I rarely write about my successes. But yesterday I managed to update Atmosphere to 1.5.3 and firmware to 16.0.3 without any issues.
Just had to copy the sigpatches again. Even saves are intact. I call it a success.
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“Did you know Advance Wars?”
Turns out, I didn’t know some things about the Advance Wars:
Like the fact that a later cancelled version for Nintendo 64 was developed at one point.
Or that there were different designs for characters in the English and Japanese versions.
Completed BIOTA.
One unexpected feature from that kind of a game is that you can save on any screen, if there are no enemies or hazards on it. This especially helps in some platforming episodes.
There are episodes in mech and submarine. A homage to Metal Slug, maybe? Those aren’t very good, though. And the worst one is the pre-final episode, where you need to rappel down while shooting enemies. I was about to drop the game at that point, because of how random that piece is. Completed it only because I got lucky.
The final fight is Star Fox style. If I wanted to play Star Fox, I’d play Star Fox, not an arcade shooter, don’t you think?
So despite the attempts at retro-vibes and introducing a new mechanic in each zone (sliding, lasers, etc), I can’t say I enjoyed it much. If it wasn’t for the save feature, I would have dropped it somewhere in the middle.
Faithful 8bit metroidvania. With different biomes and all that. I’d say it’s even a bit too faithful, to the point of being boring.
It’s also very hard to figure out what’s going on due to the 8bit style. Is that a platform or the background? Will that projectile pass through the platform or not? Can I shoot down that projectile? The only way to know is to die trying.
The game uses progression system that I remember from some Zelda games: you need to buy a key item or character to progress. But first, you need to find a purse large enough to hold the money.
First boss is an acrobatic one. You can’t shoot it. Instead you need to jump avoiding its attacks and press button that drops a bomb in its mouth at the right moment. The following bosses are standard, though. You just shoot them until they die.
As much as I’m fan of Advance Wars, I never finished the first two on GBA. Fortunately, there’s a remake now for Switch. Delayed by a year due to war in Ukraine, but still.
Not sure if they just remade the graphics or also rewritten the dialogs, and it doesn’t matter much. The significance of dialogs and storyline in Advance Wars is equal to dialogs in porn or W40K. It’s just an excuse, and we all know that.
This game always reminds me of chess puzzles (not that I’m good at them). At least the missions where you can’t build additional units. Winning is not difficult. Getting an “S” score sometimes is. Although the score doesn’t impact anything except your ego, really.
One feature I don’t remember on GBA is the ability to rewind your last move. You can’t rewind enemie’s turn, but it’s still very useful, expecially if you misjudged artillery ranges.
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Forgive Me Father
Completed Forgive Me Father.
The third boss, Dagon, is a tricky one. It disappears underwater. And your “rockets” are extremely slow, so they are not effective at all against it. Better stick to hitscan weapons. In its second phase, it starts flooding the valley, and the character can’t swim. So you need to remember in which order the valley if flooded.
The mines are quite tiring, so I ended up running past most enemies, as I was also running out of ammo for everything by that time.
Following two immobile bosses and one partially mobile one, it made sense the introduce a mobile player-sized boss. The only problem with that approach is how the game renders enemies. If you rememeber even Wolfenstein 3D, you start your game facing Nazi soldier back: enemies were drawn from multiple perspectives. But there’s no such thing in Forgive Me Father. Enemies always face you. So, it’s very hard to figure if the boss tries to run away or run towards you. Still, it was one of the easier encounters, and I beat it on the first try.
I felt like they tried too hard to make the final episode too hard. The levels are long, there are so many enemies you run out of ammo all the time, and the final level has some annoying jumping puzzles, that you won’t find anywhere else in the game.
Feeling like I just bruteforced the final boss, Cthulhu. It’s a static boss, like the very first one, no need to aim much. And just like the first boss, it’s a bullet-hell one. Luckily at that point I had fully upgraded Necronomicon that gave me enough invincibility to bear the worst of its attacks.
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Forgive Me Father
Enemies are quite brutal. The melee ones are fast and hit hard. The projectile ones react quickly, and I suspect they keep shooting at you even when they can’t see you.
As this is my first (and only) playthrough, I want to try as many weapons as possible. It’s great that you get to use most of your arsenal. Mauser is almost like a battle rifle, fast and accurate. The Tommy Gun upgraded into a laser beam is super powerful.
The only disappointment is the grenade launcher. Indirect fire is often very beneficial, but it’s not very effective here.
Underwater level was a bit of a surprise. Not something I expected in an old-school shooter.
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Forgive Me Father
Interesting bit about weapon upgrades is that your choice is between upgrading the standard weapon or changing its ammo type to something more rare and more specialised. Basically, it’s a choice between getting a more powerful machinegun or an energy beam instead.
The first boss is basically a wall throwing mines at you. But I still enjoyed it.
