Category: Games

I don’t play games that much. But when I do I usually blog about how good/shit I am at them. Also contains those strange questionairres I get emailed once in a while

So, this is Christmas 2016

… And what have you done, I hear you ask, for yet another recycled introduction to the Christmas blog post. It’s the first time I’ve done one of these in a couple of years. Well, a proper one anyway, mainly because for the last couple of years, I’ve been busy on Xmas eve. This year, however, I’ve gone and caught myself a rotter of a cold, so I’m just sat at home, feeling sorry for myself. And if you’d like to leave a sympathy comment in the boxes below, well, that’s be just lovely.

So, as usual, I’ve felt as festive as a turkey about this time of year. I’ve been to absolutely no parties this year, and I’ve only been out a couple of times, and neither of those times were particularly festive. Not a beard bauble in sight, and only a hint of a Xmas jumper.

First, let me clear up something I started off in the last post, but because I rambled too long about getting lost in Stockton, I sort-of forgot about it.

“Another year older, and no longer in debt”

You ssee, since January last year, I’ve owed a lad called Chris a tenner. Not the Chris who has been mentioned many times on this blog, but a Chris I used to work with. Back in (I think) January, we’d went for a “works” night out. I no longer work for the company in question, but I still thankfully get invited to their nights out in the town. Unfortunately, on this incredibly cold January night, I’d made one massive error of judgement, and forgot to go to a cashpoint. This was shit news. It meant I had a six-mile walk home, at mignight, with snow on the ground. Bugger. Thankfully, he was at hand to line my pockets weith the Queens’ face, and this small gesture was not forgotten.

11 months passed, and I didn’t see Chris again, until 9th December, when I was able to pay the tenner back, and I could, once again, hold my head up high as a well upstanding citizen.

Right, anyway, enough of that. Back to the topic.

2016 has taken another figure of my Xmas childhood, as I learned a few minutes ago that Rick Parfitt, out of Status Quo, has died, which is a shame. Status quo always reminds me of Xmas, because I got a tape of theirs when I was about 9. You could say this would have been the beginning of my proper music collection, as for that year, I got my first dual tape deck. And I loved it so. I even remember taking that tape deck on holiday with me to Sandy Bay.

Here’s the Discogs entry for the album, for those playing along with at home.

So, tomorrow is the big day. For the first time, I’ll be somewhere else, and not sat around my computer, but I can guarantee, somewhere between then and now, I’ll be squeezing a couple of games of Rocket League in…

I might even squeeze in a review of the year before we kick 2016 into the rubbish bin where it belongs.

Obligatory “Pokemon Go” blog post

How do you get 100 Pikachus on a bus? Pokemon.

And, if you haven’t heard that joke before, you’ve been under a rock for the past 15 years, or you’ve not sat next to me for any period of time recently, because every time someone comes out with a Pokemon Go comment, I come out with that belter of a joke. And by “Belter”, I mean that I should be belted hard across the face. With a chair.

But it still gets a laugh from somebody. Sigh.

I know, I’m getting old, my knees are hurting from jumping on and off of these bandwagons, but this is one that I couldn’t pass, even though it’s possibly the “saddest” I’ve ever even got partially involved in.

Pokemon started off as a cash-in for Nintendo. A card game, highly successful console game, and of course, a long running cartoon. I personally paid absolutely no interest in any of these, so I had no idea what the hell Pokemon go was supposed to be.

So, what’s the premise of the game? Well, if you don’t know by now, you really should have stayed under that rock you’ve just crawled out from. You play the game on your phone. It starts off by having a street map of where you’re currently stood, and you walk around the area. Literally, walk. With your own two feet. Every so often, your phone will vibrate, and in the local vacinity, is a “pokemon” (short for pocket monster in case anyone’s still actually wondering), you click on the little monster, and it’ll appear on your phone screen, with whatever your camera is pointing at, as the background, so it looks like the pokemon is there in front of you. Obviously, when you move your phone, the pokemon moves with it, and you have to flick pokeballs to catch it. Sometimes, some pokemon are very common, and you’ll get sick of seeing them. They’re very easy to catch. Others are larger, and will run around, causing you to turn your phone 360 degrees, chasing after it, and often meaning you’ll miss with a pokeball and lose it, and some will break out, meaning you have to throw again to catch it

With me so far? No? That’s OK, neither am I, but I shall persevere.

The crafty thing is….. you only have so many pokeballs! and you have to earn more (along with other collectables) by visiting Pokestops. These are actual real life locations, usually landmarks, meaning if you want to actually get anywhere in the game, you have to get off your fat arse and get them. You can add “lures” to these real life locations, which means more imaginary pokemon visit there… and therefore more actual real life people who also play the game. And it works.

