I’m a large fan of Leenks.com (NSFW) for their Random Pictures of the Week feature. (You can check out their galleries to see them; they go quite a ways back).
This week, Leenks gives us Random pics from the army and I thought I’d pass it along to all of you fine people.
It has, of course, some classics. There’s also some commentaries on alcoholism, gratuitous nudity, and of course soldiers doing what they do best – trying to cope with boredom.
Enjoy!
Hello you beautiful people you. Fans of Voodoo Farming, I’m sure you must have been wondering where the heck I’ve been. To appease those who may or may not be wrathful towards me, let me tell you all what I have been up to lately as concisely as possible.
I have just finished up a summer internship with Safe Haven Urban Redemption (a youth after-school program, It’s basically like the Boys & Girls club, but it’s held in a church) and I have subsequently been hired part-time for the duration of the school year. If you do not recall, I am indeed an Atheist, and yet paradoxically have found myself in the employ of a church. I work/volunteer there for a few reasons, namely:
If you have a few bucks to spare in these hard economic times, toss it their way. I’d appreciate it and I’m sure they would as well.
Aside from that, I have been taking jogging and weight-lifting back up. I’ve been very, very, sedentary lately, and after seeing Zombieland (spoilers: it’s awesome), I thought about the fact that I would probably be one of the first run down if it weren’t for all the awesome firepower and power tools we have sitting around the ol’ Ihmhi homestead. Moreover, a lot of my friends are making positive changes in their lives and it’s inspiring me to do the same.
I went to go see Moonspell live in concert at BB King’s in NYC on Sunday. I have loved the band for years and I was glad to get the opportunity to see them live since they are originally from Portugal and tour America sparsely. One of their videos was featured way back in Voodoo Farming #4. They played three out of the four songs I had wanted them to play (Sadly, I’ll See You In My Dreams was not in their setlist sad panda sad panda), and I’d like to share them here with you along with one other I liked:
Okay guys, happy sharing tiem over. Let’s get into the meat of the article. This isn’t so much a review as a preview – at the time of this writing, the content patch is not yet out (it drops Thursday).
In Voodoo Farming #6 I reviewed Killing Floor. Tripwire Interactive (the fine people who brought the mod Killing Floor up to retail standards) are much like Blizzard in that they treat their customers really well. A couple months ago they released a free “Heavy Metal” patch which included an AK-47, a Katana, a new map, and of course various bugfixes and whatnot. The devs vaguely hinted at something awesome coming in October.
The first awesome thing? Killing Floor is having a free weekend October 22-25. You can start preloading now. Like, right right now! If you are unfamiliar with free weekends, you can basically download, install, and play the game for free for the duration of this weekend with 100% full functionality. Take advantage of this.
And here we are – Killing Floor’s Level Up content pack. You can see some nifty screenshots and read about it over at IGN , but the basic rundown is:
Tripwire raised a little bit of extra pocket money by having four new character skins as DLC for the low low price of $1.99. They are doing this again – ostensibly at the same price – with the release of this pack, and I only have one thing to say.
Kudos.
This is how developers should do things. Optional pretty stuff costs you money (but is cheap), and the core game updates are free. Tripwire gets the utmost respect from me for this.
I am, of course, slightly biased. I am the division leader for my clan’s Killing Floor division, and I ponied up the money so we’d have a server for six months. (I’ll likely do it again in six months.) We are, of course, recruiting, and I’d really like it if you filled out an application to join us or added me as a Steam friend (Steam account name: ihmhi) if you’d care to test the waters. [AE] plays regularly and we do Suicidal runs Sunday and Wednesday nights. We’re also casual as all hell, so we’re all about having the fun.
I am also very much biased because they added the AA12 (video) to my favorite perk (class), Support Specialist (basically Shotgun guy). This gun is the king of shotguns, and I can’t wait to try it out.
I do hope that you guys will take this weekend to try out Killing Floor. I will certainly be spending an unhealthy amount of time playing it. Add me to Steam friends, let’s go shoot some Zeds.
