Review: ‘LIMBO’ is all killer, no filler
Seriously, spiders are the least of your problems.
I'm fully aware that STARCRAFT II debuted Tuesday at 12:01 a.m. EDT, and I'm enjoying this singular, momentous, 12-years-in-the-making achievement as much as anybody. If I could have played hooky Tuesday and Wednesday to run all the way through the game's incredible single-player campaign, I'd be writing that up for today.
But at my yeoman's pace, that will take a week or more.
Thank the maker, then, for remarkable, bite-sized adventures like Danish developer PlayDead Studio's LIMBO, a moody platformer released last week on Microsoft's Xbox Live Arcade.
Worlds apart from the canonical baggage that shapes franchises like StarCraft, the only narrative context you'll find in LIMBO exists entirely outside the game itself.
As Wikipedia's curators have it, you control a boy in pursuit of his missing sister.
And ... that's it.
The game's description on Xbox Live is similarly vague, and PlayDead has shown no interest in elaborating on any of it.
That's just as well. Not knowing who you are, where you are or why you're there makes a strange sort of sense in this quiet, brutal world, where spiders are as big as houses and up is often down.
Put another way, LIMBO isn't about hit points or water physics or some densely woven narrative. It's about the purity of the platforming experience, and by that metric, it performs like a champ.
As the game starts, you're coming to your senses in a dense parallax forest. The camera eases into focus for what feels like forever -- your avatar takes more than a minute to sit up, open two lamp-like eyes and climb to his feet.
This whole sequence is a joy to watch.
Eventually, you'll realize the game has relinquished control to you, and your inborn gaming vocabulary tells you to run right. You'll clamber up a small hill, instinctively jump off an enormous log and immediately fall to your death.
Then you'll respawn, start over and get it right.
This will happen to you dozens of times -- maybe a hundred or more. You'll drown, electrocute yourself, alert automatic turrets and get skewered by the aforementioned spiders.
The game's gorgeous, occasionally devilish aesthetic is partly to blame for your haplessness. Your character (and the other ten or so living creatures that populate LIMBO) are drawn only in sillhouette, and the entire game is rendered in black, white and a thousand handsome shades of gray.
So you'd be forgiven for glancing past that narrow strip of spikes that closes around your tiny legs the moment you disturb it. Or the tiny natives who attack you with blowguns on sight. Or the gravity-suspending switch that will keep you from plummeting to your doom.
PlayDead calls this "trial by death," and though it occasionally bummed me out -- I grew attached to my nameless, voiceless hero, and watching this world vivisect him over and over again was unsettling -- it works well enough.
Some of the puzzles might seem inapproachable at first, but most of them give away their secrets as soon as they slaughter you.
If you work at my pace, you'll clear the game in a little under three hours. Then, unless you're fishing for a few fantastic achievements or salivating for a second go, your time with LIMBO is regretfully finished. Like "The Empire Strikes Back," it's the sort of thing you wish you could forget, if only so that you could experience it for the first time all over again.
So, yes. It's short. I hesitate to mention all of that that in the same breath as the game's pricetag, as nearly every writer in the gaming press has managed to do. Yeah, the going rate for Xbox Live Arcade games this summer is $15, and no, LIMBO doesn't buck that trend.
But when an interactive moment is as fun and thoughtfully crafted as this one is, $15 is a bargain. If even the Practice League in StarCraft II is handing your dignity to you on a digital platter, consider LIMBO.
This article originally appeared in the York Dispatch.
Jurassic Hour #7: So Intense!
My tech is limited (iPhone over 3G in Central Texas), but I want to get the word out somehow: We made a showz0r.
In this weekmonth's episode, BFF / RPCV (retired Peace Corps volunteers, duh) Pat Himes talks about his time in Kyrgyzstan, where he pooped for two years before returning a few weeks ago.
Then, Sabotage Yahoo! Answers and what we've been playin', all colored by Himes' time in Central Asia.
