VideoGame_Discussion

Ghostwire: Tokyo

After 'Yakuza 6' being shorter than I anticipated, I was still in a Japanese culture-centric mood, and I was actually excited for 'Ghostwire' despite the lukewarm reception. That said, it earns that lukewarm reception.

From a story standpoint, some guy wants spirits and the protagonist, Akito, gets caught up in it while trying to retrieve his sister from the hospital. Honestly, the story wasn't anything until the very end, but by that point, it was the end. The game is steeped in Japanese traditions dealing with the afterlife, and it's interesting, but only scratches the surface. Most things aren't explained, and it's just "magic" basically. I look at "ok" games as either being carried by their story if the gameplay isn't great, or by the gameplay if the story isn't great. Unfortunately, the gameplay isn't great either.

Acting like a first person shooter, Akito uses elemental spells of the soul possessing him, KK, to ward off enemies. There's a standard shot (wind), spread shot (water), and heavy shot (fire). The elements don't actually come into play in any way other than to distinguish the types of shots. There's also a bow, but outside certain, forced sections, the elementals are far better. Each shot can be upgraded (so can the bow) as well as a slew of basic skills Akito gains, but nothing really changes. After everything is introduced early on, that's all there is to see. Same goes for the enemies. Their designs are really cool, but they're the same handful the whole game through. This would be okay, and indeed it works in other games, if the world was interesting to explore, but it isn't.

'Ghostwire' would've been much better served as a linear game. Instead, there's a good chunk of Tokyo to run around in, but for story reasons, it's empty. Buildings and entire areas can repeat, and besides convenience stores and specific story moments, the buildings are completely closed off. What's there is a barren, lifeless neighborhood that, while looking cool, large and accurate, isn't much fun. This might be the first open world game with "towers" that I just didn't bother with unlocking the whole map, collecting most if not all things or doing all the side quests. Speaking off, the side quests can be interesting, but most are about entering an apartment (every apartment has the same floorplan) or battling in the same arenas. The latter is especially a bummer. Like 'No More Heroes III,' outside of on-street, in-the-moment conflicts, battles take place in separate arenas. Mostly the same gray arena actually. Even boss fights are pulled into separate, empty arenas. So what little charm the open world has, can't even be exploited for most story or battle moments.

When sticking to the main story, the game is pretty short. Given the lack of story, this is a good thing, though the rest of the map is available to those that want to do more. There's a short glide ability that can be upgraded to last longer and creatures near roofs to zip to, but it's not enough to make exploring exciting. Much of this I surmise came down to budget. Things like certain character actions, even for story purposes, are not seen because the game fades to black so time and money wasn't spent on the animation. The characters looks good enough (and Akito has a lot of wardrobe options), but there are very few. I already mentioned the lack of enemy variety, but the overall repetition of the game world screams we needed more budget.

As a Game Pass game, it's worth a playthrough. Tokyo fans will enjoy the setting, but the gameplay leaves a lot of be desired. If 'Ghostwire' was designed more like their next release, 'Hi-Fi Rush,' it would've been a much better game.

The Darkness on via PS+ Premium. I'm glad I decided to revisit this, and I'm glad I stuck with it until the end. There was so much of this game I didn't remember from 15 years ago, I'm starting to wonder if I even did finish my original playthrough when it first released. Most of the voice acting (especially "The Darkness" creature) was really good, and so is the soundtrack. The music gets you hyped and kept me going through some parts where I'd die a lot. I probably was dying a lot in some parts because I was being stubborn and not wanting to switch from my pistols to a better gun, I think I used the pistols for 90% of the playthrough and that's no exaggeration.

Muramasa Rebirth

I actually started this on Wii shortly after its release. I didn't get a handle of the blade system then, but the map traversal was what really made me lose interest. I've had the Vita version for years and finally cracked it open.

Yes, the game is gorgeous. The parallax scrolling, the art style, it's really like running through a painting. And running you will be, because there's a good amount of backtracking and the environments repeat over and over. And that's kind of the downfall of this game. It isn't long (both campaigns took me about 12 hours), but the areas repeat, the enemies repeat (and usually only one type of enemy is on the screen at a time), and the combat isn't terribly deep. It has its uniqueness, but everything is done with one button, including blocking, and maybe an analog stick direction. So while the game is gorgeous, repetition sets in pretty quickly. The two campaigns are interesting though, and the music is likewise gorgeous, but I'm glad it's on the short side.

I also bought the Vita exclusive DLC the last time (maybe only time?) it was on sale. I started the first DLC campaign, all of which are more like 2-3 hours long, and while the environments and much of the combat system remain the same, the DLC does mix up the playable characters. It's more for looks, though, as they fight the same as the main game's characters.

One thing that's interesting is that the game's director went on record saying he chose the Vita for its OLED screen. So it baffles me that this game hasn't been ported to the Switch with its DLC for a complete package. Other Vanillaware games have been ported, so maybe this is on the list, but it feels like the perfect fit for the Switch.

Overall, 'Muramasa' is still a great game, but marathon sessions will produce fatigue because of the lack of variety across the board. Either way, this is a game to be played for the art and graphics alone.

@dcgx I enjoyed Muramasa - I, too, have the DLC. It's repetitious but fun to feel more empowered as you get more swords and level them up, and I was motivated by the story tidbits and finding various secrets, like the sea monster. Leveling up skills in the DLC (and getting different story endings) was fun - the different characters had some unique abilities that differentiated them.

Alaisiagae wrote:

Yeah everything is very solid, just the repeat environments and enemies got to me. Especially the flying enemies. Those are a pain. At least if they had you fight more than one type of enemy at a time on the world map would go a long way. I'm not sure why they stuck to one at a time. 20 basic ninjas of the same color is bland. I'll get back to the DLC, but I need a break lol

Pretty much every Vanillaware game is extremely repetitive, but still somehow fun in spite of it.

Finally beat The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild! (Wii U)

Ive been on and off playing this for like 5 years. While I do think this game should be a 10/10 game, if I have to compare it to all the previous Zelda games I would personally give this like a 9/10. Its awesome, I just prefer the traditional formula and Im tired of open world games.

Octopath Traveler II - 9.5/10

One of the best JRPGs I have ever played. And I have played a ton of them. It's everything a sequel should be. It's the perfect example of how a game can feel like a love letter to those classic 16-bit era JRPGs while still feeling fresh and modern because of the design choices and QOL improvements.

Graphically, OT2 is absolutely stunning. I honestly can't say enough about the lighting, the animations, and the overall attention to detail. The gameplay and the soundtrack are my two favorite things about the first game and they are even better here in the sequel. Gameplay wise it's what you expect from a traditional JRPG. It's got a great job system that gives you a lot of freedom and great side quests some of which have multiple solutions. Again, the attention to detail is just so impressive. The gameplay is simple enough that it doesn't alienate newcomers, but it is varied and nuanced enough to satisfy longtime fans of the genre. There is also a day/night component that adds depth and variety to the gameplay. You can change from day to night and vice versa at any time with a click of a button and the lighting, the overall mood, the music, the NPC placement, the enemies, buffs/debuffs...it all changes depending on the time of day. Again, attention to detail!

My only real gripe is that the 8 characters don't interact at all outside of a few "travel banter" segments. Their stories are fragmented and it can feel a little jarring at times. Luckily, the stories are all really well told and you end up connecting with each character so it wasn't as big of an issue for me. I wouldn't say all 8 stories are phenomenal. Some are definitely better than others. But even my least favorite was still very good so again, no real complaints there but I can see the fragmented nature of the storytelling being an issue for others. Once you complete all 8 stories, the characters actually come together and you journey towards the true ending. This entire section of the game and the epilogue that follows are phenomenal. I can't say more without really spoiling things, but it's always important to get to the end of a 100-hour game like this and feel like the journey was worthwhile. And I definitely felt that way at the end of OT2.

As I mentioned, this is a 100-hour game (I did everything in the game so maybe closer to 80 hours for most). That's probably an immediate turn-off to most people and I totally get that. I came so close to skipping this altogether for that very reason. I just don't have the time. But here we have a 100-hour game that feels epic and also feels respectful of your time as a player. It never felt like a grind and the way the game is designed means you can pop in and out at any time. Especially if you play it on the Switch because I believe it's the perfect portable experience.

So all in all, this is one of the truly special modern JRPGs, in my opinion. Loved every second of my time with it and it's a game I can't recommend enough to fans of the genre.

Manticore - Galaxy On Fire on which I completed 100%

So I originally bought this because I was in the mood for a Star Fox style game, and this delivered on that. Truthfully I wouldn't consider myself a big fan of the Star Fox series, I don't even know why I was in the mood for something like them. But I at least picked a good one.
So why I decided to 100% complete this, is because I felt like since the start of the year I was starting too many games and not finishing them. I knew that would be a problem with the Game Catalog on PS+ Premium, which is also why I try to stay away from GamePass. So I decided the next game I start, regardless if it is a good or bad game, I will go for 100% on, and it wound up being this game and I really enjoyed it.

I finally finished Mii Trek, the terrible 3DS Streetpass game.

Got the credit roll but it looks like there is still some post game stuff to do.

When I hear the phrase "walking simulator," this is what I will always think of. Not a focused narrative driven experience that makes you want to keep going a bit longer, but just counting steps (steps that OTHER people have taken walking with their 3ds, your own steps don't even count) and moving around a map, occasionally choosing a direction, finding an item, or dealing with a brief quick time event. Run out of steps (which happens very quickly), and you have to wait until you get more streetpasses to continue.

It's pretty much rubbish.

kevolones wrote:
Good job! How many hours did you put in?

Based on your comment about other Zelda games, what are your favorite Zelda games?

Heavyd814life wrote:
A 9.5/10 catches my attention more than a 10/10. When someone says 10/10, I'm skeptical. When someone says 9.5/10, I view it as, woah, that game sounds really good. Sounds like the rater wasn't swept away by opinions of others/hype. 9.5 ounds like a very calculated rating.

You got my attention.

So now I have to ask. If I were to choose to play just one of the games, do I play the first one or the second

@nonamesleft Definitely OT2. I think OT1 has the slightly stronger soundtrack and OT1 also has a couple of really memorable characters, but as I mentioned in my review, OT2 is everything a sequel should be and improves on the original in every imaginable way. The games are standalone experiences so you can jump straight into OT2. I hope you enjoy it as much as I did!

Heavyd814life wrote:
Thanks. Then maybe I'll play the second and also listen to the soundtrack of the first.

nonamesleft wrote:

I would think not that many really. (Actually checked. Only 54 hours, played 39 times.)



All of them are amazing, really. But A Link to the Past is easily my favorite of all the Zelda games.

Tbh I say all but I have yet to play a couple of them. Mostly the 3DS and Switch games since I never bought those consoles.

kevolones wrote:
Did you play Minish Cap?

nonamesleft wrote:

Yes, its great! Also played Links' Awakening and the 2 Oracle games.

kevolones wrote:
Link's Awakening was fun. I played Oracle of Ages ages ago. Actually just started Seasons this week. Been meaning to play it for a long long time.

Far Cry 3: Blood Dragon Classic Edition
I was glad this was such a short game because that's the main reason I kept playing when I realized I wasn't enjoying it very much. Not saying it was a bad game, but I just enjoyed vanilla Far Cry 3 more.

After beating Kirby Return to Dreamland Deluxe on Switch with my Little, 2D Kirby games are a PG version of Elden Ring with all the Mini and Major Boss fights. The levels simple then Boss fights of varying difficulty. Most of the time Multiple per stage.

Kirby kinda a Nintendo Badass.

Solid 8 out of 10.

@PizzaTheHutt I remember trying to play Blood Dragon right after beating FC3 and feeling similar. I ended up giving up on it as it just wasn't that enjoyable and it felt like a step backwards some how from the main game.
I have thought about trying to give it another shot now that it's been a few years and I know it is short, so maybe I'll do that.

Need for Speed: Unbound

I had a long write-up about this game, but the good and bad are each too long. So it's list time!

Good
- map and city/track design; the world feels lived in
- variety of cars, tweaking if you want to
- events like hot laps and some drifting are just on the map and not separate so it doesn't force events a player doesn't like on the player
- graphics and overall aesthetic; the realistic world looks great and the graffiti accents work really well
- overall story, while minimal, can be investing and works with the game design

Bad
- actual writing, especially dialogue, can be just plain bad; calling music from 2003 moldy-oldies doesn't even make sense. They try GTA-style talk radio/ads but they have no subtly for satire
- while races are well designed, they're forced to be run over and over leading to horrible repetition. It's especially bad for players going for certain cars, fully upgrading them, etc. where money is so much more necessary
- cars still drive like boats, especially early on, but it's adaptable. They don't feel as good to drive like in games like Forza. Also, oddly, sometimes the e-brake wouldn't activate no matter the car
- the map is great, but rather small, which hurts that repetition
- sense of speed; going 100 mph feels more like 55 mph. Only the very highest speeds feel fast
- cops, they need a rest. It's integrated into the story, sorta, but sometimes the eagle-eyes of cops looking through buildings or up/down hills out of sight is ridiculous on higher wanted levels. They also have a tendency spawn directly in front of the player at high wanted levels too. There's no options, even post game, to turn them off or reduce them
- Anything that happens in the prologue is pointless, where you finish, how much money is gained, but the game doesn't tell the player it's a prologue. I restarted so much because I'm the type of player in racing games that always has to finish first, but it didn't matter in the end

Subjective
- Money vs. race finishes; winning money is top, so finishing in a certain place in an event, outside of getting more money or a car for better placement, doesn't matter. It does take some stress off races, but can make them less compelling
- Music: it definitely fits the game, but I only liked a few tracks. This severely negatively impacts a game where music is so important
- character design - I think they either should've gone more realistic to fit the city and cars, or more exaggerated to fit the graffiti accents. The weird, flat shaded middle ground doesn't fit well
- A$AP Rocky - I don't know much about him, so I learned something, and he seems cool, but at one point the player has to drive him somewhere and the devs shoehorned an interview they did with him in, which sounds like he's defending himself from detractors for some reason. Just, why?

I played this on Game Pass and at times was having such a good time with it. GameFly did have the Xbox Series X version for $15 with free shipping (it has since gone up), and I almost bought it. With the right car, I genuinely enjoyed running around the map, and the world feels so great. But it's so repetitive, even for a racer, and the cops can completely ruin things either trying to shake them off or wait them out. If the game drops that low again, I might pick it up. It's a solid game for racing fans, but I still feel like 'Need for Speed' would benefit more from a straight race to race design versus the open world, cop drama sometimes.

@DCGX You can put the A$AP Rocky part in bad lol. That interview is bizarre. I still remember it vividly. It‘s some weird bit of propaganda that feels like it’s supposed to make the guy more relatable but has the opposite effect. Why shoehorn that into the game at all? He just rambles on and on for like 20 minutes. It was probably only 5 minutes but it definitely felt like 20 minutes lol.

The marketing for the game was odd. I wonder if centering the marketing around him helped boost sales. I hope it did because it’s actually a solid NFS game and I had a good time with it. I think I enjoyed the gameplay loop a little more than you did, but I definitely agree with most of the points you made.

I bought Need For Speed: Heat and need to finally get around to playing it and then catch up on Unbound from there. I'm glad they stopped doing yearly releases for NFS games. That was one of the best decisions they made for the series.

Remember with Need For Speed: Shift they had said they were going to alternate between arcade and semi-realistic style with each years' entry? That didn't last long at all. I skipped NFS: Shift 2 completely and I must not have been the only one because they abandoned that idea.

