Over with the watch

Bittersweet memories of the way it used to be

Oh man, Overwatch. What a sweet horrible scarring nostalgia that dredges up.

I’m such a slave to it, just thinking about it for more than five seconds makes me want to play it, and you better believe I’ll be playing it right after I post this. There happens to be an event going on right now, which really isn’t convenient to my life, but that doesn’t mean I won’t drop everything and play a few hours.

Let me start by saying that Overwatch is a good game. I totally endorse it and stand by nearly every aspect of it: the marketing, the character releases, the few times they roll a patch back, etc. The only thing I don’t endorse is something every other Overwatch player will agree with: the constant tinkering, aka, the development team consistently breaking and setting bones of the game that were perfectly healthy to begin with. I mean, Bastion never needed buffing. Who thought that was a good idea?

So, Overwatch. If you haven’t played, you totally can, with absolutely no preamble. It’s a nice break from the games I’m used to where I have to read an entire essay before jumping in. I’m lookin’ at you, Dragon Age.

What do you mean you don’t know what a Qunari is? Or the Qun? How about an apostate? A Dalish?? Did you even do your homework…???

With Overwatch, there’s nothing you need to know going in, there’s no essential plot or concept you have to be aware of. You really can just jump in blind, but if you don’t wanna do that, I can explain what I’m prrreeeettttty sure is the backstory.

Okay, so basically, sometime in the future, there’s a race of robots so advanced that they have emotions, personalities, and can speak and communicate. They’re basically people and they’re called omnics. But omnics are trying to fight for their rights and the fighting turns violent. Tensions escalate and countries begin to take sides.

Okay, wait, I already messed it up. I just Googled it and I’m already wrong. Don’t read that last paragraph.

Um, okay. Whatever. I guess you could find this information anywhere else.

Basically, Overwatch is a team of nice cool good guys and Talon, another organization, is their evil snooty counterpart. Oh, and Overwatch was shut down. Right before the game, one of the members called Overwatch back together for a reunion tour or something. I don’t know. I’m not an expert. I just play the game, I swear.

I suppose the point I’m trying to make is, Overwatch has an incredibly deep story happening in the background, and ironically, it impacts the core gameplay very little. Instead of whatever you were expecting, Overwatch is primarily a 6v6 on various maps, pushing payloads, capturing objectives, or defending within an allotted time.

I was always told Overwatch was originally planned to be a movie, and when it was dictated into a game instead, a lot of that “extra” stuff also made the jump. Maybe that’s why their animated shorts are so amazing.

The quality of all animated shorts, including the cinematic trailer, feels comparable to Pixar.

The benefit of the game happening in a parallel universe or, my favorite theory, a training simulation (how else can you explain the same character on each team?) is that even people who don’t play the game can enjoy it. Because yeah, there’s a little bit of story in the game. A lil bit. Not a whole lot. It’s all hidden in small details, snippets of dialogue, maps, all that.

For example, Mercy is a doctor, so she gets band aid sprays. It’s super subtle.

Blizzard has done an amazing job at making extra content entertaining and widespread, from impactful animated shorts you should definitely watch, to comics that I should definitely read.

When a short drops, everyone I know drops what they’re doing to watch it at least 5 times and then hop immediately into Overwatch, even if it’s been months since they’ve played it last.

I know a lot of D.Va mains that freaked out when her animated short dropped.

Truthfully, out of all the games I’ve written about, Overwatch is one of the biggest roots on my spine: it controls so much of who I am today and how I interact with people online. I’ve spent so much time in that game, possibly more than any other game. Likely more than any other game.

It came out after my first year of college, and all my friends were so excited about it. I’ll never forget sitting on my friend’s bed, watching the first trailer on his small television he had hooked up to his computer. He caught me up to the hype, showed me the animated shorts introducing Soldier 76, Winston, Hanzo, and my guy Genji.

**Listen to me. You *can’t* beat Genji.** P.S. his animated short is the best.

and he’s the best

With everything, the animated shorts, the comics, the characters, the playtime I’ve punched in, it feels like more than just a game to me. The characters don’t stop existing when you turn the game off; they’re still living their lives, spread all over the internet and seeping in my subconscious like a disease. I’ve dreamed Overwatch dreams too many times: playing it, existing in the world, interacting with the characters. It’s truly sad.

And it would probably be annoying for someone who didn’t like the game, but luckily for me, I love it.

For a long period of time, Overwatch was my life. I’d log on and play a full day and somehow, still have the energy and faith in humanity to do it again, and again, and again. The next day, the next day, and so on. It was becoming an actual problem.

Overwatch Shadowplays were the #1 reason why I had to get a second HDD.

And Overwatch is special because it was my first online game. The kind of online game where you could pull up chat and talk to your teammates or the other team, and get called bad words by the whole arena.

From before I even knew how to screenshot

I met so many people through Overwatch, it was insane, and I feel really lucky to have made so many friends, some of which I still talk to daily.

But that was in 2016, and things have most definitely changed since then. I don’t play every single day anymore, and we don’t all get together in 6-stacks anymore. Some have moved onto other games and some still join me in Overwatch every now and then.

It’s pretty cool to think about how many other people are doing the same: creating groups, dissolving groups, from a duo to a full team of six.

And they must’ve become the best of friends, or else this is a world I don’t wanna live in.

So, that’s me. What about Overwatch? Overwatch released in 2016 and things have most definitely changed since then. It wasn’t perfect, but my god, was it fun.

I mained (and still main) Mercy, and her ultimate ability was so game-changing. But of course, resurrecting dead players with a snap of the fingers would definitely change the tide of any game.

In 2016, the playerbase felt easy to be apart of. Everyone was still learning the ropes and silver portraits were incredibly rare. The game felt fresh to me and we hadn’t settled into our roles yet. There were no extra characters, except Ana. The devs hadn’t tinkered much with the character balances. Everyone had fun and no one was hurt.

Um, and the lootboxes? They totally broke lootboxes, and then they fixed them, and I think they broke them again.

As badly as I wanna say that that one thing about Overwatch is the careful design, the constant new content, or the lovingly fleshed-out characters, I can’t. It might be because I’m a nostalgic idiot who simply misses how things were, or maybe it’s an instrinsic human quality that we can’t fight, but that one thing that made Overwatch essential to my life was how it used to be, back in the summer of 2016.

Before all the extra characters were added and before the tweaking really began, when I knew without a doubt that every afternoon, everyone would already be gathered, waiting for me. Things have changed since then.

Featured Image source:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IBIwGKDwnWY&ab_channel=PlayOverwatch

Hey guys, welcome to my crib

My plant crib, yeah that’s right, this is a nursery, keep your voice down

I don’t really consider Viridi to be a “game,” because it absolutely doesn’t feel like one. As pretentious as this’ll sound, you don’t exactly play Viridi; it’s more a place to go to.

If you haven’t gone there before, Viridi centers around growing plants in a little pot. Mostly succulents, I believe.

That sickly brown color means I’m killing them 😀
I don’t deserve my poor plants.

Players can grow and organize their own collection of plants, each of which can have some drastically different colorations. Each pot comes with a snail that guards your plants by circling the rim, because of course it does. Can a game be legit without any snails? I don’t think so.

The plants need to be watered and any stray weeds that appear need to be pulled. Oh, and players receive a free seed once a week. Annd that’s it. That’s Viridi in its entirety.

It isn’t exactly multifaceted, but it still scratches a niche itch in my brain. It’s great for decompressing or taking your mind off something.

I really only got it because a friend told me about it and immediately followed up with, “Also, it’s free.” So, it seemed like there was no reason not to give it a try. And, well, there are ingame items you can purchase, like more seeds, but they aren’t necessary. I’ve never felt compelled to put any money into it.

Viridi is heart-achingly charming, especially with the ability to sing to your plants or water your snail.

Or combine those and sing to your snail, which makes way more sense.

I try to check in once a week for my free plant seed but lately I’ve been slacking, checking in as far as once a month. When I first started playing, I felt a sense of urgency to make sure my plants didn’t die when I forgot to water them. This feeling quickly dissipated; I’ve gone at least a month and a half without watering, and I’ve been playing since 2016 without having anything die on me.

So rest assured, unless your goal is to kill the plants, you probably won’t kill the plants.

But if you’re worried, you can turn on a “vacation mode” which will keep the plants from needing water, but also keep the plants from growing.

Viridi feels like an environment made for relaxation, and I think that’s that one thing about it that makes it great. Tending to the plants generates this great calm that I find myself seeking out sometimes. It’s a really nice feeling.

Viridi also tells you how your plants are feeling so you don’t accidentally overwater.

It’s a sweet place to go; your own small world, full of green babies you’ve carefully watered and sung to. Viridi has a calming soundtrack that I could listen to and have listened to for hours, or, if you want, you can just mute Viridi and have it running in the background.

That’s how, even without an endgame or plot, I currently have 33 hours on it. So yeah, something about it definitely kept me coming back.

Sure, the game is compact, the concept is simple, and it doesn’t have any degree of excitement. But what it has in absolute spades is an easy tranquility. There is no winning or losing, just growing your plants until they’re big enough to be moved from the pot to the big garden in the sky.

Even if you’re not someone who commonly plays games, which, I don’t know why you’d be here, at a blog directed primarily at talking about games (but whatever), you might find some solace with Viridi.

Purging Paradise

I heard there’s trouble

Some of the images in this post show graphic violence.

In any industry, the notion that you shouldn’t fix what isn’t broken is prevalent. In games, this roughly translates to: if a formula works, use it. That’s why when one genre of games begins selling more, every company takes a shot at it.

Right now, it’s battle royale games. Actually, it’s been battle royale games for quite a while now. Even Tetris has taken a slice of the royale pie at this point.

But although companies like a formula, that’s not to say that a game won’t come along that tweaks the formula, subverts the formula, etc. And of course, sometimes you have the opposite end of the spectrum: games that reproduce more successful titles of a formula.

I’m talking copycats, copying everything but the title.

It’s hard to calculate what the public will resonate with–heck, even in this blog, I haven’t pinned down what I resonate with. I just know it when I experience it, but it’s not something I could easily explain, although I think I’m learning how to.

The point is, sometimes a company tries to bottle what they think makes a game sell, and build off that. The most blatant example I can think of is Far Cry 3 and Far Cry 4.

Right, they’re in the same series, so they’re given a free pass to be identical, but AH HAH I got you! They aren’t identical, they’re just nearly identical.

Alright, so, if you haven’t played either game, all you need to know is they both bear a striking similarity in story, and an almost complete similarity in gameplay and mechanics. Although both games take place in different continents, different islands, they both have an incredible propensity for balancing scenic beauty with chaotic bloodshed. Other games of the franchise might share the same features, but I haven’t found myself at those titles yet.

Far Cry 3 has a huge reputation for having one of the best villains in a game, possibly the best. Depends on who you ask. Vaas “Insanity” Montenegro, who won us all over with his attitude, speech, and instinctual violence. He kept players guessing with his unpredictability and felt like a worthy opponent.

But this isn’t a post about Far Cry 3. This is a post about the game that attempted to recapture what made Far Cry 3 great: Far Cry 4.

Inverse to Far Cry 3’s reputation, the fourth title of the Far Cry series is stuck resolutely in 3’s shadow. They tried to improve with 4, with another go at a memorable villain, a bigger map, a quieter protagonist, elephants, so on.

But what is Far Cry 4 known for besides annoying faction leaders? Kind of nothing.

No matter which faction leader you side with, the other will do their absolute best to guilt trip you into their way because they’re absolute babies

I could give you five of the most memorable moments of Far Cry 3 off the top of my head (four of which involve Vaas in some way), but with 4, I could only give one or two.

In fact, I have some complaints about the “improvements” and “streamlining” they did in 4.

So, why mention 4 at all? What does it have that isn’t done better and with more originality than its counterpart in 3?

Well, both games dabble in the mystical at some point. I’m talking other worlds inside other worlds. Sometimes the entry to these worlds is drug-fueled, sometimes it’s a haze, and sometimes it’s hinted that it’s more than that, crossing over into the religious.

In Far Cry 3, this element comes in the shape of protagonist Jason participating in various hallucinations across the island, occasionally completing an entire mission while totally high.

But in Far Cry 4? In Far Cry 4, we go to Shangri-La.

In our setting of the fictitious country of Kyrat, Shangri-La is a place of great religious meaning, a place that is essentially a realm of enlightenment. In the game’s lore, the goddess Kyra found Enlightenment in Shangri-La, and that, in addition to the fact that only the occasional monk will somehow find their way there, Shangri-La seems like it isn’t a place for human beings, but instead, gods.

You enter Shangri-La through torn scroll pieces called Thangkas, and upon entering the first time, you quickly realize something isn’t quite right with it.

It’s a paradise world, simultaneously beautiful and sick. Goats and deer with snowy white pelts lay in torn pieces across the grass, decapitated roughly. A garbled language angrily shouts at you from the distance, discordant and unpleasant to the ears.

It feels like something beautiful is dying here

As it turns out, Shangri-La has become infected with demons, who have attacked the creatures that resided there, as well as any human that found their way inside.

