Category: Thoughts On

Sentimental ULTRAs

DryadLeave a comment

In a minute, I’mma need a…

Objective lists of bests always make me scratch my head.  I know there will always be at least some bias in lists, but my favorite rankings I hear from people I talk with are the ones that are very emotionally biased.  I’m talking nostalgia, events that transpired during plays, purely sentimental acts, and emotions just taking over.  Even if this means emotionally attached to a certain game design.  Even if this means emotionally attached to a bad game design.

If you’ve been here, you’ve heard me talk about the ULTRA, the Ultimate Loosely-Thought Ranked Analysis.  This is my internal ranking of all the games I’ve ever played.  This list is processed by a current top twelve list that rotates as new games enter that list.  When games are added to that list and leave, they graduate to the ULTRA where they are ranked. 

There is no other process other than just sitting there thinking and discussing with other players.  Things move up and down that list all the time depending on discussions, thoughts, and epiphanies.  There is no extreme, numerical game design analysis.  It’s just thoughts.  While I have studied a lot about game and art design in video games, those things are not what I pride my list on.  I love my list because it’s so emotional.

When I speak to players I like to bring up the question, “What are some of your favorite games?”  I say “some of” because asking for a number one game is usually too difficult or stressful to answer.  Just give me a couple of games where, if you had to recommend to a random player, these are the ones you’d choose.  I want them to choose whatever loosely-thought, emotional choices they made.  I want to get to know the player as a person, not as a critic.  

Each viewpoint that the player brings to the table is what makes everything so unique.  Their likes and dislikes of the game tell me a story that gives me a greater understanding not just of their thought processes and perspectives, but also their goals and what they value.  I believe every experience in life does have an impact.  This is why I oppose those who bully others online and why I oppose those who think just because something inappropriate is on a screen and “isn’t real” is okay.  It’s the same emotional connection that gives the reason why you can’t go about saying that certain anime is okay even though there are definitely pedophilic things in it or other similar stuff.  Whether you like it or not, watching that thing is going to affect you for the same reasons that other “innocent” things affect you for good.  I can’t believe I’ve had to make that argument (and have it be ignored by said person).  Why do I always hate being part of this entertainment community?

I digress.  Let me talk about something a little less depressing.

I love Remedy Entertainment’s Control.  I deal with some addictions in my life, and I don’t handle them well.  I used to be addicted to gambling (darn you lootboxes), but thankfully I’ve gotten a lot better at that.  So that’s one of the many down.  I’ve been through therapy, drugs (ironically, for drugs), and other treatments.  It’s not an easy road, but it’s a road that always makes me feel like it is my choice.  Addictions blur the line between what is choice and what isn’t.  It also brings up a ton of other contextual sociocultural things that also ask the same question depending on said contexts.  It’s just…not fun.  (I hope if any of you are dealing with similarly degrading things that you are getting as much support as possible.)

Playing Control felt different.  I felt free.  It’s technically considered a horror game, and I don’t do well with those, but I managed to get through the main game.  (I haven’t finished the DLCs, I’m saving that for spooky month.)  I’ve thought about this a lot, and I’m not sure what it was.  That week I played Control I was free from all my addictions.  I felt like I really was in control.  It wasn’t because I played all day and night or anything.  They were normal sessions.  Maybe it was Jesse’s independent attitude and my role-playing as the characters that gave me strength.  Maybe it was the emotional connection I had with her confusing experience.  Maybe it was smashing stuff with the physics in the game.  What if it was just good gameplay and world building?  These are just some of the ideas, but I honestly can’t pinpoint why.  That whole experience is one of the biggest reasons why I love Control.  

It’s so…simple if you look at it.  The event was complicated for me, but if you look at it from the outside in, it seems so simple.  It’s very emotional, and it’s super insanely biased.  It is in fact, probably one of the most biased positions on the ULTRA.  Control sits at #6.

I think what I am trying to say is that I love people.  Don’t get me wrong, I am a hermit.  I rarely go to events for the social parts.  But I admit that I really love people.  Sounds like an oxymoron, but I think it somehow works.  I’ve been following other players like Later Levels, where life, games, and being a parent all coincide.  And how about The Gamer With Glasses, a gamer trying to get through life and talk about their love for RPGs.  Or Ace Asunder’s unique perspectives on gaming feel empowering and eye-opening.   Their views on games tell stories.  These are stories that help me grow.

I am far, far from a perfect person, especially as I have just been kind of vulnerable about my life just now.  I value the struggle, and all the hardships in my life have given me the opportunity to become a softer person.  I have chosen that.  I want to see that.  I want to see how video games are a force for good for people in the world.  How has gaming shaped struggles for you?  How has it helped, even in the most minor of ways?  

Hearing emotional lists and likes of games helps me realize that the player I am talking to is a human being, and with that human being comes struggle.  And with that struggle is usually someone who is trying to be a better person.  And with that striving person, maybe another reason for me to hate being part of this media community a little less and love it a little more.

Thanks for reading. I’ll see you again later this week if my work isn’t crushing my soul.

Elise

The Many Curious Ways for Developers to Siphon Your Money

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Battle Passing the Baton

Okay, I know that a lot of the actual developers are not trying to siphon your money…it’s the people at the top.

