Trip Hazard

I read a Ray Bradbury collection recently and one story called The City creeped me out especially. It's only about 10 pages long so worth checking out. I read Richard Matheson's Hell House last year, and that's all about the visceral scare. Supernatural events occur with regularity and usually have a pleasing physicality to them. There's nothing very surprising about it, but it scratched an itch I had for a very blatant shocker. Last week I read Susan Hill's The Woman in Black, having recently enjoyed both the BBC version from the 80s and the modern one with Harry Potter getting shat up every five seconds. It was essentially a good read, *solid*, y'know, but (oddly, I thought) much tamer than either filmed version. If I were feeling charitable I'd say it were more subtle, but I just wanted more spooky bits.

It seems that, after a mere 7 hours, I've given up on Dragon Age: Origins. I picked a mage at the start but my powers don't seem to have much punch to them and I don't know the best way to set up my party to make them more effective at keeping baddies away from me. Can anybody offer any advice? I'm (mostly) enjoying the story and keen to see what happens next, but just find fighting to be such a chore.

I finished Dear Esther a couple of days ago. It only took 70 minutes, but I'm not complaining; if a game goes on for more than about 5 hours I won't finish it. When I was younger I'd finish every game, but now I just have fuck all patience. Anyway, Dear Esther was great. Imaginative and evocative scenery, a haunting soundtrack, and some excellent voice acting. My only complaint is that I was too busy gawping at stuff to fully take in what the narrator was saying to me, and I didn't have subs on - thinking that they would detract from immersion - so I don't have a clue what was going on, really. I'd have liked a journal of some sort so I could refer back, but it's a minor gripe.

I never got his tail either, although I wouldn't have been able to use it with that character so wasn't too bothered. I found Artorias seriously tough to beat the first time I fought him. I'd never be able to stun him when he was charging up and frequently dodge too early. Think it took me about 15 tries (tho I am proud that I did it solo). I just beat him last week with my current dex build, wielding a +15 Great Scythe. Nailed him on my second attempt!

Which one was it?

Oy, always with the chickens, this one

Two hours?! So that's why your score is more than double mine

I really like the pro hud but for that timer. I've decided not to use it until they make that a separate toggle, assuming they ever do.

I ballsed up today's run when I went in the mothership to show my girlfriend how hostile a place it can be. Today it was particularly bad, with an abundance of moving platforms and a quite a lot of ufos to contend with amongst them. I didn't have a bad score by that point though, so wasn't too miffed.

562, 075 points today. I think the most I've had in a daily so far. In spite of that, I was still 100k points short of hammerpants, and he died 3 levels earlier than me! It was greed that was my undoing today, much as it is every day. There were an awful lot of traps in the city of gold, and trying to ghost around them proved too much for me.

God bless that starting jetpack! Thanks to the power of temporary flight (and the Udjat eye), I was able to scour some of the mines, most of the jungles, and most of the ice caves for diamonds. I'm much more confident now at leading the ghost around, and this proved immensely lucrative. I did lose the Ankh in the ice caves because I hadn't realised my shotgun pellets would rebound from a force field, and ultimately died when I went to the alien mothership in the hope of getting more diamonds there. Not a bad run at all for me today, finished with about 440k, I think

Yeah, I hate those guys. I always try to sneak past them when I see them. Yesterday, I had a great run and finally bagged the Big Money achievement, finishing with 565k

Same here, dearth of bombs meant I couldn't get the eye. It didn't matter, because I was being way too reckless in the jungle and jumped in front of a boomerang tribal. Ended just a couple of thousand short of Hammerpants

That is so weird. I thought maybe you still carried the momentum of the shopkeepers throw (despite floating) but it's only when you hit the second wall that you actually lose the hit point.

A pretty generous seed today, quite a few crates and some well-stocked bomb shops to plunder. I got the ankh in the black market, then lost it just one level later when trying to drop a sticky bomb on a shopkeep in a tricky position. Didn't blow myself up, but fell off the ledge into a hail of gunfire. Copped it again when trying to exploit a mine in the ice-caves. Should've listened to the sensible voice inside my head saying "what's the point? It could kill you!" rather than going with "heh, mines are fun when they go boom"

There's neat callback later to one of the signs you may have read whilst stuck in the quicksand. Made me laugh loads, and it's little attention-to-detail gags like that which made Lucasarts the champions of the genre.

I think once you have those scissors the path will be opened, so to speak

In larger, less-directed spaces in adventure games, I find it helpful to break down what I'm trying to achieve. So, right now you'll need a map, a ship and a crew. You already know where your crew are, and if you talk to 'em, it won't be too hard to work out what they want from you. Apols if I'm stating the really obvious, here Have you searched thoroughly around the backstage area? I know I missed a few things there my first time around.

Returned to TBoI recently after not having played it for about a year. It's still great, but I find that if I don't get any damage-up items in the first area I'll usually restart. Just find it a bit tedious pelting tougher enemies in the caves with loads of tears. Also, still can't stand those guys who sprint at you, but can only be damaged from the back. Fatiguing.

Blood meridian is brillo, if you like soul-crushing despair.

I hope they do update it. There have been far too many times when I've launched Dark Souls and GFWL has failed - repeatedly! - to connect. One failure? A nuisance, but I can handle it. More than that? RAGE. Also, and I do feel a bit guilty admitting this, I'd love to chase some Steam 'cheeves

Oof! That is a kick in the balls, BadHat. Who was it you angered? There's a new mechanic where if you kill an NPC, by accident or design (presumably), a gravestone is formed where you'd usually find them and they can be revived temporarily for a certain amount of souls. Not sure how I feel about that. I liked that there was no going back if you'd killed an NPC (you dope)

I think Simon Parkin mentioned that he couldn't kill a particular NPC (a shopkeeper, I believe). Hopefully in the finished product we'll be able to slay anyone and everyone we wish, even if it's a terrible idea

I didn't really assume that she's fat, I just thought she moved around too slowly. Shift to sprint for GH2, plz, and don't even think about putting in a stamina bar.

Is this still The Dig? Are you enjoying it? It passed me by way back when, probably because I was only about 10 when I started playing Lucasarts adventures and it seemed awfully grown-up compared to Sam and Max and Monkey Island. I must say, I can't stand pixel hunting; even one instance of that is likely to make me ditch a game completely. edit: oops, you did enjoy it and I accidentally read an old message thinking it to be the latest one. My bad. double edit: Oh man, I love CoMI. Not my favourite Monkey Island game, but not far behind the second. I remember being really impressed with the graphics and voice acting when I first played it, back when it was released. Still looks great today, of course. Hand-drawn artwork never ages. Glad to hear you knocked Murray into the water, I can never resist doing that