Speaking of Need for Speed Unbound, I have a copy available if anyone wants it. Guess I should make a post

Heavyd814life wrote:

I completely missed the marketing then, because it took me multiple races with A$AP Rocky before I even knew he was in the game. I'm guessing in context what he says makes more sense. Obviously we don't hear any questions from whoever interviewed him. When the player character drives him, the monologue kind of makes sense to what the player character is going through, but I wish they had made it shorter in-game, and then not have it during the credits at all. Once it finishes during the credits, it starts over until the credits end. Just make it an extra to listen/view outside of gameplay from the main menu.

Anyway, it is a solid game. I just want more variety in the races since they repeat ad nauseum.

Immortals of Aveum is a decent 10 hourish game. You get three spell types that are akin to a rifle, smg and shotgun. You also have a ton of other spells to grab or move towards enemies, do tons of damage in various ways. I think the biggest issue was the backtracking and the story. I pretty much understood the story from the initial moments and how it was going to probably end and I was partially correct. Honestly if another game hadn't released with a similar idea, I probably wouldn't be bothered as much by it. Getting Armored Core 6 shipped today and Daymare unless Armored Core 6 lasts me to Starfield. Starfield is coming out on the 6th though.

I just finished EQQO on
Despite being a short game, I came close to giving up on this a few times during my playthrough. It's not because the puzzles were difficult, if anything the game overall is kind of on the easy side. It was more to do with the controls, it took too long to get used to them, and also multiple bugs I experienced (some quick examples: one bug where my character wouldn't enter a door, but when I restarted the level he entered it no problem, and another where my character fell through the ground and ended up somewhere in the void where I could no longer control him so I had to restart, and also several times my on-screen cursor would disappear and sometimes it would eventually come back but other times I'd have to restart the level). The graphics also are messy sometimes, lots of blurriness (that seems to happen quite a bit with Unreal Engine on Switch). The game was meant as a VR game on PC so I will assume it's better when played that way, but on Switch I don't think I'd recommend it. They had a decent little heartwarming story to tell, but it deserved a better game built around it.

There is a $1 DLC for the game which lets you plant a tree in the game, and profits from it go to WeForest who will plant a tree in real life.

New Super Mario Bros. 2

I've had this on my 3DS since it was on of the choices for Club Nintendo's annual rewards. I've played it off and on since, but never fully got into it. I finally finished the main worlds, though there is a ton to unlock. Solid, definitely, not mark remarkable.

Final Fantasy 16

Kommie wrote:

I should be close to the end of FF16. But for some reason I feel like doing all side quests

kevolones wrote:

I skipped them towards the end. All of them are still doable and not missable. Early in the game it warns you about an important quests, any side quest not finished before that is missable though. But not after.

I'm PRETTY SURE i beat Inscryption. There's nothing else like it out there. Completely blew my mind.

Simon_Belmont wrote:

Lol. After it really ends it starts all over. If that helps.

Yeah and Endless Mode starts.
I wish the live action parts were a little better acted but otherwise the game was really perfect.

Simon_Belmont wrote:

the kaycees mod mode were you add different variables etc has a different final boss- I don’t remember if there’s any new footage after that though. Think it’s just for trophy.

I did that, i had to use a walkthrough for one part.
Picked up XCom Chimera Squad and UFO Aftershock, working on those.
Chimera Squad is like XCOM-lite, i dig the graphic style and the new breach mechanics.

That game was wild.

Simon_Belmont wrote:

Bleed_DukeBlue wrote:

I loved every second of it. It was just challenging enough to not be frustrating and it was unsettling but not overly scary, if that makes sense.
Whenever people say that there aren't any great AAA games coming out, i point them to indie studios and games and Inscryption is on that list.
It wasn't just a game, it was an experience and became an obsession.

Agreed on all of the above. It’s nice to see that kind of creativity.

Simon_Belmont wrote:

Beat Star Trek Resurgence. It has an episodic format but covers only one main threat. I was hoping it would deal with more then one main antagonist over the duration but enjoyed the game nonetheless. The inclusion of three characters adds something from the past series but I don't remember one of them. It is a standard TellTale like game where you have options and combat set pieces with puzzles sprinkled in. Sometimes you get stuck trying to find the last object you need to scan to move forward though. It is around 10 hours long and is pretty enjoyable. Would prefer less cameos though.

Decided to beat The Last of Us Part 2 after dropping it and Guardians of the Galaxy. I was nearing the end and simply stopped enjoying it. I didn't enjoy The Last of Us Part 2 as much as the previous game but wanted to complete it. I didn't feel the gameplay was great, I hate forced stealth in the first game as well and the story introduction and ending wasn't as impactful as the first entry. I question the world as it seems like food would be a major issue and some other story elements.

I simply dislike the multiverse concept being splashed into a game without any reason and gave up on Guardians of the Galaxy after that scene. Beating it was an okay time as the gameplay was sastifying but the story was somewhat questionable to me, perhaps since I only know the characters from the TV show and recent movies.

Well beat Armored Core 6 Chapter 1. Going to take my time as September has Mortal Kombat 1 which I will only play for the story mode and arcade endings, Starfield and Daymare which is apparently only 6 hours long.

Both GOTG games exist in their own universe and don't take place in the MCU at all (other than having unlockable costumes from the movies). The Telltale game is more intuned with the comics and the action game creates its own universe using elements from the movies, TV shows and comics. Kind of like how the HBO Watchmen series invented its own universe using a combination of the movie, comics and original ideas.
I really dug the action game other than the repetitive (but fun) battles.

Beat Daymare Sandcastle. The good is the gameplay and combat systems. My god the clip system in the previous game nearly got me to give up on it and it being gone is great to me. The puzzles are quite a bit easier and less difficult then the previous game. The freeze mechanic is extremely important. The story is acceptable but I feel like most characters don't get enough screen time for my liking and enemy variety is extremely lacking. Basically enemies drop electric looking orbs that if not dealt with inhabit a new corpse. It has an upgrade system as well. If you like Resident Evil 2 Remake you might like this game. It is 5-7 hours long.

Quake II Remastered

I definitely liked this more than the first Quake. The levels are designed better and there's more variety. That said, there's still too much brown for me. I love how fast you run, but it can be problematic during the very little amount of platforming there is. It's really easy to walk onto a small platform and slip right off. I still have the expansions and 64 to go.

Blasphemous 2 - one of tf last bosses is a big difficulty spike compared to the rest of the game. Otherwise it was great

I’m almost finished with blasphemous 1 trophies. This whole game feels like a troll. I’ve heard 2 is much better?

2 is better from a gameplay point. No more instant death from pits/falls, aside from boss rooms. Story and atmosphere wise 1 is better but overall 2 is solid. I basically played it non stop when I could, 17 hours to just beat it. Not all achievements though

2 also shows you where to go next, I definitely liked that addition.

Shadow of the Tomb Raider. That was a hoot.
image

Shadow of the Tomb Raider to me felt like the most Tomb Raidery experience of the new trilogy. Shame it didn’t get much praise next to Rise.

Fast & Furious: Spy Racers Rise of SH1FT3R on
It's not a good game, but if an easy platinum trophy means anything to you, you can get it in like 3 hours. I wasn't able to get it because of one trophy that requires you to win a race in split-screen and I don't have a second DualSense controller, but in 3 hours of playing that was the only trophy left to unlock.

edit: I take that back, I did get the platinum and then even went and did it all over again in the PS4 version. Didn't take much time and there's not much challenge to the game anyway.

Finally got around to beating Strider on PS4. Really good game, wish they had a disc version but only Japan got one.

nonamesleft wrote:

I've beaten like half the Zelda's and half I haven't beaten, working on Spirit Tracks right now.

Beaten:
Ocarina of Time
BOTW
Wind Waker
Skyward Sword
Twilight Princess
Phantom Hourglass
Minish Cap
LTTP
Link's Awakening (the original)

Haven't beaten
Zelda 1
Zelda 2
Majora's Mask
Spirit Tracks (shoon hopefully)
Oracle of Ages/Seasons
Link Between Worlds
Tears of the Kingdom
Links Awakening (remake)

Simon_Belmont wrote:
It's that good? A relative of mine kept trying to convince me to buy it. He was even willing to pay for it if I didn't enjoy the game, that's how confident he was that I would.

justin_credible wrote:
Link Between Worlds was solid. One of the last (maybe the last?) 2D style Zelda games the series had.

A nice amount of games in the series I haven't played.

I haven't played Ocarina of Time. I know I should though.

Haven't played Twilight Princess either.

Although I didn't play Majora's Mask, I did read the Mana, so although it's not the same as playing it, I feel like I experienced the game's story.

Are you enjoying Spirit Tracks? I played Phantom Hourglass. Enjoyed it. But didn't play Spirit Tracks.

I have listened to plenty of music from many of the games though, so at least there's that :)

nonamesleft wrote:

It was one of the most interesting games I've played in years. Just go in completely blind and enjoy. Give it 3 or 4 hours before you make your decision either way. I know that's a big time commitment if you aren't enjoying it, but games like this are pretty rare. I don't even like card-based battling systems in games, but I really enjoyed this one.

nonamesleft wrote:

I am playing Spirit Tracks on an emulator on PC with a patch that allows you to use controller instead of "stylus" which is just mouse but you still have to use the mouse for half the things, so I am holding a Wii U Pro in one hand and a mouse in the other while I play. Kind of a PITA. I'm about half way done with the game. Like PH the controls make things hard more than the puzzles themselves.

I'm stuck in Link Between Worlds, no idea where I'm supposed to go next and the save is from several years ago. A guide might help but not sure.

Orlandu wrote:
I'll definitely keep it in mind. I've heard very good things about it, and I don't know much about the game. So I would be going in fresh.

I almost bought the physical version last year, but didn't. And now it's sold out. (Not surprising considering the fan base that the game was getting)

justin_credible wrote:
Interesting, using a mouse instead of a stylus. At first with Phantom Hourglass, I wasn't a big fan of stylus controls, but I didn't really mind it too much as the game progressed.

Maybe I should try Spirit Tracks sometime. I've been wanting to.

As far as Link Between Worlds, if you don't feel compelled to finish it, no reason to force it. Maybe Nintendo will one day give us another 2D Legend of Zelda game.

@nonamesleft If you have an even halfway modern PC it should run okay. I played it on an i7-3770 and a GTX 950 and had no problems. I don't think it will be a game you play more than once or twice so the cheapest route is probably the best one.

Beat Getaway Black Monday on PS2 (technically, PCSX 2 on PC) Not sure why, it was pretty crappy. I'm a sucker for GTA ripoffs.

Orlandu wrote:
Sadly, my PC specs are really not impressive. I think I have to go the Switch eShop route (unless I happen to find a physical copy for a good price)

Finished Resident Evil 4
21 hours.

Now playing Star Wars Jedi: Survivor.

Beat Expanse Episode 3. The pacing in this game is terrible. Episode 1 had a slow startup but got rolling and episode 2 had some real impact but episode 3 was more slow and exploration based then previous episodes. It is in no means bad and episode 4 drops in two days but so far I highly recommend buying this at a discount. Chapters only take around an hour to beat so it should be a six hour game in total. I do like these interactive stories and will be getting Mortal Kombat 1. Gave up on Horizon didn't find it fun and am going to play God of War Ragnarok.

I finished Saints Row on last night.
My friend and I were playing co-op on Sunday night, the final mission warns you there is no going back once you start it. At some point during it, the game froze. We decided to just stop and retry the next day...except she could never join me last night because there was no way to completely abort the mission and restart it, so it always started me from the last checkpoint we had reached before the game had froze on us and when playing co-op the other player can't join when the host is in the middle of a mission. So she had to connect remotely to my PS5 so I could let her watch my screen while I did the final mission alone. What a bummer that was because we had already done everything else in the game as a team up to that point.

Quake II - Call of the Machine

The content in a $10 digital game with 'Quake II' is quite staggering actually. This is a new campaign from Machine Games, and like their campaign for the first 'Quake,' they at least try to mix things up. They use enemies from the expansions and the level design is a bit more vertical. The colors are also more varied, but there's still too much brown for my taste. I had to take a break and watch a Wes Anderson film to even it out.

Beat Giana Sisters DS. If you want 2D platforming, this certainly has it. With more than 80 levels it can keep you busy for a few hours. Found all the collectibles myself too.

It's not as polished as New Super Mario Bros but it's not bad. Most levels were decent fun but it didn't seem like there was any theme to each world, so not very many of them really stood out. And weirdly enough it's a euro platformer where there aren't drops of water that fall from the ceiling to hurt you!

Quake II - The Reckoning

Yup, I'm still going with this. I might push 'Starfield' back a few days to finish all the campaigns up. This was another solid one, still brown, but they tried. Enemy placement is more suspect in this game, and it's mostly in tighter corridors. I found myself running out of ammo a little more often, and health pack placement was questionable; either too much in one spot or not enough/any in others. Still worth a run.

Didn't know Mario Rabbids Spark Of Hope DLC finished dropping and I decided to play them. Tower of Doom is where you play 10 stages and has great replay value. Basically you start are with certain sparks and slowly gain more levels, sparks, heroes and other collectibles. Last Spark Hunter and Rayman Phantom of the Opera just add a bit of story and gameplay such as traversal options and combat but each DLC pack is 1.5-2.5 hours long and are fun to play. Not as repayable as the previous game and as tactical though but fun nonetheless.

Well back to God of War Ragnarök and then the wait for Mortal Kombat 1. Expanse Episode 4 drops today though and Episode 5 is coming out on the 21st. I kind of made mistakes in Episode 1-3 such as not finishing the optional quests since I don't like exploring for items and perhaps failing in a certain moment. I hate how the trophies pretty much ruin the surprise.

Diablo IV

8.5/10

After about 45-50 hours I’m finally watching the credits roll and man what an addictive journey. Diablo games never fail to disappoint in the hooking you in functionality for sure and if I didn’t have about 12 other games in my backlog I’d def start up again on a new class. I went Druid just to see how it fared and I enjoyed shapeshifting and using Thor like lightning and wind powers alike. I also loved the sense of wanderlust the overworld map gave you to discover all areas and do all those “!” Side quests that popped up. I wasn’t as compelled to finish every single dungeon though as there’s just so damn many of them so I just stuck to doing dungeons that suited my class towards the latter half of the game. But in regards to the story it probably has the most engaging and interesting tale to date. Lilith the Daughter of hatred is as eerie as she is terrifying and it only makes it more so as she speaks mostly in a calm, mothering like yet sinister tone. And I can definitely see this continuing on as a TV series somewhere after witnessing the epilogue. Overall, I thoroughly enjoyed my time with this sequel and my only complaint would be that sometimes it’s a bit too big and dense for its own good and can overwhelm at times and not in a good way. Like I said the vast amount of dungeons do overstay their welcome towards the latter half of the game and become too similar to each other and offer not enough to warrant doing them all unless you change the world tier to a higher difficulty to pump out those rarer rewards and item drops. Other than that though it’s a groovy experience. While Diablo 3 still holds the crown for me in regards to both addictive gameplay and a nice balancing decently paced and not too overwhelmingly lengthy experience, Diablo 4 is still a very rich game in its own right that if it’s the only game you play can offer you countless hours of enjoyment and replay-ability if you wish to experience each of the 5 unique classes.

Life is Strange: True Colors on
My friend bought me this because she wanted to play through it and she likes when we play these types of games and then compare our choices after. I think the story was good, there were some fun parts and some sad parts. Not really sure where they will take this series next though, it's only a matter of time until it starts to feel like we've done it all.

