And so ends Flora's Fruit Farm. It was a good run, and in the end the characters all had a sweet party with so much fiber that the sewers were full the next day.
On to gravitron 2. With a possible pitstop at FTL, because that game is fucking great.
I don't think I can do gravitron 2. This game sucks. This game sucks in every way that is possible to suck. It's like the developers took the extremely popular idea of 'make this NEW game like an OLD SCHOOL game with GRAPHICS!' and ran before considering anything else. There's no consideration of fun vs anti-fun, no philosophy of game design, nothing. What have we been working for for the last thirty years, guys?
Well, good on them for making it bug-free and making it feel retro, I guess, because that's all a good game needs, right? :/
there are FORTY-FOUR LEVELS in this horrid train wreck of a manure pile. FORTY-FUCKING-FOUR.
Before anyone chews me for this, I like difficult games. I insist that games be difficult. It's not the difficulty. It's the pure, unadulterated, disgusting lack of anything resembling fun. That's why I hate this game.
Okay. Looks like I stopped at Fallout: New Vegas with the mini reviews.
Fallout: New Vegas Honestly, I don't have much for this. It's damn near the same as Fallout 3. Gripes are mere storyline and character gripes (and when that's your gripe, you know things went well - I was invested enough in the storyline to be annoyed at things that happened). Felicia Day voice acting for a character was pretty fun. As with all Fallout games (and bethesda games in general), the secret seems to be to max out one or two stats and live off of them - I picked speech and stealth.
Sure enough, I was able to beat the last boss by talking to him.
The game quit quite abruptly - I wasn't even sure I was at the end. I ended up choosing the NCR path, because about every other path would have had me
kill the brotherhood of steel,
and fuck that.
As with every Bethesda games, bugs were rampant - though not as rampant as in the previous iteration of Fallout, nor as rampant as in Morrowind or Oblivion. They're getting better.
As Bethesda are not evil as fuck and as the open-endedness and ability to play the game whatever way you want is AWESOME, I definitely will be watching for their next open-ended title. This is one of those companies I REALLY root for.
Flora's Fruit Farm Pretty Pretty Fruit Magnate was a surprisingly fun - if easy - game. The only gripes I had were pretty minor, which says something, amirite? That bug that makes the game almost unplayable is actually not even that bad... you can still easily make your goal.
The game plays a lot like Diner Dash, and I can see it being particularly interesting to the same demographic that made that game popular. Unfortunately, I get the feeling a lot of that demographic is now caught up in facebook games and not on steam - which is a shame, because FFF is an excellently programmed diversion.
The art and the music had Terin laughing at me in the background for days... and it was addictive enough that I found myself missing bedtime more than once. Good on you, Pretty Pretty Fruit Magnate.
Guys, I love retro games. I absolutely love them. And I have no hipster shame in saying that if a game is retro, I automatically have a slightly higher opinion of it.
But making a game retro is not an excuse to make it BAD.
In the last however many years, discussions and philosophies video game design - especially those dealing with 'fun,' 'not fun,' and 'anti-fun' - have permeated this internet. Hell, Jimmy and I have had in-depth discussions with the ICHG crew each of these two years we've done it - and we're not even game designers. To attempt to build a game without visiting these discussions and critiquing the NATURE of the game is the pinnacle of pretentiousness.
Let's go down a list of topics of 'fun.' In particular, these are specific topics that make G2 NOT fun.
1. Progress. If the player feels they are making progress, be it in character development, storyline advancement, or resource gain, the user will feel more validated - even when they're actually failing. However, a player doesn't always get much fun out of 'getting better at the game' for its own sake.
2. Skill. A player's skill must have a direct impact on his success or failure. How often have you been way-too-good at a game and hit the imposed limits of the game? A good example of this is Crysis - there are situations where you, by sheer force of will, find yourself out-flanking a location so well that the game FORCES you to leave. "YER LEAVIN' THE COMBAT ZONE. GON' KILL YA!" Well, that sucks. Why can't the game just allow me to be good at the game? Consider, too, situations in World of Warcraft designated with RNG. When a boss selects you to stun four or five times in a row (we call that 'bad RNG,' or random number generation), you feel cheated. You might cry "bullshit!" Why? Because despite any skill you might display, you were force-fucked.
