Tag: survival

Dead Space: The Most Terrifying Game Ever

~ Gareth Ellis ~ Leave a comment

Dead Space is a survival horror game that was released in October 2008 for the Xbox 360, PlayStation 3 and PC.

The game is set on a mining spaceship that is now infested by creatures known as Necromorphs. You take control of Isaac Clarke, an engineer that has to investigate what happened aboard the ship. He not only has to fight the aforementioned Necromorphs but also increasing psychosis. As you explore the ship, environmental noises and music, along with the darkness, serve to disorient you and draw you deeper into the horrific nature of the game. This game throws enemies at you that you can’t outright kill. Instead, you have to dismember their bodies one limb at a time until they stop coming at. When you’ve got multiple enemies coming at you, this serves to increase your anxiety to dangerous levels.

Back in 2008, when Dead Space came out, it was straight on my list. I couldn’t wait to get my teeth into it, but this wasn’t to last.

As I’ve mentioned before, I love horror games, but I’m a wuss when it comes to playing them. As much as I wanted to play this game, I just couldn’t bring myself to do it. I would dip in and out of it every so often, never able to spend much time playing as the anxiety it would induce was incredible. Time moved on, and I all but forgot about it. When the sequels came out, I wanted to play them, but I saw no point as I hadn’t finished the first one.

Over the years, I managed to collect all three games but still didn’t play them. Recently, however, I’ve been on a kick to finish games that have been on my to-play list for far too long. Many of these games are horror games such as Alien Isolation, Resident Evil VII, and Dead Space.

I was looking for a game to stream when I decided that it would be a good idea to do Dead Space, and I used this as motivation to finally get it finished.

As soon as I started the game again, I remembered why I had so much trouble playing it. To begin with; it’s terrifying.

I don’t know what exactly makes it one of the scariest games I’ve ever played, but I think it’s a combination of enemies that just keep on coming for you, the darkness of space, the near-constant background noise of things running around in the ship and the fact that I’m still a wuss.

After several weeks of streaming – doing a couple of hours at a time – I finally finished Dead Space this weekend, and now that I have, I’m so glad I decided to play it because it’s a fantastic game. Everything about it is so well done.

I’m going to give Dead Space a 9/10. The graphics and effect are excellent. The music and sound are top-notch, and the gameplay makes you want to keep coming back for more despite knowing that it’s not good for you.

Having now finished the first game, there is a part of me that wants to jump straight into the second, but there’s a bigger part of me that just isn’t ready for it just yet.

It has recently been announced that all three games in the series are getting a remaster for the new generation of consoles, and I feel like I really have to finish the original versions before the new ones come out. Will I actually do this? God knows. Will I try? Probably, but I don’t think Dead Space 2 will be the next game I stream. I think I need something a little tamer. But stay tuned.

You can find me streaming over on Twitch using the link below.

Zombies Everywhere! – State of Decay 2 (Review)

~ Gareth Ellis ~ 3 Comments

State of Decay 2 is an open-world zombie survival game. It’s the sequel to State of Decay (No kidding, eh?) by Undead Labs and it was released in May 2018 for XBox One. It’s also had a rerelease for Xbox Series X/S in December 2020.

State of Decay was a game that looked interesting from the get go and was definitely something I wanted to play. I bought the first game after finding it on the XBox store at a cheap price and thought, “Why the hell not?” I was hooked from the start. So when a sequel was announced, I knew that I had to play it. It wasn’t a game that I left for a while, I pre-ordered it as I wanted to play it as soon as I could.

The main base of the game remains the same as the first game, in that you control survivors of a zombie apocalypse and you have to build a settlement by scavenging items from nearby locations. As with the first game, the fear of imminent death is constantly with you as if one of your characters dies, that’s it, they ain’t coming back. There is no manual save or load. Your actions really do matter.

The game takes place away from Trumbull Valley (the location of the first game) and allows you to pick from four different locations to settle. Each location has it’s ups and downs. For example, one may be heavily built up and put you in an area with a tonne of locations to easily scavenge, and another will put you in a sparser location with bigger areas of empty space.

The mechanics to SoD2 are pretty similar to the first game but with a few notable differences.

First the similarities;

  • You control one characters at a time and can enlist one other to follow.
  • You spend your time scavenging for resources to build your community.
  • There are zombies to fight. A lot of zombies. That range from normal ones, to ferals (fast and grabby), juggernauts (big and smashy), bloaters (fat and explody), screamers (thin and noisy)
  • You have free reign over the open-world map.
  • You can add survivors you find in the world to your community. Each character has different skills that will help you survive and upgrade your base.
  • You can establish outposts (a location separate to your main settlement that allows you to drop off/pick-up items)
  • Zombies are attracted by noise.
  • If a character dies, they die (just like real life.)
  • Infestations in buildings occur and you have to wipe them out to make the area a bit safer.

