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“I Just Think They're Neat.” Like What You are Playing

Becksworth

Aging Hipster Dragon Dad
So I can find the gripe thread, but no like one? Maybe people are making threads for things they like as recommended, but sometimes you just want to exclaim something is good, but don’t have much to say about beyond one or two small posts, so here’s a thread for that.

So I’m only 30 minutes into No Straight Roads, but so far I’m pleasantly surprised after the cool reception it got at launch. I’m especially surprised at how well it runs on the Switch. I was expecting Hat in Time levels of performance, but got 60 fps with only occasional frame rate hiccups while loading new assets instead.
 

JBear

Internet's foremost Bertolli cosplayer
(He/Him)
I'm playing Dark Souls for the first time. This game is pretty fun! Who knew?
 

JBear

Internet's foremost Bertolli cosplayer
(He/Him)
Neat! is this your first game in the series? How far are you, and what sort of build are you using?
I played some Demons Souls back when it was brand new, but have largely forgotten it. I've been live-blogging the experience for some friends.

I'm using a 1H axe (my starting axe, in fact, although upgrade to +5) and a shield, and mostly putting points in STR, with a smattering into END & VIT. I also put a few points into Faith and... whatever the stat that gave me a spell slot is called. I was worried I'd regret spending 4 levels (2 for each stat) for a single Heal spell, but it turns out that I love that spell and it dramatically increases my longevity for long dungeon spelunks so I'm happy with it.

As for how far I am, that's kind of hard to answer, and I don't know that I want to spend the time giving a detailed response, so in brief: killed the gargoyles (3rd try, I think?)/rang the top bell, killed several other bosses besides (off the top of my head: Capra/Taurus Demon and a big moth, although I'm sure I'm forgetting at least one), cleared New Londo to get uncursed, and am presently back in the sewers where I got cursed, working my way down.
 
Every Hollow Knight play session is a delight. The game is just so full of thoughtful little touches. Last night, I enjoyed the adorable way that when you win the challenge against the Mantis Lords, the mantis warrior enemies not only stop being aggressive, but instead they give you a little bow and let you pass. I appreciate that they took the extra step of making a new animation for this.
 

SpoonyBard

Threat Rhyme
(He/Him)
I'm surprised with how much I'm enjoying Fire 'n Ice on NESflix, it's a neat little puzzler I missed the first time around.

I'm not in love with the aesthetics, it has that late-era NES style where sprites are over-animated but also the tiles tend to not have that much texture and there's a lot of flat single colors. And the BGM can be a bit trilly. But I do dig the puzzle aspect and it's gotten me kinda-stumped a few times.

This is exactly the sort of game I likely never would have bought standalone for 5 bux in the old VC system but am quite glad to have gotten with the larger package.
 

demi

(She/Her)
After 40 hours of my third attempt trying to enjoy FFTA2, I've burnt out... and, in its stead, picked up Tactics Ogre: Let Us Cling Together on the PSP for the first time since its release! The dramatic story, the incredible OST, and perennial Class Change system are really doing it for me. My alternative was to just replay through FFT on the PSX again and I love that game but am so so familiar with it - much less so for Tactics Ogre, which I've forgotten much about since its NA release in February 2011. That unfamiliarity compounds with the game's rich setting (backed by surrounding Quest titles such as Ogre Battle) to create something that feels so new to me, even if I'm pretty sure I'm replaying the same story path I did on my initial encounter... it's hard for me not to choose the path evidently. But, what with the post-game Chariot Wheel system, which I shirked ten years ago in favor of some of the more extravagant postgame pursuits, I can def see myself exploring the other paths this time.

Despite my familiarity with FFT, its overall plot feels a little too big for my head: there's a certain point where I stop retaining all of the new information, or forget the old bits, and my overall understanding of the narrative gets a little more scrambled, even if I feel like I have a hold on the themes. TO seems to be less complicated in narrative, even if there are three different ways it can go. There's an exploration of Denam's character as well: I'm interested in what kind of person he becomes to make the choices he does. At least, his determination and the emotions that fuel it are very pronounced in my current route, and it makes me really curious to see what he's like - and how his relationships change - in the other two main branches. Fortunately, the game makes it easy to do so post-completion. This ability to replay the file with a different route really suits the game; for as many classes as there are, Denam leads as many as 11 others into battle. There's a lot of opportunity for coverage, and not as much focus on benefits of cross-classing within individual units. FFT, in contrast has smaller parties of 5 or 6 for its fights. With the overwhelming amount of job/support job combinations and limited amount of characters to use at one time, I feel FFT is more immediately replayable since there are so many possibilities. It's nice that I can see all of TO in one fell swoop if I'm so inclined.

The game lacks some of the subtlety of FFT - they already named your best-friend-soon-rival "Vyce", and if that wasn't on the nose enough they change his portrait to a more sinister version as soon as he and Denam are at odds. It's a bit heavy-handed in a game that's already more direct in its conversations about morality (esp. if you compare how Delita is portrayed in FFT) but this isn't the gripes thread so I'll call it; It's just very very hard not to compare the games lol! But, overall, the other ways TO does things differently just serve to distinguish itself as its own unique and very-worthwhile experience.

