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[Dirty Hipsters]

Finished Resident Evil 3, with a surprisingly low E rank.

In a lot of ways, Resident Evil 3 is a natural evolution of 2: even more action, more mechanics, more weapons, and finally getting to explore Raccoon City proper instead of just seeing it as a backdrop. But at the same time, only having one character and basically one route through the game kind of limits it, despite the choices and the randomized elements. Calling it 'more of the same' as 2 isn't entirely accurate, but if you liked that game, you'll probably like 3 as well. It's not the best of the original trilogy, though; I'd still give that to 2, and it definitely won't change your mind if you already didn't like fixed-camera-tank type games.

3 S.T.A.R.S... out of 5

Unpopular opinion - I like Mr. X more than Nemesis from a visual design standpoint. Mr. X is subdued but menacing whereas Nemesis looks really over-designed.

 

[XsjadoBlayde]

Destruction All Stars.
Aight, am back in. On ps plus this month, which may very well be the best business decision for any new online battle games since Rocket League and Fall Guys also enjoyed success using the same tactic. This is destruction derby, but with disposable cars, hero-like colourful characters each with their own powers and 'special' car delivery. There's on foot traversal when your car is destroyed, but you gotta find a new one quick or pick up enough magic videogame crystals to unlock your special car summon. It's very easy to pick up and play, though not without a fresh new frustration unique to this in which you set your eyes on your next car, only for some other asshole to swoop in and steal it leaving you stranded within a screaming metal tornado of colliding vehicles.
Overall it's good, but I hope they put in some more visually varying arenas that aren't all 'Gymkhana' looking. Maybe a mud, dirt arena, beach, forest ..I dunno, anything different really.

Also it's not clear what you can do or what you're supposed to do at any given time, like taking over an already occupied vehicle, not sure what I'm supposed to be pressing to get that bad filled. And the right stick is your friend, which I found out entirely by accident.

Fun times. Smashy crashy big bang crushy car funs.

...

Oh wait, there's a second currency I've no idea how to earn.

*Sigh* but of course.

 

[NerfedFalcon]

Since I just finished Resident Evil 3 and I don't have Zero or Code Veronica, nor do I really have any interest in playing those two, I decided to start another run of 4 instead, playing on Professional this time after beating it twice on Normal. I was not prepared for how much more difficult Professional is right from the start: two hits from ordinary Ganados leaves you hanging by a thread, and since enemies and boxes drop herbs less often, you really have to concentrate to stay alive. Managed to get through 1-1 without dying, though I doubt I'll be able to keep that up forever, with scenes like the cabin, the Bella Sisters, Mendez, the water hall, the clock tower bridge, the double Garrador fight, the elevator to Salazar, the first fight on the island, the bulldozer, Krauser, Mike, and the room not long after Mike's with the emergency key card.

So basically, all of the rest of it. Still, I beat God Hand one time. This shouldn't be beyond me.

 

[Samtemdo8]

Metroid Prime Trilogy

I need to find one last missle expansion in the second game to 100% it

 

[Dalisclock]

Ace Combat 5: The Belkaning.

So it happened. AC5 tipped it's hand and revealed: IT WAS BELKA! I have to wonder if this was meant to be a surprise to anyone playing this, because it felt very visibly telegraphed for quite a while. OTOH, it seems to be quite a shock to the characters in game and it's annoying the crap out of me the way it's presented. Like there's a "no such squadron" running around stirring up shit and yet somehow you're the only one to notice this. None of your gun cameras or radio transmitters or the fucking AWACS or anyone ever seems to pick up on this. Osea keeps having these egregious security breaches The President goes missing, the Capital gets attacked, Yuke bombers almost manage to bomb a stadium full of people during the VP's speech and like nobody except your wingmen seems to acknowledge something screwy is going on. Or once they do, you get this "YOU MUST BE THE SPIES!" treatment. TWICE!

