Extermination - Thoughts

[contains minor spoilers]

For as close as Dino Crisis stuck to the Resident Evil formula, it remained a memorable (and pretty enjoyable!) game because of it. Mikami's early survival horror style isn't designed for everybody in mind, but the way you're forced to conserve munitions and memorize important intersections is a unique touch that's integral to his design. Survival horror isn't intended to make you feel comfortable—the genre is supposed to stress you out but keep you moving, urging you to learn the intricacies of its mechanics as fast as you can, or doom your save to incompletion.

So what would a bad Resident Evil clone look like? If you've been searching for the answer to this question, look no further than Deep Space's Extermination.

Where to start with this? Swery65 is the brains behind Extermination, which should already provide ample gameplay concerns (I adore Deadly Premonition, but a fun game it is not). Akin to Carpenter's The Thing, the player is whisked off to an Antarctic base that's soon overrun by fleshy alien monstrosities. Despite the Metal Gear Solid 2 resemblance, Extermination most closely mimics Resident Evil, from the limited health pickups, to the constant backtracking, to the scores of notes to read, to the awkward combat, even down to resource-based saves. As you traverse through more of the complex and reunite with former friends, the facility will gradually get more corrupted and new enemies will begin to spawn into old areas... and that's the only commendable idea the game has.

Extermination botches everything else—the combat in particular is an unmitigated chore. You must manually aim to attack your opponents and their weak spots which discourages fighting early on (as it's much easier to run away), and as the game progresses the dollar store abominations gain more and more health. This leaves your gun and its mods feeling greatly ineffectual, especially since the respawning slug enemies are so numerous that it's often more dangerous to fight rather than flee. Add to this the fact that you must stand still to climb over obstacles or enter rooms and you have yourself a recipe for frustration.

To understand why this game can get so aggravating, you must first learn that there's essentially two health systems—your standard physical health percentage, and an infection percentage. Health is easily manageable since you'll come across a lot of pickups, but the infection rate of this game is downright unbalanced. Foes frequently increase the percentage by double digits when you get attacked, and when it reaches 100% you'll start to gradually lose HP (and get stunned when touching water, which is everywhere). Your only hope if that happens is to hobble back to a save room to cleanse yourself, but the much simpler solution is to just restart in order to keep your supplies intact. I know it doesn't sound too bad, but it's absolutely awful considering how often you'll be assaulted by those dastardly slugs. Good luck trying to escape from those slimy bastards too, as I found no reliable method to shake them off before they burst into neon green gas.

The story in Extermination is barely worth mentioning. There's really nothing interesting or unique here outside of the hilariously bad voice acting ("I'll give my LIFE to protect her"). Since the major conflict between the game's central characters happens off screen you're given no means to understand why Andrew is so important to everyone (what kind of guy was he? Why should we care if he died, or if Dennis feels guilty about it?). The most disappointing part about the story is that there's barely any narrative in the notes you find; whereas Resident Evil uses its notes to both provide information and expand its lore, Extermination primarily uses them to give you the most boring, unnecessary instructions possible. Want to read several pages on draining water from the basement of the facility when the solution is right in front of you? What about extensive military orders for characters that get one minute of screen time? How about a three page list of specifications for a 20mm gatling gun? A good indicator of how bungled the narrative delivery in this game is is that only near the end of the story do you discover what the monsters are even called.

Speaking of the end, I cannot understate how stupid the final battle is—it's really, really, really awful. It's only beatable through sheer brute force, as the second and third forms of the boss relentlessly pelt you with damage, meaning that if you have less than 6-8 healing items stocked up you're basically screwed. Despite my playtime being 3.5 hours total, that encounter alone took nearly two hours thanks to the dozens of retries it took me; rarely do I come across a section in a game where it legitimately feels like it wasn't playtested, but lo and behold, Extermination always finds a way to disappoint.

