A Game Review - Home (PC)

When I first booted up Home on Steam, I expected to be drawing a lot of comparisons to Lone Survivor, another 2D horror game that I already raved about. However, while Lone Survivor is a 16-Bit Silent Hill, Home has more in common with the last game I reviewed, Dear Esther. (I recommend you at least skim that before reading this one, since I reference it quite often.) As an indie horror game, Home builds atmosphere and creates a spooky experience, but shies away from traditional gameplay elements in a way that may turn off many gamers.

Home is a short game, meant to be completed in a single sitting (I clocked in at 66 minutes.) There are opportunities to change your path and make different decisions throughout, theoretically leading down a different road, but I'll get to that later. It is primarily narrative driven, putting the player right smack in the middle of a murder mystery.

The Best and Worst Parts of Every Game I Beat This Summer

My summer is almost over. Starting Monday, I will be getting up early again and heading off to that oh-so-enjoyable college that I just love so effing much. If you didn't catch the sarcasm, I'm not exactly looking forward to it. I wish I could say that I had a great summer, but the thing is, I really didn't. It started off okay, but it quickly simmered into the one of the most boring, uneventful vacations I can remember, before a bunch of bad stuff started happening in my personal life over the last few weeks. Going back to college is just one more even in a long string of disappointmens over the last few months.

But you didn't click on this to hear me rant about my personal life. Let's talk about games. One of th eperks of all the stuff I hae had to put up with over the last few weeks is that I've had plenty of time for gaming. And I mean a lot: I think I've beaten more games in the past three months than I did in the entire year leading up to this past May. In addition to buying a Playstation 3, I've also expanded both my Wii library and my Steam library with indie bundles and sales. So even though I had a relatively crappy summer personally, from a gaming standpoint, it was great.

I love Jesus

I really really love Jesus.

A Game Review - Dear Esther (PC)

 Dear Esther is an interesting piece of software. Some people have argued that it isn't even a game. I can see where they come from with that, as it does bear more resemblance to an interactive book than with a traditional game. Developed by thechineseroom, Dear Esther is an indie art game. You might know the type. The kind that some people rave and say are destroying games, the kind that some people call pretentious or arsy or bullshit. Other people go wild over them, studying them like classic literature. I'm sure you know the type, and Dear Esther easily fits that definition perfectly.

A Game Review - The Ball (PC)

 I first heard about The Ball a couple years ago through a preview on Destructoid. It caught my interest, and I kept and eye on it for a while, until finally taking the opportunity to nab it for a sweet price during the same indie bundle that I got Sideway: New York from. I had a pretty large backlog of games at the time, and have only been adding to it since, so it took a while for me to finally get The Ball rolling.

My Top 10 Favorite Guitar Solos

NOTE: This blog contains embedded YouTube videos. For some reason, they only show up about half the time when I view it. I don't know why, nor do I know how to fix it, so if they don't show up properly, I apologize in advance.

 If somebody asked me to sum up my ideal music in one word, it would be "guitar." I love the guitar. I enjoy looking at guitars, holding guitars, listening to guitars, and playing guitars (porrly, but I try.) The things that the guitar is capable of is astounding. It is the driving force behind multiple genres adn sub-genres of music. It has been weilded by many, mastered by some, and used to creat some of the most powerful music of all time.
I've been doing a lot of reviews on Indie games lately. I'm not getting vored of it, but I wanted to take a break to keep my blog fresh. I love music, especially the guitar. While riffs and chord progressions are fine, I believe the guitar truly shines when it blazes away a good lead composition. Something about the power, the wordless voice, the tones; when they mesh together the right way, the melody and emotion can be breathtaking. So in the interest of fun, I decided to put together a list of my favorite solos.

My Apology to the Grizzled Boor

 Dear Grizzled Boor,
I'm sorry. I didn't mean to beat you up. I didn't want to beat you up. I just had to, that's all. I mean, it was part of the game. Well okay, that's not true. It was an optional sidequest, but pretty much a necessity unless I wanted to cheat the game or wait a month. It's not my fault the developers made that specific sidequest so necessary for beating the game in a reasonable amount of time. You are such a cool guy, and I wanted you to know that kicking your butt was nothing personal, and I have felt terrible about it ever since.
*sigh* okay. That first paragraph was a little disjointed. Let me start from the beginning.

