Rob Zacny Posted November 21, 2014 Kotaku's Evan Narcisse joins Rob and Fraser to discuss This War of Mine. Rather than pushing chits around from the remote general's chair, This War of Mine plunges the player into the lives of the people affected by war. Read Fraser's review here. Read Evan's review here. Listen here. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
hexgrid Posted November 21, 2014 That was an interesting podcast. I'd seen a little about the game floating around, but had assumed it was more of a "visual novel" kind of game. I'm mildly surprised other games along similar themes (Cart Life, Papers Please...) weren't mentioned. I'd also be somewhat interested in seeing how it stacks up against the various "zombie apocalypse" base building games, though it sounds like those are more geared towards winning rather than telling a story. Also, it has no zombies, as far as I'm aware, which is good; I think I've seen enough zombie games to last a lifetime or two now. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
ilitarist Posted November 21, 2014 Your description of This War of Mine reminds me of Pathologic (aka Mor. Utopia), a game from 2006 no one played cause it was Russian poorly translated bizzare title. It was storytelling survival horror RPG. Sort of. There's the city, 3 different playable characters appear there and you can play each of them in bizzare magic realism setting of Dostoevsky/Lovecraft influence. Decease spreads through city, whole districts are under carantine, militia kills anyone who tries to breach through containment, leaders of the city lie, conspire and seek for the shelter. The hero looks for vaccine/ancient cure or something else depending on their own story, they discover town secrets, look for the source of decease, satisfies primal needs like hunger and sleeps, fights maradeurs. There are sidequests with no rewards, tough decisions without mandatory obvious reaction. You're alone so it's not strategy, but I'd still recommend it to those who liked This War of Mine as it's very depressing in a down to earth sense. Lead designer of the game often talks about making games not fun too. Pathologic doesn't have rewards for quest or fast travel, it doesn't have level ups but has decaying health of your characters. Later story goes into batshit insane depths of existential horrors and spoilery thing for many characters (though the first one you can play is rather rational guy trying to ignore supernatural or psychological sides of the story), but it's still a good game. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Gaizokubanou Posted November 22, 2014 This game is just so cool and I'm glad one of my favorite podcast talked about it. And bit on tangent side of the topic but that moment that Rob talks about where your mind is still in that 'game' mode... I totally had those back when I was hardcore into BF2. Everytime I saw a flag pole I just really wanted to dolphin dive into nearest object that could provide cover. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
hexgrid Posted November 24, 2014 And bit on tangent side of the topic but that moment that Rob talks about where your mind is still in that 'game' mode... I totally had those back when I was hardcore into BF2. Everytime I saw a flag pole I just really wanted to dolphin dive into nearest object that could provide cover. Years ago, my mother got an electronic egg timer. The alarm sound from it was exactly like the "land mine arming and will explode in 0.5 seconds" sound from Dark Forces. Walked into the kitchen, baBEEP! Nearly leapt out of my skin... Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Valorian Endymion Posted November 25, 2014 This game is just so cool and I'm glad one of my favorite podcast talked about it. And bit on tangent side of the topic but that moment that Rob talks about where your mind is still in that 'game' mode... I totally had those back when I was hardcore into BF2. Everytime I saw a flag pole I just really wanted to dolphin dive into nearest object that could provide cover. Years ago, my mother got an electronic egg timer. The alarm sound from it was exactly like the "land mine arming and will explode in 0.5 seconds" sound from Dark Forces. Walked into the kitchen, baBEEP! Nearly leapt out of my skin... For me one moment like that when I was playing Daggerfall, I take a break to make a lunch, I looked to the kitchen clock and seeing it was 3 PM I just thought - "The Mages Guild still open". On the subject of "tyrany of fun".. here what I think: first one does not eliminate the other, in fact both kinds of game could exist. Now on what is fun... this is more trick, just like Rob said, even a game like this can be "fun", I think (sorry if I simplify it, this is rather complex and I am not even that sure I am right) that is because games, due their nature, can have either a harmony or conflict between how the game "feels" (gameplay, performance, ect...) and what "theme" (argument, theme, history, ect...) is, so you can have a game like this, with such darker theme which still highly enjoyable, which work great as encourage more people to try it (so more people see and talk about it). Now you could have game, like Cart Life, which does also aboard several themes, but its gameplay, performance is rather bad, which can turn people away form it (I have seen this when a podcast, which I follow, made a short stream to show Cart Life, the game crashed at least twice during the stream, while some people showed interess, other where turned away form it). Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
