Rogue Survivor: Fuck Yes

Rogue Survivor caught my attention by pure chance.  I love roguelikes, anyone who knows me will testify to that fact.  There’s just something satisfying about wandering around in these giant arenas, plundering loot, and the waves of death you’ll be facing down.  Rogue Survivor plays off the thought of the ever popular zombie apocalypse and does it magnificently. 

The survivor AI is probably the crowning feature of Rogue Survivor, and it shines at all times as you go through the paces of finding shelter and other things.  Survivors are smart, barricading themselves inside buildings and offering up supplies in exchange for other materials.

Rogue Survivor is deliciously done though, extremely difficult, and is one of the rare roguelikes that doesn’t make you feel like you’ve seen it all before.  Screenshots won’t do the game much credit, but believe me when I say this is the sort of game you need to give a shot at least once. 

Wonderfully done, Roguedjack deserves a lot more support and fame than he’s getting.  So spread the word, plunder supplies, try to live through the night, and pray zombies don’t burst through your barricades in the night.

Nation Red: Holy Shit, Zombies are Badass

I picked up Nation Red yesterday thanks to the magic of Steam’s latest sale.  For a paltry $4 I got a game that’s high on challenge, even if it’s lacking a little in content.  There isn’t anything more satisfying than blowing away tons of zombies with an AA-12 while weaving in and out of them. 

One of the most satisfying bits about Nation Red is that it tries way too hard to be metal, and the crunchy goofy soundtrack lends some odd charm to it.  Don’t believe me?  Check this out then:

So much fire, it’s amazing.

Despite sounding like a Megadeth B-Side at all times, Nation Red is wonderfully satisfying to play.  The blood and guts flying all over the screen just get some stupid ass grin out of my face while I’m mowing through legions of the dead.  All in all, even though it’s back to full price, Nation Red is a wonderfully fun game.  It’s absurd in how goddamn grim-dark it tries to be, but I have the feeling that if it were a little cheekier it wouldn’t work. 

Also, if you’ve got the time, check out Foreign Legion:  Buckets of Blood, I thought it was wonderfully absurd in just how many shooter tropes it plays with.  Pretty simple castle defense game, but I love these absurdly simple experiences.  Beats out on the nasty grim shit like Gears of War. 

Got a suggestion for the next game I review?  Give us a shout in the comment box, we’d love to hear from you….handsome.

System Shock 2: Hail to the King Baby

Gamers love Bioshock if Metacritic is to believe.  The eerie atmosphere, the phenomenal writing, and the crushing isolation make for a compelling game.  System Shock 2 did the same thing, and did it to masterful effect years earlier.  You awaken in the Von Braun, after a brief tutorial, and you’re plunged straight into the hell awaiting you.  While, the game itself is dated, the overall design still makes for a scary fucking experience.  The ghosts, the logs, The Many, and so much more just sow the fervent paranoia of the diligent player hard in their skull.

You see that gun?  Be prepared to shit yourself when it breaks.

Masterful sound design do much to make us forget the dated graphics, and a superbly told story really pushes it past the usual idea of monsters, blargh, fuck!  System Shock 2 is probably the finest example of a horror game ever made.  It broke down doors, standard conventions of gameplay just brutally subverted in one of the finest twists in gaming history.  The notion it created back then has since been reconstructed, deconstructed, and enjoyed life as a cliché of sorts.  But at the time of release, System Shock 2 was incredible for what it did.

This isn’t full of jump scares like Resident Evil, or the psychotic imagery of Silent Hill.  It’s paranoia tempered with a fine coating of fear, and for that System Shock 2 succeeds in areas where many have failed.  Dead Space and Bioshock both fail in many regards, but this is just due to chasing the wake System Shock 2 left.

Words cannot do the awful you’re about to witness justice.

So, why haven’t you played this?  And if you have, you know why it is among the greatest games created.  System Shock 2 is just as sexy to play as Deus Ex, but you may very well end up huddling in a corner when your shotgun is out of shells.  There’s a few naggling features sure, but I’d chalk it up to the limitations of the era.  For what it is though, System Shock 2 is the sort of bonafide classic everyone needs to get a taste of once.  Don’t mess with the retexture mods, they turn one of the most unnerving enemies you’ll face into a big titted supermodel from hell.  Take it as it is, a document of design long since lost upon designers.  A testament to the strengths of a young studio who has since found great fame as it were.  Irrational may possibly be my favorite American studio, they gave us System Shock 2 and Freedom Force.  They made Bioshock, and gave us the excellent SWAT 4.  SWAT 4 is more of an heir in my opinion than Bioshock, if for the simple reason that your assumptions about your environment will lead you awry. 