3. Variety and diversity. A repetitive game is seldom an enjoyable game. This is a hard one - many games, by their nature, HAVE to be repetitive. A first-person shooter, for instance, is going to require a lot of repetition - aim and shoot, aim and shoot. This can be masked, however, by the situation around the player - terrain, objectives, angles, reactions of environment, dialogue, whatever. Good developers know how to mask the repetition with variety.
I actually have a lot more, but I want to get to why G2 failed big time in these regards.
1. Progress: Gravitron 2 uses the 'score' paradigm. Scores suck. Scores suck big time, for one reason - who gives a fuck? Scores don't validate a player anymore - not since games can fit in a space larger than 16MB. Your ship doesn't get stronger, no storyline advances, and the only resource you can really accumulate are extra lives (and yes, that bit felt fun). Why pick up a scientist? Who cares? Why shoot that building over there when you can just fly away from it? Who cares? Nothing you do gives you much validation beyond blowing up a reactor or reaching a checkpoint (which are usually optional and kind of poorly placed). Furthermore, at any given time, you are actively losing resources - fuel - but the game doesn't require you to manage it intelligently. There is a large amount of fuel everywhere - so what's the point of hoarding this resource? This is a source for what could have been a great amount of fun, and just like a condom in a leprosy ward, it remained unutilized.
As if that weren't enough, every death sets you back - usually to the very beginning of the level. There are so few ways to make progress and so many to fail, that progress in G2 simply isn't fun.
2. Skill: Now, if there are lots of ways to fail, you'd think skill would be important, right? Like, rewards based on skill would be particularly gratifying? Think again. You will take damage at some point - bouncing into a wall, hitting an errant bullet - but it is RANDOM. Sometimes these things will kill you outright, sometimes they'll only scratch you. Sometimes they'll send you spinning, sometimes only knock you back. As I mentioned above, RNG kills a skill-based game - it removes every aspect of fun from having any amount of skill. Even 'getting lucky' doesn't feel nearly as good, and I chalk this up to the confirmation bias - the bias that, when you have an opinion (ie "one-hit kills happen way too often"), you will automatically and subconsciously seek out evidence that confirms that opinion (ie "SEE? It happened again! What a pile of shit!") and ignore evidence that denies the opinion (ie, getting lucky). So no, getting rewarded based on your skill is NOT gratifying.
Consider one particular trap - you are descending down a very small corridor, and a missile flies at you from off screen. You can't dodge it because of the corridor, you can only put up shields. The missile hits and imparts so much kinetic energy to your ship (without damaging it, true) that your ship is now a pinball in the corridor. You're fucked, because every wall collision eats a chunk of your health. gg. You only have one option - next time you enter that corridor, blindly fire and twiddle your ship back and forth and HOPE you kill the turret off screen before it shoots. This has a bonus anti-fun principle to it - any small validation you get from the explosion is lost, because the damn thing's off screen!
3. Variety and diversity: In a game where the player is going to die A LOT, don't make them sit through the 'exploding' and 'phasing in' animations every time. Two seconds, true, but it happens EVERY TIME, and it's ALWAYS THE SAME. Look at super meat boy instead - instant respawn makes dying forty times not seem nearly as bad. THAT'S a situation where the repetitiveness was masked PERFECTLY.
Also, in a game where the player is starting over every single time, they're probably approaching the problem the same way every time in hopes that they'll 'get it right this time.' That's repetitive as fuck - though granted, it is user-created repetitiveness. Still, if a game dev wants their game to be fun, they should try a way to mask this (the best way being to increase progress, outlined above).
Anti-fun aside, the art and music were stellar. The vector-based feel of the game was emphasized by allowing each vector to 'glow' a little bit. Furthermore, color coordination was very well done - you knew that 'fuck that blue shit,' 'OH GOD OH FUCK THERE'S SOMETHING ORANGE THERE,' 'red is annoying as hell,' etc. Clearly someone has a good head on their shoulders for art - even simple art. The only thing that really sucked in the art is the conflicting use of white - good shit and VERY FUCKING BAD SHIT were both white.