Wrapping things up, I’m going to try to crank out a handful of articles as soon as I have the energy to do it. skippy is going to have his hands full soon, and I want to do my part to back him up. ;D
Thanks for reading guys. It feels good to write again. I hope you’ve enjoyed this issue. Stay tuned next time for Voodoo Farming where I review more Zombie stuffs!
Welcome back to a very special issue of Voodoo Farming: A Not-Quite In-Depth Look At Zombies In Popular Culture. Today, we’re going to look at my Zombie Preparedness, and I hope that you will look at your own as well.
Welcome back to Voodoo Farming: A Not-Quite In-Depth Look At Zombies In Popular Culture. It’s been a little while, huh?
Today I decided to finally get around to Left 4 Dead.
What’s with Valve and Lighthouses anyway?
Threat Level:
L4D gets 4/5 on the threat level. If it were you against the zombies, it would be 3/5, but anyone who has ever played a cooperative game can tell you the most dangerous thing in the entire game is the idiot with a lot of firepower and no clue how to use it.
Did I mention that L4D always has friendly fire on?
Before I go any further – you now hear the valvE game intro bass riff:
What’s with Valve and Lighthouses anyway?
I am sick as shit of this screen. This is actually one of the many reasons that I dislike playing L4D, and I think I’ve worn out my ESC key. I constantly hammer the damn thing and mutter “Get to the fuckin’ title screen already, get to the fuckin’ title screen already…”
Look, Valve – you make highly successful games. No one disputes this. But you (and so many other companies) go to the trouble to have this seemingly unskippable logo screen at the start of every single one of your goddamned games.
I know it’s an industry standard. Fuck the industry standard. I have what is by all means a modern computer – not top of the line, but pretty damn good – and I want to get into my game as fast as possible. It’s just like booting an OS. If I have time to go make a sandwich while your game is loading and it’s still not done when I get back, you are doing something very wrong.<⁄rant>
Anyway, on to the goddamned game.
Because when it comes to zombie outbreaks, nothing bad ever happens in a forest.
L4D doesn’t have maps insomuch as it has campaigns. Every campaign runs more like a movie than a game; the loading screen is even styled as a movie poster.
Zoey must have a hard time sleeping at night.
The camera majestically pans in, and the characters talk about their current situation. “I heard we need to $COMPLETE_OBJECTIVE so we don’t die!” That’s basically how every L4D campaign starts. I’ve yet to play any custom campaigns, but I just can’t wait to see a half-assed implementation of the game with the pre-existing dialogue shoehorned into a situation that doesn’t really fit.
“Source Engine” and “Outdoors” are two things that don’t always go well together.
Valve did a bangup job on the scenary. If you play Half-Life 2 with a critical eye, you can see the places where they cut corners on architecture (using bump-mapped textures instead of actually drawing geometry) so that the beastly Source engine can run better on low-end machines. You don’t notice that so much in L4D.
Here’s the UI – your guns, your health, and the health of your comrades. Cooperation is absolutely necessary in this game. There are many situations where you’re going to be completely helpless unless someone else helps you. Of course, nothing ever goes wrong in that kind of situation.
No more s’mores left?
After a quick look around at the peaceful scenary, you immediately grab as many bullets you can stuff in your pockets. For the newer players, go with the shotgun as your primary weapon. I suppose the Uzi has its own advantages, but I stick with the shotty anyway.
Hey! Down in front!
And this is why I prefer the shotgun. In the early game, you’re going to have waves of zombies coming at you, often in big, juicy clumps. Personally, I burn through Uzi ammo way too quickly. I suppose that it’s useful for long distances, but why not just use the pistol with its infinite ammo? (One of Valve’s sick jokes is that the pistol actually does a shit-ton of damage.)
You’ll also come across two throwable weapons, namely pipe bombs and molotov cocktails. The molotovs are useful for covering a wide area with fire – they are very useful for fighting stuff like Tanks (huge, hulking infected that have thousands of hit points). When it comes to the regular trash zombies, however, the pipe bomb is superior. Simply throw it…
Beep beep beep beep beep beep…
And laugh maniacally as a few dozen zombies are turned into a fine red paste:
Is it raining?
