Ja-Ja-Ja- JACKPOT.

I just need 137 more... CRAP.

Guys, I've been playing this game at least once a year for 4 years. Has a game you've practically memorized ever made you yell "HOLY SH*T" at the top of your lungs? Borderlands fan for life over here.

Just take those old records off the shelf.

......I think he cheated.

I'd love to give Diablo 3 the fair shot it deserves but since my battlenet account is tied to a email service Blizzard no longer responds to, I'd have to buy the sucker all over again. Hmm. That's not happening. What do I have rattling around in my library that could scratch... that... itch...

Prey Review: Just who do you think you are?

Prey is something of an anomaly. It's either a waste of time or everything you've ever wanted. I happened to love it, but there are solid arguments to be made about it being almost a failure. It depends on what you really want from a game and what you can ultimately put up with. What I'm trying to say is Prey is my "settling soul mate."

It's selling itself as a shooter while intentionally putting as little effort into the actual shooting mechanics as they can. I mean, sure you shoot at things, but it's all so maddeningly imprecise your reflexes don't count for squat. The thing is Prey has a lot more going on then then gooey black aliens. This is a massive escape room that is about all exploring and gathering resources.

And I promise it's so much more interesting than how I just made it sound.

It is nearly all because of level design. The kind of thing you only notice when it's done wrong, unless it's as gob smackingly perfect as it is here. This is a metriodvania, all areas of TALOS-1 bleed in and out of each other flawlessly. The enemy encounters are random all the time. After two playthroughs I hadn't seen all the troop variety tricks it had to show me. Again, the combat isn't the greatest. But your run ins with amorphic terrors from beyond serve a purpose: draining your reserves to force you to find more stuff. And again that's much more fun than it sounds.

"If I had a world of my own, everything would be nonsense. Nothing would be what it is, because everything would be what it isn't."

Nothing about the nuts and bolts of Prey is sexy, but so much of it is interesting. Every item in the game is made of material that can be broken down. Banana peels, bullets, ramen noodles, emp grenades... gum drops. All can be broken down to their basic components and reassembled into something you actually want. I mean anything. Including this game's version of Adam (upgrade points). It turns every little discovery into a step towards whatever you want in that moment.

If you're inches away from that shiny new stealth upgrade or you need a fatter stack of shotgun shells, there is some combination of random junk in your bird's nest of an inventory that can get you what you want. It's the greatest inventory system I've ever seen... again, that sounds boring and I'm sorry. But Jesus Christ, it's perfect. Every item has so much personality. Frozen unagi rolls, Shaker Lemon Pie, Captain Spree's Fish Sticks, I adore this kind of detail.

MotherF**kin' Glucassist!

It's no accident that item discovery matters so much, because this is one hell of a sci fi haunted house. The best since the first Dead Space. The offices and living quarters are bursting with intrigue hidden on computers or notes. The station's "Guts" force you to become an anti-gravity fighter pilot. The outside is it's own wilderness pockmarked with treasure troves blown out into space. In other words, getting lost on TALOS-1 is the most fun I've had exploring a game since I... I honestly can't remember. Maybe New Vegas.

But sadly, all those unique strengths can't hide it's obvious weaknesses. The small character moments shine while the grand set pieces bore. The exploration and looting loop breaks down in the ultimately dull combat. The enemy variety eventually devolves into unimaginative literal blobs. The ending twist will not work for everyone. But it certainly worked for me!


Prey is what Warren Spector would have made if he had started out in this generation, for good and ill. The question is how much you like exploring. Did you tear Rapture upside down trying to shake out every last audio log? Then this. Is. Your. Sh*t. It may not go down as well as the other System Shock games; but it remains the closest thing to it in almost 20 years.

 I hope you like it.

Let's take a walk outside,

The Keepers Review: God is Watching.

This guy is something f**king else.

The Keepers surprised me. That much I can say for it. From the start you seem to know what you're getting. The Baltimore Catholic church wrapped up in the murder of a nun. It's like Spotlight but with somehow even more brazenly obvious collusion with the city. Sad to say that in this world the tale of unchecked pedophile priests is actually getting kinda stale. Think about how jaded we are now; or rather think about what people like Father Maskell have forced us to become. These people made our world that much darker and untrustworthy, we should never forget what they did. For that alone, The Keepers would be this year's Making a Murderer and then some.

It mostly is, though the first 4 episodes are basically all covered in the trailer.  That compounded with a slow start began to grind on my nerves a bit. The introductions to the scooby gang of 60-something investigators are a bit much as well. You ever been the new kid in school and the first friend you make tells you folks here call him "Maverick"... and you know in your bones that no one calls him Maverick? It's initially pretty hard to root for them because they chomp down on their 15 minutes so hard. They haven't let this story go for decades and they deserve it and all... but that don't make it less hard to watch.

Ah man, the suspects episode is soooooooooo good!

Honestly, Cathy's murder is the least interesting part of the whole story. It's actually almost lame by my standards, I just got done reading about the toy box killer. A sleep aid... he wasn't. But the doc smartly treats the murder as a lead rather than a destination. It's rare, but in this case the cover up was FAR less awful than the crimes.


First you hear about Sister Cathy's death, then all about "Mr. Sunshine" Father Maskell, and then? Then it gets amazing. You see, there are some holes in the accuser's stories. Their case was thrown out of court for sound reasons. I booed at the screen the second I heard "repressed memories" and the doc heard me. Near the end it takes it's time presenting the defense. Playing devil's advocate way harder than I expected it to. That witness is the star of the show and a full 15 minutes are dedicated to essentially calling her a liar.

It takes a much more journalistic tone once all the stories are told. It presents everything they got, more evidence for one side than the other, but they make every case that can be made. Let's face it... a lot of people die in Baltimore. It's entirely possible Cathy's death had nothing to do with Maskell's abuse. I love that it lets me make that judgment. In the end, all we need to clear everything up are publicly available documents the city of Baltimore refused to hand over for 4 years straight.

That's a pretty interesting story on it's own... doncha' think?

How's Everybody Doing?

Can I get anybody more cowbell?

Long week. I don't wanna talk about it. In short, I'm feeling much better and am thus much bloggier than I have been. Still plugging away at Darksiders II for the umpteenth time and I still have no idea why this has a 7/10 on steam. That's crazy to me as I could plausibly play this game forever. I'm seriously looking forward to sharing this with my kids, is that weird? It is, isn't it?

Either way, the Deathinitive version is still just so damn pretty and the loot drops are polished to a mirror sheen. Less is more here. Less loot, but the loot you get is more interesting. It's also much harder to buy your way out of a less than perfect load out, so even a grizzled veteran like me has to improvise. I'm loving it. If you've never touched this series and you have any interest in a heavy metal zelda/diablo hybrid... do it. Come on. You're killing me! These games are such a good time.

The Warmastered Editon was pretty good...

"Even my SCABS have SKULLS."- Death after 3 drinks.

...but The Deathinitive Edition



is

stunning.



Great art direction always ages well but, damn, I didn't think they could make Death's armor look that good. The best part of this game was the loot design. Every piece of loot from white to orange looked at least interesting enough to try on once. Most games treat everything under blue rarity as the garbage it is, but Vigil cared. They cared so damn much. I'm glad to see the series get one more shot, even gladder to see one of my all time favorite games get such a respectful face lift.

American Gods: A second course of Hannibal.

It's obvious from the first episode that American Gods is a direct transplant of everyone that worked on Hannibal. The most horrifically gorgeous show ever made. Because of that alone I'm gonna be there to the bitter end. No other show on the air looks or sounds anything like this, like classic Italian horror with a budget and CGI.

The same dream logic and floaty dialogue usually fits Gaiman's words like a glove, in fact it's getting hard to tell what's old and what's new. Mr. Nancy's fiery new sermon is a welcome change seeing as Gaiman (a brit) seemed to not want to talk about the Black American experience too much. Understandably.  But it's a little stagey at times, fine for the page but too flowery and broad for small talk on a long car trip.  Let's just say sometimes Mr. Wednesday comes off as more a weird asshole than a brilliant con man. Though he is certainly both.

Shadow's a lot more of a character now too, though how much of that has to do with Ricky Whittle's solid acting chops is again, unclear. He seems to have a shorter fuse and is much less passive and/or gullible than before. Though It's been 10-12 years since I read the book, it could actually be much better than I remember. I had awful taste back then.

This is worth watching if you ever enjoyed Gaiman, Hannibal, Pushing Daisies, or Deadwood. You are going to LOVE IT. The cool kids aren't going to shut up about it anytime soon either

Last political post for a while, pinky swearzies.

Obama has the ability to call someone a motherf**ker using only his posture.

In light of recent events, such as the AP reporting the Trump transition team illegally moved sensitive material the second they got their hands on it, the Wall Street Journal reporting that Putin personally signed off on payments to Trump hotels, and the fun (though possibly spurious) conspiracy chatter about the US Marshal service arresting sitting members of the House, I'd say it's time to look back to the last administration.

The story behind this picture beguiled me for months and I feel like I don't know much more than a quarter of it so far. But all that does explain why he looked so pissed here... and why he looked so relaxed on vacation.

