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Craverguy on Holy Inmate Riots, Batman!
at 00:15 on 20-09-2016 - link
It only took me three days, but I finally managed to win that damn boss battle and complete the story.
The ending was...a bit abrupt. Batman knocks the Joker senseless and the credits are rolling in under two minutes.
Once they were over, it only took me a little more than an hour to find all the remaining Riddler challenges and wrap things up.
Final verdict: outstanding combat and stealth gameplay, great voice acting, teeth-grinding final boss fight. -
Craverguy on Holy Inmate Riots, Batman!
at 17:15 on 17-09-2016 - link
I bought this the other day, and I really quite enjoyed it. Unfortunately, I can't finish it because there's some sort of glitch that causes the Ultra Batclaw not to pull properly, which makes the final boss battle (the one everyone always complains is too easy) completely unwinnable.
Favorite part of the gameplay: the Predator sections. Nothing makes you feel more like a god in black and grey spandex than stringing up three mooks from the ceiling, grabbing a fourth from under the floor, and taking out the last guy with a cape-spread aerial kick to the face.
Least favorite part of gameplay: the boss fights. The game is really quite bad at explaining what you're supposed to do to win these. When I fought Bane, it didn't tell me I was supposed to throw a batarang in his face when he charges until it appeared as a tip on the game over screen the first time he killed me.
Gameplay I have mixed feelings about: the three Scarecrow sequences. I loved, loved, loved the bits at the beginning when Batman starts tripping out and reliving past events in actual gameplay. I hated the endings when you have to sneak past the fifty-foot Scarecrow. The sudden switch to side-scrolling properly screwed me, and I died at least ten times on each level as I blundered across the screen through trial and error.
So now that I (more or less) have the hang of the gameplay, I've put in an order for the Game of the Year Edition of Arkham City, which is dirt cheap used on Amazon. Did anyone here ever get around to playing it? -
Arthur B on Dissecting Lovecraft Part 1: Juvenile Racist Pagan Sleuth At Large
at 08:56 on 16-09-2016 - link
Based on the (fairly superficial) amount I know about his later life, on reflection it does seem as though maybe he tended to generalise from himself more strongly than many other adults.
Possibly - although on balance I think it's less a matter of that than of him not being interested in generalising at all and much more invested in arguing his own corner, as well as having a really low opinion of his own ability to adapt to new circumstances and aesthetics. In later life he basically admitted that he clung to a lot of his attitudes basically because they were what the culture he grew up in had offered, and seemed to feel that if he let go of that he'd be entirely lost. -
Shim on Dissecting Lovecraft Part 1: Juvenile Racist Pagan Sleuth At Large
at 22:42 on 15-09-2016 - link
Nice article. I like the comments on how his writing style slowly coalesces over time.
I hadn't previously considered how Lovecraft's really quite unusual childhood pastimes and literary background would have shaped his mindset. Based on the (fairly superficial) amount I know about his later life, on reflection it does seem as though maybe he tended to generalise from himself more strongly than many other adults. Perhaps a habit of thought formed in a quite lonely childhood, when this usually gets broken down through socialising?
This might tie into his difficulty in coping with people of different backgrounds and mindsets - most notable in his New York years of course. But it occurs to me it could also relate to his writing; a lot of the horrific elements in stories are things he personally found awful, which sometimes means he's able to evoke atmosphere by drawing on things I can suspend disbelief for, and sometimes... not.
Or something. I'm tired. - Arthur B on Dissecting Lovecraft Part 1: Juvenile Racist Pagan Sleuth At Large at 18:40 on 07-09-2016 - link Ooops - thanks for catching, I have corrected.
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sotrain515 on Dissecting Lovecraft Part 1: Juvenile Racist Pagan Sleuth At Large
at 18:04 on 07-09-2016 - link
Hey Arthur, great read!
Minor correction: Lovecraft's dad's name wasn't "Winifred" (which is a feminine name I believe) but rather "Winfield" -- Winfield Scott Lovecraft, presumably named for Old Fuss and Feathers himself! -
Arthur B on Dissecting Lovecraft Part 1: Juvenile Racist Pagan Sleuth At Large
at 13:52 on 05-09-2016 - link
I have not had direct experience of it.
Apparently it uses the Joshi texts, so it's fine on that part. But to my eye it looks a bit expensive compared to just getting the Complete Fiction or the Penguin volumes, which means you end up getting less stories for more money.
The story selection is decent enough, though I'd query some bits. Missing out The Tomb ignores a very important bit of his development as a writer, and Herbert West - Reanimator and The Horror at Red Hook could happily have been cut to make room for better stuff. It also seems to miss out just about all of his Dunsany-inspired bits.
So as well as being incomplete, it doesn't quite fit the bill as far as a true "best of" collection goes, and on the flipside it doesn't quite provide a rounded, complete view of his work as a writer. It looks to me like it falls between two stools a bit and seems a little redundant, serving more or less solely to give Lovecraft a bit of kudos in the literary world (though the three volumes of his in Penguin Classics tick that box just fine). - Bill on Dissecting Lovecraft Part 1: Juvenile Racist Pagan Sleuth At Large at 12:41 on 05-09-2016 - link Do you know the Library of America edition of Lovecraft's selected fiction, edited by Peter Straub? Any good?