ewokskick

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Posts posted by ewokskick

  4. Posted

    I read this book awhile ago so my memory on it might not be perfect, but I remember liking it pretty well.  I think I would enjoy it more today as the questions from the book resonate more and more with the things I think about in my life today.  I am spoiler tagging the rest even though I think nothing I say would ruin anyone's experience with the book, I'd rather not presume.

     

    I am an environmental geographer and have been studying environmental justice lately and it keeps making me think that the questions in this book are not very different from those we make in our environment everyday.  In order to provide the comfort of our modern food system, for example, we tolerate levels of exposure to fumigants and pesticides that we know cause cancer and other negative health outcomes.  Epigenetics are telling us that these decisions may not just effect those workers but may impact their descendants for generations through changes to the methylation process (the process which activates genes).  So, when I reflect on the deeply human story of those people destined to die for someone else, I can't help but think of the parallels to our modern society.

     

    I don't want to get too far into the academic weeds, but it's a story that perfectly tragically captures what Foucault's concept of "biopower."  For Foucault, power is not only expressed by power over whether one lives or dies (and this is still a theme of the book), but also of the power to define life itself.  Much of the book focuses (from what I remember) on the great lengths through which the bodies of the character are controlled through formal and informal authorities.  I like how well the book captures biopower as the ability "to make live and let die," but also looks at the mechanisms of that power in a very personal way.  I think it's a novel that has quite a bit to teach us and in some ways holds up and uncomfortable mirror to the social structures of our own society.

     

    I look forward to hearing your thoughts on the book, especially since it will be much fresher for you two.

  5. Posted

    i'm loving it. it's like the sunday magazine section of the times

    Great analogy.

     

    On the topic of Valve and the steam frontpage:

     

    I think the steam remake and their horrible curators system made it so hard to discover games on the site.  Before the frontpage was basically new games, top sellers, and things on sale.  It meant that developers could put their games on sale and guarantee some level of exposure.  Now, my front page has slim downed versions of those things and a number of recommendations based on curators.  Unfortunately, the curators I would be interested in don't really update that often and the people who do update regularly have incredibly mainstream taste like Total Biscuit (for example, he recommended a visual novel, but with this caveat "A visual novel rather than a game").  So, how does a company like Arcen games get to the front page to be discovered?  They either have to sell well, release a new game or appeal to the taste of handful of white dudes who control the front page.

     

    Personally, I hate the change.  I used to discover unique games on steam.  Now, I only find interesting game elsewhere and go to steam to buy them.  The frontpage wasn't great before, but now it is basically the iOS store of PC.  It's just useless unless you wanted to find the best selling games.  It's a system that makes it easy to be a make release, but very hard to an indie release.  It's nearly impossible to be a company that makes interesting mid-level games in the system because there is just no way to find sustained exposure over time like those games tend to require.

  6. Posted

    Sorry for the double post, but there is one more thing I wanted to weigh in on. In the OP, you say that culture does not influence mechanics, but instead influences content and themes. I want to stongly disagree with this notion. Many mechanics are steeped in cultures. Take for example, the romance mechanics in a bio ware game. They simulate an idealized version of western notions of romance. As social views on non-straight relationships changed, so too have the mechanics of their romance, for example.

    I think the cultural influence on game mechanics probably a bigger factor than most people are aware of because most people never examine their cultural assumptions. If you ask yourself, would these machines look the same if this game was made in a different time or different place, I think the answer would almost always be that they will look different.

  7. Posted

    I've yet to play a city manager (and I've played quite a few) that doesn't completely erase the impact of race on urban development. I'm a geographer with some specialization in urban studies and I find these games almost completely ignore the social factors that impact urban development. They tend to follow more of an "urban ecology" approach that sees cities developing with certain predictable patterns that are largely not influenced by political ecnomy and completely immune to social factors. While I find the games good fun, I do think they reflect a very ingrained and very disastrous view on urban development. It's the same view on cities that has failed to address the huge social inequality that is rampant in our cities. It's complicated to systematize social factors, but from what I've seen no one has even tried. You'd think that the people in the cities have no effect on them if you play those games and it is a shame.

    I will say that the question of politics vs. accuracy seems to be going down the wrong road. I've never seen a system worth modeling that can be completely explained. As is the case with any systematic model, the creators will bring their assumptions to it, even picking what to model is influenced by one's preferences. So, I don't think the path way to apolitical games (why would we want that anyway?) is to fetishize accuracy.

  8. Posted

    That quote you took out is sandwiched between the one I gave and these paragraphs:

     

    In the world of The Witness, solving puzzles is its own reward. While finding a solution will very rarely make a small change in the environment that allows the player to proceed, it will far more commonly just activate the next puzzle to be solved with zero fanfare.

     

    That's not a problem the first time you solve a certain type of puzzle with no instruction and feel like Queen or King Genius of Brilliant Mountain. Those are the revelations. But the sixth, eighth, twelfth time you bash your head against a puzzle for 30 minutes, find a solution and only have the low buzz of the next puzzle screen activating to show for it? That's brutal.

