Oblitus

Usually I only talk about games after I've beaten them and despite the fact I've not beaten Oblitus it might be a while before I do so here we go.

Oblitus is a game 2D adventure game available on Steam developed by Connor Ullmann.  You play as a short masked dude with a spear tasked to save the world from some kind of great evil.  They story is a little thin on the ground but that's OK as "save the world" is quite frankly good enough for a game like this.

You, as the little guy, have to run, jump, roll and stab your way through a number of different settings in order to reach a boss.  Your ultimate goal (I think) is to kill "The Harbinger" and save the world or something, I dunno.  As you play you gain upgrades and abilities that make your life a little easier but none of these upgrades are over powered enough to ever ruin the challenge of the game.  The big thing is that every time you play the game is a little different.  The level layout and the locations of certain items and enemies will always be constant but what those items or enemies are may change.  For example, an ability scroll will always spawn in the same spot but on one run it will be a high jump and on the next run you might get a health boost or a double stab or something.

One thing that becomes very clear almost straight away is that the game takes a lot of inspiration from Dark Souls.  It plays almost as if someone took Dark Souls and made it considerably shorter in 2D yet ramped up the difficulty to 11.  Oblitus itself is actually that hard but the game features permanent death so every time you mess up a run you have to start from scratch.  Also, the healing that you get from defeated enemies is VERY small so one fight that went slightly wrong can throw up huge blockades for you later on.  The game is quite short but extremely tough and will require a good few runs before you can learn the lay of the land and make some decent progress.  Even with knowledge of the game though, your execution has to be pretty spot on to do well and since I'm a bit of a clumsy bugger the games ending eludes me so far.

The game features some nice graphics and some great music that really set a nice mood.  In general the atmosphere of  the game does a very good job at making you feel small and insignificant in it's world.  The world might not be very big but you are still nothing more than a shitty under equipped gnat trying to kill a deity. 

As for complaints I don't have many but the perma-death thing does kind of piss me off.  Also the fact that there is no save feature for mid-way runs means that I'm not able to play all that much because I fear of not being able to finish due to time.   Finally, it might be because I'm shit but sometimes the hit detection feels a bit iffy.  Like an attack that I'm sure I rolled past connects and takes off a good chunk of my health is frustrating enough to make me want to put my fist through the screen but luckily I enjoy the game enough to not do it and try again.

So yeah, you should try Oblitus, especially so if you are looking for a decent challenge because this game will keep you occupied for a good while.

RIP Terry Pratchet

On Thursday I found out that sadly, Terry Pratchett had died.

For those that may not know, Terry Pratchett was quite a famous author of fantasy novels and probably most well known for his Discworld books.  To be honest I'm not a huge fan of fantasy novels and as a result never read any of his books but Discworld did manage to find its way into the world of video games.

There's no way I could do the Discworld game justice in a short blogpost such as this but it's awesome.  If anything this event has inspired me to go play through it again so expect some in depth words about this awesome game later but if you haven't played it already you should go do it right now.  Terry Pratchett also suffered from Alzheimer's Disease so it's a news story that hits a bit close to home when it comes to the aim of this blog site. 

I've been told his books are really good too so if you can't find the game then go read the books instead, I know I'm going to go look them up now.  May he rest in peace and lets enjoy some Discworld to honor his memory.

Enclave

Enclave is a game is an action game that was released in 2002 for Xbox, but just as a testament to how long my backlog is, I only just beat it a few days ago.

Enclave, despite getting quite good reviews at the time of its release, is a game that I think went under the radar of most people.  It's a title that isn't bad and is sort of fun to play but at the same time manages to feel a bit boring and stale if that makes any sense at all.  Plus the thing hasn't aged well at all since 2002 so playing it today feels a bit clunky, but that didn't stop me from having an OK time with it.

At this point I'd usually take some time to talk about the games story but I forgot it because it's one of the most pointless and stupid things every written with lots of silly fantasy terms in it just for the sake of it.  From what I do remember there was some kind of war and the lands were split in 2, a good half and a bad half, over time the lands started to come back together and the bad half started attacking the good half.  Your bunch of heroes have to enlist the aid of some people and put an end to some demon that controls the bad half or something....who cares just fucking cut some orcs already, jeez.

Gameplay wise, it's nothing really special.  You pick a character and you click the mouse in a monsters general direction and hope it dies before you do.  Over the course of the adventure you gain access to new characters like a Knight, Ranger, Druid, Wizard etc. but I beat the whole game with the Knight with the exception of a single level that was filled with archers so I have no idea what the other classes are like at all.

While playing you are given gold to spend on items and equipment and it seems at the start like the general idea is that you have to explore and find the gold, but you get craptons of gold just for beating a level so there really isn't any need to spend time exploring like I did but it does make things a little easier I guess.

One nice thing about the game though is that it has 2 story modes.  A light campaign and a dark campaign, so once you beat the game as a goody goody protector of the lands, you can replay the game as a huge arsehole.

Also Enclave has the WORST Final Boss I've ever seen.  I'd call spoilers but the following video is just 1 minute of me shooting a monster in the face, so I don't really think it counts....

What a well designed boss battle....

It must sound from this post that I don't like Enclave at all, but quite the opposite, I actually really enjoyed playing it.  It's strange, as I was playing and as I reflect on the game I only have bad things to say but do believe me when I say Enclave is rather fun somehow.  I really enjoyed my time with it despite all my griping.

So if you want to give it a go based off my glowing review, then head over to Steam and pick it up pretty cheap.  Failing that, you can dig out your old Xbox and try and hunt down a copy in a used game shop or something, maybe the console version plays a bit better, I have no idea.