The swamp level was tough. There are a few types of enemies that hide in the water, like in the first Hexen, and those are very hard to see. And with how long the camera is placed in this game, almost Turok-like, it’s hard to spot enemies shooting at you from the grass. But if you know in which direction to go first, it’s not that hard. Still, I died on that level as much as through the entire game before that.
The second boss is a pillar instead of a wall. It’s tricky: the boss shoots homing projectiles, mobs shoot homing projectiles, and during the second phase there’s a laser grinder you need to evade, that also changes direction 🤯
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Forgive Me Father
This is certainly not what I expected. It’s a Lovecraftian game in its setting alright. But its a old-school shooter, most similar to Project Warlock.
Monsters popping out of walls, weapons without reload, secrets and all that. Strict level structure. No free saves, but there are some checkpoints. Then there’s the infamous flashlight from Doom 3, though: the one you cannot use with a weapon.
There’s an experience system, and quite an extensive tree of weapon upgrades. And also skills, such as healing.
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Arcane S01
I decided to talk about how great Arcane is some more, with the example of Caitlyn and Vi.
We aren’t told that Vi is a lesbian. And it’s even suggested early that Caitlyn is attracted to at least one man.
Often it’s shown that when two lesbians meet, they just Fall in Love. Why? Because there are no other lesbians around, stupid!
That’s not how hetero stories usually work, though, right? There’s often a conflict, a tension, they even hate each other at the beginning, because they are different (one being man, and the other, being, forgive me, a woman).
So here’s a crazy idea. What if the same would be applied to a homosexual relationship?! I know, crazy, because those are two women, and all women are identical and have zero conflicts. But humor me.
And that exactly what makes Caitlyn and Vi relationship work. They have that conflict of being from different classes, and with Caitlyn being a policewoman, and Vi’s family killed by police during an uprising. But they struggle together, the complement each other. We see that evolution, and not just “well, that’s the first homosexual woman I’ve ever met, so it will have to do”.
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Arcane S01
Finished first season of Arcane.
This is not what I expected. But I think it was brilliant nevertheless.
The world feels bigger than the single city we’re shown.
There are things that are happening outside of it. Which is a great way to build a story.
Here’s just one example:
A mother, kind of a warrior-queen, exiled her daughter, Mel, for being too soft, to another city-state, Piltover.
But now her son is dead, and she needs the weapons that Piltover produces. We’re never told who she’s fighting. Because this is something outside of the story.
Being all “Spartan warrior”, she still enjoys the benefits of civilization:
And this is mostly shown, not told. Often in a single scene.
All the characters have their conflicts. Vi with being from a lower class, and her parents killed by enforcers. Jinx being torn between her sister the vigilante and her stepfather the mob boss, Silco.
Here Silco is being offered what he dreamed off, an independent state, in exchange for his step-daughter:
I mean, just look at those sequences. The offer, the contemplation, and the statue of the hero and his friend he killed in the background.
It’s so often that characters are given easy escapes. Not here. Even when Jinx eventually kills her stepfather to save her sister:
It only sets the scene for a larger catastrophy, the ultimate terrorist act, the attack on the Parliament, which is the cliffhanger for the first season.
And I like the ineventability of this. The fact that you take a decission doesn’t mean you don’t end up hating yourself for it. Even if it was the right decission. The hate is still there.
It would again be easy for authors to make Silco point the gun at Jinx. Here, he was always using her! But he doesn’t. Adding the layer of ambiguity:
It wasn’t just an act, he does mourn her, he does try to do everything possible to save her.
And I could go on, on how Mel’s painting represents her longing for home.
Again, just a single shot, her standing, him almost laying down, the divide between.
And then we see in the last moments that she ruins it: telling the viewer that she rejects her mother offer. Again, “show, don’t tell” in the most brilliant form.
To me, it’s frustrating that they managed to pull this level of a story out of a universe whose entire purpose is to sell sexy costumers to teenagers. And then we have abominations such as Resident Evil movies, that do have excellent base material, but not the will 🤷♂️
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Mortal Kombat (2021)
The Hanzo and Bo Han introduction is brilliant. The origin of the kunai, how Sub Zero powers introduces and all that.
They made the hero a descendant of Scorpion, and a MMA fighter. MMA is all the rage, so I’m not even angry.
Kano was a surprise. More of a comic relief character.
There are a lot of little references. Like Kano trying to jump over Liu Kang’s sweep kicks. Kung Lao saying “flawless victory” after dealing fatality to the flying lady nobody remembers (Nitara).
Speaking of characters nobody remembers, Reiko was a surprise. They even recreated Liu Kang dragon fatality and Sonia’s as well.
Then there are smaller references: Katana’s fan in the background, Kano trying to steal the Amulet, Motaro in Greek vases.
The way fighters need to discover their abilities is more of a superhero-like.
