What are you currently playing?

[Absent]

I bought a hitman bundle on the steam xmas sale and keep meaning to start playing but having had no experience of the games I wondered which would be recommended as the starting point. I have Blood Money, Absolution, sniper challenge and hitman 1 and 2 (the recent ones). Blood money is 1st chronologically but I guess might be a bit old and janky feeling. Absolution I heard was a bit stinky. Any advice etc?

I would say either blood money or hitman 1. They're like two different franchises. Maybe blood money first actually. Blood money belongs to the old version, where what mattered was to succeed at the level no matter what. The new hitman are a bit less serious, more about replaying the level again and again and again in order to explore all the different ways to complete it, groundhog day like - it's fun, but it dilutes the story to meaninglessness as no events are definitive. Better discover hitman the traditional way, through a story you can get (slightly) invested it. It gives more weight to your actions.

 

[Old_Hunter_77]

Well I tried to play Oddworld: Soulstorm because it was available through PS+ and boy howdy did I drop off fast. I later read about how it's a sequel/remake or whatever, and I think one's nostalgia for this series or this type of game or- now say it with me folks, because it's been the dominating nostalgia theme of video games lately- "the 360 era of gaming."

It's 2.5D puzzles where you gotta use stealth, platforming and environment manipulation mechanics to progress. I was totally down for that. Problem is the controls are extremely finnicky and counter-intuitive. The result is that thing that makes me rage in video games- where I absolutely understand what to do and how to do it, but because you aim your joystick 4 degrees to the left of where some poorly tested game mechanic wants you to, you have to start the whole thing over. Yeah no thanks.

I didn't even make it as far as when you get to control other NPCs, a key part of the game. The mechanics that telegraphed to me that I would be quitting is how to disable mines. They alternate glow red and green and you have to interact with them on green to turn them off so they don't blow you up. Ok fine. But if you actually press the interact button on green, it turns to red and you die. So you have to get the pattern exactly right. And then there are like 5 of them in a row. Oh but then to get to them you have to be crouched and roll at them, so you have to understand the distance to not roll into them. And that movements is big so you can't just shimmy up to them. So begins an endless cycle of frustration of trying to roll at mines and play a broken rhythm game 5x.

Doesn't help that the art and presentation style is that kind of weird, so ugly it's supposed to be cute style that reminded me of Psychonauts. But with the latter, I was able to get past that because at least the damn controls worked, and I'm so glad I did. Here, that aesthetic includes cut scenes where the characters talk impossibly slow while delivering information you already gathered from the opening intro. I did like that the plot was about organizing a bunch of exploited laborers against their oppressive exploitative corporation- more socialist representation in games!

Seems like another game carried by the force of nostalgia to me. No thanks. *sigh* back to Elden Ring I guess....

Code Vein is coming to PS+ in a couple of days. I remember trying it out and feeling kind of meh but I don't remember if that was just my mood or the game or both so I'll give it another shot. Because I am in the mood for a meaty combat game that isn't made by FromSoftware, but I'm not quite ready to buy Wo Long either.

 

[EvilRoy]

Played it for an hour or two because I'm interested in roguelikes with different gameplay styles. It's pretty dull, though. Ok, search this ship for minimal rewards, ok do it again, and again, and again, and again. Great I found 13 scrap at that last ship, that will be enough to repair one of the drone upgrades that started breaking on that last mission, wow. The game is very slow and methodical too, which isn't necessarily a bad thing, but the puzzles, at least early on, were pretty simple. Just open doors strategically and route enemies into out of the way rooms or into turrets or a room with a bomb or something. I think you might also be able to suck them out of airlocks, but I never tried that.

Yeah, not really sure what you'd do if you didn't have anything like motion or sensor. I guess just open a door and run away if you see red. Interface didn't seem all that useful, pretty much every terminal I used it on just gave me a map of the ship.

I'm also not really sure of my goal. I went through a warp gate and ended up in a different part of the universe map, but I'm not really sure how that matters.

The game could also use some music.

