Review: Machinarium

Machinarium is a beautifully crafted point-and-click graphic adventure game set in a clinking and clanking world of rust, dust, and robots.

The developers at Amanita Design are chiefly known for their Samorost games: another series of point-and-click adventures in which the gamer solved environmental puzzles as the diminutive titular character in order to accomplish outlandish goals. With a combination of surreal collage art and whimsical animation, the Samorost games were a joy to play through.

Machinarium feels like the natural evolution for the company from their previous efforts. The game focuses on the trials and tribulations of a small nameless robot who looks like the most adorable flip top trash can you could ever hope to meet. As he explores the dystopian machine city the game is set in, you help him take down gangsters, break out of jail, and even play a little Space Invaders. Just a day in the life for a walking bug eyed rubbish bin really.

The game opens with our hero crashing unceremoniously into a scrap pit, literally falling to pieces. As you work on putting him back together, the game begins to introduce it's basic control scheme and mechanics.

As is the norm in point-and-click games, clicking on the environment will move the character about. Similarly, clicking on specific hotspots will make the character interact with them. The game establishes early on that you can only work with hotspots that are nearby (read literally next to) your character. While this adds realism to the gameplay it also has a few niggling drawbacks. The only way to tell if an object is clickable is by scrolling over it. However the cursor won't change if you aren't next to the object, making key puzzle pieces easily missable.

One of Machinarium's unique control features is the ability to stretch and squash the central character on a vertical axis whilst sacrificing speed of mobility. This is used in a variety of contexts such as stretching to reach hidden away nooks or squatting to fit into sewer drains. This ability feels very organic, helped largely by the charming character animation and design that accompanies it. The only downside is that if you forget to return him to normal height, you'll be moving at an uninterruptible snails pace until you reach your destination. This is particularly tedious in the game's few timed puzzles.

Graphically the game is absolutely gorgeous. Amanita Design have managed to create a visual style entirely their own. The look is equal parts children's picture book and steampunk eccentricity all conveyed in a wonderfully tangible pen and pencil sketched style. The backgrounds are filled with incidental details. Pipes spiral off into the sky, small mechanical creatures rush through the shadows and oil slicks pool under the glow of stuttering neon signs.

The character designs can be described as nothing else but charming. Each robot is unique and has their own specific animations and personalities. The game is devoid of any actual dialogue or voice acting. Instead conversations between characters play out in animated speech and thought bubbles.

This technique is also utilized by the in-game hint system. If the gamer gets stuck they can instigate a thought bubble from the protagonist on the current proceedings that will give them a nudge in the right direction. A more direct walkthrough is also available at the cost of playing an intensely tedious side scrolling shoot-em up mini game in which you guide a key into a lock. This worked as a decent deterrent the majority of the times I was tempted to use the walkthrough. You really, really don't want to play that game.

Also worthy of mention is the soundtrack, which comes with the game in MP3 format. It contains elements of ambient electronica mixed with wheezing machinery. The effect can be likened to hearing science fiction lullabies whistling through a junkyard. It perfectly matches the game's sense of wide eyed innocence meeting dark industrial landscape.

Overall Machinarium is an absolute charmer. It bursts with originality of design and setting. The only other major drawback is it's relatively short length, say five to eight hours. Whether this is worth the twenty dollar price of admission is up to the gamer. Personally, I'd say it's worth it. I can guarantee you won't have played a game quite like it before. So really, do yourself a favour: get lost in Machinarium's wonderful world.

-Dashiell 'The Diminutive Hero' Asher

Motion Control -or- How I Like To Bitch About The Future

Everybody and their mother wants motion control. With the raging success of the Wii, it's understandable. But is the slow move away from traditional gaming inputs for the best?

The tech demos so far have been relatively underwhelming:

The PlayStation Motion Controller was clearly pushed out of the gates a bit early, it's demo essentially being a sado-masochist's playground of different toys, paddles and whips to fiddle about with. The fact that the touted First Person Shooter mode was actually a phallus that spurts liquid from the centre of the screen says it all really.

The big push for Microsoft's full body motion control detector Natal came in the form of Lionhead's 'game,' Milo. Peter Molyneux described the project in an interview with eurogamer.com:

'Milo can recognise the emotions on your face and the emotions in your voice. He can recognise certain words you say... He can recognise what you're wearing. If he notices you've got dark bags under your eyes he will say, 'You look tired today.'

This may well be. But in the demo I saw, all he did was go fishing with his hands, and then stole a drawing for his homework. So assuming this is representative of the total game experience, alongside what Molyneux has described, Milo will insult me, laugh at me, plagiarize me, and then ask me to go fishing. At which point I would like to drown Milo.

