I Loathe And Despise This Horrid Game (Visage)

As the eons march onward and my wizard brain grows ever wiser, more cynical, and less patient, i've come to accept a growing disconnect between myself and the "gamersphere", if that's even a term. I don't know what it is you weirdos value in a game but i don't think we agree on it. Case in point, Visage. A "spiritual successor" to P.T. which goes to great lengths to illustrate why the important part was the T. 

That's T as in Teaser. Teaser as in 10 minutes long at fucking most. P.T. made waves by coming out of nowhere with a (then) novel concept. It was a new kind of nightmare, which sadly has since been run all the way into the dirt by the likes of Layers of Fear and Soma and all the other filthy fucking repulsive "scary hallway, can't fight the monsters, insta-death, pretentious bullshit story, turd-pile" games. If i had to give a name to this genre i would coin the term.... "SpookyGay".  Games that want to be spooky, think they are spooky, and even manage to convince some people of their spookiness, but which are in fact just totally gay. 

I don't know who these people are who keep getting fooled into praising these games as high art, but i want to see them in my office, to discuss their future endeavors. I have seen nothing but glowing reviews for this festering piece, and the day i understand why will also be the day i understand people who get offended by stand-up specials. So far all i have are theories, and for the sake of not hurting anyone's feelings i'm choosing to keep those theories to myself (for now). 

P.T. was an innovative set of ideas for its time, a proof of concept, but most of those ideas and concepts are quickly rendered flaccid when stretched over a full length game. Since 2013, i have seen these exact same scenarios and scares so many times i could make one of these games in my sleep, and I know because playing them puts me to sleep.

This is especially damning considering 

1. i don't even know how to code a video game when i'm awake, and

2. sleep is when i'm busy having my usual nightly terrors. 

So don't let this game take credit for giving me nightmares because that's like Mufasa taking credit for grass, or something. Oh this game is a kind of nightmare alright, just not for the reason it thinks. More like the reason it stinks.

This is a looooooong one too. Not only is it an absurdly long game for this genre in the first place, but it's so goddamn esoteric it takes you 5 times as long to figure out what to do and where to go than it should. This game doesn't just need a Crazy Taxi arrow, it needs a whole-ass Crazy Taxi that i can jump in and say "take me to a different game". Then The Offspring starts playing but don't get excited, it's their new album. An album just as rehashed, creatively bankrupt and disappointing as this miserable fucking game, exactly the soundtrack it deserves. 

Again, esoteric and vague is something that works well in a free teaser, not so well in a full length 20 dollar actual fucking game. The story, if you can even call it that, meanders along with all the urgency of a stoned sloth, doling itself out in such small and meaningless pieces that one begins to suspect its trying to JUMPSCARE you out of realizing it isn't really about anything and has nothing at all to say. 

One by one you teleport into each character's assey JUMPSCARE flashback before returning to the house to trundle around aimlessly wondering what the fuck to do next. You repeat this pattern probably 50 times (i'm guessing because i've been playing this game for an eternity and it still ain't over), and each time it's more nonsensical and takes longer than the last time. This first episode is an hour and a half long, and i cut out a lot.  This is as short as i could make it, and we're not even halfway through the first chapter yet. Give me strength, lord. 

Did i mentioned the JUMPSCARES? Because that's the only kind of scares you're getting here. BOO! Did that scare you? No? Well then maybe don't waste your money on this unspooky dook of a game like i so foolishly did. Spend that 20 dollars on something decent instead, like my Patreon. So you can sit comfortably and watch me hating it for hours on end. It's the better way to experience this one, i assure you. If only i had the option of listening to me complain about this game instead of playing it, but my crappy curse is actually being me, so i have to do both, which takes twice as long and just makes me want to complain harder. See what i put myself through for you people?

Years ago, i played the game Gone Home and wasn't at all impressed. I called the story pretentious, poorly written, tumblr-baiting drivel, which it is, but in hindsight i'm surprised how well that game holds up as the pinnacle of the SpookyGay genre, in more ways than the obvious. At least that game had atmosphere, and an actual coherent setting that didn't warp around you or teleport your ass into some random flashback every 5 minutes. 

It was grounded, and played with expectations, identifying and subverting tropes of a genre that was still in its infancy. You simply explored a spooky house, engaged with the lived-in details, and learned about the characters. Not a bad premise considering how uninspired later SpookyGays turned out to be, reveling in the same tired ass tropes nearly a decade after Gone Home flipped them on their head by peering into the future and taking the genre tag i just now invented as literally as one possibly could.

I remember a big criticism of that game being that you could beat it in 10 minutes if you knew what to do. But that's actually kind of cool, and a hell of a lot better than being stuck in one of these wack-ass haunted house simulators for upwards of 10 hours. So congrats, people who make these kind of games. You finally did it. You made a game so goddamn fucking insufferable it caused me to reassess my position on Gone Home, a game i was sure i hated.

What's next, a Final Fantasy 7 Remake that retcons itself into the butt dimension so poopily it makes me long for the days when i thought Final Fantasy 13 was as bad as it could get? Oh wait, that already fucking happened as well. Sweet Baby Jesus, give me back my country. 

I'll have plenty more posts to talk about Visage, so i don't wanna be here writing this one all day. For now let me say one more thing about this game that simply can not go unsaid. 

This game has the worst controls I have ever experienced in a video game. To properly describe them would take a mental and emotional vigor that i do not have at the moment, so perhaps i'll go into more detail next time. But suffice to say, they are beyond shit. Beyond dogshit. Beyond even outside-the-box cat diarrhea. If i had to describe the shittiness of this game's controls, i would point to the scene in Kurosawa's masterpiece, Ikiru, in which a man describes what happens to one's bowel movements when dying of stomach cancer. 

I would point to that, but doing so would sully a great film by association, so i will not. I'll have to come up with an analogy less offensive to myself next time i post about this wretched game. 

For now all i have left to say is it's fitting youtube chose a thumbnail for this one that features both toilet paper and a trash can. Because this a toilet game, a trash game, and every stinky thing in between. 

And just like all the worst things that can happen in a bathroom, it takes a long time. I'm nowhere near finished with this Bono-sized turd, and there's more of this series to come. For i am damned to suffer with this reeking fucker, and you must suffer with me. That's the blood pact you all unknowingly signed yourself into when you pledged here.