I forget that I own Deadly Premonition.

TACOs! Totally Arbitrary Collectible Objects. Anachronox also had a cool photography quest where you had to track down and snap all the Red Bipidri in the game. They made this very particular sound so you had a rough idea of where they were hiding. I got them all in the end. I think what I like about photography quests is that they make you slow down and look closer at your environment, a bit like the scanning in a Metroid Prime game.

xtal said
I'm trying to get away from worrying too much what genre(s) a game falls into. This is mostly because so many games are picking up an "open world" formula, and for that we're at a place that feels like Peak Open World.

It naturally becomes less useful, like so many things do in the world of video games. Anyone I interact with I'm trying to have them stop saying things like "the combat is visceral" (no, it isn't) or my pet motherfucking peeve, "Metroidvania." Metroidvania is the most useless bullshit term that for some reason still lingers in games. Just so everyone here knows, the cool people are now saying Metroid-style. Because that's actually a way to speak that isn't completely flawed. So yeah, "open world" has joined this bunch in my mind. (tl;dr: Saying "Metroidvania" seems like a way to coin check how many other like-minded dorks you're hanging out with. It's not useful if you want to speak to an 18-year-old.)

I think it's increasingly helpful to avoid-- or at least examine when using it-- the term open world because, 1) you're not setting some preconceived expectation and 2) you're not saying that, of all the things, this is what is most notable about the game.

So yes Steerpike, please steal, borrow, do what you must to play Breath of the Wild. You may then see that, indeed, Gregg is just a black-hearted crumpet tosser.

And Gregg, I wouldn't go into State of Decay thinking about it as this vast and open game. It is technically a world you're free to roam in, but it's relatively small. And I don't think the emphasis is ever on pure exploration. Exploration is more of a necessity to survive and strengthen your home base. State of Decay has more of an old school PC game mentality, one I'd describe as a modestly-sized sandbox simulation. By that I mean it seems like a game made by people who cut their teeth on things like X-Com UFO Defense, and evolved what they liked about that game.  

I meant to respond to this the other day.

As much as I hate portmanteaus, Metroidvania is useful to me, as is 'Metroid-like'. I mean, if you know what Metroid is, chances are you'll know what Castlevania is too. I really like Metroidvanias or 'Metroid-likes' so a shorthand term for those is a good flag. You know you're going to get a world that's mostly closed off until you start gaining the necessary abilities to unlock it.

'Open world' is a lot more vague but it's still a useful phrase when describing Bethesda and UbiSoft games or Zelda or Minecraft because they're vast and open. It's when you start getting to games like STALKER, Beyond Good & Evil and Miasmata that are more... intimate, I guess, that 'world' starts to lose its meaning. 'Open', sure. 'World'? I dunno, that sounds so vast. Like you say about State of Decay: it's relatively small, but open. Quite frankly, that (and everything else you said in that last paragraph) sounds much better to me. I'll take more focus and less sprawl any day.

Now, back to my tea and crumpets...

Now, four player co-op in a game like that? That I am on board with.

I think I'm almost done with Persona 5. I can't even imagine life without Persona 5 anymore, so I have no idea what it'll be like or what I'll play next.

Hai and I have been eating a lot of bagels recently. Everything ones and... onion and chive? Either way, they're amazing. I know you're supposed to slather them in cream cheese, but some good butter on them while they're hot is incredible.

I finished They Breathe, Gravity Bone and Thirty Flights of Loving last night. They Breathe was pretty eh, Gravity Bone was daft and tedious, Thirty Flights was crazy and cool. Hoping to play Firewatch next. I'm on a short games binge.

Are you new to bagels, Gregg? As a guy who worked in an office for 10 years that had a Tim Hortons inside it (Americans know what this is now, right? I saw them in California!), I have eaten a lot of bagels. Survived off of them, you might say. It's possible that bagel is the food I have eaten more of than anything else. If you need any bagel recommendations or tips I'm your man. For starters, "everything," "sesame," "blueberry" and "cinnamon raisin" are all excellent types. The two former excel with cream cheese, the latter two with butter.

Okay, here's my beef with Metroidvania, Gregg. We're "old" men now. When I say old, I mean we're both in our thirties. I'm not trying to hurt the feelings of the legit old people around here like Scout and all those "fat chicks" of yore. I just think it's a good time to replace that term with something more language-y. Like Metroid-like, or Metroid-style. Them young folks are coming up from behind!

Steerpike, if you do go back to State of Decay (I think you should), I definitely recommend you not worry too much about beating/finishing it. The ending of the game is pretty disappointing from a gameplay perspective (I wish we had a word to replace "gameplay" too). I think I mentioned this in my review years ago, but the pacing of the game is not well balanced, and by the time you're ready to leave Trumbull Valley, you're probably too overpowered. My tip is not to rush, and just focus on what you enjoy doing in the game. I don't know if the ending can ever be fun; I think one of the DLCs (I still haven't tried them) addresses this by going to a never-ending mode.

This is my absolute #1 tip for anyone who wants to have a good time with State of Decay: push yourself and take risks. I think the game is at its best when you're on the brink of death and missions are close to falling apart. So yeah. Push it to the limit!

I've also been reminded, playing again, just how much this game is not an open-world, in the sense that exploration is not even remotely a focus of the game. The focus is survival, and so you're never exploring for fun or curiosity (at least I'm not). I have so much to say (anyone surprised?), I'm going to add a State of Decay Revisited to my growing list of unfinished writing projects. Look forward to that probably never!