Pot shots at the tech demos aside, the biggest reason I'm unwilling to embrace full body motion control is this: How the hell will you, or your character, gracefully walk from one room to another? Or even walk around? This is a question which seems to have been more or less ignored in the presentations by both Microsoft and Sony. Sure, they haven't been forthcoming with many details as it is, but the basic act of movement seems to be a pretty crucial one.

But in considering the issue, finding an elegant solution proves to be more difficult than you'd think.

Natal's Milo appears to be, for all intents and purposes, on rails. And while that will work fine for some titles, it won't be a fix all solution. Ditto for the Sony Motion Controller's FPS-mode.

I've had people suggest to me that adopting a pose like you're about to run, or are in mid movement, could work. Natal or the PlayStation Eye could recognize the position and have your character begin to move.

But everyone who exemplified this tableu vivant of movement just wound up looking like they were doing an impression of an Emergency Exit sign. I refuse to play games looking like I forgot what I was doing midway through my best impersonation of The Flash.

The solution that seems most frighteningly obvious to me is having gamers jog in place to get from point A to point B. I don't think I could keep a straight face playing a game in this fashion. Imagine the scene: You're playing an epic RPG. Your hero is standing in the door way of a dimly lit cathedral. A bright white dove floats across the rafters, becoming engulfed by the darkness of a ceiling spiraling high above you. The villain stands across from you on a gleaming pedestal. Flames roar out of the ground as wings sprout from his back and he begins to soar to the heavens, raining death and destruction all around. The hero steadies himself, and runs forward.

...Only he doesn't. He jogs forward. Maybe even half asses it a little: bobbing up and down in place while hoping no one is looking.

The whole mess can be summarized in three simple words: Saviours. Don't. Jog.

And not to put too fine a point on it, but neither do gamers. I'm not in any way trying to push the tired image of video game enthusiasts being overweight and lazy. What I'm concerned with is developers taking what's a largely cerebral experience and making it so that our main interaction with it is a physical one, which seems to me to be a really great way to lose a lot of business.

It all really comes down to that old question of whether gamers will be willing to exchange the highly passive role they've been taking in their favourite past time for a more active one. I don't want to sound supremely cynical in saying, 'I doubt it,' but until some of these core questions regarding interface are answered, I for one will have trouble getting totally behind it. After all, we have to learn to walk before we can run.

-Dashiell 'The Jogging Saviour' Asher

RGGS: Lollyphile! -or- How I Learned To Feel The Burn

I'm beginning to feel that Lollyphile has let me down. The evenings of sweet and sugary joy I was breathlessly waiting for have turned out to be little more than empty-if-not-novel candy booty calls.

I'm feeling cheap and used. The saloon lights are glowing dimly above me as I soak my sorrows into a strong drink.

'Damn you, Lollyphile...' I whimper, 'Damn you to hell.'

Suddenly the doors are kicked open by a a pair of snake skin cowboy boots, followed by long legs clad in black jeans with Japanese Dragons stitched up the sides. 'Bad to the Bone' begins thumping from the old jukebox as this mysterious strangers straddles the dusty floor boards. He pulls a zippo lighter from his jacket: it's made of metal that burns as brightly as the flame. He produces a smoke from thin air and cocks his head sideways as he sucks in the fire as it's reflected in a pair of obsidian shades.

'It's the hot one...' I hear someone whisper to my left.

The cool customer slides up to me, blowing smoke over his shoulder.

'I hear you've had your heart broken a few times.'

He smells like fire and spice.

'Who are you?' I barely choke out.

'Who am I?' He replies with a grin, 'I'm Wasabi-Ginger.'

The Look: This is the first truly good looking lolly I've had so far. It's a dark burnt orange with flecks of red just under the surface. As you suck on the treat you'll find that these little flecks slowly worm their way to the top, like tiny flecks of crimson glass. It looks like a little dark ball of fire. Which is goddamn exactly how a lollypop made of ginger and wasabi should look.

I like this lollipop.

The Flavour: This is also the first lollipop that has actually tasted entirely like what it purports to be made from. About. Fucking. Time. The base candy tastes like the sweetest ginger syrup you've ever had, with a delicate warmth that slowly gives way to the potent mustard edge of the wasabi. Further into the treat the heat intensifies as those little shards of red begin to emerge. They are, I believe, tiny pieces of crystalized chili peppers. They have a tendency to scratch your tongue while sucking on the lolly, which I found to make the spice more intense as my tongue became raw. Genuinely enjoyed it the whole way through, which is a first.

Should you buy it?: Are you serious? I give you my total blessing. I really loved this lollipop, and am definitely considering getting more of them.

