demagogue on 28/12/2019 at 16:38
@Ice, you mean you're conceding Odyssey is the best? Well the rest of your post is saying that so I take it that's a little slip.
Quote Posted by Starker
it's probably more a case of intestines tending to looking alike.
That too but I was thinking more in terms of level design -- doors were sphincters, floating enemies, shooting distant flesh knobs to make progress, z-axis design, swimming play in pools of uh whatever... It's a similar point though. Once you have the idea for a setting, the gameplay kind of writes itself the same way even if it's independently done (although I still wonder here. It just takes a glance for an idea to stick). Reminds me of that period when it seemed like a lot of games suddenly started having levels in plague zones.
Starker on 28/12/2019 at 18:10
Quote Posted by demagogue
That too but I was thinking more in terms of level design -- doors were sphincters, floating enemies, shooting distant flesh knobs to make progress, z-axis design, swimming play in pools of uh whatever... It's a similar point though.
Yeah, apparently doors being sphincters was also inspired by the colonoscopy video in SS2 and there's not a lot of design options once you go in that direction... No wonder that level looked like ass.
froghawk on 29/12/2019 at 18:55
There was also a rather colon-y level in DMC3, keeping that theme going...
Tocky on 29/12/2019 at 23:47
A coincidence that I'm just now playing System Shock 2 after all these years. I know now the colon of which you speak. The sphincter head monster bares mentioning too.
Pyrian on 30/12/2019 at 06:34
Tried to play Frozen Cortex, hit a bunch of errors trying to set up an account and connect to the server, then got unceremoniously dropped by the server while playing the tutorial. No patience for that.
So instead I'm playing Druidstone: Secret of Menhir Forest by the Legend of Grimrock team. Nothing like the Grimrock games, this is a turn-based tactical fantasy RPG. I like the combat and upgrade/leveling systems. The missions have been a lot of fun so far. It annoys me that enemy special abilities aren't listed in their descriptions. The dialogs are generally too long.
Renault on 30/12/2019 at 07:32
Picked up Ion Fury, played for about 2 hours now. It's fun, it has a genuine old school feel. My only complaint is that sometimes enemies are shooting at you from so far away, you can't even see them (or barely can). Slightly annoying. And the enemy AI is really terrible, their pathfinding is as dumb as it gets and they get caught in corners on a regular basis and can't get out (maybe that's intentional?) Despite all that, it's a good time, definitely sticking with it.
Oh, and I'm still waiting for henke to start up the annual "Best Games of 2019" thread. Feels like we usually see it mid December. He must be busy making games or something.
henke on 30/12/2019 at 08:09
Well I was playing Jedi Fallen Order, but I don't think it'll make it into my top ten, so sure, I'll try to whip up a thread.
Harvester on 1/1/2020 at 18:45
I played Life is Strange: Before the Storm, since I enjoyed the original game, but my PC won't run LiS 2 comfortably, so I thought I'd play the prequel.
I had a good time with it. People said about the original LiS that the dialogues were unrealistic. It's been too long since I played it, but with Before the Storm, I thought the dialogues were pretty realistic to be honest. I mean I know I'm autistic so I'm not the greatest judge on what constitutes normal social behavior, but I never cringed because of dialogue I considered crappy. Some minor cringe moments because Chloe is such a contrarian emo-type, but that's just her character. Maybe others have a different opinion, but I thought the dialogues were well done. I mean a movie like Juno won all sorts of prizes and people in that movie talk like no real living person ever - compared to that Before the Storm has very believable dialogue.
What I also liked that the responses you can choose aren't written out completely like they were in the old LucasArts adventures, but Chloe always more or less says what I expected and wanted her to say. I hate it in games when I choose a response, but the character says something completely different than what I expected and wanted, or in a different tone of voice, like far more aggressive than I intended. That didn't happen here, thankfully. I also liked the consistency in cutscenes, Chloe always wears the clothing I chose, and minor details like which graffiti I chose, the color of the light bulb in the car and Chloe's facial bruise as a result of my actions are also correctly shown during cutscenes. I like that kind of attention to detail.
The facial emotions of the characters were good, but lip movements/syncing was less than stellar. And it has some minor animation flaws, like people dancing don't look very convincing, it looks more like limb flailing.
Puzzles are very easy but this isn't the type of game that should have hard puzzles like retro adventures like Thimbleweed have. I liked the choices I had to make, some made me think long and hard, but more on the moral level than the intellectual level. The backtalk minigame where you have to win arguments is okay, sometimes it feels a little forced but the difficulty is about right, I won about half of them.
The bonus episode is pretty short but sweet, but I must say, in that episode, where Chloe and Max are much younger, they seem a little too wise for their age.
8/10
Edit: wait, one character did made me cringe a couple of times - the play director who talks like a Shakespeare character. Didn't seem very believable to me.
Thirith on 3/1/2020 at 10:00
I've not played Before the Storm, and that's mainly because while I came to like Life is Strange by the end, I never really warmed to the writing. To my mind, it's not about whether the dialogues are *realistic*, it's about whether they're well-written (Shakespeare didn't write dialogue that any real living person ever would've uttered, but he wrote *well*), and LiS' dialogues rarely felt well-written. Earnest, perhaps, especially in combination with some of the voice acting, and that ended up carrying a lot of the weight for me, but something can be stylised and stylish, snappy, smart, witty etc. or it can be clunky and ham-fisted, and LiS largely fell into the latter camp for me. So whether characters talk "like no real living person ever" is something that I find pretty irrelevant to whether the writing works for me, unless the writing aims for realism or naturalism.
qolelis on 3/1/2020 at 11:47
I'm playing Mutazione, "[a] mutant soap opera where small-town gossip meets the supernatural". Discovering gems like this is one reason I'm into gaming at all. I can see elements of Kentucky Route Zero in there (it has a similar mystic vibe going on), as well as sort of Night in The Woods (although I haven't played that one myself yet), and some of the more whimsically endearing titles like Samorost or Frog Detective.
Also got drawn into Oversea∞, a set of four interactive art installations, or "digital poems".
Then there was the demo for Stardrop, a traditional 3D adventure in space, but kind of uninspired; mostly about going around a space ship, finding locked doors and keycodes while getting bits of story. Some elements of sneaking, some rudimentary puzzles, but mostly a keyhunt. I wasn't entirely uninvested in the story, but I don't know if that alone makes it worth paying for the full game. The reviews are good, though, so maybe the demo isn't doing it full justice.
