I’m not going to try to force my anti-retro-gaming stance onto anyone. I’ve had long, drawn out arguments with people I consider my friends on this issue. I simply think playing old games I’ve already beaten is a waste of my time. Others are content to beat Chrono Trigger for the third time this year, turning their nose up at our modern, newfangled stuff like Mass Effect 3. “Psssh, new stuff. That’s so gay.”
We’ll never see eye-to-eye on this issue, but I think I found something we can all agree on: re-releasing mediocre games that weren’t all that great to begin with is not an event. Apparently, it is to Sony. They’re in the middle of their “Spring Fever” promotion on PlayStation Network. It began this week with Journey and will apparently end in two weeks with Closure, an award-winning indie game. Yep, this promotion is only three fucking games. And what is the middle game? Rayman 3.
Wow.
Really, Rayman 3 is apparently so special now that it’s release is part of an exclusive promotion that lasts a whopping three weeks. Rayman 3 is. Ray fucking Man fucking 3. It’s not even going to be exclusive to their system! It’s being ported to XBLA as well.
Party like it's 2003! Let's all drink Red Bull and bitch about gas prices!
I know there are a ton of Rayman fans out there, but really, this is a mascot more committee designed and soulless than Sonic the Hedgehog. Sure, he’s got a better track record in recent times than the overrated Erinaceinae, but it’s not like it’s an iconic character or anything. I would wager a guess that it’s barely more recognizable among causal gamers and non-gamers than a second-string Pokemon. My boyfriend Brian is a semi-regular gamer, in the sense that he plays major releases like Gears of War and Mass Effect, and he couldn’t have picked Rayman out of a lineup before he was introduced to the series with Rayman Origins courtesy of me.
But why is Rayman 3 special? Look, I like the series. Rayman 2 was one of my favorite Dreamcast games as a kid. But the game has been ported and re-released so many times to so many platforms that I get nauseated hearing about it. And now, Rayman 3, a game nearly ten years old, getting a modern port is apparently a special event. Rayman 3 was kind of the jump-the-shark moment in the series for me. Well, Raving Rabbids on the Wii not withstanding. It was just a rehash. Like Ubisoft lucked into making something that was a borderline masterpiece in Rayman 2, decided not to fuck with the formula, and shot anyone who had an original idea. Oh, and it was one of the first games that kicked off the idea of sequels having less content than the original. In this case, the cool projectile attacks of #2 were replaced by, well, nothing.
I was 13 when Rayman 3 came out, so I get it. It’s been a long time and there’s a whole world full of fresh-faced kids who will experience Rayman 3 for the first time. It’s the same reason fanboys should lay off Nintendo for porting Ocarina of Time and Star Fox to the 3DS. You’re not the target audience and neither am I. Having said that, I can kind of see why the Nintendo ports would be an event. Zelda especially. It’s considered one of the greatest games of all time. But Rayman 3? Or how about Marvel vs. Capcom 2? Microsoft did that as part of the Summer of Arcade promotion a few years back. These aren’t even B-Lister games.
This shit along with the Smash Brothers series proves at least one thing: nerds will pay for anything that brings their wettest fan-fiction dreams to life.
As much as I loathed the Simpsons Arcade Game, at least all parties involved had the decency to just quietly put it out on the market with as little warning as possible. The same goes for the Chronicles of Riddick rehash, Assault on Dark Athena. It’s a prime example of how retro re-releases should work: the developers don’t talk about it and consumers do not buy it. What a re-release shouldn’t be is a featured game in an event designed to draw attention to a platform. Way to go Sony, you fucked up yet another event. You did it last summer when you included Street Fighter III, a game nobody asked for a port of, as part of your horrible Play event. And you’ve done it again here with Rayman 3, another game nobody asked for. I look forward to the next Sony event to find out what game nobody gives a shit about will be the next game elevated to super-special status and promoted. And by promoted, I mean Sony mentions it on their Facebook page. Really, they don’t pimp these things too hard, do they? Come on guys, you’re fucking Sony. At least pay someone somewhere to talk about your shit, even if it’s just a town crier.
Sadly, Closure will not be reviewed by me. I checked out the trailer with Brian. Lots of strobey lightning effects. Me is a sad kitten 🙁
Welcome to the first installment of Kairi’s Katch-Up Thursdays. The results were tallied and the clear favorite of the first vote was the 2010 Dream-Build-Play winner Lumi by Kydos Studios.
I hate you guys.
And obviously the feeling is mutual, because anyone with love in their hearts would not subject anyone to the sheer torture that is Lumi. I’m guessing it won the vote for the same reason that it won Dream-Build-Play: it looks good, and to most idiots, that’s all that matters. Game play be damned, if the graphics are pretty, we’ll line up to buy it and then spend hours convincing ourselves that we didn’t just waste perfectly good cash. I bought both the Xbox Live Indie Game version and the port to iOS, so I’m doubly dumb. Full of more DERP than a “Bring Back Knight Rider” convention am I.
I get it guys. It's got good graphics. Who cares? The game SUCKS!
At first, I figured Lumi would be a generic 90s style mascot platformer. You play as what looks like a premature, still semi-embryonic Pikachu thingie that has to save his species and the world when a race of invaders steals all the light. Your Pika-thingie has the ability to create red and blue electric currents that cling to various spots on the screen. Red will cling to red and repel from blue and vice-versa. Sounds great, except that you have to press a different button for each. Blue is done with the left trigger and red with the right one. This is an unintuitive nightmare the likes of which you can’t believe.
But I didn’t really care all that much over the first few levels. They were nice and breezy. You just had to collect a few fireflies, load them into a couple arks, restore light to the stage, and move on. Easy peasy. But then you start encountering water traps, enemies that fire projectiles that kill you in one shot, and magnet platforms that fade in and out of existence. Oh dears, Lumi is a punisher.