...try to give a shitty game a compliment and it still doesn't really live up to it.
In closing, to end this review on a positive note (as is good practice, or so I'm told), fuck this game.
Spoke too soon - you can cross Bioshock: Infinite off the list. Fourteen hours and done.
Also, what a trip.
2
TeramonaConsulting Tea Specialist Best Coast! Icrontian
edited July 2013
What a trip?
You write a 15 page dissertation on why pretty graphics were not a redeeming enough quality for the shitfest that was Gravitron 2... And Bioshock Infinite gets "what a trip"?
There is absolutely nothing I can say in this review to do this game justice. 10/10, would play again. Will probably play again. Hopefully after I forget everything so I can remember it again.
Storyline: You know that feeling you get when you finish a book and you're emotionally stricken inside, and you look up to see everyone else is completely normal (cause, y'know, they haven't read it)? That's B:I. No spoilers here - just praise.
Graphics: I appreciate the choice to go with cartoony graphics rather than "MAKE THIS SHIT LOOK AS REAL AS POSSIBLE." I think it gives devs an easier time realizing their design goals both in character and scene. I also think it allows for much more freedom in drawing attention to certain areas of a scene in order to guide a player (stuff that Left 4 Dead did really well). Terin watched from behind me and commented over and over that it looked like disneyland... right until that scene where you get your first weapon.
There was nothing poorly executed about this game. You become attached to the characters: the heroine is not a trophy and in fact reacts like a regular person might - she may make poor judgement calls when upset, but generally stays within the realm of reason; asks for explanation rather than flying off on tangents (unlike any hollywood heroine). You become interested in the surroundings: I can't imagine anyone passing up a voice recorder or not spending a little time looking at the crazy stuff hanging out in the skybox. The combat is enjoyable and does NOT detract from the plot:
The addition of a companion in the fighting serves to increase the player's attachment to the duo.
The only painfully small qualm I have with Bioshock: Infinite is that the fighting was way too easy - and, I mean, this is such a small thing that it's not REALLY worth mentioning or considering. The game is ridiculously fun the way it is.
...I am informed that I apparently unlocked a 1999 mode to the game, which is supposed to be brutally difficult. I will be attempting this at some point.
I'm particularly happy with this game, and my only regret is that the storyline does not continue forever and ever... you know the feeling?
I almost feel like it's not fair to write anything about this game. Pointing out flaws would be ridiculous, because this is one of those games that DISCOVERED flaws in first-person shooters. As for the high points of HL2:DM, other games have capitalized on them and pushed them farther, so these high points don't feel so high. I only wish I'd played it when it was popular, so I'd be able to see how exactly it influenced more modern shooters.
I can tell you right off the bat, though, that a free game playable on a wooden computer will ALWAYS be chock-full of twelve-year-olds spamming chat. Eff that noise.
As a side note, is anyone else sick to death of incessant Quake sound effects in every f*#!ing FPS?
At this juncture, I am currently working through borderlands 2 with a couple gentlemen, and will then back up to Assassin's Creed III. It seems I've added a few games to my backlog since last post.
I've completed the first playthrough of Borderlands 2 with Agent Sheep and one of my buddies back home. So good.
Borderlands 2
This game deserves pretty much all the praise that has been lavished upon it. It improves on the previous Borderlands in so many ways that it boggles the mind.
I will try to keep the spoilers out of this review, but it's safe for me to say that the story grips you at a gut-level. You really feel for some of the characters - which, in a game where you listen to a grown man say the word "bonerfart" multiple times, is a pretty serious achievement. It's really something else when the buddies you're playing with ALSO shut the fuck up and get all serious during the depressing part - the ability to interact with your friends while still being entertained is not something that you can experience with a book or a movie, and it's not really something that we deal with except in co-op video games. It seems like a small thing, but it's actually quite an event.
Speaking of playing with buddies, you are going to need friends for this - playing alone blows. Heck, playing alone blew in the first Borderlands. Do yourself a favor and don't even try it - just get a friend and get going.
