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Feb 15th, 2018 at 23:52:54 - This is the Police (PC) |
As I played through This is the Police, I noticed that I was willing to allow main character (Jack) to be bribed into allowing the commission of less serious, victimless crimes. I do not feel that this is a big deal. In fact, I think the setting and the backstory are a bit more interesting when you allow the main character to be a bit on the corrupt side. It seems like the corruption lends itself to the whole "Mike Hammer" vibe that the game appears to be trying to pull off. Also, I learned a bit more about the main character's past.
Potentially abusive past actions committed by Jack are suggested through a series of rather leading Rorschach Test's. If true, this information greatly changes the context of a previous plot point from yesterday's play through: Your wife may have left due to your character's potential for physical abuse. Again, I do not think that this is a major issue morally, as this game feels more like an interactive detective tale. I plan on reserving judgement for the full reveal that must happen at some point later in the game. That said, This is the Police gives you a number of unsavory options to choose from while attempting to forward the story. From bribery, to questionable orders given during police interactions with civilians, the game is rife with unacceptable behavior, and I for one can not wait to see which moral dilemmas are presented tomorrow.
This entry has been edited 1 time. It was last edited on Feb 15th, 2018 at 23:54:58.
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Feb 14th, 2018 at 23:51:23 - This is the Police (PC) |
I am an academic criminal. I realized today that I did not start a game log that is due tomorrow. I rushed home after class and purchased "This is the Police" with every intention of knocking out thirty minutes of gameplay, and then quickly hand jamming an entry. I easily spent four times the requirement playing the game.
This is the Police is an interesting mix of gameplay and story elements. It immediately presents as a Mickey Spilane detective novel, complete with Mike Hammer-like narration. The simplified, faceless presentation, along with the vaguely 70's/80's era setting go a long way towards pulling me in. Finding little bits here and there such as a rotary phone, or the police uniforms are nice touches. The mix of story and management sim is the real draw for me, however. So much so that it was easy to miss a good bit of the murky ethical choices. That is until the game hit me over the head with a choice that I found a bit too on the nose: Fire all black cops or City Hall will make you pay. I did not find this to be that tough of a decision, and I would have appreciated a bit more moral grey area. As it stands, the decisions I have found most difficult have involved team make-up and the hiring process. I actually found myself questioning which individuals to hire based on the possibility of needing to balance teams for possible future social scenarios. In the end I ended up using the characters with the highest ratings alone. I say this as someone with previous experience hiring individuals. As an member of boards that helped hire individuals for specific teams, I initially did not have pictures of the potential team members. This was done to help avoid any type of bias prior to face to face interviews. The game actually did make me question hiring practices, and that is something I had never seriously considered before. I am looking forward to seeing what else this game makes me question.
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Jan 23rd, 2018 at 00:57:27 - Shadow of Mordor (XBONE) |
It is day three of my playthrough of Shadow of Mordor, and I have realized something that I had forgotten: The game wears thin fairly quickly. As I said on day one,The game basically boils down to a series of assaults meant to strike terror into your enemies. After two days of spending my postgame time looking back at my actions, I began to look for ways to avoid the main hook of the game. Instead I tried to find a way to avoid enemies, instead concentrating on side activities such as hunting down artifacts. I do not believe that the game is necessarily immoral or without a purpose, I just do not find myself compelled to continue the activities. I have the same sort of aversion to the Grand Theft Auto series. I never really cared to role play criminal activity. This does not mean, however that I find those who do enjoy these types of games to be morally bankrupt. Instead I think there is plenty of room for all types of stories within varied media. Still, I did not think that reflecting on Mordor would lead me to this conclusion. I felt that I had just fell off the game previously due to other, newer games. Instead, I now feel like I have bounced hard off of a game that I find a bit too far on the "renegade" end of the spectrum, and that is too bad. The game has a lot going for it mechanically.
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Jan 21st, 2018 at 20:06:38 - Shadow of Mordor (XBONE) |
My second playthrough of Shadow of Mordor has gone something like this: Climb tower, get mission, get distracted trying to hunt down Orc, run afoul of different Orc, die fighting different Orc, respawn, get distracted trying to hunt down different Orc....
One of the main things that I enjoyed about the game the first time that I played was the Nemesis System. I like the way the randomly generated Orcs present themselves WWE style with a short threat/monologue. I actually did not realize it at the time, but for me the insults served as a reason to say "I need to go hunt down that jerk". I find it to be a good bit of motivation as opposed to any of the narrative driven reasons that I was supposed to be invested. Killed by an evil army? No big deal. Ghost-elf in my head? I'll live. My family is dead? Meh. Oh, what's that you say? That green guy just called me names in a Mary Poppins chimney sweep accent?! Time to die...
This second playthrough has led me to question the way the game motivates me. Family vengeance (in my opinion) is a great reason to go Orc hunting, but is not a "real" motivation. I was completely sucked in to the mechanics of the Nemesis System, and to be honest, it is a great system. I would love to see this used in other games. There are a few problems that come up when considering the gameplay within the world that serves as a setting. I need to look it up, but previous bits of lore within the world basically say "Orcs are people, too". The mechanics feel just a bit off in conjunction with the story, and I hate saying that because I really enjoy both elements separately. I think I might just really like the idea of playing a generic Orc Murder simulator, that way I could shut my brain off an go full WWE.
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JChambers has been with GameLog for 6 years, 10 months, and 8 days |
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