The Electric Underground - Arcade design champion and only true game reviewer

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Celso Bin Portiolli

Celso Bin Portiolli

Understanding the world a tism at a time
kiwifarms.net
Joined
Sep 19, 2024
There is one channel I think has a good understanding of and creates a lot of meaningful discussion about game design, which is incredibly rare nowadays.
I was first made aware of it by the "controversial" review of the RE4 remake, where he didn't suck it off and made great points about how the original worked a lot like an arcade beat'em up and the new one introduces new mechanics like parries a la carte, just for being popular nowadays, with no consideration for the gameplay loop.
He also called Stellar Blade out for being the same modern "action" slop beneath the sexy surface, with unskippable walking segments and brain dead puzzles.
His bread and butter are Shumps and Beat'em up/fighting games and brings a lot of points that go against modern, western game design sensibilities and loves shitting on crap game journos.
He may come of as a contrarian to some, but honestly, the mainstream opinions among reviewers and youtubers are so fucking uniform, being in the opposite autism spectrum provides some weird sort of balance.

Main criticisms of the channel I would give are the monotone, semi-valley girl tone of voice and the fact he can't articulate shit particularly well sometimes.

I hope I can get some opinions on arcade design going in this thread.
 
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Calandrino said:
If he's actually you, thanks for the effort.
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I wish I was half as good at shumps as he is, lol, I still suck
He did motivate me to try out and appreciate those more hardcore games; a recent thread of mine kind of quotes his Castlevania Dominus Collection review verbatim as a starting point.
I think you will like the channel if you have patience for more long winded arguments, otherwise, I won't blame you for thinking he rambles on like a fag, lol
I highly recommend Matthew Matosis if you want something more concise, shame he retired
Edit: grammar
 
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Guy is an annoyingly autistic; the algorithm used to play his shit after a SHMUPjunkie video until I finally just blocked the channel.

Modern games may be bleh but last thing I want to hear is more long winded bitching about it, especially from a guy whose l33t shmup skills aren't that impressive.

At least he's better than razorfist and can actually articulate some points whether I agree or not.
 
TATE MOOOOOOOOOOOOOOODE!! said:
Guy is an annoyingly autistic; the algorithm used to play his shit after a SHMUPjunkie video until I finally just blocked the channel.
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I fully admit I have higher tolerance then average to this type of video. I am also designing my own games, so I find them more valuable than the average guy would.
Definitely not everyone's cup of tea, but the niche he fills is depressingly empty.

Edit:
At least he's better than razorfist and can actually articulate some points whether I agree or not.
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I used to like Razorfist a bit went he still talked about games, but I stopped caring when I realized his points were all really shallow and underdeveloped
 
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CrunkLord420 said:
He's not a true SHMUP gamer until he covers BlazeItFgt2
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the fuck, this game looks fire;
TempleOS has better exclusives than the ps5 lmao

Edit: Finished a video that came out today, he's the only reviewer based enough to defend the inclusion of lives systems
I think the comment section brings up some good observations:
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Celso Bin Portiolli said:
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I too was mildly annoyed that GnG Resurrection doesn't have anything like an "arcade mode", and you're even encouraged to backtrack and replay levels to get collectathon doodads instead of attempting a straight beginning-to-end run. Similar feels about Cuphead, among others. But even in the old GnG games, running out of lives doesn't really do anything and you are allowed infinite (or at least many many) continues, so many/most people are going to ignore the Lives counter, brute force the game, and treat them like modern infinite-lives games regardless. In that way they do sort of feed the idea that lives in video games are "outdated". Those are not exactly easy even under those conditions.

iirc the indie action platformer Volgarr the Viking (for instance) had an interesting way of handling it, where you get a better ending the fewer times you die, so there's something analogous to a 1CC and some incentive to shoot for a better run despite it spotting you infinite lives. It adds replay value for those who want it, being a nice happy medium between A) forcing restarts and locking 95% of the audience out of the last 95% of the game and B) making the only goal to "beat" the game by passing each checkpoint exactly one time before uninstalling.

One trick to sell modern gamers on the concept is to just call it a "roguelike" or "run-based". It doesn't have to have any randomness or procedural generation, just say those magic words and the unwashed rabble will comprehend that the ultimate goal is to try to play all the way through without fucking up. Sifu is a more modern type of game that works like this, being marketed as a "roguelike" despite not being randomized at all (I think? I only test drove it a tiny little bit, but was the impression I got, sry if incorrect), with an aging mechanic and increasingly shitty endings the more you fuck up in lieu of lives. There are probably other/better examples.

Glad that there's at least a tiny minority out there thinking similar thunks, though that commenter who thinks that walking sims need 30 hour timers sounds like a mental case. The only motivation you should need to hurry through nu-Zelda is the fact that you're going to die someday.
 
Calandrino said:
hough that commenter who thinks that walking sims need 30 hour timers sounds like a mental case. The only motivation you should need to hurry through nu-Zelda is the fact that you're going to die someday.
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I think it could be interesting, actually. Dead Rising 1 shows how a timer completely changes how you approach an open environment, making you learn the map and route out the most efficient path through it, while considering when and where collect resources.
I hoarded all the fun items in BoTW for a "later" challenge that never actually came. If I didn't have infinite time and the game was more challenging, I probably would have used a lot more then whatever was the weakest item in my inventory at the moment.
 
So, a podcast came out where he discusses the Silent Hill 2 remake with UnderTheMayo and BoulderPunch, and I thought it was incredibly interesting. He never talks about plots in his videos, so it gives a different perspective.
Edit: I think this video is a surprisingly good introduction to a lot of the point he makes about game length, depth, reviews, remake culture, corporate mandates and all sorts of things he touches on his videos.
 
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Celso Bin Portiolli said:
https://youtube.com/watch?v=foHUIJBvOwwSo, a podcast came out where he discusses the Silent Hill 2 remake with UnderTheMayo and BoulderPunch, and I thought it was incredibly interesting. He never talks about plots in his videos, so it gives a different perspective.
Edit: I think this video is a surprisingly good introduction to a lot of the point he makes about game length, depth, reviews, remake culture, corporate mandates and all sorts of things he touches on his videos.
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I just wish they had reached out to TheGamingBritShow as well.
 
Now this is an interesting video I wish more would see.
He goes over the shady origins of Nintendo, how much of an outlier the Iwata era was due to his background and vision, and how now Nintendo will be dead set on following the Disney media empire route over focusing on videogames (and how lawsuits and their rabid fans will let it thrive).
 
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