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weekly font
Dec 1, 2004


Everytime I try to fly I fall
Without my wings
I feel so small
Guess I need you baby...



King Vidiot posted:

I want to see a mode where one counselor is the killer and only they know who they are, and the other players have to figure it out. It'd basically be Trouble in Terrorist Town but at Camp Crystal Lake.

If the Kickstarter isn't met you can only play as Roy.

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SirDrone
Jul 23, 2013

I am so sick of these star wars
Watch as the killer gets clowned by some gobs that decided to go death-matching for shits and giggles.

Accordion Man
Nov 7, 2012


Buglord
NES Jason palette or no back.

Bar Crow
Oct 10, 2012
Getting laid should be a bonus objective for the camp counselors.

King Vidiot
Feb 17, 2007

You think you can take me at Satan's Hollow? Go 'head on!

SirDrone posted:

Watch as the killer gets clowned by some gobs that decided to go death-matching for shits and giggles.

You can tell who the killer is because he'll be the only guy who isn't killing anybody.

WatermelonGun
May 7, 2009

Bar Crow posted:

Getting laid should be a bonus objective for the camp counselors.

Conversely, killing people mid-coitus should give you a mega combo.

I'm really excited for this game I'm building up way too hard in my head. :toot:

Danger - Octopus!
Apr 20, 2008


Nap Ghost

WatermelonGun posted:

Conversely, killing people mid-coitus should give you a mega combo.

I'm really excited for this game I'm building up way too hard in my head. :toot:

I'd love a mechanic so that two counsellors could make out and this would attract Jason somehow. Maybe giving him some kind of tunnel vision to them or draw him in that direction? This would put them at risk, but would also let other counsellors ambush him in theory. Would be a neat way to set a trap for the killer.

Serenade
Nov 5, 2011

"I should really learn to fucking read"
If you're playing with a group of friends, it means you'd need to figure out which two of you are the least capable of defeating Jason. Those two are the two who should make out.

But you also have to find a way to make sure neither of the two make out candidates are secretly the killer.

Circutron
Apr 29, 2006
We are confident that the Islamic logic, culture, and discourse can prove their superiority in all fields over all schools of thought and theories.

Danger - Octopus! posted:

I'd love a mechanic so that two counsellors could make out and this would attract Jason somehow. Maybe giving him some kind of tunnel vision to them or draw him in that direction? This would put them at risk, but would also let other counsellors ambush him in theory. Would be a neat way to set a trap for the killer.

So, you're basically asking for this then?

Groovelord Neato
Dec 6, 2014


Accordion Man posted:

NES Jason palette or no back.

Jmcrofts
Jan 7, 2008

just chillin' in the club
Lipstick Apathy

Zombie Samurai posted:

:spooky: RETURN OF THE 31 DAYS OF MOSTLY SPOOKY GAMES :spooky:

1. Knock-knock
2. CAPSULE
3. DARK
4. System Shock 2
5. Castle in the Darkness
6. Shattered Haven
7. Whispering Willows
8. Frankenstein: Master of Death
9. Kraven Manor
10. Our Darker Purpose
11. Stray Cat Crossing
12. Splatter - Blood Red Edition
13. The Emptiness Deluxe Edition

14. Clandestinity of Elsie



(Store page pics again, Steam overlay really hates RPG Maker games.)

Yes, it turns out that really is a word, referring to something kept or done in secret. Clandestinity of Elsie is an RPG Maker game hacked into a something resembling Silent Hill 2, pitting you as an unstable World War II veteran against a mess of creepy crawlies standing between you and your missing wife. The design is classic survival horror, meting out just enough bullets and medkits to keep you rolling to the inevitable conclusion. There are a few clever additions as well, such as using sound to lure enemies out and adrenaline doses to let you move faster.

None of this really gets around the fact that this is an RPG Maker game kit-bashed into something that is not an RPG. Don't get me wrong, I love RPG Maker and there's nothing stopping good games from being made with it. But it's not designed for action, and so the combat becomes my chief complaint about Clandestinity. Your dude scoots around the gridlike maps in a sticky, unresponsive way, which makes evading the far swifter enemies impossible. You have to draw your gun before firing and there are long delays between shots, so if a basic foe gets the drop on you, it's guaranteed to get two or three hits on you. Early on the enemies are sparse enough to sneak around and take out smartly, but by the back half of the game they form a veritable gauntlet of crappy shooting.

