Käyttäjän El Syd viimeaikaiset arvostelut

Dead Pixels is charmless and repetitive, in terms of gameplay, audio and aesthetics.

I have to begin by saying that I find the internet speak in the title, 'FootLOL: Epic Fail League', rather irritating. Now that I got that out of my system, let's talk a bit about sport games, specifically those relating to soccer (or football if you're of the more European persuasion and such). FIFA and Pro Evolution Soccer never really interested me. Soccer is something that I preferred to play in real life, with one exception. A number of years ago, I came across Level 5's Inazuma Eleven series on the Nintendo DS. To keep things short and simple, I was (and probably still am) a sucker for games with RPG elements. Soccer matches in Inazuma Eleven were more akin to battles with over-the-top special moves and abilities and that was how my attention was held in a game involving sport. It also had something of a story to it, which I found to be simple, yet engaging. That's good enough for me.

FootLOL: Epic Fail League is nothing like Inazuma Eleven, but that's okay. It doesn't play like a Japanese RPG, but I suppose I wasn't expecting it to. After playing around with it for quite some time, I think it resembles a puzzle game more than anything else. You see, the odd (but interesting) thing about FootLOL is that it requires you to fulfil certain conditions in order for you to win and attain that I-am-a-Completionist-With-OCD three star ranking after each match. For example, one match may have two 'bonus objectives’, with the first involving the creation of a situation where your team scores zero goals and the opposing teams scores 3. It's only after completing this objective that you can work on the second, which could be you having to bump up your score from zero to 3 and ensuring that other team jumps up from 3 to 6. Finally, the actual main objective would call for your team to finish up by scoring five more goals than the other. If all of this went over your head, just know that FootLOL puts you in situations where you have to manipulate matches by sabotaging the efforts of both teams.

You may be wondering about how one goes about undermining the players of both teams. Well, by placing landmines on the soccer field of course! It gets a little bit more madcap than that as you progress through the game. FootLOL will also provide access to tools such as force fields, portals, walls of fire, bombing runs, rampaging soccer fans and cows (some inspiration from Worms perhaps?), UFOs and a little something that transforms players into Spartan warriors. As you may have figured out, matches can become quite chaotic and that's how things move away from the sport genre, and more towards that of the puzzle game.

These tools have the potential to result in goals being scored in such a way that they ruin your chances of fulfilling those conditions I mentioned earlier. However, the right combination of tools can bring some semblance of order to the chaos. Usually, this translates to using the ability that gives a red card to every player that you can click on, having cannons fire balls into the opposing goal or your own, or 'cloning' balls right in front of the posts and having stampeding cows do the scoring for you. So, as you can see, FootLOL will eventually reach a point where you hardly want any players on the field at all.

Personally, I can stomach all of this craziness, which is why I'm going to say that despite the title putting me off, FootLOL: Epic Fail League turned out to be slightly better than I expected. Having said that, it is not aesthetically pleasing, the multiplayer is quite dead and the music is annoying and repetitive. Speaking of which, you would think that having an assortment of zany tools at your disposal would somehow stem the tide of boredom, but it didn't. It held my attention for a while, but I'm done with FootLOL and I'm not coming back.

What tends to keep me interested in a game (and I'm guessing this is the same for many of you) is some depth. That can be either in the story and themes presented, or in the way that you play the game. I have no interest in 'fun little time wasters'. Although, I mentioned that it seems to lean more towards the puzzle side of things, FootLOL is still too simple for me. There isn't really much in the way of tactics, strategy or skill involved. There are many matches to win, but it doesn't matter if you win them all in about the same way. Something tells me that the developers didn't put much time into observing the interplay between all of the tools they implemented.

And that's probably the best way that I can describe 'FootLOL: Epic Fail League'. Lion's Shade didn't put much thought into it, so how can we give it much thought? Lion's Shade didn't put enough time into it, so it doesn't deserve our time.

This review was submitted for Gaming Until End, through the generous contribution of HellCow.

