squid0812
BACKER
2017
I tried on this one, I really did. This is a narrative-based game that largely fell flat for me, despite including a few elements that I normally enjoy. There are some important and relevant themes at work here: the decline of the American working class, suburban malaise, post-college ennui, etc. But the storytelling and mechanics surrounding these themes are frequently misguided in a way that dampened the entire experience.
The number one problem for me was my inability to connect with the protagonist. I get it, Mae is intended to be self-destructive and a bit vain. I just was missing the elements of the story that are supposed to make me feel any sympathy for her. Indeed, I think there were a number of times in the story when the developers were expecting me to feel something positive about Mae, and it just never landed. On the contrary, there were a few times in the story where Mae struck me as a toxic asshole more than anything (see: the scene where Mae and Bea go to the college bar in the city). I’ll readily admit that this objection is subjective, and clearly a lot of players empathized with Mae. She just didn’t work for me as a character, which really harmed my overall level of investment in the narrative.
What I think is less debatable (and more detrimental to the quality of the game) is that slow-as-molasses pacing and a dire lack of interesting gameplay mechanics are not part of a great recipe for success. The sense of not having anything to do is part of the story’s ethos, sure, but it’s a tough concept to sustain over an 8-10 hour game. There’s just not enough going on in the plot to justify the length of the game, so we just end up with a lot of dead time before anything occurs that’s actually relevant to the overall story. The developers clearly hoped that players would be willing to dawdle about and soak in the world they created, but the mechanical incentives for doing so just didn’t do it for me. There are a few mildly diverting minigames here, but otherwise there is very little going on gameplay-wise. I suppose that there’s technically platforming, but it’s perfunctory and thoroughly unnecessary. This ultimately ends up functioning as a walking simulator (which is fine) that has a few half-hearted attempts at adding actual gameplay (not so fine).
There are a few scenes in Night in the Woods that stuck with me. The relationship between Mae and her parents, for instance, is genuinely sweet and affecting. And bizarre cults are a trope that I will be always be down for. It’s just ended up being an hour or two of worthwhile content in a ten hour game that I otherwise found pretty boring.
The number one problem for me was my inability to connect with the protagonist. I get it, Mae is intended to be self-destructive and a bit vain. I just was missing the elements of the story that are supposed to make me feel any sympathy for her. Indeed, I think there were a number of times in the story when the developers were expecting me to feel something positive about Mae, and it just never landed. On the contrary, there were a few times in the story where Mae struck me as a toxic asshole more than anything (see: the scene where Mae and Bea go to the college bar in the city). I’ll readily admit that this objection is subjective, and clearly a lot of players empathized with Mae. She just didn’t work for me as a character, which really harmed my overall level of investment in the narrative.
What I think is less debatable (and more detrimental to the quality of the game) is that slow-as-molasses pacing and a dire lack of interesting gameplay mechanics are not part of a great recipe for success. The sense of not having anything to do is part of the story’s ethos, sure, but it’s a tough concept to sustain over an 8-10 hour game. There’s just not enough going on in the plot to justify the length of the game, so we just end up with a lot of dead time before anything occurs that’s actually relevant to the overall story. The developers clearly hoped that players would be willing to dawdle about and soak in the world they created, but the mechanical incentives for doing so just didn’t do it for me. There are a few mildly diverting minigames here, but otherwise there is very little going on gameplay-wise. I suppose that there’s technically platforming, but it’s perfunctory and thoroughly unnecessary. This ultimately ends up functioning as a walking simulator (which is fine) that has a few half-hearted attempts at adding actual gameplay (not so fine).
There are a few scenes in Night in the Woods that stuck with me. The relationship between Mae and her parents, for instance, is genuinely sweet and affecting. And bizarre cults are a trope that I will be always be down for. It’s just ended up being an hour or two of worthwhile content in a ten hour game that I otherwise found pretty boring.
2010
My personal favorite Bioshock. This may lack the theoretical dimension of its predecessor, but it more than makes up for that by being a dramatic improvement mechanically. This game is emblematic of one of the best ways to think about designing a sequel: identify what the first one did well and build your entire game around it. The mechanical highlight of the first Bioshock was the careful planning that was necessary to confront superior forces that you wouldn’t be able to simply shoot your way past. The Big Daddy fights, and everything that went along with them - choosing the battleground, laying traps, hacking security, and so on - were far and away the best part of that game from a mechanical perspective. So, in keeping with the aforementioned philosophy, the developers made this the primary thing you do in Bioshock 2 - this game constantly puts the player in positions where they are outgunned (whether by Big Daddies, Big Sisters, or just massive groups of splicers) and forced to rely on their wits and resource management to win the day. The developers also did well to dramatically widen the player’s options for dealing with these situations - there are all kinds of different traps, mines, options for hacking, and many other ways to get creative in bringing down your enemies. The combat here is consistently expressive in a way that the first game only displayed periodically. I’ve heard some people suggest that the near-constant ‘last stand’ mentality demanded by this game can be fatiguing, but it never got old for me. Being thrown into situations where being clever and strategic can make the difference is pretty much why I play video games, so I was engaged throughout.
Another area of improvement is the level design. The first Bioshock had pretty stellar level design in its own right, but the amount of density and detail here is taken to new heights. Levels like Ryan Amusements, Pauper’s Drop, and Siren Alley feel significantly more expansive and lived-in than anything in the first game. They are also filled with all kinds of secret nooks and crannies where you can pick up useful resources. So dense are the levels that exploring them frequently made me think of Dishonored 2, which is just about as high a praise as I can give.
The one element of this game that drew a lot of flak was its narrative, mostly as it exists in comparison with the original. However, with a decade’s worth of retrospect, this seems a bit unfair. Yes, Sofia Lamb is a weak and simplistic follow-up to Andrew Ryan (still one of the greatest video game villains of all time). And yes, Lamb’s evil plan is some fairly stupid sci-fi mumbo-jumbo. But most every other story element (especially the relationship between the player character and Eleanor) works fine. And the people who derisively compare it to the first game are conveniently forgetting that Bioshock had significant story problems of its own. Bioshock 2, for instance, never suffers the dramatic drop in narrative quality that the first game does after its big twist is introduced. On the whole, Bioshock 2’s story is more personal and coherent, even if it’s significantly less ambitious.
