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Dec 23rd, 2020 at 22:25:54 - Hypnospace Outlaw (PC) |
This was a really cool one that I thoroughly enjoyed until about halfway through. If you're someone who plays GTA games and finds themselves in their virtual internet cafes or on your smartphone for half your playtime browsing the in-game internet, you will love this. It's basically a simulation of a desktop computer. Also, if you spent a lot of time on the internet in the late 90s/early 2000s. That's when I was in high school and college, so Hypnospace Outlaw's recreation of that era's netspace is brilliantly nostalgic.
The premise is neat. New technology allows people to access Hypnospace (and other "sleepspaces") while they're asleep. You are hired as an "Enforcer," someone who enforces the rules of Hypnospace. No harassment, no shady business dealings, no copyright infringement, no profane or pornographic things, and so on. You basically browse the internet looking for users violating the rules. When you see something, you remove the content and can eventually flag users if they have enough violations. You get paid for each violation you catch, so there's an ethical dimension to it. Do you bust people for minor infractions and make some cash or leave them alone?
Eventually you begin getting assigned "cases" where you have to do increasingly in-depth digging to get to the bottom of various complaints and tips. One of these finally threw me hard, Case 8, where you have to find some illegal music distribution and dig into some password-protected back end of the internet. Long story short, I used a guide for help (and learned that there is an in-game hint system if you type "hint" in the search bar), and after that I just sort of read the rest of the guide and browsed some videos instead of finishing myself because the meat of what I loved about the game--browsing webpages from 1999 and banning people--was over and it became a more difficult/tedious puzzle/detective kind of game.
I would have enjoyed continuing to devour the fake content. It is so spot on for the time period and the humor gelled with me. This was the era when everyone had a personal website, but they all sucked and had dancing skeletons and glitter on them. Teens were trying to be cool and old retirees didn't know how to use page editors. Through poking around, you learn who are friends and enemies, what's going on in the world, and learn about all sorts of drama between the users and the corporation that runs Hypnospace. There is a larger story here about hackers and sleepspace technology, but I found all the smaller connections more interesting.
There are various "communities" like Teentopia, which features a "cool" teen counselor who sings songs about not doing drugs; a spiritual community; a fantasy and sci-fi community; communities for various kinds of music; a community preserving the "good old days," and so on. The music in the game is so great. They created a bunch of genres (e.g., chillpunk, haze, flip-flop) and got some genius to write a bunch of songs, some of which are really funny or really catchy. The XMAS Medley is pretty great, and most of Chowder Man's songs had me laughing. This is definitely worth spending some time in for something different.
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Dec 21st, 2020 at 16:46:21 - Final Fantasy XV (PC) |
Burned through this fairly quickly, though possibly the shortest FF game I've played and definitely my least favorite. I finished it in just over 40 hours and that's only because I spent forever doing side quests and exploiting the leveling system. That's a big question I have about this game. Why is it so easy to exploit the leveling system? That's the number one thing I'll remember about this in the future, that I was level 65 doing level 20 story missions, that the game actually let me do that.
I'll talk about that first because it involves a couple of the game's systems. You gain XP like any other RPG, but it doesn't affect anything until you rest. You are encouraged to rest at campsites scattered across the open world, and if not there, then at rest spots in outposts. When you rest, by default, your XP is tallied as it is, but some rest spots grant bonus XP--up to double! You find a 2x XP rest spot pretty quickly in the game. So obviously you want to rest there, right? Obviously.
When you rest at camp, one of your bros, Ignis, will cook a meal. You're encouraged to rest at camp because you can eat one of these stat-boosting meals. And these can be legitimately awesome, boosting stats by a huge chunk for a long time. You can also purchase these meals at vendors. Early on, at the chocobo farm, I found that the vendor sells a meal that increases XP gain by 50%. So obviously you want to eat this meal constantly to have this buff all the time, right? Obviously.
What this means is that I spent most of the game running (driving, really) around doing side quests with a +50% XP buff, saving up tens or hundreds of thousands of XP and then resting for 2x XP for massive level increases. For example, the last one I did I went from 48 to 63 instantaneously. 15 levels at once! And those weren't the low levels that always go fast!
