Changed my mind. I'm done with games journalism. All I really want to write are poo poo jokes.
Good bye.
Sunday, August 12, 2012
Saturday, August 11, 2012
Three More Games
"I won't be a games journalist." Yeah, that might be too strong. I suspect that there may be non-review jobs.
"I suspect"? Well...that probably means that there aren't.
OK. I'm going to review three more games and make a final decision over that question: Do I care about writing reviews?
Right now I think the answer is no. And if that answer is "no," I will just write humor, satire, and short stories, and submit the humor to games sites that want them.
"I suspect"? Well...that probably means that there aren't.
OK. I'm going to review three more games and make a final decision over that question: Do I care about writing reviews?
Right now I think the answer is no. And if that answer is "no," I will just write humor, satire, and short stories, and submit the humor to games sites that want them.
Thursday, August 9, 2012
A Good Review
Okay, I'm postponing the end of serious posts.
I have decided not to stop trying to be a games journalist, for now.
Again, my issue is the reviews. So far I have not enjoyed writing them. I feel like my reviews of games have been a waste of the hypothetical readers' time, that they've been either unfunny or too long. And there's nothing I can do about the funny part; the average game (that I have played) has been too good to review humorously. [Yatzhee can review even good games humorously because of his drawings which double opportunities for humor.]
I'm not ready to abandon games journalism yet because I think I've found a structure for the typical game review, one which will at least make the "boring" reviews concise and thus useful to the reader.
The structure goes like this:
1) A hook to entice the reader for the coming luscious parts.
2) An explanation of what the game's about: what type of game it is and what the player's role is and what makes the game unique.
3) The things that make the game not as good as it should be.
4) Conclusion; overall opinion of the game and a sexy last sentence.
The better the game, the shorter the review. The worse the game, the longer and funnier the review.
If I can master this format, I think I can grow to like review-writing. But if that doesn't happen, then I'm done with games journalism. And if this divorce occurs, I'm going 100% for humor-writing.
I have decided not to stop trying to be a games journalist, for now.
Again, my issue is the reviews. So far I have not enjoyed writing them. I feel like my reviews of games have been a waste of the hypothetical readers' time, that they've been either unfunny or too long. And there's nothing I can do about the funny part; the average game (that I have played) has been too good to review humorously. [Yatzhee can review even good games humorously because of his drawings which double opportunities for humor.]
I'm not ready to abandon games journalism yet because I think I've found a structure for the typical game review, one which will at least make the "boring" reviews concise and thus useful to the reader.
The structure goes like this:
1) A hook to entice the reader for the coming luscious parts.
2) An explanation of what the game's about: what type of game it is and what the player's role is and what makes the game unique.
3) The things that make the game not as good as it should be.
4) Conclusion; overall opinion of the game and a sexy last sentence.
The better the game, the shorter the review. The worse the game, the longer and funnier the review.
If I can master this format, I think I can grow to like review-writing. But if that doesn't happen, then I'm done with games journalism. And if this divorce occurs, I'm going 100% for humor-writing.
Wednesday, August 8, 2012
Hold My Horses!
You know what? Before I abandon serious writing (i.e. games reviews), I should do some writing for an actual website.
Not to say that the amazing Stage-Zer0 is not an actual website. It is! You have to find it on the Internet.
But no one reads Stage-Zer0 (no offense).
Perhaps the reason I'm losing feelings for reviews-writing is that no one reads my reviews.
So, I'm going to fix that. I'm going to write for websites. Starting when I get back from Denmark.
Until then, I'll be here.
Tuesday, August 7, 2012
DayZ Coop Day Last and Final
NO MOAR!
Upon joining a server, my friend told me that he had been murdered (back on the southern coast, of all places). So he respawned (on the east coast of all places), and agreed to meet me in Berezino, the big city on that coast.
Long story short, he got there first, climbed a ladder to snipe zombies, got hit by a zombie that climbed that ladder, fell through the railing, and broke his legs and died (again). I uninstalled the game.
Upon joining a server, my friend told me that he had been murdered (back on the southern coast, of all places). So he respawned (on the east coast of all places), and agreed to meet me in Berezino, the big city on that coast.
Long story short, he got there first, climbed a ladder to snipe zombies, got hit by a zombie that climbed that ladder, fell through the railing, and broke his legs and died (again). I uninstalled the game.