Quake II - Ground Zero

Yeah the 'Quake II' formula was stretching thing by this second pack. Made by the same dev as 'The Reckoning,' the levels seem longer, but there's a lot of backtracking. Enemy placement is questionable; there's a lot of ambushes by the small flyers. The biggest issue I had is a few times during the campaign you have to activate something, usually calling in an air strike, and then have a limited amount of time to run. Except, it's easy to miss the on-screen cue, especially if you're fighting enemies off, and there's no timer. Once there was an audible 10 second countdown, but by then it was too late. Instant death. The compass also directs you to the point of activation, which also means certain death. It's a fine campaign for 'Quake' fans, but definitely the weakest.

Quake II 64

It was very cool of the devs to include this version in the remaster/re-release, though given its short length (about 2 hours if you know what you're doing), it should be. That said, I think it's my favorite 'Quake II' campaign. It could be because it's shorter and more linear, and therefore no level outstays its welcome, but there's a great variety in locations and, despite the ever present brown, a lot more color variation too. Enemies are fewer, but thoughtfully placed (except the last full level). It was a great campaign to finish 'Quake II' on.

I had been considering the physical release of the 'Quake II' remaster, unfortunately only available through Limited Run Games, because it'd be great to have this physically. But after playing so many FPSs like this the last two years, I just don't think this style of FPS is for me. I didn't grow up on these types of shooters, so I have no nostalgia for them, and the constant running backwards while engaging enemies is tiring. I acknowledge their contribution to the genre and games as a whole, but not pick if I have other FPSs to choose from.

Beat Expanse Episode 4. The puzzles are way to easy and like the previous episodes the parts near the end are the most important. Exploration is lowered in quantity though. Right now each episode seems to heavy on one thing or another with the ending parts being the most meaningful.

100% Mario Rabbids DLC. I am surprised you don't get to level 40 doing all the battles in The Last Spark Hunter. Rayman has a level cap of 10 and getting the gold trophies is easy minus the kraken battle but they aren't needed to 100% it.

Beat Star Ocean: Second Story R Demo which you can transfer your save data to the final game. You get to the caves and have a possible choice to go on a side quest and recruit a character. Unsure if the options really do anything though. Got max level 12 and even got the piece of armor near the mountains. There are some other chests along the side paths but the other areas aren't accessible in the demos. There is voice acting as well but not for every NPC and character dialogue.

Going to avoid Mortal Kombat 1 as I heard it has a thing I dislike in the story. Going to borrow Resident Evil 4 from a friend and play Separate Ways on the 21st and will beat Expanse Episode 5.

Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic II: The Sith Lords via

9/10

It has been far too long since I replayed this one. It’s about my 3rd time finishing this wonderful game and while not as perfect as the first, it’s still a blast to play. The gameplay is dated sure but the experience is all there from the engaging dialogue options and choices to the depth of lore to the amount of memorable characters and events that transpire. My only complaint about the sequel, that remains from years past, is that the whole Kreia story felt not as fleshed out as I would have like for my tastes. But alas other than that if anyone out there has yet to experience this damn near masterpiece I beg of you to play it for you will find and encounter a smart, deep role playing adventure that doesn’t pull it’s punches in the gameplay and story department that’s for sure. Choose to become either a Jedi master of the light or Dark Sith bringer of darkness. The choice is yours and yours alone.

Mortal Kombat 1 (PS5). Storytelling is uneven but good. Not a fan of what they did towards the end because too many things have them now, but it was fun for the afternoon. I may replay it, but for now I hope they come out with story DLC soon.

Beat Expanse Episode 5. Just waiting for the DLC. It is somewhat sastifying but I feel overall the pacing is just terrible. Episode 3 had to much exploration, Episode 4 two puzzles were braindead easy and was a glorified hallway simulator for the middle half., Episode 2 and 1 had a decent amount of exploration and dialogue which struck a nice balance, Episode 5 on the other hand had a ton of choices which makes sense since it was near the end. Takes about an hour to beat and wasn't to bad overall. If I had to rate the Episodes 5, 1, 2, 3 and 4. 4 didn't have enough added story to make it worth it to me but 3 had some bits that drew me in near the end. 1 was a nice introduction and 2 had some choices and dialogue. A major issue to me is choice. You don't have choices on some sections I feel it would be interesting if you did. Example, you could try selling it instead of destroying it.

Sadly Sonic Frontiers update on September 28th might be something I avoid. I deleted my PS5 save data and don't subscribe to PS+ to back it up so ya.... Don't feel like replaying that game again to get the new ending.

Separate Ways in 4-5 hours long. It is short and they didn't lock additional areas and mercenaries with it which I found odd after Resident Evil Village. It is well worth it, has some story, additional bosses and more time with Luis. Basically if you liked the main game you will like this plus it is $9.99. It also has some replay value.

Persona 4 Golden

8.5/10

It took me about 60 hours to finally watch the credits roll, but it was such a great journey to get there. Persona games really rarely disappoint and while it isn’t as robust to me as Persona 5, it’s still almost as good with the usual rag tag group of memorable characters with the focus on immense character development through establishing and maxing out your social links and bonds with them. Also, mixing and fusing various persona spiritual beings I thought was kinda fun and unique too. The only thing that really annoyed me was the Teddie character. I just wanted him to go away most of the time. Between that and I wish the turn based combat was a little more polished like P5 was but alas this game is 12 years old at this stage and a tad dated on that front. I got the secret ending doing after completing all of the main and bonus dungeons, which were pretty cool and one or two dungeons offered some variety in tackling certain areas and boss fights such as finding keys located on different floors to progress or using different battle tactics by digging into your attained items to topple bosses that force you to think outside the normal status quo combat. I’m also looking forward to playing Persona 3 Reload when it drops early next year too since I never played the original.

Spongebob Squarepants: Battle for Bikini Bottom - Rehydrated

Even before Sony announced the PS+ price increases I was considering not renewing. Sony just helped make my decision for me. So, I'm starting to go through the slew of PS+ titles I have downloaded, and after the drab color palettes of 'Quake II' and (mostly) 'Starfield' (which I've put on the back burner for now), 'Battle for Bikini Bottom' seemed like a colorful alternative.

I've never seen the show, and frankly the characters really annoy me (all cutscenes are thankfully skippable), so I went into this pretty blind. The story is weird, but the gameplay does live up to its reputation. Levels are laid out well and have a bit of a challenge. There are sliding sections to break-up the platforming plus multiple characters that each have special abilities, and the controls more or less are good. Yes, there's some occasional mid-ought invisible walls, platforming jank and hit-box oddities, but nothing bad. One curious thing is that the characters are able to grab onto ledges and pull themselves up, but that only happened literally a couple of times. In most cases, you either make the landing or fall to your death.

That is one sticking point, "dying" institutes a pretty long load time. Character switching is almost instant, as is the taxi service, but it seems like the whole level has to reload upon death (all enemies do respawn but items picked-up are kept).

The game itself might be the most colorful thing I ever played, and it looks great. Most of the time it's 60fps, but it can drop a frame here or there. The music is always catching, though the loops are on the short side. Voice acting from the show cast is also great, even though I didn't care about anything they were saying.

I have the remainder of the bonus world to finish, and I'm debating on getting the last handful of Patrick's socks for those golden spatulas, but I would have a ways to go collecting flowers to turn them in to Mr. Krabs for his golden spatulas. That would platinum the game for me, which I very, very rarely do for Playstation games, and I'm not sure it's worth the time and effort. Regardless, 'Battle for Bikini Bottom' is a solid platformer and I had fun playing it!

Sea of Stars

Kommie wrote:

How is this?

Tom Clancy’s Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory via

8.5/10

So I’ve been on a nostalgic kick lately, polishing off some older games in my digital library, and I came across Chaos Theory in my Xbox library and I never managed to finish it back in 2005 for some reason but I’m glad I got around to it 18 years later. Some parts were a little rough around the edges and dated, sure but the old school stealth like gameplay remains constantly strong throughout. Minus some uneven gameplay pacing in the last couple of missions, where the flip the switch from stealth to full blown action that leaves you somewhat unprepared and being a heavily focused stealth game a full on assault is not recommended with some of the more wonky aiming and weapon controls, the game was highly immersive as you strategically plotted on how to coordinate your cunning stealth patterns to navigate each level. Most missions were pretty linear and that’s just fine by me with today’s sandbox open world standard. It was quite rejuvenating to play an older title where there was just a straight line path for the most part from a point A to B to C and D. Also bless Michael Ironside for doing such a great job voicing Sam Fisher. He brought such a dry, menacing tone with black humor to the role. I lived for his interrogations of enemies as you grabbed them and put that knife to their throats. And even though the game gives you a decent amount of weapons and gadgets to play with, from silenced pistols and assault rifles to sticky cameras and shockers and stun grenades mostly I just had a blast sneaking around grabbing fools, questioning them and making them go night night. Overall it was a great game and probably one of the best Splinter Cell titles to date minus some unsteady difficulty spikes here and there but thank the maker for a quick save option. A save scummer I became by the 2nd to last mission and have no shame in using it as some of the level design in those last couple of missions were a bit questionable and left a bit to be desired.

Feeb wrote:

It was... Fine, good I guess. I think I'm just burnt out again for JRPGs for now. I did the same I did for FFXVI and went to easy mode to just rush through and beat it.

Gonna maybe do more Lies of P next and get a better feel for it. Still not crazy about it from what I played

Tomb Raider Underworld PC 8/10 - The last Tomb Raider that focused on challenging puzzles. I've now beaten Tomb Raider 1, 2, 4, Legend, Underworld, reboot, Rise of the Tomb Raider, Shadow of the Tomb Raider. Haven't beaten 3 (I have progress on a PS1 emulator, stage 8) or 5. Curious about the future of the series as it was bought out by a company from Square Enix.

I remember when the series first came out on PS1 as a teenager before there was Gamefaqs I'd get stuck on a puzzle on 1 or 2 and go to Wal-mart to look at a guide lol. Then I'd get stuck again, damn.

Another game I might be making a post soon about is Primal on PS2 I am about 3/4ths the way through, it's sort of similar to Tomb Raider and there's one part in a cemetery it has a tombstone that says Lara Croft died in 2003 lol.

Primal was a $5 dollar general purchase back in the day. Very enjoyable.

Simon_Belmont wrote:

It's one of the best games on PS2 not to get a reboot or at least a remaster. I don't think it sold very well unfortunately.

justin_credible wrote:
It was my 1st PS2 game - they netted really top notch talent for Jen and Scree. I, too, wish it'd get a remaster! Like, Shadow of the Colossus style: remade from the ground up. But keep the existing voice acting (RIP Andreas Katsulas).

Golf Club Nostalgia on

It looks like beating all 35 holes unlocked an additional story with 35 more holes. But I didn't like the original story enough to want to play more, and the golf aspect is pretty basic, so I'm not going to play through this second half. I saw the credits roll after the first 35 holes, that's good enough for me.

Just finished Primal.

And finally beat Kingdom Hearts 2.5 (PS3) after all these years a few days ago. I've only beaten KH 1 and 2 I'd like to beat 3 and the other games in the series one day.

justin_credible wrote:
I have 358/2 Days and Dream Drop Distance if you are interested

I just finished up Devil May Cry 5 on . I should have had this done at least a week ago, but really this genre of games, while I enjoy them, I also get burnt out easily with them due to the repetitiveness of them and will play through a few levels and then take a break for a few days before continuing.

Fobia St Dinfna Hotel - 7/10

Sonic CD - First time playing, and I breezed through it in three evenings. Seemed easier than Sonics on Genesis, but also I didn't bother trying to win any of the bonus stages or get any good futures.

Trials Fusion

Continuing with PS+ titles, this was one of the first games I downloaded when I got my PS4. I played it for a little bit, then stopped. I needed a change of pace, so I gave it another go. I cruised to gold in every event until the Hard levels were introduced. Then, not so much (though still some golds). There's definitely a "get good" aspect to these levels, but the problem I have with them is, unlike the "easier" levels, there isn't much flow to them. So much starting and stopping, especially if you reset to a checkpoint. Often times there's a ridiculously hard gap in the middle of a track, when the rest of the track is just fine. The other problem I have is with the trick system. The right analog stick is used to engage a trick, and it has to be held for a couple of seconds to fully register the trick, but I found the game was having trouble registering which trick I wanted. That made getting high scores harder than it should've been. I rolled credits on the game, so I consider it beat, but there's obviously so much more to go.

However, that includes the DLC which is longer than the base game. Not to mention Ubisoft's obsession with other currencies at the time. Unlocking stuff doesn't really matter since it has to be purchased with points, but mostly golden acorns. As far as I can tell, the latter are mostly obtained through microtransactions. And the menus are a mess because of it. They're organized well enough, but it's menus within menus, and despite there only being a small handful of rides, they take way too long to load.

I enjoyed this game to a point, and having reached that point, I'm fine with deleting it from my PS+ library.

That opening song, though, hot damn!

Oops, wrong thread.

I beat 007 Everything or Nothing (Gamecube) last night, 2nd best Bond game I think.

I'm playing Dead Space right now and it feels so much better than The Callisto Protocol. Such a shame the latter game wasn't as good as it should've been. Hopefully they remake Dead Space 2 and 3 as well.

justin_credible wrote:

Love it, have beaten it on PS2 many times.
It's THE ONLY Bond game (except for maybe Russia With Love) that makes you FEEL like James Bond.
That free fall in the opening is great, the motorcycle chase on the rooftops is one of my favorite set pieces ever, plus they created a new Bond story and used professional actors and a real recording artist for the theme song.
Willem Dafoe shouldve been a Bond villain ages ago.

Simon_Belmont wrote:

I don't know. I played 'Everything or Nothing' a couple of years ago on Xbox for the first time, and I thought it was okay but spliced up weird since after every mission it went back to the mission select screen. Driving in some of those levels is pretty janky.

DCGX wrote:

It's far from perfect but saying it's the 2nd best Bond game isn't really saying much. Mostly it's Goldeneye and then a bunch of mediocre to average games.

Metacritic agrees https://www.metacritic.com/search/007/

Beat Lies of P last night. I really enjoyed this one. One of the best Souls-likes I've played so far and I really appreciated how linear this game was compared to the actual Souls series. Unlocking shortcuts was frequent, plenty of Stargazers that felt perfectly distanced, and diversions off the beaten path felt concise, fun and rewarding, typically with a quick shortcut or back-track to return you onto the main story avenue.

The final boss is really the only boss that gave me real problems and I probably died 25 times on him, but other than that, most bosses weren't too big of a deal. I even managed to beat a few of them first try which was refreshing for a Souls-like game.

All in all, I really liked this game and I had a long decision making process on whether or not I wanted to run a NG+ and go for the platinum, but ultimately decided that my backlog is too friggen big right now and I should move on. Currently going back to finish Final Fantasy XVI which I'm about 65% done with. I know everyone was raving about this game and loves it, but I really cant seem to get into it. It doesn't grab me nearly as much as XV did (Which I basically was unable to put down until I plat'd it), but I'm too far into it to just drop it. I'll see it through

That NG run is very fast with all the skills. Lots of fun too. It probably takes 2-3 sessions at most. Using the puppet rope jump attack will eliminate most bigger mobs easily.

I’m not exactly sure how the leveling works in NG but it feels like each passed area raises a stagnant limit.as in you need 15k for a long time and it does not increase? Levels come very quickly and you can get op with the upgraded special weapons.

Figured as much, just have too much I want to play right now and don't feel like sidetracking for all the normal weapons and records. If it was just a speedrun play through I'd probably knock it out, but I don't think that is going to be the case

Baldur's Gate 3 - 9.75/10

200 hours of pure bliss! To think that a company that was on the verge of bankruptcy like a decade ago managed to create a game that is probably the best western RPG I've ever played is just...unreal. It's not perfect. No game is. But my issues with it are very minor. The dice-based combat system, for example, is something that takes some getting used to. I wasn't a fan at first because it's annoying when things feel so luck based and you're dealing with a pretty steep learning curve and weird difficulty spikes early on. I was worried that a game that uses the D&D rule set just may not work well in a videogame, but you get used to it and the game balances out nicely. You figure out party composition, make use of the environment, make use of all the advantages on the battlefield, figure out what character builds suit your playstyle etc and things click!

