The One Where Our Hero Nearly Loses Her Shit

Day 1

Picture the scene. I work by a quayside, so there are boats going about doing their thing most days. There is also a couple of Para Handy style boats that seem to be eternally moored there. Mostly it is quiet about here, since there is only the island past us. However, on this day something went very odd. I suspect that one of the boats had become possessed by the spirit of an angry air raid siren, or at least that is what it sounded like. Annoying and loud, which carried on for about 30 minutes or so. No idea if an exorcism had take place or what. Peace eventually ensued.

Day 2

As I walked to work, it was foggy as all hell. The closer I got to work, the thicker the fog became. This was not morning fog, we're talking 11am fog, which you must admit is quite freakish. The houses across the water were but a vauge outline. With the quite deserted feel of the area, as anyone who knows Chatham Outlet Center will know, it was quite spooky with all that fog.

Now, add these two days together.

Silent Hill

Thankfully they were on different days, as I would have totally lost the proverbial plot. Out the door, down the street and away, keeping an eye out for big men with pyramids on their head. You would not see me for dust (or rather the fog as it closed in my wake)

Indie Bundle Reviews: HumbleBundle8

Last week the latest offering from the Humble Bundle team was released, and I have to say, it is one of the best yet. A pay-what-you-want bundle which contains seven fine games plus their soundtracks (and then they added four more!) so you can sing along to the Little Inferno song whenever you want! So onto my quick review...

Note: yes, I'm aware that the buggers added four more, as I was about to finish this. I'm downloading and I'll try to get a Part 2 up tomorrow. Who needs sleep?? (*pathetic voice* me?)

Hotline Miami

"I hate to advocate drugs, alcohol  violence or insanity to anyone, but they've always worked for me" - Hunter S. Thompson

This is a top down 2D action game and I don't know what to make of this game, unless you want to hear me say "Holy bag of monkey crap". Its like someone watched too much Miami Vice, dropped some acid and played the first GTA game a lot, and I do mean a lot.

Who is this bearded bugger? Why is he giving me free food? Should I really ask?

And its really tricky. The enemy AI can take the most random paths, so carefully tuned runs can fall to pieces quickly. You also have the constitution of a wet bit of bog roll, and you can die from one or two blows or a single gun shot. Fortunately, with a bash of a button you can start that section again, allowing you multiple retries of the same bit. So far, I've died far more times than I would really care to count, and yet I still go back to it.

The graphic design is so retro it wants to paint the world neon colours. Again, its like a weird trip brought on by watching too much 80's telly and eating very old cheese. The retro CRT scan lines can be a little distracting but also adds to the drug addled feel of it, which works, although a little migraine inducing in places. Sadly I've been unable to play more than an hour or so, but its certainly one from this bundle that I'll be going back to at some point, when I have time, which may be never given everything else going on.

Proteus

"I wandered lonely as a cloud. 

     That floats on high o'er vales and hills,

         When all at once I saw a crowd,

            A host, of golden daffodils;

              Beside the lake, beneath the trees,

                  Fluttering and dancing in the breeze." - William Wordsworth

This is not a game, but an experience  You wander as lonely as a cloud... wait, no, that's something else. Its not the most visually delightful game in the bundle, but that's not the point of this. Its an experiment with sound. As you explore this island, the sound changes depending on the landscape and landmarks that you pass. 

I am a little pink floaty cloud....

Its an interesting synergy of simplicity on the graphics and the more layered complexity of the sound design. Most of all, it was really strange to load this up just after playing Hotline Miami. Its the sort of game you would play to chill out with before you climbed the wooden hill to Bedfordshire. It is not my personal cup of tea, but I can see it from an artistic and experimental point of view. A version of Minecraft stripped down to its fundamentals  so you just float through a pinky dream scape without sheep bleating at you.

Little Inferno

 "Some men aren't looking for anything logical, like money. 

       They can't be bought, bullied, reasoned or negotiated with. 

            Some men just want to watch the world burn."

                  - Alfred Pennyworth

Who needs instructions? BURN THEM ALL!!!!!

This is another experience  rather than a game, although does have a puzzle element in the destruction and mayhem in this little sandbox. Burn defective toys, nuclear bombs and other random crap in you get sent magically in the post, which is impressive considering the world is covered in snow. Its a strange little thing, on the whole. I'm not sure if its meant to be a dark parody of other games out there, or just deliberately simplistic. It was certainly a cathartic experience to burn massive piles of crap and all the coins spit out.

