Love revisiting this amorphous blob of skinner box contente every hundred-or-so days to see it take on a whole new form, almost unrecognisable to the one I experienced prior. The closest I'll get to channel hopping custom maps in TF2.
On one hand this fuckin game is an embarrassing heap of licences, brands and monetization. Stealing content from internet creators and selling them as pristinely packaged Emotes N Skins, gentrifying the culture of the moment into what is essentially a 33gb Nerf Gun advert.

On the other, there's a relative level of generosity on the user level that strings me along in a way that I need brain correction to effectively fight against. I bought one (1) season pass back in 2017 and have been able to afford every subsequent one through their rewards scheme. When the nefariously intended FOMO kicks in I still know they have my back to keep me a regular. The island of Fortnite goes through drastic changes with a suspicious enough regularity that I'm assuming the devs are crunching nonstop to keep the ship afloat. Entire mechanics and equipment can be introduced to the pool only to be removed without fanfare a few weeks later - They flooded the island and made a Waterworld season because why not. Should also be noted that Fortnite has a history of stealing unique mechanics from competitors hacking them in for themself.

This frustratingly enjoyable mid level engagement is kind of peculiar for me because my preference will always be single-player games, and I think Fortnite accommodates people like me, without a competitive bone in their body, by orienting a good three-quarters of the quest system around things that aren't related to combat. My sticking point with most of these games are that they just don't know when to chill, look at all the challenges on Apex or something, they're all different flavours of "deal xxx damage with x weapon". I throw on a movie or podcast and carve a path across the world map gathering materials, speaking to NPCs, doing environmental puzzles and prop hunts and finish a match in 3rd place under two rival streamers hopped up on GFuel haunted by the spirits of great architects, and still gain enough exp to unlock a handful of Battle Pass rewards. I unlocked Lara Croft by ringing doorbells until they broke. Help!!!!!!!
Also I know this will be contentious but I just straight up like the way the game looks. Any skin that isn't default is so meticulously modelled and textured it blows me away, the lighting as the day/nite cycle rolls over the trees and fog in the marsh and the autumn trees and the lakes and!!!!!! i could eat the screen and it'd taste like skittles. Anyway im logging this as mastered because i got 10 kills on the board right now.

It's really odd to me that so much of the writing on backloggd about this game is about whether it is "bad" or "good". Is this why we play games? Just to determine whether they pass a factory inspection test of being better than Mario Bros?

I recognize I am simplifying the process of review here, but isn't it kind of incredible how much influence this game has held over time? How you can see it in modern mystery titles to this day?

Isn't it cool that Yuji Horii played Mystery House and was like, "damn why can't computers talk to you?" and made a non-linear world for you to explore and work through dialogue trees?

Isn't it kind of just....wild that the end of this game is an abstract white walled maze that feels completely tonally offbeat in comparison to the rest of itself??

Is it a pixel hunting game with solutions that are a complete stretch! Totally! It can be a slog to play to be honest!!

But it was also paving the road for a genre and experimenting with what was even possible with an on-screen mystery adventure. Knowing this while I play makes it enjoyable enough for me.

This was super cute!

It's slightly embarrassing to admit, but I'm always interested in Sonic characters just being Sonic characters around each other and this was like a sniper aiming straight for my heart. I hate to beat on the drum that's already been beaten to death, but it says something when a game as simple as this accomplishes the role of a self-insert better than Forces. I don't need to save the world with Sonic, I just wanna hang out with them for a bit!

Any game that lets me compliment Knuckles on his hat is one worth enjoying, and yet again I'm reminded that Blaze is still my role model. God, she's so fucking cool!

Data File-
//defragmented
[#FORCED START OVERRIDE - - LOG OPENED]
BROADCAST: DSE Backloggd - - RA 18h 06m 0s | Feb 20th 2023