With music from The Gregory Brothers, Radiohead and Mel Gibson. Sweet, sweet music.
(right-click to save, use theplayer below, or get the show on iTunes here)
Review: ‘Sin & Punishment’ sequel squeezes sweet science from the shmup
I’d love to tell you that I’ve curated a complete library of games from celebrated shoot-’em-up developer Treasure, but I’d be lying.
I’ve struggled through all five stages of IKARUGA, played a couple levels of GUNSTAR HEROES and rented GRADIUS V once, and that’s the long and short of it. The games are famously hard, and I’m a wimp.
So I can’t really tell you whether it’s strange for Treasure titles to attack you with pods of homicidal dolphins and bionic hamsters, as SIN & PUNISHMENT: STAR SUCCESSOR does.
What I can tell you: If you like lasers and a stiff challenge, you’ll like Star Successor, released exclusively on the Wii earlier this summer.
You control one of two tween warriors — Isa, who has a jetpack, and Kachi, who has a hoverboard. Aside from a few mechanical differences, that’s all you need to know about either of them up front. They journey forward in three dimensions, switching occasionally to side-scrolling 2-D, and shoot everything that moves using rapid-fire laser weapons, melee attacks and a charged shot that can dispatch multiple enemies at once.
There’s a story of sorts, but if you play the game, I beg you to skip as much of it as possible. It’s nonsense of the lowest order, and even if it were Shakespeare, you’d be tempted to blow past it. The gunplay is the main attraction here, and it’s sublime.
By pinning the movement controls to the nunchuk and the aiming and firing to the remote, Treasure has developed one of the tightest action games to use Nintendo’s novelty controller. Thanks in part to a largely flawless frame rate, everything feels fluid, precise and incredibly responsive. When you get hit in Star Successor, it’s usually your fault, not the hardware’s.
Played start to finish on the easiest difficulty, the game takes only a few hours, but if you stop there, you’re missing the point. The real thrills come from mastering the many, many bosses, each with its own tricks and shortcuts, and eventually clearing the game without dying (or, if you’re nuts, without getting hit at all).
And the differences between Isa and Kachi are substantial enough to warrant playing through Star Successor at least twice. Isa’s lasers and charged shot are meant to be blind-fired for extra damage, though he can lock on to an enemy when things get hectic.
Kachi locks on to enemies automatically — a handy feature when you’re trying to boost your multiplier by killing every one of the hundreds of smaller monsters that swarm you, but an occasionally frustrating when you’re trying to select a strongerr target.
Her charge shot, however, is much more fun to use. While holding the A button, you sweep your on-screen reticle across each enemy you want to hit. Release, and voila. Lasered dudes.
There are a couple of wrinkles, particularly where those terrific boss fights are concerned.
Because you’ll be dying at the bosses’ hands quite a bit, it would be nice to be able to skip some of the cutscenes involved in fighting them. The end boss of the fourth stage, for instance, shouts “My blood is on fire!” after taking enough damage, shrieking as she morphs into a kind of winged jungle witch.
The process takes a few moments, and because this boss’ second form is exponentially tougher than her first, you’ll likely have to start over a few times, which means sitting through the entire sequence again and again.
Hammering on the Wii remote’s plus button will get you past most of the ridiculous story moments. (Pro tip: It even speeds up your Gameover screen.) But not the bosses. We’re talking about just a few seconds here and there, but when they’re repeated every time you die, they can make a stubborn boss all the more frustrating.
The game’s other major design hurdle isn’t necessarily a dealbreaker, though it might scare off more casual players.
Most of the challenge in Star Successor is impossible to anticipate if you’re brand new to the game. You’ll be struggling through impossible bullet patterns and boss attacks that seemingly cannot be dodged on your first go, and though this all becomes second nature with enough repetition, it can feel cheap up front.