The level design is my other issue with the game, and I feel the only thing I REALLY need to say here is that there are two sewer levels. They're the two longest areas in the game as well, and are bookended by a sewage plant and a warehouse using the same tileset. The other locales are functional but leave little exploration or interaction to fill the void. Most of the game is lacking in scares as well, despite the competent atmosphere and creepy enemies. In fact, almost all the horror hinges on the loud musical cues when enemies spot you, which lose all effectiveness by the damnable sewer levels that run you face-first into foes from around blind corners.

As for the story, well, there's a reason I brought up Silent Hill 2 early on. I know everyone has a horror boner that's lasted way longer than 4 hours for that joint, but the indie crowd really needs to let it go. I'm at the point where horror games that are all in the protagonist's head feel like they're cheating me, discarding any sort of world-building for an easy it-was-all-a-dream-esque handwave. You need serious writing chops to make imaginary monsters work, and Clandestinity falls far short with a disjointed story almost completely divested from the events of the game. It's an interesting experiment, and it might make you jump a few times, but the secret kept here just isn't worth it.

These posts are good and thank you for making them.

Too Shy Guy
Jun 14, 2003


I have destroyed more of your kind than I can count.



Jmcrofts posted:

These posts are good and thank you for making them.

Thanks! I've got a real good one tonight. I remember we discussed Yahtzee's Chzo Mythos games a while back in the thread, and fans of those should definitely take note.

:spooky: RETURN OF THE 31 DAYS OF MOSTLY SPOOKY GAMES :spooky:

1. Knock-knock
2. CAPSULE
3. DARK
4. System Shock 2
5. Castle in the Darkness
6. Shattered Haven
7. Whispering Willows
8. Frankenstein: Master of Death
9. Kraven Manor
10. Our Darker Purpose
11. Stray Cat Crossing
12. Splatter - Blood Red Edition
13. The Emptiness Deluxe Edition
14. Clandestinity of Elsie

15. The Last Door - Collector's Edition



A mark of a good story is how well it sticks in your head. After the last scene, you roll the whole thing around like a completed Rubix Cube, pondering the moves that got you there and admiring the final work. I finished The Last Door awhile ago, and I'm still musing over all the threads it wove together.

The game is broken into four episodes, about 30-40 minutes of point & click adventuring each. Each episode is a tight, entertaining scenario, and together they form a surprisingly gripping story. You take on the role of Jeremiah Devitt, a young man investigating the fate of his old classmate in a particularly bleak take on Victorian England. There's a great deal to uncover in each episode, some welcome variety in gameplay between them, and quite a few unexpected turns in the story. The third episode in particular takes the gameplay and story in a very strange direction that was off-putting at first, but I was pleased to see it tied up neatly with the rest of the plot.

If you're not a fan of the low-res aesthetic, you may have some trouble with this title. The graphics are extremely chunky, almost to the point of obscurity in some cases. However, interactive items are usually very noticeable due to the layout of the scenes. Also, the lighting and animation is excellent and helps prop the visuals up. But what really carries the game is the sound design, both in effects and music. Every action in the game is accompanied with a perfect aural representation, and the music is expertly crafted to drive the emotions of each scene. The attention to detail in the sound work greatly enhances the impact of the game elsewhere, making many scenes a joy to play through.

There are plenty of spooks to be had in this one as well, especially for an adventure game. The developers have a knack for surprising you at the most effective times, and leaving unsettling clues in just the right places. The desolate Victorian setting is used to great effect in setting the uneasy tone, which the story picks up and takes off with. It's perhaps the only point & click game I've played where I was on edge for almost the whole time. The puzzles don't detract from the atmosphere either, as they are almost entirely reasonable and logical.