A Game Review - Lone Survivor (PC)

I first saw Lone Survivor on the front page of the Steam store, when it was released. The image grabbed my attention, looking like it would be right up my alley. I added it to my wishlist on a whim adn more or less forgot about it, until the last Humble Indie Bundle. When I was pleasantly surprised to find that it had been awarded to me, I immediately decided to check it out.
The game was an emotionally and intellectually enthralling experience from start to finish. To be honest, I'm not even sure where to begin. I briefly considered not even writing this, since I'm kind of stumped on where to begin. Still, the game is too hidden and I loved it too much to let it go unsung.

Sportsmanship in Gaming

A lot of people play multiplayer FPS games online. We all know the same cliche, too. People spewing hate, racism, sexism, cursing. Kids with no business being online shouting slurs into the microphone because they're parents either don't know or don't care. Anger and harassment are so common that they have become an accepted feature of many games.
I'm not going to analyze the phenomenon too deeply. If that's what you're looking for, I suggest checking out the latest episode of Extra Credits: http://www.screwattack.com/shows/partners/extra-credits/extra-credits-season-4-episode-11-harassment

I don't play online that much, but I've still seen some pretty nasty stuff. I was going through Portal 2 coop a couple months back and was hooked up with a random opponent. I was just about to finish the last level, and he had already gone through it. So I went through, taking my time and trying to figure out the puzzles. The guy I was playing with spent the entire match denouncing me and calling me stupid because I had not gone through it already and while he had all the solutions memorized.

A Game Review - Sideway New York (PC)

 A couple weeks ago somebody brought my attention to a charity bundle of Indie games, similar to the Humble Indie Bundle. You buy three games of your choice and pay what you want. The biggest draw for me was a first person puzzle game called The Ball, which I have been eyeing for a while. I couldn't pass up the opportunity to get it for cheap, so I shelled out a few bucks and got a couple more games along with it.
One of the other games was the subject of this review: a 2.5D platformer called Sideway New York. The game was developed by Playbrains and released on PSN for the Playstation 3, and later brought to Steam. The game follows a hip young grafitti artist with the Nox. While parkouring around the city one day, looking for his missing friend, Nox gets himself dragged through a portal into the land of Sideway, a two-dimensional world made of paint that exists on flat surfaces. With the help of the mysterious Fume, he must rescue his friend, defeat the tyrannical Spray, and find a way back to the third dimension.

A Game Review - Bastion (PC)

 Bastion had me psyched from the first video I saw of it. Unfortunately, since I don't own a 360, I never thought I would have the chance to play it - until it showed up on Steam. I picked it up during the holiday sale (along with Portal 2) but have been so busy college, in addition to playing other games, that I didn't have the chance to give it a thorough playthrough until just recently.

If Game Characters Were Ice Cream

It's been a while since I've written a blog. Now that we have the new subscription service in place, I thought this would be a great opportunity to get back into it. I don't know about you guys, but here in upstate New York, it's hot. Okay, so maybe low 80's isn't as bad as it gets some places, but the humidity makes up for it. I've had ice cream on the mind, and when I decided to write a blog, that was the first thing that came to my head. The only problem is, is that really the way to make my return to blogging? Writing about food? I should do something game related, right?
This was my solution. I know, it's corny and goofy. Just bear with me. We'll have a little fun. I've taken six of my favorite video game characters and figured out the answer to a question that nobody asked. If these characters were actually ice cream, what kind would they be?

Nine More Games I'd Play if I Owned the Other Consoles

Being an exclusive gamer these days seems a little restrictive to me. I am by no means against having a console of choice, or being a big fan of a specific genre, company, or anything else. I'm just saying that if you're a gamer and you've spend even a few minutes on any game website, you are bound to have noticed something outside your usual haunt that has captured your fancy.
Case in point: I'm the proud owner of a Nintendo Wii. I'm not going to pretend for one secodn that I don't love my Wii and think that it's awesome. I'm also not going to pretend that there aren't any PS3 or 360 games that would interest me. If I had the cash, I would happily get myself a couple more consoles and indulge myself in these games, but unfortunately, that's probably not going to happen any time soon, so I'm here making a list about them instead.

