plasticflesh

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Posts posted by plasticflesh

  3. Posted

    Just finished. Short, sure, but I very much enjoyed it. I really enjoyed the AR time interface. Very "Last Express" like.

     

    Post game spoiler discussion:

    Spoiler

    I was genuinely attached to, and thus worried for, the crew. I was even attached to their relationship statuses, and was thus worried about the Cluey Dog intrigue. That part of the plot resolving in the last minute I really enjoyed, as well as the role of the player character.

     

    Was really excited to say hi to Minny between capsules.  Best supporting cast. 

     

    Who opened the Odin compartment?

     

    Less spoiler-full discussion on this technique of story telling:

    Spoiler

    I often feel this "Theme Park Ride" style of story telling, where you are led through vignettes of the story one scene at a time, slightly breaks my immersion. Gone Home, BioShock, Half Life, etc all share a sort of style where you experience the narrative in a sort of linear path through the world, gating your entry to later sections of the world and thus, the story. I completely understand why it is done this way from practical programming aspect, of crafting a sense of advancement through the story, of containing the scope of programming the world, and limiting the possibility space that needs to be bug checked and scripted. But it often forces certain decisions into the physical architecture of the place itself. Would certain hallways exist if the play didn't need to advance through the story in a certain order. 

     

    Not that I've played it, but Her Story might be the most non-linear application of game narrative? In that the player can in a sense access any part of game at any time? The narrative in that game is gated by your knowledge of search term keywords. So in this sense the game architecture is a conceptual one of knowledge.

     

    I suppose those are the two main ways of keeping the reader in suspense, limiting their knowledge of events as in a murder mystery or thriller. And limiting their access to conceptual evidence, or physical evidence. At least, in stories where the reader has no ways of interacting with the world besides interpreting it.

     

  5. Posted

    Started Tacoma last night.

     

    I really like the Minny AI in Amy's space car. I wish that was the main AI character. (but what the heck is up with the plywood in Amy's space car enclosing ambiguous AI hardware? Will this be explained later?)

     

    Otherwise, as I get into the game, both in story content and audio-log-interaction, I get vibes of SOMA. Good vibes. 

  6. Posted

    Absolver: Well I haven't finished the end boss yet, but I got there so I consider that finished enough. Cool game, slightly Soul Caliber style fighting meets Dark Souls exploration.  The skill acquiring system is interesting. Making combo decks is sort of obtuse and took some stumbling around to understand. Interesting punchy stuff.

     

    Spoiler-like caveats:

    Spoiler

    World map, while dense and very able to get lost in, which is very cool. Is about the size of 2 areas in a Dark Souls game.  I got to the end boss and wondered, "what will be next?" But that was the end. That's OK. It keeps the PVP in a dense area. I do wish the plus shaped 1v1 arena was in the world somewhere. 

     

  8. Posted

    On 9/21/2017 at 10:37 AM, Henke said:

    Freeways, by Desert Golfing-dev Justin Smith. I picked up the iPad version when it came out earlier this week and blazed through it in a few days. It's all about designing intersections. Your score is calculated by measuring average car speed divided by concrete used. Perhaps the most addictive game I've played this year, it's got a real "just one more intersection!" quality to it. It's a mere 3 bucks and available for Windows or Android/iOS tablets. Highly recommended! :tup:

     

    https://captaingames.itch.io/freeways

     

    I've been enjoying this game based on this recommendation. It has all the joy of "cities: skylines" without the pesky budget or city to build. Just the puzzle of traffic management. I've been rushing to finish my world so I can compare it to yours, Henke. Because if I do look at your solutions, I'll never be able to un-see them. One thing I realize is that I'm wont to replicate the highways of New Jersey, which involves a lot of jug-handles and overpasses. My rush-jobs often devolve into a lot of terrible noodle solutions, or fractured tangle of intersections. Which is pretty realistic for New Jersey. Good game.

     

    I also recently completed Steam World Dig 2, which pretty good. I swear I also finished the first game but I don't recall the Vectron sequence at all. Strange. I still think "Miner: Dig Deep" has the most pure 2D mining mini game experience, if only because there's no fast travel to the surface beside building a network of elevators. Escaping your own Blight Town is the whole fun of the mining gameplay loop. Edit, oh whoops, it does have some fast travels.

