Tyler F.M. Edwards's Blog, page 50

Review: Dark Matter, “We Voted not to Space You”

Damn, for a show that didn’t even have episode titles until recently, their title game is on point.

The title is better than the episode, but the episode isn’t bad.

Having decided not to shoot Six out an airlock, the crew plans to use his GA insider info to track down and exact revenge on One’s murderer, Jace Corso. But of course the galaxy’s most wanted criminals won’t find it easy to infiltrate a GA outpost.

This is where Sally the android comes in. With her new upgrade, she can infiltrate human society with ease, and because she’s simply property in the eyes of the law, she’s far less infamous than her human comrades.

The new Sally is going to take some getting used to. I long suspected she would find some way to become more human-like, but even so, the sudden and dramatic change catches me a little off guard. I think I like the new her, but it’s definitely a big adjustment to make.

With the information they need in-hand, the crew is off to find Jace Corso, and take their retribution. But not all is as it seems.

It’s a bit of a strange episode because it feels a bit like two separate episodes smashed together. Sally becoming more human, and then the hunt for Corso. There’s a sharp change of direction in the middle of the episode.

On the whole I think I liked Sally’s half better. The latter half was still mainly good, but it had some rough patches.

There’s a lot of leaps to further the story that don’t make a lot of sense. Where’d they find a blowtorch? Where’d the Marauder come from?

The ending wasn’t all it could have been, either. Maybe I jumped the gun, but the set-up was so full of tension and intensity that I kept expecting something truly spectacular to happen. A big reveal or maybe even a cliff-hanger leading into a two-part episode.

Instead, we got a confusing deus ex machina and a return to normal. While confronting Corso needed to happen, little was done to advance the over-arching plot beyond Sally getting her upgrades.

It’s not bad. But it could have been better.

Overall rating: 7.2/10

Filed under: Reviews Tagged: Dark Matter, review, sci-fi, TV

Review: The Gates of Good and Evil, book one: The Summonstone

Although it hasn’t been out for that long, it’s still surprising it took me this long to get around to reading the first book of The Gates of Good Evil, the newest trilogy in Ian Irvine’s vast Three Worlds Cycle. Ian Irvine is my favourite living writer, and I’ve been eagerly anticipating this book for years.

The Summonstone occupies an odd place in the mythology of the Three Worlds. It is a direct sequel to the first part of the saga, The View from the Mirror, taking place about ten years after the events of The Way Between the Worlds and once again putting the focus on the original heroes, the sensitive Karan and Llian the chronicler.

However, this also makes it something of a prequel to the other Three Worlds books, The Well of Echoes quartet and The Song of the Tears trilogy. It’s kind of a weird space for a story to be, and the competing goals make the story a bit scattered at times.

I’m going to try to avoid major spoilers for The Summonstone itself, but by necessity I will be spoiling the other Three Worlds books a bit. You’ve been warned.

In typical Ian Irvine fashion, the story wastes no time in having basically everything go wrong. Karan and Llian’s young daughter, Sulien, awakens from a nightmare, and this is no ordinary dream, but a vision.

She has seen an army gathering within the Void, the Merdrun, and they plan to invade Santhenar and claim it for their own. Sulien is the only threat to their plans, and they plan to use dark magic to snuff out her life and pave the way for the genocide of humanity.

Meanwhile, the Merdrun’s Summonstone is waking, sending out a psychic drumming across Santhenar that twists and corrupts all it touches, driving even the best of people to madness, murder, and betrayal.

And at a time when Santhenar should be uniting against the threat from the Void, war ravages the island of Meldorin as the deranged warlord Cumulus Snoat attempts to bring the land under his dominion. Soon even the Council of Santhenar is on the run from his forces.

The pacing is breakneck, perhaps a bit too much so. I found the early parts of the book felt a little rushed. I would have enjoyed a slightly slower build-up, maybe some time to see more of Karan and Llian’s family life and how they’ve changed over the years.

I was also reminded that I’ve never been a particular fan of Karan and Llian as characters. Llian is for the most part an imbecile — though for what it’s worth he was a bit more likable this time around, even if he still doesn’t do that much — and Karan can come across as a bit melodramatic at times. Yes, I know she’s a sensitive, and she can’t help it, but whatever the cause, it still gets a bit wearing after a while.

For me, The View from the Mirror was carried by the strength of its secondary characters. The good news is that’s true here, as well. We’re reintroduced to some old favourites — oh, how good it is to see Lilis again — as well as some great new characters.

Wilm is a simple farmboy possessed of great courage and goodness, and one of the most fiercely likable characters Ian Irvine has yet produced. Aviel is an ill-fated girl with a crippled foot, but the rare ability to create magical scent potions — which is an interesting take on magic if I’ve ever seen one. Then there’s Ussarine, the massive but good-hearted warrior woman, and the troubled twins Esea and Hingis.

I’m impressed that even after all this time Irvine is still managing to create characters and stories that feel fresh and different. Usually when an author has been around for this wrong, especially if they’re mainly writing in the same universe, they inevitably fall into tired formulas.

There are some patterns that keep coming up over and again in Ian Irvine’s books — mainly his determination to adhere to Murphy’s Law at every possible opportunity and the fact that almost all his characters seem to have dead or absent fathers — but it’s far from the rote routines other long-running fantasy series often devolve into.

Ultimately, my main complaint about this book is not my lukewarm feelings toward Karan and Llian, nor even the rushed pacing, but the Merdrun themselves.

Part of this is the weight of expectation. I had envisioned this series as telling the tale of Karan’s conflict with Maigraith, which would lead to all the troubles of Santhenar over the coming centuries. There’s a bit of that, but it takes a backseat to this totally new, and frankly less interesting, threat.

I’ve certainly seen worse villains than the Merdrun, but I can’t say I find them particularly compelling, either. So far they seem to be purely evil monsters, with none of the nuance that originally attracted me to the Three Worlds books.

At the same time, they’re still less interesting than the other purely evil threats of the series. We saw Jal-Nish and Maigraith become corrupted over time, which lent them colour and depth, and their cruelties were on full display. There’s a lot of telling, as opposed to showing, with the Merdrun.

Nor can they equal the alien horror of the creatures of the Void, being still more or less human, just really nasty humans.

Oh, and stop killing dogs, Ian. You can kill all the human characters you want, but leave the puppies out of it.

That said, there’s still plenty to like. If I’m critical of this book, it’s mainly because I hold Ian Irvine to a higher standard than most other writers. The action is still exciting, the new characters (as mentioned above) are mostly very strong, and the world-building remains as excellent as ever. Very few fantasy settings can equal the depth and texture of the Three Worlds.

And the climax of the book is absolutely spectacular. Tense, exciting, and with some fantastic twists.

Also, while The Summonstone didn’t entirely meet my expectations, it’s worth noting this is just book one of the trilogy, and Irvine’s series have had rough starts before. The first book of The Song of the Tears left me a little cold, too, but it turned into one of my all-time favourite series.

I look forward to the next installment.

Overall rating: 8/10

Filed under: Reviews Tagged: books, fantasy, review, Three Worlds

Review: Dark Matter, “We Were Family”

What an incredibly busy episode.

“We Were Family” gives nearly every cast member some story, excepting only Four and Six, and with how the cast has expanded, that makes for a lot happening in a single hour.

Following the tension of the previous episode, the new passengers seem to have mostly integrated with the Raza crew. Seems a bit sudden after last week’s distrust, but it moves the story forward, so I won’t complain.

Nyx seems like she may be another Two — some sort of enhanced human. I also sense some sexual tension between her and Four. This at least feels a little less forced than the One/Two/Three love triangle.

We also get a glimpse of why someone as talented and seemingly decent as Devon was in prison, and Arax plans his betrayal.

The lion’s share of the episode goes to Three, who encounters the band of criminals who raised him.

I’m no fan of Three, but all things considered, this story was pretty good… even if I could see the ending coming a mile away. It does a much better job of making him more likable than season one’s hamfisted attempts at the same goal. Rather than attempting to convince us this selfish, womanizing thug is secretly a devoted romantic, it positions him as more of a classic antihero. Rough, harsh, occasionally cruel, but not entirely unprincipled in the final accounting.

That’s much more believable, so it succeeds in elevating my opinion of Three, unlike season one’s attempt to soften his image.

Sally the android also gets quite a lot of attention. During a stopover at a space station, she encounters a secret enclave of androids who have evolved beyond mere machines.

I’m not quite sure what to make of this plot. I do like Sally getting more attention, but it’s too early to form an opinion of these new androids or how they might affect her.

Mainly I’m thinking these new androids might prove a powerful ally in Two’s hypothetical crusade against the corporations. I may be jumping the gun here, but think about it. I can’t imagine sentient androids are well-served by the corporate system, and they’d certainly be an asset. Sally has proven herself incredibly capable and deadly, and she’s just one android, and an obsolete model at that.

Meanwhile, Two delves further into her past, and Five continues to be awesome.

The sheer busyness of this episode makes it a difficult one to rate. On the one hand, it’s scattered. No single plot gets quite as much attention as it maybe deserves, and it can be hard to keep track of everything that’s happening.

On the upside, there are so many different plot threads that at least one is bound to interest you.

For my part, I’m inclined to look favourably upon it, if only for Five’s continued streak of brilliance and managing to make me actually enjoy a Three story.

