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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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Hadean Tactics (PC) by jp (Apr 7th, 2024 at 13:32:36) |
This game is supposed to be a deck-building tactical game and it sort of isn't, but very lightly is - at least in my experience so far.
So, like CD2: Trap Master this game REALLY wears it's Slay the Spire inspirations on its sleeve. Again, there's a path you that branches and you need to pick which nodes to visit - and there's fights, boss fights, resting spots, stores, artifact/rewards, and shops. Oh, there's also "story encounters" where you make a choice that often results in a benefit and a drawback. VERY Slay the Spire - though I noticed the way the events are distributed is different and that it's much more important to plan your way through it since the paths intersect a lot less and you can, for example in my last run, set yourself up with 4 rest/upgrade a card spots in a row!
In addition to a deck of cards you have the character you chose and two "minions" (they're all monsters) that exist on a 2D grid that's quite typical of tactical games. The enemies will spawn, you have energy to cast your cards - generally you cast your cards, unpause and wait for the timer to pause the game when it hits the threshold (7 seconds) for your hand to flush, a new hand is drawn, and you get more mana to cast spells. What isn't really tactical about it is that all the fighting on the tactical grid (which includes everyone having abilities they cast once their mana is full) happens automatically. You can't (afaik) give orders to anyone. At best, if you have the right spells, you can move creatures around (your own or enemy), but they then move back to whatever it is they want to do (e.g. attack the nearest enemy).
One of my runs used a character that had access to "trap" cards which are pretty neat since you lay them on the grid and then have to trigger them (with a different card) and ALL the trap laid will trigger. Some do damage, others heal your allies, and so on. So, the game isn't tactical at all in the turn-by-turn combat and movement decision-making sense. Yes, you choose whom to roll into a fight with, which spells to cast on whom, and when to cast things. But, since you don't directly control your combat units it all feels pretty indirect.
Where the game goes pretty wild (and above/beyond what Slay the Spire does) is that once you've cleared a run - you gain access to making your own hero - choose skills/talents from a list AND choose which spells will be available (again from a list, which only has the ones you've unlocked). So, in this sense the game has a lot, lot more options/replayability and that sort of thing. But, I'm not sure it's that much more interesting?
Oh, there is a meta-progression. When I beat my first run a giant death/reaper creature appeared and said "ok, now you can start to make progress towards winning - you have to collect wings". And I've collected a few since, you get them from killing the stage end bosses (which is nice in that you don't have to get all the way to the end). I need to get 7 - so I wonder if I'll just have to play over and over until I randomly get the right bosses or will the game feed me different ones until I get them all? I've also unlocked a new (third) character...but I kind of don't want to use it because I want to get all the wings with the character I've made some progress with.
I've played about 4 hours and I've really enjoyed the "decay" and "trap" mechanics... we'll see how it goes!
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Deathloop (PS4) by jp (Apr 4th, 2024 at 11:14:36) |
Argh. The longer you go without playing, the worse this game's experience becomes. This is almost entirely due to me forgetting both how to play, but also all the localized information and knowledge you pick up - like who is where, when, and so on.
I love the idea of a "clockwork" game where you deftly navigate your way through things that happen and certain times and places - there's a sense of beauty and elegance to the choreography you develop and create (sort of like when you watch those time loop movies and see a character weave through people and places because they know what's going to happen when and they've just learned it). BUT, that beauty also creates an entry barrier - at least a psychological one for me, because the game's on-ramp is past and now you're in the thick of it. But you've forgotten everything...
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Devil May Cry 5 (PS4) by jp (Apr 4th, 2024 at 11:09:05) |
So I took a break - and then came back to the game and had forgotten how to play. It took a bit to remember (I purposefully avoided looking stuff up because I wanted to see how easy it was for me to remember). So, some of the fights with V took longer than they should have - because I had forgotten that V has to "finish off" the enemies...lol.
While I often focus (for my own personal interests) on game play and game design aspects of a game - I realized as I was playing this game that..wow, the visual design of the large enemies really is phenomenal. They're both beautiful, awesome, creepy, gross, and disgusting. It's quite the accomplishment and I really appreciated it. And, this is in the context of me playing a game that is ~7 years old and running on last gen hardware. Perhaps I haven't played enough PS5 games yet so I'm still too impressionable? Have things moved that far in terms of photorealism?
I have decided to move on even though I realize, from the back of the box, that I'll miss out on the 3rd playable character. It's no fault or problem with DMC5...it's just that I've got too many games to play and I think I've understood enough about this game to move on to another.