What this also means is that I was supremely overpowered for the entire game. Literally the entire game. Side quests were the only challenge because I did so many that some of them kept somewhat pace with me. The story missions max out around level 55, and I think that's the closest I was (when I was in the mid-60s) except near the beginning of the game. I often took hunts (a type of "kill x of this creature" side quest) that were higher levels than me, but by the end of the game, I had like two side quests that were over 65 (and one was 99, which I didn't realize until I attempted it and almost died. Quests were never near my level, so why would I check it?!).
So one of this game's biggest flaws is how ridiculously easy it is, unless you purposefully don't use meals or XP bonuses to your advantage. Even then, it's probably still easy because, while death happens, it's rare. To die, you have to get knocked unconscious (HP to zero) and then have your "second" HP bar deplete to zero also. You will have a zillion items that you can replenish nearly anywhere and use any time in battle, so there is no reason you should ever die. I died once but it was during a timed event where I ran out of time. I never died from, you know, battle. You can also set your companions to auto heal and they will help you up if you are hurt too.
Easy as the combat is though (and as much as I wish they'd taken cues from a Soulslike game), it's a lot of fun. It's fast and flashy and combos (link strikes) with your teammates are a joy to pull off. I never really got tired of fighting, which is one reason I did so many hunts. The main character can cycle between four weapons or spells and has various gauges to monitor that allow him to do (or command teammates to do) various special attacks. Your teammates' special attacks level up as they use them and I had them mostly maxed out without any problem whatsoever (again, overpowered). My favorite thing about the combat is "warp strikes," where you launch yourself to the nearest high point and then zoom through the air to attack faraway enemies. The farther you are, the more damage you do.
My other favorite thing is the bro bonding. It's kinda cheesy but I found it endearing and heart-warming too. The game is basically a boys' road trip. You and your three best friends go off saving the world in a car. There's the smart friend, the jock friend, the goofy dork friend, and you, the emo friend. They play right into their stereotypes, are voiced really well, and play off each other well. This is one part of the game that I thought I would suffer through, but was surprised to enjoy.
Now, the larger story in which their bro trip is embedded sucks. It's disjointed, dense, and was told so poorly that I rarely knew or cared what was going on. It checks all the video game story boxes: kings and royalty, wild west, mechs, zombies, demons, magic, research and evil scientists and experiments gone wrong, a vicious imperial army, prophecies, gods, and so on. You also, in the course of it, get to attack enemy bases, customize cars, wear outfits, gather resources, and do all the modern video game things too. I think they even added a multiplayer mode, which looked like Horde mode to me. There's also DLC that apparently is the only meaningful source of character development for your bro companions.
I could take any or all of those things to pick apart, but I'll stick with the one thing that seems to define the game: driving around in the Regalia, your royal car. I both liked and disliked this. I liked that it was novel in the context of a fantasy game (this game is all about fantasy in a realistic world, which was a neat idea). I liked customizing it, even if that generally just meant buying some decals at shops or going on some item hunting quests for upgrade parts.
But talk about restrictions! At first, you can't even drive it. Ignis (smart bro) has to drive. Fine. Except he refuses to drive at night (demons come out and he's scared). Super annoying. It forces you to camp or just wait out the night. Eventually, you either level up enough or hit a story point and he lets you drive. Awesome. But he still won't let you drive at night. Stupid. Eventually, you level up enough and Ignis deems you strong enough to drive at night. This is fine, except you stop every time you see a monster. You can't drive around it (even after you upgrade the Regalia to a giant monster truck). Stupid. Eventually, you level up enough so that you can kill any monster easily enough and it's just a minor inconvenience. But Ignis STILL makes you sit through dialogue with him every single time you want to drive at night, where he makes sure you don't want to rest somewhere instead.
When Ignis drives, you can fast travel (when you drive, it's manual). Fast traveling only works if you are going between places that you have visited before and discovered their parking spots. Otherwise, you have to sit there while Ignis drives in real time. This takes on average probably 5 minutes to get somewhere. I read about 100 pages of a book over the course of this game while Ignis drove around. And folded a lot of laundry, packed for a trip, ate meals. I mean, thanks for making video game time more productive, I guess, but damn. Was that necessary? Can't I just fast travel? Or drive faster?
