SURPRISE DOWNLOAD! Amnesia: The Dark Descent

Hey guys! As a thank you to all the new followers on twitter, here’s a Steam Key for Amnesia: The Dark Descent!

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Superbrothers: Sword & Sworcery EP

Superbrothers: Sword & Sworcery EP

Available On: iOS, Mac, Windows (Steam), Android

Original Release: March 24, 2011 for iPad (now also available on iPhone)

D and D by: Superbrothers, Cabybara Games

In one sentence: Superbrothers: Sword & Sworcery EP is a rule breaker, through and through. And it’s a must play because of it.

“…and where the hell have YOU been?”

So where the hell have I been the last 11 months? Aside from a brief opinion I posted in February I haven’t posted an update to this blog since July of last year. That’s my fault I suppose. I still intend to continue this blog, as I hope this post and the renewal of the sites domain name suggests. There’ve been so many good games in the last year I don’t know where to start, so I’m supposing I’ll pick up where I left off… Sword & Sworcery. I daresay I blame this game for so much of my procrastination over the past year. It’s a simple barebones presentation, but much like Journey there’s a nuance to S&S that is so powerful yet so hard to accurately describe without sounding like you’re coming up short. I suppose this is the trial of new bloggers everywhere though, so I’m biting the bullet so I can move on to what I hope to be more frequent posts in the near future.

Along with the hopeful reinvigoration of the site, I’ll be experimenting with new approaches to the presentation of the reviews and blog posts, critical opinions are appreciated, but in the end it’s my blog. So enjoy it or go fuck yourself. Thank you.
-GH

Wintory’s Journey to the Grammy’s

A few months ago it was announced that Austin Wintory’s soundtrack for the spectacular game Journey for the PSN has been nominated for the Grammy for “best soundtrack for a visual media.”

Now I know this is old news, it was announced as long ago as November, but I’d like to touch on just how big a deal this is for not only Mr. Wintory himself but for the video game medium as a whole.

Journey: A Complex Personal Experiance, with Strangers!

As thatgamecompany’s last title, Journey is an accumulation of experience taken, focused, and concentrated into a two hour long dream. It is a game that strives to be more than a game, and as per the intentions of this blog, speaks to the heart of what I believe games can become. As always, this is your spoiler warning.

Humble Bundle V: Revamp Your Hipster Cred between now and June 14th!

Humble Bundle Inc has just released their fifth collection of video games and it is a dizzying collection.

LIMBO, Bastion, Sword & Sworcery, Psyconaughts, and Amnesia: The Dark Decent, PLUS all 5 soundtracks all available to you for the total price of…. you choose.

That’s right, keeping with tradition, Humble Bundle allows you to set the price you pay for all 5 games (though in order to access Bastion you need to pay more than the average customer, currently less than $8). Did I mention you even get to choose what percentage goes to the developers, to Humble Bundle Inc, and to the charities EFF and Child’s Play?

Buy it for yourself, buy it for a friend, you’ve not had a chance to get hipster cred this cheaply since you found that collage of 90s movie posters at goodwill. Just click the link here.

Oh, and hurry, the sale ends June 14th

thatgamecompany’s lead designer speaks on PS3 owners’ desire for artistic games.

Here’s a link to an interesting article by Venture Beat in an interview with one of the creators of Journey, Jenova Chen, claiming that PS3 owners seek out more artistic forms of gaming.

http://venturebeat.com/2012/05/07/ps3-owners-interested-in-art

Kids, Violence, and Video Games: My Obligatory Opinion

So a few days ago I get an email from a family member who happens to be an elementary school teacher. He confesses having problems with the fighting going on among his students, and asks me in the email what I thought of how violence in the media effects kids…

…I don’t think he was expecting this elaborate of an answer.

Dark Souls: A Game for the Masochist in Us All

I’ve spent hours trying to figure out what makes Dark Souls such an engrossing game, trying to find out what new feature utilized by the people of From Software that created a game so difficult, yet so inherently rewarding that its garnered a cult fanbase devoted to subjecting themselves to the murderous rampage of this game playthrough after playthrough after playthrough. Strange thing was, every aspect I explored was met with examples that already existed in other games. Simple controls, flexible battle system, cooperative gameplay, an immersive world to explore, and the incredible difficultly that has become an internet fad with games like Super Meat Boy, I Wanna Be the Guy, and Splosionman.

Shadow of the Colossus Analysis: All the World is but Lizards and Birds

So this analysis is painfully late, I know. I’d finished SotC sometime late October and had let the analysis sit there for sometime because I honestly did not want to write what I had to say, but here it is. As always, spoilers follow.