Remarks aside, I’ve been thinking a lot about how the gaming world has changed the way we approach our video games monetarily.  I grew up seeing nearly the entire spectrum of what it is like paying for your games, and it’s very interesting to see younger gamers and their perspectives when they’re born into, or at least in the changing tides of it, things like live service games and DLC.  So let’s take a trip through time and see how gaming has set up the ways that they determine how much our money will be worth.  Just to let you know now, it’s a long trip.

Classic Retail

A long, long time ago games were just bought as physical productions.  Oh wait!  If you’re a console gamer this is probably still the case (mostly)!  Get it, the case?  I remember the era of the SNES and N64 where we had definite boxes with games, manuals, and sometimes other goodies inside.  I loved the flavor of the manuals and how some of them are written in ways that already feel like the game itself.  I miss manuals sometimes.  While classic retail style games did feel great, remember that if we head way back the prices adjusted for inflation would be really high.  And all of that for a pixelated Atari.  Well, graphics always seemed great for whatever generation they’re in, so I can’t really blame us there!

I think there seems to be a lot of gamers (or perhaps just loud gamers) who whinge about how games were already complete back then, and that is mostly valid.  Some games even in this age did need day one fixes.  This might’ve been worse, because then you’d have to physically send in your game for rewriting, and that would take a while.  Or worse, you just got a broken version of the game.  For glitchers and speedrunners, maybe this was alright, but if a game was bad back then, it had a very small chance of actually getting fixed.  However, the pressure of getting it right the first time is a very good thing to have on the companies, but remember that this didn’t solve everything.  We still had a ton of janky releases by developers who didn’t know what they were doing or were just seeking to nab the cash in your wallet.  Oh man, the transition to 3D.  Remember that?  *shudders*

Expansions and Level Packs

Expansions are still some of my favorite forms of continued development.  In a way, you can say these were the first DLCs, but expansions were consistently large chunks of content that tended to change the way the game was played.  I’m talking about things like Starcraft: Brood War, Medal of Honor: Spearhead, and any of the Guild Wars 1 expansions.  These were exciting bundles where you knew there was a good amount of content in them. 

But again, we can’t assume that this didn’t all just feel like DLC.  There were some things like Level Packs that really felt like DLC.  New levels are great, but these tended to not add any brand new content to the games.  Back then this could’ve been enough though, especially for those who were solely focused on those games.  Speaking of which, id just updated their level packs for their old series like DOOM and Quake, so that the games come bundled with them in a less confusing way.  Now they’re, like, giant versions of their old selves!  An old family photo if you will.

Mods and Indie Games

Let’s take a detour to mods and indie games.  I’m going to just put these here.  Even though these are free, they were a huge way to access new content for those who didn’t have the money, also known as me.  Mods are the way some games are born like Counter-Strike and sometimes entire genres like DayZ.  Modding your games, especially those from Source engine games, are good fun.  I mean, as long as no one is just using it as a way to steal content.  That’s…  yeah.

Indie games were my jam.  After taking an oath to solidify my approach to video games and also being poor, I turned to indie games.  I remember back then when indie games were super shaky.  The quality was usually not the best and you had to really search for good stuff.  I talked about some of this in my Celeste article.  Indie games taught me how to look for information about games on the web.  Now indie games are usually like normal games, but bite-sized.  

One more thing is a shout out to flash games on all those websites.  Mmm, some good times there.  Some of them have evolved and are now continued as normal games on Steam, like the Bloons TD series.  There are a ton of free games out there to play, and with things like Epic Games giving games out every week and free services such as Fall Guys, you don’t even have to pay any money to be a gamer at all!  Except for the gaming device. Which is a lot.  Sorry, I lied there.

Digital Storefront

Steam was slow to go into the household.  I was still young-ish and my parents did not trust these digital stores.  But I still somehow remember the old, super chunky, off-green UI.  Now, digital is like one of the main, if not the main storefront for gamers.  It’s so strange that it has been entirely converted in the past few decades.  Waaaait a minute, did I just say past few decades?  That makes me feel old.

Downloadable Content/DLC, and Cosmetics

This is the one I remember the huge controversy about.  Two words: Horse Armor.  Back in 2006 when one of the first major DLCs came out for Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion people were not happy.  I’m sure there is something out there that already had DLC, but this was the big one that really pushed DLC to be real.  Now DLC is everywhere.  It can be content that is as small as a new shirt for your character to wear, to something as big as an expansion.

Kind of in a similar way, cosmetics have also taken over the games industry.  I mean, we even have cosmetics for single player games.  Do I totally fall for these kinds of things?  Yes.  This is how I dress up since I don’t go outside and am a pale vampire.  I won’t really argue that cosmetics and DLC are evil or anything.  Some people are really happy with their purchases.  Which brings me to something a bit more …questionable.

