Different Ends of a Spectrum

Bonus points to you if you didn't see RECTUM instead of SPECTRUM.  Or perhaps I shouldn't assume that everyone's mind is constantly in the gutter like mine.

Now before I get completely off-topic, the title of this post is referencing how a game can be both brilliant and utterly crap all at once.  More specifically, how some things can be done perfectly in a game, and others can be totally botched.

There are a lot of things that Kingdoms of Amalur does right.  The story is done right -- it's very, very typical high-fantasy fare.  Which shouldn't surprise anyone, since the writer for the game is an author of fantasy novels.  It's sort of a given.  The inventory system is done right -- it's very easy to navigate, and I love the "Junk" system, where you can send all your unwanted items and them sell them all at a vendor in one fell swoop.  There a lot of other little things too, more that I care to mention in this post.

There're also some things that really frustrate me about this game as well, though.  A lot of it is the combat.  It's the part of the game that really pulls me in two different directions, because at times it is brilliant and exhilarating.  But other times it makes me want to stab babies.  For example, there are attacks from enemies that you can block or dodge.  Blocking an attack you're supposed to dodge doesn't work, and dodging an attack you're supposed to block doesn't work.  With the former, you just get hit, and with the latter, the enemy just keeps chasing you down until they hit you.  That would be all well and good if you knew which abilities were which -- but you don't.  You have to pretty much guess, unless you've fought an enemy like it before and you remember how it goes.  The other thing that makes me want to stab babies is that a lot of enemies have certain animations when they land a hit on you.  Some of these are three separate attacks, with pauses in between them.  My question is, why would you POSSIBLY design it that way if you weren't going to give the player the change to block/dodge any of those attacks when they miss the first one?  It just doesn't make any sense -- the only thing it does is frustrate the player.  (And make them want to stab babies.)

On the whole, though, I think the game is well done.  I wouldn't call it Editor's Choice material, but I would certainly deem a score of 85% or so to be quite appropriate if I gave monetary scores.  (But I don't.)

It's been able to keep my full attention since its release, so much so that I haven't played anything else, to include TOR.  That's saying something.

All that being said, here's a cool little video that is totally unrelated to just about everything.