Tag: picross 3d

Random Ramblings, Thursday edition

Today’s song of the day:

It’s been a while, so let’s get caught up.

1. The more I think about it, the more underwhelmed I am by Sony’s reveal of the PS4 Pro.  Let’s leave aside the total lack of anything regarding PSVR – nothing I saw yesterday compelled me to upgrade my current PS4; if anything, I’d rather spend that money on upgrading my PS4’s hard drive.  I mean, if I want to get the most out of the PS4 Pro, I’d need a 4K TV (which I don’t have), and I’d also need to make sure that it supports HDR (which, apparently, not all 4K TVs do).  Fundamentally, the content simply isn’t there yet to necessitate the upgrade, and while HDR is certainly intriguing I’m not sure it’s essential – and in any event, my OG PS4 is getting the HDR upgrade next week anyway.  If I have to shell out money for a console upgrade at this point – and I’m nto sure I do – I’m leaning heavily towards next year’s Microsoft Scorpio.

2. I’ve successfully completed my Goodreads challenge, and am now currently at 37 books finished for the year.  I don’t have a secondary number to hit; I’d rather just take my time and enjoy what I read from here on out.  I’m also probably not going to participate next year; it’s an extra layer of stress that I definitely don’t need, and as far as record-keeping is concerned I’m already tracking what I read in a GoogleDoc, because I’m ridiculous.

2a. My end-of-year “Favorite Sentences of 2016” post might end up being on the short side of things; while I’ve enjoyed a lot of what I’ve read, I haven’t found myself highlighting a lot of beautiful phrases.  To wit: I just finished reading Ted Chiangs’ “Stories Of Your Life and Others”, a rather remarkable collection of speculative science-fiction-ish stories (mostly because the title story is the source of the upcoming film “Arrival“, which I very much want to see); each story is incredibly fascinating and certainly very well written, but I never found myself lingering over a particularly affecting phrase.  This is not an indictment of the book at all, but rather just something I’ve noticed in terms of my own reading.  I think it’s fair to say that in order to meet my Goodreads Challenge number, I opted to read shorter books with heavy genre trappings, and while those kinds of books are highly enjoyable, they don’t necessarily feature poetic prose.

3. I’ve hit something of a wall with respect to Deus Ex: Mankind Divided, and I’m not sure if I’m going to stick with it.  There’s a sudden difficulty spike at my current stage of the game – all of Prague is on lockdown, which makes getting around town incredibly difficult, at least in terms of my current character build – and I’m so far removed from the narrative’s motivations that I’m tempted to call it a day.  While I do enjoy some of the gameplay loops – i.e., enter an area, scout out hidden pathways, sneak around, hack stuff, get out without being seen – I’m struggling to stay invested in the story, which is just this side of Kojima-esque silliness.

4. On the flipside, I am thoroughly addicted to Picross 3D: Round 2, which is the first thing I’ve used my 3DS for in maybe 2 years.  It is a little strange that you’re not actually solving the puzzle on the 3D screen – that is, in fact, what I’d been hoping to do – but whatever; I love it anyway.  Solving a puzzle feels like sculpting a figure out of marble, in much the same way that playing Rock Band feels like playing music – it’s not 1:1, obviously, but it produces the same creative euphoria.  I worry that if I continue to bring my 3DS to work, I will get fired.

5. I’ve also been playing some indie games on XB1, as I continue in my quest to hit 100K.  I finished Valley, which I don’t really know how to talk about – there are parts of it that are wondrously exhilarating, and other parts that are a bit of a slog, and the ending – such as it is – felt a bit underwhelming.  I’m also about halfway through The Turing Test, a first-person puzzler not unlike Portal or The Talos Principle; the narrative is a bit clumsy in its execution but the puzzles themselves are satisfying to solve (at the moment, at least).

I’m continuing to feel somewhat withdrawn and hermit-like – this is something I’m working on, privately – so please bear with me if it gets even more quiet around here than usual.

>the post-vacation rundown

>I’m back from vacation and I have a lot to talk about, and I’m not sure I’m going to be able to say it all at this particular moment. So, then, the short versions:

1. Red Dead Redemption was amazing, and among the other superlatives I could throw its way, it has (possibly) the most satisfying ending I’ve ever seen. I’d have to think about it a little just to make sure, but, I mean, GODDAMN.

2. Alan Wake was good, but not quite as good as it could’ve been, and its ending was as WTF as any I’ve seen. Some games take themselves a little too seriously; this game might be near the top of that particular list. Let me also say that for a game that goes out of its way to instill a sense of dread, the beyond-creepy facial animation is a nice (albeit unintentional) touch.

3. Does it mean that I have no soul if I admit that I can’t really get into, or care about, Super Mario Galaxy 2? What if I qualify that by mentioning that I never had a Nintendo system as a kid, thus stripping me of any Mario-related nostalgia? I still probably have no soul, right? Figures.

4. Picross 3D is one of the best DS games ever made, and I”ll be a little bummed out when I finish it (which will probably happen by mid-week).

>Picross 3D

>I’m trying to remember the last time I was heavily invested in my Nintendo DS. The last game I played on it was probably the most recent Zelda game, which I didn’t particularly care for. In any event, in less than 12 hours I have become totally addicted to Picross 3D, which is somewhat of a surprise for me since I never particularly cared for the 2D iteration.

It hits all the right notes, for one thing. It’s a puzzle game, which means it can be played on the go, in short bursts, with the sound off. And it uses the stylus and touch screen about as well as you could ask for. (The only way it could be cooler is if there was a version that came with Project Natal, which you could manipulate a la Minority Report, but that wouldn’t necessarily make it better.)

In a way, on a total base level, it feels a bit like sculpture; you chip away at a lifeless mass of cubes until a shape is revealed within. Of course, it can be hard to tell just what the hell the final shape is supposed to be. Just a few minutes ago, in fact, I finished a puzzle and the solution was revealed to be a Clione.

I had absolutely no idea what the hell a clione was, and when I googled it, I wasn’t necessarily convinced that what the game presented had anything in common with what it actually is. But that’s OK; it’s a logic puzzle, it’s not something that requires 1080p graphics.