I'd be here all day if I really wanted to detail everything I love about this game. There's just so much the game has going for it: the memorable characters and their stories, the phenomenal writing/storytelling, the insane attention to the detail, the world building, the customization options, the creative, varied and nuanced combat, the stunning graphics, the sheer scale of it all...I could go on. It's overwhelming and mind-blowing and it all comes together to present what I think is the best pure role playing experience I've come across in a videogame. I think of The Witcher 3, Mass Effect 2, Dragon Age Origins, and Deus Ex: Human Revolution...the other 4 games that would make up my top 5 western RPGs of all time and I don't think I can put any of them above BG3. It's the standard, not just for cRPGs, but all RPGs moving forward. What a game!

I just finished BG3 recently too (on PC). It’s in the running for my favorite game ever. I’ll definitely be going for another playthrough and trying to platinum it once the price comes down on the PS5 version, and I generally never replay games.

Heavyd814life wrote:

Just beat Ghost of Tsushima. Great 20 hour game that takes nearly 60 to beat. A shame there's so much open world padding because when it's fun it's really fun. I'm working my way through the Iki expansion now. The story is pretty interesting so far.

Jade Empire via

8/10

I haven’t played this one in about 10 years or more and parts of it aged really well whereas others feel highly dated such as some of the combat which felt uneven at times. But I did appreciate the linear more focus based areas where in most cases there was only one main path and even in the major cities the side areas felt tightly wound up which didn’t allow any feeling of being overwhelmed to come into play. But looking back though, this one did feel a bit rushed out as I finished it in under 15 hours and did about half of the side quests. It’s definitely more on the smaller scale of most other BioWare titles but I do oh so very much miss old school BioWare titles such as this where there’s a nice blend of simplicity yet complexity in the gameplay mechanics and the narrative and dialogue is just so intriguing and interesting. Even though Jade Empire is just kinda a glorified tale of Star Wars with an Asian mythological fantasy skin overlay which is fine to me since I felt the story was pretty interesting for the most part. I wonder if we’ll ever get a Jade Empire 2 when they run out of ideas and milking those Dragon Age sequels. Likely not but a boy can dream!

BG3 is just the game that keeps giving... almost 200 hours in, second play through and I have so much stuff I missed and need to create other characters to experience lol.

Also really hoping Ghost of Tsushima comes to PC soon. I just can't pick up my PS5 to restart it after my son deleted my save a few years back just as I was about 100% through it. lol.

Mafia - Definitive Edition

I was in Chicago a couple of weekends ago, and that always peaks my interest in organized crime. Luckily, this was another PS+ game I had sitting around.

Overall, I was really hooked on this game, though being in the mood for it certainly helped. The story is nothing special. In fact, its structure adheres too closely to 'Goodfellas,' but takes a lot longer to tell a lot less. Most important story bits are mentioned in the intermissions, which leaves the story feeling disjointed from mission to mission. There isn't much relationship development, or seeing characters outside the main few and that's a shame. Yes, not everyone's lives are constant action or of importance, and the game is trying to hit more important parts of Tommy's job, but it isn't as smooth as a result.

Gameplay is varied for these types of open worlds. Shooting is fine, driving at high speeds (not that the cars of the time were great at it) can be iffy, and despite the city of Lost Heaven brimming with life, there's little to actually do in it outside of story missions and basic item collection. The game looks great, but there were some visual glitches. Nothing game breaking, but one glitch took me back. I was on the third floor of a building later in the game where I dodged an enemy and it sent me flying up, then back down to the ground floor. I didn't die, but it shouldn't have happened. The music is a high point. Mostly orchestral, but always appropriate to help convey what the characters are going through. This is especially true during the final confrontation. The voicework is also top notch. I'd argue that's what really kept me invested in the game.

Without having played the original, I'd say they did a really good job with this remake. It might not keep attention after the credits roll for too long, but it's still fun to jump back into the 1930s and cruise around for a little bit.

@sinnie Any chance of a cloud save for Tsushima?

Orlandu wrote:

No I hadn't renewed my PS+ due to lack of time to play. But it's fine... I'll enjoy replaying it but just not on PS5. My profile is now password locked btw.

sinnie wrote:

Probably a good idea!

Splinter Cell: Blacklist

8/10

So I was putting off on playing this Splinter Cell game because I wasn’t turned on by the fact that Michael Ironside couldn’t reprise his role as Sam Fisher but I got this on a deep sale at $6 so I said why not as it was the only entry in the series that eluded me for my own personal preference reasons and I’m actually glad I gave it a whirl. It was a great follow up to its predecessor Conviction. Moved very swift and had a great sense of urgency and fluidity to it not seen in most other Splinter Cell games outside of Conviction which may be a make or break for some if you’re a fan of old school Splinter Cell titles that rely solely on stealth. Blacklist does offer stealth, but does blend together some mandatory action sequences. It’s also very fast paced unlike the first 3 SC games. My gripes were just the voice actor for Sam Fisher which sounded like a 35 year old man trapped in a 60 year old’s body and the game is almost too fast paced that makes it almost feel on borderline Call of Duty paces. Other than that the game is a solid 10-12 hour fast paced high octane espionage ride offering some same tropes you’d find in most other games in the series including upgrading gadgets and gear in between missions as well as your HQ to make your journey to exercising the 5th freedom as tactical as possible.

I just finished Arizona Sunshine on
What a freakin' janky mess that was, with glitches and tracking issues galore. I still enjoyed it, but under no circumstances would I recommend paying full price for it. I really hope they have their act together for the sequel on PSVR2.

Just got the true ending to Persona 4 Golden on PC. Persona 5 is one of my top 10 favorite games of all time so I can't rank it over 5, but I still loved it. I need to beat 3. Maybe I'll just wait until Persona 3 Reload is out to play it.

Beat Detective Pikachu Returns. Around 15 hours to beat. There are side quests you can complete and will add some story either in the newspaper or other events but they are opitional. There is some button mashing moments but for the most part the biggest issue with the game is already knowing the case's conclusion by the mid point. Having to deduce it and explain the case in front of some characters reminds me of the stories in old detective books and shows but with more tediousness. Another issue to me was the pacing in the beginning I felt a small connection from the previous game but after the second or non tutorial case I felt the story greatly improved.

Going to play Assassin's Creed Mirage then Sonic Superstars.

Cocoon

Yet another perfect Game Pass game, as this only took me an afternoon to beat and get all the achievements (there aren't many). I'd say this game lives up to its hype. The whole experience is pretty straightforward: solve puzzles to move on using each biome orb by going in and out of them. That's about it, but the puzzles are fun, though the orb switching does get a little tiring near then end. There are also a handful of bosses that are simple, but a nice diversion from the puzzling. Well worth a go.

Got the platinum trophy in Saints Row on PS5. I'll give the murder circus DLC a shot but if I don't like it I'm ready to uninstall this and play something else.

Unlike TalonJedi87 who seems to be able to play rpg after rpg I can't so after Persona 4 Golden I had to beat an easy shooter.

Dead to Rights Reckoning PSP

Game is only about 3 hours long.

My next #1 to beat (which is always subject to change) is Like a Dragon Ishin on PS4.

Haha P4 Golden did take me about 70 hours of my time but since it was on the Switch I was able to play it where ever I wanted. Loved it but not as much as P5 tho. P5 to me is still king of the Persona games. Can’t wait to play P3 Reload too. But no more long rpgs for me tho for a while. Sticking to shorter games for a little while to cleanse the palate. Gonna play the Dead Space remake soon after I finish up House of Ashes Dark Pictures anthology.

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.

The Dark Pictures Anthology: The Devil in Me - 6.5/10

Solid slasher story that ramps up well and has a few intense moments towards the end. Movement still feels clunky as hell and there is far too much walking around at an annoyingly slow pace. The facial animations are also pretty awful and the characters are, again, really unlikable for the most part, though they do work well together towards the end. Overall it's a pretty average/forgettable experience and it's wild to me how much of an issue Supermassive has had replicating the success they had with Until Dawn. I actually enjoyed House of Ashes so I had high hopes for this one, but it's about in line with Man of Medan, Little Hope and even The Quarry which were all pretty mediocre. I think they may need to focus on making one great game instead of rushing out a bunch of mediocre ones.

I’m playing Devil Within Me now myself and even though they finally added a sprint option finally yeah it’s still awkward and clunky to move as well. I’m also having a hard time liking any of the characters in this one so I think I may slaughter them all haha

I've liked all the games, some more than others, but last year's game was really buggy at launch. I'm still looking forward to the next game, which seems to have gone in a new, more sci-fi direction. Unfortunately it seems to have been put on hold while Supermassive finishes up Little Nightmares 3.

I picked up several of thr Atari Recharged titles on Xbox when they were half off last week. I beat Centipede Recharged today. It's a remake with vector style graphics, generic electronic music, some power ups, and a ton of challenge missions.

Some of the challenges are stupid easy, some are excruciatingly boring, some seem like you win if you get the right random powerups, otherwise you lose, and some are pretty fun regardless.

I had it crash on me once, which was disappointing. I think one of the missions had a programming bug in it as well thst made it last way longer than it should have.

Overall it's not terrible but I honestly think the original (or even the Atari 2600 version) is a better game. The biggest problem is the slow pace of the game compared to the original.

The spider is no longer really a threat, it just crawls along leisurely. Spiders are also where you get the power ups so they are more of a help than a hindrance now. Gone is the classic spider sound effect too. In fact, gone are all the classic sound effects.

It was also a missed opportunity for Atari to not include the original as part of this game. They have a classic mode where you can play without the powerups but it's not the same frantic action.

So far this series kind of reminds me of the early Sega Ages 2500 Series on PS2. Budget remakes from B or C tier developers, and some turned out much better than others. (I have also played Yar's Recharged as well and had quite a bit of fun with that one so far.)

I think the $5 i spent was a good price for this one for me. At the regular price of $10, it would be a stretch but the mission mode might enough content to maybe justify it. There is also co-op but i only played single player. (If they had included the original Arcade version, then I would definitely say it was worth $10, even though I already have it a few times over on other collections).

The Touryst on
Pretty fun little adventure/platformer/puzzle game. I recommend it, it's on Switch, Steam, Xbox and PlayStation as well (which kinda surprised me because for the most part this little dev has mainly stayed loyal to Nintendo) so you have plenty of options to check it out on.

RE3 Remake (PS5) - 6.5/10 - I think this was good but it's such a weird game. I haven't played it since it originally came out so I didn't remember too much besides a Nemesis chasing you. Which I have disliked in all of the RE's that use this mechanic.

It's definitely a short game and wasn't all that satisfying to beat. It took me about 5 hours and I was diligent with turning the maps all blue and not leaving anything red. There's a trophy for beating this in under 2 hours, and that feels awfully tight but I believe it can be done.

Being out on city streets or in a hospital with so many blocked paths felt odd and basic after playing things like Last of Us. I enjoyed the 2-3 nights with this but it doesn't have the same lasting appeal as RE2 remake which is a far better game in all respects.

The Dark Pictures Anthology: The Devil Within Me

6.5/10

As season 1 wraps of the anthology series about twisted horror tropes I found myself rather enjoying the last installment this season for what it was worth. A Saw like plot with the works. A masked Jigsaw like killer, death traps and seemingly impossible choices. My complaints would be the cast of characters wasn’t really that likable for me and I ended up killing a couple of them without caring too much about it. Especially the older British chap who really irked me. But the atmosphere of this installment was pretty creepy starting off in a murder hotel and then circling around to an island towards the end of the game. And finally they added a dedicated true sprinting option in this installment. It only took them 4 tries to get it right but it did feel awkward to move still and a bit shaky at times. I also experienced a couple of crashes while playing in the bigger open areas too. But of all the Dark Pictures games I’d say this one is my 3rd overall fave with my first being the previous installment, House of Ashes, which felt like it had Alien/Predator vibes. But if you want a Saw like video game experience check this one out. Just don’t expect to like any of the one dimensional characters in this one.

Beat Robocop Rogue City. It is about 10 hours long and not worth $60 in my opinion. It wasn't the greatest game but made me feel like a tank. I could take so much damage without dying. The bosses which aren't many are damage sponges and are to few in number. Your base gun can be upgraded. Armored enemies are a pain to deal with resulting in me mostly using leg shots in certain sections and headshots in others. For example the first section of the game body and crotch shots are a lot better for armored helmet enemies. Finding evidence and finding health or in this case energy pickups to heal was tedious like finding side quests. The dialogue is excellent but the overall story wasn't the greatest to me. Also some voice actors aren't great to. You get XP for additional bonuses but leveling is difficult. Going to play Alan Wake 2.

Sigi - A Fart for Melusina

This was recommended by youtuber Crazy Burger, and it was on sale for $2 in the eshop. It's 20 relatively short platforming levels with a boss every fifth stage.

The bosses are cheap, though you accrue a ton of extra lives during the game so it's not difficult at all.

A bit of childish humor but well put together. Feels more like a demo than a full game.

NSMBW - 7/10

Cute colorful and I did like the inclusion of elephant/wubba Mario.

I prefer a 3D Mario. While there were a handful of levels that I liked better than others, to me this was more of the same. I really had to push myself to finish. Played mostly with Mario. Although I tried yoshi and princess peach. I had hoped her floating ability would be present. I’m just glad it’s over and I can uninstall.

Life is Strange 2 - All the feels/10

The final episode hits hard. Damn! What a game. I could definitely point out some of the issues I had with it, but when I look back at the journey through all 5 episodes and how the second half of episode 5 hits all the right emotional notes and made me feel like all the choices I made along the way really mattered, all those issues just don't matter at all. My girlfriend watched me play through this and we were both emotional wrecks at the end of it lol. This is a must play for fans of these choice-driven adventure games. Definitely one for my collection!

Glad to hear it’s good! Life is Strange and Before the Storm were great, but, for some reason, I never got around to playing the others. I should do that at some point.

Heavyd814life wrote:

I played through Before The Storm, LiS2 and True Colors all this year. Have they announced they are working on anything new?

They have a few interesting games in development at https://dont-nod.com/en/

Banishers looks pretty good.

I have my eye on Banishers too. Look interesting.

Yeah, Banishers does look pretty good. I'll keep an eye on that one.
Did they not develop Life is Strange: True Colors and LiS: Before The Storm? They're not listed on their website alongside the other games in the series.

edit: Just looked it up, those two had totally different developers. I liked both games, but Before The Storm is probably the weakest in the series. I felt like it didn't start to get good until towards the end.

Resistance Fall of Man PS3 8/10

I've now beaten two Insomniac games in a row. They make good stuff. This was a launch title for the PS3 I've already beaten Resistance 2 and my favorite was Resistance Retribution on the PSP. This was actually the toughest Resistance game I've beaten. It's one of those games you will die a lot and there's around 35 stages pretty good length.

My top 3 on my list to beat next right now in which I've made progress in all 3 are #1 Like a Dragon Ishin for PS4, #2 Persona 3 FES for PS2 and #3 Halo Infinite for PC. But sometimes I'll pick up a different game and get hooked on it instead.

