Pathologic

[Duncan]

Everyone should read this

http://www.eurogamer.net/article.php?article_id=67124

I don't know. I don't think I've ever wanted to play an apparently mediocre game more.

[miffy495]

That is a damn convincing review. Sounds brilliant.

[Roderick]

I must scoop this up when I find it in the bin!

[Twilo]

Hmmm!

That does actually sound interesting. Some of the stuff in the review reminds me of Jeff Vandermeer's Ambergris stories. More postmodernism in games is a good thing.

[castorp]

I'm sold. Sounds interesting.

[MrHoatzin]

Eurogamer is the only site that can sell me a bad game--but not only sell me, but have me going out of my way, far and wide, to find that bad game.

[Erkki]

Sounds like Omikron: The Nomad Soul. That game was also a deeply broken, but at the same time somehow totally drew me into its world. And also had some meta-references.

I think I'll buy this game if I see it.

[edit]I just also read the Boiling Point review by Kieron Gillen that was mentioned in the pathologic review. He gave it not 2, but 3 different scores: 9/10 for awesomeness, 3/10 for buginess and finally 8/10. I think I might get this after I finish Oblivion. I noticed it in the local store almost every time but never bothered to read a review

[Wrestlevania]

I think I might get [Boiling Point after I finish Oblivion.

You'll need a bleeding edge PC just to get even a modest frame rate out of the game; the 3D engine is appalling.

Oblivion runs smoothly enough on my system and is quite playable, but Boiling Point ran at approximately one frame every 10-15 seconds in places during the opening sequences. I couldn't move from the spot where the game actually spawned me to begin play either, because of catastrophic levels of slow-down. I did try the official patch, but that had no apparent effect on framerates whatsoever.

Oh and it also has possibly the most annoying installer I've ever come across, which blasts out a spectacularly shite theme tune over and over whilst the game takes an age to install.

The whole experience made my piss quickly reach boiling point... but the game still sounds fantastic (in principle).

[Wrestlevania]

"WITHE FWOM YOUR GWAVE!"

Seeing as Rock, Paper, Shotgun continue to bang the drum for Pathologic, I'm interested to know if any Thumbs got around to playing it?

I attempted to last year, but I've had performance issues with my laptop for a long time and only just got around to wiping the thing and starting from scratch with drivers, etc. So I may give Pathologic another go--it wouldn't even run last time.

How about you lot - anyone tried it?

[toblix]

I did the pirate thing with it, knowing I'd not even play it for an hour. Boy was I right. I remember starting inside a theatre and couldn't figure out what to do, and then I talked to some people inside a house.

Anyway, there's no way I'll play this game again. It's killing me, though; both this article here and the review someone linked to earlier was awesome reading. The story, structure and world seems awesome. However, the day I play these kinds of games where there's so much focus on doing timed shit just to be able to play is the day... I don't know, some funny variation on hell freezing over. I know it adds to the atmosphere of fear and whatever that you actually have to eat and stay alive, but this kind of constant pressure kills my heart into dead pieces.

Into the Blue is a perfect example of this: I usually try to experience everything when playing a game. I go everywhere and try every little thing. In Into the Blue, however, there was this fucking eating and drinking business, and no matter what you were doing OMG YORE HUNGRY AND TIRED AND THE GILR IS ABOT TO DIE HURRY BACK! There was no "checkpoint" where I could feel "safe" again. No matter what I did I had to wonder, "am I going to have to restart the game after this?"

So, with Pathologic, it's like Dead Rising to the max. Quests and shit going on everywhere, and you have to show up at the right time. It's like a simulation of the stressful life I've dedicated my life to never having to live. I'm more into the pattern of increasing feeling of risk up to a point, then you're home free, and repeat, not the one where you start playing and then tension mounts until your heart explodes.

[Wrestlevania]

There are a lot of seeds for Pathologic at the moment, so I managed to nab it quickly over the course of this afternoon. And, rather satisfyingly, it actually runs this time!

Haven't properly played it yet, just checked that it works OK, but it's got a definite style none-the-less. The intro and incidental texts so far are interesting enough.

[Nachimir]

I'm sold, I have to get this.

Dunno how I'll react - I loved Stalker, but still haven't gone back to dead rising. The setting just sounds amazing though.

The cultural differences emerging in playing and developing games are fascinating. Everything in Western games has to be "fair and balanced", newbies protected, etc. In Chinese MMOs people will just grief and grief and grief a newbie until they can't play anymore and it's just viewed as a fact of life. Games like this and Stalker too have a kind of harshness not present in many Western games.

I wonder just how much of the content at GDC is (unknowingly) not about game design, but about game design for Western markets?

[melmer]

Remake kickstarter

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1535515364/pathologic

 

Did anyone play it? Worth a punt?

 

upon further reading i don't think this is for me :-/

[twmac]

I got drunk and dropped 200 dollars on the Kickstarter (I seem to remember mentioning this in a separate thread)

 

I guess we are going to find out as it just got funded.

[Bjorn]

I got drunk and dropped 200 dollars on the Kickstarter (I seem to remember mentioning this in a separate thread)

 

 

Yeah, there's another Pathologic thread. You weren't just imagining that in a drunken stupor.