In System Shock 2, you’re a marine in space, silly worn out trope of gaming these days.  Silly worn out cliché back at release.  Despite all your military prowess, it won’t steel you for what comes inside the Von Braun.  It doesn’t make the awful any less horrible to see.  When you awake, it’s just you in this vacant ship, traversing it to find out just what happened.

Like a Star Wars character with an extra dose of grade A nightmare fuel. 

Looking at the stills of System Shock 2, it’s a little hard to imagine what made it so scary.  But the voices of The Many, the metallic tinge in the Midwives, and the blistering steel of a vicious AI all but make up for it.  To hear a legion of voices in the dead of night with your headphones donned is terrifying, but to realize your down to a wrench and low health makes it pants shitting at times. 

Wait until you hear her speak.  Good luck seeing babies the same way.

In short, System Shock 2 is a phenomenal game.  I would regard it as more important the original Half-Life for a thousand reasons.  Half-Life did much in terms of advancement and immersion, but System Shock 2 never imparted the same feeling of badassery a certain bespectacled MIT grad gave.  Despite the guns, the cool psychic powers, and even years of horror games in my wake, System Shock 2 still is unnerving.  Still potent, and just finely aged, sort of like some whiskey that makes voices whisper in your head. 

Search container?  Well, what’s the worst that can happen?

In short, just buy it.  It’s worth the huge price used.  It’s a damn shame this franchise has gone without a worthy heir.  Now, if I’m to believe things System Shock 3 is in the spanners, which is a bit like saying the third Blair Witch is coming.

Happy Halloween guys and dolls, tune in tomorrow for a look at one of my favorite indie titles.

In parting, here’s one of my favorite animated shorts.

Gotta love that hissing noise.

Cursed Mountain: Buddhists, Ghosts, and Snow

A Trip Into Some Snowy Hell

Cursed Mountain is a survival horror title that didn’t get a whole lot of press.  Released for the Wii and PC, Cursed Mountain follows protagonist Daniel on his trek through the Himalayas in the 1980s to find his brother, who went missing on a climb of treacherous means.  Cursed Mountain isn’t by any means what we’d call a great survival horror game, but it takes a unique premise and couples it some rather interesting gameplay mechanics. 

Half the time I was controlling Daniel, I was wondering why on earth he moved at such a slow clip.  Much like Fatal Frame, Cursed Mountain urges the player to avoid jogging so ghosts aren’t alerted.  The early scenes do a great job of depicting tension, and the setting is certainly a welcome one compared to the cramped mansions, hospitals, and other stock settings of most horror games.

Where Cursed Mountain fails is when it starts implementing combat.  Combat is one part aiming your mystical pickaxe, no joke there by the way, and adding gestures as per most lazy Wii developers.  Now, if there was some compelling reason as to why you need to blast things with your scyred pickaxe I wouldn’t be docking it.  However, what has the potential to be a sleeper hit turns into a bargain basement horror game while completely saying fuck you to the setting and ideas.

How can you fucking see in this game?

The sound design is wonderful to a fault, I found myself loathing Daniel’s voice actor and moaning aloud when your monk mentor instructs you on how to swipe at things to use them.  Daniel sounds like an effeminate Malcolm McDowell, the odd accent and lisp doing absolutely no favors to make me feel immersed in the game.

I feel about the same towards Daniel, truth be told.

Now, the ordinary gamer will be slightly annoyed by the visual filter that saturates everything when you attempt to defend yourself.  As depicted in the screenies, it’s this nasty black stuff that just swarms all over the place.  The first time was pretty cool, added a little bit to the overall feel, but then I found myself having to do it constantly. 

I was instantly reminded of Constantine, starring Keanu Reeves of course, and the nasty look Hell had in that film.  Playing this game is a bit like watching Constantine, great concept with a shitty execution. 

Another five dollars I’ll never see again.

Now, while I can at least excuse Keanu for the simple reason that he’s a pretty cool guy, Cursed Mountain doesn’t get the same excuse.  It’s a great concept, sure, but the oversaturated visual effects, uninspired gameplay mechanics, and creepily voiced main character just kill whatever great things I felt about this game going in.