He may have despised Hillary to an unhealthy degree, but he wouldn't do Barry like that.

Deputy US Marshal!

Just thought I'd reminisce about how much I loved Justified. The US Marshal service is on my mind tonight for some reason....

Many people are saying that a sealed indictment has been issued for Donald Trump.

...but her emails.

According to journalists Louise Mensch and Claude Taylor, who correctly predicted the FBI raid and FISA court proceedings 3 weeks ago, are now saying that Trump ceased to be President on may 9th. Senator Orrin Hatch has received security briefings and is the next president of the United States.

Is this bullshit? I don't know, if not then I love the way they lie to me.

What the sh*t, Barry?!

Archer Dreamland has been a damn good return to form after two downright mediocre seasons. Everyone has slightly new roles and motivation that changes things just enough to feel new again. Yet exactly the same, somehow.

 Though, I was worried why new Barry had to become a cyborg again. This episode was was why. Jesus Christ, someone on the writing staff had to have been bingeing Hannibal. That was just... haunting.

Goggins-Watch 2017

They really nailed the jawline...

Walton Goggins is center square in my favorite character actor bingo card. With Benedict Wong as your older brother and Goggins as a shady lab rat there is some damn good talent behind the mic. Shame the dialogue isn't better, still a firm step up from Dishonored 2.

Prey reaches the next level of interactive imersion.

Because as far as I know, no other video game character has been proven to sleep in socks and boxers. I don't know about the rest of you guys, but personally I've never felt closer to a player avatar in my entire life. Morgan Wu is my now my guiding light. My digital north star.

F**king glorious.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAA.....

...AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!

I honestly, hand to god, did NOT think this would ever happen. Darksiders 3! Holy sweet mother of Moses. It looks good, like it has a current gen budget behind it. The cartoony yet bloody ascetic is still in tact and the dialogue is still juuuuuust above average for a pulpy sword'n'sorcery affair. Plus they went with the sole female member of the horsepersons instead of the dude with all the guns. Nicely done... though the heels are a bit much.

Fargo's still got it.

There has to be a point where the overall quality of TV needs to sink. An upcoming writer's strike may do just that, but I didn't think Fargo could still be this good. Stunt casting Ewan Mcgregor as twins is usually a red flag for lazy writing but the premise this year is pretty damn awesome. The two halves of the Stussy brothers are on either side of the proverbial tracks. One stuck in a dead end job as a parole officer, the other is the parking lot king of Minnesota. They both have ridiculously intricate driving forces in their lives that somehow fit great together. Ray wants to steal a rare stamp from Emmit so he can buy into a high roller Bridge tournament. Emmit wants the Russian mob to stop politely and methodically taking over his company.

This show is worth it for David Thewlis's English accented Russian mobster alone. He somehow manages to be nonchalantly terrifying. Carrie Coon is the next permutation of the single parent cop trope this show is so good at. I'd be upset at the repetition if they didn't do such a great job at keeping it fresh. She's no super cop and only has one other person in her department and that department is run out of the library. This is the show's secret sauce. Making painful realities quietly hilarious.

At this point in American Horror Story it had already flown off the rails. While I'm not sure it's the best season yet I can say for certain that it's the best anthology show so far. And that ain't nuthin'.

He makes his own goddamn teeth a character. I mean, his face and his teeth are giving dueling performances.

Happy Birthday!

To another 100 years.

Late Night Search Hole:

Bog Butter.

That up there is a crazy old husk of butter. This is how the English/Scottish made it since at least the 6th century. They'd bury dairy product slurry in a wooden vessel deep in a peat bog. But the jury's out on why they made it that way. It doesn't have any salt and isn't very nutritious. I lean toward the idea it was for security reasons. A "go bag" if you will, in case of emergency.

Anywho, that's how I spent the last 2 hours. What's new with you guys?

A Post about another Post

Democracy Dies in Darkness

       

I finally got a subscription. One, their comment sections are incredible reads. Two, when the FBI finishes their investigation I want court side seats. I honestly can't think of a better way to spend my money.

Digging up Cathy.

Got a true crime itch that needs scratch'n?  Netflix has got your back with this year's answer to Making A Murderer. It looks amazing. Think Spotlight but with nun murder. Wait... May 19th? Come on, Netflix. You know I can't curse in an article about nun murder!

Well damn, that was actually worth 7 bucks.

It name checks a song that isn't in it! Good thing I was sick of it...

Cards on the table, the school uniform from Persona 4 is the closest I've ever gotten to actually wanting to cosplay. There's a reasonably cheap costume for sale on etsy and I'm going to break down and get it eventually. Tell everyone at a future Halloween party that aren't in the know I'm a Japanese school boy. That might get a laugh or 2.

