Lisa: The First (PC)

Trigger warning: the main theme of Lisa: The First and child abuse. Although there’s no overt depiction of such abuse the overall experience and hints can be incredibly distressing.

An abused young girl walks out of her broken home and into the realm of her broken mind. Maybe she can put something back together. Maybe she can fight back against the encroaching darkness moving in on her psyche. Maybe there’s no fixing what’s been smashed and ripped apart. Join her as she wanders and explores her mindspace.

History

Lisa was created by Austin Jorgensen, known as Dingaling at the time of release. At the time the company was called Dingaling Productions but is now LOVEBRADgames. It was made in RPG Maker 2003 which is strange considering it’s an adventure game. The game is very much like Yume Nikki (Dream Diary) made in RPG Maker 2003 by developer Kikiyama, a series based on the dreams of a social recluse. Except this one is about social isolation via parental abuse instead of a sort of self-imposed exile.

Lisa: The First was released on October 9th, 2012. It’s competition was Dishonored (PC, XBox 360, and PS3), Hotline Miami (PC), and He-Man: The Most Powerful Game in the Universe (iOS).

Experiences

The whole time I played Lisa: The Painful I was haunted by Lisa but had no idea who she was. The Painful only offered cryptic answers but I wanted to know ‘Who is Lisa?’ I knew that she was related to Brad, The Painful’s main character, in some way. That she’s related to Buzzo, Brad’s rival, in some way. That Brad is stricken with sorrow when he thinks about her. But no true answers to what happened to her or who she is. Those answers are more easily derived from this game, Lisa: The First. Each game like a ripple in a pond, growing further and further from the locus of Lisa’s pain.

Gameplay

Lisa is an adventure game where Lisa explores a bizarre and hellish mindscape to find items that she can use to further progress in different areas. Occasionally beset by block puzzles, trade sequence quests, and traversing areas filled with disgusting Marty spiders the game is mostly about exploration. It’s just about going around and seeing things. Seeing what abuse looks like and what Lisa’s relationship with Marty, her abusive father, is like.

Step one, escape the house.

So explore, collect items, witness terrible visions, and get chided by Marty while trying to find meaning to the madness.

Step two, existential torment.

The Gush

The visuals in this game are top notch. While not particularly visually impressive they evoke a definite and disturbing raw emotional response from the player. From the disgusting bile in the bile world to the Marty’s face marque background it’s all pretty disturbing.

And just, this. This exists. Oh god.

The game is short and does what it sets out to do and says what it sets out to say quickly. Not disorientingly quick but quick enough to not overstay its welcome. It’s a punch to the gut that knocks the wind clean out of you in a marvelous way.

The Kvetch

The Marty spiders are very annoying enemies. They generally come as a sort of puzzle in which they move around in patterns and Lisa must traverse the area while dodging the spiders. That’s fine, frustrating but overall fine. What sucks is when you’re exploring an area and you have those damn hellbeasts chasing you. It’s really difficult to determine where they’re going to move and therefore how to avoid them.

Also, it’s just terrifying.

The Verdict

Very much like my evaluation of I have I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream I would never describe this game as fun. It’s not fun, although it is entertaining in segments, for the most part this game is all about human misery. It’s a marvelous and compelling exploration into the world of abuse and it’s free so it’s really worth a play. So the next time you feel like being spooked or wanting to be totally miserable then I suggest giving Lisa: The First a try.

Next Week: I guess I brought it up so I should talk about I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream

Dungeon Defender (The Kongregate Flash Game One, Accept no Substitutes.)

Ages ago you were the terror of the surface world. Close to total conquest the cowardly mages of the world wrought a spell that trapped you far beneath the earth. Deep below you’ve been gathering allies, minions, and loot to prepare your campaign to retake the surface. Now is the time to begin that campaign. Unfortunately for you, the armies of the overworld were prepared for such an invasion and are sending their heroes to take your gems. Without which you’ll lack the necessary wealth to pay the salary of your allies or bribe certain salacious guardians along the way. Marshal your forces and prepare your traps to keep your fortress safe while you enact your revenge.

History

Dungeon Defender was made my Tom Delorenzi of Grey Hound Games fame. A studio most known for an iOS port of the Gemcraft series — and with a website not updated since 2012. It seems like Dungeon Defender was one of the first games of Delorenzi’s that met widespread release on the website Kongregate.

As you can see in the title image, Dungeon Defender was released in 2008. It’s a Flash Game so it’s hard talking about competition.

Experience

I’m the kind of guy who keeps going back to a game, often long after I’ve finished it. I was wondering why I keep coming back to Dungeon Defender and I’ve found that it’s shockingly verbose for such a simplistic seeming game. Between the different villains you can play as, the ability trees they can put points into, and the different strategies you can employ. Now… I just wish that these differences had a more concrete impact… because I just keep using the same strategy under all these circumstances and I keep winning.

Gameplay

Dungeon Defender is a tower defense strategy game where you’ve got to coordinate your forces to withstand an onslaught of so-called heroes. You do this by digging through tunnels, placing traps in your opponents’ path, placing monster nests, and send your own avatar to dish out heavy damage on their own. Heroes will spawn in through portals on the map and they will take the most direct route to your fortress. Whether that’s through a bunch of lairs or around a giant maze they’ll do it — be careful about digging things out because tunnel walls cannot be placed once removed. Should a hero walk on a lair with no monster in it that lair will be destroyed and will have to be rebuilt, costing valuable gold.

Placing your lairs tactically is the name of the game considering gold is such a limited resource. Need gold fast? Some of the tunnel wall chunks are lined with ores which can be pawned when your peons dig them out. Lairs contain monsters who will fight until they die. Fear not, another will take its place before long. Monsters are seperated into fliers — who can fly over walls or otherwise phase through them somehow, melee mashers who duke it out with whoever gets close, and ranged monsters who will support and fire ranged attacks at nearby enemies. You can also place support buildings that raise the stats of the monsters of adjacent lairs in completely imperceptible ways.

As you can imagine, your peons cannot dig through steel walls.

Every wave of enemies you defeat earns you gold, and every bit of gold leftover at the end of a round earns interest. But.. not spending enough gold to survive the round is a dangerous preposition. Your avatar starts every round at your fortess is an able fighter. If sometimes fragile, who need not fear death. Should you avatar die he’ll return to life at your fortress after his brief stint with death.

