From Newsgroup: uk.games.video.misc


Yes! Put the ball where it needs to go! Do it again tomorrow! Do it
again next week! Sustain advertising and economic inequality! Yes!

Play:
--=--

Stellar Interface (PS5) - The star attraction of a newly arrived order,
and it's not winning me over. On paper it seems like the best thing
ever, modular danmaku with little bite-sized levels that have clear
objectives and clear rules. All the pieces fit together great for a procedurally-generated 2D shooter that's both fair and endlessly
replayable. But it's just not fun, and I can't really put my finger on
why. I'm starting to think that for all the things that you can
customise and explore, the whole game just isn't juicy enough, in that
it's not satisfying to lob missiles and laser beams at enemies that just
float around the screen at a consistent speed and in a predictable
pattern. It's not reasonable for me to want a designed quantity of
personality out of what's essentially a space shooter roguelike, but
that's the thing that's missing that would make this more than just the
sum of its well-polished parts.

Demoniaca (PS5) - I'm pretty sure I've spelled that game title wrong.
It's super compelling pixel graphics married to a really original
medieval premise, and creative traversal mechanisms that stand out from
the pack of same-y Metroidvania games. And the characters are really interesting and make you want to know more about them, and it's got
exactly the right amount of sex appeal to match the violence without
seeming exploitative or sleazy. So why isn't *this* game any fun? I feel
like four attack buttons (and the use of the analogue trigger for jump)
is just too many inputs to manage, and that breaks up the flow a lot
even after I spent a pile of time learning how to play. It's just not
fluid or natural enough, and having to look down at my fingers while I'm trying to solve the mystery of why the demon army killed the whole
village but left the protagonist alive means I'm not getting into it.

Virgo Versus the Zodiac (PS5) - It's a 16-bit retro turn-based RPG, two
parts cynical Monty Python film to one part Super Mario RPG. And it's
too hard because having to hit buttons to dodge enemies or ensure my own attacks connect is more work than I want out of my 16-bit retro
turn-based RPG. I have a pile of more traditional games that scratch
that itch that aren't also trying to murder me in my old age.

Want:
--=--

More physical media distribution - The thing I miss most about video
game stores is walking in, being surrounded by all of the game art and
the posters and the promotional material, and then having my attention
be drawn by something unique that only I would have noticed or cared
about. I used to love going to what was otherwise an unremarkable retail store, seeing some leftover PS2 game hiding on an endcap, bringing it
home for ten bucks and the discovering that it was a really nice game.
We don't have that anymore because efficiency experts and investment
vultures all decided that maximising engagement and earning meant
leaving me out of a game buying cycle that only cares about the first
six months of availability and not about the decade that might follow.
What I want is for the games industry to stop treating its product like
it's disposable and beneath contempt, and that's not likely to happen as
long as there are bloodthirsty misanthropes running those companies.

My mobile glass screen protectors (DROID) - Stuck in a state where
they're hosting a World Cup match. The US postal service has warned
people that deliveries will be delayed as roads, aeroplane routes and basically the whole of human existence is held up in the name of
sportsball.

Bin:
-==-

Boutique game retailers - The three games in today's post all came from
a particular American online shop that I'm declining to name. I placed
the order in November, and when I had the temerity to ask where my games
were in February they sent back a snarky response indicating that they
told *everybody* about the release delays. What that tells me is that
they marked something 'in stock' by mistake and couldn't own up to it.
I'm pretty sure that's exactly what happened because I got a tracking
number the day after I submitted the order, and the tracking data was mysteriously withdrawn 48 hours later. If the games had made a more
positive impression after the big long wait I might be more forgiving,
but as it stands I'm not likely to be a repeat customer.

-KKC, who could probably have said all that with fewer words.
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From Newsgroup: uk.games.video.misc

Kendrick Kerwin Chua <kendrick@nospam.io-nyc> wrote:

Yes! Put the ball where it needs to go! Do it again tomorrow! Do it
again next week! Sustain advertising and economic inequality! Yes!

I've been particularly enjoying the way matches clearly now have
quarters instead of halves, given the hydration breaks. It really took
a long time for a sufficiently devious and socially acceptable means
of imposing this to finally be contrived, so you have to credit the
persistence if nothing else. :-)

Play:

GPTA6: Slop City (gpta6.com) - browser-based sandbox game, supposedly
made with Claude Fable 5 in a day. It's like a shaky beta of an indie
GTA parody, with lots of bugs (clipping partly through the ground
seems quite common, for example, and it has dubious physics), but I
mean, you can get in a spiffy-looking car or a tank or a helicopter
and they do actually work and stuff (albeit sometimes with bizarrely
reversed controls), and the map mostly looks reasonable. The
police/military are way too trigger-happy though, which I suppose
could be seen as social commentary but is mostly just a PITA. And I
got teleported across the map after getting on a jet ski - probably
not the most desirable of gameplay mechanics. Anyway, I think this is
more a case of it being interesting that LLMs can apparently do this
much now, than of the game itself being especially amazing or
anything.

The Pinball Arcade (PSV) - played The Addams Family on this for the
first time in a while, but no "SHOWTIME" so far. It's weird the way
the muscle memory kind of does and doesn't seem to transfer over from
having played the real table. But the place where I last had a shot at
The Real Thing closed back in 2013 IIRC, so this version is definitely
handy. :-)

I played No Good Gofers as well, which is... no good. Or at least,
arguably this version isn't. The problem is the ramp in the middle
which drops down, as it just seems much too hard to get the ball
counted as hitting the ramp (when it's down, I mean) - I can rarely
manage it more than once per go, and that's kind of an issue for what
should be a relatively routine shot to be making.

Want:

To play some other TPA tables again. As much as I moaned about the
Vita version's issues at the time (and those of every other version I
played, to be fair) there's no denying that it did get a whole bunch
of pretty good tables.

More physical media distribution

Surely the parcels get chucked around hard enough already.

My mobile glass screen protectors (DROID) - Stuck in a state where
they're hosting a World Cup match. The US postal service has warned
people that deliveries will be delayed as roads, aeroplane routes and basically the whole of human existence is held up in the name of
sportsball.

I think over here, those of us of a certain age got impossibly
indoctrinated in the unquestioned majesty of Proper Sportsball
practically from birth (by it just being absolutely everywhere and
totally unavoidable). So it can feel more the case that the many
billions of humans who have ever lived have been serving only as a
sort of necessary evil, a substrate existing primarily to promulgate
the legend and maintain this ever-evolving grand composite being of
Sportsball throughout the ages... hydration breaks and all.

My hunch is that major-tournaments-only fans like myself have this odd love-hate relationship with the game. Yeah, it's great, I hope we win.
But also, I'm happy to ignore it the rest of the time, and bloody hell
the World Cup is how many matches now?

Bin:

Nothing.

-Rus.
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