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Kinect Adventures! (360) by dkirschner (May 22nd, 2013 at 20:05:57) |
Closing this one because I don't see myself ever playing it again. Tried it out with some friends after it'd been sitting on my shelf for 1.5 years. It's alright. Only 5 minigames that you just play over and over. A couple of them are pretty neat, like the whitewater rafting one (lean left/right to guide the raft, jump to make the raft jump, and try to collect a bunch of coins) and the plug-the-holes-in-the-glass one (position your hands and feet to stop water from flowing into your glass tank as devious underwater creatures try to crack the glass).
Actually the thing that surprised me most about playing the game was how tired my friends got. Out of shape! I figured at that point I could play it alone for exercise, but it's really boring alone. There are way more entertaining multiplayer games for Kinect. I need to get one of the dancing ones.
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Super Columbine Massacre RPG (PC) by ajg993 (May 20th, 2013 at 12:26:28) |
Playing Super Columbine Massacre was not too fun today. It just involved a lot of shooting and killing without much variation. At this point of the game I really don’t know why the game was created. Is it a tribute to Eric and Dylan? Is this a way to attract even more hate against the killers? It can be interpreted in many different ways. Not to mention, many times when a gamer is playing a game, he or she will often get some kind of emotional attachment to the character he or she is using. Was this game a way to “feel for” Eric and Dylan? The game really isn’t good, I would probably never play it in my free time, yet I see it is extremely popular. I am confused about this, is it because the tragic event really happened?
Anyway, when the time came to choose to end the mission or continue, I decided to end it. The cops showed up and the mission was over. They showed pictures of the tragedy and explained a few things about Eric and Dylan how all they wanted was to be isolated from everyone. SCM really didn’t have much of an effect on me. The graphics were so low that it was somewhat hard to get into the realism of it. The tragedy happened and there is nothing anyone can do about it. I feel like because there are so many violent movies and games that this one has virtually no difference for me, even though it really happened. The media itself has taken the value out of real life situations by creating so many equal or even worse situations that are fake.
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Super Columbine Massacre RPG (PC) by ajg993 (May 19th, 2013 at 20:14:53) |
I returned to Super Columbine Massacre today and noticed how much this game moved me. I researched and found out more information about the tragedy and understood the gameplay much more. It is unbelievable how close the story mode is to the real thing. Other than a few things like an unlimited arsenal of weapons or getting passed hall monitors by having them not touch you (even when they clearly see you but you are two boxes away so the game doesn't register it) the game was quite real.
I noticed that they left a message to whoever found it. They were apologizing to people they knew for what they were about to do. I feel like this was a way for them to feel better for what they were going to do, it almost seemed like the message provided justification for their actions. On top of that, they were planning on killing 200 plus people. I just don’t understand what kind of people would want to take out their revenge on the lives of innocent students and staff.
The final thing I would like to point out is that for some reason, I felt very weak when I was playing this game. As if any power was taken away from me by the developers. There was only one way to play it, no alternative conclusions. I felt myself actually wanting to avoid the story, but there was just nothing I could do about it, except of course just not play.
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Super Columbine Massacre RPG (PC) by ajg993 (May 18th, 2013 at 21:53:42) |
Super Columbine Massacre was interesting. It is remarkable that someone actually recreated the event and made a video game out of it. Although the graphics are pretty low, the game was far from simple. I noticed that many random objects have deeper meanings. For example, when I was in the basement, I saw a pizza box and decided to walk up to it and hit “enter”. The pizza box took me through a flashback to explain how they were getting ready for the “big day.” The creators really wanted to show the players the entire story.
I went into playing this game without much knowledge of the actually shooting. I knew it was 2 boys, who were mad at society, who killed their fellow classmates and teachers. I was going to do a little research to find a little more background information on the even but decided to just play the game without that information. I felt like the game would do a good job in telling the story. I only got passed the cafeteria part where I have set the bombs and grabbed the guns. That mission was really annoying, it took me over 10 tries to fully infiltrate the building, and right when I finally did, I got caught again and had to start all over again.
This game obviously has a lot of ethical hazards. The idea of the game itself seems a little immoral, since it is based on a true story. I think if the situation never happened, it would lack any controversial opportunities against it. However, since it actually did happen and innocent people died, this realism truly makes the game open for discussion. I also noticed how the creators of the game were implying that the killers’ ideas of the attacks were enhanced by media. Because in the game, when I was in the basement I saw a movie that seemed like it was motivation for them. As if the media inspired the killers actions.
