If it's not Raven, it's crap...

Just finished playing through Blendo Games’ Gravity Bone (free) and Thirty Flights of Loving (not free, but available on the Blendo website & Steam) for what feels like the 100th time, while preparing for a PowerPoint presentation on both games. They're both short-form/interactive storytelling/ "first person walkers". In other words, not really what you expect out of a video game, but very engaging stories nonetheless. Gravity Bone starts off with very familiar first person shooter elements, before pulling the rug out from you. Thirty Flights is...what it is. I can't say more than that without it being a spoiler alert. I want to make stories that feel like that. “That” being the near indescribable feeling of, “What was I just doing in the last 15 minutes and why did I think it was so cool?”  The game envy is strong in me tonight. On a completely unrelated note, the Quake 2 engine, cube-headed people graphics totally made me think of a scene from the mo

Have you ever wondered what it would be like to be blindfolded, kidnapped (by the mafia or something like that), transported to some far off (possibly remote location), escape your captors and the have to figure out where in the holy fuck you are? Great! Me too! Now you can do just that with this addictive little game called Help me! I’ve Been Kidnapped by the Fucking Mafia or Something and I Escaped but I Don’t Know Where They Were Holding Me. Seriously, I Could be Almost Anywhere by Now: The Game Geoguessr Using Google Street View, you basically wander around whatever random place (again, where I can only assume you’ve just woken up in after being abducted and, I assume, held for ransom by a criminal organization). Then you have to try to make your best guess as to where you are. It’s not so easy, but luckily, you can rule out a good chunk of the world that lacks Google Street View (i.e. huge swaths of Asia, South America, most of Africa, the Arctic, and Antarctic, etc)

(Source: Penny Arcade )

Part Progress Quest , part WTF.... Candy Box has captured my attention for the past week or so. Mostly off and on, but I've found myself in meetings thinking, "I need more candy" or "I need more lollipops". And, neither of the actual candy or lollipops...but yes...more, more, MORE!!! Last week, my boss sent around the link to the entire department with a cryptic message, "Just be patient...there's more." Clicking the link, you don't see much more than this: "You have ___ candies!" (a candy timer that increases with each second). Because I have no patience, I just kept alternating between eating candies and throwing candies on the ground. With no effect, until I actually had real work to do and just happened to leave the browser open. A week later, I have a lollipop farm that churns out 100 lollipops per second; a powerful, flaming chocolate sword; and a cauldron with which I can craft powerful potions to get me throu