Some of you may remember in the Youtube video I posted a couple of months ago, where me and Chris went past “Jimmy’s Green”. I laughed because I thought it couldn’t possibly be a land mark. Well, here it is, swarming with Pokemon Go players…

Photo courtesy of ARD Photography
Photo courtesy of ARD Photography

I have a feeling this will be the same for areas up and down the country.

Here’s a couple of screenshots tro try and illustrate what it’s all about… This is me, walking across the street, and this little thing pops up in front of me…..
Screenshot_20160717-131437
… I have to flick the red ball towards it. If I hit it. I’ll capture it, and get points towards levelling up. The more you level up, the more you can capture easily, I presume.

Screenshot_20160724-174652
And here’s a wild Rattata I caught whilst sitting on the toilet. I could get him arrested for watching me like that.

And where would I be without the obligatory “Playing the game whilst pissed” photo…

Screenshot_20160717-005644

It’s one in the morning, As you can see, the bloody thing was to the left of me, as I was too busy trying to take the screenshot whilst walking after several pints that it had bounced out of view. I wasted so many pokeballs trying to catch that fecker, but a Hartlepudlian never gives up…

Screenshot_20160717-005830

Questions? You’ll have a few. But then again, too few to mention. So I’ll mention them for you.

“So, is there any point to the game?” Yes. You have to catch all of them. I think there are something like 136, and some are much rarer than others. Expect to do a lot of travelling if you’re going to attempt this.

“Aren’t you too old to be playing this”? Yes, and no

Yes, as in, I sort-of secretly play it. Obviously, you sort of have to wave your phone around flicking the screen at certain intervals, so I sort of do it in secret. I’ll load the app up when no-one’s around. I certainly wouldn’t go and hunt down a popular pokestop and join a group of people playing it. No, as in you’re never too old to have a bit of a walk, and if it adds to the “point” of the walk, I can’t see any harm in it. Remember, there’s no upper age limit on games (only perceived upper limits), and if I want to play it, I will. Though now that I’ve written this blog, I’ll probably never play it again.

“Where are the best pokestops in Hartlepool?” There’s loads in the town centre, as you’d expect. There’s quite a few on the Marina, especially around the lock gates (watch where you’re walking!), apparently, there’s 11 in Ward Jackson Park, and a load on the Headland.

Well, I think that covers most things. Comment if you have any other questions. I’m going for a Weedle in next door’s hedge.

The Steam Easter Indie sale. My purchases.

EDIT MARCH 2017: No doubt there’ll be a steam sale in the next month or so, and in the off-chance someone finds this during the same, here’s my update on what I still think of these games…

So, for a few more days, Steam are having what they’re calling their “Indie” sale. These are games what are written by individuals, or small independent companies. My love for them dates back to the days where another word for them was “public domain”. and the games were on the Amiga. I would save up what little pocket money I had, and rush down to the now defunct “Peak Computers” in York Road. to pick up 3.5″ floppies, with some of the latest “PD” games on them.

Fast forward almost 20 years, and my love for the independent developer has not died, and as this is a sale, I thought I’d buy a few. I’m brassic for the next 5 weeks, so this couldn’t have came at a worse time, but I’ve still picked up a couple up.

First up… “Thomas Was Alone”, in the sale for £2.99.

This obviously comes out of the “Less Is More” stable of graphics, and this is not necessarily a bad thing. Movement is fluid, as you’d expect from 4-sided polygons, music is perfectly acceptable, but the highlight of the game is strangely the narration, and the fact that each block has its own story. Narration is provided by Danny Wallace, someone who I have actually heard of. As with all of these types of games, you’ll think you’re stuck on a level, then get fed up and quit, only for you to sit there for the next 20 minutes, staring at your desktop, working out how to do this. You eventually have an idea, you load it straight back up, you complete the level, and the circle of life is complete.

MARCH 2017: I don’t really play this one anymore. It’d been a good 18 months since I last gave it a blast, but I do remember getting into it slightly. Probably worth getting if it appears cheaper.

Hokay… next up… “Garry’s Mod”, which set me back a whopping £1.49

I… I just don’t get it. It seems insanely popular, but I just can’t seem to be able to do anything at all with it, and where’s the fun in that? I spawned some balloons, which I popped. Some crows and seagulls, which I shot. A table, which I threw about a bit, and that’s practically been it. Maybe I’m just reading too much into a sandbox game which is many years old, but I can’t see the point in it? Is there any point? There’s even Steam achievements that claim “2 hours of your life wasted”. Maybe I’m just too old for this shit? See, now if I was 4 when this game was released, the little-me would have embraced it with open arms. The 33-years-old me keeps thinking “Well, I really could be doing the pots right now. Or getting myself a life”. naaah, the latter will never happen.

