Noble intentions

Finally, a cause I can stand behind: Ban Comic Sans. Yes, I know, there are Comic Sans-laden remnants of my youthful folly enshrined on this very website, but I preserve these mementos to remind the world that, all indications to the contrary, I’m not actually infallible.

ANYWAY. Contact is out this week, and you should buy it for more than just Sony E3 mockery. It is a pretty good game! Maybe a bit of an acquired taste, but it’s easily the least bizarre thing ever to come from Grasshopper Manufacture. Consider this a gateway drug. Just don’t be mislead by all the rampant misinformation about the game:

  1. It is not connected to Earthbound, and in fact the only similiarity it really has to Earthbound is in the little professor dude on the upper screen. It’s really much more like StarTropics in that you control a little dude traveling from island to island, but the combat system is more along the lines of Diablo (point, click and wait for everyone to duke it out) with a SaGa-style leveling system. So.
  2. It was not created by the director of Killer 7, although it is from the same developer. Suda51 doesn’t personally create everything Grasshopper produces, kind of like how Shigeru Miyamoto doesn’t actually design every Nintendo game ever.
  3. It doesn’t suck, seriously. I don’t even know what some of the negative reviews are talking about.

As a fun aside, despite the fact that Rockstar’s Bully (also out this week) has been the target of countless shrill declamations by opportunistic ambulance-chasers, Contact allows for much more anti-social behavior than the surprisingly saintly Bully. Not only can you beat up innocent people, you can also abuse defenseless rabbits and sheep. Shocking! Anyway, that’s all. Go get it, kids.

19 thoughts on “Noble intentions”

  1. I’ve been very selective lately in what games I buy, but I totally preordered this. It’s cool if it’s not Earthboundy. Startropics is also TEH R0x0R.

  2. Does this mean I’ll have to dip the box in water, so that I can get the codec frequency to call Meryl and keep going past the first couple of chapters?

  3. I’m willing to leave Comic Sans alone if it’ll stop webcomic artists from choosing a different font for each speaking character.

  4. Few other games everyone needs to play is Shin Megami Tensei: Devil Summoner and God Hand. ’nuff said.

  7. Yeah, I’ll agree to help ban Comic Sans when JP decides that Startropics was “totally rad”

  8. My mother-in-law is a teacher and insists on putting every handout in Comic Sans. It’s pretty bad.

  12. Sorry! I already spent my money last month to reserve summon night2.
    …
    Anyone know if the third one will make it? I’m looking forward to that one the most.

  13. I would be very happy if I never had to see another work e-mail or document in that demon-spawned font.

  14. NPC:
    I certainly hope so. I’ve been waiting for my copy oftwo, and if it’s better tan the first, the critical reaction should be even better.

    I hope the localization is a good as the first. Iron Chef jokes and clever puns are the key to my heart.

  15. I can’t wait for Contact, its my filler (portable) game from now until FFIII (even though I’ve been looking forward to it as much or more than FFIII).

  16. speaking of games tomm wants to sell, i finally got my hands on trauma center =)
    here’s to hoping it lives up to my phoenix wright expectations.

  18. Except it’s not out this week? Best Buy told me they pushed it back AGAIN ;_; Of course they were the ones that told me they didn’t carry Okami the day after it was released, so… My endless sorrow!!! (Well, maybe it will end the 24th, or the 31st, or the 7th, or next year sometime…)

  19. It’s totally out. I can’t say I’ve ever played an RPG quite like it. (anyone need a friend in Contact? send me an e-mail)

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