Another month rolls around, and another bunch of cheap games becomes
available on HumbleChoice. Humble has been on a roll these past few
months, making up for some cheesy selections earlier this year. Will
they keep givin' us the good stuff, or will it be more filler
material?

(Games are purchased through https://www.humblebundle.com/membership/
but all are available on Steam. Steam links provided for informational
use)


* The Forgotten City https://store.steampowered.com/app/874260/The_Forgotten_City/
An action-adventure game set in ancient Rome
where your time-manipulation powers are needed to
break a curse. In a city where the sin of almost
one person will doom an entire city, it's up to you
to figure our who the sinner is, constantly looping
through events and learning what's going on (and
trying to stop it). Sort of a Roman "Groundhog Day".
A bit clunky, but innovative. It might not be the sort
of game everyone appreciates, but I like it.

* Tiny Tina's Wonderlands - Chaotic Edition https://store.steampowered.com/app/1286680/Tiny_Tinas_Wonderlands/
The best DLC of "Borderlands 3" makes it as a
single-player game. This version includes the
original game, Dragon Lord Pack, and a Season Pass.
But despite all the goodies, I can't get too excited.
The Tiny Tina DLC was an awesome send-up of table-top
gaming and a unique twist to the Borderlands
formula... but its brevity was also its charm.
Extending the joke doesn't really make it better. And,
honestly, it's still "Borderlands" at its core, and I
never really cared too much for that franchise. For
what it is, it's an okay game but... I don't really
like what it is.

* Deceive, Inc
https://store.steampowered.com/app/820520/Deceive_Inc/
James Bond (spies!) crossed with Hitman (disguises)
by way of "No One Lives Forever" (humor) and "The
Ship" (multiplayer). Sneak into installations, disguise
yourself as anyone, and exfiltrate with the secrets...
before anyone else beats you to the punch. An
interesting idea whose implementation doesn't seem up
to the task.

* Aces & Adventures https://store.steampowered.com/app/1815570/Aces__Adventures/
I could go into what this game is all about, but
honestly, I don't care. It's a deckbuilding game
that uses poker rules for its combat. Is it good?
Maybe? I won't be finding out. Card-based games
are anathema to me.

* Patch Quest
https://store.steampowered.com/app/1347970/Patch_Quest/
An Indie metroidvania with cutesie graphics. Not
my thing. I'll leave it to others to judge whether
its any good or not.

* ForeTales
https://store.steampowered.com/app/1170080/Foretales/
Another game utilizing card mechanics. Don't
need to know more than that. Nope.

* Who Press Mute on Uncle Marcus https://store.steampowered.com/app/1628130/Who_Pressed_Mute_on_Uncle_Marcus/
FMV games have been making a bit of a comeback.
Some are good, but most seem to selling themselves
on the kitchness of the medium. This one seems to
be the same; it's not really that good a game, but
you might get some value from the absurdity of
the videos.

* Autonauts vs. Piratebots https://store.steampowered.com/app/1907720/Autonauts_vs_Piratebots/
In essence, a tower-defense game. Build up your
base, automate its defenses, and wait for waves
of baddies that try to overrun your fortress.
Basic logic and programming skills required to
properly automate your units. Apparently this game
is much more limited in capability than the 'Autonauts'
game on which it is based. It doesn't really sound
all that much fun to me, and I don't really like
the visual aesthetic either. Meh.



Well, I can't say much for this month's selection. The best game in
the bunch is pretty niche, and the rest are average at best. Still,
seeing as this gets me "The Forgotten City" for half its usual price,
I might as well pick up the bundle. But there's too much filler this
month to really recommend it to anyone else. Unless you see a game you
really like, maybe skip HumbleChoice until next month, eh?

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)

On Tue, 05 Sep 2023 19:55:23 -0400, Spalls Hurgenson <spallshurgenson@gmail.com> wrote:

Well, I can't say much for this month's selection. The best game in
the bunch is pretty niche, and the rest are average at best. Still,
seeing as this gets me "The Forgotten City" for half its usual price,
I might as well pick up the bundle. But there's too much filler this
month to really recommend it to anyone else. Unless you see a game you
really like, maybe skip HumbleChoice until next month, eh?

I will definitely be skipping over this one. Thank you for the
summary.

