Headlander Review

*head-related pun*

I imagine that I have a different relationship with Double Fine than others do. I never played Grim Fandango or Day of the Tentacle as a child despite my love of adventure games. And regardless of the serious fandom surrounding it, I've also never touched Psychonauts. I have played Stacking and The Cave, the former I won from a Game Informer contest and the latter was a free download on Playstation Plus at some point. And I enjoyed both of them. The game I did pay for, enough to get my name in the credits, was Broken Age, which started well but ended poorly. So it was with a reserved fascination that I found myself taking advantage of a code for Headlander, sent to me by the publisher, Adult Swim Games, unsolicited.

Headlander takes place in a retro-futuristic setting where the universe is no longer populated by humans but rather by semi-conscious robots. You, the player, are a head. Where your disembodied head came from or why it has been detached is left for the final act — your whole being is contained in a remarkably utilitarian helmet. Awakened on The Starcophagus as it is falling apart, you make a hasty escape towards adventure while learning what your helmet has to offer. Initially, your only defensive ability, though a good one, is vacuuming the heads off of robots and assuming control of their bodies. And this is the basis of the gameplay.

As you progress, you gain other abilities, of course. As just a floating head, you can eventually form a shield to reflect lasers, charge into robots to behead or destroy them, and even slow down time. Attached to a body, you can transfer your regenerative healing abilities, enhance melee strength, turn bodies into bombs, and more. The bodies of ordinary denizens, however you'd interpret that in this setting, don't do anything special and are rather fragile, though pressing the button for melee will make them dance. (There's an achievement for seeing all of these, and they are all wonderful.) Instead, your goal is to inhabit the soldiers of various colors and utilize their laser guns to attack, defend, and progress.

It's just so retro and beautiful.

The massive space station you land on after the tutorial is explored much like any Metroidvania-style game. As you gain access to new abilities by finding upgrades hidden about or by possessing higher-echelon colors on the ROYGBV scale, more paths open up. The soldiers can only open doors of their colors or below, as determined by a sassy security system by the name of ROOD, and they can do so by walking in front of them or shooting their colored lasers at the doors. These lasers reflect and bounce around, characteristics you must take note of, and as you make your way through the game's ten-hour campaign, shootouts with other robots become almost nonsensical as bright line segments fill the screen in criss-crossed chaos.

Throughout my time with the game, these shootouts never got particularly good, though. Although I enjoyed finding soldiers with more useful guns, some shooting three or four lasers at once and in different angles, sitting there and trying to shoot an onslaught of enemies felt tiresome. Shooting from the hip felt careless, especially since the most efficient way to finish an enemy is to behead them, but the time it can take to use the aim assist mode from behind cover somehow dampens the immediacy of the situation. Instead, upgrading my vacuuming and shield abilities proved to be the most useful, often finishing off a room by flying from robot to robot with my Hoover on high. During times when I needed to stay connected to a particular body, I would often leave it in a corner while the tiny head did all the work. Obviously, this makes Headlander seem to lend itself to anyone's style of play, but I personally cannot imagine anyone wanting to waste time with guns. Sucking heads off is honestly more fun, and it can be amusing to watch your opponents try to resist.

Attention to detail: vacuum robot porn poster.

Reservations about the combat aside, prevalent as it is, traveling about the environments is a treat for a myriad of reasons. Mainly, the visuals are just delicious. Not only has much care been poured into maintaining a cohesive style, reminiscent of sci-fi movies and TV shows from the 70's, but little details are abound. Almost every room is littered in logos, pictures, decorations, and furniture in a diorama-style presentation, making each seem like a nostalgic collector's fantasy dollhouse. But it's not just about looks. Shag carpet crumples under your feet as you trample it, ordinary citizens make varying comments as you pass them, and there are computer terminals with no purpose but to amuse you upon interaction. Put simply, the world of Headlander has occasional brushes with realism when its labyrinthine maps hint at a plausible ecosystem, greater fiction notwithstanding. Much like Remember Me, rooms often felt like they served some purpose, and the game offers many reasons to stop moving and bask in the goings-on.

The story feels like a swing and a miss, exacerbated by a vacuous couple of acts at the end, where you're left to explore aimlessly across a huge section of map. The underpinnings of the story relate to the aforementioned semi-consciousness of the robots. Humanity is apparently long dead thanks to a dictatorial supercomputer, Methuselah, and your actions predictably act in opposition to it, even aiding in outright rebellion. Taken lightly, the whole idea of liberating the free will of the people because you're So Darned Special™ is facile and done to death. But more seriously, your existence as the only human, albeit just a head, and free-thinking being in a world of robots waiting for your help kinda sorta reeks of common colonialist and imperialist undertones we find in much of Western fiction. That you are eventually required to aid a faction of robots who have already developed free will somehow, beret-wearing feminists really, but just cannot overcome their oppressor adds that extra shake of spice to the formula. It's mundane.

Seriously, look at all this!

Delving into the sub-story, that of your head's identity and origins, there's still much to be desired. The explanations given for who you are and why you were even resuscitated are shaky at best, and you are not properly given much payoff on your quest. Ultimately, your struggle is inherently tied to the greater fight, that of defeating Methuselah, while your personal tale takes an unfortunate backseat. Even in an often humorous story like this one, I felt there were matters of identity and purpose that should have been addressed in such a manner that one could feel a spiritual victory over the present circumstances. Coupled with the post-finale world — that is, after you've defeated the final boss — being roughly the same save for a few thankful robots, your quest feels fruitless and worthless.

Thank goodness for the work put into the environment! Headlander is authentically a delightful game to play if only for the joy of discovery it facilitates. While combat could use some work, and the story is thoughtless, I loved my time spent seeing new things, engaging with funny characters, and marveling at the sparkling, mod world created for me. But it would be nice if other aspects were given as much attention. It just can't get a-head.

