VideoGame_Discussion

TalonJedi87 wrote:

Did you know Supermassive Games the ones behind Dark Pictures Anthology used the first one as a prototype for a Silent Hill game. Konami turned them down so they turned it into Dark Pictures Anthology.

I need to play those, I've only played the first one a little.

Oh wow. I didn’t know that. Would have been cool if they let them make a Silent Hill one of these tho. Actually, I think there is a Silent Hill game coming out too soon like these point and click horror games.

The Dark Pictures Anthology: House of Ashes

7.5/10

This was probably the best one in the series I’ve played out of the 4 (Devil in Me is next when it’s on a sale) as it didn’t really feature much fake outs or super crazy silly plot twists like the first two games in the series did. Or maybe I’m just a sucker for a good tale about creepy demonic forces. Plus the whole setting and time in history made sense for the atmosphere. Taking soldiers in place of a post 9/11 war torn Iraq and putting them deeper down into the poop was interesting as was the lore that followed within the ancient Sumerian culture. But the usual complaints remain as we’re with the previous titles as in its very limited in mobility when moving around as there’s no real sprint button. Movement still feels clunky and the contextual timed button presses are still a bit passé for this day and age but I guess it still works if you’re just wanting to sit back and enjoy a story more so than use your hands constantly as with most other games. Overall though it’s a solid story with some decent performances I thought throughout its 5-6 hour short journey that once again begs to be replayed to see the numerous different endings. Preferably with someone else for a coop experience.

Devil's Third Wii U

It's a 6.5/10 type game, would be a decent rental. It's hard to believe Itagaki made this after he made what I consider the best 3D action game of all time Ninja Gaiden 1 on Xbox and then followed up with 2 which is one of the best also, but it's not as bad as reviews said (average was like 4.5/10) but not a great game either.

Sega CD - Jurassic Park. I like point and click games well enough, but this was just not great. I could not have done it without using a walk through and the gas gun cheat. Some of the actions you need to do don't make any sense. The hit box for attacks and finding/using items doesn't seem to always be right. Visually its pretty cool for its time, and the audio is good.

Unpacking on
It was worth one playthrough, that's about it. Very easy trophies if you're into that sort of thing.

A couple more games:


Descenders

The idea is that each mountain bike course in each of the four biomes are randomly generated like a mystery dungeon, and as the player on a downhill bike, must navigate the path and stunts of each course, worming course to course to the "boss" (which is just a big jump) while accruing the in-game currency. There's a stock of lives and for each bonus objective completed (one per course) another life is added. Though the pool of objectives is small, and, because of the randomly generated nature, sometimes the bonus objective just doesn't fit with the course type.

It's a solid idea, and in theory the game can be played forever. Other players show up on the courses, but cannot be interacted with. There's a lot of customization items to unlock, and the biking itself can be rather fun. Completing a certain amount of courses and bonus objectives also makes special perks, represented by teammates, available to choose from to have for the duration of each session. They can make things harder or easier, though it doesn't affect the score much regardless, so easier is always better.

However, on PS4 at least, performance can be a major problem. It seems like it's been a problem since day one, and it's never been addressed. The steeper the course, the more slippery it can be. Precision is key, but the framerate on PS4 seems unlocked. Most of the time it isn't a large issue, but whenever an objective is completed, trophy unlocked, you're too far off the main path, or just traveling too fast for the game, the framerate hitches and tanks. Again, this game demands precision on most courses, so the slightest slip can send the cyclist careening down the map, and with a limited pool of lives per session, some deaths can feel incredibly cheap. Jumps are also problematic at times. It's hard to gauge how much speed on what kind of jump is appropriate, because getting too much height can cause a crash upon landing. All this doesn't make the game unplayable, but it does make it frustrating. The game is clearly going for a "one more time" appeal, but the poor performance actively discourages that. General performance isn't the only problem though. I've had courses never load, and after I beat the game (read: saw the credits) the camera was stuck so close to the textures it looked like a wash of green and blue. I could still move and hear the other players biking around, but it required a hard restart to fix.

