It was not but four and a half minutes after arriving home from my vacation with my family that I pushed over my girlfriend, stepped on the dog and ordered my man servant to load up the demo of the third chapter of the PixelJunk trilogy Special Edition. As the ambient acid induced music began to emerge from the depths of the Cross Media Bar (no I will not spell cross with an X that is just fucking stupid) I knew that, in the words of Robert Nesta Marley, every little thing was definitely going to be alright.
As the luxurious pink tower rose from the soil of Eden, I knew I was in love. Like many artsy gaming endeavors, the controls did not come naturally, but when I finally settled down with the single button play mechanics I was making Radd Spencer look like my bitch. I leapt up blossoming plants like a toad on methamphetamines and swung like Spiderman. I did not even mind the time management system which involved picking up these amoeba-looking blobs to increase my constantly depleting oscillator bar (if it runs out you fail the level). It just gave me the opportunity to swing more. After gathering my third Spectra, I decided to give co-op a try.
I pulled my sixaxis controller from the cobwebs in the corner of my basement and handed it over to my brother who had yet to dabble in the bliss of the PixCrunk. I explained to him the controls and gave him a bit of time to become one with the Eden. After the downtime he seemed comfortable so I began feverishly making my way to the heavens. In a matter of moments, my brother was hanging off the bottom of the screen, a timer appeared over his head and he ceased to be. I did not fret for long, for in a matter of seconds he appeared next to me. After the second time this had occurred I realized that his demise had punished the both of us. All of the pollen that was in the surrounding seeds was reduced to half that amount. This turned that game into a Merry-Go-Round simulator in which we both spun around in circles for a couple of minutes recuperating our losses. I also could not figure out which person the camera was locked on to. At one point, my brother and I coincidentally jumped for the same seed. He got there a split second sooner making me pass though the seed and plummet to my death. This same thing happen to my brother on another occasion and the screen decided to follow him as well. Apparently using random screen/character following technology, the camera followed either me or my brother and other was killed so we lost our high ground. So, I slowed my pace in order to keep my brother on the screen and began to feel what I call Sonic Syndrome.
As you may recall, the old Sonic the Hedgehog games had this feature called one and a half player, where one person had a lot of fun while the other put all of his or her efforts into catching up. Now this worked wonderfully if it was your 3-year-old little brother who wanted to play because he got the illusion of participation. If you wanted to play with someone who actually enjoyed and had the ability to play games, you had to play slower and you both got to play Sonic the Hedgehog: Babysitters Club Edition. In the Babysitters Club Edition, you both agreed to keep it so both of you are on the screen most of the time for the sake of fun. But it wasn’t fun, it was the opposite of fun, you both wanted to be playing as Sonic, but one of you fucks had to be Tails and ruin the game. And now we arrive back in 2008 with PixelJunk Eden: Babysitters Club Reunion Special.
Now this doesn’t make me love this game any less, it just is a mode that is utterly impossible to use, unless you have two people with exactly the same skill and play style. From what I have noticed, all of my friends play this game completely differently, making co-op seem relatively useless. Notice I have yet to bring up that there is three-player cooperative play. This is because I am pretty sure this mode is impossible. I just feel that they could have had some kind of online co-op where each player was followed on their own television set, but since this technology was not in PixelJunk Monsters, I doubt it is in Eden. I just wish co-op was more of a primary focus of the game rather than an afterthought. I personally thought the co-op was so well-suited for Monsters that the single player seems pointless.
With all the verbal defecation aside, I still believe that this game is a shining star of originality and fun in a gray/brown world where space marines thrive and morons complain about adding color and life to certain Satan-influenced PC titles. Next week will be a great moment for gaming and a terrible moment for my mother who will be consistently cleaning my gleefully soiled under garments.
No comments:
Post a Comment