What are you currently playing?

[BrawlMan]

I'm now debating, since I seem to be on a sneaky FPS kick, to either play FC Primal again, try and play FC 4 for the first time, or start Dishonored 2: Death of the Outsider. Never did finish that one, and I did enjoy it. Hmm, decisions decisions.

Since I have a hatred for nearly everything modern Ubisoft, just take Dishonored 2. If not, Far Cry Primal. Primal is basically a modded version of 4, except cavemen. I admit, it's the best Beastmaster game you're ever going to get. You did mention, you already did Primal, so 4 I guess, if you want something you have not played yet.

 

[happyninja42]

Since I have a hatred for nearly everything modern Ubisoft, just take Dishonored 2. If not, Far Cry Primal. Primal is basically a modded version of 4, except cavemen. I admit, it's the best Beastmaster game you're ever going to get. You did mention, you already did Primal, so 4 I guess, if you want something you have not played yet.

I decided to split the Farcry difference, and go with Dishonored Death of the Outsider. It's both a game I have played before, but also I didn't beat, so it's also kind of "new."
And yeah I enjoyed Primal a lot when I first played it. It was a refreshing setting for the FC mechanics of savage jungle prowling and stuff. I'm still downloading FC 4 as well, because I'm trying to actually go through my library of unplayed games, and that is on the list.

 

[Dreiko]

Just finished playing that, I don't understand why they force you to use Lan/Rey in your party the entire game, I was constantly finding new monster that I wanted to put in my party only to remember that I couldn't because the spot needed to be Lan/Rey. Who ever played pokemon and though the game would be better if 2/6 of your pokemon were boring human?! The game eventually let you bench them but it's like it has to be dragged to that idea begging and screaming so it punish you for doing that by taking away a bunch of mechanic. This is one of those strange situation were a really simple fix would make the game twice as enjoyable for me.

In a similar "easy fix makes the game better" I'm playing dragon dogma which has one massive problem, your character stats gain are dependent on which class they are when they level up. This is a pretty terrible idea since most of the fun class have absolute garbage stats gain forcing you to play other classes the entire game until you reach max level so your character don't end up as garbage. I previously played it on PS3 but now I'm playing it on PC and a simple patch let me change the class stats gain, letting me play as w/e class I want without having to worry about stats. Such an easy fix yet it was somehow to complex for the dev to even realize.

Well it's a story driven game so you want the heros to participate, for me it totally fit the narrative of the game so I didn't mind at all. Honestly the stuff it does better, such as letting you go back and forth in the evolution tree whenever you want and having just...one pokeball that's got infinite use and no PP on attacks, it just goes so far for me since I've literally spent thousands of hours with these limitations on pokemon so it feels extremely fun to be able to just evolve and devolve the monsters whenever I feel like it.



And I don't remember dragon's dogma having an issue on stats, I played as the two handed sword class mostly cause of the Berserk cosplay but also a bit of the thief class, I never really had an issue with the stats, maybe those are the "not fun classes"? I honestly don't rememeber even paying attention to stats and I had no problems beating both the main game and dark arisen which is pretty hard. I didn't play as a mage because my assistant I decided to theme after Schierke so she handled all the spellcasting stuff. Maybe if you're a mage or archer that causes you to struggle?

 

[meiam]

Well it's a story driven game so you want the heros to participate, for me it totally fit the narrative of the game so I didn't mind at all. Honestly the stuff it does better, such as letting you go back and forth in the evolution tree whenever you want and having just...one pokeball that's got infinite use and no PP on attacks, it just goes so far for me since I've literally spent thousands of hours with these limitations on pokemon so it feels extremely fun to be able to just evolve and devolve the monsters whenever I feel like it.

And I don't remember dragon's dogma having an issue on stats, I played as the two handed sword class mostly cause of the Berserk cosplay but also a bit of the thief class, I never really had an issue with the stats, maybe those are the "not fun classes"? I honestly don't rememeber even paying attention to stats and I had no problems beating both the main game and dark arisen which is pretty hard. I didn't play as a mage because my assistant I decided to theme after Schierke so she handled all the spellcasting stuff. Maybe if you're a mage or archer that causes you to struggle?

