It's so ham-fisted I had to laugh when it happened, as I could only think of "Give me money or the kitten gets it." Good game, though.
In the next scene the boy walks into a spiderweb, and the villain from the previous battle picks the boy up, and JUST before he gets impaled on some kind of talon, the game asks you if you're REALLY going to just leave the boy to his fate. You eventually end up in combat with the aforementioned spider, and if you prevail you are subject to what basically amounts to ransom. This goes a long way to not breaking the atmosphere the game works so hard for. The demo level starts with some basic tasks to teach you the games mechanics without giving you a tutorial or having messages pop up. The sparseness of the level designs and the setpieces really drive home how alone the protagonist is in a visceral way. Done entirely in a hazy black and white, you guide a boy's silhouette through some physically and metaporically dark forest. This game is tied with Stacking in my book for the most evocative atmosphere in a game this year. Lives are infinite and checkpoints are plentiful, though, so the programmers' inability to adequately plan a level isn't as bad as it could be. The ability to severely weaken gravity with the push of a button adds some interesting twists to the level flow, but it can really interefere with what is already wonky and uncomfortable combat. The game utilizes a really nice looking 2D sidescroller style, with exploration and backtracking making up a huge part of the game. Apparently being a space miner in the 23rd century requires you to look and act like a miner in the 19th century. You are walking dick joke John Rochard, and you are a space miner. I'm still sour about Shadow Complex's Xbox exclusivity, but in the meantime this will have to do. I have been dying for a good Metroidvania game for ages, especially after being stiffed by the last two Castlevania games (one a 3D action game, the other removed all the RPG elements and forced you to work with pre-teen dingbats whose parents never taught them basic manners or words that aren't "bitch" or "nigger"). Plenty to come, so be sure to get your robe and wizard hat ready for six months worth of updates! Pretended San Francisco had sunny weather and did some biking Started working on some more difficult guitar songs
Sort of lost my mind during the Steam Sale So now that we're back on a normal schedule, here are some things I've done recently that will probably receive coverage before I leave for my honeymoon in September: The senioritis that comes with having a huge upcoming vacation also makes a lack of action even more difficult to endure. But now, with the wedding over and the honeymoon completely planned/reserved, I'm back in that familiar pattern of having jack shit to do until 5pm. The problem that originally got me writing this blog was a complete lack of activity at work, a problem that was briefly remedied by the need for wedding and honeymoon planning. Much has happened since the last installment just before Christmas, the biggest thing being that I got engaged and subsequently married.