If you’re a once-and-done kind of gamer, or one who’s easily set off, this might be a problem. For example, that same fourth-stage boss — the one who enthuses about her fiery blood — eventually unleashes a flock of blue and red birds that she calls her “ravens of time.” Once the ravens reach your character, they turn into circular blobs that appear to be unblockable.
Only through experimenting (or reading this review) will you learn that you have to use your melee attack on the blue raven blob, which will explode nearby red blobs and slow down time so that you can get in a few extra hits.
If you accidentally touch one of the red blobs instead, time speeds up, giving said boss a few free hits on you.
It’s one of hundreds of unpredictable risk-reward scenarios littered throughout the game, and it isn’t unique to the bosses. Do you use your melee attack on an incoming missile to fire it back at your target, or do you dodge the missile to keep your score multiplier safe?
How this sort of thing rubs you could decide whether Star Successor is your kind of game. I found it exhilirating and well-crafted, but I’m a patient, nimble masochist. Your mileage may vary.
Drama! Big Egos! Guild Rejection and Other MMO Woes
Before I get to the meat of this truly selfish, rant-tastic post, let me start by reminding readers that the upcoming MMORPG FINAL FANTASY XIV is coming upon us very, very soon. The open beta is about to be rolled out. And its retail release date has been set for September 2010. However, despite the optimistic outlook from the Square Enix team during E3 2009, there will not be a simultaneous PC/PS3 release. The PC version hits in September 2010, but the PS3 version will not come any earlier than Spring 2011. Awesome. Since my PC is barely able to handle five-year-old games, I'll have to wait for the PS3 version. That gives me more time to play FINAL FANTASY XI, which is the only MMORPG into which I've put more than 10 hours.
Recently, I declared in an editorial on RPGFan that I am, among other things, a hypocrite. I used to really lay into people who found themselves "stuck" to their avatars. You know... the type who are still playing the original EVERQUEST after all these years. Well with FFXI's new content update, I'm back in, and I'm back in strong. I've at least mentioned it on every one of the last 4 or 5 episodes of The Jurassic Hour. Short summary of the June 2010 content update:
- Level cap increase (for the first time in 6 years) from 75 to 80, with plans to eventually increase to 99.
- Some new crazy, combat-based add-on scenario called VISION OF ABYSSEA (with two more "Abyssea" titles to follow in coming months).
- Finally reaching the end of a three-year plot arc for the fourth proper expansion, WINGS OF THE GODDESS.
- New spells, abilities, equipment, etc for all jobs.
- New endgame event tied to WotG called "Walk of Echoes."
That sucked me right back into the game after going a good six months of only logging in, at most, once a month for a few hours. In the last two weeks I've played more than I have in the last, say, nine months or so. There's been a lot to do and I'm enjoying it.
Even more fortuitous is that I managed to ruin the lives of bring back my older brother and his wife to play the game as well. They too were intrigued by the content update. They used to have separate characters, but they've decided to kill off my brother's character (who never reached the old 75 level cap) and share the account of the character named Lauralanthalasa, a female Elvaan Paladin. Said character has plenty of stuff to accomplish, but with the latest update, it will be easier than ever.
For example, the second expansion, CHAINS OF PROMATHIA, was designed to be played with leveling in mind. It's broken into eight chapters, and each chapter had players traversing different zones, and fighting different bosses, with a "level cap" for that area. Chapter 1 was 30-cap, chapters 2 and 3 were 40-cap, etc. Well, they lifted those caps with this update, but kept all the enemies at the same level. Areas that used to require a party of 6 or more to safely travel through can now be soloed without batting an eye. Very exciting for my brother and sister-in-law.