The Gush

I don’t know what it is that I like about the simple sprite designs but I find them a delight. From the tiny goblins to the giant heroic bears I think they look great for a set of pixels. They only move mildly with the the facsimile of animation but I love it anyway.

Every level has a new gimmick. Something that really shakes up the nature of gameplay and gives the player an opportunity to get really far ahead. From neutral nests defending ancient treasures to a mission where enemy monsters attack your fortress it’s a great way to make each level special.

Gimmicks like the houses in the final level sending a gold to the coffers when destroyed.

The Kvetch

The music is a special kind of bad. It might be a 2 minute long loop, maximum. And its tone is completely unrelated to the events of the game. It sounds like something that should be playing out of a music box. Not something that punctuates a campaign is deep villainy.

It’s a small thing but having to manually dig out every chunk of wall takes a lot of time and is simply annoying. If only there was a way to select multiple chunks of wall to be designated for digging out at once. Sadly, no such thing exists.

Flying enemies are a necessary evil in this game. It’s important to have them to mix things up but they ignore the maze paths that you’ve made and make a b-line for your fortress from the gate. They cannot be attacked by normal melee monsters but can be attacked by ranged monsters and manticore flying monsters. So… if you’re a death knight, the melee avatar, then you’re gonna have a bad time as you stonewall these elven wizards but can’t actually damage them. Desperately trying to scrabble together enough money to set some ranged lairs. Perhaps if there was a warning as to which waves of enemies would be ranged then it would be on the player to prepare but at this point it’s just a matter of memorization.

The support buildings are really powerful but their effect seems largely invisible. Apparently they’re instrumental to optimal strategy and their efficient placement will make your monsters much more powerful… but it doesn’t seem that way. You gotta make that seem impressive, you gotta make me want to use these buildings that do not produce cool monsters that beat up my enemies. They have no flair.

The Verdict

This game is a great way to kill an idle afternoon. Although it’s got a couple of cheap shots and simply lacks polish the overall experience of placing lairs and watching enemies come to their doom is satisfying and fun. Just like all the games in this series it’s completely free. Just going to show that a decent game doesn’t have to cost an arm and a leg.

Next Week: Lisa The First

Au Sable (PC)

Sable — at least I think that’s the character’s name, I don’t know for sure there’s no clarification — is um… adventuring. Well the story in the readme says that she looking for the lost city of Harmonia. Unarmed and unarmored but accompanied by the two eyes of a god, she will do anything to reach the sunken fortress.

History

Another Benjamin Braden game, another nightmare. You might remember him as the creator of All of Our Friends are Dead — my review in the link. Braden, known online as Amon26, has made several games based on his intense and vivid nightmares. Giving anyone the opportunity to take a walk through these sinister dreams and finally fight back against the monstrous beasts that haunt the dark corners of his mind.

Au Sable was released in November 2009. It’s competition was Braid (PSN), Left 4 Dead 2 (PC and XBox 360), and Assassin’s Creed 2 (PS3 and XBox 360).

Experiences

Now, it’s unfair to compare games… but I’m gonna do it anyway. And this is for October’s spookiness so which game is scarier? It’s a tough thing to judge because they’re so similar but AoOFaD has a much more terrifying and ineffable world. The rough animation of the bosses and uknowable nature of the situation is pretty frightening. That being said, Au Sable seems like there’s some sort of grand design. It’s not just a nightmare, it’s a nightmare with a story. There’s something to be lost, it’s not just a bizarre hellscape. The monsters of Au Sable seem to be connected to something instead of just monsters for monsters sake, and they look more purposefully designed. In the end I would say that AoOFaD is truly scarier but that Au Sable is the superior game.

They’ve both got mysterious text but Sable has identifiable objects.

Gameplay

Au Sable is a pretty simple action platformer. You can move, jump, and eventually get the ability to fire weapons. There’s really not much to it. You just keep moving until you find the next place to go, sometimes it’s a little easy to get lost. The other main mechanic of the game is that Sable can use the eyes that follow her to activate switches and open doors — it’s quite bizarre that she can’t activate these switches without the assistance of a god.

The Gush

The monsters designs in this game are simply great . The Hunters and other various hellbeasts rival Splatterhouse in grotesqueness. There’s only one boss but their absence is supplemented by incredibly haunting god-like idols. And the enemy placement is superior than AoOFaD, much fewer enemies in places that will blind side you.

I don’t know what these god eyes are but I goddam love them. It’s interesting to be haunted by this greater power but I don’t know if I can trust their influence. I do wish though that I had gotten a greater idea of what they are and why they’ve been sent — I suppose because the deity wants me to continue.

The sound, music, and art do a marvelous job at creating a moody creepy atmosphere that builds a definite sense of dread. A few jump scares get thrown in there for good measure but they’re not so intense that they overwhelmed me.

The tentacle pursuit scene scared the hell out of me.

The Kvetch

The shotgun and machine gun are pretty good weapons but what sucks is that the standard configuration of the game comes with no cross-hair. Braden did it to represent her unfamiliarity with the weapon. I think that’s a really interesting idea but it makes the game very difficult to play. Perhaps the cross-hair becoming more opaque the more monsters she defeats would create a gradual difficulty curve, and strike a good balance between themeing and gameplay ease. Thankfully the cross-hair can be enabled by pressing the backspace key.

Seriously, shooting without the cross-hair is damn near impossible.

I heard something about multiple endings but I have no idea how to find anything but the one I keep getting. I’ve also heard that the most recent version of the game makes it impossible to unlock it… and that would suck. This is all hearsay because I couldn’t verify it myself but if this is the case then that’s a serious oversight.

The Verdict

Au Sable is a decently fun and compact game. I was able to beat it in a mere 30 minutes but I had a helluva time. Like all of the games in this series so far, Au Sable is totally free and available to download on the independent game wiki. It’s a nice way to spend 30 minutes getting absolutely spooked this Halloween season.

Next Week: Dungeon Defender

Madness Interactive (Flash Game)

Somewhere in Nevada the world has gone mad and you have chosen to fight back against injustice. The Sheriff is the ringleader of this circus but you’ll have to fight through hell and back to defeat him. Whether with your fists or scavenged weapons use your bullet time and perks to avoid harm and dish it out on the way to the Sheriff’s office.

History

The Madness series started off as an adobe flash animation series by the Newgrounds creator Krinkels. The Madness series started on July 25th of 2002, kicking off a series that would continue until July of 2013. Each one depicting the iconic cross-faced men fighting in progressively larger and larger melees — the benchmark for badass for every 14 year old on the internet. In between the 4th and fifth installments of the series Krinkels teamed up with game make, Flecko to create a game based on his series. Complete with the mindless violence that the madness series had been predicated on.

