So, today, I gotta write six more posts to reach my goal of 31 posts for Blaugust. Just the day before yesterday, I was sitting at 17, which is why I wrote five posts yesterday, bringing me up to 22… and then I wanted to write 9 more but I only got to 3 and the day is nearly over.

Thus, it’s time to…

“REV UP THE SHITPOST MACHINE”

Blockade85 from WordsUnderMyName

2019/07/30 at 3:05 am

That’s the last time I worked on my review for… Ori and the Blind Forest???

Wait, that’s actually a critically acclaimed and incredibly atmospheric game. Why did I never finish my review on it?

Well, turns out I spent 600 words explaining the story and combat systems while also comparing it to other metroidvanias and then I just kind of ended up forgetting about this draft, never finishing it in the process.

I did never actually beat the game, so I wanted to finish it… but then I got so fed up with the frustrating platforming elements of the game as well as the performance issues that game has from time to time which make the platforming elements even more frustrating… Yeah…

I don’t hate Ori and the Blind Forest but eventually, I just wondered “why bother?” and never actually got to finishing the game. I will at some point try to play the game again but I’m sure it’s going to be incredibly frustrating, again, and rather annoying to get through.

I hate platforming, after all. It’s a skill issue.

But I loved Hollow Knight and I loved Celeste and I love Super Mario 64, so I don’t quite get what it is about Ori and the Blind Forest that got me all salty… but it’s just not great at platforming… and that’s a lot of the game.

More than anything, can we just look at the time that Past-Magi stopped writing that post at.

Jesus christ, 3 am.

Man, Past-Magi really struggled with their sleep schedule… and I’m better now at that. Not a whole lot… but still much better than to go to sleep that late. At least, I assume I went to sleep back then before eventually giving up on that review.

Now, to not turn this into a complete shitpost: Reviews!

Nowadays I wouldn’t go into as much detail about the story. I had the names dotted down on a college block and little doodles explaining shapes and story bits. I don’t do that anymore.

Pretty much whenever I write reviews, it’s from fresh memory after just having played the games, then I take a break, and then I go back into the post to edit it, remove paragraphs, cut away anything that doesn’t add value or that the player would experience themselves anyway.

If I were to tackle Ori and the Blind Forest’s review again today, I’d drastically reduce the size of the post’s story-synapsis sections, stop explaining what buttons combat utilizes and instead I’d talk about the amazing soundtrack, the beautiful aesthetic, and how fun combat actually is… and then I’d start a rant about the platforming segments and just how long I was stuck at one specific tree after the boss fight in question.

I’d tackle it entirely differently and I guess that shows growth in a way… or change, rather?

At the time, I was still writing 3k word reviews and I just don’t do that anymore since nobody has 20 minutes to read a review on a game they’d probably wanna experience spoiler-free.

My stance on spoilers hasn’t changed much: I don’t mind them all that much but I don’t wanna include them in reviews.

But this kinda reminds me of those early review-writing days where I wanted to showcase games I loved more… so maybe I’ll write a review soon on some of my recent obsessions… or some of my all-time favourites, like The Red String Club or Deadbolt.

Either way, this was one heck of a shitpost and I only have five more Blaugust posts to go. Yay.

This post was first published on Indiecator by Dan Indiecator aka MagiWasTaken. If you like what you see here and want to see more, you can check me out on Twitch and YouTube as well.