The juxtaposition of bright, beautiful, child-friendly graphics and tough-as-nails level design was completely out of left field, even though a few of my fans warned me about it. After the first couple levels, I didn’t believe them. Bunch of liars they must have been. Well, there’s egg on my face. Lumi gets so brutally difficult that it’s almost like it started its period. But once again, we have to examine why its difficult. Is it the level design? The enemies? Not really. The fault clearly lies in the control scheme. Using the magnetic red/blue powers to launch yourself from floating platform to floating platform is frustrating, because there’s so much you need to keep track of. What colors point you in what directions, what buttons you need to press, and when do you then hit the opposite button to repel you to towards the next area. This is like asking someone to take their driver’s license test while practicing sword-swallowing. You know it’s a bad idea before you even start. Surely someone at Kydos had played a video game at some point in their life and recognized the control scheme was unacceptable.
As bad as the Xbox version is, the iOS port is even worse. And it really pains me to say that, because one major flaw in the console version is fixed: the whole “separate colors” thing. On iPhone, you tap the screen and it sucks you into whatever is the closest platform. It’s such a no-brainer of a design choice that I feel like I should sarcastically type DUHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH, but I’m too classy for that. Unfortunately, movement is controlled with one of those fake iOS joystick things they map to the corner of the screen. They suck. I call them “Joyshits.” I don’t care what anyone says: those fucking things never work, they are not accurate, and they need to be abolished by any means necessary. I don’t care if we have to pull eggheads off of curing cancer to do it. Joyshits have got to go.
On iPhone, I made it to the first level that its possible to die on. And trust me, I sure realized it. At least on Xbox, if I push the analog stick to the right, the fucking dude moves right. Here, if I try to push right, I’m just as likely to not be pressing anything at all because my thumb is not properly lined up. And NO, I’m not going to buy some peripheral that lets you suction-cup an actual joystick to the screen. It would be like surgically grafting a tumor onto it. Can’t we all just accept that not every game belongs on iPhone? I know those precious iBucks are tempting to make a play for, but do the right thing. If your game requires the precision of a control stick, you should probably put it on a platform that HAS A FUCKING CONTROL STICK!
The iOS port. I seriously doubt anyone has actually beaten it.
My overall Lumi experience ended during the first boss encounter. Some giant rhino-bug thingie started chasing me through a forest and I had to make a run for it. The stage is laid out like a hopping puzzle, sort of like the boss encounters in Super Meat Boy. Only that game had something resembling responsive controls. In Lumi, you cannot afford a single wasted second or misstep. One mistake and you will have to start over. After at least a dozen tries at this, I came to two realizations. First, I was having no fun at all and hadn’t since I started Lumi. Second, I must have really pissed you guys off something fierce for THIS pile of shit to win the vote. Rage quit, console off, controller thrown, and you guys are now officially on my shit list. I hold grudges, and I will remember this. Pay back will be mine. Oh yes. I have plenty of free time and access to Africanized Bees. Be afraid.
Yesterday, I played a game that drove me from apathy to suicidal thoughts in approximately fifteen minutes. Yes, I actually spent forty-five minutes with Lemmy Lizard. The remaining thirty minutes were spent under the assumption that I would suffer a cerebral hemorrhage if I continued playing. Forgive me. I had forgotten that I was playing a video game and not listening to the poetry of Grunthos the Flatulent.
But today is a new day. Albeit one spent with a slightly sore neck after my botched attempt at hanging myself yesterday. Note to anyone reading this: pantyhose do not make an effective noose. So back I go into the murky waters of Xbox Live Indie Games. I had promised to make this a special Minecraft clone week, but then I remembered that we’re already in the middle of the fucking week, so I bought Retro Arcade Adventure instead.
A decidedly Anglo-Saxon looking dude fighting off a tribe of dark-skinned humanoids brandishing spears. Hey, if it's good for Capcom, who am I to say anything?
Retro Arcade Adventure is a single-screen hoard-slayer where you play as a dude with a sword who has to kill various evil thingies. All the baddies except the final boss take a single swing to kill and have no variations outside of size and speed. They’re all pretty much like the guys who run at you with the clubs in Smash TV. To fight, you swing with the A button, dash with the triggers (I never even knew this existed until after I had beaten the Adventure mode), and use a power-up with the X button that turns you into a gigantic black dude with a giant sword. Someone’s over compensating for something.
Every stage features you taking on 200 or more of these pantywaists. After four levels of fighting the same fucking guys, you fight a boss, beat it, and the game is over. Fifteen minutes tops and you’re done. So what did I think? Well, Retro Arcade Adventure is as shallow as the wring-off of a moist towelette, easier than winning the skip-rope competition at the National Amputation Foundation’s annual picnic, and over with faster than a Roseanne Barr hunger strike. Yet, it’s not the worst thing I’ve played all week. Then again, compared to Lemmy Lizard, Retro Arcade Adventure would have to come to life and decapitate my boyfriend just to contend for that honor. It did try to pad things out by adding an “arcade” mode, which is really just the same game, only the power-ups might also cause damage to you as well. Oh, and one of the modes has you fight an endless string of mummies. There is no score and, as best as I could tell, no end to it. I wasn’t sure if the developer forgot to include a finale to it or if I really did have a cerebral hemorrhage during Lemmy Lizard and had been sent to video game hell.
80 Microsoft Points wondered out-loud why pumpkins would be killed by getting rained on in the making of this review. Seriously, why would they? Wouldn’t a pumpkin actually feed on rain and grow stronger from it? I suppose in theory it could be acid rain, but if that’s the case, why wouldn’t it hurt me too? I wasn’t aware that water, acidic or otherwise, could distinguish between good and evil. What, did my knight guy wear his special acid-rain repellent armor out in battle on the off-chance that he picked a power-up that would unleash acid rain upon his enemies? Given all the absolutely useless story text in this game, I find a plot hole of this size to be inexcusable and I demand an answer.
I’m giving away 1600 Microsoft Points as part of a new feature called “Kairi Katch-Up Thursdays” and you buttholes aren’t participating enough. 1600 MSP! That’s 16 XBLIGs! Read how you can win it.
