Irish Coffee, April 25th, 2013

Good morrow! Blood Dragon, Blood Dragon, Blood Dragon. Yesss! Dammit, I'm excited about this video game, and if you need evidence of that, just read the following blog. It's a bit gushy. In other news, another ridiculous video (Iron Man 2 this time), and I think it's an improvement. I've just been making these damn things as a warm up exercise, then watching them in a loop for no reason other than extremely short attentio- SQUIRREL!... False alarm, sorry about that. Weird morning.

The excitement. It’s consuming me. Has the world ever given you a present - a game, a movie, a book, a song - that so encapsulates everything you love that you feel like it was made just for you? Oh, to be a unique and delicate snowflake. And to receive the gift that is Far Cry 3: Blood Dragon. My childhood is one giant neon blur of cyberpunk movies, flux capacitors, ghost busting, and ninjafied turtles, and Ubisoft seems to have Inceptioned that particular part of my brain.

If you’ve read my blog at all over the past month, you’ll know that I’ve made no small deal about this game, and that deal is only getting bigger between now and Blood Dragon’s May 1st release date. Hollywood gives me Iron Man 3, Ubisoft gives me Blood Dragon. My 30th birthday shall not suck.

Movie time:

Even if, for some reason, the Day-Glo dystopian aesthetic isn’t making your tingly bits stand up in take notice, did you happen to notice the fucking cyber-dragon shooting down a fucking helicopter with a fucking laser it shot out of its mouth?! If that had no effect, you have no soul and I’m fairly certain you should be on a watch list of some sort. You frighten me.

But beyond the differences are the similarities, and this expansion is going to give me more Far Cry 3. A game that came out of nowhere to be my AAA game of the year in 2012, and that I’ve sorely missed. I’ve actually just thrown it back into my 360, as I know I’m out of Far Cry 3 shape, and I need to get limbered up for Blood Dragon. Sacrifice is demanded.

Far Cry 3 is a game most effectively played when you chuck survival out of the window and put your energy into cinematic destruction of your enemies. Yes, you can just sit outside of a base with a sniper rifle and slowly pick off every offending pirate, but that’s just a waste of gaming’s gift to us all: Infinite respawns. Pick up a bandolier of molotov cocktails, burn everything around the base, and while the enemies are distracted, jump off of a water tower and bury a machete in their neck. Maybe a throwing knife. Maybe you just run through their base being chased by a tiger like you’re in a Benny Hill sketch, leaving them to deal with the blood thirsty beast. The point is you can have fun with it. 

And there’s that word again: Fun. Games are supposed to be fun. And any bastard developer that forgets that is gonna have me to deal with. It won’t be pretty. I’m 20% redneck and I have a drinking problem.

Irish Coffee, April 17th, 2013

Sorry there wasn’t a blog post yesterday folks (or any word from me for that matter). I had the events in Boston on my mind, wouldn’t have been able to write without mentioning it, and didn’t want to mention it on a comedy(?)-gaming blog. So I didn’t. And honestly, there wasn’t much to write about in the way of gaming news yesterday. Nor is there today, it would seem. 

Oh, before we go any further, I'm completely aware of this morning's Nintendo Direct and Link to the Past 2. I just don't care. How is this a big deal? More rehash. Another tasteless cash grab that insults the original game by putting it on a gimmicky portable. Fuck you Nintendo, the WiiU is bad and you should feel bad. Moving on.

I know these blog posts are usually topical, but there honestly aren’t any topics to discuss. Not one stitch of gaming news out there that would make anyone react with more than a “meh.” Oh, look, Ace Attorney 5 has a release date. I don’t even know what the fuck that is. I’m assuming it’s the japanese DS game with the screaming anime attorney, but I could be wrong. Don’t care if I am, either.

Boooorred. I’m so bloody bored. I’m like Sherlock between cases, just not as smart or handsome. I am cranking away at my first video project ever, and it’s going well, but no one warned me how tedious video editing can be. They should’ve called it digital crochet. I should come up with some better analogies.

Oh, there is this live action Far Cry 3: Blood Dragon video released in anticipation of the game’s launch on May 1st, and it’s fairly amusing.

But that’s hardly news. And I’m consistently terrified by the lack perspective shown by 90s kids toward the 80s. I suppose that explains why they’re all wearing 80s clothes. They don’t realize how horrible it was the first time around... And why the fuck is youtube encouraging this shit with “VHS mode” on their videos? I... just... huh? 

