The Groginati Sales Thread

[Labbug]

Fantasy Kommander is on sale at Matrix for $9.99 for digital and $19.99 for the boxed version.

[Gusington]

Tempting on Outlast but my two dark mistresses right now are Shadow of Mordor and AoWIII. Outlast does look quite drawer-soiling though.

[JasonPratt]

Dear diary,

Tonight I joined the Ghostbusters. They had a job opening for "equipment tester" and somehow I got chosen through the screening process! The $3 I donated to a project Ray was working on may have helped: he called it a "Steam" "Valve" but I think that was a code word because, really, it's 1991 and I think steam valves have already existed for at least twenty years.

Professor Venkman is mean; he doesn't even want to know my name, in case he gets too attached. But even though I lost the fat ugly green ghost, and damaged their containment unit, he seems to have softened his attitude -- he even gave me a nickname, "Scooter"! Squee! Maybe he's impressed that I'm field testing new equipment for him.

I haven't seen the fourth Ghostbuster yet, um.... what's his name. The guy who looks like Eddie Murphy but his voice is much deeper. He isn't in the commercials, but I've seen him in the background of some of the newspaper and TV reports.

Something level 7 just happened somewhere in the city; I hope it didn't have anything to do with that new Gozer exhibit, which my mother said was only courting trouble. Dr. Venkman says that on a scale of one to ten, this would be like a seven; Dr. Stantz says we're going to get busy now, so it's a good thing they hired me!

Gotta go, diary. This is going to be the best Halloween ever! THIS IS MY EVERY DREAM COME TRUUUUUUEE!

[JasonPratt]

(Less fanboying: this is the 3ps game, not the top down twin-stick shooter game; basically this is GB3 if GB3 took place between GB1 and GB2 and featured all the original cast plus guest stars like Erin Gray (!) and Max Von Sydow (!!) Written by "Spengler and Stantz" themselves. Plays pretty much exactly like the movies.)

(Forgot to add: it probably plays best with a 360 controller, but a bug in the game, for Win8 at least, crashes the game before launch if the controller is already plugged in. The game must launch without the controller, then plug it in.)

[BanzaiCat]

Dear diary,

LOL

It IS a good price for that game. I might bite with the few remaining bucks I have in my Steam wallet. Though the internet connection at this hotel reminds me of my 1200 baud days so it might wait until I get home to actually download it.

[JasonPratt]

Wait till you get home; it's like 6+ Gigs.

[BanzaiCat]

Is it really only about 10 hours of gameplay?

Not bad for three bucks...just curious if you knew.

Also: yeah, the Internet connection in this hotel SUCKS. I've been trying to download Beyond Earth to my work laptop and the speed is around 35-80 KB/second. Got to 17% so far in the last two hours. Gotta let it run overnight and hope it'll get it there in case I need a fix late in the evening this week.

[JasonPratt]

No idea about playtime yet. I've spent the past 5 minutes wandering around the firehouse.

I was wrong: this game clearly takes place after GB2, because the painting with Vigo the Carpathian is prominently displayed in the main ground-level room! (Somehow I'd gotten the impression from reading the Steam page that it was set between movies. Huh.) Max Von Sydow is playing him (he did the voice in the movie, too), and interacting with the painting gets dialogue from him.

[JasonPratt]

Just got finished wrecking the Sedgewick hotel.

10 hours isn't unreasonable even for a full priced game. The Arkham games tend to run about 10 hours each (though double that if you're going for a Riddler win, which is worthless on any game except ACity.) Quality counts a lot.

Granted, this isn't Skyrim. Or Arkham. Or even any of the better Spider-man games (also each of which run about 10 hours). Heck, it isn't even Lotro which is completely free for at least 10 hours (maybe more if you're willing to get meticulous about doing quests.)

It is, however, reasonably awesome. Murray essentially said back in... good Lord, was it 2008 when this game was released?? This was effectively GB3.

It isn't. It's too nostalgic about putting the player in expanded versions of classic situations so far to stand alone as its own story (yet). Immediately after I finished Sedgewick, Stay-puft tromped up and I started to feel like the game was pandering too much.

Still. It is 100 percent Ghostbusters, unlike the "Sanctum of Slime" which actually came after this game and didn't have a hundredth of the production values. (And seems to be a loose sequel?)

[Huw the Poo]

Max Von Sydow is playing him (he did the voice in the movie, too), and interacting with the painting gets dialogue from him.

Oh cool, I didn't realise that was von Sydow. :)

[Gusington]

You're telling me fhere's a good Ghostbusters game currently available on Steam for 3 dollah??

[JasonPratt]

Huw, Me neither until I checked. Physically he's played by someone else in the movie (and by 'likeness' in the game), VS just does the voice.


Gus -- yes, yes, a thousand times yes. Wait until you see the gear you carry. You will plotz. The designers even got the 'shuffly' motion right when trying to run or even walk with the proton pack and gear; everything clunks around, too. The proton gun/pack got the most love because naturally you'll be seeing it more than anything. It is legitimately geeky badass. Health status is shown on the pack instead of on a HUD -- which in-game makes no sense as there's no way your character could possibly see it, or the temperature gauge; those should have been on the gun itself, not a back quarter of the pack.

Still. Dang.

I need to read the instructions a bit, though, as I don't understand yet if I'm penalized or rewarded for collateral damage.

[Gusington]

ERMAGERD!

[undercovergeek]

Huw, Me neither until I checked. Physically he's played by someone else in the movie (and by 'likeness' in the game), VS just does the voice.

the actor is the guy from ally mcbeale - the crazy lawyer

[JasonPratt]

No, you're thinking of the guy who allies with Vigo (played by Peter MacNichol).

The guy who actually acts the part of Vigo is a German, um... {checking} Wilhelm von Homburg.

He was a boxer and wrestler in Germany, of some popularity (and much more noteriety), but after his career stalled he started playing thuggy German parts in films. Other than being the physical actor of Vigo, he's one of Hans Gruber's crew in Die Hard, though oddly not the tall blonde lieutenant henchman. Rather he's one of the guys McClane "uses artillery" on while crewing the rocket launcher, detonating several bottom floors.

Admittedly I didn't know that until I poked around this afternoon. :)