The game itself leans heavily to the realistic side. Graphics and textures look like the real world. Physics, though a bit wonky at times, also try to stick to reality. This aesthetic clashes with the aforementioned teammates, as they look like they crawled out of any of the Switch Pokémon games. This game was made by a small team, so it's admirably what they were going for (despite that, it has some of the slowest and therefore longest credits I've ever witnessed), and the game was made in Unity, but the lack of experience can show through. Because of the randomly generated courses, it can feel like biking through an open Unity toolbox.

One definite shoutout is to the music. It's licensed, atmospheric Euro dance, but it fits so well and, like Tony Hawk, continues to play during whatever you're doing. I personally like this kind of music and can relax to it, but I know that's highly suggestive at the same time. The devs are from Norway.

There's fun in this game. It can be played infinitely for anyone that loves mountain biking and a bit of challenge. It's unfortunate that the performance can be so bad. After amassing 100,000 in-game currency, a whole second set of biomes opens, but I didn't want to fight the performance anymore. For anyone looking for a more laid back 'Trials' or enjoys mountain biking, it's a good recommendation. Just play it somewhere other than the PS4.


Little Nightmares

'Tis the season. Obviously this game has had a heap of praise dropped on it. At the risk of spoilers, I'm not going to talk about the narrative. What I will say is that the game is extremely effective with its atmosphere and art direction.

That said, and I know you're playing a child that's often hungry, the controls can be an issue especially when it comes to jumping. Because of the use of darkness and shadow, there's rarely a shadow of your character visible, and jumping is loose. Combined, it makes judging depth harder than it should be. Speaking of darkness: maybe it's the HDR implementation for this game, but the blacks on my OLED appear gray and and grainy.

There's some collectibles and trophies/achievements for beating the game in under an hour (I beat it in an afternoon my first time through), and while I enjoyed it, I have no desire to play it again. Definitely worth a look though.

Ghostbusters: The Video Game Remastered on
I forgot it was a little on the short side, but that's fine since it was meant to be more of an interactive Ghostbuster 3 movie. On one hand I wish we could have had a few sections where we could drive the Ecto-1, but then on the other hand I remember lots of people saying that about the Batman Arkham trilogy, and then they disliked it when they finally could drive it in Arkham Knight.

Need for Speed: Carbon - Own the City via

I had been chipping away at this for weeks. I played the console version on Xbox shortly after its release and remember liking it. This is similar, but its own thing. Unlike the PSP's version of 'Most Wanted,' 'Own the City' is a full open world racing game. The map isn't terribly big, but that also means it's pretty well designed. Free Roam is available from the main menu and between story events, and it's here where you get chased by cops and try to escape. None of that during events, which is nice. Being on the PSP, the world looks empty, but doesn't necessarily feel empty. A car or two will pop up from time to time, but that's it. It all looks very nice and sounds good. The soundtrack is hit or miss, but it does support custom soundtracks like many PSP (and original Xbox) games did. You might want to use custom soundtracks because you can't skip tracks during gameplay. The voice acting is also solid.

The ma is broken into 14 regions for the story, each controlled by various gang lieutenants, each with a boss after clearing their respective lieutenants regions. Each region contains 7 to 9 story events except the final region. There's a decent mix of events: circuit, sprint, escape, knockout, takedown (which isn't like Burnout, unfortunately. You rub against the cars until their life bar depletes) and package delivery. The arrow for the open world events it isn't as helpful as it should be. The rest is raced on closed off "tracks." When racing gets going, it's fun and there is a good sense of speed. However, there are a lot of sharp corners, which would be fine, except there is no drifting in this game. Either you slow way down, which can cause the rubberband prone AI to catch up, or smack into a wall which will turn the car 90 degrees. And this is when the biggest issue comes into play.

Racing, for the most part, is really good, and at high speeds, plays well. But at slower speeds, your car acts as if it's on those plastic furniture pads that allow larger pieces of furniture to slide on carpet easily. It's most evident at the start of a race and when trying to turn or reverse where your car with move sideways. Basically, the cars don't act the way cars act at low speeds. It can be infuriating. That other large issue is the wingman system. You can choose up to two friendly CPU wingmen (or women) which, when their meter is filled, can create a slipstream for you to gain speed behind, knock opponents away, drop spike strips or repair cars. They mostly, kind of work, but about half the time they get in the way. If not in use, they'll drive right behind you as not to steal a win, and I found this most effective, because they can inadvertently block opponents. This issues don't break the game, but, again, they can be very frustrating especially when you've been leading a race the whole time and either your wingman gets in the way or the weird sliding of your car from hitting something completely ruins a race, forcing a restart.