Last Week Was a Shitty Week…in Games

At 2 AM Eastern Time on Sunday, June 12th, Omar Mateen approached Pulse, a gay nightclub in Orlando, Florida, and began hours of absolute terror on their Latin-themed night. Utilizing legally purchased weaponry, he murdered over 49 people and injured 53 others, involving some in a hostage situation before dying from police gunshots.

At 4 PM Eastern Time on Sunday, June 12th, after a brief, unbroadcast moment of silence, Electronic Arts (EA) began their yearly official Electronic Entertainment Expo (E3) press briefing, showcasing new video games in jovial fashion.

Gamers, but most notably, LGBTQIA and Latinx members of the gaming press, were given 14 hours to find a way to cope with the violence their communities and those communities' intersections had suffered earlier that morning. But those had been a busy 14 hours. As is common for any mass shooting, social media and the press were alight with input. With each new detail — body counts, details about Mateen himself, the weapon of choice — opinions flowed in like water, and, to keep the simile going, washed over us as we tried to make sense of it all.

I woke up at 8 AM to prepare for a flight to LA, where E3 is held, in the afternoon. Scrolling through social media before really getting up, I learned of the shooting. I had to get ready. I tweeted out a continually updating Buzzfeed article at 8:30 AM, expressed foreboding displeasure at having the validity of the lives of my community being debated at 8:38 AM, and got up to take a shower right afterwards. I didn't say anything to my husband at the time, mostly because I did not want to distract myself from what I needed to do — because I didn't want to cope yet.

In the car on the way to the airport, I was absolutely glued to Twitter, retweeting other people's commentary, occasionally making my own. The politics had begun well before my plane took off at 12:30 PM. Folks were debating increased gun control versus "good guys with guns" theory; was it likely at all that queer and trans' lives would be the ones to inspire Congress to increase regulations? I saw debates, even, about what is and isn't an AK-47, y'know, besides the rifle model used to slay and maim so many people that morning.

I witnessed erasure as politicians, including the Florida Governor, Rick Scott, appropriated this tragedy into the greater American population. I called him out in what is likely to be my most popular tweet for this month (as opposed to the shitposting I'd rather be known for) because the lives of the LGBTQIA community, people of color, and immigrants are barely considered American 364 days out of the year by conservative politicians that I couldn't see what made them American on this one all of a sudden.

And 13 minutes later, I was in the air. And I felt alone and maybe a little scared to be cut off from the constant feed of information. Maybe as long as I kept learning more, I'd understand more. Maybe I'd stop being so angry and tired and upset while feeling physically unable to show it in an airplane full of strangers. Why did this happen?

***

Each E3 press conference featured some show of support, though some were not shown on camera. Except for EA, the telecasts featured prominent figures at each company wearing LGBTQIA pride ribbons. Ubisoft, Sony, and Nintendo included broadcast moments of silence or respect for the victims of the Orlando massacre, whereas the others did so before turning on the live feed.

I was in the audience for the Microsoft conference on Monday morning. As people finished taking their seats, all the music in the theater stopped without any explanation. Was one needed? Many of us didn't think so. This was a moment of silence. But before Phil Spencer, head of the Xbox division of Microsoft, emerged amidst the sea of fluorescent green and reflective black to tell us what was going on, numerous members of the press took the music stopping to mark the beginning of the upcoming show. The discomfort was palpable as those who did not get it cheered and whooped in excited anticipation of what was to come. Less than one second after Spencer terminated the silence, Microsoft's flavor video started playing on the screen. I felt an offense I barely understood.

Between Sunday and Monday, thus excluding Nintendo's long internet-only broadcast, for at least five uninterrupted hours total, members of the gaming press were asked to give a shit about games — games that were not even out yet. No doubt, many of those in attendance wanted to do so, myself included. Though I was not emotionally prepared for E3 by the time I touched down in LA, I actively sought the distraction.

Yet for how much I would manage to keep my mind off the tragedy, basking in a sea of lights and sounds, my favorite medium in this world, I would receive sobering reminders that life is not so simple. How many times across those telecasts did we see an assault rifle? In fact, at least seven of the featured games across each of the conferences, by my count, featured militarized violence during a time when people were feverishly arguing why anyone but the military needs an AK-47.

To anyone not dealing with the ramifications of the tragedy in Orlando, especially those who are not members of either the LGBTQIA or Latinx communities, I'm sure this doesn't seem remarkable. I mean, every year, we see violent games with guns glorified at these presentations. And without arguing the merits of violent video games — I do enjoy plenty of them — I still feel the need to express this circumstantial dissonance that comes with seeing these games featured minutes after paying respects to victims. We're sorry about gun violence, they said, but let's worship the gun violence.

Ubisoft, about three minutes after Aisha Tyler's touching expression of sympathy and solidarity with the victims of the Orlando shooting and only several seconds after suggesting Ubisoft's teams have been "flexing their creative muscles," introduced yet another Ghost Recon game. Dubbed Wildlands, this entry, according to lead game designer, Dominic Butler, asks "What if a Mexican drug cartel moved in" to Bolivia, a country whose economy runs on coca leaves? Butler's answer, unsurprisingly, is that armed Americans covertly invade and kill a ton of Latin Americans.

The day before, an armed American did the same.

***

For a time spent running through the gamut of emotions — from enjoying myself to questioning my enjoyment of gun-focused games to feeling deeply saddened by the loss of my siblings in Orlando — I had a nice time. I focused as much as I could on my work, writing articles with much better timing and skill than I had the previous two years. (And, for the sake of acknowledging this blog, I cannot believe that less than four years of writing my first article here that I'd be attending my third E3.) 