These human monks, called Seekers, are frozen in their final moments in Shangri-La

Kalinag, our protagonist only in Shangri-La, communicates in Hindi, although turning on subtitles reveals what he’s saying. He soon becomes focused on purging the evil from Shangri-La, and as the missions progress, becomes more driven and equipped to do so.

I’m talking cool knives, a bow that can slow time, and shooting more than one arrow at a time.

In case you thought I was lying with that “bow that can slow time” thing

The best part about taking out the trash of Shangri-La is that you don’t have to do it alone. An immortal white tiger with a death wish has deigned to help you. She’s even decked out in full regalia, in case you thought she wasn’t already cool enough.

“The Tiger had returned from the dead. Not to save my life, but to gain an ally.”
-Kalinag

This specific tiger is known throughout Kyrat as the Sky Tiger, a special white tiger with heavy alignments to religion and justice.

Initially, I was all set to say that Shangri-La itself was that one thing of Far Cry 4, in the sense that it set it apart from Far Cry 3 and was, on its own, a beautiful world caught in a turbulent time. However, it’s clear that this element can be narrowed down even further.

That’s why that one thing is the Sky Tiger. Not only is she my favorite NPC in the game, which might be a little sad considering she doesn’t even talk, but clearing out Shangri-La with the Sky Tiger is the most engaged I ever got with Far Cry 4. And that’s because of the tiger.

You and the tiger work in tandem. When the tiger crouches, she camouflages, which makes her the perfect tool for stealth attacks. You can actually point her to a specific enemy to take out quietly (or not quietly idk how you play).

Some of the heftier enemies require the two of you to work together

The tiger’s AI is smart enough to keep up to whatever pace you set, which helps her feel like your partner. She runs alongside you, matching your speed, and never feels unfocused or lost.

As dorky as this will sound, I always find myself talking to the tiger while we go through a Shangri-La mission. Things like, “You take the farthest one, I’ll take the closest one,” or, “You hold him down while I get him!” Even though none of what I say is transferring into the game, it’s not something I can help. The tiger feels like another player to me, an element equal to myself in terms of goals and prowess within the game.

I appreciate that Far Cry 4 could’ve made you complete the Shangri-La missions on your own, but instead gave you an ally who is actually useful and interesting.

Also, I really love animal companions.

But that aside, not only does Far Cry 4 earn a point for creating such a rich area within the world of Kyrat, but also for painting it full of detail, story, and a dutiful tiger ally.

The experience of Shangri-La couldn’t be duplicated successfully, and the haughty Sky Tiger couldn’t be recaptured in another time or game to the same effect. Together, the two create an atmosphere and adventure that defy imitation.

Alex Mercer is a parasitic cowboy change my mind

yeehaw

Some of the images in this post show graphic violence.

Prototype is the oldest game that’s ever existed in the history of the entire planet and it runs like a fat, sweaty dog. And it’s ugly, too. The color palette is dirty and dull.

Alex Mercer, our SuPeR cHaRiSmAtIc protagonist is an indestructible rhino that nobody, not even the army, likes.

And you won’t believe the amount of trouble it took me to raise the framerate to 30 from 15 on my PC. Oh, and there are weird, unforgiving difficulty spikes that come out of nowhere.

At low fps this game is headache-inducing and I can’t tell what’s happening at any time

Yo, and the story?! Don’t even get me started on it.

Strictly speaking, I know there’s a story to Prototype, I do. I’m generally aware of a story being present. However, everytime a cutscene ends, I can’t remember whatever it is I just watched.

And anything I do remember is completely baffling. Um, like, why does Alex’s ex-girlfriend just accept he’s alive and send him off with orders to capture a tank within 5 seconds of seeing him? That’s been really bugging me.

But for some reason, despite all this, Prototype is damn fun. It has no right to be so fun, but here it is. Trying its hardest to be serious and edgy and accidentally stumbling across genius.

Don’t worry about those guys. They’re totally fine.

If you haven’t played then I don’t know what to tell you. Usually, I’d write a little something here about the plot or characters, but I don’t have too much commentary on those. Alex Mercer is amusing in an ironic way, and he’s only fun to control thanks to his abilities and not much else.

Man, I’m usually not this critical about the game. Don’t get me wrong, I do like Prototype, but certain aspects of it like characters and story feel wasted in their mediocrity. If those parts could be perfected, or at least have a small amount of personality injected into them so they don’t feel so bland, the game would be so much better for it.

Sometimes the setting looks very bland, and nothing stands out except… is that a DC billboard?

So, I guess, if you haven’t played, Prototype takes place in a city where a virus outbreak has just begun spreading. People are becoming infected and slowly the city transforms into a chaotic, sick mess. Alex wakes up in a morgue with amnesia and freaky super powers that let him eat people and turn his fingers into knives.

I think where Prototype strives is in Alex’s abilities.

Definitely not his personality, but in the easy way he does impossible things. The way he casually runs up completely vertical walls, jumps over buildings, and punches pedestrians without the need of a combo or special move. Also, yeah, I know that last item wasn’t an impossible thing, but it’s still something Alex does automatically.

Anyways, you’re given this stuffed bag of goodies, aka superhuman abilities, and told to go nuts and have fun. The game actively takes a step back and lets you roam the world without nagging you about some story mission or side quest.

Alex may be a total lug, and amnesia may be an overdone cliche, but the sensation of running so fast that colliding into pedestrians kills them is totally fresh and new. Which is odd, considering how old the game is.

When “move it or lose it” becomes literal.

If I had to explain it without using game terminology, I’d say that Prototype is like setting a piece of paper on fire, where the fire is Alex Mercer and the paper is everything else. It’s an addicting experience.

And I never get bored of it. No matter how many times you pick on NPCs, they’re always freaking out. No matter how many times you use a disguise, the army is still completely baffled as to where Alex went.

WE’VE LOST SIGHT OF THE TARGET WHERE DID HE GO?????

And you can purchase more moves and upgrades, so it feels like Alex is always evolving to become more deadly, making that stagnant world around him easier and easier to dominate.

Truthfully, this means that despite some brief difficulty spikes, the game is relatively easy. When the objective is to clear an area, you can pretty much just sneeze in the clueless army’s direction to pass the mission.

Some people prefer a challenge, but personally, I don’t mind a trollingly easy experience every so often. Since Prototype feels like such a low effort game for me, it makes it perfect for relaxing or playing just for the fun of it.

Besides, I think this feeling contributes to the best part of the game.

