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al-azad posted:quality poo poo You're doing god's work, son. Thanks for these. Edit: oh gently caress new page. Uhh, content: I know the Friday the 13th NES game is supposed to be a piece of garbage, but it was probably the first "horror" game I ever played as a kid and it holds a special place in my heart. The useless map only really added to the tension as you tried to find your friends before Jason killed them, which you would inevitably not do because you were going the wrong way the whole loving time and your counselor moves like they're weighed down on quaaludes. I remember thinking I could wait it out in the lake and Jason couldn't get me (I hadn't seen the movies yet because my parents weren't complete idiots.)  
WatermelonGun fucked around with this message at 21:26 on Oct 4, 2015 |
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Oct 4, 2015 21:06
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I've always thought Friday the 13th gets bagged on more than it deserves. It looks pretty nice for the year it was released, and the music is pretty spiffy too. It's one of the earliest games developed by Atlus, so it definitely had some talented people working on it, like the composer Hirohiko Takayama: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xFMDhbdzEdY
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Oct 4, 2015 23:20
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I've never played it, but at some point I downloaded an awfully deep and well done fanmade guide for the game. It seems like it's not good at all, but it's fascinating anyways.
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Oct 5, 2015 00:14
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ayn rand hand job posted:You should do Murdered: Soul Suspect I'll put it on the list! double nine posted:Out of curiosity, did you review System shock last year? Nope!  RETURN OF THE 31 DAYS OF MOSTLY SPOOKY GAMES1. Knock-knock 2. CAPSULE 3. DARK 4. System Shock 2    I'm always apprehensive about reviewing classics. Anyone familiar with the game will already have their mind made up on it, and it's often hard to convince those who aren't to try it. I haven't played System Shock 2 since its release ages ago, and I'm happy to report that it holds up surprisingly well for newcomers and veterans alike. Not for the whole game, sadly, but for enough of it. System Shock 2 is one of the originators of the FPS/RPG genre, which spun out Deus Ex, Vampire, Bioshock, and all manner of dense shooters. You play a hacker stashed aboard the USS Von Braun, mankind's first faster-than-light starship. It becomes immediately apparent that issues have arisen during the voyage, and it's up to you to hopefully make things right. You do this by scavenging weapons and gadgets, hacking devices, upgrading your skills, researching the odd artifacts you come across, and killing lots of really, really freaky monsters. There's an enormous range of activities involved in growing your character, and a little of everything is required to keep up with the surprisingly varied enemies you encounter. The story is among the best the FPS genre has ever seen, detailing the final hours of the Von Braun's crew and leading you through every nook and cranny of the enormous ship. A competent minimap and extensive log of the audio files you find through the game help keep you on track as you progress through the ruined decks. Unfortunately, the game starts to come apart after you leave the Von Braun. The open maps and fully-realized levels give way to isolated setpieces and cramped, confusing halls filled with monsters. It's very clear the back end of the game was rushed, and it suffers terribly for it. Abuse of the quicksave system is a must near the end, which sadly drains a lot of the tension from the game. It really cannot be overstated how good the atmosphere is either, which makes its collapse near the end all the more tragic. The sound design is incredible, with unsettling cues popping up at all the right times. Well, except for the music which you should mute immediately, unless you have an irrational love for 90s programmer techno. Even the graphics hold up, with the bold colors and boxy designs masking the incredibly low-res textures. You'll feel like an idiot the first time a chunky-looking enemy makes you jump, but your heart will be pounding too much to care. It very much is a classic for a reason, and the precipitous drop in quality near the end still can't sully the first 8 or so hours. It's a long, long game, with plenty of secrets and scares to keep you engaged. If you've never played System Shock 2 I guarantee you're in for a treat, and if you haven't replayed it recently I can still promise the same.
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Oct 5, 2015 00:19
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For a long time you couldn't actually buy System Shock 2 either. A really messy situation happened where EA halfway owned the rights to it, then some clearing house or something owned the other half and weren't willing to stop sitting on it. This led to the game practically only existing via  for a long while there.Thankfully something happened and GOG were allowed to sell it at long last, then Steam were able to pick it up and you can get it all over the place now, plus it goes on further sale like all the time. Buy System Shock 2 basically.
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Oct 5, 2015 00:28
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WatermelonGun posted:You're doing god's work, son. Thanks for these. It does interesting things, it just doesn't do them great. It's easier to be kinder to it in hindsight.
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Oct 5, 2015 02:54
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I really think the game would've been alright if there were no zombie monsters. If it were just you and Jason, and you had to hunt for key items that you needed while doing the whole plate-spinning thing with the counselors and kids.
