This post is a lot about voice acting.
PushingupRoses has a new review of the The 7th Guest from 1993. This is an odd game, it was one of the major PC games best-sellers along with Myst, but I could never get to like it. PUR described it quite well just on what has bothered me about the game: a comically ebil man creates dolls that he sells to children to kill them. Then he gets another impulse to build an ebil mansion. That's the entire story, no background whatsoever to the reason behind creating a mysterious mansion that kills people. Agatha Christie's Then There Were None was an influence. The game is visually stunning for its time, but lacks depth. PUR touches upon the terrible voice acting.
Lately, I have watched a few LPs from all over the place. This one through a Simmer player, one with an odd title, Life is Strange.
It was very Twin Peaks light and it peaked my interest a lot at first, set in a small awful town with equally horrid people. I was like holy ****, must everything after The Walking Dead be so hideously ugly and drab. Twin Peaks wasn't ugly like this. Well, I went to the Wiki and it turns out it's made by a French developer (and published by Square Enix of all people). I was so surprised to find out that the developers travelled to the US to get an authentic feeling. Holy guacamole, I don't know what's more horrifying, Lovecraft monsters that devour you from a hidden closet in an evil mansion or that towns like this actually exist to this day in our world. The grimy '70s never left, that's for sure. The grating over-acting was the other off putting thing, it should be labelled with "Melodrama" , but I couldn't hear over the misogyny. I'm not going back for more of this visual assault, nothing wrong with the Let's Player as it was my mistake finding it.
The game Full Throttle has some interesting settings in the US desert area. The story revolves around bikers and isolated towns in the middle of nowhere. It's a LucasArt adventure game and it's an extremely well-crafted game, it's rendered in pixels and the animation is flawless, the soundtrack is wonderful. It has some of the most phenomenal voice acting, this sets the standard for gaming, it's that awesome. It's so odd that voice acting hasn't come that far, we still get stuff like MGS and Mass Effect. It isn't so much about acting per se, but about directing dialogue that the gods forgot, and well, it's a writing problem. Whatever the LucasArt did they got the acting flawlessly, there isn't one line out of place, though I think much of it it's due to the voice talent, every line is full of meaning.
I love the mix of absurdity and bleakness, the story is pretty hard-boiled with the violence and adult themes. It was obvious the influence was Road Warrior in the action scenes. The game is worth playing for the songs at the end credits alone imo."It's not the blood, it was how you were twisted up like a pretzel."
"Send me a postcard from the ambush!"
"I wonder how they keep it so smooth."
"Cars! No, thank you!"
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I'm not sure how many times I've died but I'm already save-scumming like crazy (don't judge, I've got two kids under 3 and limited time). Last night I got killed by a tree. An effing tree. CURB-STOMPED by said tree. I'm having a blast.