Madness Interactive was released on August 26th, 2003. It’s competition was Soul Calibur II (PS2, XBox, and GCN), Silent Hill 3 (PS2), and F-Zero GX (GCN).

Experiences

I remember the days of sneaking this in during class in middle school. One eye on the bad guys and the other on the teacher to make sure I didn’t get caught. It was damn hard to play on a track pad but we did what we had to do to have fun during those dark times. Heck, I ended up playing the game before I saw the flash movies. Then came the mods. Most of them just had different weapon skins and backgrounds but a few changed the game significantly. I used to have the flash source files for a mod known as The Matrix: Rayne. Complete with dual wielding and multiple characters with unique stats. Sadly this sort of thing was lost to the ages, rediscovered but I haven’t been able to track down the browser independent version. I last found the full download 8 years ago but the link was dead. Now it’s time to go back to the original, let’s see if it holds up.

Gameplay

Madness Interactive is seperated into 3 basic modes, the campaign, experimentation, and challenges. Each mode is a 2-D side scrolling beat ’em up with guns that your player can recover from enemies. The player can also drop weapons while swinging them to hurl them at enemies with mixed results. When the screen gets crowded with fire-arm toting badies then the player can initiate bullet time to slow down gunfire and give the player more breathing room.

The campaign has you going through progressively more and more difficult levels with staged spawning enemies. Every level you complete gives you the option between one of three perks which can range from longer character reach to additional bullet time. Unfortunately the character only has 3 lives so you’d better make them count, you don’t have a lot of health.

Some of the perks are really useful, others… not so much.

The challenge modes are zombie attack, matrix mode, knife throwing, and laser dodging modes. They’re a little self explanatory but the point is that they offer a great change up to the normal gameplay. And they unlock cheats! Get all those cheat codes! You can use them during the campaign mode to make it a little less difficult but, you won’t unlock any campaign mode cheats with any other cheats enabled.

Experimental mode is how most people played the game. Full control, spawning in any weapon, spawning in bad guys, and just having fun.

The Gush

The challenge modes manage to be fun without relying on combat expertise. Half of them don’t even have opponents. Why is it important that they’re fun without combat? We’ll get to that…

The music in this game is really good. Between the moody music of the main menu and the ongoing music of the campaign mode it makes me feel slick as hell. I only wish I knew where to buy these tracks, I’d put hard money down on them.

The game comes with a lot of cool costume elements you can use to decorate your character. It’s something small but it’s fun to create a goofy looking Jesus with an eyepatch in a suit.

The Kvetch

Some of the perks like Golden Bullet are really interesting but others like First Aid (which restore the character’s incredibly low health) fall flat. It’s such a pain because the three available options are chosen at random so a run of bad luck can ruin your run.

The campaign is based more on memorizing enemy spawn points than quick reflexes and accuracy. The game moves so fast, the controls are so clumsy, and the bullet time is so limited that it’s goddam impossible to survive past the third level without knowing what’s coming.

Miss one shot and it’ll plunge you into hit-stun hell.

What’t not fun about the combat? The incredibly clumsy controls. I can scarcely aim at enemies because the mouse controls are overly sensitive. In a world where one missed shot means getting riddled with bullets and ending up in a life losing fiesta these clumsy controls are unacceptable.

The Verdict

My Rose Tinted glasses have failed me. I did not enjoy revisiting this game. Playing the online version is damn near impossible because if your cursor slides off of the frame then the game won’t respond to any controls until you get back on. Things get better in the full flash edition but good luck finding a good download — Flecko.net has been defunct for a good long time. If I didn’t find the SWF file in my old computer’s folder then I would not have been able to find it. Overall the campaign’s limited lives systems makes it uncomfortably difficult. But it’s not all bad chum, at least it’s free.

Next Week: The Sonny series.

Defend Your Castle (Browser Flash Game, iOS, and WiiWare)

An army surrounds your entire fortress nation, the enemies are at the gates. As they marshal their forces you must make use of your castle’s ancient guardian, the mysterious cursor spirit. It has the ability to manipulate things in reality, sending them flying into the air and then crashing back down. Otherwise unprepared for the assault you must manage and build more defenses using the blood of your enemies to fuel your war machines. — By which I mean I made this all up in order to justify the rules of a flash game.

History

Defend your Castle was made by XGen Studios, a Canadian indie game studio lead by one Skye Boyes. Fully founded in 2005 after Boyes’ browser games began to accumulate acclaim. Skye also took this time to drop out of the Computer Science field. XGen would go on to attempt to port Machinarium to WiiWare, an enterprise which would ultimately fail due to WiiWare’s resolution and memory limitations. Xgen would go on to release an updated multiplayer version of Defend Your Castle to WiiWare.

I would say that it looks pretty nifty… but a little too messy.

Defend your Castle was fully released in 2003. It’s competition was Samorost (Browser Flash game), .hack//infection Part 1 (PS2), and Call of Duty (PC).

Experiences

One of my favorite things in games is creating a perpetual motion machine. I know that sounds weirdly paradoxical, ‘your favorite part of a game is the part where you don’t have to play it anymore?’ And the answer is, yeah kind of. I love the point when the castle becomes this sort of self sustaining engine. With enough archers to defend the gates and enough engineers to repair it I kind of don’t have to do anything anymore. I let it go and watch the points roll in. There eventually comes a point where even the engine gets clogged and overwhelmed by the sheer number of attackers. But that just reveals the experience of watching entropy take its claim.

Gameplay

Defend Your Castle is a point and click browser game in which an array of stick people invade from the left side of the screen. Using the cursor you can move and manipulate them, sending them hurtling into the sky where they eventually land in a bloody fanfare. Every level they send more enemies toward the castle and eventually send different and more advanced enemies.

Ah, the days of the early castle before things spiral out of control.

Every one you destroy awards you with points — not dollars, gold, gems, or any other form of currency… just points — and these points can be spent to repair and upgrade your castle. Allowing you to build building like the Temple which allow you to brainwash — I MEAN — convert your enemies into loyal minions — I MEAN — citizens who can be put to work as archers who occasionally dispatch enemies automatically. Or to the mana pool where they can become wizards capable of casting devastating and useful spells.

The Gush

The sound design is really good. From the way the ambient music clashes with the sound of stick figures falling to their doom. To the annoyed plop they make when they survive a fall or the bizarre cackling laughter of the death spell. It all just sounds good.

