And games...

[amethyst73]

So, the huz has been away in Uppsala, Sweden this week.  (There's a really really old cathedral and a quite old university and a pretty old castle, all of which the huz says are cool.)  I've managed pretty well, with help from hoshikage, nezumiko, and huz's parents (with whom I actually have a good relationship).  Every other night I've gone and hung out with people until some reasonable hour, then gone home to pill cat, shower me, and put various organisms to bed.  Unsurprisingly, I've spent much of the evenings that I've stayed at home in front of the Wii. 

I've ground away at Super Paper Mario, which at the moment is feeling a little like a chore.  I really played too much on Sunday, doing the MiMe fight at the end of 8-2 and then slogging - yes, that's what it felt like! - through all of 8-3 and the insane Dimentio fight at the end in one long 2-hour go.  With essentially no healing items left, I had to go back to town and stock up.. and have since played through 8-1 and 8-2 (sans boss battles, thank heavens). 

I've also done some small bits of Endless Ocean, which I continue to enjoy a great deal.  I did a guided dive on Saturday, went hunting for - and found! - a particular small fish for a photo shoot, and filled in a little bit of map (and found a Japanese spider crab and a pistol shrimp).  Much more relaxing than SPMario.

And tonight... well, I couldn't help myself.  I wanted a game that was largely relaxing, but somewhat more exciting than simply exploring and petting fish.  So I started Okami, and of course I love it.  It's beautiful, and I seem to have little trouble with the Power Slash technique which was initially causing the huz a bit of grief.  And of course, it being quite early in the game, it's not difficult yet.  The one aspect that I find irritating is the camera control, mostly because after turning I cannot re-center the camera behind me with a push of a button; all manual camera control is done with the D-pad, which feels very clunky.

Perhaps the most interesting effect of having played Okami for an hour and a half or so is that I now feel ready to embark on further SPMario slog.  Just needed a little bit of a break, that's all.  Or a foretaste of the game to come.  :)

Huz will be home tomorrow!  Yay!

Comments

[meepodeekin.livejournal.com]

Yeah, World 8 of SPM was NOT FUN. It's a slog, the boss battles are annoying and go on forever, and there's really no pay off aside from the standard one of having finished. It was driving me insane and I wanted to just sell it back without finishing. Hubby more-or-less forced me to finish it first. That was a bad day. Needless to say, I never finished the optional pits of 100 trials.

It's funny, I have essentially never had the experience of being home without hubby, since I travel a lot and he never does (at least without me). I bet it would be weird.

[amethyst73.livejournal.com]

Here, for your amusement, is a review (http://www.escapistmagazine.com/articles/view/editorials/zeropunctuation/2563-Zero-Punctuation-Super-Paper-Mario) of SPM that I think will resonate with you.

It's definitely strange. The weirdest (and hardest) day was Sunday. I went out in the morning for a few hours and did errands, but was otherwise home all day, didn't interact with anyone much. The cats helped some, but they just weren't enough. The rest of the week's been okay, just weird.

[meepodeekin.livejournal.com]

I did enjoy that, thanks!

I hope you enjoy your reunion today. I've always wanted to go to Uppsala, so I'm jealous of your huz.

[amethyst73.livejournal.com]

He's back! He's very confused about what time or what day it is, but he had a good time, and he's back!

And I have slogged ALL THE WAY TO THE SAVE POINT BEFORE THE FINAL DOUBLE-BOSS BATTLE!

Crikey, that was tedious. No game should ever force you to play more than 5, maybe 10 minutes without the option to save. An hour was really obnoxious, and the lack of save points was surely present only for the sake of making the level 'harder'. But hey, if it turns out that I need to go back and get yet MORE healing items, at least I have an accurate map of the corridor labyrinth.

[/SPM stuff. Sorry!]

[meepodeekin.livejournal.com]

Urgggh. I absolutely abhor games that try to make things harder by save point manipulation. (OTOH, I have been enjoying the original Super Mario a lot, and it has no saves at all.) But I don't remember the final battle as being half as bad as the earlier boss battles in the world. Hopefully you'll be ok.