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The following post is part of a series of posts that are published every Wednesday to update readers on what I've been playing during the week (this also includes games on my "Pile of Shame"). The games to target are picked by Choicest Games contributors Choona, Luke and myself. As I'll be talking about my progress through these games, there may be spoilers ahead, especially for games containing a narrative. Consider yourself warned.
Battlefield 2042
- Picked by Me
- Percentage Complete = 100%
Continuing to play this. Not much to report. I finally reached Mastery Level 4 with Lis which means I've unlocked a new uniform for her which looks more professional than the default one (hey, at least she gets a helmet). It was a hard slog though. It's not easy getting kills with her rocket launcher. I got plenty of assists, but most vehicles need at least 2 or 3 hits before they're finally destroyed, and if they're actively repairing and you have no other allies harassing it, it's nigh on impossible. I'm now hoping to reach Level 4 Mastery with the other characters too.
SpaceVenture
- Picked by Me
- Percentage Complete = 5%
SpaceVenture a game that has been in development for almost a decade finally released a few days ago. Developed by ex-Sierra developers who gave us the Space Quest series (Mark Crowe and Scott Murphy) a lot of fans were keen to finally get their hands on it. Indeed, some fans gave up they'd ever see its eventual release. You won't find the game available on any digital storefront just yet as it's only been released to Kickstarter backers and unfortunately, the game is buggy, really buggy.
But firstly, let's discuss what's good about the game. The voice acting is top notch so far and the opening cutscene looks great. Most of the animations themselves are actually pretty good except for the lip synching when a certain character talks. It looks creepy. I also found it novel that you use a drag-and-drop mechanic to move items around the screen, instead of your traditional use of just clicks to interact with the environment: the drag-and-drop mechanic would make the game feel at home on a mobile device.
In terms of what's bad with the game, well there's still quite a few bugs. Sometimes voice samples play and sometimes they don't. Sometimes the game locks your mouse and then you have no choice but to Alt+F4 out of it and start again. Save games somehow only save at the beginning of a scene and nowhere in between and your robotic dog called Rooter sometimes walks in the opposite direction you indicate. Sometimes you receive feedback of what you can't do and sometimes you don't (verbally and visually through highlighted hotspots). Considering this is a game made by old-school adventure developers, the game's buggy state makes it extra difficult to determine whether you're on the right track or not, without the aid of a walkthrough.
Speaking of walkthroughs, the developers did provide one for the first part of the game but I've already read that even if you follow the walkthrough it isn't going to guarantee success, which is not encouraging. Anyway, I'll keep soldiering on with the game. Apparently, the Space Quest Historian has already completed the game and while I'm by no means a guru at point 'n' click adventures, I'm guessing it will take me a few days to clock this one. We shall see.
Return to Monkey Island is just around the corner though…
Return to Monkey Island
- Picked by Me
- Percentage Complete = 5%
And speaking of Return to Monkey Island I finally got around to giving it a go. The difference in terms of bugs is night and day, but to be fair Terrible Toybox has Devolver Digital as a publisher so I daresay they have much more funding and support than the Guys from Andromeda ever received.
While some people criticise the art style, I actually don't mind it. It reminds me of art styles employed by Double Fine in their games such as The Cave or Broken Age. It also works since it emulates the janky nature of animation that existed in the original pixelart versions of the game, yet with higher resolution art.
Voice acting is top notch and Dominic Armato returns as the voice of Guybrush Threepwood and the soundtrack is fantastic (but then again, the Monkey Island theme is so iconic now).
The game also treads over familiar territory, with a starting sequence very similar to the end of Monkey Island 2. I also like how Ron Gilbert seems to have accepted the other Monkey Island games after the second game as canon, or so it seems, as there's the ability to recap on what happened in the previous games via a scrapbook feature from the Main Menu.
In terms of the interface, it seems very intuitive and just to let you know I picked the harder difficulty option instead of the casual one. I hope I won't regret this decision but I figure since I've played over 100 point 'n' click adventures in my lifetime, I should know a thing or two about them.
LINK: [ The Pile of Shame ]
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