The campaigns are split into five parts. Between each part is a safe house where you can restock on ammo and health, take a break, etc. Once you close the safe house’s door, the next section of the campaign loads and you’re treated to a variety of stats about your gameplay and some funky techno music.
Stats stats stats
I’d like to say that between Left 4 Dead and Killing Floor, I prefer KF hands down. But one of the things Valve gets right and Tripwire Interactive doesn’t is that they put flashlights on every single gun (and they look beautiful):
Cue “Prairie Dog Surprise” music.
In KF’s latest patch, they finally fixed the flashlight. It looks nice now, but it’s still only on two guns. Shape up, Tripwire Interactive.
You get the opportunity to pick up a second infinite-ammo pistol very early on. You will also typically get a shot at grabbing the second tier of weaponry sometime in the second of five parts of the campaign:
Choices, choices…
Between the Assault Rifle, Combat Shotgun, and Hunting Rifle, I almost always pick the Hunting Rifle. Why?
BOOM! HEA… I think I did this joke already.
That’s why. Boom, headshot. If you’re skilled under pressure you can wreak havoc – even against Tanks (surprisingly). When the other players are crying about being out of assault rifle bullets, you’ll be sitting pretty with half your reserve of Hunting Rifle bullets still in your pockets.
Wrapping It Up:
L4D is an okay game, but I don’t believe that it’s worth the $40 I payed for it or the $50 that many more people shelled out for it.
Killing Floor literally cost me half of what I’ve paid for Left 4 Dead, and I’ve probably played it a hundred times as much. And while KF has had paid DLC (four new character skins for $2, and yes I bought it), they’ve been doing quite well with their free updates (see the aforementioned update).
Valve, meanwhile, decided to cause a shitstorm and announce Left 4 Dead 2 before they released any significant DLC for the first game (READ: new weapons, maps, creatures, etc.). No, Survival mode doesn’t count.
I’m not a member of that L4D2 Boycott group, but I don’t think that I’ll be buying it – certainly not at full price. Why? Valve has taken far too long to release any decent DLC for a very short game that they made a shit-ton of money on. When the price comes down, you’re going to get more content than the early adopters and at a better price. When it’s down to around $20, maybe I’ll buy it.
So should you buy L4D? I highly recommend trying it out at a sucke- er, friend’s place first, or perhaps renting the 360 version. Play through one whole campaign, and that’s the entire game over and over and over again. At least with Killing Floor you have DLC coming out at a steady pace and a dedicated community that has actually been making good maps.
Reader Mail:
No Reader Mail this week.
Special Message From Ihmhi:
I hope you guys haven’t felt particularly screwed over the last few weeks. I’ve fallen behind in my research for VF and had to actually take last week off because I couldn’t sit down to write anything. Part of it is that a friend of mine is really ill and that has been affecting my sleep, and another part has to do with my dad getting drunk on a near-nightly basis and playing polka music until 2am. I typically drown it out with something like loud techno music (which is what I’ve been listening to for the last two hours on loop). So… yeah. I SUFFER FOR YOU GUYS WORSHIP ME AS YOUR NEW GOD.
I’m going to try to keep VF going weekly, but I’m working on fun things like trying to get financial aid to go to college, find a job, etc. I honestly might not be able to dedicate the several hours of research and writing it takes to make an issue of VF every week and still remain sane. If it comes to that, I’m sorry, but I’d rather write quality work every week or two than come out with some crappy stuff every week on time.
That’s it for VF this week.
Ihmhi is a developer for Fortress Forever, a free, fast paced Team Fortress mod for Half-Life 2.
A note to my readers: I’m currently in the market for a video capture card or device that can use the standard Red-White-Yellow cables. I’ve been bumming my friend’s computer and that arrangement can’t last forever, so I need to get something of my own so I can hook up consoles to take screenshots (and possibly video!). Any suggestions should be left in the comments or sent to ihmhi6@gmail.com. Thank you kindly!
Welcome back to Voodoo Farming: A Not-Quite In-Depth Look At Zombies In Popular Culture.
I am admittedly running late with this one. I’ve been pretty busy this week but I still try to deliver on time, so I’m staying up late (with work tomorrow, no less…) to get this out to you guys.
