Monthly Roundup, July 2015

I had to be somewhat of an opportunist with my gaming this month. I attended three weddings back to back to back, which ate up a lot of my weekend time. I was more than happy to support my friends of course, but it did leave me tired and in need of some genuine downtime more than once. I found that downtime in odd places when I could, and did get through some cool games during this hot, sticky, and nuptial July. So let's get to them!

Pillars of Eternity

I wrapped up Pillars of Eternity this month, and while I unloaded most of my thoughts about it last month, it’s worth a few more closing ones. It was once again the game I spent the most time on this month after all; RPGs are long, and Pillars is no exception. Yet Pillars didn’t feel needlessly long. Unlike many RPGs I play, it didn’t drag down the stretch, and I thought it wrapped up the final hours nicely. There was only one part of the game that felt really bogged down to me, and that was around the middle of the game, when you spend hours and hours in a single large city (Defiance Bay for those who’ve played it). I was ready to leave this city a few hours in, but it just kept going. Otherwise I think Pillars paced itself well, and it did a better job than most 50+ hour games at making me remain attached during the back half. Often times I end up just wanting to be done with a long game well before it’s over, but that feeling never came with Pillars. I think that’s primarily due to the balance it has between combat and storytelling; the moment I got tired of one, the other came to the rescue. And as I described last month, both of those aspects are very strong, and remained so throughout. I enjoyed playing with the new abilities I acquired all the way up to the level cap, and I was genuinely interested in how the story wrapped up. I was pretty invested in this world and its tale by the end, and thought Obsidian did a good job of tying it all together.

Another thing I realized as the game neared its end, was that I also enjoyed most of Pillars of Eternity’s side content. I didn’t do everything, but I did the vast majority of it, and most of what I did was very good. Only a few side quests boiled down to trite fetch quests; more often they involved either an interesting side plot, or a challenging dungeon and/or boss. It felt like Obsidian flexed their creativity a little more here, both in terms of storytelling and dungeon design. I enjoyed spending the extra time doing that stuff, and if I didn’t have so many other games I’m eager to move on to, I would likely dive back in to clean up anything left that I haven’t done. But I do feel the need to move on, and give a fond farewell to Pillars of Eternity. As I mentioned last month, this was my first legitimate dive into a “true” CRPG, and I really liked what I found. It makes me want to go back and check out the Infinity Engine classics, but that’s a bigger time investment that will have to wait. For now, PIllars of Eternity is a great game in 2015, and one I feel is totally worth it for any fan of such RPGs.

Hotline Miami 2: Wrong Number

I wasn’t necessarily the biggest fan of the original Hotline Miami, but I did enjoy its frantic, miss-and-you’re-dead style combat. It was tense and thrilling in that tightrope kind of way, and the game’s audiovisual style added a lot of flavor. What I liked most about the game, however, was the almost puzzly nature of the combat. I enjoyed scouting each room, looking for the most appropriate angle of attack, and then trying to execute said plan. This was engaging because of the melee vs. gun dynamic; guns were certainly more powerful, but they also drew attention. It was easy to get overwhelmed if you used them in a poor spot, and using melee weapons efficiently is something that took some engineering. The levels and enemy placement seemed well measured to take advantage of this dynamic, and the result was an exciting and clever romp.

While Hotline Miami 2: Wrong Number retains the original’s basic structure, I also feel like it has lost some of that critical dynamic that made combat in the original so fun. Almost every single level seems to demand the use of guns, as indicated by the fact that the vast majority of enemies wield guns, and they are generally scattered haphazardly in open spaces. It simply doesn’t feel as meticulously crafted as before, and rewards raw aiming and reflexes more than strategy, which is inherently less exciting to me (though it may be what others are looking for). In addition, it makes the combat feel decidedly more one-note. There generally aren’t that many angles to approach any given situation, and while I’ve died a lot in both Hotline Miami games, my deaths in the sequel feel more like bashing my head against the wall until I manage to land a precise shot. Trying to execute a simple act like that over and over can get old quick, and that’s been my experience with Hotline Miami 2 thus far... especially since it’s a much longer game than its predecessor. I think I’m near the end (just finished Act 22), and I’ve already clocked a few more hours than I did on the original. That would be fine if the game had more variety or tighter levels, but it doesn’t, which has lead to me getting tired of the game relatively early. And while it still looks and sounds great, I don’t think it’s stylistically any better than the original. In fact, I care about the story even less than before, and the soundtrack isn’t grabbing me as much either. There just don’t seem to be any standout tracks that will implant themselves in my psyche like they did in the first game. Anyway, that’s my mini-rant about Hotline Miami 2. It retains most of the basics, which still work well enough for anyone looking for more of that. But I also think it’s a few small, but noticeable steps backwards in terms of pacing, variety, and combat design, and the presentation isn’t able to make up for such regressions. It’s just not as tight, but I do plan to go ahead and finish it; I feel I’m close, and doing a level or so a day is fine enough. Just don’t sign me up for more Hotline Miami anytime soon.