How soon a rage-quit is too soon? I’m honestly not sure. Since I’m not a professional game critic, nor do I care to be one, I’m not sure there really are any rules or ethics that apply to me regarding this issue. But just to be on the safe side, I’m going to walk you through the 45 minutes I spent with Lemmy Lizard vs The Mecha-Eggs and let YOU tell ME if I gave up too soon.
Upon starting the first level, I pick up a note. The note informs me that I’ll want to eat various food things over the course of a level, but I probably shouldn’t because they take up spaces in your inventory. You can fit eight items in it at a time. All notes you find take up a space in that inventory and you have to manually discard them. It’s about the most inconvenient method of sign-posting game mechanics I’ve ever seen. As if that wasn’t ominous enough, it took me all of a single second to figure out that the control scheme was going to be wretched. Without any D-Pad mapping, you’re stuck with just the analog stick. Applying even the tiniest bit of pressure to it sends your lizard thingie off like it just got whacked in the ass by the Motivator from Wipeout. We’re not off to a good start.
Nope, I didn't make it this far.
The first enemy encounter was fun. A couple mecha-egg thingies marched up on me. Thankfully, I could shoot at them, so I did. And they kept coming. So I kept shooting. But then they were on top of me, munching my health away. I kept shooting. And shooting. And shooting. After around a dozen shots, one of them died off. Only a dozen more and the other one died. Nice, so the opening level enemies are bullet sponges. Later, I encountered one that could shoot back at me. Only it moved twice as fast as me, shot twice as fast, and did damage twice as fast. So I died a couple of times against it, which resulted in me getting to start the game again. Even though I had saved. Nifty.
Well, I’m a tough chick. I drink molten lead and spit nails. I can deal with this shit. I had picked up some items that would cause my dude to spit sticky stuff at the enemies, slowing them down. I threw a couple of those on and I actually managed to kill the dude with the gun. This was immediately followed by another dude with a gun falling from the sky to take his place and finish me off. Only this one had wheels and a faster gun, so I died extra fast. Maybe the game’s policy is “die in 30 seconds or less or your pizza is free.”
Not being a masochist, I wasn’t prepared to deal with getting gang-banged this early into things. So I did what any self-respecting gamer would do: legged it past the baddies. And it worked. I got past those guys and instead came upon a fire pit. Situated above the pit were a few single-block platforms for me to hop across. Unfortunately, controls are extremely slippery, so I kept falling into the fire, dying, and being sent back to the checkpoint. So I used a carrot on myself, increasing my ability to jump. I managed to clear the fire and pick up a key. I don’t remember seeing a door or anything that was locked, but that didn’t matter. I had to get past the fire again. Only this time, I simply could not stick the landing on any of the platforms. Or, if I did, I would die as soon as I pushed any button, because even just pressing jump caused my dude to skid off the block and into the fire. After a dozen or so tries to make it past this, I quit.
If it seems like I'm being too harsh on this game, I'll remind you that the developers sent me a request for this review. Then again, I'm not sure they actually have ever read my site, given that they sent me a review code with the request. I pity the fool the actually ends up cashing that in, because their day is pretty much ruined when that happens.
Was it too soon? I had played Lemmy Lizard vs The Mecha-Eggs for maybe 45 minutes at most. In that time, I encountered inexcusably horrible play control, amazingly bad level design, horrible graphics, and the feeling that my leg would be much nicer if I carved a large chunk of flesh out of it. I can’t really recommend you actually purchase Lemmy Lizard. In all seriousness, it’s one of the very worst video games I’ve ever played in my entire life and I hate myself for paying $1 to find that out. But try it yourself and tell me if I’m nuts. Maybe you’ll make it further than I did and discover that the game magically stops being terrible at the exact moment I quit. Or maybe you’ll take a chainsaw to your own foot.
80 Microsoft Points said “That Light” sarcastically in the making of this review.
I’m giving away 1600 Microsoft Points as part of a new feature called “Kairi Katch-Up Thursdays” and you buttholes aren’t participating enough. 1600 MSP! That’s 16 XBLIGs! Read how you can win it.
Ah, Team Shuriken. The guys behind the infamous Temple of Dogolrak. I receive more bitching about their games than I get about Silver Dollar these days. It all began a few months ago when I released the list of search engine terms that have led people to this very site. If you need a reminder, here are just the search terms that people have done for Temple of Dogolrak, along with Trailer Park King and Don’t Die Dateless, Dummy.
trailer park king 2,043 (#1 search term)
temple of dogolrak 2,011 (#2 search term)
don’t die dateless dummy 1,059 (#4 search term)
trailer park king review 266 (# 6 search term)
dont die dateless dummy 247 (#7 search term)
trailer park king game 246 (#8 search term)
don’t die dateless, dummy! 180 (#10 search term)
And those are just the top 10. Once you start getting lower than that, you really do get lower. Some other prime searches include the following:
trailer park king nudity 106
trailer park king porn 103
trailer park king nude 17
is there nudity in trailer park king 15
temple of dogolrak sex 14
trailer park king nudity? 14
does trailer park king have nudity 11
xbox indie games with nudity 11
don’t die dateless dummy porn 7
temple of dogolrak porn 7
xbox live indie games with nudity 7
trailer park king girls boobs 5
are there any xbox indie games with nudity 5
And that’s just the stuff that gets multiple searches. On my most popular day ever at this blog (January 16, 2012), these were some of the random searches.
best xbox indie game tits
trailer park king has nudity?
xbox indie game that has nudity
trailer park king girls
indie porn games xbox
temple of dogolrak hentai pics (Hentai means “Perversion” in Japanese, kinda)
can you fuck in temple of dogolrak
temple of dogolrak hentai
xbox hentai
dogolrak nude code
how do you see porn in trailer park king
You get the picture. In short, three out of five searches that land people on this site center around those three games. Also, damn, I’m embarrassed for you guys.
