barregar wrote:

Stusue, thank you so much for talking about Origins: Elders of Time.  I went looking for it at BF ....apparently it was a soft release so I must have missed it.  I tried the demo and I'm loving it!!!  What fantastic graphics, so sharp and clear, and I really like the fact that if you don't want to find the objects in the HO scene you can play golf solitaire instead...cool.   One weird thing is that there are still collectibles in the SE version but I couldn't find them displayed anywhere.  Have read your reviews on the game, thanks.  I'm getting this one on Monday for sure.  

I love it when devs. give us CE quality games at SE prices.  The one I'm playing now, Alex Hunter: Lord of the Mind is a SE game with collectibles and an in-game SG.  I was so surprised by that.  I love the graphics, the setting in England, and I know I'm going to enjoy playing it.  Have you finished that one?  

Barre, I mentioned in my review that the collectibles aren't displayed anywhere in the CE version, either!    At least the achievements are displayed in the CE, whereas they aren't in the SE and you won't even know what they're for as they just come up with a name, not what you'd done to achieve them. 

I have the CE version of Alex Hunter: Lord of the Mind from GameHouse, just like Origins: Elders of Time, although I haven't played it yet - how surprising! 

If BFG only releases the SE of a game and GameHouse releases the CE (it's a contractual thing), the BFG SE version will often have the achievements and collectibles but doesn't have the other extras, like the bonus chapter, wallpapers, music, replayable puzzles, etc.  There are a few games like that - Apothecarium is another one.  If I got the SEs of those games at BFG I'm now playing the CEs with my FunPass at GameHouse.  I've also got a list of games that I only got the SE at BFG (even though they were first released as CEs) that are also available as CEs at GameHouse and am slowly working my way through those as well if I haven't already played the SE.

One of those is Portals of Evil: Stolen Runes, which I've just finished after playing for most of the day.  Main game took me over 6 hours (including time it took to take review notes) and the bonus chapter took me about 1 h 40 m - and that was getting the solution for one of the puzzles in the SG as I was just going around and around in circles and it was simply taking too long to finish - and my patience was running out as it's almost time for bed for me and I haven't even had dinner yet!  And that puzzle isn't included in the replayable puzzles in the Extras.    There are 15 minigames/puzzles you can replay and yet there were about 30 in the main game and about 8 in the bonus.  I really wish you could play that one I cheated on in the Extras but oh well.  At least the one I skipped in the main game is included (hence why I skipped it as it was taking too long).  I took copious notes so I'll post a review once I've sorted them all out.  But I really loved playing it - not one of my favs but I really enjoyed it - and it was long! 
 

Last Monday we got literally struck by lightning. We had taken out all the electric plugs due to the heavy thundering and suddenly an enormous flash came out of one of the sockets and I screamed 
because it was totally unexpected. We went to the second floor where we have our bedroom and in the closet the cable was burned and it was smokey.
We had no TV, no telephone and no internet. The telephone and net were fixed today but we still have no TV and the Ipad is not working either 

It seems I have a lot of catching up to do 

Anki -- OMG!  How very, very scary!  I an so glad that you are okay.

I've just posted a demo review of today's TGT - Haunted Manor: Painted Beauties CE - in my demo review thread if anyone's interested.

It was really funny as I kept on playing, taking notes, and thought that surely the hour must be up soon so eventually stopped as I always like a bit of time left in case I want to check something.  Then I realised that the demo was 90 minutes!  I have no idea why but make the most of it.  One reviewer said that she finished the entire demo with 36 minutes to spare.

ETA:    I've just updated my demo review after reading a review by Belamba on the main game page at BFG.  I now only recommend the SE, not the CE, and this is why:

Belamba wrote:

Don't think I've played any game before with so much back and forth. After a while it got a bit tedious, but I was determined to play game to the end.
The main game had a good 6 hours of game play, but the bonus chapter was over in 20 minutes. Hardly value for double the price, and seemed like more HOPs in that 20 minutes than in the entire game!
The graphics were excellent, the music a bit annoying at times but ok.
Morphing objects, but not that easy to find and I gave up looking for them after a while. Mainly due to the fact that the morphing things disappeared for far too long, which meant you had to watch a scene for what seemed like forever before spotting it. 

A 20-minute bonus chapter full of HOPs?  I'll be getting the SE with a PCC.
 

Last edited by stusue (May 24, 2014 12:50 pm)

Hi Anki, glad to hear you are all well.  I imagine that freaked everyone out! And what no IPad?  No Township!  Argghh that would be withdrawal for me.  Your town is going to be covered in balloons from me. (fyi no update yet)

I still haven't decided on which games either and instead of doing demos or looking at stusues reviews I started playing Lost Lands Dark Overlord and boy is this a gorgeous game.  I am having a great time playing this one.  This starts out and from the music and the initial interludes you would think a movie is going to start.

Tomorrow I have a sculpting class with a group I belong to and the weather is supposed to be gorgeous for the next few days, as it was today, so no sitting inside playing.  Although I did watch a movie after I mowed the back lawn.  I had to relax for a bit out of the sun.  It was Temple Grandin.  I thought it was quite good and she is a pretty remarkable lady for what she has done for animals.

Last edited by oscar66 (May 24, 2014 11:52 pm)