The game itself looks really good for the PSP. There's a good selection of cars which can be upgraded with performance and visual parts unlocked during the story. Outside of tooling around in free roam, driving the best car in the game is always the way to go during the story, because the opponents can be relentless in their speed and cornering.

Overall, I did enjoy the game. I didn't go after the crates for unlocks in the open world, but the story took me eight hours. For the UMD, this game sits around $12 while on the Vita PSN store it's $20. I go back and forth on if $20 is a good price for this. After the story, I can see myself messing around with the cops in free roam with the various cars, but I don't think I want t go back through the story again. If all else, there is a Quick Play option. Racers are surprisingly scarce on the Vita, and even more so when not counting the poor racers or kart racers, so 'Need for Speed: Carbon - Own the City' might scratch a good itch for Vita racing fans.

I wouldn't mind revisiting NFS Carbon one day to see how it holds up. It was one of my favorite Wii launch titles.

Lone Fungus - 8/10

I beat Driver Parallel Lines on the PC. It's a 7/10 type game.

Beat Assassin's Creed Mirage, I haven't beat any Assassin's Creed game since the third which I loved the DLC powers. I didn't really care much about this game. Traversal was okay but i find locating objectives using the hawk to be time consuming then actual fun. The combat is way to basic for my tastes. The use of stealth and having a wanted system like in previous games just made things annoying. I also disliked the amount of tie in with the modern day events of the story as I didn't really 100% the game to find audio logs and other things that might add details to it. I think I am done with the series. I played Vahalla and the other 2 set in Egypt and the one near Sparta but found them to be way to time consuming. Onto Super Mario Wonder or Sonic Superstars and then Spiderman 2. My backlog is clogged at the moment at three games. With 5 more games coming in the next two weeks my backlog won't be empty any time soon.

Beat Super Mario Wonder, but didn't 100% it. 99 is the max lives which is surprising considering it was 999 on previous titles. Secret exits are present in some levels alongside secret Wonder Seeds. It is a great game. Collecting some wonder seeds require transformations which change the game aspects heavily. Sometimes enemies grow larger, the terrain changes, enemies behavior changes and sometimes the gameplay just from side scroller to isometric or top down. The new powers are useful and are fairly unique. Keep in mind I didn't play Super Mario Maker stage creator so I may be wrong. There are 8 worlds, one hidden, one hub world and six I count the end as the hub world which others might not. I took my time and beat it within 15 hours. I am going to 100% this and play Sonic Superstars since I heard it sucks. Then the wait for Alan Wake 2.

@ued222 I could be wrong but I thought only Super Mario 3D World let you have 999 lives and all the others capped at 99?

With as many lives as they stuff down your pants in modern Mario games, I'm a bit surprised they haven't just done away with them. It's essentially unlimited anyway.

benstylus wrote:


Yeah, dumbing down the game's difficulty with Yoshi and Nabbit wasn't enough, they let you buy 1-ups too.

I just finished Super Mario Bros. Wonder. There's only a handful of collectibles and top of flagpoles I didn't reach that prevent me from reaching 100% and I'm going to start taking care of those after dinner.

PizzaTheHutt wrote:
You might be right I could swear NSMB U let you have 999 but I might be wrong.
PizzaTheHutt wrote:
Honestly the hardest level was Climb to the Beat. Spent 40 lives on it. Nabbit and Yoshi aren't to helpful for it.
It is accessible at least and honestly previous games just had the game over and continue screen. Lives are meaningless overall since the N64 days I think.