To me, this game is all about that point the castle doesn’t need me to babysit it anymore. I kickstarted the engine and now it’ll run until it’s out of gas. The real challenge of the game is figure out how to reach that point.

The Kvetch

Trained archers, engineers, and wizards take a toll in the form of upkeep costs. Every day they cost points, and that’s fine. The problem is that you need enough points to cover their costs at the beginning of your day, not at the end. If you train too many archers then you’ll get charged for upkeep costs, and then lose all the archers you couldn’t afford to pay with the points you had at the beginning of the day. I don’t know how many you lose, I’m not sure if it’s proportional, but they still charge you the cost of the people who leave. It’s really frustrating and it can kill a good run if you spend too much on wall upgrades buildings.

Escalating enemies are the only thing this game has in terms of a difficulty curve. Now, the guys with the battering rams, they’re cool. The problem comes with the giants. They can only be slowed down with clicks and cannot be flung so you either have to wait for a lucky arrow to dispatch them or have a mana pool to cast the instant death spell. If you don’t have the mana pool by the point they arrive — and you, the player have no idea when that will happen — then you’re basically screwed.

They also do a lot of damage, as you can imagine.

Speaking of different enemies. There’s one that sort of rubs me the wrong way. There’s a suicide bomber enemy because this was 2003 and we all thought it was cool to be edgy. But the thing that really bothers me about them is that every other stick figure is white with a black outline and the suicide bomber is all black. They’re apparently referred to as suicide ninjas but it just seems really off-putting and weird. Why are these reported ninja blowing themselves up instead of sneaking in? Why was it necessary to visually differentiate them in this way?

The Verdict

First things first, I am SUPER nostalgia blind for this one. I’m certain that the only reason I went back to it is because I’ve played it before. I’d be genuinely curious what a newcomer thought about the game, playing it for the first time, because it’s really rudimentary. That being said, for the flash games of the time it’s a real powerhouse which comes at the great price of completely free. There are far worse ways of burning an afternoon than playing this. And the WiiWare version looks fantastic, I’d really love to go a round or too waggling wii-motes with some friends.

Next Week: Madness Interactive.

Pony Island (PC, Mac, and Linux)

After long days of purging the wicked it’s nice to just take a load off, walk down to the local arcade, and play some Pony Island. Let your worries slip away as you hop over gates and annihilate your enemies with deadly lasers. Some say the game isn’t complete but how can a game so perfect be unfinished? Enough talk of doubt. Now, insert your soul to continue and get lots of tickets from the Pony Island machine.

This new DLC policy is really anti-consumer.

 

History

Pony Island was made by Daniel Mullins for the Ludum Dare 48 game jam with the theme being ‘Entire Game on One Screen’. It earned high praise at the game jam and inspired Mullins to try to get it on Steam through Steam Greenlight. Mullins wanted to make a game that defied player’s expectations, a game that almost didn’t want to be played.

The Greenlight campaign was successful and Pony Island was released on January 4th, 2016. It’s competition was Oxenfree (PC, Mac, and XBox One), Darkest Dungeon (PC and Mac), and That Dragon, Cancer (PC, Mac, and Droid).

Experiences

Play this game blind, people. The less you know, the better. I watched Jesse Cox’s playthrough of it on an idle Saturday before I played it and it kind of ruined the experience for me. It’s a fine playthrough, that’s not the problem, the problem is that it’s a game meant to be experienced firsthand on one’s own. Naturally, this review will have the lightest spoilers possible and intentionally obfuscate anything important. So once you’re done reading this, speak of it to no one, immediately purchase the game, and then finish it in one sitting — the clock is ticking before you get spoiled from somewhere! Well, that’s a little extreme. What I’m really saying is be careful how much you look up about this game.

Gameplay

Pony Island is split between pony platforming sections and puzzle sections. Pony platforming consists of jumping, gliding, and shooting lasers at enemies — don’t fret if you die, it just takes you to the beginning of the stage. It seems simple at first but the mouse controls, left click for jump/glide and right click for lasers, can be a little tricky.

Puzzle sections consist of navigating pseudo-code segments. You can use certain commands blocks to change the course of the cursor through the code. Therefore changing the operations of the block and allowing you to do whatever it is you’re doing. That being said, why are you messing around in the code? Isn’t that, like, cheating or something?

Someone worked hard on this and you’re ruining it, you cruel thing.

The Gush

The developer of Pony Island — um, in the game canon, not Mullins himself — is a pretty tragic character. I was genuinely sympathetic to his desires to be loved and appreciated despite his methods and goals.

This game is weird and silly and fantastical. I almost busted a gut laughing.

Oops… um… may bad.

The game sits firmly in the Goldilocks zone of difficulty, not too hard and not too easy. The puzzles are quite intuitive and the platforming controls tripped me up at first but I eventually got the hang of them. The only thing that I needed outside help on was how to find all the secret hidden tickets.

Speaking of hidden tickets! For all you completionists out there, there are hidden secret tickets. If you’ve got the inclination you can get all 24. I’m certain something good will happen if you find them all.

The bosses in this game were fantastic. There’s a puzzle boss, a platforming boss, and then a boss who’s something different entirely. They present an incredibly fun challenge.

The Kvetch

There’s not a lot of gameplay that’s related to the story. It overall feels less like a game and more like a story with gameplay elements attached. The game is fine, I liked the story, but I’m not exactly certain what they’re doing in the same room with each other.

I’m just not exactly sure what all this has to do with itself.

Is there anything more annoying that being shown up by someone? There’s a counterpart character in this game who’s clearly more powerful than you and knows way more about what’s going on. He exhibits bizarre abilities but refuses to explain anything about his abilities or who he is. I guess that’s his character but I wanted to wring some truth or meaning from him.

The Verdict

I would say that Pony Island is well worth someone’s money and time. It’s only $5 on Steam and even though I was spoiled hard I was still able to have fun with it. I feel like it’s got a lot to say about game development and the act of creation. And if you don’t care about that then hey, at least there are cool puzzles.

Next Week: Defend Your Castle

Party Hard (PC, Mac, Linux, PS4, XBox One)

Sleep is important. We spend a third of our lives wrapped in dream’s sweet embrace. Without it we go mad. It is the year 2000 and your character just wants to sleep… but the party next door is so loud. He’d sworn he’d lain the knife and mask down for good but the sleepless haze clouds his judgement. His goal is simple, kill the party by killing its guests by whatever means at his disposal. And once he’s got the taste for blood back… he wants more.