I ended up far more pleased with The Last Door than I ever expected. The atmosphere, writing, sound design, and gameplay were all top-notch, and even the pixel graphics worked in its favor by the end, leaving all the right bits to the imagination. The final episode has a solid ending, but leaves matters open for a second season which is mostly complete at this time. You can get the first episode of this first season for free from the developer's website, and the other three are only 0.99 GBP each, but with quality like this there's no reason not to go for the superior Steam version.

RightClickSaveAs
Mar 1, 2001

Tiny animals under glass... Smaller than sand...


resurgam40 posted:

So... I just finished Albino Lullaby: Episode One last night, because I had been curious about it and no one seemed to be talking about it either way, so I took the plunge. (It's only 10 dollars anyway...)
Oh forgot about this game! It looks awesomely strange, going to pick it up for sure.
Yeah this is well done low res pixel art. The blockiness did trip me up a few times, as it was slightly harder than I thought it should be to find a couple items and hotspots, but no big roadblocks, and the style doesn't feel like just a cheap gimmick.

Jmcrofts
Jan 7, 2008

just chillin' in the club
Lipstick Apathy
Newest spooky game I'm tackling is Resident Evil HD Remaster. I was honestly blown away by how amazing this game looks, and how it manages to be legitimately creepy at points despite being an upres of a 2002 game. First couple recordings from my stream are here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FSagJ_dImB8

Blattdorf
Aug 10, 2012

"This will be the best for both of us, Bradley."
"Meow."

This game is better than you'd think. I dismissed it at first because of the graphics, but then gave it a fair shot and got hooked.

It's not because the graphics are terrible in particular, it's just that the style is used so often that it's usually a sign of low-effort. But no, here they use it to great effect.

Morpheus
Apr 18, 2008

My favourite little monsters
Yeah I'm going to, uh, fourth the good opinion on Last Door. If you're an adventure game junkie then it may be too easy/simple for you, but I really liked playing through it, and I usually get frustrated by the genre. Some really spooky bits, the story is suitably horrific, with all the right kinds of horror, and there are a few hidden scenes scattered throughout the game that really add to it. I don't know if they're ever planning a sequel, but I'd play it for sure.

Too Shy Guy
Jun 14, 2003


I have destroyed more of your kind than I can count.



Morpheus posted:

Yeah I'm going to, uh, fourth the good opinion on Last Door. If you're an adventure game junkie then it may be too easy/simple for you, but I really liked playing through it, and I usually get frustrated by the genre. Some really spooky bits, the story is suitably horrific, with all the right kinds of horror, and there are a few hidden scenes scattered throughout the game that really add to it. I don't know if they're ever planning a sequel, but I'd play it for sure.

You're in luck, because they're already three of four episodes into season 2! You can pick them up straight from their website, though they're quite a bit pricier since they're newer releases. I'm definitely interested but I'll probably wait for them to make it to Steam as a complete package again. I think they've said they're going to take a break after season 2, but that it should wrap up the whole story for now.

Bar Crow
Oct 10, 2012

Danger - Octopus! posted:

I'd love a mechanic so that two counsellors could make out and this would attract Jason somehow. Maybe giving him some kind of tunnel vision to them or draw him in that direction? This would put them at risk, but would also let other counsellors ambush him in theory. Would be a neat way to set a trap for the killer.

You could have a mechanic where the counselors can't escalate the situation, only Jason can. The counselors are normal people who don't have a reason to grab weapons or build traps until Jason shows himself as a threat. So the goal of the counselors players is to goof-off and bait Jason attacks which unlock the abilities to defeat him.

CuddleCryptid
Jan 11, 2013

Things could be going better

Bar Crow posted:

You could have a mechanic where the counselors can't escalate the situation, only Jason can. The counselors are normal people who don't have a reason to grab weapons or build traps until Jason shows himself as a threat. So the goal of the counselors players is to goof-off and bait Jason attacks which unlock the abilities to defeat him.