Within ten minutes of fighting my first enemy, I went from going, “Hey, this is pretty cool so far,” to “Why can’t dying just end this?”  Developers take note, a good horror game doesn’t need to rely on combat, just take a look at Amnesia or Penumbra.  Both stellar games, both really fucking scary, and you don’t have a singular weapon on you the entire time.  Both are going to be looked at quite extensively in the coming weeks by yours truly, and hopefully I can will myself to play for more than a half hour at a clip. 

Am I shooting this in the dick?

I won’t lament things though, I only spent five bucks on this turgid piece of shit.  So, really, you get what you pay for.

As a parting note, take a look at a little gameplay from Amnesia by Frictional Games.

I guarantee you, you’ll be running a lot.

Get That Fuckin' Guitar Outta Here! - Lightning Bolt

I don't think anyone is quite prepared for what Lightning Bolt has to bring on their first listen. The guys look tame enough; two pale, skinny white boys named Brian from Rhode Island who cite avant garde composers should be fairly harmless, right? My incorrect preemptive judging of the band only furthered the positive impression they gave me.

Chippendale is perhaps the perfect embodiment of Animal (the Muppet). If anything, the man does something the creator of the character, whose exaggerated, unparalleled hyperactivity made him an iconic puppet, could never begin to fathom. People falling and holding on to his drum set for dear life is something this man simply brushes aside. His spastic playing has convinced some of his fans and onlookers that he's simply not human. I wouldn't be surprised at all.

Don't let your friend who's been playing in that Three Doors Down/Kenny Chesney cover band for three years fool you, this man uses a bass guitar equipped with a couple banjo strings, numerous pedals, and nothing else. Chippendale's seemingly random, ADD-fueled clamoring is made sense by Gibson's heavy, noisy goodness. Live, it seems he is the calculated, controlled method behind his co-conspirator's blind rage.

Together these noise makers have a wide variety of unconventional venues, the oddest most likely being in a small kitchen in a Texan house. Like a small handful of other bands, they perform guerrilla-style - right smack dab in the middle of the floor - almost always forgoing any traditional stage. Their albums are recorded live in-studio, only furthering the potential chaos these two deliver.

This band may appear to lack members, but they are sure as hell full in sound.

Fatal Frame 4: Cute girls, Awful Ghosts

Fatal Frame, or Project Zero for you filthy diehards, is one of those rare series in horror that maintains a great consistency in terms of atmosphere, scares, and overwhelming dread.  I’d dabbled over the years with games like The Crimson Butterfly, but usually my rental time would be up and I would be forced to go get something else.  I dunno why, seeing as how my library has always had at least one Silent Hill and one Resident Evil amongst the other titles, but I just sort of avoided Fatal Frame for whatever reasons.

Well, all that changed last week when I procured a copy of Fatal Frame 4 for the Wii.  An import only sort of affair, Fatal Frame 4 is a stellar game that I’m honestly a little appalled will never be making it to our fabled American shores.  Now, this isn’t to say it’s unplayable because the filthy pirates amongst us have devised a translation patch and get to play this gem in a manner similar to watching a subtitled film.  I however don’t get such luxuries and as such I’ve had to use a combination of Wikipedia and various guides to play. 

Gah, someone needs some moisturizer.

Initial Impressions

Upon my booting up of Fatal Frame 4, I was amused by the fact that the game doesn’t fuck around by throwing you right in the middle of a spooky ass place.  Your opening scenes are spent in an abandoned facility, and the echoes of your footsteps only underscore the simple fact of the absolute silence surrounding you.  One of my biggest complaints about modern horror games is how they underscore every little bit of the score with a musical motif.  Fatal Frame 4 doesn’t afford it self such nasty little amusements.  This may be in part of Grasshopper Manufacture’s involvement.  As any gamer that loves some of the more esoteric titles know, Suda 51 doesn’t trifle with cheap scares.  Fatal Frame 4 follows three young girls who return to the place they were kidnapped, and it’s a game rife with various nods to Shintoism and a decidedly different take on the occult. 