But either way, as great as Persona 5 is, P4 was just a smidge better and after putting in 70 hours to finish her up; I needed a fresh coat of paint on my crew to deal with a new game +. The p4 costume pack sounded lovely, though $7 was a little steep. But I got some neat XP boosting accessories and apparently the battle music and victory jingle from 4 carry over. If I'm being honest I love reach out to the truth but I wouldn't be heartbroken if I never heard it again.

Except that's not what I got, it's some hot new sh*t from the vita remake I'd never heard before. F**ck it's so good, worth every damn penny.

Where have I been?

Welp... I've been doing a lot more writing vs blogging. See, when I'm not procrastinating on my blog I'm procrastinating on the 3 and 1/2'ish things I'm kinda sorta noveling. Not to worry, I've finally seen What we do in the Shadows and I'm just about done with Persona 5 (dropped it like a stone for a few days, got super burnt out). So blogging is incoming. And I'm still on a podcast!

Slow news day, huh?

Apropos of nothing and no one, I'll put up this scene from a fun little movie with a great message that's somehow still relevant today: Get Carter.

We need to talk about P5's menus.

The user interface is the part of the game you're going to look at the most. You'd think there'd be an arms race in the industry to make the best and most interesting UI possible. Atlus seems to be the only studio who gives a damn. Lord do they give a damn.

Look what the internet can do with it:

 

For 14 hours  Imgur isn't going to know what hit it...

That. Little. Sh*t!

What have ye done?!

I'm sure Mike Fahey's son is a sweet boy. No one is abdicating for corporal punishment here. No one is saying that. But good people can be responsible for monstrous things. Things like deleting a 40 hour Persona 5 save. That sucks Mike. That sucks times a million. I also like to point out there's a cloud save option and I suggest ya'll use it!

P5 is... ok, I guess.

Persona 5's good. Pretty good, even. Good enough so that the near decade wait was worth it. I'm not saying you need to rush out and buy it, but there is a nice bonsai-like feeling tending to the day to day grind of being a japaneese teenag-... what the hell do you mean it's been 6 days?

6 days?! Then why does it feel like I've just started?! This game is the closest thing humanity has to a f**king time machine. 

9 and 1/2 years later...

...and we have a new persona game! I broke a week long solemn vow not to buy it until I finished Horizon. But I hit a really good stopping point just after midnight on tuesday . What was I supposed to do? Respect Chance's friendship?! Probably.

Though I'd feel worse about it if it wasn't so. Damn. Magnificently Japanese.

What the hell, April Fools?!

This is why reddit won't shut up about szechuan sauce.

Sometime 12 years ago April Fools must have became a chapter in a universal MBA text book. Since then, every marketing department across the world tries to do... something on April 1st. Most years I don't mind being burned a little but this time April Fools hurt me. Real bad.

The season premiere of Rick and Morty came and went while I slept off a 14 hour shift. There is nowhere I can legally watch it for at least a week. It's been almost 2 years since the last season ended and now my corporeal  shell can no longer contain my rage. That's f**ked, AF. That's f**ked to the nth degree. You've wounded me. I don't think we can be friends anymore.

I've been distracted.

The world of entertainment has so much to talk about right now, but I find myself silent. Because it's raining dropped shoes in the world of politics. Kinda like how John McCain said it would. We haven't had a political scandal like this in decades and the journalist in me can't get enough of it. I'm just endlessly refreshing Politico over here.

Andromeda continues to impress and vex in equal measure.

Just when I think I'm falling in love with Andromeda it does something stupid like make a character say "let's get out of here" or "we got company." Screen writing 101 should have made those radioactive to a writer worth half a damn. But then I go on Drak's loyalty mission where we get into a spectacularly bro-mantic chase for a stolen seed vault and I forget it's flaws for a while. It even gave me my favorite ME gun yet, a space age revolver that just melts my heart. Accurate enough for off hand head shots yet still decent at long range with a scope. Perfect for sniping and close range "where the f**k did you come from?!" moments. So I basically use it all the time.

Can't say for sure whether everyone should play this eventually, but $60 isn't worth it for most of you. Because most of you hated the first ME. Unless sci-fi western stuff is as much your thing as it is mine.

Your emails are all pretty funny.

Good on you, Andromeda.You're really no where near as bad as I feared. Doomed to be the red headed step child of the Bioware library, but still genuinely fun. Also thanks for getting DA2 out of the dog house, it never deserved the rap it got. Avaline forever!

ME:Andromeda is... sumthin'.

'Scuse me for Goldbluming but this game is just... ummmmm... well, yeah.