And while I think Sean Doherty (the Trailer Park King dude) gets a free pass on the hostility because his games actually make an effort to be games, there’s unquestionably resentment towards Team Shuriken. Although I’ve found them to be fairly nice guys, I admit that I did think their marketplace pictures of Dogolrak were extremely misleading compared to the actual graphics of their game. Having said that, don’t blame developers for taking advantage of the hopeless pocket-pool crowd. They sort of have it coming, because about ten seconds of research on Google would let them know that nudity and sexual intercourse are no-nos on XBLIG. Another ten seconds and they would learn that jerking off too much causes your palm to turn purple.
Over/under on the percentage of readers that just looked at their palm? What, 30%?
It’s not like Team Shuriken relies completely on boobies. Over the last month, they’ve released two new games to the marketplace that don’t tease titties at all.
Well, mostly.
Both games still use the same engine and play mechanics as the previous game. First up is Paper RPG. It uses sketch drawings to tell a very short story of a knight trying to save the kingdom. How short? Oh, about three to five minutes, depending on how many mistakes you make.
Like any “choose your own adventure” game, luck is everything in Paper RPG. There’s no visual indications of what choices will advance the story and which ones will lead to death. This is especially problematic in game #2 of this review, The Impossible Dungeon. Here there is nothing in the way of graphics, aside from a useless map. Everything is text driven. In this one, you can lead yourself down certain paths where no matter which of three to four options you choose, none of them will lead to anything but death. So moving the story forward is 100% luck, based on nothing.
It's like Russian Roulette, only some wisenheimer loaded every chamber.
And if you die, you get to start over again. Sure, there’s the occasional checkpoint, but that’s not much help. You still have to read the same fucking dialog again and again. Who would ever confuse this for entertainment? Neither game is fun. Or anything vaguely resembling fun. If you were terminal with cancer in the middle of a nuclear holocaust having just watched your puppy eat its own leg off and bleed to death all over your mother (thus drowning her) and the only thing that could be offered to you for any comfort was these games, you would think it was a final “fuck you” from God himself. And you would be right.
I will admit that I liked the art style in Paper RPG. The main character has a Spy vs. Spy like charm about it. If Team Shuriken was willing to put forth some effort, they might be able to use this character in a platforming game and find modest success. But I’m guessing they’re not willing to put in the effort. Prove me wrong, guys. I would love to be able to tell people that you’re not the worst thing that can happen to a gamer. Right now, you’re neck-and-neck with hand amputation. Which, ironically you caused, because they also proved that jerking off to anime porn causes cancer of the hands. It’s distinguishable by yellow freckles on your lower palm.
80 Microsoft Points apiece always bet on the black spy in the making of this review.
I’m giving away 1600 Microsoft Points as part of a new feature called “Kairi Katch-Up Thursdays” and you buttholes aren’t participating enough. 1600 MSP! That’s 16 XBLIGs! Read how you can win it.
I’m going to try to keep this spoiler free, but obviously that’s going to be difficult. You should probably avoid the comments section until you have played the game. Any plot discussion will be hidden with invisible text.
Going into Journey, I wasn’t exactly a fan of Thatgamecompany. For one thing, I hate their name. It’s not the fact that they call themselves THAT Game Company. Even though that sounds like something gaming snobs say when scoffing about a larger developer. I once heard someone say “Mirror’s Edge? I don’t play anything by that game company.” No, the name sucks because it has that “we’re too cool and/or quirky to put spaces between words” asshole vibe to it. “Pssh, spaces. Whatever. That’s such a conformist thing.”
But more important towards my firm dislike for them was their previous titles, Flow and Flower. I know both games are critically acclaimed, but I though they were boring, pretentious, self-indulgent pieces of shit. And you know what? I don’t think most people found them entertaining. I think they got a free pass because they could ride the “art house” label. If you actually admit to being bored stiff by them, that puts you firmly in bed with what’s left of Roger Ebert and the rest of the so-called “anti-gaming-as-art” crowd, or something like that.
Well, I was bored stiff by Flow and Flower, and I’m not afraid to admit it. I didn’t get what they were pitching, I didn’t get why people liked them. According to Thatgamecompany, when they begin developing a title they start by choosing which emotion they wish to invoke in a player. I’m not sure what emotion I was supposed to get out of Flow. Is confusion an emotion? How about self-mutilation? Is that an emotion? Because that was about the only thing I could have done while playing Flow that would have stimulated anything other than apathy in me. And as for Flower, the only emotion I felt towards it was anger that I had dropped ten bucks on it. I mean what the fuck, seriously? You use the crappy PlayStation 3 tilt-motion-thingie to clumsily aim some petals at bulbs and bring life back to the world. What the fuck kind of hippie bullshit is that? It’s not that I don’t think gaming can be based around an abstract concept, but it has to make at least some effort to be fun. Flower was just not fun.
Having spewed all that, there was something undeniably different about Journey. You could feel it even before the game was released. Maybe it was because Journey looked like it could be a Team Ico game. Now that it’s becoming obvious that Last Guardian is some sort of elaborate hoax, this is as close as we might get to another entry in that series. And unlike Flower or Flow, the character in Journey looks human, so we might actually be able to relate to it. Plus it still has a minimalist story and no dialog, so the art house crowd can still get all snooty over it.
Not included: soundtrack by Maurice Jarre.
Journey got released this week if you’re a cool PlayStation Plus subscriber, like me. Was it worth the wait? The hype? The $15 without any PS+ discount? Yes, yes, and hang on, and why is my underwear so damp?
Journey gives players no indication of what exactly the plot is. You’re placed alone in a desert, with only some flags on a hill to kind of steer you towards where you should be walking. Eventually, it’s made clear that you should be traveling towards a mountain that is visible in distance. Soon into the game, you get a piece of cloth that extends the scarf the protagonist wears. The longer scarf, the more you are able to fly for short amounts of time. You can’t die in Journey, and there is no time limit, so you’re free to explore. I have to say, normally I am the type to hunt every nook and cranny. That wasn’t the case in Journey. It wasn’t because I was bored, but because I was compelled to move on. The story is revealed in snippets between each “stage” and I was totally enthralled with it.