I mean, holy shit people, Wardog comes across as the only unit that does ANYTHING in this war(Or they're so desperately short of pilots that you're getting triple-shifted) and if they're enemy assets, you're fucked either way. But the sheer number of enemy planes, super subs, bombing raids and such apparently doesn't factor into the "Do you really think these dudes are enemy agents? REALLY? REALLY?" The Osean Army can't seem to wipe it's ass without your help and apparently nobody else can ever provide air support/air cover/air superiority. They could have given the war to the Yukes by calling out Sick, you realize that right? Of course, the war grinds to a stalemate the moment Wardog is "killed".

Sigh. Maybe they actually justify this at some point but so far OSEA seems be holding a massive idiot ball(or is massively corrupt if That many people are in on the conspiracy) and it makes it hard to enjoy the story for what it is, OTT and devoted to spectacle as the series is. Strangely I'm getting similar vibes to Capt America: The Winter Solder, where apparently someone has the fantastic idea of hiring all the ex-(fantasy) Nazis after the war and then letting them run around unsupervised(Yes, I'm aware of Operation Paperclip).

Admittely, I'm kinda grumpy that I got held up for hours on a particular set of missions that all come one after another with no save points after another, no warning that the 2nd one has you continue directly from the first one with no ability to swap out planes and the third is not really hard but there's a particularly tricky tunnel section near the end(and since I kept crashing in that tunnel, I'd have to redo replay the entire 7 min mission before that and rehear ALL the dialogue EVERY SINGLE TIME to get back to that tricky bit). Really, there should be no excuse for not allowing saving between missions, even if they flow right into one another because otherwise you might be faced with having to replay the entire set if you can't get past the 3rd in a play session(and it's not like the first 2 are particularly easy). At least the rescue mission after that was a bit more cathartic.

It feels like AC5 is taking pleasure in trolling me. Between all of these and the fact the game will be like "Oh, did you think this mission is over so you've used up 90% of your missiles? Oh, here's phase 2 ************! Have fun taking down those priority targets and their escorts with like 10 missiles left" It wouldn't be so bad if this game had a return line but I haven't seen one except when the plot demands it for that mission. Especially during the stadium mission where I was down to guns at the end and just barely hanging on when I ran out the clock.

I really was about to call this the best AC game so far but yeah, it feels like every step forward is paired with a step back. It's like AC7 made a lot of the same mistakes, except at least in AC7 you could save after every mission and got in-mission checkpoints.

 

[Casual Shinji]

Since I just finished Resident Evil 3 and I don't have Zero or Code Veronica, nor do I really have any interest in playing those two, I decided to start another run of 4 instead, playing on Professional this time after beating it twice on Normal. I was not prepared for how much more difficult Professional is right from the start: two hits from ordinary Ganados leaves you hanging by a thread, and since enemies and boxes drop herbs less often, you really have to concentrate to stay alive. Managed to get through 1-1 without dying, though I doubt I'll be able to keep that up forever, with scenes like the cabin, the Bella Sisters, Mendez, the water hall, the clock tower bridge, the double Garrador fight, the elevator to Salazar, the first fight on the island, the bulldozer, Krauser, Mike, and the room not long after Mike's with the emergency key card.

So basically, all of the rest of it. Still, I beat God Hand one time. This shouldn't be beyond me.

I think Professional also gets rid of the dynamic difficulty. Meaning if you're low on health items no convenient herb/spray drops by enemies. My biggest issue was the Gigante 'jump on back/slice parasite' QTEs, which seem to have a ridiculously small window to initiate on Professional. Just one second hesitation to gauge whether it's a square or an X prompt and you get grabbed and smashed into the ground.

 

[laggyteabag]

Moved onto Assassin's Creed Revelations now, and I would just like to say that I love it when games developers try to do something impressive, but they cheat due to limitations.

Like how in Fallout 3 (never played it) there is apparently a train, but the game engine didn't support vehicles, so they just made the train carriage a piece of armour, stuck it onto an NPCs head, and then stuck the NPC in the ground and told him to run around a track.