This is a game that has lived for too long in the shadow of its predecessor. Bioshock 2 remains one of my favorite games of the 2010s.
Another area of improvement is the level design. The first Bioshock had pretty stellar level design in its own right, but the amount of density and detail here is taken to new heights. Levels like Ryan Amusements, Pauper’s Drop, and Siren Alley feel significantly more expansive and lived-in than anything in the first game. They are also filled with all kinds of secret nooks and crannies where you can pick up useful resources. So dense are the levels that exploring them frequently made me think of Dishonored 2, which is just about as high a praise as I can give.
The one element of this game that drew a lot of flak was its narrative, mostly as it exists in comparison with the original. However, with a decade’s worth of retrospect, this seems a bit unfair. Yes, Sofia Lamb is a weak and simplistic follow-up to Andrew Ryan (still one of the greatest video game villains of all time). And yes, Lamb’s evil plan is some fairly stupid sci-fi mumbo-jumbo. But most every other story element (especially the relationship between the player character and Eleanor) works fine. And the people who derisively compare it to the first game are conveniently forgetting that Bioshock had significant story problems of its own. Bioshock 2, for instance, never suffers the dramatic drop in narrative quality that the first game does after its big twist is introduced. On the whole, Bioshock 2’s story is more personal and coherent, even if it’s significantly less ambitious.
This is a game that has lived for too long in the shadow of its predecessor. Bioshock 2 remains one of my favorite games of the 2010s.
1987
This review covers the watered-down port for the NES, rather than the co-op arcade beat-em-up (which, I’m told, looks and controls significantly better). In some ways, this functions as a cautionary tale about the pitfalls of porting a game. The NES wasn’t capable of handling the graphical output of the original arcade game, which forced a series of awkward compromises: the bland and anonymous backgrounds, only allowing two enemies on screen at a time, the removal of the co-op mode, and so forth. The features added in to compensate are either willfully obtuse (a poorly explained XP system that allows you to gradually unlock more powerful moves) or straight-up terrible (it’s difficult to adequately describe how cheap and awful the platforming sections are).
Now, this isn’t completely lacking in the old school NES charm. Once you unlock your full moveset, beating the snot out of the endless parade of enemies becomes rather fun. Unfortunately, this also isn’t lacking in the trademark NES hostility. The difficulty curve is one of the more bizarre I’ve encountered in games: you can breeze through the first two levels in 90 seconds a piece, but the last two levels are lengthy slogs jam-packed with hostile design choices.
It’s probably best to skip to the sequel - or better yet, just play River City Ransom instead.
Now, this isn’t completely lacking in the old school NES charm. Once you unlock your full moveset, beating the snot out of the endless parade of enemies becomes rather fun. Unfortunately, this also isn’t lacking in the trademark NES hostility. The difficulty curve is one of the more bizarre I’ve encountered in games: you can breeze through the first two levels in 90 seconds a piece, but the last two levels are lengthy slogs jam-packed with hostile design choices.
It’s probably best to skip to the sequel - or better yet, just play River City Ransom instead.
This standalone expansion is a fairly dramatic downgrade from a gameplay perspective when compared with previous Dishonored content. The broad array of powers present in the base game is trimmed down to just three here, and they aren’t as useful as previous Outsider abilities. The unfortunate result is that stealth / non-violence feels a lot less viable (the removal of the chaos system also eliminates any consequences for just killing everybody throughout the level). I spent a lot of time here just straight-up fighting dudes. I’ve always thought of the basic sword-and-gun play of Dishonored as a fallback plan for when you didn’t have the mana to remain undetected or wreak absurd chaos with the Outsider powers, so operating frequently in shoot-and-strike mode was a bit of a downer.
With that significant caveat out of the way, here’s where I should mention that Arkane’s ridiculously dense level design and stellar world-building acumen kept me hooked throughout the game. In any normal video game series, the wonderfully complex bank heist mission, for instance, would be a towering, singular achievement. However, because this is Dishonored, it will have to be content competing with Jindosh’s Mansion and Aramis Stilton’s Manor from the base game for the title of best level of the past console generation. Such is the level of quality we are talking about here.
The world-building here continues the Dishonored tradition of being extremely creepy and evocative. Bizarre rituals, malevolent cults, languages that can only be spoken by the dead - these are just a few of the tropes expertly deployed to maximum effect. If Edgar Allan Poe and HP Lovecraft had collaborated, this is the sort of world I would’ve expected them to create.
Our protagonists, Billie Lurk and Daud, are arguably the most interesting characters this series has produced. The writers at Arkane have definitely not received enough credit for the ballsy way they have gradually transformed their supposed antagonists into complex antiheroes. The interplay between these characters consistently feels real and engaging, aided by the superb voice acting.
The removal of most of the outsider powers and the chaos system notwithstanding, this is pretty much everything I hope for in a Dishonored game. It may not stack up gameplay-wise to the best in the series, but there is more than enough quality content here to compensate.
With that significant caveat out of the way, here’s where I should mention that Arkane’s ridiculously dense level design and stellar world-building acumen kept me hooked throughout the game. In any normal video game series, the wonderfully complex bank heist mission, for instance, would be a towering, singular achievement. However, because this is Dishonored, it will have to be content competing with Jindosh’s Mansion and Aramis Stilton’s Manor from the base game for the title of best level of the past console generation. Such is the level of quality we are talking about here.
The world-building here continues the Dishonored tradition of being extremely creepy and evocative. Bizarre rituals, malevolent cults, languages that can only be spoken by the dead - these are just a few of the tropes expertly deployed to maximum effect. If Edgar Allan Poe and HP Lovecraft had collaborated, this is the sort of world I would’ve expected them to create.
