Fauxscerf
2019
This game doesn't know when to stop. Every single thing in it is put in place so as to facilitate the player's relationship with the object - the way you glide, shoot and relate to its characters. So of course it's fun - at times exhilaratingly so - but I find myself demanding an annoyance, a chance to breathe that would get in the way of this constant flow of "things".
This is not Respawn's design though, because Apex Legends is slick, accomplished. But just as I can play ten games in a row while finding new ways to approach its gunfights, I will put it down at a moment's notice and leave with no hesitation, no sense of longing.
Apex Legends is violently pedestrian.
[Updated since I replayed the game quite a bit these days]
This is not Respawn's design though, because Apex Legends is slick, accomplished. But just as I can play ten games in a row while finding new ways to approach its gunfights, I will put it down at a moment's notice and leave with no hesitation, no sense of longing.
Apex Legends is violently pedestrian.
[Updated since I replayed the game quite a bit these days]
2021
Hitman 3 would not make it past the front door at the Berghain.
2018
The puzzle of capital is there for us to solve, over and over again through shapeless disguises and witty killings that are so easy to pull off you end up feeling like you're nowhere in particular.
I'm bored by Hitman 2's humorless approach to fun.
I'm bored by Hitman 2's humorless approach to fun.
2018
Doc Burford once said that he wanted to force the player to shoot a gun inside a walking simulator.
While I appreciate the sentiment, the real suspense of Paratopic lies in its atrophy of the audiovisual language. Something the game forgets in favor of showing-off facile sleight of hands.
While I appreciate the sentiment, the real suspense of Paratopic lies in its atrophy of the audiovisual language. Something the game forgets in favor of showing-off facile sleight of hands.
Liquid pleasure and disintegration.
2018
Nightline makes the act of traversal an aesthetic in itself, but misses the narrative fluidity - the flowing stories, untold and everpresent - that makes it such an essential experience.
The spectacle of excess fuelling Desperate Struggle is exactly what No More Heroes avoided in the first place ; it's vulgar without being subversive and cynical without the tender humor to match.
2017
Two impulses battle it out at the core of Marginalia ; lust for mystery and performative death-drive. You know the beast won't jump out of the shadows yet you dread it nonetheless, you expect a face to manifest itself far in the distance because what else could this panoptic audio landscape summon forth ?
It's impossible to avert your gaze. That's what Connor Sherlock's games are all about : Craving for the end to come whilst wishing to fade inside the screen.
A true haunting.
It's impossible to avert your gaze. That's what Connor Sherlock's games are all about : Craving for the end to come whilst wishing to fade inside the screen.
A true haunting.
The Phantom Pain is where my divorce began. Paradoxical fuel to fire. Videogames will never be anything "more" but we gotta keep trying.
2013
Thrills because it overwhelms. Exhausting because it's bloated.
Vapid, yes, but thankfully not as dishonest as its Rockstar counterpart.
Boxed-in.
That it works so well is a damning indictment on the Dynasty Warriors franchise ; it simply is a matter of swapping the color palette.
2009
Plain rag.
2006
Everyone's own fashion journey has to draw from somewhere and mine began here.