Category: Games

Hard to say something about Skyrim which has not yet been told. It is an immense open world RPG, it is huge, it has tons of quests.

… which I have to say is overwhelming. I got as many sidequests as I could. So I did the whole Wererwolf-path, cured myself form Lycanthropy, switched over to the full Vampire-Line, became master vampire and cured myself again from vampirism, *before* I started the main quest or had decided for the Empire or the Stormcloaks. Yeah! There is a ton. To get lost. At a later stage I just followed question markers and finished it without any remembrance about what the original quest has been. Here I think less could be more. It is simply too much. You can also go into alchemy, crafting, and can read tons of books within the game, build some houses, marry, adopt children, be generous or go stealing, or both. It is all there in the game.

However, finishing the main story plot felt somehow unsatisfying. Cut scenes which bring the story forward are seldom and if the happen they are rendered within the game. Finally finishing the main story felt like finishing one of the myriads of sidequests. Somehow shallow.

The graphics and music is great! And I extended the game using mods. This made the game even look greater! … but also slightly unstable. One crash every half hour is common.

Besides these crashes, there are some minor quirks: why do I need to have a mod telling me if I had read a book already? Why do I have to have a mod which gives a real working interface? Why do some quests end up in the very same location I cleaned already? … why sometimes 2 quests at the same time (happened!)? Why are the default vanilla models so poor given the amazing artwork of some modders?

A masterpiece with some flaws.

9/10

This is a fun adventure. You play Rufus who just want to get to Elysium and off Deponia, a planet full of dump and waste. The planet is thought to be uninhabited and ought to be destroyed by the Organon. But as it happens one of your tries to escape the planet had actually succeed in landing on an Organon cruiser. You and accidentally also the girl Goal from Elysium are dropped again on the planet’s surface. Your task is to a) save Goal, b) get Goal to Elysium to report that there is still life on Doponia and c) get yourself off the planet.

This can’t be hard, could it? Well it is. Since Rufus, your character, is a blighter, boaster, a loafer, which always exaggerated the opinion of himself. He can’t do nothing good and his tries to get off the planet as well as his inventions usually end up in total catastrophes. This is stuff for a lot of funny conversations and hilarious dialogues. The (german) voice acting is brilliant.

The planet, its people and also Rufus do entertain and are not without sympathy. The riddles are sometimes quite hard to solve and I did some by pure trial & error (which is no good).

Controlling the game is clever made, the scenarios are nice drawn and there is no room for a technical reproach.

8/10.

In the Wolf Among Us, you play Bigby, the Big Bad Wolf (hence: “Big-B”) of Red Riding Hood. Living in New York. Today. Undetected by normal people as sheriff of the small community of exiled fairy tale A- and B-celebrities.

Yes, quite an extraordinary setting. And cool! Bigby is sullen loner, heavy smoker, tosses down a few drinks every now and then and is generally mistrusted by everyone. But Snowwhite which is ambitious trying to get the whole fairy tale thing secretly living in New York working. Somehow. But now a murder has happen and it’s you to investigate and find the murderer.

The game is a reminiscent of the private detective series, a lonesome grumpy hero in a dark, rainy New York. The saxophone is playing in the background…

The story is interesting. But not consuming like The Walking Dead has been. There are cliffhangers as well, yes, but they missed to touch me and hook me in. It’s a nice cool setting with a cool character. Part of the curiosity is to what has become of some fairy tale figures? What had happened to Red Hiding Hood? The Frog Prince? The three little Pigs? How are they doing now in a modern city? And yet there is still magic around!

However the story itself is embedded right into this fairy tale setting and therefore follows also a fairy tale logic. Mixed with blackmail, prostitution, exploitation and other dark forms of a modern civilization. And somehow this story seems to be the weakest part of the game. It just “ripples”. Some occasions feel unnecessary stretched (e.g. investigation at Toad’s, finding all the clues). Some scenes and characters are, well, just added to the game without any real impact (e.g. Bluebeard and his way of interrogation of a suspect).

Still a nice game, but doesn’t hold to The Walking Dead.

8/10

You play Lee, a convicted murderer, on his way to prison. Suddenly the Zombiecalypse happens and you barely manage to get out of the wrecked police car after a zombie stumbled right into it on the motorway. Free again, you start to wander around and soon you find a little girl, Clementine, who is hiding in her treehouse in the parent’s garden. Without any clue where her Mom and Dad are, you promise her to take care and help her to find her parents.