Lootboxes, Mobile Game Leeches

Remember when lootboxes were actual, like, treasure chests in a game?  And now when you say lootbox people think of the gambling thing.  Lootboxes are a problem because they are predatory.  A lot of games set it up in that way, and let’s be honest not all gamers are ready or able to fight against that dope rush of opening this thing only to get…that duplicate item you already have.  I don’t really feel like lootboxes that are unbuyable are bad.  Those are no different from normal boxes.  They’re just presented differently.  But nowadays it’s always buyable stuff.  

Some people say that cosmetic only, buyable lootboxes are fine, but remember that it still involves the buyable gambling aspect and that can pose a risk for some gamers.  As long as we can feed money into the loop, it can be harmful.  I don’t care that I have worked on myself enough to the point where I don’t do that stuff anymore.  I don’t care that I can work myself to that point.  It’s the fact that there are some people still within that struggle who may not be successful.  We don’t know what is going on in their lives that is leading them to that, and I don’t want people to have to struggle with those unhealthy situations.  

Mobile games also prey in the same way.  They want you to just try one more time.  They want you to have to use that one cash item that will let you beat the level, or even…might beat the level.  I’m looking at you Candy Crush and all related situations.  These kinds of things can lead to insane amounts of profits, but it’s all feeding on people who shouldn’t have to suffer those kinds of things.  

It’s possible to argue otherwise, but I think these two things should go away.  I mean, lootboxes in their original forms of just treasure boxes in games can stay, but goodness, some of these things are horrifying.

Subscriptions and Game/Battle Passes

I put these two in the same category because they feast on the same thing: time.  You have already paid for your content and now it’s up to you to make use of it.  It’s almost like a, “it’s out of our hands” kind of approach.  I think these kinds of payments are great for those who focus solely on one game.  Those people will likely get the things they want out of it.  Let’s be honest, those free tiers on the battle pass are way less exciting though.  

I have some negative feelings about these because time is not something I have.  I’m always jumping around to different games and it’s hard to make me feel like I’m making good time.  Battle passes are cruel for me because they usually have such shiny, beautiful cosmetics.  There are some Battle Passes where you can earn some of the payment back in some…non-cash form such as getting the next pass free.  I think Warzone and Fortnite do this.  But that usually obliges you further to need to play the game.  And when playing becomes something that is against your choice, it’s very easy for the game to feel like a chore.  

It’s a weird thing when the company wants you to pay so that you might like their game less.  It’s even more awkward when people who play games for a living through things like Twitch show off the battle pass, because they play games for a living.  Of course the battle pass will be worth it for them.  But what about that woman who is working in the office and comes home exhausted some days because people are sexist and they really just want to be a blob on the couch?  Or a stay-at-home dad who is helping out the kids with…oh my goodness, whatever apocalypses kids create.  Maybe they can’t even play the game when kids are around because it’s too violent.  I mean, I’m kind of just spouting stuff, but these are also real situations for people where time consuming things like this just don’t feel as worth it.  And I would say that if we can’t pay with time we can pay with cash, but we’re literally paying with both of these things in this situation, so…  yeah.

And that’s it.  Well, I’m sure there are other things out there, but that’s most of it.  Thanks for taking this exhausting trip with me.  I like to be all happy and chummy with video games and the industry, but I have to also remember that sometimes the people leading the charge, like the execs, just want to make money.  And here we see the river of pain that flows through developers, artists, and then to the gamers.

I think in some ways, we’ve got a lot of good stuff going now.  Live service means a lot of free and fixed content.  It also means content can eventually feel ruined by a developer’s changing ideals. We get some really good deals on digital storefronts today that no one would’ve even dreamed of with physical stores, but a lot of the novelty is gone and now we have some suspicious ways of companies setting things up for money.  

I hope that didn’t make you feel too depressed!  Sometimes you have to take care of real life, your real self.  We’re gonna get through whatever else they throw at us (and maybe throw some things back).  So keep that money secure.  Take a deep breath and a step back.  Let’s focus on enjoying the game for ourselves.
I’ll see you again soon!
Elise

Thoughts on Summer Game Fest Part I

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Summer Time Lovin’

This is just going to be a bit of rambles on my thoughts of, as the title implies, Summer Game Fest so far.  These are just selected things out of the huge group of games, so don’t expect all of them.

The Callisto Protocol

I admit I’ve never finished Dead Space…1.  I got about half way through it and it was really good.  I’m not good with horror games, but there are certain horror games that don’t scare me.  I don’t know why, because I am really easily scared.  Dead Space is one of them.  That being the case I was able to play some of it and I really, really like it.  This game captures that same feeling again.  I’m just worried about Dead Space (2023), because now it’s going to have to compete with a game that’s really meant to be almost the same.  It’s not even like, two competing games in the same genre.  It’s Dead Space and Dead Space: The Callisto Protocol.   Even more so now that the latter is no longer involved with PUBG.

I will likely be playing both anyway.

Final Fantasy XVI

I’m not sure if I’ve mentioned this before but I have a fixation on completing games in release date order.  …and this is XVI.  I still have a ways to go.  However, I’m still really excited about this.