I never cared for the story of world of fantasy since it was all over the place, sometime it would go "w/e, it doesn't matter how it work, just go with it" and sometime it would try to have this big complex lore, none of it worked for me. So I really didn't care for the MC and just really resented them for taking spot on my team I'd much rather have a monster in, they could have just being in the background, it would also work better from a story point of view since every single time they get in a fight in a cutsecne they get their asses kick.

for DD, on hard mode you can't really afford to have unoptimized stats, also enemy tend to be tanky so it's annoying when you're just gently tickling them. Warrior has ok stats growth but assassin has waaaaaaay better growth. But the real issue is magick archer/magick knight which have absolutely garbage stats growth, basic mage (only class that can heal) also has very poor stats growth. Stupidly the basic rogue has the same magic stats growth than both magick archer and knight, despite literally having no magic attack while also having better growth of almost everything.

 

[Dreiko]

I never cared for the story of world of fantasy since it was all over the place, sometime it would go "w/e, it doesn't matter how it work, just go with it" and sometime it would try to have this big complex lore, none of it worked for me. So I really didn't care for the MC and just really resented them for taking spot on my team I'd much rather have a monster in, they could have just being in the background, it would also work better from a story point of view since every single time they get in a fight in a cutsecne they get their asses kick.

for DD, on hard mode you can't really afford to have unoptimized stats, also enemy tend to be tanky so it's annoying when you're just gently tickling them. Warrior has ok stats growth but assassin has waaaaaaay better growth. But the real issue is magick archer/magick knight which have absolutely garbage stats growth, basic mage (only class that can heal) also has very poor stats growth. Stupidly the basic rogue has the same magic stats growth than both magick archer and knight, despite literally having no magic attack while also having better growth of almost everything.

Yeah I played this back in the day when it was free on ps+ so I don't remember how stats work in particular, I remember the thief class just had this one skill that made you run really fast that I enjoyed the most, I was mainly focusing on the warrior class for most of the things though, only changing to the thief class for a bit pretty late into the game. Didn't mess at all with the magic stuff.

 

[sXeth]

Well it's a story driven game so you want the heros to participate, for me it totally fit the narrative of the game so I didn't mind at all. Honestly the stuff it does better, such as letting you go back and forth in the evolution tree whenever you want and having just...one pokeball that's got infinite use and no PP on attacks, it just goes so far for me since I've literally spent thousands of hours with these limitations on pokemon so it feels extremely fun to be able to just evolve and devolve the monsters whenever I feel like it.



And I don't remember dragon's dogma having an issue on stats, I played as the two handed sword class mostly cause of the Berserk cosplay but also a bit of the thief class, I never really had an issue with the stats, maybe those are the "not fun classes"? I honestly don't rememeber even paying attention to stats and I had no problems beating both the main game and dark arisen which is pretty hard. I didn't play as a mage because my assistant I decided to theme after Schierke so she handled all the spellcasting stuff. Maybe if you're a mage or archer that causes you to struggle?

The two hybrid magic classes (knight and archer) i believe, give you really subpar stat gains on level up. so to be optimal with them you'd have to do alternating levels in a purre class or whatever

 

[Chupathingy]

Finished replaying Dino Crisis after finishing it once a while ago.

I love the graphics, the sound, the atmosphere, the characters, and the enemies actually feeling threatening for the most part but dear god is the constant card key collecting awful. You're just running back and forth collecting cards which unlock doors that lead to other cards and it never ends. I know it's common for survival horror games but it feels worse here.

 

[BrawlMan]

Finished replaying Dino Crisis after finishing it once a while ago.

