Category: Video Games


Glitch: It’s Like if Farmville and Maple Story Had an Awesome Baby

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January 12, 2012

miss buckets

See that thing here on the left? Yeah, that’s me. Or, that’s me in Glitch, anyway. I’m Miss Buckets, a level 25 Glitch with a propensity for bingeing on No-No Powder and Hooch while I garden and cook. I like shiny things, and Mab is my chosen giant.

If you don’t play Glitch, most of that probably doesn’t make a lot of sense. And that’s okay. A lot of stuff doesn’t make sense even when you do play (word to the wise, don’t drink Essence of Purple unless you’ve got some free time). And that’s okay, too. Glitch is a 2D, sidescrolling MMO sort of game. You can buy property, create and sell goods, garden, raise animals, be a hunter-gatherer, smack people with planks of wood, and leap really, really high.

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Uncharted 3: Thoughts

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November 6, 2011

yeah, it's badass

So, I recently had the lovely experience of watching my best friend play through Uncharted 3: Drake’s Deception. I didn’t play it myself – I am a platforming wizard, but I’m not good with switching between that and combat. That, and my best friend is possibly secretly the God of Video Games, because I think he died all of ten times throughout the whole game.

Which we beat in one sitting, coincidentally. My brother and friend and I sat on couches to “watch the movie,” with snacks and backseat gaming goodness.

So, anyway, the game itself: WAS AWESOME! I have to admit that I remember the motion being a bit smoother in the second game, but I also experienced some voice-syncing glitches, so I suspect my PS3 may have just been having a bad day. The rendering of the characters was absolutely beautiful, but it was nothing compared to the backgrounds. There were a few times that I was shocked when the characters appeared on screen, because I’d forgotten that it wasn’t real footage.

The story itself was excellent. While I found the second one (and the first, to some extent) a little too supernatural at times, this was perfectly tasteful in its allusions to otherworldly things: it was nuanced rather than IN YOUR FACE OMG ZOMBIES. The characters were well-fleshed out, even the less major ones. The game surprised me by making one of the characters claustrophobic – it was an attention to detail that I wouldn’t have considered, and I was really impressed. Side note – I totally didn’t realise that Chloe’s voice actress also does the voice of Morrigan in Dragon Age: Origins. I guess I shouldn’t be surprised, considering that Alistair’s voice actor did a role in Uncharted 2.

One critique I have to make regarding the game was the combat. Not the system itself; the controls seemed fairly fluid and the only issue we really had was accidentally picking up the wrong gun instead of ammo 147380432 times. No, the problem was that there was so much of it. Some scenes were really exciting, but others dragged and dragged, and you just wanted it to end so you could get back to the spectacular story (or to puzzles or chase scenes!). They keep throwing battle after battle of 20-30 guys at you, when really most fight scenes would be plenty exciting with 5-10 guys. You start to wonder how on earth the baddies are affording nice black suits for all their henchmen. You also wonder how many 7′ tall, 400lb guys they hired (really, could have at least given them different faces). After a while it felt like the developers either thought “we can make the game longer by making them kill more guys” or they couldn’t think of any other way to make combat harder as the game progressed.

In defense of the development team, I greatly appreciated the few bones they did throw us – having Drake shout “Why are they shooting at me?! Don’t they know we’re sinking?!” made what might otherwise have been an issue worth complaining about into a meta-game joke.

tell me you don't see malcolm reynolds here

Speaking of voice overs, the actors in Uncharted are far and beyond some of the greatest voice actors, hell, actors period, that I’ve ever had the privilege of listening to. Their interactions are so natural that one wonders how much is adlibbing – or if they were even given a script at all! You can easily imagine them just told what happens and then made to act it out on their own. It’s fantastic. I highly recommend at least renting the game – as we’ve showed, it can be beaten in one sitting. However, purchasing it means you get the badass multiplayer as well! Admittedly, Battlefield 3 just came out, but if you’re looking for a change, the multiplayer in Uncharted 3 is pretty damn solid.

I’m looking forward to the movie – I swear to God if Drake isn’t played by Nolan North or Nathan Fillion, though…heads will roll.

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Portal 2 Review

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April 27, 2011

chell is basically deified

I beat Portal 2 last night.