Thankfully, I always have material prepared for a future VF, so I didn’t have to start from scratch (*whew*).
There will be some changes coming in issue 10 or 11 – namely, I’m going to try to streamline VF a bit. If you read through the archives, you’ll note that the video game reviews are different from media reviews (like movies). I’m bouncing around potential changes in my mind, and I’ll detail my thoughts on that at the very very end of the post (after the reader mail).
But anyway, onto the game! Way back in Issue #2 I reviewed The Last Stand, and now I’ll be getting into its successor: The Last Stand 2.
Remember that helicopter you flew away in at the end of The Last Stand? Yeah, that’s the fiery remains.
The Last Stand 2 is a significantly more challenging game compared to TLS and that’s a wonderful thing. I rarely lose in the original, but I often get my ass whipped in the sequel. I love a challenge.
Threat Level:
Well first and foremost, no more “huge group of survivors armed to the teeth” backing you up. Now the survivors armaments depend on the weapons you’ve found, and they can’t use all of the weapons (such as the Chainsaw).
The enemies have gotten a lot tougher and your survivors can actually die during the game – not just while searching. (More on that below.)
Armaments:
In addition to many of the armaments in TLS, you have a few new toys. Downside? No more Barrett. Upside? In exchange, you get hand grenades, the M249 SAW, a compound bow, and a rocket launcher. A friggin’ rocket launcher!
It’s pretty difficult to get all of the weapons on account of the time limit you now face (40 days), but it can be done. Aside from the missing Barrett, all of the original weapons make their return.
The game mechanics are the same – infinite ammo, but manage your reloads.
You can also get your hands on “traps” – propane tanks, bear traps, and mines. that you can set up on the map beforehand to help take out crowds of zombies. The propane tanks can be troublesome and they seem to work best if you put them on the outside areas so you don’t accidentally hit them off. You or your barricade don’t appear to take any damage from something going kaboom.
Cause of the Outbreak:
Same at TLS… who the hell knows? You just wanna get the heck outta there alive.
Co-Stars:
A pure zombie game to the end.
Odds of Survival: Lower than TLS
This game is definitely way way more difficult. I cannot stress that enough.
Bang bang!
Pew pew!
Your survival is dependent partially on smartly managing your time and resources and mostly on picking a good weapon and using it skillfully. This isn’t like TLS where you can just load up 7 survivors and do amazing things.
The above pictures are one of the earlier levels. Although you visit different locations, they all follow the same basic formula of “make sure your barricade doesn’t go down”. A nasty addition: some zombies now carry weapons, and they can kill your survivors instantly if they get too close. As a result, you have to be very careful with prioritizing your targets. One swing of a cleaver or club and you have a useless corpse with a gun sitting next to it.
The Devilish Details:
I’m having flashbacks to Silent Hill.
Instead of simply managing your time carefully, you now have to pick out locations on a map to search. The weapons pretty much spawn in the same locations, so you can learn where the good stuff is and do better in successive runs. (An element of randomization in this respect would have been nice and made the game a bit more challenging.)
Searching buildings takes up different amounts of time, and on your first playthrough it’s pretty much a diceroll. Even if you are very careful, you can still end up having leftover time. Thankfully, until you submit your search pattern you can pick out different places and try to find the sweet spot. You will definitely have leftover time at least a couple of times in your run.
So many zombie scenarios take place in the backwoods… it’d be nice to see one take place in a huge city for once.
TLS2 isn’t as linear, either – you can pick different routes. As you’re searching through the houses, you gather supplies. Travelling from one place to another uses up some of your supplies. The basic formula (aside from SURVIVE DON’T DIE OH GOD DON’T DIE) is to gather supplies, weapons, and allies, and then move on to the next area when supplies permit.
Failing in this game can be fun in a way because you can get a hint of where you went wrong and try again. TLS2 will take a little bit longer to play than the original game simply for all of the stuff there is to do. For a free Flash game, this is a steal and a good way to spend an hour or two.
Wrapping It Up:
The Last Stand 2 adds elements of depth where there were previously very little. If you enjoyed the first one, you are going to absolutely love the second one. Give it a play and give props where props are due to the wonderful people who came up with such an awesome game.
