In Other News #002

Between sweltering record heatwaves, malfunctioning transport networks, trespassing dogs and national flood warnings, this week has been quite unusual to say the least. It’s just typical that by the time the weekend comes around, the “glorious” temperatures that baked us alive on our fragile daily commute are replaced with greying skies and miserable torrential rain. As luck would have it… Ok, enough of that. What else have I have been up to lately?

First of all, I finally dusted off SuperHot (pun not intended) after leaving it on the virtual shelf for quite some time, and eventually beat the main campaign into submission. I’d hit a brick wall on the later levels and put it to one side, but I’m so glad I came back to it. Man, I love this game. The core mechanic of “time only moves when you do” mixed with chaotic replayability reminiscent of Hotline Miami, and the bombastic style of That lobby scene from The Matrix creates an experience worthy of the “One more go” club. The icing on the cake are the dystopic and subversive plot events that unfold as you progress. There’s a lot of fun hidden gems within the game’s menu system too. On completion of the campaign, I seem to have unlocked both an endless mode and challenges. And I thought I was finally free…

Continue reading →

When it Rains, it Pours – The Rain Season 2

Season two of The Rain was a wild ride. As with music, the sophomore release is always perceived as more challenging, the original serving as a benchmark. However once again the creative team of Jannik Tai Mosholt, Esben Toft Jacobsen and Christian Potalivo delivers triumphantly.

Picking up right from the end of the first season, the surviving members are desperately trying to find a cure for Rasmus before Apollon’s soldiers can capture them and deliver him to the hands of the nefarious corporation. A lead points them in the direction of a group of scientist defectors, where they meet several new compelling characters, and again the show does a great job of peeling back the layers of each one to explain who they are and how they came to be in this situation.

Continue reading →

In Other News #001

So what games have I been playing lately? What shows have caught my eye?

I recently finished watching season one of The Rain on Netflix, a pretty enjoyable Danish drama set in a post-apocalypse where a deadly virus carried by rainfall infects and kills anyone exposed to it. The series follows a group of people thrown together six years after the outbreak as they attempt to survive and reach safety in a Fallout-meets-The Walking Dead-meets-“Coming of Age Story 101” vibe. I say Fallout, because there are bunkers (ie “vaults”) dotted throughout the region belonging to a corporation called Apollon, for who the father of two of the protagonists works for, and within them secrets that unravel and present themselves as the episodes go on. What I especially enjoyed was the character development of each of the group, and the glimpse into their backstories; what brought them to this situation, how they survived this far, how they deal with danger and what lengths they will go to in order to stay alive. Definitely worth a watch if this is your type of genre.

Continue reading →