 It takes about an hour to run through all the burnings, and chaos *oooooo pretty flames* but once its done its done. The soundtrack is quite charming, and the Little Inferno song is annoyingly catchy. Time to burn some demented leprechauns.

Awesomenauts

"There is no problem that cannot be solved by the use of high explosives." - Anon

Not Lemmy from Motorhead, but Sheriff Lonestar

This is a 2D MOBA with all the convoluted complexity you find in League of Legends stripped out, thankfully. Two teams (Red and Blue) beat the snot out of each other in a cheerful and colourful way. By blowing up anything of the opposing colour, gives you Solar, the in game currency that you can spend on upgrades and such to gradually improve your efficency at beating the opposing team to a pulp. I'm a relative newbie to the MOBA genre, having only played a little of DOTA2 and LOL. Its not one that has really grabbed me, to be honest. Even though Awesomenauts is a stripped down MOBA but that it still has the potential to get on my nerves because I can't plough hundreds of hours into it to level up the characters. Shame really. It may be better to play with friends, rather than the cheap and dirty AI (who seems to poop Solar at an alarmingly quick rate) but as yet, I've not had a chance. I'm sure I'll edit this when I do get to play with other humans. The music is kick ass though, and the graphic style makes me feel like I'm playing a kids cartoon.

Capsized

"And pray that there's intelligent life somewhere up in space...

         ...'cos there's bugger-all down here on Earth"

                          Eric Idle, "Galaxy Song", Monty Python's The Meaning of Life

Always know where your trousers are.

Capsized is a fun little platform run and gun game, with an awesome science fiction/alien world theme. Its also very nice on the eye with an art style I really like. You fly little Spaceman dude around the level with your jet pack, randomly flinging rocks around with a rope and anti gravity gun thingy. The general premise being that you have crashed on this lush jungle planet, and you need to survive by jumping around and exploring. The main focus really is the movement in this game, with a great deal of flexibility in how you get from point A to point B; rope, gravity ram or jet pack  And collectables, which are always lovely, as you ninja rope around the environment. But why does everything want to eat me? This is a silly place! Its a surprisingly fun game that clocks in at about 5 hour mark with the story mode, with an extra arcade mode to chase high scores through the level. Its certainly something I'll be heading back to play, when I have some time!

Thomas Was Alone

"Walking with a friend in the dark is better than walking alone in the light." - Helen Keller

Blocks Assemble!

TwA is a lovely little minimalist puzzle platformer written by the lovely Mike Bithell that he made in his own time. This was, and still is, the main reason that I bought this bundle at all. It is amazing how emotionally attached you can get to those bouncing cubes. The number of times I've shouted "John, you useless prat" as I miss a jump again, well, more than I can count. The premise revolves around the establishment of several AI entities, shown as various coloured irregular quadrilaterals (Apart from Claire, who is an awesome big blue regular quadrilateral aka a square!) Now, there are many reasons I love this game, its cute and simple but sometimes devilishly tricky for a start. Then there is the quirky Douglas Adams style humour  voiced by Danny Wallace. I do like Claire, who is a super hero and needs a cape. Nearly finished this one. And I'll be going back as soon as I finish writing these delicious eye words for you to devour.

Dear Esther

“If you have ever lost a loved one, then you know exactly how it feels. And if you have not, then you cannot possibly imagine it.” 

― Lemony Snicket, The Bad Beginning

Not somewhere for a jolly holiday.

I feel bad. I haven't devoted enough time to this. I feel its a game that requires me to be in the right head space, and I've not been in it for the last few days. I've played a little of it, as much as you can "play" it really. Set on some isolated unnamed Scottish island (In the Hebrides according to Wikipedia) it tells the story via a series of letters that are triggered as you reach various points on your stroll across the island. Although its not a game in the traditional sense, it has the most lush graphics I've seen for a long time, and is fantastically detailed to the point that I could almost smell the sea and the decayed flotsam and jetsam on the beach. Having grown up on the West Coast of Scotland, I'm familiar with the bleak grey that it manages most of the time, and the details of the plants and rock structures were very real to me. I also have to mention the sound design. I have 5.1 surround sound, which I switched to after just being on the 2 speaker setting for a little while. It is very very good. It was like candy for my ears (but less sticky) So I've left this for now, not because I don't want to play it, but because I want to pay it the attention it really deserves. 

Invisible Disability And A Turnstile

I'm about to post a non computer game issue. If you want you to skip this then feel free, but I need to vent because I want to get it off my chest before tomorrow. I'm on my way to sunny Yorkshire for a very good friends' wedding, which I've been excited and apprehensive about.