Three in the morning? I’d be pretty steamed too.

History

Party Hard was developed by Pinokl Games, a small Ukrainian studio, and published by tinyBuild games — you might remember them for making No Time to Explain. Party Hard is their first major non-mobile release. Mobile titles they’ve released include Real Steel and Fruit Story — and they don’t look like games I would want to play.

Party Hard was released on August 25th, 2015. It’s competition was Shadowrun: Hong Kong (PC, Mac, and Linux), Grow home (PS4), and um… Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain (PC, PS3, PS4, XBox 360, XBox One) — a bold move to go up against the biggest release of the year.

Experiences

Between the nonsensical story, the bizarre premise, and the simple visuals I figured this game was gonna be silly. One thing that I did not expect was just how difficult the game was going to be. I’m not even going to avoid comparisons with Hotline Miami because these games are similar in a lot of ways. Party Hard puts its own silly spin on the ultra-violence that Hotline awakened into the world. Where Hotline is visceral and personal, Party Hard is slapstick and absurd. But where Hotline was tight, smooth, and clean Party Had throws in a frustrating dose of ‘lol, so random’. Sometimes new guests arrive or leave, the character has a very slow movement speed, and restarting after level failure can take an infuriating amount of time.

Gameplay

Your goal is simple, be the last man standing on the dance floor, but executing it isn’t easy. Quick with a knife, most party goers don’t stand a chance against The Killer. The Killer might have a penchant for murder but he’s not actually too tough so police officers or rowdy guests can take him down pretty easily. He’s also more of the Mike Meyer’s stalker type so he doesn’t move too quickly, but he can use level shortcuts to escape or close the gap. Be careful, if you use an escape route too many times it’ll stop working.

Learning the map and character AI is imperative to your success. You’ll want to know your ins and outs to evade authorities and keep your activities quiet. The Killer can stash bodies in certain areas so use that to keep revelers in the dark about what you’re doing. You can also poison bowls of punch to kill surreptitiously, but once the well is poisoned they’re sure to know. It’s difficult to keep track of everything that’s going on but the more parts you eliminate the simpler the machine gets.

As you can see, it’s all a lot to take in.

Once party goers get keen to what’s going on they’re going to call the cops. Cops will arrest you on sight and if they run into a guest who’s seen you killing they will be able to track you down. Don’t bother fighting the police, I guess The Killer’s too rusty stab a battle ready foe.

You’d expect someone so intimidating to be better at fighting, not the case.

The Gush

The music in this game is positively dancy and 80s as hell. It really carries me through the experience. The sting of playing a level over and over again for 45 minutes is numbed by the knowledge that I will be listening to sick tunes the whole time.

I think I’m a sucker for unlockable characters. This game has got three characters to unlock and I’m instinctively excited. Only problem was that the game was too difficult for me to unlock any of them. The unlock mechanisms aren’t even difficult, just grindy. They all play differently for instance the Ninja is stealthy and the Chainsaw Psycho attracts cops like ugly on an ape.

The game frames the story as a police detective investigating the series of killings. It’s a campy romp through every Lethal Weapon cop story and I found it quite humorous.

Fantastic pixel art punctuates the silly story.

The Kvetch

The hit detection on the stab attack is dicey at best. I had a really hard time determining when I was parallel to a target or when they were near enough to attack. Brandishing the knife will also alert people to your murderous intent leading to police and other nastiness. Every stab needs to count but its hard to count on your stab.

It wasn’t immediately apparent when party goers could see me or what activities would alarm them. Poisoning the punch has no animation and would sometimes alert nearby guests and sometimes wouldn’t. It’s also difficult to determine what angles people can see you through windows.

I get this game is not serious but when I mentioned that escape routes can only be used so many times this is only because Mario, as in the Super Mario of Nintendo fame, breaks them. He comes out of a sewer line, either through a manhole cover or a toilet, bumbles over to the window or whatever and smacks it with his wrench and then it doesn’t work. I think it’s supposed to be funny but it just struck me as ‘LUL SO RANDOM’. It would have been just as easy for there to be an animation or dialogue box to explain the ladder is broken, or the tunnel collapsed.

Every level has a dance floor and I still have no idea how to handle it. It’s a lot of people all crowded together, so many watching eyes. Some characters leave but it seems like some never do. This leads me to rush in and invite failure. Either I luck out and kill them all before any of them can get to a phone or I get caught with a handful of victims left.

The Verdict

Party Hard is… okay. I found it fun, I don’t regret my purchase, I liked giving Pinokl 13 dollars because I can see promise in this game. A little more testing and polish would have turned Party Hard into a genuinely good and consistently enjoyable experience. As it stands though, I can only recommend it to someone who would appreciate the the LUL SO RANDOM humor and semi-puzzle mechanics. It’s also only 13 dollars so nothing ventured nothing lost

Next Week: Pony Island

The Consuming Shadow (PC)

Do you remember that part in the Call of Cthulhu when they said the Old Ones will awaken when the stars are right… Well, bad news, the stars are right and a Great Old One is poised to invade. You are a researcher at a UK university and you’re reasonably certain a cult devoted to this dark god is going to perform a ritual at Stonehenge and envelop the world. What you need is the banishment ritual and to understand which god is attacking, which one is backing them up, and which one is trying to stop them. But don’t dally, you’ve only got 60 hours before it’s too late. Stay sane, stay alive, and stay moving because town after town is already falling to The Consuming Shadow.

History

The Consuming Shadow is a game by renown game critic, Ben ‘Yahtzee’ Croshaw. Croshaw has been making games since 2008, small projects here and there, particularly point and click adventures. His games have often dipped into the eldritch, walking the halls of Lovecraft’s twisted manor. Playing Faster Than Light made him think about going up against a greater threat that’s constantly in pursuit. With the exception of the music and the testing the whole game was made by his hand.

The Consuming Shadow was released in full on July 28th, 2015. It’s competition was Rocket League (PC and PS4), Five Nights at Freddies 4 (PC), and The Binding of Isaac (XBox One, WiiU, and Nintendo 3DS)

Experiences

The Consuming Shadow inspires paranoia like a bad acid trip. Between the strange texts the player gets and the random events, anything can be good or bad. Texts come in patterns I.E. if texts from strangers are threats, the next stranger probably has a new threat. But if your family keeps wiring you money then it’s probably safe to accept the next text from Grandma.