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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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2157 registered gamers and 3103 games. 7605 GameLogs with 13093 journal entries. 5072 games are currently being played.
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Dynasty Warriors Gundam (360) by Trinity Dragon |
| Logged. An excellent combination of accurate battlefield imitation and the Gundam series. Great for anyone who likes Gundam and massive open battlefields. |
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most recent entry: Wednesday 5 March, 2008
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Gameplay
The game allows the player to move freely through several different environments including desert, city, cave, space, and ice. The terrains differ in size and natural obstacles and space gives the illusions of terrain and altitude change by making units float upwards as you approach. Some items lodged in the ground can be destroyed but larger objects cannot be damaged and only a few can be affected directly. Beyond that the player can fight all enemies without damaging allies and it is often up to the player to actively push the attack on enemy bases and conquer territories.
The game is broken into campaigns by pilot and each pilot in turn has a set of missions that they set out to beat. The levels are one continuous set of events that the player must react to as they occur and act to prevent a loss. The player and subsequent pilot are locked into a single mobile suit, which they must maintain in order to continue fighting and prevent a loss. At each of the levels the pilot will be arbitrarily given a mobile suit except that once the player completes all of the missions for the pilot they can choose which mobile suit to use.
The main hook that grabs the player’s interest in a game that takes the better part of an hour to do one level is the variable point of view for each pilot. Different pilots in the same mission can have completely different objectives because they have different motives as defined by their personality from the anime series. This variable personality and motivation combined with the alternating levels for different pilots ensures that no matter where the player starts they will discover new features as they continue to play.
The game holds the player’s interest by pitting them against other mobile suits that can be unlocked as they continue to play. In addition to locking the player with the promise of new mobile suits the player can unlock pilot abilities and equipment modifications that open new pathways at every turn. Some of the suits even promote themselves by demonstrating amazing and powerful techniques to the player. Many of the equipment and skill modifications only become available at later levels, which drives the player to continue exploring and fighting. The game eve drives the player by increasing the difficulty between levels and in the later mobile suits (such as the one with no ranged techniques).
Design
The gameworld consists of independent, open-territory levels, strung together to facilitate the illusion of a real battlefield where the only boundaries are natural ones. This often includes tactical objectives, retreats and advances, surprise attacks and mass numbers of both allies and enemies. The game is designed to imitate the Dynasty Warriors saga with the template of the Gundam universe and as such everything is scaled to show the difference in scale between a human and a mobile suit. For instance, an expansive temple with enough space and buildings to make any human feel insignificant gets the walls and smaller buildings trampled by the mobile suit forces.
The level designs are based around tactical arrangement of allies and enemies in order to permit any of the three possible sides to take complete control of the battlefield or lose everything. Allies and enemies navigate the terrain and obstacles to try and conquer and hold strategic points and defend key areas. Every level includes a set of units that carry names and pilot stronger suits. In most cases these are recurring protagonists/antagonists from the different Gundam shows that are represented in the game.
The rewards are given in three conditions: mid-level, end-of-level, and end-of-campaign. Mid-level rewards are items that give the player temporary upgrades to attack, defense and speed or health and special attack gauge. End-of-level rewards are given for leveling up the pilot and mobile suit during the battle and usually include items to improve the mobile suit and special skills that the pilot can use to improve their performance in combat. End-of-campaign rewards are only given once a player has completed all the missions for their selected pilot and are only presented once for each pilot. They include unlocking new pilots and mobile suits as well as granting the pilot the ability to choose from the available roster of mobile suits when they revisit old levels.
Battle for this game is conducted as if the player was engaged in a real war. Enemies consist mostly of minions, which pose no real threat to the player, and bosses/leaders, which force the player to use defenses and special techniques more frequently. The player always takes the role of a leader and can coordinate special attacks with allied leaders to release more powerful techniques. Enemy minions act as units of health for the different territories and most mobile suits have a “field clearing” button combination attack that make it more efficient to group enemies around you.
While most of the conflict for the official mode is designated by the original series and not explained very well in the game the shifting allegiances in the four-faction power struggle of the original mode are only explained by the in-game dialogue and for the most part seem to revolve around misunderstandings and sheer stubbornness. The reason for conflict usually boils down to “I live to fight,” “Fighting is a way of life for me,” or “There is someone/something/some event that I must kill/destroy/stop.” As often as not allies from original series are broken up and rivals are teamed up with each other. There is one case of interesting alliances where a protagonist of one series is partnered with the antagonist of another series and vice versa.
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