Posted by Pip

FL4- What Could Happen

When logic, reason, and all else fail, just stick your face in it. Really the worst that could happen would be that it kills you instantly and without suffering because you just sheared your brain off and then think of all the good that could come from a glowing portal.

End of the month and the first official full month of dreaded summertime. Even though it’s been damn hot since March here. Donate arts, creativity, or money and then just ask and this month’s wallpaper could be yours!


This month’s amusing search string leading to Sins is a simple one but worth it: “7 deadly sins of algebra”. Honestly, the fact that “i” is considered a quasi-real and legit number in math is all the proof you need that algebra isn’t on the level.

Quick Review: Overlord (PS3)- Overlord is basically a Pikmin that’s actually fun to play, has great characters, and isn’t horrifically boring. That’s why it pains me to say that under no circumstances should you buy the game. I’ll explain in a second but let’s just get the basics down. The characters are awesome, the dialogue is fantastic, it’s funny, and the story is really interesting and for anybody that really likes or really dislikes the Lord of the Rings, you basically get to inflict torment on hobbits, dwarves, elves, and every other annoying as all get out fantasy race. The initial main problem is just the horrendous level design. Levels are basically laid out like you gave a child a crayon, told him to go nuts and scribble all over a sheet of paper, and that’s your level. There are constant dead ends and loops and areas that sometimes you can get into but the next time you see a similar area, you can’t get into it. Trying to find out where to go, where an objective is, or even how to get back from where you came is an exercise in hair pulling annoyance and tedium made that much worse by a camera and lock on system that shows more disdain to the user than just about any I’ve experienced. The minions suffer from the same brain-dead AI that the Pikmin had and will seemingly go out of their way to drown, poison, set themselves on fire, or blow themselves up. Getting them to heal one another seems to be completely random because your healers are more willing to jump into battle where they die in a single hit than to actually do their job and help you. You’ll frequently have a large group of healers walk passed an injured minion, refuse to help him when you order them, and do nothing when you manually guide them to the body. But if there’s something on fire, dammit they are there to rush into the flames and die on their own accord! The extra levels for the expansion are just so poorly laid out and executed that you’re better off just skipping them or pretending that they don’t exist.
Even with all those problems, the game would be salvage and actually still fun until we hit this one bottleneck. Theoretically, this section should take no more than thirty seconds, but after an hour trying to do it, I was so broken down that it wouldn’t take much to reduce me to tears. I calmly saved my game, ejected the disc, and put it back in its envelope to return. All you have to do is herd a person through some passages and into a specific spot. Again theoretically, sounds pretty easy. However, the controls, camera, and lock on just absolutely give out and leave you with nothing to control you character, the view, or your minions. Left randomly becomes right, right becomes left. If you're too far away, the character doesn't react to the minions herding her but if you get too close she walks through you and goes back to the start. I actually felt physically ill from the camera shaking, jolting around, and just randomly spinning at this part so that combined with the shear frustration and hatred of the moment, the game ceases to be fun, or hell, even playable at this point. Up until this point and even with the horrible AI, the game wasn’t hard (it’s actually pretty darn easy) and it typically made sense. But then... THIS. You can’t advance the game if you don’t finish this spot, so there’s nothing to do but quit, curse yourself for all the hours you sunk to get this far into the game (no, this couldn’t happen at the start of the game, this is getting near the end), download the ending from Youtube, and possibly weep in a fetal position.
Sins Committed: Bad camera/lock-on, bad AI, bad level design