Would be cool for Jason as well if his actions didn't count towards unlocking counters unless someone saw him/found the evidence. Or maybe they would find a blood stain and just get minor things versus seeing him rip someone's arms off

Bar Crow
Oct 10, 2012

DreamShipWrecked posted:

Would be cool for Jason as well if his actions didn't count towards unlocking counters unless someone saw him/found the evidence. Or maybe they would find a blood stain and just get minor things versus seeing him rip someone's arms off

Escalation could be per character and has to be spread by telling other characters or showing them the body. No witnesses would causes only a minor hit as people go missing while disemboweling a character in front of the group would leave you facing an entire team of "final girls".

AnonSpore
Jan 19, 2012

"I didn't see the part where he develops as a character so I guess he never developed as a character"
Also this game will be literally perfect and do everything I dream it will do.

Bar Crow
Oct 10, 2012
Nah, it will be bad and the multiplayer for it will quickly die. Truly the most horrific fate of all.

Too Shy Guy
Jun 14, 2003


I have destroyed more of your kind than I can count.



:spooky: RETURN OF THE 31 DAYS OF MOSTLY SPOOKY GAMES :spooky:

1. Knock-knock
2. CAPSULE
3. DARK
4. System Shock 2
5. Castle in the Darkness
6. Shattered Haven
7. Whispering Willows
8. Frankenstein: Master of Death
9. Kraven Manor
10. Our Darker Purpose
11. Stray Cat Crossing
12. Splatter - Blood Red Edition
13. The Emptiness Deluxe Edition
14. Clandestinity of Elsie
15. The Last Door - Collector's Edition

16. Albedo: Eyes From Outer Space



You would think there'd be more games out there that aped the old, shlocky B-movie styles of horror and sci-fi. I'm particularly surprised it's not more common among indie games, where you could pass off Poser models and barren levels as rubber suits and movie sets. But I suppose if this game proves anything, it's that you need more than B-movie stylings to make your game fun.

Albedo is a first-person adventure game, posing you as a dopey security guard at some secret laboratory. Things go wrong as they always do, and you end up trapped in the basement with a bunch of impolite ambulatory eyeballs, presumably from outer space. The first thing you will notice about the game is how intensely... intense the graphics are. I can't rightly call them hideous because they are expertly rendered and arranged. The colors tend to be far too saturated an garish, however, straining your eyes against the otherwise darkened backdrops. This can also make it very hard to locate things you want or need to interact with, hidden as they are amid a technicolor mess. Which is kind of ridiculous, given that the game is broken into tiny single rooms to puzzle your way through. Despite there being virtually no room to explore, it's STILL hard to find the things you need.

It's harder still to use the items you find, thanks to the onerous inventory system. I'm sure it sounds good on paper: Left click to pick up, mouse wheel to scroll through possible actions, left click to take action, right click to move items into and out of your inventory. But what actually happens is a lot of confused scrolling because not all items have the same interaction options. And then once you decide on what you want to do with the item, there's no guarantee you can DO it because the game is full first-person 3D and you need the hit detection to line up. Some items have a convenient Use With prompt but others do not, requiring some agonizing trial-and-error to get things into the right spots.

The puzzles themselves can be maddeningly obtuse, and I'm sure I'm not the only person to get stuck in the first room because I didn't realize I needed to attach the rope to the broken snack machine and put the loaded mousetrap in front of it and then pull the rope to open the door on the other side of the room. Oh, and there's combat too, so enjoy clicking Use Screwdriver On Monster about a dozen times every few rooms. I think you get weapons later on, but I'll never be able to confirm. The icing on this wholly unpalatable cake was that the rooms are so small and the field of view is so narrow that the game made me nauseous after about 30 minutes. The host of negative reviews on the Steam page indicated that this is not an uncommon problem, so add that to your list of reasons to give this one a pass.

King Vidiot
Feb 17, 2007

You think you can take me at Satan's Hollow? Go 'head on!

AnonSpore posted:

Also this game will be literally perfect and do everything I dream it will do.

Bar Crow posted:

Nah, it will be bad and the multiplayer for it will quickly die. Truly the most horrific fate of all.

It'll be good it just won't be tailor-made to the whims and fantasies of people who don't actually design games professionally or even as a hobby. The gameplay will be shallow and simplistic but rewarding and fun, but like with all multiplayer games the public interest will die down and the player base will dwindle down to almost nothing within a few months after release. But it'll still be a fun game to dick around with with a handful of friends.