Resident Evil 4 (2023)

Another horror game that I was actually scared of (which is dumb, because I feel like Dead Space is technically scarier than RE4), that I somehow played through.  Resident Evil 4 is my favorite game in my small pool of horror games.  So I definitely am ready for this one.  I’m excited for expanded story elements.  And Ashley, who I still feel like is one of those characters that you have to save that doesn’t feel like a derp AI.  I know she frequently calls Leon for help, but for some reason to me, she still felt kind of independent in her preemptive actions.  Maybe it was just a coincidence for me, but the AI performed well.  She showed that she was still scared (who wouldn’t be?), but that she could still do things even if she was.  I like the co-existence.

Wait, this is about the Remake.  Yes. I’m ready.  Sorry. I rambled.

Spider-Man for PC.

Yes.

Modern Warfare II, not to be confused with Modern Warfare 2

…look.  I’m a campaign gal.  And frankly I’m quite tired of the reused-ness of Call of Duty.  It’s not that there was a lack of effort in the making of the game, but that reusing old stuff that isn’t even that old is just…it doesn’t look great.  It feels like money-making.  The reason why I like indie games and Nintendo is that they take risks.  Nintendo has had some major flops, but I really feel like they learn from them.  Unless you’re the Online/Virtual gaming side of Nintendo.  I don’t know what’s going on there.

I like weird attempts like Call of Duty: Ghosts and even things like Call of Duty: Vanguard.  I liked it when they went a different route back then with Black Ops.   I mean, Battlefield took a bunch of weird turns and look at their multiplayer fanbase.  It is torn to shreds. But I still like that they keep going in unique directions.  Man, I guess what I’m saying is all that weird stuff they were going off the rails with in Advanced Warfare and stuff, that was great.  Even if it wasn’t…great for multiplayer.  It was great for the campaign.  Well, I guess I just proved their point then, huh?  It has to be Modern Warfare II if they want the money from multiplayer and Warzone.  Okay.  Fine, Activision, be that way.  Hmph.

Aliens: Dark Descent

I like games like Alien Swarm, but…this game looks a little wonky.  That, like, five seconds of gameplay at the end looked kinda weird.  But, we’ll have to see when it’s done.  I love co-op, but finding people to play with is difficult, especially because I am super picky, and I’d rather people not have to deal with me and vice versa.

Stormgate

I love Starcraft.  And I’m really hoping this can scratch that itch.  I mean, not that Starcraft 1 or 2 are anywhere near dead.  Well, maybe SC2.  Thanks for abandoning co-op, you sickos.  Anyway, maybe this will be good?  I have no idea.  I need to see in game stuff for this to really try and dig into the wallet.

Honkai: Star Rail

…I will probably play this?  I think I know, I mean, er, yes but it’s all wrong.  I still play Genshin Impact, and, oh no, there’s also Zenless Zone Zero.  Mihoyo is trying to eat up all my time.  But I do still want to play both.  There aren’t enough games that are originally in Chinese that I can play.  I mean, some people say that it’s originally Japanese.  In that, that is, I think I disagree, but it’s nothing to get hung about unless people get colonist about it.  (Which is almost every single time.)

Warhammer: Darktide

Well, if you read my previous article, you know that I am so ready for this.

The Last of Us: Part I on PC

Yes.

Animal Well and A Little to the Left

These two indie games are the ones that I’m really interested in.  I love the weird liminal feeling of A Little to the Left and Animal Well brings me back to old, creative indie platforming days.

There are other games that I am also interested in, but I have no interesting thoughts on them other than that I am interested in them.

This has been a pretty mellow summer game time, but I’m still pretty hyped for stuff.  
Thanks for letting me ramble. 
But also…what games are you getting hyped for from Summer Game Fest so far?!    

Elise

Cheers if you noticed The Beatles.

Thoughts on Back 4 Blood: Tunnels of Terror

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Contains Both Tunnels and Terror

Well, what I wrote in the subtitle explains it all.  The end.

Just kidding.  I’ve been playing Back 4 Blood since…December, I think.  And like similar intense co-op games like this, we blasted through it in like three days.  It was fun, and then that was it.  Back 4 Blood also brings with it unlockable things to keep me coming back: Cards can be unlocked.  You use the cards to make decks and you draw those cards as you play through the levels.  The cards are always in the order you set them in the deck to be, so that’s nice.  It makes playthroughs a little different every time.  You can also unlock skins.  If you know me, I’m definitely a girl who really likes making her characters look the way she wants them to.  And then there are weapon skins, which I also am a great fan of.

The characters are pretty likable..  The variance in their lines is not as diverse as Left 4 Blood, but they’re still fun to hear.  I admit it took me a little bit to like the characters, but by the end of the Recruit difficulty it was all good.  Oh, that’s right.  Then we worked our way through Veteran difficulty with only two players, because by that time most of the group stopped playing.  And then we tried Nightmare and we got slaughtered.  The most recent update made it a little easier, but we still get slaughtered and I am just not going to play with randos.

Alright, let’s get to Tunnels of Terror.

Is it worth it?  Kinda?  Let’s talk about the different things and then you can determine for yourself, because we likely have different interests.

