Category: Video Games

Give a hoot

I’m basically defined by my obsession with video games. It’s a little sad, but it’s true. What some people don’t know though, is that I have other hobbies! Hobbies that I have been sorely neglecting as of late, in favour of, well, playing more games.

As of this writing, I have beaten 131 games this year. That’s more than a little excessive.

So next year, in addition to trying to draw more, I’m going to try to read more. Though I’m well aware that “read more” is a goal that I’ve set for myself for at least the last four years or so. It should be easier now that I have the Kobo, with scores of books at my fingertips at any given time. According to the Already Read folder, I’ve read ten books on it so far this year. Though to be fair, three of those were issues of SCROLL magazine, and two were comic books.

I have purchased no fewer than six Story Bundles this year, so I have a veritable mountain of literature to work through. Which is great, but I’ve said it several times before that I don’t read enough to actually know what I like to read. Story Bundles seem like a great solution to that problem, because each one has had at least one book that immediately interests me, so it’s like I’m paying for that one and then getting a whole bunch of other stuff to check out for free.

Maybe I’ll even get around to finishing Frankenstein one of these days, too. I’ve only read about a quarter of the book, but I’ve enjoyed that portion of it so much, it’s a darn shame that the Kobo Store doesn’t offer free versions of classic literature like iBooks does. I just find it too hard to read on my tiny iPhone screen.

Monthend Video Game Wrap-Up: November 2014

Another month down, another month saturated with Smash Bros. Two flavours of Smash Bros this time, even! And also some other things. Mostly Zelda. Why do I even own any non-Nintendo machines?

~ Now Playing ~

Super Smash Bros for Wii U (WiiU) – Thank you, Nintendo.

Pokémon Alpha Sapphire (3DS) – Having completed the Generation VII Pokédex in Pokémon Y, I decided to eschew my normal Pokémon tendencies and do a nuzlocke run. It was going really well until my Voltorb died and now I don’t know if I have the will to go on. Poor Vince, he was so young…

Hyrule Warriors (WiiU) – I’d be done this if it weren’t for the massive DLC packs that keep coming out. They add weeks and weeks to the game’s already-pretty-long lifespan. And I haven’t even finished the original Adventure Mode yet!

Wii Fit U (WiiU) – I really shouldn’t bother writing this in, but I’ve been using it a lot lately! Enough that I’ve even gotten passably good at that waiter game that I used to hate with a firey passion. Still, every time I turn it on, I get a sad from remembering that I lost my Fit Meter long ago.

Always Sometimes Monsters (PC) – I don’t even know where to start with this one. It’s a 2D RPG in a modern setting, where you’ve got to wrangle up a bunch of money to pay your rent. There’s more than that, but I feel like going into it would ruin it. It’s a bit slow, but it seems like a good way to spend a few Saturday mornings.

Alien: Isolation (360) – It’s too scary to type anything about it!

Super Mario Advance (GBA) – This was the only GBA game I owned for quite a while, so I played the ever-loving crap out of it. That also gave me great deal of nostalgia for it. I’d love for it to be HD-ified, because it’s my favourite version of Mario 2, but the colours look so faded and it doesn’t fit quite right in GBA resolution.

~ Game Over ~

Super Smash Bros for 3DS (3DS) – I’m not ceasing to play it, but I’ve cleared all the challenges, so I’m calling it beaten.

The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess (Wii) – Probably should have lumped this one and Majora under “Re-runs” because I burned through them both fairly quickly, but I think the “Game Over” category has a little more clout. Or something. I really like Twilight Princess. This is the fifth time I’ve beaten it. To 100% (less the Poes because F the Poes).

The Legend of Zelda: Majora’s Mask (N64) – I always start writing this feature near the beginning of the month, and initially I’d written a blurb about how I’d like a 3DS remake of this game to happen. Guess what was announced literally that afternoon. Still played the N64 version because I had just dropped $10 on the Virtual Console version. You’re welcome.

Picross e5 (3DS) – Yup it’s another Picross game. And I played it.

Spirits (PC) – Kind of like Lemmings, but less cartoony and more artsy. Also your spirits can’t do nearly as many things as lemmings, and any action effectively kills them. I played through all the levels, but I just don’t care about it enough to bother with perfect clears. I wish that would stop being a thing.

Mighty Gunvolt (3DS) – A cute little 8-bit freebie they gave away with Azure Striker Gunvolt (which I still haven’t played). Four stages and a final boss of very base-level Mega Man-style action. Not totally fulfilling, but a good way to kill twenty minutes.

