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Before Your Eyes (PC) by dkirschner (Apr 14th, 2024 at 13:51:13) |
I've been looking forward to playing this, especially after playing One Hand Clapping, which had a singing mechanic. That game activates your mic and you use your voice, raising and lowering pitch, to interact with the game. Before Your Eyes was similar in that the game activates your webcam and uses your eye blinks as input. Before Your Eyes works WAY better than One Hand Clapping, and it's the better game all around. I figure that detecting blinks (yes/no) is easier than detecting notes along the range of human vocal pitch, so kudos to One Hand Clapping for trying.
Blinking in Before Your Eyes doesn't do anything unless you do it over a prompt (mouse over the prompt, then blink to interact) or unless you do it when the metronome icon is visible, which progresses the story to the next scene. The rules are simple, and it became a game in and of itself for me to blink strategically. I imagined that at the end of A Clockwork Orange, Alex's eyes are forced open so that he could successfully complete this game. At times, I felt like holding my eyes open with my fingers. This is because your eyes will get tired/dry/itchy while playing and you will screw up and blink when you don't mean to, skipping dialogue or ending a scene early. That's frustrating enough. Make sure you do the blink calibration, but I think that no matter how well you do it, it will still occasionally register some non-blinks as blinks. This really didn't happen much for me; through calibration, I think I turned the sensitivity way down, and I wonder what effect wearing glasses had. But like I said, it works surprisingly well.
So, the game itself is narrative-heavy. It's an obvious play on the idea that a life can pass in the "blink of an eye." You're picked up by a ferryman of souls who asks you to tell the story of your life. Back in time you go to remember it: your childhood, your parents, your career, etc., blinking your way through each scene. I won't spoil the story, but there is a twist that I absolutely did not see coming (though I should have paid more attention to the mysterious dark scenes) that changes the narrative and the tone of the game. This is one you can spend time reflecting on.
Aesthetically, it's got a simple visual presentation, sort of painterly, with some really nice piano music. The voice acting is good, with the exception of the girl-next-door (who sounds the same at 10 as she does at 40). For some reason, they also used the same voice actor for your dad and her dad, which made the one scene with her dad calling her very confusing ("Why is my dad at her house?!"). But I liked the dad and mom's performances. I was wondering through the whole game if your character was mute and/or on the spectrum because he doesn't talk--only through a typewriter later in the game--and otherwise expresses himself through his prodigious musical and artistic talents. But I think he's just a silent main character, not actually mute.
Anyway, the game won a BAFTA for a reason. It didn't blow my mind, but it's a neat experience that's worth having. It's short too, doesn't waste your time. I'm considering incorporating it into a class.
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Stray (PC) by dkirschner (Apr 13th, 2024 at 12:00:39) |
Patrick and I have been playing this together this semester, and finished it a couple weeks ago. We were talking after beating it about despite how simple and straightforward of a game this is, it manages to be something new. Playing as a cat (and being able to do cat things like curl up and sleep, scratch things, knock objects off tables, etc., so cuuuute) was novel, and the setting and story were interesting. But really, playing as a cat. I smiled a whole lot throughout the game. The lil companion robot was cute too.
On the other hand, I was often tired and bored while playing, and literally fell asleep during several sessions. Patrick would be making dinner or something in the kitchen, and I'd snap awake, cat walking into a wall, and I'd pretend I had not fallen asleep, and that I was just watching the cat walk into the wall and thinking. Like how my dad always used to claim he was "resting his eyes" when he'd fall asleep on the couch.
I would not call the game exciting. It was a lot of wandering around the city and talking to robot NPCs, fetching things for them. The city is a really good-looking dystopia, and the robots are quirky, but I wish they had more dialogue. You don't get a sense that many of them have personalities besides whatever one-note thing they do. I mean, the lack of dialogue makes sense, and it's not really "dialogue" since the cat can't talk. The fact that you are a cat adds a whole layer of silly to the game. Like, why has this lil robot befriended a cat? Why are all these robots putting all their faith in a cat to save them? Cats don't understand what we're saying to them, and cats do whatever they want! Playing as a cat in a game where you're doing fetch quests (fetching is dog stuff!) and doing things to help people is very un-cat-like.
But, you know what? The ability to play as a cat and do cat things trumps how little sense it makes, and I would play as a cat in this dystopia again. Idea for next time: more cats. And what do you think? Were there cats at the end?! Optimistically, I think so.
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Hadean Tactics (PC) by jp (Apr 7th, 2024 at 13:32:36) |
This game is supposed to be a deck-building tactical game and it sort of isn't, but very lightly is - at least in my experience so far.
