*SNIFF* I have a cold wahhhHhhgghsniff. Had to not record the last couple of days which had set my precious schedule out of whack, and let me tell you, it was fully whack before. But this is still an exciting time for the dystopian Offy D Corp, as I've now started my new project, the Frostpunk narrative, AND I need to start another new project very soon.
As mentioned in previous blogs it will be some kind of adventure tale in Kenshi, although actually it might take a couple of weeks to start as I've got free copies of Anno 1800 and Imperator Rome, and should probably at least make an abridged commentary or two while they are still relevant things, ya know? I'm pretty much the worst when it comes to getting views via trends and being topical, but this time I'm CONSIDERING TRYING only SOMEWHAT after the moment has passed. Professional internet games man wants to evolve... oh, it stopped!
People seem to like my nice depressing writing style in Frostpunk, so great! I remember when I first played it one of my major criticisms was that it was too depressing. The relentless way in which things just get worse with no explanation really didn't make me want to keep going with it, and when I eventually finished it I was shocked at the nearly 'cut-to-black' non-ending. So that's where I come in eh?
Basically Frostpunk is perfect for writing about because almost everything is just unexplored premise in its existing story, with no explanations or justifications for why things are like they are, or why things happen as you play. And with no ending at all, I can write any fate for the world I feel like! In chapter 4 I've written several minutes of rant where the narrator explains what automatons are and roughly how they work, since I always felt that was something central to the lore that was not addressed in the game, perhaps added as an afterthought for gameplay reasons.
It will be similar with Kenshi, as there the world is almost just as implausible, being a nightmare land of barren, arid or desert environments instead of a frozen one, and also featuring understated AI technologies that have surprisingly little effect on anything. So guess I'll be able to fulfill my fetish of explaining how the societies in that game survive, and come up with fun reasons why the lost technological civilisation the game implies existed is not there anymore.
Oh yeah, one interesting thing to point out with my quest to explain Frostpunk: I can't work out what direction is north! At first glance the camera is looking north, as the shadows point towards the top of the screen. But look closely and you'll notice that they point to the left of the screen when the sun sets, meaning west is to your right, meaning the camera is looking south... a paradox! In my lore I decided to go with the camera looking south explanation, because it also fits with the ships from America being discoverable on the right hand side of the map, which is most likely the west coast if we accept the implied lore that the game takes place in Greenland (implied only by a snippet that says London is some 2000 miles away, which roughly fits).
Long story short: WHO WROTE THIS TRASH? DON'T MATTER NOW, CAUSE THE TRASHMAN IS HERE BABY. I'll sort them out.
Back to talking about the channel: I do have this concern with the Kenshi series that will be long yet not especially popular, and so expend a lot of effort on my part for no particular reward. It was that feeling that make me stop making the 'Truth' videos, and even TiC to some extent. The most successful things on my channel are the Abridged Campaign Commentaries, simple, high quality Let's Plays. This is good and bad for me: good because they are simple and low-stress to make, and work with far more games than written stuff; bad because if I did the 'right' thing and focused on making those kinds of videos exclusively, it would be something of a betrayal, and a shame. I'd have to close my patreon for a start, and open an inferior one, which is the main reason I haven't buckled already.
It's particularly stark right now, with the Belgium abridged campaign outshining everything else I've done, and perhaps ever done, with minimal effort from me. It makes me think that eventually the narrative videos will die off on my channel, and I'll just do the occasional thing like this Frostpunk series where I want to do it for its own sake. So basically I'm worried that once I get too deep into a hard-to-keep-short Kenshi adventure tale, my work will become so inefficient view-wise that I'll just burn out entirely. Also, did I tell you that I have a cold? Please have sympathy for this poor internet games man!
Oh yeah, I was planning on writing a cool story for TW Three Kingdoms when it's out, probably to replace Last of the Lamplight, and also do an abridged campaign of 3K at the same time. So that will be the ultimate test: two series', same game, vastly differing amounts of effort and quality, one views-per-hour-spent showdown to decide the fate of Middle Ear- my work ethic.