Well, I really hated this one, as I couldn’t get anything to work as it was supposed to. Currently uninstalled, and I don’t geel any great need to ever go back to it.

And so… onto “Super Hexagon”…

Well, this one set me back a silly amount of money. 67p. to put that into context, a can of coke out of the vendy at “Newest Employment Palace” sets me back 70p. therefore, if I can get 30 seconds worth of enjoyment out of this game, then it’s been worth it. And you, know what, I haven’t managed to get any more than what’s stated above – 24 seconds! Is that a bad thing? Not necessarily! It is very, very difficult. For me, anyway. If you’ve got the hand-eye co-ordination of a nettle, you’re going to struggle with this. And that’s its beauty, as strange as it may seem.

You control a pointer on the screen, which you rotate by the cursor keys, and you have to avoid hitting the bright lines. Seems simple enough, except the screen is constantly spinning, and the playfield is spinning in the opposite direction. The screen pulsates to the sound of the music, and everything gets faster, at more of an angle the further you get into it. I’d say, the average game length for me is 12 seconds. It’s something I can’t describe in text.

Before I loaded it up tonight to get the screenshots, I was going to put it in the “This is shit” pile, but then I broke my record by a few seconds, then a few seconds more, and those small time differences actually gave me a sense of achievement. Last time I felt that good after 20 seconds of action, I was [insert sexually explicit joke here]

MARCH 2017: Worth every single penny of what I paid. I decided to tackle the hardest levels first, then work back, as it made the easy levels so much simpler. Up to about 75 seconds on the easy level now. Get it, if it reappears.

Last, but not least, “Puddle”.

I do like my physics games. I’d put them up there with driving games as one of my favourite types of game. the premise is simple. you control fluid, you tell it where to go by rotating the game screen using the cursor keys. The more fluid you get to the exit, the better your score. If fluid leaves the screen, for instance, it gets caught somewhere, and it disappears off the top of the board, you lose it. Each level requires you to finish with a certain amount of fluid. Go below this, and it’s game over. Naturally, there are also obstacles that will evaporate fluid, making it just that little more tricky.

There’s plenty of worlds to explore, and the graphics are the best out of the bunch I’ve purchased of the last couple of days. Despite it being pretty much a physics engine simulation, it just feels too linear. You can only turn the board to a certain angle, which invariably leaves you with large smatterings of stuff everywhere, which naturally disappears off the top of the screen. I might just be in the early stages of the game. I don’t know if I can be bothered getting much further.

MARCH 2017: Got bored of this one really easily too. Not for me, I’m afraid.

HONOURABLE MENTIONS

Get these while they’re hot. Or cheap.

THE BINDING OF ISAAC

Have I mentioned this before? If not, get it. Now. 99p. This game is huge, yet you’ll actually struggle to see much of it. Think “Atic Atac”, but with poo jokes and random maps. I bought this ages ago, and have never been able to take screenshots from it. Odd.

MARCH 2017: Yeeeeeeah, it’s still OK I suppose. I could never get anywhere wit it, and it gets repetitive very quickly, even though the maps are different each time.

10,000,000

I would love this, but it falls into the all-too-obvious trap of getting easier and easier the more you play it. It’s not that you actually get better, it’s that the items you unlock just make the game easier. I’ve not played it for a while though, as I know I’m literally a couple of playthroughs off getting 10,000,000 points to complete the game (hence its name). I’d completely write it off, if it wasn;’t for the fact one of the tunes in the game is remarkably similar to “Monday“, one of my favourite Amiga chiptunes of all time. Also, this one, known as “intro33.mod“>. I’m posting it here, as it’s taken me 20 years to find out its actual name. I just knew it as the jolly little tune that played when I inserted my Project X disk, with its blue handwritten label, and the “Future Zone” logo emblazoned on the disk shutter. I digress.

MARCH 2017: I still really enjoy this game, and thankfully it’s still available on Steam, so if there’s a similar sale in 2017, I’d recommend getting it..

I was going to put a couple more in, but there’s no point. All I have to say is that everyone on the planet, whether, to mis-quote Johnny Mathis, you’re white, brown, yellow, it doesn’t matter. you just have to own Audiosurf, Chime or Beat Hazard.

An update on my Steam purchases

Wow, I never thought, that at any point, I’d turn part of this site into some type of games review. I’ve never had time for them. I’d buy the odd game, and then never play it. I still have games I bought years ago, still wrapped in their plastic. Armed and Dangerous, anyone? I have that. On my shelf, still sealed.

Since my discovery of Steam a while ago, I’ve purchased many games. Quite a few of them cheap “indie” games, but a couple of full-price ones too.

You may remember my post a few months ago regarding my recent purchases from the afore-mentioned software distribution site… well, there’s been more since then.

Altitude – £3.49

I’d previously downloaded the demo, but didn’t rate it, probbaly because you couldn’t do much. Back then, it just looked like a cartoony shoot-em-up involving planes, with a bit of a dodgy control system.

Football was on the television the other day, and I needed something interesting to do. There was a “free weekend” of Altitude, where you got the full game for a weekend. It’s not a powerful game, so I was able to install it on my laptop. Even better was the fact it actually supported the Xbox 360 controller, meaning that my previous worries about the control system were solved.

I played through the training levels, and found myself actually enjoying the game. I connected online for the first time, and found myself enjoying the game even more. The more I played, the more I killed and unlocked new planes. A small sense of achievement was… erm, achieved, each time a plane fell out of the sky thanks to my gunfire.

Longevity is a bit of a question with this one, though. Will I still play it in a months time?

Just Cause 2 – £18.44 (inc. DLC)

No multiplayer in this one, but as a question of longevity… why, yes, I’ll still be playing it in a month. I’ll probably still play it in a year. It’s one of the best games I’ve played.

There’s no point going into the storyline. I could do, but I’d be here for literally minutes. The storyline, to me anyway is… blow shit up and kill the guys in uniform. And there’s a lot of shit to blow up. This game is absolutely massive. For some reason, it was half-price on Steam, and I really shouldn’t have bbought it. The demo ran awfully on my machine. It wasn’t until I’d clicked the “purchase” button that I realised how bad it run. Despite uttering “fuckshitpiss” for the entire length of the download process, I ran the game and found that yes, it also ran awfully. 30 seconds later, after adjusting the graphics settings accordingly, I had a working game!

This one suited mouse/keyboard controls, so I was able to get into it pretty quickly.

I’ve never experienced a time-eating game, but a few weeks ago, while Daddykins was away, I literally lost an entire day. The house was empty, so I didn’t bother getting dressed. I sat in my computer chair, naked, at approximately 8AM. Next time I looked at the clock, it was 4PM, and I was still naked. None of you needed to know that, I just thought I’d add the “cannot be unseen” element to this post.

You can also get mods for it, apparently.

I’ve just realised I’ve not described the gameplay at all in these few paragraphs. never mind, eh?

Chime – £3.99

Literally, a new release, coming out on September 6th, I bought this, oddly without downloading any demo, or knowing anything about the game, except the fact I knew I would like it. My instinct was spot on, I love it.

Gameplay is hard to describe without referring to Tetris, and a little-known arcade game called “Block Hole”, released by Konami in 1989. The premise of *that* game was to make quadrangles of any size – partial shapes would fall down, and you’d fill them in to make quadrangles.

Chime is similar in that you have to make quadrangles, enough to fill a large grid the size of the screen. Each piece you lay is 5 grid blocks in size. Make a quadrangle over some of the squares, those grid blocks are filled in. Ultimately, create a quadrangle on each block of the grid, you complete the level.

Obviously, it’s not as simple as that. You have 6 tracks of different tempo to choose from, each with its unique speed, grid shape, and block shape. Certain elements are controlled by a visible white bar that sweeps across the grid.

As I mentioned, each block is 5 grid sizes in length. If you complete a quadrangle, you get a certain amount of time to add pieces to it, building your score. After that time, if you fail to add to the quadrangle, you score the points, and you can’t add any more blocks to those grid locations until the white bar passes over them. You then get a limited amount of passes of the white bar before you lose your multiplier bonuses, and the pieces disappear.

Thankfully, the white bar also does good. If you have an active quadrangle, you will get an extra sample of music, adding to whichever track you’re playing. Sometimes this is a good thing, fitting in perfectly, but sometimes, it can sound like, as someone else described it, “a baby hitting a keyboard”.

Some of the music is pretty awesome. Now, I know that coming from me, that’s a bad sign, but I really mean it. Tracks are included by some well known artists, such as Moby, Philip Glass, and one of the guys from Orbital, Paul Hartnoll. The latter is my personal favourite track.

A lot of you will remember the “bonus” track featured in the PC version… “Still Alive” by Jonathan Coulton. I’m a bit amazed to notice that my version of Audiosurf also came with this track, which I’ve only just noticed a few seconds ago. Anyway, you should remember this was the end music in the original Portal. I’m shit at that game, so I’ll probably never complete it.

If I’ve not explained any of the above very well, then tough. Buy it. It’s simple to get into, and infuringatingly difficult to master, and some of your money will go to childrens charities. 5% of it… which works out at.. 20p?

Actually, speaking of Portal…

Portal – £0.00

Well, I got it free, and got up to level 15, then found it too hard. Still, I can listen to the important part of the soundtrack in two other games, so there’s no incentive to complete it.