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Orcs Must Die! (PC) by jdh681 (Feb 4th, 2012 at 21:53:37) |
For this entry, I decided to play the game Orcs Must Die!, an unorthodox tower defense game where the player takes the third person perspective of the "apprentice" as opposed to a more traditional overhead view. This game was made by indie game developer Robot Entertainment and bought/downloaded through Steam.
The game begins by giving a brief exposition. The player is an apprentice in an institution known as the Order. His master has just died, and he is alone left with the task of defending a fortress against hoards of Orcs and Goblins and assorted other monsters. Following, it gives an explanation of the main game concepts. Waves of monsters spawn from large double doors, and they attempt to get to "rifts" which the player must protect using different weapons, traps, companions, and spells contained within his spellbook. Items from the spellbook are bought using gold gained from killing monsters, and an initial supply of gold is given at the beginning of a map. Only a select few abilities may be chosen from the spellbook to use on a given map, limiting the player to just a few options of their choice.
In the first level, the player doesn't have many options, but the defense is not difficult. The map is a straight hallway between the single set of double doors and the rift. Two archer companions are placed on the sides of the hallway to assist you. Companions generally stay in the location that they are assigned and automatically attack monsters that come in range, and monsters will reciprocate. The player is given a sword and a crossbow as means of personal defense, along with spike traps which damage enemies who walk over and tar traps, which slow enemies. If enough enemies make it to the rift, the player loses and must restart the level. If the player character dies to enemies, it also counts against this rift total.
During downtime between levels, the game gives the player a number of "skulls" based on their performance during the previous level. The skulls can be used to purchase upgrades for your spellbook, giving abilities an extra effect or increasing their strength. New abilities are also given as the player beats new levels. The first trap unlocked is an arrow trap, which is placed on a wall and fires arrows at any enemies that walk in its area of effect.
The game does not take itself very seriously at all. The apprentice is portrayed as a dimwitted individual with little regard to his enemy or what he is fighting to protect. The cartoony animation supports this, and the story is not a major factor in the enjoyment of this game. The action is the main focus, with hectic and fast paced action, including weapons that fire/swing as fast as you can click the mouse button, combo counters, and headshot indicators. Humor supports the action with quips from the apprentice and funny hit/death animations from the orcs. The apprentice even does different dances at the end of a level based on how well he protected the rift.
Overall, I completed three levels and explored as many of the game's options as I could for this first session. I will reserve any judgement for my second log.
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Half-Life 2 (PC) by jws412 (Feb 4th, 2012 at 16:34:54) |
I started playing Half-Life 2 three days ago. I have been extremely impressed by it because the game flow is quick and intense, and the story is unique and captivating. Before I get into talking about the game and its story in detail, understand that I have not played Half Life 1.
At the start of the game, the player gets immersed into a world past the brink of destruction, meaning that the player can obviously see that the world is not as it should. The first scene of the game is an old man's head appearing in the screen telling you strange things in an even more absurd way of speaking. As you continue, the story gets only weirder and darker, which pulled me into it even deeper.
Since I am a role-player and love role-playing video games, story is always the make or kill feature of games for me. This story is amazing and does more to captivate the player than anything else in the game.
The gameplay is tremendous because it is extremely realistic. You start out the game utterly defenseless, but most evade capture from a much superior force. Shortly into the game, you receive your first weapon - a crowbar. With this weapon, you can defend yourself and quickly kill a soldier to receive a gun. The aiming is simple yet very effective with considerably realistic physics. Meaning that the gun recoils realistic with each shot and head killers do extra damage. My only complaint about the game is that it does not allow the player to look down the scope and manually aim.
The game is very innovative for its time because its graphics are amazing for when it came out, the physics engine realistic, the story detailed and well thought out.
The game creates conflict by placing you in a strange world and giving you only one command: RUN! The steam reward structure is enjoyable because it allows you to show off your achievements in game to your friends. The other reward system is giving you a feeling being a major badass because you can kill an army of advance soldier with just a crowbar.
The game flows very well through having not out of game cutscenes and few loading areas. There is, however, one drawback in the game: no multiplayer.
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Limbo (PC) by Joey Green (Feb 3rd, 2012 at 20:31:59) |
Thus far, the main conflict that the user faces in the game seems to be a giant spider. When you first encounter the spider he is hiding behind a tree and when you walk up to him he tries to stab you with one of his legs. You have to explore the environment to find out that you must use one of the bear traps to attach his legs when they come after you.
The second encounter that I had with the spider he spun me up into a web like a mummy. I then had to get loose from his spider web, still wrapped in spider web, and hop around the world. I died shortly after freeing myself, which is where I ended the game.
Limbo really shows that 2D games have really evolved and that you don't need 3D games to experience full immersion. The designers were able to create a world that is very intriguing and entices the player into learning more about the story/environment. Their use of sound and visual effects to set the mood is innovative IMO. I have not experienced a game like this before. What I can take away from Limbo for my own game designs is the importance of world mood and how to control the world mood through sound and visual effects.
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L.A. Noire (360) by sweenr (Feb 3rd, 2012 at 15:08:58) |
I started playing this game based on reviews I had read online when the game came out about the unique and interesting the gameplay. Knowing it was a Rockstar game and how immersive their games are (see GTA IV and Red Dead Redemption) I had no doubt that L.A. Noire would be of a similar quality. And from what I've seen so far, I have not been disappointed.