Let me start by saying that I have game-ending anxiety. There comes a point in a game where I want to stop playing because it’s going to end soon, and I’m going to miss it. I still haven’t beaten FFX, for example. There are a few exceptions to this, one of them being Okami. The three fake-you-out endings freaked me out, but I got a good 90 hours of gameplay out of it. When it ended, I had closure. I was okay.

The other is Portal 2. It also has a few fake-you-out endings, and much like Okami one of these was within the first few hours of the game (“really? this is it? oh”). Unlike my mutual parting with Okami, my relationship with Portal 2 slogged on for at least two or three hours after I was ready for the end. However, don’t let my funereal whining put you off – this game was amazing.

It frequently stunned me over the course of the game how perfectly fine-tuned everything was. Portal 2 is less of a platformer and more of an intricate Rube Goldberg machine, with you as the sentient rolling ball. With a portal gun. Portal 2, in a way, taught me to have faith that I would land where I needed to, and not to freak out about which way I was facing as I was hurtling through the air at terminal velocity toward a yawning precipice.

The puzzles themselves are challenging and satisfying to solve. They introduce some new gameplay elements – you don’t just have turrets, boxes, and switches anymore! You have platforms that launch you into the air, a series of gels that do different things when placed on the ground (bouncy gel, slippery gel, and portal-anywhere gel! pay attention to that last one, it’s important), and forced-gravity funnels. Oh, and laser platforms. Laser platforms! You heard me!

Stephen Merchant, of the Ricky Gervais Show and probably other more-known things, voices a cute little node-type robot. He is your companion throughout portions of the game, and is an amazing comic relief no matter what he is doing. I highly recommend waiting until he stops talking to do what he says, in every case. He will keep going, if you let him!

And, of course, GlaDos is back. With a vengeance, literally. Not content to merely run you through the gauntlet of tests, offering misleading advice and empty compliments, she now actively insults you.

“Most people emerge from stasis horribly undernourished. You seem to have beaten the odds, and even managed to pack on a few pounds.”

I won’t spoil the circumstance, but I will also say that the phrase “fatty fatty no-parents” is used in the game at least once.

Unfortunately for this review, a large portion of the game is a complete spoiler, so I am trying to avoid it, without much success. What can be said is that you get to learn quite a bit more about Aperture Labs’ history, which is amazing. That portion of the game is has distinct Bioshock/Fallout overtones, which absolutely tickles me. You begin at the beginning (a very good place to start) in the 1950′s, and continue on through the 70′s and up to the modern day. The kitsch is perfect and the ambience is very, well, period.

Here is the part where I alienate the majority of Portal fans: I wasn’t in love with the Companion Cube. I mean, it’s cute, but I did not get that feeling of fuzzy camaraderie that the game implies you’re meant to. I much preferred the unbearably-sweet turrets, who would declare “I don’t hate you” as you killed them.

Luckily, Portal 2 has something for both of us! The companion cube makes a triumphant, if still silent, return (and plays a minor role in the ending that fans should appreciate). The turrets also get a bit of a bigger role, although they are mercifully not used as frequently in the tests. Not to spoil too much, but at one point you will meet a very special little turret – that scene warmed my heart. No joke.

The ending to the game is, strangely, pretty sweet. I don’t mean sweet like schweet, I mean sweet like awww. It’s satisfying, funny, and makes you a little nostalgic. The ending theme, while no Still Alive, is pretty catchy, and sums up its singer pretty well (it also contains some spoilers).

Long story short, Portal 2 retains everything I loved about the first game: excellent control and gameplay, puzzles that were challenging and only occasionally frustrating, magnificent voice acting, a great script; and added a ton of excellent new features to it. With PSN down, I haven’t gotten to play co-op yet, but I look forward to it. All the other single-player features were well-integrated, they didn’t feel particularly tacked-on because of their presentation, and they didn’t overrule the original features, and most importantly, they didn’t suck.

Hello, how are you? Because I'm a potato.

In closing, if you rent this game, get it for the 5-night option, because this is pretty darn long for a puzzler-platformer. Also, play with the subtitles off so they don’t distract you…until, and this is important, you are introduced to the potato. I can’t say any more – spoilers – but the potato is a little hard to understand.