I've gone through some mental gymnastics to appreciate Andromeda. I'm pretending this came out two years after ME3 and I've put off buying it until they remastered it. Because this couldn't possibly have been in development for 6 years. Because that would be a goddamned tragedy.

Everything you've heard about the first hour or two is true. ME's dialogue wasn't exactly Mamet* at the best of times, yet this manages to be a pale imitation of that. I'm still in, though. There's no question it's the worst cast in the series but that's still good enough. At least for me... at least for now.

There is still one amazing thing Andromeda's got that the originals don't have and that thing is jetpack fights. 

Motherf*&%ing Jetpack Fights. That is all.

*look how crazy young Spacey is! I bet the guy passed for 50 in his 30's

I'll buy Mass Effect Andromeda... for the blog.

For 7 years I've never hesitated to buy a Bioware game. Not even for a second. Yes, ME3 and I had irreconcilable differences. Sure, Inquisition ultimately drowned in a sea of it's own half baked "content". But Bioware has never hit below an 8/10 for me. Andromeda looks poised to break that streak.

It looks... rough. Like a cheap straight to video spin off of a once great series. Reviews are harsh. Polygon literally called it "a total goddamned mess." I do not wish to play it at launch as I'm already knee deep in Horizon. While it's pretty bland in the story department, it's refreshingly confidant and reeeeeaaaaalllllly pretty. Andromeda is none of those things, but I need to know. I need to know how far a great studio has fallen, if at all. The blog and the podcast deserve to know too. Hope tips are good next week.

Night in the Woods Review: Rite of Possum Springs.

Do you ever get the feeling that something was made just for you? Something that seems to take your musings on fear, insecurity, and loathing and makes them funnier than they have any right to be? Night in the Woods is a watershed moment in gaming. It's almost like I've been waiting for something like this since 1996. I don't want to oversell it, but there is a very good reason it has a 10/10 on steam reviews. That reason is I have NEVER played a game this well written. I just want to shout superlatives from the rooftops now, so here we go.

People may argue that NITW is visual novel, that it's not interactive enough, that it's forced ending robs it of any lasting impact. You may feel like your time in Possum Springs is "wasted" and there are solid arguments for calling this a flash in the pan. I'll even fess up that the final act is a rushed misstep. But I say it's all about the journey. I can only speak to my own experience and my own experience was a goddamn trip, man.

The story of Night in the Woods is a new one, though painfully familiar to anyone in their 20's. Mae is a cat that was too anxious and depressed to finish college and chose to move back home with her parents while she figures out what to do next. All day every day she hops around town meeting up with her friends at their workplaces, walking on power lines, getting heckled by old neighbors, anything to drown out her creeping feelings of failure and inadequacy.

This shouldn't be anything but a stone cold bummer. So why did it make me laugh out loud more than any game I've ever played? I'll give you a hint, because this is the seminal creative text of my generation. It earns that title by understanding that everyday life can be funny or sad and is routinely both at once. This is the millennial tragedy writ small and it. Is. Hilarious. 

Punch lines are set up that don't pay off for hours. There are quick 30 second conversations with your mother that manage to be emotional roller coasters. There's a scene in which you start a knife fight with your best friend and it's not a mellow dramatic showdown. It's just some dumb fun you're both having. 

When NITW has characters read poetry, it's actually poetic. When you think the story is going to point towards a happy ending for anyone, a barbed anecdote about their past suddenly makes it impossible. Addiction, abuse, loss, and irrational self destruction are given a grace and humor that escapes not just most games, but a lot of writing in general. No, really. Stephen King couldn't pull off characters this three-dimensional or fun to save his life and remember I warned ya'll about the superlatives.

The one aspect that falls short is it's attempt at cosmic horror. That's kinda my wheelhouse and if you came to play you best not give me the ending to American Gods (but with a mine this time instead of a lake). How is it that in a game about a sad small town the ghostly kidnapper manages to be the least interesting thing about it? It also comes perilously close to having the villain be a problem that solves itself and for a game that's so good at dialogue and characters... that's a stark rookie mistake.

So I'd say take your time. Talk to everyone. Climb the buildings. Go to Church. Just fall in love with Possum Springs and take the ghost hunt with a grain of salt. This is just the first project from these guys and they've already thrown down the gauntlet for anyone trying to tell stories through games. If you can't see that this is now the high water mark then you aren't paying close enough attention.

RayBans, Anyone?

My twitter got hacked for the very first time. Chance pointed it out to me as well as making me this lovely screen grab. It's like a magic eye poster but with words. The harder I try to read it, the less it makes sense. So thank you twitter bot, thank you for being a confounding word salad.