Bring on the blacklight…

A few weeks ago, Kotaku ran a post on whether readers preferred digital, in-game content or solid, tangible stuff with their collector’s edition purchases. (I would link to the post itself, but am too bewildered by Gawker Media’s horrible new redesign to search for it).

I fall squarely into the “I like STUFF” camp. I don’t want some mediocre, ugly in-game armor that my character wouldn’t be caught dead in, but I luuuurve collectible figurines, posters, and the biggie—art books. I treasure game design art books like few other possessions. In the case of a fire, I would certainly save my limited edition art books before the games they came with. Hell, I’d snatch them up before I grabbed the console the games are played on. Game discs and consoles are more easily replaced than my precious art books (except for Jade Empire, perhaps. I’d make an exception to grab at least one of my two copies of JE).

Bioshock 2, followed by runner-up Fallout: New Vegas, is the best money I’ve ever spent on a collector’s edition video game. In a 13″ x 13″ box graced with awesome (if somewhat confusing to my Dollywood-loving soul, what with that butterfly) artwork, the collector’s edition contained three posters featuring vintage ads from Rapture, a vinyl 180g LP featuring the orchestral score from the original Bioshock, a CD containing the Bioshock 2 orchestral score, and a 164 page 8″ x 11″ hardbound art book. I was blown away when I opened it. I framed the posters and decorated my bathroom in a Bioshock theme—if the sink springs a leaky faucet, it’ll fit right in, ya know?—and they have hung there unmolested since….UNTIL I read an interesting comment on the previously mentioned Kotaku article, which mentioned a surprise if one shines a blacklight on the three Bioshock 2 posters. Of course I went home and tried it (with my laptop sitting on the floor playing the song from the Sea of Dreams teaser trailer for maximum effect), and…

HOW HAVE I MISSED THIS FOR SO LONG?

Behold:

Well, I suppose I missed it for so long because I have moved past the stage in my life in which I thought it was cool to have blacklights hanging around my house. I was so excited to discover this real-life easter egg, however, that I am now prepared to put a blacklight nightlight in the bathroom so guests can be awed/creeped out, according to their preferences.

More fun after the jump:

So…

The last time I posted about Bioshock 2, I was royally disappointed. I revisited it a million years (read: a couple months) ago and gained a whole new appreciation for it. That post is still forthcoming, but while the love (and continued annoyance with Sofia Lamb) is rolling over me:

Sofia Lamb = Joan Allen in the movie version, yes?

In defense of Carth

If you’ve poked around a bit on this blog, you may have noticed that I’m a fan of Bioware’s roleplaying games. A huge fan, in fact. One of the things that drew me into Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic (and my subsequent Bioware love) back in the olden days of 2003 was KOTOR’s inclusion of romance quests. While watching my ex-boyfriend play KOTOR, bored nearly to death (KOTOR is one of those games that’s so much better to play than watch, no?), a lightbulb went off in my head.

“Wait, there’s a romance element to this game? You’re going to hook up with that Bastila chick?”

“And you can make a female character, right?”

“If you make a girl character, do you get to hook up with one of the dudes?”

“YES?!”

Sold.

Well hello there, Mr. Onasi.

Nostalgia time with Pokémon Snap

Real world stuff has taken over my life a bit lately (boring!), but I did have time to play an intense session of Pokémon Snap recently with a friend. We dusted off the N64, blew on the game cartridge, and went to it.

Good times!

…and my love for Dragon Age continues unabated!

My Dragon Age crisis is over!

Spoilers:

Resident Evil 5, you disappointed me.

The recent release of Resident Evil 5: Gold Edition made me remember: oh yeah, I played Resident Evil 5. That’s never a good sign.

I recall being terribly excited to play Resident Evil 5, because I loved Resident Evil 4 so much. I watched early trailers of the game with bated breath; I could hardly WAIT for it to come out.

Then it did.

I played it. I remain decidedly underwhelmed.

In the world of unfortunate names…..

This exists. Just thought you should know.

Resident Evil 4

How much do I love this game? SO MUCH.

Growing up, I wasn’t interested in shooters. Goldeneye left me cold. I played Halo’s campaign on co-op and enjoyed it, but never felt a burning desire to pick it up again. I didn’t start playing Resident Evil 4 until 2006, but as soon as I began, I fell madly in love.

Assault is not sexy, Zoo Today.

I haven’t heard much about Heavy Rain since its release. I wrote earlier about my distaste for Quantic Dream’s focus on a female character’s sexual assault in the game’s marketing, and hoped that the scene might be handled more sensitively in-game than promotional materials suggested.

Last night, I stumbled across this on the website of “lad’s mag” Zoo. If you don’t care to click through and give a pageview to rape-appreciating misogynists, I’ve got you covered. The piece in question is a slideshow preview of Heavy Rain titled “The List: PS3 Goes X-Rated!” It focuses entirely on Madison Paige’s storyline, and includes several nude screen captures of her. It also includes this quote, which realizes my worst speculations about players finding Paige’s sexual assault at gunpoint “sexy”:

“What you’re supposed to do next [to avoid being forced to strip and save the female character's life] is obvious fairly early on (hit him with a lamp, so that you can tie him up and interrogate him), but clearly we wanted to play the scene out for as long as possible. You know, for research.
We’re pretty sure that you would do the same.”

This text appears under a screenshot of Madison Paige naked in a shower. Her head hangs dejectedly, and the water is running down her hair into her face.

I am utterly and thoroughly disgusted. I realize this vile attitude comes from Zoo, a publication that exists to objectify topless women. Unfortunately, Zoo has many real, live, human readers who presumably share and support the views expressed in its pages and on its website. I originally found the idea of a simulation of a woman’s sexual assault being used as some sort of proxy for male players to experience a shadow of the degradation inherent in such an experience distasteful, but I found it far preferable to the thought of players being titillated by a woman’s violation. The appearance of the latter point of view on a popular magazine’s website forces me to revise my notion that only a few sickos might take pleasure in the scene.

There isn’t an adjective powerful enough to express how much this horrifies me.

Sony heralds the apocalypse

Last night/today’s global PS3 failure is supposedly fixed now, but I’m still prepared for a machine uprising à la Skynet.

Fortunately, countless hours of Resident Evil 4 have made me deadly with a riot gun.