Line of Duty

 

This post is going to be pretty short because it's not about games but I've not enjoyed a show like this since The Wire so I just HAVE to say something about it

Line of Duty is a British police drama series that was first aired on the BBC in 2012.  The show was then brought to my attention by a friend of mine when he showed me the opening of the first episode on Netflix.  I then promptly forgot about it for a couple of years until recently when I decided to put it on in the background so there was some noise going on while I was working from home.  I promptly had to stop putting it on during my work from home hours because I was fucking GLUED to this shit whenever I threw it up on the TV.  

The show starts out with a bloke called Steve heading up an anti-terrorist operation.  The whole thing goes tits up and an innocent man is killed by an armed officer in front of his wife and by the blessing of plot armor the baby he was carrying magically didn't get hit by a bullet or die when it fell to the ground.  Steve cottons on to the fact that the whole operation was rushed and poorly thought out and wants to speak up against his superiors to get justice for the family that just lost a father, but his team instead all put together a story to cover their asses and basically Bully Steve into following along.  Not wanting to to this, Steve quits (or gets kicked out of, I can't remember right now) the anti-terrorist force and joins AC-12, the anti-corruption wing of the police dedicated to bringing down bent coppers.  From there it's hard to say anything without major stories but it's 5 seasons of drama, betrayal, action, plot-twists and subterfuge everywhere.

Rarely ever do I binge a series.  In fact rarely ever do I even bother to watch a series all the way through, I'm just not that much of a TV guy but I just could not pull myself away from Line of Duty until the very last moment, it's just that good.  It does this thing each season where there's a sort of lull in the action, bunch of standard cop-show shit going on and then right at the end of that episode it'll throw something absolutely insane right out of left field that you absolutely weren't expecting.  That gets you to immediately hit the "next episode" button and from there its so break-neck and intense that it's hard to put it down until the season finishes.  

So if you're still locking yourself down away from Corona and you need something to kill 30 hours with, I highly recommend this show.  At time of writing there are 5 seasons and you can bet your ass I'm praying for a 6th

Henry Hatsworth in the Puzzling Adventure

Henry Hatsworth is a very silly, yet really very good platform game for the DS that I bought ages ago and never beat.  Now that I'm coming to the end of this game, I thought I'd do a little bit on it.

The plot of this game is very simple.  A long long time ago, there was a suit that was so classy you could rule the world with it.  Some guy known only as The Gentleman ruled the world with this suit and when his time came to an end, he spread the suit all over the world to prevent anyone getting their hands on it and fucking everything up.  That's where you come in, as Henry Hatsworth, the extremely British adventurer as you must go gather all the bits of the suit.

Despite the stupid sounding plot of this game it's actually rather charming and doesn't really get in the way of the game in anyway.  There are a few cutscenes dotted between each world as an excuse to crack a few jokes but plot really isn't all that important in this kind of thing anyway.

You may be asking yourself right now, whats so "puzzling" about this adventure.  Well here's the thing, when you find the first bit of the suit, you open up a rift to the "puzzle dimension" and cause a load of monsters to start pouring out of it.  In game play terms, this means there is a upward scrolling field of coloured blocks in the bottom screen of your DS.  When you kill a monster, it doesn't die completely, it returns to the puzzle where you must then match it up with 2 other blocks of the same colour to get rid of it for good.  Any monsters that reach the top get another crack at trying to kill you before they blink out of existence.

The platforming in this game is really good too with some great level design and really tight controls.  There is also some room for some exploration as there are a number of secret levels that dole out some nice rewards if you bother with them.  On top of that there is a shop where you can buy upgrades for Henry which gives you good reason to actually take on enemies rather than just find ways to rush and avoid them.

I will say though this game is really fuckin' hard.  The platforming can be really tricky sometimes and the enemies will really do you over if you're not careful.  Also the secret levels are insane so if the main game is too easy for you, there is still something that will really challenge your platforming skills.

So if you didn't play this game when it was new, go find a copy.  Easily one of my personal favourite games on the DS.