Okay, here’s the story discussion. I’ve spoilerized it. Just highlight it with your mouse.
Allegedly, the story is left up to interpretation. I really don’t see how. It seems pretty cut and dry early on to me: the dude (or dudette, as it could be either/or) is dead, and is progressing through the afterlife. This isn’t something like Shadow of the Colossus (or All the Bad Parts if you’re one of those types that wants me to stick to XBLIGs) where there’s a lot of open-ended questions. I suppose I could come up with one or two more cerebral, artsy-fartsy explanations, although it would feel weird to do so without putting on a beret and using a cigarette holder. I suppose the dude could be an embodiment of human civilization itself. The cut scenes show a progression in technology, which suggests that a significant amount of time has passed throughout the entity’s existence. But I still lean towards the “he’s dead” theory. Perhaps the dude died early in human civilization, and before its soul is reincarnated (which is how the game ends), a significant amount of time passes. And now I feel a little snobbish. Back to the game.
Despite all the mean things I’m about to say, Journey is a truly fantastic game. It might be the best PlayStation Network title ever. It really does feel like an emotionally driven experience, and although it only takes between 2 to 4 hours to complete, depending on how much fucking about you do, the conclusion is beautiful and satisfying. But the game is hardly flawless. My biggest gripe is the continued hard-on the guys at Thatgamecompany have for using the Sixaxis. There is nothing that couldn’t be done without it, and in Journey it’s especially unnecessary. All it does is control the camera. Mind you, the right analog stick, which was put there in the first place just to move the camera in games, also does that. I think my “Thatgamecompany is full of assholes” theory is spot on, because you can’t turn off the Sixaxis camera control, even though it’s provably useless. And don’t think it doesn’t get in the way. If you pause the game, but then put the controller down in a way that sets off the motion controls, it un-pauses the game. That could (and did for me) make a difference in some of the later stages. So yea, Thatgamecompany is full of more assholes than a Proctology text-book.
Other issues include the fact that you’re utterly dependent on your ability to fly, yet in some areas of the game, the art style renders depth-perception difficult to get the hang of, resulting in some frustrating missed jumps. Also, despite how much fun it is, it’s still a three-hour game with limited replay value and thus I feel $15 is pretty overpriced. UPDATE 2022: I no longer feel this way. In 2012, when I wrote this review, the indie pricing landscape was a LOT different. Now, I fully support pricing flexibility and I regret I ever made comments like this in my reviews.
I also want to point out that I thought the game’s concept for online multiplayer was a dumb idea. Basically, you’re paired up with some random person to play the game with. There’s no method of communication with this person, aside from doing a chirpy call. Microphones are disabled, there’s no texting, no shortcuts, or anything to talk to the person with. You can’t even see the name of the person. To anyone who hasn’t followed the game since it was announced, you wouldn’t even know you’re actually playing with a real person. In fact, it actually surprised many people on my Twitter when they learned it wasn’t an NPC. It’s another move that is artsy for the sake of being artsy.
Shockingly, it does work. Sometimes. Not a whole lot. Quite frankly, not very often. The first time I played Journey with networking turned on, I didn’t even realize I had been paired up with someone. They just sort of snuck up behind me, startling me. But then we actually did work together and did a good job, at least for a little while. When we encountered a stage that had an element of stealth to it, things fell apart. Having played the level before, I knew what to expect and tried to give my partner a heads up. Unfortunately, with only one form of chirping as an option, even slamming the thing as fast as I could wasn’t enough to communicate “shit in this level can fuck you up” to my new buddy. Thus he charged in and got his cock turned inside out. There were several other moments of this type of frustration, almost to the point that I’m not sure the whole thing is worth it.
Well look at that. That dude looks just like my dude. The same thing happened to me when I visited Prague. It was weird.
Even if you are marooned on an island with someone of an entirely differently culture, you can communicate on some level other than whistling. In a video game where you can’t use facial expressions, gestures, other forms of body language, things really are too limited in most of the game’s situations. That so many people are unaware you’re playing with a real person actually isn’t all that surprising. It’s almost as if someone from Thatgamecompany saw the horrible online component for Demon’s Souls and said “you know what? This would be better if it had mimes instead! Mimes with no functioning limbs. Make it so!” When it works, it is unquestionably something special. But those moments are few and far between.
You know what? Despite all that muck I just dredged up, Journey is one of the best games I’ve ever played. Yes, ever played. It does strike an emotional chord with the player. You feel a connection with your on-screen avatar, and legitimate concern for their ultimate fate. The world created seems barren, and yet you get a feeling that it is living being, a character in and of itself. Intimate objects have that same quality, although in the case of the scarf pieces, it is anything but subtle. Perhaps Journey is too manipulative in getting players to draw the conclusion that the developers had in mind. But even if that’s true, it’s not as if they’re the only ones guilty of that in one of these “minimalist” games. Look at Shadow of the Colossus. As you progress in that, your hero’s body becomes warped and monstrous, his voice deepens, and I swear your horse seems to approach you with increasing apprehension (although I’ve had people argue otherwise on that). Journey never takes it that far.
Do I recommend Journey? Yes. For my money, it’s the best game PlayStation Network has put out, and actually it might just be the best overall exclusive on the entire system. What limited time it gives you is breathtaking from start to finish, and ending sequence actually made me cry. Me. The chick who has caused three confirmed panic attacks in developers just by mentioning that I had started to review their games. Have I gone soft? Let me answer that by saying this: the next one of you mother fuckers that makes a “Don’t Stop Believing” joke in reference to this game is getting stabbed in the fucking heart.