Play it safe or get involved? The investment here could pay dividends… or not.

Gameplay

The game is basically split into three sections that work in tandem to make a spooky adventure. First, there’s the car. The Researcher has got to drive from town to town and that can take a lot of time and proper navigation — sadly it’s not as easy as just hitting the destination and letting the GPS choose the quickest path. On the road he’ll receive texts from various numbers including family members, someone from the Ministry of Occultism, and complete strangers. Some of these can be helpful but they can also damage your sanity. Occasionally the car will be beset by travelers or you’ll spot something on the road. Get involved at your own risk however. Besides that, this is basically the hub where you can heal thyself, check your notebook, and take sanity ‘restoring’ drugs. Should your sanity dip too low options in menus will be replaced with the ‘kill yourself’ option which will put you into the suicide minigame.

The more times you engage the suicide game the harder it is to resist.

From there you’re on to towns. Towns that are untouched by the shadow are hubs of commerce where you can purchase items, bullets, medical supplies, and drugs. When towns are tainted by the Old Ones they present the opportunity to delve into a dungeon. Each different type of dungeon presents different rewards and different challenges. Offices are more likely to contain clues but warehouses are more likely to contain items. There you will encounter monsters hellbent on… well their interest in you is sometimes secondary — some monsters are not malicious, simply deadly. That being said, any monsters you let live will take a toll on your sanity. So long as you succeed you will be rewarded with a piece of the banishment ritual needed to rebuke the Old One — but sometimes it is better to flee.

Ammo is limited and getting close to enemies is a dangerous preposition.

Now that you’ve helped the people and assembled the clues and rituals it’s time to figure out which god is which. There are always only three gods who have an interest in this world. One of them means to destroy it, the other is helping them but cannot enter for ineffable reasons, and the third is a sworn enemy of the invading god. Every god has a name, rune, color, aspect, and role. Certain clues provide certain pieces of information, some of which are reliant on others such as ‘the god in purple is enemies with the god in white.’ If you don’t know what the gods’ color is then that information isn’t useful… yet. You’ll need to determine the invading god to use the banishment ritual properly so happy hunting.

The Gush

As you kill more enemies the bestiary becomes more and more full with actually useful advice as to how to defeat them. The bestiary entries also include background information about the bizarre and insane attributes of the world beyond.

This game is hard… but that’s okay because every character can level up. Getting a star to distribute across the constellation grid to give them passive upgrades. Eventually, no matter how badly you’re doing in this game, you will get enough stars to get enough passive upgrades to succeed.

The dialogue ends up being a little repetitive but it’s well written and a joy to read when it’s fresh. I’ve got eight hours clocked and no longer read the dialogue. Still, at this point I do run into dialogue I haven’t seen before.

There are unlockable characters! Each of them has a different playstyle and I found them fun to experiment with. There’s the warrior who’s a well dressed criminal who shies away from guns but has a mean kick, a slick dodge, and a warrant out for his arrest. Then there’s the librarian who does not take sanity damage from casting spells but can only use runes so many times — oh and she can’t use melee attacks. And then the Ministry Man who only has 24 hours to save the world, but has the full banishment ritual from the get-go.

The later the clock ticks the more powerful the Shadow becomes and the more dangerous things get. You’ll also probably be getting pretty desperate at this point. But the thing is, The Shadow tips its hand — or tentacle — in a series of ways. For instance, the God’s rune will glow at Stonehenge and because the God’s rune is always part of the banishment ritual it offers a vital clue to the desperate investigator who’s at Stonehenge for a last ditch effort.

The Kvetch

One of the most useless clues I’ve found is ‘God 1 is the enemy of God 2’ because this does not clarify which one of them is the invader and which one is not. It simply clarifies which one of the three is the assistant which is one of the more useless pieces of information.

It’s sometimes unclear whether the character will elect to fire his gun or make a melee attack. Normally I’d chalk it up to the characters being unversed in combat with monsters. But the difference between getting hit or not hinges on me not clipping my arms through an enemy and firing past them.

Although the text messages form patterns, the random car events do not. Most of them are pure gambles. As such it’s really easy to get screwed over my RNJesus and end up in terrible situations by no will or volition of your own. My favorite encounters are the ones in which a secondary item would guarantee a positive result. Even if I don’t have the item I feel like I have agency. The pure toss-up ones really irk me.

The item events have clear criteria — have pads? Succeed — but the random ones don’t.

The Verdict

Once you figure out the games quirks, and even before then, The Consuming Shadow has a lot to offer for a fantastic price. For Ten dollars on Steam you get a decent value of eldritch delight. If you’re the sort of person who liked Dark Corners of the Earth and needs your Lovecraftian fix, or enjoyed others of Croshaws’ games then this is a title you should check out.

Next Week: Party Hard (The game, not the activity)

Hearthstone (PC, Mac, Android, and iOS)

Have you ever played Magic the Gathering, The Pokemon Trading Card Game, Duel Masters, Yugioh, Bakugan, The Lord of the Rings Trading Card Game, or the World of Warcraft Trading Card Game? Well now you can play the digital World of Warcraft Trading Card Game. A game complete with Leper Gnomes, Murlocs, Goblins, and legends like Deathwing or Leroy Jenkins himself. Relax, sit down, and just play a round or two of Hearthstone.

History

Hearthstone is an internet collectible card game created by Blizzard Entertainment. It was created by Team 5 within Blizzard, a team formed to create a smaller side project. They decided on a collectible card game because it would take lots of design knowledge, fairly little tech, and it would be something that was fresh and new in the digital space. When the game was nearing release Blizzard had a hard time creating interest for a card game where an up front fee would give the player access to all the cards. So they instead opted for a free-to-play model that enabled the cracking pack experience but further enabled impatient players to get the cards they wanted right now — and make some profit on the side.

For a trading card game it may come as a surprise that there’s no way for player’s to actually trade cards. The design team figured it would be best to avoid balancing a reactive economy, presenting opportunities for duplicating cards by meddling with the trade system, and enabling third party sales.

Hearthstone was released on March 11th 2014. It’s competition was Dark Souls 2 (PS3 and XBox 360), Smite (PC), and Luftrausers (PC, Mac, Linux, PS3, and PS Vita).