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XENOGLYPH I
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Writings by “BeachEpisode”
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[Translation Accuracy: 86%]
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“Never should have smoked that ҂ѼҎ҉֎ (excrement? physic?), now I’m in the Abyssal Scar.
I must admit to having been left gobsmacked and dumbfounded by how much Returnal has left such a strong impact on me. I don’t have much history with Housemarque’s library of games, despite Super Stardust HD being such a near-permanent fixture on my PS3 that it could have passed for my TV’s screensaver. Outland is relatively slept on these days too, I reckon, but ƺƻƛʥʭФѩ (unneeded digression?). Returnal finally received a PC port, allowing me to give the title a shot. The ᵬᶚỻӜѯ (electronic device?) is so deprived of games it’s genuinely heartbreaking…”
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XENOGLYPH II
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Writings by “BeachEpisode”
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[Translation Accuracy: 91%]
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“Typically I’d run for the hills whenever someone threatened me with a roguelite - a genre I often find ƛʥ؆ٱᵯᶈ (disinterest in?) at the best of times, and one that stands in stark opposition to what I personally find fulfilling about videogames at worst. There wasn’t much in place to prepare me for how deftly Housemarque utilised their core arena arcade design tenets around this Cronenberg/Villeneuve aesthetic pastiche with equal parts confidence and purpose. It must be said, because it is ﬗꬳꬲﭏ (true?), that this is the best-feeling third-person shooter I’ve touched. The degree of freedom of expression in the general character movement, as well as the broad utility of the tools available allow for some astoundingly gratifying excursions through arenas fraught with enemies spewing endless pointilist bullet patterns in easily analysable & counterable on the fly attack patterns.”
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XENOGLYPH III
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Writings by “BeachEpisode”
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[Translation Accuracy: 95%]
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“The compounding subtleties and delicate touches to the way Returnal’s roguelite structure was sculpted for purpose to encapsulate Selene’s purgatorial journey convinces me of this being one of the best character studies I’ve seen since maybe Silent Hill 2? Blurring the line between ﬕתּﻼἕ (symbol?), metaphor and physicality and never prescribing strict and demystifying literalisations. I think it is a very special thing when taking a moment to enjoy the environmental art design can yield subtle narrative realisations, lines drawn between the fragments of a character that they allow you to excavate. The world of Returnal is so dizzyingly all-encompassing.”
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[!!!!CONTENT WARNING: Topics of suicide!!!!!]
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XENOGLYPH IV
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Writings by “BeachEpisode”
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[Translation Accuracy: 0%]
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“Rot13 Rneyvre va gur jrrx, V znqr na nggrzcg ng raqvat zl yvsr. Qvqa’g nppbzcyvfu zhpu orlbaq fbzr oehvfrf naq n srj qnlf fcrag va n orq va RE. Va gur zbzragf yrnqvat gb zr npgvat ba zl vqrngvbaf, vg sryg yvxr funeqf bs vpr jrer cvrepvat guebhtu rirel cneg bs zl obql - svyyvat zr jvgu n qrrc puvyy naq fgvyyarff, nyzbfg nffhevat zr gung vg’f bxnl, gurer’f ab funzr, V’ir nyernql orra qrnq. Jura V neevirq onpx ubzr, fgvyy n yvggyr qehax bss gur cnva naq funzr bs vg nyy, V qvqa’g xabj jung gb qb. Guvf ebbz qvqa’g srry yvxr zl bja nal zber. V qvqa’g erpbtavfr gur crefba va gur zveebe, gur crefba jub jebgr zl grkgf be zrffntrf. Yvfgyrff, V gubhtug abguvat bs pbagvahvat zl cynlguebhtu bs Ergheany, vg jnf whfg na rnfl cvrpr bs abeznypl V pbhyq fyvc onpx vagb.
Fryrar ernjbxr ba na nyvra cynarg jurer fur nyjnlf qvq, gur napube cbvag ng gur fvgr bs gur vavgvny nppvqrag. Fur znqr n pbzzrag ba ubj haerpbtavfnoyr gur raivebazrag jnf sebz ure ynfg yvsr, fur yvfgrarq gb nhqvb ybtf erpbeqrq ol urefrys naq rkcerffrf qvfthfg naq pbashfvba ng ubj guvf crefba pbhyq cbffvoyl or ure. Univat na nethzrag jvgu tubfgf naq ybfvat gb lbhe bja ibvpr, qrfcrengryl pynjvat sbe n yvtug ng gur raq bs gur ghaary bayl gb erirny gur znyvtanapvrf naq cnenfvgrf rngvat njnl ng lbhe bccbeghavgvrf sbe frys shysvyyzrag. Fghpx va n fvflcurna gevny sbe frys, sbetvirarff, ngbarzrag gung bsgra srryf qbjaevtug shgvyr.
V xabj nyy bs guvf fbhaqf evqvphybhfyl gevgr, ohg Ergheany fgehpx n areir jvgu fhpu cerpvfvba vg sryg nyzbfg vainfvir. Univat guvf yvggyr fvzhynpehz bs n wbhearl gb puvc njnl ng naq zrgnzbecubfr bagb zlfrys unf urycrq prager zr, svaq pbagrkg va gur abvfr naq pbashfvba, znqr zr srry yvxr V pna nvz gb or abezny ntnva. Znlor gur wbhearl V'z ba vf n shgvyr bar, gurer'f rirel cbffvovyvgl V'yy ybfr zl sbbgvat naq snyy gb gur onfr bs gur zbhagnva lrg ntnva - ohg orsber gura, V'yy fgevir sbe nppbzcyvfuzragf gung whfgvsl zl cynpr va guvf yvsrgvzr. V'yy fubj zl gunaxf gb gur crbcyr jub znxr yvsr n wbl. V'yy xvpx gur jbeyq va gur qvpx orpnhfr fcvgr pna or n cbjreshy zbgvingbe.”
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[LOG CLOSED]