...and that brings up one of my small gripes with the game - no level-down system. There are days when your friends just aren't around, and what do you do then? You don't play without 'em, you'd outlevel them! But... but... I mean, you want to play so bad, what do you do? Nothing, unfortunately. There is no "oh, you're seven levels lower than me? Let me just back up a bit..."
Now, in Guild Wars 2, for instance, there exists a system by which if you enter zone of lower level than your character's, you automatically become the highest level allowed by that zone - you scale down. This sort of system would have been phenomenal in Borderlands 2 - all guests could scale down temporarily to the host's level and receive less experience, and all weaponry could temporarily scale as well, meaning you wouldn't leave your buddies behind if you worked ahead a little!
On a totally different note, I highly enjoyed the diversity of roles. Unlike the original Borderlands 2, there didn't seem to be one stupidly overpowered role - and in fact, some of the roles were completely nuts. I played a Siren and went STRAIGHT down the harmony tree for a while - my job was to keep the team healed up and on their feet. With a Mechromancer going full glass cannon/anarchy (very small health bar, wildly inaccurate, must be right in the middle of the fight) and an Assassin going full melee with roid shields (shields that do additional damage whenever they're down... so you keep them ALWAYS down), healing and reviving was a SERIOUS priority... and it felt GOOD. The number of clutch saves really made me feel like a serious contributor to the team. Sure, I could have done a traditional DPS build, and any class can be good with plain ol' rifles and damage, but... where's the fun in that? Borderlands 2 lets you specialize the team, and playing with strengths and weaknesses is SO much more fun!
All in all, this was one of the better games on my backlog, and I'm glad I got a chance to play it. I'm also grateful to whoever donated it for an Expo 2013 prize, or I'd have never gotten the chance!
I'm starting to get really curious about my choice of video games. I think I have terrible taste.
Working on Hitman: Codename 47 right now... this game is so buggy as to be almost unplayable. I have, to date, restarted the lee hong assassination mission four times now due to:
1. Getting stuck in a wall 2. Getting stuck in an elevator 3. CIA agent won't talk to me 4. Closet door stuck shut.
Are you kidding me?
I'll save complaints about shallow voice acting and the awful level design for later.
Comments
On to gravitron 2. With a possible pitstop at FTL, because that game is fucking great.
Well, good on them for making it bug-free and making it feel retro, I guess, because that's all a good game needs, right? :/
You're only allowed what, like five continues?
That's fun. There's definitely not a reason that the 'start over from the beginning' paradigm got phased out.
EDIT: nope, never mind, there was just some different condition that was met in the UI that was NOT IMMEDIATELY FUCKING APPARENT.
Before anyone chews me for this, I like difficult games. I insist that games be difficult. It's not the difficulty. It's the pure, unadulterated, disgusting lack of anything resembling fun. That's why I hate this game.
Also, perhaps you can tell which one is me?
But at this point, Gravitron 2 is finished. also, I realize I have forgotten to write mini reviews of each game. Next post.
Fallout: New Vegas
Honestly, I don't have much for this. It's damn near the same as Fallout 3. Gripes are mere storyline and character gripes (and when that's your gripe, you know things went well - I was invested enough in the storyline to be annoyed at things that happened). Felicia Day voice acting for a character was pretty fun. As with all Fallout games (and bethesda games in general), the secret seems to be to max out one or two stats and live off of them - I picked speech and stealth.
The game quit quite abruptly - I wasn't even sure I was at the end. I ended up choosing the NCR path, because about every other path would have had me
As with every Bethesda games, bugs were rampant - though not as rampant as in the previous iteration of Fallout, nor as rampant as in Morrowind or Oblivion. They're getting better.
As Bethesda are not evil as fuck and as the open-endedness and ability to play the game whatever way you want is AWESOME, I definitely will be watching for their next open-ended title. This is one of those companies I REALLY root for.
Flora's Fruit Farm
Pretty Pretty Fruit Magnate was a surprisingly fun - if easy - game. The only gripes I had were pretty minor, which says something, amirite? That bug that makes the game almost unplayable is actually not even that bad... you can still easily make your goal.
