I’m struggling. Things aren’t going well. I’m broken.
My first little bit of scribbling thoughtforms onto the intersplodge this year was to be a review of BIT.TRIP.RUNNER for GamingDaily.co.uk. Around January last year I reviewed BIT.TRIP.BEAT for the site and a quirk of fate had landed this other BIT.TRIP game in my lap so, “How fun” I thought, “it would be to review it as a call back to that other piece.” The problem was when I wrote the RUNNER review it was, well, shit. An uninteresting description of the game and its mechanics. A lifeless interpretation of an otherwise enjoyable, if shallow, platform romp. It simply would not do.
There was a time I’d have sent it in anyway and let Craig (Gaming Daily's Editor) fix it or throw it back at me with pointers as to how to fix it, but not now. Now I would be embarrassed to show it. I was as surprised as anyone to discover I’d developed standards. I’m sure they’re low standards, but standards none the less.
I intended to rewrite the review but first I had to undertake a joyless experience in the playing and reviewing of Postal 3 for plughead.net. I didn’t expect it to be joyless, I expected contrived controversy and poor humour. If only it were that crude!
The review was difficult to write, not least because I was somewhat enraged by the game, and I did seek assistance as to its content prior to submitting it to the world. I was attempting to straddle the line Postal 3 failed to. I hope I succeeded.
Having no further use for Postal 3, I uninstalled it, performed an exorcism on my HDD, and bleached my eyes. I was now free to returned to the BIT.TRIP.RUNNER review. The problem was I sat reading through what I’d written and couldn’t see a way to salvage it, so I decided to start afresh and deleted it. Blank page, fresh start. That blank page stared at me for an hour. I started to panic. I just couldn’t express myself. I’ve exhausted my catalogue of reproductive organ jokes, similes, metaphors, and innuendos, suddenly finding myself unable to perform.
I blamed it on BIT.TRIP.RUNNER. Clearly the game was mediocre and so couldn’t inspire me. I needed something grand or something dire. Something to juice me up a bit.
Gaming Daily were instigating a Friday Night Race Night. I’ve always enjoyed racing games, though like most genres I enjoy my ability lags far behind my enthusiasm. In the discussion to seek a suitable game for the inaugural event I got to thinking about all the various racing games out there and a way for the venture to be completely inclusive. I figured the best way to be all inclusive would be for a game that anyone could pick up easily and cheaply and that wouldn’t be too demanding on hardware. I came to the conclusion that such a game would be Need For Speed World. I decided to check it out.
Having checked it out I decided I should warn others and so sat down to explain why when it comes to racing games you certainly seem to get what you pay for. The fact you’re reading this rather than that should convey how well it went.
These failures have been on pieces I was doing because that’s what I used to do, have an idea or thought about a game and squirt some words out. I’m thinking that as for over a year now I’ve been doing what was asked rather than what I felt like my brain now salivates only when an assignment drops.
I’ll get to test this theory over the next week or so as my review copy of point and click comedy adventure Da New Guys is inbound.
My first little bit of scribbling thoughtforms onto the intersplodge this year was to be a review of BIT.TRIP.RUNNER for GamingDaily.co.uk. Around January last year I reviewed BIT.TRIP.BEAT for the site and a quirk of fate had landed this other BIT.TRIP game in my lap so, “How fun” I thought, “it would be to review it as a call back to that other piece.” The problem was when I wrote the RUNNER review it was, well, shit. An uninteresting description of the game and its mechanics. A lifeless interpretation of an otherwise enjoyable, if shallow, platform romp. It simply would not do.
There was a time I’d have sent it in anyway and let Craig (Gaming Daily's Editor) fix it or throw it back at me with pointers as to how to fix it, but not now. Now I would be embarrassed to show it. I was as surprised as anyone to discover I’d developed standards. I’m sure they’re low standards, but standards none the less.
I intended to rewrite the review but first I had to undertake a joyless experience in the playing and reviewing of Postal 3 for plughead.net. I didn’t expect it to be joyless, I expected contrived controversy and poor humour. If only it were that crude!
The review was difficult to write, not least because I was somewhat enraged by the game, and I did seek assistance as to its content prior to submitting it to the world. I was attempting to straddle the line Postal 3 failed to. I hope I succeeded.
Having no further use for Postal 3, I uninstalled it, performed an exorcism on my HDD, and bleached my eyes. I was now free to returned to the BIT.TRIP.RUNNER review. The problem was I sat reading through what I’d written and couldn’t see a way to salvage it, so I decided to start afresh and deleted it. Blank page, fresh start. That blank page stared at me for an hour. I started to panic. I just couldn’t express myself. I’ve exhausted my catalogue of reproductive organ jokes, similes, metaphors, and innuendos, suddenly finding myself unable to perform.
I blamed it on BIT.TRIP.RUNNER. Clearly the game was mediocre and so couldn’t inspire me. I needed something grand or something dire. Something to juice me up a bit.
Gaming Daily were instigating a Friday Night Race Night. I’ve always enjoyed racing games, though like most genres I enjoy my ability lags far behind my enthusiasm. In the discussion to seek a suitable game for the inaugural event I got to thinking about all the various racing games out there and a way for the venture to be completely inclusive. I figured the best way to be all inclusive would be for a game that anyone could pick up easily and cheaply and that wouldn’t be too demanding on hardware. I came to the conclusion that such a game would be Need For Speed World. I decided to check it out.
Having checked it out I decided I should warn others and so sat down to explain why when it comes to racing games you certainly seem to get what you pay for. The fact you’re reading this rather than that should convey how well it went.
These failures have been on pieces I was doing because that’s what I used to do, have an idea or thought about a game and squirt some words out. I’m thinking that as for over a year now I’ve been doing what was asked rather than what I felt like my brain now salivates only when an assignment drops.
I’ll get to test this theory over the next week or so as my review copy of point and click comedy adventure Da New Guys is inbound.
