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Sherlock Holmes: Crimes and Punishments (PS4) by jp (Apr 21st, 2024 at 00:26:13) |
This game is way more interesting than I initially gave it credit for (and I might even play all the cases, I'm that curious!)
There's a bunch of cases, you're Sherlock and you gather clues, investigate locations, use your special "eyesight", interrogate suspects, and more. So far, this is what you'd expect.
Some clues become more important and they show up in your "brain" where you can pair it up with another clue (if it's the correct one) to deduce something. Once you have enough of those, you can reach a conclusion. ALSO, once you've reached a conclusion you can decide how to act on it (usually it's either call the cops or call Mycroft - i think...).
What's really wild is that in the brain-connecting clues interface, you can reach lots of different conclusions! (I think it's 4 per case, at least it has been that so far and I've completed two cases). OH! And, as far as I can tell, the you can get it wrong! And, you just move on...the game calls some of them moral choices - which I'm confused by. But the idea that you could arrive at an incorrect conclusion and the game just moves on to the next case is pretty wild. So far, I've gotten both right (because there's abutton you can press that even warns you - like "spoiler alert" and it shows my result in green - which I assume is that I got it right).
Anyways, that's super cool!
Oh, and the game haslots of little mini-games that you play once, and they're part of the story (e.g. taking sherlock's pulse, or arm-wrestling with a sailor)..
The 2nd case is pretty neat - it takes place in the UK, there's a missing train...and there are rich Chilean (and Mexican) businessmen involved! Whoah.
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Fights in Tight Spaces (PC) by jp (Apr 21st, 2024 at 00:19:38) |
This one's a bit weird and I'll confess I didn't play it that much (just played one mission - which is like 1/5 of a full run?). It looks like it wants to be SuperHot, but it isn't - that's ok. But, it has a "play the movie" of what you just did in a level that you would think would play fast and smooth and super action-y. But now, it's slow and it even pauses between card plays...so it looks rather boring, which is a real shame.
As for the game, there's interesting stuff going on, but I haven't fully understood everything:
a. There's a typical energy system for casting, but a secondary system (combo) that lets you play some cards with a combo cost. If you move in your turn you lose combo so it's sometimes tricky to get everything to pull off.
b. While playing I was disappointed (because it seemed unfair) that there are objectives (bonus ones) in each level - and I wasn't getting any because I didn't know what they were! Apparently they're actually shown on screen, but in a place I did not see or notice.
c. The game seemed a bit slow - I was just moving and getting out of the way as I waited to draw into a good hand of cards. This cuts the momentum for sure and also made it hard/impossible to accidentally hit the secret (not really secret) objectives. So, I'm curious to go back and try again with awareness of the objectives. They should help a lot - in that I'm more likely to try to "solve the puzzle" of each turn and hopefully get the bonus objectives.
d. It's strange that you have to pay to heal, but I thought it was neat that you can upgrade several cards (if you have the money) and that some cards are cheap to upgrade - there's different pricing for them!
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Hadean Tactics (PC) by jp (Apr 21st, 2024 at 00:11:34) |
Ok, I've now cleared the game (not unlocked everything, of course) and it really is quite fun and interesting. The 3rd character (which I was waiting on to try out because I wanted to clear the game with the 2nd one) is pretty neat as well though as I write this all I can really remember is that it has an orb mechanic similar to one of the characters in Slay the Spire.
The harder ending is basically another 3 levels, but they get shorter! The last one, if I remember correctly, is just the boss. I don't remember what deck I was running, but it was pretty good - in the sense that I had picked up some good combos..traps and all.
I'm going to stop playing, for now, mostly because the list of games too look at keeps on growing - one a week - because of the design seminar I'm teaching.
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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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Gears Tactics (PC) by dkirschner |
| Crunchy Gears tactics game. Fun so far! ----------- Don't feel like committing to the end. Fun and intense combat, but the rest of the game doesn't do it justice. |
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most recent entry: Saturday 13 June, 2020
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I had never heard of Gears Tactics until I saw an ad for it on the Microsoft Game Pass storefront. Lo and behold, when it came out, it was included for free in Game Pass. Now, I'm wary of spinoffs, free games, and games I've never heard of that are all of a sudden available and appealing to me. But I do love tactics games, and the reviews for this were good-but-not-great (81% critic and 7.7 user scores on Metacritic, 76% "mostly positive" on Steam...and somehow a 4.8/5 on Xbox). I read a lot of reviews because the length appears to be 25 or so hours and I'm not keen on committing that amount of time to something that might be just okay. Plus, I have XCOM 2 and Shadow Tactics, two tactics games that I've actually been excited about for way longer.
Anyway, the perk of it being free is I can try it. If I'd paid for the game, I'd feel more compelled to finish, but to try for free? Eh, if it doesn't grab me I can put it down. I'm not sure how long I played, but I completed Act 1 (of 3), and I have a good impression of the game. The quick take is that it's XCOM-lite and a Gears game translated very well for tactics gameplay. I certainly had fun with it, but for everything cool about it, there are drawbacks that I know I'll not want to deal with for the remaining 2/3...and about 15-20 more hours...of the game.