Here’s hoping for The Last Stand 3!
Reader Mail:
Voodoo Farming #8: Super Ghouls and Ghosts
Sequoia Says:
July 29th, 2009 at 8:07 pmThis game sounds E.P.I.C. But alas, I don’t own a SNES.
There are systems out there that can apparently play both NES and SNES games. I’d get one if it weren’t for the fact that my NES(s) and SNES are still in excellent working order.
Billy Says:
July 30th, 2009 at 8:05 amNow I can’t wait for you to do Silent Hill for voodoo farming. If those things count as zombies for you, i’m not sure. I still remember a magazine that, in describing the monsters in Silent Hill, Fatal Frame, and Resident Evil went in this order: Zombies, ghosts, creatures out of your most twisted ****ing nightmares! If you do a silent hill special, I will explain the cause of the threat, a freaking god of death and hunger decided to try to cross over to our world. And he still needs to be born in order to fully enter.
captcha: engaging lion, prepare to be eaten.
I’d love to do Silent Hill, but all of my SH games are currently lent out to a friend who’s out of state!
I would also need to get a video capture card. I’ve gotten most of my screenshots at my buddy’s (usually doing a few reviews in a clip), but his work has picked up so I can’t see him as often. ):
Hopefully in the next couple of months I can afford a cheap video capture card or device – any recommendations from my readers would be appreciated.
Upcoming changes/improvements:
Better WC3 compliance: A request from Mrs. Skippy. No more <i>s and <b>s – instead, <em>s and <strong>s! I like how <strong> sounds. Makes me feel manlier.
Streamlining of Formatting: I’m probably going to ditch most of the sections (like Armaments) and break it down to a simpler article. I’ve found that there’s quit a bit of overlap with some of the sections for some things, and no overlap whatsoever for other things. They’re a bit troublesome. I will be keeping Threat Level, though, because I love Threat Level.
More diversity: I’m constantly expanding my horizons and trying to find tons of zombie stuff to do. I’ve been trying to focus on analog (as in non-digital media, books and what have you) and I’ve found some very promising prospects.
More polish: No no, not Polish stuff. Pawl-ish. Like, making it look nicer. I have some ideas. I’m also waiting on some people to cook up some things for me. Sorry for vagueness, but I wouldn’t want to ruin the surpriseseses.
Whatever it comes down to, I’m going to try to come up with a consistent format for Voodoo Farming so it can apply to literally anything I put out.
Thanks for reading. G’night everybody!
Obama Zombie picture delightfully borrowed from Instapunk.com. Took me 30 seconds of Googling. I love the Internet.
Ihmhi is a developer for Fortress Forever, a free, fast paced Team Fortress mod for Half-Life 2.
I have a couple of friends who live in Britain, and I’m genuinely scared for them.
Here’s what I read on Slashdot today:
UK Plans To Monitor 20,000 Families’ Homes Via CCTV
metrix007 points out a story in the Sunday Express with more surveillance-camera madness from the UK, where the government now wants to place 20,000 CCTV cameras to monitor families (“the worst families in England”) within their own homes, to make sure that “kids go to bed on time and eat healthy meals and the like. This is going too far, and hopefully will not pass. Where will it end?”
Slashdot Story:
http://yro.slashdot.org/story/09/08/02/0725224/UK-Plans-To-Monitor-20000-Families-Homes-Via-CCTV?from=rssSource Article:
http://www.express.co.uk/posts/view/115736/Sin-bins-for-worst-families
Holy Moses on a rocket-powered pogo stick. Did these guys read 1984 like a How-To manual? Did they think V For Vendetta was a documentary?!
Britain has been steadily encroaching on the rights of its citizens in an effort to “protect” them – snooping on e-mails/telephone calls, web browsing filters, cameras frickin’ everywhere.
One could say I’m a gun guy. I don’t yet own any guns (not enough fundage atm), but I very much plan to once I have some slush money. Guns are a big no-no in Britain. Even the regular police don’t carry them!