The game plays a lot like Diner Dash, and I can see it being particularly interesting to the same demographic that made that game popular. Unfortunately, I get the feeling a lot of that demographic is now caught up in facebook games and not on steam - which is a shame, because FFF is an excellently programmed diversion.
The art and the music had Terin laughing at me in the background for days... and it was addictive enough that I found myself missing bedtime more than once. Good on you, Pretty Pretty Fruit Magnate.
Gravitron 2
Guys, I love retro games. I absolutely love them. And I have no hipster shame in saying that if a game is retro, I automatically have a slightly higher opinion of it.But making a game retro is not an excuse to make it BAD.
In the last however many years, discussions and philosophies video game design - especially those dealing with 'fun,' 'not fun,' and 'anti-fun' - have permeated this internet. Hell, Jimmy and I have had in-depth discussions with the ICHG crew each of these two years we've done it - and we're not even game designers. To attempt to build a game without visiting these discussions and critiquing the NATURE of the game is the pinnacle of pretentiousness.
Let's go down a list of topics of 'fun.' In particular, these are specific topics that make G2 NOT fun.
1. Progress. If the player feels they are making progress, be it in character development, storyline advancement, or resource gain, the user will feel more validated - even when they're actually failing. However, a player doesn't always get much fun out of 'getting better at the game' for its own sake.
2. Skill. A player's skill must have a direct impact on his success or failure. How often have you been way-too-good at a game and hit the imposed limits of the game? A good example of this is Crysis - there are situations where you, by sheer force of will, find yourself out-flanking a location so well that the game FORCES you to leave. "YER LEAVIN' THE COMBAT ZONE. GON' KILL YA!" Well, that sucks. Why can't the game just allow me to be good at the game? Consider, too, situations in World of Warcraft designated with RNG. When a boss selects you to stun four or five times in a row (we call that 'bad RNG,' or random number generation), you feel cheated. You might cry "bullshit!" Why? Because despite any skill you might display, you were force-fucked.
3. Variety and diversity. A repetitive game is seldom an enjoyable game. This is a hard one - many games, by their nature, HAVE to be repetitive. A first-person shooter, for instance, is going to require a lot of repetition - aim and shoot, aim and shoot. This can be masked, however, by the situation around the player - terrain, objectives, angles, reactions of environment, dialogue, whatever. Good developers know how to mask the repetition with variety.
I actually have a lot more, but I want to get to why G2 failed big time in these regards.
1. Progress: Gravitron 2 uses the 'score' paradigm. Scores suck. Scores suck big time, for one reason - who gives a fuck? Scores don't validate a player anymore - not since games can fit in a space larger than 16MB. Your ship doesn't get stronger, no storyline advances, and the only resource you can really accumulate are extra lives (and yes, that bit felt fun). Why pick up a scientist? Who cares? Why shoot that building over there when you can just fly away from it? Who cares? Nothing you do gives you much validation beyond blowing up a reactor or reaching a checkpoint (which are usually optional and kind of poorly placed). Furthermore, at any given time, you are actively losing resources - fuel - but the game doesn't require you to manage it intelligently. There is a large amount of fuel everywhere - so what's the point of hoarding this resource? This is a source for what could have been a great amount of fun, and just like a condom in a leprosy ward, it remained unutilized.
As if that weren't enough, every death sets you back - usually to the very beginning of the level. There are so few ways to make progress and so many to fail, that progress in G2 simply isn't fun.
2. Skill: Now, if there are lots of ways to fail, you'd think skill would be important, right? Like, rewards based on skill would be particularly gratifying? Think again. You will take damage at some point - bouncing into a wall, hitting an errant bullet - but it is RANDOM. Sometimes these things will kill you outright, sometimes they'll only scratch you. Sometimes they'll send you spinning, sometimes only knock you back. As I mentioned above, RNG kills a skill-based game - it removes every aspect of fun from having any amount of skill. Even 'getting lucky' doesn't feel nearly as good, and I chalk this up to the confirmation bias - the bias that, when you have an opinion (ie "one-hit kills happen way too often"), you will automatically and subconsciously seek out evidence that confirms that opinion (ie "SEE? It happened again! What a pile of shit!") and ignore evidence that denies the opinion (ie, getting lucky). So no, getting rewarded based on your skill is NOT gratifying.
