Another Extraction

Tolvir's remaining voice torturously crawled its last few pleas of mercy as the mage's magic intensified. Thousands of glowing strands of brilliant blues raced within the labyrinth of wrinkles in his brain, surgically pillaging one hard-fought memory before seeking the next, careful never to disturb the vital components necessary for his survival. This was not the work of an amateur, and Tolvir's unraveling psyche would serve as further training among the countless other heroes whose egos dwarfed their capabilities.His eyes darted helplessly around the cellar, unable to clearly discern anything of aid through the blindingly thick stream of cackling blues and whites. The only recognizable shape beyond the noise is the intrigued gaze of the mage responsible for what has distorted to feel like multiple lifetimes of agony. He leans forward closer to the shackled savior, angling his limply held wand for a more comfortable angle as another torrent of electric tendrils crashes into his eye before attending their designated markers that could only be accurately mapped through centuries of administering similar fates. The mage's expression sharpened with interest following another movement of the wrist.The inspiring eyes, once a beacon of prosperity in the face of the wicked, now retreated to the back of his head as Tolvir's spiritual flame is smothered and silenced to a docile ember. The whites of his sclera buzzed with electric vigor for a brief moment before stabilizing into a window of usable information. Each memory manifests as a fuzzy image briefly before being disassembled and replaced by the next. A moment of holy triumph over the hell-spawn tasked to collect the contractually owed souls of the desperate. An uneasy yet empathic speech to a father to resist the temptations of reanimating his now decaying reason to trudge forward another day. A narrowly eked victory of wooden swords as Tolvir's elated son boasts of having bested the village's greatest warrior to the applause of his mother, impressed with her husband's ability to act. Every defining moment, every lesson learned, every comforting thought is brought forward through the windows of his soul, and delivered to the intruding presence of the mage. The voyeurism is addictive.Content with his findings, the mage pulls his arm back, averting the wand as the bright cobalt cellar returns to a dull torchlit amber. The murky air thins. Echoing screeches of the spell retire to a low pitch hum, then to a silence. Dusting off his cloak, the mage turns to his table in search of an appropriate container for such an accomplished mind. The dirty flask of a potion that's long expired will suffice. Carefully, he nears his wand to Tolvir's now soulless eyes. They dart around the unfamiliar cellar, incapable of making sense of the now alien incantation being cast upon him. After the incantation is finished, the mage pulls back his wand, and a stream of mana begins to float directly into the weathered flask. The radiant and electric blues now faded to a viscous tar that slowly engulfs the container."Tolvir. Tell me the name of your son."His brows furrow in response to the unfamiliar sounds of even his own name. The mage takes a note of the date and attaches it to the flask.
"Lovely." He remarked in a neutral tone. "I'll have someone return you to your village in the morning." Corking the flask and setting it back down on the table among several other disorganized glassware containing the essence of so many other legends.

A Prospector's Case for Typing Games

A friend of mine recently brought to my attention a new typing game on Steam, Blood Typers. It was a Resident Evil-inspired horror, where all actions were input via typing mechanics. The thing that caught my eye was that it wasn't on rails - unlike Typing of the Dead. No! Even the act of movement itself was typing-based. This small change really brought a level of tension to the genre that I found incredibly refreshing.There's an amount of powerlessness in horror that's required for the genre to thrive truly. Ideally, some push and pull, a tug-of-war between the game and player, where as the player becomes more adept at the game's mechanics, developers pull new tricks from their sleeves to destroy that comfort zone and raise tensions again. You attack enemies by typing randomly generated words that appear on them. For the most part, you can only attack one at a time, and even then, a single enemy could have 3, 5, or even more words (of varying lengths) to take down. This makes for VERY tense moments where as little as 2 enemies rushing at you can cause a panic where you're struggling just to type AMPHIBIAN correctly!! Same with trying to retreat. The words for traversal are usually much smaller, usually 3-4 letters. The thing is, if you get caught off guard, it's incredibly easy to forget what the words for the nodes behind you were. Now you need to slowly move the camera (while you're being attacked) until you can see the word again.The co-op is fun and makes getting the necessary items to progress much easier. My friend group decided on who takes the top, middle, and bottom words when we're taking on the same enemy at once - which was hard learned after a couple of moments where 2 people are typing out the same words, see the other person typing, and both stop and move to the same different word...again. The game's VOIP is proximity-based, but looking at how we played, it's probably for the best that we stuck to Discord.Be warned, the game is new, and there's a modest helping of indie-jank to be seen. On my second run, I got soft-locked in an area I couldn't escape while holding critical items. We had to restart the level. There was also some wonky combat interactions where you'd be targeting one enemy, but while you're attacking, the game auto-targets to a different enemy. Otherwise, I've been having a really good time.