 

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Fable III – Mo Money, Mo Problems

Filed Under: Reviews, Video Games by Katuchuu — Leave a comment
November 6, 2010

I am the noble but beleaguered queen of a land threatened by an encroaching darkness. I spend most of my time whistling at my townspeople to make them like me.

Yep, I bought Fable III. I beat the first game, loved it. The second game was good, but I got nowhere close to beating it due to the jobs being so addictive that I never got much past the first few quests. The third game definitely doesn’t fall into that trap – the jobs are an irritating minigame with recycled catchphrases played at you over and over (I swear, if anyone else compliments my pie-making, I’m going to set them on fire).

I like a lot of aspects about the new game. First and foremost, I have to deeply thank the makers for allowing me not to be a gigantic hosebeast just because I fight with a sword. Thank you for making the characters more realistic and less, well, fugly. The 360 has immense graphic capabilities, so the fact that their characters no longer look like NPCs in an old PS2 game is a welcome one. Actually, the graphics are all fairly gorgeous, though motion is still pretty clunky and glitches abound. Oh, and did I really have to be a head taller than every single person in the world? I know I’m a Hero and all, but man.

i am pretty bitchin'

Secondly, battle is greatly improved. Death just loses you a bit of progress towards your next Guild Seal (this game’s form of EXP), and then you stand right back up again – no item needed, no checkpoint involved. Potions become available for use on the D-pad as they are needed (not missing enough health to warrant a healing potion? It won’t show up, but a carrot will), to avoid accidental item usage. And spells, ah, my bread and butter, those they’ve done some really nice things with. Spellweaving is without a doubt my favourite part of the battle aspect (and is really the only reason I don’t groan whenever I get into an encounter) – Choose any two spells, and use them simultaneously. Want to set someone on fire and shove a sword through them? Fireball + Blades. How about electrify someone after you throw them back from you? Shock + Force Push. Or maybe you’re like me, and you want to toss people around in a freezing ice storm? Ice + Vortex. It’s. Awesome.

I admit that part of the reason I quit playing the second game was that I couldn’t keep a spouse. No matter their house or upkeep etc, as soon as I’d fast travel somewhere, they’d get lonely, and even if I immediately fast traveled back, they’d divorce me upon loading. Clingy bastards. This game does not have that problem, thankfully. A heart appears on your D-pad icon when your family, uh, “wants” you, or when they have a gift for you. This does not always come at a good time (surrounded by Hollow Men in the midst of an epic battle…not the most convenient time for a booty call), but fortunately your spouses (spice?) have learned some patience, and will just as happily jump your bones whether you come right away, or whether you finish saving the world first.

I have currently one husband, Luke the Worker. Formerly of Brightwall heritage, now he lives in Mistpeak Valley, in the Hunter’s Lodge, with our two children: Alistair, my son, named for the Dragon Age character; and Gaia, my daughter, named after Gaius Julius Caesar (I’m taking a history class right now, okay?). They get 100 gold a day, and thus spend most of their time yelling, “I have so much stuff!” and “Our house is the greatest ever!”

Despite my idyllic home life, I must say that I’d like to marry a more major NPC, instead of the random townies. Okay, actually, I suppose I’d really like to marry Logan, because he’s so hot and tragic. I mean, come on, we’re royalty, that’s practically normal. And anyway, I’m the queen, I can do whatever I want! And besides, it’s so darned unfair that the hottest character in the game is usually your sibling (coughTeresacough)!  At the very least, I should be able to hook up with Page or Ben Finn (or both? Eh? Eh?). Or, at the very VERY least, with a character who has a special voice or script, not just the same old same old that you can run into in any old town. But now I’m just whining.

I’d like to talk a bit more in-depth about the game now, so this does contain spoilers. If you are not the Regent of Albion, you don’t want to read past this point.

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FFXIV – Nuna’s Guide To Crafting and Not Sucking*

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October 19, 2010

*results not guaranteed. You may still suck.

nuna is a goldsmith! among other things.

How the hell does crafting work, anyway?

I wondered this, too. Actually, everyone did. I witnessed a zone full of people flail madly as they attempted to discern the secrets of even getting past the “Synthesis” menu. Some didn’t even get that far. So here’s the scene: you begin crafting. Oooh, the pretty lights! And oh look, sparks! Whoa, what’s that halo around my glowy blob? Oh my GOD, how exactly does embroidery EXPLODE?