This is the starting point of a “road movie”. You’ll met other which are in the very same situation you are in: no clue what is going on, has the government taken up some actions or not, why are some infested by some zombie disease and some not, … Some have taken the law in their own hands, lacking any nation wide control and power, some will help though their motives may be unclear and … “fishy”.

The graphics are comic-style and sort of nice to look but not superior. The controls are clumsy, you find yourself running straight into some obstacles from time to time. You may pick up some items every now and then also and can solve some riddles – which are a laugh. Finally you are also served with some quick-time events, which, well, can be annoying and distracting sometimes.

Why it’s a masterpiece then? Because of the story! Because of the characters! Because of the dialogs and the choices the game has you to offer! The whole game is more like an interactive movie with a lot of twists and turns, suspicious characters, love and very deep emotional moments. Some parts are creepy, some parts are terrifying and some parts are very touching. The game does not overwhelm you with graphics, explosions or a vast exotic universe. This game consumes you. It slowly captures your imagination and charms you. At end of each episode you simply MUST know, how it will develop and go on.

Bravo. This is a statement for the art of gaming. 10/10.

Memoria tells two concurrent tales placed within the mythology and history of the world of The Dark Eye. As Geron you want to find a way to lift the spell from you faerie Nuri which has turned into a raven at the end of the last adventure. As such you encounter a gypsie which could help you out… if you help him out solving a riddle. Time is running short since Nuri seems to forget her origins and becomes more and more “raven” by time.

On the other side you play Sadja, a princess 450 years before. She is on the way to find a magic mask, of which is said it could decide the faith and outcoming of any battle.

As both plots overlap from time to time, you switch between Geron and Sadja. As Geron is reluctant and shy, Sadja is cheeky and defiant. Geron’s world is colorful and bright whereas Sadja’s world is dark with a looming total destruction by hordes of daemons due to mage wars.

The connection between both story lines is not obvious but develops from chapter to chapter. And soon you discover that Sadja is not the “princess” at all. At the end you face again, as in the Chains of Satinav, a bittersweet love story.

The riddles are fair, sometimes a bit trial and error. The environment is beautiful drawn and one can see that the developers really had a caring hand when crafting the scenery along with the dialogues and audio and lots of details and charm. The interface is beyond any doubt.

A nice adventure!

8/10

This adventure is really a love story full of melancholy. An impossible love between a human and a fairy, relentless gods, revenge and journey to the different wonders of Aventuria, the continent of the Dark Eye.

The graphics are nice painted, the sound supports the overall mood of the game and the interface stays out of the way.

The riddles range from easy to quite tough (like in the fairy realm).

I love it.

8/10:

Finished Darksiders on Saturday.

This game is fun. You play War, one of the four horsemen … to bring devastation on the world. And, oh my, you do. Hell is loose, the angels and daemons are fighting each other and in the middle is mankind. Well, mankind: not long.

Soon you find yourself tricked and are “accused” to have been showed up at the wrong time, since noone actually has called for you. You are brought before the cosmic council and you are given a second chance to remedy your “failure”. You are sent back to earth to only find out that centuries have passed since you have been trapped. You are weak and lost all your powers (and your horse). Further more, the council decided to attach an enervating spirit to you which watches every step you take. Step by step – level by level – you regain your powers and abilities back (and finally your horse too). You figure out who is behind your imprisonment and manage to take revenge. It’s a road movie in a post-apocalyptic world roamed by daemons and angels alike fighting each other … and you.

The action is pretty cool. You jump, swim, run, crawl, climb, etc. Fighting has some nice moves and as the game goes on you learn new skills and weapons. It really is smooth. The graphics are comic style nice and pretty to watch. The riddles range from easy to pretty awesome. And after learning new skills and abilities you tend to go back to levels you already cleared since you might now discover new places and spots you haven’t been before lacking the ability to fly to these places or even teleport (!). This game has looting features you get hooked on.

War is a cool character. … who is lost in a cool though confusing world.

The setting has some real nice touch. The world is filled with angels and daemons of all kind fighting each other and you’re fighting all of them. Some boss monsters are huge and some are pretty tough. Still one question remains: why I’m doing all this? What’s the point? The “mighty” council is a bundle of idiots easily fooled by a child or they deliberately sent War to prison … for what? Daemons and angels are fighting because … they don’t know what else to do? Yes, the overall action in the game is very addictive but the story could use some improvements. It seemed that some boy child fantasy has gone wild and just stopped at the point when one starts to justify all the action and reaction the characters in the game perform. “It’s there because … it’s just damn cool, isn’t it?”