Overall rating: 7.9/10

Filed under: Reviews Tagged: Dark Matter, review, sci-fi, TV

WoW: 7.0 Changes, a Stroke of Luck, and the Rise of the Mountain Queen

With the launch of the Legion pre-patch, I have returned to my dark master. Warlords of Draenor’s reign of terror has ended; let the cries of joy echo across the land!

A whole new world (of Warcraft):

The class changes for any expansion are always big, but this time the changes are so radical that it almost feels like an entirely new game. The new versions of classes are a bit of a mixed bag, but on the whole I’d say the good outweighs the bad.

I’m most happy with the changes to rogues. After several expansions of stagnation, rogues have received a much needed facelift.

I’m very pleased with the new outlaw spec. Despite the name change, it still feels a lot like the old combat, just with a bit more flavour. If you take slice and dice, you’re basically just playing combat, except a little faster and a lot flashier.

The animations have been vastly improved for nearly all melee classes, but rogues may have gotten the best of it. There is so much style and flair to everything they do now — a stark contrast from how visually bland they were before. Killing spree is now a strong contender for coolest looking ability in the game… though it’s probably not good if you get motion sickness.

Also, pistols. Damn the pistols are fun.

I do miss the cooldown reduction and energy refunds on finishing moves, but otherwise outlaw is the embodiment of everything I envisioned combat to be: a versatile weaponmaster proficient in all fighting styles, quick as thought and deadly as the embrace of the grave.

Subtlety is really hurting from the loss of a separate action bar for shadow dance, but aside from that, it seems to have turned out well enough. I like that it’s now a hybrid magical spec. Gives it a very distinct flavour from the other specs — again, something the class badly lacked before.

Thanks to the new ability to swap to any spec within your class, I have also now given assassination a try for the first time. It turned out to be almost as boring as I expected it to be, though, so I don’t expect to play it much.

Rogues are in a better place than they have been in a very long time, but warlocks, on the other hand, have been run through a woodchipper.

Demonology was my favourite spec in the game before the patch, and I’m quite bitter over its loss. I spent the last few days before the patch playing demo heavily and taking lots of screenshots of metamorphosis while sad music played in my mind. You are missed, Minidan.

I refuse to even look at the new demo. My initial reaction to affliction was one of utter disgust. Once I tried it a bit more, I mellowed a bit, but it’s still pretty dull. When I last played it, it was too complicated, but now it seems too simple, and the talents you can take to add more complexity come with problems of their own.

RIP, Minidan.

Destruction, alone, is okay. It’s slow and turrety, which I’m not fond of it, but it works, and with the right talents its AoE potential is pretty insane. It will probably be my go-to spec now.

I was very worried about the changes to brewmaster monks, but my fears seem to have been unfounded. Mostly.

My concern was that the loss of chi would make the class feel as slow and awkward as other tanks, but that doesn’t seem to be the case. If anything the rotation might be a little faster now. I always have something to press.

I do badly miss keg toss, but otherwise the spec is still pretty fun to play.

The downside is that I’m super squishy now. My mitigation abilities don’t seem to do much of anything. I pity my poor healers. I can only hope artifacts will make the difference.

Windwalker seems to be pretty much the same, with only minor tweaks. It was fun before, so that’s fine by me.

With so much changing, I’ve also been revisiting older characters I had stopped playing to see what they’re like now.

My shaman is probably the most different, with enhancement having been heavily overhauled. I think it’s probably an improvement over the old “whack-a-mole with cooldowns” version, but I’m still not in love with it. The rotation just doesn’t seem to flow quite right.

Mages seem pretty much the same — somewhat satisfying but very basic. Fire is slower than I remember, and I miss living bomb.

Let me tell you, it felt very weird to be playing my mage again, however briefly. He was my original main, but I hadn’t played him since the end of Cataclysm.

On my even more neglected death knight, the current iteration of frost seems very dull, but unholy seems okay. Nice rotation — not too simple, not too complicated. Animations are surprisingly bland by the new standards of WoW melee.

Paladin healing isn’t hurt as much by the loss of holy power as I expected. WoW healing still feels a bit dull to me after playing other games like Neverwinter and The Secret World. Whoever came up with light of the martyr deserves a hearty slap.

On the other hand, I did take a quick look at paladin tanking, and that looks like it could be very fun now. Further investigation is warranted.

Transmog transition:

And then there’s the transmog changes. Ah, the transmog changes.

I made at least five to six thousand gold in the first day just by vendoring all my old mog gear. I was also able to get the “Fabulous” title on the first day. I was only missing three shirts, so I bought a few cheap ones off the AH.

I mean, I’m a Blood Elf. Of course I’m Fabulous.

*Hair flip.*

I was also pleased to discover that the Pandaria legendary cloaks can now be used for transmog. They don’t trigger their wing procs, and other legendaries are still ineligible, but it’s a start.