Today I noticed that my Xbox’s hard drive was filling up. Given my tendency to not replay games, I decided it was time to purge some digital shit. So I began the process of clearing stuff when I realized that I had more Xbox Live Indie Games than I have reviews. Like, a lot more. I’ve done 168 XBLIG reviews, but I’ve got around 260 games on my hard drive. How did this happen?
Then my loving boyfriend reminded me that I bought around $100 worth of XBLIG games when I started IndieGamerChick in July. We spent a few days just watching trailers for XBLIGs on Youtube and purchasing the games. The thing is, I figured nobody would read me, so I wouldn’t have to worry about sticking to new releases. I mean, who knew that anyone would actually read this shit? Besides, I’ve gotten bored with every other would-be hobby I’ve been trying to find since I turned 18. Why would this be any different? A week or two tops and I would be looking into something else, like Etch-a-Sketch, or paragliding. Or Etch-a-Gliding, which I invented just now and it totally fucking rocks.
Well, obviously I’m here to stay. And that’s all well and good, but I’m also a penny-pinching tightwad, and the thought that I downloaded nearly 100 games that I haven’t played made me sick to my stomach. So what do I do with them? Well, I’ll review them, exactly the same as I’ve done with 168 other games. But I’ll let YOU guys decide what order I review them in, and include YOUR comments in the reviews. Who knows, if the feature works, I’ll probably add some other games to the queue.
Below is a list of the games that I have that I haven’t reviewed. Now, I have played some of the games, and I’ll make a note if that’s the case. It doesn’t mean I won’t review them. It just means the game isn’t fresh for me. Others might be off-limits due to my epilepsy. Again, I’ll note it if that’s the case. The selection of the game will not be based on total votes, but rather which game receives the most convincing endorsement. Voting will take place on Twitter all week, every week, with the selection taking place on Wednesdays and the review going up on Thursday. Or possibly on Fridays if I’m lazy.
And to celebrate the launch of this feature, I’ll be giving away a 1600 Microsoft Points code on April 5 to one lucky person who participates via voting. Vote early and vote often, but you’re limited to one entry per week. The code is only valid in the United States. If you’re not an American, you can still participate, but I can’t provide you with a replacement prize. Make sure you follow me on Twitter so that I can provide you with the winning prize code. Ah, see what I did there? This is also a way to get new followers on Twitter. Sneaky. I should work in a way to get you to follow me on Facebook too.
Here are the games. This page will be updated as games are reviewed, or new games added. Kairi Katch-Up Thursdays officially starts on March 15. So start voting now!
Escape From Robot Doom (Played it for about 10 minutes, maybe the worst game I’ve ever played in my life, not an exaggeration, couldn’t get past first stage, worst controls ever)
Lil’ Demons: Splatter (This was recommended to me when I bitched about lack of good first-person shooters on XBLIG. Played it for 10 minutes, hated it, forgot about it)
Occasionally I’ll get bored trying to pick from newly released Xbox Live Indie Games and put out a call on Twitter asking for older stuff on the platform that has the chops to compete for my leaderboard. Normally, this results in stuff that I like. Sure, I thought Apple Jack was hugely overrated, and in retrospect the choice of NYAN-TECH was baffling, but a pair of games have landed on the board. Those being Decimation X3 and Johnny Platform Saves Christmas, if you were curious. Of course, I don’t take on every game that’s suggested. Since starting Indie Gamer Chick in July, one title has popped up more than any other, by far. And yet, I avoided it. Why? Well, call me shallow, but the game had box art that looked like this.
And screen shots that looked like this.
Plus it seems to be riding coattails on the Minecraft craze, which I’m not against, but I just haven’t given it a try yet. I just figured Miner Dig Deep would be no good. So I ignored it. And now I feel like this.
To clarify, this is a picture of a jackass, not Nate Graves. Although the two are interchangeable.
In Miner Dig Deep, the object is to collect precious metals from deep inside the Earth. Why? So you can buy better equipment. What do you use that equipment for? To collect precious metals from deeper inside the Earth. And so forth, and so forth. I don’t get the comparisons to Minecraft myself. My understanding is that game is equal parts harvesting and building. Besides the occasional elevator, you have nothing to build here. So it’s all digging, all the time.
Make no bones about it: Miner Dig Deep is a time sink and nothing more. It has no purpose and no clear objective. It’s also got addiction potency that rivals weapons-grade heroin. How addictive are we talking here? I was ready to write a Dear John letter to Brian and let him know that I had discovered a new love in life and it was time for us to go our separate ways. And I totally would have done it, if I could have pried myself away from the game long enough.
The grind of making minimal progress and trying to figure out exactly what upgrades to get, only to come up just short on funds and having to dredge back into the mine is both soul-crushingly dismal yet oddly satisfying. Not so satisfying was filling my pockets with premium materials only to get cocky and stay in the mine long after the kerosene for my lantern had run out, usually resulting in me getting bludgeoned to death by a falling boulder. If you die, all metals you’ve pocketed are lost, so save often and remember to load if you die, because that stuff you lost isn’t coming back. It’s gone to where your dog Spot went when it got ran over by that UPS truck. You know. Hell.
I wasn’t kidding about the “just a little bit longer” quality of Miner Dig Deep. I put about six hours into it. I’m pretty sure I was having a good time. Brian said it was hard to tell from his perspective. I tried to explain to him that joy is expressed in me through slumping six inches down into a couch, mouth gaped, drool slowly cascading off my lips, unblinking eyes locked on a television. He said “whatever” and spent the rest of the day playing Gears of War on his Xbox and trying to convince people that he really does love his girlfriend, the carrot.
But all good things must come to an end. I got to the point in the game where I could no longer place elevators and had to dig for myself. After finishing upgrades to my drill and buying a large tank of gas to go with it, I dug myself to about 1,500 meters. Down there, I was harvesting dozens of gems worth 250K a pop. I was so excited I started singing “We’re in the Money!” while birds fell dead off of power lines and the seas started to boil. I dug a little more and came across an enormous diamond. My eyes bugged out and I screamed to Brian “OH MY GOD, LOOK AT THIS ONE!” And then, as I approached it, the screen faded out and fireworks started to go off. The game was over.
