#and also 'all of your upgrades are decided randomly. fuck you Survive.' would be a fantastic game mode

[bitchfitch]

Tbh the only thing I haven't liked about any holocure update is that they removed the random option on the character select screen. which I Get because one of the main mechanics of the game is about finding the characters you like and getting them maxed out, but all the characters are fun and I have 0 attachment to any of them over the others. +idk. holocure is one of those games you play to turn your brain off. I do not want to make decisions I want to listen to good tunes and zone the fuck out with the anime girl bullet hell equivalent of pressure washer simulator.

[everygame]

Cinco Paus (iOS)

Developed/Published by: smestorp Released: 12/02/2015 Completed: n/a Completion: 33 games, 632 points. Trophies / Achievements: n/a

So, Cinco Paus, then. It’s a game I’ve resisted playing for ages and ages largely because I wasn’t that into Michael Brough’s previous games (I somewhat liked 868-Hack, but I didn’t find it very compelling somehow?) but we got to a point where Metanet’s Raigan Burns just bought it for me so I decided to give it the old college try.

Cinco Paus is incredible. It’s also frustrating, unfair, probably taking the piss when it comes to time investment, and yet something that I managed to lose more time, more intensely on, than any game I’ve played in ages. Like legitimately losing 14 hours to it within the first three days.

It’s an easily misunderstood game, so I’m going to outline (first of all) that you absolutely should play it, unless you’re easily addicted to rogue-likes, in which case you probably shouldn’t. Basically, it goes like this:

You’re a wizard.

You have five wands that you don’t know the behaviors of; each wand does five things. Your goal is to compete FIFTY sets of five levels, which are five by five, by getting to the exit on each level.

Wands do a variety of things. You learn by shooting them (drag them to your wizard and point them in a direction; you can’t use them directly against a wall.) They don’t tell you what the thing they do is unless they do that thing so you can’t tell if it hurts an enemy unless you hit an enemy. But you also can’t tell if it does something good that requires it not to hit an enemy (the “buried treasure” ability) unless it doesn’t hit an enemy!

All the explanations are in Portuguese, so ignore them and just look them up here.

You can pick up items.

Books teach you one thing one wand does.

Gems. Collect five gems and you can unlock an artifact (you can have five) which do one (powerful) thing.

Keys. Collect five keys, which you can only do via wand shenanigans (there’s one key per level, and that always gets used up to unlock doors) and you can find a secret level (a hidden door on a wall that doesn’t contain an exit/entrance already) which will upgrade an artifact. Each artifact can have five upgrades. They’re extremely good.

Potions. Heal you one point. This is valuable, but if you’re at full health you can ignore or transform these.

Treasure. It’s just points! If you’re going for score, these are high risk because they give you nothing else. Transform ‘em early if you can, I say.

After a set of five levels, everything resets except for your gems, keys, score and artifacts. So you “keep” some progress.

If you die: you lose everything and start again.

Oh, and every set of five levels is basically the same; the layouts are close to random, but the selection of enemies you face are consistent; level 3 in your fiftieth game will have the same possible enemy selection as it would have in your first game (recounted in this excellent guide).

You die if you lose your hitpoints; you will generally die because an enemy hit you.

Enemies move after you do, semi-randomly.

If you walk into a space next to them, they will hit you. Do not do this! Make sure they move next to you, and hit them.

There are shrimp, lizards, toads and roosters. You don’t want to slug it out with the toads and roosters.

There are also Ghosts, who are weird; they will hit you if you move next to them, but if you are next to them and you move towards them, they’ll move away. That means you can’t kill them without a wand, but is also means that you can move and not get hit by them even if you think you’re trapped!

That’s… a lot. So you might be asking, what the hell am I doing?

Try and learn as much about the wands as soon as possible each run. If you can, track all the big things a wand can do (did it hit a wall, an enemy, etc).

Don’t get hit, and especially never ever get cornered (two enemies next to you) unless you have a big power that will pay off and kill them. On the first level, if you’re deep in a multi-game run, carefully slug it out with lizards if you would otherwise have to fire at point blank range. There are too many ways for things to go wrong on that first level and taking a couple of hits is more survivable than turning a lizard into a rooster, and then having the beam bounce off corners and duplicate it several times (and then teleport you in the center of them. Which could happen.)