Yeah, we’ve all been there. Here’s how not to be. This is geared toward local leves, since in theory you’ll be doing tons of them to grind your level high enough that you don’t fail low level real synths. For the uninitiated, local leves let you use NPC-ingredients to make items for NPCs. You don’t actually GET the items, so your dreams of stealing some poor woman’s Blacklip Oysters is dashed. You actually have to MAKE her the Bone Hora, and in return you get a healthy stack of carrots.

Well, and essentially free experience.

What’s the difference between the kinds of synthesis?

It’s fairly self-explanatory, but with a few things that aren’t immediately obvious. Standard gives you fair Completion, fair Quality, and on a success, uses little or no Durability up. Rapid gives high Completion, no Quality, and always uses Durability up. Bold gives the lowest amount of Completion, high Quality, and always uses up Durability.

So, what about the colours?

It’s been said that MMO players (or all gamers, really) are a cowardly and superstitious lot. As such, there were tons of theories floating around regarding the magical

nuna and raze make sweet crafts together

crafting colours before SE released anything. Some people said white meant do Standard, yellow meant do Bold, and red meant do Rapid. Others said white meant Standard and yellow meant Bold, and red meant Wait. And while basically no one knew what to make of the changing-colour state, everyone got that the woobly halo and the sparks were bad. SE’s official release says that white means high odds of success (NOT guaranteed. There is ALWAYS an element of chance in crafting), yellow means lower odds of success, and red means low chance of success. However, if you do Bold on red and it succeeds, you get a significant Quality boost. It says nothing about the changing-colour state, so we can just assume that is a sort of wild card.

Okay, I get it. How do I make high Quality items without failing?

It’s not easy, and because there’s always that element of chance, there will be some crummy synths, even if you’ve got fancy cooking armor and a funny hat, and have access to a cookery (400g at your local camp warden!) and are level 99. Here is my personal method for making good stuff well.

Your local leve will give you 2 extra sets of ingredients. USE THESE, EVEN IF YOU DON’T NEED THEM. You don’t get the items from them, but you DO get the XP/SP and it also ups your reward from the NPC (especially if they’re good quality). Let’s say you have to make two Bone Hora for your quest.

For the first two, my strategy is:

1% – 80% Completion: Standard on white, yellow, and wild card. Wait on red.

80+% Completion, if Durability is 40 or higher: Bold, regardless of colour. If it fails, go back to Standard.

80+% Completion, if Durability is lower than 40: Standard on white, yellow, and wild card. Wait on red.

For the second two:

1% – 80% Completion: Bold on white and red. Standard on yellow and wild card.

80+% Completion, if Durability is 40 or higher: Bold, regardless of colour. If it looks bad, switch to Standard.

80+% Completion, if Durability is lower than 40: Standard on white, yellow, and wild card. Bold on red.

Using Bold synthesis on red is a gamble, but with the last two, they’re technically “free” anyway, so I don’t mind the risk. To be honest, it works out for me at least as often as not, if not better.

Bonus Question: What happens if I let the timer run out?

You “Wait.” This loses you 1 Durability the first time, 2 the second time, 3 the third, and so on. So don’t go AFK at the wrong time!

Bonus Question: How much is the most durability I can lose in one go?

I’ve seen it go as high as 25, although it’s usually below 20, depending on colour/synth type. Beware that it can go higher, though! There have been plenty of times that I’ve gambled a synth because I had 20 and it ended up taking away 23.

a post-craft cuddle

Hopefully these guidelines will work out for you as well as they have for me!

If they don’t, please don’t MPK me or refuse to teleport me. If they do, however, feel free to shower me with gil and presents.

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FFXIV – The Introduction

Filed Under: Video Games by Katuchuu — Leave a comment
October 18, 2010

nuna and the moogle

FFXIV – The New Frontier

So, I was a veteran of FFXI. Not the highest in level, not the richest, not the best crafter. I spent most of my time chatting with my linkshell, and putting on my little Tarutaru bathing suit to go out Clamming on that one island that I forget the name of. I frequently got razed by the tentacle monster that lived on the beach, but it was so quiet and lovely I could hardly complain for long.

