Patreon Prompt 621
Added 2024-07-09 00:06:16 +0000 UTCPrompt: Excerpts from a review of a Tomb Raider-like action-adventure video game, describing the changes that the newly introduced status ailment "Overstuffed" can bring about in the actions and behavior of the normally cool and competent female protagonist.
Upon starting up Tomb Raider: Curses, I was met with the typical, yet still exciting gameplay I expected from the series. Lara Croft could still jump with ease while putting on a fine display of how next gen graphics translate for her brown hair braid and legendarily ample bosom. The big change this time around was the introduction of various status ailments. This ranged from poison, to frozen, and my biggest concern upon getting hands on with the game, starvation. So focused on keeping her hunger meter full, I ended up stuffing her face with food any chance I got. This turned out to be a huge mistake.
My reckless binging ended up inflicting the Overstuffed condition on Laura. Visually, this causes her stomach to bulge out into a large, taut potbelly that makes it look like she’s nine months pregnant. Gameplay wise, the extra bulk significantly slows her movement, making it comical how she tries to lug the extra weight up walls and over edges. Not to mention, she develops a serious case of indigestion that foils any stealth attempts with a deluge of burps and farts.
Try as I might, I could never get Lara free of this strange ailment. In spite of her bloated gut and constant gas, she kept automatically ingesting any food I passed by. While this seemed like a bug at first I realized that this was an intentional choice by the developers as a way to criticize hunger meters in games. This artistic choice has elevated the game in my eyes to make it the very best in the series, if not the best game of all time. 9.76 out of 10.