It’s nice to be able to easily transmog weapon enchants now, too. While I was dusting off my paladin, I got her to make some of the illusion tomes. Light of the Earthwarder, berserking, and netherflame are my favourites right now. Not too subtle, not too flashy.

I haven’t made many new outfits yet, but I did take the opportunity to return my rogue to her traditional outfit, including my favourite weapons from back in the Wrath days: Liar’s Tongue and the Bone Warden’s Splitter.

The new system has also created an odd opportunity for making money. Several starting shirts from pre-Cataclysm are now BoE, and because those appearances can no longer be obtained, they’re very valuable. Easiest ten thousand gold I ever made.

This sent me investigating even older characters as I searched for any other pre-Cata shirts. At one point I wound up on a level three Dwarf paladin with no abilities and broken boots (?) running in terror from troggs on my way to Ironforge to see if his shirt was worth anything.

The mountain queen cometh:

Just before the patch, I finally got around to using my free level 90 boost that came with Warlords of Draenor. I chose a race and class I never could have predicted a few months ago: a female Dwarf warrior.

Warrior has traditionally been one of the least appealing classes to me, but what I’ve heard about their artifact and class hall storylines in Legion sounds amazing, so I decided to give it a shot.

As for the race choice, I always thought if I did play a warrior I’d make them an Orc or Tauren — go big or go home — but I really like how female Dwarves look since the model revamp, and since I may be dusting off old characters, most of which are Horde, another Alliance character seemed a decent idea.

Plus, female Dwarves are among the rarest race/gender combos in the game, so I get to be a hipster.

As for gameplay, based on my vast experience of two hours /played before the patch, I’d say fury is much improved by the changes. It’s not going to be my new favourite spec, but the rotation is mostly solid, and I like the mobility… even if having that much mobility on a plate class makes no sense at all. Also, I love the rampage animation.

I’ve also been milking the nostalgia by going for as much of a “mountain queen” build as I can. Avatar, storm bolt… All I need now is bash, and it’s Warcraft III all over again.

Because priorities are important, I have not yet spent any time on leveling or anything practical and have simply been farming transmog gear for her. I’ve already got a pretty good outfit established, though I would like more weapon options. Turns out WoW has almost no decent two-hand hammer models.

RNGesus smiles:

Finally, a few nights ago a friend was running Black Temple for the pets, and I decided to tag along. I figured “Well, the Warglaives won’t drop, but it can’t hurt to try.”

So guess what dropped.

Yeah.

Of course now I have to get the other one…

Filed under: Games Tagged: fantasy, Warcraft, World of Warcraft

Review: Dark Matter, “I’ve Seen the Other Side of You”

The ponderous beast known as iTunes has at last awoken from its slumber and bestowed upon me the latest episode of Dark Matter. Better late than never.

“I’ve Seen the Other Side of You” isn’t quite the rollercoaster of the last two episodes, but it does maintain Dark Matter’s record of (almost) always delivering a decent hour of entertainment.

Tensions are high on the Raza as the original crew and the new arrivals struggle to integrate. The old crew doesn’t trust them, and at least some of that distrust may be warranted.

But there’s little time to deal with these trust issues. As Sally the android shuts down for some badly needed repairs, Two, Three, and Four collapse with a mysterious illness, and things only spiral downward from there.

Five is the last one standing, and it’s up to her to set things right.

Relative to what blockbusters the last two episodes have been, this one feels a bit like filler. I would have rather seen them focus on the difficult integration of the new members. We know hardly anything about the new characters; let’s get to know them. I still don’t have an opinion of any of them because I don’t know anything about them.

Or perhaps we could have seen more of the crew’s conflict with the corporations play out. At the start, Two seems to be plotting an all-out war on the entire corporate system — which would seem like an absurd fantasy if anyone but Two was putting it forth — but then that, too, falls by the wayside.

Instead we’re given just a random “crisis of the week” story. I could see this episode having some repercussions eventually, but right now it doesn’t seem to have any significant relevance to the ongoing storyline.

The science behind doesn’t even begin to make sense, either. I mean, I’m not expecting hard science fiction from Dark Matter, but at least give me plausible-sounding technobabble. Make some effort.

However, one thing does save what would otherwise be a very mediocre episode: Five.

“I’ve Seen the Other Side of You” gives Five the opportunity to take center stage, and Jodelle Ferland puts on an excellent performance from beginning to end. Granted, Five has always been my favourite, so maybe I’m biased, but I thought she completely stole the show.

I really admire Dark Matter’s ability to give a character like Five the opportunity to play the hero. It’s not always easy to give interesting stories to characters like her — geeky tech types who aren’t at home on the battlefield. As much as I loved Star Trek: Enterprise, it certainly struggled to find Hoshi anything to do. I half-expected Five to get the same treatment here.