Do whatever you can to get as many gems as early as possible; if you can dupe them, do so. If you can use transform on books/potions/treasure to try and get a gem, do it. 

Do whatever you can to get as many extra keys. Upgraded artifacts are so important.

Above all: survive. If you’re fucking up a level, just do whatever to get to the exit. Don’t get greedy. There’s always the next level, or at worst the next set.

Right. So that reads as insanely complicated, I think, but the beauty of Cinco Paus is that it’s actually extremely simple. While there’s a lot of things a wand can do, the things you can do are limited, so the play-space is always extremely understandable (the map is always 5x5; you know you’re getting a particular set of enemies next time, etc.) It’s actually extremely elegant.

The thing about Cinco Paus is that it’s the closest I think I’ve come to truly seeing genius at play in game design. Like, ok, maybe that sounds absurd, but I mean like when you think about a piece of art or music where you think “oh, I could do that” and you probably could, but it’s the idiosyncrasies of the artist that make it something far more interesting and unique and you sort of second guess any critique of that.

I mean listen. This game looks like shit. Just shit. It’s disgusting to look at. I hate it. But maybe that’s totally still necessary to what it is. And I honestly think the decision to make all the text in Portuguese is… problematic? I know it came from a genuine interest in using the language (Brough is, or was, learning it) but that it’s used to make the game more mysterious and alien (for everyone except people who can speak, as he admits, the sixth most spoken language in the world) is kinda… I just don’t think it’s good. 

And the thing is, for me it doesn’t add anything. This game could, I think, look crazy polished and feature some brilliant UI and be in English; like it could track all the things you’ve learned in a big database; fuck it could even cross off all the things you’ve tried. The game would still be extremely challenging, and if anything, more enjoyable as a puzzle.

But… would that actually be better? I’m not sure. I really can’t tell, because it’s a bit like saying Van Gogh should have just drawn normally.

So, you know, here’s to the iconoclasts. Fuck knows I’d probably have been a better games journalist if I didn’t put my best writing in a printed zine, you know? I still did it the way I wanted to.

I suppose the question might be though: why have I stopped playing? Well, I died frustratingly in the middle of my greatest run ever as it turns out Roosters had unlocked a way to warp me three runs ago and, despite being well prepared, I was warped by one where I was surrounded and literally couldn’t survive (some people might quibble.) I didn’t feel any rage, I felt pretty proud of getting that far, but the idea of starting the grind again made me really bored.

You see, in order to get to the point where Cinco Paus is really fun, you have to put up with the “starting grind” where with no artifacts yet you have to play loads of times trying to get a good start and get a few artifacts going. That’s potentially hundreds of games, and after bumping up against that for a few days I just said fuck it.

I know, you can’t question genius by my own parameters here, but I think about a similar genius (uh, actually not similar) Jeff Minter, and how he came up with that genius “high score save” where it just saved the game at your highest score each level and you could restart there. You could always restart too. Here I wish I could just pick a random artifact or two and start at level 5 or 10 with less score, even. Because it’s the getting of those that are the ball-ache when you’re so weak and shitey.

But look. It’s probably good. I kicked my habit. But I’m glad I played it. I’m better for it. I’m still not watching the Wire though.

Will I ever play it again? Maybe if he updates it, which I think has been rumoured. I’m taking a big break from Brough but I’ll be back for Imbrouglio though. Actually excited.

Final Thought: There’s no daily seed here, which might have kept me playing, but I realize that he can’t really do that because one person could just tell you what’s coming, plus doing fifty levels is, what… 8 hours or something? It’s wild that I want a game where everything is so restricted to five of anything still maybe streamlined a bit more. But as I said, what do I know? I’m not a genius.

[weekendwarriorblog]

MoviePass’s Latest Scam is Ingenious but Infuriating

If you’re anything like me, you schedule your life around the movies you want to see and you see a mix of movies in arthouse and indie theaters as well as bigger franchise movies at the multiplexes.

