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Stinkers – Sim City (2013)

Genre:  Simulation
Platform:  PC

As I stated in my last post, I am a fan of city builders and Sim City.  I liked Sim City original, Sim City 2000, Sim City 3000 and Sim City 4.  So, naturally, I was really excited for Sim City (2013) and even pre-ordered it, as did my husband.

We picked it up on launch day, installed it and…didn’t get to play it.  This game was an online-only game at the time, and Origin’s servers were overcrowded and down half the time.  This was an omen of things to come.  To their credit, about a year later, they did create an offline mode, so if your (or their) internet is down, you can still play.

Once we started playing, we were having fun.  The game does do a lot of things right.  I can’t say this is the worst game that I’ve played, but there were some things that killed it for me.  Let’s start with the good.  The graphics are great and you can zoom in to street level.  It helps you feel more a part of your city.  Your citizens also ask you for help from time to time and you get rewards for doing so.  You have a nice selection of each item to build – for example, there are several different types of parks to add, all with their own rewards.  You have another type of road to add, a multi-lane street (non-highway) which can be nice for traffic reasons.  There are a myriad of special buildings to build.  Overall, this still feels like SimCity, and that’s a good thing.

simcity2013-3

Now for the bad things.  First, you are severely limited in your plot size.  Their biggest size is way too small.  This was the killer for me.  I liked to make large, sprawling cities in the previous games.  There are so many things to build, but you just won’t have room for half of them.  Next, water is always a problem.  You can still build pumps and water towers, but now the water depletes at a level that I felt was unrealistic.  Yes, this is a problem that real cities face, but let me have some fun, too.  Before 200 years, one of my cities was bone dry.  Finally, pollution is also a constant problem.  I had to destroy a lot of my buildings to make room for more trash facilities (see the small map size issue).

If you don’t mind the small city sizes, then you might enjoy this.  It was just too crippling for my play style, so I can’t say that I would recommend this game to anyone.

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Oldies but Goodies – Sim City

Genre:  Simulation
Platform:  PC

Sim City has been around for so long that I played this in 7th grade.  My school actually used this game to teach us about local government and city planning.  I was hooked immediately and spent a ton of time playing Sim City original, often referred to now as Sim City classic.  There have been many city builders since this one, but it was the original.

The graphics were basic, but the depth of the game was impressive.  We were introduced to the three most common zones – industrial, commercial and residential.  It was just those three, but the foundations were there.  Residential folks didn’t like living next to industrial, you didn’t want to overdo the commercial, etc.  Traffic was an issue, as it has been in every Sim City game to date, you needed to be careful with your fire station placement as it was critical and you NEVER removed funds from transportation or your advisor would get pretty angry.

The disasters actually made this one fun, too, as you didn’t have to have YEARS of recovery efforts to re-build.  I always enjoyed making a UFO attack or have a violent earthquake ravage my city.  It was so easy just to plop a new square down and watch it upgrade fairly quickly.

I still adore this game and play it from time to time.  Its relative simplicity compared to the games that followed is refreshing, but it’s still a satisfying game.  You can find this game online through free download or web-based pages.  If you’ve not played this one before or for a long time, go back and do so!

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Genre:  Puzzle
Platform:  Nintendo 3DS

I was doing a fairly routine “when is Picross 3D 2 coming out” search last night when I found out that it’s out and has been since September 1!  It’s been out in Japan for some time now, but because the 3DS is region locked, I could not play it without buying a Japanese 3DS.  I love this franchise, but not that much.  This game is digital only and available from the Nintendo store.  I’m a bit bummed that it’s not a full retail release, but I still get to play the game.

I immediately bought it ($30) and dug in.  I didn’t let myself get too wrapped up in it as it was a work night.  I ended up going to bed at 2:30 anyway.  There are some notable differences from the original.  The first is the addition of colors.  You no longer need to simply clear all of the blocks that aren’t there.  Now you have to mark the ones that are left and determine which color they are.  This adds an entirely new level of difficulty and makes the game more fun for me.  The other change is the shape of the figure you’re working on.  As you can see in the image above, there are now curves and differently sized lines.  This might help later on when the puzzles really get tough.