Interface can give you a scan which locates all the stuff onboard for you, and defense which lets you use turrets to kill infestations. It doesn't matter all the time but certain types of ship seem highly likely to have a lot of defenses and also a lot of enemies, so if you end up on one then not having that option makes stuff needlessly difficult.

I looked up the gate thing because I had the same question as you. The verdict? Cut content. It was gonna be a thing where you mapped constellations that would persist between runs but they dropped it. That plus the music plus the lack of direction has me thinking that the game either had a lot pulled out or cut short because of budget or time.

 

[Kyrian007]

-In what's probably against the grain...I'll say it, Brom's actually pretty useful. He's nothing special, and is outshone by Gatrie (who of course, is back in the party now), but as a damage sponge? Yeah, he's got his money's worth. I really don't get why so many people disregard him.

Brom was one of my MVP's. He didn't just turn into an invincible and unbreakable spearhead of my shieldwall, his propensity to take 1 damage then deal out just enough damage to not quite kill an opponent in a single counterattack (provided I'd equipped him right) didn't just keep him getting constant xp... but it helped powerlevel anyone around him. Anyone I needed to get a level or 2, just put them near Brom and rake it in.

The really against the grain thought would be saying that Brom's daughter Meg in Radiant Dawn was actually useful. But I got her some quick levels early on and got some really good randomly generated stat boosts... and she became completely unstoppable for me in Radiant Dawn. She was so much more powerful than her teammates through most of the game, I had to intentionally give her the least powerful paper mache weapons I had just to keep her from getting ALL the XP as enemy after enemy would step up to her in the shield wall and just get utterly destroyed.

 

[Hawki]

FIRE EMBLEM: PATH OF RADIANCE

So I was able to play a bit more to the extent that I've started the next mission (where you need to take out the laguz slave traders). Since I've only just started, really don't have much to say, only just that:

-I poured a significant portion of bonus XP into Astrid to make her level 10. It's a risk, sure, but my rationale is that not only is she the only bow knight available to me, but that I've got an overabundance of bows already (so may as well spread them out), plus, cavalry is incredibly useful in this game compared to prior entries (given the ability to move after attacking). So far, seems to have paid off.

-So, Marcia's recruited Malakov. That's...neat, I guess. He's not bad so far, but nothing special either.

-Mia's back to being useful again. Sort of. Maybe. I mean, bandit-type enemies use axes, so she's good as a sword-user, but still, her strength's really lacking.

-Boyd's probably still the MVP. He's arguably even a better unit than Ike at this point.

WORLD OF WARCRAFT

I'm using what's left of my subscription, since I finally finished the Warcraft story I was working on that dictated I play WOW. Since I'm no longer bound by the needs of the story, it's actually more relaxing to play (e.g. I can stick with the one character and explore at my leisure).

Really, at this point, can't say too much that I haven't already. There's some casual fun to be had (at least when I'm not being killed by elite mobs who have nothing better to do than go stalking through Duskwood, attacking me when I'm killing spiders, and I can't escape because the spiders have paralysed me and God fucking damn it!), but at the end of the day, just isn't my preferred genre. Not that this is really a warranted comparison, but if it's a choice between a more focussed less (e.g. Fire Emblem) and a less focussed more (e.g. WOW), I'll generally go for the former.

 

[mirbrownbread]

Super Mario 64 for the first time ever!
I'm very annoyed by the camera, not gonna lie, but overall, the game is very charming and watching how the levels unfold as you uncover more secrets is a treat. So, even if the platformer genre is really not my cup of tea (Psychonauts is the only other platformer I've ever bothered with, I think...), seems that it is possible to enjoy SM 64 in 2023

 

[Chimpzy]

Started Dark Cloud 2. Haven't got far tho. It takes a while before you get to actual gameplay. Seems a serviceable action rpg for the era. Fought some knife wielding clowns.

I am of course emulating it through PCSX2 of course, because I'm not getting my PS2 or PS3 out of storage for this. It's been a while since I used it, and it's changed a lot. They got rid of the annoying plugin system, implemented Vulkan api, made some much needed improvements to the UI and general usability including an in-game option overlay, and it seems like it overall needs less fiddling with settings. Should try to run Valkyrie Profile 2 as a litmus test, that used to require a bunch of hacks and patches to run. Anyway, good showing. I mean, Dolphin is still the gold standard, but this now feels a lot more modern and pleasant to use.

