Can’t stop ripping out eyeballs in Tentacles: Enter the Mind

It really seems like the Windows 8 phone just lumps a bunch of freemium games together and publishes them all closely together in one big spurt. I mean, Throne Together, Hungry Shark Evolution, and now Tentacles: Enter the Mind all came out in just the last few weeks alone, and this is following another burst of free-to-play experiences with Hexic, Snap Attack, and that trilogy of Microsoft-themed classics like Mahjong, Minesweeper, and Solitaire. Oh boy, my phone might be filling up a little too fast. There’s even a few other free games to download that I’ve held back on simply because I don’t want to overdo it, though clearly that is not a thought in Microsoft’s mind.

That said, so far, Tentacles: Enter the Mind from Microsoft’s very own Press Play studio seems like the most traditional videogame of all these freebie titles I’ve touched of late, even if there are still options to purchase digital money with real-life money. Thankfully, they really don’t get in the way of playing the game, which I’m a thousand times thankful for, since playing the game is a lot of fun and I don’t want anything coming between me and my fun. Perhaps the best missing element is any form of an energy system, which means I can keep stretching from one brain shop to another for as long as I like, or as long as I want to run my phone’s battery into the ground.

To begin, Tentacles: Enter the Mind features a fully 3D and colorful landscape that you can explore via your tentacle-laden monster called Lemmy by tapping all over the screen. Basically, each tap moves a tentacle, so if you quickly tap four times in a row, the monster will zip over to where you want…or you can stretch it out across a bunch of different spots and see how far it’ll go. The story goes that you’re inside the mind of the mad scientist Dr. Phluff, fighting off invading enemies in his subconscious. How do you do this, you ask, probably already knowing the answer based on this blog post’s title? Simple: you pluck their eyeballs out from their heads. You can also use special powers, like a AOE bomb that hits all nearby enemies, by swiping down on the screen. There seems to be 15 areas in total, but each area–or level of subconscious–is made up of multiple stages, which may or may not be randomly generated. I’m currently on one themed around kitty cats, meow.

As you travel from one stage to another and aren’t too busy ripping the eyes from your enemies–yes, I’m a big fan of that scene from Kill Bill: Vol. 2, how did you know?–you can also pick up gold coins, hammers, eggs, and revive tokens. In between each stage, you pause at a shop menu to purchase upgrades for your monster, including new tentacle effects, different eyeballs, and additional power skills. You use your gold coins on this, and so far, the amounts are not too crazy high that you immediately see the unnecessary need to purchase gold with real money. Everything will come in time, plus you can earn more gold from cracking colored eggs with the matching colored hammer, as well as completing side objectives, like ripping the eyeballs from X monsters in a row without taking any damage.

The feeling of moving Lemmy one tentacle at a time is actually quite satisfying. I mean, after all these years of watching octopus videos, and I finally sort of know how it feels. Throw in that plus dodging and attacking enemies simultaneously, which you also have to tap on, and your phone and your index finger are going to become quite close friends. The only parts I’m struggling with are having Lemmy move to a really specific point in the level; for instance, there’s a part inside a confined tube, where these rotating dividers block your way forward, save for a small hole in them that you have to dart through when the moment is right. If you don’t, you get electrocuted, which is usually a whole heart gone. I can’t get past it, but at least I get to keep the gold coins and eggs I find along the way.

I look forward to seeing more of Tentacles: Enter the Mind and growing Lemmy into an even more fearsome eyeball-ripping monster. Y’all best stay out of my tentacles’ way now.

It is only through Motocross Madness that the soul is revealed

Trials Evolution is a game I both love and hate, one with extremely hard swings, where one minute I’m leaping off a ramp high in the sky across a gorgeous vista and doing sick backflips and the next grumbling curse word after curse word as I try to get up an extremely steep hill and hit the next checkpoint. It’s really been my only toe-dip into the videogaming world of dirt bike racing–I guess since Excitebike–and its focus on hyper sensitive controls really means that only the driven and dedicated will continue on. Alas, I have not; think the last time I touched it was last fall, and even then it was only for goofing around in the user-created levels, which are, nine times out of nine, absolutely bonkers.

Well, I got the itch to gas a bike up a steep ramp and do silly tricks, and so I turned to Motocross Madness. No, no, not that Motocross Madness, the one from 1998. This is Microsoft’s Avatar-spearheaded take on arcade style and open sandbox motorbiking, and it was given out for free this month to Gold accounts, along with Dishonored, which I continue to be terrible at. More on that somewhere down the line…

To be honest, I’m enjoying Motocross Madness. A lot. While there may not be a ton of variety in the courses, there’s certainly variety to the things you can do in them. First, you can partake in a standard race via Career mode, aiming for that first place gold medal each time. Rivals mode has you competing against developer avatar ghosts. There’s a Trick mode that tests your aerial button-pressing skills and rewards you with new trick combos. Lastly, and probably my favorite part of Motocross Madness, is Exploration mode, which lets you hop off the track’s main path and explore every corner of the environment for gold coins and collectibles, all at your own leisurely pace. The courses are spread across three differently themed worlds, though I’ve only gotten to bike around Egypt and Australia for now; Iceland is still to come.

