There's no method to the madness.

• 19Dec 09

  Have blogs on GameSpot taken away from the discussion on GGD?

  I was thinking about how there are relatively few regulars that post new topics to GGD, they either link to news or just respond to what topics other users bring up, and I wonder if the reason is due to journals being a feature on GameSpot. I mean, if I recall, a lot of what used to be posted on GGD was fairly personal in nature; one person would be playing through a game that was a couple years old, and they'd relate their experiences in a GGD post. Now, that sort of thing usually ends up with a blog post. I do having a blog, but I wonder if we're making a mistake by putting our game-related experiences on our blogs instead of the game boards.
  
  I'm starting to think I should reserve my blog for rants, and post anything game-related thoughts to GGD.

  • Posted Dec 19, 2009 1:25 pm PT
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• 14Dec 09

  The Bs: Batman and Beatles.

  I picked up these two games at once, and I must say that they're both highly impressive in their own ways.
  
  The situtation is this with Rock Band; I bought the original when the PS2 version was on sale, but later when I bought the PS3, I found out the instruments, but not the game were compatible, so I have not delved too deeply into the formula. Granted, I have played Guitar Hero I and II fairly extensively, but what's nice about this one is that I really like the whole track list. The Beatles strayed into a wide variety of musical territory, but what they had, beside their basic musical genuity, was accessibility. It's hard not to like them whether the song is blues, do-wop pop, a pre-cursor to hard rock or psychedelic rock. I'm also starting to make the transition from normal to hard on guitar... a perilous transition, due to the sheer mind-twisting power of relocating your hand on the frets, but I think the reported reduced difficulty of this one has helped. If I can master hard on Beatles, I can probably survive it on other ones. Singing is fun, though it's hard to find the middle ground between the way I want to sing, and the way the game wants me to sing it.
  
  Batman is an intelligent simulation of being in Batman's shoes. It casually integrates stealth, brawling, puzzle-solving, exploration and the moody atmosphere in the series so naturally that it's hard to believe it's taken this long to bring a truly excellent Batman game out. I remember being indifferent to the first trailer, which to my eye, made it look like a standard brawler with above-average visuals. The strength of the game is that it underplays the action; you will spend as much time exploring and sneaking as you will fighting hand to hand. Oh, and the writing and acting is surprisingly decent; the strength of the game is that you actually feel like you're filling Batman's shoes in their entirety. Also, the writing and acting are surprisingly decent, letting you really sink into the role. Batman himself is a little stiffly acted, but most of the time, he doesn't get in the way.
  
  As an aside, I beat the original Uncharted today. Fun game, but not special. Unsurprising coming from Naughty Dog. They are still making the same stupid mistakes with poor checkpoint design. There are definitely some frustrating sections. It's the game equivalent of a mindless, summer blockbuster. But in this industry's absence of games both interactive and emotionally deep, that's about as complicated as games get I suppose. I'm a little lukewarm on jumping into Uncharted 2, simply because I do not trust Naughty Dog to do anything particularly impressive, regardless of what accolades critics and fans throw their way. They're highly derivate and usually create games with unwieldly difficulty curves and bland stories. For some odd reason, I keep buying their games; I have a Crash game, bought two Jak games and completed the third during a rental, and bought Uncharted (I think for a lack of ideas of what else to buy with my PS3). I think I'll finish up Persona 3 (I think I'm... eighty five hours in? The end is nigh for that one.), and maybe Devil Survivor, then go after a few other RPGs. The sooner I beat some of my role-playing games, the sooner I can justify Dragon Age.

  • Posted Dec 14, 2009 4:54 pm PT
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• 15Oct 09

  Hey, that videogame stole my name!

  http://www.gamespot.com/xbox360/puzzle/lucidity/review.html
  
  Who knew that Lucidity would be someone that another human being would think of as a good title for a videogame?
  
  I don't suppose this really affects me, but it was certainly jarring to see a 5.5, of all possible scores, next to the title of my pet concept.

  • Posted Oct 15, 2009 9:29 am PT
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