Star Trek: Resurgence - 7.5/10

I enjoyed this. It was made by a bunch of ex-Telltale devs and the Telltale-style storytelling, decision-making, and action sequences are the highlights of the experience. The game does a wonderful job of capturing what makes Star Trek so awesome. If they had just stuck to the Telltale model, I think this would have been better received and I would definitely have enjoyed it even more. But for some reason - I guess in an attempt to make it feel more like a "game" - they added a bunch of really stupid and overly complicated puzzles and minigames to pad out the length of the game. It took me 10 hours to beat it, but really 3 of those hours are wasted on these terrible sections that really detract from the overall experience. All that said, this was still a really enjoyable experience and one I think Star Trek fans and fans of these narrative adventure games will enjoy.

Beat Expanse Archangel, it is about 1 hour long and is more dialogue and story driven with some puzzles mixed in. It has a new set of characters. Not much to say other then that. Playing Star Ocean 2 but finding it to be a slog to playthrough. Hoping Alan Wake 2, Super Mario RPG Remake or Walking Dead Destinies breaks my game slump after the glory of Super Mario Wonder.

Found The Order 1886 (PS4) at the library and replayed that and got the Platinum trophy. I just missed a few collectables 7-8 years ago apparently. It still holds up ok but there is a TON of cutscenes and they are not skipable. That's not acceptable in 2023. So if you're in for the story it's still good, but some scenes go on for 10-15 mins so I had to fiddle on my laptop quite a bit while waiting.

I also just beat the Dragon's Lair Trilogy getting all of the trophies (PS4/5). I appreciated the settings that make them more forgiving but it was a lot of fun to revisit these and re-learn the moves. Dragon's Lair 2 is just absurd though...long ass scenes and you also need to go against the normal moves to grab the treasures to be able to beat the game. This prob generated millions in quarters.

Anxiouz wrote:


This is something I have been meaning to replay for the past few years but just never get around to it (I will usually prioritize playing a game for the first time over revisiting something I've already played). I don't remember a whole lot about it other than like you said about some of the cutscenes being too long, the game itself being fairly short, and that the graphics were probably the best I'd ever seen in 2015, not sure how they hold up now though. I do recall people complaining about it being in letterbox mode or something, and that if you removed all of the cutscenes the game would only be like 5 hours long, so maybe that's why they don't let you skip them.

The Order 1886 let me down so much. I mean for what it was is okay but they hyped it up way too much in the marketing. Even had that cliffhanger like ending thinking it was gonna be a mother lovin’ franchise but nope. Just turned out to shoot a bunch a crazies for a few hours and an on occasion beastie. I think it would have done better as a TV series.

Remnant 2

TalonJedi87 wrote:

Yeah man, The Order is the last time I got swept up in the marketing campaign for a game. I still remember that reveal trailer like it was yesterday. It looked soo good. And I was rooting so hard for Ready at Dawn because they had made those fantastic portable God of War games. It’s just such a shame that the end product wasn’t what anyone expected it to be. The game was like 5 hours long and half of that time was spent watching these 10 min cutscenes that you couldn’t skip. The stories, characters, game world etc were actually really good, but the brain dead AI and stupid QTEs just ruined the rest of the experience for me. That said, It’s one of the rare times where I’ve been disappointed with a game but hoped it’d get a sequel because there was so much unfulfilled potential.

The Order 1886 is a perfect example of why graphics aren't everything in games.

I loved that game. The characters and plot left me wanting more by the end. The graphics still look amazing to this day.

That said I know it wouldve pissed me off if I had payed full price for it. 5 hours long without any replay value is pretty bad for a $60 game. I gameshared it back then and bough it when it was $5 on PSN. I would pay $25 today for an upscaled 60fps release and would love a full fledged sequel.

I was one of those tools who spent $60 at launch for The Order 1886 only to get burned hard. Never again and yeah Ready at Dawn did such a good job on the God of War portable titles that I thought they would be a sure fire success with creating their own IP.

TalonJedi87 wrote:

With the exception of the abrupt ending, I really like 'The Order 1886.' But I also spent only $6 on it.

Interesting takes about The Order, it was one of the PS4 exclusives I wanted, but took about the longest to acquire after I finally got my PS4 a few years ago. I got it cheap and gave it a go ~3 months ago and only got 1 session in. I wasn't turned off from it, but had other, higher priorities and haven't gamed much recently. I do want to get back to it and finish it off.

10-15 min cutscenes don't sound fun though, especially if the gameplay is pretty short. BUT that actually sounds a TON like the last game I beat, The Bouncer on the PS2. It was hyped, from a big name studio/publisher, was an early system game and was otherwise pretty bad.
I left a longer 'review' of it on the 'Beat a Game 2023' thread, but the game was not good. The story was pretty dumb and there was more cutscenes vs. gameplay which also was completely mediocre and crazy short. But it too was sold for $60 (I'm pretty sure) just after the launch of the and sold well thanks to the pedigree of prior titles.

Beat Star Ocean 2. Okay first thing to do is get the SP decrease skill and get endurance and resilience to level up quicker as well as enemy encounters being increased. You'll level up super fast and have a ton more SP and BP. After that just beat the game and turn off training if you have trouble or if you max level. Should of went Rena as I found Claude's portion more predictable. It is 18 hours long if done my way. Was level 50 by the 5 hour mark. Honestly wasn't the longest game spent 5 4 hour sessions and finished it. Onto Alan Wake 2 then either Super Mario RPG or Walking Dead Destinies.

ued222 wrote:

Is that the new remastered version?

Love the original, but I wish they would balance the final fight somehow. Definitely buying it again once it drops a bit.

kevolones wrote:
Ya, the remastered version being able to fast-forward during cutscenes when people are walking and from what I understand autorun really helps cut down on playtime. Didn't care to go backtrack for PAs though.

I just beat Persona 3 FES The Journey PS2 which is like saying I beat Persona 3 vanilla version. I give it a 9/10. FES added The Answer which I just started but I'm having fatigue from playing this game plus without major spoilers I can't mention why but I almost feel it shouldn't have happened. However I am going to play through it anyway.

On February 2nd they will release Persona 3 Reload which is an updated version of Persona 3 but they are not including The Answer. There also was recently a re-release of Persona 3 Portable which also didn't include The Answer. FES is the only version to include The Answer.

While I don't have any current plans to play through 1 or 2 I have now beaten 3, 4 and 5 (and Strikers). This is one of the greatest series of rpgs of all time in terms of story, gameplay and everything else. I can't wait until Persona 6.

justin_credible wrote:

Persona is life! If you aren’t feeling The Answer, you may want to skip it and just watch the cutscenes on YouTube. I still haven’t met anyone who enjoyed it as much as I did. It’s a solid 20 hours and it’s a lot of dungeon crawling. It’s basically Tartarus 2.0 with no social links/school stuff. But I loved it, personally.

Heavyd814life wrote:

I guess I'm a little frustrated by the character change I'm sure you know what I mean. Are you going to buy Persona 3 Reload?

It's sad that my cousin is somewhat of a hardcore gamer like myself loves rpgs but I can't get him to play the Persona games. It's because we briefly tried 2 back in the day and we both didn't care for it. I tried to tell him they revamped the series starting with 3 and the social links but he's still yet to touch any of them but if it's a Final Fantasy he buys it day one and plays through it without stopping. To me after FF 10 Persona has surpassed FF easily but I haven't played 16 and didn't finish 15 or play through the 13s.

@justin_credible I agree. I think P4, P5, and Strikers are better than any modern Final Fantasy game, and I absolutely loved the FF series growing up. I bet if your cousin finished the first dungeon of P5 he would be hooked.

I cannot wait for P3 Reloaded. Literally a day 1 purchase for me.

P3 is pinnacle for me. Just too much going on in the games after that. Solid jrpgs but overstay the welcome due to length- and the pet / demon as well as social stuff is tired. I’d like to see it reigned in a bit.

Resident Evil 6 on
Started this around a year and a half ago with a friend from Japan. Due to the time zone differences it took way too long to complete this one, but we finally got around to it.

justin_credible wrote:

Yeah man. Definitely grabbing P3 Reload day 1! P3 is my favorite JRPG ever and I still can't believe how big the series has become. I'm sure they'll remake 4 at some point. And maybe they'll get around to remaking 1 and 2 because I'd love to finally play those.

Heavyd814life wrote:

The thing about 1 and 2 I can't see how they'd add social links or the calendar to those games. Maybe they wouldn't need to but for me that's what makes Persona games Persona games now.

Fatum Betula on

I don't know if it counts, though. It's a 15-20 minute game with 10 endings and they expect you to replay it multiple times to see them all. I'm just not interested in doing that. The story is vague and I guess you can better understand it after seeing all the endings, but I don't give a crap enough to find out. Also the developer really nailed the PlayStation/Saturn circa 1996 ugly pixelated look he was going for, but he might've nailed it too well because it just looks like ass on a 50" TV screen and in the 32-bit era I don't think many people were playing on screens that big.

Beat Pizza Tower. It is a short platformer with high speed and difficult bosses. It is enjoyable breezing through levels once you get a hang of it. Skipping Super Mario RPG remake as there is a lack of new content and will be 100% Star Ocean 2's cave of trials. I cannot seem to justify spending $60-80 on Alan Wake 2 at the moment. Hopefully Walking Dead Destinies is okay else wise I might just buy Alan Wake 2.

Blasphemous II

8/10

While I much more enjoyed a lot of things present in the sequel here such as the ability to utilize different sets of weapons not only as offensive tools but methods of progression and traversal a-La Metroid, there were some things I could have done without. Like some of the cheap bosses once again present with multiple phases and crushingly brutal DPS. Even with the numerous amounts of prayers, beads and other items you can utilize to buff up your character, it just never seems enough for some bosses like the 2nd to last boss fight which took me a bazillion attempts at only to have the final boss be a cake walk in comparison. Alas, besides the various unbalanced boss fights, the game really is quite good and a step up from its predecessor in many ways, one of which mentioned above. Other mechanics such as unlocking moves like double jump, air dashing etc like Metroid were most welcomed as well. And the art style continues to impress with its gothic like undertones and dreary backdrops alike. And also there’s more quality of life improvements now such as progressing in certain side quests to unlock different methods of healing at an altar or being able to fast travel from any altar to the main city hub or clear out any guilt you’ve accumulated at an altar. I also liked the fact of hunting for collectibles to increase my HP, fervor, and damage dealt by unlocking new levels for the 3 game’s weapons you get. The game still retains that sense of wanderlust for clearing the entire map like any Metroidvania as well. Overall minus some difficulty balancing I rather enjoyed this sequel a little more than the original. I just hope if there’s a third game they’ll be able to tweak it a bit more in the difficulty balancing department.

TalonJedi87 wrote:

Second to last boss fight was the most brutal. Other than that they weren't that bad

I wanted to toss my Switch out the window with the first penitent one boss fight.

Beat Super Mario RPG Remake. I played the OG game but got stuck and beat this within 10 hours. I played on the easy mode since my timing ability is terrible. There are a ton of optional mini games and Yoshi racing was difficult due to my lack of rhythm. It is fairly short but has decent RPG mechanics. Max level is 30. Giving up on 100% Star Ocean 2 as I would need to replay it for the other endings and avoiding Walking Dead Destinies. Will be getting Alan Wake 2 and then Avatar on the 17th I think.. Going to be a dry end of the year for me. Think I beat around 15-20 games.

Accounting+ on
This game was hilarious. Possibly the most F-bombs I've heard in a game, which I don't always mind in a game like this, I dislike it more when it's coming from a game or movie where the character thinks it makes him sound like more of a tough guy. This, like that Trover Saves The Universe game, pretty much had me laughing non-stop from start to finish. It's a bit strange then that I have absolutely no interest in ever watching Rick And Morty even though I like these games and they're by the same writers. I might end up going back for the platinum trophy in this one like I did for Trover.

edit: Got the platinum, it was easy and I enjoyed the game enough to spend that little bit of extra time to go for it.

Alan Wake II

8.5/10

Aside from some stiff acting and aiming controls that felt a bit sluggish at times, I thought this was a great sequel to the 2010 action/horror title. It felt like the best of both the Resident Evil remakes and what I imagine PT would have been if it made it into a full blown Silent Hill game. It definitely had an emphasis on survival horror too this time around especially if you play on normal or hard, limiting your resources and forcing you to conserve ammo and medkits etc. The graphics and sound quality were superb as well. The north light graphics engine did the job while playing in performance mode with minimal drops in frame rate. The sound, while playing with my surround system on, felt like the dark presences were in the room with me whether it was a door creaking or slamming or rustling of leaves in the wind I felt engaged and alert at all times. The story can be a bit convoluted at times like its predecessor and I think it tries to end on an ambiguous ending from what I can tell but I just enjoyed the ride and detective work throughout. Playing as both Alan Wake and newcomer detective Saga Anderson was a good tag team combo and each character brought something fresh to the table. Whether it was Alan’s light clicking and scene swapping ability which allowed him to rewrite scenes with more plot devices he uncovered or utilizing the clicker to suck light sources into it and install them in other places to change the environment completely, or Saga using evidence she finds to solve cases on her case board, the game was very unique and intuitive. The combat can take a bit getting used to though with some wonky controls here and there. I much rather enjoyed the case solving and scene rewriting sections over the combat in this one for sure and I’m glad once you got to the endgame there wasn’t much combat to undertake. Overall, Alan Wake II was a solid sequel and good survival horror game in its own merit and I just hope we don’t have to wait another 13 years for another installment.

I had a really similar experience to you with this. I also never watched Rick & Morty but thought that Trover and Accounting+ were hilarious.

PizzaTheHutt wrote:

Ghost of Tsushima on
Already typed up pretty much everything I could think of about this game in the review thread. It was fun, I enjoyed the journey, never once felt bored or like "I wish this would end already" like I do with some open world games, but I still have no interest in going for 100%.

Bleed_DukeBlue wrote:

Did you play through it more than once? If so, when you're asked to select a meme in the beginning and the narrator tells you to select carefully because each one makes important changes to the dialog and story, that's just part of the joke, right? Because I selected a different meme on the second playthrough and there was no difference at all.

Starfield via Game Pass

I need to preface this review by stating that I've never played a Bethesda developed game in the 'Fallout' or 'Elder Scrolls' series. With that out of the way, I don't think I've been this torn on a game for a while.

I started 'Starfield' just after its release. I played for about 12 hours, and between the weight management, restrictions on selling and glitches, I stopped hard and moved on. After finishing up a few other games, and waiting for work to come in, I came back to 'Starfield' with the intention of finishing the main quests and not worrying about picking up anything. Once I did that, barring another bug that almost prevented my progress, I was able to finish the main game. With the main game completed, I also understand why so many say the real game doesn't begin until New Game Plus.

I enjoyed some of the exploring and combat. At one point the story was getting interesting. Eventually, after leveling up some stats and settling on a weapon I liked, things mostly fell into place. But regardless, the game gets in its own way more than anything else.

The still shots during any "cutscenes" feel so out of date it's laughable. Early on, there's a mission where you have to talk down (or storm) some thugs in a bank holding hostages. Literally the whole conversation is a static shot of the intercom box. For someone like me, who used to be in film and TV, I just can't with this. Come on. Half the time whoever you are talking to has their back turned to you if you chose to interact with them from the wrong angle or they're talking to another character. Voice acting is fine, but most of the writing is simple OK. There's also bugs in characters' personalities that make no sense. Finally, the Persuade system seems broken, or at the very least, too random. No matter what temporary boosts or permanent boosts were applied, it felt like a crap shoot if persuasion worked. In one example, I chose logical points and failed at every one. After reloading my checkpoint just before the conversation, I started by choosing the same first point, got a critical, and immediately persuaded the guy.