Actually, I spent most of my time in that game exploring…not far, because even as a level 54 white mage, bunnies could somehow sense and maul me. Sneak and Invisible were my two favourite spells (aside from Reraise, of course). When I gave away my account, I would occasionally go into fits of mourning/withdrawal; XI was like acid. You do it once, and you have flashbacks forever. It hides in your spinal fluid. I regretted losing Katuchuu, because like hell was I gonna do all those starter quests again…not to mention the hours of grinding, the thousands of gil spent on armor – gil that was hard-won from selling the occasional rare drop, or the one successful synth out of five failures.

Yep, for some reason I missed all that. So when I heard that XIV was in the works, I was ecstatic. Okay, I lied, I was utterly apathetic at Squeenix’s new MMO…until I found

nuna meets a strange new creature

out that all the races were the same as in XI. I’m not sure why, but that made all the difference. I rushed out to my local Gamestop and reserved the special edition (I used to work at Gamestop – not only do the employees NEED to make people reserve things to stay employed, but sometimes if no one reserved a game, we wouldn’t get ANY copies. I’ve missed out on one too many games that way). It came with neat extra stuff, but more importantly, an extra week of playtime!

People argued that the game was unplayable at that time (open beta to CE release), but I disagree. I admit, I didn’t play much of the open beta, because I didn’t yet have a new graphics card (I ended upgrading my nVidia GeForce 9500GT to the GeForce GTX 460), and couldn’t really get into it. There were no instructions, and it seemed like there was nothing really to do except cutscene, instance, talk to NPC, cutscene, instance, talk to NPC, cutscene, and then they cut you loose and I just went “…Uhhh.” and logged out. That, combined with the fact that I knew nothing carried over from beta to the actual game, made me fairly unenthusiastic about the whole thing.

Frankly, I was worried. I wanted to like the game. I wanted to be excited, but I wasn’t, really. Until the day before CE release. I considered taking off work (that’s how I roll), but decided against it at the last moment. I did, however, set it to do the massive updates during my shift. When I got home, I created my female Dunesfolk Lalafell (I’m getting better – I barely even wanted to say Tarutaru there) Nuna Banyan, and started the game out as a Conjurer.

Since then, I’ve mostly leveled the Disciples of the Land, although I like my Disciples of the Hand as well. I have about 8 jobs between rank 7-11, and am Physical Level 19. I’m on Rabanastre server, if you feel like saying hi sometime!

Two other things I’d like to mention while I’m on the subject (and before I do my nightly guildleves): Fantaji.com, and the new update. First, Fantaji. Fantaji, pronounced “Fantashi,” is a romaji spelling of the Japanese name for the game: Fainaru Fantaji. It’s kind of like Facebook, but for XIV players. It also has Twitterlike aspects, but without the soullessness. Right now it’s pretty grassroots, so it’s a nice little community of people from different servers who chat to one another and cheer each other on, or help out with various experiments (such as food effects, etc).  In fact, my linkshell is named for the site, and is intended for people who use it (so another heads up to Rabanastres!), which is a funny story involving a local gamestop employee who coincidentally has been to my house before without either of us knowing it…but that’s a story for another time.

Lastly, oh my god, the new update. If you haven’t seen it yet, it’s here: Ask The Devs! @ The Lodestone. Now, every company says they listen to their users/consumers/fanbase. And really I suppose with as vocal a group as XIVers, it’d be hard to ignore them…but wow, it’s like they read my mind. The features I’m most looking forward to are:

  • Scroll the map by dragging the mouse.
  • The <pos> command.
  • New Chat Log tabs (hello, linkshell only and party only!), as well as multiple chat logs!
  • Chat log transparency adjustments (so it’s a bit more opaque, thank GOD).
  • Targeting party members from the party list. A healer’s best friend!
  • REMAPPING KEYS. That means CAMERA CONTROL WITH THE ARROW KEYS EFF YEAH!!

Right now, I’m stoked for these ~new features~. In a year, we’ll all look back at this and laugh at how hard we had it.

Hell, back in MY day, we had to kill 50 skeletons, just to get a subjob!

some of the fantaji linkshell look to the ~future~

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