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Oct 5, 2015 04:40
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I've been having an awesome time playing through SOMA. I went ahead and uploaded my stream archives to YouTube if anyone wants to see a grown man get scared. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eydAlcVNS3M&list=PL2N8qJGW36fxqtlya_VZPnj7CqKQNBr2D
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Oct 5, 2015 15:08
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Hey guys, do you remember a game where you have to solve a murder by going through photographs and poo poo?
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Oct 5, 2015 15:10
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King Vidiot posted:I really think the game would've been alright if there were no zombie monsters. If it were just you and Jason, and you had to hunt for key items that you needed while doing the whole plate-spinning thing with the counselors and kids. or if the map/movement made sense.
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Oct 5, 2015 15:15
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So I've been playing I Can't Escape: Darkness and it's pretty creepy dungeon crawler. I'm not that far in because I'm a little baby and all those sounds are making me a bit too tense.
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Oct 5, 2015 15:16
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I decided to replay Eternal Darkness, and dang, I forgot how lousy it ended for all the protagonists across the different timelines. Only Edwin Lindsey, Peter Jacob, and (possibly) Michael Edwards made it out of their chapters and didn't end up suffering some terrible fate. When I first played it, I was like, flabbergasted that you went four storylines straight before you got one where your protagonist 'won' and didn't end up a continually suffering corpse, a ghost, or insane. I also thought the Cathedral level was the most interesting, given how much it changed between Anthony, Paul, and Peter's timelines the mood/style of things changed. I will also not get past the fast one they pulled at the end of Paul's chapter. You go into the Black Guardian's chamber. I was expecting there was going to be some big boss fight or something, then, nope! Smashy-smashy (or, in my case, his head got exploded). Letting your sanity get low on purpose is always how I've played it, since I like seeing what weird stuff would start happening...
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Oct 5, 2015 18:31
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That was a big part of why Eternal Darkness was so good, though. In a lot of cases, too, even though your protagonist suffered and died they completed a little thing necessary to give a future hero a chance to actually win; almost no-one dies pointlessly in ED, but almost everyone dies and it keeps the story tense without being unsatisfying.
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Oct 5, 2015 18:35
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ayn rand hand job posted:You should do Murdered: Soul Suspect This was kind of an odd game for me. Objectively, there's a lot of reasons not to like it: extremely limited combat and stealth segments (with stealth that's either difficult to perform adequately or pathetically easy), surprisingly short length, and almost zero challenge. At the same time, it's unusually engrossing. Salem is really atmospheric and built well and there's a lot of detail to look for. I beat it over about two days of play, and I can't even explain what made it so enjoyable. I think my biggest complaint is the length. It seriously feels 1/3 or 1/4 as long as it was meant to be, like you're just completing one chapter of a larger story. I would have been happy to see more plot with it.
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Oct 5, 2015 19:26
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Night10194 posted:That was a big part of why Eternal Darkness was so good, though. In a lot of cases, too, even though your protagonist suffered and died they completed a little thing necessary to give a future hero a chance to actually win; almost no-one dies pointlessly in ED, but almost everyone dies and it keeps the story tense without being unsatisfying. Oh, I didn't mean to imply it wasn't good that they did that, I thought it was effective storytelling. And I thought it added weight to the times a character actually succeeded. Going back to locations at different points in time to see how things progressed was cool. Like, Karim became a ghost, but he was there in order for Roberto getting the artifact. He died, but in turn, what he did helped Michael to eventually succeed. Gave it a sense of, well maybe the situation isn't totally hopeless... And man, Michael's chapter ending was the best. Gets the artifact, give it to Edward, and just walks off, accepting his fate. His VA did a good job selling the sense of resignation he had. (Though since he didn't have a statue, I think he might have been the one to ding-dong-ditch and leave the gladius...)
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Oct 5, 2015 19:42
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I meant to agree that it was a great part of the storytelling, not to come off as hopping in to defend it. ED was the game that got me into horror games. So good.
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Oct 5, 2015 19:49
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chitoryu12 posted:This was kind of an odd game for me. Objectively, there's a lot of reasons not to like it: extremely limited combat and stealth segments (with stealth that's either difficult to perform adequately or pathetically easy), surprisingly short length, and almost zero challenge. At the same time, it's unusually engrossing. Salem is really atmospheric and built well and there's a lot of detail to look for. I beat it over about two days of play, and I can't even explain what made it so enjoyable.
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Oct 5, 2015 20:15
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I think I'll be playing Yuyami Doori Tankentai. I've been playing parts of it before but I was having difficulties with the save files. It's quite an interesting game and everyone should look into it (there are some blogs about it online but no translations). I might also replay some old Twilight Syndrome games as well. In fact, does anyone have any good horror recommendations that never came out in the west?