 

[hanselthecaretaker]

Super Mario 64 for the first time ever!
I'm very annoyed by the camera, not gonna lie, but overall, the game is very charming and watching how the levels unfold as you uncover more secrets is a treat. So, even if the platformer genre is really not my cup of tea (Psychonauts is the only other platformer I've ever bothered with, I think...), seems that it is possible to enjoy SM 64 in 2023

It was a magical time back in ‘96, being able to have that level of control and precision over a game character, and in a 3D environment no less.


On topic, started Mafia 3’s first dlc Faster, Baby! (wasn’t aware they’re all free on PS store for anyone who bought the game as part of the Definitive Edition, so yay for that). This one focuses on driving, stunt jumps, and blowing shit up, plus Lincoln’s got what will probably wind up a girlfriend. So far so good.


Also got back into Forbidden West. If I didn’t have better stuff to play I’d be more inclined, but after just crossing over the Western border my patience for the game’s clusterfuck battle sequences is already wearing thing. You have these grunts peppering you with arrows while others are doing drive by’s on machines, and fuck if I know how much progress I’m making until I hear someone say, “One more!” Thank god I say, doing good this time at near full health, I got this…and then while whipping the camera around to look for that last one I proceed to get one shot in the ass by a bristleback.

That’s when I called it a night.

As an aside, the cutscenes look well and good but are kinda oddly put together. I generally don’t have the patience for every dialog wheel option to play out, so will usually just speed read the CC’s and skip ahead, which makes the background music skip too. But it only happens outside of the main story sequences. Ultimately I won’t even remember the drama surrounding these characters anyways so will probably just try to avoid as much of the filler squabbling as possible from now on.

 

[meiam]

Started Dark Cloud 2. Haven't got far tho. It takes a while before you get to actual gameplay. Seems a serviceable action rpg for the era. Fought some knife wielding clowns.

I am of course emulating it through PCSX2 of course, because I'm not getting my PS2 or PS3 out of storage for this. It's been a while since I used it, and it's changed a lot. They got rid of the annoying plugin system, implemented Vulkan api, made some much needed improvements to the UI and general usability including an in-game option overlay, and it seems like it overall needs less fiddling with settings. Should try to run Valkyrie Profile 2 as a litmus test, that used to require a bunch of hacks and patches to run. Anyway, good showing. I mean, Dolphin is still the gold standard, but this now feels a lot more modern and pleasant to use.

Good to know it got better tried a long time ago to play front mission 5 translation patch and it was very fiddly and ultimately not worth the time.

Still annoyed at how bad company are at making their old game available to play. A bunch of uncoordinated people are able to develop tool in semi illegality to near perfectly play these old game on just about any systems and yet the company themselves will takes years to release a few title here and there. I'd gladly pay good money to play trough some of these game that I already own.

 

[Piscian]

At some point I picked up Evil Within for $5 because I'd heard it was a kind of rough around the edges hidden gem. I got about an hour in and find myself just not wanting to play it anymore.

I think my biggest peeve is that it doesn't seem to know what it wants to be. It starts out being gritty horror but immediately devolves in scifi fantasy tropes, then it literally breaks gameplay up into bizarre chapters with stats like it's residential evil 5 or house of the dead. I can't tell if the game actually wants me to take it seriously or not.

Worse the gameplay is just an unrefined clunky mess. Literally caused a couple bugs in the opening scene where for some strange reason it gave me the option to stealth kill what's supposed to be an unkillable monster, who then immediately turned around and killed me. Movement sucks, it doesn't tell you what items or weapons are for, nor does it explain enemies.

It's almost immediately apparent that this is all a dream or some nonsense which sorta kills your immersion so by chapter 2 youre like "Oh Im in Resident evil 4 now for some reason and I guess I'm just trying to get out" instead of having any kind of clear goal.