It'll be worth the $5-10 it'll cost on a Weekend Deal on Steam.

Songbearer
Jul 12, 2007




Fuck you say?

resurgam40 posted:

So... I just finished Albino Lullaby: Episode One last night, because I had been curious about it and no one seemed to be talking about it either way

The concept of a game that says it does horror without gore (and I think they also said it has no jumpscares?) is incredibly interesting to me as games can rarely ever manage it. How successful is it in this regard? Is it just creepy due to how bizarre it is?

The things I've seen of it give me a early 90's FMV game impression, like 7th Guest or Dark Eye. Is it in the same veins?

E: Obviously not in a technical sense, but in a way that those games were creepy through their sense of strangeness.

Songbearer fucked around with this message at 17:58 on Oct 17, 2015

chitoryu12
Apr 24, 2014

Someone a while back in this thread linked a video of Conan O'Brien playing Slender, Amnesia, and Outlast as a guy with very little video game experience or interest and never having played horror games before. It was a good look at exactly what it takes to actually get people scared. Slender did pretty much nothing to him, but the disturbing imagery in Outlast and Amnesia is what got a reaction.

This is something I'd been thinking about myself for a while. I've long been critical of jump scares as a cheap way to get a shock out of people, and I wonder how much of the "scariness" of popular indie horror games is a result of conditioning. People think it's scary and want to be scared. Maybe they even have to be scared so they get the YouTube views they need. So they react much more to sudden noises or appearances of monsters than they would normally. But imagery that actually disturbs the viewer (usually with something unnatural and threatening) without needing to scream in their face can accomplish the same or greater results.

Accordion Man
Nov 7, 2012


Buglord
Scratches and playing as Alex in Eternal Darkness are the like the best examples of building tension and creepiness without relying on jump scares and the like in a game. (ED did have one jump scare in that segment, but it was an effective one.)

Night10194
Feb 13, 2012

We'll start,
like many good things,
with a bear.

Accordion Man posted:

Scratches and playing as Alex in Eternal Darkness are the like the best examples of building tension and creepiness without relying on jump scares and the like in a game. (ED did have one jump scare in that segment, but it was an effective one.)

Having one is fine. In fact, having ONE is not a bad idea at all; it's a good way to payoff some of that tension, right when someone starts to relax and is convinced nothing is going to happen.

Accordion Man
Nov 7, 2012


Buglord

Night10194 posted:

Having one is fine. In fact, having ONE is not a bad idea at all; it's a good way to payoff some of that tension, right when someone starts to relax and is convinced nothing is going to happen.
Or in the case of ED it leaves you on edge, because they that do that jump scare early on in the game. They also do subtle things like give you Pious' gladius really early on so the expectation of enemies is there but you don't fight any enemies as Alex until the very end of the game and the section of the second floor of the mansion where the fixed camera angle focuses on a stained glass window so you expect something to bust in through it ala the Cerberuses in RE1 but nothing ever happens.

Accordion Man fucked around with this message at 19:39 on Oct 17, 2015

Nckdictator
Sep 8, 2006
Just..someone
Well, the Friday the 13th kickstarter's reached a little over half their goal. Looks like they'll make it.

Too Shy Guy
Jun 14, 2003


I have destroyed more of your kind than I can count.



ayn rand hand job posted:

You should do Murdered: Soul Suspect

:spooky: RETURN OF THE 31 DAYS OF MOSTLY SPOOKY GAMES :spooky:

1. Knock-knock
2. CAPSULE
3. DARK
4. System Shock 2
5. Castle in the Darkness
6. Shattered Haven
7. Whispering Willows
8. Frankenstein: Master of Death
9. Kraven Manor
10. Our Darker Purpose
11. Stray Cat Crossing
12. Splatter - Blood Red Edition
13. The Emptiness Deluxe Edition
14. Clandestinity of Elsie
15. The Last Door - Collector's Edition
16. Albedo: Eyes From Outer Space

17. Murdered: Soul Suspect



I will make this one very simple for you: Do you love collecting poo poo? I mean, really REALLY love collecting poo poo? Is all you ask of a game that you push a button, hear a pleasing jingle, and see the "X out of Y" counter increment? Because if you do, you will love this game. And if you don't... well, let's talk.