I am thoroughly enjoying it so far and didn’t feel I needed to wait to the end to post about it.  I know what I’ll be playing all weekend!

 

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Chey’s Top 25 – #5 – Psychonauts

Genre:  Adventure/Platform
Platform:  XBox Original, PC

Psychonauts is the highest console game to make my list.  Everything after this is a PC game.  This game is one of my favorites ever.  Top 5, actually.  It is also the most unique game on this list.  I happened to have found this one day at a GameStop.  I hadn’t heard of it previously, but it looked interesting.  I have since bought the game two more times as I gave away my first two copies to other people because I want everyone to play and enjoy it as much as I have.  I am a Psychonauts evangelist.

You play the game as a character named Rasputin, or Raz.  Raz is just a kid.  A kid with special powers.  His family doesn’t approve of his powers and is in a circus.  Raz runs away to a summer camp for kids with special mental powers hosted by the Psychonauts – a do-gooding organization whose members all have psychic abilities.  At this camp, he makes new friends and quickly shows that he is special indeed.  Then something bad happens and it’s up to you and Raz to return the camp to normal.  Through the game, you learn new powers, which help you defeat many enemies.

The game play is broken into two main areas – the campgrounds itself and the psychic realm.  In the campgrounds, you go from area to area, looking for hidden objects, buying upgrades and progressing the story along.  In the psychic realm, you are helping individuals sort out their mental issues.  This is really where the game shines.  Every psychic level is completely unique.  There is a level where you are basically Godzilla and hated, one where you are essentially in a pinball table, another in a person who thinks he’s Napoleon and so many more!

Goggalor!
Fighting the lung fish

There are tons of things to collect in this game, which I always enjoy.  The graphics are also unique.  Some people like them, some don’t.  Because they are a bit unusual, I feel the game still stands up today.  What makes this game for me, however, is the writing.  This game is HILARIOUS!  There were a couple of levels where I laughed for a solid 5 minutes.  When you play it, I recommend that you really take your time and listen to the things the other characters have to say.  If you stick around, you’ll hear some really funny stuff.  Read the billboards, too!  The Milkman level is one of my favorites and I have played it over and over because it’s so funny.

This was the first game I had played by developer Double Fine, headed by Tim Schaefer.  I have Psychonauts shirts, pins, a signed poster by Schaefer and Psychonauts figurines.  This game has reached cult status, and I’m definitely there.  I am a big fan of a lot of their other games as well.  They all have that same sense of humor and excellent writing.

psychonauts-figures

My little Psychonauts

I only have one criticism about the game.  The game plays really well, not overly difficult, until the ending.  As many times as I have played this game, I have never finished it.  The ending requires ridiculous precision and is really frustrating.  It’s so disproportionate to the rest of the game.  It’s never made sense to me.

Otherwise, however, if you have not played this, GET IT NOW AND PLAY IT!!!  It’s available for PC on Steam and it’s available in the Microsoft Store for the XBox 360.  I’m not sure if it’s been ported to the XBone yet.

By the way, Psychonauts 2 is in the works.  I will likely disappear for a week or so after it comes out.  I’ll come out a zombie, but a happy zombie.  I’m a bit nervous about it, though, because this is a tough game to follow.

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Oldies but Goodies -Little Computer People

Genre:  Simulation
Platform:  Commodore 64

Long before there were The Sims, in 1985, there was Little Computer People.  This was a game on the Commodore 64, but I also believe it was released for the Apple II and Amiga, too.  My cousin had a Commodore 64 and she had this on her computer.  We played it quite a bit.  The premise is this – there are actual little people living inside your computer and they want to interact with you.  Each copy of the game had a different person and all were unique.  My cousin and I named her little person Norbert.

We could give Norbert commands to do things like sleep, play the piano, cook, etc.  He would also do these things without us telling him to.  It was really a unique game for the time that I really enjoyed.  I haven’t played it since, but after a quick Google search, I see a download for it.  I might try it again as an adult and see how it stands up.  If you like sim games and want to see the foundation of that genre of games, check it out!

The video below is pretty funny, btw. This player gets pretty frustrated with his little person.