Experience

When I play Magic I don’t talk trash. I’ll happily engage in banter with an opponent, especially during the early turns of a draft event. But if that guy starts talking or they need to focus I shut my mouth immediately and try to give nothing about the board state away. I want to influence their play as little as possible. There’s none of that in Hearthstone. I shout, challenge, jeer, and get pretty rowdy about things overall. I can’t count the number of times I’ve played my win condition while bellowing, ‘CAN YOU DIG IT!?’ There’s something about the anonymity of the game over the web and the fact that I’m not face to face with someone that bring out my inner hooligan.

Gameplay

Hearthstone is a class-based collectible card game. You and your opponent each start with 30 health and your goal is to reduce their’s to zero by playing and attacking them with minions and playing spells. Each class has cards unique to them but there’s also a pool of generic cards that any class can use, which makes each class feel uniquely their own. Each class also comes with a hero power that costs 2 mana and does something simple such as the Ranger’s Steady Shot which deals 2 damage to the enemy hero. Each deck is composed of 30 cards with no more than 2 copies of each card in it so once you’ve seen your opponent cast those 2 fireballs, you know they’re fresh out.

Naturally the classes are the World of Warcraft classes.

Unlike Magic there are no land cards to produce mana. Each hero’s max mana supply simply increases by one and refills every turn. Also unlike MTG you cannot play cards on your opponent’s turn — there are no instant speed effects, only sorceries [This guy would like that kind of game]. The closest things are secrets which are cards that trigger under certain circumstances. Such as the Paladin’s Noble sacrifice which will bravely jump in the way of an opponents attacking minion and take the blow instead. Further unlike MTG there are no phases, you can play cards and attack with minions interchangeably during your turn. Minions also have a health total that does not restore in between turns so they’ll eventually wear down over frequent attacks.

Now that the lecture is out of the way you can start playing. Every day you’ll get new quests which earn you gold which you can spend on packs, rounds at the Arena where you build a deck out of randomly generated cards, or Solo Adventures.

The Gush

Hearthstone is a free to play game and I would say that its micro-transactions are quite tame. You can purchase packs of cards or single player adventures with in game money or real world cash. The single player adventures are a little pricey at 700 gold per area — the gold purchase is sadly only available in one semi-hidden menu — or 20 dollars for the whole thing. It’s totally possible to get everything in the game without spending any real world money, and quite attainable at that. I’ve been playing for two years, have not spent a single penny, and I’m able to construct a decent deck.

The packs pseudo-random distribution is really interesting. Every pack is guaranteed to have a rare level card in it, every so many packs is guaranteed to have an epic card, and every so many packs is guaranteed to have a legendary card in it. There’s no guarantee that you won’t get extra copies but then you can break them down into dust which can be crafted into other cards you do want. You can even break down all the cards for a class that you never play in order to create cards for the classes that you do.

The single player adventures are simply fun. They all do very interesting things to warp the game or alter the rules in some sort of way. Such as having you play a unique class or having your opponent steal your deck — make an awful deck and watch him struggle.

Have you ever missed an ‘at the beginning of your upkeep ability’ in MTG? Or forgotten an ability that you can’t opt out of? Never again says Hearthstone. Because those systems are automated, there’s no room for that kind of human error.

This also creates ease in bizarre systems, like replacing your character with a demon lord.

If the solo adventures don’t strike your fancy or are out of your price range then Hearthstone’s still got you covered with the Tavern Brawl. A special way to play the game is presented every week with new rules or stipulations. Sometimes the players team up to defeat a boss minion or maybe you must construct your deck of 15 of two different cards. Also, if you win, you get a free pack! FREE STUFF!

The attention to detail is top notch and keen. Certain cards will have different aesthetic elements when played against or alongside certain other heroes or minions. For example, if you play Illidan Stormrage while Mal’Furion Stormrage is your opponent his dialogue will change. Every play board also has things on it that you can fiddle with when you’re waiting for your opponent to make his move.

The Kvetch

You may have just started playing and you’re looking at your cards and you’re brewing up a brand new deck but it’s probably just going to lose a lot. There’s these little things called the meta-game and dominant strategy. A lot of players — or bots — have figured out what is the, statistically, most powerful deck. And then they’ve spent enough money to get every card they need to support this deck. Worse yet, in ranked play they can lower their rank by conceding repeatedly until they hit rock bottom and start smashing the newbies in a new meteoric rise. I’m just tired of facing top tier decks at low ranks when I just wanna have silly fun with my Druid Murloc deck.

As far as I’m concerned The Arena is black magic and the people who are good at it are literal wizards. Arena is most analogous to MTG’s draft format. You choose one of three random available classes and then build a deck by choosing one from 30 sets of three random cards. Then you go up against opponents until you lose three times. Then you’re awarded prizes for every victory you racked up. Rewards like gold cards, crafting dust, packs, and gold. The implementation is great, I must say.I’m just so consistently bad I had to complain.

Pictured is a literal wizard’s Arena winning.

Occasionally cards will not interact in the way that you expect them to. If you’ve got 2 secrets that trigger at the same action, which one goes off first, do they both go off? Hell if I know. And that not knowing means that I can’t plan or strategize.

The Verdict

One of my major problems with Magic the Gathering is the pedigree. There are so many old cards that don’t fit with modern design sensibilities or are otherwise worth so much money that it acts like an incredibly high barrier to entry to certain formats.Hearthstone dodges all of these things by learning from MTG’s mistakes and being a pretty new game with no 500 dollar cards that you need to be competitive. It’s digital automation makes it much more difficult for someone to cheat on purpose or on accident. It’s also a much simpler game subjected to a different kind of RNG — never get mana screwed again but who knows what you’re Unstable Portal will produce. In short, it’s a damn fine card game that requires no previous knowledge of the World of Warcraft or experience with collectible card games. Oh yeah… and it’s free.

Next Week: The Consuming Shadow

Deus Ex: Human Revolution (Mac, PC, PS3, XBox 360, and WiiU)

It is 2024, the future of humanity is now. Rapid technological breakthroughs have made human cybernetic augmentations commonplace. These grant augmented individuals superior, strength, stamina, and cognitive abilities. Unfortunately, something in the human body causes them to reject their augmentations requiring a synthetic drug to keep the limbs functioning — and preventing massive amounts of pain.

You play as Adam Jensen, security chief for Sarif Industries. Sarif is one of the major providers of augmentations and, the most popular anti-rejection drug, Neuropozyne. Sarif HQ is attacked by paramilitary operatives, major scientists are kidnapped, and Jensen is left broken and battered after a run in with a powerful augmented individual. Not much of him is salvageable and to save his life Sarif has to replace his legs, arms, lungs, eyes, portions of his brain, and portions of his torso — they do throw in some cool sunglasses prosthetics, so that’s a plus.