Unlike Trials Evolution, the racing here is much looser and more forgiving, meaning you can spill a few times and still stay in the lead or, with enough time, catch back up with everybody. I appreciate this greatly. If that’s not the case, then you probably need to lightly grind for some more coins and upgrade your bike a bit, which is easily done via Exploration mode or playing an older race again. The physics are not entirely arcade-ish, as landing after a jump or trick does require you to maintain some balance or skid out, and you eventually are able to ride behind another biker and coast within their wake, which is silly fun.

Much like with Doritos Crash Course 2 and, maybe, World Series of Poker: Full House Pro, seeing your Avatar in action is a blast. It’s a shame that the game encourages you to cover up my silly, bearded face with riding helmets, but sometimes you need to do that to look super stylish. While the outfits are cosmetics, you can make stat changes to your bike, purchasing new engine parts, tires, and brakes, and you will occasionally need to up a bike to perform better in a higher-tiered race. The cartoony graphics all around work well, though there’s some strange pop-in after each race is finished, when your Avatar hops of his or her bike and greets the crowd of cheering fans.

For another monthly freebie, Motocross Madness is a great addition to anyone’s digital collection on the Xbox 360. Perhaps a bit small in scope, but still brimming with things to do. You can also race competitively online though, if y’all know me like I hope y’all would know me by now, I’ve made no attempts to try this as of yet. Personally, I end up spending most of my time in Exploration mode, staring at coins and skulls in the sky and trying to figure how best to get ’em. It’s certainly more enjoyable than hitting restart every few seconds on a tough-as-nails track in Trials Evolution.

The lengthy grind for an urn without a name

I find it both bizarre and amusing that Suikoden gives the player two extremely similar recruit requirements at nearly the exact time in the plot, and both ask that a specific creature be killed in hopes that it drops a certain item. Nothing too out of the ordinary in a JRPG. However, from what I can gather, the drop rates for both of these monsters range dramatically from one player to another, and some people find the item after the first battle and others, like me, end up grinding for two hours just to see its name pop up. As the Brits say, that’s a bunch of bollocks.

Okay, details. The first side recruit involves killing Nightmares, which are floating casino-card like enemies, in the Soniere Prison; one will eventually leave behind an opal, which you can then give to Esmeralda to get her to sign up with the Liberation Army. The second recruit quest has you murdering Holly Fairies for a nameless urn, which will most likely stump even Jabba, a wizened appraiser from Rikon. The objective couldn’t be clearer: kill X until X drops Y. The problem is, there is no way to tell when you’ll see that item. Might be within minutes, hours, or–the horror!–days.

In fact, I had almost left Soniere Prison entirely and started that really tough Gremio scene, but I purposefully back-tracked for a bit to get into a few more fights starring Nightmares. I would wager it only took four or five more rounds until an opal hit my inventory, so that was nice and had me thinking optimistic thoughts about future grinding quests even though I knew what story beat was coming, but hey, at least I didn’t have to grind for two hours first.

So after gathering up a few more recruits for Castle Castle, I double-checked my list to see who I could still get on the non-Imperial side before serving Milich his just desserts, and I noticed that Jabba the appraiser was still calling Rikon home. So off I went, to grind outside on the world map for a bit, searching for that nameless urn. I skipped all battles not involving Holly Fairies and, given how well the opal hunt went, figured I’d maybe spend fifteen minutes at most doing this before getting the urn and moving on with the game. Nope. I grinded Holly Fairy fight after Holly Fairy fight for at least an hour and a half, having to even mute the game’s sound and listen to a podcast so that I didn’t lose my mind. Eventually, I gave up for the night. Upon returning to Suikoden in the morning, it took another thirty minutes or so of fighting the same fights before those magical words appeared on screen: Obtained Nameless urn. My heart swelled, I shoved it right under Jabba’s whiskery nose, and saved my game twice because I was so ecstatic and distracted that I immediately forgot if I had saved or not after just choosing to save. Oh man.