Consider one particular trap - you are descending down a very small corridor, and a missile flies at you from off screen. You can't dodge it because of the corridor, you can only put up shields. The missile hits and imparts so much kinetic energy to your ship (without damaging it, true) that your ship is now a pinball in the corridor. You're fucked, because every wall collision eats a chunk of your health. gg. You only have one option - next time you enter that corridor, blindly fire and twiddle your ship back and forth and HOPE you kill the turret off screen before it shoots. This has a bonus anti-fun principle to it - any small validation you get from the explosion is lost, because the damn thing's off screen!
3. Variety and diversity: In a game where the player is going to die A LOT, don't make them sit through the 'exploding' and 'phasing in' animations every time. Two seconds, true, but it happens EVERY TIME, and it's ALWAYS THE SAME. Look at super meat boy instead - instant respawn makes dying forty times not seem nearly as bad. THAT'S a situation where the repetitiveness was masked PERFECTLY.
Also, in a game where the player is starting over every single time, they're probably approaching the problem the same way every time in hopes that they'll 'get it right this time.' That's repetitive as fuck - though granted, it is user-created repetitiveness. Still, if a game dev wants their game to be fun, they should try a way to mask this (the best way being to increase progress, outlined above).
Anti-fun aside, the art and music were stellar. The vector-based feel of the game was emphasized by allowing each vector to 'glow' a little bit. Furthermore, color coordination was very well done - you knew that 'fuck that blue shit,' 'OH GOD OH FUCK THERE'S SOMETHING ORANGE THERE,' 'red is annoying as hell,' etc. Clearly someone has a good head on their shoulders for art - even simple art. The only thing that really sucked in the art is the conflicting use of white - good shit and VERY FUCKING BAD SHIT were both white.
...try to give a shitty game a compliment and it still doesn't really live up to it.
In closing, to end this review on a positive note (as is good practice, or so I'm told), fuck this game.
Also, what a trip.
You write a 15 page dissertation on why pretty graphics were not a redeeming enough quality for the shitfest that was Gravitron 2... And Bioshock Infinite gets "what a trip"?
Bioshock: Infinite
There is absolutely nothing I can say in this review to do this game justice. 10/10, would play again. Will probably play again. Hopefully after I forget everything so I can remember it again.Storyline: You know that feeling you get when you finish a book and you're emotionally stricken inside, and you look up to see everyone else is completely normal (cause, y'know, they haven't read it)? That's B:I. No spoilers here - just praise.
Graphics: I appreciate the choice to go with cartoony graphics rather than "MAKE THIS SHIT LOOK AS REAL AS POSSIBLE." I think it gives devs an easier time realizing their design goals both in character and scene. I also think it allows for much more freedom in drawing attention to certain areas of a scene in order to guide a player (stuff that Left 4 Dead did really well). Terin watched from behind me and commented over and over that it looked like disneyland... right until that scene where you get your first weapon.
There was nothing poorly executed about this game. You become attached to the characters: the heroine is not a trophy and in fact reacts like a regular person might - she may make poor judgement calls when upset, but generally stays within the realm of reason; asks for explanation rather than flying off on tangents (unlike any hollywood heroine). You become interested in the surroundings: I can't imagine anyone passing up a voice recorder or not spending a little time looking at the crazy stuff hanging out in the skybox. The combat is enjoyable and does NOT detract from the plot:
The only painfully small qualm I have with Bioshock: Infinite is that the fighting was way too easy - and, I mean, this is such a small thing that it's not REALLY worth mentioning or considering. The game is ridiculously fun the way it is.
...I am informed that I apparently unlocked a 1999 mode to the game, which is supposed to be brutally difficult. I will be attempting this at some point.
I'm particularly happy with this game, and my only regret is that the storyline does not continue forever and ever... you know the feeling?