Anyway, Assassin's Creed. So, this was a game made for the Xbox 360/PS3 generation, and obviously those consoles weren't very powerful, so graphical features such as volumetric fog weren't possible. But Revelations has fog? So, what it looks like they have done, is they have just stuck a transparent fog effect onto the camera, and made it scroll slowly, and move with the camera. Honestly, the effect looks completely adequate when you are standing still, but it is super noticeable, and hilariously terrible when moving, because instead of moving through the fog, the fog moves with you.

A for effort, I guess?

 

[meiam]

Moved onto Assassin's Creed Revelations now, and I would just like to say that I love it when games developers try to do something impressive, but they cheat due to limitations.

Like how in Fallout 3 (never played it) there is apparently a train, but the game engine didn't support vehicles, so they just made the train carriage a piece of armour, stuck it onto an NPCs head, and then stuck the NPC in the ground and told him to run around a track.

Anyway, Assassin's Creed. So, this was a game made for the Xbox 360/PS3 generation, and obviously those consoles weren't very powerful, so graphical features such as volumetric fog weren't possible. But Revelations has fog? So, what it looks like they have done, is they have just stuck a transparent fog effect onto the camera, and made it scroll slowly, and move with the camera. Honestly, the effect looks completely adequate when you are standing still, but it is super noticeable, and hilariously terrible when moving, because instead of moving through the fog, the fog moves with you.

A for effort, I guess?

Revelation was originally a PSP game (iirc) that was later upgraded to main console so there's a lot of wonky stuff with graphic in the game.

 

[laggyteabag]

Revelation was originally a PSP game (iirc) that was later upgraded to main console so there's a lot of wonky stuff with graphic in the game.

I think you are thinking of Liberation, which was the PSP one set around the same time as AC3.

Revelations is the last of the 3 Ezio games.

Looks like the generic subtitle strikes again, 10 years later.

 

[meiam]

I think you are thinking of Liberation, which was the PSP one set around the same time as AC3.

Revelations is the last of the 3 Ezio games.

Looks like the generic subtitle strikes again, 10 years later.

Double checked, it was actually originally planned for 3DS.

 

[laggyteabag]

Double checked, it was actually originally planned for 3DS.

Well you aren't wrong, but it looks like the only thing that came from the 3DS version of the game, was the plot.

This isn't exactly surprising, seeing as the game appears to be running on the same engine as the 3 previous games.

As interesting as it would have been to see a 3DS port of Revelations, I doubt these early plans had any impact on how the game looks, and these effects were janky simply because of the ambitions of the developers, fighting against the aging hardware of the 360/PS3.

Good memory though. That is a really random and obscure fact.

 

[Dalisclock]

Well you aren't wrong, but it looks like the only thing that came from the 3DS version of the game, was the plot.

This isn't exactly surprising, seeing as the game appears to be running on the same engine as the 3 previous games.

As interesting as it would have been to see a 3DS port of Revelations, I doubt these early plans had any impact on how the game looks, and these effects were janky simply because of the ambitions of the developers, fighting against the aging hardware of the 360/PS3.

Good memory though. That is a really random and obscure fact.

On one hand, I was glad to see Ezio finally retire and even circle back to Masyaf and how Altair's story ended. OTOH, the rest of the plot is really.....eh.

Apparently the game was made to keep the fans content until AC3 was finished(apparently they were having issues with the new engine).

Also, if you do the weird computer platforming missions, you finally get some character development for Desmond, which isn't bad. The problem is, it's like 3 games too late to really matter.

 

[NerfedFalcon]

Finished act 1 of Resident Evil 4 on Professional, and had my first death to Del Lago, which is a fight that I hate doing on Normal. On Professional, where you can only take one hit before the second kills you, it's god-awful. Still, at least it's over now, and I can move on to the much better rest of the game, albeit with fewer healing items than I'd hoped.

