Adventure Gamers - Forums
You are here: Home → Forum Home → Gaming → Adventure → Thread
Post Marker Legend:
-
New posts -
No new posts
Currently online
NORCO
You actually read that right, I just have the sneaky feeling that the brother either joins
Well, aside from going into spoilers about those two predictions, the conversation on your brothers laptop is specifically a take on imageboard/chan boards, you can see that the posters are labeled anonymous with associated id numbers. If you’re not familiar with the typical discourse on chan boards you’re among the lucky, but NORCO’s invocation of them is not turned up to 11. It’s actually a tamer version of it.
In any case, it’s not there to be a trendy dig at the conversation’s participants. NORCO has a lot of rough, flawed, and abrasive characters, but most are given more than one side to them, and don’t exist merely as punching bags (although of them are just jokey side characters). Nor did I ever get the impression that the game was trying to serve me a moralistic lecture. Which is a feeling since confirmed from reading interviews with the dev.
] I can only add my own personal feeling about it, which is that I tried to write it from a place of honesty. I didn’t want to write something prescriptive. I wanted to write something that spoke to the reality of Louisiana as I had experienced it. As I do experience it, which, in many ways, there’s not much room for optimism. But there are glimmers of hope, glimmers of humanity.
A lot of it is written straight from experience and having conversations with people. My dad and his fishing buddies are encoded in the game. And so there’s a lot of very intimate relationships that are reflected, at least to some degree, or have inspired characters in the game. And there are so many fascinating people. There’s also moving through different worlds in Louisiana. The punk stuff was always such a stark contrast to the more familial relationships that I had in the river parishes outside of New Orleans, or friendships I had developed with people who didn’t have any of the subcultural baggage. I wanted to explore that range of personalities.
This strikes me as basically the exact opposite of something like LiS2, who’s developers have no authentic connection to American culture or it’s politics, and offered their cheap and predictable commentary on those subjects because it was the fashionable thing to do.
Yuts, on the other hand is trying to give a honest, if stylistically embellished, portrayal of a place he is deeply connected to. And there’s aspects of fear and criticism, but also belonging and care. Whether or not that comes across to you in 20 minutes, or even the full game is another story. Also whether you felt it was competently executed, which I’d say not since you hated the writing, is a separate issue. But I think the author’s POV is different than what you assumed.
As for the QTEs, yeah, they’re shitty. They just didn’t bother me enough to spoil the experience.
I have indeed read a lot of 4chan stuff and 95% of that are trolls making post. I don’t think they actually meet in abandoned malls in post-apocalyptic Louisiana. I also don’t feel like necessarily the devs are coming from a moralistic side either like a life is strange 2 did. But it’s still in the same wheelhouse. It feels like a writer who is trying to pretend to know the characters instead of being the characters themseleves, if that makes sense. The writing floats above the characters not within them. like every time the game let me make a choice of what to think or say in my mind, I hated all of the responses bc it seemed so false and unauthentic to me. I know the writer is from Norco and I while I’m not, I am from the south and have visited Louisiana a lot. And this struck me as a college kid trying to relate to the culture of the city while also looking down his nose at it. It just doesn’t work for me at all.
But leaving the writing behind for a minute I also just did not enjoy the presentation of the game, the background art was really awesome but I hated the characters and how they looked. The mind map made all the characters look like swamp creatures out of the Black Lagoon. just terrible looking all the way around to me. The one thing I did enjoy is when you turn on the TV in the living room and you get all these weird static images of the smokestacks. It felt like a southern rip off version of the opening shots of Blade Runner but I still kind of dug it.
We both agree that qte stuff is there for no real reason at all.
I just feel like the game was trying to be more “High art” than a real game, with real characters and that’s a huge turn off to me.
For instance off-topic a bit I’ve been going through David Fincher’s entire catalog as a director and writer everything from Aliens 3 to seven, The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, Fight Club, social network Etc… and I really do believe he’s a writer/director who gets that a movie still has to be a movie and entertain, even if there is a lot of high art in it, if that makes sense.
I just finished watching his Show on Netflix mindhunter season 2 and that season took place in the south, Georgia to be exact which is where I’m from. The show is about the fbi learning how to profile serial killers, and in Georgia in the 70s close to Thirty young black boys went missing and they sent FBI profilers, to try to help catch the killer. The way Fincher and crew handle this topic about race relations and police relations in the seventies in the south is brilliant on every level and not heavy-handed at all. I wish more entertainment these days could add nuance and not hit you over the head with a hammer with a message.
Yeah, that 95% of “just trolls” is gonna vary wildly depending on the sub forum. But getting into the weeds on that is moot because you could just as easily say NORCO is portraying the trolls. Which, in part, it is. Either way it’s not a stereotype dialed to 11. It’s much tamer than the conversations you’ll actually find on those boards. Hell, it’s even tamer than real threads a forum like RPGCodex.
And this struck me as a college kid trying to relate to the culture of the city while also looking down his nose at it. It just doesn’t work for me at all.
Yeah, this is the biggest point of disagreement here and I’d go as far as to say the game is unambiguously the opposite. One of the only characters the game plainly mocks is an elitist Hollywood director who’s trying to hastily caricaturize the south. Even cultists at the abandoned mall are shown a degree of empathy and understanding. To the point where there’s a dialogue sequence with a snobbish kid who calls them nazis and gets rebuffed for his lack of perspective.