I don’t remember if there are any further “grind for item” quests in Suikoden, but I certainly hope not. Two hours is much too long to devote to such a mundane and trivial quest. My logged playtime is now in the twelve-hour range, and I think this is one of those early JRPGs that you can probably complete in under twenty hours. We’ll see. I am a bit obsessive about getting all 108 Stars of Destiny, no matter what it takes. If any good came out of this, it’s that Pauly McDohl got mega-rich and sharpened all his friends’ weapons, and it wasn’t even any of their birthdays. What a nice, army-raising boy he is…

Hungry Shark Evolution wants you to experience life as a shark

I know I’ve covered this before, but if your videogame has a ridiculously weird name, there’s an even greater chance that I’ll check it out. Which leads us to Hungry Shark Evolution, from Future Games of London and, strangely, Ubisoft, the powerhouse behind time-standing franchises like Assassin’s Creed, Prince of Persia, and Rayman. It’s okay to be curious; I know I was the minute I saw the name scroll by on my Windows 8 phone. However, after playing about fifteen to twenty minutes and not really getting anywhere great in this digital shark life of mine, I think this is one strange title that probably shouldn’t have surfaced. Hey, look at that…a totally unplanned Microsoft-themed pun!

The short of it is that, in Hungry Shark Evolution, which I’m playing on my Windows 8 phone, you are a shark that is very hungry. No, really. Like starving. Your hunger meter–which is basically your health bar–depletes extremely fast, and so the shark is never satisfied despite eating an entire school of fish in one gulp. Your goal is to survive as long as you can, which means constantly swimming around, looking for your next meal. This can be easy targets, like tiny fish that don’t fight back, or other sharks…or even unaware swimmers if you head towards the beachy area. Along the way, you can complete side objectives specific to each shark type, and these generally boil down to things like “eat four turtles” and “survive for at least six minutes.” Nothing terribly difficult, seeing as I have already unlocked one of the six total Achievements for the game:

Reef Shark (20G): Complete Super Mission 1 using Reef shark.

To complete the Super Mission, you have to first finish all the side missions and do whatever is asked of you next. For this, it was hitting a high score of 25,000 points. Not too hard. The other five Achievements are tied to the other five sharks–Mako, Hammerhead, Tiger, Great White, and Megaladon–which you unlock by first leveling up the prior shark to its fullest. I’ve got the Mako shark next on my evolve list.

The challenge in Hungry Shark Evolution comes from enemies, like sting rays, other sharks, scuba divers, etc, which attack you and significantly lower your food meter. I’ve found some enemy aquatic life harder to kill than others, specifically the sting rays, and if you miss on your first chomp, chances are the shark is taking a hit of health. If you go too long without eating something, that’s it. Your score and gold coins are added up, you watch your shark’s XP grow, and you get returned to the start mission menu, where you can enhance your shark’s swim, bite, and boost abilities, as well as purchase one-use items, accessories, and treasure maps. Some parts of the underwater map are also gated depending on what shark you are using; for example, the reef shark can only swim down so deep.

Much like in Throne Together, I’m finding my finger to be a hindrance to performing a great run. To move the shark, you simply press on the screen and move your finger in the direction you want it to swim. I find it easier to keep my finger in the middle of the screen, because if I move it too far over to the right then I risk the danger of hitting one of the buttons to return me to my phone’s home screen. Keeping it on the left means my wrist is now covering the screen. Again, my finger ends up obstructing a good portion of my view of the shark. Also, while moving with one finger, you can tap the screen with another finger to perform a boost of speed, which is easier said than done, considering I’m using my other hand to cradle the phone in place.

It’s a strange game, for sure. It looks nice, with cartoony, World of Warcraft-like graphics that help flesh out a colorful underwater realm. And it is teeming with puns, like when you eat a scuba diver, the words AQUALUNCH pop up, or VITAMIN SEA after gobbling up a bunch of fish. I think I even saw SUN SCREAM when you leap from the water onto the beach to steal away some clueless sun-tanner. As a cartoonist that lives and dies on pun-related humor, I can’t help but squeal and smile at all this. Goofy name and goofy humor currently outweigh all the free-to-play elements here, which, so far, are easy enough to ignore.

Life as a reef shark was fairly perfunctory, so I’m looking forward to what I can do as a Mako shark. At some point, I also need to Google whether Megaladon is a real shark or one from dinosaur times; it looks ridiculous.

Suikoden’s rock, paper, scissors take on war

All right, I know I teased you last time I covered Suikoden about forthcoming elves and kobolds, so let’s get right to it–I met some elves and kobolds.

After a mighty banquet and stealth ninja assassination attempt (how rude!), Pauly McDohl and his friends tried to leave Castle Castle in hopes of pursuing new recruits, but stumbled upon an elf, exhausted and drenched, right on their front doorstep. Evidently he was so desperate to speak with Lady Odessa that he swam all the way over. Hmm, well, Kirkis, we have some bad news for you, as does he for all of us. The pointy-eared fella who could probably pass for a rebellious teenager from Lothlorien based on his ginger hair says that the Great Imperial General Kwanda Rosman is planning to exterminate all the elves.

