Alamut

I thought to actually read the novel Assassin's Creed was inspired by after having learned about it last year. The book, Alamut by Slovenian Vladimir Bartol (1903 – 1967), turned out to have a Finnish translation (by Kari Klemelä). The covers had some background information like how the novel was mostly forgotten during Bartol's lifetime but was found again and became more widely known after the September 11 attacks.

Last Argument of Kings

Unlike with the names of the previous two novels in The First Law trilogy, this last one's origin I was familiar beforehand: There's a roguelike in development called Ultima Ratio Regum -- Last Argument of Kings -- which are the words King Louis XIV had had cast on his armies' cannons. The novel's title is again maybe somewhat relevant to its plot but I feel it's again mostly there just because it's cool.

Games I Finished in 2022

Looking at the list of games I beat this year, I think there were more suspect ones than usual. But at least the current backlog is looking to be of somewhat higher quality, although it has its unknowns as well. I almost beat all the games I had a year ago on my backlog but subscription services again and the sudden Assassin's Creed series binge prevented that from actually happening. Currently my backlog is about the same size as it was at the end of 2021. Theoretically it's once again doable in a year but backlogs have a tendency to grow, as one knows.

Of Orcs And Men

There was still one more older Spiders game I was slightly interested in: Of Orcs And Men (2012) that Spiders co-developed with Cyanide Studio. The latter went on to make two prequels to it later on -- the Styx stealth games I have already played.

Half-Life 2

After having bought (and played) Black Mesa, I thought I might as well get Half-Life 2 (or HλLF-LIFE² as it's stylized) and experience first hand how Gordon Freeman's journey ends. The game's second standalone DLC, Episode Two, which was released in 2007, teases another sequel but Valve has not been willing to create one so far. In 2020, they did release a virtual reality game called Half-Life: Alyx (stylized with an upside down lambda as y which I'm unable to reproduce in text) but its events are concurrent at best (though the game does add to Episode Two's ending a bit).

Black Mesa

I have not been interested in Valve's Half-Life games because I knew I wouldn't be able to appreciate the possible innovations they did at the time: I have already played newer games that have done same things better. Half-Life and its sequel would just feel old to me. Despite that however, due to a deep discount last year, I bought Black Mesa (or BLλCK MESA as it's stylized on the cover with the lower case Greek lambda letter) which is a third party remake of the first Half-Life (1998). Originally it was a free mod but later Crowbar Collective got approval from Valve for a commercial release.

A Plague Tale: Requiem

Everything I wrote about A Plague Tale: Innocence applies to its 2022 sequel, Requiem, as well. I don't know myself how one would exactly expand the adventure-stealth gameplay but you'd expect that at least the story would have some progression. But even that in Requiem is pretty much the same thing all over again.

Scorn

Back in 2019, on my Agony post I noted how some people had mixed it up with Scorn and had been disappointed. Well, here we are in 2022 and Serbian Ebb Software's Scorn too is finally out -- and it's not exactly much better than Agony. Visually Scorn is without fault -- it is one massive, masterfully created moving digital painting -- but its gameplay leaves a lot to be desired.

Silverfall: Earth Awakening

Years ago, I eyed up Silverfall, an isometric action roleplaying game developed by a now-defunct French company Monte Cristo, wondering whether I should buy it. I decided against it -- which was a smart decision because there are dozens of more interesting and entertaining titles in the genre out there, especially these days. However, last year I saw someone on my Steam friendlist pick up the game and its standalone expansion Earth Awakening -- most likely entirely for collection purposes -- while they were next to free on sale. Against my better judgment, I bought them too but with the intention of actually playing through them. (Don't do that.)

Legend

I borrowed Legend by David Gemmell (1948 – 2006) from the local library because I remembered reading one of his novels a couple of decades ago and wanted a refresher on how his heroic fantasy was like. There's a pretty high chance the novel was this one because only two of Gemmell's works have ever been translated into Finnish. The other one would be the second volume of this same Drenai series, called The King Beyond the Gate whose Finnish title for some reason was quite liberally set, instead meaning 'prince of shadows' (Varjojen prinssi).