Aaron Riccio
@illogicaljoker
video game reviews @ slantmagazine.com cryptic crossword solves @ twitch.com/thatcrypticguy
I'm not entertained by winning by this much, nor do I find the lampshading amusing, i.e., that I've been typing out a negative review that so accurately details all of the issues I have with the game. Nitro Type has issues, too, but it's free and more immediate.
Look, if this doesn't say it all about the inflated bullshit of the stock market I don't know what to tell you. The VALUE of stocks is climbing even as the companies continue to invest in anything but PEOPLE, so those who can afford to invest get richer and everyone with a regular job gets poorer.
Odd that it only seems to recognize the work I did from 2001–2011 (though I've been pretty clearly writing about video games for the last fifteen years), but then again, nobody should be writing about me, especially with AI, so it hardly matters.
I worry sometimes whether we did the right thing moving into a new apartment, and then I get a view like this of a rainbow from the kids' bedroom and we're all just happy to here together.
I mean, I love that Persona 6 is coming, and in my favorite color, natch, BUT that logo is straight up Suicide Squad (a not-inaccurate way to describe the way the characters sometimes invoke their Personas).
Brushing up on Bridge. Let's bring this cartoon from the Dummies book back into circulation.
I know there are at least 50 "prompts" in the game. I imagine it's not overly complicated to add more, so here's hoping that FINAL SENTENCE becomes the sort of game I can just dip into every now and again and have a fun, tense typing battle. I just hope they don't break the fourth-wall to do so.
I also think having lore/story play out through your typing attempts to get free/survive might help to add more to the game between rounds. As is, there were three starter quests and then . . . nothing? Typing of the Dead and Epistory are still standouts here—give me more to do with this text!
Like, I like the idea of having to type "Crepidiastrixeris denticulatoplatyphylla"—that's challenging and interesting! But I'd be more fascinated with the game making me type out, say, a manifesto of the leaders of this cruel system, or to recite the crimes that have led me to be punished here.
As others have mentioned, if you can type at 100 WPM or higher, you're probably going to win most public matches; I dislike the idea of having to visit a Discord to find tougher private games. I also think the game should've leaned far more into texts that give context do its dystopian world.
This, to me, is the key to understanding how surprisingly deep this game's design goes.
There is a direct throughline from my mother installing Mavis Beacon Teaches Typing on our home computer to my fifth-grade computer lab having Mario Teaches Typing to now.
My argument isn't based on whether it *can* be used, but whether it *is* used. I'd say the same thing if people started breaking out "yon" or "olde" in a sentence that wasn't meant to evoke Shakespeare or a quaint village.
Tell me you're a puzzle nerd without telling me you're a puzzle nerd.
I've played 50+ hours of Digimon Story: Time Stranger, and it might be one of my favorite RPGs. I'll write more later, but every element of the game connects, and the time-traveling arc really fulfills the idea of these initially cute and silly Digimon evolving into things like Apocalymon.
For a minute, I thought the new Paddington movie was going to be called "Escape from New York" and I got excited. (Maybe it's not too late?)
Finally found some of my collection. Now if I could just find the PS1.
Sort of watch bore talk endlessly about self The surface is neat (they're bores b/c they gab about themselves), but I found it hard to read that way. [Sort of watch] was too distinct. Also, the parser oddly ruled out T(A)IL. Parseword #52 ⏱️ 4m15s ⭐️ No Hints 🐰 1 Easter Egg Found 🗿 Challenge Mode
Like, one refresh it's there; gone the next. They announced it, but they haven't rolled it out to all the subscribers? Am in some sort of weird cached hell?
Reminds me of this Far Side cartoon. These are all perspectives of the same thing, and none of them are "fake news." Hegseth has literally described this as a war where we have intensified the bombing, so what he wants is less factual accuracy and more rose-tinted propaganda.
I also appreciate that Opus Magnum gives you some range. I toyed around with a dense, low-area mechanism for one solution, then decided to go low-cycle (but big) with another. If you're not consulting a guide, players will come up with very, very different solutions, and that's beautiful!
In advance of the surprise upcoming Opus Magnum DLC, I'm diving back into my old save file to try and remember what the hell I was even doing and, well, I don't think this is terrible? (Also, can I just say how cool the GIF-maker tool is? Makes me actually want to try optimizing.)