I'd juxipose this with Silent hill 2 which is similarly clunky and mysterious, but it's always driving you towards a goal. You know why you're in Silent Hill and you feel like it's drawing you towards a direction. This I just had a lot of instances right off the bat where I was just looking around waiting for the game to tell me what it wants and I was thoroughly miserable.

You ever play a game where it becomes immediately apparent that the devs are using the game to try and have a conversation or interaction with you but you simply do not speak the same language and you are forced to throw your hands up and politely excuse yourself?

 

[Casual Shinji]

At some point I picked up Evil Within for $5 because I'd heard it was a kind of rough around the edges hidden gem. I got about an hour in and find myself just not wanting to play it anymore.

I think my biggest peeve is that it doesn't seem to know what it wants to be. It starts out being gritty horror but immediately devolves in scifi fantasy tropes, then it literally breaks gameplay up into bizarre chapters with stats like it's residential evil 5 or house of the dead. I can't tell if the game actually wants me to take it seriously or not.

Worse the gameplay is just an unrefined clunky mess. Literally caused a couple bugs in the opening scene where for some strange reason it gave me the option to stealth kill what's supposed to be an unkillable monster, who then immediately turned around and killed me. Movement sucks, it doesn't tell you what items or weapons are for, nor does it explain enemies.

It's almost immediately apparent that this is all a dream or some nonsense which sorta kills your immersion so by chapter 2 youre like "Oh Im in Resident evil 4 now for some reason and I guess I'm just trying to get out" instead of having any kind of clear goal.

I'd juxipose this with Silent hill 2 which is similarly clunky and mysterious, but it's always driving you towards a goal. You know why you're in Silent Hill and you feel like it's drawing you towards a direction. This I just had a lot of instances right off the bat where I was just looking around waiting for the game to tell me what it wants and I was thoroughly miserable.

You ever play a game where it becomes immediately apparent that the devs are using the game to try and have a conversation or interaction with you but you simply do not speak the same language and you are forced to throw your hands up and politely excuse yourself?

Pretty much the same experience. It's been years since I touched it - one of the first games I played on the PS4, eventhough it ran like a PS3 game - but in the hour or so I gave it before turning it off forever it felt like an unfinished mess. The letterboxing actually got in the way of button prompts in a lot of cases. And to think Shinji Mikami made this turd. Even if it didn't run like shit and actually had solid gameplay it still would've been one of the most generic horror settings I'd ever seen. Oh look, a hospital, and barbed wire, and a hooded guy with scars, how spooky.

 

[gorfias]

I'll take horny vending machine over depressed cowboy that only know one song med bay

That's a really nice song! Thanks for sharing.

Pretty much the same experience. It's been years since I touched it - one of the first games I played on the PS4, eventhough it ran like a PS3 game - but in the hour or so I gave it before turning it off forever it felt like an unfinished mess. The letterboxing actually got in the way of button prompts in a lot of cases. And to think Shinji Mikami made this turd. Even if it didn't run like shit and actually had solid gameplay it still would've been one of the most generic horror settings I'd ever seen. Oh look, a hospital, and barbed wire, and a hooded guy with scars, how spooky.

One of the 1st games I bought for Xbox One and barely scratched the surface. I've got 2nd on GoG and so far it is a pretty polished game.

 

[MrCalavera]

Catching up on the classics, this time with the very first(though itself a sequel) Metal Gear Solid.



I can see why it was a hit. The animations and in-game engine cutscenes are really impressive for 1998.
Though, i thought of it as a new opening, the story does make you feel like you miss out on important info from Metal Gear 1&2, if you didn't play those(there's a summary of two last games in the menu, fortunately).
BTW, i'm playing on PC(GOG version), which funny enough, makes the fabled Psycho Mantis fight harder than it was on PS1.

 

[Chimpzy]

BTW, i'm playing on PC(GOG version), which funny enough, makes the fabled Psycho Mantis fight harder than it was on PS1.

Now you mention it, how does that fight work on pc? Do they make you use the keyboard, of if already on keyboard, an odd set of keys?