So far, though, Five is getting plenty of opportunity to get the spotlight, to save the day and be the hero. And I’m loving every minute of it.

Overall rating: 7.4/10

Filed under: Reviews Tagged: Dark Matter, review, sci-fi, TV

Cheating on WoW: Riders of Icarus + Pay to Win Rant

Despite the myriad flaws that quickly drove me away from the game, part of me still has a soft spot for dearly departed Dragon’s Prophet. When I first heard of Riders of Icarus, which had a similar mount-taming premise, I hoped it might succeed where Dragon’s Prophet failed, so I resolved to check it out now that it’s hit open beta/soft launch.

But it did grab me? Well, not really. Head on over to MMO Bro to read my full thoughts on the matter.

As an side, sometimes I really like my job. In what other profession could I find myself using phrases like “Sir Mittens the Sparkle Kangaroo”?

Also on MMO Bro, I take another look at MMO business models, which used to be one of my favourite rant topics. This time I take a look at the concept of “pay to win,” and I come to the conclusion we may have been wrong about it all along.

Oh, and if you’re wondering where my Dark Matter review is, so am I. iTunes is taking its sweet time in getting the next episode posted, that’s for sure…

Filed under: Games, My writing Tagged: fantasy, Riders of Icarus, writing

SW:TOR: Life Is Better Where It’s Vette-r

I can’t decide if that’s my best headline ever, or my worst.

Another class storyline is now under my belt in Star Wars: The Old Republic. This time, the Sith warrior is on deck, and it turned out to be a good one.

Chirp! Chirp! Chirp!

The interesting thing about the warrior storyline to me was that the companions really ended up stealing the show. Especially one companion in particular.

As you can probably tell by now, for me the warrior story was pretty much The Vette Show, and everything else came second.

Vette is just so funny, so charming, so endlessly delightful in every way that she just eclipses everything else. Rare is the time Vette opens her mouth without making me laugh.

Yet she’s not just comedy relief, either. As you get to know her, you learn how harsh and painful her life has been — and how incredibly strong she most be to maintain her cheerful, defiant, and kind-hearted nature in the face of all she’s suffered.

Vette isn’t the best Bioware character I’ve seen, but she is possibly my favourite character in SW:TOR to date.

Vette isn’t the only strong companion for the warrior, though. I also quite liked Jaesa. I admire how earnest she is, and her disdain for fake or dishonest people.

It’s actually rather a shame she’s a warrior companion. With almost any other class, she might have become my go-to companion, but she just can’t compete with Vette.

Of course, it’s not all good news. Broonmark is a literal monster, and Pierce is a disgusting goon.

And then there’s Quinn.

Well, if you’ve played the story, you know what happens. It’s actually a shame, because I rather liked him before that. And honestly… I understand why he did what he did. I don’t condone it, but it was something of an impossible situation he was put in. Try as I might, I can’t bring myself to hate him as much as most people seem to. Mostly I’m sad our bromance had to end.

That said, you better believe I Force-choked the crap out of him.

All in all, though, warrior still has the best companions of any class I’ve yet played. No doubt about that.

I also liked that you unlock companions a little quicker as a warrior than the other classes I’ve played. Usually the game is all but over before you have a full team. Warriors have much less waiting to do.

Companions aside, the warrior story also features some great incidental characters. I want a mission that’s just the warrior, Darth Vowrawn, and that Jedi from Belsavis going out for beers. Those are some cool dudes.

All right! Back to Sith business. Grr!

But while the companions were most memorable this time, that’s not a knock against the actual storyline itself. The warrior story does not equal the agent story by any means — and at this point I doubt anything in the base game will — but it was a good ride while it lasted.

The thing I found most surprising about the warrior story is how much humour it has. Vette’s obviously a big contributor to that, but even aside from her, the amount of snark, sarcasm, and silliness you can engage in is staggering, and I found myself laughing out loud many times throughout the story. The voice actor for male warriors does deadpan incredibly well.

This is especially surprising given that Bioware’s writing, though good, has generally struck me as rather stiff and humourless (drunk Tali and offering to appoint Sera the next Divine notwithstanding). The Sith warrior story is very out of character, but in a most welcome way.

The other positive thing about the warrior story is that it’s very consistent. Every other class story — even the agent — has had at least one slow leg where not much interesting happens. The warrior story doesn’t have a lot of stand-out moments, but it also doesn’t have any significant stumbles or slow patches. It has a good flow and a consistent theme from beginning to end.

It’s very similar to the inquisitor story in some ways, but the villain in this case is a lot better. He’s truly vile, and I spent the entire time longing for the day when he would meet his end at the tip of my lightsaber.