Now I’ve been using MoviePass for well over two years. In March 2016, the Metrograph theater opened in my neighborhood, and I soon learned from a friend that the theater took MoviePass, which at the time was $45 a month for a single movie a day. Still no 3D/IMAX, but you could see movies multiple times and there were few other limitations except that you could only use it once a day. That was already a pretty good deal because if I saw 3 movies that month, it would be about the same. They then raised the price to $50 and I still found it to be a good deal because I was freelancing but still had more free time than free money.  I mainly used it at the Metrograph over the next year or so, but once in a while would go to the multiplex and see a movie which I missed or wasn’t invited to see (like every Disney movie since Dec. 2016).

When MoviePass was bought and the price was lowered to $9.99 a month, I was thrilled because I was already using it and a fan of the service and that would save me $40 a month. A few months later, MoviePass offered an annual fee for the service for $89 which was even lower than the monthly fee.  When the price was dropped last July, there were a lot of negative nellies saying that it would never work and there was no way for MoviePass to survive, and maybe they were right.

Anyway, earlier this year, they offered a service of 4 movies a month for $7.99 which if you live in New York is STILL a great deal compared to paying $15 to 18 for a movie (and that’s not including 3D upcharges). There were definitely some growing pains as MoviePass upgraded its APP and started making conditions, one of them being that you have to take a picture of the ticket to prove that you used it for the movie you checked in for, mainly to avoid scammers. It was a pain, especially at theaters like the Quad which have TERRIBLE celphone and WIFI service. And it also was buggy because when it started, it would randomly ask you for a picture before you could use MoviePass again and if you didn’t keep your ticket on you, you were fucked.

MoviePass kept instilling new rules… that you couldn’t see a movie more than twice and then they started adding surge pricing for the bigger movies. The thing is that because I bought a year’s service in advance, they couldn’t change the deal and start making long-time users pay surge charges. That alone already pissed a lot of MoviePass users to the point where they dumped it and switched to the AMC Service.

Okay, let’s fast-forward to last week Thursday when MoviePass’ service went down completely, something that has happened sporadically since last year. These issues were frustrating, but not as frustrating as the customer service which pretty much vanished and you were told to use the APP. I actually had to upgrade to a new smartphone because in Feb or March, the APP stopped working on my old Droid altogether.

Anyway, MoviePass went down and it was soon reported that they ran out of money to pay their vendors and had to borrow another $6 million to stay solvent. Once again, the negative nellies started ranting on about how they told them so and that it would never work. The stock quickly tanked and everyone assumed doom for the service, especially with AMC offering A-List to those who normally frequent the multiplexes and wanted to see the bigger movies that play at them. For $20 a month, that was still a good deal if you actually went to see 3 movies a week and saw IMAX/3D movies.

During the week after the money problems, it was very hard to get MoviePass to work at all… either you couldn’t check-in or the APP said there were no screenings available at ANY theater… except of course, MoviePass’ partners, which in NYC is exactly THREE theaters… The Roxy (repertory and 2nd run indies), the Landmark 57 which is WAY out of the way unless you live on the Upper West Side and the Chelsea Cinepolis which is closer downtown (23rd and 8th) and plays a mix of indies and major releases. You could see anything you wanted at those partners even with all the problems, which is HUGELY suspect in itself because it looked like MoviePass was trying to shut out the theaters who didn’t outright partner with them. 

But that wasn’t the SCAM that I referred to in the title… THIS is the SCAM:

Last Friday, I decided to try MoviePass again, although it had been spotty in the past week. That morning, I woke up and said, “I want to see Equalizer 2 since I missed the press screening.” I went on the MoviePass APP to see if it was working and it showed a number of afternoon screenings around 3pm or 3:30 which sounded like I could make happen.  I went on about my daily business and then around 1:30, I checked the APP again to make sure it was working before I got on the bus ($2.75 each way if you don’t have a weekly pass, which I don’t) and went up to Kips Bay to see the movie. I then saw that the earlier afternoon screenings had been deleted and unavailable on the APP and the earliest screening of Equalizer 2 was at 7pm or 7:30.  Again, this is at 1:30 in the afternoon. 