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Oct 5, 2015 20:48
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I've been playing Alien: Isolation for the first time recently and I've had some genuine pulse pounding moments that I enjoy. I did end up playing on Hard though which I didn't find out until later that people don't recommend that. It hasn't seemed unfairly hard so far though. Am I in for trouble in the future though?
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Oct 5, 2015 21:00
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I honestly don't remember Dark being that overly terrible gameplay-wise. Aggressively bland, mediocre and disappointing, yes, but hardly the worst stealth gameplay while Styx: Master of Shadows exists. That'd make a good entry if "Goblin" counts enough for the 31 Spooky October games.
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Oct 5, 2015 21:06
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NeilPerry posted:I think I'll be playing Yuyami Doori Tankentai. I've been playing parts of it before but I was having difficulties with the save files. It's quite an interesting game and everyone should look into it (there are some blogs about it online but no translations). I might also replay some old Twilight Syndrome games as well. In fact, does anyone have any good horror recommendations that never came out in the west?
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Oct 5, 2015 21:09
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Glagha posted:I've been playing Alien: Isolation for the first time recently and I've had some genuine pulse pounding moments that I enjoy. I did end up playing on Hard though which I didn't find out until later that people don't recommend that. It hasn't seemed unfairly hard so far though. Am I in for trouble in the future though? If you can get past medical, then you are past the worse of it. It isn't too bad.
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Oct 5, 2015 21:12
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Niggurath posted:Well if you really want to extend the length, and torture yourself, there were like a billion useless collectibles in the game. I mean some of them were cool and interesting, but a lot were not. I actually got at least half of the collectibles on my run. The game is pretty short even if you 100% it, unless you decide to do it without a guide and are left wandering for that last gas can or something.
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Oct 5, 2015 22:23
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Niggurath posted:You could try the recently fan translated Nanashi no Game: Me- http://www.romhacking.net/translations/2456/ Thanks but I speak Japanese (  ) though so I'm more looking for really obscure poo poo. And I think I'll just watch Niggurath's LP of that game eventually.
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Oct 5, 2015 22:26
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Friday the 13th suffers from the same issues as most crappy NES games: the controls are bad, there's little direction, and it's way too difficult. Jaws is basically the pure implementation of Friday's system: level up your dude so you can whittle away at this randomly encountered super boss and as a result it's a better game not that it's saying much. I really think the kids in the center cabin that you can't stay at for some reason is a pointless addition. Either have Jason attack the counselors thus forcing you to switch to another counselor to save them or if you want to keep the kids management have Jason only attack at night.
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Oct 5, 2015 22:32
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Merrill Grinch posted:I honestly don't remember Dark being that overly terrible gameplay-wise. Aggressively bland, mediocre and disappointing, yes, but hardly the worst stealth gameplay while Styx: Master of Shadows exists. That'd make a good entry if "Goblin" counts enough for the 31 Spooky October games. Was Styx really that bad?
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Oct 5, 2015 22:32
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NeilPerry posted:Thanks but I speak Japanese (
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Oct 5, 2015 22:35
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Niggurath posted:I wouldn't watch that guy, he's dreadful. What about 'The Fear': https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=whQTHVdOfCk I really enjoyed those videos, actually. Exactly the kind of thing I'm looking for, except I'm not in Japan right now so PS2 and onwards is really difficult to make happen. EDIT: Except the daijobu counter. It really doesn't stand out that much man. EDIT: If only my life had a daijobu counter tho.
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Oct 5, 2015 22:56
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LadyPictureShow posted:Oh, I didn't mean to imply it wasn't good that they did that, I thought it was effective storytelling. And I thought it added weight to the times a character actually succeeded. Going back to locations at different points in time to see how things progressed was cool. Like, Karim became a ghost, but he was there in order for Roberto getting the artifact. He died, but in turn, what he did helped Michael to eventually succeed. Gave it a sense of, well maybe the situation isn't totally hopeless... I always liked the monk's (Luther?) chapter the best. You've got this pathetic health bar and a useless crossbow, but you still manage to put down an eternally rotting squire and give him some solace before ending up a stain on the floor. On the other hand, setting up that 12 point dispel magjikk spell in Grandpa Roivas' chapter was utterly grueling. I'm not spoiler tagging a game that was originally going to come out on the n64.