Her Story

Her Story is fascinating. That’s the word I keep circling back to when trying to describe this oddly compelling game. The basic premise is simple, and seemingly non-interactive: all you do is scrape through a video library consisting of police interview tapes. These interviews are of a single woman, and concern the death (presumably murder) of her husband. In other words, the primary thing you do in the game is watch videos. These videos are live action, however, and the game’s sole performer (Viva Seifert) does a fantastic job. Given how focused the game is on these videos, along with the fact that every single video shows her and only her, a high quality performance from Viva is mandatory for Her Story to work. A daunting task, but I think she does a wonderful job, and really brings the game to life. It helps that the writing is strong as well, and I also really enjoy the underlying story. A lot of it is shrouded in mystery, and not all of the questions are definitively answered by the end. The game does a great job at giving you enough clues to satisfy the general thread, while also leaving many minor, at least one significant detail open to interpretation. It’s the kind of thing that has (and will continue to have) message boards buzzing about what’s really going on. That could have been annoying, but I think it’s cleverly done here, and leaves just enough room to apply your own interpretation in a satisfying way.

But what makes it all so fascinating, past the quality of the acting and writing, is how you go about accessing and viewing these videos. You interface with an intentionally dated UI, and enter search terms to parse the archive of all the videos. Every time you submit a query, the game lets you know how many videos the given term was spoken in. The catch is that you can only watch the earliest five videos that contain that term (each video is time-stamped). This means you have to eventually get creative with your searches to access the later videos, and the writers have clearly paid a lot of attention to the wording in each video. In fact, by the end I was starting to pick up on subtle hints in Viva's speech about terms to search. There are a few ways to “game” the system if you want, but if used as intended, this method of exploring the game’s story is a surprisingly mesmerizing exercise. Everyone should uncover the videos in different orders, based on their searches, and thus piece together the events slightly differently. I have to imagine this has an effect on how different people interpret the game’s main unanswered question, and I’d love to know if that was their intention. Either way, it’s fascinating, and I think Her Story is totally worth a shot from anyone who enjoys mucking around with experimental video game stories.

The Other Stuff

• I finally got around to trying Mount Your Friends, which is just as hilarious and ridiculous as it always seemed when the GB crew played it. I only played it with one other person, and while I’m sure it’s better with a few more people in the mix, I still had a lot of fun (and laughs). The controls and movement are just precise and robust enough that you can develop some real skill, and pull of some cool maneuvers with practice. But they’re also just frantic enough to encourage a lot of general flailing, and provoke horrible missteps. It’s controlled chaos at its best, and it also has a wonderfully stupid tone. Just a rad game for a local get-together.
• It’s no secret that I’m a bit of a tennis nut, but Tennis Elbow 2013 had somehow eluded my eye until it recently came out on Steam. Billed as a tennis simulator made by and for hardcore fans, I finally picked it up and tried playing for a bit. It’s certainly an interesting game if nothing else, and has a lot of intricate mechanics that are clearly trying to simulate professional tennis as accurately as they can. There’s a lot that goes into each and every shot you hit; it’s a technical game that has a steep learning curve for sure. And while it can be uneven at times, I’ve also had a few incredibly rewarding moments when it all clicks. I’m not sure that it comes together as a simulation any better than what the Top Spin series has done, and it's certainly not as accessible, but there is something there. If they could iron out a few kinks (and polish up that awful interface), they could have a special tennis game on their hands.

Looking Ahead to… the Future!

As far as August is concerned, there’s a few interesting games coming out that have caught my interest; more than I’d expect for the final month of the traditional summer gaming drought anyway. It begins with Galak-Z: the Dimensional, which looks potentially fantastic, and is followed up by Everybody’s Gone to the Rapture and Volume. I’ll almost certainly play at least one of those in August. I also have some other high priority items, such as Danganronpa: Trigger Happy Havoc and N++ (both of which I've already started), and Massive Chalice. Hopefully I can make good progress on those in August.

Whatever games I play in August though, I currently don’t plan to write about them. At least, not in this format that I started almost exactly two years ago. It’s a format that I still think suits me extremely well, and is something I’ve genuinely enjoyed all along, which doesn’t make it something I drop lightly. But as I do every so often, I’ve been re-evaluating how I spend my time, and what I could be doing with it. Now that I’ve gone through a big move, a hectic and tumultuous year in grad school, and have begun settling back into something resembling a normal and stable life, I have ideas. Lots of ideas, big and small, related to video games and otherwise. Some of which I’ve wanted to do for a long time, but just simply haven’t been in a comfortable position to follow through on. Now is my chance to start doing stuff, to put it bluntly, and I need time for that. I know that all sounds incredibly nebulous, and even still it will be slow going. But as much as I enjoy these regular monthly ramblings, they do take up a good chunk of time consistently (more than you may think). I’ve decided that, at least for now, that time can be used better elsewhere.

That’s by no means to say I’m going to disappear, or even that I won’t be doing any more writing here on Giant Bomb. In fact, some of those aforementioned ideas are writing ones, including a relatively lengthy blog series that I’ve wanted to write for over two years, but haven’t been afforded the time (and it will take some time for me to put together still). So you will see posts from me here and there, but it will be less overall, and not on any schedule; I’ll write when I have the proper inspiration. Otherwise, just know that I’m out there still playing video games, checking Giant Bomb, and living the life. And to anyone who’s read any of my writing over the years (which stretches back to Giant Bomb’s founding (and beyond) in one form or another), I appreciate it. Ya’ll have been great.

Anyway, that's the update! Like I said, I’m not going away, and don’t plan to be a stranger. I’m just not going to be doing this specific thing for the foreseeable future. See you around! :)