The differences;

  • When you set up an outpost you’re no longer able to set traps around it.
  • You can no longer board up the windows in houses your looting.
  • There are now a new type of zombie – blood plague zombies. These will infect you with a virus that if left untreated will eventually kill your character.
  • Along with the blood plague zombies there are what’s called “Plague Hearts.” These are kind of nests in certain buildings that you have to destroy in order to complete the game’s story. These locations are similar to the infestations, but they will be full of (and attract more) blood plague zombies.
  • You can no longer assign other characters to loot locations while your controlled characters are doing whatever you’re making them do.
  • There’s now a “Stuck” radio call that you can use if you end up stuck or trapped in a certain place (this would happen a lot in the first game and it was hard to get your character out, so this was a welcome addition.)
  • You now need to manually fuel and repair your vehicles – in the first game they would repair overnight if placed at your base and the fuel was infinite. This adds a whole new level to the game and makes you think about your journeys more carefully.. 

Some of the things that were in the first game but not the second I kind of miss – like the getting your other characters working while you’re out. That was really useful for gathering things quicker. But there’s nothing that lets the game down. It just takes a bit of getting used to the changes.

But with the good, there’s of course, the bad.

This game can be glitchy as f!ck. The first game was pretty glitchy but you could forgive it as it was made by a small studio that seemed to be just starting out. But this game at times is ridiculous. You can go a while without anything happening and then your vehicle will hit invisible rocks, or flip for no reason, your characters might fall through the floor or get stuck in between more invisible rocks, or the game might just crash when saving meaning you have to close it completely and restart it. So far in the many hours that we’ve played this game, there haven’t been any game breaking bugs. Even the game crash allows you to restart the game in the same place as it died. If nothing else, the bugs are mildly irritating.

I’ve lost count of how many hours we’ve played and how many times we’ve played through the game. It’s just a game that no matter how many times you play it, it’s always a challenge because you don’t know what’s going to be thrown at you next.

State of Decay 2 also has a number or DLCs that have been added – for free – to the base game allowing you to play without any extra costs. I think this is a great addition, especially these days when some DLCs cost as much as the main game and only give you an extra hour of play time. I’ll go into more detail about the Heartland DLC – that sees your return to Trumbull Valley– in next week’s blog because it’s a game in itself.

I’ll leave this review with my rating. This game has it’s issues, but overall it’s a really enjoyable game. I feel like I can’t give it ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ because it is very glitchy. I’m going to change my rating system to a larger scale because I think this game deserves to be higher on the scale. I’m going to give it 8/10. It’s a solid game, with it’s issues. I just hope the third game – which is currently in development – adds to the story and irons out some of the bugs. I’d recommend it to anyone that enjoys zombies or looting and pillaging.

Bipolar Disorder: What Is It Really?

~ Gareth Ellis ~ 4 Comments

I’ve mentioned before that I have Bipolar disorder. In the years since my diagnosis, I’ve come across several people that don’t really know what it is or misunderstand it. In this blog, I’m going to try to explain it a little so bear with me as things may get a tad technical/medical.

What is Bipolar, and what are the symptoms?

At a basic level, Bipolar is a mental health condition that causes extreme mood swings. So this isn’t just feeling either happy or depressed, it’s feeling them to extremes. These moods can last for weeks or months.

What we’re talking about is this;

With the depression side, it’s not just feeling “sad.” You can feel the below sometimes multiple ones combined;

  • feeling sad, hopeless or irritable most of the time
  • lacking energy
  • difficulty concentrating and remembering things
  • loss of interest in everyday activities
  • feelings of emptiness or worthlessness
  • feelings of guilt and despair
  • feeling pessimistic about everything
  • self-doubt
  • being delusional, having hallucinations and disturbed or illogical thinking
  • lack of appetite
  • difficulty sleeping
  • suicidal thoughts

On the flip side, being manic isn’t just “happy,” it’s all of the below;

  • feeling very happy, elated or overjoyed
  • talking very quickly
  • feeling full of energy
  • feeling self-important
  • feeling full of great new ideas and having important plans
  • being easily distracted
  • being easily irritated or agitated
  • being delusional, having hallucinations and disturbed or illogical thinking
  • not feeling like sleeping
  • not eating
  • doing things that often have disastrous consequences – such as spending large sums of money on expensive and sometimes unaffordable items
  • making decisions or saying things that are out of character and that others see as being risky or harmful

Sometimes, one side of the Bipolarity is felt more than the other, in my case – and indeed most cases – depressive episodes are experienced more often than manic episodes.

