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Jul 5th, 2010 at 09:48:31 - God of War 2 (PS2) |
God of War was awesome. God of War 2 is more of the same. I played the first one so long ago, maybe 3-4 years, that I can't compare the two side by side, but from what I remember, yea, it's basically the same as the sequel. You are Kratos, you are a badass, you are pissed off at the gods (Zeus in this case), and you go on an epic adventure in mythological places fighting hordes of mythological creatures (minotaurs, medusa [how do you say medusa plural?], and cyclops[es?]), and proving yourself over gods (Hermes, the Fates [not really gods], Zeus, and others I don't remember).
When you defeat enemies, you receive various colored orbs that do various things. Reds accumulate to level up magic attacks and weapons. I was a fan of the bow and arrow magic in this game. The medusa head I never used. I remember earthquake being handy in places, as well as the lightning spell. I mostly used my main weapons and the berserk type ability to tear through difficult fights. And fights are difficult. One thing I enjoyed about the first game was the 10 minute epic boss fights and even the long regular battles that I found myself dying from and not upset to start over. Same in this game. The Zeus battle comes to mind. I did it a few times before perfecting my movements and timing of repelling his magic and shooting him with my bow and arrow. Also, the button context portion of the fight I did over and over memorizing when I'd have to react fast to the cues on screen, and eventually calming my hands down enough to press the correct buttons fast enough.
This game looks absolutely fantastic on a PS2. It must be pushing the PS2 to its limits. The environments are so nicely done, detailed, and you can see far into the distance. I remember being very impressed by the Atlas level. One thing I didn't mind in the first game that bothered me in this is Kratos himself. He's too pissed off and yells a lot. I think in a few years, as with the last game, the intensity will stay with me, but I'll forget the details. These games are intense. They're masculine. You get pumped up and kill stuff and are a general asshole to accomplish your goals. You're on edge to mash the context commands. It's bloody. There are always naked women. Yea, I found myself only able to play for short spurts before it just being too much to handle. I don't care much about Kratos himself, as he seemed to be the same Kratos from GoW 1, just pissed for a slightly different reason.
Oh right, and the opening battle is a massive boss fight. Totally cinematic and immersive from the get-go. I would have more to say about this, but I've played so many other things since then. Nice game, wonder if I'll get around to the third one some day.
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Jul 5th, 2010 at 09:32:17 - And Yet It Moves (PC) |
I figure I'll knock out one of these games from a month ago. For the record, I tore through about 10 in a month and a half, mostly short ones, to clear out my game library before I go home later this month. Surprisingly, I've nearly done it, just Rogue Galaxy left (and Oblivion, but I'll be playing that for MMObility).
Anyway, And Yet It Moves I got in the Steam Indie Pack for $19.99 with Osmos, Galcon Fusion, World of Goo, and Machinarium. And yet It Moves is a 2-D side (or up, down, and all around) scroller in a world made of paper. You are some guy trying to get somewhere. Make it to the end of each level, point A to point B. This is complicated by obstacles such as trees, 90 degree angles, angry monkeys, etc. Gameplay involves jumping and rotating the world 90 or 180 degrees at a turn. Instead of jumping over objects, you can rotate the world to maneuver yourself around them, usually involving some jumping too, although there is an achievement for finishing a level by ONLY rotating the world! I got the hang of it fairly quickly and the first half of the game was so-so, pretty easy, not too exciting, few new mechanics. Halfway through though, you get bitten by a snake that totally injects you with some LSD or something, because the world gets progressively weirder. Colors like a disco ball, pulsing light, nightmare trees, etc. I loved the game after this point. It got very artistic, like I said especially with all the colors. The sound, which I liked before, but don't really remember now, got even better. The one sound effect I specifically remember is the death sound, which was like a "whoosh" mixed with tearing paper. Anyway, if I need an example of good game sound and music in the future, go back to the last levels of this.
I remember the audio and the visuals were playing off one another. My favorite part of the game was near the end. There are disappearing platforms to jump on. They are different colors, and disappear and reappear in sequence. This sequence was in synch with the music of the level, and when you jump on a platform, it accents notes or effects in the music. It was very fluid and engrossing. Later, these platforms disappear and reappear depending on what angle the world is turned. Flip 90 degrees, some platforms appear, others disappear. Completion required me to toy with which platforms appear at which angles, and gauge my jumps towards invisible platforms, rotate the world, and hope I jumped toward the correct position. It was very cool.
So this was a month and a half ago, and I don't remember some details, but that's the gist of this one. I think it took about 5 or 6 hours to beat, not long, but worth playing.
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Jul 5th, 2010 at 09:16:44 - Overlord (PC) |
Played a couple hours of Overlord today and am just before the end of the game. One more short session should do it. I'm struck every time I turn it on by how good it looks. Overlord is 3 years old, but looks better than some newer games. Seeing 40+ minions each in various stages of equipment, today seeing the worms blown up by eating the bugs that blow up, the desert level...Everything has these soft, glowing edges.
