don't mind using the Kinect. While the 'we track your every movement' thing is a little disconcerting, especially with facial and body recognition, I, for one, welcome my robot overlords because the Kinect is actually something that people have been dreaming of since video games began.

No controller? Body movements? Physical interaction in the game world? Swinging swords and throwing knives? YES YES YES!

I've used the Wii-mote controller before and found it very 'meh'. It doesn't really do exactly what I want it to do, and I preferred the Kinect's 'hands free' feeling. And anything is certainly preferable to being seen with a Playstation Move controller - "Hi, I'm going to stand here holding an 8 inch shaft in my hand which I'll be waggling at people. Don't be put off by the swollen knob at the end. That's very normal."

Should this be used in public? (source)

If you're not familiar with the Kinect, here is a nauseating video of happy family play time.
Also, here's a video of all the really inspiring ways this  technology will play a good role in our lives. (I'm being forced by the robot overlords to post this propaganda! SEND HELP!)

But enough selling Xbox! This is about my take on the first mature rated game they released for the dang thing. I was getting so sick of Kinectimals!  X(

"Unashamedly mature" is how Nightmares is described. Think again, developers! You should be very ashamed. And 'mature' is not really how I'd describe the content. For adults? Not really. It seems to be aimed at the same group of slavering teenagers that flock to near-snuff films like Hostel or Saw.
I'm no puritan, but I do go for more suspenseful psychological horror like found in the works of Hitchcock, or especially the cult hit indie game Amnesia: The Dark Descent.



Plot: You're a drunken slob. You have a wife. She gets abducted by a hilarious monster. YOU MUST SAVE WIFE.
There is an attempt to weave in a spooky storyline with train wrecks and Romanian monsters and gypsy fortune tellers and marital strife and mad scientists and sexy nurses, but it all kind of falls flat after you meet the monster and the hordes of zombies that seem really out of place in the setting. It's like "Silent Hill" meets "Island of Dr. Moreau" meets the old arcade "House of the Dead" (not surprisingly, as Sega developed HotD as well).

 As you can see here, Dr. Moreau is VASTLY scarier than anything in Rise of Nightmares.

 (source)

Gameplay:

Thankfully, the secondary characters don't last long. (source)

Oh, that reminds me. For some reason the game portrays all Europeans as assholes.
They shake their heads and mutter about 'f-ing Americans' continuously. AND they don't even speak American. How is he supposed to know what's going on? He's in Romania! Why are they speaking Romanian??
I'm starting to get the feeling that Sega writers have MAJOR inferiority complexes.

A monster sporting a silly cravat and stealing your wife. Understandably, those hideous soccer-mom capri pants made her a target to be eliminated. Learn from her fail, kids.  (source)

The scary monster has tiny hydraulics that open his mask up like a dainty butterfly... (source)

Slow zombies. The way I like em.  (source)

I think having the main character be an alcoholic was probably a good choice. That nicely explains his staggering, lurching movements as you pilot the meat puppet around awkwardly.
Which leads us to the controls.

To walk you have to place your foot forward (only after standing nearly 100 yards away from the screen - Kinect keeps prompting you to get back. Futher! FURTHER!). To turn in game you have to move your shoulders in the direction you wish to go. It took me a few levels to really achieve a flow and stop face-planting into stone walls.
The best part (and the reason anyone buys the game) is the hacking and slashing. You do as you would imagine: raise your hands and hack and slash or punch and pummel. It's very satisfying. ^.^

Opening doors, picking up items and activating switches is fiddly, frustrating, and time consuming, and the novelty of kicking down doors in your cowboy boots wears off after the first few "I'M CHUCK NORRIS BITCHES" *BOOM*

From the playthroughs I've seen, and from my own experience, players often get stuck at one part of the game where you're required to run. Because, incredibly, there's no clear instructions on HOW to run in the game, most people just naturally stick their foot out further than the 'walking' gesture. But when no running occurs (and you die for the 10th time), you'll probably feel compelled to look up how to run on the internet.

The only way to run, or swim, in the game is not to actually make running or swimming motions as you might presume - but to flail around like a madman having a violent seizure during a horrific earthquake.
You could probably be in great danger of harming yourself if you're not normally the physical type.
It's as unintuitive and crazy as it is hilarious (especially when spectating).
To climb ladders in game, I'm forced to disco dance. Whatever works. 



At the end of the day, I would have been happier were there simply more waves of things to hack and slash instead of attempts and failures at suspense and intrigue and lame puzzle solving. I think however, some leeway should be given to a game that seems to be largely an experiment in gaming and the Kinect tech as it is now.