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)

* Who Press Mute on Uncle Marcus https://store.steampowered.com/app/1628130/Who_Pressed_Mute_on_Uncle_Mar cus/
FMV games have been making a bit of a comeback.
Some are good, but most seem to selling themselves
on the kitchness of the medium. This one seems to
be the same; it's not really that good a game, but
you might get some value from the absurdity of
the videos.

Wait, really? That entire genre was spawned from companies showing off their cd tech, right?

---------------
user <candycane> is generated from /dev/urandom

... I do have a memory. It's backed up on DVD... somewhere...
___ MultiMail/Linux v0.52

--- Mystic BBS/QWK v1.12 A45 2020/02/18 (Linux/64)
* Origin: The Bottomless Abyss BBS * bbs.bottomlessabyss.net (21:1/172)

Am 06.09.23 um 19:53 schrieb Mike S.:

On Tue, 05 Sep 2023 19:55:23 -0400, Spalls Hurgenson <spallshurgenson@gmail.com> wrote:

Well, I can't say much for this month's selection. The best game in
the bunch is pretty niche, and the rest are average at best. Still,
seeing as this gets me "The Forgotten City" for half its usual price,
I might as well pick up the bundle. But there's too much filler this
month to really recommend it to anyone else. Unless you see a game you
really like, maybe skip HumbleChoice until next month, eh?

I will definitely be skipping over this one. Thank you for the
summary.

As usual 2 games interest me, the rest is meh...
Unfortunately I already have The Forgotten City

But the other one which is interesting is enough reason not to skip it!

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)

* Who Press Mute on Uncle Marcus https://store.steampowered.com/app/1628130/Who_Pressed_Mute_on_Uncle_Mar cus/
FMV games have been making a bit of a comeback.
Some are good, but most seem to selling themselves
on the kitchness of the medium. This one seems to
be the same; it's not really that good a game, but
you might get some value from the absurdity of
the videos.

Wait, really? That entire genre was spawned from companies showing off their cd tech, right?

---------------
user <candycane> is generated from /dev/urandom

... I do have a memory. It's backed up on DVD... somewhere...
___ MultiMail/Linux v0.52

--- Mystic BBS/QWK v1.12 A45 2020/02/18 (Linux/64)
* Origin: The Bottomless Abyss BBS * bbs.bottomlessabyss.net (21:1/172)

Am 06.09.23 um 08:53 schrieb candycane:

Wait, really? That entire genre was spawned from companies showing off their cd
tech, right?

More or less, but some companies got FMV games really right, for
instance Sierra with their FMV adventure games like GK2!
But overall FMV never really stood a chance there were too many who
wanted to make a quick buck by shoving out movies with lackluster
choices instead of games.
And yes there is a small comeback nowdays, for better or worse ymmv!
I always liked FMV games but I never played the bad ones which swamped
the early 90s consoles!

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)

On Thu, 7 Sep 2023 12:52:57 +0200, "Werner P." <werpu@gmx.at> wrote:

But the other one which is interesting is enough reason not to skip it!

If there is at least one game in the list you want, it is probably
worth it. It is definitely worth it if there is at least two.
Unfortunately for me, this month sits at zero. :-P

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)

On Thu, 7 Sep 2023 13:22:55 +0200, "Werner P." <werpu@gmx.at> wrote:

Am 06.09.23 um 08:53 schrieb candycane:

Wait, really? That entire genre was spawned from companies showing off their cd
tech, right?

More or less, but some companies got FMV games really right, for
instance Sierra with their FMV adventure games like GK2!
But overall FMV never really stood a chance there were too many who
wanted to make a quick buck by shoving out movies with lackluster
choices instead of games.
And yes there is a small comeback nowdays, for better or worse ymmv!
I always liked FMV games but I never played the bad ones which swamped
the early 90s consoles!

Getting full-motion video was a huge triumph for games in the early
90s. Not just because of the immense disk space required, but because
it required a lot of horsepower to pull off. Games were pushing FMV -
or at least trying to push FMV - long before CDs became common,
although the limited transfer capactity of floppies limited how long
those videos could be. But until 486/33 (and faster) CPUs came along,
it really wasn't doable. Even years later, computers struggled to
render video full-screen without shrinking it down to a tiny part of
the screen, compressing it to shit, or using tricks like interlacing
to keep the framerate up.

(I remember being incredibly excited about "Prophecy of the Shadow",
an otherwise forgettable CRPG from SSI released in 1992, because it
featured brief postage-stamp sized 'videos' for some of its
characters. To see live action video on the computer screen - as
opposed to the cartoons of other games - seemed incredibly advanced
technology. That only a few years later we'd have minutes long videos
running full screen was almost unthinkable at the time).

There were a number of games that did FMV well, but they almost all
utilized FMV as one of many tools used to make a good game. "Wing
Commander III", "Command & Conquer", "Under a Killing Moon"... the
acting was often cheesy, but the video was fun and exciting. The worst
games - and the ones that gave FMV such a bad reputation - were the
ones that were entirely FMV: games like "Johnny Mnemonic", or "The
Hive" or "Terror TRAX: Track of the Vampire".

TL;DR: FMVs inclusion wasn't /just/ about showcasing the CD-ROMs
vaunted data capacity, but also showing off the cleverness of
programmers getting it to run on such puny CPUs. But whatever the
reason, everybody was excited about it because it was so exciting ;-)

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)

On 06/09/2023 00:55, Spalls Hurgenson wrote:

* The Forgotten City

I'd forgotten about that one, it's was interesting but it was in the
category of I just don't get it. I will fire it up again sometime but
only after I watched a YT video so the gameplay mechanic clicks with me.

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)

Am 07.09.23 um 13:29 schrieb Mike S.:

On Thu, 7 Sep 2023 12:52:57 +0200, "Werner P." <werpu@gmx.at> wrote:

But the other one which is interesting is enough reason not to skip it!

If there is at least one game in the list you want, it is probably
worth it. It is definitely worth it if there is at least two.
Unfortunately for me, this month sits at zero. :-P

Understandable, fortunately, I have yet to encounter such a month, but I
also so far have not had one, where more than two games were interesting.
It still is a good deal overall!

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)

On 9/7/23 07:36, Spalls Hurgenson wrote:

TL;DR: FMVs inclusion wasn't /just/ about showcasing the CD-ROMs
vaunted data capacity, but also showing off the cleverness of
programmers getting it to run on such puny CPUs. But whatever the
reason, everybody was excited about it because it was so exciting ;-)

Oh, so it's kinda like how demos are seen nowadays?

--
user <candycane> is generated from /dev/urandom

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)

On 9/8/2023 12:42 AM, candycanearter07 wrote:

On 9/7/23 07:36, Spalls Hurgenson wrote:

TL;DR: FMVs inclusion wasn't /just/ about showcasing the CD-ROMs
vaunted data capacity, but also showing off the cleverness of
programmers getting it to run on such puny CPUs. But whatever the
reason, everybody was excited about it because it was so exciting ;-)

Oh, so it's kinda like how demos are seen nowadays?

You get much more excited about demos than I do. MUCH more.

:P

--
I've done good in this world. Now I'm tired and just want to be a cranky
dirty old man.

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)

On 9/8/23 10:40, Dimensional Traveler wrote:

On 9/8/2023 12:42 AM, candycanearter07 wrote:

Oh, so it's kinda like how demos are seen nowadays?

You get much more excited about demos than I do.  MUCH more.

:P

Oh no, I'm not super into the demo scene. I know some people are tho.

--
--
user <candycane> is generated from /dev/urandom

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
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On Fri, 8 Sep 2023 18:37:47 -0500, candycanearter07 <no@thanks.net>
wrote:

On 9/8/23 10:40, Dimensional Traveler wrote:

On 9/8/2023 12:42 AM, candycanearter07 wrote:

Oh, so it's kinda like how demos are seen nowadays?

You get much more excited about demos than I do.  MUCH more.

:P

Oh no, I'm not super into the demo scene. I know some people are tho.

Now I'm confused.

Are we talking demos for games, or demo-scene demos?

I never got that excited about the former, and - honestly - don't
thing I have played any since the death of the DemoCD. Certainly I
haven't played any game demos since it became easy to stream videos of
gameplay on YouTube/wherever.

But demo-scene demos? Those things are /awesome/. Modern ones less so,
because they don't press the hardware quite so obviously... but the
classics? They were fantastic examples of artistry and technology
combined, showcasing the developer's skill at both.