All of this has put me back into a state of frantic activity. Indeed, I am "active." Of course, that means my guild took notice. Now, in FFXI, we have proprietary terms for everything, so this ain't a guild. It's a Linkshell. The specific Linkshell in question is Bringer of the Dawn, which resides on the Leviathan server. I've I'd been with them for over 3 years. During certain periods of my life, I was very active in the game, which meant I was very active with the LS. We had mandatory events on Wednesday and Sunday evenings, and other optional events nearly every other evening. I attended most of this stuff. That allowed me to rack up attendance points, which then allowed me to lot on high-end gear and stuff. But, awesome as that was, what's more important is that the majority of my friends were on there. They'd help me. I'd help them. As a White Mage, it's in my nature to help and I do like to help as much as I can. However, I did prioritize certain things for myself, particularly as a writer for RPGFan, I wanted to make sure I was always up-to-date on story content.
Before we go any further, let's introduce the cast of characters for my story, which is sure to rival my last whiny rejection post.
Hiya! This is me, Tonelico. As you can see, I'm a male Tarutaru, and my graphics card leaves a lot to be desired. I only have one endgame job: White Mage. I like to stand back and keep people alive while they bravely charge into battle. It's my thing. I'm also (slowly) working on making Summoner an endgame job as well thanks to this cheap exp-grinding strategy.
I've been playing, with differing levels of regularity, since 2006. My primary goals are to complete all story-centric missions, and I'm pretty well up to speed with that goal. More MMORPGs need this kind of linearity. But I digress. Next up!
That's Lauralanthalasa (a name taken from the Dragonlance books). Only endgame job is Paladin (tank job). This avatar is controlled at times by my older brother, and at times by my older brother's wife. Of all the people in today's story, they are the most "casual" players, with well under 100 days logged. The fact that they have an endgame character with their schedules is a miracle. They're working on completing the story stuff that I've already done and keeping up with the new level cap stuff. Lauralanthalasa is the only person in our story who is not, and was never, a part of BotD.
The central character of today's story (other than me) is Antonioklaus. Above, he is pictured as a Summoner. Antonioklaus has all mage jobs leveled (WHM RDM BLM SMN) as well as Bard, Ninja, Paladin, and probably others I don't know about. I haven't asked him in awhile, but I'm sure he has well over 500 days logged into FFXI. Of note, while he is not the founder of the "Bringer of the Dawn" Linkshell, he is its self-proclaimed dictator for the past few years. Also noteworthy: he has the relic Bard instrument "Gjallarhorn" which is insanely powerful, yet he tends not to want to play Bard even after having invested thousands of hours into getting that one item. He also has a wife and kids and is known to play for 8 to 12 hour blocks of time. He has more than once whined on the LS about wanting to divorce his wife because she mismanages money. I'll allow you to express your judgments as you see fit.
Draylo is one of my favorite people in FFXI. He is often willing to help with activities, even if there's no immediate gain to him, because he enjoys the experience and/or can call in the favor at a later point in time. Draylo is an extremely active member of BotD, as well as its sister Dynamis/Einherjar event LS, "Beacon." He's got a lot of jobs leveled (I believe he's pictured as a Blue Mage above). Unfortunately, his role in the coming story isn't the one I hoped it'd be. But I still respect the guy because he's an open communicator and is always understanding of others.
You know in that one episode of South Park where the Canadian character Scott is introduced: "that's Scott, he's a dick!" Like, every character in the show knows that by the end of the episode. Well... "that's Shelbelle, she's a bitch!"
Antonioklaus has some strange bedfellows: people that follow him, worship him, and know how to act like an even bigger prick than him. Shelbelle is #1 on that list. She has most of the same jobs leveled as Anto (most mage jobs). From the first time I entered an event with Shel, I knew she'd be trouble. It was about two years ago, when she started making snide remarks about me, claiming I was an "inferior WHM," telling me how to play my job, etc.
(Aside: y'know when people are like "don't tell me how to do my job!!!"? It's a lot funnier when your "job" is a class in a videogame.)
Shelbelle has a planet-sized chip on her shoulder. She hides it sometimes, but I've yet to see such a catty player as her in my life. Fitting that she plays as a Mithra. Seriously, she talks down to everyone and never gives anyone the benefit of the doubt. Everything is everyone's fault but hers. She's just totally unlikeable. Of course, she also plays the game 24/7 so people try to get along with her so they can be in her good graces, much the same way she has cozied up to Antonioklaus. If Anto is away for a day, or a weekend, Shelbelle is probably the one who gets to call the shots these days.