What?
No.
No, come on, Miner Dig Deep. Maybe we were spending too much time together, but I think it was too soon to call things off.
I had been dumped.
What followed was the gaming equivalent of a jilted lover cutting her ex’s brake line. The game gives you the option to continue with your current mine or start a new one while retaining your current items. For some reason, I figured a new one might have new things. Sadly, that’s not the case. Even worse, if you gather “blueprints” that allow you to buy new items, you can’t get rid of them, and they take up a spot in your inventory. But that’s no problem. I just bought 100 large elevators and proceeded to line them all in a row across the top of the map. Now, if you dig too wide open a space in your mine, it can result in a cave in. Well, elevators can’t be caved in. So instead the game shook, declaring that a cave-in was happening, although none could be seen. Finally, the frame rate sputtered and the game crashed. Ha, serves it right.
Yes, I gave the game the best 300 minutes of my life and it left me high and dry. But that’s okay, because I’ll always have the memories. Was Miner Dig Deep the leaderboard contender everyone told me it was? To hell with the leaderboard. If things hadn’t ended when they did, I was totally prepared to bear its children.
80 Microsoft Points tried to explain to their boyfriend that the game really meant nothing to them and he was the only one for me in the making of this review.
Last month, I stumbled upon an Xbox Live Indie Game with beautiful pre-rendered graphics, online play, and a sense of whimsy that could earn the seal of approval from Disney. Seriously, Bug Ball is just so damn cute I want to hug it and kiss it and love it forever. Of course, I do so at the risk of infecting myself with leprosy. As it turns out, the name of the game is quite appropriate.
Ever wonder what the enemies in Pikmin do when Olimar wasn't around? Now you know.
The idea is basically “A Bug’s Life” meets volleyball. You play as various bugs. A ball falls. You want to hit it towards your opponent and hope they don’t return it. The controls operate like a non-sporting platform game. A jumps, B does a “spike” jump (which catches the ball and throws it), and the triggers dash to the left and right. As a fun fact, the original build of the game always had the right trigger going the direction your bug was facing and the left trigger always had it go in the opposite direction. Well, apparently anyone could recognize how this could be impossible to get the hang of. Well, anyone but the guys behind Bug Ball. Thankfully, Brian and I were on the case. You see, we were unable to fully play Bug Ball due to some severe online glitches, and informed the developers that I would hold off on reviewing their game until some fixes were in. And then, while they were at it, they should clear up some of the issues with movement as well.
And they did. Edible Entertainment took on our suggestions exactly as we said them, removing 90% of the stuff I planned on complaining about in this review. The jumping physics are spot on. The quick-dash is vastly improved. When the game is playable, it’s a damn fun experience, and an easy leaderboard contender. Mostly because it keeps things simple and focused on delivering the most entertaining possible experience. It embraces its fantasy-sports persona and uses it. Imagine if a real volleyball game (bore-ring) started tossing extra balls into play that the teams had to keep track of as well. That happens in Bug Ball. If the ball comes in contact with a spiny thingie that walks across the ceiling, it splits in two, with each ball now counting against your score. Ah, but the spiny bug thingie can appear again to further split the ball. Brian and I had volleys with a half-dozen balls in play all at once. And trust me when I say, our smiles were never bigger.
Unfortunately, Bug Ball is still besieged with glitches. Most of them are firmly stuck in online play, so if you’re playing local-only, you’re sure to have a blast. Maybe the game is a little bit too anal about what constitutes the ball hitting the ground, but otherwise things run smoothly. Online, shit gets pretty buggy. It’s not as bad as it once was, where the ball would often go invisible to everyone but the game’s host. Having said that, I was able to cause the game to “lag out” simply by playing close to the net. Or by tapping the A button to float in the air. Or by taking too long to serve the ball. Or by dashing around before the ball is served. Or by using the “spike” jump to bounce on and off the ceiling. Or if more than two balls enter the play field. Come to think of it, online Bug Ball seems to have problems when you do anything but play the most basic of game with it.
I can only work with the assets I'm given, and for whatever reason the developers decided to post a static shot of the courts on the Marketplace page without any of the action going on. Guys, be more choosey. These pictures could be your one and only chance at making an impression on potential buyers. For the record, the graphics totally hold up in gameplay. These static shots made me think the graphics would suck. They don't, but if I didn't know that I would guess the developers were hiding something.
It’s such a shame, because when Bug Ball worked, it was one of the best times I’ve had playing an Xbox Live Indie Game. It’s not particularly deep, and it probably won’t excite the type of crowds who expect some kind of six-hour long epic for their $1. At Indie Gamer Chick, my only criteria has always been “be fun.” Bug Ball is amazingly fun. Maybe it’s a call to developers that they should get back to basics. Drop all the pretentious fluff and filler and accentuate the actual gameplay. Work it. Refine it. Don’t settle for “good enough.” Strive to be better than all the rest. If you’re going to put in a half-assed effort, stop developing for XBLIG and go fiddle-fart around with someone who shares your don’t-give-a-shit attitude. I hear Sega is hiring.
80 Microsoft Points said more like Buggy Ball. Nah, that makes it sound like a version of soccer played by Volkswagens in the making of this review.
A review copy of Bug Ball was provided by Edible Entertainment to Indie Gamer Chick. The copy played by Kairi was purchased by her with her own Microsoft Points. The review code was given to someone else to provide her with a proper online experience. That person was not involved at all in the writing or editing of this review. For more information on this policy, please consult the Indie Gamer Chick FAQ.
Yea, sorry. “Living La Vita Loca” was used by just about anyone that’s even thought of video games.
