JonCole

Black Friday Deals

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It kind of doesn't matter. If a game isn't worth your time, I don't see why it's important to note the exact degree.

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It kind of doesn't matter. If a game isn't worth your time, I don't see why it's important to note the exact degree.

Totally agreed. In fact, recently Chris Grant over at Joystiq posted a negative review of Left 4 Dead 2 due to problems with the AI director with respect to difficulty, and lots of people were giving him grief because he wasn't giving the graphics, plot, and such their due time.

He made the perfectly reasonable counterargument that if he can't enjoy the game on a fundamental level, why does he have to spend time going through the ridiculous bullet points that some publications (one of particular note being Game Informer) really subscribe to? If you can barely play through a game, why rate it on its replay value? If you spend most of your time at a killscreen, why rate the graphics?

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Agreed. Listening to the GWJ interview with him this week where they were talking about how his review may have been slanted because the 360 version is harder than the PC had me practically screaming at my iPod. "No! Don't go back on your statement! It's valid! IT'S VALID!"

Not enough to make me hate the game, but enough to make me think that something went wrong during production. All his complaints seemed legitimate to me. Whether they bring your opinion of the game down as much as they did his or not is a personal thing, but the complaints stand.

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Also, this may be exclusive to the PC version, but the fact that it is mouse controlled but also on a grid means that everything sticks really awkwardly. If you move your mouse just a little bit, the piece will stay exactly where it is. So you move your mouse a bunch. This results in the piece being about 5 lines on the grid past where you want it to be. By the time you can correct for this, the girl is either dead or really close to being dead. On PC, I'd go so far as to say the controls feel busted as well.

On a personal note, not regarding broken gameplay or controls, but something much more a matter of opinion, my god the game is saccharine. I like cute games. I will defend Wind Waker to no end. I love The Legendary Starfy. I really want to buy A Boy and His Blob. I'm not against things that can melt your heart by any means. That said, Lucidity is trying so damn hard to tug at your cute receptors that it comes off almost as a cynical parody. Too much.

I suspected Lucidity was probably bad because it was done by the Special Edition team, but that's about it. I don't have much interest in playing it.

But... I guess I wanted to say I'm looking forward to you playing A Boy and His Blob, Miffy, because I want to read what you think about it, since I'm on the fence about the game and I think your tastes are somewhat or vaguely similar to mine.

I also really wanted to badly enjoy the original A Boy and His Blob as a kid but the game was insanely difficult and seemed to love to punish you.

AND I HAVE NO BLACK FRIDAY DEALS. I did buy Wii Sports Resort at Target for $40 new last Friday on their sale, but didn't see much else in terms of video games.

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Agreed. Listening to the GWJ interview with him this week where they were talking about how his review may have been slanted because the 360 version is harder than the PC had me practically screaming at my iPod. "No! Don't go back on your statement! It's valid! IT'S VALID!"

Not enough to make me hate the game, but enough to make me think that something went wrong during production. All his complaints seemed legitimate to me. Whether they bring your opinion of the game down as much as they did his or not is a personal thing, but the complaints stand.

There seems to be a real lack of credible professional criticism these days (either that or I'm looking in the wrong places). I was just recently thinking of how I was spoiled by Amiga Power back in the day. These days there isn't a voice I feel I can trust like I did them (even if I didn't always agree).

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I'm sad that the Steam sale is over. I got the Monkey Island remake, some casual game for my sister and was hoping for cheap Torchlight.

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Are you seriously saying you're thinking of not buying a game because it's too "cute"?

All games looked rather cute back in the day of 2D gaming, game only got "uncute and manly" when the PSOne came out! :oldman:

Mega Man, Sonic, Mario, Link, Commander Keen and so many others were adorable and still are today... But now it's unmanly to admit it so we convince ourselves they aren't...:shifty:

*goes back to unicorn tea party*

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Picked up Odious Tea on amazon for $30 (plus a $10 credit to bring it down to $20). Man, this game is suprisingly cool so far! I'm about 2 hours in, and it's already my favorite Halo campaign. Love the narrative, music, open-world-esque nature of the levels, and of course, the return of the magnum. :tup:

Also grabbed Far Cry 2 off Steam for $10, only to see it in Best Buy on Sunday for $5. :hmph:

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Are you seriously saying you're thinking of not buying a game because it's too "cute"?

All games looked rather cute back in the day of 2D gaming, game only got "uncute and manly" when the PSOne came out! :oldman:

Mega Man, Sonic, Mario, Link, Commander Keen and so many others were adorable and still are today... But now it's unmanly to admit it so we convince ourselves they aren't...:shifty:

*goes back to unicorn tea party*

Wait, what? I specifically said I love cute games. Lucidity's problem is not that it's cute, but that it's entirely textbook cute. As if they looked at things people thought are cute and said "right, do that." As a result, though the graphics are stylized in a way to evoke "awww" responses, and the narrative is as well, all told it comes off as a cynical marketing cuteness rather than a genuine wish to make a game with a heartwarming style. Obnoxiously cute may be the right term, but it leads to confusion where it may be read as "so cute it's obnoxious." What I mean is "cute in a way which is also obnoxious."