The art rules, the new arrangement of the OST rocks, and the game plays fast - forgot to highlight that last one earlier, but god what a welcome change of pace for a genre that tends towards slow and methodical. It's addicting and fun. And, I am already lamenting my lack of experience with pretty much any other games that take place in its setting, so maybe I'll check out Ogre Battle next!

edit: Wait no I don't remember any of this happening this way lmao, I must've done the Neutral path my first time...?
 
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JBear

Internet's foremost Bertolli cosplayer
(He/Him)
Blather 'Round from Jackbox Party Pack 7 is the best game they've ever done and we've been playing it a lot and aren't sick of it yet. You have to get other people to say words based on limited vocabulary clues, and we all love it. It's got that Pictionary appeal where when you draw something terrible and the other person gets it you feel like they're reading your mind (just to be clear, this is not a drawing game, although jackbox has many of those). I got to describe Candyland as a "terrible rectangle". A+
 

lincolnic

can stop, will stop
(he/him)
Blather 'Round from Jackbox Party Pack 7 is the best game they've ever done and we've been playing it a lot and aren't sick of it yet. You have to get other people to say words based on limited vocabulary clues, and we all love it. It's got that Pictionary appeal where when you draw something terrible and the other person gets it you feel like they're reading your mind (just to be clear, this is not a drawing game, although jackbox has many of those). I got to describe Candyland as a "terrible rectangle". A+
I got to play this a couple of weeks ago and described Mr. Peanut as a "salty brand". It is a good game.
 

R.R. Bigman

Coolest Guy
I’ll go into more depth after I have finished it, but I am really liking this second DLC offering for The Outer Worlds. It’s quite different than the previous DLC, which was very combat focused and took place on a mostly deserted asteroid. This time, you somehow become enlisted to take the role as an inspector to investigate the murder of an actress at a hotel on a floating colony on one of the planets you didn’t get to visit in the main game. There’s way more focus on talking to folks and sussing out information on who done did the crime. The first DLC had it’s moments, mainly some great writing from your crew, yet I feel very confident in saying if you enjoyed the The Outer Worlds then you should pick up Murder on Eridanos. Maybe not Peril on Gorgon, though.
 

Lokii

(He/Him)
Staff member
Moderator
The Year of Luigi was the last time things were good and among the gifts it gave us was Mario and Luigi: Dream Team. Conventional wisdom is that, as an even numbered game in the series, it's a stinky pile of goomba poo. As the follow up to the mega-charming Bowser's Inside Story it certainly seems like a misstep. Its primary crime is over-tutorialization, for which it deserves a life sentence in Game Jail. Parish in his review said "you can actually feel your soul leaving your body the dozenth time that stupid star sprite guy floats out to reiterate some basic point he just made two minutes prior."*

lol at the casual misgendering of Starlow. "The tutorials are so bad," Parish seems to be saying, "I can't be bothered to learn this character's name or identity." Not an effective argument, I feel.

The game does have a certain soul draining quality about it, I have to agree. I quite disliked it when I first started playing. I purchased it by spending my saved gold points and I felt like I had made a mistake at the time. And yet, I kept coming to back to it. It's a long game, 40 hours that feels more like 60, and when I reached the end I found I developed a fondness for the experience. I wanted it to keep going. So yes, it is overly hand-holdy and has a slow (turgid?) pace with lots of interrupting dialog, but there's something compelling about it too. A big, meaty Mario and Luigi adventure, that, through its love and celebration of Luigi's inherent Luiginess, has a soul affirming quality as well.


Luckily, there's a whole Hard Mode that unlocks after beating the game. A youtube cinema-sins style video came across my recommendations last night for Mario and Luigi: Superstar Saga and it was dinging the game for things like "Mario and Luigi speak in faux-Italian" or "Peach's word balloons explode." Just crapping the game for having an identity. But it got me thinking about Dream Team and so I decided to start up Hard Mode and see how it goes.

I don't know if my expectations are now bettered tempered having played through the game once already, but the tutorilization doesn't seem so egregious anymore. Maybe that will change as I keep going, but it seems... fine? I certainly don't feel like my soul has been sucked away, as if Dream Team was the video game equivalent of a dementor's kiss.

I think expectations are a part of it and having a bit patience to allow the game to be the game it is, but I think part of it too comes from the way Hard Mode articulates. Items are capped at 10 each, enemy HP and attack values are greatly increased, and windows for timed attacks are tighter. All this goes a long way for making individual battles consequential, demanding, and potent for interesting player choice. You really have to learn how to dodge enemy attacks or else you won't survive. Enemy power has been increased to a point where, despite leveling, any given baddie is going to be able to KO the bros in two, three hits max. This is a great approach in a battle system where you can negate all damage if you're skillful enough. If you do get hit you now have an interesting choice: do you spend a turn to gulp a mushroom from your small supply, or do you ride the line, trusting yourself to dodge the next attack. It's engaging and tense and gives the battles a flavor that doesn't exist in the base game.