Our protagonists, Billie Lurk and Daud, are arguably the most interesting characters this series has produced. The writers at Arkane have definitely not received enough credit for the ballsy way they have gradually transformed their supposed antagonists into complex antiheroes. The interplay between these characters consistently feels real and engaging, aided by the superb voice acting.
The removal of most of the outsider powers and the chaos system notwithstanding, this is pretty much everything I hope for in a Dishonored game. It may not stack up gameplay-wise to the best in the series, but there is more than enough quality content here to compensate.
2014
This was one of the very first Soulslikes to hit the market back in 2014, but, alas, it’s not exactly a highlight of the genre. The most common objection is the slow and plodding combat, which exceeds even the early Souls games in terms of stodginess. However, despite its flaws (i.e. enemies that turtle interminably behind shields that are nearly impossible to consistently guard break), it wasn’t the combat that ended up sinking this for me. Instead, it was the abject lack of anything evocative or interesting in the visual, audio, or narrative design.
Aesthetically speaking, this game is pure Teflon. The characters, weapons, armor, and enemies all look like knockoffs from World of Warcraft. The environments are consistently bland and repetitive - you will either explore dreary castle walls or dingy crypts with little variation (either way, the level design mostly just consists of hallways). In some of the more labyrinthine levels toward the end, I frequently got lost due to the repetition and the lack of distinguishing landmarks.
The story and writing are equally uninspired. This is most obvious in how things are named. You have weapons named things like ‘Breaker’ and ‘Scratch’ and bosses called ‘The Commander’ and ‘The Beast.’ This doesn’t even qualify as fantasy boilerplate - it’s like they straight-up ran out of time and were forced to leave placeholder names in the actual game. This wouldn’t be a huge issue if this sense of shoddy incompetence was avoided in the actual narrative content, but no such luck. I found most of the audio logs and paid attention to the cutscenes, but I still couldn’t tell you what the connection was between the various story elements: there’s a demon invasion, a spreading infection, and a rogue priest, but how it all fits together is beyond me. Worse yet, I never really cared to figure it out.
Unfortunately, Lords of the Fallen sort of set the standard for my relationship with the games of Deck13 - I’ve never had much of a problem with the gameplay, but the aesthetic choices are so overwhelmingly not for me that it overshadows any positive feelings.
Aesthetically speaking, this game is pure Teflon. The characters, weapons, armor, and enemies all look like knockoffs from World of Warcraft. The environments are consistently bland and repetitive - you will either explore dreary castle walls or dingy crypts with little variation (either way, the level design mostly just consists of hallways). In some of the more labyrinthine levels toward the end, I frequently got lost due to the repetition and the lack of distinguishing landmarks.
The story and writing are equally uninspired. This is most obvious in how things are named. You have weapons named things like ‘Breaker’ and ‘Scratch’ and bosses called ‘The Commander’ and ‘The Beast.’ This doesn’t even qualify as fantasy boilerplate - it’s like they straight-up ran out of time and were forced to leave placeholder names in the actual game. This wouldn’t be a huge issue if this sense of shoddy incompetence was avoided in the actual narrative content, but no such luck. I found most of the audio logs and paid attention to the cutscenes, but I still couldn’t tell you what the connection was between the various story elements: there’s a demon invasion, a spreading infection, and a rogue priest, but how it all fits together is beyond me. Worse yet, I never really cared to figure it out.
Unfortunately, Lords of the Fallen sort of set the standard for my relationship with the games of Deck13 - I’ve never had much of a problem with the gameplay, but the aesthetic choices are so overwhelmingly not for me that it overshadows any positive feelings.
2019
A flawed game with one particular aspect that stands out as S-tier: the astounding pixel art, which is possibly the best I’ve ever encountered in games. Whatever type of imagery you prefer, this game has it: the creepy, the surreal, the ineffable. A giant, blindfolded baby with bleeding eyes. A floating head pockmarked with scars and exposed brain matter. These are just a few of the more jaw-dropping examples in a game that is full of this kind of stuff. Even if this isn’t your type of game, you owe it to yourself to check out some screenshots - it really is that good.
Alas, every other part of the game registered as just OK for me. The combat is fun enough, but it’s also rather simplistic. Nearly everything that isn’t a standard attack, dodge, or parry feels tangential or only situationally useful. The various Metroidvania upgrades are all exploration-based and thus never play a role in combat as sometimes happens in other games of this ilk (i.e. Hollow Knight). Fundamentally, the combat moveset at the beginning of the game is very similar to the moveset at the end. It’s fine, there’s just not a lot of movement.
I feel similarly ambivalent about the platforming and exploration. I love the way the dodge feels in this game, but the jumping always felt a bit off for reasons I can’t describe. It didn’t happen a lot, but there were definitely times when I missed a jump or mantle that I felt like I should’ve had. Normally, I wouldn’t consider this a big deal, but when instant death spikes are in play (why?), even trivial amounts of platforming jank are unacceptable. Most of the really tough platforming is in optional areas, so at least there’s that. Speaking of which, there are plenty of cool, optional secrets here - illusory walls and riddles abound. Unfortunately, a lot of what you find are meaningless Kickstarter collectibles - this game sort of has a desperate need for more useful items that give you a reason to fully explore its world. It doesn’t help that your character never picks up any movement upgrades - I kept hoping to pick up a double jump or air dash that would make it more fun on a moment-to-moment basis to backtrack and scout out the map for secrets.
The stellar imagery and oppressive mood were enough to keep me going here - but a follow-up with some gameplay and story refinements (more direct storytelling and a little less figurative / lyrical mumbo-jumbo might help the plot stick a bit more) has the potential for greatness.
Alas, every other part of the game registered as just OK for me. The combat is fun enough, but it’s also rather simplistic. Nearly everything that isn’t a standard attack, dodge, or parry feels tangential or only situationally useful. The various Metroidvania upgrades are all exploration-based and thus never play a role in combat as sometimes happens in other games of this ilk (i.e. Hollow Knight). Fundamentally, the combat moveset at the beginning of the game is very similar to the moveset at the end. It’s fine, there’s just not a lot of movement.