cannot say i am particularly enamored with the idea that we should frame this discussion in any way that pretends it is not ultimately a willful net loss for games preservation. the idea that in order to aggressively push hardware a development team was enlisted to resurrect a long forsaken ip, in the process fundamentally misunderstanding the majority of its artistic sensibilities (sometimes aggressively so) to showcase a console’s power rubs me the wrong way for several reasons. and there’s potent irony here because we must also remember that in essence sony is banking on from softwares death cult to launch a console cycle for the second time in a row now. recall the invective words of shuhei yoshida, 2009: 'This is crap. This is an unbelievably bad game.' surely what is now a valuable ace in the sleeve for sonys financial strategy in the 9th generation of consoles onwards deserves more respect than this?

as an immediate contrast in the field of remakes, i’ll put forward that at the very least, ff7 is one of the most ubiquitous games of all time - to such a degree that altering its content and expanding on its themes in a rebuild-esque scenario is not only sensible, but appreciated. the same case is difficult to make for demon’s in my opinion.

perhaps bluepoints alterations, seldom rooted in any reverence for aesthetics but instead prioritizing largely perfunctory gameplay, are to your tastes. but they are not to mine. the original demon’s souls is an intensely difficult work to assess, litigate, and reconcile with, to be sure, but whatever your stance on it, it’s difficult to deny how exquisitely it worked with its limitations to fashion something that was entirely inspired and bold, yet quintessentially from software. none of that same evocative ethos is reflected here, and for these reasons i find bluepoint’s iteration extremely difficult to respect - doubly so because im in a position now of having twice been told to give bluepoint a chance on a remake, both times to personally and deeply unsatisfactory results. i only wish more folks had a convenient way of experiencing the original so they were free to pass their own judgments

not gonna play again bc the gacha is evil and the only thing i care about in this world is feature film length shhis (+ luca) commus on youtube and reading a spreadsheet of whatever translations arent on video but please note: the candy in this 4koma are honey lemon candies which earlier nichika had made honey lemons as a nice snack for mikoto to in her passionate if painfully anxiously roundabout way show her love for her and mikoto has acquired a taste for them outside of her diet of water bottles and constant machine precise practice and nothing else bc she has in her quiet if frustratingly stuntedly roundabout way has already accepted the love nichika has for her. im not in pain at all i just thought this was interesting

GeoGuessr is the greatest feat achieved in games for reasons entirely external to the game itself. I think that's something realised by all its players on a (sub)subconscious level, but is rarely mentioned in discourse about the game, or even its constituent parts. It exists only because of an incomprehensible amount of photographic data being readily available for almost anyone on Earth to use. And this access is borderline mundane to us, alongside so much borne of the Internet age.

That I can get live information on traffic and see the outside of a restaurant across town in seconds is already dumbfounding on its own. However, I could do that for anyplace, anywhere on the globe. We have this asset which lets us see anywhere on the entire planet in crystal clarity, and instead of exploring the sheer boundlessness of our world, we use it for our local sphere the vast, vast majority of the time. I can see a dirt road in the middle of the Australian outback with the same amount of effort I consistently put towards checking for street parking near my doctor's office.

Where GeoGuessr excels is in showing you an elsewhere without requiring input. The sheer near-infinity of possibilities in global exploration vis-à-vis Google Street View can instill a decision paralysis, even when actually committing to a choice. The local sphere pulls even here not as a magnet to your present place, but to one starkly similar or dissimilar. And in seeking, however inadvertently, a (perhaps misguided and miscalculated) maximal boon of knowledge and culture and worldliness, there is that gravitation to the noteworthy. Similarly, there is a repulsion from the non-place, defined by Marc Augé as an anthropological space of transience and anonymity. This dissection of the world into places and non-places is perhaps semantically valueless, but it is a truth as, in being dropped into a non-place, there is a feeling of disappointment because one's perceived worldliness does not expand. The non-place thus remains necessarily transient and anonymising as this information of the non-place remains bounded to the non-place; there will not be talk around of the globe of a random Albanian fence post, or the interior of a suburban shopping centre in a town of 50,000. This is, in part, due to perceived worldliness being denoted by visitation to places of supposed import. In contradistinction and in theory, one's worldly knowledge should be the sum of familiarity with non-places distant from actualised places, as non-places are most void of knowledge. Through memetics and mimesis, places of import can already be, in essence, visited without physical travel, but a non-place cannot. Yet with GeoGuessr, they can be.