The uncanny similarity between last week's Wolverine and Extermination is that both games punish you for fighting its enemies, but whereas Wolverine is short enough to remain more entertaining than frustrating, Extermination is the exact opposite. Its combat is terrible, its world is boring, its story is barely amusing, and its level design is ultimately shallow (the battery packs are used for what, like four doors?). Every remotely interesting idea gets squished faster than the slugs in this game do—Extermination is arguably survival horror at its worst. Perhaps the only achievement I'll grant it is that—despite its best efforts—the game is at least beatable. Oh, and Roger's death is pretty good too.
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Images obtained from: youtube.com, giantbomb.com

Wolverine - Thoughts

Did you ever want to know what it would be like if Wolverine was a coward? Well have I got good news for you! LJN's aptly titled Wolverine is a platformer that discourages fighting, punishing the player with terrible combat if they dare engage their enemies. It's best for Logan to run away with his tail tucked between his legs, finishing every level by clumsily leaping over all foes and obstacles. The game is actually somewhat entertaining when you're forced to play this way, though the awful design makes it more funny than fun.

Despite being known as one of the most dangerous of the X-Men, LJN neuters Wolverine by reducing his attack range to a scant few pixels in front of his face. Our eponymous hero can unsheathe his claws for some extra range but it comes at the cost of health, and considering how often he'll collide with enemies in an attempt to pummel them, it's easier just to skip combat altogether. Oh, and there's also one little teeny tiny itsy bitsy caveat: you possess no invulnerability frames at all, so any mistakes on your part will be trumpeted by "BWEWEWEWEW" as your health evaporates faster than dew in the desert at high noon.

As abysmal as Wolverine seems, it's still beatable. There's some atrocious traps and pitfalls awaiting you (the blind jumps and insta-death in the "Trial by Fire" level are absolute shlock), but the game rewards memorization similar to Battletoads or Werewolf: The Last Warrior. By the end of it I was sitting on a fresh cache of lives, having mapped efficient routes for each level in my head. It's not particularly fun for those that abhor trail and error, but as someone that grew up on these types of games this task was right up my alley. True, the game frequently irked me, but the path to its mastery was brief so I harbor no real ill will towards it.

Wolverine is a game that treads a thin line between player engagement and monotony. The fact that it makes combat so deplorable is kind of intriguing, especially considering the bizarre i-frame preclusion (they had to have playtested it and known it was a terrible idea, right?). Without extra continues sprinkled throughout the game I would've soured on the experience much faster, but for what it is, it's certainly far from the worst of LJN's library. Wolverine is a messy platformer that demands that you take advantage of its poor design, and I'm always down for that so long as it's viable (and doesn't cost me a dozen hours).





... And this doesn't really fit anywhere, but I wanted to mention that when you fill up the "BERZERKER" bar, Wolverine begins to flash and attack entirely at random—isn't that just so awful it's amazing?

Mighty No. 9 - Thoughts

It's difficult finding the words to describe my feelings on Keiji Inafune's Mega Man successor, Mighty No. 9. As a backer of the game and longtime fan of the blue bomber, my expectations for it were sky high with Inti Creates onboard. Gradually that excitement fizzled out as the project was repeatedly delayed, each video of the ongoing alpha builds doing nothing to rouse me. Receiving a lukewarm reception at launch, I didn't quite know what to expect from Rock's estranged cousin, and even after finishing it... I still don't know what to say. If I had to lead with something, it's that Mighty No. 9 is a troubled game.

... That's not to say it's a terrible game. Embittered fans (and foes) of a franchise are often too eager to resort to hyperbole as a means of entertainment, chomping at the bit to watch a game crash and burn. Keiji Inafune also did himself no favors when he boldly attempted to grow the Mighty No. 9 franchise before the game was even released, his business strategy coming across as unchecked arrogance. Comcept having to port the game to ten separate SKUs and implement a plethora of promised features outright crippled development, and the longer the game stayed in development the worse it seemed to age. Stacking these factors together meant the game was ripe for verbal lashings when it was released, with plenty of people gleefully denouncing the folly of both Kickstarter and Inafune alike.

But here's the kicker: Mighty No. 9 is most definitely a Mega Man game at heart. Those that peer at the older titles with rose-tinted glasses may not see the comparison, but the Mega Man franchise has always had its fair share of issues. From the hilariously incremental differences between the NES games to the baffling design decisions that plagued the PlayStation titles, the 2D series has ranged from "pretty good" to "grossly mediocre" (and in X7's case, "an affront to platformers everywhere"). This isn't to excuse Mighty No. 9's problems but rather to illustrate that Comcept's debut is more or less what I would expect from a (non-NESlike) Mega Man game made nowadays, flaws and all.