When you’re playing Prototype, you feeling absolutely invincible, and it’s fantastic. Even for a game that hasn’t aged well, it somehow manages to make me feel like the sky’s the limit, like I can do anything in its world. It feels like a lot of games strive to trigger that feeling in the player, but I’ve never played one that compared with the feeling I get with Prototype.

That’s why I think that one thing about Prototype that makes it fun for me is that feeling of invincibility. It almost feels like you’re using cheat codes in vanilla gameplay; it’s insane. Alex is an absolute tank who could run a 200 meter dash in a half second and then, you know, sprint up a building like a freak.

Bonus: anything that’s not tied down is free game.

The civilians around you feel like paper. Land on them, they die. Punch them, they die. Trip over them, d e a d. Cars, buildings, heck, even tanks, all seem like child’s play.

And Alex doesn’t just have you covered with his strength and agility. He can also disguise himself. As funny as putting on a fake mustache would be, Alex instead consumes people until there’s nothing left and takes their form. So, when the spotlight is on you and you’re getting shot at, you can just whoop completely change your whole body and the trouble passes with minimum effort.

As Alex Mercer, you’re completely untouchable.

That’s a tank. A TANK. It’s supposed to stop Alex, not tickle him.

Add to that a completely open world (although it’s not as complex as modern open worlds) and Prototype elevates itself from drab amnesia story to who cares when I can punch a tank story.

Even now, when I’m feeling low or need an outlet for something, I get the craving to just mess around in Prototype for a few hours. I think it’s an excellent testament to the game that with all these new Triple-A releases I have burning a hole in my game library, I still return to Prototype even today.

(Also, Alex is a cowboy; he sounds just like one. And, umm, the boots? C’mon. The boots. Can’t forget about those.)

Pokemon Pokemon Pokemon Pokemon Pokemon Pokemon Pokemon Pokemon Pokemon

Crawl out of my screen and into my pocket

It’s time to Pokemon.

If you haven’t played any Pokemon games (which is insane, what are you doing here?) you capture creatures with different abilities as you journey throughout a region. As you train them and battle them, they get stronger and sometimes evolve and look more badass. Or in some cases, evolve and look so. so much worse.

I’m lookin’ at you, Kadabra.

The base of all Pokemon games, excluding GO, are roughly the same, like turn-based combat, movesets, storylines (“We gotta stop those evil trainers from taking over the world by using the legendary Pokemon of this region that has only been a myth until now!”) Oh, and there are legendaries, which you can only catch once a game (unless you cheat ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°) ), and they’re usually a slam dunk.

So that basically brings you up to speed on all the Pokemon games that have ever existed and ever will exist.

Pokemon is such a strange thing because it happened to occur at the right place and time to become a cultural phenomenon. I almost want to argue that public sentiments to video games are thawing thanks to Pokemon GO.

That summer when GO was huge felt like a fever dream. I remember driving home one night and turning on the radio, and the announcer was giving away rare Pokemon to people who called in.

Um, but okay. Back to the Pokemon games.

I gotta be upfront about something: I’m a Pokemon purist.

I wholeheartedly believe Pokemon get worse with every generation released. Long gone are the “good old days” when the Pokedex ended at Mewtwo and you could turn the TV on Saturday mornings to watch Ash and Pikachu blindly stagger through the Indigo League.

This is just my opinion and I will fight you if you think differently (kidding! I’m kidding).

Here’s a helpful diagram so my mother, who is the only person to read all my posts, can follow along. Hi, mom 🙂

Everyone started somewhere with Pokemon, and my start was with Pokemon Ruby, which is still one of my favorite Pokemon games to this day. Probably from the nostalgia, idk.

It’s been a rough journey, but presently I’ve gotten all the way to Pokemon Moon, although I skipped White/Black and White 2/Black 2. After writing that sentence, I now realize how confusing this would be to someone who doesn’t follow the Pokemon games. You’re probably better off not knowing at this point. Run while you can.

*It’s here. It’s right here. You’re so close. I’ll just slow you down, you have to leave me. You can make it if you just leave me behind.*

Pokemon feels like something I definitely should not poke with a stick, considering it’s a series rooted in many a childhood. People have strong feelings about it. I don’t want to ruffle feathers, but at the same time, I’m three posts behind my class quota and I wanna talk about Pokemon. There, that’s my justification.

One opinion we probably won’t agree on is that, to me, Pokemon’s jump to 3D was rough. Platinum, one of the last traditionally 2D games of the series, was an absolute gem, and they followed it up with Pokemon White/Black, the problem child. The pixeled dimension felt like it couldn’t make up its mind, blending the worst of both the 2D and 3D realms, which up to that point I thought was impossible.

A demonstration of how jumpy the camera is during Pokemon battles from the trailer.

This led to me giving away my copy of White after a week of trying to play it. Or Black. I can’t remember which one it was. It was a long time ago.

But I’ve come all the way up to Pokemon Moon for one reason, and that reason is Pokemon Y. And Pokemon X, by extension, I guess. They’re basically the same game.

If you haven’t played Pokemon Y, all you need to know is everything I had an issue with, 3D headaches, really dumb Pokemon designs, and everything else, were totally eclipsed by an essential element every game of the series had been needing. That one thing that made Pokemon Y (and X) so amazing and revolutionary is the ability to pet and touch your Pokemon. It was decades in the making, really, but oh my god. Finally, I could pet my beautiful, hardworking Pokemon.

I’ve never been happier than the moment I saw the introduction of Pokemon-Amie in the trailer.

It seems so simple: give players the ability of faux-tactile bonding between them and their Pokemon, but it’s a closer step to reality. I mean, I totally know Pokemon won’t become real suddenly, no matter how many birthday wishes I spent on that dream.

But that’s not the point of the game.

The game’s purpose is to drag you into that world, lose yourself in a winning streak, name your Pokemon cute names like Tom Jones and Booger, and feel like you’re a part of team. When I’m playing Pokemon, I completely lose the distinction between my real life and the game world. It’s like if the temperature of a pool was the exact same temperature of the air, so you didn’t notice when you’re slipping in and out of it.

This is a problem I face with a lot of games: being too aware of the distinction between myself and my character. When a game can’t draw me in to the point where I say “me” and “I” rather than “my character,” it’s easier for me to walk away from it. (Example: I need to get my guy some health versus I need some health).

But in Pokemon, it’s me. It doesn’t feel like a character, it feels like myself.

I think this is because the focus isn’t on making a believable or authentic character for players to control, but on the relationship between the player and their Pokemon. So, in all ways, the playable character is just a vessel used by you to interact with your Pokemon team.