We’ve spent all these years, clawing our way to 3D/HD video, only to optionally go back to low-def as a novelty? Is the world so lacking in substance that the concept of VHS seems a rich experience? Cuz it fucking wasn't. There's is NO REASON TO BE NOSTALGIC HERE! Turn back!

Do you kids have any idea how hard it was to masturbate to a blurry VHS pause screen? Do you? Cuz it was fucking annoying. Especially if you had a VCR that stopped the video after being paused for five minutes. So, twenty minutes for a blur-free boob-pause, and five minutes to finish up. Fucking horrible. If you want to relive the 80s so badly, buy a shitty Zach Morris phone that barely gets any reception, go to a store to buy your media, masturbate to pictures on parchment, and watch everything in low definition. Do that and I won’t punch you for wearing leg warmers.

I’ll try to think of any interesting topic for tomorrow morning. More interesting than fapping, I mean.

Irish Coffee, April 10th, 2013

Ok, I had to get this out. It was tearing me up inside. The entire gaming world is fawning over Bioshock Infinite, and well...

I didn’t like Bioshock Infinite.

Everybody keeps talking about all this “new” stuff it did. Am I just that thick? What exactly did Infinite do that was new and interesting, or is there some sort of tacit agreement with Irrational Games that I’m unaware of, and they send a hit squad to your house if you don’t repeat the PR verbiage? It’s a shooter (and everyone seems capable of admitting that it’s not very good at that job), set in a very pretty place, with powers very similar to those in the last two Bioshock titles, and a twist ending that’s designed to make people feel dumb if they don’t get it when in fact it doesn’t make any damn sense anyway. Sorry, but Infinite just bored the piss out of me.

Sorry, Lizzy, this only gets worse.

I loved Bioshock 1, played all of an hour of Bioshock 2 because it was retread, and must have finished Infinite because I’m a masochist. Yet the whole world keeps talking about it like it's gaming's second coming. Please, somebody, help me out here.

If I say Bioshock Infinite is a bad game, I’m the idiot. Why the hell is that? Because it’s a boring game with dead backgrounds, gameplay that feels more turned based than anything else, a floating city that does very little to convey that it’s floating, and a rehashed (and paired down, for some fucked up reason) version of a combat mechanic from Bioshock, which has been out for six years and is a far better game in nearly every respect? Is it fun to shoot at bad guys that don't react to gunshot wounds for hours at a time for the privilege of experiences an awkwardly scripted cut scene?

Yet Infinite gets amazing reviews... Why? Because they “tried something new.” Everybody keeps fucking saying that, but what exactly did they try that was new? Anybody? Please someone tell me, because the reviews don’t. They just leave it there. Bullshit, they tried something new. It’s Bioshock on a floating city. Bioshock did some new things, Bioshock Infinite doesn’t.

Does ambition preclude fair assessment of the end product? What the fuck did Infinite actually do so well? Everyone keeps saying that Columbia’s "brilliantly realized," but it’s just fucking not. It’s inhabitants barely say a word, don’t move (how long will that paperboy wave his product in my face? Until time rends itself from the universe?), and fucking vanish when combat begins. They don’t run away, they vanish. Do mothers carry their children on the skyrails? Did I miss that explanation? Why can’t I talk to anyone or buy anything, or in any way interact with this big, pretty, city they spent so much time designing? The whole of Columbia feels like the Wounded Knee exhibit from the end of act one, or a movie set from a spaghetti western.

Oh, they must be talking about the plot. The over-the-top, cheese dripping swill the likes of which I haven’t seen outside of a Lifetime movie. Other games have had better plots, or at least similar plots as far as their means of conveyance and execution, so it can’t be that.

So... Skyhooks?

But I would still be “wrong” if I wrote a bad review for it. Why? Because it was expensive to produce? Because everyone on the development team tried so hard? Has the real world started handing out fucking achievement ribbons? Do we now reward mere effort like the judges of a fifth grade science fair? I blame metacritic.

I don’t have a problem with a lot of what Infinite does, but it certainly isn’t new, it certainly isn’t innovative, and it certainly isn't blowing up any skirts in the gameplay department. I felt bored and unsatisfied every second of the Infinite experience. I’m playing Journey and Tomb Raider again to get the taste out of my mouth. Maybe a bit of Far Cry 3 or Bioshock 1. Y’know, good video games.

Really liked Elizabeth, though. 5.5/10

Doesn't make any sense to me, either.