As many know,my physical   health has not been great, with a potential Lupus diagnosis in the offing, and Fybromyalga. The long and the short is that I'm in pain all the time, which gets worse and more severe when I have to do stressful or physical things. So travel from Kent to Yorkshire was going to be a stressful experience, so MrMe and I planned this carefully, plenty of time for changes and reservations when it was possible. MrMe is a bit poorly today and his back is playing up, but the gentlechap he is he has my case and his backpack. I had to make a coffee stop, since I need to make it Yorkshire without falling over, so cue Starbucks. Yumyum.

We got to Kings Cross fine, and I found Starbucks and bought a coffee, laughed at the queue of people wanting platform 9 3/4 photos. So now I have to navigate the turnstiles, with two biggish bags, a hot coffee and tickets. I can't carry much in my left hand, and I certainly don't trust it with a coffee, since it cramps randomly and drops things. The ticket thing has its slot on the right.

Do you see the problem?

MrMe has gone ahead, I don't want to overload him anymore as he is struggling too. I think to myself "Time to get over the British insecurity of asking for help when I need it" That's what the staff at ticket barriers are for, after all. Two of my friends work at South East Trains, and the trains are rubbish, but the staff are super helpful in the stations. This morning I saw one staff gent help a lady with her pushchair down the stairs at Gillingham whilst explaining how to get to her destination.

So I ask for help, all I want is for one of the gaggle of three to check my ticket and open the barrier so I can waddle through. It must have been a really interesting conversation between her and her two colleagues, because they ignored me for what felt forever. I coughed it that polite British way, and still no dice. Buggeration. So I did the "Excuse me?" The universal call of the stranded. Well, bloody hell, if I was a lesser lass the woman's dirty look would have mad me skittle off ashamed for disturbing her conversation. But not today, I'm tired and I hurt all over and I'm really quite cranky*. My left hand is starting to cramp trying to hold my wallet and my ticket. "Could you help me through the barrier please?"

"What help do you need" while she looks at me like I smell of doggie poop.

WTF help do you think I need, I think.

"Errr, my hands are full?!?" I reply sheepily,  thinking I've committed some grievous faux par of train travel.

I'd have thought the tired haggard look on my face, the fact I limp plus the fact I'm a customer would have been enough. I'm on this side of the barrier, and I need to be on the other. Here is my ticket of passage, I require your assistance to facilitate the transition.

The extent of the help?

She turned the ticket round in my left hand and pointed at the barrier.

I looked at the barrier, back to her, but she had gone back to her conversation with her back to me again.

With some creative personal origami I got to the train and sat down. I was angry, and a little humiliated by the whole thing. I don't have a crutch or a wheelchair, nor any major external indication that I'm struggling. Why was I made to feel so stupid and silly for asking for a tiny amount of help to make my journey a little easier.

I have a number of friends in the invisible disability team, who are worse than me by a long way, it's an issue I'm acutely aware of. I'm made of sterner stuff than most, so I can imagine that if I'm a little cross, someone else could be quite upset. No one should be made to feel like dog do for asking someone for help, especially when it's that persons job. A few people I know have messages me with similar stories, so it's not an isolated inn dent. So this is an open letter to East Coast Train to give their staff some equality training and and a reasonable apologise to all disabled people, pregnant, little people etc who have been made to feel awful for asking for help.

As an aside, the chap next to me is having issues because the previous one was cancelled and he want to claim back some money. Sounds like they'd wiggle out of that too.

EDIT: As of today (5/6/13) I have not heard a dickybird from East Coast Trains. I am not surprised. So off I go to poke them again. The good news is that it didn't ruin the weekend, and I got back to KX with little trouble by just avoiding any issues by planning ahead!


 * London is full of entitled twits at lunchtime, who are far too important to look where they are going.

To the Airwaves, AWAY!

I recorded my first ever pod cast on Monday night. Fun on the whole but quite nerve wrecking. It didn't help I was a bit tired, and suffering Monster Rehab rage*. Recording has been something I've pondered doing before, but been far too chicken. I think I'll build a little confidence and perhaps do my own thing in a few years with Kitty and Wyrdness, probably with some ironic name like "Shrink it and Pink It" as so many companies seem to think that's how we woman want gadgets (Honestly, pink is a nasty colour!)