I think when the battles are more rote the tutorials become more painful. If the gameplay is kind of a breeze, and you're already going through the motions, and then the game interrupts to explain how to go through the motions it firmly places the game in Baby Mode. That is to say, the game seems to be telling player that it doesn't respect their ability to think on their own. That's a good way to erode the patience needed to engage with a slow paced game. Harder battles g a long way to balance the game experience and bring its best qualities forward. Tutorials are still intrusive, but they don't carry that soul draining feeling anymore. They're minor annoyances, at most.

This is all too many words to say: I like Dream Team. I think it's pretty good. It's shame that the best expression of itself is locked behind 40 long hours of a compromised version. I wish Adult Mode was available from the start, but I can see why they felt like in this game for children should be made with children in mind.

I hear that Hard Mode gets more demanding as it get further in. But for now it's the hitting the right notes. I'm glad it exists.

tl;dr:

92625.jpg
 

Lokii

(He/Him)
Staff member
Moderator
Hard Mode takes its first W. I walked into a random encounter, got KOed before I could take an action and lost a half hours progress and two (TWO!) tutorials. That's their real purpose. Punishment for fucking up. Ah well, dems the breaks in the mushroom kingdom.

hurts tho
 

Violentvixen

(She/Her)
Spiritfarer is an utter delight. I tried it out on Gamepass and really liked it! But my Gamepass runs out soon so I started trying to rush it and realized, no, I want to absorb this game, I want to just putter around the map, I want to figure out everyone's favourite food, I am going to buy it and take my time. Highly recommended.

It's on Gamepass as I said and also on sale on Steam right now because it's up for a billion BAFTA awards.

Oh and the animation is beautiful.

 

madhair60

Video games
Spiritfarer doesn't get enough love. It's a joyous thing in co-op too, which also mitigates some of the more laborious elements.
 

madhair60

Video games
Oh yeah, Balan Wonderworld's reception online has been about 99% disingenuous impressions-as-performance, like the reviews are being treated as the writer's Tight Five about Bad Game So Bad. I appreciate the plank in my eye here. But the game is good, and interesting, and you should consider playing it for yourself.
 

R.R. Bigman

Coolest Guy
I finished the Murder on Eridanos DLC for The Outer Worlds. If you have the game, please get this DLC. It's a lot of fun and a fair bit different from the rest of the game.
 

FelixSH

(He/Him)
Aside from playing through FF V, I also started Baba Is You again. It's still a joy, and I'm already back were I stopped the first time, or at least very close. Just had a really good run, where I beat the two extra-hard puzzles of the first world (completing that world in the process) and made it through all but two puzzles of the second world (it's two regular puzzles that I haven't beaten yet). Felt really good, solving so many in one sitting.

This game is really great, and I hope that I can beat it, this time.
 
Oh yeah, Balan Wonderworld's reception online has been about 99% disingenuous impressions-as-performance, like the reviews are being treated as the writer's Tight Five about Bad Game So Bad. I appreciate the plank in my eye here. But the game is good, and interesting, and you should consider playing it for yourself.

Do you (or does anyone else) know if this Box Fox thing really works like that as a kind of prank on the player, or is it being misrepresented? I saw this clip and thought it was hilarious, if anything it made me more interested in the game.

 

Violentvixen

(She/Her)
Spiritfarer doesn't get enough love. It's a joyous thing in co-op too, which also mitigates some of the more laborious elements.
I still need to try co-op! My spouse and I have had pretty opposing work schedules recently so we haven't gotten to play anything together for a while.

Do you (or does anyone else) know if this Box Fox thing really works like that as a kind of prank on the player, or is it being misrepresented? I saw this clip and thought it was hilarious, if anything it made me more interested in the game.


Bwahahaha what.
 
I'm surprised with how much I'm enjoying Fire 'n Ice on NESflix, it's a neat little puzzler I missed the first time around.

I'm not in love with the aesthetics, it has that late-era NES style where sprites are over-animated but also the tiles tend to not have that much texture and there's a lot of flat single colors. And the BGM can be a bit trilly. But I do dig the puzzle aspect and it's gotten me kinda-stumped a few times.

This is exactly the sort of game I likely never would have bought standalone for 5 bux in the old VC system but am quite glad to have gotten with the larger package.
I am playing this now and also liking it.
 

Octopus Prime

Mysterious Contraption
(He/Him)
I’m surprised at how much more I like it than Solomons Key.

I blame the much more emotive, detailed sprite work.

also, the fact that it plays a lot more like... err... that Gameboy puzzle game about cats kicking mummies to pieces that I can never remember the name of.
 
Well, that sounds like something to investigate... Catrap, I guess? It's on my list of things I would love to play if the Switch ever gets... GBflix? GuiBi! (already incomprehensible... I literally couldn't remember what Quibi was called)
 

Octopus Prime

Mysterious Contraption
(He/Him)
That’s the one! I assumed it had a cat pun in the name, not a cat portmanteau.

It’s also on the 3DS VC, which I believe is the only reason I remembered it at all!
 

Lokii

(He/Him)
Staff member
Moderator
Octo I'm mad you made up Meow Meow Mummy Punter Deluxe: Super Puzzle Edition 98.
 
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