Maybe this says something about the game as a whole. There are a lot of neat ideas. But the implementation wasn't always on the mark. I often found myself wondering why the game wanted me to do this or that or why this or that wasn't different. In the end, I sort of wondered why I'd stuck with it and played the whole thing. I think it's because I really was having fun doing all the open world stuff, even if I did read half a book while doing so. Then around Chapter 8 or 9 (of 14), the game railroads you into linear story chapters and you are basically done with the open world with little fanfare. Why did I spend all that time leveling up?! I didn't even need 10 of those levels! I was so glad when it ended (Chapter 13 is like 5x too long) and relieved to be done. It's like all of a sudden at the very end I was like, "This game sucks!" But it was just my late-game thought. I really enjoyed most of it, weird as it was.
Recommended? Not really, unless you have to play all the Final Fantasy games.
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Dec 6th, 2020 at 11:22:46 - Observation (PC) |
Finished this yesterday evening. I was really looking forward to it for the clear 2001: A Space Odyssey vibes and the role reversal where you play as the AI instead of the crew. I thought I would be like HAL trying to kill my crew or following some secret orders, but it wasn't quite that exciting. This also reminded me of Carrion because of the role reversal (there you play as the monster escaping the facility instead of the typical human trying to fight the monster).
Observation is a slow burn. Something has happened; the lone survivor, Emma, needs you to help her figure it out. Gameplay involves traversing Observation (the space station) and interacting with a lot of computers to help Emma do things. You'll also find tidbits of information on computers that clue you in to the relationships between the Observation crew, their problems, and their mission. There are twists and turns in the story that I won't spoil, and each one pulled me into the narrative. However, the end...I didn't like the end. And I'm someone who usually is fine with whatever ending! How to say...the end makes conclusive something that was best left ambiguous, or that I wish had been conclusive in an unexpected way.
So, overall, I enjoyed the story and the way that it was presented. I didn't mind how slow it was except that a lot of the slowness isn't the story but the ways in which you will be hampered by trying to figure out what the hell to do. Some of this is okay because it sets the mood. You're confused. The space station is busted up. People are dead. It's dark and hard to navigate. Fair enough. As SAM (the AI), you can look through cameras scattered throughout the space station and you can possess spheres and putter around yourself. Often, you are looking for some specific terminal. Moving the cameras around to look is very slow and I realized at some point that this aspect of the game is essentially a pixel hunting, like in those hidden object games. A couple times I missed scanning a document I needed that would be taped to a wall but didn't stand out as I looked around. Unless you look right at a thing, SAM doesn't see it. Another time, I had been stuck forever. I knew I needed some schematics and knew they were on a laptop somewhere, but couldn't find them. It was the only time I had to look something up. The answer? It's on one of the laptops displaying a low battery icon. I thought those were just unusable. Turns out you have to follow the power cable to the wall plug and MANUALLY TURN ON THE PLUG. Really? That's when I realized that this was part hidden object game and became a bit disappointed.
Another thing that I disliked was that you have to get Emma's explicit confirmation before being able to perform actions sometimes. So for example, there was one part where I had to find and enable three things, like pressure detectors or something. I had found them but couldn't figure out how to interact with them. It was driving me nuts. I knew exactly what to do but I couldn't do it. Finally, I realized that I had to report to Emma first that there was even a problem with the pressure. She already knew this so I have no idea why I had to report it. Anyway, once I reported it, she tells me to go look for the pressure detectors and then I could magically interact with them. This happens often. Emma has to "know" what you are doing before you can actually do it.
There's a third problem that's a technical one. This might indicate that development was rushed in the end (perhaps explaining the letdown ending too?). Toward the end of the game, objects (NPCs and SAM) seem to not have collision detection. During this very emotional scene, Emma sank through a wall (then stayed in a very weird position with her arm disappeared into the wall). She asked me to give her some light, but because her position was all wrong, I couldn't complete the objective correctly. Another time, SAM follows Emma and Emma was moving really jerkily, like the girl in The Ring, floating through the station. Unsettling. Then during the final sequences of the game, Emma is holding SAM and walking. She literally moves through objects and drags SAM through them too. It was so weird. For the final final part of the game, she put me (SAM) down and my view of the finale was blocked by an object! After a minute, SAM just teleported to the left a few feet (where he was obviously meant to be placed) with a clear view. Really glaring issues there!