Tunnels/Hives:

So you can go into Ridden Hives that randomly spawn in the levels.  And these hives are actual entire levels you get to play in.  The way they’re attached to the main campaign instead of their own levels reminds me a lot of Path of Exile’s content additions.  And I love that.  I love it in Path of Exile because they keep adding more stuff and that means more chaos and unexpected occurrences.  I love that kind of chaos.  But that also means you will not be choosing hives as levels to play through.  Even when you’re playing through the campaign, they’re not guaranteed to spawn.  …at least from what I’ve seen.

The hives themselves are really fun to play.  Even though their designs are mostly just slimy tunnels, there’s something about venturing through them that makes the gameplay of them really fun, if not better than most of the levels in the campaign.  Sometimes they’re fairly straight forward, and other times they feel like mazes.  In both senses they have been really fun for me and my ally to play in.  We love them.  While in these hives you can open warped chests which drop a bunch of good loot at the expense of some negative effect like everyone in the team taking trauma damage after opening it.  Which leads me to…

Legendary Weapons:

You can find these in warped chests.  I love the legendary weapons.  They are exactly what I want from such things: unique look, flavor text, and some fancy effect.  These are unmoddable weapons that do special effects like adding burning damage to an AA-12 while giving the wielder immunity to fire damage.  I like to open warped chests just to try and find these weapons, because they’re so fun to use.  They’re a very refreshing effect to the usual guns we wield.  You can also find unique, named mods that have crazy effects like 100% recoil reduction, but lose a ton of movement speed while shooting.  Those are also really fun and great.  Also in the hives we can find…

Skull Totems/Skins:

To be clear, skull totems are not skins, but they’re related to them.  In hives you can find up to three skull totems.  They’re a melee weapon that you have to actively hold.  Switching to any other item will make you drop the totem.  Each totem can be combined with the next to make it stronger (and slower in attack speed).  This allows for convenient travel with multiple totems, uh, in one totem!  That way only one person needs to carry it if need be.  If you’re using a melee build, these skull totems are great!  If you’re not, they’re not great!  It’s annoying to have to drop it just to switch to a ranged weapon if there are sleepers on the walls, and then pick them back up again.  But if you manage to escape the hive with the skull totems, you can spend them at the convoy to get other unlockables.  Like skins!

The new outfits are great, but there are not that many new skins.  I honestly expected a little more out of something they deemed an “expansion”.  The character skins are fun, but it’s the weapon skins that I’m kind of disappointed in.  Most of them are the same style on every gun.  A new biohazard skin?  A ton of them have that same yellow-black styling.  A new hot rod skin?  It’s on a lot of them as well.  None of the skins are unique to any type of gun, and I don’t really like that.  I like it when the skins are unique to the guns.  I don’t mind if there are a few repeats, like in Counter-Strike: Global Offensive, but when it’s always repeated, it doesn’t feel great.  It’s just a mixed bag for me on this one. 

Some of the new talents and cards and stuff are really great though.  I’ve yet to be disappointed in the cards.  Some can seem kind of plain, but are still important for creating variety in decks, and I’m very okay with that.

Characters:

I’m glad there is another Asian.  I’m super biased about that, but I’m glad.  Heng is a new cleaner who has more utility in accessory items.  There usually isn’t a huge feeling of difference between characters in Back 4 Blood.  Even with other characters abilities and damage buffs, to be honest they tend to feel mostly the same.  I’m honestly okay with that, but so far Heng is just another cleaner to play as.  If you like to combo accessory effects though, he’s definitely someone to try out.  I like trying to make items be reusable or drop/spawn as frequently as possible and he’s just the person for that.

However, Sharice makes the game feel very different.  Sharice makes it so armor plates can be found in the maps.  Armor plates will take a heavy hit for you, and you can equip multiple.  Shooting off armor from enemies will also have a chance of dropping armor plates.  These things can make a huge difference.  Just imagine having any of the accessory items not spawn because one of the team members isn’t using a character.  I mean, that’s how big of a deal she is.  Well, quite literally, that’s the difference.  She also gives increased max temp health for the team, which is also really nice if you like gulping down meds or are using cards to get temp health.

Mutations and Monsters:

The new variations of ridden are really fun to play with.  The tallboy variant Ripper can slam the ground and send spikes through the ground as it does so, making it a ranged tank.  The reeker variant is the Shredder, which pulls people towards it.  Instead of bursting in gross goo, the Shredder’s head just pops and just kinda spews it out in a small area of effect near it.  The stinger variant is the Urchin, which shoots spiky mines.  

Parting Words:

As a last note, only one player needs Tunnels of Terror for everyone to experience hives.  Skull totems and their associated skins can be earned even if you don’t have the expansion.  Characters can be unlocked in PvP by playing PvP, but to use them in PvE you need to have the expansion.  The expansion by itself is $14.99 right now.  If it’s just the hive content you’re wanting to play, it’s not a bad price for the content for a party.  I’m still pretty mixed about how I feel about the package as a whole, but I will not deny that I enjoy my time with Back 4 Blood and the new content is a welcome experience. 

With most co-op games, how fun it is really depends on who you’re playing with, and even though there is only one other person in my party left, we have a really good time with the game.  I hope there can be more improvements at the next expansion.  