Between these episodes, you may have periods of feeling “normal.” Which is just not high or low, but still far from what other people would call normal.

The patterns for the highs and low can vary from time to time, and person to person. But these patterns can be classified as the below;

  • rapid cycling – where you repeatedly swing from a high to a low phase quickly without having a “normal” period in between
  • mixed state – where you experience symptoms of depression and mania together; for example, overactivity with a depressed mood

Living with Bipolar

Living with Bipolar can be hard at times sometimes – especially a manic episode – you may not be aware that you’re having an episode. After an episode is over, however, you may realise that you were and may even be shocked by what you did during it. But while you’re in it, you may think that people are just being negative or are against you in some way.

Just because you have a Bipolar diagnosis doesn’t mean that your episodes will be the same as someone else with the disorder, everyone can experience it differently.

The extremes of it may also affect your life in other ways. For example, it might be hard to stay in a job; personal relationships may suffer, and there’s also an increased risk of suicide. During an episode, you may also experience strange things, like hallucinations which can also affect your daily life.

Along with all this fun, you may also have delusions or psychotic episodes thrown in for good measure.

Causes

Bipolar disorder is widely believed to be the result of chemical imbalances in the brain.

The chemicals responsible for controlling the brain’s functions are called neurotransmitters and include noradrenaline, serotonin and dopamine. If one or more of these is imbalanced, then you may experience symptoms of Bipolarity.

For example, there’s evidence that episodes of mania may occur when levels of noradrenaline are too high, and bouts of depression may be the result of noradrenaline levels becoming too low.

It is also thought that Bipolar can be genetic. So if you have family members with it, you’re at an increased of also developing it.

From what I’ve read, there’s isn’t a single gene that causes Bipolar, unlike other genetic disorders, but both genetic and environmental factors can cause it.

A stressful situation or circumstance can often trigger the symptoms of Bipolar disorder.

How is it triggered?

Some examples of stressful triggers include:

  • Relationship breakdown
  • physical, sexual or emotional abuse
  • the death of a close family member or loved one

These are life-altering events and could bring about a depressive episode at any time in a person’s life.

Bipolar disorder may also be triggered by:

  • physical illness
  • sleep disturbances
  • overwhelming problems in everyday life, such as problems with money, work or relationships

As far as my Bipolar goes, I’ve spent year’s trying to work out triggers. Sometimes I can pinpoint them down to life events, but others seem just to happen. They also don’t have a regular pattern so I can’t even work out when they might occur and plan for them. The fact that they can happen at any time is also a cause of stress because I find myself worrying about when a depressive episode might hit me

Getting diagnosed can be a struggle. In my case, it was hard to get because I would only contact the doctor when I was in a low mood. When high everything was awesome – much like the Lego movie; just without the singing – so at the beginning I ended up being told I just had depression. It’s only when the moods went up and down regularly that I questioned this and spoke about it.

I’ve done several rounds of CBT, spoken to psychiatrists and doctors and been on more medication than. I can remember before I got to the “stable” place I’m in now. Don’t get me wrong, I still ups and downs, but now they didn’t happen as regularly, and when they do, I can handle them slightly better.

There are, at times, still bouts of depression that floor me. I had one of these at the back end of last year where I felt worse than I’ve felt in a long time. The fact that it was the first really low mood I’d had in a while made it feel so much worse than it was. It was so bad that I didn’t want to be here anymore, and if I didn’t have the love and support of those around me – especially Alex – then I might not be.

Living with Bipolar is hard, but it is not all that I am – even though it might feel like it sometimes.

In future blogs, I’ll talk more about how both the depressive and manic sides have affected me.

One last thing before I sign off. If you’re reading this and you think, “This is me” and you’re struggling day-to-day, just know that there is help out there for you. It sucks asking for help, and I’m someone who finds it really hard to ask for it and say what I need, but without being able to make that first step, God knows where I would be.

As hard as it is to tell my story, I feel like getting it out there may help people realise that they’re not alone because I know that that’s how it feels sometimes.

December PSNow – Stranded Deep (A Review)

~ Gareth Ellis ~ 1 Comment

A few months ago we decided that to stop us spending a fortune on new games, and to play things that we wouldn’t necessarily have bought, we’d get PSNow.

As we play through the games when they’re added, I’m going to give them a bit of a review and let you know what we thought of them.

The December PSNow additions are; Horizon: Zero Dawn (Complete Edition), Stranded Deep, Wreckfest, The Surge 2, Darksiders III and Broforce.