I would call it a success. While rudimentary, I think this type of gaming holds much promise, and I'd like to see more adult/mature titles added to the Kinect menu.

One review called Rise of Nightmares "hackneyed at best and nonsensical at worst."
HA! Very true. But I'm still going to play it right now because it's fun! ;)

I Heart Trevelyan

My Take: Three Musketeers Secrets: Constance's Mission

Sometimes I just wanna flake out and not *think*.
What's that you say? I never think?

Well you laugh now, but you'll be crying once you experience "Three Musketeers Secrets: Constance's Mission".
It's a derpy little 'hidden object' casual time killer for when you have housework, homework, exercise, or other important tasks you wish to avoid doing.

Why did I pick it? I was reaching complete Skyrim saturation, and needed a break from the ravages of endless questing. Also, I like Three Musketeers stuff, and it was flaunting a sassy rogue:

Source

Obviously English is not the first language of the game, because the subtitles leave much to be desired.  Forget the intended puzzles - try and solve the mystery of what the game is actually trying to say!

This woman sports the only expression more enigmatic and indecipherable than the Mona Lisa.

This game has some unique additions to the normal 'hidden object' genre: It has fully animated cut scenes with ACTION!! and ADVENTURE!!, interesting* story without being burdensome, and relevant mini games.

(*Well... 'interesting' compared, to... say, watching paint dry.)

The game suffers (or rather the player does) because the actual 'hidden object' part of the game is kinda crap. I've seen it done much MUCH better in other titles. Also, the menu screen theme music for this game is truly awful. It's totally off key. I listened to it for like 5 minutes because I'm a crazy masochist who enjoys pain and suffering.  I wish I could find it and play it for you over and over so you could share in the madness.

I'm big enough to admit that I play these "casual games", albeit infrequently, and I've found most of them endearing because of their little idiosyncrasies, their amusing flaws, and most notably the obvious personal involvement of the game designers and creators reflected in the work.
These are also all the reasons I enjoy trying out indy games as well. 

So while I appear to chastise games and point out their imperfections, to me it's like talking about a crazy and irritating friend and all the stupid stuff he does - but it's all good, because he's fun and life wouldn't be the same without him.

When I drink wine I can get pretty 'demolished' too.

 

 Micheal Jackson! Why you sneakin' round my palace?

Skyrim: Rant of the Bosmer

Dear Journal;

Well, I FINALLY found my bum of a husband. I was starting to wonder if he didn't like Wood Elves in general, or me in particular. Or perhaps he'd died.

But apparently he just 'got lost'; I found him moping around at the Temple of Mara in Riften. (City of Vice!)

He was pretending to not know why I was mad, which made me madder, so I firmly sent him directly to our house in Whiterun to get cookin'. No time to waste!

I don't know why these people are called 'spouses', when obviously they're just indentured servants. House slaves, really. They are restricted to the property, you confiscate their money, they cook and clean for you, and they can't leave unless under your supervision.

Hop to it! And wipe that look off your face. YOU'RE MINE NOW.

But that's the problem with finding good help - it ain't easy.

I frankly haven't got time for all this babysitting! Esbern is on my back to "save the world". Man he's OLD. I feel like I better hurry and save it before he has a heart attack.

And Delphine keeps giving me attitude. Look, lady, *I* give the attitude around here, and if you don't like it I will Fus Ro Dah you off a cliff, capiche? Furthermore, I didn't ask you and Old Man Time here to follow me around on quests. You go do your own thing. I got this.

Perhaps I can sneak away while they're not looking...

I was given a ring only to find out it's somehow magically FUSED TO MY DAMN FINGER and I cannot get it off and oh by the way it turns me into a hideous beast whenever it whims. That's been inconvenient, to say the least.

Dragons are attacking me in groups now. >.<  Just ONE dragon at a time isn't 'cool' these days I guess.

And to top it all off, multiple Daedric Princes are breathing down my neck to run their errands for them. Aren't they supposed to be all powerful? Am I missing something here? Why do they need me to do stuff for them again?
One of them actually has sent a DOG to accompany me on various missions. Is he trying to torture me? Doesn't he know I have a shaky history with canines? Or perhaps he does know. They're all pretty much jerks.

Also, I think I'm seeing things.

 
I think I need more sleep. OH NO SORRY CAN'T I'm a hideous werewolf who doesn't nap!



****

On the upside, I was able to catch a little Shakespeare In The Park:

OOoh I love this scene from MacBeth!

