Why I love and hate horror games

I hate being scared. I don't think that's unreasonable, and for me the idea that people would want to be scared is as nonsensical as wanting to take a nail gun to your hands (something that gets a heck of a lot harder once the first hand is done.)

Horror games however, do have a certain state of affairs that gives them a little golden podium in my heart. You see, in order to scare someone, you have to threaten their feeling of safety, and in a video game you can only do it by outsmarting them.

Only smart people can make a decent horror game.

Take 'Slender' for example: a little indie game based off a forum discussion about 'The Slender Man'. These are pretty basic beginnings. There was no talk of gaming, just folks discussing a modern internet-fuelled myth. Then this guy, a Mr. Mark J. Hadley, started writing a game.

The game has you, walking in a forest, with a torch and the ability to jog a bit. Those are your only forms of input. Your aim is to find 8 pages of a book about the Slender Man, which are pinned up all over the place. If the Slender Man sees you, you start to go mad and television static starts to fuzz up your screen. If he catches you, you loose. It's immensely simple and that's exactly why it's good. It's very hard to analyse a game with so very little 'gaming' going on. It's an experience and within the long gaps of you stumbling about your imagination, the horror-mind's best friend, starts to fill in the gaps. "Where am I?", "Is the next page far?" and "What the hell was that in the grass?!" were all things I started uttering to myself whilst playing. Of course, if you're not willing to get involved, you won't enjoy this game. Switch the lights off and turn the volume up though, and you're in for an amazing/nerve shattering journey!


I don't like horror games, but this is a job well done!

I must add however, that I would have not known about this game if it wasn't for a Youtube friend of mine: JPachoD. There's something evil but enjoyable about watching someone get scared at a video game, and it does the game a real justice to see what effect it can have on the willing mind. Click here to see him freak out! I will also add that his other videos are also greatly enjoyable, so check out his channel! (The review of Hambo comes highly recommended!)

Poor scared Irish boy!

Fantastic game things I have experienced as of late

This post is, admittedly, an amalgamation of many posts I haven't got round to doing. Fact of the matter is though, I've been having a lot of fun. Lets gets right into it (and in no particular order)

Minecraft 1.3.1 update
The latest version of Minecraft is delicious! If you don't know what Minecraft is, as unlikely as that scenario is considering it's forever-growing popularity; it's a game by independent developer Mojang where you mine, craft, explore and survive in a world made entirely of of cubic structures. It looks dated, perplexes many, but ultimately rewards players who stick with it and make the most of a world where you can more or less make anything.

Sometimes I like to go sailing. With a sword. Other times I play the game like a normal person.

Back to the point though, even before Minecraft was completed people who bought the game have been given every update for free. New content, bug fixes and massive increases in possibilities downloaded automatically to your gaming computer sometimes months after your initial purchase. That's great in itself. Some super games on the market remain glitchy and stale for very long periods of time and few ever get decent new content if at all, whilst this unassuming game is throwing new shapes at players consistently.

So, here's what's new that's got me excited"

• Integrated multiplayer access to games over LAN
• The ability to trade emeralds for rare gear from NPC villagers
• 'Ender chests', allowing a pool of items to be retrieved from multiple points wherever such chests are placed
• Books you can write in (a lot) and then share with other players
• Tripwires, so you can also be really horrible to other players
• The ability to generate 'large biome' maps with massive expanses of terrain. Effectively turning your world into huge frontiers.

It's really cool stuff, and before I even get into the new multiplayer possibilities I'm enjoying a solo adventure into a massive desert: working on writing books on my survival trials as I explore and look for other civilizations.

Nuzlocke Challenge on Pokemon Yellow

Graphical representation of my team. The Pidgey is grey while they sit in my PC. I'd write something funny but I'm terrified I will blubber like a small child if one of my team dies!

As I've written before, the Nuzlocke challenge where Pokemon die when they faint and only the first monster from each area can be caught, is an emotional rollercoaster in the most unflattering way. Attempting it on Silver did not go well, so with a friend we both started the challenge on 1st generation games: Yellow for me and Red for her. Asides from the fun of revisiting the games that started it all, there's a certain wonderment in being forced to play with Pokemon I may not have bothered with before. In effect, it's a fresh experience, and as I start my grueling trek through Mt. Moon my inner child feebly questions which of my precious few am I going to loose just to make it to the next town? Gripping stuff!