If you’ve lived under a rock for the last ten years, you’ll know that Fatal Frame’s combat isn’t quite the shotguns and explosives of Resident Evil.  You have to use a supernatural camera to damage your enemies and your efforts are greatly rewarded by them getting in really close.  The ghosts in this game are rather nasty, looking far more disheveled than I was expecting.  You really feel bad for these girls as they traipse about this place, well except for the bitch in the opening.  Nothing good ever comes of walking off with no one following.

Someone needs to tell Ke$ha to get a new publicist.

I love the fact that Fatal Frame doesn’t necessarily need the standard elements of making you jump in your seat.  By using a smart combo of isolation and dread, you can really feel like you’re completely alone in the world.  This is my first entry proper into the series, as I lack the hindsight to account for my lack of playing Crimson Butterfly through to completion.  You aren’t some boulder punching madman fighting a dude in sunglasses though, you’re a small and frail girl navigating a hellish maze littered with the souls of the dead.  You’re urged to keep pressing on to find your companions, you’re urged to keep going deeper and deeper into the black abyss.  Fatal Frame succeeds where a game like Dead Space fails, and that’s by making sure you’re not some hardass engineer with a master’s in asskicking.

Is she wearing a French Maid costume under there?

Go Buy It Plebes!

There’s the very real possibility that Fatal Frame 4 will never make it to our shores, which is a crying shame.  However, you can make sure you need brown pants on a permanent basis by ordering it now.  It seems to be sadly out of print so it looks like your best bet is eBay.

Hmm, so much for sleeping.

Dead Space: It’s Resident Evil 4…..in space!

A Look At EA’s Hyped Horror Game


I suppose I came to Dead Space about two years too late.  After a 2008 release to critical success, the survival horror game from EA’s Redwood studio apparently set some high marks.  Now, after having played it to completion I can say that’s it’s decent, but not quite the horror fueled nightmare I was expecting.  The simple fact that our hero Isaac is quite possibly the most badass man in a technical position since Gordon Freeman may have something to do with it.  The plot is rather simple when the game thrusts the gamer into the midst of it.  Isaac Clarke is sent to the Ishimura to get systems back online.  Isaac’s an engineer, which you really wouldn’t guess during your playthrough of this game.  Most of the engineers I’ve met aren’t hardly the type for scrapping, their more concerned about running a raid on Naxx to the utmost efficiency and complaining about how majoring in English was a bad choice. 

This seems an awful lot like some happy psychology hating church


When you first boot up Dead Space you’ll be struck by how damned pretty it can be.  The nasty bloody environments are gorgeous and it really shows what the power of a huge production studio can do.  It’s like discovering that a chicken in a can isn’t as tasty as that made by a graduate of Le Cordon Bleu.  Having a whole chicken in a can is a whole different sort of horror when you consider exactly what your digestion track may be doing after cooking the fucker.  Dead Space is a pretty game and greatly benefits from all the major production behind it. 

Buh, how did they make space look so neat?

Major productions, as my esteemed colleague points out, don’t benefit from the sight of what makes something truly scary.  So we’re left with the simple fact that our mute Mr. Clarke is a badass.  I don’t mean badass like Batman, but more or less Ripley from Aliens with a dick. 

Isaac, it just has some indigestion from all the yummy flesh.

Now, ordinarily I wouldn’t complain about this.  Leon S. Kennedy made having a foppish hair cut and spouting out dumbass phrases a lesson in badassery.  He looked stylish while doing so, this may be in part because Capcom really had to use a French model to make Leon into the envy of every man and make girl parts’ a-quiver.

I’ve been figuring out how to get my hair to part like that for six years.

Dead Space does tie into the notions of abandoning the survival part of the survival horror genre.  You don’t really feel like you’re fighting for your life, but just sort of blasting ugly things nonstop as you go through the motions of it.  Simple thanks to EA for making it seem like engineering is a great career choice.  Now, I can’t really say too much on the plot because it was beginning to make my head hurt, also spoilers are bad.  Dead Space does terrific things as far as immersion and making nasty baddies go.  Demon babies, bladed arm things, things that jump a lot, and something that looks suspiciously like a vagina and a burst boil had sex are all present and accounted for.

As pictured:  Da sexy

In short, Dead Space is the sort of game that should really end up in most gamers’ libraries.  It can be picked up at your local game store and can be picked up if you don’t live in the stone age on Steam, Direct2Drive, and a few others I’m sure.

Next up is a retrospective look at my favorite sci-fi movie of all time, that other movie directed by James Cameron about aliens.