Hotline...HALLOWEEN

Happy Halloween!  I hope yours isn’t as sugary bittersweet like mine (I think I had one trick-or-treater!); I really wanted to scream “WHAT TIME IS IT?!” whilst wearing my sweet Finn hat. Yeah, bro. You heard right, big Adventure Time fan.

What the hell am I talking about? Uhm, so I wanted to make a Halloween special post, but I hadn’t really played any worthy games as of late.  I recently completed this indie phenom called Hotline Miami –you can find it on Steam for about $10.  The game’s not really scary, but it’s trippy and rather creepy at times. They wear masks!!!!!!!!  FITTING.

So this game is a 2-D top down fuck ‘em up.  Yes.  It’s like an old school GTA, and it’s in the best way possible.  Hotline casts you as a dude with a troubling career – a hit man.  The game is set in late 80’s, and you guessed it, Miami! At the beginning of each level your phone rings in your 8-bit apartment, and you are given a “mission” – The jobs are described as menial jobs like cleaning up a mess at so-and-so’s address.  It’s very blatant, but you can’t help to appreciate it.

Each level plays out generally the same; you are tasked to murder every thug in the building.  This is so much fun!  You are given either melee weapons, guns, or your fists to finish off your foes.  There’s a lot of depth here; if you use guns it alerts the nearby dumbbutts to your vicinity, but it gives you quicker kills.  Melee weapons can generally OHKO most guys (aka crack their skulls!), and can also be thrown at enemies.  Melee weapons are actually my favorite because they don’t alert bad dudes, and the kills are much, much more visceral. And lastly, the fists.  Oh the fists! So you cannot really kill guys with one hit like the crowbars, axes, knives, and other assorted headbusters, but you can knock them down!  When you knock them down…you can execute them!  This gets pretty crazy, and if nothing else, the scene in Drive comes to mind – When Ryan Gosling crushes that dude’s head repeatedly in the elevator.  Blood all over. Heavy breathing.  Brains on your shoes. It’s JUST like that, I swear! You have to mash the left button of your mouse like a madman to kill off this scum as quickly as possible.

Oh and there’s masks!  That’s probably what brings me back and back and back to this game.  This game has a score system that grades your quickness, variety, and combo chain score.  Depending on your score you unlock more weapons and masks.  Masks give you extra abilities.  My favorite is the frog because it lets you chain combos for a longer period of time; some other good ones are the giraffe (allows you a longer peek around your surroundings), monkey (allows you to kill and steal guys in one motion), unicorn (your guns are silenced), and the elephant (allows you to take more than one hit).

This sounds fun, albeit a little boring right?  Well, not even half-way through the game they drastically change up things.  I don’t want to give away too much, but the way they set it up is you get comfortable doing the same thing, and WHAM it gets real.  I’m talking police raids.  I’m talking you’re seeing dead people.  I’m talking serial killers are killing peeps right in front of your face.  

 

Hotline reminds me of the amAAAzing movie, Drive - The contrast of dark characters on bright colors of the background.  Hotline Miami’s colors are very bright and vibrant.  They do a great job of making the colors slowly changing/flashing – it makes the whole experience feel more surreal.  The music is probably my second favorite part.  It feels like they drew a lot from Drive, and they make a soundtrack that could fit in that movie.  It’s all dark, ominous, electronic/pop.  I was really blown away how well the music fits, and gets your blood rushing. (Here’s the soundtrack! http://soundcloud.com/devolverdigital/sets/hotline-miami-official)

The final thing I want to touch on is the story.  It’s presented to you in this Pulp Fiction meets Drive.  Hotline begins with you walking into a pitch black room that slowly reveals three figures wearing masks (you actually earn all three of them in the game) talking to you; pretty much demanding why you are such a psychopath.  There are a lot of trippy parts to this game, but the way the story unfolds you want to eagerly uncover why you’re sent on these ‘cleanups’. 

This game is what's keeping me from celebrating America (Fuck yeah!) and Assassin's.  IT'S THAT GOOD.

Welcome to my Zombie Hype Train!

So this weekend has found me mainly worried about zombies. With the return of the Walking Dead, Halloween, and the release of the game: The War Z... How could I not spend my time worried about those clumsy man eaters? Let me begin with a brief review of the Walking Dead season premiere...

SPOILERS APLENTY AHEAD!!!!!!!!!!!

 

TURN BACK!!!!!

 

 

Still here? Ok cool. So Season 3 of the Walking Dead began with zero dialogue. It was a depressing intro where you can finally see the signs of the world Rick and the gang inhabits catching up with them. Rick looks grizzled and crazed while the rest of the group looks tired and frustrated. It makes sense with the way the last season ended. The episode was a bit slow paced on the story side of things, but was chock full of zombie killin'! The most exciting kills definitely came from the fights with the zombies in riot gear in the prison courtyard. With that being said I don't understand why they just didn't uppercut those guys with knives to begin with. So after fighting the riot boys they arrive inside of the prison. Things slow down again until one of the gang takes a bite to the leg and then has Rick cut it off in a pretty gruesome fashion. Finally, it ends with team Rick realizing they are not the only ones inside that hell hole of a prison. All in all, I believe it is setting up for an awesome season, even if the pacing of this episode was a bit slow. 

 

So what about Andrea and her new ninja buddy? Well I don't think we saw near enough of them. Apparently Andrea had a rough winter and is on the verge of dying from what may be pneumonia. Micchone (Ninja lady) on the other hand is still doing her thing. I really hope they go deep into her back story this season as it is very interesting and perfect for the TV adaptation. I can't wait for next week and the rest of a season that will be pretty dark (if the first episode is a precursor)

 

Now, let me talk to you about a game you probably have never heard about. It's called the War Z and I am pumped about it!!!! You get to create a survivor during a zombie apocalypse and scavenge, kill, steal and hunt your way to safety. You can build safehouses, take over buildings, kill other players for their stuff and live out your own zombie fantasy. There is a leaderboard that is based on how long you survive and it has PERMADEATH! Once your guy bites the dust that's it. You're dead. Start over. It makes you really pay attention to what you are doing and not screw around, especially if you broseph has been around for a while. I plan on reviewing the crap out of it once me and my cynical partner, P, rage on some wobbling corpses.

 

Anyway, it is nice to be back and see y'all Broskingtons later!