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Ultima VII: The Black Gate (PC) by dkirschner (May 18th, 2013 at 07:44:04) |
I'm just making this to chronicle my efforts to play Ultima 4 and 7 today. I gave both games a good-hearted run but they are so. very. old. These games are always on 'best of' lists so I finally downloaded 4 since it was free with my GOG.com account, and bought 7 because it was on sale and is usually the one people cite as the best. Surely these games have been influential to the fantasy genre in games, to RPGs, perhaps especially of the open-world variety. But I had forgotten what games were like when I was a kid I guess.
Playing Ultima 4 was like attempting to read Chinese. I haven't played a text-based role-playing game in such an unbelievably long time that I've forgotten how they work. Moving north, south, east and west, pushing T to talk to an NPC then typing north to talk in that direction. The NPC greets you and says nothing else until you ask him about specific things: "job," "look" and so on. I had to look these interaction words up in the manual because I couldn't figure out what I should say to him. Then I couldn't figure out how to disengage from the conversation, so I was stuck. Oh, maybe "bye" would work...
Anyway, I couldn't deal with that, so I installed Ultima 7. Ooh, point and click, sort of. Uses mouse, plus 10 points. Ooh, inventory screens and character panes from 1992. The first thing you have to do is investigate a murder, which was surprisingly gory. I figured out how to pick up items (hold right mouse and drag & drop them onto your character), so I guess I investigated the crime scene. I was supposed to go talk to the mayor, who was *just* at the crime scene before I went in, but he seemed to have disappeared and I wandered all through this city looking for him. Dunno what he got up to.
When I talked to the NPCs this time, they have the interaction words like "job" and "look" as options to choose, like a dialogue tree. I noticed the "murder" option and thought I might see what happened if I murdered a citizen. Alas, I could only *ask* about the murder, not murder anyone. I retract my praise about this open world! Anyway, I never did find the mayor and the text really hurt my eyes. It's in yellow, on multicolored background, so it's kind of like reading a highlighter. Also ye olde font and olde English style of language really bothered me after a short time.
I'm sure these early Ultima games were amazing decades ago. I'm sure some people can enjoy them today. I appreciate them, but cannot play them. And that's my uncritical review. Oh, but all the manuals and extras from GOG.com were neat to browse.
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GameLog hopes to be a site where gamers such as yourself keep track of the games that
they are currently playing. A GameLog is basically a record of a game you started playing. If it's open,
you still consider yourself to be playing the game. If it's closed, you finished playing the game. (it doesn't matter
if you got bored, frustrated,etc.) You can also attach short comments to each of your games or even maintain a diary (with more detailed entries)
for that game. Call it a weblog of game playing activity if you will.
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1661 registered gamers and 1787 games. 5594 GameLogs with 9916 journal entries. 4329 games are currently being played.
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Super Smash Brothers (N64) by bchang953 |
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most recent entry: Thursday 21 February, 2008
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Gameplay:
The second time around I really came around to seeing how the game could be so addictive, and could spawn so many subsequent versions of the game. It was just so much fun and lighthearted, one could play it for hours against their friends. It is not as heavy or stressful as darker themed games. It is the perfect video game to crack open a soda and make some popcorn with your buddies. We played on one particularly hilarious level themed for Yoshi, with prettily colored clouds and happy music in the background. When playing as characters such as Pikachu and Samus, trying to blow each other up set in this backdrop, one can't help but smile or be cheered up.
Another thing is that te humans without the Y-chromosomes, being ladies, even dig the game. They were having just as much fun as us guys, and were clamoring for the remotes. Unlike shmups or other more "manly" games, Super Smash is all about just having fun. The characters could also be described as "cute," which probably also helps.
Design:
The game design is original, simple, elegant, yet effective. What more could one ask for. This game has proven itself to be a timeless classic. Because the game is easy to pick up for newcomers/observers, it attracts them easily. It is not (usually) a game that people obsess over to achieve their maximum skill potential. There is a single player mode which did look fun, but from what I've been told it is beaten fairly quickly and quickly wears out. It seems to be a game which mostly enhances social interaction and can act as an icebreaker at a party, or just something fun to do among friends. Most players can relate to at least one of the characters, as all the characters have been iconic figures for video games. This makes it fun to be able to control Mario for example, in a completely new way with completely different mechanics than in the actual Mario game.
Each level has it's own theme and it's own unique feel. As such the game does not get old too quickly, but I wouldn't say it's a game which I would play every day, just one which I'd pull out if my friends were over and we had nothing to do. This game isn't too pretentious. There are no real stories behind any of the characters, except for what people know from the characters in their real respective games, and there's no real reason that they're all fighting, except that they're possibly actually puppets being controlled by some glove thing? Anyways, the point is, it's not too deep of a game, but still is very satisfying and entertaining.
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