PixlBit

I'm on vacation this week for the most part. LJ and I went to Washington D.C. to visit the Smithsonian Zoo and Museum of the American Indian (also, accidently - 'cause we parked beneath it - the Bible Museum and saw the Dead Sea Scrolls exhibit), but I manged to squeeze in some gaming on a few days here and there and last week, which I couldn't report on 'cause Pixlbit was down. 

DS

The World Ends with You - This game has great style. You play as teenagers in Akihabara confronted with a secret organization that wants to make them fight mystical creatures for them. Or, that's how I percieved it.

You use pins (items of fashion, I believe) to do various things like read minds, see the mystical creatures, and perform a range of attacks in the battle screens. The battles use the stylus and here's where I got frustrated with it because I had some trouble pulling off the various attacks. Each pin has you do different movements with the stylus for attacks. Maybe the movements are quite specific, and I didn't pull them off precisely enough? I'm not sure, but after a lot of battles, I got annoyed by not being able to consistantly get them to work. It's probably just me. Anyway, a very visually interesting and inovative game, just maybe give me another way to do attacks than wth the stylus. 

 X360

Skyrim - I have bounced off this game many times before by getting lost, killed or generally confused. I have some trouble with these big open world games with minimal guidance, but I love the concept and keep trying them. 

I made up a Nord warrior with random attributes and used a two-handed sword as a weapon. I surprised myself by getting to the Greybeards mission and receiving my first dragon shouts for the very first time. I also cleared a Barrow side mission which nearly did me in fighting many reanimated skeleton warriors. I had to figure out how to quickly access potions, which is not obvious, to stop getting beaten up. Then I had to stop for the day. 

In returning to it the following week, I wasn't in the mood for figuring out how to navigate such a big world and moved on. No glowing lines on the ground here, you just have to hike it and wind your way to the destination, hoping you don't get lost. I feel like Todd Howard and the crew were really into hiking and wanted you to experience that in the game and not be distracted by glowing directional markers speeding you to your destination (although, once you've been to a place, you can fast travel there). The feeling of being lost is probably the main thing that repells me from the game, but now I'm beginning to get what the intention was and am down with it. 

What a fantastic and content rich game. It's kind of amazing the shear amount of stuff you can do and interact with here. 

Portal 2 - I played this many years ago but didn't get far, being a player who is easily annoyed by puzzles. This time, though, I cruised through without too much difficulty. Not to the end though. Somewhere in Chapter 6, I believe, when you get the bouncy goo, I started to feel exhausted from having to decifer so many puzzling situations.

It's astonishing to me the wealth of complexity piled into this game; finish one set of puzzles with the tools given and another tool or matterial is presented to you, and a new set of problems must be solved. Games just test my problem solving skills lately, and if I'm dealing with a real life problem, I lose some patience with a game - puzzlers like this, especially so. 

I loved the story and voice work in this game, as most do. Really great stuff. It's a joy. I also noticed the similar graphics engine used in Half-Life 2 in a few instances. 

Batman Arkham City - Apparently higher rated than the first game. I guess that's right, at least in wealth of content. What can't you do in this game? Traversal has so many options. You can get around and execute missions any way you want. It does require a great bit of stealth, though, in many situations, and stealth is my weak spot. I just don't have much patience for it right now, so I stopped after several missions - absolutely a gem of a game though. I will tackle it again when I have more patience. 

Pac-Man Championship Edition - I had to pick up the Xbox Live Arcade physical disc to play this on my 360 because I didn't buy it digitally when the store was up. Compared to Pac-Man CE 2, this is a bare bones version but still great. Gameplay is fast and the objective is to score-over-time instead of clearing screens.

I had occasional issues with the 360 controller because the thumb stick is an all-directional stick. I sometimes have trouble making a 90 degree turn and miss a quick escape from a ghost in the maze. I must pull the stick in a diagonal direction slightly which doesn't register the turn. The game only requires four directions on the stick. I wish I had an arcade style controller for this, maybe an eight directional one like the Atari's. I realize now that I could use the d--pad on 360 which is four-directional. 

Braid - So, another platformer I tried to grok for the second time since it came out. Everyone loved this thing but me it seemed. Well, I appreciate it for what it does and feel obligued to give it another shot from time to time. I got several worlds farther this time around before wanting to destroy my controller. 

The reverse time mechanic is finally registering as a novel and interesting game mechanic to me. I noticed later that some levels I left puzzle pieces on could've been got easily by reversing time. You don't seem to reverse everything on the screen on some levels which gives you some new solutions. And so I will continue to try this at odd moments and test myself. 

Purchase Binge

Over the two weeks, I was really getting a little out of control, so I started wishlisting things instead. Here's what I got before I put the breaks on. 

4 for $15 at Game Exchange

Borderlands 2 (wanted a phsyical copy for 360 even though I can download it digitally)

Darksiders 1-2 (I remember good things about these, and I found two very clean copies for cheap)

Kinect Disneyland Adventures (I loved this in its digital version, stripped of Kinect features. I somehow still have a Kinect device and realy wanted a physical copy of the game to memorialize it. It doesn't use the Kinect all that much anyway.)

$50 worth at Classic Game Junkies

Portal 2

Fallout 3 (I have a coworker whose a mega Fallout fan, and so I wanted to try this again and create some talking points.)

Plants Vs. Zombies (physical version with Zuma and Peggle too. Nice)

Xbox Live Arcade Compilation Disc (A collection of digital games on disc including the Pac-Man C.E. I needed. Also, Uno, Luxor 2, Feeding Frenzy, and Boom Boom Rocket)

Digital Explosion on 360

I discovered that even though the 360 store is down, I can still buy digital games for it. Wah?! Yes. If the game is back compatible and on the current Xbox store, I can buy it on the Xbox phone app and it will show up in my Downloads list on 360, where I can install it to my 360. Revelation! 

A lot was on sale too but after 10 titles, I stopped, realizing I was breaking the bank a bit. All these were $3 or less on sale. 

Mutant Storm Reloaded (multi-directional shmup)

Alien Hominid 360 (run-and-gun game like Metal Slug)

Darwinia+ (sort of real-time strategy)

Ilomilo (puzzle game)

Ms 'Splosion Man and 'Splosion Man (platformers)

Joe Danger S.E. (kinda like Excite Bike)

Ikaruga (shmup)

Braid (plaformer)

There were more, but I wishlisted them for a later time. I just love that I can download games to my 360 still. 

And that's a couple weeks worth.