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Oct 5, 2015 23:59
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Merrill Grinch posted:I honestly don't remember Dark being that overly terrible gameplay-wise. Aggressively bland, mediocre and disappointing, yes, but hardly the worst stealth gameplay while Styx: Master of Shadows exists. That'd make a good entry if "Goblin" counts enough for the 31 Spooky October games. My experience with DARK was muddling through the goofy goth intro, getting into the stealth murder groove at the museum, and then spending half an hour on a room that comes out of nowhere with like 15 guards. I finally managed to beat it, only to be dropped in a room with two guards who automatically knew I was there. I killed them, and then got spotted through a wall by a third guard and killed. After that I tried 5 times to do the EXACT SAME THING to those first two guards and died every time. I'm suppose there are better experiences to be had with the game, but holy poo poo I am never going back to it after that. I don't have Styx, sadly, so that one will have to wait at least another year. RETURN OF THE 31 DAYS OF MOSTLY SPOOKY GAMES 1. Knock-knock 2. CAPSULE 3. DARK 4. System Shock 2 5. Castle in the Darkness    I wanted to like this game so much. And I did, too, for about three hours. Castle in the Darkness is an unapologetic love-letter to the 8-bit era of gaming, both in aesthetic and challenge. You play a peppy little knight who is the sole survivor of a curse that took hold of your castle. It's up to you to explore every corner of the kingdom to find all the gear and doodads you need to save the princess, and there is a LOT to find. The game is most like Simon's Quest if you ever played that. It's a side-scroller where the stages are stitched together into a continuous world, full of side paths and secrets. There's no map, but the level design is mostly direct enough that you should have no trouble navigating. It's important to note that Castle holds nothing back in its fanatical adoration for the NES era. Enemies are pulled right from Metroid, Castlevania, Gargoyle's Quest, and even stuff like 8 Eyes and Magic of Scheherazade. Also in line with the bygone days of gaming is the challenge. The difficulty ramps up quickly, with enemies doing huge chunks of damage to you and more and more insta-kill spikes making appearances. Finding better weapons, armor, and spells can mitigate the former, but the latter will quickly become the bane of your existence. There's no getting around it, sadly. Unless you're the kind of person who got Impossible Boy in Super Meat Boy, you're going to reach a point where the difficulty becomes too much. Mine was right at the end of the game, when I discovered that the final boss would take almost five minutes to kill and could kill me in maybe five hits. I started looking for more secrets that could help mitigate this, and got through an insane gauntlet of spikes and collapsing floors to find an even harder boss. As much as I (mostly) enjoyed the journey there, reaching that point of frustration and defeat soured me on the entire game. I really want to be able to recommend Castle in the Darkness, but I wouldn't want anyone else to suffer that same heartbreak.
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Oct 6, 2015 00:54
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Zombie Samurai posted:My experience with DARK was muddling through the goofy goth intro, getting into the stealth murder groove at the museum, and then spending half an hour on a room that comes out of nowhere with like 15 guards. I finally managed to beat it, only to be dropped in a room with two guards who automatically knew I was there. I killed them, and then got spotted through a wall by a third guard and killed. After that I tried 5 times to do the EXACT SAME THING to those first two guards and died every time. I'm suppose there are better experiences to be had with the game, but holy poo poo I am never going back to it after that. I ended up having to cheat engine this. A shame because I really wanted to like the drat game.
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Oct 6, 2015 02:04
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Terrible Opinions posted:Was Styx really that bad? Styx is another game that suffers the Cyanide curse. They often have really cool ideas and sometimes that equals neat gimmicks, but it's also pretty buggy and the AI is real dumb. I liked it enough as a novelty playthrough, but then again I got it for free. 
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Oct 6, 2015 02:20
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I almost forgot about this, but the Asylum Game Jam is a thing that's been going for the past couple years.quote:Join game developers all over the world challenging themselves to make a horror game on Halloween without utilizing negative mental health stereotypes in just 48 hours! There are 48 entries total so far, and I'm going to do a few in no particular order. First up is One after Another.  Overall website rank: #2 This is a low-res pixel art sidescroller where you wake up a shirtless dude in some kind of asylum. Your main goal seems to be to escape, which is a little difficult given that it's kinda dark in the building and there are what appear to be straightjacketed patients lurking in the shadows waiting to do you harm.  As if that weren't bad enough, some inconsiderate rear end in a top hat has also left bear traps lying around the place.  If you're spotted by one of the potential assailants, you can hide, Outlast-style, in lockers and cabinets that appear throughout the building. The layout is procedurally generated, which makes it a crapshoot as to how long it will take to get to the end (and there is an end, I finally found it after several attempts). Most of the deaths will come from the beartraps, I kept running headlong into them as they don't pop up until you're close, and the run speed is fairly breezy. On a scale of “Eh” to “Give it a try”, I'd award it a solid “Check it out”, it's a quick diversion. I don't know if it necessarily does anything to de-stigmatize mental health fears, as the main antagonists aside from the bear traps seem to be straightjacket wearing inmates, but it has a bit of a neat twist ending if you can make it to that.