I don’t really give number ratings for games, but that was my experience.  Some people express their concern that I am fairly positive about everything in games, but this does not make this thought process for naught.  I’m sure there are things about the game that I said that you might think, “Oh, I don’t really like that,” or maybe, “I don’t think this is enough content for me.”  And if any of my words help clarify any of those thoughts, then I believe myself to have succeeded.  I just want you all to be able to find the fun in games wherever you can, and if you can’t find it here in the Tunnels of Terror expansion, that’s okay!

Thanks for reading, I’ll see you next time~

Elise

Unsurprise! Why I Hate People Who Spoil Things

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And Not Really The Spoilers Themselves

Spoilers are not bad.  There is no “right” path to choosing when it comes to whether or not you want spoilers.  It is merely that someone chooses a path, and you respect that path.  

I am apparently one of those people in the world that don’t enjoy things well when things are spoiled.  According to studies it seems that most people do enjoy things well with them, but I can’t even count any games or films that I actually enjoyed when it was spoiled, even when critically and/or popularly acclaimed.  I don’t care if people want to spoil things for themselves, it’s whether or not they care about spoiling it for others.  It’s not so much a matter of entertainment for me, because it is something I can lose.  It is a matter of gauging people’s respect for others.  The only thing someone can lose for not telling a spoiler is the pride that someone can have of telling someone something they don’t know.  Which, frankly, is a very douchey reason to do it.  Most websites put pretty good spoiler tags, so if you spoil those for yourselves even when it’s obvious like that that’s your own fault.

So it’s mostly the same thing you can realize for how they react to other life decisions, and for this one, it’s really shopping cart-esque.  To put away the cart is of little effort, and there is no consequence for not doing it.   There really is very little loss in not spoiling something, and whether or not someone can hold their tongue in that aspect is quite a tell of someone’s respect.  Accidents happen of course, especially when vocally speaking, and that’s fine.  People make mistakes.

For me it all stems back to what the person is like towards me.  It’s so much more than just the game or the film.  And what worries me the most goes even further.  I am worried for the people who think that, at any level of anonymity, it won’t affect them.  But again, this is a matter of respect, and nobody lives in a vacuum. Sooner or later they will have to learn respect, and I just don’t want their experience to end up being worse than just words.

Leaks are a bit different.  Leaks are more like a surprise party.  I find it even more selfish in this situation than spoilers to give away leaks because the creators are withholding information for the sake of our enjoyment.  I just think, “We just wanted to make you happy,”  kind of thing is a sad expression to see broken.  I also don’t like leaks because they create an unwarranted and unexpected level of hype.  The audience may grow an expectation that is much higher than normal because usually only a little bit of information is let out and at too early a time.  Then they are disappointed when it was they themselves that set up the situation.  A good marketing team sets up times for announcements for a reason, and a lot of it is this.  You want a controlled situation when you show your product to the public.  You’re not being a superfan by sabotaging the creators.

So by all means, if you want to know the stories for yourselves, go ahead and look them up.  If you want to feel ahead, just do it.  Leaks can be illegal, so I would discourage that.  But don’t feel bad about spoiling things for yourself if you consent.

I can’t tell you how many times I’ve been gatekept out of a situation just because I am someone who doesn’t do well with spoilers.  Not because they can’t talk about it, but because I am both actively and passively removed from the group the same way some women won’t work in some places because the atmosphere is just too toxic.  I am always seen as a lesser person in this community because of this, and, let me tell you, as part of a minority group in real life I get enough of that.  So for goodness sake, all I want is some respect.  The fact that I have to actively ask for that in the entertainment community I exist in is such a low standard, and I care enough to actually vouch for it.

Elise

Day 8 of Genshin Impact

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This will probably be the last of my Genshin Impact diary things, but not because I won’t play it anymore.  I think I’m just done writing about it.

The longer I play this game, the more it grows its own identity.  I feel like the first prologue area was a nice dedication to all the things that have influenced it so far, but once you start moving out of that area things become more refined into the idea that Genshin Impact is its own thing.

So far, I feel like I’ve gotten enough characters to get myself through most of the stuff with the wishes I have been able to use.  I don’t think I ever directly explained that.  Wishes are gachapon tickets used to get stuff.  Every 10 is a guaranteed four star or better item.  Granted, I have been given a lot of those prismogems, which are one of the cash currencies.  This will not always be the case, as most have been given for an event for starting near launch day.  I’m already satisfied with the current cast I’ve been given. 

However, I am beginning to feel the tugs of lack of resources.  I am now at Adventure Rank 21, and I’m starting to feel the thing where if I don’t play every day I am falling behind.  The strange thing about that is, for most of the content I play, I really don’t need to care that much.  Of course I care a lot about story, that’s one of my favorite aspects of a game, but the combat is fun enough to log in and just fight some monsters and log out.  There will always be monsters to fight.  Some good fights to do for fun are those ley line ones.  They cost resin, which is the energy system, but the resin replenishes every day.  If I just play a little every day, not only am I secretly grinding, but I’m also making good use of that stuff.

Everything levels up.  The characters, the artifacts your characters equip, the weapons, and the adventurer rank, which is like your account level.  The first four can get strained when they need to ascend, because they require looking for certain materials that may only drop during specific days of the week.  So yes, I am beginning to see that, but that doesn’t restrain me from playing for fun.  And when the time comes that all that time playing for fun can pay off for moving forward in the story, I think it will be okay.  My prismogem growth isn’t exactly quick though.  Maybe more events in the future can provide for that.