So, like CD2: Trap Master this game REALLY wears it's Slay the Spire inspirations on its sleeve. Again, there's a path you that branches and you need to pick which nodes to visit - and there's fights, boss fights, resting spots, stores, artifact/rewards, and shops. Oh, there's also "story encounters" where you make a choice that often results in a benefit and a drawback. VERY Slay the Spire - though I noticed the way the events are distributed is different and that it's much more important to plan your way through it since the paths intersect a lot less and you can, for example in my last run, set yourself up with 4 rest/upgrade a card spots in a row!
In addition to a deck of cards you have the character you chose and two "minions" (they're all monsters) that exist on a 2D grid that's quite typical of tactical games. The enemies will spawn, you have energy to cast your cards - generally you cast your cards, unpause and wait for the timer to pause the game when it hits the threshold (7 seconds) for your hand to flush, a new hand is drawn, and you get more mana to cast spells. What isn't really tactical about it is that all the fighting on the tactical grid (which includes everyone having abilities they cast once their mana is full) happens automatically. You can't (afaik) give orders to anyone. At best, if you have the right spells, you can move creatures around (your own or enemy), but they then move back to whatever it is they want to do (e.g. attack the nearest enemy).
One of my runs used a character that had access to "trap" cards which are pretty neat since you lay them on the grid and then have to trigger them (with a different card) and ALL the trap laid will trigger. Some do damage, others heal your allies, and so on. So, the game isn't tactical at all in the turn-by-turn combat and movement decision-making sense. Yes, you choose whom to roll into a fight with, which spells to cast on whom, and when to cast things. But, since you don't directly control your combat units it all feels pretty indirect.
Where the game goes pretty wild (and above/beyond what Slay the Spire does) is that once you've cleared a run - you gain access to making your own hero - choose skills/talents from a list AND choose which spells will be available (again from a list, which only has the ones you've unlocked). So, in this sense the game has a lot, lot more options/replayability and that sort of thing. But, I'm not sure it's that much more interesting?
Oh, there is a meta-progression. When I beat my first run a giant death/reaper creature appeared and said "ok, now you can start to make progress towards winning - you have to collect wings". And I've collected a few since, you get them from killing the stage end bosses (which is nice in that you don't have to get all the way to the end). I need to get 7 - so I wonder if I'll just have to play over and over until I randomly get the right bosses or will the game feed me different ones until I get them all? I've also unlocked a new (third) character...but I kind of don't want to use it because I want to get all the wings with the character I've made some progress with.
I've played about 4 hours and I've really enjoyed the "decay" and "trap" mechanics... we'll see how it goes!
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Deathloop (PS4) by jp (Apr 4th, 2024 at 11:14:36) |
Argh. The longer you go without playing, the worse this game's experience becomes. This is almost entirely due to me forgetting both how to play, but also all the localized information and knowledge you pick up - like who is where, when, and so on.
I love the idea of a "clockwork" game where you deftly navigate your way through things that happen and certain times and places - there's a sense of beauty and elegance to the choreography you develop and create (sort of like when you watch those time loop movies and see a character weave through people and places because they know what's going to happen when and they've just learned it). BUT, that beauty also creates an entry barrier - at least a psychological one for me, because the game's on-ramp is past and now you're in the thick of it. But you've forgotten everything...
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Devil May Cry 5 (PS4) by jp (Apr 4th, 2024 at 11:09:05) |
So I took a break - and then came back to the game and had forgotten how to play. It took a bit to remember (I purposefully avoided looking stuff up because I wanted to see how easy it was for me to remember). So, some of the fights with V took longer than they should have - because I had forgotten that V has to "finish off" the enemies...lol.
While I often focus (for my own personal interests) on game play and game design aspects of a game - I realized as I was playing this game that..wow, the visual design of the large enemies really is phenomenal. They're both beautiful, awesome, creepy, gross, and disgusting. It's quite the accomplishment and I really appreciated it. And, this is in the context of me playing a game that is ~7 years old and running on last gen hardware. Perhaps I haven't played enough PS5 games yet so I'm still too impressionable? Have things moved that far in terms of photorealism?
I have decided to move on even though I realize, from the back of the box, that I'll miss out on the 3rd playable character. It's no fault or problem with DMC5...it's just that I've got too many games to play and I think I've understood enough about this game to move on to another.
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Drakan: The Ancient's Gates (PS2) by dsj49 |
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most recent entry: Wednesday 30 March, 2011
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Drakan: The Ancients' Gates
Drakan is an 3rd person action adventure game with a few RPG elements. It was developed by Surreal Software and published in 2002 for the Playstation 2.
