A MOST AGREEABLE PASTIME
Video Games, Victorian Style
Author: Lewis Packwood
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Good morrow to you all, and welcome to ‘From The Armchair’, the first in a series of regular posts in which I, Lucius P. Merriweather, spout forth on any old subject that’s been picking at my addled brain, as well as giving you the odd salacious titbit about what’s been happening behind the hallowed doors…
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As usual I’m a little late to the party, but isn’t The Walking Dead brilliant? Despite hearing nothing but good things about it, I’ve only just got around to playing Telltale’s 2012 games series over the past few weeks. I read the first couple of Walking Dead comic books several years ago, and although I…
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I played Deus Ex: Human Revolution – Director’s Cut immediately after finishing The Last of Us, and I have to say the comparisons are unkind to the former. Then again, seeing as we voted The Last of Us as the second best game of this generation, anything that I played immediately afterwards was probably going…
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Crimson Shroud snuck out for release on the Nintendo eShop around Christmas 2012, and it quickly became one of my favourite 3DS games. It was created by Yasumi Matsuno, director of Vagrant Story and Final Fantasy Tactics among others, and it’s easily the highlight of the Guild01 series developed by Level-5. In modern RPGs there’s…
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Seven years after its launch in the UK, I can finally give you my first impressions of the PS3. Here on A Most Agreeable Pastime, we’ve never been ones to hurry. We can often be found dawdling around The Manor, idling flicking through The Times and absent-mindedly wondering how long it will be until Mrs…
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Trine 2: Director’s Cut was an impulse purchase on the weekend I received my Wii U, and it quickly turned into a surprise hit with my two sisters. Since then I’ve been playing through the game with my friend Mark at intervals of a few months, and last week we finally finished it, over a…
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When we created our rundown of the best games of the generation a couple of months back, I took Sir Gaulian’s word for it that The Last of Us should come in at number two, having not played the game myself. Now that I’ve had some time to hang out with Joel and Ellie in…
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Well, 2013 has certainly been an eventful year for gaming. The Xbox One and PS4 arrived with chest-beating bombast but a fairly shoddy line-up of games, and instead the real action was to be had on those soon-to-be-relegated ‘legacy’ consoles. The PS3 received what many are saying is its best game with The Last of…
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Hotel Dusk: Room 215 is a brilliant example of that most niche of genres, the visual novel. It’s difficult to classify Hotel Dusk as a game, if by ‘game’ you mean having some sense of autonomy in a virtual world – here it’s a mostly passive experience in which you talk to different characters, scroll…
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The PS4 and Xbox One have now both launched in the UK, so the question is, which one am I going to get for Christmas? Well, the answer is neither: I’m getting a PS3 instead. Both the PS4 and Xbox One look like impressive pieces of kit, but I’ve yet to see a single stand-out…
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Sir Gaulian’s experience of the Xbox One launch was underwhelming to say the least: only a handful of people turned up for what sounds like a mostly joyless and slightly militaristic midnight launch in Canberra. Having said that, it sounds like the launch went off with more of a bang in Sydney, and London was…
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I was intrigued to read an update on the Snap feature of the Xbox One today. The feature was announced at the Xbox One’s fateful unveiling, but it was somewhat lost beneath the tidal wave of outrage at the console’s ‘always-on’ internet requirement and the fact that Microsoft might be spying on our bedrooms. Now,…
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Last week we said farewell to the Wii with a list of our top ten games on the console, and right there in seventh place was this little gem: The Last Story. It snuck out for release in Europe in August 2012, right before the launch of the Wii U, but it turned out to…
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There was a sad piece of news last week as Nintendo announced that it was ceasing production of the Wii. It’s a console that’s divided many, but here at A Most Agreeable Pastime, it’s a gaming machine that we hold close to our hearts. The Wii has been criticised over the years for becoming a…
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There have been a few announcements over the past couple of weeks about Valve’s upcoming Steam Box, but I’m still utterly clueless as to what it is or why it’s important. I’m not sure whether this is intentional on Valve’s part as a sort of intrigue-generating PR strategy or whether it’s just the result of…