Well, we simply can’t allow that, and so the gang is off, first through the woods, which are unnavigable without Kirkis’ help, then through an empty kobold village, and off to visit the mighty elves, who live high up in the trees and just think the snootiest of thoughts when it comes to humans. Long story short, things go awry, and the gang is tossed into jail, though Kirkis’ girlfriend helps set everyone free shortly after. We then visit the home of the dwarves, where we learn that Kwanda Rosman was able to build a Burning Mirror after stealing the blueprint from one of their mines. The dwarven leader doesn’t believe this, so he tasks us with stealing something to prove such a feat is possible. I won’t go into more detail there as it is a pretty straightforward dungeon crawl, though I must comment on the “telephone puzzle” to open the boss door, another nugget of strangeness I forgot over time.

Upon returning to the village of the elves, we find it burnt to the ground. We were too late, and now Kwanda Rosman must pay, taking us into Suikoden‘s first large-scale army battle, which, much like the castle and 108 Stars of Destiny, is to become a trademark of the series. In these, it’s all about scope, with your army of tiny pixelated soldiers versus another, and the army count actually does reflect the number of people you’ve recruited, so even if Onil and Krin serve little purpose once in your castle, they at least participate in war. Basically, you select from four options: charge, bow, magic, and others. Your opponent is also making a choice, and the outcome is determined in a rocks, paper, scissors fashion that I’m sure Fire Emblem: Awakening could appreciate. Let me break it down:

• Charge beats bow
• Magic beats charge
• Bow beats magic

If both players pick the same attack, the damage is reduced for both, but still accounted for. The “others” option allows thieves to sneak in to the opposing army’s camp and steal gold or get a hint as to what attack they’ll do next. It’s really just a guessing game, and I got creamed on my first two attempts, even ending up losing Eileen. See, for many of the non-vital story-related characters in your army, death can come quite easy during these army battles, and this is permadeath, so you best be careful with who you send out. Since I’m ultimately going for 108 total Stars of Destiny, this was an instant “reload my save” scenario, something I’m usually against. Finally, with a little luck and a good streak of my army casting magic against Kwanda’s charge attack, the fight was over. Now it was time to storm the stronghold.

Once you get through all the random encounters, open all the hidden treasure chests, and take care of that dragon miniboss, which was a bit hard since I still don’t have much in the “heal the entire party” option, you fight Kwanda, one on one. Mano-a-mano. And just like the army battle, it’s a game of choices. Here, let me break it down one more time:

• Attack (damages opponent, even a little damage through defend)
• Defend (blocks opponent, counters if against desperate attack)
• Desperate attack (deals big damage, but can be countered)

Once again, it’s the whole rock, paper, scissors thing, but at least this time, so long as you read the dialogue carefully, your opponent’s attacks are televised. Like, when Kwanda is ready to do a desperate attack, he says something aggressive so you know to hit defend. I beat him on the first try, so it’s a much easier way to fight, going for something more cinematic than strategic. Anyways, because Pauly McDohl has an obsession with recruiting characters, he let Kwanda live and join the Liberation Army since he was clearly acting under a magic rune spell.

I’m hoping to progress further in the game and not need to stop and comment about every single section I encounter. However, when I last played this game, I wasn’t even a writer, just some mopey teenage kid who thought ska was the gratest music ever, that khakis were more comfortable than jeans, and that George Constanza had a way of looking at the world that I totally grokked. Yeaaah. I think, at this point, I’ve seen all the big component parts of Suikoden–if I remember right, that is–so all that should be left is story stuff and more turn-based fights, army battles, and one-on-one combat scenarios. Plus more recruiting. Gotta grow that castle, after all. As soon as the Kwanda stuff was done, I went right back out to grab a few more friends for the fight before seeing what Viktor and the recently returned Flik were talking about. I guess I’ll be back if something strange or interesting pops up and I’m compelled to write about it. Until then.

Throne Together, a block-based puzzle game about building castles

Recently, I got my fill of Angry Birds Rio, so much that I even unlocked all twenty Achievements in it, and so I happily removed it from my Windows 8 phone feeling pretty satisfied with the experience. Which is not at all how I felt about Temple Run 2, since it glitched out and wouldn’t let me unlock the last Achievement despite meeting its requirement on many runs, as well as Microsoft Mahjong, also glitched to the point where I’ll no longer be able to earn 20 medals despite totally being able to. It seems like many games for Microsoft’s Windows 8 phones are less than stellar in the quality assurance section, but since the majority of them are all free, it is hard to grumble too loudly. Anyways, I downloaded two more recently, Throne Together and Hungry Shark Evolution, and I’m here to talk about the former first. Sorry, shark fans.

Well, once again, I couldn’t come up with a clever blog title for Throne Together, and so I went the straightforward route of simply describing exactly what it is: a block-based puzzle game about building castles. So far, after doing five to six puzzles, that premise has remained true and untouched, and so the diversity revolves around what kind of castles you need to build, the pieces you use to build them, how fast you move, and other level-specific challenges. Seems like there is a “lives” system similar to Hexic, wherein you get five chances to not fail and can keep playing until you run out of lives, with them regenerating over real-life time. Oh boy. Definitely not my favorite aspect of free-to-play medium, as I just want to play when I want and for how long I want, but I wonder then if people would just burn through everything super fast and move on to the next shiny item before even contemplating the thought of spending real money to buy a boost or extra slew of blocks. Me, no, I’ll never do that.

I’m no professional castle builder–though I always did make LEGO houses full of booby traps as a kid–but neither is Microsoft. Here’s how it works. Basically, you are shown a crown floating in the air (or sometimes multiple crowns), and you have to construct a castle that will touch these, all either under a time limit or specific number of block pieces used. You also have to factor in that the castle has to be stable, that constructing a long, narrow structure might sway and fall or too much heavy weight on top could crack the foundation and bring everything tumbling down. You can counter this by place additional pieces next to the parts cracking, but only for so long. So far, it’s all been fairly easy to figure out, but I can see future levels as getting very tricky, especially depending on where the crowns are positioned. Additional challenges, like building over a river, are also tossed at you.

I’ve only quickly touch upon the Achievements for Throne Together, which certainly look grinding and some require you to pester your friends, which I won’t do, but what really gets me down is that all the icons are the same: a red throne on a blue background. C’mon, we’re no longer living in the medieval times of Achievements (2007-2008). We can get more creative than this.

Right. I’ve run into a problem that I’m surprised has not popped up on other Windows 8 phone games yet. When moving pieces around with my pointer finger, it is difficult to see the screen and pinpoint where exactly to place them. Maybe I have fat fingers or maybe I don’t. I’ve had to rely on the Tetris way, lining up where I want the piece to fall and then watching it trickle down slowly on its own. During untimed missions, this is fine, but when I need to complete a castle in under X number of seconds, this will not work. The problem is that the castle block pieces are smaller than the end of my fingertip to begin with, so when I touch the screen, I can’t even see what I’m manipulating. You’ll probably hear me complain about this again later in Hungry Shark Evolution.

Anyways, not sure how many levels in total there are here, but I stopped at 16, which is one or two after you learn about blueprints and how building them while trying to build a castle can add extra bonus points to your ultimate score and help you on your path to a three stars rating. There’s no story to follow here, just instructions from a nameless castle inspector, and that’s fine because, while it worked in a cutesy way for Hexic, I just can’t see it adding anything here. The meat of the game are the levels themselves and figuring out the best way to build a castle. I’ll keep at it for a bit, but if the later levels prove too challenging I don’t think I’ll feel too bad abandoning this one. It definitely doesn’t have its hooks in me despite my love for castle structures. While this is absolutely a game of thrones, it is also no Game of Thrones.

The great wheel of discovery turns again in Suikoden

Let’s see, let’s see. Where did I last leave off with my Suikoden progress?

Oh, right. Pauly McDohl and the gang had had their fill of playing Chinchirorin and were preparing to storm a gloomy castle in the middle of an ocean, one evidently guarded by fog, snails with long necks, and a mighty fire-spewing dragon. Don’t worry. We won, though Pauly and Gremio both fell unconscious during the fight and missed out on a largely sweet EXP boost, now a bit behind everyone else in terms of leveling. And so, with all the monsters cleared out of the castle, every treasure chest opened, and it given a proper name, the real meat of Suikoden can start. I’m talking about recruiting members into the Liberation Army and watching your castle expand as people move on in and call it home.

Before continuing on with the next story section, I immediately headed back out to all the towns I could visit to see who I could instantly recruit to the Liberation Army. Some Stars of Destiny are more eager or easily swayed than others; take for instance Onil, a gossip-monger living in Seika. She’s already heard about Pauly looking for recruits and is ready to go, and I think that’s the extent of Onil’s usefulness, but at least she can be ticked off of Luc’s recruit-tracking stone slabs. Other people you can recruit are more useful gameplay-wise, such as Marie–you remember her, the stuck-between-a-rock-and-a-hard-place innkeeper from way back in Gregminster, yes?–who now operates a free inn inside your castle, as well as Sergei who puts in an elevator, which will grow in importance as your castle itself grows in importance. And then there are the fighters you recruit who you can actually add to your party’s formation and see what kind of neat runes they have or special unite attacks, such as Varkas and Sydonia.

After getting all that I could–sorry Lorelai, you’ll have to wait until I’m a higher level–I jumped back on the plot wagon and went to Kouan to speak with Lepant, a wealthy merchant, at Mathiu’s request. This took the gang inside a mansion brimming with robotic enemies, evidently created by Juppo the trickster. Fine, fine. I can fight mimic treasure chests all day long. However, I was once again completely surprised to enter a room featuring Juppo’s masterpiece: a giant roulette wheel of chance, backed by that jaunty, somewhat jarring banjo-lead tune previously heard during, I think, the cups game in Rockland. See above. Anyways, you step on the wheel, it spins you round and round, and you get what you land on. Strangely, there are slices for +10 EXP and -10 EXP, which is an amount so minor that you’d have to land on them five thousand times to really feel any kind of impact. It took me maybe seven or eights go-arounds to land safely on the other side. Again, a strange part of Suikoden that I completely forgot about, but one I have to imagine the developers were excited to see implemented at the time, in a JRPG of all things.

In the room after that, you meet Rock, a man eager to open up a warehouse in your castle. I recruited him as fast as I could hit the button because I’m beginning to struggle with Suikoden‘s old-school take on inventory slots. It’s quite limited, and with Rock’s warehouse, I can now at least store rune pieces, armor, and ? ornaments to my heart’s content until I’ve decided what to do with them. See, each party member can hold nine items, but this includes armor they are wearing, which can take up a maximum of five slots if you have something on from head to toes. I generally try to keep a Medicine 6 on everybody too, which leaves little room for much else, and when you are trying to share equipment with someone but they are full on inventory it can be quite maddening to shuffle things to and fro. It’s definitely an aspect I wish was stronger, but I don’t know if a shared inventory would work either, as sometimes deciding who to carry that Needle or Mega Medicine 3 is a strategic decision for sure.

Right, so, there are some big story moments in Lepant’s mansion. First, you learn that your old Gregminster boss Kraze is in control of Kouan and ends up kidnapping Eileen, Lepant’s wife. Secondly, there is the great return of Pahn, and Pauly McDohl’s previous bodyguard redeems himself, physically placing his body between Kraze and Eileen. Then there is a choice: kill or let Kraze go. All I could do is think of Ted, and so Pauly’s hands ran red that day. Digitally red. Well, no–not really. All that happens is the screen fades to black and you hear a “hitting” sound effect; when the scene comes back up, Kraze is gone, so we’ll never really know what happened there, just like we’ll never know what went down in the Tower of Joy unless Howland Reed decides to stand up and speak. Yup, I’m comparing Suikoden with A Song of Ice and Fire. Pony up.

I never intended for me to be covering my replay of Suikoden in a “let’s play” fashion, but I just keep finding interesting moments to talk about. Again, I haven’t touched this game in over a decade, so there’s a lot I’ve forgotten, as well as many memories tinted by nostalgia. Some of the mechanics are still extremely enjoyable–recruiting dudes–while others I’m finding frustrating–equipping dudes–but I’m glad to be back in this colorful 16-bit world, even if it feels a little less epic and more to the point than I previously remembered. Up next, I guess…elves and kobolds.

Hatty Hattington is working for the cats in BattleBlock Theater

The title of this blog post might not make any sense to those unfamiliar with BattleBlock Theater‘s plot. That said, it might not make sense regardless. Either way, it sounded catchy in my mind, and so I wrote it, because “working for the cats” is the sort of life no one should live. As a daily scooper of cat poop, trust me–I know. Rarely do I struggle with finding an image and silly phrase to write on top of it in my now classic Showcard Gothic font, but blog post titles are tricky things; you want something that will, at the same time, grab a reader’s attention and inform them about what they will be reading about. Some of my post titles are more successful than others. Just a little insider baseball here at Grinding Down, Inc.

Right. On with the show, pun completely intended. BattleBlock Theater was one of July’s free Games with Gold thingies, and, just as with Charlie Murder, I ended up downloading right at the end of the month, almost missing it entirely. I have to not slack on these because free is free, and we’re getting Motocross Madness (nay!) and Dishonored (yay!) for August 2014. I just might have to remove both Halo 3 and Crackdown from my hard-drive to make space, but that’s okay–I don’t think I’m going back to either ever again, despite there still being some 100+ Agility Orbs left to collect; I’ll live, and so will you.

I knew next to nothing about BattleBlock Theater or its developer before diving right into it. I guess they previously made Castle Crashers, which seems like a fantastic group game if you have people to play with, which I unfortunately do not. Cue sad violin music. A quick glance makes it seem like a cartoony, side-scrolling action platformer, and I think I was pretty close with my first assumption. I wasn’t expecting it to be so quirky, but quirky is fine in my books, and so listening to the narrator–voiced by Will Stamper–dramatically tell the doomed voyage of the S.S. Friendship and how all of its people, even the great Hatty Hattington, got captured by an island of cats and forced to entertainment everyone via deadly obstacle courses…well, it delightfully took me by surprise. Seriously, his voice is a rollercoaster, and it takes you places, most often from one level to another, but in a way that’s more fun than a silent loading screen or text pop-up.

For the story mode, you play through a bunch of short, platform- and puzzle-themed levels, trying to complete them as fast as possible while collecting gems and balls of yarns, both of which are used to unlock new avatars and powers, respectively. At the end, you get a letter grade, with the best being A++ and giving you two extra green gems. To get that, you need to move fast and collect everything in one go. Your little dude–which is always green for me and generally rocking a funny face–can jump, double jump, punch, and use a special attack like throwing fireballs or tossing boomerangs to knock away persistent enemies standing in your way of progress. Other parts of the level require timing, hitting switches, finding secret teleporting portals, clinging to walls/ceilings, and so on.

Naturally, getting the gems and balls of yarn is fairly easy in the early levels, but I’m now up to world five and struggling to even finish the levels with a letter grade above a B. That’s not to say that the levels are punishingly hard, just more devious about the puzzles and ways to reach everything, and since time is of the essence, you have to pick: pound your head against the wall in hopes of figuring it out or move on and finish the level faster. That said, every part of the level has a purpose, so there’s never any frustration felt over getting stuck in this corner or that; each piece in a level has a purpose, but you have to figure that out yourself. BattleBlock Theater is the type of game that gets under your skin, driving you forward to see what the next world’s levels look like and what new twists they throw at you. It also helps that, in reality, each level can be completed in under a few minutes, so the dopamine pace is rapid-fire.

As I already mentioned, the narration throughout is fantastic. In fact, audio is possibly BattleBlock Theater‘s lead actor in the limelight, deservedly so. The song that plays during the main menu begins with just some electronic noises before kicking it to the next level with a catchy-as-all-gets drum beat and horn combo. The majority of the soundtrack is upbeat, bouncy, which works great for leaping from platform to platform and punching enemy cats in the face. Oh, and the sound effects are snappy, but addictive, like the notes that play when you snag enough gems to open the exit to the level. I’m excited to hear more of it.

There’s some online play and co-op stuff in BattleBlock Theater, which I’ve not tried yet and most likely won’t ever get to. I mean, I could take a deep breath and randomly join another online player’s game, but I won’t. For starters, I’m not sure what the benefit of playing these levels with a second player is, though I guess we could potentially grab all the gems faster. Eh, I’d rather just go at it by myself, that way when I repeatedly fall into spikes or water seven times in a row I don’t have to explain it to anyone. If co-op adventure story levels aren’t your thing, then arena challenges exist, which are basically twists on classic multiplayer games like King of the Hill. Lastly, there’s a level editor, which I’ve also not explored…yet.

As a freebie for Gold members, BattleBlock Theater is a hit. It is colorful, accessible yet still challenging, brimming with content to eat up, and flavorful in the same vein that Thomas Was Alone is. Those that consider graphics everything are not going to be blown away, but this experience is more about learning a level and running through it as perfectly as possible, and it really helps that the game plays well, save for the unsatisfying melee combat. I’m glad I’m playing it now and am looking forward to finishing up the Story mode; I think there’s six worlds in total to go through. Again, I most likely won’t try to play any co-op Story levels, but maybe I’ll jump into an Arena match or two and see what that’s all about. Until then, my feline overlords.

Remember Me teaches us to never forget the painful memories

If I had actually played Remember Me in 2013 and not dragged my feet to getting around to it, this heartbreaking tale of mind and memory most likely would’ve made my list of my five favorite games for the year, knocking out Doritos Crash Course 2. Yes, in spite of its shortcomings, of which there are several, it’s still that good, and I urge anyone reading this that has even the slightest interest in checking out Dontnod Entertainment’s debut to bite the bullet and do it. There most likely won’t be a sequel, and there might come a time when you won’t, ironically, even remember this came out.

I covered a lot of Remember Me in my last post, which saw me just entering the game’s fourth chapter. Also known as the halfway point for this roughly seven-hour journey. The second half of the game is still formulaic, more of the same platforming, punching, and pondering, but with tougher group and boss fights, as well as hard-cutting plot twists, one of which actually honestly caught me by surprise. No, really. I leaned forward and muttered, “No way.” You got me, game. Some later beats I saw coming, but not in execution, so that continued to keep me on my toes, because in a world where anything and everything is malleable, even hopes and dreams and memories, nothing can be expected.

Remember Me‘s premise is so dang good, and I’m not just saying that because I love movies like Inception and Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, short fiction by Philip K. Dick, and, of course, George Orwell’s 1984, where playing with one’s mind is the key to making things work. At least for a time. It’s perhaps not as byzantine as those previous mentions, but it still packs a punch, holds power, and proves poignant, especially when talking about how personal pain can result in far-reaching consequences for the ones we love, even entire cultures. It’s certainly a cinematic adventure, but it’s handled quite seriously and personally, unfolding at a great clip with enough interaction peppered throughout to not slip into Metal Gear Solid 2 territory, where you only watch things happen as a passive player.

Something I neglected to comment on in my previous Remember Me post is that it features a fantastically strange soundtrack by Oliver Deriviere. Every time I’d scroll past Remember Me on my list of PlayStation Plus games, I’d get a one-second tease at the futuristic tunes that back up all those glowing signs, futuristic buildings, drones, and chaotic fights. It’s an orchestral and electronica mix, spiced with a number of glitches and synthesizer bleeps, which creates rather appropriate cyberpunk music. You might not ever notice when a song starts, but once it begins to amp up, it’s all you’ll hear, and it is used to great effect, especially during boss fights and the last chunk of the game.