Let's start with the cool stuff. If you've played a Gears of War game, you know it's already pretty tactical, as far as shooters go. I mean, it basically invented the modern third-person cover shooter. Just tilt the camera so you see the battlefield from above and, bam! Gears Tactics! Okay, it's more than that, but the franchise feels right at home in this genre. They kept standard enemy types and gun types and added classes. There are 5 classes that each have a couple specializations and quirks that make them feel unique. Some of the classes revolve around a gun type, such as the sniper (this one is obvious), the vanguard and support (which revolve around the lancer), and the heavy (which revolves around the mulcher [a chaingun]).
Each class has a big skill tree that branches off into four directions, allowing you to differentiate multiple characters with the same class. For example, the heavy can spend points around the Anchor skill, which is perfectly mapped from regular Gears games. In those games, you can't move and shoot a mulcher. Thus, in Gears Tactics, when the heavy takes a shot, he gains a stack of Anchor, which increases critical hit chance and damage. For every shot, he gains another stack, up to 3 or 5 depending on how many skill points you've invested. If you move, you lose your stacks. Maybe you're not interested in rooting your heavy to one spot and you'd rather spec your heavy so that shots do explosive damage in a radius. Maybe you want your support class character to specialize in healing individual units, or maybe in healing all units at once, or maybe in giving units other buffs. There are a good number of options here!
Enemies are similarly well translated from the regular games. Hammerburst drones like to take cover and use the Overwatch ability (all your characters can do this too, and it is quite useful), just like they tend to stay behind cover in the other games. Melee units will charge and try to get in range; genadiers become enraged and shoot harder and move farther; and so on. I suppose having played all the other Gears games (and two just recently) makes understanding Gears Tactics a little bit easier, but it's a pretty basic tactics game regardless, so far offering little challenge on normal difficulty. I also think playing two Gears games recently is making me care less about this one. I wonder if I'd be more into it under usual haven't-just-played-Gears-of-War circumstances.
Another way that the game adapts the regular franchise is through the focus on being aggressive. All your characters can perform executions on enemies if they are downed (dying), and some classes have abilities to charge and melee kill enemies. There are always perks for doing this, rooted in some character class's designs. When support class units kill an enemy, they heal all allies for a small amount. My vanguard is specced to gain 20% damage and 20% evasion for the rest of the round when he bayonet charges an enemy. My heavy has a perk where he gains 2 AP when another ally executes an enemy. Also, when you kill a downed enemy, every other ally gains 1 AP. So, the game really encourages up-close-and-personal combat through synergistic class skills. It's like the more you kill, especially with bayonets and chainsaws, the more actions you get. Very cool.
Despite the neat ideas Gears Tactics brings to the table for the tactics genre, the drawbacks are plenty as well. First, this story is so paper thin and uninteresting. The entire game is about you hunting some bad Locust guy named Ukkon. He's really bad, which you know by the fact that he's like an evil scientist, he kills COGS and laughs, he gets shot in the head and lives, he wears a cape and a crown, he uses an Immortan Joe style facemask to breathe sometimes. I mean, he's bad okay? So bad. Nearly every story mission so far has been "search for survivors/more COGs!" or "go to where Ukkon might be."
The story missions' narratives are bad enough, but the side missions are even more pointless. There are four types, which you will repeat over and over again. Or so I've read in reviews. But I've done two types and I already don't want to do any more side missions. The real problem? Side missions are mandatory! You have to complete x number of side missions every so often to progress the main story. They are pure filler to make the game longer. Gears Tactics has really annoying ads touting the fact that there are no microtransactions (what, is this a mobile game??) and asking you to rate it, but it is silent on the sin of padding a game with filler required side missions.
Couple this with the fact that your Gears level up so unbelievably slowly and you will be drowning in repetition. My main characters, the ones I've used every map, are level 4. My other COGs are level 2 or 3. I am looking right now at a video of the Act 2 boss (another 1/3 through the game) and they are playing with main characters level 4-5 and other COGs level 3-4. I've read that this is just how it is! People are finishing the game at level 7. Ugh. You only get skill points when you level up; otherwise, all you get are like weapon modifications and some armor, which generally do pretty boring things like just increase damage or evasion.
Speaking of the inventory system, it needs some streamlining. During missions, you can retrieve "cases" scattered around the map for parts, and you'll get some other parts as rewards. To equip something, you have to click through a bunch of menus for each soldier. Say I got a new helmet. I click a soldier, click the helmet slot, and see what they have equipped and the list of what else I have. If that soldier already has a good helmet, I have to click the roster, click the next soldier, click the helmet icon, and then see the list. I should be able to see what helmets all soldiers have on at the same time! Or, I should be able to see all of one character's equipment on the same screen! This clicking down into separate menus for each equipment type for each character is madness.
One of the best things about XCOM is that each of your soldiers matters to you (especially if you name them after your friends). When they die, it sucks. You're sad and have a hole in your team. Gears Tactics' extra COGs are totally dispensable. They can die permanently, but it doesn't matter at all. You have a constant stream of new recruits that, unbelievably, will often be of a higher level than the units you've groomed in battle. Well, time to bench reliable Todd who's been with me for this whole act and recruit Amanda because she's a level higher. Bye Todd. Gears Tactics also has no meta strategy layer. There's no base-building, no flying around the world, no nothing except leveling and equipping your Gears from mission to mission. It makes the game feel shallow (perhaps shallower than it actually is).
So, way more than I intended to write for this. Not a bad game at all! The battles hold my interest for sure. They are well done and exciting, and the one boss fight I had at the end of Act 1 was great. But almost everything else is barely propping it up. I'll wait for another tactics game that I was looking forward to!
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