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Oct 6, 2015 03:07
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Terrible Opinions posted:Was Styx really that bad? Imagine a game that does everything 100% right except gameplay. It's like the best voice-acted, best level-designed, best storied piece of trash that ever existed. And they're making a sequel! I would totally buy you a copy if I could find one online less than $30 but I don't want to encourage them, Zombie Samurai. Zombie Samurai posted:My experience with DARK was muddling through the goofy goth intro, getting into the stealth murder groove at the museum, and then spending half an hour on a room that comes out of nowhere with like 15 guards. I finally managed to beat it, only to be dropped in a room with two guards who automatically knew I was there. I killed them, and then got spotted through a wall by a third guard and killed. After that I tried 5 times to do the EXACT SAME THING to those first two guards and died every time. I'm suppose there are better experiences to be had with the game, but holy poo poo I am never going back to it after that. I tend to try to ghost stealth games, so maybe that accounts for our different opinions. It's still a pretty "meh" game, though, please don't think I'm white knighting this mediocre crap. Merrill Grinch fucked around with this message at 05:03 on Oct 6, 2015 |
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Oct 6, 2015 04:52
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RightClickSaveAs posted:I almost forgot about this, but the Asylum Game Jam is a thing that's been going for the past couple years. Uh isn't the premise of that game a massive negative mental health stereotype?
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Oct 6, 2015 07:29
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Started playing Fran Bow. Finally, the Nightmare Ned spiritual successor I always wanted.
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Oct 6, 2015 13:52
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papasyhotcakes posted:Uh isn't the premise of that game a massive negative mental health stereotype? Apparently, according to the page for the game, it's an abandoned "research facility", so I don't think it's outright supposed to be an asylum. It's low res enough where you can fill in some blanks on your own though, and it seems pretty stereotypical on the surface. It was 7 MB though and ranked #2, so it was my first random selection.
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Oct 6, 2015 15:05
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Oh boy, I'm kind of putting along in Marine Philt because it's sooo involved. I wish this game came to the west in 1993 because it's pretty and is one of the best implementations of Ridley Scott's Alien formula in a video game. The action is about as complex as Snatcher but the UI with its built in motion tracker and the overall tone and look kicked the poo poo out of every licensed Alien game of its time.
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Oct 6, 2015 23:23
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RETURN OF THE 31 DAYS OF MOSTLY SPOOKY GAMES 1. Knock-knock 2. CAPSULE 3. DARK 4. System Shock 2 5. Castle in the Darkness 6. Shattered Haven    Arcen Games is one of those studios that I'm really glad exists, even if I don't rush out to buy every one of their games. Each of their titles is a unique mashup of incongruous mechanics and off-kilter storylines that, if nothing else, makes for a truly singular experience. And so it is with Shattered Haven, a zombie puzzle RPG that takes you through a strange and unpredictable tale of loss by making you kill monsters in inexplicably contrived levels. The catch is that this time, the aesthetic limitations and questionable design don't really carry the game. Shattered Haven is presented from a top-down tiled view, not unlike indie roguelikes such as Tales of Maj'Ayel. You always play as a pair of survivors in the post-apocalyptic landscape, either in co-op with another player or with the second character following you around aimlessly. The world is an open series of static screens wherein you will find portals that transport you to puzzle screens. In these, you must kill all the Grays (exotic zombies weak to iron) using whatever you find lying around, from thumbtacks to bear traps. There are quite a few interesting item interactions, but most of these are ignored in favor of aggravatingly gimmicky levels like The One That's All Pits and The One That's A Hedge Maze. There's a fair bit going on in the overworld, too, with additional foes to deal with, NPCs to speak to, and puzzles to solve. The story is some hackneyed garbage about losing your home and super zombies, and definitely wasn't enough to keep me playing. I went into this game pretty positive, being a fan of clever puzzles and off-beat games, but this doesn't really satisfy the urge for either. If the puzzles don't turn you off, the poor writing or eye-straining graphics will.
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Oct 7, 2015 04:54
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Found my old Cosmology of Kyoto stuff. This game is clunky as hell but it's still drat good for slow-burn atmosphere stuff, even if it isn't out-and-out horror. e: And Ice-Pick Lodge is not only making the Kickstarted remake of Pathologic, but also an up-rez edition coming out beforehand? Bogart fucked around with this message at 17:56 on Oct 7, 2015 |
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Oct 7, 2015 17:46
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