 

[laggyteabag]

Still on AC Revelations, and yeah, it is definitely the worst of the 3 Ezio games.

For one, there is basically no antagonist. Well, that isn't quite true, because IIRC I know who the "final boss" is, or whatever the correct term is, but he has barely even appeared in the game, and he hasn't been introduced as a villain yet, and I am over 2/3s of the way in the game. So the enemy at the moment is just the Templar faction as a whole, which is honestly super boring, and a stark contrast to the first 2 games, who were quite quick to introduce the baddies.

The main plot in this game appears to be "find these 'keys' to open a special door, and fall in love" - and that is fine, im happy to have a smaller, more personal plot, but the game still being an Assassin's Creed game, still gets me to infiltrate barracks, jump of building to stab guys in their necks, start riots, and manage the Assassin's guild, and it just seems a little... out of place, at least for the story that the game is trying to tell.

Also, this might sound like a strange complaint, but there is almost 0 side content. In AC2 and Brotherhood, there was all sorts of crap around the map. Races, assassination contracts, faction missions - all kinds of stuff - but in Revelations, there doesn't really appear to be much of anything. And on one hand, that is fine, because I hardly did any of this stuff anyway, but in its absence, the map feels really empty, and honestly, completely pointless.

This is also by far the buggiest game of the 3. I am playing on PC, which I guess was never the game's priority in the first place, so I guess that explains a lot, but even from the literal first minute, there were issues. Turns out, if you run the game on Windows 10, the entire game is having an earthquake - which is to say that the camera will rapidly jerk left and right. One quick file rename later, and we are fine again. But, there are still problems. Enemies spawning literally next to me. Ezio committing suicide by jumping off a building, and landing next to a hay bale. Ezio trying to run up small objects as though they are walls, instead of climbing them. Occasionally sounds bug out. Nothing gamebreaking (aside from the first one, but that was an easy fix) - just little inconsistencies that make the game feel a little less polished than the others.

And just to get this off my chest now, the game undermines its own climbing mechanic. Assassin's Creed, more than anything else - at least at this point in the franchise's history - is known for its parkour/freerunning. So, why is it that they introduced the hookblade, which basically undermines a lot of the nuance in the climbing mechanic? For example, some walls are just slightly too tall to run up, so you normally need to run up an adjacent wall then jump off it at an angle, to get that little bit of extra height. The Hookblade, though - just climb it normally. Or if you are climbing a wall, you can use a jump/grab, where you have to time the grab to get a little higher than you would if you climb normally. But with the hookblade, you just hold the A button, and you just launch yourself up this tower. You are literally just climbing at 2x the speed as normal. Sure, the hookblade now allows you to use ziplines, and longjump off hanging objects, and that is great, but did they really need to sacrifice the normal climbing?

But, its not all doom and gloom. Again, im surprised at how good this game looks. Sure, I've moaned above about that silly fog filter (which still looks stupid, especially when moving vertically), but the texture quality is still impressive, and the character models still look great - especially for a game is still running on the original Assassin's Creed engine. The music, as always, is stellar - honestly, across the 3 Ezio games, the music is probably the most consistently good thing. And thirdly, Ezio is as charismatic as ever. I love watching this guy, and it is going to be really sad saying goodbye to him, after this game. I have no idea why the rest of the Assassin's Creed franchise is just one-and-done Assassins - because Ezio is still the franchise's poster boy, and he hasn't appeared in a game in 10 years.

Oh, and this game is also super short. I feel like AC2 went on for ages, but I completed this game in a day, when I first got it in 2011. This is fine by me.

 

[Dalisclock]

Still on AC Revelations, and yeah, it is definitely the worst of the 3 Ezio games.

For one, there is basically no antagonist. Well, that isn't quite true, because IIRC I know who the "final boss" is, or whatever the correct term is, but he has barely even appeared in the game, and he hasn't been introduced as a villain yet, and I am over 2/3s of the way in the game. So the enemy at the moment is just the Templar faction as a whole, which is honestly super boring, and a stark contrast to the first 2 games, who were quite quick to introduce the baddies.