That’s right. Even the bloody 5-0 don’t usually carry weapons. They have the equivalent of SWAT, but other than that the average boots-on-the-ground bobby carries pepper spray and a nightstick at most. There’s plenty of discussion on that topic for those interested.
I don’t have some long diatribe describing why Britain is getting more and more fucked. I don’t think I need one. I’m angry, I’m scared for my friends who live there, and you should be, too. Mark my words, in the next 50 years Britain’s going to have the equivalent of the Norsefire party.
It’s that time again! No, not Tool Time, it’s time for Voodoo Farming: A Not-Quite In-Depth Look At Zombies In Popular Culture.
The first game I reviewed was Zombies Ate My Neighbors, one of the classics and a hard game at that. Today I will be hitting up another classic SNES game and one of my favorites: Super Ghouls ‘n’ Ghosts.
I can’t recall Capcom ever making a bad game.
Super Ghouls ‘n’ Ghosts is part of the Ghosts ‘n’ Goblins series of games. Our protagonist is a knight named Arthur trying to save a Princess named Guinevere.
That’s right. You’re King Motherfucking Arthur. When I was a kid, damn near every boy on the block wanted to be King Arthur, because he had magic armor and an awesome theme song.
Threat Level:
As I’ve said many times, I play on “Normal” difficulty (or the best equivalent) to approximate the average experience of playing the game.
Let me be clear on this: SGNG is regarded as one of the most insanely hard platform/run & gun games ever – right up there with stuff like Megaman 2. Calling the medium difficulty “Normal” in this game is the sick joke of a very disturbed mind.
You can adjust some stuff since the series has its roots in arcades – you can choose how many lives you get (1-9) and which difficulty you’d like to play with. For the purpose of screenshots, I’ve put it on Easy with 9 lives. But for normal play, I usually go with Normal difficulty… and 9 lives.
I’m the sort of person who will drop $5.00 into Time Crisis 2 and play for over an hour so I can beat the damn game. Yes, I’ve done that before. So given the chance to have more lives, I’m gonna take it.
Armaments:
Arhur, a.k.a. Lance Armstrong. BA DUM PISH!
There’s a variety of weapons in SGNG. They all do roughly the same damage, but they do it in different ways. For insance, the lance (the weapon you start out with) just goes in a straight line. The torch flies forward in an arc and then creates a trail of flame on the ground where it lands. The bow & arrow shoots a couple arrows in an upward direction.
In true arcade style, you can upgrade your weapons with powerups. After your standard Iron Armor comes what I assume to be Copper Armor (since its green). Or maybe Arthur just made armor out of a dragon’s finger, because he’s that badass.
Note the awesome built-in mohawk on the armor.
When you get your green armor, your weapons get an upgrade. Typically, they just do more damage. They might behave slightly differently; for instance, the bow gets homing capabilities.
Gold Armor, however… that’s the shit right there:
I tried so hard to think of a Double Dragon joke so I could get a 34-hit K-Groove Nostalgia combo.
Your weapons get a little bit more powerful, but you also gain a chargeup ability. Once you charge your weapon you can unleash a super attack. The only limit on this is that you have to wait to charge it again – no mana bar, no “x amount of shots”. You might think it would make the game unbalanced, but the odds are stacked against you from the very beginning.
Cause of the Outbreak:
This is the Super Mario Formula, dead on. Evil baddies kidnap a princess. Hero hulks the fuck out and cuts his way through a few thousand bad guys just to get her back.
Co-Stars:
This is one of the many games where zombies are simply trash enemies – the simple thing that, if it hits you, means you have either fallen asleep or went into an epileptic seizure while playing the game. It’s pretty difficult to get hit by them unless you make a serious error of judgment.
Aside from that, you’ll come up against things such as dire wolves, fire skull dragons, bats, floating blob… thingies, a jester that turns you into things such as a baby or a milk maid (seriously), and all kinds of other fun monstrosities.
Odds of Survival: I’d have to invent a new word that means lower than low. So pretty bad.
Here’s how the game works. If you get hit, you lose your armor and you’re down to your skivvies. Literally:
Give him a cape and a shield, and he could be Leonidas.
