Beating Games

[Octopus Prime]

Don’t just shout into the void when you successfully whittle down your backlog a bit! Shout into this thread, and let us toast your fallen enemies together!

Just finished Panzer Dragoon Remastered, which is great game if you’re interested in Star Fox with a Weird European Sci-Fi aesthetic, but I kept comparing it negatively to Star Fox in a number of ways too; the Dragon (Dragoon?) is pretty hard to maneuver compared to an Arwing (and it’s a much bigger target to boot, fills a lot of the screen), and I was never a fan of rail shooters where movement and aiming are independent of each other, also, even with the radar, keeping track of a full 360 degrees around yourself while stuck on a track is Pretty daunting.

That said, the game is still incredible to look at, and the sweeping camera makes the game even more immersive than SF64 (which I believe wasn’t made until a couple of years later). Hoping we get a similar remaster of Zwei before long, as I’m lead to understand that’s the Good One.

 

[Octopus Prime]

And speaking of, I also beat Star Fox before bed; wound up taking the Black Hole to skip to Sector Y and approaching Venom that way, this time. But I started on Route 1, so I still only got the Easy Mode Final Boss.

Still one of my favorite Rail Shooters ever, and I’d give a totally insignificant body part if it meant getting a rerelease with a quarter way decent processor. The last few levels chuck *way* too much stuff at you for the barely double-digit FPS the game sometimes saddles you with.

 

[lincolnic]

Makes more sense to post this here than in the "whatcha playin'" thread:

Finished Blasphemous yesterday, I'd give it a solid B-. The moment-to-moment gameplay is satisfying and the boss fights are pretty fun, but (like I mentioned in my post above) it's got some real early game balance issues. It also has some of the most inscrutable (but optional) puzzles I've seen in a Metroidvania, to the point where I'm not sure how you're supposed to solve them without help from the internet. A friend of mine who also played it said "a lot of designers remember the feeling of being confounded by Dark Souls, but don't quite get the balance of 'obscure but not impossible'" and I think that's a good summary of what happened here.

I'd still recommend it to anyone who likes the genre, but I don't think I'll be going back for NG+.

 

[Sarge]

Just finished Panzer Dragoon Remastered, which is great game if you’re interested in Star Fox with a Weird European Sci-Fi aesthetic, but I kept comparing it negatively to Star Fox in a number of ways too; the Dragon (Dragoon?) is pretty hard to maneuver compared to an Arwing (and it’s a much bigger target to boot, fills a lot of the screen), and I was never a fan of rail shooters where movement and aiming are independent of each other, also, even with the radar, keeping track of a full 360 degrees around yourself while stuck on a track is Pretty daunting.

Oh, wow, did they add independent movement for aiming and movement? It didn't work that way at all in the original.

I still have really fond memories of the original. I still have the PC port, which was really solid (640x480, baby!), and that soundtrack was spinning in the CD tray a lot. I don't think I ever beat it, but my brother did.

 

[Violentvixen]

Beat the boss of the Greymoor Expansion for Elder Scrolls online. Frustratingly it took two tries as the boss bugged on the first attempt. But fun!

I've been really pleased with their female characters in this exapansion and in the Elsweyr one. Khamira is awesome, Lyris is a hoot and Svana's arc surprised me.

 

[Octopus Prime]

Finished of Streets of Rage 4

Easily among the best-in-genre for Beat Em Ups, and not anything I’m going to be removing from my Switch with any great speed. Unusually lengthy for the genre, too

 

[Falselogic]

Final Fantasy XII is done!

 

[Dr. Nerd]

I beat Elliot Quest a few days ago. It's a very good mix of Zelda 2 + Kid Icarus NES.

Also, the game is much bigger than I thought it would be! There's a ton of areas, and I have maybe half of everything I need to 100% it.

 

[Droewyn]

I finished Last of Us over the weekend, along with the Left Behind side-story. I'd forgotten how good the game is at storytelling, particularly in the development of Joel and Ellie's relationship. I still agree with Joel's decision in the end, not only because of his emotional bond, but because the Firefly scientists were fucking stupid. You've got a real live Immune, possibly the only one in existence, and you're just gonna up and kill her? The same day she shows up? Because you're "pretty sure" you can make a vaccine from her brainmeats? Which you know from the whole hour and a half's worth of tests? NO WONDER YOU HAVEN'T MADE ANY KIND OF HEADWAY AGAINST THE DISEASE IF YOU GO AROUND MURDERING ALL OF YOUR LEADS ON SIGHT. THIS IS TERRIBLE FUCKING SCIENCE.

