What I Played Today: September 19

Mage: The Ascension, DDR, Minecraft, Secret of Monkey Island

I’ve suddenly been inducted into a roleplaying group of dudes I mildly know, and it appears we’ll be meeting every Sunday and just hanging out, and it’s a good thing that they all seem like pretty chill guys. We sat together for a while chatting and all agreeing that we’ll be willing to roleplay in pretty much anything, and so we started by rolling up some Mage characters and giving that a try.

I attached to the idea of the Cult of Ecstasy, the cult who awakened to their magic ability by doing something crazy, and made a bit of a sleazy music agent, who once was a musician but turns to the biz when his fear of drug addiction overwhelmed him. He seemed to naturally transition into a leadership role during character creation, and we played a session where my character basically walked around collecting the other PCs to join his cabal while being a bit of a dick. It was pretty fun, especially near the end where another mage overdoses in an alley and started dangerously bending reality. After confirming I could do jackshit to him with my magic, I hid behind a dumpster while another PC shot him in the head, then stepped up and immediately took credit for the situation. Luckily I had connections the “manager” of the club we were in allowed us to clean up the body quickly, and we called the session. I look forward to playing again, although I have concerns that some of my character traits don’t match up to how I play my character, and my tendency to try to do too much has hampered my character.

Also played some DDR. The quest mode in this game is really stupid, but I finally made some headway and earned a new song. So, hurray?

Also played some more Minecraft, and I think it’s neat, but man, I do not know what I’m supposed to be doing. I found a really neat cave, and found a way to get down into it, but it just keeps going, so I thought, hey, I think I’ll go build something neat on that island I started on, only to find out that I have no idea how to get back there without dying. So...

I also played some of the Secret of Monkey Island because I was apparently very bored. I was one of the self-named island when I stopped playing the game last, and so I was a bit confused on what to do next, so I wandered around the island for a while, and man I have no idea what I’m supposed to do. I thought I figured out how to do something awesome when I pushed a rock, but man, it did not do a thing, so I ragequit.

What I Played Today: September 12

Dance Dance Revolution, Puzzle Agent, Red Dead Redemption, Persona 3

A day of small wonders, I played a bit of DDR, going to try that every chance I get, if only to get myself moving again. I wish the Kinect would come out already so that I can play Dance Central instead; the songs will be better and the amount of dancing required will actually look like dancing rather than pathetic feet flailing. I can’t believe I used to be fairly good at this, because I topple if the song moves too fast.

Also played about five minutes of both Red Dead Redemption and Persona 3, trying to grab a couple of old sparks, but instead finding myself getting a bit bored. In Red Dead, I was suddenly pulled into a raid on a town that I didn’t actually want to participate in, and just as suddenly my feet touched a small patch of water that I could have waded out of and I died instantly. Guess that foot drop off the pier lead to deadly decompression. And in Persona 3 I ran around that damn tower some more. By the end of the game, you come to hate that damn tower.

But in terms of new and non-exhausting experiences, I picked up Puzzle Agent for the iPhone, and I like it so far, even if the puzzles take a lot of lead-in to get around to and when they do appear, they are a bit simple. I mean, there’s this build-up to some number being written in code, only for it to be an impossible-to-miss white space picture. I did get a bit stupid and screw up the last couple of puzzles I’ve done, including one that should have been obvious, but I went too far in assuming what the puzzle meant. “Maybe all the icons are supposed to be closed symmetric loops with a solid baseline. Oh wait, no, it’s just the numbers 1-4 put next to their mirror images. Well, don’t I feel stupid.” But the game makes up for the crappy puzzles by the building of atmosphere and voice acting, with a very Twin Peaks feeling to the game (which was exactly what they were going for, of course). I look forward to playing it through, as I enjoy most of what Telltale works on.