Murdered is the tale of the tragically-named Ronan O'Connor, lose cannon of the Salem PD with nothing to lose. The game opens with him getting ventilated by the world's least-subtle-slash-least-catchable murderer, the Bell Killer, and you spend the rest of the running time trying to figure out why. Well, that's a lie. You spend most of the running time wandering around Salem, ghosting through walls and people in search of the 242 collectable knick-knacks scattered throughout the city. While some require your ghostly powers to reach or reveal, most are just sitting out, waiting for you to mash X on. Each one gives you a tiny snippet of backstory on the characters or Salem if you bother to open the menu, and a few let you hear a cute creepypasta story if you collect the whole set.

If you're wondering why I haven't talked about the core gameplay yet, that's because it's dogshit. No lie, the investigations in Murdered are probably the worst of their kind. At every major story beat, you have a crime scene you need to investigate for clues to answer a specific question. Around the scene you'll find plenty more doodads sitting out for you to mash X on, each giving you a clue. After finding all the clues, you have to pick the clues that are the most relevant to answering the question at hand. This is where it all falls apart, because the expectations of the developers in picking answers ranges from so obvious you'll miss it to absolutely non-nonsensical. You're either going to breeze through every investigation or stumble over every answer depending on how well your brain is wired like the developers. Not that it matters either way, because there is literally no penalty for loving up an answer, you just try again.

So that's how Murdered plays, terrible detective sequences broken up by fits of collection-sperging. If that was all, we could flip it the bird and move on with our lives. The weird part is, everything else about the game is fantastic. The graphics are gorgeous and detailed, bringing the town of Salem and its residents (living or dead) alive. Sound direction is on point with satisfying effects and a moody, fitting soundtrack. The characters are charming and memorable despite what seems like every effort to make them obnoxious. Bad-boy Ronan is vulnerable and compassionate, manic goth-girl Joy is plucky and nuanced, and the entire supporting cast is interesting in their own ways. Your ghost powers also keep things fresh, allowing you to possess people to intrude on their idle thoughts, or poltergeist their appliances to freak them out. There's even some stealth combat against some pretty horrifying demons that's simple, engaging, and a welcome break from the running and collecting.

I'm not going to pretend Murdered is a great game, or great for everyone. But even after identifying its flaws, I had a blast with it. Full disclosure, I watched my buddy stream the entire game months ago, and still had enough fun with it to play through the whole thing myself. A lot of your enjoyment is certainly going to hinge on the collect-a-thon aspect, but if you get into the story and learn to love Salem and its characters, there's a perfectly good game to be had here.

Macaluso
Sep 23, 2005

I HATE THAT HEDGEHOG, BROTHER!
I'm watching Jesse Cox's playthrough of that game right now, and I can tell that it's pretty janky but has a ton of really neat ideas that would've made a really great game if they had been executed better. The characters all seem really well done though

Accordion Man
Nov 7, 2012


Buglord
Y'all should really play Ghost Trick and the Blackwell Series, they are both what Murdered was gunning for but missed the mark on and are fantastic.

They're both not horror games though, just supernatural mystery games.

Accordion Man fucked around with this message at 02:19 on Oct 18, 2015

The Saddest Rhino
Apr 29, 2009

Put it all together.
Solve the world.
One conversation at a time.



Ghost trick is really really good and I wish they would do more games like that

al-azad
May 28, 2009



So everything I've looked at so far has been largely Western inspired horror. I want to ditch that a bit and look at games that are more traditionally Japanese. There are few things more iconic in Japanese folklore than Yokai, often malevolent spirits that haunt the material and spiritual realms. Unfortunately I wish I picked a pack of better games to demonstrate!

Youkai Club



Youkai Club for the Famicom feels like a total rip-off of Kid Icarus. It's largely a vertical platformer, although horizontal stages are thrown in more liberally. You have a short range projectile attack that gets automatically upgraded as you earn experience points by collecting items from defeated monsters. There are suspiciously similar doors that lead to single room encounters which allow further progression into the stage. And at the end of a level there's an obligatory boss fight against the most bullet sponge enemies I've seen in an NES game.