That’s partly why the development of touch felt so important to me. If it’s me in the game, why can’t I directly interact with my Pokemon? Instead, I have to go through menus, I have to feed their 2D sprites Poffins, and if they’re cute enough, I can walk around with a little 5 pixel large version of them through a specialty park. You can compete in contests with your Pokemon, but you can’t pet or touch them.

And that was the extent of it for a long time.

Allowing you to finally, after 20-some odd years, touch the damn Pokemon is so beyond touch. It’s breaking the barrier between our reality and that fantasy world.

The ultimate magical killing machine that also ✧sparkles✧

Any way you want it, especially if what you want is more glitter (ノ°ο°)ノ☆･:*

Yeah, I guess mobile games exist, too.

Now, some people will argue that mobile games aren’t necessarily video games, and if they are, then they aren’t on the same level.

It is kind of hard to take mobile games seriously when they’re so littered with advertisements and 60 second long commercials that play between rounds, ironically advertising other mobile games. It almost feels lawless.

But the idea of ultimate mobility is incredibly appealing, so much so that many companies have given it their best shot. The Playstation Vita, for instance, which I always wanted and then eventually forgot existed until writing this line just now.

On a more successful note, the Nintendo Switch. I couldn’t tell you the number of times I’ve seen someone on campus playing on their Switch.

Oh wait, yes I can. Once. I’ve only seen it one time.

Personally, my childhood mobile device of choice was the Gameboy and eventually, the Nintendo DS systems. My rate of finishing games is already low, but they’re near 0% on the DS. I don’t really know why that is, just that I have a hard time immersing myself in a DS game versus a console or PC game. In my defense, there are exceptions. I’ve played through more than half of the Pokemon games, one of the Cooking Mamas, and the Happy Feet game they released for the first movie.

So someone smart thought, hey, why don’t we just make games for our phones? I mean, we’re already holding them all the time, why not just put the games on that?

Now we can play games e v e r y w h e r e. On the bus, in an elevator, at full volume during class, even places where we really shouldn’t. I couldn’t count the number of times I’ve seen people going into the bathroom holding their phone only to drop it on the floor while they’re on the toilet.

Oh wait, yes I can. THREE TIMES. GET IT TOGETHER, PEOPLE.

Three is too high.

But I can’t blame them. Mobile games can be incredibly addictive. Which, oh would you look at that, brings me back to the topic at hand: mobile games. I bet you didn’t think I could make it back here, did you? But I did. I allllways do.

Yeah, I’m not a huge fan of mobile games.

Not to pull a Shyamalan twist on y’all, but I only play two, count ’em, TWO, games on my phone, and one of them I hate so much. The other is Robot Unicorn Attack 2.

If you haven’t played RUA2 is an endless runner where you play, surprise, a Robot Unicorn. It’s about as fun as it sounds. You jump through the level, collecting fairies and teardrops, dashing through stars and giants, and attempting not to crash and die in a fiery blaze. You get three separate lives per play which are adorably called “wishes,” and your score from all three wishes are tallied at the end for a total sum.

It’s pretty repetitive, but then most endless runners are. Usually you have to play the same parts over and over, especially at the beginning of a run.

Probably the only reason why this game is even on my list is because (surprise!) it’s deeply rooted in an event from my youth.

Story time. I was talked into joining a student organization in high school that I had no interest in, and anytime I tried to leave, I was barraged by people pleading for me to stay. I had a jellyspine, so I stayed.

Eventually, we went to this huge event where tons of schools met up at a hotel for a whole weekend, participating in events and mingling. The daily schedules were really full.

It sounds nice, but to this day it was the worst weekend of my life. We were confined to our rooms, supervised 24/7. We had 2 beds and 4 people. I was 18 and couldn’t find anyone my age, only freshman that were trying to impress each other with Goat Simulator and edgy jokes. Over controlling volunteers dictated our access to elevators. One time we were let out early and tried to go back to our rooms, but the volunteer wouldn’t let us use the elevators and we had to wait 3 hours to go to our rooms. There were a few ceremonies I was told I didn’t have to attend, and then last minute it was decided attendance was mandatory. A roommate came onto me just enough to make me uncomfortable for the rest of the weekend. A rash formed over the backs of my hands from the hotel soap, growing in severity until I realized the cause on the second to last day.

So bored, grumpy, itchy me was left sitting in a room for hours on end with only my phone on hand. You can probably see where I’m going with this.

An artist’s rendering of what that might’ve looked like.

I had dabbled in RUA2 until then, but that weekend, I became a true aficionado.

Even when I was tired of playing the same map over and over again, and my butt was falling asleep from sitting in the same pose for too long, and my phone was dying, I had to keep playing. Half of it was because there was truly nothing better to do and it did well to distract from the horrible, clawing redness taking over my hands, but half was an intense desire.

And that desire, that one thing that made it all better, was the drive to craft the perfect unicorn specimen.

Let me explain. While playing, you collect teardrops which act as currency. You can spend these on unicorn modifications, from bodies to wings and everything in between. There are some really lame parts, but buried hidden between those are some really cool combinations. And my goal, which I happily met that weekend, was to collect all the best parts (which happened to be the most expensive ones) and create the most majestic, creepy, OP unicorn that has perhaps ever graced a phone.

I mean you *could* choose based on running speed. But you won’t. You choose by how COOL it looks :b

A nice bonus is that RUA2 isn’t completely obliterated by ads and the goals are very achievable without feeding money into it. It is a little grindy, but put on a good playlist and you’re basically set. Granted, I tend to like the grind, so it isn’t a detraction for me.

It’s actually really refreshing the amount of detail they put into the game. To me, mobile games tend to all feel like copies of one another, especially when it’s a popular trend like endless runner or city builders. The skeleton of all these games are the same, and more often than not, it feels like whoever made it is just slapping on a cheap coat of paint to sell adspace while you play.

RUA2 is perfect at this. Just by name alone, it claims a unique premise that makes anything like it a copycat. I mean, how many games can be about robot unicorns without stepping on their toes?

And then there’s the detail and uniqueness of the unicorns themselves. I was a little worried how footage from my tiny iPhone would transfer to a computer screen, but I have to say, it looks surprisingly amazing. I couldn’t count the number of times I’ve needlessly returned to the menu just because I want to see my unicorn close up, tossing its mane in the wind like a majestic… majestic…

Huh. Majestic something. Unicorn, I guess.

I love my unicorn. If I’m being completely objective, it’s probably the best one out there.

Maybe all these reasons are why RUA2 is one of the few mobile games I play.

And now, gaze upon my unicorn, Princess Sparkledeath, in splendor. Kneel to her glory.