Dead Space 2023

9.5/10

I fudging adored this remake. It was right up there with Bluepoint’s Demons Souls and Capcom Resident Evil Remakes for me. The amount and level of tender love and care that went into this remake deserves recognition. It took everything that made the original title so good and built upon it to make several noticeable quality of life changes such as no longer requiring using precious upgrade items such as nodes to unlock certain lockable doors but instead gives you a series of side missions to perform to overall unlock a master override key item which will unlock all those locked doors with goodies behind them as well. Little nuanced changes such as that coupling together with some superb visuals and more cohesive in-depth storytelling now that the main protagonist has full on voice acting lines as opposed to the original where you didn’t even see his face until the end of the game. Also they made the alternative weapons feel meatier too in the remake here whereas in the original I would just rely on the primary plasma cutter tool. But in the remake it was particularly hard I found to find ammo for the plasma cutter. I guess the devs wanted to encourage folks to switch it up and use the variety of other weapons at your disposal which was fine for me because all of the weapons minus the ripper blade felt like they packed a punch. And if you’ve never experienced the original Dead Space I’ll just sum it up in a couple of sentences. Expect a sci-fi horror esque title that resembles a cross between Alien and Resident Evil in space with a tight linear narratively focused story that takes place on a ship and you’re in the shoes of an engineer sent to adhere to a distress signal and perform ship repairs when everything goes belly up and you’re tossed into quite the space demon rabbit hole. It’s only a 12 hour game but it’s so neatly laid out that the only thing that may turn off some is the backtracking throughout the ship although I barely felt like that bothered me because it was done in such a tasteful way that you appear in previously locked sections and come full circle back to each area that it makes it almost feel like a brand new area. Overall any fan of sci-fi horror or horror action in general will find solace here. I hope they remake Dead Space 2 next. That one was probably my favorite of the series.

Starfield via Gamepass- 7/10

I put about 28hrs into this game. While I’m a huge fan of Fallout 3/Vegas and Skyrim. Starfield is neither. Imo the game doesn’t begin to get interesting until the latter half of the main quest. It’s almost like Bethesda forgot what made FO and Skyrim special. I didn’t feel inclined to venture out and explore. Most of the planets felt barren. I think they missed an opportunity here. Take earth/nasa for example. No eye candy, no FO throw back fan service, etc.

I completed the secret base mission very early in the game. Which netted me some great rewards… that lasted the entire campaign. Out side of upgrading lasers and grav drive on my ship. I never spent any credits. I never bought any weapons. I never needed to upgrade my space suit. I had more Med packs and buffs that could have ever used. Looting was fun initially but became redundant and even tho there were tons of rare loot items… I never needed to equip them. The skill system was average. Outside of choosing skills to increase my weapon efficiency I was always torn as to where to spend my points. In fact, right before the end “boss” I had 6 skill points marinating that I eventually haphazardly spent on whatever.

Graphics wise, game looked great. The gun play was fine too. Space navigation and ship stuff was moot since you could grav jump pretty much anywhere. I didn’t build a ship, I didn’t build an outpost. Maybe I played it all wrong? Lastly after the push for the final artifact (really it felt like the game was just getting started) the ending is super anticlimactic and predictable. I guess the idea is to hop into NG+ but why bother. I read (afterward) that nothin really changes but some dialogue with few exceptions. I’m a little let down… Starfield wasn’t boring. It just could have been so much more.

loztdogs wrote:

I started 'Starfield' right at launch, and got bored of the story (and how the story is presented) and annoyed with the weight limit pretty quickly. I think I got 5 or 6 hours in and stopped. I want to at least finish the story missions. Thank god this is on Game Pass, because an impulse buy would've made me so mad at myself.

In my case I cant put it down. I did put skill points into weight lifting though. Being over encumbered is very annoying, I agree.

Well 100% Super Mario Wonder probably spent 20ish hours mainly trying to find secret exits and finding out the purple coin limit is 999 which makes me question the live limit of 99 even more. I think the biggest issue with the game is the bosses. They are to easy and having other bosses instead of Bowser Jr mostly or more unique battles would be nice. Like the battleship ones could have been way better then hitting a red button to reverse the belt. The stages are fun, enjoyable and colorful. You have to unlock all standees to 100% and the reward badge at the end isn't worth the effort.

I am playing Sonic Superstars and am finding the stages enjoyable and the bosses are tedious. I heard the difficult ramps up but the bosses so far aren't fun to beat. You also get a new power with each chaos emerald and Amy with her double jump seems to the best ability so far. Sonic jump into a spindash like in mania isn't to useful anywhere, Knuckles glide and climb isn't to useful and Tails is great to navigate stages. Hoping once I get the 6th emerald that might change else wise this seems like a low effort attempt by Sega.