Hellick is a cool dude. He plays a lot of "front line" melee jobs: Blue Mage, Samurai, etc. Last I checked, he's still a member of BotD, though that may change. He plays a particularly important role in the epilogue of the story.
So that's our cast of characters. Let's get down to business.
-------------
In late June 2010 (between the 20th and 22nd), the aforementioned major content update was pushed through all FINAL FANTASY XI servers. Feeling the immediate need to get my WHM from 75 to 80, I decided that's what I'd devote my time to so it would 1) be easier to complete story-based missions and 2) make me a more worthwhile WHM for my LS.
Before this point, I had been inactive. Really inactive. I said as much in the post's intro. So me showing up again, having my BotD Linkpearl equipped (allowing me to chat within the LS), must've raised some eyebrows. "Who is this old fart?" some must have thought. But I was back, and I was going to get my WHM un-gimped, come hell or high water.
Granted, I also work a 40 hour job, write for RPGFan (and other sites, like this one, which is where I can let my hair down!), and I got a wife and kids who I intend to neglect far less than Anto must to his family. So when I found time, that's when I'd level.
On Sunday, June 27, 2010, at about 7pm, I was in the middle of an excellent experience points grind party for my WHM. It was going really well, and I wanted to keep it going so I could get to 80 faster. I get a tell (private, one-on-one message) from LS mate, Draylo. "Hey, we're doing B2 (Bahamut 2) run, you coming?" I take this as a suggestion. Like, "the LS is doing this, should be fun, wanna come up?" I've done the Bahamut 2 fight a number of times. It's basically like the first Bahamut fight, but harder, and with good drops. I said "no, I'll pass, got good exp going here."
I then get a tell from Shelbelle that just says "you coming?" Instead of replying to her, I asked Dray why someone else was bugging me? He said "it's a Sunday event. It's a mandatory event."
Now, granted, I hadn't been privy to months' worth of discussion (and we'll get to that), but the last I had heard, the rule was that LS members attended the Sunday and Wednesday night events. If they didn't attend an event but were logged on the game, they would get like, minus 25 points. "Points" are tracked on the LS's website, and they're awarded for attendance at mandatory and non-mandatory events. This is a common thing for all MMO guilds to do. I figure I could take the hit on the points, and I remembered long ago talking to Anto about being deemed an "inactive" member of BotD, which meant: I could talk to people in the LS, go to events when I felt like it, not really lot on any cool gear but still have fun with the group, and stay in.
Either I was on crack, or Anto's memory is short-lived and he's since made up new rules.
Anyway, I told Draylo via tells that I had had said conversation with Anto and it shouldn't be a problem. Draylo seemed concerned for me (at the time I didn't understand why, now I do...). I continued to exp while they killed Bahamut and got sweet gear. They did just fine without having the extra WHM around that day.
The next night, Monday night, I logged on quickly to get in a little exp and "allied notes" using the "campaign battle" system set up with the fourth expansion, WINGS OF THE GODDESS. I was on the Linkshell, and when a campaign battle started in Xarcabard [S], I thought it would be worth letting the LS know. I mean, it usually amounts to big points on all fronts; people want to know about it. People usually want to hop in for 30 minutes and get sweet grind-age out of it.
So I say in LS chat: "to anyone who's interested, there's a campaign battle in Xarcabard [S]!"
To which I see a lone reply from Antonioklaus: "to anyone, whether they're interested or not, Sunday night events are mandatory."
Wow. Passive aggressive much?
He could've sent me a tell at any point Sunday night. Or Monday night. He could've said "look, we're tightening rules around here, gonna need you to come to LS events." Instead he decided to be a prick about it. But whatever, it wasn't the first time and it wouldn't be the last.