What was really annoying about them limiting my choice to the evening screenings was that it was Friday evening, Equalizer 2 had been out for about a month and it was playing in the smaller theater which had already sold a lot if not all of its tickets. I figured that the chance of the 7pm screening being sold out by the time I got there was definitely not in my favor.

See, that’s the thing with MoviePass… it has always been the case that you have to buy your ticket within 30 minutes of check-in AND you have to be within half a mile, and none of the theaters playing the movie were close enough that I could guarantee buying a ticket.

I decided to go with Good Manners at the IFC Center which was listed on MoviePass, so I went to that and go there fairly early to get a ticket which was good because that TOO was playing in a small theater that did indeed sell-out its seats.  

That got me thinking that maybe MoviePass was deliberately scanning the people who regularly used the service, maybe once a day or three or four times a week. Many of those people (and there are a lot in New York) are single people, maybe unemployed (like myself) who prefer to see movies on weekday afternoons when the theaters aren’t as crowded.

On Saturday, I woke up early to see The General at Metrograph and MoviePass seemed to be working, no problem, but on Sunday, I wanted to see Wanda, a 1970 indie film that was restored, and I saw that it was playing at 12:45 in the bigger theater and not many tickets have been sold, so there shouldn’t be a problem.

I wake up on Sunday and check the MoviePass app and the 12:45 of Wanda isn’t listed. In fact, NO movies are listed anywhere (except the partner theaters) before 5pm, so basically they want to make sure that the people who might go see a movie Sunday afternoon to get out of the heat (or just to see a movie) won’t be able to do so and they have to wait until Sunday evening/night which isn’t ideal for those who work on Mondays or those who just want to do other things Sunday night. (They did have the 9:30 showing listed but that was in the smaller theater and could definitely sell out before anyone with MP is able to get tickets.)

ADDENDUM: It’s now 5:12PM and I’m getting the “There are no more screenings at this theater” message for EVERY theater on the APP other than the partner theaters. Either service is down again, MoviePass is trying to make sure I realize that I already used MoviePass (but what if I didn’t?) or they continue to try to screw over long-time and annual MoviePass users.

For a long time, MoviePass even had a choice to “check-in for a movie not shown here” for the times that a movie wasn’t listed on the APP especially for big theaters with a lot of different movies. That option is GONE, because they want to limit you to whatever movies they feel might sell out 

So to spell it out…this is MoviePass’ scam: they’re making it harder and harder and harder… nearly impossible… for the regular MoviePass subscribers, those who have been with the service from the days it was $45-50 a month to use, those who paid for a year in advance and had the confident that MoviePass would deliver the service as promised for a whole year (which is definitely not the case). 

And you know what? When they started making people take pictures of their tickets after using MoviePass, they threatened to cut off the service of anyone who didn’t take a picture of their ticket. By doing that, they’d save themselves a lot of money on a service that they clearly didn’t think through when they lowered the price to $9.99.  I stood by that decision and thought it would be great to get people signed up, but I never thought that would stick.

Now it’s $14.99 but I don’t have to renew my service until November and we’ll have to see if I do so under the current conditions. If it was $14.99 a month and there were no limitations other than seeing one movie a day, no repeat viewings or 3D/IMAX, that would be fine and still a good deal. But MoviePass is also cutting off new releases like Mission: Impossible and Christopher Robin and even The Darkest Minds (which probably could have been helped by MoviePass). 

So to recap: MoviePass is trying to fuck everyone over that hasn’t already dumped their service because they realize they overreached by lowering the price to $9.99 when there are many people who would gladly see a movie a day if given the option.

MoviePass, you should be ashamed of yourself, especially the recent decision to limit moviegoers’ choices in how they use MoviePass. In November, when I have to decide whether to spend $14.99 a month for a lesser service, I just hope AMC still is doing A-List because I’ll do that even though It won’t be able to see movies at any of the downtown arthouse/indie/repertory theaters (and they’re going to get fucked by losing all the MoviePass users).