The main plot in this game appears to be "find these 'keys' to open a special door, and fall in love" - and that is fine, im happy to have a smaller, more personal plot, but the game still being an Assassin's Creed game, still gets me to infiltrate barracks, jump of building to stab guys in their necks, start riots, and manage the Assassin's guild, and it just seems a little... out of place, at least for the story that the game is trying to tell.

I found it interesting what an asshole Ezio turns out to be in his old age. Burns down half the harbor, start a riot so he can get through a door, sets a fire in an underground city full of people....so he can get some keys. This isn't even remotely related to anything he really cares about and people have pointed out the Irony of Ezio siding with the Ottomans merely because they oppose the Templars, despite the fact the Ottomans have plenty of their own baggage to contend with.

Then again, the Assasins(and the Templars for that matter) tend to pick and choose sides seemingly based on which way the wind is blowing that day(in Rouge, it's pointed out the Assasins are supporting both sides of the 7 years war in different places).

 

[laggyteabag]

I found it interesting what an asshole Ezio turns out to be in his old age. Burns down half the harbor, start a riot so he can get through a door, sets a fire in an underground city full of people....so he can get some keys

I did find the riot pretty weird and out of character. The dude spreads some shit about the Jannisaries to rile up the townspeople, they start a riot, and start bashing on some big wooden door. Then dozens of guards spew out of the alleyways, resulting in a bunch of civilian deaths. At least the door is open though. All according to plan.

I though the Assassin's were all about protecting the innocent, or at least whenever you kill a civilian, the animus glitches out as tells you that Ezio would never ever do that. But like, Ezio caused this. This is on him.

Maybe this is some kind of commentary on how the creed is a massive hypocrisy - but I doubt it is that deep, and Ubisoft just thought it was cool.

Im interested to get to the underground city though - I briefly remember it, but I cannot remember the context that surrounds it. Maybe Ezio is just an asshole under all of that charisma.

 

[happyninja42]

I found it interesting what an asshole Ezio turns out to be in his old age. Burns down half the harbor, start a riot so he can get through a door, sets a fire in an underground city full of people....so he can get some keys. This isn't even remotely related to anything he really cares about and people have pointed out the Irony of Ezio siding with the Ottomans merely because they oppose the Templars, despite the fact the Ottomans have plenty of their own baggage to contend with.

Then again, the Assasins(and the Templars for that matter) tend to pick and choose sides seemingly based on which way the wind is blowing that day(in Rouge, it's pointed out the Assasins are supporting both sides of the 7 years war in different places).

I did find the riot pretty weird and out of character. The dude spreads some shit about the Jannisaries to rile up the townspeople, they start a riot, and start bashing on some big wooden door. Then dozens of guards spew out of the alleyways, resulting in a bunch of civilian deaths. At least the door is open though. All according to plan.

I though the Assassin's were all about protecting the innocent, or at least whenever you kill a civilian, the animus glitches out as tells you that Ezio would never ever do that. But like, Ezio caused this. This is on him.

Maybe this is some kind of commentary on how the creed is a massive hypocrisy - but I doubt it is that deep, and Ubisoft just thought it was cool.

Im interested to get to the underground city though - I briefly remember it, but I cannot remember the context that surrounds it. Maybe Ezio is just an asshole under all of that charisma.

Yeah the actual moral standings of either side is muddled at best when you actually try and analyze them. The Templar are ultimately a bad thing, based on WHY they are trying to obtain global unity, and how it's under their iron thumb, and the body count they are happy to pile up to achieve it. But the Assassins don't have any alternative idea in place. They just react to counter the Templar agenda where they encounter it, and just leave everything else to "freedom"(chaos).