On top of these, the game isn't optimized well enough for Series X. The PC has gotten two major patches to help with things like the picture, etc. but not console. HDR implementation is poor. Lip syncing is still out of sync. As I said, there were a couple instances where the game broke and impeded my process, like when a companion wasn't where she needed to be, and without checking in with her, the story couldn't go forward. It took about a dozen checkpoint reloads, including completely turning off my Xbox to no avail, until she appeared. The weight, selling and O2 systems are a very big hinderance in the early game that make it a slog. The story and story missions aren't terribly interesting, though a few side quests are, but the main missions don't take the player enough in the direction of key game elements. There's too much information in all the menus, and they aren't laid out very well to handle all the stuff. Simple things like when you reach the end of a list of items, pressing down once more does not bring you back to the top like it does in so many other things, so you're forced to scroll back up. The rarity system makes no sense. I can find a common version of a gun with better stats and add-ons than epic or even legendary versions of the same gun.

With all that said, if someone is more into exploring words and taking their time, this is a great adventure! Not a great story, but a great adventure, and I get that. But it isn't for me. There's a lot to dig one's teeth into, but it's almost all handled either sloppily or explained halfway. Also, jump on the "Y" button? Why? The attention to detail is also astounding! But the amount of things that can be picked up and interacted with actually slows things down too much, and is ultimately pointless in most cases. The one thing that kept me going during moment to moment gameplay was the atmospheric music. It felt soothing while fighting through menus and jumping from system to system for the umpteenth time. Eventually the latter works itself out a little better, but most of this was too late for me.

I finished the story, but have no desire to slog my way through 'Starfield' any further.



Jusant via Game Pass

Another perfect Game Pass game, as 'Jusant' took me less than five hours to complete, with only a handful of collectibles (and there are quite a few categories of collectibles) to seek out, if I so choose.

You play an unnamed child with a squishy side-kick being that uses what might be echolocation to traverse up this incredibly tall land formation, whilst reading a mountain of notes to find out what happened to both the water and the people that used to depend of that water. The notes definitely start to take a toll, because some are way too long, and most are parts of conversations but don't say too much. 'Jusant' is more a game about the journey rather than the destination, though, and the journey is accomplished by rock climbing everywhere.

For the most part, this can be engaging and even thrilling. Climbing has always been my favorite part of series like 'Tomb Raider,' 'Assassin's Creed' and 'Prince of Persia,' so to have a whole game around that mechanic was intriguing. And for the most part, it works. There's definitely some jank here though. Grabbing on to flat space ledges can cause your character to pause. Jumping can be imprecise, and the character in general moves around too loose even when walking. When climbing, the camera is designed to swing around to a position that feels the most cinematic, but often times that hinders judging distance and positioning of the character. The camera can be moved back, but because it automatically swings around in this moments, that means fighting the camera for a good angle to see what you're doing. There's a generous stamina meter and a pretty good length to your rope, which can also be karabiner-ed in up to three spots to allow for swings, etc. At times the loose controls get in the way, but for the most part the whole climbing system works well.

It is worth noting that it was common for the character to get stuck in the environment on simple geometry. I'm talking about things like walking on flat ground, going over a stationary item, and getting stuck. Usually repeatedly pressing "jump" can get the character loose, and none required a restart, but it happened way more than it should.

'Jusant' is recommendation. It's short, interesting, and has amazing music. It's a good journey to take.

I did play it more than once. I’m pretty sure the meme is a joke, and it’s the same regardless of which one you pick.

PizzaTheHutt wrote:

Beat Alan Wake 2 took around 4 4-4.5 sessions. It is 17 hours long if playing on story mode and 100% it for platinum. Being able to play on story and get the platinum is surprising, The story is good but felt it was a bit slow for the first hour. Combat has changed and found teleporting enemies to be somewhat annoying as I'd hope it be more like the OG games but understand the boost to horror elements that comes from it. It has a dodge which I could rarely if ever time properly. The case board mechanic was terrible a lot of times you already know the outcome. A ton of busy work but not much fun. It was not worth the $80 to me as it has no replay value and am hoping the season pass content changes that. A new game plus to get all the weapon upgrades would have been nice.

Waiting for Avatar which I might hate.

Pixel Gear on

Yet another typical run-of-the-mill VR wave shooter, like we don't have enough of those (though in this game's defense this was a very early PSVR release, so I guess at the time that genre wasn't oversaturated yet).

The graphics have an almost Minecraft-esque look to them, but everything is so low resolution that it is a bit troublesome if you're like me and trying to rack up combos by going for headshots, because you won't be able to see enemies clearly until they get close enough for you to tell where the head even is.

The game requires a PS Move controller and the tracking is spot-on, I have no complaints with it.

As is typical of VR games, the game can be beaten in an hour. There are only 3 levels, with each having 5 waves of normal enemies and then a boss fight. There are 4 difficulty levels and the default difficulty is too easy, so you might want to crank it up a bit. Unlike most VR games, this one actually offers a local mutiplayer mode.1-3 players play on the TV using DualShock 4 controllers and they try to sneak around the level collecting coins while the other player wears the VR headset and the PS Move controller to shoot at them and prevent them from getting the coins. I feel like there are way too few VR games that offer any type of local multiplayer, so this one at least has that going for it.

Fe on

I don't dislike this game, I don't even regret playing through it, but I feel like I would've liked it a lot more had I played it on PS4 or PC, because the frame-rate is freakin' horrid on Switch, to the point where a few times I had considered not even finishing the game. I'm not a frame-rate snob, I'm fine with 30fps as long as it is consistent, but the only thing consistent about this game's frame-rate is how bad it is. I'd question why they would even release it in this state on Switch, but since this is a 2018 release and Switch was the hottest thing going at the time, I figure they felt obligated to release it on Switch just for the easy money (it was published by EA and you know how they treat Switch owners, just look at their Fifa games).

Not saying the Switch version isn't worth playing at all, just that if you have the option to play it on another platform, play it that way.

Been in a madden kick…

07 - 7/10. Fun with pretty great presentation for back then. Went undefeated and destroyed the opposition (I think it was the Vikings or the Seahawks) in the Super Bowl.

12 7/10 - not much change honestly between the two games if I remember correctly. Went undefeated and won the Super Bowl.

23 cloud. 8/10. I guess technically it’s ea play but I launch from game pass. Lost two games and won the Super Bowl. Continuing the next season currently 3-1 lost to the chargers by 3. Presentation and the clock management qol stuff keeps me playing. Don’t really care about upgrading staff and I usually skip the draft etc… but it’s just fun if you don’t take so seriously. The one irk is there are a ton of dropped passes. Pretty much if you get hit any where I’m the air it’s dropped pass. Love the running though.

Mario Wonder was a lot of fun. Very imaginative, but not particularly challenging. It was really impressive how they kept surprising and subverting expectation in each stage. It's the first 2D Mario I've enjoyed since World. Plays much much better on a controller with a good dpad. I used a Dualshock 4 for my playthrough.

My friend and I just finished Moving Out 2 on
I will probably continue going for 100% on my own over the weekend.

Some dsiware clone-stlevania that I have had for goodness knows how long but only played it for the first time today.

Controls ok except for jumping. The timing for jumping off ledges feels too short, like you press jump at what feels the right time but it's actually tol late so you fall instead of jump.

Wait no the controls are not ok. B IS JUMP AND A IS ATTACK AND THERE IS NO WAY TO CHANGE IT.

The levels are decently designed for the most part, although there are a few trial and error instant death segments and some slightly too long auto's rolling levels (they were fun and unique, just overstayed their welcome)

There are a good variety of enemies and bosses too, although the second to last boss is a grind because you can't hit it very often (and when you can get multiple hits in in one of the phases, you have to jump out early or get an iinstallation.

The final boss "not dracula" was a bit of a pushover though.

I unlocked a hard mode but I don't know if it's worth going through it again.

It wants to be a real Castlevania game so much is adorable. Even the music at times is just different enough to not get sued

Even though I was just playing it a few minutes ago I already forgot the name because it's basically Castlevania.

It's mostly linear but within each level sometimes there can be some exploration.

If I remember the name I will post it, not that it matters because you can't buy dsiware anymore thanks to Nintendumb

Sonic Superstars

8/10

I really enjoyed the classic take this had on Sonic games of the past. Like Sonic Mania, it was a no nonsense for the most part old school 2D Sonic fest with 3D graphics. The music was pretty catchy and it was cool to be able to swap between Sonic, Tails, Knuckles and Amy between stages. There was even character exclusives stages as well which was a nice treat and catching those chaos emeralds by swinging around and launching yourself to them was pretty fun and granted you a new power up with each one you collect. The only drawbacks and they are kinda big for me would be the length of the game which can be toppled in about 5 hours, and the boss lengths are way too long than they ever needed to be. I never recalled an old school Sonic boss fight taking over 5 minutes to topple across several phases. It is a speedrunner’s nightmare I’m sure. But I think I enjoyed this one more than Sonic Mania of late because it wasn’t as crushingly difficult as Mania was in the final acts and the checkpoint system was very forgiving. Overall I say wait for this to be on deep sale like I did and nab it for half price and you’ll be in for a classic Sonic good time.

Archangel on
Really good game. Just had one of those weird moments where when I was playing earlier I was struggling a lot, so I just set the game down for a few hours and now came back and continued and just breezed through the second half of the game easily. If this was a non-VR game that end boss would've just been alright, but experiencing it in VR was pretty damn cool and maybe something I'll remember for years to come. I haven't put the effort/thought into making a ranked PSVR list, but I feel this just might be in the Top 10 if I did.

There's only six trophies in the game and I somehow missed one for not listening to all the "friendly chatter" crap after each level. Except I did listen to it all and went out of my way to do so (it's optional), so I don't know why they didn't credit it for me, but I'm not going back for it, I'm going to the next game which is currently TBD.

Detroit become human - 8/10

I really enjoyed this choose your own adventure movie. Top notch presentation! I felt a connection to Connor (I liked Connors swagger lol) and Kara, not so much with Markus. I just didn’t like his character from the get go. Sooooo many decisions to make and about 3/4 through I really started to think maybe I’d made some bad decisions along the way. The ending was a bit of a let down. For my ending which I guess would be considered a good ending; lacked closure. After spending all this time getting to this point in the game, I though it would have ended with just as much emotion or consequence as the main story presented. Rather I got the credit roll kinda unexpectedly and I was just left feeling like- that’s all you’re gonna give me. I suppose the other endings may garner a different reaction but not sure I’ll play through it again to see.

I really was hooked on the story and I felt it was beautifully laid out and well presented. I kind of want to play Heavy rain and/or beyond two souls now.

loztdogs wrote:

You and @kommie can never be friends again now

benstylus wrote:

Lol funny you mention. The thought had crossed my mind.

Tyranny

Super Mario Bros. Wonder

What an absolute joy! My fiancé and I played the whole way through, just missing a handful of seeds, large purple coins and a few more hidden levels. Yes, it's pretty easy, even the special world levels, but the amount of variety and the way the game keeps things fresh is rivaled only by 'It Takes Two' in recent years. And while I always found the 'New Super Mario Bros.' series to be lacking in style and even color in some cases, this game is bursting with it. Such a good time. I haven't been this excited about a 2D Mario game maybe ever (I was too young for the NES and SNES games when they were new). I can't wait to see what they do next!

loztdogs wrote:

Glad you enjoyed it! I know it's not really much of a game in the traditional sense, but games like Detroit are some of my favorite games of all time. I'm curious about the ending you got and the choices you made because there should have been an emotional payoff for all three main characters.

And yeah, you should definitely check out both Heavy Rain and Beyond since you enjoyed Detroit. But don't expect them to be as polished as Detroit is. Heavy Rain is a little rough by modern standards (it came out like 15 years ago, after all), but I have such fond memories of it. And Beyond is a tough one to recommend because I still haven't met anyone who enjoyed it as much as I did. I look back at all the games that came out in 2013 (one of the best years in gaming, imo) and I have Beyond really high on my list of best games of that year. It's far from perfect, but it hit all the right emotional notes for me.

Heavyd814life wrote:

From what I read it was one of the good endings. I tried to be mostly a pacifist.

I just played through the VR Campaign of TrackMania Turbo on
Short but sweet, I guess. On one track I even finished with a good enough time to place me in the Top 3 of the North Carolina leaderboard and around 3 or 4 other tracks I placed in the Top 10. I'll play some more tomorrow in the non-VR mode to see how much else the game offers, because the VR mode is pretty limited (it's basically just a time trial mode).

Spider-Man Miles Morales - 8/10

I only played the main missions since my trial sub for PSN will expire in a couple of days. This looked gorgeous on the legion go. I guess my only gripe would be it’s pretty dang short. Oh and miles as spidey looks like a pencil with shoulders. Other than that it’s great web slinging action. There were a couple of times when in a… complete this puzzle room to continue, I was confused as to what the objective was. The hints helped but I would fumble around enough that it pulled me out of the game. Also close quarters combat in some cases, was a little to close and I would lose my bearings. I really liked how they fleshed out the relationship between miles and phin without going overboard. I could relate to the turmoil the two shared. If I renew ps now I may go back and do the sides just so I can more spidey fix. Wont be play 2 anytime soon.

Dying Light 2: Stay Human

7/10

I've had this one in my queue for quite some time. Over a year and a half and I finally got around to it and I rather enjoyed my time with it for the most part but I would in no way replay it again unless it was in co-op on a new game plus perhaps. It suffers from the tired sandbox open world Far Cry like motif of checking off boxes to level up your character in the world, etc. Also, there's windmills like radio towers to take over and the fast travel system is terrible. You must pretty much do a quest within each metro station scattered around the open world city and only then can you fast travel to each one of them. Never have I ever quickly decided to skip fast travel in a game until this one and instead slogged around from one end of the map to the next. Traversal is okay but I expected more from a game heavily focused on parkour. They wanted you to spend all the time doing side missions, gathering resources, and what not to upgrade your traversal and paraglider and even then it still feels lacking in regards to getting around the big open world map. Some of the control precision could be a bit more tightened as well as I found myself falling to my death more times than I should have. And the combat had some cool ideas, like parrying and blocking at the right time to traverse over enemies and such, but I felt a lot of the time I was just mashing the right trigger while dodging left/right to kill enemies quicker that way other than the fancy ways they set out in front of me. But those grievances aside, the story was pretty solid about a guy in search of his long lost sister. I played the first Dying light years ago and I think it's the same dude from the first game. I stuck to mainly the story missions too and I'm glad so I didn't lose focus on the tale it was trying to tell. Upgrading the main character too lets you choose which function you favor upgrading, stamina or combat. I stuck with a balance of both but more so favored stamina to get more efficient traversal skills. And you can find special boxes hidden in the map or by progressing through the story to upgrade your health or stamina meter as well. Overall, the story and gore was enough to make me see it through to the end. The parkour was solid enough, albeit minor control issues, that it reminded me of Mirror's Edge from time to time, especially during some climbing missions and I love me some Mirror's Edge like traversal. If you want a new zombie first person action co-op game I will likely hope to suggest Dead Island 2 over this one, which I am about to play next and hear really good things about.

I beat and 100%’d (takes deep breath) Mario & Luigi: Bowser’s Inside Story + Bowser Jr.’s Journey, exclusively for the Nintendo 3DS family of systems. It was great!
[imgt w=1536 h=2048]https://pbs.twimg.com/media/GAetDv4XgAAN1Mf?format...[/imgt]
I haven’t played the DS original in about a decade, so it was nice playing this new version with a superior art style. Unlike last year’s Superstar Saga + Bowser’s Minions, which was similar to playing a completely new experience, BIS is a game I have nostalgic memories of playing—comparisons were drawn this time. The DS game is often heralded as AlphaDream’s magnum opus, which I mostly agree with.