I actually got my Vita for Christmas. It was a neat surprise from my Daddy, which was cool and proves why he totally rocks. Of course, I only had Little Deviants to play around with, and while it was a little fun (and hugely annoying in some ways), it was just a glorified tech demo. Those aren’t exactly famous for their staying power. By December 26, the novelty of having a Vita two months early had officially worn off and it joined my 3DS on the shelf to collect dust. It was either that or look around for smiley faces to take pictures of. Um, yea, no. Dust works.
Well, you guys have had Vita for a few days now, and I’ve been getting requests to “go all Indie Gamer Chick” on it. You know, I resent the idea that I’m some kind of assassin for hire. You guys are big boys. You can fight your own fights. Besides, I don’t hate the Vita. Yet. You see, I’m willing to give it time. Why? Because there’s only three true certainties in life: death, taxes, and hand-held gaming consoles having shitty launches.
Let’s look back to the original Game Boy, which came out very shortly after I was born. At the risk of ruining my credibility here (no shouts of “too late” from the peanut gallery please, thanks), I never played the original Game Boy. Never. Not once. I’m talking about the original model of it, because I caught the Pokemon craze like everyone else who was nine-years-old in 1998. By then, I had got the Game Boy Pocket, and shortly thereafter, the Game Boy Color.
But, in retrospect, I didn’t miss much. The launch lineup for the Game Boy looks a bit abysmal. Sure, it had an iconic pack-in in the form of Tetris. But it also had some pretty craptacular secondary titles. Being the serious journalist I am (and no, I couldn’t even type that with a straight face), I bought them on the 3DS Virtual Console. Baseball, Alleyway, and Tennis. Wow, dynamite launch lineup. And of course, there’s the original Super Mario Land. Which is, sorry to you Nintendo fanboys out there, one seriously fucking terrible game. It’s glitchy, Mario is like three pixels tall, it’s glitchy, the enemies all look stupid, it’s glitchy, there’s horizontal space-shooter levels and oh God why is THIS considered a classic? You guys back then had no taste at all.
But I do have a point to go with this. Things got better. Once a developer gets past the learning curve, good stuff starts to happen. Look at the gigantic leap Super Mario Land made to become Super Mario Land 2.
You don’t need to go back to a period when your friendly neighborhood Indie Gamer Chick was still vulnerable to coat hangers for examples either. Sony’s history with the portable market is shaky at best. The PSP, while simply incredible to look at when it came out, had a pretty underwhelming launch lineup. Sure, Luminies was cool, but does anyone look back fondly on their time spent playing Untold Legends? Metal Gear Acid? Ape Escape on the Loose? Of course not. Nintendo DS was the same way. In fact, it was so bad that people instantly wrote off the machine as the second coming of Virtual Boy. Among the “highlights” was an unplayable port of Mario 64 and a seriously lousy tech demo by Sega themed around fucking called “Feel the Magic.”
But things got better. The PSP and especially the Nintendo DS became two of my favorite consoles of all time. It just takes a while for developers to get the hang of a system. In fact, that’s true these days of most consoles. I don’t think I would have trouble finding people to agree with me that the Xbox 360 and the PS3 both got off to a shaky start. I can’t even remember any launch titles for the PlayStation 3. I even forgot about Resistance. It just wasn’t that memorable. For the Xbox 360, all I remember is how disappointed I was in Perfect Dark Zero, and that I spent most of the first week I had with it playing Hexic.
The Vita is too new to write off. I’m not being an apologist for it. I’m just trying to keep it real. Yea, it bombed in Japan, but I think that has more to do with the mentality of gaming having changed so drastically. No matter how much it pains hardcore video game players to hear this, portable gaming is now tied to phones. iPhone moves hundreds of millions of games yearly. Hell, it’s damn near billions. When I point that out to your traditional, old-school, crotchety old gamer, it usually results in a cringe followed by some half-assed attempt at damage control usually discounting it as not being relevant. They’ll say it doesn’t count because phones are for “casual games.” What does that even mean?
Hardcore gamers, who usually also pride themselves on being Retro gamers, want to have their cake and eat it too. They want to talk about the good old days when a quarter bought you three minutes on Defender, but then immediately discount that $1 on your iPhone buys you a game like Cut the Rope, because that’s a “casual” game. I don’t get it. When old farts reminisce with me about the glory days of arcades, they speak with a tremble in their voice and a glimmer in their eyes as they describe rows of games, all unique, accessible to everyone, and cheap to play. Geez, that sounds kind of familiar.
Perhaps we’ve come full circle and the long-time gaming populace doesn’t realize it. I never got to experience a smokey arcade full of class-cutters and mohawk-wearing juvenile delinquents. My gaming life began just as the arcades were dying off. But with iPhone, I think I can kind of imagine the sense of awe players felt in the golden age of the arcade. I think that’s true of many gamers my age. Whether we realize it or not, phones are our arcade. And they’ve changed what we expect a portable gaming device to be. When you can have the gaming version of the Library of Alexandria on you phone, with games costing $1 or less, it’s hard to justify paying $300 for a dedicated console that tries to bring console-quality titles but will inevitably come up short.
The sun is setting on the era of the dedicated portable gaming device. Given its luke-warm reception, I think it’s a safe bet that the Vita will close the book on Sony’s journey in portable gaming. Nintendo will probably stick it out at least one generation longer, if only to triumphantly hold up the dismembered head of Sony much like they did with Sega, NEC, SNK, Bandai, Nokia, and nameless others. But that doesn’t make the Vita a bad console. Yea, the camera is shit, and the much trumpeted OLED display already looks dull in comparison to iPhone’s. You know what? Who cares? I like games, and I like Sony’s brand of games. So in the long run, I’ll probably like the Vita. Plus I’m sure it will be good for a few laughs when professional asshat Jack Tretton takes the floor at E3 next year to announce the next model has a completely unique glasses-free 3D display unlike anything ever done by anyone ever, for real, fingers in ears, la la la la la, we’re not crazy.
We don’t know what you guys are talking about. 3D was totally our idea. Nothing like it out there.
Journey
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