Re: Video Games
 

Going through Bloodborne again. Good game, but it frustrates me. Probably because I'm crap. Currently stuck on the Blood-Starved Beast. Again.

Edit: I beat it. Now I'm stuck on the next boss. I don't think the camera works well during fights with huge enemies.

Re: Video Games
 

The Soulsborne games are challenging enough that, whenever the game offers me a summon sign in offline mode, I take it out of principle. Though they are rightly challenging, as early on as Demon's Souls I found the lore and the detective-like manner in which it is presented, along with the grotesquerie of the entities not being at all arbitrary but intimately tied to the affliction of the world, as so strong, that this is the true 'soul' of the series so to speak, and not merely its difficulty. The first two Dark Souls were weaker entries in my opinion, especially that pointless second entry.

They definitely got back on track with Bloodborne and Dark Souls III though. However, if you're one of those crazies who insists on fighting Ludwig alone with just your fists, then I've got absolutely no advice available to you. You're on you're own there.

Re: Video Games
 

Yeah, sod it. I'm summoning the AI to help me with bosses. As long as I'm taking an active role in the fight then it doesn't feel as if I'm cheating, which is what I feel summoning other players is. Made it to the Forbidden Woods. Snakes!

Re: Video Games
 

Yes, I refuse to face the Shadows of Yarnham by myself either, but I know what you mean. I don't summon other actual players online. For one thing, I am nowhere near skilled enough to beat some of these trolls that invade others.

Re: Video Games
 

The game Active Shooter was up for a few days before backlash made the company think twice and they took it down yesterday.

Re: Video Games
 

I've been playing a lot of Civilization V as of recent. Until this year I had never played a Civ game before.

Re: Video Games
 

I mostly avoid summoning other players in Bloodborne and Souls because I am afraid of embarrassing myself in front of them by playing badly... I am like that, I avoid multiplayer and co-op games in general... I perform worse when I know that others observe me

Re: Video Games
 

I plan to play this game World of Horror. It's inspired by Junji Ito and Lovecraft. Still in development but it's promising.

http://www.hardcoregaming101.net/wp-.../5-480x236.png

Re: Video Games
 

Looking forward to Sekiro? I hope there's more variety in enemies than the trailer shows.

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I bought the remastered Dark Souls. Stuck at Nito.

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Re: Video Games
 

This SulMatul guy has reviewed/analyzed Pathologic and The Void too.

Re: Video Games
 

I finally finished Gabriel Knight: Sins of the Fathers 20th Anniversary Edition; it is a pretty good remake.

The Gabriel Knight series is my favorite, just because the great plots Jane Jensen came out with.

Re: Video Games
 

His analysis of Pathologic is quite unsurpassed, detailing, over the course of more than two hours of video, every aspect of the story as experienced by all three playable characters.

Re: Video Games
 

I find this compilation of books which inspired Pathologic on its subreddit here.

The books are:
1. Morphine by Mikhail Bulgakov
2. The Foundation Pit, Chevengur by Andrei Platonov
3. Utopia by Thomas More
4. Sakhalin Island by Anton Chekhov
5. A Feast in Time of Plague by Alexandr Pushkin
6. On the Steppes by Maxim Gorky
7. A Shot From the Monitor by Vladislav Krapivin
8. Master by Vasily Shukshin
9. The Plague by Camus.
10. Germs, Genes, & Civilization: How Epidemics Shaped Who We Are Today by David P. Clark
11.The House, in Which (or The Gray House) by Marianna Petrosyan
12.A Journal of the Plague Year by Daniel Defoe
13.An account of the plague which raged at Moscow, in 1771, by Dr. Charles de Mertens

Re: Video Games
 

It has been a long time since I played a video game, but I am tempted to try this one. I love the animation.

Re: Video Games
 

Beat new Resident Evil 2 on the hardest difficulty as both Claire and Leon. This game is really nice, but I wish the A and B scenarios had the variety of the original RE2 game's dual scenario system. My only major complaint.

Now to beat Hunk's scenario without breaking my controller.

Re: Video Games
 

Going through Siren. I love and hate it. Eerie, ambitious and fascinating, but unruly and maddening due to abstruse objectives. Impossible to beat without a guide.

Downloaded it to my PS4 along with Layers of Fear and Detention. I almost exclusively play horror games.

Re: Video Games
 

I finished Siren. Gameplay-wise it's a mess, but the atmosphere is the best you'll find outside of Team Silent's original Silent Hill games, which is perhaps due to it being by the director of Silent Hill 1. If you can look past the ridiculous flaws this is something special. The gaming equivalent of Hodgson's The Night Land. Highly recommended for the curious few. Very Lovecraftian. The nest at the end reminded me of Uzumaki.

Re: Video Games
 

have you played the Siren remake? also Outlast 1 and 2? I get so anxious playing horror games but I greatly admire them even tho I feel unable to play them. what about resident evil 7? I know that one also has PS VR support which I imagine would be terrifying

Re: Video Games
 

Not played any other Siren games. Wish they'd make them downloadable for PS4.

Outlast 1 was silly, but had good tension. Outlast 2 less so, despite the eerie school sections.

Resident Evil 7 is... divisive among fans. Myself? I enjoyed the hell out of it. With that and the RE2 remake I'm optimistic about the future of RE again. Both great games. Currently playing the new DLC for RE2. Nothing special, but at least it was free. Fingers crossed for an Ada campaign DLC at some point .