It also does better job than usual of not presenting the divide between the Republic and Empire as entirely black and white. Being able to take the moral high ground versus the Jedi is simply delicious.

And while it may not be as galaxy-shaking as the agent story, the warrior storyline does have much less of a “side quest” feeling than most other classes. Some of what happens does have some major relevance to the game’s main story and overall lore.

I have no idea how this quest got past the censors.

The one other noteworthy thing about how this particular class story is how mature it is. In general I’ve been impressed by how much SW:TOR is able to get away with in terms of sex and violence, given the usually family friendly nature of the Star Wars universe, but the warrior story takes it to a whole other level. Your warrior can get up to some impressively kinky stuff.

On a darker note, I was quite disturbed by a mission in which you have the option to abduct a woman and deliver her to a man who clearly intends to rape her. I of course did not do so, opting instead to have the wannabe rapist killed, but damn, that’s about as dark as I’ve seen video games get.

As for gameplay, I enjoyed playing the warrior a lot, even despite SW:TOR’s innate flaws.

Of all the classes in The Old Republic, warrior (and its Republic equivalent, knight) is the only one that even comes close to capturing the extravagance of the action sequences in the Star Wars movies. The animations are both fluid and flashy, and the acrobatic agility of the class is a joy to behold.

The downside of that is it makes me hate SW:TOR’s button bloat all the more. My warrior had a perfect, satisfying rotation at around level thirty. I had enough abilities to give some depth to the rotation, but it was still relatively simple, and everything flowed beautifully.

But they just kept dumping new skills onto me after that. Having to spend half my time watching cooldowns and twisting my fingers into knots with shift modifiers bogged down the once beautiful flow of the class. Being a mainly solo player, I can mitigate this a lot by simply not bothering with a full rotation — most things don’t live that long anyway — but it’s such a shame to see a class get less fun as you level.

On the whole I still had fun playing a warrior — maybe more so than any other class — but it does perfectly encapsulate my core issue with traditional tab target/button bloat games. It’s not that I can’t have fun in such a system, but I always feel that I’m enjoying myself despite the core mechanics rather than because of them. It’s more about mitigating annoyances than capitalizing on strengths.

Um, so, what happens now?

I’ve said it before, but this time I think I mean it: I’m going to take a little break from SW:TOR now. Probably not a long break — my backlog being what it is, it might already be over by the time this post is published. But at least a couple weeks.

But I’ll be back.

I think part of the reason I’ve felt compelled to provide these little “what’s next” segments in my SW:TOR posts is that I’ve still been thinking of it as a temporary investment. Something I’ll play once, and then forget. But now I’m starting to think this might be a long-term game after all.

I’m very surprised (and perhaps a little embarrassed) by that, given all the trash I’ve talked about Star Wars over the years, but then this game is a very different beast from the movies.

So there will be more.

As for what’s next, I want to play through Knights of the Fallen Empire on my agent as soon as all the chapters are out.

I’ve also been weighing whether to bring any other characters into expansion content. Given how fun the class is and the fact Vette shows up in KotFE, my warrior is probably the best candidate for that.

The consular is also tempting. I’d see the Republic side of things, and I do sort of miss that character. But I don’t enjoy the class’s gameplay much (really regret not picking the melee subclass), and really the main thing I miss is Nadia, and her story isn’t continuing for the foreseeable future, so…

As for alts, I plan to finish my bounty hunter’s story at some point, but I’ll probably wait for the next double XP event. The completionist in me says I should play more Republic classes, but I don’t like the subclass I chose on my trooper, and the knight story seems pretty dull from what I’ve seen so far. Never saw much appeal in smuggler.

Maybe I should just embrace being an Imperial loyalist.

Filed under: Games Tagged: sci-fi, Star Wars, Star Wars: The Old Republic

Review: Dark Matter, “Kill Them All”

Dat title doe.

We’re only two episodes in, and it already seems like Dark Matter’s second season might just surpass its first.

In what is probably the best episode of the series to date, it becomes clear that the crew of the Raza are merely pawns in a complex chess game between the galaxy’s most powerful corporations. In such a deadly game, they can only lose, and so the message is clear: They must escape. Now.

Of course, escaping from the galaxy’s most secure prison won’t be any simple task, even for the galaxy’s most notorious criminals.

My theory that the second season will expand the world and mythology of Dark Matter definitely seems to be panning out. It’s quite a web of political intrigue the crew seems to have found themselves in. Slightly overwhelming at first, but I think I’m figuring it out.

It also shows how strong and how corrupt Dark Matter’s corporations truly are. Right now their reach seems nearly boundless.

I’m also really starting to like Tori Higginson’s character (perhaps not surprising considering I loved her on Atlantis). So delightfully smug.

