Leapfrogging

Sometimes I just can't decide what I want to play and find myself bouncing back and forth between a few different games.  That's where I'm at right now, doing a little bit of this and a little bit of that.  Other than my inability to settle on one game, I've also been feeling a bit sad about the sudden demise of TellTale Studios.

Bouncing!

After I finished Two Point Hospital, I felt the inevitable crushiness of the "game hole."  "What do I play now?" as I stare at my Steam library and try to make a decision.  I don't know about other people, but I usually have at least one really weird period of time where I just stare at my giant list of games AND CANNOT MAKE UP MY MIND!  I decided to take to the store page and see if anything looked good--there's a new Tomb Raider game (but I usually wait till those go on sale for super cheap, because they inevitably will), there's a new Valkyria Chronicles game (also, a game that I will wait for a sale for)--the store page looked like kind of a bust, but one game did make a strange appearance on the top sellers list--CrossCode.  I decided to check it out and was intrigued by what it offered; a pixel graphics, SNES-inspired, ARPG-like, with a strong story.  The best part of the whole packages is that it was $16.99--a relative bargain!

Lea, the main character of CrossCode, meets many engaging characters.

I snatched up CrossCode like a delicious waffle on a Sunday morning.  CrossCode starts off with an unnamed character who is apparently trying to rescue someone who is important to her.  After a brief combat tutorial, your character finds who they are looking for, but something unexpected happens and all of a sudden this character wakes up in a completely different place--a ship that happens to be part of a huge, virtual MMO.  Your original character is now an avatar and is introduced to the mechanics of this new world through a series of tutorials.  At the end of the tutorial, the ship is attacked by a mysterious villain-like character who seems to have it out for you.  The crew of the ship helps defend you and you are transported to the beginners zone of the game world.  Your goal is to participate in the MMO and to work to unlock your memories to discover who you really are (the mysterious character at the beginning of the game).  Recovering your memories is complicated by the fact that your avatar's voice function is defective and you can only say "Hi!"  (A tech character named Sergey is working to recover your communication abilities and more one word responses get slowly added in).

So far, I've been mostly enjoying CrossCode.  Since the story is taking place in a virtual MMO, there are a lot of aspects of MMO's and MMO humor built into it.  The other characters that are part of the story are similar to many people you actually find playing MMO's--one of your initial encounters is with a character of your same class who decides that he needs to show you he is superior and challenges you to a duel.  The guy keeps randomly popping up and talking smack until you finally agree to duel him.  Yup, that's about right.  You also encounter helpful characters who end up becoming your pals and who will team up with you.

The gameplay is ARPG-like and you can face off against groups of enemies throughout many zones.  Unlike ARPG's, CrossCode also features a large amount of puzzles or puzzle-like features.  Simply navigating the map is a little bit like solving a puzzle--maps are made of of tiered features that can be navigated by finding certain places where your character can climb up and then figuring out how to get back to specific areas.  The puzzles themselves are fairly straightforward, but I am a little worried that many of them seem to be built around quick reflexes (like performing one action and very quickly having to move to another or manipulating 2 things very quickly).  I don't think my reflexes are what they once were and that I might struggle with some of the more difficult reflex puzzles.  I'm also a fool for knowing that games with a lot of clicking tend to make my wrist sore.

Trailer ownership allows you to add many customizable features to your trailers.

My other bounce between game has been EuroTruck Simulator 2.  I was excited by the most recent big content patch which added in several new and fun features.  The feature that people seem to be the most excited about is the ability to buy and modify your own trailers.  I am still not completely certain what the benefit is of owning your own trailers (maybe jobs pay more because you're using your own equipment?), but I do know that you can add unique paint jobs and other cosmetic features.  If personalization is your thing, owning your own trailers offers you another chance to make your trucks feel like your own.  A new DLC pack which offers new Krone trailers also dropped (for me, ETS2 DLC is usually a sale item).

The latest patch also offered an overhaul to the management UI as well as some graphical upgrades to some German cities.  I decided to scoop up the Italia DLC because it was on sale and am looking forward to some peaceful drives through the sunny Mediterranean.  It's really great that they continue to add content into ETS2 and that there is a large community of players who enjoy a truck driving sim.

Sad News

The sad news this week was that TellTale Games, makers of choice-based story games like The Walking Dead, suddenly closed.  This is particularly sad for players of The Walking Dead series who have been devotedly following the story of Clementine, and who had been looking forward to the latest (and what was to be the last) installment of her story.  Since the news of the studio closing, the newest season has been pulled from Steam and other digital platforms.  Originally it sounded like they were going to try to finish rolling out the series, but now it looks like it won't happen.

Group hug to remember TellTale Games.

Probably the worst part of the whole TellTale debacle is that the studio closed with virtually no notice--employees were basically told that they didn't have a job any more and were let go with no severance pay.  It's a sad end for a studio that had niched itself a unique place in the gaming spectrum.

I really enjoyed the storytelling and difficult moral choices in The Walking Dead and the ability to see what choices other players made.  Tales From the Borderlands is another of my favorites and I was surprised that the game could be so humorous but also still be strongly choice based--plus, it had some of the best musically scored moments.  This isn't to say that the games were perfect; there was much criticism that the games hinged strongly on the illusion of choice and anyone who had ever decided to buy a series at release knows how horrible those releases actually were--games were released that were full of bugs and it became completely normal to expect that release dates were more like soft targets that would inevitably be pushed back by weeks (or even months).  It got to the point where I wouldn't buy any TellTale games until the full series had been released--it just wasn't worth the frustration anymore.

I'm no expert and don't have any in-depth knowledge about why TellTale collapsed, but it really felt like after The Walking Dead became such a success that they went CRAZY.  There were so many new series and many of them seemed like really strange choices (Minecraft?).  Part of me feels like they bit off way more than they could chew.  Maybe they would still be around if they decided to focus on improving their successful products rather than trying to branch out in a million different directions?  I read something that mentioned that they stubbornly kept using their proprietary engine even though it was really difficult to program certain things.  

But who knows, I'm definitely not someone who understands game development or the gaming industry.  I hope all the employees who worked for TellTale land on their feet and thank them for the stories and great moments that they did create.