And Syntheticgerbil, I'll probably be waiting until after christmas to get ABAHB, just in case someone gives it to me. My birthday is a week before as well, so I pretty much just can't buy things in December on the off chance a relative or the girlfriend goes for it.

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Wait, what? I specifically said I love cute games. Lucidity's problem is not that it's cute, but that it's entirely textbook cute. As if they looked at things people thought are cute and said "right, do that." As a result, though the graphics are stylized in a way to evoke "awww" responses, and the narrative is as well, all told it comes off as a cynical marketing cuteness rather than a genuine wish to make a game with a heartwarming style. Obnoxiously cute may be the right term, but it leads to confusion where it may be read as "so cute it's obnoxious." What I mean is "cute in a way which is also obnoxious."

And Syntheticgerbil, I'll probably be waiting until after christmas to get ABAHB, just in case someone gives it to me. My birthday is a week before as well, so I pretty much just can't buy things in December on the off chance a relative or the girlfriend goes for it.

Ooooh! Okay... I'm not the kind of person who could ever find anything so cute it's obnoxious, but I get what you mean! ^_^;

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Obnoxiously cute may be the right term, but it leads to confusion where it may be read as "so cute it's obnoxious." What I mean is "cute in a way which is also obnoxious."

How about "cloying"?

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YES!

...also, it's not Black Friday anymore, but there's a midweek thing going on on Steam where Zeno Clash is $5.10. It's the one game I was really hoping to see go on sale last weekend, so I'm overjoyed. The "games I am interested in that are on Steam" checklist is almost completely covered now.

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Awesome, Groucho, you taught me a new and excellent English word! I will buy you an imaginary pint.

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As this seems to be the place where Lucidity is discussed, I'm going to add that I have now played it some more, using both the keyboard control scheme and the mouse, and can confidently state that the way the game controls is broken on some fundamental level. The controls (not necessarily the game, Tanu) are fucking awful. It seems like it could be an ok (read: mediocre) game if the controls were fixed, but as it is it's simply infuriating to try and get where you want to go. The little girl was running straight into a wall like a Quake 3 engine game's broken AI character for a full 45 seconds while I was throwing useless pieces into an upper corner of the screen looking for something that would make her jump over a goddamn 2 foot high thing. I'm done with this game.

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So Steam are having another ridiculous sale and this time I have some money. Lucasarts classic adventure pack for £1.74, Thank you very much Steam!

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Honestly, there's so much stuff sitting around on sale that I have no idea what to pick up. If you guys buy stuff, let me know so I can have a little bit of guidance here. So far, I've got these on my mind:

Chronicles of Riddick: Dark Athena - $6.80

The Witcher: Enhanced Edition - $13.60

Indigo Prophecy (Fahrenheit, for you foreigners :P) - $3.40

Borderlands: Zombie Island of Dr. Ned - $6.70

Rollercoaster Tycoon 3: Platinum Edition - $10.20 (Are these games still competent? I remember loving the original, $10 is a low price of entry for nostalgia's sake...)

Oblivion GOTY Edition - $22.50

Majesty 2 - $15

Machinarium - $10

Eufloria - $10

Tales of Monkey Island Complete Pack - $24.85

Stalker: Clear Sky - $5

Edited by JonCole

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I picked up STALKER for $2 to have it on Steam after my great disappointment with the way D2D handled it earlier this year. I'm sorely tempted to double-dip on Mirror's Edge for $5, but my computer can't handle it.

I'm waiting on other stuff till after Christmas since it seems most of the sale continues until Jan. 3.

Also I think you can get Machinarium + the developer's other games for $10 total from their own website, if you like.

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As a backlogger I must scream in terror and hide under the bed.... :fart:

I was so close... I could have got my backlog under 70 by the end of the year... :frusty:

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Holy fuck.

I just bought Civilization IV pack (with Civ IV, the 2 expansion packs, and even Civ IV: Colonization) for 13 euros on on D2D Christmas calendar. That alone is enough to consume all my spare time. And now this!

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Been trudging through the all games list:

Audiosurf £1.50

Dawn of War II £10

Splinter Cell Chaos theory £4.49

TGP and BTDT £1.50

Jedi Knight Collection £7.49

Anno 1404 £17.49

There's a lot more also. Fuck you steam!

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Aww, I want colonization :( I have the others already.

It's on a stand alone offer on steam.

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Honestly, there's so much stuff sitting around on sale that I have no idea what to pick up. If you guys buy stuff, let me know so I can have a little bit of guidance here. So far, I've got these on my mind:

Machinarium - $10

If you're interested in Machinarium, the developers are selling a bundle with it, plus Samorost2 and the soundtracks for both games for $9.95 here.

The caveat is that the download links are only available for 15 days after purchase, but since the games have no DRM as long as you back the files up that shouldn't be a problem.

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