But this is Dark Matter. That means there’s going to be action, and “Kill Them All” definitely doesn’t disappoint on that front. I mean, with a name like that, how could it?

I’ll tell you what surprised me this time: Five. Holy Hell, go Five. Sally has some good moments too, but Five… man, Five.

We’re also introduced to Four’s ex, who is a character I hope to see more of. The world could always use more badass ladies with swords, after all.

There’s so much that happened in this episode it almost feels overwhelming. It’s hard to imagine how they crammed so much into a single episode. At the same time it’s hard to find much to say about it in a review. Partly because I like to avoid major spoilers, and partly because it was pretty much all awesome. Total satisfaction doesn’t make for an interesting read.

Also, am I crazy, or was that Anne Mroczkowski on GNN? If so, awesome.

Overall rating: 9.1/10

Filed under: Reviews Tagged: Dark Matter, review, sci-fi

Review: Oxenfree

Some months back, I watched a friend livestream Oxenfree over the course of a couple nights. I had never heard of the game beforehand, but it intrigued me. So much so, in fact, that I resolved to buy and play through the game myself, even though I’d already seen all of it via her livestream.

The Steam summer sale provided me the perfect opportunity to finally grab Oxenfree, and having now experienced the game both first and secondhand, I will now bring you my thoughts on it.

Oxenfree is a difficult game to define. It’s part of the new generation of highly story-driven games with little to no substantive gameplay.

The story is about a small group of sometimes troubled teenagers holding a beach party on an abandoned island. The island is famous for its mysterious radio signals that seem to come from nowhere at all, and while investigating those signals, the main character (Alex) accidentally opens a bizarre rift in space.

Shenanigans ensue.

There are definite shades of Life Is Strange here, right down to having a teenage girl with blue hair, but there’s less lesbian romance and more surreal creepiness. There’s are also very strong echoes of The Secret World, especially its Halloween mission The Broadcast. Personally I think The Broadcast is one of TSW’s best moments, so any comparison to it is a very good thing.

If I had to put a label on Oxenfree, I’d call it horror, but it doesn’t fit any genre particularly well. It’s closest to horror, but it’s not a particularly scary game, really. Don’t expect to be jumping in your seat or yelping in terror. It’s more strange and creepy than genuinely frightening.

The graphics are unusual, but interesting. I’m normally not a fan of the whole 2.5D thing, but the art here has a really nice style to it, and overall Oxenfree is a nice game to look at, even if it was clearly done on a budget.

Taking a cue from The Secret World, Oxenfree also likes to mess with its own graphics, blurring, shifting, and turning things upside down, among other things. It helps sell the surrealism of the game quite well.

Something else Oxenfree shares with TSW is fantastic sound design. The soundtrack is very ambient but sells the spooky atmosphere excellently, and the sound effects and voice acting are strong.

One thing I couldn’t see from watching my friend’s livestream is that Oxenfree’s gameplay has some minor hiccups, though nothing too frustrating. Movement, for example, can be a little finicky. Alex doesn’t handle corners very well.

Somewhat more troublesome is that your dialogue choices have a tendency to time out, sometimes very quickly. In a story-driven game, that can get irritating. I’m used to Bioware dialogue wheels, where you can puzzle over what to say for as long as you like.

Oxenfree offers a lot of choices to the player, but they don’t seem to matter very much. I made a lot of different choices from my friend, but the end results seemed to be almost entirely the same. You can get slightly different endings, but that’s about it.

Ultimately a game like Oxenfree lives or dies by the strength of its story, and the good news is Oxenfree’s storytelling is quite strong. It’s a very surreal experience, but it’s fascinating and compelling in its oddness, and the ambiance is, again, excellent.

It doesn’t have quite the same emotional punch of Life Is Strange, but that might be a good thing. Life Is Strange got a bit over the top after a while. To put it mildly.

The consensus seems to be that all of Oxenfree’s characters are likable except one, but not everyone agrees on who the exception is. My friend hated Clarissa, but I like her just fine. It’s Ren I can’t stand.

Anyway, the point is Oxenfree’s cast is pretty strong.

The one significant gripe I’d have with Oxenfree is its recently added new game plus mode (for lack of a better term). You can now replay the game for a slightly different experience with some new or modified scenes and an extended ending.

It’s a free update, which is nice, but it doesn’t really change much, so mostly you’re just playing the same stuff all over again. And while the new ending is theoretically more conclusive, I honestly liked the original ending better.

It’s hard to explain without going into major spoiler territory, but basically they solved one problem by creating a bunch of new ones and kind of invalidating the rest of the game. It feels like adding something just for the sake of being able to say they added something. I think I’m going to recommend just skipping the new game plus mode entirely.

But the base game is great.