THE END
Monday, August 6, 2012
DayZ Conclusions
Message to my friend:
Dale! I deleted Arma II (AKA DayZ). I couldn't stand how broken it was and how there was no end game. All you do in DayZ is spawn, sneak around zombies to collect items to not die, and work with your friends to hunt other players. Maybe helicopter-restoring occurs.
The length of time you survive and the people and zombies you kill do not get saved anywhere. DayZ's creator Dean Hall says, in a future game (which won't be the mod) he would like to add base-building. Until that game comes out, I feel like DayZ mostly wastes the player's time. And it's buggy as hell. My friend kept getting knocked through railings (which is physically impossible) and thus falling to his leg-breaking deaths. My ammo mysteriously disappeared upon joining another server once. Bugs like these are bad.
At the same time, I'm excited to see the games that this mod will create.
Dale! I deleted Arma II (AKA DayZ). I couldn't stand how broken it was and how there was no end game. All you do in DayZ is spawn, sneak around zombies to collect items to not die, and work with your friends to hunt other players. Maybe helicopter-restoring occurs.
The length of time you survive and the people and zombies you kill do not get saved anywhere. DayZ's creator Dean Hall says, in a future game (which won't be the mod) he would like to add base-building. Until that game comes out, I feel like DayZ mostly wastes the player's time. And it's buggy as hell. My friend kept getting knocked through railings (which is physically impossible) and thus falling to his leg-breaking deaths. My ammo mysteriously disappeared upon joining another server once. Bugs like these are bad.
At the same time, I'm excited to see the games that this mod will create.
Tribes: Ascend (Review) 2nd Opinion
I, like you, read Paul's review of Tribes: Ascend, downloaded the game, and was convinced Paul is dumb as bricks.
Here's the make-up Stage-Zer0 review:
Tribes: Ascend is a team vs. team, PC shooter (played in the first or third person, depending on your preference) in which you zoom across maps at 100-200+ miles per hour. This speeding is done via the game's unique "skiing" mechanic. At least, that's what the game calls it; I like to think of it more as ice skating with guns. You hold down spacebar and the laws of physics glide you across the ground as if there's no friction. And there's still gravity, so what you'll want to do to go fast is jet pack into the sky or to the top of a hill, and "ski" down the hill. When you're skiing brings you to an incline up a hill, jet pack to the top (maintaining your speed) and ski down the new hill, making you go ever faster than before.
The game is free-to-play, although you can unlock tools and weapons with XP you gain in matches or with cash. This is not what prevents the game from being great.
The problem with the game is the auto-balance. It doesn't occur enough. And I'm not even sure it works. What this failure does is makes most matches one-sided, ski-fests. You might as well play waltz in the background.
And yes, this makes the game a waste of your money and, if you continue to play it after learning the new mechanics, a waste of your time.
Here's the make-up Stage-Zer0 review:
Tribes: Ascend is a team vs. team, PC shooter (played in the first or third person, depending on your preference) in which you zoom across maps at 100-200+ miles per hour. This speeding is done via the game's unique "skiing" mechanic. At least, that's what the game calls it; I like to think of it more as ice skating with guns. You hold down spacebar and the laws of physics glide you across the ground as if there's no friction. And there's still gravity, so what you'll want to do to go fast is jet pack into the sky or to the top of a hill, and "ski" down the hill. When you're skiing brings you to an incline up a hill, jet pack to the top (maintaining your speed) and ski down the new hill, making you go ever faster than before.
The game is free-to-play, although you can unlock tools and weapons with XP you gain in matches or with cash. This is not what prevents the game from being great.
The problem with the game is the auto-balance. It doesn't occur enough. And I'm not even sure it works. What this failure does is makes most matches one-sided, ski-fests. You might as well play waltz in the background.
And yes, this makes the game a waste of your money and, if you continue to play it after learning the new mechanics, a waste of your time.
DayZ Days 4 and 5
Day 4
My Mormon friend and I decided to meet outside of Cherno. But to make things less suicidal we joined a mostly vacant server. Perhaps it was this that convinced my friend to run through that dangerous capitol city. Or maybe it was because I asked him to and he trusted me for some reason.
Anywho, he got everything he ever wanted in twenty minutes in that city, and finally he liked DayZ. I reminded him that, in the five hours he played before, he didn't get as much as he just did now.