And I felt comforted by sharing a hotel room with my queer friends from Game Revolution: Nick Tan, Jessica Vazquez, and Kevin Schaller. These were friends with whom I could express joy in seeing folks wearing pride ribbons for us, even those working at Nintendo, who expressly suggested that same-sex couples weren't fun or families a few years ago. I cherish them for keeping me company and making me feel like there's some sense in a world that felt like madness.

Also, I valued the good, messy cry I had on Wednesday in the hotel room. It was the first time since I found out about the slaughter in Orlando that I had been completely alone in a room. I received a voicemail from a client checking in on me and my husband in light of the violence, and I just lost it. Almost halfway through the week, I finally let myself find emotional release that wasn't by taking violent action on someone else in a video game. What an odd instance of gratitude I felt.

***

That's it. This is your rambling thinkpiece that's supposed to find a way to relate real-world tragedy back to games somehow. For how much some gamers like to pretend that video games are these apolitical safe havens for meaningless fun, the worlds in games and the world of games are inextricably related to our lived realities. And sometimes, when it hits close to home, when you authentically worry that you will die because you're attracted to people of the same gender, your mind takes a highlighter to the events of a week that you would otherwise like to be apolitical, a safe haven, meaningless, and fun.

But VR does look like cool tech.

A Guide to Gil at Game Events

Inspired by the inimitable Tanya DePass, I decided to take a stab at explaining a bit about myself and how I like to engage in public. In no particular order, here's stuff worth knowing about me to help you engage with me so we're each happier people.

• Gil Almogi is my real name, not short for anything and not a nom de plume. Gil is pronounced with a hard 'g' sound: ghil. It means, "joy," in Hebrew. Almogi contains a long 'o' sound and a hard 'g' sound: ahl-MOH-ghee. It means, "coral," in Hebrew.
• Identities: homosexual, white, male (he/his/him), Israeli-born, Israeli-American-raised, agnostic, atheist, gamer.
• I do not work full-time in the game industry yet. I've also never made a game.
• My favorite video game genres are adventure and RPG. I'll happily play games from other genres, except I don't like sports, tower defense, turn-based strategy, or endless games. At home, I prefer single-player games and avoid online multiplayer. With friends, I enjoy some multiplayer games. I actually do not inherently care for tabletop games; some can be fun, but I don't seek them out. I love watching people play games, especially single-player.
• I'm not well-versed in anything! I didn't own an Atari, NES, or SNES growing up and missed out on a lot of "classics." I'm also not well-read, haven't watched many popular films, and don't like a lot of popular music. That said, I'm very interested in listening to people talk passionately about stuff I haven't experienced.
• I can be very social with people I like and trust, but I can also find it taxing. I have a hard time introducing myself to people I've never met. Also, I am not comfortable in huge crowds of people I do not know, and I typically won't go to huge parties. When I do, it's usually because there's free food. If you'd like to invite me to a party you're going to, I hope you're offering to hang around me for the duration. Oh, and I have a lot of trouble understanding people over loud music or a lot of ambient noise, so I'm sorry if I ask you to repeat yourself or nod blankly.
• I love hugging folks I know, and I may even be willing to hug you if I don't know you that well. That said, if we're not already there in our relationship, please ask if it's OK. I will try to do the same for others. Also, I generally do not assume people want a hug unless I feel that it's been communicated that it's desired. I'm OK being touched in a completely platonic way (head on shoulder, sitting close together, etc).
• I love to eat, and though I am a pickier eater than many, I love a variety of foods. The most welcoming thing you can do is to invite me out for a meal while at an event. My favorite cuisines are Indian and Mexican. Lately, I've been really into curry.
• I generally do not drink alcohol unless I feel completely comfortable, and the drinks are free. (I had maybe three drinks in all of 2015.) I also do not drink to get buzzed or drunk, and I prefer not to be around others doing so with a few exceptions depending on my comfort level at the time. I will politely reject invitations to events where I believe people will be drinking a lot, such as those with an open bar.
• I don't and have never smoked or ingested marijuana. I also hate the smell.
• I subscribe to intersectional feminist beliefs, and I strongly believe in diversity in gaming and society at large, however that manifests. I'm happy to talk about these issues, but not with people who are disingenuous and want to be devil's advocates.
• Please do not ever use "retarded" in front of me. I will ask you to choose another word to convey your thought.
• Whether or not we know each other, if there's something I can do to make you feel safer, please do not hesitate to come to me. I'd rather foster a safe space than worry about the above bullet points.
• Whether or not we know each other, if there's something I did or am doing that makes you feel unsafe, I hope you can talk to me about it privately or with someone to moderate and make you feel safer. I'd rather foster a safe space than worry about my pride.

Final Fantasy VI Review: Episode I

Magical Predestined Ladies, Unite!

Then it all goes to hell.

It's been a while since I last ventured into a traditional JRPG. In fact, I'm not entirely sure what was the last one I played, given that Demon's Souls was not traditional. [Edit: My last JRPG was Persona 4 Golden. I'm an idiot.] It's also been super long since I played a Final Fantasy title, my last one being XIII. Of course, this isn't just any Final Fantasy. When people fight about which is the best, this one is often thrown in with much fervor.

My first one was Final Fantasy VII, which was also the first one to be rendered in 3D. While the graphics to that one were laughable by today's standards, it is also considered one of the greats and might still stand as my favorite. I don't know if nostalgia is a big part of that, but I just remember a supremely engaging title that was fun to play and fun to witness.

Ooh, intrigue!

My husband, whom I got into the series, played Final Fantasy VI well before me and insisted that I do the same. However, I have always had a problem with reaching back when it comes to media. If I get into a musician's second album, I often hesitate to check out the first. Classic movies of the 80's that I never saw may remain unseen for my entire lifetime. And looking back into the SNES era for games I haven't played, of which there are many, is daunting. There are so many games from what is now last generation that I haven't played that going truly old school (as opposed to playing a new game with old school graphics) almost feels foolhardy.