Story:
Drakan: The Ancients' Gates is a sequel to Drakan: Order of the Flame but the story is not dependent upon the first game. You Play as Rynn, a dragon rider who is bonded to her Dragon Arokh who is a Dragon of the Elder Breed, which turns out to be very important. To Summarize Rynn and Arokh are summoned to the City of Surdana where they find out an evil race of demons know as the Desert Lords are gathering monsters from around the world and enslaving humans cities. They only way to fight back is to awaken the rest of the Elder Breed, who have the power to save them. They are told the only way to do so is to Activate several Gates that are scattered around the world. Arokh alone posses the ability to reactivate these gates so the task falls to you the only Dragon Rider.
World:
The World of Drakan is very large, and filled with places of interest and things to do. The Game is basically broken into several zones that each have a main quest and several minor quests. Each zone has a different theme, such as Forrest, Coast, Arctic, and Desert, this variation of scenery helps keep things fresh and gives a sense of progression. You begin only being able to travel in one zone, but as you progress through the game you are given opportunities to travel to new zones and once there you then must find and unlock a Gate in that zone which allows you to travel back to the zones you have previously been, by traveling through the gates. You do most of you large scale travel with the help of your Dragon Arokh who will go anywhere he can fit, but as he is quite large this leaves you to explore all those dungeons, caves and Buildings on your own. In general the world is very pretty for a game of its time, and the environment are generally interesting to traverse.
Dialogue:
The game is fully voice acted and you can talk to everyone you meet. Overall it is acted and written fairly well. Most of the dialogue is actually worth listening to and there is a definite humor is some. I found that I especially loved the back and forward between Rynn and Arokh.
Controls:
The controls are well thought out and map well to a console controller. I did find the movement to be a little stiff, this is due to the lack of sensitivity setting options that I am used to modern games. Instead of newer games where you press the stick in one direction and that is the direction you run, Drakan uses the scheme: press up move your character forward and Pressing left or right turns Rynn at a set rate left or right. This probably sounds worse than it is as the camera stays behind Rynn so movement end up working like most games Its just turning is a little to slow. The game does allow you to change the control scheme to duel shock but there is still no sensitivity so it didn't really help me. However even with this issue I was able to get used to the controls fairly quickly.
Combat:
There are basically two kinds of combat in Drakan, ground combat and aerial combat. More of the Game takes place on the ground so ground combat is more complex. For ground combat basically you can have a one weapon and optionally a shield. You are able to perform a 3 hit combo with melee weapons as well as 8 different special attacks. Each special attack has a different range and a different swing, you learned to chose which special to use based on the enemy you are fighting and the position you and the enemy are in. This special attack can have a variety of effect such as staggering your opponent, knocking them down, and even disarming them. To perform a special attack you press a combination of up to 2 buttons on the direction pad followed by the attack button. This allows you to very quickly choose the best special attack and execute it in combat. This system felt great to me, it was like mixing a simple fighting game into an action game. It added the tension of making you be careful not to mess up a special attack under stress. It was also a great way to map more attacks then would fit on a normal console controller. In addition to the melee option Rynn is very maneuverable, she is able to dodge attacks by rolling or Flipping out of the way, which is very important as her health does not recover over time. In addition to dodging Rynn is able to parry or block (if she has a sheild equiped) incoming attacks, this however requires timing as you can not simply hold down a block button.
Arial combat is actually done well in Drakan. The controls to fly Arokh feel pretty good and he is responsive. Basically Arokh can fight other flying enemies and enemies on the ground. He starts with fire breath but you can find other breath weapon types. Each breath weapon type has two attacks which generally fall under the categories of ranged and close quarters. Arokh is able to make may breath attacks quickly but each attack takes energy. The energy bar regenerates fairly quickly but it is slow enough that it is better to only attack when you are sure you can hit. In order to dodge incoming attacks you can try to dodge by quickly flying up or diving down. I found that i tended to strafe enemies while zig zaging up and down to avoid incoming fire.
Gear:
In Drakan you have a fairly small inventory that contains all the weapons, armor and items you are using as well as what you are carrying. The inventory is slot based so larger items take up more space. Due to the size of the inventory you cannot just carry everything you ever find with you, choices of what is useful have to be made and everything else should be dropped or sold. In addition to limited space your weapons and armor all have durability, where each hit you deal (or take for armor) reduces the durability of the item by one and when the item has no durability left it cannot be used. Items that are broken in this way can be repaired but when this is done the total durability of the item is cut in half. This imposes a natural limit on how long you can use any particular item and forces you to change your gear as you find new things.
Leveling:
This game has a very simple leveling mechanic, when you gain enough experience you gain a level which gives one skill point. You may spend a skill point in one of three categories: Melee, Archery, or Magic. You can not every reset your skills. And based on your skill you are able to use different and better items and magics.
Overall:
Basically I remember loving this game as a kid when I first played it, and now when I come back to it so many years and game later I find I still find the game quite enjoyable. I even like the combat so much that I wish other newer games were like it. It has its flaws but Drakan has aged very well.
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