I didn't play at all Tuesday. Then Wednesday came, and that was around the time the miracle occurred. My older brother and his wife resurrected their even more inactive account (theirs was cancelled, they hadn't paid a dime on it for a year). With the removal of the level caps on CoP, I was excited about rushing them through the CoP missions so they could witness what I consider one of the better plotlines of an FF title, period. So that evening we set off to Phomiuna Aqueducts to complete mission 2-3 (which, despite what you might think, still does require two people because of a simultaneous switch-pull near the end of the zone). Along the way, as I passed through Lufaise Meadows, I saw a ram-based NM I'd never seen before. Unsure of its level, but assuming it couldn't be too hard, Chris and I attacked it, only to die in a record 8 seconds. I thought this funny, so I decided to mention it in LS chat. "Anyone ever fought 'Flockbock' before? Just got creamed by it." Someone in LS (I actually do not remember who) said "The only NM I know is _____" (and they put in that blank the name of the NM the LS was currently fighting). What I didn't know was that the Wednesday "mandatory event," which I actually assumed was canceled (as Wednesdays often are ... as I write this article, Antonioklaus is off leveling instead of participating in an event), was a ZNM run. I didn't even know ZNM runs were part of the rotation! "Zeni Notorious Monsters" require doing a Pokemon Snap-style event to take pictures of enemies. Then you earn points. Then you use those points to pop the NMs and they take 6 or more people to kill. That's what I was missing out on. To be honest, I happily would've been there, if not for the enthusiastic return of my in-laws to the world of Vana'diel.
Anyway, after I made my gaffe in LS chat and another member made their damning statement, Antonioklaus said something along the lines of: "you don't get it, do you? This is mandatory."
I was silent for a little, and my daughter was crying. I walked away from the computer for about 2 minutes.
Upon my return, I saw in my LS chat history from Antonioklaus:
"Oh, now you're ignoring me, are you?"
"I guess it's time to do some weeding."
And then I saw a system message I'd never seen in my 4 years on the game. It said that my linkpearl had been broken by an administrator. I was no longer a member of Bringer of the Dawn.
It was the only LS I'd ever been a part of. There were full years where I was active, attending every event, mandatory or no, just because I had the time. I don't have the time anymore. Whatever. I was pissed, because I don't like rejection, and I sure as hell don't like it happening when I don't see it coming.
So I sent Anto a tell and he was like "this isn't a social LS. This is an event LS. It's rude to the other LS members when you're chatting about whatever you're doing and they're sacrificing their time to be at the event."
You know what? I actually get that line of logic. It may sound crazy to you non MMO-ers, but getting people to show up for events is challenging. So I understand that. I guess it was rude, or at least thoughtless and careless, of me to do that. So I apologized.
That wasn't good enough. I was still out of the LS.
So at this point, I was already resolved to write this article. But I talked it over with the Mrs., and she said I should really give it time to think it over. Maybe try to reconcile.
Saturday morning, I went to an event with BotD's sister shell, "Beacon." Actually I went to two events: Einherjar and Dynamis. All told it took up about 6 hours of my Saturday. It was plenty of fun. Part of the reason I went was to have an opportunity to interact with Antonioklaus. That morning I sent him a tell.
Tonelico: Hey man, can I talk to you for a bit?
Antonioklaus: ... ?
Tonelico: Look, I've been thinking it over. And you're right. I was treating BotD like a social LS and that's not what you designed it to be. You're in charge, I get that.
Antonioklaus: ...
Tonelico: I thought about asking if I could re-join, but yeah, maybe I really can't commit to an arduous schedule. Maybe I should just join a social LS.
Tonelico: But what I wanted to tell you is that I understand your decisions, even though I wasn't clear on the rules at the time. And I appreciate, even cherish, the memories I had with the LS. And if you guys ever need a spare WHM, I can come out to help, wouldn't need rewards or anything.
Antonioklaus: ...
Antonioklaus: k. whatever.
what a fucking prick.