'ZerothGhost' Youtube channel

This is Zeroth Ghost. He's a lot more chromatic in real life.

Ok so clearly, this isn't a game. What it is however is a very entertaining youtube channel by a Mister Cameron Rose, largely focusing on gameplay with commentary and wit. At turns he is both informative about the features you want to know about, and thoroughly entertaining. He does not aim to promote himself as a guru or expert gamer, but simply an equal-level funster and charmer, who's simultaneous insight and flaws endear him to the side of gamers oft reserved to solo gaming: the character who expresses bewildering emotional highs and lows tempered by an unrestrained sense of personal enjoyment. Hard to really put across the joy of his videos in words alone, so check it out for yourself here.

Team Fortress 2 finally working on my Mac

Fear the bright colours!

For months it refused to play, and now it does. This isn't really a review or anything, TF2 has always been good, but with new gameplay modes and a constant onslaught of new items it's forever worth a play if first person shooters are your street. On an interesting side note though, I've recently learned that I am actually better playing with a touch pad than with a mouse. No idea why.


Left 4 Dead 2's Cold Stream DLC and update

Remember that feeling when you first saw these guys? Now you get to watch them die in new locales! :P

Yes more Valve-goodness! Hot off the presses, news flitted across blogs and social networking sights that the slightly delayed Xbox360 release of this zombie-blasting joy-slice had finally arrived just a few hours ago. At 560 Microsoft Points (£4.80, ignoring the cost of purchasing points in set block multiples of 500 points) it's pretty reasonable for what you get. Stings a little that PC/Mac gamers get it for free, but considering the start up costs of personal computer gaming it doesn't seem so bad. Importantly the content is joyous for everyone:

• All mutation game modes now available from the menu screen.
• A brand new campaign, Cold Stream, originally made by fans of the game but now integrated into the main game completely spare canonically-speaking.
• All the campaigns from the first Left 4 Dead that had not been added to L4D2 are now fully playable and include minor tweaks to bring them up to modern standards. That means Crash Course, Death Toll, Dead Air and Blood Harvest; all with added crowbars, jockey-humpings and grenade launchers!

So far I've played through a bit of Lone Gunman and Last Man on Earth mutations (great solo challenges, if a bit on the difficult side) and finished the Cold Stream campaign on Normal difficulty. The new campaign is, without a doubt, brilliant. It's what Crash Course was to L4D1, and even that's on L4D2 now! The potential for amazing Versus games is hugely apparent here, with close attention to choke points and player distractions feeding into a thoroughly exciting experience. There's a lot of fun to be had here, and no noticeable problems since some initial download glitches were ironed out earlier to report. Highly recommended!

'Kingdom of Amalur: Reckoning' Demo

For a good few many years, I've had a concept of what my best game would be.

It would be a combat-orientated (read: hack & slash) role-play game, with lots and lots of customisation. The end result that you could pour your attention into your own character, rather than the game maker's world, and then enjoy tearing your way through in satisfying and epic battles.

Kingdom of Amalur: Reckoning might just be along those lines, and with more besides. The presentation is glossy, with something sparkling or glowing or exploding every couple of minutes. The combat, a player-pandering array of flashy moves and screen-filling spectacle, also has just what you need for challenging game play. Blocking, dodging, combination moves and weakness exploits are all in there to task the player with utilising them to their benefit. There's a reasonable amount of customisation when you first make your character, but a truly expansive potential when you start making choices over equipment and skills.

Some dog trainers are harsher than others. Lovely day for it though?

For your weapons you have a primary and secondary weapon slot. However the only real difference between the two slots is which button they use (X and Y on the Xbox360, respectively) as you inevitable use them together in combat to create combos. A simple example being, you knock an opponent backwards or skywards with a sword and then plug them with arrows from your bow. The types of weapons available are massive hammers, swords both one and two handed, pairs of daggers, pairs of 'faeblades' (think double bladed curved swords), bows, spell casting sceptres and staves, chakrams (bladed rings that are thrown like boomerangs) and finally shields both physical and sorcerous . It's a healthy list, and importantly each weapon is used differently. That means individual animations, move lists, and tactics.