There is a battle pass.  I hate battle passes.  Although different from gachapon, they force the same pressure where you must spend time on the game within a set period of time or you won’t get the reward.  Even worse, you have to pay.   I suppose if you’re chunky enough in cash you can pay to get the whole thing at once.  I mean, the honest truth is that all online game events are like this, so can I really complain?  Perhaps.  

I still like the writing and the characters.  I like the voice actors, although I don’t know about the English ones.  Sorry about that.

Two more things to note before I stop this diary.  The boss battles are really fun.  I like them a lot.  They’re very fun and they really let me show off the power of each of my people.  I can also get owned when I run into one that’s way too high level for me, but that doesn’t keep me from trying (and sometimes beating) bosses that are ten levels higher than me just through my combos.  I love when RPGs let you wander into areas that are higher level areas, or that there are high level monsters hiding in lower level areas.  It’s like running into a bear in the forest.  It’s a chance high level encounter.  Disclaimer, I don’t like running into bears in the forest in real life.

The second thing I wanted to note is the Spiral Abyss, which is a rotating dungeon that is simply chambers with enemies.  Each floor has three chambers.  You have to try and beat them as fast as you can for rewards.  The twist is that you can choose buffs that affect the chamber or floor.  I really like this rotating dungeon and it almost feels rogue-lite in the manner that you can choose the buffs and that the dungeon rotates every few weeks or so.  It’s kind of like a remixed version of those floor trials like in The Legend of Zelda or Paper Mario.  I love it.

And this is where we part ways concerning the writing of Genshin Impact.  I will continue playing a little bit here and there.  It’s a good experience, and I think it’s a game worth trying out.  It’s possible if it keeps it up (and maaaaybe make it easier to not have to grind too much later) that Mihoyo pulled off a good gacha game.  I will probably write more about this in the next few months or so, but that’s it for the diaries for now.

If you’ve tried it, what are your thoughts?  


Thanks for reading, and I’ll catch you all next time!

Day 4 of Genshin Impact

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I think there are a couple of things to note about Genshin Impact.  It looks like Breath of the Wild.  We’ve established that already, but it definitely doesn’t feel like Breath of the Wild.  Even with the climbing and gliding it feels like a very different game.  And that’s a good thing!

I said it before, but I’m saying it again, the gameplay is very good.  The flashy strikes, switching of characters, and elemental combinations make it very fun.  Regular combat is actually fun and worth playing.  It reminds me of Black Desert, but I think I like Genshin Impact’s combat a little more.  I like being able to combine elements.  The differences between characters can range greatly.  Sometimes things are very small, like how Kaeya actually takes a step back when he performs his charged normal attack, but the protagonist takes a step forward.  And of course, the big things are their actual elemental skills and stuff. I want more of that variance, in both sizes.  It’s great.

Your elemental combos actually feel like they have a punch.  You could go through fights with just one character, but you can definitely see the difference when you combine the elements to cause status effects.  Mixing both the regular and ultimate (or whatever that move is called that is on Q) combat elemental skills with the different characters is not too difficult but has high skill potential.  I especially like characters like Xingqiu.  His ultimate provides bonus wet damage even after you switch the character out.  Other characters that likewise create fields or effects that last long after you’re done with the move help create some cool combos.

The other thing I wanted to note is the writing.  I am playing the game with the audio in Chinese and the type in English.  I’m very impressed with the way they’ve translated the stuff.  A lot of the things to read are amusing or interesting.  I think it’s funny that there are some really far out dialogue choices you can make.  I mean, most of the time the only thing you’ll change is a different reaction, but it’s still fun that I can say stuff that is weird or almost meta.  I also like the things the NPCs say.  Again, they did a great job translating it to feel good.  I like it when MMOs have NPCs that wonder about life or other random things.  I ran into Ross the Quick, and he’s talking about how he feels like he shouldn’t run from things in life anymore.  He also talks about taking a break from missions, which almost feels like he knows the UI.  

A lot of MMOs from China, Japan, and Korea has great music, and I think Genshin Impact follows suit.  There are some melodies that may sound a bit familiar, but it’s still got good songs otherwise.  

So far, the cash stuff still is not demanding at all.  If I played the game a bit more intensely, maybe they will, especially later.  For now, I don’t see it as a problem.  The game has already provided me with characters that do well enough on their own.  More characters would just mean more fighting styles, which hopefully aren’t strict on their necessity.  As annoying as it would be, if that kind of content isn’t too far out of reach and I can still do all missions with the normal characters I happen to get, I think I would be okay to keep playing this game.

If I have more impressions, I will continue to post them.  Thanks for reading!~

Initial Thoughts: Genshin Impact

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Any Impact?

Genshin Impact is an action RPG featuring anime characters.  The graphical style is like Breath of the Wild, because it’s kind of…from Breath of the Wild.  Luckily, it seems they’ve veered off into less Breath of the Wild-ish stuff for most of the other things like story.  I hate plagiarism.  So, we’re going to state what IS like Breath of the Wild first.