A disease called the Blorbs infects the citizens of the Mushroom Kingdom. The villainous Fawful is the culprit, and he tricks Bowser into eating a Vacuum Shroom. This makes him suck up a bunch of stuff—including Mario, Luigi, Peach, and Starlow. With them out of the way and Bowser incapacitated, Fawful conquers Bowser’s Castle and brainwashes his army. Now Bowser has to thwart his maniacal scheme while the Bros. manipulate him from the inside.

It’s generally the most emotionally impactful M&L game, with a memorable cast of characters and an awesome collection of special moves to use in battle. The soundtrack is one of the best in the series, and journeying through Bowser is brilliant. Every area of his innerds looks visually distinct and creative, never gross. Some even have fun minigames to play, like bulking Bowser’s muscles or making him violently sneeze.

The bosses are great, too. They have boatloads of health and varied attacks you need to dodge or counterattack. They give you a good reason to whip out those special moves and practice with them. (The 3DS version made one of the bosses especially adorable.) There are even fights where Bowser grows massive and punches buildings in the face! Top it off with a killer finale and you have an RPG for the ages.

Now for the cons. My goodness, 75% of the new characters have obnoxious speech patterns. Fawful’s dialogue is expectedly bonkers, and he’s always entertaining. But the others just pile on, making half the text irritating to read. Midbus uses choppy sentences; the Emoglobins talk like artsy, medieval criers; Durmite drawssss outttt her wordssss; zee deux French garacteurs ‘ave exaggerated accents; Dr. Toadley speaks in questions followed by answers; and who even knows what Chakron the sage is babbling about half the time. I think they should’ve reigned it in a bit more, focusing on eccentric personalities that are conveyed through regular English.

It’s weirdly difficult to save your progress when you’re inside Bowser, because the only save blocks in him are characters who disappear when the scripted event you’re playing is finished. It feels like you see what there is to see in the world before halfway, and then they make you backtrack to previous locations instead of making new ones. The enemy variety can get a bit sparse, making you fight the same enemy groups constantly. Dr. Toadley tells you to “prepare for the final battle,” but then the game continues for about four more hours after he says that—the last area is traversed as the Bros. and Bowser, unlocks another inside-Bowser area, requires several mini games, and has five bosses plus a giant battle. Aside from the aforementioned killer finale, the area drags.

As for some remake changes, the art is better than ever and the music is largely improved. Many of the special moves were tweaked—some are now easier to execute while others were nerfed hard. You can restart a battle immediately if you lose, even dropping the difficulty if you wish. Any use of the DS microphone was ditched, which I’m fine with. The Giant Bowser battles were adapted by the infamous developer Arzest, which is why they’re now sluggish and low-poly. The overall difficulty was toned down on 3DS as well.

The most indefensible change is the title screen: The original had a simple image of Peach’s Castle on the top screen and Bowser’s Castle on the bottom, with one of Nintendo’s most beautiful tunes playing over it. It was an elegant way to highlight the duality present throughout the story: The Bros. and Bowser are enemies, but with a larger threat looming over them both, they’re now two sides of the same coin. The remake ditched this visual and melody completely, opting for a forgettable, militaristic tune playing over a picture of Bowser and Bowser Jr. standing near lava. It’s a hard downgrade that, no joke, made me skip the game at launch. (The credits and end card of the 3DS version still use motifs of the original title tune, highlighting how strange this change was.)

As for Bowser Jr.’s Journey, it’s an 8-hour strategy game that improves on the Minion Quest mode from Superstar Saga + Bowser’s Minions. You choose nine characters for your army and arrange them to defeat the advancing squads. The Best Fitness Friends villains are great here, and their dialogue is funnier than the main game. Bowser Jr. is insufferable through most of the quest, until he hits rock-bottom and has to mature. It’s a decent story, but the Minion Quest misadventure was more endearing. At least this mode did the unthinkable and made me kinda care about the Koopalings.

All in all, this game is worthy of your time. Play it on the DS for more difficulty and a wonderful title screen, play it on 3DS for superior graphics and sound, plus Bowser Jr.’s Journey.

Always liked the ending for Bowser's Inside Story, with Bowser waiting until his minions left before he opened the present from Peach.

BloodPuppetX wrote:
Agreed. Bowser deserved a nice reward for all that work he went through, even after his attempted Peach abduction at the end.

Dead Island 2 was fun.

TalonJedi87 wrote:

Paranormal Activity: The Lost Soul on
I'll probably post some thoughts about it in the review thread because I would like to play through it again tomorrow using the DualShock 4 instead of PS Move controllers this time and see which I prefer. Overall though, it wasn't a bad game, though it might just seem like that because admittedly I had low expectations going into it.

Beat Final Fantasy 16 Echoes DLC. It is about 2 hours long and not worth $9.99. It adds some new story beats and a boss and some mini bosses with some memorable music but not much else. I was hoping for a small hub world or area to explore. Considering the expansion pass is $24.99 I am hoping the Leviathan dlc is longer. Going to get my copy of Avatar today or Monday and Undertale Yellow is out now. Well January has Prince of Persia since Alone in the Dark got delayed so my backlog is bound to be empty again soon.

Spider Man 2 for PS5. Real fun game. A great sequel with some great storytelling, though I’m not sure where we go from here. That is overall a great thing, though. I did think the last boss fight dragged on a bit long but I can also understand why. I may or may not go for all the trophies.

BucketofJustice wrote:

The story was awesome! I kinda wanted to see a couple more of the last bosses. Its a big spoiler so Ill leave it at that, but I was very surprised by the previous to last one, wouldve been cool to see the others. Wouldnt mind more boss fights overall, but that applies to most action games these days.

I also didnt go for the trophies. Barely even did any side stuff (except when on the way to a main) cause I know its where Insomniac always fails to keep things interesting.

kevolones wrote:

More boss fights would’ve been great. I feel like they could’ve put one or two more in and spread out the last third or so a little more. I did all the side stuff I could, like the bases and crystals and stuff.

The only trophies I’m missing are the platinum, the one where I need to use Peter’s robot arms to beat enemies but I think I need to start over since I don’t see an option to go back to them, and the one where I have to glide from one side to the other only using the wings. Even watching the hint video on the gliding, it hasn’t worked out super well thus far.

Oh well, I guess we wait on DLC now.

Beat Undertale Yellow. It is short but enjoyable. It is free fan game and has a few returning characters who are revealed fairly early on but are very few in number. The gameplay is pretty much unchanged and puzzles are present as well. It is a decent experience if you go for a pacifist run. Given the ending though I am guessing nothing is canon. Didn't care for Avatar and will be waiting for Prince of Persia.

I finished the story in Need For Speed: Heat. That was shorter than I had expected, and I'm not going to bother going for collectibles and stuff, I'm done with it.

Cocoon: short and sweet with some fun puzzles dealing with recursion (not nearly to the extent of Patrick's Parabox...an excellent game you should play now) and an interesting atmosphere. Boss fights were a bit of an annoyance, but they went by fast enough. Didn't get the secret ending, but I didn't miss much.

Last game I beat? Wow. It's been awhile since I beat a game.

Theseus on
This could have been such a good game if it had lasted longer and had more to it. I beat it in one sitting at almost exactly 90 minutes. I recall buying this after seeing a preview where someone said it looked like it'd be the closest to a God Of War VR game we'll probably get. Well after playing it myself, that was a terrible way to describe this game.

It does have a few tense moments where you're trying to hide from this Minotaur that is the size of King Kong, and a few sections where you have to fight against these gross spider creatures. But that's it. There's 3 or 4 sections where you fight those spiders, you don't even actually fight the Minotaur, you just pull 3 or 4 levers that lets light shine through and eventually defeats him. Roll credits, because that's all the game offers. It's just way too linear. This could have made a great tech demo if they had something bigger to lead up to, but that isn't the case, this is the finished product. The game wants you to beat it without dying, and I know that's possible because it wasn't too difficult at all, but I don't feel the need to play it again.

Arca's Path on
This is just one of those games that is so unremarkable that you struggle to come up with positive things to say about it. I still wasn't sure what they were going for with the story by the time I had reached the end.

Rogue64 (a C64 game via Evercade)

Not much to this one. It's a randomly generated very basic dungeon crawl. Kinda fun, although I discovered a bug that made the temporary strength potions permanent, and it was fairly easy.

Took maybe 45 minutes to an hour to get through

Sea of stars via Gamepass - 9/10

Sea of stars is a truly delightful game. Filled with delightful characters and an engaging plot line. Sea of stars is an Instant classic for sure. Really had a good time with this one. I think I finished just short of 24 hours. There is a post game… which I understand expands the story (I read about it, no spoilers) to which I think I will, at some point, complete just for the added narrative and “surprise” turn of events.

Great graphics. Great, fleshed out characters. Fun bosses. I should note that I played on easy and felt the pacing was just right. There’s exploration to find different upgrades but it never veers to far from the main quest so it’s fairly easy to clear a dungeon and move on. There are a couple narrative twists that keep things exciting and keep the player engaged. If I had any gripes I would say for me it was bit slow in the beginning and maybe a tad bit long in the tooth at the end but over all a gem of an adventure.

Sea of Stars is so damn good. I’m almost on chapter 3 I think. I don’t want it to end.

TalonJedi87 wrote:

It really is. It’s worth playing the post game from what I understand.

There’s a post game too? Rad

TalonJedi87 wrote:

Yup. It eludes to it after the credits role.

loztdogs wrote:
I really have to make some more progress on the games I'm working on, in order to play Sea of Stars. Been hearing good things about it.

Just dropped the other two games i was trying to finish to start Sea of Stars. Midnight Suns DLC and MWII Campaign can wait!

Alan Wake Remastered - played on

I bought a copy but it's also available on PS+ Plus. Never played the original release. Great presentation, atmosphere, score. Gameplay was okay, but fairly repetitive.

nonamesleft wrote:

What games are you working on?

The Dark Pictures Anthology: Man of Medan

Free on PS+ Plus. Not much of a game at all. As the first release of the 4 anthologies, it’s definitely the weakest. Also the shortest from what I can tell.

Until Dawn and The Quarry are much more enjoyable. As are Little Hope and House of Ashes. I just have The Devil In Me left to play for what has been released by Supermassive Games so far.

loztdogs wrote:
Inscryption.

Omori.

A Hat in Time.

I'm a good way through Omori, but stopped for some reason. Not sure why. I was enjoying it, and am curious about how the story develops.

I was playing A Hat in Time not too short ago, but then got stuck. Could not figure out what to do next. Haven't continued since. But I don't like to start another game without finishing a game I'm in middle of. That just adds to the backlog. If I'm not enjoying a game, then of course move on to another one. But I was enjoying a Hat in Time. I simply got stuck and couldn't continue. Maybe I'll look that part up.

Inscryption is a rogue style. So, I guess I can play that alongside another longer game. Not that rogues indicate that they won't take up a significant portion of your gaming time :D. When I was playing Slay the Spire, I would sometimes intend on playing a short run and then switching to the main game I was playing at the time. And that short run sometimes ended up turning into several hours. Same was with Hades.

I'd like to finish either Omori or A Hat in Time before taking on Sea of Stars.

Shady Part of Me on

A fun puzzle/platformer that I recommend checking out if it happens to be in the PS+ Extra game catalog or on GamePass.

Witching Tower on
This was good and I'mma say it now, one of PSVR's hidden gems because I don't ever hear anyone talk about this one.

Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire

Super Mario RPG. Another game I’ve owned multiple times in the past and never played more than 10 mins. This version definitely grew on me. By the end I was reflecting on how much more I enjoy 3D Mario games over the 2d variant. I don’t think I would have enjoyed the original as much… janky platforming and all. I’d give it an 8 out if 10 just for fun factor.

I just beat Tears of the Kingdom the other day. Been playing off and on since it came out. Up to ~190 hours now. First Zelda game I actually finished. :)

Duke Nukem 2 Remastered

image

I think I like the gameplay in DN1 better, but DN2 has better content after the first episode (DN1 pretty much reuses everything while DN2 brings in new enemy types and bosses).

Street Fighter 6 (World Tour Mode)

8/10

Well I didn’t really care for SF5 due to its constant barrage of microtransactions but I absolutely adored the accessibility controls to modern style here. I haven’t been this into a SF game since SF4 back in the 360 days. The implementation of a story like mode in World Tour made me feel like I was playing a bit of Yakuza with the ability to literally beat the crap out of anyone on the streets, from young dudes to old fools. I also enjoyed leveling up and unlocking new fighter skills and abilities you could add to your avatar as well as learn new techniques from classic SF characters as you enroll as their students. You could even call in some of your masters in battle by using a super meter and they can assist in non rounded fights. Now I absolutely stink for the most part in regards to the competitive aspect of this title and only play casually for the cool tricks and moves to pull off fluently and that’s exactly where SF6 shines. It allows the non-elite fighters like myself to have a chance against either super difficult AI or pro gamers online. And for me I still struggled a bit even with the AI in the late game story where I had to grind a little to match or go above their levels a bit. That would be one of my few gripes with this game. The difficulty spikes and the need to grind in late game areas to stand a chance at progressing. And of course the story mode while neat and all is just there to get you ready and take on multiplayer either online or via couch versus play. Overall whether you’ve been out of the SF game for a while like myself or are curious to start I think SF6 is a great jumping off point. You cannot ask for more accessibility than what is present here I feel and it’s really gnarly for those newcomers and folks like myself who strayed away from the franchise for a while due to not feeling confident enough to be good enough to extract any fun from it.

Played and beat Legendary Wings for the first time in years.

Forgot how trivially easy the game gets when you are fully powered up. There's only basically the final boss and a couple of short segments on the final vertical level that pose any risk at that point.

Dusk HD on 8/10 this is a "boomer shooter", old school style fps like Doom. Really good/fun shooter.

The Curious Tale of the Stolen Pets on

This is pretty much a kid's game, which you could probably guess by the title. You're searching for lost pets, which you could also guess by the title. There's other parts to the story involving a sibling rivalry, and your character is jealous because as a child you always thought your grandfather loved your sister more than you, and he spends most of the game trying to convince you he loved you both equally. Whatever.
It's basically a puzzle game, there were 4 or 5 levels and you rotate the world and pick up objects, hunting for these pets and also gold coins in each level. The gold coins have a sparkly indicator thing to show where they're located but I found a bunch just by accidentally moving the PS Move cursor over where they were without even seeing the indicator. I ended up finding them all (42 total) and for the most part the puzzles weren't difficult except two animals in the last level took me a while to find. My total playtime was just under 90 minutes to get 100% (minus one glitched trophy) but if it wasn't for those two animals in the last level I bet it would have taken closer to one hour. Now that I know all the solutions I could easily rush through in probably 35-40 minutes though. There are way better VR puzzle games for adults but for kids I think this would be a fun one. I kinda enjoyed it myself but it was just too easy and over too soon to get much out of it.

Sea of Stars

9.5/10

What an incredible journey. This was Chrono Trigger 2 for me in all but name. I haven’t had this much fun with a 2D RPG in a very long time. It brought me such joy that the ontl downside I could see is it being too familiar and trying to be too much like old 16 bit RPGs but that’s just fine and dandy to me. If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it! And Sea of Stars to me feels familiar while feeling fresh too with some new gameplay mechanics to improve a lot of the quality of life the older generations of RPGs didn’t such as adding an extra layer to your attacks by timing a button press and utilizing combo attacks with all your party members, etc. I loved all the characters too. They were memorable as they were charismatic and charming. The plot was simple enough too. You’re playing as two children and warriors of solstice. One of the sun and the other of the moon and you have to take down an evil entity known as The Fleshmancer who’s about to bring upon a cataclysmic entity known as The World Eater to destroy all life on the planet and it’s up to you to save the world alongside the rag tag crew you encounter along the way. You also get to utilize a ship to sail across a sea to explore new lands and find new items and gear upgrades along the way. You can also level up traditionally by fighting enemies in the fast paced turn based combat system. And last but certainly not least, the music is purely sensational. A pure delight to the ears. Especially the fight and battle music. It’s just so dang catchy! And there’s a post game story content too by completing the map and side quests you can unlock the final true boss and get the good ending which I think I may do next. Overall, Sea of Stars is an astounding game with an addictive combat system and sense of exploration and wondrous joy to which its only hindrance I can see is it mimicking a little too much from old RPGs of the past like Chrono Trigger but again that’s really its only flaw in my humble opinion.