Seriously, what is this guy's deal? Has he no emotion? I spent hundreds of hours in front of a computer with my avatar standing next to his avatar, keeping him alive, taking orders from him, working together in harmony to accomplish very difficult feats in the game. Apparently that all means nothing to him. Did he never care about the people in his LS? Or is it just because I blew off 2 "mandatory" events that he now decides that I'm roadkill to him?
I still went through that whole day doing Einherjar and Dynamis. Anto intentionally said nothing to me. Shelbelle asked me a lot of questions since I was becoming "active" again on this inactive shell ... I think she's looking for a reason to boot me from Beacon too. As for Draylo, I talked to him, and he said that he's in agreement with the policy, though he would've expected more communication than what actually happened. Draylo's line of thought is that, if you're in an event LS, you've made a time commitment. If you can't hold to that time commitment, don't be in the LS. That's fair. But let a guy bow out gracefully, don't call him a "weed" and break his pearl. Right? Right.
~~Epilogue~~
I joined a social LS called "Celtic Order." A range of folks in there: some seem to be absolute noobs when it comes to the way the game is played. Others seem to know what's going on. A few of them bitch and moan, but most are very nice and I've gone to some fun, not-at-all mandatory events with them already.
A lot of old friends from BotD have seen me running around, and I've gotten the question from over a dozen people now: "hey, are you still in BotD?" Invariably I tell them a truncated version of what you've read here. And 100% of the time, I get more than mere sympathy. I hear them saying that Anto's attitude has gotten worse and worse lately.
Most importantly, I heard this from Hellick. Hellick apologized to me; he told me he couldn't help but feel at fault for my being kicked from the LS. How so? Hellick said the "missing mandatory events is grounds for kicking a member" rule was developed rather recently because of Hellick. Hellick had been camping a 24 hour NM (that means the monster only appears once every 24 hours and Hellick wanted the item that dropped from him). For weeks Hellick kept an eye out for that stupid monster, because he really wanted whatever it dropped. As such, he missed a bunch of events. The "minus 25 point" rule I had remembered was increased to "minus 250 points" for Hellick. Hellick told Anto "look, I'm never gonna get anything from most events anyway, you can take all the points away you want." Anto's reply? "Should I take away your Linkpearl too then?" Anto didn't make good on that threat, perhaps because he knows Hellick is a totally badass player, and probably 10x more active, and more useful, than I am. But at that point Hellick did start making an effort to go to mandatory events.
In any case, all this happened while I was not playing the game, and not going to some outdated message board to try and keep up on the new policies put into place.
Hellick told me that Anto has a group of cronies who have made it their job in life to parrot everything Anto says. When people miss an event now, everyone jumps down said person's throat. That line that someone gave me, "I only know about such-and-such NM" has apparently been used dozens of times in the last two months when someone in LS chat talks about anything other than the LS event. It's become a fucking nazi camp. No one can have fun there anymore. It's just strict, by-the-book event bullshit. When I joined the LS in 2006, I knew Anto was bossy, but even he wouldn't lead like that. Something's happened to him. Hellick has made that conclusion as quickly as I have, if not quicker. Others have too. I could name plenty more people, but Hellick was the most vocal about it.
So yeah, now Lauralanthalasa and I are steadily plowing through CoP (on 3-3 now) and I'm trying to keep current on WotG missions and the new Abyssea expansion. If I were still in BotD I'd probably try to hit up two or three "mandatory events" per month without lotting a single item, just to show my support. Fortunately, the "Friend List" menu in the game allows me to see the online status of most of the people I knew from the LS anyway, so I guess I just get to be an ex-BotD member. All in all it hasn't affected the way I play much.
What it has done is made me realize just how awful people can become over a game. I just wrote a 4000-word post about it, and that's probably a testament to how the game has made me a less reasonable, likeable person. But for however much the game has warped me, the problem is found exponentially intensified among people like Anto and Shel. I love playing this MMO, but God help me and may my wife be quick to call me out if I ever started acting like them.