     

    He's clearly talking about the lack of excitement/reward being out of balance with the difficulty.  You can take the whole context of the review into consideration or, you can just pull out the paragraphs about difficulty and be outraged.  Either way, it's truly funny that you read that review and decided he was saying he hates the puzzles for being clever.

  9. Posted

    That Polygon review is kind of irritating. It seems kind of like he knocked the game because the puzzles are so clever that nobody would be able to resist using a walkthrough, which would defeat the entire purpose of playing and experiencing the game. Also, hearing such a bold claim regarding the puzzle difficulty only makes me want to play this more.

     

    I thought he was saying that the game doesn't reward you enough for the frustration.  In fact, that's literally what he said:

     

    But The Witness throws endless puzzles at the player while almost never recognizing their accomplishments, which creates something of an antagonistic relationship between player and creator. I fear that will send players running to walkthroughs faster than they would have in a more rewarding environment.

     

    If you disagree with that, I understand, but I think that's substantially different than saying he doesn't like it for being "so clever." 

  10. Posted

    I loved it.  The dialog and voice acting felt pretty natural.  The mood hit well for me.  It's very unique in the horror genre.  It's occasionally creepy, but mostly the horror is used to explore grief and relationships.  The art was exceptional and the animations were usually good.  By the end of the game, I found navigating the island more tedious than enjoyable.  After awhile, the game requires a lot of backtracking, even more if you want to get all the story items.  Without a fast travel or even a run button navigation felt time consuming for sparse content.  I probably would have given up on finding all the items, but I was still enjoying the ambient music and noise in the game.

     

    Overall, the experience of the game is unique.  The running dialog, great sound/music, and beautiful art make this game really fun to play.  I think it's a game horror fans would like, but it's not "scary" so much as occasionally creepy.  The humor mostly worked giving the game a lot of comedic relief.  I played my 4 hours in one setting, so maybe the repetitive environments from back tracking was especially bad.  The game uses a unique radio mechanic.  One of the main ways you interact with the world is through tuning a portable radio.  It worked pretty well, but I think it's potential wasn't fully tapped.  I'd have liked to see them do a bit more with it.

     

    I'd say that anyone interested in this game will probably like it.

  11. Posted

    A video series with Night School the developer talking about the game:

     

     

    It's amazing when they give you a glimpse of their choice trees and talk about the amount of dialog in the game.

  13. Posted

    I'm sorry if there is already thread on the game, but I searched for "Langeskov" and only the GOTy thread came up.  I thought this game deserved its own discussion.

     

    Before you read on, I highly recommend going to steam and playing it.  It's free and takes about half and hour to 20 minutes and is by a designer who worked on The Stanley Parable and his team.  It's voiced by English comedian Simon Amstell.  Some minor spoilers below, and since it is short and free you should honestly just play it before reading the discussion. 

     

    It's another entry into the now common games-about-games genre.  However, I think it has a fairly unique take on it.  It's game fiction doesn't care about experience of a developer (e.g. The Beginner's Guide or The Magic Circle) and isn't really about the experience of a player in the game (e.g. The Stanley Parable).  Instead it's more playful.  It treats the game as a kind-of live theater performance where the player is trying to run the back stage systems in the wake of a strike over unsafe work conditions.  The game is fun and fast.  It's a concept that is executed well and doesn't overstay its welcome.

     

    I played the game thinking it was an actual heist game.  I had briefly dug into the ARG that crowcrowcrow ran before its release which set-up the heist.  So, the game instantly taking a 180 on me sort of surprised me.  I was worried that the designer was just retreading old territory, but I think this game brought something different to the table.  It's a game that seems to value humor above all else.  In The Stanley Parable, I thought it's humor was meant to be also be a commentary on game choice.  This game seems to be more of a fun lark.  I recommend it to anyone.

     

    What are your thoughts?  What deeper meaning am I missing?  Is it just silly fun?

  20. Posted

    I am really bad at using bombs.  I mostly use them to get other items.  I rarely use them offensively, unless I get an item that makes it extra appealing.  I think it is a flaw in my kills at the moment.

     

    As far as keys go, I rarely use them on a store room unless I have a lot of keys or have an obejective.  If I have 15 gold, I'll check to see if I get some good item.  If I need HP or or a bomb, I might open it.  Otherwise, I try to save my keys for either the double key bonus rooms later or a key feeding boy.

  23. Posted

    Interesting! Do you happen to know (or were you able to flip between modes to see) if the mouths move more than in the original?

     

    I did not try it in the other mode.  I will say that the user interface feels much improved.  They've simplified the verb-guessing a little bit.  When you select an object it limits the number of possible verbs.  Even on the console with a controller it didn't feel too awkward.  I'll always recommend playing an adventure game with a mouse, but it still felt okay with the playstation controller.

  25. Posted

    Oh, I also played Outer Wilds.  It seems like a very cool exploration game.  I was just exploring a planet and quickly found a way to take off and all of a sudden I was exploring a solar system.  It had a nice balance of relaxing moments and moments of wonder.