Re: Video Games
 

I liked Resident Evil 2 back in the day, but I preferred the Silent Hill franchise as far as the horror element. RE felt a bit more cartoonish, to be honest.

I'm highly interested in RE7—how is it from an atmospheric horror perspective? Is it one of those games that amps up your anxiety as you sit down to play it at night, when you're the only one home or awake?

Re: Video Games
 

I found RE7 to be profoundly claustrophobic, clammy and uncomfortable for the first two thirds. Unfortunately the final act loses most of its power, but it's overall worth it.

My favourite horror games are Silent Hill 1/2/3, the remake of the first Resident Evil and Alien Isolation. I suspect Siren will make the cut after a replay.

Re: Video Games
 

Alright, I gotta check it out, then. Seems like we have a similar taste.

Silent Hill 2 is actually one of my favorite horror works period—the atmosphere is better than most films, and the story, with all of its symbolism and emotional weight, is better than most literature. It's not perfect, of course, but it really is great. I wish that the film version of Silent Hill had been based on that rather than the first game. Alas.

Re: Video Games
 

Finished Layers of Fear in a few hours. Nice presentation for an indie game, but I didn't find it very involving. Inessential.

Amnesia did it better. That was a good game, though I will never get why it lacked consequences for enemy encounters. Lowers the tension considerably in the second half. Thankfully the game had a nice story and atmosphere. Wasn't overblown like Layers of Fear.

Re: Video Games
 

The team who made Layers of Fear went on to make Observer, which really builds on what they were doing in the former game but more effectively incorporates it into the game world; while amping the surrealism up to a genuinly hallucinogenic level. It's a wonderful Cyberpunk/Horror experience, which, while perhaps not being the most original in terms of gameplay, cannot fail to leave an impact on the player.

Re: Video Games
 

Sounds similar to Soma? I liked that. Frictional should make more horror games.

I'll start Detention when it gets dark.

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It's in a similar vein to Soma, but a whole lot more disorientating.

Re: Video Games
 

Detention is a visually stunning horror game set in oppressively anti-communist 60s Taiwan and deals with more mature subject matter than you'd expect from horror or gaming. Any semblance of gameplay vanishes for the final act, but as a horror experience it is an intelligent and atmospheric one. Recommended.

Deciding between Observer and last year's Call of Cthulhu as my next purchase while I replay the terrific Siren. They need to make the sequels downloadable on PS4.

Re: Video Games
 

Both games are worth a playthrough, but I found Observer to be a much more memorable experience than Call of Cthulhu.

Re: Video Games
 

Finished Siren Blood Curse. It's alright. A more accessible remake of the original game, but lacking much of the ambience and weirdness that made the first Siren a classic.

Horrible frame-rate issues with sightjacking sadly hurt the experience.

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Finished Everybody's Gone to the Rapture. This barely had gameplay. Trudged through the 'follow the light' banality for the surprisingly profound, moving story. As a walking simulator it impressed me more than Layers of Fear. Deeply hauntological. Would appeal to fans of weird lit. Hard to call it a game, but it was an experience of value.

Re: Video Games
 

Personally, I preferred the previous effort from the same studio; 'Dear Esther'. While both games are pleasant, if thoroughly melancholic, experiences, boasting wonderful musical scores from Jessica Curry, I thought 'Dear Esther' benefitted from a more breath-taking setting. Something about the relative wilderness of a wind swept Hebridean island, replete with crumbling cottages and mouldering sea vessels, stirs me more than the balmy climes of a sunny English village. Both games are well worth investigating though, if anybody fancies an interactive experience rather than a game.

Re: Video Games
 

There isn't enough to do in Everybody's Gone to the Rapture for it to be a great 'game' in the traditional sense. If I had to follow clues to figure out where to go instead of following annoying lights it would be so much better. Still, the emotional element worked on me so well that I am satisfied if viewing it not as a game, but as its own experience. Such beautiful music and quality writing.

I shall look up Dear Esther. I got a PS Now 7 day trial to play Siren Blood Curse, so I'm trying to cram in as many curious games as I can before it ends.

Tempted to pick up a PS2 just for Siren 2.

Re: Video Games
 

Dear Esther features the same style of 'gameplay' - if we can call it that - as Everybody's Gone to the Rapture, but where you are prompted to follow a particular path in the latter game, the former game allows you to roam freely about the island. The story of Dear Esther will unfold no matter what order you visit the key features of the island; it's all just a matter of covering all the terrain.

Re: Video Games
 

Um, I just started Deadly Premonition. Now crying with laughter. Absolutely speechless at this. I think I'm going to really like this one. What the hell am I playing?

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After playing The Last Express for years, I finally got the good ending. What an incredible game. Now let's hope Paul Verhoeven finally develops the live-action version.

Re: Video Games
 

The ending was kind of bittersweet if not inconclusive for me.

Re: Video Games
 

The original game, while good, has a huge learning curve. It's close to 20 hours long too. I'm tempted to install it again on my PS4. I really liked what they did with the facial animations.

Re: Video Games
 

Film of Siren looked pretty good, apparently based on the second game. First two were called Forbidden Siren in UK. I never got far into them.