Sadly, I will say that I felt no desire to search for the collectibles in Remember Me, unlike the feelings I got for Agility Orbs in Crackdown and shards in inFAMOUS 2. I finished the game with over half of the Scaramechs found, which are the parasites feeding on ambient memories in each level, generally located by the static-like sounds they emit; when you shoot them down, you get a slight PMP bonus. The most straightforward collectibles are the Mnesis memories, which are found in the environment. SAT and Focus pick-ups expand your health and energy after you collect enough of them. I don’t remember how much health Nilin had by the end, but she definitely only had two pips of Focus, so I missed a bunch, but again didn’t really feel driven to snuff every single one out. Plus, with the health-restoring combo attacks, you can get by on very little.

Again, Remember Me is a game you should play. It’s a smart, confident sci-fi adventure that’ll most likely take you ten to eleven hours on the middle difficulty level, with enough combat customization to keep things interesting and challenging, though there really isn’t any point to replaying it a second time, unless you missed some Trophies and collectibles. All the events will play out the same regardless, but man, what a series of events, lead by Nilin, a strong female protagonist capable of doing her own dirty work, and only sexualized in a few shots where the camera angle lingers a bit too long on her lower backside. She stands tall next to heroines like Jade from Beyond Good & Evil and Konoko from Oni. She, and her tragic tale of learning who she is and how she ultimately became Nilin, the Memory Hunter, is unarguably worth remembering.

Chinchirorin tests Pauly McDohl’s patience in Suikoden

So, Suikoden surprised me again. I completely remembered the cups game with the old lady in Rockland, though I don’t exactly remember how the exploit works to earn a bajillion bucks–er, sorry, I mean bits. Think it has to do with only playing one round over and over, and it’s always under the same cup the first time. However, I was not at all mentally prepared for the trial of patience when Pauly McDohl and friends arrived in Kaku, a small fishing village on the coast of Lake Toran, and a second mini-game came into the fold, one that got in the way of the actual plot advancing. It’s based entirely around luck, and luck, it seemed, was not on my side, but I guess it hasn’t been for some time since a certain someone began wielding a certain “soul-eating” True Rune.

Right. Well, since the last update, Pauly McDohl and friends are now considered rebels and on the run. They eventually meet up with Lady Odessa, the leader of the Liberation Army, which thrives underground and exists to fight back against the Empire. After helping to deliver some secret weapon plans to friends, they return to find Empire soldiers attacked the Liberation Army headquarters–which is simply a basement beneath an inn–and Lady Odessa critically wounds herself protecting a small child. As she dies, she gives two final requests: deliver an earring and to not let her death be known, otherwise support for the Liberation Army will fall. When you deliver this earring to a man called Mathiu Silverberg–her brother!–he sees great potential in Pauly and declares that the Liberation Army needs a new headquarters, one that could withstand an attack from the Empire. Mathiu suggests the castle in the middle of Lake Toran, and so the gang is off to Kaku, to find somebody willing to row them over to it. That’s when we meet Tai Ho, his bowl, and his magical dice-throwing skills.

Tai Ho is willing to give the gang a boat ride over to the castle, but only if Pauly can beat him at his own game. However, you have to put up all your money against him so make sure you spend a bit before doing so. The gambling game played with three six-sided dice is known as Chinchirorin, or more commonly called Cee-lo in the United States. Rolling a 4-5-6 is always treated as a winning combination for the first player who rolls it, and a 1-2-3 automatically loses. If you roll two dice of the same number, the third dice scores, so a 4-4-6 would mean a score of 6. If you miss the bowl or the dice fall out, it’s also an automatic loss. There is also something called Storm, which is when you get three of the same number, but a 1-1-1 means you lose and pay double while a 6-6-6 means you win and get paid double.

All of that means nothing when you realize the game is based entirely around luck, and it took me at least seven or eight attempts to beat Tai Ho. However, you can’t play against him unless you have at least 1,000 bits, so the rinse, shampoo, wash cycle went as follows: lose all money to Tai Ho, venture out to grind for money, use some of that money to heal up via a night at the inn, go back out to recuperate losses, and then return to the dice master to try again. Took me about an extra 20 to 30 minutes. I guess some people save right before this part and reload to try again, but that’s never been my style, as you’ll recall from my time with Fire Emblem: Awakening. If you’re curious, my game-winning throw was a 3-3-5 to Tai Ho’s 2-2-4. Suck it.

I suspect I’ll have to play Chinchirorin a few more times to actually recruit Tai Ho and his brother down the line, but for now we’re moving on. There’s a gloomy castle filled with monsters in the middle of a lake to investigate!