PixlBit

I played Lego City Undercover to the end, a little bit of Dead Space 2, Technomancer, Battleship and Pillars of the Earth the other day. 

I got to the end of the story missions in Lego City Undercover. Really cool! You go to the moon in pursuit of the main villain. Then I started exploring and doing whatever missions I saw to do. The game is broken into two big islands and some small ones. It makes me think of Crackdown with its three islands connected by bridges. However, in LCU you can take a train or bus to get around if you don't feel like driving. What a cool idea. 

It's such a blast to explore this world. It's full of NPCs and traffic that makes it feel alive. There are collectibles, traversal and driving challenges, painting puzzles, building zones, crooks to bust, and crimes to commit. There's a lot to do, and with the way this game is designed, I'm happy to do it.

The design has nothing confusing about it. Objectives are clear. You have eight character types that allow you to do everything. There seems to be only one character that can lift heavy objects, though, and you don't get him until the last mission in the story. My only issue is the paint gun that the criminal characters carry. There are so many things you need to paint but you can't always find a dispensary to get the right color. I'm trying to remember where they all are but it's a big world. I'm hoping that one of the red brick "cheats" will unlock the ability to change colors on the fly. That would solve a lot of problems. 

I picked Dead Space 2 randomly from the EA Play collection within Game Pass. I liked it at first but I ran into a problem with the "freeze time" ability. When you first get it, a terribly difficult monster comes at you. If you don't freeze it quickly and often, it just mauls you and ends the game. And, you also have to freeze a door open while this thing is right there in a small room with you. I failed this part too many times and quit the game. I'll try again some other time. I really like the story of the Dead Space games. A favorite comic writer of mine wrote at least the first one in the series, Anthony Johnston. I've the read comic adaptation he did as well. 

Technomancer was a Games with Gold random choice. I found the battle system too darn complex. Plus, after I had assigned my electrical attack to a button, it wouldn't activate, and I couldn't get through the tutorial mission. I assigned it correctly, so I don't know what was wrong. I hate that sort of thing. Too bad, the world was interesting: post apocalyptic. 

Battleship is still fun for me. The online doesn't seem to work anymore though, which is a shame. If my friend gets it though, we can play locally. I love the way they gave all your ships special attacks. That's really fun to do and expands the gameplay in a very satisfying way. 

Pillars of the Earth is interesting, and beautifully drawn, but I'm begining to feel the sensations I got that made me stop reading the Ken Follet book. These characters go through some really hard times, and are surrounded by some really nasty people. It's oppressive to me. But it's fun. You are given some choices along the way that affects how the story plays out in its details. I imagine the overall story has to conform to the book. So far i haven't gotten to the part where I stopped in my reading. The mason still hasn't got the job he's looking for building a cathedral. I stopped soon after that. 

Well, that was a day. I set up my Switch again and lined up all my Wii-U games. I have Fire Emblem Birthright coming to me too, so plenty of Nintendo gaming to come.