One could examine the various 'parts' that make up DLC Quest, such as its gameplay, music, graphics and so on. However, I don't think there is much that can be said about those aspects. DLC Quest is very retro in its presentation, which can be expected with the great indie game and Steam Greenlight boom around the time it was released. Nothing particularly special about that. The story is a light-hearted (and very self-aware) take on the whole 'hero saves village' theme that one often sees in action-adventure series. You may get a chuckle from the references to tired video game conventions and clichés, but I never cared much for this style of humour as it is a little too 'nudge nudge, wink wink' for me.

With all that said, where do I think the true value of this game lies? As one may have gathered from the title, the main focus is on purchasing DLC in order for the player to progress. Not to worry though, you will be spending coins collected within the game itself rather than using your real hard-earned money. What the developers have to say about DLC and video game developer business practices should be pretty clear (even without purchasing the game) and I would think that most people have some sort of stance towards that as well.

I think that DLC Quest serves as a reminder to anyone who likes games. What it has to say about DLC is perhaps now even more relevant than when it was first released. Think of it as a museum containing countless examples of the things that consumers had once resisted (and rightfully so in my view), but have gradually come to accept, and perhaps even embrace. Nowadays, there are many of what you may call, 'optional extras', but as DLC Quest reminds us, these things used to be free.

It may not have been part of the developers' intentions, but DLC Quest left me to think about how the video game industry has slowly, but surely eroded what willpower and self-control consumers once had. How much worse will it get? Will people still be able to pause and think and approach new business practice developments with caution and a level head? What about other industries, or even aspects of society? Is something important and valuable being worn down by a constant, unrelenting force? Should I be putting my tin foil hat on right about now??

Doesn't that just leave you feeling all warm and fuzzy inside?

***

I think it fitting to end this by including two examples of what I believe to be current questionable practices, which DLC Quest touches upon:

-Blizzard only offers one free BattleTag name change. After that, if for some reason or another you'd like another name, then it's time to dip into your bank account. So choose wisely if you want to be thrifty, or learn to love your poorly-chosen 'UNBORNSOLDIER999' moniker.

-Paradox Interactive sells a disgustingly large amount of DLC and 'optional extras'. For some, this is not an issue because they may only stick with a handful of games, but what if variety is the spice of life for you and there is a strong urge to dabble in a variety of things from other publishers and developers, who (GASP!) may also be selling exorbitant DLC?

***

Just where exactly will the industry go from here and are consumers able to exercise enough power to cause a shift in their favour? Will we all soon forget about the things that we once received as part of the full package? Perhaps a little reminder from a game such as DLC Quest is in order.

Human life is not as fragile as ‘Cahors Sunset’ makes it out to be. At least that’s something of a lasting impression that was left on me, for what it’s worth.

I was left with little choice but to put aside the fact that the developers intended for us to play the role of an old man. Quite simply, even though I make his decisions, I don't feel as though I am him. Decisions made by the player and random events can affect the old man's attributes by increasing or decreasing their values. An example of this is an event in which a pigeon defecates on the old man's head.

Now, we’re led to believe that this sort of event is supposed to worsen someone's mood. I don't know about you, but if I was an old man and this happened to me I would probably laugh it off after cleaning myself up. It's not the end of the world, but in ‘Cahors Sunset’, these sorts of insignificant events are supposed to have lasting effects. That is, unless they're mitigated by some other decision and its corresponding effects. One must also keep in mind that if an attribute’s value is less than 25, there is a chance that the old man will book a one-way trip to rigor mortis. Numerous situations like this are likely to leave one thinking throughout this experience, ‘If it were me, I just wouldn’t have this kind of overblown reaction’. There is a strange sense of disconnection as a result.

Given the frequency in which I encountered events involving faeces, one has to wonder if the developers were just having a laugh. In fact, it was the repeated defecation on the old man's head and his inability to avoid stepping on dog doo-doo that led to his unfortunate demise at the relatively young age of 71. I guess that after all of that poop, he just really didn’t want to live, quietly and tearfully doing away with himself in solitude. I must say that the animals of France must really have it in for this old man.

In between making decisions, I enjoyed reading about the old man’s past, which I believe may be part of the developers’ plan to make some sort of emotional impact on the audience. However, as a whole, ‘Cahors Sunset’ is more of a ‘numbers game’ than anything else. A numbers game where the odds may very well be stacked against you and before you know it, it’s death by poo.