After this we trekked northeast, away from the city, for half an hour, traversing a sixth of the map. In a forest we called it a night. It was nighttime in that server.
Day 5
His friends weren't online today. So we changed plans; instead of heading to the east coast where they were trying to restore a UH-1 helicopter, we decided to head towards the center of the map, where the town Stary Sober lay, where a small military post was, where military stuff been?
During our trek there, I told him about how the military post would almost certainly hide a bandit, just waiting for players.
We stopped at a castle. It was nice.
As we neared Stary Sober, I re-realized how big the town was. For one thing, it had a water tower. Towns with water towers usually mean big towns. And big towns in zombie apocalypses have lots of zombies (See? This game does teach useful things).
We began crawling into the town. And then, for whatever reason, a zombie attacked us. We shot it to death. And then ten zombies attacked my Mormon! I killed them (just the zombies), and my Mormon friend went unconcious (in the game). I revived and bandaged him. Then he said something like, "My blood is at 4,000, and I'm seeing black and white." So I gave him my one blood bag, restoring him to full health (12,000).
We attempted to cross the dirt road. For whatever reason related to us standing straight up in the middle of the day with zombies roaming the place, we got attacked by two zombies stumbling from town. After shooting them, twelve zombies attacked! And I nearly died, my AK-74 (tiny edition) felling most of them. My health was at 1,800. The screen was black and white and blurry and blind.
"So much for sneaking into the town and not raising the suspicion level of nearby players." We said.
We sneaked (and by "sneaked" I mean "attracted the attention of a zombie," which failed to follow us up the stairs) up to the second floor of this giant, rusty, metal warehouse. It was my idea. I forgot my friend's tall-buildings curse.
He fell from the second floor and broke his legs.
He bandaged himself, but he was now unable to walk. Crawling became his way. Not the worst thing really, we didn't want anymore zombie attention. And to make him feel better I lied to him by saying that the military camp might have morphene (lying is important). As we neared the military camp - which comprised fifteen of those half-cylinder-shaped, green tents - we were attacked by a horde of zombies. My health, which was at 1,800, went to -300; so I died. My friend survived, however. "Hey Paul! The zombies are eating your body! Lol!" Not that I felt bad about that, because there was not going to be morphine in that camp. "PAUL! I found morphine! I found morphine! And there's just one!"
He fixed his bones and then entered a forest and left the server.
I restarted on the southern coast, determined to go back to that town and get my avatar as loaded as his.
My respawn was near the southern airport. I sneaked into a medical military camp, which was surrounded by barbwire and filled with zombie soldiers. They attacked me, of course, so I climbed a tower. When they got bored of me I climbed down and found the bodies of two players, which were loaded. I took an AK-47 and some ammo. I got out of the camp and ran across the airfield. There was an unarmed player on the runway, running away from me in jubilant fear. I told him he didn't need to fear me but that if he followed me I would kill him.
Once in the forest north of the airfield, I sneaked along the airport to where the control tower was, knowing there would be military loot in it. The tower was surrounded by someone's barbwire. But they didn't barbwire off the ladder. Blah blah blah blah blah.
Halfway to Stary Sober the server crashed. I joined another server and discovered that all my ammo was gone. "Servers" they're called. Ha.
So I sneaked into Stary Sober and attracted NO ZOMBIES (I now suspect that Mormons are zombie magnets). I even got a new gun (an AK-74), with ammo. I went to some bushes in an open field, lay down, and logged out.
My Mormon friend and I decided to meet outside of Cherno. But to make things less suicidal we joined a mostly vacant server. Perhaps it was this that convinced my friend to run through that dangerous capitol city. Or maybe it was because I asked him to and he trusted me for some reason.
Anywho, he got everything he ever wanted in twenty minutes in that city, and finally he liked DayZ. I reminded him that, in the five hours he played before, he didn't get as much as he just did now.
After this we trekked northeast, away from the city, for half an hour, traversing a sixth of the map. In a forest we called it a night. It was nighttime in that server.
Day 5
His friends weren't online today. So we changed plans; instead of heading to the east coast where they were trying to restore a UH-1 helicopter, we decided to head towards the center of the map, where the town Stary Sober lay, where a small military post was, where military stuff been?
During our trek there, I told him about how the military post would almost certainly hide a bandit, just waiting for players.
We stopped at a castle. It was nice.
