|
I beat Monster Hunter Stories 2 for a 2nd time. It's my favorite Pokemon style game - bar none. It's based off of a lot of simple strength vs weaknesses mechanics all layered on top of each other, which give it some depth, and variety of choice. So in a battle you're considering the type of attack you do, the type of weapon you use, the element you use, the type of monster you're deploying, and your NPC party mates, as well as some mechanics surrounding items. The art style, music and story telling are great too. I hope they can tweak it if they make a 3rd one, because the game has some bad balance. There are some really interesting mechanics you can exploit, or go out of your way for the best monsters; but doing so will make you way too excessively strong. Strong to the point that you'll enter a new area, and already have the option to auto-complete battles because you're so strong. At the point of the game where that extra work you can put into it IS valuable (ie, post-game), the formula is wearing a bit thin. Very fun game though.
|
#
?
Dec 5, 2023 01:20
|
|
|
|
| # ? Apr 28, 2024 05:38 |
|
|
Finished The Forgotten City. Quite enjoyed it and it was obviously made by someone with a lot of passion for history, even if the conversations were adorably video-gamey. Only got three of four possible endings but I don’t think I’m particularly bothered to go back for the one I missed 🤷🏻♂️
|
|
#
?
Dec 5, 2023 10:42
|
|
|
Finished Spear of Destiny with 100% on each level for the first time (as opposed to getting bored of indescrimninately humping thousands of wall tiles, and mindlessly blasting my way to the exits ASAP instead), thanks to ECWolf and a functional kills/treasures/secret counter along with that holiest of holy grails in FPS games, an automap feature. I loving hate the zombies (or 'mutants', as they're officially known as, for whatever reason) in this series and I'm glad I killed every loving last one of them this time around. Yeah my final time absolutely sucks mountains of balls. Some of these maps are just complete and utter slogs to contend with on a 100% run, and I'm one of those weirdos who refuses to make mid-level saves.  Unfittingly, the final boss is by far and away the easiest enemy in the game to deal with, aside from the meatshield dogs. Slow moving projectiles vs turbocharged player movement, go figure. Score here is wrong, by the way. It's missing a digit.  I still find it odd how the HUD was spaced out in such a way that it's incapable of displaying the score properly beyond six digits. Surely even during development the guys at id Software were actually playing these games all the way through and should/would have realised such a thing? Ahhhh, whatever.
|
|
#
?
Dec 5, 2023 17:46
|
|
|
Spear of Destiny, a copy of which I bought at K-Mart, was the very first video game I purchased when I got my new 486DX. I had a pirated copy of Wolf3d that I played at a friend's house but figured I owed them the money for how much I played it.
|
|
#
?
Dec 5, 2023 23:32
|
|
|
I still remember excitedly telling my friend at school about my shareware copy of Doom that I was playing on my 486DX2/66mhz computer. "What's a 486DX2/66mhz?" my friend asked. "I don't know," I explained.
|
|
#
?
Dec 6, 2023 01:05
|
|
|
Jerusalem posted:I still remember excitedly telling my friend at school about my shareware copy of Doom that I was playing on my 486DX2/66mhz computer. "What's a 486DX2/66mhz?" my friend asked. "I don't know," I explained. 
|
|
#
?
Dec 6, 2023 01:14
|
|
|
i beat astlibra yesterday. that game sure goes places.
|
|
#
?
Dec 6, 2023 07:11
|
|
|
I beat the main campaign of Dicey Dungeons a few days ago. It was pretty fun, and the soundtrack is fantastic, but I felt like it was wearing its welcome out by the time I got to the later levels, where whether you win or lose is basically up to how hard the RNG wants to gently caress you on rolls / enemies. If you run into a particularly tough enemy, sometimes it basically just makes it impossible to finish the episode because there's no way you're gonna get to the next level up / health pickup based entirely on the amount of HP you're guaranteed to lose to the next enemies on attrition. I would have liked it better if they put in more episodes that varied the gameplay instead of the ones that are more of a slog where enemies have more HP / hit you harder, the way they mix it up for the final episode feels wasted by only getting to do it that one time.
raditts fucked around with this message at 16:03 on Dec 6, 2023 |
|
#
?
Dec 6, 2023 15:59
|
|
|
Finished Guardian Legend on NES recently. I loved this game back on my russian NES clone Dendy, even if it was in Japanese, and even if the merging of genres meant I didn't understand anything about it and was stuck on like third boss. On its surface, a Zelda-like with shmup dungeons is a very interesting idea, and it is a fun time: the game features a pretty sizable overworld with tons of weapons and some upgrades, but it plays its hand far too early. The real strength of this game is ease of play. Despite being an NES game, it's got a really good map, and its translation is very solid. As far as I can tell there's no penalty for death, and enemies LOVE to drop health for you (even bosses often shoot destroyable projectiles that can drop items). It does feel like a game from further into the future with how it prioritizes fun over weird insurmountable challenge that most NES games thrived on. Hell, you have a health bar in this shmup and even get level ups through score which might heal you mid-boss in addition to "heart container"-like items. However, even if it's quite short, I feel like it can't offer you enough, as it eventually becomes really formulaic. You go to a new area, find two corridors - double-digit and single-digit - where the latter has some sort of lock which you open thanks to the clue you receive somewhere nearby. Single-digit "corridors" are usually tougher but provide progression keys, while double-digits will usually contain power-ups. The unfortunate part is that by mid-game you'll pretty much see everything the game has to offer. You'll get all the weapons (which, granted, you can upgrade by finding more copies) and will see most of the bosses. If it had 2-3 more zones I doubt I would've finished it, as by the end I was really getting bored: overworld became linear, started featuring enemies that were way too tanky, and rewards would usually contain consumables. Still, it's a fun game to play for a few evenings, but I wish it was more varied as it loses its charm quite quickly. Honestly, surprised no indie game has tried to replicate it, as beginner-level shmup with exploration sounds good and the game IS fairly well-known.
|
|
#
?
Dec 6, 2023 17:01
|
|
|
Beat Tiny Tina's Wonderlands (solo) - About 20 hours I like the variety in the classes you choose and the enemy design. The game is borderlands in the same lootie/shootie kind of way. My main cons on it are : - They didnt lean heavy enough into the fantasy motif. You still have guns. There was a real missed opportunity to make really wacky weapons here and they just didnt take it. - The writing isnt bad per say, but it isnt as sharp as the old BL games. - (I cant say for myself) but apparently the dlc is worthless. Overall i had a good time with it. Played the whole thing on Steam deck and worked great
|
|
#
?
Dec 6, 2023 19:13
|
|
|
Followed up The Messenger with Blasphemous 2. Felt like a big step down from the first game unfortunately, but it had some rad moments. The difficulty spike near the end is some wild poo poo, most the bosses were pushovers otherwise. Wasn't a fan that collecting all the cherubs was required for the B ending, nor that there was no actual difference between the two endings other than the cinematic you get after beating the boss.
|
|
#
?
Dec 7, 2023 03:48
|
|
|
So I decided I'm gonna do the Remnant series and yes I started with Chronos: Before the Ashes. Already finished the game and it wasn't that bad. A little stiff and outdated but it helps build an interesting world. Can't wait to see what happens with Remnant: From the Ashes. Also started a replay of Metal Gear Solid using the new Master Collection. Game still holds up well but I overestimated how much gameplay there is between codec calls/cut scenes/boss fights. It's really a small game, small area.
|
|
#
?
Dec 7, 2023 04:40
|
|
|
Ineffiable posted:Also started a replay of Metal Gear Solid using the new Master Collection. Game still holds up well but I overestimated how much gameplay there is between codec calls/cut scenes/boss fights. It's really a small game, small area. That's the one game from the collection I haven't played, and it's part of what's holding me off until a good sale price. Everything I know about it sounds very solid  , there's just not a huge amount of game there.
|
|
#
?
Dec 7, 2023 04:44
|
|
|
Captain Hygiene posted:That's the one game from the collection I haven't played, and it's part of what's holding me off until a good sale price. Everything I know about it sounds very solid I decided to get it full price because they actually did a decent job with the collection and to be honest my only playable copies are on ps3 now and I'd take any chance to eliminate reasons to take the ps3 out. Now I could use remasters of the ps3 armored Core games...
|
|
#
?
Dec 7, 2023 05:03
|
|
|
I just beat In Stars and Time, an indie RPG that just came out. It's really good! Very charming, I love the cast, the main crew are all well fleshed out characters and a joy to watch interact. Probably my favorite RPG of the year even above Octopath 2 and Baldur's Gate 3.
|
|
#
?
Dec 7, 2023 05:15
|
|
|
ZCKaiser posted:I just beat In Stars and Time, an indie RPG that just came out. It's really good! Very charming, I love the cast, the main crew are all well fleshed out characters and a joy to watch interact. Probably my favorite RPG of the year even above Octopath 2 and Baldur's Gate 3. I actually have my eye on that game. How long did it take to beat?
|
|
#
?
Dec 7, 2023 05:39
|
|
|
I have just beaten Half-Life. It's pretty good! I think these crazy Valve kids are gonna do alright ya know.
|
|
#
?
Dec 7, 2023 10:52
|
|
|
Bumhead posted:I have just beaten Half-Life. Good news, they've already made 4 sequels to it! And one day, we might even get Half Life 3!
|
|
#
?
Dec 7, 2023 11:23
|
|
|
got the first ending in Armored Core 6 after a long break to focus on other games. There are few (maybe zero) combat systems that make you feel like more of a badass. Also a top 5 soundtrack for me. And I love that it throws you into NG+ immediately with no prompting. Might just try to 100% this game
|
|
#
?
Dec 7, 2023 19:24
|
|
|
Ineffiable posted:I actually have my eye on that game. How long did it take to beat? 20ish hours, I'd say. I didn't hundred percent it or anything, so I could probably wring a few more hours out of it if I was inclined to try and see everything.
|
|
#
?
Dec 7, 2023 22:49
|
|
|
emdash posted:got the first ending in Armored Core 6 after a long break to focus on other games. There are few (maybe zero) combat systems that make you feel like more of a badass. Also a top 5 soundtrack for me. And I love that it throws you into NG+ immediately with no prompting. Might just try to 100% this game It's so goddamn good, enjoy New Game+ and New Game++, it's totally worth it!
|
|
#
?
Dec 8, 2023 02:03
|
|
|
I finished the new final fantasy xvi dlc. Good stuff but it's essentially more of the game so it's not a high priority for a lot of people I think. Second dlc is likely to be way more interesting.
|
|
#
?
Dec 9, 2023 03:46
|
|
|
I beat Death Stranding again, which was great fun. The thing I enjoy the most about that game is getting into fights, beating guys in the face with boxes of canned food and other goods. That game has a lot of good idea and I'm interested to see where it goes in the sequel. It was a shame that most of the fun equipment came towards the very end of the game after most of it really mattered, like rocket/grenade launchers.
|
|
#
?
Dec 9, 2023 11:26
|
|
|
Finally finished the inkle Sorcery! game — I’d played all the way through to near the end of the last game when they first came out but I got stuck and frustrated and gave up. The iOS apps also work on AS Macs so I started over and completed it this time  Really impressed with all the ways choices from earlier games carry over to later ones; I don’t think I’m going to NG+ any time soon so I went looking up things I missed in a guide and there’s loads! Really seems like you could replay it and have quite a different experience. There’s quite a few things I’m curious about that the wiki doesn’t cover and it’s hard to find info about a relatively small, old indie game like this. It’s kind of given me a hankering to get back into IF games as well TBH.
|
|
#
?
Dec 9, 2023 12:06
|
|
|
I just beat Marvel's Guardians of the Galaxy (2021). I enjoyed it, but I think whether you will depends entirely on how much you care about Marvel's Guardians of the Galaxy. Short review: - Great characters and story - Technically sound - Pretty good combat - Meh exploration/collectibles - Bad level design I wrote a longer (spoiler free) review too: https://steamcommunity.com/id/theslothbear/recommended/1088850/ I don't know why, I just felt compelled to.
|
|
#
?
Dec 9, 2023 20:22
|
|
|
SlothBear posted:Marvel's Guardians of the Galaxy (2021) I keep hearing that's surprisingly fun. I kept wanting to try it back when it was on PC Gamepass and I had a subscription, but I never got to because Microsoft's Windows gaming environment is kind of a trashfire and I went all  at the amount of fiddling I'd have to do to get it working. I'll look for a cheap console copy sometime when I need more games to play.
|
|
#
?
Dec 9, 2023 20:39
|
|
|
I remember when Mass Effect came out, I bounced off it because it wasn't as good as Star Control 2. ... So I recently gave ME another shot. I bounced off it again. ...and went and beat Star Control 2. Stupid good game that one is.
|
|
#
?
Dec 10, 2023 06:40
|
|
|
H13 posted:I remember when Mass Effect came out, I bounced off it because it wasn't as good as Star Control 2. Well, pop my pupae! Good job on beating a good game.
|
|
#
?
Dec 10, 2023 06:45
|
|
|
Node posted:Well, pop my pupae! Good job on beating a good game. I admit, I did it with a guide. I don't have the patience (nor the free time) to explore THAT many stars for each specific Macguffin needed to beat that game. However, it's still an engrossing, fun experience with awesome and hilarious dialogue and really cool backstory and lore.
|
|
#
?
Dec 10, 2023 06:54
|
|
|
I beat Baldur's Gate 3 on the new for honour mode. Literally being incapable of save scumming made it a lot of fun and forced me to accept failures in dialogue. Couple close calls, very stressful at times, but ultimately Hold Monster and a fighter/paladin frontline is still an answer to almost everything in the game. Usually rolled with thief rogue and sorcerer, sometimes swapping people out for quests and variety. I also definitely did not appreciate the legendary wizard staff on previous runs, that thing is bonkers.
|
|
#
?
Dec 10, 2023 23:12
|
|
|
I just finished out the game and bonus dungeon in Star Ocean: First Departure R. I have mixed feelings about it. I really loved the original Star Ocean, probably mostly out of nostalgia--it came out right when I went to Japan for a semester abroad and I have a lot of fond memories playing it after class in my tiny room and trading tips with others at the local game store. I played it to death since it was one of the only games I had while there, and when I saw its remake for sale for only 1000 yen on the Switch store I figured I'd pick it up. It's really weird to see a remake that somehow manages to be worse than the original but I think SOFDR manages it. The original was a flawed game for sure, and the remake makes a lot of improvements, but for every thing that they made better there's a baffling design decision that makes it worse. Having battles in an actual 3D space is a huge improvement, a lot of the weird plot holes are patched, and there are a ton of skills and abilities you can learn that weren't in the original. On the flip side, the camera in battle is awful no matter what setting you have it on, there are events that were changed for the worse or outright removed, the ability to create crazy chain combos of the original was pulled completely, requirements for getting certain party members are inexplicably more strict and arbitrary, a lot of the combat techniques were nerfed too hard, and most importantly, there's no way to go back to the first planet after you beat the game, making a ton of content "missable" in a way the original never did. I had fun with it, but rather than play it again it with a different party it made me want to give the original another whirl, so maybe I'll do that if the battery hasn't died after 25+ years.
|
|
#
?
Dec 11, 2023 04:32
|
|
|
H13 posted:I remember when Mass Effect came out, I bounced off it because it wasn't as good as Star Control 2. That's what it's called! I played (and beat) it forever ago and I could never remember the name. Pretty good game. uh.. For the thread topic, I'm currently in the process of "beating" Terraria again.
|
|
#
?
Dec 11, 2023 06:50
|
|
|
I finished Avatar Frontiers of Pandora. I liked it! It is absolutely a Far Cry high effort mod, but the graphics upgrade is next-gen and equal to Cyberpunk 2077.
|
|
#
?
Dec 11, 2023 09:12
|
|
|
I just beat Thief: the Black Parade, a total game mod for Thief Gold. I've not had a game completely consume me like this one did; it's...it's perfect. They perfected the Thief franchise. 10 massive missions, layer upon layer of new material, professional-quality voice acting and asset work and cutscenes and music and writing, all in the same style as the original games, seamlessly extending their plot, but improved in every way that a multi-decade labor of love by a team including professional developers using with modern design and tech can. I really don't know what anyone else will be able to do now; this free mod has set a bar I don't think anyone can get over for an entire subgenre. Discendo Vox fucked around with this message at 09:27 on Dec 11, 2023 |
|
#
?
Dec 11, 2023 09:20
|
|
|
Finished another game from my backlog - Symphony of War. Pretty cool, upgrading the units is fun, but by about the halfway point it kinda becomes a bit boring, which is why I left it unfinished for so long. Once you get a good deathball rolling, it's just an exercise in vacuuming up all the enemy squads. Not enough strategy or special abilities to keep it interesting.The plot and characters is also nothing to write home about, a pretty standard 'good guys defeat an evil demon'. Still, pretty good for the studio's first commercially successfull game, I'll e interested to see where they take the sequel.
|
|
#
?
Dec 11, 2023 11:44
|
|
|
Just beat two Early Access FPS games: Wizodrium and Incision Both are really good at what they do, but what they do is also quite different. Wizordium is a bit more Wolf 3D with its flat enviroments and sprites, but features sprawling mazes and tons of secrets, as well as score counter (just for bragging rights it seems). Levels can go nearly an hour long and may feature multiple enviroments within them (castle level starts in a burning town before leading you through castle square and garden into the castle and its crypt). Insicion is more of a Quake-like: fast and gorey, making you feel like you're Silent Hill's first ever mass shooter decimating all the weird body horror creatures at hyperspeed. I kinda feel like the levels run together a bit with its use of very red/brown palette and after the first level in the town you barely go outside, as the game sticks to weird organ factories and crypts. Recommend them both although I liked Wizordium a little more.
|
|
#
?
Dec 11, 2023 13:55
|
|
|
I just finished Dread X Collection 2 which was great more importantly I did it all on the steam deck. I had to do the occasional key rebind here and there but otherwise it was a great experience! Downloading dread x 3 now
|
|
#
?
Dec 11, 2023 15:04
|
|
|
H13 posted:I remember when Mass Effect came out, I bounced off it because it wasn't as good as Star Control 2. I've heard people express a similar sentiment before but like, aren't they entirely different genres of game?
|
|
#
?
Dec 12, 2023 02:27
|
|
|
Yeah, they are totally different kinds of games. But if you love getting to learn about a galaxy full of fun, weirdo aliens, there’s significant overlap.
|
|
#
?
Dec 12, 2023 03:16
|
|
|
|
| # ? Apr 28, 2024 05:38 |
|
|
I finally 100 percent'd vampire survivors. Just in time to hear they are releasing a new DLC on the 18th. The game plays well on steam deck! I also completed a rocket launch for the very first time with no mods in factorio. I will admit it took far too many hours but it was a fun accomplishment. I'm ready for my honorary degree in whatever engineering you get for completing that game.
|
|
#
?
Dec 12, 2023 03:27
|
|