...I am so not ready for FINAL FANTASY XIV.
Review: ‘Singularity’ tears up space, time
You'll be facing all manner of mutated Russians in Singularity's many shiny, Unreal Engine 3-powered corridors.
As the MC of "Cabaret" once said, "You know the funny thing about Herman? There's nothing funny about Herman."
That basically sums up my feelings for SINGULARITY, a first-person shooter from veteran action developer Raven Software. The great thing about the game, released on HD consoles and the PC this week, is that there's nothing truly Great (capital "G") about it.
It doesn't aspire to some sort of literary permanence, a la HALF-LIFE 2 and its rudimentary multiplayer getup isn't the tent-pole spectacle of MODERN WARFARE 2.
Instead, Singularity revels in the silliest, schlockiest corners of science-fiction gaming, tasking your American avatar with an investigation of Cold War experiments on a secret island off the coast of Russia.
In pursuit of an edge over the tyrannical West, the Soviets in 1950s apparently created a time-space anomaly on said island, inadvertently mutating its inhabitants and screwing things up in 2010. Your character might or might not have participated, thanks to some time-travelling shenanigans. Awkward!
The game offers you the standard complement of FPS weaponry -- shotguns, rifles and explosive stuff -- as well as a few less conventional items. The Seeker, which you find only during scripted moments in the 1950s, lets you guide your bullets in slow motion; another gun fires darts that detonate a second after burrowing into their targets.
Each gun, save for an utterly useless pistol, is fun to fire, and all can be upgraded tokens you find hidden throughout the game.
But Singularity doesn't really take off until about 90 minutes in, when you find a mysterious robo-glove (called the Time Manipulation Device, or TMD) that lets you stop time, instantly age enemies by hundreds of years and, of course, throw heavy objects great distances.
If that sounds familiar, it's probably because you played BIOSHOCK or its sequel. Magic in your left hand, gun in your right, dispatch meanies as you please.
But where combat in BioShock and BIOSHOCK 2 never inched past serviceable, Singularity feels genuinely good. This is the DOOM of modern-day shooters, throwing plenty of ammo and nine or ten enemies at you at once. The game is not about conserving bullets; it's about shooting time-travelling zombies in the head and telekinetically chucking explosive barrels at them, counting your remaining health packs after the fact.
Puzzlingly, you're constrained here by the Halo Rule. Where Doom, QUAKE and their successors allowed you an entire arsenal of destruction, today's shooters limit you to only a handful of guns at once. This presumably is done in the name of realism -- how many rocket launchers, plasma rifles and BFGs can one man carry, after all? -- but when a game trafficks in the absurd with as much gusto as Singularity does, the size of your war chest seems like a silly place to draw the line.
Still, the fighting is usually very satisfying, particularly once you pick up the Deadlock power about one-third of the way through the game. The ability lets you create a sphere inside which enemies are frozen and bullets move at a snail's space. That trick, coupled with the sniper rifle's slow-motion zoom, lets you watch rounds actually rotate out of the chamber on their way to your target's face.
The single-player campaign (no co-op here), shiny and diverse though it is, lasts about eight hours on normal difficulty, and once it's over, you're at a crossroads. You could slog through the first hour or so again on the harder difficulty, armed with naught but your terrible pistol and dodging enemies who steal nearly all your health in one swipe.
You could try the game's two class-based multiplayer modes, which pack a few thrills but currently suffer from awful connection issues and terribly net code.
If neither of those sound appetizing, you're done. At $60 for the console versions (and $50 on the superior PC version, though the game performs like a champ on all platforms), that can feel like a tough sell. And that's totally fair.
But the single-player content here is as cheeky and exciting as FPS campaigns come today. Even though story isn't something you'll be quoting years or even days from now -- there's no "would you kindly" moment here, folks -- Singularity is packed with enough memorable sequences and tight gameplay to merit any action junkie's attention.