The Love Letter (PC) – An adorable browser game that I wrote about a week ago.

~ Re-Runs ~

Mega Man X2 (SNES) – I usually play through Mega Man X once or twice a year, but I only go through X2 every few years and almost never touch X3. It’s really too bad, because X2 is pretty good. I just don’t know the optimal way through the game, so it seems like I end up revisiting stages to collect power-ups more than I should have to.

Year of N64 – November – Majora’s Mask

It’s a little-known fact that The Legend of Zelda: Majora’s Mask is my third-favourite Zelda game. Shocking, right? It’s a little divisive, but that’s only because of fools who can’t deal with the time limit. People who dive in headfirst and take the time to truly experience the game generally come out with a great appreciation for it and the living, breathing world that resides inside of it.

Majora’s Mask had it rough from the start; it was released on the same day as the Playstation 2. Whoops. Mega Man Legends 2 suffered from a very similar overshadowing, being released only two days prior. What a “fun” coincidence that two of the best sequels of that generation met with the same terrible fate.

Majora’s Mask wasn’t just a sequel though. It shared so much DNA with The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time that you might think it was the same game. However, Majora took things in a wild and disturbing new direction. Ocarina was a revolution for the series as far as visuals and gameplay went, bringing Zelda into 3D and all that. But it still stuck fairly close to the Zelda formula: go through eight(ish) dungeons and then fight Ganon. Get a Triforce, save the princess.

The thing that many whiny pimple-faced teenagers complained about the loudest is that Majora only has four proper dungeons. Only half of what was expected of it. Regular villain Ganon/dorf was nowhere to be seen, I don’t think he gets as much as a name drop. Even the titular princess Zelda only shows up in a brief flashback. The treasure in each dungeon is a different type of arrow. Things were amiss, and at the time, fans were not happy about it.

But there’s so much more to this game than popping in all the familiar elements, giving them a new coat of paint, and calling it a day. In fact, Majora’s Mask is the exact opposite. It re-uses Ocarina’s assets without shame, and keeps the vast majority of Ocarina’s tool set. The basic gameplay mechanics are the exact same. It’s all very familiar, but the way that all these thing are put together is like nothing before and nothing afterward.

As the story goes, out hero Link stumbles into the bizarre world of Termina, a place that seems familiar at first glace, but if distressingly alien upon closer inspection. Speaking of distress, there’s a gigantic, grinning moon in the sky, and it’s falling. In only three days, that moon will collide with the Earth, eradicating Termina and all of its inhabitants. It’s a tension-filled race against time.

Well, maybe not that tense. You see, you have the power to turn back time whenever you like, and start the three-day cycle anew. This throws a lot of people off. “How am I supposed to win in three days?” they ask, stupidly. You’re not. You’re supposed to accomplish a few little things on each cycle. You’re not expected to be doing something important for entire duration of all three of those days.

This repeating three-day cycle is the other huge point of contention among the haters. “But everything I did is undone when I reset time!” they complained, ignorantly. That’s kind of the whole point.

The overarching theme of Majora’s Mask is despair. It’s oppressive, violent, and bleak. As you play those three dire days over and over again, you’ll get to know the people of the land. You’ll see their excitement for the coming carnival slowly give way to despair for their coming doom. There are very few gaming experiences that are so chilling as running around Clock Town with only a few hours left to impact.

Take the postman for example. He jovially runs around town, picking up and delivering the mail every day. He is shackled to his rigid schedule, but he loves his work. He’s perfectly happy with his daily routine. Until the evening of the third day. If you enter the post office at that point, the postman will be writhing on the floor, unable to run for his life because of his duty to adhere to the schedule. On his bed is an opened letter, written to the postman by himself, urging him to flee even though it’s not on the schedule. But he can’t do it, can’t save his own life. His life is his work. What would he have left if he abandoned his post? It’s dark, it’s haunting, it’s beautiful.

Of course, you can help the postman. There is a way to convince him to run to safety. But then you start the cycle over, and it’s like you never did a thing. The new instance of the poor postman will probably spend his final hours in mental agony, wishing that he could run, but unable to. Because you won’t save him again. Why would you? You already have the Postman’s Hat for doing it once. Every future postman (until you complete the game) will die a horrible death.

That’s just how it is. Many of the people of Termina have problems. Some more dire or elaborate than others, and you’re literally only helping them for the prize. You’ll gain no satisfaction from giving them a hand, because when you turn back time, it’ll be like you never did anything at all. And you’re going to feel bad about it too, because these characters are very well-realized. while the NPCs in Ocarina were just sort of there, these are people with lives and schedules and personalities. You’ll get to know them well, watching them live out their last three days over and over again.