Of the many problems Mighty No. 9 has, nothing stands out more than its bland visuals. The game looks like a PSP title, complete with stretched textures and pitiful character models. The character art is fine in and of itself, it's just that the execution leaves a lot to be desired. I would've loved for the game to adopt a sprite-based artstyle—especially since Inti Creates is so damn good at it—but luckily after an hour with the game you quickly become numb to the cavalcade of flat, lifeless polygons before you. The only part where I thought to myself "hey this looks alright" was the anteroom before Countershade; every level frankly fails to impress.

The gameplay holds up quite well in comparison. The main mechanic that separates Beck from his inspiration is that he can dash into weakened enemies to absorb them, gaining a temporary boost to one of his stats. It gives the Mighty No. 9 a closer feel to the X series with its focus on dexterity and speed, the pace at which you can clear certain sections of a level being surprisingly satisfying (provided your frame rate remains stable). Level design is alright too—I've seen many lambaste the game for it's terrible stages, but outside of Countershade and Call's missions there's a decent heaping of traps, enemies, and environmental hazards to keep an eye out for. Certain sections in the game are sadly too demanding for a Normal playthrough (crumbling towers in Pyro's stage, the turbines in Dyna's stage, spike sections in each of the penultimate levels), but barring that the game is surprisingly fair and fun.

There's a couple of other things I would also like to remark on—like how I think it's really cool that bosses help you out after you defeat them, and that the final boss is atrociously designed—but my thoughts are so disorganized that I'm trying to hit all the important bits before the end of this entry. I don't think it's a bad game, but I also don't think it's a game that people unaccustomed to Mega Man will enjoy. A legion of tiny issues lie in wait beneath its unremarkable exterior, but there's nothing in there that I would deem game breaking or unforgivable; I lean less "it's boringly mediocre" and more "this game seems to be designed by amateurs". In a way, it's almost more fun to take Mighty No. 9 apart piece by piece and analyze it rather than play it, pointing out where it works best and where it trips and falls flat on its face.

Mighty No. 9's greatest sin is that its sloppiness appears unbefitting of its pedigree. I specifically state appears because the game is actually an oddly balanced blend of both Mega Man (1) and Mega Man X6. There's a promising blueprint here—insofar as it's worthy of its legacy—but the game is spread so thin between all its different modes (four difficulties, two characters, co-op, speedrun, challenge missions) that corners were bound to get cut. If more time was spent refining the core gameplay for a single platform I reckon a lot more people would've been pleased with the outcome of this project—as it stands now it's uh...

... something, I guess.

Hook - Thoughts

Hook is a brief yet pleasant title that's all about following lines. If that sounds really simple to you, it's because... well, it is. Despite being labeled as a puzzler, Hook feels more like the skeleton of a puzzle game, requiring only a rudimentary grasp on its mechanics to reach the end. Your first task in the puzzle genre—which step do I take first?—is the only question that the game asks of you, every mechanic introduced serving to obfuscate the answer. It's a fun diversion for the maze-minded, but don't expect your brain heat up while playing it.

If there was one thing that could greatly increase it's longevity, it would be to implement a "least moves" objective for each problem. Introducing something as simple as "complete the puzzle in X number of black button clicks" would at least force the player to look at all options on the table, instead of chipping away at the tangled latticework piecemeal. It might not seem like much, but since the game can be safely completed in under an hour I kinda wish there was just a tiny bit more to do.

Screenshots belie its complexity; Hook is very approachable and aesthetically pleasing title that I gladly devoted two brief afternoons to. While I still wish there was more lurking beneath its surface, every game I play can't be Fire 'n Ice—what's here is nice, especially when you take the price tag into account.

1001 Spikes - Thoughts

The PC version of 1001 Spikes is not my first rodeo with the title. While the Xbox Live Indie Games marketplace was rotten with a whole lotta junk, there were a handful of great gems if you dug deep enough: They Breathe, Astroman, Cthulu Saves the World, VolChaos, Soulcaster, and Radiangames' numerous arcade titles were among the best. A less-than-stellar entry was the aforementioned (minus one spike) 1000 Spikes, a retro-styled game that takes a page from Prinny's book and hands the player 1000 lives to finish it with. Some parts were clunky while others were overtly cruel, but at the end of the day it was a kinda fun experience. Lo and behold... my opinion has not changed.

