A timetable for fun!
The fantasy of subscription services is that one day we’ll have time.
Let’s pretend: 48 hours with nothing else to do but playPS Plus games.
What follows is my imagined journey through Playstation’s new service.
Do you remember Cuboid?
Over and over you’d turn it to navigate mazes and avoid traps.
That feeling it gave you, of actually holding a block and turning it around in your hands.
Ingenious and gentle, this feels like a lovely sleepy start to a day of games.
Something to wake you up over the course of a few minutes and get your brain going.
But also, look at the enemy waves, the laser fire and sheer choreography of the thing.
Look at the way the specter of Eugene Jarvis still hovers in the sky.
Next we should slow down a bit.
And what could be slower than being dead?
A perfect mid-morning game.
No spoilers: just head in and see what you’re free to find.
Watch your footing, and yes, that is the voice of Ubercorn.
Listen: it’s early afternoon.
A time of day when I traditionally want a nap.
It’s time to bust out the games that I can’t turn away from.
First up, Magicka 2, with its robed heroes and inventive, finger-tangling dial-a-spells.
Also there are jokes.
Finally, Big Sky Infinity is a space shooter in which you might chew through planets.
This is basically the easiest sell of all time.
It’s a beautifully lurid button-masher about pure endless rage.
A font of rage spilling from the centre of the earth.
Plus, at one point you punch the earth so hard that it grows a beak.
Early evening and I’m going for a deep cut.
Festival of Blood is a perfect slice, and an ideal game to play as the sun goes down.
It’s Halloween in New Orleans, or something very close to that.
I mainly remember clouds of claret and the fact that I had a good time.
I think this is a game that is best played in sessions of about four hours.
Give it the whole evening, and then ring in midnight with the fireworks of Fantavision.
Day one was flighty: so many games!
Day two is about making choices and living with them for a bit.
you’re free to rest in the glittering disarray of the Queen’s Station.
What’s for lunch?
LocoRoco and Ape Escape!
It’s great to have a bit of light-heartedness to go along with your sandwich.
Use this as a gateway to one day explore the dizzyingly rich catalogue of this brilliant games console.
Both are enlivened by beautiful detailing and animation.
How to bring things home?
With a game that’s all about home, I think.