Six months later, Jensen returns to service but there are still few leads concerning the attack. He must use his augmentations to do whatever it takes to rescue the kidnapped scientists — one of which is his girlfriend because they have to throw in a heavy emotional attachment or he won’t care apparently — and figure out what happened to them. The whole while he must grapple with his, perceived or real, loss of humanity.

History

Deus Ex: Human Revolution was developed by Eidos Montreal and published by Square Enix. The original Deus Ex was developed by Ion Storm and spearheaded by studio founder Warren Spector. It produced a sequel known as Invisible War and Spector left afterward. In his absence the studio floundered for two years, gaining no real headway in creating a series sequels until Eidos Interactive shut the studio down in 2005.

Development on Human Revolution began in 2007 with the formation of Eidos Montreal. The leaders of the team began by reading up on what Cyberpunk actually is. The new team contained no members of Ion Storm so many of them had to play the original Deus Ex to determine what should stay and what should go.

Deus Ex: Human Revolution was released in August 2011. It’s competition was Bastion (PC and XBLA), Limbo (PC), and Duke Nukem Forever (PC, Mac, PS3, Xbox 360).

Experiences

In real life being moral is its own reward. Someone who does good things in the EXPECTATION of being rewarded isn’t really a good person — getting cookies for doing the right thing is nice but if someone gets mad for not being rewarded then they’re just a jerk. The same goes for any game. Being a good person should be difficult, especially in a world as murder-centric as the cyberpunk dystopia of 2024 Detroit. But here’s the thing, I was TOLD that Deus Ex: Human Revolution rewarded the player for a non-lethal playthrough and that just doesn’t happen. It’s not the game’s fault but this failed expectation tainted the entire experience for me severely.

Bonus XP for knocking guards out is nice but I was told there were solid story changes.

I ended up wasting my time trying to knock out bosses — which is impossible by the way, not that I knew at the time. What really irks me though is that this is a game about player choice. You can play this game how you want and the game will, usually, support your playstyle. There is however one section especially that does not. I spent 40 minutes stuck in a closed arena where I had to non-lethally take out 11 guards and a giant robot attacking a downed chopper. There is no opportunity for stealth, and under pacifist restrictions you probably didn’t bring any heavy, robot-blasting, ordinance. The point being, I was fed some bunkum information by the internet. Combined with previous experiences with the pacifism gameplay differences of the original Deus Ex created a cloud of frustration that really tinged the rest of the game.

Gameplay

Deus Ex: Human Revolution is a first person shooter RPG with stealth elements where you can play your way. Longing for the days of the Thief series of games? Be a sneaky bastard. Just wanna shoot things? This title’s got you covered. No matter what path you choose — and sometimes for finding intricate solutions — Jensen will get experience points. Every 5000 XPs Jensen will get a Praxis point which he can spend making his augmentations more powerful. Like giving him the ability to run faster or the ability to breath toxic gasses — Just remember, it’s a good idea to keep Praxis points in reserve so Jensen can adapt quickly to a new and unexpected problem.

Do you need everything? No. Can you get it? Yes!

The game has a relatively rote quest structure within hub world maps. The big boss will give Jensen a job and then en route a series of hard up locals will ask a complete stranger, Jensen, to help them with their problems. Naturally, people you’ve helped out will reward Jensen in some way, at the very least with XP but sometimes with rare items or information.

The Gush

The thing that really kept me going through the game, no matter how frustrated I got, were the social encounters. Every so often Jensen can try to talk his way into what he wants using logic and other debate tactics to run verbal circles around his adversaries. A certain augment will give the player more information about the character, or you can derive it from their actions or e-mail messages. I am a huge fan of arguing, using friendly prattle to reach a mutual conclusion, so I really enjoyed being able to do that in a game. There’s nothing like using verbal sparring to render a foe into humble silence.

Check their profile and then choose your tactic, it’s time for a battle of wits!

The Cyberpunk atmosphere is really on point. Instead of seeing things from the downtrodden rebel’s point of view, like most cyberpunk media, Jensen is in an elevated and corporate position. Although, I admit, it’s still a story of defiance it’s a unique take on the Cyberpunk genre.

Everything gives Jensen experience and I do mean everything — pick your nose, I’m sure there are a few XP up there. Finding secret areas, sneaking around, and hacking all provide enough XP to build a decent Jensen.

Some of my favorite quests in the game were the detective quests. Jensen needs to find enough evidence to figure out what happened or whodunnit. There’s something exhilerating about searching a room for clues and then crafting the correct narrative for the crime.

And there are a lot of sidequests to boot.

The Kvetch

For a game that lets you play the game your way the boss fights are all gunplay. The Director’s Cut introduces advanced tactics but I didn’t play the Director’s Cut and don’t want to shell out ten dollars for a game that should have been released complete or patched. It’s baffling that they would create encounters that render certain skill-sets useless, especially against such a powerful foe.

I think it’s time to retire the Illuminati as a thing in media. When was the last time you heard a story in which the Illuminati being revealed was a cool thing — personally, the last time I saw the Illuminati implemented well was in The Secret World so good on them. Whenever a story writer needs a secret society to be evil, have near infinite wealth, and influence they’re go to is always the Illuminati. There are tons of conspiracies out there, there had to be one that fit this setting more. Maybe they could have just come up with a new one.

The melee take-downs in this game are visually and viscerally satisfying. It’s a pity that they consume a resource that has a really slow recharge cooldown. At least there’s a taser but it can only carry one shot at a time and is also resource dependent. The point being there’s no ammo-less melee weapon. Can I please just throw a rock, or have a punch, or a baton or something? I have metal fists, even if I don’t have a take-down in reserve I could still grind someone down with punches while they shoot me — I can take it, my robo-heart gives me regenerating health. Sadly, the solution instead is to hide behind a table or something like a total jackass until Jensen’s kung-fu energy recharges.

I’m not sure why the lethal take down is an option. Unconscious guards cannot be roused.

The Verdict

I do not have in recent memory a more frustrating game that I finished. The side-quests were much more satisfying than the main story. The gunplay may be grand but being bound to the moral high-road meant I got to use lethal weapons twice. The point is, if this sounded cool to you then get the Director’s Cut, it’s on Steam for 20 dollars. There’s no way to get the normal version anymore so you guys can get the TRUE experience. At this point, I don’t care to.

Next Week: Hearthstone