The opening cutscene sets the stage - postwar 1940's L.A. From that point on, all of the sights and sounds look like they're pulled right from a period movie - colorized of course. You start the game as a beat cop, Cole Phelps. The first "mission" of the game, as it were, was to search an alleyway for a gun used in a murder and tossed by the suspect as he fled. Here you are shown the basic mechanics of the game. As you enter an area to search, music swells indicating that there are clues in the area. While searching the area, your controller vibrates as you walk near an item that can be searched. This definitely helped, because many times (before I got the hang of it) I would try searching every area that seemed logical to me. Once all of the clues for an area had been found, the music fades away. So the physical and audio clues were an interesting way to aid the player in the search, and a gameplay mechanic I really liked.
The other really unique aspect of this game are the interrogations. L.A. Noire uses extremely accurate facial modeling (creepily so at times) to show the player exactly what the characters are thinking while they speak. It is these nonverbal clues (avoiding eye contact, fidgeting) that aid you in the interrogation. You ask the suspect a series of predetermined questions based on the evidence you have collected so far. If you think the suspect is telling the truth, you treat them kindly and keep questioning. If you know they are lying, and have the evidence to back it up, you can accuse them of lying and get them to confess. If they look uneasy but you have no solid evidence to hit them with, you can doubt them, but if you are wrong they are likely to clam up and not say anything. The interrogations can be challenging but they are definitely unique and engaging.
Other aspects of gameplay: the game is broken down into cases and each case has you performing a series of 5-8 investigations, searches, and interrogations. After becoming promoted from beat cop to detective, you start at the traffic desk. As you prove yourself as a traffic detective you move up through the ranks of detectives. Each detective's "desk" you sit at appears to last around 5 cases before being moved to the next level. This would seem to be repetitive, but in the 4-5 hours I've played so far the cases have been varied enough to not get boring. Between cases we see flashbacks of Phelps' time in the Marine Corp during WWII. These also help keep the player engaged with the Cole's backstory, which you can only see by completing more cases.
The most frustrating part of the game I've found so far is driving. It is bad. Period. Some reviewers have said this adds to the realism, and that cars back then were a pain to drive. That may be, but at some point you have to sacrifice some realism for playability. It also doesn't help that the game penalizes you for every accident and pedestrian you hit - which I guess it should; this isn't GTA after all. The one saving grace of all this is that you can let your partner drive to locations, saving you the infuriating frustration and penalty of driving yourself by instantly teleporting you to your destination. One really nice thing about this feature is that if your partner has any dialogue he was supposed to say while you were driving, the conversation will still occur before being sent to your location. This way you don't miss out on any of the story or immersion of the game - other than the fade to black and sudden reappearance across town.
I guess that is it for my first impressions of the game. My next GameLog will delve deeper into the game's character as I continue playing through the story.
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Limbo (PC) by Joey Green (Feb 3rd, 2012 at 12:57:58) |
When you start Limbo, you're a kid waking up in the forest. There isn't any instructions or goals defined. You just start trying to figure out what this game is about, but you're intrigued because you're wondering why is this boy waking up in the middle of a forest. Is he lost? It plays on the same emotions that you might of felt the first time you saw Bourne Identity. Why can't Bourne remember anything? Why does he have super-ninja powers? etc.. This makes the player intrigued about the story and motivates them to discover these questions for themselves.
All aspects of the game is exploratory. There is no communication on your goal( which for me is to uncover the story), controls, or mechanics, which I feel adds to the mood of the game. You soon find out that all you can do is go left/right, jump, and do actions on things. These actions are also exploratory. It seems so far that all things that you see in the game( which are not trees or grass ) you can interact with.
So, after you wake up you just start going right to explore and learn more about the game. There is no color in the world, just shades of black/gray. This is also a game you want to put your headphones on for as the sound effects really set the mood.
There are a couple innovative elements in this game including the art style and environment. The art style leaves a lot for the imagination to process itself. You don't really see the boy, just a shadowy figure with white eyes that blink occasionally. Also, because everything is blacked out you have to pay closer attention to the environment to make sure your not fixing to do something that will cause harm to the boy such as drown, step in a bear trap, or get killed by a spider.
The mood set by the game really make this such an awesome game. The visual effects give the player a lot of feedback. For instance, while walking the grass moves and when you land after jumping there is a puff of dust. There is also a flicker for the whole screen like what you would see in a old black and white film, which adds to the whole spookiness of the game.
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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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1514 registered gamers and 1406 games. 4781 GameLogs with 8919 journal entries. 3728 games are currently being played.
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Super Smash Brothers (N64) by Mirri Night |
| This was great back when it was new. And though it is still great, I prefer the newer version. |
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most recent entry: Wednesday 31 January, 2007
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7:50 pm
I continued to be beaten by both Adam and Eric for a while after the previous entry. They are both pretty good players, and though I can beat Adam at Melee, I’m pretty helpless against him in the original version.
I find it interesting that the original and the sequel are so different from one another in gameplay. For one reason, it is highly more enjoyable to play Melee for long stretches of time than the original. Part of this could be because there are fewer characters in the original, and even fewer GOOD characters. Eric played as a single character the whole time until Adam forced him to change characters (he was convinced that Kirby was the key to success). I can’t quite put my finger on what else could be the reason why this game is less enjoyable now; I know that back when it came out, it was a lot of fun to play. I can only presume that since a sequel has come out and heightened this type of gameplay to an even more enjoyable level, going back to the original is a bit of a turn-off. Lots of elements in the game were improved in Melee, and it’s very obvious when one plays the games for long stretches of time.
Overall, I didn’t terribly enjoy playing this game for this long. I enjoy it for a certain length of time, but then it becomes boring – it seems monotonous after a while, and especially if one continues to lose. I much prefer the new one over the old one, but I know a few people who like the old one better – Eric and Adam, though they both like the new one more, say the old one has its “perks”. Regardless, the game IS a classic by its nature, though it has a newer and better successor.
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