Tomato Pie is Gross

 I really don't like tomato pie. The flavor, the texture, there is nothing about it that really appeals to me. We have a tomato pie in the house that was left over from New Years, so we froze it and only recently thawed it out. As everybody in my household proceeded to start fawning over this square mess of a food, I've found myself turning my nose up again and again at its, in my mind, putrid properties.

A Music Review - "Th1rt3en" by Megadeth

Note: I originally wrote this for my college journalism class. I had to write a music review and chose this because I had just gotten it. If I had written it as a blog, the language would be much more laid back and I probably would have gone into more details on the songs due to having more freedom and space. Still, I wrote it, so I thought I would let you guys check it out.

Christmas is Simple

The other day, somebody told me that they weren't feeling the Christmas spirit because things have been "complicated" this year. I don't know why, and I'm not sure they did, either. Something about being busy, maybe a money issue, I don't know. I replied with, "Christmas isn't complicated. It's only complicated if you make it complicated." And I firmly believe that.

They say the holidays are can be stressful. I can see why they would say that, even though I don't agree with it. Maybe it's because I absolutely love Christmas and everything about it. Maybe because I'm generally a pretty relaxed person and I don't get stressed very often. Maybe it's something else, which I'll get to in a second. I just don't think that Christmas is very complicated.

Eight More Games I'd Play If I Owned the Other Consoles (in no particular order)

A year ago, almost to the day, I posted a blog about games bearing the title, "Thirteen Games I'd Play if I Owned the Other Consoles." If you want to read it, you can see it here:
http://adamsblogaboutstuff.blogspot.com/2009/09/games-id-play-if-i-owned-other-consoles_23.html

The basic premise is simple. I own a Wii. And, I love it. I play the Wii all the time, and I have an absolute blast while doing so. You'll find no complaints here; the Wii is a great console with great games and I love it. But, being an active member of the video gaming community, it's impossible not to take notice of some of the great games out on other consoles as well. I'm not saying I'm disappointed in the Wii; I love it to death. But with three great consoles on the market, and some awesome gems on all of them, you're going to miss out no matter what your choice (unless you can afford to own all three, of course. Which I can't.)

The Man on the Silver Mountain, a Tribute to Dio

Musically, 2010 hasn't been a good year for me so far. A couple months ago, Scorpions (a.k.a. the single greatest band in the history of music) announced that they are retiring. This will be their last tour, the latest album their last one. It was some sad news, but then yesterday I got some worse news.

Heavy metal legend Ronnie James Dio died of stomach cancer yesterday afternoon.

If More Classical Literature got the Dante's Inferno Treatment

Video games often take their inspiration from existing media. Movies, television, comics, anime, even music has their creative juices exploited by game companies. And yet it seems as though in all this time, once thing that inexplicably escaped it is literature. That's not to say that books have never been adapted into games, because they have, but with literally millions of books out there, it's surprising that there aren't as many literature-based games as you might think. How many works of classical literature would make great games? How many have actually been turned into such? Exactly.

The Day the Music Died - A Lesson in Rock 'n Roll History

Helllllooooooooooo baaaaaaaaaaaaaaby!

NOTE: This blog is a day late. It was supposed to be posted yesterday, on the anniversary of the actual event, but I got a late start writing this and didn't make it time. I had written too much not to finish it, so I decided to just post it a day late. Sorry about that.

Everyone likes music, plain and simple. In the modern day, there's a lot to choose from. Pop, metal, techno, hip-hop, grunge, even country. Most of them are a form of, or at least descended from, rock. Even modern country has more in common with contemporary pop than it does the cowboy western ballads of old. Unless you listen to world music or classical, pretty much any popular genre of music nowadays is a from of, or closely related to, rock.