"Mean-spirited" is the best way to describe 1001 Spikes. It looks like a simple pixelated platformer but has a lot more DNA in common with I Wanna Be the Guy than Mario, keen on killing the player in indefensibly cheap ways. Of course not every death you'll suffer is cheap, but foreknowledge is your greatest weapon here, and the only way to acquire it is to die, die, and die again. It's not a crushingly difficult game—there's only five or six levels in the campaign that'll truly test your resolve—but it's definitely an experience that prioritizes memorization and repetition over reflexes. Because of that, it's a hard game to recommend unless you have a stomach for punishment or penchant for masochism (or, like me, both).

Having been reared on NES games, I'm beyond pleased with the presentation in 1001 Spikes. Both the music and graphical fidelity are fantastic, respectfully borrowing from the 8-bit era while keeping the controls buttery smooth and responsive. The antiquated style feels like it works in service of the gameplay, but I have to confess that the "oldschool" design could use some improvements. Trap inconsistency really grinds my gears: for instance, the spikes that pop out under your feet can have a range of timings before they recede yet all share the same sprite, and dart traps are a few pixels too thin while the flame traps are a few pixels too long. Crumbling platforms sometimes look the same as regular platforms, and there's no rhyme or reason to the location of hidden spikes. These grievances are central to the "gotcha" style gameplay, which isn't too egregious during the main campaign (where the levels are two screens long) but is constantly vexing during the larger levels post game. That, and some sections are frustratingly obsessed with unevenly-timed patterns (dart traps above hopping statues, penguins running into spike switches), further obscuring the path to the finish line.

The most surprising thing for me was that the PC edition of 1001 Spikes is far and away superior to the XBLIG version. There's a ton more content, new modes, goodies to buy, characters to unlock, and multiplayer! All of these features don't allay the misgivings I have with the game's design, but they are a nice inclusion that help to beef up the title, easily tripling its length. The one addition that feels completely unnecessary is the new narrative; the story told here is absolutely asinine and longwinded, taking up minutes of your time to say something that a single splash screen could handle. It can be thankfully skipped, so it's not quite as detrimental to the game as the nefarious trap placement is.

1001 Spikes provides a pretty decent package if you're up for the challenge. I think the game's greatest strength is its sheer simplicity—there's no mechanics to master or upgrades to choose between. The only thing stopping you from getting to the exit are the innumerable deaths you must suffer to learn the lay of the land, which... admittedly doesn't sound that appealing. For that reason alone I certainly wouldn't classify it as an excellent/must-play experience, but it does what it sets out to do, and I kinda admire it for that. Well, also maaaybe because I have a soft spot for good-looking 8-bit art too.

DOOM (2016) - Thoughts

A palpable shock must have blanketed my face during my first hour with id Software's new Doom. "Wait, this doesn't suck?" is what I was most likely thinking, mouth agape at the spectacle of gore before me. But it wasn't the blood that had me nonplussed—no, it was how good the game felt to play. A bizarre realization unraveled before me in Lovecraftian fashion, a maddening truth sprouting from this newly formed coil—"I'm playing a Doom game in 2016 that doesn't suck!" Better yet, not only did it "not suck" for the entire campaign, but it was actually a hell of a lot of fun.

The catch, of course, is that it contains some of the most baffling design decisions I've seen all year.

For those that don't know, I grew up with the classic 1993 Doom as a kid. I played it and its sequel on my parents' IBM work laptop, and in my spare time nowadays I occasionally make maps for it. Having such a close attachment to a 20+ year old program means that I'm extremely critical of anything that sprouts from the brand's name, skeptical of whether it actually has any relevance nowadays. The crux of my concern for the new Doom was that the series hadn't been relevant for a long time. Sure, Doom 3 was a fun game in its own right, but it took the franchise in a questionable direction, structuring the game largely around its untenable "horror" roots. For myself and many like me, there just didn't seem to be a good way to revive Doom, especially considering how many leaps and strides the FPS genre had taken beyond it. The series felt almost Shakespearian in its relevance, heartily revered for its accomplishments but likely to be laughed at by the common-folk if it was placed on the silver screen today (which ironically happened in '05).