Alan Wake 2 comes out in 2 days. Unsure if I should get it digitally on Epic Game Store or Playstation or wait and hope for a physical release.

DCGX wrote:

I had a similar experience. Was mildly excited for it, so I resubscribed to GamePass for it. Played for probably 5 hours and decided it wasn't for me and didn't feel like giving it any more time. Immediately cancelled my GamePass sub after

Bayonetta Origins: Cereza and The Lost Demon

8/10

I really enjoyed the origin story of Bayonetta more than I thought I would. When the trailer first dropped I admit I was a bit skeptical saying to myself “Do we really need an origin story for Bayonetta?” But lo and behold I was about it. The way it was presented was like a twin stick action adventure puzzle game where you take control of a young Bayonetta and her first demon Cheshire and trek your way thru a forbidden forest following a mysterious wolf that unravels plot threads as you progress, encountering puzzles and demons to fight in between. Cheshire the demon gets 4 elemental powers too which unlock as you progress the story while Cereza can use her spells and magic to lock enemies in place while Cheshire smacks them up. My only real complaint is it takes getting used to in regards to the control scheme. Numerous times I got confused and lost track of which character was where on the map, especially during battles. It’s a very train your brain kinda game in that regard too. You can also unlock upgrades for both characters too, enhancing their abilities to help you take down foes and outlast them in various ways. And the story too was a bit touching towards the end and definitely showcases how Bayonetta comes to be by the end of the game and all of the trials and tribulations she took to get there. It’s a worthy 12-15 hour romp in my opinion and bodes well for any fans of the series like me or anyone who wants a lite action adventure puzzle game.

Stasis Bone Totem - 9/10 - This is a walk around point and click puzzle game. Isometric style. There are only 9 set times where you can die. Very story focused. Some annoying puzzles though, I definitely tried some combinations, it didn't work but then tried again and it worked. Picked it up on a Humble Bundle sale with some other stuff.

Mortal Blitz on
This was a game I bought years ago and only finally played it tonight. It's fun. And like a lot of fun VR games (way too many of them actually), it's over before you know it, so that's a bummer. I'm going to try playing a bit more on a harder difficulty (the game starts you on the easiest setting by default, which I didn't realize at first) and then post my thoughts in the review thread, but just from that initial playthrough I had a blast, just wish it was longer.

BJB wrote:

I want to get back to it, and finish at least the main story, but there's enough coming and going on Game Pass for me to keep it for now. My sub is through next December, and I get months of Ultimate pretty much monthly through Microsoft Rewards. If I ever had to pay full monthly or annually though, I wouldn't keep Game Pass. I have too much else to play for the every-so-often I play games on Game Pass.

Beat Sonic Superstars and will be getting rid of it ASAP. It is about 8 hours long. To 100% I think I would need to gather enough tokens for the shop which I am not willing to do. There are three story modes sort of more like two but some stages and bosses are not enjoyable at all. The one in Lagoon City reminds me of the boss in Sonic 1 done way worse, that one boss reminds me of the mystic ruins fight from the 3rd game but worse. All the bosses overall are just worse compared to older titles in one way or another to me. I think one of the many benefits of the older games was the ability to understand the story better via the manual. The battle mode isn't fun to play but can be played with AI players. I don't have PS+ at the moment. I just cannot suggest this game at all.

Onto Alan Wake 2.

Are the bosses that infuriating in Sonic Superstars? I was thinking about getting it on a Black Friday sale.

TalonJedi87 wrote:
They just have so many unable to hit moments and take way to long. Some stages take 2-8 minutes to complete but bosses can take the same amount. Some are painfully easy when using Amy's double jump due to being able to hit them earlier then your supposed to but others just take way to long. I would still give it a shot if it was on sale but for $60 I couldn't justify it. Just watch a video of the Fortress boss fight as that was a long battle along with three others.

Thanks. I may still snag it on a deep sale.

Its a Sonic game, you won't be waiting long.

Yeah they drop in price almost as fast as Ubi games.

Figment - 8/10

Charming pseudo platformer, puzzler. Short game, I think I was at near 5hrs to the finish line. Unique environments and characters. Puzzles got a little redundant and some puzzles were irritating. Game was pretty focused on story so very little combat and only a handful of enemy types. None the less an enjoyable experience.