I suppose, to give it some balance, I should point out some potential downsides to this sweet. Buyers beware of these caveats:

1. The whole thing SMACKS of ginger, and will do nothing to convert those who don't like the spice to the cause.

2. The whole 'raw tongue' aspect, I could that see turning folks off. I suppose not everyone wants their tongue to be going through an S&M session to get the sugar. But they just don't know what they're missing.

3. The heat, while never overwhelming, is strong enough to be the key sensation to this treat. This is sweet, sticky, and HOT.

GOD DAMN this is a SEXY lollipop.

So yes. Oh godddd yesssss...

To be continued in: Lollyphile! -or- How The Dude Abides

-Dashiell 'The Sexy Bon-Bon' Asher

Image Courtesy of Lollyphile.com

RGGS: Pornogrind -or- How To Fuck Like The Frog

I'll keep this brief.

There is a musical movement known as pornogrind.

Awesome.

One of the bands involved in the movement are called Cock and Ball Torture; a charming group of young men from Germany who craft pop gems with titles like Titty Torture Bondage Boys, The Taste of Animal Sperm and of course, Anal Sex Terror.

Fuck. Yes.

Sadly the whole thing turns out to be as sexy as a venereal wart.

Dammit.

The music is essentially bland death metal with vocals that literally sound like a frog drowning. As far as I can tell, outside of the titles, there is nothing even vaguely pornographic.

Maybe we can pretend the frog was choking on a penis.

-Dashiell 'Amplexus' Asher

PS. Before you go googling Pornogrind, be careful of the images. Even with safe search. Seriously. Semen on cornflakes is the softest image you'll find. And the least violent. Now go do it anyway. You Sick Fuck.

Image courtesy of some dudes myspace, for reasons listed above.

FMS: A Horse Is Not A Home -or- How To Be Bored While Having Your Ear Molested

The opening line of 'A Horse Is Not A Home' does a better job of describing how I feel about this song than I ever could: 'Oh God! I think I'm dying!'

A Horse Is Not A Home is a track off of Miike Snow's self titled debut album released back in May of this year. Miike Snow, as iTunes point out, is not in fact one bland artist but three bland artists: singer/song writer Andew Wyatt and production duo Bloodshy & Avant, less pretentiously known as Christian Karlsson and Pontus Winnberg (okay, just as pretentiously known as).

The band are an electro pop group that have been compared by The Guardian's Paul Lester to A-Ha, and I'm not entirely sure if that's supposed to be a good thing or not. Sort of like being told you have the charisma of William Shatner.

The track is average dance fair with a basic thud-thud-thud club beat; the drums suddenly falling over every so often, presumably out of boredom. Ghostly pianos echo across the majority of this void of a song eventually giving way to ugly rave synths until Bloodyshy & Avant seem to agree that this was just making things worse and very quickly bring the piano back. Frankly, I expect a hell of a lot better from the Swedish production duo who have churned out hits for a smorgasbord of other artists including Kylie Minogue and Britney Spears.

But while the music is simply dismissively uninteresting the lyrics are God awful. They sound like one of the worst attempts by a Euro-Pop band to craft earnestly-overly-emotional-English-is-my-second-language lyrics ever. It's almost impossible to know where to begin. One of my personal favourites is: 'Uninvited to the play / where language doesn't hurt / with nothing on my shirt.'

...What?

The song's whole lyrical feel, particularly the choruses titular line 'A Horse Is Not A Home,' feels like they played a game of song writing madlibs:

Christian Karlsson: "A noun is not a home?"

Andrew Wyatt: "How about horse?"

Pontus Winberg: "Haha, yeeeah! Sounds like a hit!"

Christian Karlsson: "Fuck yeah, that's hi-lar-ious! Hey, somebody pass me our respect for the music buying public, I want to rape it some more."

It's the only way to explain away lines like 'With a golden hand by your fortress side / but without magic.' Initially I assumed the group song writer, Andrew Wyatt, must have also been a Swedish native like his production duty counterparts, explaining away the bizarrely Eurovision-esque lyrics. But he's an American.

So yes Miike Snow, I think we are dying. A slow, boring, pointless, vapid, disgusting, insultingly bad death.

-Dashiell 'My Fortress Side Has This Much Magic' Asher

Image courtesy of Downtown Records / RCRD LBL

RGGS: Lollyphile! -or- How I Sucked A Hobo Treat

So today's neat sweet treat to get your tongue to move its feet is Lollyphile's! Bourbon Lollipop.