By the way, I've noticed that plenty of other internet games men (and it is only men of course) have access to 3K already. But not me... Look I'm not crying, it's just my cold, okay? This happened with Warhammer 2 as well - got promised early access, then noticed everyone else had it but me. In that case I just begged for a copy in person, and got it. I'm 99% sure I'd get 3K if I begged in person again this time, especially since I was previously invited to the real-life preview events that I couldn't attend. HOWEVER I felt so snubbed with the Warhammer 2 begging incident that I can't be arsed this time. If they want me to perform free marketing labour for them, they can at least ask me, ya know? Poor internet game man Devin is standing up for his rights as a horrible sponge creature. Is this another milestone on my years-long secret campaign to not be a Total War channel anymore? Judging by what I plan to do with my narratives this summer, I'm pretty much there already!
Not that I'd even have time to play it, with 2019 being the year in which I went from having no backlog to a huge one. This is mainly because I started making a profit with Offy D Corp (because of Kings of Generals that is), and ploughed those profits into buying games I don't play, and a VR headset to not play games on too. Still considering playing Bloodborne on PS4, which was mentioned a few blogs back I think. Hey, on the topic of vidyo gaems, let's talk about...
#####
WHAT I PLAYED THIS MONTH
The Elder Scrolls Online - fell for their free weekend trap, and ended up buying it to play with my other half. It's like if Elder Scrolls was an MMO! Whoa! Basically it's the standard set up with towns, quests and areas full of enemies like Skyrim, only the combat has an MMO layer on top of everything where you cast spells and such with the number keys, rather than equipping them like weapons. In my opinion, it would basically be a great successor to Skyrim if the rest of the immersion-breaking players were ousted! All the writing and voice acting is of same or better quality to the older games, the amount of written quests and content is unfathomable, and if you like that MMO stuff, like raids and teamwork, then that's kinda there too, but you can mostly ignore it, as we are. At only like 7 quid in that entrapment sale (~3 more than I paid for Skyrim lol), it's been great value I say.
Anno 1800 - I've played like 6 hours and... I might... hate it? I can't tell if I hate it. I was thinking of making a short rant video about how the game is nearly amazing, but has these one or two issues that happen to be the perfect anti-matter to my frail psyche, and make me constantly frustrated. Guess if I'm gonna make a video I won't spoil it here. BUT, it is still very pretty and a nice casual town building game (APART FROM THE INSANE OVERSIGHTS). I got it for free, unsolicited, as if they wanted me to play it, which was very nice of a big evil corporation like Ubisoft! HEY CREATIVE ASSEMBLY SEND ME FREE THINGS NNOOOOWWWWWW. Oh and it has some high quality west country accents and cute Southern (England) Belles, which makes it minimum 6/10.
I also played Imperator Rome for like 2 hours last night. It's okay, but I don't like paradox games much so...ya know... I can't be bothered to write about it, but I'm told it's very well regarded. Still gonna make some videos on it though because I'm a grissled professional - if I can make videos in Total War Attila, which I don't like and have never played for pleasure despite 500 hours logged on steam, then I can soldier through anything.
Basically the only games I actually like are: err.... must be some... Cities Skylines? FFXIII-3 (didn't even finish it, but I remember liking it...)... I liked Mount and Blade when I first played it... Look, as ever, we return to the fact that I hate video games. However did I become an internet video games man? I LIKED STAR OCEAN 2: THE SECOND STORY, ON PS1, LIKE 20 YEARS AGO. Oh yeah, I liked Team Fortress 2, I remember now! That was good. And Lord of the Rings Battle for Middle Earth. I think I liked Dark Souls too, but only after looking up where you're meant to go all the time, so it loses points there. Did anyone else play Sims Bustin Out on PS2? Played a load of that, I seem to recall. DYNASTY WARRIORS 4 & TIMESPLITTERS 2. I liked Total War Shogun 2 (and 1 because I'm that old), which is how I ended up in all this mess I guess. Why do I have 300 hours logged in Dissidia Duodecim on PSP? Err... Err...
AND THAT'S WHAT I PLAYED THIS MONTH / EVER
#####
Thank you for reading my blog. Next time I will explain why I deleted my youtube channel. See ya!
OH SHI THE FINALE OF RECS ROMANUM IS MEANT TO COME OUT TODAY BETTER UPLOAD THAT HUH