I love the graphics, the sound, the atmosphere, the characters, and the enemies actually feeling threatening for the most part but dear god is the constant card key collecting awful. You're just running back and forth collecting cards which unlock doors that lead to other cards and it never ends. I know it's common for survival horror games but it feels worse here.

That is why Dino Crisis 2 is the best in the series. It was basically the RE4 mercenaries mode as an entire game. I remember renting the sequel a couple of times back in the day.

 

[Dalisclock]

Playing Castlevania 2: Simons Quest.

I think I'm about halfway done, maybe. I'm at the 3rd mansion and have it's a bit smoother going(despite difficulty spikes) now then it was before. Though it helps that I learned time doesn't pass indoors so the mansions are the best place to XP and heart grind. The downsides of this is that it feels like I've spent more time grinding XP and hearts then actually going places because you need to buy certain things to proceed or make your life less of a living hell, especially early on.

So I do like that they tried something very different then the first game in that you spend much of the game roaming the countryside exploring and looking for dracula's bits in mansions. Now, why they're in big creepy dungeon-like mansions is not explained at all and feels like they're cribbing just a little but from Zelda 2(which had palaces that served much the same function) but the world feels bigger and more alive because there are towns are other people to actually talk to, which is cool. The downside is that half of what people tell you is either "WELCOME TO CORENIA" or cryptic bullshit(either because of mistranslation of flat out lying to you). There's also the feeling of a early version of a Metriodvania since you need certain items to progress and know how to use them. Of course, the game doesn't really explain this to you, like what the hell the crystals do. I'm getting serious FROM vibes here and yes I know Castlevania did it first.

Unfortunately, there's another major flaw. Time passes extremely quickly in game and towns shut down completely at night and become infested with undead. This is really annoying because the only purpose of towns in game is to buy things and to go to church, so if you get there as night falls, well, sucks to be you. Better wait till morning, either hiding in a corner, running around the woods killing monsters or running around town killing undead(which are surprisingly strong in the early game). The church not being open at night is far more obnoxious because that's the only way you can heal other then leveling up, and you can only level up to a certain cap based on the game region you're inI(I think there's like like 6 levels but it takes a while to get there even if grinding).

However, add to this the invisible time limit running in the background which determines the ending you get and it can maddening if you want to get the best ending because you need to do in in 7 in game days and as far as I can tell, you need to be doing some serious sequence breaking or be completely on the ball with how you're leveling up and progressing. If you don't finish the game in 16 in game days, you get the worst ending and considering how fast time passes in the game, yeah, you pretty much need to know exactly what you're doing to have a chance of getting either the best or even the normal ending.

So while I really like the ambition here, it feels like something the NES really wasn't ready for and if it had come out a couple years later, maybe for the SNES, it might have been a much better realized game. Unless the devs just really hated the players that much, but I haven't played the SNES Castlevanias yet so I don't know if it's less hard or what).

 

[Drathnoxis]

Playing Castlevania 2: Simons Quest.

I think I'm about halfway done, maybe. I'm at the 3rd mansion and have it's a bit smoother going(despite difficulty spikes) now then it was before. Though it helps that I learned time doesn't pass indoors so the mansions are the best place to XP and heart grind. The downsides of this is that it feels like I've spent more time grinding XP and hearts then actually going places because you need to buy certain things to proceed or make your life less of a living hell, especially early on.

So I do like that they tried something very different then the first game in that you spend much of the game roaming the countryside exploring and looking for dracula's bits in mansions. Now, why they're in big creepy dungeon-like mansions is not explained at all and feels like they're cribbing just a little but from Zelda 2(which had palaces that served much the same function) but the world feels bigger and more alive because there are towns are other people to actually talk to, which is cool. The downside is that half of what people tell you is either "WELCOME TO CORENIA" or cryptic bullshit(either because of mistranslation of flat out lying to you). There's also the feeling of a early version of a Metriodvania since you need certain items to progress and know how to use them. Of course, the game doesn't really explain this to you, like what the hell the crystals do. I'm getting serious FROM vibes here and yes I know Castlevania did it first.