I feel similarly ambivalent about the platforming and exploration. I love the way the dodge feels in this game, but the jumping always felt a bit off for reasons I can’t describe. It didn’t happen a lot, but there were definitely times when I missed a jump or mantle that I felt like I should’ve had. Normally, I wouldn’t consider this a big deal, but when instant death spikes are in play (why?), even trivial amounts of platforming jank are unacceptable. Most of the really tough platforming is in optional areas, so at least there’s that. Speaking of which, there are plenty of cool, optional secrets here - illusory walls and riddles abound. Unfortunately, a lot of what you find are meaningless Kickstarter collectibles - this game sort of has a desperate need for more useful items that give you a reason to fully explore its world. It doesn’t help that your character never picks up any movement upgrades - I kept hoping to pick up a double jump or air dash that would make it more fun on a moment-to-moment basis to backtrack and scout out the map for secrets.
The stellar imagery and oppressive mood were enough to keep me going here - but a follow-up with some gameplay and story refinements (more direct storytelling and a little less figurative / lyrical mumbo-jumbo might help the plot stick a bit more) has the potential for greatness.
2018
This review contains spoilers
Includes light spoilers***
I have some mixed feelings on this one. At first glance, Frostpunk appears to be a fairly straightforward management sim / city builder, albeit one with a unique and intriguing hook (it’s an alternate history scenario featuring a catastrophic climate shift occurring in Victorian era England; the player’s job is to construct a functioning settlement around a massive coal-fueled generator in the frozen north). However, beyond merely constructing a city, the player is also charged with passing laws that will affect how the people living in the city view your leadership. And the game does everything it can to make this element of the play as stressful and tense as possible. You start off short of workers, short of supplies, with your citizens becoming ill and complaining about your failure to heat their homes. The game immediately pushes you to start passing laws that are morally dubious, to say the least. Short on workers? Well, why not just put the kids to work? Need more productivity? No problem, just bump the length of the workday up to 14 hours. This is Frostpunk’s unique twist…it wants to slowly but surely coerce the player into becoming a complete monster by introducing a series of (seemingly) desperate conditions that make the player feel like they have no choice: become a tyrant or die. And for the first time through, this emphasis on desperation degrading morality is really effective.
Here’s the problem, though - all of the challenges the game throws at you are really just part of a ruse to make the game appear more challenging than it actually is. After my wonderfully engaging and tense first playthrough (which ended in failure - the city folk justifiably kicked me out as I was desperately trying to hold onto my job by transforming the city into a totalitarian police state), I reflected on my strategy. Going back through for the second time, I focused on making my city as efficient as possible - and noticed in doing so that I could almost completely ignore the lawmaking process and the conditions the game intermittently throws in the player’s way. All of the dangers that had vexed and challenged me the first time through were exposed as mere checks for whether my city was efficient enough. A great example is the Londoners scenario - a few weeks into the main campaign a large group of panicked citizens plan to leave the city. Not only that, but they start stealing food and recruiting other people to leave with them. The first time through, this event produced a lot of angst for me - it was ultimately what pushed me over the edge into becoming a straight-up dictator. The second time through, I simply ignored the Londoners - and because everyone was warm and fed, they all gave up and agreed to stay within just a few days. The first time was a great moment of tension and moral uncertainty. The second time wasn’t even an event - it was just an objective marker that filled corner of the screen as I ensured that coal thumpers and sawmills were functioning at max efficiency.
I finished my second playthrough in victory - the city survived, no one died, the game even gave me a stamp of approval to show I hadn’t become a moral abomination. But, in spite of my improved performance, I didn’t have nearly as much fun - all of the surprise and tension was gone, all of the rueful chuckles this game had produced from me with its constant twists and turns were replaced by the furrowed brow of the manager, meticulously checking to ensure all of his tools are working properly. For me, this is the rare game in which mastery does not improve the experience; indeed, for me, it only dampened it. Most of the other base game scenarios ended up with the same issue - because I had figured out the formula for success, they were generally frictionless and lacked suspense (The Fall of Winterhome - a clever and challenging scenario in which the player must deconstruct a poorly run city before rebuilding - is an exception).
A great game the first time through that loses a lot of its magic once you start to see the strings. Still, a must-play for those who prefer games that generate tension and stress galore.
I have some mixed feelings on this one. At first glance, Frostpunk appears to be a fairly straightforward management sim / city builder, albeit one with a unique and intriguing hook (it’s an alternate history scenario featuring a catastrophic climate shift occurring in Victorian era England; the player’s job is to construct a functioning settlement around a massive coal-fueled generator in the frozen north). However, beyond merely constructing a city, the player is also charged with passing laws that will affect how the people living in the city view your leadership. And the game does everything it can to make this element of the play as stressful and tense as possible. You start off short of workers, short of supplies, with your citizens becoming ill and complaining about your failure to heat their homes. The game immediately pushes you to start passing laws that are morally dubious, to say the least. Short on workers? Well, why not just put the kids to work? Need more productivity? No problem, just bump the length of the workday up to 14 hours. This is Frostpunk’s unique twist…it wants to slowly but surely coerce the player into becoming a complete monster by introducing a series of (seemingly) desperate conditions that make the player feel like they have no choice: become a tyrant or die. And for the first time through, this emphasis on desperation degrading morality is really effective.
Here’s the problem, though - all of the challenges the game throws at you are really just part of a ruse to make the game appear more challenging than it actually is. After my wonderfully engaging and tense first playthrough (which ended in failure - the city folk justifiably kicked me out as I was desperately trying to hold onto my job by transforming the city into a totalitarian police state), I reflected on my strategy. Going back through for the second time, I focused on making my city as efficient as possible - and noticed in doing so that I could almost completely ignore the lawmaking process and the conditions the game intermittently throws in the player’s way. All of the dangers that had vexed and challenged me the first time through were exposed as mere checks for whether my city was efficient enough. A great example is the Londoners scenario - a few weeks into the main campaign a large group of panicked citizens plan to leave the city. Not only that, but they start stealing food and recruiting other people to leave with them. The first time through, this event produced a lot of angst for me - it was ultimately what pushed me over the edge into becoming a straight-up dictator. The second time through, I simply ignored the Londoners - and because everyone was warm and fed, they all gave up and agreed to stay within just a few days. The first time was a great moment of tension and moral uncertainty. The second time wasn’t even an event - it was just an objective marker that filled corner of the screen as I ensured that coal thumpers and sawmills were functioning at max efficiency.
