So, as I've noted in the past, I've been on-and-off playing
Going Under. It's a roguelike that had the misfortune of being released around the same time as that one Greek mythos roguelike that everyone turned into some kind of identity badge for a while (that's now getting a sequel?). Sad really, it's a good roguelike. I've gotten the hang of how it plays, and now I've made enough progress to clear 2 of the 3 dungeon areas. I suspect one of the reasons it got glossed over is that, ultimately, it is kind of a short game. I'm pretty sure that once I clear the third dungeon, I'll face the final boss (which I presume to be
Marvin, Jacqueline's boss, equipping himself with the three relics from each dungeon
), and that'll be that.
It's kind of sad, too. Having been involved with startups at some points of my career, I can relate to a lot of what Going Under is making fun of. It's clearly taking the piss on startup culture and everything it stands for. Its graphical style is just Corporate Memphis, period, right down to the models and loading screens. The music is pretty good in how it parodies certain internet trends, with a couple tracks definitely sounding like something from Lo-Fi Beats to Study To. Your first dungeon is a parody on gig worker apps, your second a take on Tinder/Grindr/Feeld, and the third was making fun of crypto
before NFTs were even a thing. Ray, the CEO, reminds me a lot of my old CEO (before she fired me) in the sense of having this broad vision of a startup based on some personal experience but not having
any fucking clue how to make the business work. (Yeah, I'm still annoyed about losing that job.) The office settings all feel like startup offices, especially the hub area. It's a well-refined take on startups and the modern tech industry (though, with all the startup money disappearing thanks to
Inflation™, this might become a "product of its time"). It's good fun regardless, though I wish weapon durability was a little less of an issue.
Meanwhile, I'm now over halfway through
Grand Theft Auto IV. More specifically, 53.49%. Tonight, I just unlocked
New Jersey Alderney, which means the entire world is open. I've cleared all the piegons and stunt jumps (save one) in Algonquin, which means I only have to worry about Alderney stuff for side-quests and all that moving forward, which I'll get to once I get the Alderney safehouse (which I think is only 2 missions away). I currently have the Derrick and Gerald missions unlocked, as well as the second
Mike Toreno United Liberty Paper mission. I also just unlocked Packie as a friend, as well as the chance to date Kate.
I also got Dwayne after killing off Playboy X, along with the bonus safehouse.
More on the friends in another post.
There are definitely a lot of quality-of-life improvements in GTA IV over the 3D Trilogy that I do appreciate. Some are minor: For example, you don't lose your weapons when you get Wasted anymore, and if you die on a mission, you get a text that allows you to start the mission over instantly. Those are really nice touches. Vigilante was a lot less a pain in the ass, since you don't have to go on streaks to complete the mission for your percentage, and you can even take breaks if you want. There's a lot less drudgery work to getting the 100%, which is quite the opposite of what I experienced in Bully or even the 3D GTAs. Finally, while imperfect, the subway functions as an incidental form of fast travel, as well as a great way to lose Wanted Levels.
Still, game has a lot of issues, too. First: After Algonquin opened up, I really started to see the performance issues. I have a computer that's top of the line from 2019 (Ryzen 3700X, RTX 2080 Ti, NVMe SSD on m.2, so on), and I get a lot of frame drops to sometimes even 30 frames per second. It's probably going to be at least another 5-10 years before computers can surpass Rockstar's terrible porting skills to deliver consistent high frame rates. Second...I can see why the (Girl) Friend System was unliked. I can understand, in a certain way, the mechanisms in place, and how it relates in real life: If you don't see your friends all that often, they're not going to be close to you at all. Same goes with your girlfriend. It's secretly a lesson on being social. Trouble is, they do this by basically making your friends
needy as fuck. Practically all of them call at least once a day, if not every two days. And while I think I've reached the max number of friends at 5, that's STILL a lot to juggle. I've yet to even touch the girlfriends element outside of Michelle (though I'll probably meet Kate soon), even though supposedly maxing the optional girlfriends out offers benefits. It got really annoying as I was clearing out the pigeons in Algonquin, as the friends called me like a dozen or so times throughout the process. So yeah, not as good as I thought it would be. Ah well. I'll keep going regardless.
#1 mega cd enjoyer AND "making fun of"-er 
) and I should probably finish up Psycho Dream on the Super Famicom. I wonder how much time I'll have since the semester is about to start up lol. 
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