A Personal Response to The Last of Us

I finished The Last of Us last week. It was a delight of a game. No, I take that last statement back, it was a delight of a narrative and the game was fine. Let me explain, and I will try to mark spoilers as such but I cannot promise anything so read at you own risk. The Last of Us has great characters, amazing characters. The end of the world plant-zombie apocalypse plot is honestly a little too cliched and the stealth, third person action game play is solid even if combat gets a little old by the end of the game. But both the cliched plot and the good, albeit redundant, game play doesn't even matter because Naughty Dog (the team that developed the game) created some of the best characters that I have ever played. The voice actors do a great job, the script feels natural, and the characters' facial animations are amazing. 

What have I been up to?

Currently, I have a good bit of spare time on my hands. Well, not literally on my hands, but I'm sure you've heard the commonly used phase, right?  Luckily I don't have access to many video games during this stretch, so I'm forced to do something besides play The Last of Us, which is pretty amazing. So, in the spirit of self-betterment, I'm trying to be more constructive with my times and write a bit more. I'm also trying to edit Derek's novel (Derek is my pal from high school; you can read his blog here). While his prose is impressive--it's making me doubt the quality of my own work--my editing is slow. You'd think with all the papers I grade that my editing skills would be like at LV 99, but, nay, I'm still a mid-level editor. So that's taking some time.

Review: Infamous 2

When Sucker Punch released Infamous in 2009, I bought it on release day and beat it in two marathon sessions. The third-person, open-world game had its flaws, but Cole's electric journey from delivery boy to super powered hero (or villain if you prefer) resonated with me personally and still stands as one of the PlayStation's best exclusive titles. And for the most part, Infamous 2 delivers the same great open-world action as the first game even though the game's narrative and missions don’t always hit the right notes.

Review: Portal 2

Personally, I was late to play Valve's first person puzzle game Portal. I played it about a year ago when my friend let me borrow his copy of The Orange Box. Out of all three wonderful games on that collection, Portal was the stand-out game that blew my mind. I turned into the annoying guy that played Portal after everyone else. I wouldn't shut-up about how funny and well-designed the game was. All my friends were like, "We know." What made Portal so great was the reward of feeling like a genius after solving a puzzle in the game; this feeling is key to any puzzle game. It’s the catharsis that classic dramas are centered on, but instead of emotional purification, it’s a mental purification. And Portal gives this ‘puzzle-catharsis’ after almost each of its tests. The game has a way of making me feel like I am the smartest person in the world even though I know that I’m not the first person to solve the puzzle. So, it’s an understatement to say that I was excited to play Portal 2. And I've got to say that Valve came through with the sequel. Portal 2 offers the same humor, intelligently designed stages, and 'puzzle-catharsis' as the first, but all of these elements are wrapped in a slicker package, which makes the first game seem like a tech demo.

Review: Helsing's Fire

If you’re in-the-know when it comes to indie game development or obscure iPhone games, then you already know that this review is extremely tardy…like months tardy. And I can only claim ignorance because Ratloop’s Helsing’s Fire was unknown to me. That is, it was unknown to me until it won the 2011 Independent Games Festival’s Best Mobile Game award. When I saw Helsing’s Fire win over games like Colorbind and Halcyon, I figured that I should play this game, and I’m glad I did.

Review: Radiant Historia

Radiant Historia is a wonderful DS game that harkens back to the best elements of the SNES generation of JRPGs while simultaneously feeling very modern. If you grew up playing games like Final Fantasy VI, Lufia 2, and Chrono Trigger, then Radiant Historia will feel like a warm homecoming. That’s not to say that you have to be over 20 and a connoisseur of classic JRPGs to enjoy Radiant Historia. The game feels like a modern take on a classic formula. You play as Stocke who, at first glance, seems like the archetypal quiet protagonist. But once the story gets going, it becomes clear that Stocke has a specific and well-developed voice that isn’t as clichéd as one may expect from a protagonist in this genre. He’s not your typical starry-eyed teenage boy with hopes of saving the world, and he’s not an amnesiac. He is, however, a smart, thoughtful, reflective protagonist.

Review: Cut the Rope (iPhone)

Cut the Rope caught my eye when it dethroned Angry Birds as the number one game on the iPhone app store. It's a simple but addicting physics based puzzle game. There are tons of physics based puzzle games on the app store, so what's different about this one? In short, Cut the Rope oozes with personality, looks good, has responsive controls, and offers 100 different puzzles for the low price of ninety-nine cents (plus free updates are in the works with the promise of new stages).

Sorry About Another Videogame Post....

I'm not writing to rant against achievements or trophies. I'm writing to say that I'm done trying to get all of them. Let's take a few steps back so I can fully explain myself.

Since I bought my Xbox 360, I've noticed that achievement points have slowly become more and more important to me. When I started playing 360 games, achievements were unimportant to say the least. They were merely random interruptions during a game. I was like, "what do they points even do?" And when I realized that they were not worth anything monetarily, I just ignored them.

Thoughts on Red Dead Redemption and Final Bosses

So I bought Red Dead Redemption last Tuesday, and it's been an engrossing experience. My wife has been annoyed with the late night shootouts in Pikes Basin, my students have been jealous of my achievement whoring (me and a few students have an ongoing achievement contest), and I've--well--I've been lulled into John Marston's world, and I'm just waking from this week-long slumber.

5 Great Videogame Podcasts

1. The Bombcast - This is the podcast that got me into podcasts. It's the four main guys that run Giantbomb--Ryan Davis , Vinny Caravella, Brad Shoemaker, and Jeff Gerstmann. They follow the basic setup of most videogame podcasts: whacha been playing, news, new releases, and fan emails. The main thing that makes this podcast standout is that all four casters have a crap load of personality. These are four guys that I look forward to listening to every week. I don't listen to the Bombcast to waste time, I listen to the Bombcast because it's two hours of sweet videogame nerdery, and while they are prone to get off topic, it's always for the best. My wife likes to listen to these guys and she doesn't care about games.