I finished my second playthrough in victory - the city survived, no one died, the game even gave me a stamp of approval to show I hadn’t become a moral abomination. But, in spite of my improved performance, I didn’t have nearly as much fun - all of the surprise and tension was gone, all of the rueful chuckles this game had produced from me with its constant twists and turns were replaced by the furrowed brow of the manager, meticulously checking to ensure all of his tools are working properly. For me, this is the rare game in which mastery does not improve the experience; indeed, for me, it only dampened it. Most of the other base game scenarios ended up with the same issue - because I had figured out the formula for success, they were generally frictionless and lacked suspense (The Fall of Winterhome - a clever and challenging scenario in which the player must deconstruct a poorly run city before rebuilding - is an exception).
A great game the first time through that loses a lot of its magic once you start to see the strings. Still, a must-play for those who prefer games that generate tension and stress galore.
2019
A significant improvement on the first game. The devs at Deck13 seem to have finally learned their lesson about varying up their environments so the player doesn’t get bored or lost (the fatal flaw of both Lords of the Fallen and the first Surge). It’s not like the urban landscape is particularly riveting as a set piece, but at very least the environments are clearly delineated and differentiated from one another - I always had a good sense of where I was and where I needed to go next. Not exactly glowing praise, but it’s a step forward at least.
The mechanical changes from the original game also tend to be in this game’s favor. In the first game, it was easy to spam dismemberments and end up with a lot of unneeded vendor trash, but here slashing off limbs is tied to battery power, the same resource that you use to heal. So, the game creates an interesting choice - dismember the enemy for parts or hold on to the battery power for a potential future heal. Adding onto to the complexity of this system is the fact that you refill your battery power by attacking. This encourages aggression in a way that reminded me a little bit of Bloodborne’s rally system. Indeed, considering that this is also a much faster game than its predecessor, the shift from the stodginess of Dark Souls to the nimble ballet of Bloodborne is a rather apt analogy for the relationship between the original Surge and its sequel.
Except that Dark Souls and Bloodborne are packed to the gills with weird and evocative concepts and ineffable set pieces, while The Surge…well, it’s sci-fi gobbledygook in the worst way. Genuinely, I admire how the devs at Deck13 have clearly improved since they got into the Soulslike business with Lords of the Fallen. But the one thing that has never changed, whether in Lords of the Fallen, The Surge 1, or here, is that their narratives are so bereft of inspiration, their writing so bland, that my eyes glaze over as soon as the characters open their mouths. I really hope my experience changes with their future games, but I’m not hopeful. The narrative here centers around trying to find a little girl with nanite powers (yep, not joking) before a petulant, snot-nosed cult leader named Eli can steal the aforementioned powers for himself. Transhumanism, worship of technology, corporate malfeasance - all of your typical sci-fi cliches are incorporated here, if only half-heartedly.
I didn’t care one iota for the story, as you might have guessed, but I won’t deny that the actual act of playing this game is pretty damn fun. So, it’s empty calories. But what would life be without an indulgent little snack every once in awhile?
The mechanical changes from the original game also tend to be in this game’s favor. In the first game, it was easy to spam dismemberments and end up with a lot of unneeded vendor trash, but here slashing off limbs is tied to battery power, the same resource that you use to heal. So, the game creates an interesting choice - dismember the enemy for parts or hold on to the battery power for a potential future heal. Adding onto to the complexity of this system is the fact that you refill your battery power by attacking. This encourages aggression in a way that reminded me a little bit of Bloodborne’s rally system. Indeed, considering that this is also a much faster game than its predecessor, the shift from the stodginess of Dark Souls to the nimble ballet of Bloodborne is a rather apt analogy for the relationship between the original Surge and its sequel.
Except that Dark Souls and Bloodborne are packed to the gills with weird and evocative concepts and ineffable set pieces, while The Surge…well, it’s sci-fi gobbledygook in the worst way. Genuinely, I admire how the devs at Deck13 have clearly improved since they got into the Soulslike business with Lords of the Fallen. But the one thing that has never changed, whether in Lords of the Fallen, The Surge 1, or here, is that their narratives are so bereft of inspiration, their writing so bland, that my eyes glaze over as soon as the characters open their mouths. I really hope my experience changes with their future games, but I’m not hopeful. The narrative here centers around trying to find a little girl with nanite powers (yep, not joking) before a petulant, snot-nosed cult leader named Eli can steal the aforementioned powers for himself. Transhumanism, worship of technology, corporate malfeasance - all of your typical sci-fi cliches are incorporated here, if only half-heartedly.
I didn’t care one iota for the story, as you might have guessed, but I won’t deny that the actual act of playing this game is pretty damn fun. So, it’s empty calories. But what would life be without an indulgent little snack every once in awhile?
For me, this is the lesser of the two story expansions for Dragon Age II (I’m not counting The Exiled Prince DLC). A big part of how much one enjoys this is going to come down to how they feel about Felicia Day’s performance as Tallis. Tallis is a bit too cloying and aloof for my liking - she’s full of smarmy wisecracks and showy acrobatics, but lacks the elements that would make her feel like a multidimensional character rather than a collection of haughty poses. The game also rather transparently expects your character to pursue a fling with her, so if you don’t, there are a few moments of jokey flirtation that end up feeling weirdly dissonant.