If you had your fully upgraded bitchin’ Gold armor, well… Arthur is understandbly pissed.
…
Get hit in your undies and you die.
So basically, you get two hits until you die and have to restart the level. There are a few automatic save points, but knowing your luck you’re likely to just end up right back at the start.
Note the gold armor comes with a shield. While this won’t save you from a direct monster hit, it will save you from a projectile. You can upgrade the shield and take 2 hits from projectiles (so long as it hits the shield).
The Devilish Details:
SGNG runs very much like a first person shooter, except not first person. (I guess that’s how you define a 2-D “run and gun” game…)
After some initial experimentation, you are going to find a favorite weapon and go with it. All of the weapons seem very well balanced and they all have their pros and cons. (Personally, I like the scythe, just for those lovely screen-clearing tornadoes you pop out when you use the super.)
You’re definitely going to want to practice double jumping. It is a skill unto itself. If you’re off by half a second, you could drop into the ocean or come landing back down onto an enemy. While this does have a lot in common with Super Mario Brothers, you’re not going to be stomping on any enemies.
SGNG is all about precision movement and being very, very, very, very, very aware of your surroundings. When I was younger, it took me something on the order of a month to be able to beat the game on normal.
Wrapping It Up:
I’ve kept this one relatively short. This is not for lack of content in the game. It’s difficult to accurately describe the gauntlet that these sadomasochistic developers put you through in only a few short levels.
I definitely don’t have time to take all of the screenshots to show all the ways that they can fuck you over. I kept mental track in the first level of all of the devious traps, pitfalls, etc. that are thrown your way, and I stopped counting at about 50.
If you like insanely challenging games, Super Ghouls ‘n’ Ghosts is for you.
If you’re prone to stress or heart trouble, this game is not for you. You’re going to want to try a more relaxing activity such as walking on hot coals or trying acupuncture with knitting needles.
What lessons can we take away from Super Ghouls ‘n’ Ghosts?
Get a good burglar alarm, keep your princesses indoors, and definitely don’t fuck with King Arthur or you’ll catch a flying magic Lance up the ass.
Reader Mail:
Voodoo Farming #7: The Evil Dead
ineedhelpbad Says:
July 24th, 2009 at 12:15 amEvil Dead is awesome, but no mention of the sequels evil dead 2 and army of darkness.
Well, I gotta save material for future editions!
If I did, say, The Evil Dead Trilogy instead of just the first movie, then that’s one long article instead of three shorter ones. I average 1,500-2,000 words and it takes me anywhere from 1-6 hours to crank one of these out – I definitely don’t want to spend 12+ hours writing.
I’m sure I’ll catch shit for this, but I’ve never seen Evil Dead 2 or 3. Lambast away, I’ll get to it eventually. Geez.
Minty Says:
July 24th, 2009 at 9:19 amI recommend putting The Serpent and the Rainbow on the review list, if only because I can’t wait to see how you trash Bill Pullman assuming the “Girl Running Around Screaming in Her Underwear” cliché.
CCO Says:
July 25th, 2009 at 6:44 pmHere’s a book you may like: Monster Hunter International by Larry Correia.
Here’s the opening sentence:
On one otherwise normal Tuesday evening I had the chance to live the American dream. I was able to throw my incompetent jackass of a boss from a fourteenth-story window.Yep, then our hero goes on to get a job killing monsters.
I always appreciate suggestions from my readership and I’ll be sure to check those out in the future.
Once again, I have no idea as to what I’m doing next week. I can’t believe that I’ve been doing Voodoo Farming and staying on schedule for a whole two months! (I’m terrible with stuff like that.)
Before I go, I wanted to issue an apology to my readers. I had VF 6 and 7 prepared way ahead of time, but skippy was in the middle of a move and he apparently forgot to inform Michiel that VF goes up on Thursdays. They still went up anyway and I apologize for the delay. I’m a bit to blame for not checking up with Michiel that everything’s good to go. Sorry for the inconvenience.
Thanks for reading, I’ll see you next week!
Ihmhi is a developer for Fortress Forever, a free, fast paced Team Fortress mod for Half-Life 2.
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