Janitorial duty, trying not to get shanked, and punching people

These days, I’ve found ways to keep my homework load down as much as possible, and be able to play games. So as such, I’m actually playing three games equally.

Of the three, I’ve been playing a lot of Planescape: Torment.

 

I adore this game. The setting is fantastic, the party consists of RPG characters you’ve always wanted to be, the plot is complex but never confusing; seriously, it is a work of art. Outside the lackluster combat, (which isn’t the point of the game, but I wish it was more involving) everything else is still top notch stuff.

With modern games having a huge focus on morality, I’m still of the opinion that the way Torment (and to a lesser extent, the other CRPGs of the time like Fallout and Baldur’s Gate) pulls it off better than the contemporaries.

It’s not so much about being good, evil, or neutral, but just being you. Which okay, that sounds like a vapid facebook-generation marketing slogan, but Torment never feels like it punishes experimentation. Special mention has to go to being an evil character, which is absolutely chilling. You can do so much bad to people in non-violent ways. Right now, I’ll leave it at that, but seriously, its really cool. 

I’m enjoying the heck out of my stay in the city of Sigil. Despite how much I get shanked!

 

Sometimes, though I can only take so many knives to the kidney, so Dustforce, is a great pallet (and organ)  cleanser.

So far, Dustforce is okay. I don’t know if it’s just my computer sucking, or if it’s badly programmed; but most of the time it seems to be running at half speed. I’ve tried getting it to run faster by defragging my PC, setting my resolution at different settings, turning off graphical flourishes, and minimizing it, but nothing seems to make it smoother. 

But game design wise, it's good. The mechanics click with each other rather well.

However, any time I play it I get this sinking feeling that something’s missing. I don’t know quite what it is, but I can’t lose myself in it like I did with Bastion.

    

 

Other than that, I’m (still) dinking around with King of Fighters XIII, concluding that Clark is a destroyer of worlds.  I’m at the point where I’m starting to pull off Hyper Drive combos that take away 60-80% of an unlucky person's lifebar. Pulling these off feels really nice, like all my time in practice mode is paying off. 

The real fun of the game is playing it with my friends. The lot of them like it as much as I do. Can't say I hate it, being in company with a bunch of KOF fanatics is the bee-knees.

Sometimes, the little things are what you need.