Unfortunately, there's another major flaw. Time passes extremely quickly in game and towns shut down completely at night and become infested with undead. This is really annoying because the only purpose of towns in game is to buy things and to go to church, so if you get there as night falls, well, sucks to be you. Better wait till morning, either hiding in a corner, running around the woods killing monsters or running around town killing undead(which are surprisingly strong in the early game). The church not being open at night is far more obnoxious because that's the only way you can heal other then leveling up, and you can only level up to a certain cap based on the game region you're inI(I think there's like like 6 levels but it takes a while to get there even if grinding).

However, add to this the invisible time limit running in the background which determines the ending you get and it can maddening if you want to get the best ending because you need to do in in 7 in game days and as far as I can tell, you need to be doing some serious sequence breaking or be completely on the ball with how you're leveling up and progressing. If you don't finish the game in 16 in game days, you get the worst ending and considering how fast time passes in the game, yeah, you pretty much need to know exactly what you're doing to have a chance of getting either the best or even the normal ending.

So while I really like the ambition here, it feels like something the NES really wasn't ready for and if it had come out a couple years later, maybe for the SNES, it might have been a much better realized game. Unless the devs just really hated the players that much, but I haven't played the SNES Castlevanias yet so I don't know if it's less hard or what).

Don't look into the Death Star, or you will die.

 

[happyninja42]

Playing Dishonored 2: Death of the Outsider. (DotO)

Ah Dunwall, I forgot how drab and dreary your design is. How everyone is just various shades of shit and obnoxious. I like the mechanics of the powers and stuff, but the level designs can be really frustrating, at least with this iteration of the game. Really tall, vertical buildings, but you are unable to climb all that high, because the rest of the buildings are just setpieces. I mean it's a 10 story building, with tons of things on them I could teleport to, but I can only go as high as like...the 3rd or 4th floor at best.

There is a lot of back and forth with DotO, that I don't remember having to deal with. But, yeah I find myself going to objective A, learning about Location B, when I get to B, it tells me about Location C, which very likely tells me to go back to A, with new information to do something else. They also love hiding the various safes with the special loot, in one spot, but have the clues for the combination be somewhere else in the city. Which again, just leads to lots of back and forth. I've found this is especially common if you're doing the side contracts for extra cash. So, I've decided to not really do most of them. I dunno, it's strange. Like, it wants to be the spiritual successor to Thief, and in a lot of ways it is, but then it gives me all these pure mercenary/profit oriented missions, when the plot is nothing to do with money. I'm not a thief just trying to make a buck. I'm an ex-assassin, apprenticed to another ex-assassin father figure, that I am compelled to rescue, because he spared my life, and made me question my morals and life choices. Our goal is to literally kill a god, because we think that will help purge the world of evil, something we've helped to make worse.....and...then I also am doing jobs to settle petty disputes between distilleries? Kill a dude just because they insulted someone else? All just for money? Seems....a bit hypocritical to do these things, while my character is opining about the greed and corruption of the citizens of Dunwall. Just feels like ludonarrative dissonance. Decry the people around me for being brutal and shallow....agree to kill someone just for money. *shrugs*

So yeah, I'm just playing the pacifist angle, and basically avoiding most of the sidejobs. It's just making me have less cash to play with for upgrades, but a lot of the upgrades and equipment are lethal in nature, so I don't really need to buy them. I don't need to buy increased ammo capacity for my wrist bolts, as I don't use them for anything other than occasionally breaking an object, and there are plenty of spare bolts just lying around every level. I've already bought the boosts to stealth and silent movement, and just have 1 more upgrade on that line to buy. So next mission I should have it. After that, yeah money's not really going to have much use.

I'm enjoying the game, though I'm finding the oppressive cynicism and jaded atmosphere, to be fairly grating at this point.

 

[Dalisclock]

Don't look into the Death Star, or you will die.

YOU CAN'T TELL ME WHAT TO DO! YOU'RE NOT MY REAL DAD!