Somehow—somehow!—I was wrong. Doom not only successfully exists as a modern game, but it actively puts other FPS campaigns to shame. The best (and most integral) part about the game is that it is fast. While it's easy to overlook such a simple adjective when you're reading a review, Doom's speed absolutely dominates the gameplay from the moment you take control. No longer must you wait behind cover and gradually lick your wounds; the key to surviving is to blow the face off of any enemy that gets within sniffing distance. Initially the glory kills seem like a gratuitous and pace-breaking inclusion, but they're a brief and satisfying way to pick up health during the first half of the game, perfectly fitting in with the "dumb metal" theme of the game (speaking of, the soundtrack is pretty kick ass too). Before long, you'll get a good handle on zipping around imp fireballs and snapping their jaw clean off their skull—and it'll feel great too.

Complementing the breakneck speed of the game are the bone-shattering weapons. Doom disregards modern FPS conventions by tossing out maximum weapon capacity and reloading, urging the player to constantly switch up their armaments in the midst of battle. Toss in some weapon mods that vastly change how you'll use each of the guns and you have a veritable amusement park of death right at your fingertips. To accompany the variety of firearms are a parade of some of Hell's finest, most requiring a different approach from one another. Hell Knight getting too close? Machine gun rockets or plasma stasis will give you some room. A mancubus blocking the path? Blow that sucker up with some rockets or get up close and personal with the super shotgun. Too many low tier enemies warping in? Rev up the chaingun or line 'em up with a gauss siege shot. The bread and butter of Doom is playing around with its weapon and enemy combinations to see what works, what doesn't, and which are your favorites.

The levels are the cherry on top of the creamy gameplay sundae, wonderfully accentuating the brisk pace of combat. Since staying mobile means staying alive, each of the arenas you'll duke it out in give you plenty of clambering avenues, ensuring that it'll be difficult for your enemies to overwhelm you. Outside of combat you can scour the environment to find some tricky secrets or hidden weapons... until the game starts gating you from backtracking for some reason. And here is where Doom really starts to miss its mark.

The levels work in perfect tandem with the game's battles, but past the Argent Facility (level 4) the design shifts towards unidirectional linear progression, tossing interconnectivity by the wayside. This pushes the game to focus only on combat, even when you're eager to explore its hallways for stray goodies. And for some reason the designers become insistent on stopping you from backtracking to find secrets, even when there is no reason for them to do so. One moment you'll be wandering around and the next a door will slam behind you, lock, and trigger a checkpoint. By the time you get to the end of the campaign, Doom doesn't feel like the full game it promised it would be at its start.

There are copious other issues that unfortunately mar the title too. The starting weapons are blatantly outclassed by the late game armaments, especially once you unlock the final upgrades on the weapon mods. Doom presents its ludicrous story with a straight face (which I commend it for) but feels insistent on forcing the player to sit there and listen to dialogue, even after it's established that the Doom Slayer doesn't care one iota for Hell's sympathizers. The multiplayer is serviceable but lacks an identity (if anything, it made me miss playing Halo), and Snapmap is plagued by the worst of Zdoom-isms: text-laden gameplay that tries it's best to emulate something other than Doom.

In spite of these failings, I continue to want to play Doom. Akin to Hyper Light Drifter, the flaws on display do not outshine the title's greatness; Doom contains one of the most satisfying gameplay systems of 2016. The snappy response of battle, the ease at which you can traverse the environment, tackling the challenge, weapon, & rune tasks in combat, and the excitement that comes from facing the higher difficulties meld together to form a non-stop adrenaline rush that sticks to your mind long after the credits have rolled. Doom joins Wolfenstein: The New Order in not only successfully revitalized a series from perpetually obscurity, but also making its contemporaries look tame and meek in comparison. Do I wish it was a tad better? Yeah. Did I nevertheless enjoy my time with it? Hell yeah.

Valdis Story: Abyssal City - Thoughts

[contains minor spoilers]

It's often easy to overlook subtle design decisions when you begin playing a game, finding yourself easily rapt by the more prominent features (story, gameplay structure, co-op inclusion, etc.) Yet at the end of the day—as long as the framework holds up—it's the nuance that you'll engage with most upon repeated visits to a title. Small aspects like attack sound effects, length of invulnerability frames, character walk speed, menu simplicity, and UI readability all contribute to a player's overall impressions of a game, sometimes to a significant degree. It's why some people hate the character movement in Dark Souls II, or criticize the muddy combat of Uncharted 3, or even disparage the greats like Ocarina of Time for its incessant menu pausing to switch out a single item. On the flip side these small and overlooked details can also add to a game's longevity in a profound fashion, like the satisfying sound of the gunfire in Battlefield 3, the speedy respawn rate of Super Meat Boy, and the ease of comparing equipment in Diablo 3. These aren't often make-or-break features of a game, but they can subversively influence if you want to continue playing or not.