I will give the developers credit for using the DLC as an opportunity to experiment with unconventional gameplay mechanics. I never thought I’d see stealth sequences in a Dragon Age game. Unsurprisingly, it doesn’t really work, but I appreciate the effort to think outside the box. More successful is the party sequence, which feels a bit like a miniaturized dry run for the verbal tête-à-têtes of the ‘Wicked Eyes and Wicked Hearts’ mission from Dragon Age: Inquisition (easily the best part of that game).
Everything else here - from the dungeon crawling to the bosses - is simply more Dragon Age II, with all the positives and negatives that go along with it. If that’s what you’re looking for, then this expansion delivers the goods.
I will give the developers credit for using the DLC as an opportunity to experiment with unconventional gameplay mechanics. I never thought I’d see stealth sequences in a Dragon Age game. Unsurprisingly, it doesn’t really work, but I appreciate the effort to think outside the box. More successful is the party sequence, which feels a bit like a miniaturized dry run for the verbal tête-à-têtes of the ‘Wicked Eyes and Wicked Hearts’ mission from Dragon Age: Inquisition (easily the best part of that game).
Everything else here - from the dungeon crawling to the bosses - is simply more Dragon Age II, with all the positives and negatives that go along with it. If that’s what you’re looking for, then this expansion delivers the goods.
1998
Something of a quantum leap forward for the Resident Evil series. The RPD may lack the iconic reputation of the Spencer Mansion from the original game, but in every other aspect - level design, scope, environmental detail - it’s a significant upgrade.
This is also a much more cinematic experience - it keeps the campy sense of schlock but ditches the cheap voice acting and FMV of the original game. Consequently, the set pieces are shockingly effective - from the first licker appearance, to Chief Irons giving his deranged villain speech with the dead body of the mayor’s daughter draped over his desk, to nearly every sequence involving Mr. X, RE2 really nails multiple shades of creepiness and tension in a way that’s rare for any game, let alone one from the PS1 era.
One way that this game didn’t really change from the original Resident Evil is in the gameplay - it’s still principally about solving a series of relatively simple puzzles, fighting off zombies and other monsters, and managing inventory slots as you explore a confined space. I openly acknowledge that tastes will vary here - some people really can’t stand the tank controls and fixed camera angles. I, for one, love the gameplay of early Resident Evil. Exploring a space that’s been stricken by catastrophe, improvising on the fly in order to conserve resources, blowing zombie heads clean off with sweet, sonorous shotgun blasts - all of these are gaming tropes that I am huge sucker for, and this game has them in spades.
Of course, some elements of this game haven’t aged well. The zapping system was meant to add a wrinkle to the inventory management as you played through the game with each character - but the choices it involves are so slight that the effect is barely noticeable. Add on the fact that many parts of the story make no sense if you choose to play Leon A / Claire B, and I’m inclined to label this system a dud. Also, the sequences in which the player controls a character other than Leon or Claire are annoying (if mercifully short) slogs.
Still, whatever its flaws, RE2 was where Resident Evil crossed the line from being an intriguing diversion to being one of my all-time favorite game franchises. Having replayed this fairly recently as a point of comparison with the (superb) remake, I can testify that this game holds up exceedingly well. Not to be missed.
This is also a much more cinematic experience - it keeps the campy sense of schlock but ditches the cheap voice acting and FMV of the original game. Consequently, the set pieces are shockingly effective - from the first licker appearance, to Chief Irons giving his deranged villain speech with the dead body of the mayor’s daughter draped over his desk, to nearly every sequence involving Mr. X, RE2 really nails multiple shades of creepiness and tension in a way that’s rare for any game, let alone one from the PS1 era.
One way that this game didn’t really change from the original Resident Evil is in the gameplay - it’s still principally about solving a series of relatively simple puzzles, fighting off zombies and other monsters, and managing inventory slots as you explore a confined space. I openly acknowledge that tastes will vary here - some people really can’t stand the tank controls and fixed camera angles. I, for one, love the gameplay of early Resident Evil. Exploring a space that’s been stricken by catastrophe, improvising on the fly in order to conserve resources, blowing zombie heads clean off with sweet, sonorous shotgun blasts - all of these are gaming tropes that I am huge sucker for, and this game has them in spades.
Of course, some elements of this game haven’t aged well. The zapping system was meant to add a wrinkle to the inventory management as you played through the game with each character - but the choices it involves are so slight that the effect is barely noticeable. Add on the fact that many parts of the story make no sense if you choose to play Leon A / Claire B, and I’m inclined to label this system a dud. Also, the sequences in which the player controls a character other than Leon or Claire are annoying (if mercifully short) slogs.
Still, whatever its flaws, RE2 was where Resident Evil crossed the line from being an intriguing diversion to being one of my all-time favorite game franchises. Having replayed this fairly recently as a point of comparison with the (superb) remake, I can testify that this game holds up exceedingly well. Not to be missed.
2018
A difficult game to critique, for two reasons. Firstly, so much of its appeal is due to its reliance on couch co-op (this is playable as online co-op but it seems to me like that would eliminate a lot of the fun). Secondly, I have no clue if the people who made this game were in on the joke - this is low-key one of the funniest games I’ve ever played, but the humor seems to be at least partly unintentional.
The story here is a pile of cliches derived from American crime movies of the past fifty years. Again, I’m not sure if the developers wanted us to take this plot seriously, but my wife and I were laughing constantly at how the game continuously churns out bad, weirdly off-kilter imitations of scenes that you’ve seen in a hundred different movies - and all with a straight face. A large part of the goofiness is derived from the voice acting, which ranges from eerily emotionless (Vincent) to sounding like an alien in disguise visiting Earth for the first time (Leo). So many of the line readings here sound strangely divorced from their context. In a way, it helps - every time we got bored with the story, one of the characters would say something ridiculous and get us laughing again. But, again, expecting much beyond a few so-bad-it’s-good chuckles from the story is a fool’s errand.
Gameplay-wise, the co-op elements are occasionally intriguing - there are a few sequences, like the jailbreak, that force the players to work together in an interesting way. As the game goes on, the gameplay gets a lot less engaging, though. There are a few sequences in which the players are let loose to explore individually - but this is not an really an exploration-based game, so I typically found myself bored stiff during these parts. There a few shooter sequences as well, and these also felt pretty perfunctory to me. It felt like they had a solid concept for some engaging gameplay, but they didn’t iterate enough on it to justify a 5-6 hour game.