As we neared Stary Sober, I re-realized how big the town was. For one thing, it had a water tower. Towns with water towers usually mean big towns. And big towns in zombie apocalypses have lots of zombies (See? This game does teach useful things).
We began crawling into the town. And then, for whatever reason, a zombie attacked us. We shot it to death. And then ten zombies attacked my Mormon! I killed them (just the zombies), and my Mormon friend went unconcious (in the game). I revived and bandaged him. Then he said something like, "My blood is at 4,000, and I'm seeing black and white." So I gave him my one blood bag, restoring him to full health (12,000).
We attempted to cross the dirt road. For whatever reason related to us standing straight up in the middle of the day with zombies roaming the place, we got attacked by two zombies stumbling from town. After shooting them, twelve zombies attacked! And I nearly died, my AK-74 (tiny edition) felling most of them. My health was at 1,800. The screen was black and white and blurry and blind.
"So much for sneaking into the town and not raising the suspicion level of nearby players." We said.
We sneaked (and by "sneaked" I mean "attracted the attention of a zombie," which failed to follow us up the stairs) up to the second floor of this giant, rusty, metal warehouse. It was my idea. I forgot my friend's tall-buildings curse.
He fell from the second floor and broke his legs.
He bandaged himself, but he was now unable to walk. Crawling became his way. Not the worst thing really, we didn't want anymore zombie attention. And to make him feel better I lied to him by saying that the military camp might have morphene (lying is important). As we neared the military camp - which comprised fifteen of those half-cylinder-shaped, green tents - we were attacked by a horde of zombies. My health, which was at 1,800, went to -300; so I died. My friend survived, however. "Hey Paul! The zombies are eating your body! Lol!" Not that I felt bad about that, because there was not going to be morphine in that camp. "PAUL! I found morphine! I found morphine! And there's just one!"
He fixed his bones and then entered a forest and left the server.
I restarted on the southern coast, determined to go back to that town and get my avatar as loaded as his.
My respawn was near the southern airport. I sneaked into a medical military camp, which was surrounded by barbwire and filled with zombie soldiers. They attacked me, of course, so I climbed a tower. When they got bored of me I climbed down and found the bodies of two players, which were loaded. I took an AK-47 and some ammo. I got out of the camp and ran across the airfield. There was an unarmed player on the runway, running away from me in jubilant fear. I told him he didn't need to fear me but that if he followed me I would kill him.
Once in the forest north of the airfield, I sneaked along the airport to where the control tower was, knowing there would be military loot in it. The tower was surrounded by someone's barbwire. But they didn't barbwire off the ladder. Blah blah blah blah blah.
Halfway to Stary Sober the server crashed. I joined another server and discovered that all my ammo was gone. "Servers" they're called. Ha.
So I sneaked into Stary Sober and attracted NO ZOMBIES (I now suspect that Mormons are zombie magnets). I even got a new gun (an AK-74), with ammo. I went to some bushes in an open field, lay down, and logged out.
Wednesday, August 1, 2012
The End of My Games Journalism "Career"
This, I hope, is the last serious post I post.
I am tired of treating games seriously. Games are not serious. Even so-called serious games are not serious. They ask you to play with them. Only the e-sports community proclaims playing computer games is serious, and they come off as silly.
Although games' inner workings sure are interesting, I don't find game rules and game theory exciting. Rather I find the experiences games create exciting.
I see myself aging. Twenty-four is not young. I, am quite done spending my creative time making unexciting things.
So this is the end of my game reviewing career, which is to say I am not going to be a games journalist; I'm pretty sure games journalists are supposed to focus on disseminating information - tell the truth, entertainingly if possible.
All I really want to do with my life is hang out with my friends and make poo poo jokes. I want to make great poo poo jokes.
I am tired of treating games seriously. Games are not serious. Even so-called serious games are not serious. They ask you to play with them. Only the e-sports community proclaims playing computer games is serious, and they come off as silly.
Although games' inner workings sure are interesting, I don't find game rules and game theory exciting. Rather I find the experiences games create exciting.
I see myself aging. Twenty-four is not young. I, am quite done spending my creative time making unexciting things.
So this is the end of my game reviewing career, which is to say I am not going to be a games journalist; I'm pretty sure games journalists are supposed to focus on disseminating information - tell the truth, entertainingly if possible.
All I really want to do with my life is hang out with my friends and make poo poo jokes. I want to make great poo poo jokes.
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