But then, they had to establish abilities of a lot of fighters in a very short period of time. Tonfas were a surprise as well. But it’s a new character, and the actor is master of those.
Then there’s the appearance of Scorpion, with the iconic music (if there’s such a thing) and even more iconic “Get over here!”
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Resident Evil: Welcome to Raccoon City
It’s a strange attempt to mash together Resident Evil 1, Resident Evil 2 with a bit of Code Veronica on top.
There is some notion that they knew what they were doing. First Aid Spray, Umbrella logos, Dr Birkin, Spenser Mansion. They did reconstruct the original intro of Resident Evil 2, the one with the truck, quite faithfully. And the one from Resident Evil 1 is pretty accurate as well.
Leon S. Kenney is a bit more… Middle Eastern, than what I’d expect. And Jill is also a little more… black.
They made Wesker one of the regular cops, friend of Jill. And mostly a clueless guy.
Then there’s Chris and Claire Redfield that were kids in an Umbrella orphanage. Completely unnecessary, I think. What purpose does this detail has, except a way of bringing Claire and Leon to the underground train, really?
I had zero expectations. But still, I mostly wished this would be over.
I think that someone who managed to make this:
And this:
Knows what they’re doing. I’m no expert, but there are some solid Amy Winehouse and Lady Gaga references there.
But this surprised me:
Everyone regards this as something personal, and I think it’s not, but still that’s a much more heavy theme that club music.
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Arcane S01
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Skipping breakfast
Strangely enough, I got accustomed to skipping breakfasts. Funny, because we’re taught that breakfast is the most important meal of the day and all that. I would still drink coffee, and sometimes eat something around 11. But often, I’m alright until 2PM. And sometimes I even feel better without breakfast.
Finished listening to Consider Phlebas. On one hand, I was surprised this book was written in ’87. It seems to be 10 years ahead of its time at least.
But the ending left me feeling unsatisfied, in an almost Warhammer 40K manner. You see, in Warhammer 40K, different factions usually chase an ancient artifact. In case of “Consider Phlebas”, it’s an artifact alright, although not ancient, but brand new: unique kind of AI, that managed to teleport itself into a planet, something no other AI managed to pull previously.
There’s a lengthy sequence of firefight for that artifact between humans and a couple of 3 meter tall warlike “Idiran”. Some people get killed. The protagonist decides to keep one of the Idirans captive. It escapes, and kills or mortally injures everybody else, besides a single crew member, that manages to return the AI to her people.
But then, the AI doesn’t seem to play any role in the ensuing war. Just like in W40K, where every artifact gets destroyed “because Chaos”, or, in other words, because no singular even can have any effect on the overarching story.
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Modern Warfare 2 multiplayer
The game does offer some interesting ideas around leveling weapons. Some weapons are unlock by leveling up your character, that hasn’t changes.
But in Cold War, most of the weapons had same set of upgrades which you had to unlock for each. And the way to unlock weapons is that you use weapons from the same category.
In Modern Warfare 2, you unlock weapons by “platform”. AK74 has the same platform as RPK, so you have to level up the former to unlock the later.
Also, leveling up a weapon unlocks attachments that are shared between all weapons. You can add a silencer to your LMG, but only if you unlock it by leveling up a particular sniper rifle.
Most attachments also support tuning, which is a bit mindboggling for me. That means that not only the attachment provides some tradeoffs, like accuracy versus Aim Down Sight speed, but you can also make those tradeoffs more prevalent.
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Sinking City
Completed Sinking City.
There’s a funny pice of self-awareness in the dialog with the police officer that explains why he dislikes the protagonist:
In most games, “choices” are about either being an alright guy or a complete asshole. In Sinking City, they are sometimes more subtle, and I like it.
At one point we need to choose between a necromancer that resurrects the dead to torture them and a Mayan vampire. Torturing dead people – bad. Eating people at night – also bad.
In another quest, you can either give away the real killer, a decent guy who committed a crime only because his family was held hostage, or frame a politician that plans to poison his mother. I see clear Witcher influence here.
Speaking of choices, though, what you did throughout the game doesn’t affect the ending. You just pick one of the three available, and that’s it. I’m glad the were some bossfights in the middle of the game:
Something I wish the game would make more fuss about are the weapons. They’re given to you during some key sequences, but you don’t actually get to see the process. A character would say “here’s something”, and you need to go to your inventory to discover that you’ve been awarded a Tommy Gun.
Also, what slightly ruined the experience for me is that all the investigations are basically the same. You find the clues. You recreate the sequence of events, which is almost never challenging. You unlock that secret wall. I wish the “puzzle solving” would somehow ramp up. But it never does.
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Arcane S01
What can I say? It’s absolutely phenomenal. Everything. The storytelling. The visuals. The animation. The fact that they managed to make compelling characters out of a spinoff of a spinoff.