Observation nails the atmosphere and tells a slow, engaging story, but one that doesn't have much to chew on and that disappoints in the end. Playing as SAM was novel. I look forward to playing No Code's previous game, Stories Untold, but I wouldn't really recommend Observation unless you are a huge fan of this kind of sci-fi or you really enjoy a good walking simulator. I think this will be memorable, but it's not a great as I'd hoped.
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Dec 6th, 2020 at 10:49:50 - Katana Zero (PC) |
Done. Game isn't all that long (though the difficulty will give more length--game is HARD--and it's easily replayable). Ends on a serious incomplete note, which was disappointing. "...to be continued."
Katana Zero is kind of like a 2D Hotline Miami mixed with some Mark of the Ninja (one-off stealth sections that I wish had been used more often). Combat is crazy fast and deadly. If you get hit, you die, period. You have to be perfect and there is no room for error. You can slow down time, you can swing your katana, you can dodge roll (to avoid damage), and you can pick up items and throw them. A couple items have some slightly different uses (e.g., dynamite). There are occasional laser traps and some drones (again, only used a couple times) that you can also use to your advantage.
Let me come back to the difficulty, specifically the boss fights. These aren't long (usually you only need to hit the boss like four times, but you must be perfect to do so). The last one I am sure I retried 75 times. This is the kind of game where every time you die, you learn something and can immediately implement new knowledge or refine timing. So the last boss will begin with one of three moves. Through dying over and over, you eventually realize this and learn how to avoid each one. She'll shoot a targeting laser, the laser disappears for a beat, then she fires a bigger laser. This is really about timing, learning not to dodge during the targeting laser, learning how long the beat is (dodge now!), and timing that dodge to avoid the giant laser. The second move she'll do at the outset is to toss remote explosives. These are easy to avoid. Dodge roll when she throws them. The third move is a fast forward dash, indicated by a red line around her. This is so fast it's hard to react, but dodge your best as soon as you see that. So, to even get past the very beginning, you have to be prepared for any of these three moves. The laser is the most difficult and most frequent, so the others, even though they are easier, will catch you off guard because you're really tense waiting for that laser.
When you dodge her first attack, your life only gets more difficult because she might do any of them again, or a couple others that you need to learn. You need to hit her. When you hit her, she disappears and two turrets emerge from the left wall. Destroy them before they begin firing because they will kill you 100% of the time. She re-emerges and does an easy-to-read laser pattern that you need to dodge. Hit her again when she drops to the ground. After the second hit, she tricks you! She teleports to the right side of the screen and shoots a targeting laser. You think she's going into a full laser animation, but she actually teleports away and does a mid-air spin-and-shoot move that you need to dodge ALONG WITH the laser. You can avoid the laser by running all the way to the right and essentially standing where she was. The laser won't hit you. You just have to avoid her spin-and-shoot move. If you hit her again, she drops some dynamite. Your last challenge is to get to it, pick it up, and throw it at her. Win. And this was actually the second phase of the fight against her. The first phase was a lot of memorization, also challenging.
I felt like a twitchy god after beating some of the levels and bosses in this game. It's the kind of feeling that when you die the first time, you're like, "There is no way. This is too fast, too hard." Then you get a little better and a little better. The game excels at instilling this feeling.
The story is cool too. It's dark and humorous (RIP Strong Terry) and sweet (the neighbor girl). It's told very unconventionally, back and forth through time, through nightmares, through drug trips. Once it twists on you the first time, it takes a little while to figure out what's going on, but it will clear up. I always like when these twisty turny stories are able to be figured out instead of just remaining dense and confusing.
I might buy this on Steam when it goes on sale just to own it. I liked it that much. Also there is bound to be a sequel, so it might be worth replaying later.
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