I didn't want to play his PS1 edition, so I waited until it was released digitally and on sale to buy it. So what I'm playing now is not the Final Fantasy VI of my contemporaries' childhoods but rather the 2011 digital re-release of a 1999 special upgrade of the 1994 original. The digital release didn't add anything, but the 1999 one for the Playstation added 3D-rendered cutscenes and some other graphic retooling. Note that this edition was released between Final Fantasy VIII and IX. I guess that's what the kids were clamoring for at the time.

Starting Final Fantasy VI leads to a brief explanation that the Empire is using Magitek armor and searching for espers, magical beings of the past. A thousand years prior, there was the War of the Magi, which ended with the abolition of magic entirely, turning society into something strictly agrarian or steampunk, depending where you reside. The player controls Terra, who wears a headband that prevents her from riling against her captors accompanying her on this mission to find an esper. Terra, of course, is mysteriously able to wield magic with no other tools to assist her, and thus becomes the center of much of the story. Her green hair is of little concern, though.

Small dose of cuteness.

After finding the esper, which kills off Terra's partners, Terra ends up unconscious and under the care of some locals. Meanwhile, the Empire is taking over cities left and right for no immediately clear reason. When Terra awakes, she and her new friends hop from city to city meeting more and more people invested in finding out what's going on with the Empire and their use of magic.

Thus far, the story hasn't really resonated with me, but it's not uncommon for a Final Fantasy game to take a while to get to its point. I hope I'm not wrong in assuming that there is more afoot than an Empire amassing magic and property. There better be something more sinister or complex going on. Still the narrative was initially engaging because certain events saw the team breaking apart and meeting new people more quickly than any other title I've played. I was about five hours in and had already controlled nine people in battle, which is larger than the cast of other Final Fantasy titles.

The divergent narrative was exciting and introduced a number of scenarios really quickly, including fighting enemies while floating down a river on a raft, battling a train while it chases you, and defending a mountain top with three teams in a maze. It's been a number of hours, though, since everyone has come together again, so I'm not sure if we'll break up once more, or if this is it. For the time being, Terra is out of commission, and I'm leading my party of four with Celes, a fallen general of the Empire who was fused with magic by her employers.

Sometimes conversation happens mid-battle.

Battles are typical Active Time Battle fare, though I do find it interesting that each character has unique skills I can utilize without using up magic points. Edgar uses Tools that you can purchase in shops, which have a variety of effects on enemies; Sabin, his twin brother, has Blitz attacks, which are basically fighting game inputs that do reasonable damage, and Cyan has sword skills he deploys based on how long the player waits for a timer to count.

Celes is inherently blessed with the ability to use magic, which is handy for curing your party if you're not an items fan. (I'm not.) Unlike all of other Final Fantasy games I've played, this is the first one where magic doesn't become available to everyone until a particular story point. In the others, either they could use magic from the start (after tutorials), or they were never allowed to use magic because of their class. Still, I appreciate magic being tied to the story. In this case, magic comes with the ability to summon espers, and one learns magic from the esper equipped.

It's not a terribly complicated system, though none of them are once in practice, but I'm finding that I have almost no reliance on magic yet. Celes is still the only one I use to heal, and the others chip in when appropriate. The summons themselves fall short of the grandiose animations I've become accustomed to starting with VII. They just appear, do something ambiguous, and disappear. Maybe espers acquired later on have more to offer.

That whole crazy thing.

Actually, battles are generally amusing to me since I never had to witness them play out like they do. When a party member attacks, he or she simply waves his/her weapon and damage is done to the selected enemy. Enemies attack by flashing, and occasionally there's an accompanying animation done to a party member. Only magic and skills have more pronounced animations that actually demonstrate the characters engaging with the enemies. Again, I'm not used to this, but I do know this was once how it was.

The only technological complaint I have is for the chocobo riding, which I've only done once as dictated by the narrative. It looks like Square tried to shoehorn 3D map travel into this 2D game by flipping the perspective so that chocobos actually run on top of the map. It looks just awful, though, because everything flattens, even buildings and mountains. It's like walking on a drawing. I'd have been perfectly content riding my chocobo on the same map in the same perspective as my party does. I do miss being able to rotate the map and see objects in the distance, though. But I get it.

In terms of progress, I've played over twelve hours, mostly due to grinding, and just passed the famous opera scene. I'd like to express that it was way overrated. As a game scenario, it works just fine and is in line with the rest of the game. That's not my problem. What bothered me is that the actual opera is merely fiction that doesn't enhance the main narrative.

Bosses get to look like people…kinda.

While the song is pretty, it is ultimately just a thing that happened, and I found it challenging to connect to it on any emotional level. Couple that with the fact that you can fail the actual opera scene itself, and I'm left a little confused about why its so impactful to some people. Some folks, who I'll refer to as Six-splainers, expressed that it was an impressive feat for the technology at the time. I guess I'm inclined to believe them, but I can't seriously be expected to be floored by what the SNES could or could not do in 1994 at this point. Either the scene contributes, or it doesn't, and in my opinion, it's the latter.

The scene also exemplifies a problem I have with Celes' character. She has no agency, and seems to be dragged around at the whim of all the other characters. She was a general! Unless that was a mistranslation, or I'm misunderstanding, this should an important facet of her character. Despite my efforts to make her important, putting her at the lead of my party, she thus far has been in command of nothing. And she only performs in the opera because someone else nominated her to do so. She even objects but does it anyway with no real argument.

One of the cooler scenarios.

I will admit that I'm waiting for that a-ha moment when it all gels together. As explained above, I am assuming it's coming. I was halfway through Final Fantasy X before I cared about a single character, but by the end of the game, I was shedding a few tears for them. It just took that special something to come out of the woodwork, and right now, I believe Final Fantasy VI has that. For now, I'm just going through the motions, and it feels like I'm running on the tracks, fighting a giant hype train.