  9. Posted

    Weird food:

    As a seven year old I would eat "peanut butter, butter, honey, and cheese" sandwiches. This was invented when I wouldn't eat anything while staying with my mother at Cub Scout camp she was working at. Some how I ate this combonation of food stuffs, and it became a staple of my diet through elementary school. I do not consider returning to it.

     

    Violators:

    The water-mark icon of a channels on the lower right side of the screen is often called a "bug". My favorite is when the bugs pile up over each other as footage is aired and re-aired from other sources. wiki refers to it as a more euphemized name. 

     

    I wonder if there's an equivalent of a podcast sponsorship advertisement violator? :P

  15. Posted

    My only problem with the every body is a Tulpa argument is that lodge spirits, such as Tulpas and Dopplegangers, don't seem to have corporeal bodies that follow normal earth rules. Mr C regenerates every time he dies, and confirmed Tulpas like Dougie Jones and Tulpa Diane warp out of existence when they get murdered. I'd absolutely love to believe that Darya and Ray Munroe are Tulpas conjured by Buella and her wizards. But they die human deaths with lingering mortal coil bodies and had communication with the FBI before they emerged from "back there".

  16. Posted

     

    Last week I picked up Dragon Quest Builders on the PS4 and I love it. It has the griddy detail of Minecraft but a lot of the grind is taken out. So gameplay focuses on just tweaking your build, and resource gathering. A bunch of NPCs populate your town as you build. The main quest seems meaty, and progresses in a quest - mob fight - quest - boss fight structure. It's split into 4 chapters in different biomes where you build a new castle hamlet in each biome. Then you unlock the free mode. It's basically Hyrule Town Simulator, the game. Including knock off music of all the Zelda Snes music. I'm all in on this. Casual, cute, creative, contemplative.

     

     

  17. Posted

    This isn't exactly the right place to post this, but the shared appeal is obvious: I've been playing Dragon Quest Builders on PS4 the past few days, I enjoy it well enough. The main story is a bit of a very long tutorial / story / adventure / puzzle to unlock the free build mode. I enjoy the games emphasis on building a town for a collection of characters. Unfortunately it seems like its bound to Paystation and Nintendo consoles, nary a PC release.

  18. Posted

    @BonusWavePilot I guess in that reading, for Carrie not responding to Laura's existence would be explained by repression. It does make it strange that Carrie would be so eager to hop on board with the alleged FBI man to escape the situation in her apartment. The Diane and Coop crossing over into Richard and Linda does just beg a super natural read.

     

    The vortex that Gordon investigates seems to be in the front yard of the house of Carrie Page... even though that house is in Odessa Texas and not South Dakota.  The 430 miles location of the cross over point is very visually similar to the strip of highway that Mr C flips his car over on, and that Cooper looks onto from the red room. The vortex point that has only one use that I can see of is the one that immolates Richard Horne. But that could potentially be the way that Jerry Horne got to Wyoming, naked.

  19. Posted

    @BonusWavePilot that is a fair assessment on that article making too many assumptions. I agree on the Jiao Dai explanation being the ultimate evil to thesis of the show.

     

    I spoke with a friend today and he had a simpler and less paranormal theory about the ending. That it was the same world, but just one where Laura Palmer creates a new name for herself as Carrie Paige. But is still re-enacting trauma because Cooper intervened before the murder, but after the years of trauma.

     

    I guess if they really wanted it to be real life, RR Diner would be Twede's Cafe. Although Twede's does close at like 4pm, so it does track that it'd be closed at the time they passed by. (edit, it's 8am to 8pm, but I visited on Labor Day so it closed at 4pm)

     

  23. Posted

    So now to respond to the podcast's take on "evil" and "good" coop not being truly an evil or good coop. There is the Jungian psychology concept of "the shadow self" which is not good or evil, but is the aspects of a self or identity that an individual's ego does not accept or does not see utility in. So it shoves those aspects into "the shadow".

     

    This I feel is legit read because episode two ends with a song that relies heavily on lyrics about "my shadow," this is also the episode that hammers home the Doppleganger existence.

  24. Posted

    Just now, pabosher said:

    kinda see where this is coming from, except we don't see any suggestion of BOB in Richard, but he's definitely there in BadCoop.

    I agree it's not an air tight read in that form. But if I extrapolate.... it could be that Richard goes through the Judy world and ends up in the red room and Dale Coopers doppelganger at the end of season 2, merging with Bob there.