Also yeah, I know my unicorn doesn’t have wings. I’m not about that. Flying is the coward’s way out.

cover image source: Robot Unicorn Attack 2 Trailer for iPhone & iPad

The power of infinite birds

And Elizabeth is there too, I guess

Some of the images in this post show graphic violence.

When I was a lil gaming tot I always wanted to play Bioshock.

However, as previously mentioned, I’m not a big participant of the horror genre, so I seemed doomed to live a life without it. The trailer gave me nightmares, to the point where I couldn’t walk around the house without feeling an intense fear that a Big Daddy would be waiting for me around the corner.

You’re walking down the street when this guy blocks your path. What do you do?

Everything about the advertised game was traumatizing, from stabbing yourself with needles, to the BEES BEES EVERYWHERE, and the Big Daddy drilling a hole through the Splicer’s shielding hand.

But I’m not really going to get into Bioshock 1 right now, because spoiler: I did eventually play it, and plan on getting into deeper detail with it down here in the deep blue sea. Eventually.

All you need to know, if you didn’t already, is that Bioshock ≠ Bioshock Infinite. Bioshock is claustrophobic, dark, and tension-filled. You crawl around a drowning city full of screaming mutants going through withdrawal and it’s extra dark and extra spook and Infinite is infinitely not that. In comparison, Infinite is downright cheery.

As someone who wanted to play Bioshock but couldn’t, I was ecstatic when Infinite was announced. Finally, a Bioshock for me (a coward), with all the previously terrifying elements replaced with a clear blue sky.

So. If you haven’t played Bioshock Infinite takes place in Columbia, a city that floats above the clouds. Super religiously driven, chock-full of archaic practices and unusual hero worship, Columbia undergoes rapid change as a civil war breaks out. And Elizabeth is there too.

We like Elizabeth, she’s doing a great job

The Vigor system (see: magic) paired with a small arsenal of guns makes for satisfying combat, although I wouldn’t say it’s my favorite combat system out there.

Storywise, Infinite is full of memorable moments. I’ve actually written an entire essay about the tonal shift of the game when Booker arrives at the raffle. But, after playing the game once or twice, you kind of already know what happens. The game is so compact and the story is so streamlined that those memorable moments are never really forgotten, so you can never fully recreate that feeling you got when you experienced something for the first time.

This is probably the biggest drawback to a good, short game. The fact that it’s so impactful and compact means everything is purposeful. There are fewer glitches, more detail put into areas, characters, weapons, everything. I don’t think it’s a stretch to say shorter games are made with a more evident amount of love.

Horizon Zero Dawn interaction (average ~49 hrs to complete)
Bioshock Infinite interaction (average ~14 hrs to complete)

But after my first playthrough, when I knew everything that was gonna happen before it happened, there was one thing that helped me keep coming back.

The birds.

That one thing that makes Bioshock Infinite so unique to me is the Vigor ability that lets you direct a murder of crows at people to distract them from shooting at you. I used it exclusively for 1.5 of my playthroughs.

And then I stopped being so shy about it and started branching out, and turns out, there isn’t just a bird Vigor; there’s eight Vigors, all with unique abilities and effects.

But still, the best is the Murder of Crows, and I’m stuck in the precarious pickle of trying to explain why that is to people when I don’t know why myself.

Likely, it’s a combination of things: the way feathers sprout on Booker’s hand, how his nails grow long and black, accompanied by the dizzying sound of a hundred birds screaming their subservience as you beckon them out of the sky and point the way.

The effect of Murder of Crows on Booker’s hand

Somehow, the configuration of my brain is just enough that the combination of these elements tickles it in just the right way, leading to my bias. It’s an aspect of human opinion that is inexplicable and embarrassing to mention out loud.

Although, I think my opinion is due to change the next time I take on Infinite. Each Vigor is actually really fun to unleash on people, and plus, you can use them in tandem with each other. Meaning you can set crows on fire or give them a little burst of electricity before siccing them on people. So already, my notion that nothing can beat birds has been trumped by electric birds that are also on fire.

If you squint, you might be able to see a little bit of electricity in this gif

In fact, I already feel differently about this blog post, but it felt wrong to change my mind so quickly because for a long time, Murder of Crows was integral to my playstyle. And it probably seems stupid to read, believe me, it feels even stupider to write, but it’s true. Sadly.

But I think we can take something out of all this. It’s reasonable to assume that Murder of Crows, despite the amount of elbow grease gone into making it work, wasn’t intended to be That One Thing that keeps players coming back. And the fact that it did for at least one person tells me that Bioshock Infinite is a game of details, which is a very good game to be.

Even when we play those big, huge, long titles, sometimes it’s the smaller details that stick with us the most. I’ll watch a whole movie for just one scene (Kingsmen Freebird fight, for example), or play a whole game just for one interaction or moment (Roxas’s forlorn finality in saying, “Looks like my summer vacation is… over,” in Kingdom Hearts 2). Even the severity of a wormlike demonic sickness in Princess Mononoke will run through my mind when I see a sunny patch of green grass with a blue sky in the background.

The intense, squirming frenzy of this sickness projects the rage of the beast

Sometimes unintended details drive us to action. Heck, I bought a container of unicorns mostly because their little horns were all bent and it looked adorable. Also, they were pink unicorns. How could I not buy them?

You may think these unicorns are identical, but you’d be wrong. The one of the left is Jazz and the one on the right is Spinesnapper.

And it’s not that these little things are what make the media (and unicorn) great; they’re symbolic of the work as a whole and they stick with us. They’re small enough to tunnel in the folds of our brains and live in there for maybe forever. Who knows.

Sometimes they completely overtake the game in our minds. Does Murder of Crows completely change Infinite? No, no it does not. Does it change my experience? Well, yeah. For some reason that’s not entirely logical or explicable, it does.

And to me, it means Infinite is a good game, even on the minute level of one weapon in the player’s arsenal.

More deserts except they’re online this time

Don’t play Black Desert Online* it’s for your own good

It’s an enjoyable experience, but it’s also an experience that rapidly draws you in until 24 hour days pass quicker than minutes and your real life, separate from the game, fizzles out into white noise. Distracting, totally unnecessary, white noise.

I only know two kinds of people that play Black Desert Online: either they tried it for a week and dropped it, or they became totally obsessed and shove BDO into every facet of their waking life and spend hundreds of dollars on in-game items. I commonly “anti-recommend” it, warning people away from its dangerous hold.

But I guess overall it’s good, or else I wouldn’t be writing about it right now.

If you haven’t played BDO, it’s an MMO where a bunch of people go online and loiter. It’s kind of a mess, really. I haven’t played a lot of MMOs, just BDO and Wizard1o1, but it feels like a trend of the genre to be a chaotic mess. Also, there’s always someone better than you, you never have any idea what other players are talking about, and big towns are laggy.