I'm still fond of "Get a Silk Bag from the Graveyard Duck to Live longer".

Legends of Localization: Why the “Graveyard Duck” from Castlevania II Isn’t a Mistranslation After All

This odd line has puzzled fans for years. It turns out ducks and Castlevania go hand-in-hand!

legendsoflocalization.com

I've heard that "Graveyard Duck" might be a slang term for "Night Watchman". I get the word used can only refer to a bird but apparently one can liken Patrolling to a "duck walk" and thus the metaphor.

 

[BrawlMan]

Arkham Asylum (PS4) - Boy, the Arkham style combat is rough and it shows. The Spider-Man games and later Batman games definitely improved on this combat. I'm assuming the same for the Shadow of War/Mordor games too. The combat works, but it sluggish since it's the first of its kind. Boss battles are not the best with this game's combat, but once you get the flow and rhythm, you will get used to it. I'm getting used to it again.

The checkpoints are bit weird and show their age too. Some are spaced a bit further than they should. but it does not bother too much. I already did the Scarecrow section and got it on the first attempt, rescued Gordon on the first attempt, and took me twice to beat Bane. I know I am heading towards the Killer Croc section, but I am stopping for tonight.

 

[deleted20220709]

DELETED

 

[Dalisclock]

Finished Castlevania 2.

So pretty much what I said earlier still stands. In addition, I will say the world FEELS rather big, in much the same way the world in a SOULS game feels big despite not actually being big. It's so dangerous to travel between towns and mansions that even a couple screens of wilderness feels like a long trek, especially since healing can only be done in towns(and not all towns at that). The mansions are rather meh to go through and it runs into the problem old school games had with making buildings look like actual places(assuming they even cared to, which they normally didn't) but yeah, the mansions are just big mazes with like 3 monster types(90% of them skelingtons) that I spent most of my time in grinding levels.

What I did find interesting is that in the last section of the game there's 2 towns between the last mansion and Dracula's castle and unlike the others, these two are increasingly unwelcoming. The first everyone fucking hates you and is more then happy to tell you so and the town beyond that, just before you reach the castle, is basically abandoned(except for some old crazy lady squatting in a house). It would have been even more effective if the same town music wasn't playing in those towns but whatever. It was cool that Dracula's Castle is basically empty, and there's no opposition at all, like once Dracula died all the monsters wandered off and having to traverse the empty ruins of the castle lends a sense of foreboding.

My only remaining gripe(aside for the fact Dracula goes down like a ***** but then again he just woke up so maybe he's more dangerous after he's had his coffee) is that in the normal ending, Simon dies from his wounds anyway, which is exactly the fate he was trying to avoid by resurrecting Dracula to kill him again but apparently not in the other two. But then again, maybe the monsters went away for the next century or something? It does feel like a kick in the balls to essentially feel like Simon goes through all of that for no real reason unless you get the best ending(and maybe the worst). I probably shouldn't overanalyze an NES ending when the standard was "You are winner" and the next game would be a prequel and then there's be a couple of remakes of the first game a few years down the road.

With that said, I'll be moving onto Castlevania 3 in the near future.

 

[Chupathingy]

Finished Turok. A short but fun game that felt tight, had a nice pace, a good variety of weapons that were mostly satisfying to use and good level design. Boss fights were your typical "circle strafe until they're dead" affair but FPS generally don't have very exciting boss fights.

 

[NerfedFalcon]

I played through all of Final Fantasy 1 for the NES in the last week or so, with a party of Fighter, Red Mage, White Mage, Black Mage. The early game was a little grindy, trying to outfit a Red Mage being more expensive than a Thief, but it made the actual dungeon crawls a lot easier. Ended up finishing the game at level 24 (of a cap of 50), without even getting access to the highest level of spells.