Now, bourbon has a reputation. It's a Tough'n'Rough-All-American-What-Did-You-Just-Say-About-My-Mother-Mother-Fucker kinda booze. It's the kind of drink that burly backwoods gentlemen guzzle in boxcars while Home On The Range wheezes from a broken harmonica.

So then why the hell does the bourbon lollipop taste like sugar, cream, and angel farts?

The Look: The lolly is a nice soothing off white (which is not how it looks in the promo shot), suggestive more of pina coladas than bourbon. Honestly not much more to say, it's fairly non-descript compared to the gorgeous green of the Absinthe or the fucked up Franken-pop of the Maple-Bacon.

The Flavour: Well not like fucking bourbon for starters. It basically just tastes of sweet, caramelized sugar. Frankly it felt no different than the pops you can get at the dentists. Unlike the absinthe lolly I didn't detect any trace of the alcohol, which might have given the sugary flavour a slightly unique edge. Putting it bluntly, had I not been told this was bourbon flavoured, I never would have guessed. And even having been told, I still want to call Lollyphile! liars.

Should you buy it?: I've had some trouble writing this review. It's been almost impossible to find anything interesting to say about this sweet. And that pretty much sums up the whole experience. Tasty? Yeah I guess so, but in a kind of inoffensive and harmless way. There is genuinely little to recommend about this lollipop, particularly considering it's supposed to be made out of badass bourbon, which is how Lollyphile! are trying to sell it (see the photo). But really? This is less guzzling a bottle of hobo booze and more like licking Charlie Brown's head.

Comin' Soon: Lollyphile! -or- How I Learned To Feel The Burn

-Dashiell 'And I Like Vanilla' Asher

Image Courtesy of www.lollyphile.com

RGGS: Lollyphile! -or- How I Sucked On Bits Of A Pig

Hands up who likes maple syrup! Okay, hands up who likes bacon! Now everyone who didn't raise your hand get out, because I don't want you to see these good people crying over what should have been a great, great, idea.

I freely admit that I was the most excited about Lollyphiles! maple-bacon lollypops. The tantalizing thought of having meat in your candy; invoking dreams of portable pancake breakfasts. I mean, this is one step closer to the chewing-gum meal in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory! Bacon and maple syrup are best friends. This could only be awesome.

But...

The Look: This time around the lollypop has a dark brown sheen with... a bizarre piece of gristle lodged in the top of it. Like someone scalped a barbie doll only to find it had actual brains inside of it. When I pictured a lollypop with bacon in it, I pictured little diced pieces of bacon crystalized within it; like the mosquito in amber in Jurassic Park. Only edible. More edible.

But that is not what you get. Not by a long shot. Apparently the way Lollyphile! gets the bacon into the maple syrup lolly is by ramming a hunk of bacon gristle into the top while it's still hardening. The result looks something like what would happen if you pushed too hard on a baby's soft spot.

It's pretty damn off putting. Both the one I ate and the one my girlfriend ate looked this way. So either we were just really damn unlucky, or they're all like this. I'm leaning towards the latter.

Okay, so the look is awful. Really awful. But my dreams of sweet-meat-sweets can live on if the stuff tastes as good as it should.

Well...

The Flavour: Overall first impressions are positive. The sweet syrup flavoured candy contrasts nicely with the salty 'brain' of bacon on the top of the sweet. However, I didn't really feel the candy bit tasted all that much like maple syrup, more like toffee or golden syrup. Which seems like a small point in the scheme of things, but there's something very specific about the alchemy of flavours between smoky bacon and maple syrup that just didn't seem to be happening here. It wasn't unpleasant, just not what I had hoped for.

Okay. So far, so positive, with a few reservations.

Then the bacon started flaking off.

As you suck on the lolly the bacon becomes more and more exposed at the top. But rather than being a chewy piece of bacon jerky, it's more of a large lump of really hard... pig flavoured... wood. The only way to really get to taste the bacon proper was to scrape at it with your teeth or to allow little pieces to flake off. Either way your mouth becomes filled with pig grit. I wouldn't say I found this pleasant, but I wasn't totally disgusted by it. Maybe I was blinded by my desire for this treat to be good. But I will tell you that it made my girlfriend disappointedly give up on the lolly at that point, even though she loved the maple flavoured section.

Should you buy it?: So what we have here is maple syrup candy that doesn't taste like maple syrup coating bacon that looks like brain and feels like its doing it's best impression of tree bark. Do I need to spell it out?

In the end I'm not impressed. I can only really recommend it in an adventure seeking kind of way. But unlike the absinthe one, you're unlikely to want to travel this road again no matter how much you liked the flavour. Sad really. They came so close to greatness. But like Icarus, these lollypops just flew to close to the sun. And melted into strange shrunken heads with the brains bursting out the top.