Overall rating: 8.7/10

Filed under: Games, Reviews Tagged: Oxenfree, review, sci-fi

Off Topic: Liebester Questions Because Why Not

Recently I was nominated for the Liebester Award by Ashley over at Robo♥beat. If you’re not familiar with the Liebester Award, well, for one thing it’s a fairly misleading name. It’s not really an award so much as it is a chain letter questionnaire bloggers send each other.

As a rule I have a pretty strong dislike for chain letters and their ilk, but on a whim, I have decided to answer Ashley’s questions. Don’t ask me why.

You’re also supposed to forward the question to eleven other bloggers, but I’m not going to do that. For one thing, I don’t even follow eleven blogs.

How did you get started blogging?

When I first started out trying to find work as a freelancer, I wanted a way to showcase my work to potential clients. Blogging seemed a good way to do that.

What’s your favorite thing about blogging?

I don’t even know why I’m still doing this, honestly. I have enough published clips that I don’t really need the blog as a demo anymore. It’s a handy way to aggregate links to my stuff, but there’s easier ways to do that.

I do enjoy my occasional discussions with fellow bloggers, but it’s not like I’ve made any friends blogging or anything. Bar one, but that didn’t end well.

It’s a thrill when one of my articles goes viral and I get to be Internet famous for a few days, but that’s a pretty rare occurrence.

Clearly I must get something from blogging, or I wouldn’t do it, but I’m not sure what that is. I think a lot of it is that I have always had a boundless enthusiasm for running my mouth off about the things that interest me, and if I do so in blog form, people don’t roll their eyes and try to change the subject the way they do if I try this in meatspace.

What’s your favorite hobby outside of blogging?

Gaming.

Favorite movie?

The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers.

Favorite video game?

Picking a single favourite game is difficult because of the advance of technology. There are games I played in my youth that were masterpieces for their day and which I truly loved, but which would seem incredibly crude by modern standards.

I tend to say that my favourite old school game is Warcraft III: Reign of Chaos, and my favourite current game is The Secret World. Mainly because they both feature unbelievable story-telling.

“The sands of time have run out, son of Durotan…”

I’d also like to throw an honourable mention to No One Lives Forever: The Operative for being absolutely one of the best games ever made. I’m not the sort of person given to cynicism about the current state of the industry or waxing that games were so much better back in the day, but NOLF is one game that has not been surpassed even today.

Game you’ve never finished and why?

There are a few I could mention, but I’ll go with Mirror’s Edge. I love absolutely everything about that game — the story (what I saw of it, anyway), the graphics, the music, the whole look and feel. I just can’t play it.

I’m spectacularly bad at platforming, and after becoming hopelessly stuck on the first major jump of the second mission, I just realized it was pointless. Breaks my heart, because I really did like it.

Star Wars or Star Trek (or both)?

Trek if I have to choose between those two, but there’s better sci-fi out there. Stargate, Dark Matter, Continuum, the first three seasons of Battlestar Galactica…

DC or Marvel (or both)?

Marvel.

Not keen on comic books, really, but I do really like some of the characters Marvel has created (namely Spider-Man and the X-Men). And DC is just boring.

What’s your greatest gaming accomplishment?

I kind of feel like “gaming accomplishment” is a bit of an oxymoron, honestly. The whole reason I’m even playing games is because they don’t really matter.

I take some small measure of pride in my successes in StarCraft II, as that it is a very challenging game and one that cannot be cheesed by grinding, or good luck, or outside assistance. Personal skill is the only path to success.

I’ve beaten all three major campaigns on the highest possible difficulty and gotten some very tough achievements. I swear I was sweating blood after that one to beat the first Protoss mission in Wings of Liberty without Zeratul taking any life damage.

Then there are a few less tangible accomplishments. Supporting that gay pride march in World of Warcraft felt really good, and I always enjoy sharing my loot bags with the Secret World community. It feels good to be sending something positive into the community for once. One time someone on their free trial got the revenant polar bear — one of the rarest and most coveted rewards — from one of my bags. That was a good day.

What’s your current obsession (a TV show, a video game, a topic)?

Mostly the usual: The Secret World, Blizzard games, Chvrches, Metric, Elves. I’m also really excited that season two of Dark Matter has started. Love that show. It’s just so much fun.

Do you have any other social media accounts we can follow?

I have a Facebook fanpage that I would appreciate more followers for.

That’s pretty much it. I know I should probably have more, but I dislike Twitter, and I’m not even sure what the others are exactly. Social media in general makes my brain hurt.

You must understand: I’m really a crotchety ninety year-old man trapped in the body of a pudgy twenty-something. Ah don’t understand you goshdern kids with yer Tweeters and yer Instant Grams.

*Harrumphing noises.*

Filed under: Misc. Tagged: Off topic