Yeah, it sounds really bleak and depressing. And it is! But think back, and try to imagine any other Zelda game that’s actually evoked an emotional response from you (aside from The Wind Waker). There probably aren’t any. Majora’s Mask is unique in that it’s a game world that makes you want to save it. You’ll feel beaten down and hopeless most of the time, but that just makes it that much more rewarding whenever you make those little bits of permanent progress.

When it first came out, I did feign disinterest in Majora’s Mask while in public, because that was the popular opinion amongst my peers, and high school is the very last place you want to stand out from the crowd. But secretly, I adored it. I was charmed by its offbeat world, I appreciated the three-day cycle, and I loved the grim atmosphere that permeated the entire game. There was a point in time where I would go home after school every day and play it until I fell asleep. Must have beaten it four or five times in a row. Even if it’s not the best video game, it’s absolutely a work of art. I can’t wait to experience the polished-up version on 3DS.

Comics that aren’t mine

I’ve been playing Pokémon Alpha Sapphire here and there between Zeldas and Smash Brothers, though this time I’m doing it a little differently. I’m playing Nuzlocke-style, which means that I can only capture the first monster I see in any given area, and that any of my pokémon that faint are considered dead and set free.

The challenge gives the game a little extra oomph, as it means you have a finite number of Pokémon to work with, and you don’t get to choose them. Good on this Nuzlocke fellow for coming up with an interesting way to keep the game fresh.

Also, he wrote and drew many comics about his own poke-adventures! They’re mostly about going through the poke-motions with the altered rules, but there are plenty of laugh-out-loud jokes in there. The art is pretty shabby to begin with, but it’s clearly because Nuzlocke is rushing these out the door and not putting much effort into them. They do start to look much better later on.

The only thing that I don’t like? The comic was abandoned only a few episodes into the White series. Things that end mid-story make me sad. But what can you do? Point of this post: Nuzlocke’s Pokémon: Hard-Mode comics were very much enjoyed by me, and they could be enjoyed by you too. Check ’em out.

There are other comics on his site there, but I haven’t read them yet. Investigate at your own risk.

Some Amorous Mail

Nintendo is releasing Super Smash Bros for Wii U, Pokémon Omega Ruby and Pokémon Alpha Sapphire, and their Amiibo figures today. It’s like one big love letter to Nintendo fans. So for today, I prepared a little post about a browser game called The Love Letter.

It’s a simple game. You probably assumed as much when you saw the word” browser” up there. I know I’d have written it off right then and there. But I first read about the game in an article on authenticity in video games, so I had a much more thoughtful introduction to it than some idiot blogger talking about how cute it is.

loveletter

And it is cute! That’s basically its entire appeal. The Love Letter will take you no more than five minutes (assuming that you win), and it doesn’t have an especially elaborate story. The premise is that you are a young man in junior high or so, and you discover a love letter in your locker. You’re then tasked with reading the letter in the five minutes before second period. So where’s the game?

Like actual junior high, the other students are all nosy jerkoffs, and you have to read this letter in secret. Students meander about the hallways of the school aimlessly, unless they spot you, in which case they will beeline towards you. You are a bit faster than then, but they’re fairly relentless in their pursuit. Your only chance is to try to shake them around a corner, and then find a vacant nook where you might be able to skim a sentence or two before some wayward classmates wander over. There’s much more tension than the cute graphics would suggest.

If another student catches you reading it, they’ll snatch it away and make fun of you. It’s a much more relatable losing state than those in many other games. Well, at least I imagine that it is. To date, I’ve still never received a letter from a secret admirer. I guess the time for that kind of thing has long passed, but it still bums me out a little. I know that I was a big goof throughout all of school, but you’d imagine that somebody would have found me more charming than stupid.

But enough about my silly hang-ups. The Love Letter is a perfectly fun little distraction. It’s not so deep that it should be any sort of conversation piece, but it’s a little nostalgic and maybe says something about childhood? I feel like I should have some sort of insightful thing to say here, but I can’t really find the words. Something about how things this seem silly to adults are very serious and important to kids? I don’t know. Take some time to think about it and come up with your own conclusion.

Monthend Video Game Wrap-Up: October 2014

I really didn’t think that I’d play many games in October, what with the Smash Bros and all, but I did! Less than usual, perhaps, but I’ve still got a respectable list here.

