Portal 2 (1.7 hours) - Beau bought this for me a really long time ago and I have shamefully taken this long to actually play it. The 24 hours that were on it before are from a friend who played through with Beau on my account and Beau says that doesn't count for my challenge.
Here's the thing...I don't like puzzle games. I play video games to relax and to shoot the crap out of things. Puzzle games accomplish neither of these objectives for me. It's not that I find puzzle games too hard, because I don't. I just don't get much entertainment value out of figuring them out. I played the first Portal game because it was the hotness at the time and I greatly enjoyed the humor. I never finished it though. I got stuck on the second to last puzzle and gave up without too much effort, then just YouTube searched the ending. I am committed to finishing Portal 2...eventually. I still do love the humor but I knew that I would. However, I can get the humor out of silly clips and .gifs and images with quotes from the game without all that puzzle business. If I were to ever like puzzle games though, Portal would be it. The puzzles and challenges are extremely clever and well done, to the point that I am more entertained by how impressed I am with their genius than with actual game play. I do get some amount of joy out of figuring them out though. It's just not my bag, man.
Play again? Fo sho yo. Beau will make me.
Anomaly: Warzone Earth (61 minutes) - This one was definitely from a bundle of some sort. I have no idea why I buy bundles of indie games. Most of them are strategy and I hate strategy games. Oh wait, I know why! Because Steam makes them cost three cents each! a;hsi'hatgiw'hith
I didn't hate this one! I'm going to be honest with you guys. I'm super hung over right now. Like, a lot. This game has three modes of challenge. Usually I try to pick whatever is "normal" or in the middle so that I can get a good sense of the game. However, my brain isn't functioning right now. I would say in this game "Casual" is basic brain functions, "Advanced" is quick thinking, and "Hardcore" is intelligence. I am just barely making it by on Casual at the moment. It's like that Austin Powers scene with the guy screaming as the steamroller comes at him super slow. My little military units are like "Shit, shit, turn right! There's a giant killer vortex in the road that we're very slowly rolling toward!" and then I go "Oh, uh, OK, hmm, I think I click the right mouse? No, left mouse. Then..uh.." and then they all die.
Anyway, the game is fun for a strategy game. I am surprised that I didn't hate it. I could be severely biased though since you only have to use the mouse to play and that is blessedly leaving one of my hands open for a cup of coffee. I thought the voice acting would be annoying but the guy yelling at you the whole time sets the mood well. The graphics in general are amazing for an indie game, the cut scenes even more so.
Play again? I think I will! Not until I get some more one hour challenge done, but I'll definitely be re-installing this one some time in the future.
Eufloria (64 minutes) - This must have been from a random indie pack of some sort.
I...I don't know. I don't know what is going on. It's some sort of strategy game I guess? You're some little red dots that are seeds and you want to plant trees on asteroids which are different sized circles. There are little grey dots that don't want you to plant trees or they're sick or something. The Deku tree wants you to kill them before they kill you, so that it can spread its seed across the universe. OK OK, it wasn't called a Deku tree. Seriously though, this game is creepy. I feel like I am helping the god tree rape the rest of the universe. That's how the language of the "story" played out in my head. Then once I got a bit further I felt like the little grey ones were Reavers and that I was the Alliance trying to destroy all the Browncoats.
Play again? No. It's creepy. I only managed to get through the full hour because it wasn't even a little bit hard so I could zone out most of the time.
Hammerfight (6 minutes) - I don't even know where this came from.
This game is stupid and glitch-tastic. The game mechanic of using your mouse to control your little floating machine and moving it around in circles to try and hit things with your very physics based weapon is kind of cool. Unfortunately, the dev ruined it with a poorly slapped together game over a cool idea for a mechanic. Even the writing is awful and I wasn't a fan of the music. This game might have been saved with a silly multi-player battle royale, but it is retardedly only single player.
Play again? No. There was no way I was even going to last close to an hour on that one. Those were some pretty rage filled six minutes.
Hard Reset (a deceptive 2 hours because I left it on when I ate dinner and watched Project Runway) - I have no idea where this game came from. Probably saw it on sale and liked the cut of its jib.
I really loved this one! It's an extremely solid FPS with a few interesting elements tossed in. Nothing super exceptional, but it was a refreshingly well put together game. The pacing is perfect, normal difficulty was a great challenge; it's rare that I find a game that sits on that perfect line between challenging but not frustratingly difficult. I like that the game throws in a ton of environmental hazards to shoot for electric output or explosions to supplement your weapons. I wasn't very good at utilizing the mechanic, but my brain is still on the fritz. Everything also pretty much looks the same and melds into each other, so I didn't always notice things. It has a very good selection of weapons and I like that you can pick between energy weapons and typical bullet based weapons. The upgrade system was great too - you collect orange "money" canisters and once they add up to enough you get one upgrade point to spend on either of your weapon types or your armor. The voice acting is horrendous and I didn't understand the story, but I can get passed both those things easily given how fantastic the actual game play is. Then again, I am the type of person who prizes game play well over story. I know that a lot of other gamers would choose the opposite of fantastic story with shitty game play if given the choice. However, I believe that this game is so well made that anyone looking to shoot the crap out of some robots in a solid FPS would love it.
Play again? Heck yeah! This was a surprising very well done treat. I'll be watching out for other games from the studio.
Hahaha! I googled Hard Reset and found the Zero Punctuation review. As always, Yahtzee says it better than I ever could:
-------------------
No comments:
Post a Comment