My time with Valdis Story: Abyssal City can be summarized with a seemingly innocuous design choice that spoiled a lot of the fun: juggling. Well, that and a couple other issues too.

For what it's worth, the game starts off promising. It has a distinctive artstyle, intriguing setting (city at the bottom of the sea), multiple playable characters, and an extensive skill tree. There's loads of items and gear to find/upgrade, a variety spells that blend with the combo system, and plenty of unique bosses that will test your mettle. What piqued my interest in the game was hearing it described as "if Platinum made a Metroidvania"—if that's not an enticing proposition, I'm not sure what is. And the first hour with it appeared to deliver on that premise.

Ah, but the devil is in the detail! Struggling against Jahzracht as Reina on Hard is what caused me to reach the end of my rope; too many times I found myself getting caught in his fire tornado or bouncing off flame geysers. I'm not leery of difficult games—far from it—but there was just no feasible way to beat this boss. I was dying too quickly, had no equipment or items that could help me, and couldn't even retreat out of the level to hunt down more upgrades. Ultimately I had to restart on Normal, and proceeded to blow my way through the rest of the game, S-ranking almost every boss after Jahzracht. I went from occasionally struggling with the game to outright crushing all of my opponents, especially after I began to upgrade my critical hit chance. The key difference?

I could juggle my foes to death before they could do the same to me.

There are almost no invulnerability frames in Valdis Story, and any time your character suffers a hit they go into a stunned animation. Coupling these things together means you'll easily find yourself helplessly bouncing across a spiked floor until you're dead. It also means that any time a boss uses an attack that does 40 damage instead of 10, there's a high chance the attack will hit you multiple times in a row unless you're a safe distance away. This makes the game feel less a tactical fighter and more like an unfair brawler, where your highest priority is to strike first and keep the enemy dazed. It turns fighting multiple low level enemies into a greater pain than the bosses, and traversing the environments a chore while under fire. The combo system can be fun when you get a grip on dodging attacks right in the nick of time, but it doesn't negate the fact that a single combo loop and spell set carried me through the entire game.

And when it's not the juggling that's driving me up a wall, it's a myriad of other issues. There's no indicator over the player character that the dodge cancel has been refreshed, so you always have to keep an eye on the corner of the HUD (plus it pauses at random times so you can't intuitively memorize how long between dashes you have). The method of teleporting throughout the world in this game—the tram—doesn't go to the library headquarters and all the shopkeeps sell different items, which makes remembering which upgrades require what materials and where they're located a mess. The door timers don't change between difficulties which means that they all require tight timing, and there's almost no reason to collect other equipment once you start upgrading one armor set. Focus finishers are more flashy than they are practical, and delegating the double jump to a missable NPC is a travesty.

Lastly, the final boss is a slap in the face. Valdis Story's strength is in its combo system, so guess how you tackle its final foe? By striking orbs back at it for infinitesimal damage. Whereas I could shred most bosses down in under a minute, this fight took over five, which was only made worse by the fact that I was constantly taking damage thanks to the severe cold of the area. Eventually I had to backtrack and pick up a warmth elixir since the fight is essentially impossible to survive without it, something I wouldn't need if I could've just hit the boss. I was outright flabbergasted that the game's best asset—the combat—was cast aside for its biggest and longest fight, and upon completion I promptly uninstalled the title.

At certain points, I really did enjoy Valdis Story. Since the game was basically created by a single person (Kyron Ramsey), I don't feel too comfortable with ranting about it at length—if anything, I'm just greatly disappointed I didn't enjoy it more. Ramsey clearly knows how to design a video game, it's just that this particular title begins to fall apart once you apply a critical lens to its mechanics. I suppose it's a niche game that will resonate strongly with some, but all I felt when I watched my character bounce endlessly between two enemy attacks was sheer frustration.