Next up: Lollyphile! -or- How I Sucked A Hobo Treat

-Dashiell 'MS + B = ♥' Asher

Image courtesy of Lollyphile.com

RGGS: Lollyphile! -or- How I Crunched The Little Green Fairy

To kick off this five-part-lolly-lickin'-love-fest in style I thought we'd begin with Lollyphiles! first crazy confectionary creation, The Absinthe Lollipop.

So. Absinthe. Let's get some facts up front. Absinthe is no longer the taboo liqueur that has been banned in countries around the world for its insane psycho-active effects that fueled the Bohemian life style of many a midget Frenchman. The main reason for this is absinthe doesn't actually have insane psycho-active effects. Like, none. Outside of getting you, you know, wasted. But these lollipops won't even do that: no alcohol here, all been burned off in the cooking process.

So now that I've crushed the whole romantic side of the equation, let's get to the real deal: the CANDY.

The Look: The lolly is a deep green colour and carries a sweet scent of anise. The packaging is a bit rough round the edges, the wrapper looking a little frayed and the logo scuffed. But that's a fact that seems to have carried across to all the sweets.

It should also be noted: these are some big lollipops. I'm not talking like huge fair-ground discs made exclusively to be consumed by Victorian children (it's the law) , but these suckers are easily the size of a large ping-pong ball. While this means they last a hell of a long time (well over an hour for me, they're freaking hard to crunch) they're also not very comfortable to leave in your mouth for longer periods of time. So expect to be holding them like a ciga-lolly.

But in the end what we all really care about is:

The Flavour: First reaction finds a pleasingly subtle and sweet natural liquorice flavour from the absinthes anise. It's more akin to fennel than the synthetic black liquorice candy flavouring found in treats like jelly beans or twizzlers. The sweetness is balanced by a slightly bitter trace of the alcohol that I personally found pleasant, but I could see putting off some people.

Should you buy it?: Well... Maybe. I'm not going to pretend I didn't enjoy this lollypop. A large part of your own enjoyment hinges on whether or not you like the anise (read liquorice) flavour. If you do, then yes, you will like this sweet. However it should be noted that, while it's a nice liquorice flavour, it's probably not the first time you've had a sweet that tastes like it. Yes the bitter edge of the absinthe makes it a bit more unusual, but these are relatively expensive sweets we're talking about (ten bucks for four), and if the experience isn't all that unique some might feel a bit gouged by it.

All that being said, the real allure of trying these sweets is that they are made with absinthe, a vilified and romantic liqueur. They rank as being the kind of experience it's fun just to be able to say you've tried. I don't know that I'd rush to do it again, but I wouldn't say no.

Considering that they come in both of the variety packs Lollyphile! offers, you are extremely likely to wind up trying one anyway. They're fun and definitely tasty. Just don't expect anything mind blowing. Think less 'The Green Fairy' and more 'The Green Vaguely Nice Person You Met Who You'd Probably Enjoy Seeing Again But You Don't Have Their Number And Won't Go Out Of Your Way To Get It Because You Know How It Is.'

Tomorrow: Lollyphile! -or- How I Sucked On Bits Of A Pig

-Dashiell 'Your Midget Frenchman' Asher

Image courtesy of Lollyphile.com

RGGS: Lollyphile! -or- How To Get Bacon In Your Candy

For those of you who haven't yet stumbled across its brightly coloured banners currently screaming pink, sweet toothy murder across the internet, Lollyphile! is an online independent candy store with its prime (and only) stock being a variety of unusually flavoured Lollipops.

The company is based in San Fransisco and had its start around Halloween in 2007 where, as they put it, they found themselves with 'a lot of absinthe and no candy. One thing lead to another...'

From these humble beginnings, alongside a whole lot of imagination and some trial and error in the kitchen, they have emerged with a series of bizarre Lolly creations for us, the lucky public, to sample.

The full list as it currently stands goes a little something like this:

-Absinthe Lollipops

-Bourbon Lollipops

-Maple-Bacon Lollipops

-Wasabi Ginger Lollipops

-White Russian Lollipops

Now, being a gentleman genius scholar, I felt it my duty to try out each of these sweets and report back to you, Joe-everyman, which ones were worth your hard earned bucks. It'll be hard. I've heard tell these are some LARGE lollipops. But never fear. There is no pop too large for this scholar. I'm ready to get my sucker on.

Because that's the kind of man I am.

Check back tomorrow for Lollyphile! -or- How I Crunched The Little Green Fairy

-Dashiell 'I Want Candy' Asher

Image Courtesy of www.lollyphile.com