Blood: Fresh Supply - this is like OG Doom, but better.

Beat two NES games this afternoon

Trojan - the side scrolling action game from Capcom. Much easier than the Arcade, can one-life this one on a good day (lost two lives on the last level because I forgot the patterns since I haven't played it in ages).

Pinball Quest - the Pinball RPG from Jaleco. It's... well I rented it back in the day and remember having fun with it back then. But holy moley the ball physics are awful in it. It's still a cool idea, and there are some non-rpg tables to play as well (though with these ball physics they aren't as good as they could be).

Cocoon
6/10
It wasn't bad by any means, but without a clear-cut purpose like Limbo and Inside had, it got boring completing the puzzles and moving around the orbs. At least it was only 3.5+ hrs long, I was happy to be done with it.

Alan Wake Remaster - 8.5/10 - The game has aged really well, the atmosphere is great, game play is fun but gets repetitive, the story was very well done. I started up Alan Wake 2 right after finishing this and seeing Cauldron Lake, the woods, and then Bright Falls for the first time with modern visuals is amazing.

TMNT via Cowabunga Collection

7/10

Thank goodness for rewind functionality and save states or else I would’ve tossed this one in the trash like I did when I was 5 years old haha. It’s a very tough old school game with constant annoyances such as respawning enemies if you happen to back step then go forward again, inconsistent platforming and knock backs when you get hit. But I oddly enjoyed my few hours trekking thru this game with the quality of life improvements like rewinding up to 10 seconds and save states. Plus the music was pretty catchy and it was cool playing as each ninja turtle although Leo and Donny are by far the best of the 4 since their weapons have severely long range and that is most needed in this game to ease the brutal difficulty it ensues. The boss fights were somewhat annoying in the latter half of the game with the exception of Shredder who can be cheesed with Donny’s staff. Overall it was a classic tough as nails old school action platformer and if anyone hasn’t finished it in the last 34 years thanks to its difficulty the Cowabunga collection can make it possible thankfully.

Postal: Brain Damaged

Started Dead Space Remastered last night, had to turn it off due to getting too scared. I don't think it's possible for that game to get more scary but it did.
Going back and forth between that, Sea of Stars and random bouts of The Finals, which i'm not sure if i like yet, but it sure is a pretty F2P game!

Given what I know about the game, this may be the first rational score I've seen. A lot of folks have been gushing about this but I don't get it.

Slickriven wrote:

Herald of Havoc

Snakebird...Primer. I may be too dumb for Snakebird proper. It's a little too fiddly for my taste. It's kind of like Stephen's Sausage Roll or Baba is You where you have to move very particularly for a solution.

Drift Circuit on the G.G. Collection

The last race on Hard difficulty is super aggravating. You basically have to drive perfectly and hope no one else hits you to catch up to the lead car before the end of the race.

Other than that one race, a lot of fun.

Signalis - 9/10

A near-perfect love letter to classic survival horror games like the early Silent Hill and Resident Evil games. If you love those games then I can't recommend this game enough! It's also got a really unique pixel art anime aesthetic that I really dig and the story is trippy as all hell. Like seriously! It's a little scifi, a little Lovecraft, a little psychological horror. It's just such a unique experience and I loved the 14 odd hours I spent with it.

There are couple of things that keep it from getting an even higher score from me. The first is that inventory management is a huge part of the experience. You only have 6 inventory slots and they fill up fast. It's by no means a dealbreaker and I played Resident Evil games obsessively when I was younger so I didn't mind it at all, but it's a little annoying having to backtrack and I think others may find it more annoying than I did. I ended up just going with a flashlight and one weapon for a huge chunk of the game just so I'd have enough space for whatever I came across. I think 8 inventory slots would have been the sweet spot, but again, it's really not a huge negative. The second thing is that I didn't love the ending I got. I got the "Leave" ending. I wouldn't say it's a bad ending, but it definitely feels a little anticlimactic...and unfulfilling. I want to avoid spoilers so I won't get into details about how you reach the endings (the game has 4 endings, I believe), but there wasn't enough closure - at least for me. And more than anything I don't love the way the game determines which ending you get, but others may feel differently.

All that said, it's such a great game and I don't want to dwell too much on the way I feel about the ending because others may play it and feel completely differently. I will say that as a survival horror fan, I spent large chunks of the game just blown away by how well the game captures the feeling of those classic survival horror games while still feeling like it's own thing. I honestly can't wait to see what the devs do next. This is definitely one for my collection!

@Heavyd814life there is a update on pc that ups the inventory that will eventually be on console.

I think I got the Promise ending. I loved the game but can't bring myself to replay it yet, there is also a secret ending too.

I think I got the Memory ending. But like Kommie says...well, you can read the spoiler.

Mafia II - Definitive Edition

I have the original release thanks to GwG, but never played it, and after playing the first a few months ago and having just finished The Sopranos, this felt like the next game to play.

I know people complained about the remaster and the technical state of this release when it came out, and a few years removed I figured it had improved, but no it has not. The audio mixing isn't consistent, there are graphical glitches on the buildings, the frame rate, especially when driving around the city is all over the place, hit boxes are inconsistent and enemies are frickin' sharpshooters with every weapon, character mouths don't move during cutscenes and characters talk over each other, and cutscenes in general have weird character movement/frame rate. It's just so poorly done/rushed. It doesn't help that the story is cliché, feels like it was written by an uneducated teenage boy and doesn't get interesting until the last couple of chapters. The world is fine, but there's nothing to do in it, and while 'Mafia I' felt like a decent fictional version of Chicago, Empire Bay in 'Mafia II' does not feel like New York City much at all. The missions are standard, yet most are busy work. The two times the story gets interesting with actual mafia operations the game uses a cutscene montage instead.

There are three DLC packs that are included with the definitive version, but after looking them up the consensus is that they are some of the worst DLC around. Apparently the pack around the character of Joe was actually stripped from the game originally. I'm glad to be done with this game. I might, out of curiosity, play the original release on 360 one day, but as far as the remasters, I much prefer 'Mafia I.'

TMNT: The Manhattan Project via

6/10

The next game in my Cowabunga Collection trek thru finds me at the hands of I want to say a poor man’s TMNT Turtles in Time or The Arcade TMNT because the quality was definitely lacking even though it was playable for the most part. The enhancements were nice though to remove sprite flicker and grant infinite continues. It also came out in 1992 I see right after the Secret of the Ooze movie came out so it was piggybacking off of that having Tokka, Razar and Super Shredder in it alongside some comic book characters such as Krang. Overall while a bit bland I still found some enjoyment with it. Its not my go-to TMNT beat em up entry that’s for sure but it’s worth a peek for a playthrough and may be more fun in coop as most TMNT games are.

The Dark Pictures - Switchback VR on PSVR2

This game was so good. Its predecessor was already one of my favorite VR horror games of all time, and this one managed to improve on it in pretty much every way you can think of. For now I'm crowning this as the scariest VR game I've played, but I have Resident Evil 8 and Resident Evil 4 Remake that I'll get to eventually, we'll see if either of them can dethrone this. I will play the free DLC horde mode tomorrow and see how good that is.

Project Warlock

TMNT: Fall of The Foot Clan via *switch Cowabunga Collection

6.5/10

It doesn't get much more simple than this. 5 stages of simple side scrolling coupled with lite platforming that felt very stiff at times but granted this game came out over 30 years ago when the Game Boy was first created, with hack and slashing, one punching enemies to death with a boss at the end of each stage. The game literally took me a little over 1 hour to finish all 5 stages. It was also a treat to have a TMNT game that wasn't too difficult for a change. I guess after the NES TMNT game, everything feels easy though!

Dead Island 2

9/10

Man I adored this game way more than I thought I was going to. It’s easily the best zombie FPS/brawler I’ve played in years. Probably since the first Dead Island over a decade ago. If completely blows the likes of Dying Light out of the water too in regards to quality within not only the fluidity in gameplay mechanics but the visuals as well. I’m not sure what graphics engine Dead Island 2 uses, but it’s very pretty looking. And I almost experienced no frame dips at all as it ran in 60fps overall. The story was pretty entertaining to boot as was the dialogue and acting commentary from not only other characters but the character you choose too. I picked the Irish goth chick Dani and she was a pip and as sarcastic as they come which was gnarly. The weapon customization was very accessible and addictive to undertake as well. As you level up your character you’re constantly finding new weapons of various qualities from common to superior and you’re able to add elemental mods from Lightning to Fire to even corrosive damage. Some zombies have weaknesses and immunities to certain elemental types like firefighter zombies are immune to fire but weak to water, etc. I also loved messing around with environmental hazards too. Pour or toss a can of water on a live wire cable and watch a pack of zombies get fried and so on and so forth. And in regards to boss fights, while there was some stronger enemies they paraded as bosses that’s really the only area I felt that could have been improved upon. Even the final boss fight was a little bit weak. And if anyone is wondering if this is a sandbox like game, rest assured because it is not. There are open zones you can explore and fast travel maps to connect and transport you around between each zones but no objective was further than a couple of hundred meters within each mapped zone. And there’s no new game plus mode which I felt it could have benefited from too. Overall I loved my time with this one and I may go back to mop up any remaining side quests and such and I can highly recommend this zombie title over the Dying Light series without hesitation by far

The Last Case of Benedict Fox 7.5/10
I gave this an 8/10 when I left a score in the 'recent titles played' column last night, but I just finished it and dropped the score just a touch. Dropped it because a few things annoyed me due mainly to a complete lack of explanation and the ending felt a little abrupt and confusing, also the final fight was meh.

7.5/10 is still a great score and if you like more puzzle focused and lower fighting in your Metroidvania titles and can deal with some minor bugs and a lack of solid explaining of most mechanics, then it could be worth your 10-12+ hours. Solid GP title, though I would've paid $10-15 for it and been fine with that, maybe even $20 but I'm cheap.

TMNT II: Radical Rescue via

6.5/10

This Game Boy Ninja Turtles sequel had a slight graphical sprite remodel than the first game that made it look less stiff. It also played a little more fluently too but was still limited by the hardware of its time and relied on the same simplistic punch kick and jump punch and kick offensive style. The bosses were pretty much recycling the last game’s bosses with an inclusion of some weird army looking dude that shot some type of bullets at you that you had to fight a couple of times. It also felt a bit longer than the last Game Boy entry, adding an extra stage but I still managed to finish it within under 2 hours. Next stop, Radical Rescue, the last installment of the Ninja Turtle games on Game Boy.

Sonic Superstars

I had a bunch to say about this, but the TLDR is that it's a solid 2D Sonic game that feels like the first two games, but is not as good as '3 & Knuckles.' I enjoyed it, especially at its $30 sale price, but it could and should be better. It controls well, but Sonic takes too long to get going from a dead stop. Some hit boxes are iffy, and the later levels trail off in quality from the first half of levels (just like 'Sonic 1' and '2'). I didn't try multiplayer nor the mini-game...things, but it's fun to play the game with Sonic in a Santa costume. This is worth it for Sonic fans, but nowhere near as good as 'Super Mario Bros. Wonder.'

TMNT The Arcade Game via Cowabunga Collection

7.5/10

Now this one takes me back to when I was 5 years old at my birthday party in an arcade and spent a good $20 in my mother's quarters to plow thru this game in a few hours. Ah, those were the days. It hasn't aged too bad also. Animations were fluid. The tunes were still catchy. Those one liners were as cheesy as ever. And the last set of boss fights, Krang and those duo Shredders were such a pain in the butt. You can tell now all grown up those fights were clearly made to drain your funds too as every time you knocked off Shredder's helmet on one of the Shredder's and he turned red, a couple of seconds later he respawned with his helmet back on. Only after about 5 rounds of this did the 2 Shredder's finally fuse into one and then he could be toppled. Overall though, this was a nice trip down memory lane and shall continue next with possibly my all time favorite TMNT game, Turtles in Time.

LEGO 2K Drive on

Kinda just glad for this to be over with tbh. I did the bare minimum to reach the end credits. There's really a lot to do in single player if you enjoy kart racers and collect-a-thons, but I just wasn't interested in more than completing the story.

I will say a lot of races were pretty intense and ended with me in 1st or 2nd place in just fractions of a second either ahead or behind the closest CPU. I don't know if that's to do with rubber band AI or the fact I never bothered to upgrade my vehicle that they started me with, but I just never had a big lead over the other racers.

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Turtles in Time (Arcade Version) via Cowabunga collection

9.5/10

This is my penultimate Ninja Turtles experience to date. Even the very good Shredder’s Revenge still can’t top this one for me. It just holds such a dear piece of history for me and not only that but it aged like fine wine to boot. It’s still as simple and effective as it was when it came out over 30 years ago. A short, sweet and to the point beat ‘em up that doesn’t waste your time. It gets you in, off and out in under 2 hours and leaves you coming back for more and then some. I adore it right down to its cheesy one liners and oddly placed sound effects that make still me giggle. And this emulated version comes with a turbo mode so you can play it like you were if you took an ample amount of amphetamines prior to pressing start. Good times indeed!

Wilmot's Warehouse: A game of making the most out of the limited space of a warehouse. People come in with orders, and you have to fulfill them as quickly as possible. The goal is to hit 200 different items in your warehouse. A decent enough veg out game, but it gets pretty tedious toward the end. I can't say I'd recommend it.

Warhammer 40k: Boltgun - really didn't like this. Too many bullet sponge enemies. If it weren't for in game cheats I'd of dropped it. However, cheats don't disable any Achievements so you can easily get them all.

TMNT Turtles in Time version via Cowabunga Collection

9/10

While I felt the arcade version was a bit superior with more audio tracks and a lot faster framerate (especially turbo mode on emulation), the SNES version was still fun as heck complete with cool bonus stages not found in the arcade version. Also the final boss was Super Shredder instead of just Shredder and they mixed it up a lot with bosses that weren’t a complete 1 for 1 from the arcade version. But the SNES version took me right back to me being 8-10 yrs old and visiting my cousin’s house on weekends and having us tear thru it in coop mode. Good times indeed!

Songs For A Hero - Definitive Edition on

It's a funny game. As a 2D platformer it's only a little above average I'd say, but the humor makes up for it. There's a bit of post-game content with a metal soundtrack, but honestly I've had my fill of the game and going to move on to something else. I'd recommend it but to wait for a sale.

TMNT Tournament Fighters via Cowabunga Collection

6/10

I had no idea this one even had a story mode and it was basically an intro to the VS mode like most fighting games but very, very short. I was finished in about 7 fights. It was just like Street Fighter II Turbo. Heavy emphasis on the turbo too with its turbo mode feeling like I was moving in super fast motion. I almost had to lower it to normal speed. It was pretty ok while it lasted though but nothing to really write home about other than pretty much mimicking the Street Fighter series in the way you block and perform special moves. I recall having more fun with the VS mode with this one as a kid but again it didn’t last more than a couple of weekends before moving on to the next game. Fighting games within most generations to me are a good rental at best or a deep, deep sale unless you’re a major league gamer and compete.

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