Yes, even this concussive-force artiste has his place in the world of tactics.

Further more there is a massive selection of unlockable abilities, based on three classes of might, finesse and sorcery, which asides from new spells and combos include other weapons like harpoons and magic-based landmines. The end result is that by perusing a play style you like, you further unlock more ways to experiment with it. There's only so far you can get in the demo but one imagines it allows for new elements to enter gameplay throughout.

The demo itself is very pleasing, with an introductory level giving back-story and basics of game play, then 45 minutes of game time in a very large slice of the game map.  It's well worth a look, and will probably be sat on my Xbox 360's hard drive for a long time to come! More information can be found on the game's very informative website.

A little more on Mari0

For those of you who read my last post (if not you can catch up here) I was not all that complimentary towards the indie fan game 'Mari0'.

I may have spoken too soon.

What I did not realise is that there is much more than just the Super Mario Bros levels on offer. There is actually a whole bunch of Portal-styled levels AND a level editor! Further inspection shows that both of these utilise both Mario and Portal mechanics to great effect and are actually a lot of fun. I now have more reason to encourage you to check it out for yourselves, and hope you enjoy it too!

As for myself, Mari0 will get a bit more playtime in between Minecraft and Skyrim sessions which have taken up most of my gaming time. Those who actually read this blog will remember I said I was planning a big writing piece for this blog: it's still in the works and it will be about either Minecraft or Skyrim.

Or both.

Or something else.

Tatty-bye for now!

What 'The Expendables' and 'Mari0' have in common.

I had two options: either watch 'The Expendables' or play 'Mari0': a free-to-play game combining the wonder of Super Mario Bros. and Portal.

I won't lie, my attention was split. The Expendables is by far one of the most gratuitous alpha-male-pleasing pugilism-porn films I have ever seen. Watching Stallone chop off someone's hand with a bowie knife is just something you can't ignore. However Mari0 was just too intriguing for me not to give my full attention, so I waited for a gap in the wafer-thin plot to give it a go.

Manly men, ready to do manly things, like killing and dealing with emotions poorly.

For those who don't know, Mari0 is a creation from Stabyourself.net: a two man independent games company. Had it not been for a chance find, I wouldn't know about them at all. This game though instantly grabbed my attention. Mario with a portal gun? It is just one of those geeky concepts that was designed to excite the fandom masses, very much like The Expendables for that matter.

I think we can all appreciate why this will be funny.

The controls are a comfortable WASD affair, but with the addition of the mouse for the portal gun. There isn't really any other way it could of been done. However as soon as I started playing I started to wonder IF it should have been done. There's a sprint button, like in the original Super Mario Bros, but you never seem to use it because you have the means to teleport. Considering that Mario is pretty much the great great grandfather of platforming games, the portal gun does some what take away from his fame with it's shiny new generation thinking.

Exhibit A. Notice how this situation does not require portals.

Naturally I felt allegiance to both of these elements, and wanted to see them used in unison. The problem is that for every problem that can be solved with portals, a brand new problem can also be made with them! Goombas flying through the air, koopa shells appearing right where you don't want them, and simple jumps made infinitely harder because you decided to line up a tour-de-force of geometry and physics. Mario never needed portals to get the job done, and it was one of the greatest selling games of all time when Mario's only special kit was a trusty pair of brown shoes and a resourceful utilisation of mycology.


So, what does this game have in common with Stallone's kill-fest? Both of them are too much of good things. I love action films, but watching The Expendables felt like watching little boys incessantly shoot each other with sticks with the added horror of them then blowing up. It doesn't matter who's the goodies or the baddies, and violence is entirely mitigated by how determined that kid is to keep on inflicting it. As for video games I adore platformers, but Mari0 does seem to encourage you to just dick about rather than really enjoy the finesse of either games that it's based on. It's too much of what you want and not enough reason to question it.

I can't really say whether it's good or not yet, as I have faith that the more I play it,the more I'll get into it. It can be downloaded for free here. For the mean time though I'm very tempted to just play Super Mario or Portal, rather than both. Or maybe I'll just watch Rocky.