Skyrim: Lovin' and Leavin'

I'm well into my 153 hour of Skyrim, and am finding, like a child teetering on the precipice of adulthood, that things aren't as rosy in the world as I'd imagined.
The carefree days of whimsical bardic singing, idle wildflower picking and cozy home decorating are slipping away, and my Wood Elf's golden eyes have become a jaundiced, jaded yellow. The yellow of concern. The yellow of disappointment.
The yellow of depression.


I think it started in Riften. These things always start in Riften.

My Wood Elf had seen a darkness that she'd never experienced in her green and native land of Valenwood.

The stain of Riften is a hard one to wash away and so, to forget, she threw herself into a myriad of quests, hoping that with each fetch she would be sent farther afield, into dangerous territory. At some point, she realized that she was so dismayed by the world and all its suffering, that she was secretly and desperately hoping for that one quest that would end it all. A quest so suicidally dangerous that she wouldn't have to think about murders in Riften, or public executions in Solitude, or dead children in Morthal.

My Wood Elf, sick at heart, did the one thing that, single, unhappy women always do in these situations; She got a puppy.

She got a dog and disgusted all her friends with nauseating baby talk and endless pics of the creature on Facebook.

AWWWWWWWW!!!!! Look at that widdle guyyyy! Look at him!! Is you a good boy? YES you IS a good boy! Look at you! Look at you! Are you my schnookums? Are you? YES YOU ARE!

I will call you Charlie! Yes! And you will stay with me forever! You're such a good boy, Charlie!

Charlie! WALKIES! Come on! Let's go on a flower picking ADVENTURE!
YAY FOR CHARLIE! MUMMY LOVES CHARLIE!!!!!

Happiness, when found, is fleeting in Skyrim.

Noooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!!!!

To be honest, Charlie had been pushing his luck the entire time he'd been around (which amounted to approximately 25 minutes). If Charlie hadn't been killed by that bandit, I was going to have to resort to putting him in more drastic and life-threatening situations.
Sorry Wood Elf, the mutt had to go.

The mechanics and AI of the dogs aren't the best, to my mind.

Rather than finding them good companionship, I was constantly bothered by the noisy creature barking, chuffing and whining everywhere we went. When I was viewing rich vistas atop deliriously high cliffs, not only would Charlie not STFU, but in his attempts to be 'near' me, he kept bumping me and my horse nearly off the mountain!!!
Most frustrating (and scary).


My Wood Elf, however, was traumatized by Charlie's bloody demise, and took some time to get over the loss.  "RIP Charlie my little puddin' pop."
I insisted that the funeral involve nudging HIM off a cliff.

But in her quest to end the unhappiness she felt inside, my Wood Elf moved on.
And know what else perks up the female of the species when they're feeling low? A WEDDING!
Oh golly!!!

It wasn't too long after that my Wood Elf decided that a man about the house would put everything in perspective. She already had a beau in mind - a reasonably attractive Nord who had flattered her on many occasions (thank Mara!), and who seemed responsible and strong. Wilhelm, having his own inn in Iverstead, seemed a quiet, yet encouraging figure who could inspire a weary Wood Elf to stop staring into the maws of great beasts and yearning for the release of oblivion. (Not that Oblivion.)

Not exactly a fancy lady, my Wood Elf nevertheless became excited as the 'special day' grew near, and actually went out of her way to purchase some fine garments and hair accessories for the occasion. She annoyed all her friends with unceasing wedding-related chatter:

"No, I haven't met his parents. They're labouring in the corundum ore mines in The Rift, and can't get away. They literally can't get away. They're chained there."

"I've got a dress, but it's yellow - do you think I'll look sallow? I already look sallow? YOU BITCH that's my normal skin colour!"

"NO I WILL NOT slay that vampire and save the village children on Turdas. I've got a prior engagement that day."

Finally the big day arrived, and my Wood Elf made her way at the appointed hour to the appointed temple, to join the love of her life in a sacred and solemn vow of matrimony - whereupon all her hopes and dreams of a bright and shining future were forever dashed.

First tragedy: The over-eager Priest of Mara started the ceremony before she was even at the altar, so her 'walking down the aisle' fantasy was thrown out the window immediately.  Next, apparently Wilhelm didn't love her enough to bother even changing out of his filthy tavern attire to get married! And check out the look on his face!

Oh I'M SORRY!! Is this whole marriage thing an INCONVENIENCE TO YOU? 

  

PS: SHAVE you dirty hipster!

And as soon as the words "I do" were out of my Wood Elf's mouth, Wilhelm burst out of the temple and fled to Deities-know-where without a single word.