Ratchet & Clank (PS2) 9/10

While I had always collected them, I've never beaten a Ratchet & Clank game until now. They are fantastic, up there with Mario in terms of great platformers. I will eventually get to Going Commando and Up Your Arsenal.

Now I'll be trying to play through another Insomniac Games game (and no not Spider-man 2) Resistance Fall of Man on RPSC3 emulator for PC.

Stray Gods: The Roleplaying Musical - 7/10

Adventure games with branching narrative paths are kinda my thing. It's probably my favorite subgenre of games and I'm about to go a bit of a binge since I have a few of them in my backlog. I wanted to start with Stray Gods because I was drawn to the art style the moment I saw it. It's written by David Gaider (Dragon Age: Origins), scored by Austin Wintory (Journey), and the main characters are voiced by an all-star cast so I had really high hopes. Conceptually, it's so unique and I always want to support developers who think outside the box. In a nutshell, it's a game that combines musical theatre with interactive storytelling based on Greek mythology. It features stunning 2D hand-illustrated visuals that give off a sort of comic book-style aesthetic. I've never played anything quite like it. And I definitely enjoyed it, but it just didn't quite live up to my expectations. The voice acting is fantastic, the art style is really striking, and the overall concept is fresh but it doesn't quite come together, in my opinion. The music, which is supposed to be the highlight of the experience, is very average and forgettable. Songs are crafted based on the choices you make, but they never quite flow or sound right. Not to me at least. I think the very first song is the only one I liked. The rest are forgettable. Then there's the story which also falls short, imo. It's a decent murder mystery and while enjoyable, it doesn't really leave a lasting impression.

This is still a game I'd recommend, but only if you are able to grab it on sale. I'm a little bummed because this is one of the few 2023 games I was really looking forward to and it was a bit of a disappointment. But maybe my expectations were too high and others who give it a shot will enjoy it more than I did.

justin_credible wrote:


This was a good game. I played for the first time earlier this year, though it was the PS3 HD Remaster via PS+ Premium. I had to give up at the end boss though, because of a stupid design decision, I didn't like how every time you died you'd lose whatever ammo you had used and you'd have to buy more each time you died and you wouldn't get the bolts back that you spent on your previous attempt.
I eventually got fed up with that and just started from scratch and played the PS4 remake instead and they fixed that problem I had with the original, plus a lot more. I originally intended to play through the PS4 remake last, but because it didn't work out that way now I am a little unsure if I should play through R&C 2 and 3 because they're probably going to feel like a big step backwards after playing the remake.

PizzaTheHutt wrote:

Yeah I read in advance that he was completely cheap and that you needed the RYNO to beat him, but that costs 150,000 bolts. On PS2 though there was sort of a glitch that you could become Giant Clank and replay that mission over and over by falling off the ledge them fight more enemies rinse and repeat. I did it for about 2 hours to get enough bolts to get the RYNO and beat the final boss. I was playing the PS2 version though, I don't know if that glitch works on the PS3 collection.

About the remake though everything I've read the original is way better. First of all they cut out a lot of areas and didn't add anything new and they dumbed the game down for kids. If you look at howlongtobeat.com the original averages 12 hours to beat but the remake only averages 10 hours.

Goodbye Volcano High - 8/10

Another really unique adventure game. It's a narrative adventure/rhythm game set in world of anthropomorphic dinosaurs and it focuses on the last days of high school for the main character Fang and their friends. The main character is part of a band and that's where the rhythm portion of the game comes in. The music is really great and rhythm minigames offer the perfect level of challenge. I'm listening to the soundtrack on Spotify while I write this. Easily the highlight of the experience.

The animation is also really great. As are the voice performances. Fang is an awesome character and you get the usual coming of age stuff with teenagers coming to important crossroads in their lives as they try to figure out where they fit in the world. And I think that was my biggest issue with the game. You have a lot of interesting plot points that aren't fully explored. There is so much potential with the story, but it just kinda drags and loses a lot of steam towards the end. And it's a bummer because early on I thought it had a shot to be one of my favorite games of the year. But in the end, I think the only thing I'll remember is the killer soundtrack. Definitely a game I'd still recommend to folks who enjoyed games like Night in the Woods, Life is Strange, the Telltale games etc.