It's still a really great game that holds up well. The party selection means that there's a lot of different ways to play it, dungeons are (almost) all exceptionally well designed, monsters look great, mechanics are fairly solid even with quite a lot of bugs. There's grinding involved, like a lot of 3rd- and 4th-gen JRPGs, and you'll probably want a guide to which spells do or don't work, but as long as you talk to every NPC, you probably won't need a guide for progression. It's definitely worth trying if you're interested in the roots of the genre, and don't want to go as far back as Dragon Quest.

Personally, I recommend either the NES or PS1 (Origins) versions, since they both use the Vancian spell slots; Origins has improved graphics and a lot of bug fixes and QoL. The GBA (Dawn of Souls) and PSP (Anniversary) versions replace that with mana points, which make the game a lot easier than intended, as well as adding extra items and making everything cheaper. The core game is still more or less intact, and the extra dungeons may be interesting, but I just don't like them that much for the magic rework.

I'll probably get back on Mother 3 now that I've finished this; I'm about halfway through Chapter 5, having reached the titular tower. And this time, I actually remembered to do the mouse side quest to get the Shield Snatcher. And I'm still playing Genshin Impact in the meantime; not ready to call it quits on that one yet by a long shot.

 

[hanselthecaretaker]

Playing Castlevania 2: Simons Quest.

I think I'm about halfway done, maybe. I'm at the 3rd mansion and have it's a bit smoother going(despite difficulty spikes) now then it was before. Though it helps that I learned time doesn't pass indoors so the mansions are the best place to XP and heart grind. The downsides of this is that it feels like I've spent more time grinding XP and hearts then actually going places because you need to buy certain things to proceed or make your life less of a living hell, especially early on.

So I do like that they tried something very different then the first game in that you spend much of the game roaming the countryside exploring and looking for dracula's bits in mansions. Now, why they're in big creepy dungeon-like mansions is not explained at all and feels like they're cribbing just a little but from Zelda 2(which had palaces that served much the same function) but the world feels bigger and more alive because there are towns are other people to actually talk to, which is cool. The downside is that half of what people tell you is either "WELCOME TO CORENIA" or cryptic bullshit(either because of mistranslation of flat out lying to you). There's also the feeling of a early version of a Metriodvania since you need certain items to progress and know how to use them. Of course, the game doesn't really explain this to you, like what the hell the crystals do. I'm getting serious FROM vibes here and yes I know Castlevania did it first.

Unfortunately, there's another major flaw. Time passes extremely quickly in game and towns shut down completely at night and become infested with undead. This is really annoying because the only purpose of towns in game is to buy things and to go to church, so if you get there as night falls, well, sucks to be you. Better wait till morning, either hiding in a corner, running around the woods killing monsters or running around town killing undead(which are surprisingly strong in the early game). The church not being open at night is far more obnoxious because that's the only way you can heal other then leveling up, and you can only level up to a certain cap based on the game region you're inI(I think there's like like 6 levels but it takes a while to get there even if grinding).

However, add to this the invisible time limit running in the background which determines the ending you get and it can maddening if you want to get the best ending because you need to do in in 7 in game days and as far as I can tell, you need to be doing some serious sequence breaking or be completely on the ball with how you're leveling up and progressing. If you don't finish the game in 16 in game days, you get the worst ending and considering how fast time passes in the game, yeah, you pretty much need to know exactly what you're doing to have a chance of getting either the best or even the normal ending.

So while I really like the ambition here, it feels like something the NES really wasn't ready for and if it had come out a couple years later, maybe for the SNES, it might have been a much better realized game. Unless the devs just really hated the players that much, but I haven't played the SNES Castlevanias yet so I don't know if it's less hard or what).

It’s been years and years since I’d even replayed it but it’s highly likely you’ll be pleasantly surprised/relieved/etc.? Series purists may dismiss it as not hardcore enough, but to me it felt like a step in the right direction for advancing the series in terms of design let alone presentation.

But let’s not get ahead of ourselves, as III comes before IV!

Finished Turok. A short but fun game that felt tight, had a nice pace, a good variety of weapons that were mostly satisfying to use and good level design. Boss fights were your typical "circle strafe until they're dead" affair but FPS generally don't have very exciting boss fights.