No? How 'bout now?
HTML tags too stronk
But in all seriousness, isn't this subforum set to members-only? Why bother with SEO?HL2: Deathmatch
I almost feel like it's not fair to write anything about this game. Pointing out flaws would be ridiculous, because this is one of those games that DISCOVERED flaws in first-person shooters. As for the high points of HL2:DM, other games have capitalized on them and pushed them farther, so these high points don't feel so high. I only wish I'd played it when it was popular, so I'd be able to see how exactly it influenced more modern shooters.I can tell you right off the bat, though, that a free game playable on a wooden computer will ALWAYS be chock-full of twelve-year-olds spamming chat. Eff that noise.
As a side note, is anyone else sick to death of incessant Quake sound effects in every f*#!ing FPS?
At this juncture, I am currently working through borderlands 2 with a couple gentlemen, and will then back up to Assassin's Creed III. It seems I've added a few games to my backlog since last post.
Borderlands 2
This game deserves pretty much all the praise that has been lavished upon it. It improves on the previous Borderlands in so many ways that it boggles the mind.I will try to keep the spoilers out of this review, but it's safe for me to say that the story grips you at a gut-level. You really feel for some of the characters - which, in a game where you listen to a grown man say the word "bonerfart" multiple times, is a pretty serious achievement. It's really something else when the buddies you're playing with ALSO shut the fuck up and get all serious during the depressing part - the ability to interact with your friends while still being entertained is not something that you can experience with a book or a movie, and it's not really something that we deal with except in co-op video games. It seems like a small thing, but it's actually quite an event.
Speaking of playing with buddies, you are going to need friends for this - playing alone blows. Heck, playing alone blew in the first Borderlands. Do yourself a favor and don't even try it - just get a friend and get going.
...and that brings up one of my small gripes with the game - no level-down system. There are days when your friends just aren't around, and what do you do then? You don't play without 'em, you'd outlevel them! But... but... I mean, you want to play so bad, what do you do? Nothing, unfortunately. There is no "oh, you're seven levels lower than me? Let me just back up a bit..."
Now, in Guild Wars 2, for instance, there exists a system by which if you enter zone of lower level than your character's, you automatically become the highest level allowed by that zone - you scale down. This sort of system would have been phenomenal in Borderlands 2 - all guests could scale down temporarily to the host's level and receive less experience, and all weaponry could temporarily scale as well, meaning you wouldn't leave your buddies behind if you worked ahead a little!
On a totally different note, I highly enjoyed the diversity of roles. Unlike the original Borderlands 2, there didn't seem to be one stupidly overpowered role - and in fact, some of the roles were completely nuts. I played a Siren and went STRAIGHT down the harmony tree for a while - my job was to keep the team healed up and on their feet. With a Mechromancer going full glass cannon/anarchy (very small health bar, wildly inaccurate, must be right in the middle of the fight) and an Assassin going full melee with roid shields (shields that do additional damage whenever they're down... so you keep them ALWAYS down), healing and reviving was a SERIOUS priority... and it felt GOOD. The number of clutch saves really made me feel like a serious contributor to the team. Sure, I could have done a traditional DPS build, and any class can be good with plain ol' rifles and damage, but... where's the fun in that? Borderlands 2 lets you specialize the team, and playing with strengths and weaknesses is SO much more fun!
All in all, this was one of the better games on my backlog, and I'm glad I got a chance to play it. I'm also grateful to whoever donated it for an Expo 2013 prize, or I'd have never gotten the chance!
I have decided to take a small break from the backlog in order plaaaaaaay:
BIOSHOCK INFINITE: 1999 MODE.
That is all. God help me.
Died three times; not as hard as I expected... but as you all know, the hell with lady comstock.
Working on Hitman: Codename 47 right now... this game is so buggy as to be almost unplayable. I have, to date, restarted the lee hong assassination mission four times now due to:
1. Getting stuck in a wall
2. Getting stuck in an elevator
3. CIA agent won't talk to me
4. Closet door stuck shut.
Are you kidding me?
I'll save complaints about shallow voice acting and the awful level design for later.