On 29/06/2011 08:51 PM, Warp wrote:

>    A few years ago I bought Psychonauts because it was available on Steam,
> and because I had heard such good things about it.
>
>    I didn't get it. What's so good about it?

 From a technical perspective... nothing special here. In fact, pretty 
poor. From a playability perspective... the camera handles very poorly, 
the difficulty curve is wonky as hell, and there are various other glitches.

 From the perspective of imagination, creativity, story-telling and just 
plain fun... wow.

In most games, the story is entirely optional. You can follow it if you 
wish. Or you can go make a cup of tea while the dialog happens. All you 
have to do is walk forward and shoot anything that moves. OK, you might 
have to pay attention just enough to realise who's the good guys and 
who's the bad guys, or that the blue sparkly thing is the thing you're 
supposed to pick up to unlock the door to the next room. But that's 
about it. The story only really exists as an excuse to explain why you 
have to stand in this room for 3 minutes while waves of enemies bombard you.

Psychonauts is the only game I've ever seen that takes "telling a story" 
seriously. Until I played this, I hadn't even realised what a joke most 
other games are in this direction. The characters actually have 
personallities beyond "I'm the good guy" and "I'm the evil guy". The 
voice acting wasn't an after-thought. There's wit and humour.

And you can set squirrels on fire with your mind.

It's not the greatest game that has ever existed. There's several ways 
it could be made better. But it's the best story experience I've ever 
seen. Still, I guess if story isn't your thing...

-- 
http://blog.orphi.me.uk/
http://www.zazzle.com/MathematicalOrchid*

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