Hopefully you have T2: Seeds or Evil because it is pretty much like comparing the first two Uncharted games. If you’re unfamiliar, the common thread is the sequel is such an improvement it makes the original game feel merely like a proof of concept vs fully realized game.

 

[hanselthecaretaker]

On topic, I nabbed the God of War platinum last night. In the final stretch I decided to finish upgrading my mist armor set in GoW before trying Sigrun anymore, so the first step was heading back to Muspelheim for more of Sutyr’s hidden trials. The next one I got was defeating tiers of enemies without getting hit. *ugh*, I thought, as getting a gold rank for the best loot I needed required 3.5x as many as completing the first “impossible” trial that yielded one of the keys to unlock it. To my surprise though, it actually wasn’t too bad. I needed 35 kills but ended up with 40, so yay teamwork boi.

Then it was another trip to Niflheim where I spent about as much time running the maze for a single aesirbane drop to complete my set as I did dying to Sigrun for a few nights earlier. Thankfully last night, I ended up getting not one, but two of them on my first run through. Hells yes, because I was beginning to get Pure Bladestone vibes.

Then finally, feeling as prepared as I was planning on getting, I made my way back to the queen. I also turned on the touch function for boss health, as I was hoping the visual feedback would be encouraging, and in a way it was. On the second try, after three prior nights full of dying to her, I had what felt like a kick ass run at her. So I peeked at her health to see it was almost gone!. One more runic would probably do her in, but no. Then I got anxious.

Big mistake. My heart raced and I flubbed my whole rhythm up, and she wasted no time taking advantage of it. Dead again. But then, after maybe another half dozen attempts incrementally regaining my composure and confidence, I felt like I was pretty much dominating her. I wouldn’t have even needed a resurrection stone until the very end where she was hanging on by the tiniest sliver I misread a jump, probably getting a tad anxious again. It might’ve been just the act of being zapped by Atreus that brought up the glorious finisher prompt which I took swift advantage of.

Boi that was satisfying. What started as an optimistic, then unbelievable, then frustrating, then borderline depressing, then inspiration-finding, then gear-tweaking, then realizing I’d actually done a decent job learning her tactics, then refining my offensive into something that posed a considerable threat, to finally capitalizing on it, was an arc rarely experienced in my time gaming. Even SoulsBorne bosses hadn’t managed to run the gamut on me like that (although I’ve yet to finish Sekiro). I played on the GMaC difficulty but would love to do a NG+ run on GMGoW.

Anyways, I still wasn’t “done”. I had a couple treasures left to find, namely from the “Dead and Bloated” (STP fans perhaps?) and “Creation Island” maps. Since the latter one had a nicer ring to it, I naturally planned on doing it last for a pleasant Platinum screenshot. But for some reason, I ended up getting the Treasure Hunter trophy after completing the “Dead and Bloated” location, and dumbfounded just kinda stared there in slight bewilderment as the Platinum popped. I’ll have to upload the screenshot later because it’s a bit of a doozy and is front-loaded with dark humor, and is in a way thematically appropriate considering Kratos’ history of violence. I of course still went to get the “last” treasure, and took a moment of respite to contemplate how my journey ultimately transpired.

Spoiler: Oh what the hell

 

[BrawlMan]

Personally, I recommend either the NES or PS1 (Origins) versions, since they both use the Vancian spell slots; Origins has improved graphics and a lot of bug fixes and QoL. The GBA (Dawn of Souls) and PSP (Anniversary) versions replace that with mana points, which make the game a lot easier than intended, as well as adding extra items and making everything cheaper. The core game is still more or less intact, and the extra dungeons may be interesting, but I just don't like them that much for the magic rework.

I still have the GBA version. I'm never letting go of that version. I nearly did all the bonus dungeons. I went for a fighter, red mage, black mage, and white mage. I was able to get them to their near maximum level.