Friday, July 03, 2009

Friday afternoon tidbits

It's a holiday weekend, as we here in the USA celebrate "America, Fuck Yeah" day. (Contrary to popular belief, that is not every day.) Hopefully you're not still at work. If so, have some links.

-The Brainy Gamer plays The Darkness, and makes some astute observations. It's impossible to play this game and not feel the urge to analyze it. At this point, it can't cost any more than 20 bucks. You owe it to yourself to give it a shot.

-Speaking of repairs, Mike Rousseau's Xbox RRoD'd on him. The service went fine, but then Microsoft tried to charge him to re-download his stuff from the marketplace. After that first post, somebody from the company contacted him and fixed the problem. That's good customer service, but they should be treating everybody that way in the first place. Right, Sony?

-As you may know, I'm a man who loves his taxonomies. So I was psyched to read Justin Keverne's "Taxonomy of Left 4 Dead," in which he breaks down the personalities of each of the characters. What I like best about the game is that the player's actions can mesh with the characters' personalities in unexpected ways. Francis might be written as misanthropic, but depending on who's controlling him he may be shown to have a heart of gold. That interaction makes for depth I wouldn't have expected before I played the game.

With that, I'm on vacation. Regular posting will resume the week after next.

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