I didn’t do a very good job of playing anything terribly Halloweeny. I didn’t even buy Alien: Isolation or The Evil Within. A few of the games on this list are of a spooky-ish nature, but nothing overtly horror-themed. And Monster Manor doesn’t count, because I play a little bit of it every month.

~ Now Playing ~

Super Smash Bros (3DS) – Yeah, this version of Smash doesn’t play on a TV, but it’s so good. It’ll probably be the death of my 3DS. It’s great to have Smash on the go anyway.

Dragon’s Dogma: Dark Arisen (PS3) – Dark Arisen is an expansion pack for the original DragDog. It was not released as $15 DLC, but rather a reissue of the whole game plus the new content for $40. I wanted it badly (DragDog is one of my favourite games), but not at that price. When it went on sale for $7 in September, I nearly exploded with excitement. However, I only played up until the point where I was able to leave Cassardis.

Hyrule Warriors (Wii U) – I may have plugged almost as many hours into this as I have Smash so far. Currently I’m trying to clear off as much of the Adventure Map as I can. I’d say I’m three-fifths done. Maybe?

Continue reading Monthend Video Game Wrap-Up: October 2014

Year of N64 – October – Army Men: Sarge’s Heroes

I have two strong memories regarding Army Men: Sarge’s Heroes. The first is having spent a lot of time playing with a very good friend of mine who I’ve barely talked to over the last decade. Thinking about it makes me a little sad about how I lost touch with many of my friends because I’m so self-centered and bad at taking initiative.

The other memory is of having finally beaten the game after a rental or two on Halloween night. I remember battling my way through the final stage while my brothers were out trick-or-treating, and having to take a break to watch the new Treehouse of Horror. Also gorging myself on treats stolen from the bowl meant for trick-or-treaters. Sadly, it is the stronger of the two memories. Probably because of the whole “I’m so self-centered” thing.

Anyway, that’s why I chose this game to play in October. For whatever reason, Sarge’s Heroes and Halloween are inextricably linked in my mind. Go figure.

Playing Sarge’s Heroes again seemed like a bad idea at first. My nostalgia for the game left a very nice impression in my mind, even though I do seem to recall it being pretty janky even at the time. And janky it is. It lacks a lot of handy features and smooth edges that we’ve gotten used to in modern games, but I would wager that back in 1999, it was still passable. Possibly even good.

Controlling Sarge is the biggest problem with the game. He moves at a brisk pace, but the game works on a tank-like control scheme where pressing the control stick to the left or right will turn Sarge in that direction, not move him that way. Unlike Resident Evil and other games that use this control scheme, Sarge doesn’t have to stop to turn; you can swerve him to either side while moving forward. It’s not perfect, but it’s something.

There are also no camera controls, so you’re stuck hoping for the camera to swivel in the direction you want it to. Most of the time this amounts to you running around blind for a moment while you wait for the camera to get behind Sarge. There isn’t even a button to quickly snap it behind him like in 3D Zeldas. You can press the first-person aiming button to get that effect, but you’re stuck going into first-person mode for a second that way.

Strafing is a skill that can help you to deal with these issues, but it’s the kind of strafing where you hold a button and then Sarge walks sideways instead of turning. And it’s on the Right C button for some reason. Sure, it’s the best you can do without a second analog stick, but it’s still not ideal.

The most important thing I want you to take away from this review is this: if Army Men: Sarge’s Heroes had a modern control scheme (including camera control), it would be a considerably better game. Let me play it with a dual-analog controller of some sort and my opinion of it would be very positive. I don’t even care if the graphics are crummy and the gameplay is simple. I like it that way.

That said, it’s still actually pretty fun. The game is made up of fifteen missions, each of which drops you on a reasonably-sized map with a big X marking your destination, and lets you come up with your own way to get there. Some maps are less open than others, but they’re all fairly unique and give you plenty of opportunities to goof off and explore.

Some missions simply require you to get to the X. Sometimes you have to destroy a certain thing, and sometimes you’ve got to escort someone. The escort missions aren’t nearly as bad as you might imagine, as most of the time your ally is smart enough to hide from enemy fire. Occasionally they won’t though, and they do get shot to bits pretty fast if you aren’t keeping tabs on them.

One of the modern conveniences that Sarge’s Heroes lacks is checkpoints. All missions have two or more objectives, and there’s no saving between them. If you get killed, it’s back to square one. It’s a bit of a pain in the behind, but most missions are fairly short, and if you know what you’re doing, they generally won’t take more than five to ten minutes.