All images obtained from GameFaqs. Although I'm playing on the Playstation Vita, the Playstation emulator doesn't allow screenshots. :-(

Gil's Best of 2013

As promised, here is my list.

The Best Games I Played in 2013

10. I Am Alive

Due to all the middling reviews this game got, I almost never gave it a chance. However, Scott Nichols vehemently defended it on Twitter, and it eventually went on sale, so I got it. I can honestly say that playing it was extremely rewarding, and I fell in love with the combat that played out more like a puzzle than a shooter. I understand that it did not live up to original hype and trailers, but it's a game worth juxtaposing against other survival games that often go astray.

9. Thomas Was Alone

I played this game last month when I had some downtime and ended up finishing it and getting all the achievements in one night. Not only are the mechanics extremely simple and accessible, but the lovely narrator creates compassion for these quadrilaterals that we never thought possible. Coupled with a wonderful soundtrack and beautifully simple graphics, Thomas Was Alone easily placed itself on my top ten list.

8. The Last of Us

Winter. I already gushed quite heavily about this game, but it's worth repeating that the story is touching and affecting in a way few games have managed to accomplish for me. I know this is topping many other lists, but the rote gameplay that only manages to distinguish itself during one wonderful chapter knocked it down some pegs. Still, this is a must buy for Playstation 3 owners.

7. Asura's Wrath

I was curious about this game from the get-go, but even after checking out reviews and trailers, I did not know what to make of it. Coincidentally, I found it for pretty cheap on some website, and I played it and its (English) DLC over the summer. While it lacks a lot of gameplay to speak of, the bombastic story and events are brilliant to watch, providing entertainment for more than just the player but also anybody watching. Although a game primarily made of QTEs has a limited audience, I can honestly say they went a long way towards making me feel like I am actually accomplishing the ridiculous feats Asura performed.

6. Tomb Raider

My only experience with Tomb Raider was playing the original for the Sega Saturn for about a week. I did not know what to really make of 2013's entry and so ignored it mostly until it was on sale. How wrong I was! Although many aspects of the misfortunes Lara experiences made me uncomfortable in a bad way, she managed to maintain a strong persona amidst a sea of poor female representations. And this action story laced with mysticism actually made a ton of sense. This game felt good to play and good to watch, much like Uncharted 2, but more affecting and personal. I just hope the next entry is not riddled with such poor happenstance for our heroine.

5. Demon's Souls

I started this in 2011 but put it right down when the going got too tough. But all the hub-bub about Dark Souls gnawed away at my distaste until I picked it up again. Although not my favorite game, I had an amazing experience conquering this beast, which I wrote about elsewhere. It also provided me with the rare instance of enjoying consulting Wikis for information, which the game provides little of. Finishing it left me with a sense of accomplishment that is just hard to describe. You feel somewhat sexy for having this under your belt.

4. Gone Home

Gone Home caught a lot of flack from privileged cisgender white male gamers who balked at it for having a feminist or even gay agenda (and for being short, of all things!). I'd rather not directly engage with such an ignorant group, but I don't understand why a very well-written story about a teenage girl falling in love with another girl is considered part of an agenda. Sifting through the Greenbriar family home was just an awesome experience, more akin to Myst than Blue Is the Warmest Color. There is a true feeling of loneliness and suspense coursing through the few hours is takes to complete Gone Home. Simply put: it's an incredible return for the adventure genre that I recommend to all fans.

3. Persona 4 Golden

To say there is no game like Persona 4 would be a lie because other Persona games are like Persona 4. Though distinctly a JRPG, Atlus created a genre unto itself in many ways. The story is long and fascinating with supernatural occurrences just becoming par for the course. I loved collecting and fusing my personae and building my relationships daily. There's always something fun to discover as you work your way towards the end game. The next game is on the horizon, and I can't wait, because this is seriously one of the best RPGs you'll play in your life.

2. Antichamber

I love Antichamber. Somehow, Alexander Bruce managed to sneak in a puzzle game whose tutorial teaches the player more about life and love than about playing it. The visuals are striking, and the music and sound effects are poignant; nothing is overdone. I also really enjoyed the challenge, which required me to both learn and unlearn in order to progress. Sometimes, solving a puzzle means just sitting and staring at the screen for a few minutes until you finally consider the one action you haven't tried. I can easily recommend this to absolutely everyone because of its simple controls and hours full of "A ha!" moments. Although beating it feels triumphant, it also feels personally fulfilling as if you're a better human being because of it.

Also, this is the default Game of the Year for 2013 as this is my highest ranked game actually released in 2013. It was going to be #1, but recent events changed all that…

1. Zero Escape: Virtue's Last Reward

OK. I didn't beat this game in 2013. No, I beat it on January 3rd, 2014, at about 3 in the morning. But it just seemed extremely stupid to lump it into next year for no reason. Here's the deal. As mentioned in my last post, my husband bought me this game, which necessitated my purchase of 999 before it. And 999 was a great game. Now, if you take 999's story and make it about 20 times more complex, you'll get Virtue's Last Reward.

Like its predecessor and Asura's Wrath, it is arguably not much of a game. There are definitely puzzles to solve — plenty of them — but you spend more time reading/listening than doing those. But what you witness is, in my opinion, just amazing. I found myself becoming truly obsessed with this game, which not only provided crazy amounts of twists and turns but found a way to work multiple playthroughs into its narrative in a way I hadn't witnessed since Eternal Darkness for the Nintendo Gamecube.

I do plan on writing a review for it, but just know that it's hard to describe exactly why this is one of the best games I've ever played. Yes, that's right. Ever! I just adore it, and it really revitalized my game-loving spark at just the right time. I'm so thankful for my husband for buying it for me.

Screenshots were either taken by me through Steam or the Playstation Vita, from Game Informer's website, or from the amazing Demon's Souls Wiki.