That's one reason I always found the present day plot far more interesting, as it was at least consistent as presented. All the messy flashback motivations are, ok whatever, but present day, the world is almost totally enslaved to Abstergo, and a handful of genetic assassins are trying to stop their literal global mind control plan. It's at least one I can get behind, and it doesn't have any weird ambiguous stances about why they are doing what they are doing

 

[gorfias]

Just played some Halo CE. I was worried I caused a bug by trying to pry some closing doors open with a Warthog. Didn't work and the thing just vibrated in place, unable to move forward or back. But I was to go to another place to unlock the doors. When I did so, the Warthog came loose. Phew. ITMT, I had to fight 4 of those giant bazooka wielding purple bastards. Bathed them in grenades and used an Imp's handgun to do the rest. (I am playing on easy). I've won the game before but am amazed how well the gameplay has kept up. Graphics have been updated in the Master Chief collection.

 

[Dalisclock]

Yeah the actual moral standings of either side is muddled at best when you actually try and analyze them. The Templar are ultimately a bad thing, based on WHY they are trying to obtain global unity, and how it's under their iron thumb, and the body count they are happy to pile up to achieve it. But the Assassins don't have any alternative idea in place. They just react to counter the Templar agenda where they encounter it, and just leave everything else to "freedom"(chaos).

That's one reason I always found the present day plot far more interesting, as it was at least consistent as presented. All the messy flashback motivations are, ok whatever, but present day, the world is almost totally enslaved to Abstergo, and a handful of genetic assassins are trying to stop their literal global mind control plan. It's at least one I can get behind, and it doesn't have any weird ambiguous stances about why they are doing what they are doing

Having played every mainline game but Unity and Valhalla at this point, I'm convinced the main purpose of the Assassins and Templars is one long griefing feud that just happens to span much of human history. Neither of them provide much evidence or real action to back up their ideals, in a way that actually supports their ideals. The assassins are apparently on the side of Freedom, which is clearly why history is rife with dictatorships, tyrants and atrocities and the Templars want to unite the world under order, which is clearly why the closest thing to a world government thus far(the UN) isn't remotely effective at anything and if the Templars are pulling humanity in one direction, there's little evidence of it. Then again, that goes back to the two sides are far more interested in griefing each other then...well, anything else, so I guess I'm not surprised.

 

[happyninja42]

Having played every mainline game but Unity and Valhalla at this point, I'm convinced the main purpose of the Assassins and Templars is one long griefing feud that just happens to span much of human history. Neither of them provide much evidence or real action to back up their ideals, in a way that actually supports their ideals. The assassins are apparently on the side of Freedom, which is clearly why history is rife with dictatorships, tyrants and atrocities and the Templars want to unite the world under order, which is clearly why the closest thing to a world government thus far(the UN) isn't remotely effective at anything and if the Templars are pulling humanity in one direction, there's little evidence of it. Then again, that goes back to the two sides are far more interested in griefing each other then...well, anything else, so I guess I'm not surprised.

Yeah I mean, it's not well written, not going to lie. I mean you can see what Ubisoft was trying to set up, but, the execution of the plot, and motivations, doesn't carry well through each game, because they didn't put much effort in it. They just used it as a thin framework to justify bouncing around history for Ancient Assassin Simulator in historical locations, the franchise. Which is what really bothers me personally, because I can see how cool it COULD be, but the writing is...not up to it.

I've always kind of lumped their motivations into something similar to Jedi/Sith, in that yeah, there are other bad things the Jedi could be dealing with in the galactic republic, but they simply can't put out EVERY fire that exists, so they focus (mostly) on trying to counter the supernatural machinations of the Sith, as they are the group, most likely to stop them. To me, the whole Progenitor conflict, between the Order/Chaos factions, fought out via a proxy war between the Templar/Assassins, is similar to that. But it's just not written well. So it falls flat. Which again, annoys the shit out of me, because the entire framework is built around "genetic memory", which, for me, as a Dune fan, is like catnip for crazy concepts and stories that could be told. But they never really do anything with that, other than to justify the era hopping.