Finally the controls: I played with my XBox controller on PC. First it starts all nice and easy. Pretty simple and clear. But as you learn new skills, abilities and weapons you find your controller overloaded with zillions of different moves and actions you can do. At the end I felt having about ~40 different key combinations to choose from. And as such I sometimes ended up jumping and flying around before I got the right keystroke to actually hit my foe. This is simply too much.

Still, a very pretty entertaining game.

7/10:

In Borderlands all is about shooting. Diplomacy, talking, solving problems by getting to a common conclusion, a consensus, humility, compassion, logic and all other ideals of humanity are wasted. This game is about killing. Shoot or be shot. If you have a gun, you have a solution for any problem. “Riddles” are not present. The whole gameplay comes down to where to shoot which enemy with which weapon best. This is totally brainless. This is how a good American Republican will do it. Get weaponized, fire any bullet you can squeeze into your rifle, and *then* ask whose left of what the real problem is about.

Boy, this game is fun! =)

The setting is on planet Pandora (ring a bell?). This is a SciFi-version of Texas of the Wild West. The landscape is totally dumped with waste of all sort. Garbage all around. You are searching The Vault: a place with mysterious treasures somewhere on the planet. On this quest you get jobs assigned via local citizens or a bounty board. This results in money and other loot to improve weapon stack.

And it is this where the real fun sets in. Borderlands is a RPS – a Role Playing Shooter. There are zillions of weapons to find and loot. Rifles, shotguns, pistols, grenade launchers, etc. All with different qualities in damage dealt, accuracy, rate of fire, etc. Plus: your stats in accuracy, speed, etc. Yes: once you reach level 10 you basically have seen it all.

… but this did not hinder me to get my hunter get level 37(!).

Borderlands is like playing Diablo, but with guns, but from first person perspective, but in the Wild West, but on Planet Pandora in the Future Science Fiction, but with coolness instead of drama, but with laughter (the ever appearing Claptraps are hilarious).

Also the game does level opponents. So it always stays challenging. I have to confess, I had my good share of trouble defeating the main villain at the end. This is great.

One can argue that the story is poor and once you have gained level 10 you basically have seen it all. And actually the game concept “solving your problems by killing them with guns” is definitively *not* pedagogic.

Yes. Be it so.

It remains a massive share of fun.

Yee-ha!

8/10:

Finished Penumbra: Overture 2 days ago.

Played fully on Linux with Steam (native, no Windows Emulation).

You are at the search for the mysterious death of your father. He worked at some mining complex at Greenland and that is the place the game starts right with the entrance to the pit at the game’s cover. In the next 4 chapters you delve deeper and deeper to reveal the strange and frightening secrets of this place. Along your journey you find various items to use and even some weapons which you desperately need: this place is haunted by zombie-like dogs, gigantic worms and spiders the size of racoons. Eventually you discover excavations from alien origin and make contact to the sole survivor of this place: “Red” which apparently has gone mad.

As the game was created by Frictional Games the mechanics are very, very similar to Amnesia. This game is older and when playing you can see the polish the developers did to Amnesia.

Compared to Amnesia this game let’s you actually kill your enemies, though it is a though job. Which is sorta strange, since the game changes dramatically once you know how to kill all these dogs in the corridors. Then the dominant opponent turns into a “piece of cake” and what’s left are the riddles to solve. However getting a grip on these Zombie-Dogs is not an easy task and it takes you several (!) attempts to figure out how to get rid of them.

I can imagine why they dropped the possibility to kill enemies in Amnesia: here the game stops been frightening at this point.

The riddles in the game are of different qualities. Some are stupidly easy and for some you simply get false hints, which is bad. I remember myself in chapter 4 been chased by a big worm. The game tells you to ” … to seal that door”. Right then you find a crate on the right side. When I jumped up the crate I couldn’t reach the door mechanics, but the worm didn’t appear. So I thought I’m on the right place and tried over and over and over and over to get somewhere from that position. Wrong! I needed to simply push a button on the left side of the door! And sealing the door didn’t help either …

Such quirks appear occasionally in the game: game mechanics great, story telling nice, riddles range from childish to misleading.

Still, walking the strange mine renders some nice and creepy impressions, 7/10: