Video Games...Discuss Them

Unfortunately I have to disagree with D_Davis and say I really loved the culmination of the stories in "BioShock: Infinite".

High art? No.

Best sci-fi has to offer? Not even close.

But it hit an emotional note with me, and I felt it a very satisfying ending to the story, and an interesting (and yes, done before...but that doesn't make it bad, by any means) idea.

I didn't feel that the revelations in any way, shape or form rendered the themes of racism, socialism and capitalism pointless. Not at all.

Eh...guess all I can say at this point is "different strokes".

I finished the game under an hour ago, but some musings on the ending and its reflection/transformation of the themes present in the other games in the series...

[

Show Spoiler

Baptism is obviously a huge trigger in this game. It signifies your entry into Columbia, and then later on your death and rebirth (simultaneously). It also shows the transfer of guilt in your life over past events and how that guilt is twisted by:

a) accepting the baptism
b) not accepting the baptism

The Booker DeWitt we played as did not accept the baptism, and in doing so dealt with the guilt of giving up Anna through a life of alcoholism and gambling. This leads Booker to the story we play...

The Booker DeWitt who did accept the baptism feels cleansed of the guilt of giving up Anna. However, with both Bookers having committed atrocities at Wounded Knee, this Booker is still dealing with this part of his tortured psyche.

In creating Columbia, a city where racism is rampant and blacks are told they should be grateful for slavery (hey, free food and shelter!), DeWitt has placed blacks at a level so low in the social hierarchy that they are practically animals. Dogs. And he can much better deal with the guilt of Wounded Knee if he sees his victims (non-whites) as far less than the noble humans he dictates his prophecies to in his city.

It makes the socio-political issues in the game both grander and more personal. It shows the makings of the man behind the madness, the reason for all of the misguided hate and prejudice. Both Bookers were destined to fight the Vox (the blacks) for very different reasons.

]


Also I hate to call someone out, but I'm anxious to find out the reasoning behind Milky Joe's "I haven't played the game but I watched a video of someone else playing the first fraction of a fraction of it and it's the sucks, it's depressing that people like it."

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by D_Davis

12 minutes of Dark Souls 2.

http://www.ign.com/articles/2013/04/...-reveal-coming

---

More variety of ways to die. ...great, like the first one was really lacking those.

Heh, I'm excited though. Looks great and, at the least, a continuation of the first.

Unfortunately my copy of "Super Street Fighter IV" seems to be defective - gives an error message that the disc is unreadable and I should try cleaning it, but it's a brand new copy with nary a speck of dust on it.

So while I try to sort out an exchange for that, I have started with "Street Fighter X Tekken". They've basically just put the Tekken characters into a Street Fighter game - it's 2D (as opposed to Tekken's usually 3D environments), and it controls like Street Fighter.

And it's AWESOME. The level of strategy required in the fights is immense. It's easy to pick up and play, but feels like it could take years to master.

They've done a great job with the tag-team mechanic, being able to swap in your mate for assists in combos and special moves, but balancing it really well. You need to look at your team as one unit - if one character's health is brought to 0 you lose, regardless of the health of your teammate. However, if one teammate is getting low on health, you can swap them to the back and a small chunk of their health will replenish over about 15 seconds.

This all makes the switching back and forth (when, for how long, and for what purpose) much more strategic.

For Mr. Davis....

https://sphotos-b.xx.fbcdn.net/hphot...87746003_n.jpg

Went to Gamestop and picked up a used copy of the Stranglehold Collector's Edition for $6. Fluff game and the subtitles on the Hard Boiled Blu-ray included in it is shit, I know, but both of them together for $6 is worth it.

I also got MAG for 99 cents. I don't remember if people thought it was a good game or not, but it's 99 cents.

Finished up Lego City Undercover. Ended up taking around 12 or so hours to make it through and I finished at 30% complete. This was easily the best Lego game I've played and I've played through most of them. I usually end up going back and getting all the collectibles and 100% completion ranks on them but alot of that has to do with achievements and this one being on the Wii U I have no reason to do that. I was thinking about why I liked this one the best and I think it has to do with feeling fresh compared to the other Lego games which are almost purely based on franchises which I am already very familiar with. I like the regular Lego world designs and they've used all the knowledge of the previous games to fine tune their formula. Still has some issues like insane load times (which I mentioned before) but bears repeating because they are unacceptable in this era of gaming. Also saving/checkpointing issues were you make it to a location start a mission and it saves. If you quit out after that it starts you back at the police station (the main game location) and then you have to travel all the way back to that location sometimes doing a lot of platforming/traversing to get into that mission again.

Now I'm gonna play The Unfinished Swan (a PSN game I've been meaning to play) and Guacamelee and I have Bioshock Infinite coming next week.

Ended up playing through all of The Unfinished Swan this afternoon. It scratched the same itch that games like Journey and Limbo did. I can't recommend it enough. Also had a cute little Journey easter egg.

Just completed my first successful run through Arcade Mode in "Street Fighter X Tekken", using a team of Law and Ryu.

I love this game, but am very disappointed by how much content I am missing by not being able to play online.

Still, though, with Arcade Mode, Trials and Missions, it should hold up for a while longer.

The fighting system is just fantastic. The second-to-last boss is a team of M. Bison and Juri, and it was so damn hard. But unlike the Shao Kahn fights in "Mortal Kombat", here I was losing because I just wasn't good enough - not because the game was cheating.

I actually kind of like how pitifully non-existent the "story" is - all of the game's focus is on the fighting.

I really hope they make the other version they were supposed to, importing the SF characters to Tekken. I would be all over that.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by EyesWideOpen

Ended up playing through all of The Unfinished Swan this afternoon. It scratched the same itch that games like Journey and Limbo did. I can't recommend it enough. Also had a cute little Journey easter egg.

---

Forgot about Swan. I'll have to download that soon.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Skitch

I really hope they make the other version they were supposed to, importing the SF characters to Tekken. I would be all over that.

---

Yeah, that would be crazy cool.

I'm anxious to see what the reviews are like for "Injustice".

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by megladon8

Yeah, that would be crazy cool.

I'm anxious to see what the reviews are like for "Injustice".

---

I just played the demo, and it was sweet!

First impressions of "Dead or Alive 5" are...not good.

While the "triangle system" is kind of interesting, that's about all the fighting system has to offer.

When the actual instructions by the game's tutorial are "to perform combos and special moves, simply mash on the punch and kick buttons!"...can't say it's the type of fighting game I really get in to.

Alex Navarro writes a great breakdown of "BioShock Infinite", it's strengths and abundant weaknesses.

Broke out my Rock Band again for the first time in like a year. I always forget how much I love this game until I'm playing it. Sadly, the realities of living in a tiny New York apartment means the instruments have to be stored away and forgotten most of time.

Recently I have mostly been using Rock Band as a karaoke machine. Because I'm kind of a k-junkie these days.

Latest episode of Idle Thumbs examines Bioshock Infinite, and they all basically came to the exact same conclusion that I did. Pretty interesting, especially considering that one of the guys worked on the game!

http://www.idlethumbs.net/idlethumbs...to-video-games

Spoilers of course, and great conversation as is usual for these guys.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by number8

Went to Gamestop and picked up a used copy of the Stranglehold Collector's Edition for $6. Fluff game and the subtitles on the Hard Boiled Blu-ray included in it is shit, I know, but both of them together for $6 is worth it.

I also got MAG for 99 cents. I don't remember if people thought it was a good game or not, but it's 99 cents.

---

That's a good price point. I paid the full $60 for both those games. Definitely did not get my money's worth.

Yeah, I pretty much just looked at it like I bought a Bluray of one of my favorite movies for $6 and it came with a free game. :P

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by number8

Yeah, I pretty much just looked at it like I bought a Bluray of one of my favorite movies for $6 and it came with a free game. :P

---

Yeah, I came close to buying that using that same logic.

Fired up Far Cry 3 last weekend. Yeah, I'll be sinking a ton of time into this. Only done a couple missions, but already have a pimped out M1 (semi-auto 'assault' rifle) and M700 (Sniper rifle).

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Scar

Fired up Far Cry 3 last weekend. Yeah, I'll be sinking a ton of time into this. Only done a couple missions, but already have a pimped out M1 (semi-auto 'assault' rifle) and M700 (Sniper rifle).

---

I may ask to borrow that when you're done. Scar, did you ever play Darkness II?

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by number8

Yeah, I pretty much just looked at it like I bought a Bluray of one of my favorite movies for $6 and it came with a free game. :P

---

I will be looking for it for just that reasoning.

Looks like "Injustice" is pretty darn good.

I continue to love the logic in fighting games. In IGN's review they showed footage of a fight between Deathstroke and Nightwing, in which Deathstroke shot Nightwing in the face twice then speared him through the throat with a sword, and he was still alive.

Damn! Jealous of the 360 today.

Flixster/UltraViolet is now on the Xbox 360