Glyphica

Another typing game I picked up while I was in the mood was Glyphica. This one was much more straightforward in being a typing game. Enemies with words appear; you type to destroy them. More enemies will spawn with increasing frequency and a few quirks to keep things interesting. I really liked the boss who jumbled the words that entered its area of influence. Having to mentally swap from typing out full words you recognize to absolute gibberish tripped me up more than I'd have thought it would.I really appreciate how you don't need to backspace at all in this one (Having to backspace has led to quite a few deaths in Blood Typers). You're free to jump straight to the next target without penalty. The time lost from messing up is punishment enough. The roguelike elements are fun as well. There's a good array of pickups to help you along your way, as well as a vanilla mode you can enable if you just want to type away, without all the extra fluff. There isn't much to dissect. Glyphica is just a fun typing game.

Games Reviewed for an Audience of None

Cyberpunk 2077

I've been playing Cyberpunk a bit after hearing a lot about it from some close friends. I've always been a sucker for games that depict the future through a political lens, so it's probably not a surprise that I'm very much enjoying my time with the game.The premise of having an artificial construct of another person jammed into your mind is a captivating one. Doubly so when it's Johnny Silverhand. Silverhand is a rockstar terrorist responsible for detonating a nuke at the heart of Arasaka Industries' mega tower. Needless to say, he hates corporations with a burning passion. Having chosen my character's background to be from said corporation, there was naturally a lot of initial conflict between us.
Beyond the initial theme of "Becoming a legend", there's one of being your own person. Despite being an asshole to just about everyone he's ever met, even going so far as to MASSIVELY violate your autonomy and get piss drunk once given control for a simple conversation. (Though the tattoo he got while in control was admittedly pretty cute.) Silverhand took notice that my dialog choices were sounding a lot like him; he does everything he can to help you unfuck your current predicament. He's dead set on living his ideals, and one of them is that everyone should be their own person. Not a corporate drone hot off the assembly line. Things like this make him a really interesting and complex character. It's great.There are a few quests that I really enjoyed that capture that theme very well. First is a short one named "Violence". A celebrity thinks she's being cheated on and contacts you to confirm her suspicions. If you snoop hard enough, you find out that her boyfriend was actually trying to make a personality copy of her, similar to Silverhand. He says that ever since she's gotten so many trans-humanist body modifications (I mean, the woman's skin is entirely chrome!), she hasn't been the same. He wants the version of her that he fell in love with. When you speak to her, you can understand where the boyfriend is coming from (while not condoning his solution). She snaps in and out of this state of cold, robotic speech that I'm sure would scare anyone.

Baldur's Gate 3

Definitely one of the best games to release in some time. BG3 actually made me want to role-play. The game has so much content, I'm not sure how the dev team managed to craft it all. I'm incredibly impressed with how much there is, and how much the game is willing to let you just skip, or even pass by, without even knowing that content exists. I'd call myself satisfied with the $60 price tag with the content I experienced on my first playthrough alone, but I didn't even experience everything. I didn't have Karlach or Wyll for the majority of my playthrough, so their storylines are unexplored. There might have been split paths throughout that I could have taken at different points, also. I didn't clear the fog in Act 2. That didn't even register as a possibility for me. I'd like to play around with the ascended version of Asterion. Maybe see what Halsin's quests look like. Same with the evil drow and Minsc. My next playthrough will be with a handful of mods, mostly QOL stuff. As soon as I finished this first playthrough, I just about started the second one before realizing I wanted to mod first. I'm just so incredibly impressed by this title.There were definitely a few gripes to be had, though, for a game built on replayability. I wish the beginning were a bit faster to run through. I would have definitely liked a "skip the nautilus" button that lands Shadowheart and me on the beach after customizing my character. (With a few customization buttons for the minor decisions to be made in those first 20 minutes. Hopefully a mod can help.) The characters move a bit too slow for my liking when maneuvering the overworld, too. I think the biggest annoyances came in Act 3. I ran into a couple of bugs that really sucked. Quest markers that wouldn't go away, even if you completed the objective; Quest markers that just wouldn't appear in the first place; The game crashed a few times towards the end; Inventory management is a pain, and group fights can get a bit boring when it's 10+ enemies that all take their turn before you. That being said, the highs of BG3 far outweigh the lows.
I really did love the characters, too. Gale is a sweetheart. Astarion is a lovable asshole. Shadowheart starts fairly annoying, but she begins to open up more as you keep playing. Laezel is supposed to come off as unlikable in the beginning, but she ends up reminding me of a caveman who stumbled into a time machine and can only solve modern issues by smashing things. It works for me. Jaheira is this "aged legend" archetype that I absolutely adore. She's been around the block as an adventurer before, and she's seen everything. I really liked having her around, even if she wasn't as effective in combat as others.