I enjoyed the desert level very much. The deadly sand worms get agitated when you cross the sand, and emerge to feast on minions in range. They quickly wiped out my army a couple times, so I reloaded until I figured out what to do. Actually I looked it up because I didn't think to lure the bugs with eggs onto the sand. I didn't even think the worms could necessarily be killed, but I knew I had to get the bugs to move somehow to blow up the bone barriers blocking my passage. If I had shifted around, I would have seen I could pick up eggs, and the game certainly had me shifting to pick up other eggs and things before. I wasn't thinking I guess. So you have to take a minion (brown or green to withstand attacks), steal an egg, and lure the bug onto the sand. When the earth rumbles, drop the egg and run back. The bug will stay and protect the egg, and the worm emerges and eats the bug, which explodes in the worm's belly. 2 bugs kills a worm.
This was a cool idea, but I found the controls of moving the minions with the mouse to be a little difficult because I simultaneously had to move my Overlord behind the bug and the camera was fixing in front of me. I had to move my lure minion out of my sight some and try to edge it around rocks without knowing exactly where he was going. Twice, my minion got stuck on some rocks and couldn't move, and died, and then there was another area where a bug kept pinning my minion down. Overall, I like the controls for this game, sweeping the minions by holding down both mouse buttons and moving the mouse, picking up an egg and then moving the mouse as if it were the minion, but sometimes it's a bit wonky and doesn't respond how I want it to, or minions don't go quite where I'm trying to direct them. Get a minion to pick something up by holding shift to target the object, then left click to move the minion to it, then continue to hold shift the entire time the minion is moving with the object, and simultaneously move the mouse as if it were the minion. It's tricky. Easier with practice, but still tricky.
I quit playing today because I was near the end, had spent a long time blowing up worms and losing minions to these assassins that toss fire and wipe out 5-10 at a time, and came across a part where I basically had to stop to go farm green essence to get more green minions. The last levels, these beholders are flying and can only be taken out by reds or greens. I have plenty of reds but no greens. These beholders spawn assassins, either melee ones or fire throwing ones. The fire throwers are particularly deadly. To kill the beholders, you have to move your minions above them on conveniently placed ramps and throw fire (reds) or leap on them (greens). Then you and the rest of your army must guard the reds from assassins, watching out not to get hit by the beholder aura, which will instantly kill minions. I guess I was tired of losing minions, feeling the game was being a little cheap with those fire throwers because they like to hang around the minion aura and kill you from range, and if you go closer, your minions get caught in the aura. Also I need more greens and will have to just go grind them in the Evernight swamp. I could use more browns too.
I'm going to test out writing more thematically next time, maybe take a few notes during play. I have this nice set of questions for MMObility I could use to frame these entries.
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Jul 4th, 2010 at 09:13:40 - Overlord (PC) |
I began Overlord Monday and planned on finishing it by Friday, but I haven't yet. I skipped a couple days to deal with taxes (yuck). Everyone says Overlord is like Pikmin. I never played Pikmin. It reminded me of Fable from the beginning. The art looks like Fable and human NPCs might as well be plucked from Fable. Fable was a year ago for me, so it's not degenerated too much in memory.
My first impressions were loving the minions and finding them a bit difficult, but fun, to control them. Now, they are entertaining as ever. I love sending Browns on a rampage through a room, smashing up crates, furniture, enemies, and informing me that they've brought me treasures. I've gotten more used to guiding them where I want them to go, especially the Blues through water. I find little need to micromanage the different minions. I generally swarm with Browns and Reds, and have no problem simply replacing the dead. Swarm, minion berserk spell, win. I actually think it's more efficient to run in with a billion Browns than have a varied army. Who cares if they die. They like dying for me, and I can just summon more. On the other hand though, I think it's a weak point in the game that I can swarm like that. I rarely use blues or greens unless the environment says I have to. There's little actual need to be strategic, and although swarming makes me feel powerful like an overlord should, I wouldn't mind using my overlord brain a little more.
The animations are great, all except the overlord's. He's really clunky, which is weird because everything else is so nice. Another thing I don't like about the game is the forging/upgrading items system. I've played almost the whole game with my original armor and weapon, and done fine. I finally got the third smelter and upgraded everything, but haven't imbued them. Sacrificing minions is a serious commitment because it takes so many to upgrade an item! I think this helmet I was upgrading takes like 1100 minions. Man, i have like 200 and I need them. Gold is a bit more plentiful. I've been spending it on making my tower look cooler, completely pointless, but fun. Again with the upgrading, it's something in the game that I don't need to do to succeed. Like it doesn't even make it difficult if I don't use the forge. I would have liked to see a little bit more in-depth item creation system, maybe even a little personal inventory.
So playing today, the Overlord faced a moral dilemma at the end of a quest. I was to find the elven women (the last in existence in fact), and free them to their menfolk so the elves could continue as a race. When I get there, I have the option to rescue them or NOT rescue them, and take gold instead. I found this a bit disturbing that someone would choose gold over keeping the race of elves alive. That's basically extinction through nonaction. Usually in these 'moral' choices in games, I'll think about it, and usually side with good. This one though, it was like "What?!" There was no considering not rescuing the women. Overlord makes fun of the fantasy genre by casting you as evil and maintaining a humorous tone throughout, but this quest ending, even though my adviser made a joke about how great it would be if there were no elves, just hit me as a serious topic. I mean, do I let people die for wealth and personal gain?
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