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I finished The Wonderful 101 at the weekend, and I’m still not sure whether I enjoyed it or not. The game has a nasty habit of being utterly opaque and confusing, yet it offers up moments of sheer delight along the way. For the first few hours of the game I was frankly lost. The…
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I really didn’t get on with Donkey Kong Country Returns 3D – so much so that I sold it when I was just halfway through the second world. I figured I’d prefer that my copy gave someone else some pleasure rather than simply causing me consternation. I had the original Donkey Kong Country on the…
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Yesterday afternoon I had a chance to check out this year’s Eurogamer Expo at Earl’s Court, which proved to be a lot of fun. I have to say I’m paying for it now though – I had a cold coming on yesterday morning, and half a day of excitedly wandering around buzzing and flashing booths…
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Just in case it’s escaped your attention, the Wii U isn’t doing very well. Not very well at all, in fact. It got off to an OK start, with around 3 million consoles sold worldwide between its November 2012 launch and the end of 2012. These sales weren’t quite as good as the Wii’s (3.19…
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It’s fair to say the Wii U hasn’t gotten off to the best of starts. I met a gamer the other day and told him I owned a Wii U, and his look of surprise was palpable – he admitted that I was the first person he’d met who actually owned one. With just 10,000…
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I’m a big fan of the Phoenix Wright games, as regular readers will have gathered from my glowing reviews of games one, two and three in the series. But Apollo Justice: Ace Attorney – the fourth game – almost defeated me. I was keen to complete Apollo Justice ahead of the release of Ace Attorney…
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I only finished ZombiU a few weeks ago, despite buying it when it came out in November 2012. This isn’t just because it’s hard to find time to play games these days (although I do struggle to fit them in), it’s because I couldn’t play it for more than an hour without wanting to rush…
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My first article for Eurogamer was published yesterday, and judging by the positive comments piling up beneath it, I’m pleased to say it was well received. Phew! If you missed it, here’s everything you ever wanted to know about the DIY computer revolution in Yugoslavia: http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2013-07-30-the-story-of-yugoslavias-diy-computer-revolution. I’d be the first to admit that it doesn’t…
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When Capcom revamped Resident Evil: Revelations for console release recently, I was tempted to pick it up for the Wii U. After playing the demo though, it just didn’t quite feel right on the big screen – it was designed for the 3DS after all – so I ended up buying the original 3DS version…
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Wow, what an E3 it’s been this year. Revelation after revelation. It’s been so exciting I even tried to engage some of my non-gamer friends in conversation about DRM policy, with predictably unsuccessful results. I think we can safely say that the show has been a complete PR disaster for Microsoft. After confusing the hell…
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I loved the original Luigi’s Mansion – I bought a GameCube at launch, and Luigi’s Mansion was one of the first games I got for it (along with Bloody Roar: Primal Fury, in case you’re interested). I can’t believe that was all the way back in 2002 – Nintendo sure took their sweet time in…
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So let’s get this out of the way first: Xbox One is a stupid name. I’m vaguely aware that the idea behind it is probably that there should be ‘one’ box under your telly that does everything, but it just sounds like it’s the first ever Xbox. I’ll bet they spend AGES thinking it up…
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Seeing as a sequel to The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past was announced for the 3DS just the other day, it seems like a good time to write about that other great portable Zelda game, Phantom Hourglass. I only played it for the first time very recently, but I was immediately struck…
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It’s not often that a video game makes me laugh out loud, but Far Cry 3: Blood Dragon had me giggling like a schoolgirl. It’s ridiculous, it’s funny, it’s lewd, but most of all it’s bloody good fun. What I like most is that the game doesn’t take itself seriously for a moment, and it’s…
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I caught up with the rest of the gaming world this week by finally, finally finishing Mass Effect. Loads of people, not to mention my co-blogger Sir Gaulian, have recommended that I play it, and it’s not hard to see why: the story is up there with the best I’ve seen in a video game.…
A MOST AGREEABLE PASTIME 