I don’t think they actually meet in abandoned malls in post-apocalyptic Louisiana.
It seems to be that some of the things that are intended as humorous or absurdist embellishments, you’re taking as straight digs. Which is somewhat understandable because you didn’t see how these portrayals develop.
But this would be like a conversation where someone thinks David Madsen from LiS1 is a one dimensional stereotype based on the first two episodes. The portrayal of him is given more depth as the game progresses. Except it’s even more extreme because in this case because your assumption of the authors POV is from an even smaller snippet.
It’s fair that you disliked the presentation, prose, and aspects of the gameplay enough to not want to continue. I doubt seeing more of the game would make you enjoy it. But I do disagree with your take on the author’s perspective and think it’s half baked.
I just feel like the game was trying to be more “High art” than a real game, with real characters and that’s a huge turn off to me.
This is also a game where a cat gets launched through the roof of a bookstore by being pet too hard, and an NPC tells you a 5 minute story about how he shit himself in a limo. There’s a lot of funny moments in NORCO that wouldn’t be there if the devs took themselves too seriously.
Yeah, that 95% of “just trolls” is gonna vary wildly depending on the sub forum. But getting into the weeds on that is moot because you could just as easily say NORCO is portraying the trolls. Which, in part, it is. Either way it’s not a stereotype dialed to 11. It’s much tamer than the conversations you’ll actually find on those boards. Hell, it’s even tamer than real threads a forum like RPGCodex.
And this struck me as a college kid trying to relate to the culture of the city while also looking down his nose at it. It just doesn’t work for me at all.
Yeah, this is the biggest point of disagreement here and I’d go as far as to say the game is unambiguously the opposite. One of the only characters the game plainly mocks is an elitist Hollywood director who’s trying to hastily caricaturize the south. Even cultists at the abandoned mall are shown a degree of empathy and understanding. To the point where there’s a dialogue sequence with a snobbish kid who calls them nazis and gets rebuffed for his lack of perspective.
I don’t think they actually meet in abandoned malls in post-apocalyptic Louisiana.
It seems to be that some of the things that are intended as humorous or absurdist embellishments, you’re taking as straight digs. Which is somewhat understandable because you didn’t see how these portrayals develop.
But this would be like a conversation where someone thinks David Madsen from LiS1 is a one dimensional stereotype based on the first two episodes. The portrayal of him is given more depth as the game progresses. Except it’s even more extreme because in this case because your assumption of the authors POV is from an even smaller snippet.
It’s fair that you disliked the presentation, prose, and aspects of the gameplay enough to not want to continue. I doubt seeing more of the game would make you enjoy it. But I do disagree with your take on the author’s perspective and think it’s half baked.
I just feel like the game was trying to be more “High art” than a real game, with real characters and that’s a huge turn off to me.
This is also a game where a cat gets launched through the roof of a bookstore by being pet too hard, and an NPC tells you a 5 minute story about how he shit himself in a limo. There’s a lot of funny moments in NORCO that wouldn’t be there if the devs took themselves too seriously.
You might be right and I will fully admit 20 minutes does not equate a whole game but nothing about the game made me want to play anymore of it. It’s the same as when someone says you just have to get through the first season of a show, then it gets good. I feel like it’s the writer’s job to hook me from the very start and this just did not on any level.
Going back to the writing I understand what you’re saying and I believe he thinks he’s doing that. But it does not come across that way to me. Best way I can explain it is from his interview where he says I heard stories about my dad and his buddies going fishing.. I don’t think he actually ever went fishing himself to see what it was really like, he just heard stories. That’s what I mean by it seems like it he floats above the characters with the writing. I could be totally wrong but that’s the vibe I get from the writing.
Plus what you told me about a guy shitting in a limo and a cat flying into space because he was petted too hard does not make me want to continue either lol.
I think I will firmly lock this game as not for me in any way shape or form, but I really do hope others enjoy it.
I’m now onto the Fincher film Zodiac, the director’s cut.
......I just feel like the game was trying to be more “High art” than a real game, with real characters and that’s a huge turn off to me.
I’ve only got so far through the demo but so far, as much as I like the game so far, I don’t disagree!
......I just feel like the game was trying to be more “High art” than a real game, with real characters and that’s a huge turn off to me.I’ve only got so far through the demo but so far, as much as I like the game so far, I don’t disagree!
I am very sincere when I say I hope people enjoy norco, it’s got great reviews all over the place. It’s just not for me and I don’t get the praise, either on a writing level and def not on a game play level.
I just finished it and thought it was one of the best adventure games I’ve played in the last few years
I just finished it and thought it was one of the best adventure games I’ve played in the last few years
How long is the game, approximately?
I just finished it and thought it was one of the best adventure games I’ve played in the last few years
How long is the game, approximately?
On average it seems to be about 6 hours. It took me 7 but that’s only because I was poking at everything and trying to find secrets/easter eggs.
Mh, thanks. Was hoping it’d be a bit meatier, so to speak.
You are here: Home → Forum Home → Gaming → Adventure → Thread
