This week Matt Nute joins us and explains how he might not be eligible to join the VFW, but he is kind of a conquistador. It’s complicated. We also talk JRPGs, which at least two people on the podcast are qualified to do.
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One thing I’ve been clear about in playing community levels, one might say to the point of harping, is that I don’t care to go into a level that is a movie. I don’t want to sit through your sack-version of the Scream movies, or watch you remake Indiana Jones with LBP design tools and no real gameplay. I have better things to do with my time. Therefore, I tend to automatically avoid levels described as “cinematic” in the review notes, because more often than not this means I’ll be watching instead of playing. I don’t play games for watching. I have real movies for that.
The drawback here is that in avoiding “cinematic” as a descriptor I miss out on some levels that are not movie remakes, but play like your sackdude is in a movie. This week’s level, Hurricane Edna, is one of those. I took a chance on it because I remembered playing another level by its designer, Kelitorious, last year. It was called The Casino Robbery, and while it had pacing problems I liked it. Hurricane Edna is much leaner, but still very cinematic, in the best possible sense.
Stop me if you’ve heard this one. In Resident Evil: Insert Slightly Intriguing But Ultimately Irrelevant Word Here, a virus, a secret laboratory, a sneering villain, Jill Valentine, a ship, and bioterrorism walk into a videogame.
After the jump, the punchline Continue reading →
Fortunately, no one has cross-bred a pinball machine with an an RPG. It’s bad enough that we can buy loot on the Blade table and upgrade the actual table in Moon Knight. The last thing I need is a persistent RPG system that lasts between games. I get RPGing in, well, nearly every other genre I play.
But the pushers at Zen Studios will change that later this month with the Epic Quest. At first glance, Epic Quest looks like a tongue-in-cheek Medieval fantasy themed table. You should be so lucky. It’s a persistent RPG in which you level up your character and earn loot as you play, all of which lasts over successive games. As if pinball wasn’t already enough of a time sink.
After the jump, take a closer look, if you dare Continue reading →