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)

On 9/9/23 06:48, Spalls Hurgenson wrote:

Are we talking demos for games, or demo-scene demos?

I never got that excited about the former, and - honestly - don't
thing I have played any since the death of the DemoCD. Certainly I
haven't played any game demos since it became easy to stream videos of gameplay on YouTube/wherever.

But demo-scene demos? Those things are /awesome/. Modern ones less so, because they don't press the hardware quite so obviously... but the
classics? They were fantastic examples of artistry and technology
combined, showcasing the developer's skill at both.

Oh, I meant demoscene demo.

--
--
user <candycane> is generated from /dev/urandom

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)

On Saturday, September 9, 2023 at 4:48:41 AM UTC-7, Spalls Hurgenson wrote:

On Fri, 8 Sep 2023 18:37:47 -0500, candycanearter07 <n...@thanks.net>
wrote:

On 9/8/23 10:40, Dimensional Traveler wrote:

On 9/8/2023 12:42 AM, candycanearter07 wrote:

Oh, so it's kinda like how demos are seen nowadays?

You get much more excited about demos than I do. MUCH more.

:P

Oh no, I'm not super into the demo scene. I know some people are tho.

Now I'm confused.

Are we talking demos for games, or demo-scene demos?

I never got that excited about the former, and - honestly - don't
thing I have played any since the death of the DemoCD. Certainly I
haven't played any game demos since it became easy to stream videos of gameplay on YouTube/wherever.

I used to love getting the floppies or CDs with game magazines that
had a ton of game demos when I could afford to buy one. Of course
the used game scene was pretty good back at that time too before
DRM got going.

I'm doing well enough I can afford a new game at full price if I want, but old habits die hard and I'm probably tighter with my money than I need
to be so it's deals and free games for me with rare exceptions - though
I've probably bought more full price games since 2020 than the previous decade.

But demo-scene demos? Those things are /awesome/. Modern ones less so, because they don't press the hardware quite so obviously... but the classics? They were fantastic examples of artistry and technology
combined, showcasing the developer's skill at both.

/agree

- Justisaur

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)

Justisaur <justisaur@gmail.com> wrote:

I'm doing well enough I can afford a new game at full price if I want, but old >habits die hard and I'm probably tighter with my money than I need
to be so it's deals and free games for me with rare exceptions - though
I've probably bought more full price games since 2020 than the previous >decade.

I'm the opposite. I can't remember the last time I paid full price
for a game. I do remember eagerly, almost desperately, buying Pool of
Radiance and Ultima V when they first came out, but as I've gotten older
that part of me has pretty much withered away. If I feel any temptation
to get a game when it first comes out these day, it's easily erased by
looking at the huge backlog of games I've bought and still haven't played.

--
l/ // Ross Ridge -- The Great HTMU
[oo][oo] rridge@csclub.uwaterloo.ca
-()-/()/ http://www.csclub.uwaterloo.ca:11068/
db //

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
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On Sat, 16 Sep 2023 15:16:59 -0000 (UTC), rridge@csclub.uwaterloo.ca
(Ross Ridge) wrote:

Justisaur <justisaur@gmail.com> wrote:

I'm doing well enough I can afford a new game at full price if I want, but old
habits die hard and I'm probably tighter with my money than I need
to be so it's deals and free games for me with rare exceptions - though >>I've probably bought more full price games since 2020 than the previous >>decade.

I'm the opposite. I can't remember the last time I paid full price
for a game. I do remember eagerly, almost desperately, buying Pool of >Radiance and Ultima V when they first came out, but as I've gotten older
that part of me has pretty much withered away. If I feel any temptation
to get a game when it first comes out these day, it's easily erased by >looking at the huge backlog of games I've bought and still haven't played.

Same. Well, mostly. I /can/ remember the last full-priced game I
bought ("American Truck Simulator") but I've stuck to sales since
then, and for much the same reason. It's hard to justify $40, $60, or
$70 USD for a new game when I already have so many older games waiting
for me. All the more since modern games tend to offer a lot less value
for the dollar (despite often offering much longer gameplay), what
with so much of the game being chunked off into DLC or filled with
grind.

Sadly, this wisdom doesn't apply when I see games on sale. "What,
Space Wars: More Warring in the Space III" is 75% off?!? Quick, where
is my credit card?"

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
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