The graphics could be said to be inspired by Breath of the Wild, but some effects almost look pulled from it, the grass and fire combo especially.  The layout of enemy encampments and the first small enemies in those encampments.  The music in the shrines.  The death animation for animals dying and turning into meat.  I’m not going to say cooking because cooking has been implemented as a normal thing in RPGs for a while now.  The climbing and gliding system.

So, that’s quite a lot for the short few hours I’ve played so far.  After that, it splits off into its own thing.  Obviously the anime character’s style is pretty different from Breath of the Wild, and the story and gameplay elements are pretty different.  It is fun to play, and the ability to switch between characters in your party makes the fighting more energetic and intense.  Every character feels at least a little different so it’s nice to collect them and level them up.  I noticed that they seem to have their own story arcs you can play as well, which would be very nice if they developed that well.

The music is quite obviously inspired by Breath of the Wild with some of the music sounding like it was inspired, and some of it sounding…a little too familiar.  Overall though, I think it could possibly be good enough on its own.  The sound effects of the different characters swooshing and slicing are fun and satisfying to produce.  The menu sounds are nice as well.  

Oh, that’s something that I’m quite pleased with.  The UI and menu are pretty well done.  There’s a lot of stuff to cover, as it is a mobile-style game, but they actually present it all very clearly and I think it’s pretty concise for all the stuff it has to cover.  

So, of course we have to bring up the last two things that make any gamer worried.  The gacha system, and the energy/real life money system.  If the gacha ends up being something where cheap, powerful copies of the normal characters are a thing and only available for like, two months, that is something I am not going to be happy with.  I am pretty sure this will happen for real life events, similar to how Fire Emblem: Heroes does this.  This “you must grind or feel left out” system sucks.  It’s a little different if you are not set to have to grind within a short period of time, like just added content.  Of course, the company wants to make you play their game more, but it’s in a seriously bad way.  We’ll have to see how they handle that.

And then the energy system.  A lot of mobile games have this thing where after you use up all your energy you are either highly restricted in what you can do (efficiently) or you can’t do anything at all.  And most of the time the energy returns slowly enough that you are brought to the idea of spending money just to get your energy back.  These are both systems that are in typical mobile games, and I frown upon both.  Again, how they handle it will depend on how things go from here on out.  If it turns out to be a cash-time eating monster, then I will probably just finish the main story and then go, because otherwise I don’t think it’s worth my time.  

If it ends up being a pretty easy-going game concerning this stuff, then I will keep playing it.

Thanks for reading my thoughts on Genshin Impact.

The graphics could be said to be inspired by Breath of the Wild, but some effects almost look pulled from it, the grass and fire combo especially.  The layout of enemy encampments and the first small enemies in those encampments.  The music in the shrines.  The death animation for animals dying and turning into meat.  I’m not going to say cooking because cooking has been implemented as a normal thing in RPGs for a while now.  The climbing and gliding system.

So, that’s quite a lot for the short few hours I’ve played so far.  After that, it splits off into its own thing.  Obviously the anime character’s style is pretty different from Breath of the Wild, and the story and gameplay elements are pretty different.  It is fun to play, and the ability to switch between characters in your party makes the fighting more energetic and intense.  Every character feels at least a little different so it’s nice to collect them and level them up.  I noticed that they seem to have their own story arcs you can play as well, which would be very nice if they developed that well.

The music is quite obviously inspired by Breath of the Wild with some of the music sounding like it was inspired, and some of it sounding…a little too familiar.  Overall though, I think it could possibly be good enough on its own.  The sound effects of the different characters swooshing and slicing are fun and satisfying to produce.  The menu sounds are nice as well.  

Oh, that’s something that I’m quite pleased with.  The UI and menu are pretty well done.  There’s a lot of stuff to cover, as it is a mobile-style game, but they actually present it all very clearly and I think it’s pretty concise for all the stuff it has to cover.  

So, of course we have to bring up the last two things that make any gamer worried.  The gacha system, and the energy/real life money system.  If the gacha ends up being something where cheap, powerful copies of the normal characters are a thing and only available for like, two months, that is something I am not going to be happy with.  I am pretty sure this will happen for real life events, similar to how Fire Emblem: Heroes does this.  This “you must grind or feel left out” system sucks.  It’s a little different if you are not set to have to grind within a short period of time, like just added content.  Of course, the company wants to make you play their game more, but it’s in a seriously bad way.  We’ll have to see how they handle that.

And then the energy system.  A lot of mobile games have this thing where after you use up all your energy you are either highly restricted in what you can do (efficiently) or you can’t do anything at all.  And most of the time the energy returns slowly enough that you are brought to the idea of spending money just to get your energy back.  These are both systems that are in typical mobile games, and I frown upon both.  Again, how they handle it will depend on how things go from here on out.  If it turns out to be a cash-time eating monster, then I will probably just finish the main story and then go, because otherwise I don’t think it’s worth my time.  

If it ends up being a pretty easy-going game concerning this stuff, then I will keep playing it.

Thanks for reading my thoughts on Genshin Impact.