This is mainly going to be about gushing, because I really love today’s level, Refuse Ridge. I don’t care much for the theme of the level, which is the idea that your sackboy has landed in a dump, thrown away with a bunch of other toys and license plates. A sad toy race car with a creepy blinking eye tells you to escape by making your way to the puzzle horse. I thought this was a great start, even though it took me about a thousand tries to get a snapshot of that car with his creepy eye open. It was like he could anticipate whenever I would hit the start button, or maybe hitting the button caused him to blink. I don’t know, at any rate the trashed toys theme really doesn’t go anywhere meaningful. No matter, because the playing of the level itself is just great.
Part of it is this nifty Habitrail sensibility where tubes carry you from place to place and can launch you unexpectedly into danger with the use of hidden jump pads. I wonder how my childhood hamsters would have felt about that. Added to this element is the way the grappling hook is used in this level, as a tool for slowing down and avoiding as well as swinging. I loved that twist. Even the regular swinging had a different feel in this level. It called to mind Indy using his whip, or my fantasies of being Indy using his whip to get out of jams. The above picture shows my sackboy, having been thrown by swinging under a rising platform, in mid-air over an electrified column just before I grapple hook to the next platform which will rocket me up to a much higher area. That’s a thoroughly clunky way of describing a moment when I should just have used one word: exhilarating.
I played this level several times and I cannot recommend it highly enough. Now, you’ll have to indulge me with one more picture, because taking it took me forever.
After the jump, creepy eye Continue reading →
Is there any better feeling than seeing a really substantial update for an iPhone game you already own and love? Yes, of course there is. It’s a game update, not the birth of your child. But still, it’s great. That’s why you should hurry up and grab Dungeon Raid. There’s a big, hefty 1.3 update coming any day now — it’s already submitted to Apple for approval — that adds a bunch of great stuff. If you act now, you get to love the game before the update, then get all excited while you watch the update download.
After the jump, you’d rather have this game than three dollars. Continue reading →
I’ve already talked a bit about the multiplayer in Homefront here and here, mainly in relation to the excellent multiplayer in Killzone 3. But what about the rest of the game?
Oh no, something’s blowing up and I’m being blown up, but I’m rescued and, oh god, the younglings have obviously been murdered even though you can’t show it, and now someone is blowing our cover because he’s screaming insanely at the horrible grimness of it all…Now I’m hiding under a body — well, waiting for the in-game cutscene of me hiding under a body to finish, at any rate — and now Boone is dead, and… Wait, who? Who’s Boone? I wasn’t really paying attention. Boone from Lost? Why is that news? That was, like, season two.
Read the full review here.
A lot of people might not have realized it, but railroads used to be pretty important. Without them there would have been no hoboes in Bugs Bunny cartoons, and without the ability to sit around and build track, sell goods, and upgrade trains, a lot of college students would probably have passed their physics midterms.
After the jump, it turns out railroads were also pretty important for attacking Russia. Continue reading →
When you get past the discussion of graphics and texture size, when you get over lamenting the inevitable plot holes, when you’re done praising or damning the dialog and structure, and when you’ve had your fill of grousing about the UI, one thing makes or breaks whether you play an RPG: the combat.
After the jump, I’m talking about every game that isn’t called Planescape: Torment Continue reading →
Team Tepig had a huge victory tonight. Huge. A major upset. I can’t really talk about it at this juncture, but let me just say we’re all pretty excited. Don’t worry. I will get to it eventually. Suffice to say, it was pretty sweet. For now, however, you should probably forget we had this conversation.
Hold on a second. Let me call up my Reader Screen. There. Now I’m selecting Forget. Wait another couple of seconds. There. You’ve forgotten it. No worries about that though, because I’ve replaced your Victory Excitement power with Reader Interest. I’m activating that now. Look at that! Your Interest just rose!
Excellent.
I don’t know if you can detect it here, but I’m feeling kind of guilty about messing with the heads of my Pokemons the way I’ve been doing. I’m feeling kind of oogy about it, and not because Team Plasma has been inundating me with all this liberation folderol. Those dudes are clearly abusive jerkwads and I have no intention of listening to them. If you’d seen the way they kicked around Munna you’d understand. I was there. I saw it. In fact, I intervened and now Munna is just fine. In fact, he’s an starter for Team Tepig and an integral part of tonight’s victory—
Crap. Now I have to use Forget on you again.
After the jump, I try to remember not to forget Continue reading →