With all that being said, I won’t deny that I had a good time with my wife while playing this - the game works as a vehicle for social interaction. But looking at it as a game rather than as a chance to goof around with family or friends leaves it wanting.
The story here is a pile of cliches derived from American crime movies of the past fifty years. Again, I’m not sure if the developers wanted us to take this plot seriously, but my wife and I were laughing constantly at how the game continuously churns out bad, weirdly off-kilter imitations of scenes that you’ve seen in a hundred different movies - and all with a straight face. A large part of the goofiness is derived from the voice acting, which ranges from eerily emotionless (Vincent) to sounding like an alien in disguise visiting Earth for the first time (Leo). So many of the line readings here sound strangely divorced from their context. In a way, it helps - every time we got bored with the story, one of the characters would say something ridiculous and get us laughing again. But, again, expecting much beyond a few so-bad-it’s-good chuckles from the story is a fool’s errand.
Gameplay-wise, the co-op elements are occasionally intriguing - there are a few sequences, like the jailbreak, that force the players to work together in an interesting way. As the game goes on, the gameplay gets a lot less engaging, though. There are a few sequences in which the players are let loose to explore individually - but this is not an really an exploration-based game, so I typically found myself bored stiff during these parts. There a few shooter sequences as well, and these also felt pretty perfunctory to me. It felt like they had a solid concept for some engaging gameplay, but they didn’t iterate enough on it to justify a 5-6 hour game.
With all that being said, I won’t deny that I had a good time with my wife while playing this - the game works as a vehicle for social interaction. But looking at it as a game rather than as a chance to goof around with family or friends leaves it wanting.
2015
I can’t imagine how the pitch for this game must gone. Soccer, but with Hot Wheels instead of humans? Clearly some genius had faith, though, and we’re all better off for it.
For me, this is a more or less flawless online game. The matches are short enough to be addictive but long enough to contain multiple momentum shifts. Everything about the controls feels amazing - gunning it after a loose ball, drifting into the corners, jumping after a centered pass. You just can’t beat this in terms of game feel. Importantly, the matchmaking works so that you’re placed with folks of roughly the same experience level - it’s pretty rare to get stuck in matches with opponents who are overmatched or significantly more skilled.
Like the best online multiplayer games, this works for equally well for the diehards and the casuals - whether you’re putting in 10 hours a week or just picking it up for a quick game once every blue moon, there’s a lot of fun to be had. These kinds of games never really stick for me, but it’s hard to deny the superb design and craftsmanship on display here.
For me, this is a more or less flawless online game. The matches are short enough to be addictive but long enough to contain multiple momentum shifts. Everything about the controls feels amazing - gunning it after a loose ball, drifting into the corners, jumping after a centered pass. You just can’t beat this in terms of game feel. Importantly, the matchmaking works so that you’re placed with folks of roughly the same experience level - it’s pretty rare to get stuck in matches with opponents who are overmatched or significantly more skilled.
Like the best online multiplayer games, this works for equally well for the diehards and the casuals - whether you’re putting in 10 hours a week or just picking it up for a quick game once every blue moon, there’s a lot of fun to be had. These kinds of games never really stick for me, but it’s hard to deny the superb design and craftsmanship on display here.
1986
The original Metroid controls surprisingly well for a game of its vintage. The platforming isn’t spectacular or anything, but it’s always functional at very least, and occasionally it crosses over into being straight-up satisfying. And it goes without saying that the concept of progressive empowerment through exploration is a brilliant and influential design innovation. Add on an impressively moody and dark atmosphere that would become something of a series trademark, and you can see the foundations of something really special even here in the earliest moments of the franchise.
With all that being said, there are some major issues here that are very nearly fatal flaws. The game badly needed a map considering the relatively repetitive environments - without it, being asked to navigate the maze-like levels feels unreasonable, to say the least. There are quality maps online, but that doesn’t mean the developers deserve a pass. An even more frustrating issue is the fact that crucial upgrades and progression markers are hidden behind random pixels that show no outward signal of being potential paths. Poking at the edges of the world to find secrets is certainly part of the joy in these games, but here it’s just obtuse. The player’s only choice is to either use a FAQ or to roll around every screen spamming bombs in the unlikely hope of finding a new path. I can only imagine how infuriating this must have been in the pre-internet days of 1986.
For as much of the unique Metroid appeal that’s present here in the first game of the series, it’s all unfortunately tainted by the game’s indulgence in the more hostile NES design trends of the period. An interesting historical artifact, but no one is going to miss much by skipping ahead to Metroid II or Super Metroid.
With all that being said, there are some major issues here that are very nearly fatal flaws. The game badly needed a map considering the relatively repetitive environments - without it, being asked to navigate the maze-like levels feels unreasonable, to say the least. There are quality maps online, but that doesn’t mean the developers deserve a pass. An even more frustrating issue is the fact that crucial upgrades and progression markers are hidden behind random pixels that show no outward signal of being potential paths. Poking at the edges of the world to find secrets is certainly part of the joy in these games, but here it’s just obtuse. The player’s only choice is to either use a FAQ or to roll around every screen spamming bombs in the unlikely hope of finding a new path. I can only imagine how infuriating this must have been in the pre-internet days of 1986.
For as much of the unique Metroid appeal that’s present here in the first game of the series, it’s all unfortunately tainted by the game’s indulgence in the more hostile NES design trends of the period. An interesting historical artifact, but no one is going to miss much by skipping ahead to Metroid II or Super Metroid.