...

The TWO guests trickled out, embarrassed and awkward, without saying anything to the new bride.
What the hell had just happened?


In the hopes that perhaps Wilhelm had been SO excited to get to 'their' home in Whiterun and whip up some homecooked meals, my Wood Elf journeyed there only to find NO Wilhelm and NO homecooked meals, but also faithful Lydia had taken off as well.

And it was right about then she realized her horse was missing, too.  >.<

.......

Men! Ladies, amirite?
This Wood Elf now knows she can rely on only ONE person to survive: THE DOVAHKIIN.

Skyrim: The Greatest Battle

"NASA called, they want their computer back."

My Take: Dracula Series, Path of the Dragon

Perhaps I'm not doing something right. Perhaps my computer is screwing with me. Perhaps I should do a reinstall. Perhaps the evil nature of vampires has corrupted my computer and my very SOUL!

Whatever the problem, I can't seem to get The Dracula Series to work properly for me.
And that's a shame, because I enjoy suffering through really crap games.

It's not that I didn't take pleasure in these games. I did! I was truly entertained with scoffing at the nonexistent plot, wailing through the excruciating monotony, and laughing hysterically at the voice acting. They games are just so glitched out that I cannot complete them.

HobbR Htpa?   (Source)

The Kheops / Microids trilogy is horror adventure game Dracula 3: Path of the Dragon. Part 3 is divided into three episodes, (totally unnecessarily in my view):

Dracula Series 3 Path of the Dragon Part I: The Strange Case of Martha
Dracula Series 3 Path of the Dragon Part II:  The Myth of the Vampire
Dracula Series 3 Path of the Dragon Part III: The Destruction of the Evil

You know what, it doesn't really matter what they're called, because they all involved the same characters repeating the same dialogue and doing the same puzzles in the same shitty little town!

You play Father Arno Morianai, Devil's Advocate sent from the Vatican to investigate and debunk the myth of vampires. Well, you call him Arno Morianai, I call him hottie Keanu Reeves.

You hear that Mr. Anderson?... That is the sound of inevitability...

Actually, to be fair Arno's voice actor expresses more emotion and range in his work than Reeves ever could, but whatever.

Upon arriving in the small village of Vladoviste, Arno learns there's something not quite right going on.
Eventually.

I really wanted more from this game, but it takes a LONG while to warm up.  Fully 3/4 of the games are spent endlessly walking through screens.
The peasants from the Transylvanian countryside immediately ruin your immersion by all speaking like loud Americans (for the love of god, can't you just fake a really bad clichéd Transylvanian accent? We won't know the difference, trust us.)

The plot is slow, and the incredible stretches of boredom are punctuated by long sessions of dialogue. Sometimes a wild cut-scene will appear in an attempt to liven things up and give you hope of a better future, but they only titillate players with Arno sitting on a train, Arno walking, or Arno washing his hands. Seriously. :/

If you're hoping to catch a glimpse of a vampire in Part I, forget about it.
I got half way through Part II and still never had a brush with anything nearing danger.

Admittedly, one time I was gawked at menacingly by a dark stranger, and a dog DID bark at me, but that's it.

The 'score' is just one typically cryptic song looped over and over. I think the point is to drive you insane so you won't be able to vocalize to future potential victims that the game stagnates somewhere near the opening credits.

I don't know if I got crap copies, or what, but I found both first and second parts to be ultimately un-finishable (I'm sticking with that word).  In Part 1 I could only progress the game so far before a necessary item was missing and I couldn't proceed. In Part 2 some puzzles either wouldn't allow me to solve them, or if I clicked on them they'd do themselves for me. Hm. Self-completing puzzles aren't really what I'm looking for in a video game.
I can only imagine Part 3 shares the same integrity. Yet even without glitches, the game is a bit of a bore. If anyone has played Part 3 successfully, lemme know how it ends. >.<
I think it's fair to say that the games are 'good enough' if you can get them to work.

Source

Source

Source

Source

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If I have something complimentary to say about The Path of the Dragon, it's that it gets 9/10 for moodiness and scene-setting.
The graphics, though not groundbreaking, are quite beautiful. The artwork is dramatic and chilling and atmospheric. I didn't mind looking around because it was all so darkly pretty. I did learn quite a bit about the Dracula mythos in particular, and about Bram Stoker in general.
The NPCs, on the other hand, were quite derpy. Voices aside, they often were glitchy in hilarious ways; They would twitch and blink incessantly, and spawn/despawn randomly.

