Yeah, maybe I was a bit too harsh on it. The fact that I could go back later to the first area I visited (the one in the West) and find immediately a whole lot of secrets I missed the first time around surely proves that the game teaches you to "read" its language. I know, for example, that there is sometimes debris…

How delightful!

"School rivalries are an unfortunate and inescapable result of human tendencies."

To be fair, "relentlessly punished" might paint a somewhat misleading picture. Hyper Light Drifter has an approach to difficulty that is clearly inspired by Dark Souls or Hotline Miami:
You can't cheese your way through encounters, but the game runs on faith in the player's capabilities and his patience. Whenever you…

It's something that survival games sometimes do well, actually. One of my favourite game series of all times is Das Schwarze Auge, more commonly known as The Dark Eye-trilogy. I struggled to find a name for them for a long time, but now you could
just call them a hardcore medevial RPG game meets a survival game.

This is as good a place as any to drop the following (sorry for going all mini-essayish, but the people here are a fine commentariat to talk about it): Hyper Light Drifter seems like the devs had read Tevis Thompson's "Saving Zelda"-essay and decided to make a game out of it. Thompson argues there that the Zelda…

This is as good a place as any to write the following: Hyper Light Drifter seems like the devs had read Tevis Thompson's "Saving Zelda"-essay and decided to make a game out of it. Thompson argues there that the Zelda series has lost a lot what made them great by stripping them from the sense of discovery and mistery…

It's something that survival games sometimes do well, actually. One of my favourite game series of all times is Das Schwarze Auge, more commonly known as The Dark Eye-trilogy. I struggled to find a name for them for a long time, but now you could just call them a hardcore medevial RPG game meets a survival game.

To be fair, "relentlessly punished" might paint a somewhat misleading picture. Hyper Light Drifter has an approach to difficulty that is clearly inspired by Dark Souls or Hotline Miami: You can't cheat through encounters, but the game runs on faith in the player's capabilities and his patience. Whenever you die, you…

I stand corrected. Thanks for the information, I wasn't fully aware of it.

Same here. I even did write a feature article on the whole Let's Play-phenomenon back when it got big, interviewing a lot of people… and why I know all the reasons why people might like them, I just can't get into it myself.

I think I've read somewhere else that Weerasethakul decided to let himself be called "Joe" simply because people couldn't bother to learn his actual name, even less pronouncing it correctly. (All of which made reading "Joe" all throughout this piece a bit grating, I have to admit.) Also, it's been a while since I have…

Yeah, it's like the developers read that Saving Zelda essay in which the author (rightfully) argues that the series has lost all mystery and then decided that, well, Son, we will give you mystery and secrets, we'll give you ALL OF THEM. I won't complain, though, this kind of discovery is still very much exciting to me.

If you want a gentle hint for Nelly Cootalot without having the puzzle solved outright for you, I might maybe be of assistance. I finished the game earlier this week. "Charming" is very much the word I'd use for it, too.

I just wonder if Greenwald had to battle Schwartzmann in order to get to date Larson, which might have been… awkward.

Some suggestions: I personally liked Lone Survivor a lot. Great soundtrack, really dense atmosphere. Also, it does not overstay its welcome. The creator once made a de-made of Silent Hill, and this one is a personal take on the subject.

Color out of space?

For a more nuanced take on the "he was a colossally bad writer" argument, I'd like to direct your attention to Joyce Carol Oates essay on Lovecraft in the New York Review of Books:

You know that one of the very first mods for the game is/was one called " "Into Free", which restores the original song?

That makes two of you already! Patrick, here's another one!