cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/37932218
Yesterday I played the demo of the new game Dispatch and it is all beautifully written, but at some point, while presenting the team in-game, there was a casual funny line, pronounced by a voice off-screen, so without graphical support and I just burst out laughing (I was alone at home, so not pressed by social influence of any kind).
When I stopped, I realized how uncommon this has become lately. As a kid, I found LucasArts games extremely funny and I laughed more than occasionally, but this aspect of video game entertainment has been dying out.
When was the last time you actually laughed out loud while playing a game for something that was actually designed as funny (no Fortnite or CoD shenanigans stories please)?
Stardew Valley has plenty of silly and funny moments to begin with. But the last patch added a “green rain” event, and during the first occurrence, all villagers are hiding inside, except Demetrius. This guy is just walking around in a full hazmat suit, collecting samples and babbling about mushrooms.
The funniest thing I saw in Stardew recently, was that I have installed the Anthro characters mod and it’w really good at making everyone some kind of anthro, even their dialogue portraits… But in one of the relationship sequences, it flashes dialogue portraits of various characters and in that once scene they were not altered by the mod, so there’s all these “random” ghost humans showing up.
I laugh a lot during games. Though, most often, it’s from some unintended consequence or bug or just game physics being game physics (like a ragdoll spazzing out cuz it’s stuck in something).
Humorous little game.
Surprised no one’s mentioned Thank Goodness You’re Here yet.
That game had me rolling from start to finish.
When Split Fiction made me a pig that had magic fart powers.
Before that in BG3, when I accidentally released the brakes on the windmill.
Started playing “RV there yet” with my wife and we were laughing out loud how silly the game is.
Like two days ago in megabonk, game physics yeeted me into the stratosphere
“Backfirewall_” from a little while back. A masterpiece that deserved more attention! Highly recommend to anyone here who is big on tech (especially programmers)!
The Dragon Quest games make me laugh all the time. The NPC dialogues are beautifully written, and frequently have little humorous elements in them. The monster designs and animations are also often funny in their own ways.
Can’t recommend these games enough.
Been playing Midnight Club 3 lately and some of the songs are very silly. “Can you make your fatty roll like a 24? (24)”
Disco Elysium had me laughing out loud a few times.
Disco Elysium is definitely the most memorable one with the level of absurdity it throws in your face. Thinking about the “Dios Mio, a LIBERAL” still cracks me up.
I played Tiny Terry’s Turbo Trip and laughed multiple times in the first few minutes
Weirdly - Clair Obscur: Expedition 33. Despite whole game’s emotional atmosphere being pretty heavy, I think it had very good humor moments in it, I actually laughed out loud few times. Maybe a part of it is that it took me by surprise but I appreciate wittiness of these lighter moments.
Great writing overall by the way.
I really want to try it, also because I am studying French and it has full voice over. Problem is, I never managed to play JRPGs, so I am afraid I would be throwing money away.
You can play at low difficulty to make it less frustrating while still enjoying the beautiful story!
I’m playing it right now.
!When Verso tries to recruit Monoco to go to old Lumière, Monoco is like “No thanks, after last time I made a promise to never follow you again”, to which Verso responds “There’ll be lots of fights…”, and Monoco is like “I’ll follow you anywhere!”. The delivery is a lot better obviously.!<
Monoco: It’s time do defeat her.
to Verso Please help me.
Exactly the scene that came to my mind when responding to this thread, delivery was perfect - especially that you don’t know the dynamic at that point yet. Didn’t play with french voice over but they did a stellar job with english one. They also must’ve had a lot of fun recording these scenes.
Small suggestion though - I’m not sure if I wouldn’t hide this behind a spoiler, you never know which detail might affect someone’s experience.
Good suggestion
Another thing I loved about the game is how much of unapologetic nerds Lune and Gustave are.
I still need to start this.
But I know the feel - games that expand their emotional range often get the best reactions because moving to an extreme of seriousness, sadness, or even humor, can shock the player.
Acts 1 and 2. 3 was sad.
Plenty of jokes remaining in Act 3. Like Expedition 60.
I think the loudest and longest laugh I ever got was at the very end of Untitled Goose Game. Not gonna spoil it for anyone, but once I figured out the joke that had been stewing for three straight hours, it had me laughing for the rest of the night.
On a similar theme, “Thank goodness you’re here!” had me creasing at times. Especially at the lawn mowing bit.
Portal 2 is a classic and I enjoyed Tales from the Borderlands.