First, we decided to play Stranded Deep. We would have played Horizon: Zero Dawn, but that’s a bit of a sore subject. Before I get into Stranded Deep, I’ll explain the Horizon issue.

I bought Horizon: Zero Dawn when it came out. We’ve been playing it again recently to platinum it – after we’d done that we decide to get the DLC. I checked it wasn’t on sale (it wasn’t) and we went ahead and bought it. It’s a good DLC, that’s not the issue. The issue is that 2 days after we bought the Frozen Wilds DLC, the new PSNow games were announced and it included *drum roll* the complete edition of Horizon: Zero Dawn with the Frozen Wilds DLC *cue overdramatic scream into the air* I’m past it now, I’m over it. No, really, I am *sob*. So let’s get back to Stranded Deep.

Stranded Deep is a suntan simulator, I mean it’s a first-person survival sim. It starts with your character sat in a (private) jet which then goes down in the middle of the ocean, after a dramatic scene where a large hole is ripped in the side of the plane – maybe by gremlins, we don’t know – and crashes conveniently between a group of islands.

You start with a life raft and a few rations (which are hidden in the raft. – we didn’t find these for quite some time.) So when you drift up to your new island home, you have to find ways to survive. You can craft different items – which this, what looks like CEO of a company, miraculously knows how to make – in order to survive. Oh yeah, you also have a watch that tells you how healthy you are and what skills you have – are you listening Apple?

You kill crabs for your first island meal, and despite having all this in-depth survival knowledge, when getting meat from a crab you still say “Ew, gross!”. You soon discover you can drink water from coconuts to stave off thirst, but you can also eat coconuts, but if you eat or drink too many, bad things happen. Once you’ve got your makeshift shelter built – just a few sticks and leaves required for this – complete with fire pit, you go about your business and strip the island that you started on of all it’s natural resources all this while knowing that nothing will grow back – at least not in our lifetime. Once you’ve done this you then have to venture out into the ocean to discover new items.

Now, I must say that I tapped out before we got to this bit. I’m all for games that make you slog, but this is beyond me. So from this point, picture me, whiskey in one hand and a cigar in the other, giving helpful suggestions (Actually I was generally slouched in my pyjamas with an Irn-Bru and Kit Kat in hand, shouting the world “rock!” whenever one appeared on screen, but that’s by-the-by) watching a professional (Alex) master the art of survival.

As you cross the ocean, you soon realise that there are things beneath the waves that want to kill you – at this point we switched the animal AI to passive so they wouldn’t kill us – just like in real life. On the other islands, you can find all sorts of bits and pieces from scrap wood and corrugated metal, to engine parts? and a whole host of creatures to murder for your survival – unless they kill you first, that is – especially the damn spiky purple starfish of death. Just be careful when leaving your island because it’s very easy to get lost and end up rowing in circles for a few days before eventually giving up and reloading the save you took 3 days ago because you forgot to save it before leaving the island like a numpty.

As you continue, you’ll find shipwrecks which you can scavenge for more stuff for your collection. We also found a knackered plane that you can fix – isn’t that really helpful and totally non-coincidental?

Alex has restarted I don’t know how many times after dying from drowning, dehydration, a broken leg, poison, but luckily not dysentery. But she’s on a roll and making some progress now; she’s even managed to build a Sims-like hovel in the centre of one of the islands.

We’ll continue to play – probably until Alex gets the platinum – so it will have a lot of hours put into it. So if nothing else it’s suitable for playing to pass the time.

As I said, I’m not overly enamoured with it because I don’t have the attention span for these kinds of games that I used to, but Alex is enjoying it as she loves a good slog, although she’s not really playing it to win and get off the island rather more like a Sims-like game.

One thing I will say is that I can’t help but admire the detail that’s gone into some of the effects and creatures. I mean the turtle alone deserves an honourable mention.

Personally, I’d give it a 3 out of 5, it has some good points, it’s stunning to look at, and the idea is executed really well, it’s just not for me. I’ve never Googled things for a game as often as I have for this. It doesn’t give you much prompting on what to do after the very basic tutorial when first reaching the island. The music is good, although it does go from sounding like The Last of Us to Vampyr to A Series of Unfortunate Events (the Jim Carrey version.) But, if you like a good slog, then this is probably a game for you, but there are also probably better games out there that do the same thing.

I’m not sure what the next game is that I’ll play. Though, hopefully, I’ll actually be able to play this one.

As an addition to all this, I’m also going to be trying to get back into streaming on Twitch. My profile is linked on the home page of this blog, so feel free to follow. I’m aiming to stream on a Saturday morning (GMT) so hopefully you can join me.