BDO has some elements that I’ve been led to believe make it unique from other MMOs, like a really comprehensive AFK system, soft level caps, and a super in-depth character creation, but I don’t really care about those elements. When I was making a list of my favorite things about the game, there were really only two things on that list, and I found that for once, I couldn’t narrow it down to just one.

An exclusive, behind-the-scenes look at my master list

So we have a tie! Here on Those Two Things, that blog about the two elements of a video game that make it unique and one of my favorites. Yeah, I changed the name of the blog as you were reading this. Don’t check the header or URL, just take my word for it.

Usually, I wouldn’t be about changing the rules of something so basic (see: 2 ≠ 1), but in this case, I decided to appeal to the grand jury of myself and allow it just this once, because the two elements feel like opposite sides of the same coin.

Let’s talk about the first element that makes BDO one of my favorite games, and this is a little abstract, so let me paint a picture.

Do you remember the last time you went on a picnic? Personally, I can’t.

But I can remember the feeling so clearly. Sitting on a small threadbare blanket older than I am, fighting the itch of the grass tickling my bare ankles as ants launch an assault on the PB&Js we packed. The ground is hard under the blanket and the wind keeps blowing my hair straight into my mouth. It’s uncomfortable, but peaceful.

The wind pushes through the tree branches, scattering a sprinkle of little leaves over our coleslaw. There is a euphony of distant noises, as mothers call to their kids from the nearby playground and dogs bark excitedly over the open grassy field. A stone’s throw away is a busy intersection, a parking lot, a line of glimmering cars exuding heat and impatience, a reminder of the life you’re taking temporary reprieve from.

You’ve successfully carved out a place of solace where no one is paying your lazy butt any notice.

That’s one of the elements of BDO that I like the most. Those isolated places that feel so real and peaceful. When I’m sitting there in the game, I feel like I’m really there, soaking up the ambiance and slight melancholy of the “girl hiding in the corner of the party” syndrome.

And there’s an abundance of them. You could park your butt anywhere slightly out-of-the-way and feel the effect. Spots where you can sit and listen to the sound effects of water and wind blowing through the 0’s and 1’s. It’s so relaxing, at least until someone runs up and PKs you.

It seemed like nobody was using the diving board during the summer event

But wait, there’s more! This is a two-for-one game.

The other element that keeps me comin’ back to BDO is… the combat.

It ticks all the boxes for me: there’s a learning curve, a large move set, and it’s fast. So, you know, feeling peaceful and lying around is cool and all, but sometimes you just gotta

So much is happening, sometimes you can’t even see yourself. It’s total mayhem and if you’re not watching your health bar, it could lead to a very embarrassing death. I don’t wanna brag, but I’ve died a lot. I’ve spent so many hours grinding in this game, I had to make my own playlist for the occasion.

I daresay no other playlist could compete

It might seem a paltry thing behind the poetics of lonely places, but it’s completely undeniable that the combat feels downright good. The hits are satisfying, the controls feel tight, and moves look cool.

And, once you reach level 56, you “Awaken,” which unlocks a new weapon and crazy powerful moves. The difference between someone who’s Awakened and someone who hasn’t is staggering, and Awakening reprieves the monotony of the game.

There’s no doubt that when your moves are hitting and you’ve gotten into the rhythm of the combat, you feel absolutely powerful. At least until someone runs up and PKs you.

Admittedly, it’s a little harder to make whacking things with sharp objects sound as lovely as picnics and a nice nap, but the sensation of satisfiable combat is so difficult to put into equally satisfiable words. It’s more of a visceral feeling, and if it’s made right, you find yourself craving it even when you’re away from the game.

As for BDO, I absolutely love that there are two wildly different experiences side-by-side in the same game. I feel like there’s a duality to these two elements: you can sit back and relax somewhere calm, or you can run around like a madman and swing a sword around. Two opposites, that together, make the game something to return to.

Hopefully not too often. I just reclaimed my life from BDO, I don’t want to repeat the process again for at least another six months.

*Irresponsibly :b

Whales, rats, assassins

and a murder most foul!

I want to take you somewhere.

To Victorian-influenced streets, broken and crumbling, decorated with a heavy patrol of hungry guards and rats. Debris forms hidden coves and secret caches left behind from families long fled. Homey pubs, intricate brothels, and upper-class estates cling to a dying city.

A floating world, dreamlike and separate from the rest, watches on impassively.

People are murderous and hungry in their washed-out tones and dirty clothes, and there’s a dark thread of otherworldliness as people are driven mad by an outside touch. It should be an ugly world by all accounts, but it’s too deep and resonant to condemn. Everything, even in its state of sickness, is infinitely more vibrant than the world you live in now.

Just a regular old street in Dunwall (from the gameplay trailer)

It may be clear by now that I have an intense appreciation and possibly bias towards Dishonored. Even so, I stand by the opinion that Dishonored is downright poetic.

If you haven’t played: Dishonored is a stealth game centered around a seemingly straightforward revenge plot. I think the entire game was marketed on the revenge thing, although there’s a little more nuance to it than that.

Personally, I enjoy the simplicity of the goal. It feels like more often than not, books, movies, and games are under the impression that a highly complex plot will be more interesting and engaging to an audience. Usually, I can’t keep up and get bored, so a plot like Dishonored’s feels refined in a way. As if they cut away all the fat and focused in on what mattered.

Something about the game–and I haven’t figured out what it is yet–is tied to the season. For some reason, when the weather starts to turn cold, around October/November, I have a recurring desire to return to the game. It’s been that way since high school (about 5 years ago at the time of writing this). Logic can’t explain it. I’m like a bird returning to the place it was born with that strange internal compass that boggles scientists.

The wild cuckoo baffled by its own internal compass

I’ve never thought about it until now, but I guess I have a strong personal connection to this game. It feels strange to realize literally as I’m writing this.

But nobody cares about that. Back to the summary. If you haven’t played: you play as Corvo Attano, mute protagonist and royal protector to the Empress and her daughter, Emily. I’m pretty sure the trailer spoils what happens but I won’t be as cruel. No, no, no, instead I’ll just link to the trailers. That’s waaay better.

Corvo has a perfect life and nothing bad could *ever* happen to him

It’s hard to begin talking about Dishonored because I don’t know where to start. There’s honestly so much in this game that makes it fantastic and it’s legitimately one of my favorites. I feel like I say that for every game, but it’s true. There are so many elements that influence me I’d need a book, not a blog post, to talk about them until I’m satisfied.