Gil's Gaming Year in Review 2013

What Sacrificing All Other Hobbies Looks Like

I don't know how many people are looking to me to judge my own year's worth of gaming, but I thought I'd give this a go for the first time. Thanks to trophy tracking on PSN, Steam's "Last Played" date markers, Raptr, and a handful of saved conversastions on Gmail, I was able to tabulate a fully comprehensive idea of how my gaming looked in 2013. Let's go down this road. Shall we?

What Did I Play?

Here, for you to ruminate, is the full list of games I played in 2013. I have gone to the effort of highlighting which games actually came out in 2013, since that'll be important later on. Also, note that I did not beat all of these. That's next.

999: Nine Hours, Nine Persons, Nine Doors	Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning
Alien Rage	Knytt Underground
Antichamber	The Last of Us
Asura's Wrath	Legend of Kyrandia (Book One)
Betrayer (Alpha)	Legend of Kyrandia: Hand of Fate (Book Two)
Beyond: Two Souls	Legend of Kyrandia: Malcolm's Revenge (Book Three)
Bioshock Infinite	Mass Effect 3: Citadel
Blackwell Convergence	Mass Effect 3: Omega
Blackwell Deception	NiGHTS into Dreams HD
Blackwell Legacy	Okami HD
Blackwell Unbound	Persona 4 Golden
Borderlands 2: Captain Scarlett and Her Pirate's Booty	Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney - Dual Destinies
The Cave	Rain
Dead Space 3	Rayman Origins
Deadlight	Sonic: Lost World
Demon's Souls	Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory
Dishonored: Knife of Dunwall	Syndicate
Doki-Doki Universe	Thomas Was Alone
Expeditions: Conquistador	Tomb Raider
Gone Home	Total War: Rome II
Gravity Rush	Unfinished Swan
I Am Alive	XCOM: Enemy Within
Ibb & Obb	Zero Escape: Virtue's Last Reward
Injustice: Gods Among Us	Zork Nemesis: The Forbidden Lands
Jade Empire

That's 49 games played last year, which I think is darn impressive. Referring to my subheading, I was able to accomplish this by severely limiting free time devoted to much else. People who are more well-rounded may watch a lot of TV and movies, but I pared down my viewing of either media to what most would consider meager. I've never been a book-reader, so compared to others, that wasn't something I had to actively sacrifice.

Of the 49 games (including DLC listed above), I beat 41 of them, or 84%, which I also think is impressive. I had numerous reasons for not beating certain titles. Some of these games were assigned as review material, and I did not see finishing the games as necessary to be comprehensive in my review by deadline. I only dabbled in the story mode for Injustice: Gods Among Us, but since I only bought the game because it was on sale, I decided to devote my play time towards other titles. And Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning had the distinction of boring me out of playing it. I might go back someday, but for now, I don't see that time coming soon.

Now, onto 2013 exclusives. While it is probably not that tough for major gaming sites and blogs to pick out what they've done all year, I had a lot of Googling to determine what I've played that actually came out in the same year. That said, as you can see in the table above, I played 21 games published in 2013. Of those, I beat 15 of them or 71%, which is still not bad. I probably would have played less 2013 games had I not been assigned reviews, so I'm thankful for those opportunities.

Here are some handy dandy charts I generated for stat freaks:

Lessons Learned

On that note, I learned a lot about different gaming genres and niche games last year. Expeditions: Conquistador and XCOM: Enemy Within were the first turn-based strategy games I've played since Blazing Heroes for the Sega Saturn, which I only rented because it looked pretty. Total War: Rome II, which has a turn-based mode and a live battle mode, was also added to the strategy mix last year. Although XCOM's rather unrelenting difficulty left me a little sore, I was impressed with how much I was able to accomplish in each title. Although I am unlikely to desire a strategy game in the future, I think those games are a testament to how approachable the genre has become for newbies.

I got a lot of my point-and-click on via the Blackwell and Kyrandia series, thanks to GOG's awesome offerings. Although the Kyrandia games allowed me to relive some nostalgic memories, they also pointed out some of the major flaws in the genre back in the early 90s — arbitrary puzzle solutions, maze-like maps that also required backtracking, and genuinely being at a loss for where to go next were among the worst offenders. In that respect, the Blackwell games manage to offer up adult tales that eschew most of these errors. On the nostalgia note, nothing brought me back to the feeling of playing Myst like Gone Home, which managed to fuse a contemporary tale of family and romance with a true sense of adventure and exploration.

2013 exposed me to niche games like Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney - Dual Destinies, 999: Nine Hours, Nine Persons, Nine Doors, and Zero Escape: Virtue's Last Reward. All of these fall into the interactive visual novel genre if I had to choose, and although I enjoyed each of them, I have to admit that only a certain kind of (patient) player would want to play them. If you exclusively enjoy action games, turn your eyes away, I say. Though I'd still take a gander at Asura's Wrath. Featuring more interactivity at certain points, it was a crazy ride for what is mostly a giant QTE.

Lastly, I learned something about disappointment. Both Ibb & Obb and Rain fell way short of my expectations, the former requiring exact platforming with inexact controls and the latter just falling flat in terms of narrative and creativity. The Citadel DLC for Mass Effect 3, although entertaining, became majorly frustrating due to a niggling bug for which I could find no solution on Origin's boards and FAQs. The game kept crashing at a certain point no matter what choices brought me there, and I managed to solve it by deleting my local save. Apparently, my hard drive and the cloud were fighting.

Although I didn't have high expectations for Sonic: Lost World, I certainly thought it wouldn't be a piece of shit. (Note, I don't curse much on this blog, but I can find no other description for such a game.) I specifically played the Nintendo 3DS version, and though the WiiU version didn't fare much better with reviewers, I can honestly say the handheld version was like the console version took a dump into a 3DS cartridge.

