5) Music and sound effects are immersive and help you get a better grasp of the game mechanics Darkest Dungeon deftly manages its themes of darkness and despair and was a great choice for a pandemic game. I have found cynical, dark, heartbreaking and even depressing stories and other artworks to be oddly comforting and reaffirming in this time of flux. There are two responses to the feelings evoked by the COVID-19 pandemic: you either immerse yourself in escapist media that’s overwhelmingly upbeat (think Animal Crossing or The Great British Bake Off), or you immerse yourself in depressing, dark media (stuff in the vein of The Last of Us Part II or The Haunting of Bly Manor) as a coping mechanism. 4) Darkness of themes was alluring and just what I needed. By the end of my playthrough, I would quote entire lines as the Ancestor uttered them. Thus, while I would reject a book with that kind of writing-overly-reliant on bombastic adjectives-I found it endearing in the context of this game. With each subsequent visit to the different dungeons, and after hearing the Ancestor-voiced by Wayne June-nailing some relevant, tonally on-point lines, I started growing fond of the writing style. Lovecraft so, to my ears, the writing simply sounded bad. I later found out that the writing style was a deliberate choice: Darkest Dungeon was showing its strong Lovecraftian influence. It sounded phony, like it was trying too hard to be literary. I was unconvinced by the trailer-which also happens to be the pre-game video-when I first watched it. Such a unique, dark, and yet beautiful style immediately caught my eye and swayed me to stick with this game through the initial bewilderment. If you power through the learning portion of Darkest Dungeon, I can assure you that the view beyond is beautiful, complex, and intellectually satisfying. And this is barely scratching the surface of the vast ocean of possibilities this game offers. There are hundreds of possible party combinations, and each party member can fill in four different positions and be capable of different skills. While the incredible amount of factors to keep an eye out for was responsible for my initial confusion, I think they are also the main reason why this game is so replayable. Armed with my newly-found knowledge, I decided to start a new game from scratch. I also realized I had accumulated a surprisingly high amount of stupid choices-all caused by my baffled ignorance-in the couple of hours I had thus far played. Thirty minutes into a 50-minute tutorial, I felt like I understood the game better. I decided to watch a couple of YouTube tutorials. I felt like I was randomly throwing attacks and getting attacked, and none of it made much sense to me. There are dozens of stats to be aware of. Thus far, I have logged 112 hours, which has been roughly the time it has taken me to finish the main story on Radiant mode while smashing easily through the last dungeons (thanks to all the grinding and hero quirk enhancements I acquired). So I thought, “how about trying out a different system, something other than PS4?” Coincidentally, Darkest Dungeon was on sale on Steam (a steal, really, for US$ 5.99), so I got it and started playing it. None of those games captivated me enough for me to want to stick with them (at least not in the headspace I was in). The premise and the artwork of the game intrigued me even at a brief glance, and I made a mental note to play it sometime.įlash forward to two months ago: I had given up on playing any of the PS4 games in my backlog-Hitman 2, Spiderman, and Red Dead Redemption 2. I first heard about it earlier this year, while watching one of Game Maker’s Toolkit’s videos.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |