What are you currently playing?
- Thread starter Nick Calandra
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Haven't played ED but I've heard it's excellant.
BB is an excellant action horror that starts as a victorian gothic horror but slowly reveals lovecraftian nightmare shit lying underneath.
CoC: Dark Corners of the Earth is something that tries to hew to Lovecraft pretty close, except when it doesn't. It works great when it's doing a rather nice adaptation of A shadow over innsmouth(survival horror), much less so when it's trying to be a lovecraftian Call of Duty shooter(and oh does it fall flat in those cases). It also has some nasty bugs which might keep you from finishing the game( never beat it because of said bugs) because they prevent forward progress.
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Grim Fandango Remastered
Haven't played the original in 20 years and could sleepwalk through all the puzzles in year one. The reason for that is that I used to run a very dodgy copy of the game back in the day that would usually crash when a cinematic showed up, so I played year one A LOT. And I remember making it as far into year three at one point, but I never did beat the game - got stumped in the boat and quit. So it'll be nice to finally play the game fully, though I wonder how obtuse the puzzles are going to get. The early ones are ingrained in my head by now but objectively I don't know how I'd figure them nowadays if I were to go in blind.
Also the writing in this game is terrific and should definitely be brought up more often when discussing good plotting, dialogue and characters.
Haven't played the original in 20 years and could sleepwalk through all the puzzles in year one. The reason for that is that I used to run a very dodgy copy of the game back in the day that would usually crash when a cinematic showed up, so I played year one A LOT. And I remember making it as far into year three at one point, but I never did beat the game - got stumped in the boat and quit. So it'll be nice to finally play the game fully, though I wonder how obtuse the puzzles are going to get. The early ones are ingrained in my head by now but objectively I don't know how I'd figure them nowadays if I were to go in blind.
Also the writing in this game is terrific and should definitely be brought up more often when discussing good plotting, dialogue and characters.
So I finished God of War PS4. Was pretty fun! For my first Souls-ish game too.
That said, I am a little underwhelmed. I was expecting much more, and while the presentation is amazing, as a game I feel it doesn't offer much. Didn't need to be open world, all the backtracking is fucking annoying, and majority of the boss fights are ass. Especially the Valkryies. On their own, they're great tense boss fights that gave me more difficulty than any recent game I've played. But getting good at fighting them somehow makes you worse at general combat. I can't help but feel like their decisions to have "no" loading screens
BUT I still really enjoyed the game. I'm a big sucker for alternate versions of mythology, and Norse mythology is great. Really looking forward to how the next games will be considering the stakes are now higher. Now let's hope I'll be able to afford a PS5 (and still be alive) when the time comes.
I am now considering between Horizon Zero Dawn and Spider-man PS4 for my next game. HZD is cheaper, but I know I'll enjoy Spider-man more. Decisions, decisions.
That said, I am a little underwhelmed. I was expecting much more, and while the presentation is amazing, as a game I feel it doesn't offer much. Didn't need to be open world, all the backtracking is fucking annoying, and majority of the boss fights are ass. Especially the Valkryies. On their own, they're great tense boss fights that gave me more difficulty than any recent game I've played. But getting good at fighting them somehow makes you worse at general combat. I can't help but feel like their decisions to have "no" loading screens
BUT I still really enjoyed the game. I'm a big sucker for alternate versions of mythology, and Norse mythology is great. Really looking forward to how the next games will be considering the stakes are now higher. Now let's hope I'll be able to afford a PS5 (and still be alive) when the time comes.
I am now considering between Horizon Zero Dawn and Spider-man PS4 for my next game. HZD is cheaper, but I know I'll enjoy Spider-man more. Decisions, decisions.
Those are both solid games. If you're not as much of a fan of stealth/open world exploration games, compared to more fast paced actiony types, I'd suggest Spiderman. HZD is a very great game, and I loved it, but it's a much more slow burn of a game, with a more story driven feel than Spiderman. Not saying Spidey doesn't have story, it does, and a very good one, but it's also got random crime fighting fun with quips, and just swinging around the city for fun itself.
- Apr 1, 2009
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I never beat it back in the day either. I feel like I got right to the end but was thwarted by a crashy game. Seems like most games back then were held together with tape cause the crashing was real. I would try to do this one puzzle and it would almost always crash so I just stopped playing it.
Would you say the DLC is worth it? I'm a bit of a stickler in that regard. But if the DLC isn't much than I guess I wouldn't mind buying the regular non-GOTY versions.
Cinematics would crash mine. Basically every time Manny went to the garage was a gamble.
Which DLC? HZD or Spiderman? Well, honestly yeah I'd say both were worth it. The Frozen Wastes DLC for HZD was basically an entirely contained offshoot story. With much tougher robots, and new gear. It was a good story that my wife and I thoroughly enjoyed. The DLC's for Spiderman were...of varying levels of quality. It was fun to have more excuses to swing around the city, but I wouldn't really lose sleep if I hadn't played them. It was more of the same stuff, just different characters and motivations. I'd say both were worth it though, but if you go with HZD, and budget is a concern, you could play a LOT of HZD without touching the DLC content. Hours and hours of gameplay.
I got HZD and GOTY Spider-Man.
Spider-Man is the more fast-paced, story-focused one but I think it has the problem of having multifaceted gameplay that shakes up what you're doing every 5 minutes, and you're bound to not like all of it. There's a lot of "you'll be walking as Peter for 5 minutes in this part", those horrid MJ/Miles stealth & insta loss sections, and generally a lot of sections that force a specific gamestyle with arbitrary conditions.
It's a great game because the good outweighs the lame or mediocre though and do recommend it. The combat and traversal are fantastic, and there's plenty of good side activities that feed on that. Plot is pretty run of the mill. The DLC is nothing special, just more of the same with a couple of new characters mucking about. Alright but wouldn't pay extra for it.
HZD not only has the better plot, it also has fantastic storytelling that expands and develops at a good pace without losing focus and kept me interested, which at least for me is unusual with these big lore-heavy fantasy plots. For gameplay I felt more in control of what I did and how I did it; save for some climbing bits everything is generally less scripted. The world's considerably bigger and it can feel a bit directionless at times where to go or what to do next but I personally like that in open worlds. And generally I had more fun crafting and collecting stuff and upgrading Aloy than I did Spidey, because the process is more fun and specific and felt like it made more of a difference in the game.
(Haven't played Frozen Wilds)
If you liked HZD that much, I would strongly recommend Frozen Wilds. It's more of the same, but tougher robots, and the story, while completely self-contained, does dove-tail into the main one very nicely. More quality voice acting, something of a community reputation system, as you do things for the tribe up in the tundra, it unlocks more upgrades for you and such. Just, really solid More Of The Same in my opinion. Which, if you like the original stuff, should be good. Be prepared for a difficulty spike though in those robots. They seriously made them tougher and more deadly. When you first get to the DLC, and you just have your old equipment, it can be really tricky to make it through the opening bits at first. But yeah, really good content. Highly recommended.
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I remember having a problem with crashing at the end of chapter 1 but once I was through with that the game was mostly stable till the repeated crash neat the gates of haven.
Just finished Act 1 of Ghost of Tsushima, after taking a while to clean up all the sidequests I could beforehand. There's some pretty interesting stuff going on in that game, and like Sekiro the combat is fun and skillful enough that it hasn't felt 'samey' despite objectively not having that much variation to it. I'm pretty invested in the story as well, and actually making pretty frequent use of the photo mode, which I've never done in a game before.
Yeah, that game loved it's cinematic combat. I think one of my favorite moments, was calling out a group of thugs outside a camp to a duel, and I had maxed out the chain I could do (3 given the outfit I was wearing), and took them down. I was wearing a wide brimmed straw hat, and the Ronin outfit, and with the final strike, the camera slowed down, panned around me, as my side strike trailed a glittering trail of blood, and silhouetted Jin against the setting sun, painting the camp in golden hues. It was just gorgeously done and I was like "hehe, ok yeah, I dig this."
Decided to drop back into Resident Evil 3 after all, after giving it a night to settle and realizing the game wasn't totally at fault. Got past the restaurant and as far as the tram, met the Umbrella guys, and now I need a set of three key items to proceed any further, as usual. I got the power cable already, and I only have a couple of unexplored areas to search for the fuse and oil.
Put my first save just after that, and then got jumped by one of those insect monsters because I thought orange health was safe. At least I didn't lose much.
Nemesis being able to wander around, appear at random and chase you through loading doors is a lot more scary than I expected; I was figuring on another Mr X like in RE2, where he appears in certain specific rooms, just harder to get past than 'just run past him lol'. Reminds me more of Remake Mr X, and that's a really good thing.
Put my first save just after that, and then got jumped by one of those insect monsters because I thought orange health was safe. At least I didn't lose much.
Nemesis being able to wander around, appear at random and chase you through loading doors is a lot more scary than I expected; I was figuring on another Mr X like in RE2, where he appears in certain specific rooms, just harder to get past than 'just run past him lol'. Reminds me more of Remake Mr X, and that's a really good thing.
Ah I meant both, sorry about that.
Thank you both for your recommendations!
I would say both DLC's are good, with HZD being the better value, in my opinion. The DLC's for Spiderman, they're fine, I don't really remember much from them honestly, other than what happens to a particular side character, and her personality. Well, 2 of them actually now that I think about it. I found Silver Sable's content frustrating, given how she behaved, and reacted to Spidey, compared to her behavior in the main game. And the Black Cat content genuinely angered me. Seriously, fuck Black Cat and what she did. The mobster DLC was fine, but again, it sort of messed with a side character's personality in a way I thought was annoying, but nothing like how annoyed I was with Black Cat. Did I mention fuck Black Cat? Fuck Black Cat. (please note, not saying Black Cat's DLC is bad, just the character motivation and actions pissed me off) Spidey DLC, I'd give it a solid 6.5-7/10, overall, for all 3. Decent, more excuse to swing around New York, but, easily forgotten, and I've yet to feel compelled to play it again.
HZD however, had a very fleshed out story, well developed personalities that felt real, motivations that made sense (though that faction is kind of really Dudebro in their Viking-esque warrior stance, which got a bit tiresome, but that's not just the DLC. ) Fun new equipment that dramatically improved your capabilities in the rest of the map, and just really good stuff. That one I'd give an 8-8.5/10 Felt way more narratively satisfied after playing it, than the 3 Spidey DLC's combined.
Im replaying Assassin's Creed Brotherhood, after finishing AC2, and it is a lot better than I remembered.
For the longest time, I always had it in my mind that AC2, Brotherhood, and Revelations, were basically 3 parts of the same game, but getting into Brotherhood, right after AC2, and im noticing quite a lot of refinements.
Honestly, I would say it is quite similar to Arkham Asylum, and Arkham City, in how both games look more or less the same, and the core gameplay loop of both also looks more or less the same, but subtle adjustments and additional mechanics, make the game unquestionably superior.
Also, this game isnt as afraid of colour, like AC2 was, so it looks miles better, even if there are undoubtedly a lot of shared assets.
For the longest time, I always had it in my mind that AC2, Brotherhood, and Revelations, were basically 3 parts of the same game, but getting into Brotherhood, right after AC2, and im noticing quite a lot of refinements.
Honestly, I would say it is quite similar to Arkham Asylum, and Arkham City, in how both games look more or less the same, and the core gameplay loop of both also looks more or less the same, but subtle adjustments and additional mechanics, make the game unquestionably superior.
Also, this game isnt as afraid of colour, like AC2 was, so it looks miles better, even if there are undoubtedly a lot of shared assets.
Damnit Ghost of Tsushima. You trained me to press the right trigger to get on my horse without thinking, and now my beautiful loyal horse in Assassin's Creed Valhalla has been sadly, viciously cleaved in two by the very hands they put their faith in. Poor Colonel Hoofums never got to see their 6th birthday. Lesson. Learnt. Maybe?
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Finished the epilogue ending of Hades, got all the Skelly trophies and am done with the game. *Some endgame spoilers ahead.*
It's a very good game to be sure, but not completely without flaws. As I've said previously, the story and characters are all very charming and there is a seemingly endless amount of dialogue lines recorded for the game. I did 122 runs and was still getting new dialogue from various characters almost every time. The core gameplay is also still great and feels really good to play, and it's always satisfying clearing a room without taking damage.
However, as a roguelite the game is somewhat lacking. Once you manage to defeat Hades you've seen nearly all the content the dungeons will offer up. There is no procedural generation, rather there is limited number of prefabricated rooms that the game will randomly choose from for each zone and you will likely see many of the same rooms again and again from run to run populated with a different combination of enemies. There is not much in the way of variants. Even going back as far as Nethack roguelikes have often had several interchangeable versions of the same location with different challenges to keep things fresh between runs. The Binding of Isaac did exceptionally well in that regard. Each chapter of the dungeon can be one of 2 or 3 variants that unlock as you get further into the game to help keep going through the same locations again and again fresh. For example when starting a new save file you always start in The Basement, however after you've defeated each of the bosses that can spawn in The Basement you can randomly start in The Cellar instead and experience the thrill of exploring a new area in a long familiar segment of the game. This happens again after you finish the game 11 times and can start in The Burning Basement instead. Hades, by contrast, has Tartarus, Asphodel, Elysium, and Styx, in that order, the same every time. You will see them all a hundred times before you finish the game, the rooms all blending together without much to differentiate them. Mercifully you do see some variation for the bosses, the first boss can come in 3 variants, the second 5, but the next two don't have any. You can also choose an option once you've escaped the first time to give each boss one additional more difficult form, which is nice. However, it's a far cry from the variation in The Binding of Isaac, and the game suffers from the repetition.
This leads into the next problem, that the game expects and requires hundreds of runs to see all of the content. Like I said, I was still getting new dialogue when I quit the game. It's fine to give people a reason to keep playing, but I feel the balance is a little bit off in this case. In my opinion, once the dungeon stops offering up new content is the balance point that the story should be based around. Yes, you can get additional mileage from inflicting harsher and harsher challenges on yourself with the pact of punishment, and it is fun for a while, but it only does so much to distract from the fact that you are doing the same run again, only harder. Once I'd done the 32 heat challenge, there didn't feel like there was any point in playing with higher difficulty and it was only a matter of going through the same rooms again and again to tie up the remaining story threads. I feel like the game was just a little too stingy with its dialogue compared to how much dungeon it had. I would have liked it more if you could reach the epilogue ending with significantly less grind than exists in the game. It wasn't too bad for me, since I was having fun with high heat runs, but if that was something I didn't care about it would have been a long slog toward that epilogue.
Some aspect of the game could have used a bit more explanation or a rework. In particular, the heat system and titan's blood. With the heat system it's not terribly clear whether or not the game will give you recognition for skipping heat levels or whether you need to go up one level at a time. For example, getting the 32 heat Skelly trophy only requires you to complete the game with 32 heat, but does not require a linear progression from 1-32 as the game seems to indicate. I would also have rathered that higher heats gave higher rewards so that the game did not encourage you to slog through one by one through levels that don't pose appropriate challenge. However, this once again goes back to the fact that the game is designed around requiring the player to play through it an excessive number of times. The other aspect that I felt did not work well was titan blood. There are many versions of each weapon that each play differently, but require a (to begin with) very limited resource to unlock and upgrade. I found that early on I was simply not spending titan blood because I could not decide which description sounded better than the 2 aspect I had already unlocked. It would have been better if you had some way to try them out before you bought them or that you could spend keys to respec your weapons like you could with your skills on the mirror.
The Fated List was kind of a pain to fill out. I had 2 or 3 legendary and duo boons that I was missing because you need 2 or 3 requisite boons first and then it's still a random roll on top of it to get the right boon, and if the game only feels like giving you 2 Athena's or whatever you're screwed no matter what you had in mind. I only completed the bow upgrade list too, because of similar randomness. Also giving ambrosia to Eurydice was impossible. You can only do it after you reunite her and Orpheus, but they can't be together, and they're always together! She was the only one who's bond I didn't max out because out of like 20 runs I never was able to give her ambrosia! Not once.
The epilogue was a little disappointing too. It was nice the family was reunited, but I would have liked to at least have a bit of dialogue from each of the Olympians in it. Basically you hear from Zeus, and that's it. It was fine, I guess. The only other story complaint was there was far too much romance in the side plots. It was a little awkward giving nectar to everyone and suddenly having Zagreus declare his love for them. Could have done without the harem aspect.
All in all I enjoyed my time with it for the most part. It was a good story, good setting, good gameplay, but only an ok roguelite.
It's a very good game to be sure, but not completely without flaws. As I've said previously, the story and characters are all very charming and there is a seemingly endless amount of dialogue lines recorded for the game. I did 122 runs and was still getting new dialogue from various characters almost every time. The core gameplay is also still great and feels really good to play, and it's always satisfying clearing a room without taking damage.
However, as a roguelite the game is somewhat lacking. Once you manage to defeat Hades you've seen nearly all the content the dungeons will offer up. There is no procedural generation, rather there is limited number of prefabricated rooms that the game will randomly choose from for each zone and you will likely see many of the same rooms again and again from run to run populated with a different combination of enemies. There is not much in the way of variants. Even going back as far as Nethack roguelikes have often had several interchangeable versions of the same location with different challenges to keep things fresh between runs. The Binding of Isaac did exceptionally well in that regard. Each chapter of the dungeon can be one of 2 or 3 variants that unlock as you get further into the game to help keep going through the same locations again and again fresh. For example when starting a new save file you always start in The Basement, however after you've defeated each of the bosses that can spawn in The Basement you can randomly start in The Cellar instead and experience the thrill of exploring a new area in a long familiar segment of the game. This happens again after you finish the game 11 times and can start in The Burning Basement instead. Hades, by contrast, has Tartarus, Asphodel, Elysium, and Styx, in that order, the same every time. You will see them all a hundred times before you finish the game, the rooms all blending together without much to differentiate them. Mercifully you do see some variation for the bosses, the first boss can come in 3 variants, the second 5, but the next two don't have any. You can also choose an option once you've escaped the first time to give each boss one additional more difficult form, which is nice. However, it's a far cry from the variation in The Binding of Isaac, and the game suffers from the repetition.
This leads into the next problem, that the game expects and requires hundreds of runs to see all of the content. Like I said, I was still getting new dialogue when I quit the game. It's fine to give people a reason to keep playing, but I feel the balance is a little bit off in this case. In my opinion, once the dungeon stops offering up new content is the balance point that the story should be based around. Yes, you can get additional mileage from inflicting harsher and harsher challenges on yourself with the pact of punishment, and it is fun for a while, but it only does so much to distract from the fact that you are doing the same run again, only harder. Once I'd done the 32 heat challenge, there didn't feel like there was any point in playing with higher difficulty and it was only a matter of going through the same rooms again and again to tie up the remaining story threads. I feel like the game was just a little too stingy with its dialogue compared to how much dungeon it had. I would have liked it more if you could reach the epilogue ending with significantly less grind than exists in the game. It wasn't too bad for me, since I was having fun with high heat runs, but if that was something I didn't care about it would have been a long slog toward that epilogue.
Some aspect of the game could have used a bit more explanation or a rework. In particular, the heat system and titan's blood. With the heat system it's not terribly clear whether or not the game will give you recognition for skipping heat levels or whether you need to go up one level at a time. For example, getting the 32 heat Skelly trophy only requires you to complete the game with 32 heat, but does not require a linear progression from 1-32 as the game seems to indicate. I would also have rathered that higher heats gave higher rewards so that the game did not encourage you to slog through one by one through levels that don't pose appropriate challenge. However, this once again goes back to the fact that the game is designed around requiring the player to play through it an excessive number of times. The other aspect that I felt did not work well was titan blood. There are many versions of each weapon that each play differently, but require a (to begin with) very limited resource to unlock and upgrade. I found that early on I was simply not spending titan blood because I could not decide which description sounded better than the 2 aspect I had already unlocked. It would have been better if you had some way to try them out before you bought them or that you could spend keys to respec your weapons like you could with your skills on the mirror.
The Fated List was kind of a pain to fill out. I had 2 or 3 legendary and duo boons that I was missing because you need 2 or 3 requisite boons first and then it's still a random roll on top of it to get the right boon, and if the game only feels like giving you 2 Athena's or whatever you're screwed no matter what you had in mind. I only completed the bow upgrade list too, because of similar randomness. Also giving ambrosia to Eurydice was impossible. You can only do it after you reunite her and Orpheus, but they can't be together, and they're always together! She was the only one who's bond I didn't max out because out of like 20 runs I never was able to give her ambrosia! Not once.
The epilogue was a little disappointing too. It was nice the family was reunited, but I would have liked to at least have a bit of dialogue from each of the Olympians in it. Basically you hear from Zeus, and that's it. It was fine, I guess. The only other story complaint was there was far too much romance in the side plots. It was a little awkward giving nectar to everyone and suddenly having Zagreus declare his love for them. Could have done without the harem aspect.
All in all I enjoyed my time with it for the most part. It was a good story, good setting, good gameplay, but only an ok roguelite.