 

 

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Football games – John Elway’s Quarterback

Genre:  Sports
Platform:  NES

I am a HUGE (American) football fan.  The regular season kicks off tonight, so to celebrate it, I thought I would discuss a football game I played as a kid – John Elway’s Quarterback.  Previous to this, the only football games I had played were ones that my uncles owned – Mattell Football and one of those vibrating football tables:

I was only a kid – maybe 5-9 when I played those two older games.  I didn’t really know how football worked at that time.  My knowledge was pretty much limited to touchdowns, field goals, sacks and interceptions.  The fine details of the game were a bit beyond my interest.  Those two electronic games were perfect for that because that’s all they focused on.  John Elway’s Quarterback for the NES really helped to teach me more about the game.

In this game, similar to every game now, you had to be familiar with those fine details.  You needed to understand receiver routes and plays, but you were really more the head coach.  You called the plays and your team tried to carry it out.  This is the screen where you made your decisions:

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As a kid, it didn’t make too much sense, but it did the more I watched football on TV.  As I look at this now, however, it’s very basic stuff.  I really did enjoy this game and I got to be pretty good at it.  I like these older games better than the current-day football games.  They are just too complicated for my liking.  I miss the days of the simpler play.  There were many other football games on the NES as well and they were all fairly similar.  We just happened to have had this one and so it’s what I knew.

 

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Hidden Gems – Harry Potter + Order of the Phoenix for XBox 360

Genre:  Action-Adventure
Platform:  XBox 360

I am a fan of the Harry Potter books and movies.  I wasn’t too sure about playing the games, though, because video games based on movies are notoriously bad.  I picked this one up, anyway.  It was the first Harry Potter game that I had tried.  I was pleasantly surprised and this makes it a hidden gem.

If you are a fan of the Harry Potter series, you will really enjoy this game.  It follows the story of the movie very well, but it lets you set the pace of the story.  You could finish this game in about 8 hours if you wanted.  However, as a bit of a completionist, I did every side quest, played every mini-game and collected every achievement (except for the one that is bugged).  There are a lot of really fun mini-games and things to collect in this game.  My favorite was marbles.  It could be difficult at times, but was a lot of fun.  It also let you have full run of Hogwarts, which felt like a very large and comprehensive environment.  The colors in the game are a bit drab, but I believe it was intentional.  The graphics are also a bit dated at this point, but it’s still quite playable.

Along your way through the story, you have your fellow Hogwarts crew to help you out.  You will do tasks for them and they will return the favor.  In the end, you will fight “He Who Shall Not Be Named” and hopefully come out victorious.

If you’ve not played this, I would recommend you try it out!  Beware, however, that other platform versions of this game are not the same.  For example, the DS version of the game seems to only have the story portion of this game, which makes it a lot less fun.

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Oldies but Goodies – Paperboy

Genre:  Arcade
Platform:  NES

It is Labor Day here in the US, which is a day honoring workers.  What a better game to review today than a job that many people started out with – a paper route.  This game was released on multiple platforms, but I had primarily played it on the NES.  It started as an arcade game.

In this game, you are a paperboy simply trying to deliver all of his papers accurately and on time.  However, this is a neighborhood from hell for a paperboy.  There are obstacles at every single house on your route.  If it’s not a kid on a big-wheeler trying to run you over, it’s a cat getting in your way.  You can take your revenge, however.  Using well-timed throws, you can break windows and vandalize other items.  This was where most of the fun was for me.

Your goal is to deliver all of your papers to the correct houses as accurately as you can.  It’s a near-miracle if you can actually throw one in the paperbox.  It will count if you get your paper somewhere on their property.  You can ride either on the sidewalk or on the street.  Both have their perils.  The sidewalk gives you little time to react to the obstacles, but you’re likely to be run over by a car on the street and it’s harder to make your throws.  At the end of your route, you have to go through an obstacle course for some reason.

This game is HARD.  I think I got to the fourth level once.  I could cruise past the first level, but after that, it was tough.  I still played it repeatedly, however.  It’s a fun game and it kept me playing for hours.  I played it recently and found that I just didn’t have the patience for this anymore.  It’s a good game, though, and I recommend it!

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