The graphics are beyond ugly for a 1987 title, with repetitive tiles and barely recognizable enemies. Items flicker like flashing lights even when nothing else is drawn on screen. There's no sense of theme or architecture to the levels. Yokai designs are supposed to be iconic. No matter how they're drawn, yokai are instantly recognizable but Youkai Club's aesthetic is absolute poo poo.





Play Holy Diver instead.

Youkai Yashiki



As a brief aside, this game's title is oddly Romanized in-game as Ghost Manor, not to be confused with the Atari 2600 Ghost Manor (which is probably a better game). Originally released in 1986 for the MSX by Casio, it was republished by Irem for the Famicom Disk System. I don't know the exact date of the release, but I can't help but believe it was directly inspired by Konami's The Goonies. It follows a similar design with large levels you must explore.





Your health is directly tied to a flashlight which can only be recharged by fighting specific enemies in a single screen of the map. Getting hit reduces the charge which subsequently reduces your range. At one hitpoint you can only attack enemies literally a pixel away, it's such poo poo. Your goal is to acquire all of these talismans to proceed to a boss. A map allows easy guidance but the areas constantly loop and in odd directions. It's not uncommon to drop through the floor in the middle of the map to end up at the very top!





Instead of this garbage, play Wanpaku Graffiti. The one good thing I can say is that the music is decent.

Yokai Dochuki







Namco's first 16-bit arcade game, it has appeared in a fully English version called Shadow Land although there's no evidence of it ever being officially distributed outside of Japan. This is an action platformer where you must guide a young boy through hell to meet Buddha and be judged. You have a ki energy attack which can be charged up to unleash a giant beam across the screen. You collect money to purchase upgrades and health which the game is surprisingly generous with. There are five endings determined by how you complete the final level. If you somehow don't kill any enemies or collect a single item in the last level then you're sent to heaven!









I could actually call this a good game if it weren't for some maddening design decisions. You only have one life. If you die, you start at the beginning of the stage regardless how far you've made it. There are some items that resurrect you but they're expensive. This wouldn't be such an issue if enemies didn't literally spawn in front of you. Some enemies have patterns but overall there's no predictable elements. You will be bombarded at every turn by monsters that drop from the top of the screen or materialize in your space. And there's a 100 milisecond invincibility frame. You will be juggled through multiple enemies with no way to prevent it.





The PC-Engine version looks pretty good but is a really cut back version of the game with linear, almost entirely flat levels. The Famicom version is surprisingly faithful and the console limitations mean that enemies have to be carefully placed on the map. It's an oddly better adaption than the arcade version. Had this come out on the Sega Genesis (there it is again) with arcade-like graphics and sensible design I think people would be talking about this as one of Namco's lost classics.

Nckdictator
Sep 8, 2006
Just..someone
'Eh, I liked Murdered: Soul Suspect. I found Salem to be atmospheric and fun to explore (besides the bland old Asylum, the characters were likable by video game standards (though that's not saying much), and I enjoyed the story for what it was. That said the collection gameplay was terrible and charging $60.00 on release for this was a crime for whatever poor soul bought it.

Too Shy Guy
Jun 14, 2003


I have destroyed more of your kind than I can count.



al-azad posted:

So everything I've looked at so far has been largely Western inspired horror. I want to ditch that a bit and look at games that are more traditionally Japanese. There are few things more iconic in Japanese folklore than Yokai, often malevolent spirits that haunt the material and spiritual realms. Unfortunately I wish I picked a pack of better games to demonstrate!