Of the three DLCs for Dark Souls II, this is probably the worst in terms of level and encounter design. That being said, the level design is still miles ahead of the base game, and despite their obnoxious configurations, most of the new enemies are fun to fight one-on-one (I especially enjoyed the giant guys who have lava pouring out of their shoulders to punish circle strafing). Most significantly, two of three new bosses here are among the the best in the series. Sir Alonne is a tense and challenging honor duel who somehow makes his deplorable boss run completely worth it. And the Fume Knight is another superb one-on-one fight with a clever mechanic tied into level exploration. These two bosses alone make the expansion worth your time (the third boss is a lazy reskin of the Smelter Demon tucked away at the end of one of the ridiculously hostile challenge areas that were apparently obligatory in all of the DSII DLCS). Add on some level exploration that is very good (even if it’s not quite as strong as Shulva or Frozen Eleum Loyce) and you have a quality expansion that anyone who picks up Dark Souls II should definitely play.
2017
A game with several appealing features that more or less make up for its abject embrace of some of the more stultifying open world design trends of recent years (filler side quests, a bland loot system, under-baked attempts to incorporate RPG mechanics, etc).
First off, the archery-based combat against the machines is consistently satisfying and engaging. My favorite moments involved staking out enemies from stealth, rigging the battlefield with tripwires, picking my preferred elemental ammo, and finally engaging the targets with precise bow strikes, hitting weak points and breaking off crucial parts to limit the machine’s attack options. It’s a near-perfect mixture of the methodical and the chaotic. It’s not lacking in drawbacks: melee combat feels like an underdeveloped afterthought, and fighting human enemies is consistently bland and generic. Nonetheless, you will spend most of your time in this game fighting robo-dinos, and that never really gets old.
The other element that helped me look past open world bloat is the creative and mysterious sci-fi backstory. Without revealing too much, there are a number of surprising plot developments that provide clever and satisfying explanations for why humanity has regressed back to tribalism and machines roam the earth. Slowly following the trail of bread crumbs to figure out how the world got to the point it’s at in the game is an addictive process that had me hooked from the start, obnoxious appropriations of Native American cultures notwithstanding (I dislike pretty much every story element involving any of various tribal interactions; cliches indulged include sun worship, initiation rites, and ‘chosen one’ mythologizing, among others). In a bit of awkward dramatic irony, I had the big twist figured out well before my player character did, but the finer details of the backstory are so intriguing that my interest never flagged regardless.
While the combat and storyline are good enough to have made this game well worth playing, it doesn’t completely transcend open world fatigue. I wasn’t nearly as engaged when doing anything besides the main storyline. I did all of the side quests, and I would estimate that only about 10-20% of them carried any interest. There are way too many of the uninspiring ‘find my family heirloom’ or ‘save my relative from certain death’ missions that just feel like filler. The one piece of side content that really worked for me were the cauldrons, the short yet challenging dungeon crawls that grant an override ability - these were consistently engaging and fun.
The RPG systems here are also mostly wall dressing. This is most obviously the case with the strange inclusion of role-playing dialogue choices, which only pop up a few times and are never interesting (the whole plot revolves around Aloy being heroic and kind, so these dialogue options mostly just let you choose between ‘good yet vengeful’ or ‘good and forgiving’). Leveling up also felt mostly pointless beyond raising Aloy’s health - this is not really a game where leveling allows for diverse builds or anything like that. I think the game probably would have been better off if the devs had just put in a skill tree and called it a day.
Horizon is a game that I enjoyed in spite of its genre underpinnings rather than because of them. Played as a 25 hour, plot-driven action-adventure game, I imagine I would have loved it unequivocally. As an overstuffed, 50 hour open world game, I have significant quibbles. Still, absolutely a game worth playing, whatever its flaws.
First off, the archery-based combat against the machines is consistently satisfying and engaging. My favorite moments involved staking out enemies from stealth, rigging the battlefield with tripwires, picking my preferred elemental ammo, and finally engaging the targets with precise bow strikes, hitting weak points and breaking off crucial parts to limit the machine’s attack options. It’s a near-perfect mixture of the methodical and the chaotic. It’s not lacking in drawbacks: melee combat feels like an underdeveloped afterthought, and fighting human enemies is consistently bland and generic. Nonetheless, you will spend most of your time in this game fighting robo-dinos, and that never really gets old.
The other element that helped me look past open world bloat is the creative and mysterious sci-fi backstory. Without revealing too much, there are a number of surprising plot developments that provide clever and satisfying explanations for why humanity has regressed back to tribalism and machines roam the earth. Slowly following the trail of bread crumbs to figure out how the world got to the point it’s at in the game is an addictive process that had me hooked from the start, obnoxious appropriations of Native American cultures notwithstanding (I dislike pretty much every story element involving any of various tribal interactions; cliches indulged include sun worship, initiation rites, and ‘chosen one’ mythologizing, among others). In a bit of awkward dramatic irony, I had the big twist figured out well before my player character did, but the finer details of the backstory are so intriguing that my interest never flagged regardless.
While the combat and storyline are good enough to have made this game well worth playing, it doesn’t completely transcend open world fatigue. I wasn’t nearly as engaged when doing anything besides the main storyline. I did all of the side quests, and I would estimate that only about 10-20% of them carried any interest. There are way too many of the uninspiring ‘find my family heirloom’ or ‘save my relative from certain death’ missions that just feel like filler. The one piece of side content that really worked for me were the cauldrons, the short yet challenging dungeon crawls that grant an override ability - these were consistently engaging and fun.
The RPG systems here are also mostly wall dressing. This is most obviously the case with the strange inclusion of role-playing dialogue choices, which only pop up a few times and are never interesting (the whole plot revolves around Aloy being heroic and kind, so these dialogue options mostly just let you choose between ‘good yet vengeful’ or ‘good and forgiving’). Leveling up also felt mostly pointless beyond raising Aloy’s health - this is not really a game where leveling allows for diverse builds or anything like that. I think the game probably would have been better off if the devs had just put in a skill tree and called it a day.
Horizon is a game that I enjoyed in spite of its genre underpinnings rather than because of them. Played as a 25 hour, plot-driven action-adventure game, I imagine I would have loved it unequivocally. As an overstuffed, 50 hour open world game, I have significant quibbles. Still, absolutely a game worth playing, whatever its flaws.