Progress for April 27, 2010 - BioShock (Take 2) - COMPLETED!

Beat it tonight. If I'd have known I was this close to the end, I would have beaten it a long time ago. How come I always seem to beat these games near or after midnight? Never in the morning or afternoon?

Anywho. I got the good ending, but I didn't get the achievement for it because I accidentally harvested one of the last 2 little sisters. I'm not looking forward to playing through those last two levels all over again, but I'll probably do it later, since it's worth an easy 100 points.

This is going to be a tough game to review. May take a few days to get my bearings straight.

Progress for March 28, 2010 - Final Fantasy VIII

I've been playing this one very slowly over the course of the last week or so. I'm only about 3 hours in; just finished the SeeD exam and got a rank of 8. I really don't know what to say about this game. This is one of those games that is so deep and complex that a "perfect playthrough" is almost impossible, especially the first time through. I've also found that trying to do these things perfectly really kills the fun of any game. So what if you can't get the super-awesome spell by collecting all of the randomly scattered chess pieces around the world and arranging them on the chess board in the final boss's room? Does it mean you can't beat the game? No, of course not, it's just for the insane completionist. I find it just more fun to play through based on my own mood and decisions and just let the game adapt. Unfortunately there are a good number of games that CAN be rendered unbeatable by this method; more an oversight on the part of the designers I suppose.

I am in fact having a lot of fun naming all the characters weird stuff.

Squall = Spoony
Quetzalcoatl = Lugia
Shiva = Cold Tits
Ifrit = Mr. Burns
Siren = Paris (Hilton)
This resulted in the somewhat amusing line:

Hooray for juvenile humor! ^^

Anywho.
Time: 3:01
Place: About to go down to talk to Quistis in the training area.

Clear Ring of Death

I really don't know what to say as I write this. My 360 has betrayed me. Look at what it did to my beloved Fallout 3 GOTY disc!

Earlier today, my foot caught the memory card hanging over the ledge of the entertainment center as I was moving, which caused the console to make a terrifying clattering noise as it was jolted around, but I immediately took the disk out and inspected it for problems and there weren't any scratches like this. I continued to play, but about 3 AM this morning the dreaded "Disc Read Error" message popped up. I pulled it out, fearing the worst, and absolutely wanted to murder myself when I saw those ring-shaped death-scratches.

I don't think my xbox is still under warranty, and I don't know what to do. I don't know how to fix the disc, I don't know how to fix the system, I don't have the money to get a new one, and I don't trust this thing anymore to put any more of my game discs into it to test it out. So that means no BioShock, no Assassin's Creed, not even any Mass Effect, which I haven't had a chance to play yet. I'm now limited to my downloaded games, which leaves Fable as the only "full retail game" I can play on it.

FUCK!

Progress for March 24, 2010 - BioShock (Take 2)

It took me a while to get back into it, but I'm glad I did. I really liked the plot twist in the middle of Hephaestus. It almost averts the idea of having objectives in a shooter. Why are you doing these things? Well, the game told you to. Okay then!
The difficulty spikes are so strange, but even when the game kills you, there are absolutely no consequences; you just revive at a vita-chamber. In a way, this keeps you playing because you WILL be able to finish the game, simply through pure perseverance, but it does cripple the immersion factor and tension of being low on life. Others have criticized the game for this design choice, but since there's an option to turn it off, you can't really fault them. Personally I prefer to have the option than to simply have it nonexistent by design; it allows more players to play through the game, even if they're not good at shooters, or just not good at console controls.

Seriously, fuck console controls in shooters.

Progress for March 18, 2010 - BioShock (Take 2)

Well, that was hell. I had to kill about 5 big daddies in this level, even though it only has 3 little sisters in it. For some reason those bastards just hated me and started attacking me due to some collateral damage. I suppose I could have let them kill me and just rezzed at a vita-chamber, but that feels like cheating, doesn't it?

Progress for March 16, 2010 - BioShock (Take 2)

I played just a few hours today, I made it through the whole jungle mission and now I'm going on to.... whatever the third area is. I don't have the game on right now as I'm writing this, so I don't know the name of it. I'm really just trying to get to where I was when I stopped playing last time, that way I can actually start analyzing the story again.

An all-rescue run is hard to do on medium or hard... Sometimes I just want to rip one of those little girls open so I can get all the Adam I need. Too many tonics. Not enough slots.

Progress for March 15, 2010 - BioShock (Take 2)

I started all over again, this time on Medium difficulty. It does add a lot of much needed challenge to the game compared to Easy. I'm still not going to turn off the vita-chambers, though.

I made it through the first couple of levels. I just got to the part where the submarine explodes, and I'm rapidly running low on things like first aid kits and eve hypos. I'm trying to get the good ending by rescuing all of the little sisters, since you're rewarded with a bunch of Adam anyway with the care package, so I'm not sure what the big deal is.

The game feels very similar to Fallout 3, but a bit less open. I do like the fact that BioShock rewards you for killing your enemies in creative ways, since you save on ammo and health, whereas Fallout 3 punishes you by not giving you experience for enemies that your hacked turrets and satellites kill. Saving ammo and health isn't as important in that game, since it is very easy to come by.