These are pretty funny, considering how popular Yokai Watch is for Japanese kids right now. That last one reminds me a lot of Super Adventure Island, another really good-looking game marred by being loving impossible.

oldpainless
Oct 30, 2009

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Zombie Samurai posted:

:spooky: RETURN OF THE 31 DAYS OF MOSTLY SPOOKY GAMES :spooky:

1. Knock-knock
2. CAPSULE
3. DARK
4. System Shock 2
5. Castle in the Darkness
6. Shattered Haven
7. Whispering Willows
8. Frankenstein: Master of Death
9. Kraven Manor
10. Our Darker Purpose
11. Stray Cat Crossing
12. Splatter - Blood Red Edition
13. The Emptiness Deluxe Edition
14. Clandestinity of Elsie
15. The Last Door - Collector's Edition
16. Albedo: Eyes From Outer Space

17. Murdered: Soul Suspect



I will make this one very simple for you: Do you love collecting poo poo? I mean, really REALLY love collecting poo poo? Is all you ask of a game that you push a button, hear a pleasing jingle, and see the "X out of Y" counter increment? Because if you do, you will love this game. And if you don't... well, let's talk.

Murdered is the tale of the tragically-named Ronan O'Connor, lose cannon of the Salem PD with nothing to lose. The game opens with him getting ventilated by the world's least-subtle-slash-least-catchable murderer, the Bell Killer, and you spend the rest of the running time trying to figure out why. Well, that's a lie. You spend most of the running time wandering around Salem, ghosting through walls and people in search of the 242 collectable knick-knacks scattered throughout the city. While some require your ghostly powers to reach or reveal, most are just sitting out, waiting for you to mash X on. Each one gives you a tiny snippet of backstory on the characters or Salem if you bother to open the menu, and a few let you hear a cute creepypasta story if you collect the whole set.

If you're wondering why I haven't talked about the core gameplay yet, that's because it's dogshit. No lie, the investigations in Murdered are probably the worst of their kind. At every major story beat, you have a crime scene you need to investigate for clues to answer a specific question. Around the scene you'll find plenty more doodads sitting out for you to mash X on, each giving you a clue. After finding all the clues, you have to pick the clues that are the most relevant to answering the question at hand. This is where it all falls apart, because the expectations of the developers in picking answers ranges from so obvious you'll miss it to absolutely non-nonsensical. You're either going to breeze through every investigation or stumble over every answer depending on how well your brain is wired like the developers. Not that it matters either way, because there is literally no penalty for loving up an answer, you just try again.

So that's how Murdered plays, terrible detective sequences broken up by fits of collection-sperging. If that was all, we could flip it the bird and move on with our lives. The weird part is, everything else about the game is fantastic. The graphics are gorgeous and detailed, bringing the town of Salem and its residents (living or dead) alive. Sound direction is on point with satisfying effects and a moody, fitting soundtrack. The characters are charming and memorable despite what seems like every effort to make them obnoxious. Bad-boy Ronan is vulnerable and compassionate, manic goth-girl Joy is plucky and nuanced, and the entire supporting cast is interesting in their own ways. Your ghost powers also keep things fresh, allowing you to possess people to intrude on their idle thoughts, or poltergeist their appliances to freak them out. There's even some stealth combat against some pretty horrifying demons that's simple, engaging, and a welcome break from the running and collecting.

I'm not going to pretend Murdered is a great game, or great for everyone. But even after identifying its flaws, I had a blast with it. Full disclosure, I watched my buddy stream the entire game months ago, and still had enough fun with it to play through the whole thing myself. A lot of your enjoyment is certainly going to hinge on the collect-a-thon aspect, but if you get into the story and learn to love Salem and its characters, there's a perfectly good game to be had here.

It's loose cannon not lose cannon jfc put some effort into these

chitoryu12
Apr 24, 2014

It's kind of a shame that Murdered: Soul Suspect had so many flaws and got such poor reviews. Objectively it really isn't that good as a game, but it's still extremely engrossing thanks to the story and atmosphere. Unfortunately, there's not really any fandom to talk about it with because of how much of a flop it was and it's unlikely to get a sequel any time soon.

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Jmcrofts
Jan 7, 2008

just chillin' in the club
Lipstick Apathy
You honestly kind of sold me on Murdered: Soul Suspect. Looks like something I would enjoy.

I've been streaming more Resident Evil HD. I know this is old as hell news but this game is awesome. Playlist of the vods is here:

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL2N8qJGW36fwWkyX7EAJWYwRRfHqnLHqV

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