Anyhow, it should be on iTunes tomorrow so I am quite apprehensive today. I'm really honoured to be invited on by @RobbieRoo28 and @Fen_man to talk on the MGP Night shift. Of course the black dog of StupidBrain raises its head, tells me I'm rubbish and that I will never talk on a pod cast ever again. Won't be able to listen to it myself because I'll be convinced that I'll sound like a retard, which is a shame, because on the whole the pod cast and its siblings are awesome. They talk about awesome things, have a fantastically active community and are generally good fun.

On the other hand, the game I'm designing resolves around that black dog, its become that much a part of who I am. It comes and goes, being a little irritating chiwawa to a giant slobbering St Bernard to a dangerous Rottie who has just lost a fight with a wasp.** Talking about my game was a scary thing. TBH its not something I've discussed with a lot of people, because I worried about the reception. Although I have the plot and structure straight in my head, I've yet to commit it to paper or consider the format. And if I decide to go down certain routes there is the cost implication.




* I think I'll never drink it again, it seems to give me really bad temper issues whenever I drink it. Which is a shame because it tastes so nice.

** Remember, kiddies, there is no such thing as a bad dog, just bad owners.

Best Spectrum Games

This is my list of best Spectrum games. Just type "Best Spectrum Games" into Google and you'll get loads of other lists, but since this is my blog you can all sit down and shut up.


Sabre Wulf

Rebel Star

Starquake

Wheelie

Chaos

Head Over Heels

Batman 3D

Jet Set Willy

Kokoton Wilf

Special Mention For Being Awesome

All the Dizzy games

Special Mention For Being Ballbreakingly Hard (even though I have none!)

Soul of a Robot

Special Mention For Being Banned In Our House

Daley Thompson Decathlon 

You all know this one. If you owned a Spectrum in the '80s then you almost certainly had this game. It was banned in our house (or rather my grandparents) because my Grandfather was sick of having to fix the joystick and 'n' and 'm' keys when Lil'Sis and I busted it. Ah fond memories.  

Now when I play Kinect Sports and I'm flailing around like a loon in various events and failing to get anywhere, I just think of this. Then KS doesn't seem so bad.

The Cube is Full of Bubbles

I'm not sure what will be in the middle of 22Cans Curiosity Cube and I don't think I actually care. 

"It is good to have an end to journey towards; but it is the journey that matters, in the end" - Ursula K. LeGuin

For those that don't know, and I know a fair few friends who don't have a clue about the project, Curiosity is the first of 22 projects/experiments from 22Cans, the company set up by Peter Molyneux. It hovers, 2001 monolith style in a white room that exists on the servers at 22Cans. At the time of writing (14th January 2013, at about 23:30) the Cube is 70 days old, with 159 layers removed. The current layer (a rather busy Christmas market at Winchester Cathedral) has 52,254,395 cubelets remaining. 

"Too often we are so preoccupied with the destination we forget the journey" - Anon

Mr Molyneux seems to be a man who teeters between works of crazy, and works of pure genius. Depending on how Curiosity pans out, I'm still not sure which side he is on that. After playing rather often the last few weeks, there is something rather humanising about the experiment; watching as little cubes pop off your screen knowing that another human is doing it, but that we will never know who that person is. Like the worlds biggest communal piece of bubble wrap. Slowly chipping away at the enormous cube is a cooperative effort, but barring a few people I know in the Real World, the chippers are anonymous.  I can't help be feel that the sketchy Facebook implementation is intentional, and all we are left with is tiny pixel toilet wall graffiti. Perhaps it is all a commentary on Social Media Games (pointless clicky clicky, I'm looking at you Zynga, you money grabbing pirate poopheads) 

"It is one of the commonest of mistakes to consider that the limit of our power of perception is also the limit of all there is to perceive" - CW Leadbeater

In various interviews that Molyneux has given in the last few weeks, he has hinted that there is more to this mythical cube that meets the eye. All of this data is going somewhere, something is crunching these numbers and looking at how each of us interacts with the cube. The data must flow... But what will we find out about the data; how the human collective can work together? How we still communicate, given such immense barriers? I'm interested as to what will be gleaned from this first experiment. Perhaps its all just a matter of perspective?

Real Life Sucks

It would be nice for my life not to go belly up every month or so. To give you an idea of the up and down nature of December; Cambridge and back to deal with a family death, Scotland and back to deal with direct family death, then Wales to celebrate the New Year with friends.

When we got home on the 4th January, I firmly told everyone that I was not going anywhere in the next month, or at least no more than about 45 minutes on the train. So sick of travelling this month.

But I'm back and full of writing beans, and interesting things! Oh yes! So bored of life messing up my schedule of life. I've also added a little donation button so that kind people can clicky and put a little towards me not starving. All good in the long run.

//Commlal