Keeping the criticism going, even though I heartily recommended Bioshock Infinite for its primary story, its gameplay was a large letdown that soured more in my mind as time continued to pass. Bioshock was a lot of fun to play, and I did so at a time when I had exactly zero FPS games under my belt. Having played a number more than zero between it and Infinite, I realized that there is something indeed lacking from the latter. It just felt like a shooter. And let's not forget how it brings up a story about racism only to drop it like a bad habit, even going so far as to be racist in doing so. Bitter, bitter tastes.

The Year of the Handeld?

In 1989, my parents bought me a Nintendo Gameboy. It went on to be the only handheld gaming system I'd own until 2013. I bore no distinct dislike of handhelds, but I just didn't want them. I thoroughly enjoyed my HD gaming on console and PC, and I also had few traveling opportunities to play like others who commute by train or bus.

However, the urge to play Persona 4 Golden grew too great, and my husband chose to help me scratch that itch as a gift for our marriage/anniversary. I loved Persona 3 FES when I played it on my Playstation 2 a few years ago, and even though I owned the PS2 copy of Persona 4, I felt the Golden version calling to me. Having a Playstation Plus account made that purchase more worthwhile, and I got to play both Gravity Rush and Knytt Underground for free. In retrospect, I'd probably pay money for them now.

As for the Nintendo 3DS, I did review two games for it, but I played them on my husband's 3DS, which I bought for him a few years ago. However, I then ran into this predicament recently:

I'm sure Nintendo hears this all the time.

So now you know why I bought a Nintendo 3DS XL and played 999 this year. Out of sheer coincidence, I ended up buying the golden edition of the 3DS XL made for The Legend of Zelda: A Link between Worlds. I was going to buy it anyway, and buying this edition saved me $20. Go me!

Despite abstaining from purchasing a handheld, I somehow found myself to be the owner of two last year. And now I have no excuse for not going through the backlog and playing some of the awesome games that came out for the Nintendo 3DS, the Nintendo DS, and the Playstation Vita in the past years. What was already an impossible task just became a joke.

The Future of Gaming

Anybody who's been paying any attention to video games last year is aware that the next generation of gaming consoles made its appearance in 2013. I originally had no intention of buying either at launch in November, but I did plan to get a Playstation 4 in 2014 when a worthwhile game came out. I just knew I didn't need it right away. (Like the Xbox 360, I have nothing against the Xbox One. I just don't actively want one. If I had either, I'd play it.)

Well, much like my random handheld acquisition, I randomly acquired a PS4 in the 11th hour. I browsed Twitter briefly one day, and I saw someone mention that Amazon had them in stock. I went to the Amazon app to verify this, imagining they sold out in minutes, but I was wrong. I stared at it for a moment and then checked the currently available library of games. Nothing. I wanted nothing of what's out right now. I had already claimed my freebies in November, but neither excited me.

Yet the Playstation 4 found its way into my cart and into my home as of December 26th. It would have been sooner, but we were out during the first delivery attempt on Christmas Eve. It doesn't matter. It has been nine days since I've received it, and I still haven't hooked it up. I was honestly so drawn into Virtue's Last Reward that I had no compelling need. Maybe tomorrow…

Best Of 2013

Obviously, one should end a retrospective with a Best Of list, right? Next time, Kitties. Next time!

Beyond: Two Souls Review

Caged by Its Creator

A strange child's bedroom. Look how weird it is with its...lamp!

The very first screenshot I included on this blog was of Beyond: Two Souls, a game I was awaiting. Of all the games listed — including Borderlands 2, Dishonored, Assassin's Creed III, and Bioshock Infinite — it is a little odd that I would end up playing the first game last. But so it goes. Although the game is definitely entertaining, I'm not convinced about the footprint it leaves behind in comparison to its predecessor, Heavy Rain. Both games play similarly, and unfortunately, Beyond: Two Souls commits some of the same mistakes, sometimes worse.

Jodie Holmes is the sole focus of Beyond: Two Souls compared to the fractured tale that came before it. The story is also not presented in chronological order, so there are scant few details I could betray without spoiling some of the greater moments. Put simply, Jodie is a girl who has had an "entity" tied to her since she was born. This entity, named Aiden, is invisible but has the ability to interact with the visible realm: flinging objects around, messing around with electronics, possessing people, and choking people to death. Somehow or another, Jodie ends up being studied for the majority of her life by Dr. Nathan Hawkins, who becomes something of a father figure to her, while her unique situation isolates her from others and prevents her from forming healthy relationships. Oh, she ends up in the CIA.

During the course of the game, the player is given the ability to control both Jodie and Aiden under different circumstances. For the most part, players can choose by toggling with the triangle button, but certain specific scenarios force you to control one or the other. It works well, and both have sufficient controls, but Jodie's simple walking ability can often be cumbersome and tank-like. There are a number of circumstances where it would have been useful for Jodie to be able to run, but unless context dictates it, she generally walks casually everywhere. Aiden, on the other hand, has full 3D mobility, using R1 and R2 to move up and down respectively. He can also pass through some walls, which allows players to witness conversations and goings-on that Jodie would otherwise miss, providing some modicum of dramatic irony.

Willem Defoe doesn't think any of this is funny.

As events move along, Jodie uses Aiden in a number of ways, such as possessing a doctor to escape detainment, viewing memories attached to buried items, forming a bulletproof barrier, and even taking down an entire army of soldiers turned against her. As interesting and exciting as these moments can seem, given Aiden's abilities, it can be particularly frustrating when you can't control him or when he can't pass through walls. He does come to help her in numerous ways, so it seems stupid when Jodie's life is put in mortal peril, and she just kind of has to deal with it for a few minutes until he steps in like a prince in invisible armor. As far as moments when he can't pass through walls, there's an annoying scene in a hospital where Aiden has the ability to enter every room and view every patient before Jodie finds the room she's looking for. However, as soon as you enter that room, suddenly the door becomes an impenetrable barrier, preventing the player (and Aiden) from seeing what awaits Jodie before she witnesses it herself.