I really wanted to play the hell out of this game. The idea is compelling, and with the gorgeous backdrop, who wouldn't want to pilot Father Keanu Reeves into Transylvania to experience forbidden romance with beautiful women (in a totally pious way, naturally) and to kick the shit out the nasty, evil, bloodsucking vampires?

Alas.

Man... this trailer makes it look really good.
Well, it's not.

My Take: Terraria

I really like it when my friends introduce me to games that I might not otherwise pick up.

Terraria Montage Wallpaper by Demon1160

Having purchased, played, and thoroughly enjoyed Minecraft, I was excited to give this a try. The game is a blend of a sandbox-building Minecraft theme and exploration-adventure games like Metroid.
Minecraft  focuses more on building, whereas Terraria is more about enemies and items.
At $2.50 I couldn't afford NOT to try it, right?

Wrong-O.

With apologies to those who give a shit, I really REALLY hated Terraria.

And when I say hate, I mean that it so offended my sensibilities that I brutally murdered it, chopped up the corpse, and scattered and buried the pieces in shallow graves throughout the land in random, difficult-to-reach cavities so that NOONE will ever find it and be able to piece it back together.

I opened up Terraria today for one more shot at it, to make sure I wasn't being unfair - that my first attempts a month ago were tainted by Minecraft fever. Nope.
At least this time I closed the game in something other than a frothing state of rage-quit fury. This time my experience ended with more of a resigned exhalation followed by a migraine headache.
Where to begin?

My complaints are hundredfold, but for brevity's sake I'll only list the immediate and surface problems I had with Terraria:

~The sprites are cute and all, but why is everything so goddamn small on the screen? I'm over 25 and thus old. I cannot see shit. How can I enjoy a game with my face mashed against the screen? "Oop! I see movement! I wonder if that.. yes, that's me dying."
Night sure is dark around there.

~How the hell do you even play this game? I get that it's like Minecraft, but isn't Minecraft. So, I sort of had a basic understanding of what my motivations were (to not die), and what  my probable obstacles would be (zombies and shit). I knew the first thing I had to to was 'get wood'. After that the entire game sort of stagnates and I spend all night dying never-ending deaths in total darkness.
Total and repeated failure in the first 10 minutes of a game sort of puts me off.


~Crafting on the crafting table is out. That's fair enough, as some people really don't find the Minecraft crafting table that intuitive. Know what ALSO isn't intuitive? Whatever the hell they replaced it with in Terraria.
I couldn't figure out how to do things or make things or, well.. anything. The inventory is kind of... everywhere.. and nothing really seems to jive together. I see lots of spaces to put things eventually, but no clear idea as to how to actually make anything.
I realize I'm going to have to be doing a lot of what people complained about with Minecraft - tabbing out.

Display ALL the menus! Screenshotted by Adam

~One one of the glaring design flaws (or cunning game design genius?) in Minecraft was that there was no adequate in-game tutorial or help function. You're plonked down in the middle of nowhere with your bare hands and no rescue in sight. You're sort of on your own in a sink-or-swim/life-or-death scenario that one finds charming and refreshing - the first time. For most games, however, I like to be 'in' on the joke, not the butt of it.

~Why in god's name do the zombies leap tall buildings in a single bound? Seriously. That's... well. It's as crap as zombies that sprint.

You're crap.

After a bit of research I found I'm not the only idiot in the world as other people seemed to share my troubles when it came to playing this game. Admittedly I'm in the minority, as most of the reception was favourable, and I have to believe it by all the Let'sPlays that exist of Terraria that stretch into 30 and 40 video series. I have never WATCHED those videos, preferring instead to administer myself a messy frontal lobotomy.
Perhaps it's the 'Metroidness' I'm missing. I never played Metroid, and it could be I'm lacking that necessary nostalgia which might allow me to endure the frustration.
NAH!

I didn't want to play Terraria and do a negative comparative study. I wanted to play Terraria and have a good time.
Terraria =/=Minecraft. Terraria =/=Metroid.

I spent $2.50 to be reminded that just because it looks like a duck and quacks like a duck DOES NOT make it a duck.

Okay, maybe it does.

I am Dovahkiin

Here in Skyrim, things aren't ALWAYS 'kill the dragon' and 'fetch me an epic poem'.
Sometimes they're just 'walk around and take crappy pictures'.
And I don't even have my horse with me :(

NOTE:
Listen to this while looking at the pics. It'll make everything more wonderful. ^.^

Thistles and tundra cotton

Abandoned shack? Probably teeming with undead.