 

[hanselthecaretaker]

Now you mention it, how does that fight work on pc? Do they make you use the keyboard, of if already on keyboard, an odd set of keys?

Yup and Nope (depending on default keys, I guess).

https://screenrant.com/metal-gear-solid-defeat-psycho-mantis-pc-controller/

However, leave it to Screenrant to still screw up the wording in the Only Keyboard section.

 

[The Rogue Wolf]

Catching up on the classics, this time with the very first(though itself a sequel) Metal Gear Solid.

View attachment 8213

I can see why it was a hit. The animations and in-game engine cutscenes are really impressive for 1998.
Though, i thought of it as a new opening, the story does make you feel like you miss out on important info from Metal Gear 1&2, if you didn't play those(there's a summary of two last games in the menu, fortunately).
BTW, i'm playing on PC(GOG version), which funny enough, makes the fabled Psycho Mantis fight harder than it was on PS1.

Kojima was kind of up his own ass even then, but at least he wasn't being avant-garde just for the sake of being avant-garde.

 

[Old_Hunter_77]

I started Code Vein last night. I only played like an hour or so so I'm not gonna have any strong opinions yet. It's like a JRPG/anime style Dark Souls? So this can go either way for me. So far on the plus side, the most intriguing thing is the combat system. It's melee style attack dodge with some range and magic stuff, sure, but it has this sort of on-the-fly class system to allow you to manipulate your stats. This provides potential for some dynamic combat or gameplay.
The flip side that it's all a bit overwhelming right now. Didn't help that the intro is a mess- first you get a huge info dump of the systems and using weird terms like "ichor" instead of normal stuff like health and stamina.
The down side is I dunno about this movement, it's slower than I've become accustomed to with all my Bayonetting and Sekiros. Once I get past a few levels I imagine either this will all click or it won't.

 

[Drathnoxis]

Played a couple of hours of Little Big Planet. I hate it. The controls are so clunky, I especially hate shifting between the 3 horizontal planes. It doesn't feel good at all. Also I'm just not into the huge focus on character customization. Literally the third thing they teach you is how to customize your character, right after how to run and jump. I just don't care at all and am just using the default skin. You can also control your head and pelvis movements with the six-axis and the arms with the left and right triggers for absolutely no reason. They have Stephen Fry voice the narrator and it's pretty great listening to him talk, but all he does is voice tutorials pretty much, which sucks.

I might finish it just because I'm nearly half way through the game after an hour or two, but I'm not feeling it at all.

 

[Drathnoxis]

Interface can give you a scan which locates all the stuff onboard for you, and defense which lets you use turrets to kill infestations. It doesn't matter all the time but certain types of ship seem highly likely to have a lot of defenses and also a lot of enemies, so if you end up on one then not having that option makes stuff needlessly difficult.

I looked up the gate thing because I had the same question as you. The verdict? Cut content. It was gonna be a thing where you mapped constellations that would persist between runs but they dropped it. That plus the music plus the lack of direction has me thinking that the game either had a lot pulled out or cut short because of budget or time.

Yeah, it seems the game could have stood to have a lot more dev time. Apparently there is no ending, you just keep collecting supplies to survive until you get bored and quit.

 

[NerfedFalcon]

I 'finished' Pizza Tower a while back, but I've been trying to get 101% completion, which I don't normally do for games - this one's something special. So far, I have had to look up a few locations for collectibles, but after seeing where they are, it does seem fair that I could have spotted them if I was trying harder.

For 100% completion, you need to get all the collectibles in each level, as well as at least an S rank by getting enough points. For 101%, you also need to get all the achievements (which are tracked separately on save files), as well as the elusive P rank, above S. To get a P rank, you have to not only score enough points for the S rank, but also find all the collectibles in a single run, complete Lap 2 (beat the escape sequence a second time without resetting the timer, usually required anyway for S-level scoring), and do that without losing your combo at any point. Routing a P rank run through each level, as well as executing it, is basically the experience of speedrunning in miniature, and it's a great game to demonstrate/teach that mindset to non-speedrunners.