But, I could pick out a favorite. If I absolutely had to pick out one of the elements of Dishonored that makes it amazing and unique (which I do), the choice would be easy.

But there are levels to it, so I have to do the whole “there’s a frog on a bump on a log in a hole in the bottom of the sea” thing.

We have our hero Corvo, who lives in Dunwall. And sometimes when Corvo goes to sleep, he goes to a dream world, where water falls up and buildings are caught suspended in a strange gravity. And in this dream place, there’s a man. This man’s name is The Outsider and he is my favorite thing about Dishonored.

I worked very hard on this diagram, meant to complicate things further

The Outsider is never fully explained in the first game. When you first meet him, you actually don’t know who or what he is. It’s only through your eventual journey through Dunwall that you see his influence: shrines hidden in swathes of purple, people who can teleport and cast spells, and a religious order who advocate against his supposed existence and worshippers.

The Outsider likes to check up on you, but he can only appear in his realm or at shrines

Let’s talk about The Outsider, by which I mean let me talk about The Outsider. You just sit back and give me moral support.

The Outsider is a constant in his own realm, watching the tinkerings of humanity for his own amusement. He’s not good or evil, he’s just present in a behind-the-scenes kind of way. The events of Dishonored wouldn’t have happened if he hadn’t intervened, and the gameplay wouldn’t be as fun without his gifted powers. The game would be so different in his absence.

I think what I find most appealing about The Outsider is that he’s the core of the poetic nature of Dishonored. He’s a bored god, amused by the antics of his select humans and picking favorites out of the most “interesting” ones.

The way he speaks, with detached tones and careful word choice, makes him feel like a weirdo at first. But the casual reminders of how old and omnipresent he is reminds you that he hasn’t been human for a long time, if ever. A leviathan in human clothing, a miasma of chaotic force, or a big rat wearing sunglasses; I don’t really know what he is. The game never feels compelled to answer that question, and I love that. Maybe it’s the sense of mystery that keeps me spellbound.

The Outsider in The Tales from Dunwall Ep.2, offering candy to children and being generally creepy

Dishonored is an amazing game. I’m always saddened when I talk to someone who hasn’t played it because it’s unlikely they ever will. Its time in the spotlight is long over and I doubt it’s collecting many new players. It’s just the nature of games: everything keeps moving, and newer, better titles release to demand your attention. It’s a shame.

I’d really like if more came from the Dishonored franchise, even in the form of the written word or more animated shorts.

As an advertising campaign, a series of animated shorts were made exploring Dunwall. You should check them out.

The city of Dunwall is an amazing place, even rotted by the plague, and I really think you should visit it. You should visit The Outsider’s realm, too.

I’m sure he’d like that.

(I wanted to note that I haven’t played Dishonored 2 or Dishonored 1 DLC yet. I bought everything, but it’s been sitting untouched in my Steam library for a few months. They changed The Outsider’s voice actor and that’s a huge reason why I’m dragging my feet on playing the new stuff.)

She talks in stereo

She sounds so good to me

I don’t know why it’s called Oxenfree. I really don’t. There aren’t even any oxen.

If you haven’t played it: I’d really recommend playing it. It’s hard to justify not trying it out. Oxenfree is short, but completely packed with rich dialogue and characters who feel real. It puts so much care into story and interactions, and so much of it is story and interactions, that I’d rather recommend playing than spoiling anything.

I toiled over how to present this, you know. I went into the game blind and the introduction of–well, I’ve already spoiled it. I’ve already spoiled that there aren’t any oxen in the game. It’s a total scandal.

Simply put, that one thing that makes Oxenfree one of my favorites is an element I wasn’t aware of from the get-go. I wouldn’t say it’s a spoiler exactly, considering it’s written on the Steam page, but the reveal is much better if you don’t know what’s coming. Thus, I recommend playing the first 20 minutes? 30 minutes? That should be enough time to see what I’m talking about.

To talk about Oxenfree, I want to not talk about Oxenfree. I want to talk about horror movies.

I have a complicated relationship with horror movies. I’m not a huge fan in practice, but I like it in theory. I tried to watch Evil Dead with a friend, tapped out a quarter way through, and scoured the wiki page to sate my curiosity. Repeat every year with a different horror movie. So on paper, yes I’m a horror fan. But put it on the screen and no, no I am not. I wish I could be, but I can’t.

So when I say certain ideas or designs anchored in horror are inspiring and transcendent of the genre, I’m speaking as someone who can’t handle or stomach the genre.

I’m talking about the panic-inducing theme song of Jaws; the tock sound Charlie makes to accentuate the stilted, uneasy tone of Hereditary; a little girl saying, “They’re here,” in a movie I have no plans of seeing anytime soon, Poltergeist (guys, it’s cursed, I can’t watch it, it’s cursed). These design choices, coincidentally all auditory, can be recognizable even by people who don’t watch horror movies.

I sound like I’m building up Oxenfree to be this massive horror game hit, but I wouldn’t actually class it as horror. I’m just saying that the game dips a toe in horror every once in a while, and when it does, it’s amazing.

Just to be safe, consider everything from this point on to be a spoiler.

The horror element that transcends the game, that one thing that makes it amazing, is The Sunken. The Sunken is/are an amalgam of ghosts that died in a submarine wreck, a total of 97 people fused into one being. They aren’t a constant presence in the game, but every once in a while they’ll come and steal the show.

It’s hard to tell how your exchanges with them will go or when they’ll show up. The thing that really gets me is how they talk, which might sound weird if you haven’t played the game or don’t remember. Their voices fantastically convey a numb, uncaring tone, as well as the sheer number of people who comprise the entity.

Radio is a huge part of the game and essential for The Sunken to communicate. Something about the radio draws them out in all their triangular glory, and they use it as a voicebox to demand things of you. There’s nothing I like more than listening to them speak but boy, does it make it hard to sleep at night.

Of course, they have other tricks. Things that span multiple playthroughs of the game, and they know you’ll keep coming back.

They talk about if “Leave. Possible.” Or, “Another round,” at the beginning of a playthrough. I don’t remember that happening the first time I played. Do they know they’re in a game?

Granted, I’ve only played twice as of writing this, but I swear different things happened. There were new scenes that I didn’t remember and weird images that would flash across the screen rapidly, both of which scared the pants off of me. But at that point, I was compelled to replay it.

As might be expected, I have a complicated relationship with Oxenfree. I’ve never played another game like it yet although they probably exist. But there is nothing that I’ve met that can come close to The Sunken. The Sunken aren’t just compelling horror antagonists or spooky ghosts–they’re something that once you see and hear, you don’t forget.