This plays into the grand issue I have with Beyond: Two Souls, which is the lack of sufficient fail states. David Cage made it well apparent when he made Heavy Rain that he's not interested in "Game Over" and "Continue?" His way of sticking his middle finger up at typical game concepts was to craft a story where characters could die, and the narrative would continue on without them. In both that game and Beyond: Two Souls, though, he asserted too much control on when players could "fail." This problem is exacerbated in the latter game to the point of ridiculousness.

You see, the opening of the game takes place after the majority of the chapters you'll play through. Thus, we know Jodie lives at least up until that point. This is actually not such a huge problem in and of itself. Instead, the cracks really begin to show when the player is either unable or unwilling to do well, the definition of which as dictated by the gameplay. The way Jodie is handled during action scenes is that she or her limbs will move in a certain direction while the action slows down considerably. Then, the player is expected to push the right stick in the direction it looks like Jodie is moving. During a fight, failing to push the stick in the right direction leads to Jodie getting hit or becoming vulnerable.

Channeling her inner Jewel.

During your first playthrough of Beyond: Two Souls, you will, of course, try to do all these sequences correctly, probably making a few mistakes along the way. I implore you, however, to try not doing them at all or to do them entirely wrong on your second or third time around. What you will witness is largely the same exact game. OK, we know Jodie lives up until the Prologue. What I don't understand is why Cage, the auteur that he believes himself to be, couldn't write more fail states: If Jodie doesn't succeed at doing all this crap, how will external events play out to get her to the next scene? The answer is that the same external events play out regardless.

For example, during a fight with an enemy agent while she's trying to escape a crumbling facility, she is saved at the last moment by an attacking entity. But despite the fact that this man uses a machete, a chain, and a crane hook to kill Jodie, failing to interact during this fight still results in his impalement and her mild injury. Thus, trying and not trying have the same consequence, and some scenes would absolutely not continue until I did exactly what the game expected me to do. My efforts to play as Jodie Holmes: Worst CIA Operative Ever only exposed the lack of fail states to account for poor player performance. And no, an extra bloody nose or bullet wound is not what I'm looking for. Throughout the entire game, I only encountered three chapters that adequately accounted for Jodie being a total failure at life.

Ironically, and I don't know if David Cage did this on purpose at all, Jodie complains in one chapter about how she just wants to die but just can't. In the context of the narrative, this is in light of Aiden's efforts to keep her alive, but in the context of gaming, it just ends up being a fourth wall-breaking moment of commentary on Beyond: Two Souls itself. Later, when another character, who has asserted pure and utter dominance over her, comments, "We can't kill you," I found myself rather resigned. After all, it wasn't for lack of trying.

It's a fair fight because you have to win. Get it?

Heavy Rain actually committed the same sin. The four characters (technically, only three of them) can only die in prescribed scenes. In other dangerous scenes, "failing" typically left a more damaged character. But the vast difference between it and Beyond: Two Souls is that the former had more failure effects. Characters wouldn't get information out of someone, entirely new scenes would play out when a character was successfully captured by police, or a new interaction would take place later on to make up for previous failures. Heavy Rain appeared much more adaptable in that regard, even when it became plainly obvious that I couldn't kill off a character who was in mortal peril.

All that being said, and it was six paragraphs of saying it, Beyond: Two Souls is certainly entertaining when you are actually trying to play it. I tend to harp on the negative, but I was thoroughly interested in how most chapters played out. While being out of chronological order can seem like a pain, Cage actually crafted it in such a way where the next scene has much to do with the previous scene, regardless of how they are related in time. Slowly, the answers to many questions trickle out in small doses until the resolution, which answers the biggest question of all. (Not spoiling it.) Unfortunately, there are a few chapters that seem a little too distant from all the others in terms of narrative, and motivations behind the events of the final chapter are weak and slightly out of left field. The final chapter itself, though, is a thrilling resolution to the story.

One thing I have to hand to Quantic Dream and Cage is their ability to stretch the graphical capabilities of the PS3, whose relevance is ending soon as the next generation approaches next week. The game is often really beautiful. Whereas Heavy Rain before it demonstrated lifelike character faces and models (for the most part), Beyond: Two Souls performs many feats with light that are often astounding. Even the face game has been upped. Many games stumble when showing wet, dirty, or otherwise affected faces, but this one actually makes them so much more realistic.

Stan, the (homeless) man.

The only common issue this game exemplifies like so many others is in the sterility of many environments. When the camera focuses on characters, or when the action is high, everything looks smooth and interesting, but in slower-paced scenes, such as in a house, walls and objects tends to look very clean. I'll admit that I'm really reaching with this complaint, since most of the graphics are really immersive.

I like to rip on Lorne Balfe as a composer because of the beyond uninteresting tracks he composed for Assassin's Creed: Revelations, but I have to hand it to him on this game. The music, which ventures occasionally into science-fiction territory, is often appropriate and interesting. As for the acting, not just voices, it is mostly done really well. Jodie is played by Ellen Page, and Nathan is played by Willem Defoe. If you like them as actors, you will like them as characters; that's really what it boils down to. Other supporting characters are also very well-done, not suffering from the Canada-in-America idiocy that plagued Heavy Rain.

So this isn't quite Heavy Rain II: The Moistening. Beyond: Two Souls definitely stands on its own and is a worthwhile interactive experience both in its technical capabilities and in its narrative, that is, when you are trying to play it like you would any other game. Unlike its predecessor, I just don't recommend trying to fail. Just take the cards handed to you unless you enjoy seeing a game flounder in embarrassment.