Enemies function exactly as you imagine they would in a game from 1999. They’re either sitting in one spot, waiting endlessly for you to get too close, walking a predetermined sentry path, or set to appear when you trip an invisible switch. Their AI is pretty pitiful. Once they spot you, they’ll either charge straight at you or stand perfectly still and fire a shot every few seconds. No cover, no dodging. It’s pretty much a shooting gallery. The only time enemies get any more dangerous is when they’re packing better hardware. For example, shotgun troopers deal heavy damage and flamethrower guys can melt you pretty much instantly.

Tanks and helicopters can be incredibly dangerous foes, but they can also be handily dispatched by figuring out their range of vision and picking away at them from just outside of it. If you know where they show up and how they move, they shouldn’t cause you much trouble at all. If they catch you off guard though, about the best thing you can do is to run away like there’s no tomorrow.

Sarge has a fairly wide array of weapons with which to stop the Tan army. Most of the time your M16 is more than enough to handle the situation, but you also have access to sniper rifles, shotguns, grenades, rocket launchers, flamethrowers, and… a mine sweeper? Each weapon functions pretty much exactly as other video games have taught you. The bazooka you obviously want to save for tanks and choppers, but the sniper rifle and grenades are fantastic ways to clear out enemies without getting your hands dirty. They’re almost too effective…

The one thing that really, really irks me about the gameplay is how enemies show up on the mini-map. Tan blips don’t appear until you’re close, which I can understand. Don’t want to make it too easy, you know? But they also don’t disappear until long after you’ve already killed them, which is annoying, and means that you’ll be waiting around for a few seconds after every encounter to see if you’re dispatched all the nearby foes. It’s really not a huge issue, but it still bugs me way more than it should.

There isn’t a lot to be said about the music in Sarge’s Heroes, as it’s mostly cheesy faux-military sounding stuff. However, there is one track in the game that is so very similar to Van Halen’s version of “You Really Got Me” that I’m sure a few people didn’t notice that it was just a ripoff. There may be more “borrowed” tracks in the game, but I didn’t recognize any during my time with it.

Army Men: Sarge’s Heroes isn’t really a great game, as far as the average video game enthusiast’s standards go. It’s got a lot of rough edges, but there’s a fairly solid product under there. I really like it, and if I were able to maneuver Sarge around a little more gracefully, I think it could be a contender. It even makes me want to seek out and play some of the sequels, but word on the street (Wikipedia) is that Sarge’s Heroes 2 is good and then it’s a steep downhill plummet from there.

In any case, it was a breath of fresh air after Donkey Kong 64.

Creepier than the average uncle

I suppose I probably should clarify a stance or something, but I’ve been trying to avoid any GamerGate-related talk on here because the only thing that’s good for is bringing people down, and I want my blog to be a more positive place. If I’m going to type anything depressing, it’ll be personal woes, not about people being horrible to other people.

For the record, I don’t think that social politics should be part of video games, so I don’t want to get involved. But I do believe that video games should be enjoyable for everyone. Men, women, everyone in-between. They’re not for an exclusive club of socially-challenged nerds. All my life I’ve been waiting for the stigma against gamers to go away, waiting for the day when I could play my 3DS on the bus and not have to feel like I’m being judged. GamerGate is just making it worse. It has nothing to do with journalistic integrity and everything to do with hatemongering. So yeah, I want GamerGate and all their stupid crap to go away.

But that’s just sort of a preamble for what I really want to write about today, because I honestly can’t say much about it: The Uncle Who Works for Nintendo. It’s a text adventure, which might immediately disinterest a few, but keep in mind that it’s short and you can probably reach the final ending within about 20 minutes.

The game starts out all cute and nostalgic, but quickly gets creepy and uncomfortable. It’s probably the most enjoyable Twine game I’ve played, which isn’t playing much, since I’ve only played like three. There are a handful of endings to earn, and the game does a very nice job of hinting towards ones you haven’t yet found. It also provides a very nice option to restart at the point in the game where your decisions start to matter, cutting out all the setup on replays.

I’d like to say more about it, but I don’t really want to spoil anything. The one thing I do want to mention is that if you make certain choices, the game does go down a very GamerGate-relevant path. Yeah, it gets a wee bit preachy, but it doesn’t detract from the overall experience.

I absolutely recommend checking out UWWFN long enough to find your way to the real ending. A good way to kill half an hour, if nothing else. And it’s a browser game, so you’ve got no good excuse not to. Just make sure you do it on a real computer and not your phone or tablet, because the audio component is pretty important.

Oh, and if you’re a big fraidy-cat like me, maybe play in the afternoon. It gets pretty spooky.