As mentioned above, GeoGuessr shows its players an elsewhere determined at random from an enormity of data (unless one plays a fixed map). I am equally as likely to land in Jardin des Tuileries or Ngorongoro Crater as I am to be placed on a barren strip of highway in Uruguay. In the case of the latter, perceived worldliness approaches uselessness compared to an understanding of non-places. This is due, in large part, to the identifying features of a space meant for anonymity. In the absence of signifiers we might know through cultural osmosis, the mundane becomes an invaluable asset. This is multiplied exponentially by how transient the non-place is. A highway, as a non-place, is identified with ease should it be near a roadsign indicating distance and relation to real places. Increasing obfuscation of the relation to actual places renders the non-place more anonymous and unknowable. Consider an approximated heirarchy of identifiers in GeoGuessr: place label, landmark, flag, TLD, language, country telephone code, architecture, license plate, street sign, flora, cars, utility pole, bollard, resolution, relation to sun, road composition. Some of these are considered of greater value than others in determining (and establishing) a place due to their applicability to a specific place (or non-place).

By being thrown into a non-place, that hyper-specific knowledge of no real value (for the vast, vast majority of the population) becomes essential in achieving a high score. And even without it, locating a place or non-place, however approximated, remains fun as one learns deliberately of subconsciously those signifiers. Consider and compare the play of an amateur entertainer, a speedrunner, and the high-scoring player. They play the game with vastly different knowledge and technique, and indeed for very different purposes. But they're all having fun and honing their skill while doing so. They are all analysing the properties of the non-place to render it into a place.

What I am long-windedly trying to convey is that GeoGuessr, as an extension of Street View, demonstrates the (un)knowability of the world in a way allowed only by our attempts to make it known. In a cynical sense, corporations try to make the world knowable for its exploitation. Optimistically, in quantifying what is or can be known, we are made aware of how much we do not know, and how much there is left to know. In its random presentation and in asking the player to locate themselves, GeoGuessr implores us to consider the non-places of the world as places unto themselves.

Minus one star for increasing feature bloat and the effective need to subscribe. If the reduction of value for something so miraculous by something so petty doesn't show you how underappreciated our contemporary miracles are, nothing will.

in now-sterilized, man-made familiar locales, we find our hero stripped of her defining characteristics and sense of self.

opposes super metroid’s encouraging game feel with something almost akin to a horror game. you don’t want to continue searching this facility. you want out. to go back to your super days and forget this fusion. danger is always lurking right around the corner. its linearity does away with the extrinsic exploration of yesteryear and forces the player to frantically discover unorthodox pathways and tunnels as samus’ last resort to escape the stale and artificial landscapes that crumble at “her” feet. now you see how it feels to be those Geemers and Kihunters once taken out by the masses within planet zebes. you are the helpless one. powerless in the shadow of your former glory. samus now uses more organic controls to complement her newfound body, creating further distinction between her and her “imposter.”

i find it to be pretty interesting how every game in this series tends to be its own piece yet always feel connected to its companions. they all tie back to their similar atmospheres, exploration and fear obviously but its their executions that each carry their own unprecedented singularities and efficacies. metroid 2: the black sheep that strikes terror via one’s commonly identifiable monotony. super metroid: the crowd-pleaser that invokes its trepidation based off of the unknown. and finally fusion: creating fear centered on what is known. we know our over-powered cold-blooded doppelganger is following us and awaiting our next move. we know monsters like the Nightmare and Ridley are out there. inevitability sweeps up emotion and carries it for as long as it sees fit.

there’s overall a broader focus on creating anxiety and suspicion here, compared to super where those things were more intentional byproducts of how the different areas were designed. fusion senses the player’s discomposure and plays around with it to a shockingly powerful degree. all the more satisfying in its climax where we finally get to strike some mania into our foes. features a story that somewhat subtlety places a critique on the nature of science. our once free alien friends now imprisoned for research along with other past monstrosities. the narrative unfolds cleanly and in just the right amount of doses to not feel too intrusive. the enemy is closer than it seems, but so are our friends.

not sure how i’d rank this one against its siblings but i could say that for all of them, due to their differences as previously mentioned. they work expertly in tandem with one another. this was one of the only nintendo franchises i actually fully enjoyed, hats off to nintendo r&d1. also happy 20th to this game, coincidentally started my playthrough on its release day lol. dread is coming soon….