Also, cannibals are overplayed. There. I said it. Someone laud my bravery.

 

[Becksworth]

Can’t really beat a game like Animal Crossing, but I think I’m done with New Horizons. Just wanted to say that somewhere to help suppress the desire to check in on my village everyday so I can get that 30-40 minutes a day back to play something else.

 

[Octopus Prime]

Finished off a (really bad) run of Star Fox 64. On the 3DS, but in Original Mode (genuinely unsure what differences there are besides Gyroscopic Aiming).

Playing them side by side, I really do genuinely thing the original is the superior game, even if it runs like a butt and it’s incredibly Hard to aim at anything without a target reticle.

I like that the levels are predetermined with your difficulty selection, with the ability to change lanes via trickery more than static, branching levels, and 64 has more levels that are straight-up duds.

 

[lincolnic]

Just wrapped up Guacamelee 2, which I really enjoyed. It's been a few years since I played the first game, so I'd forgotten that one of the things I liked most about the series is how the special attacks you learn double as your new exploration abilities as well.

I'd also forgotten just how hard some of the platforming can be, especially if you go for the optional challenges (which I did). Some of the Secret Key challenges felt like they could've fit into a kaizo game. Still, nothing was too bad, and it was all pretty satisfying to complete.

My one criticism is that sometimes when the screen zooms out and there are a lot of enemies at once (like for the big combat arenas), it could be easy to lose track of your character. That led to a handful of unnecessary deaths for me, but since there's no real penalty for dying it's not that big a deal.

With all the optional stuff and getting the good ending, I clocked in at just under 11 hours, which is totally fine by me. Of the three console games I've played in the past month-ish (Prey and Blasphemous being the other two), this was far and away my favorite.

 

[Sarge]

Ganbare Goemon 4 is done. Very fun game, although it does come up short of both Goemon 2 (the game it's closest to structurally) and Goemon 3 (which is an absolutely fantastic game that adopts some Zelda-style gameplay into the proceedings). All of them beat out the first game, in my opinion, but that also received a new retranslation that I'd love to check out.

 

[Seven]

Finished both Donkey Kong Country (SNES Online App) and Super Mario Odyssey last night; I was on an RPG binge for most of the year and getting a bit burned out so it was great to play some games that are as far from that genre as possible.

This was my third time beating Donkey Kong Country, the past two times were on the SNES back when I was younger. It's very simple compared to future entries, but I had fun breezing through the game and the underwater theme is so relaxing that I usually took a break from playing just to listen to it. Looking forward to playing through the sequel again when it drops on the SNES app later next week.

I had a blast playing through Super Mario Odyssey and it's easily my favorite 3D Mario, which isn't saying much since I've never played 64 or Sunshine; I did play 3D Land to completion though so maybe that counts? Overall SMO was a great game and I loved exploring the various kingdoms and playing around the environments. I just picked up Super Mario 3D All-Stars yesterday so I'm excited to finally give the past 3D Mario entries a playthrough later.

 

[Falselogic]

Tangle Tower and Raiden V in the last few days.

 

[R.R. Bigman]

The last boss in Doom: Eternal is as much of a terrible mess as everyone said it was. That being said, I really enjoyed DoomE once I got the hang of the new rhythm of battle that the game wants you to follow. I look forward to playing the DLC that I can only hope has the real ending to the story, because there sure as shit isn't one in the main game.

 

[Octopus Prime]

My Bunny... has been Married

 

[Ghost from Spelunker]

Blazing Chrome is beaten for the first time.
Yes, it's a tribute/clone of Contra Hard Corps. I had a pretty fun time and I look forward to ninja mode. I even liked the Space Harrier part.

It took me a while to get to used to my heroes not sticking to every wall like the games that inspired them did. Hope the ninjas can, but I doubt it. And I guess you can't jump down from thin platforms. And I swear your jump is more of a slow float upwards, because I had countless deaths where I tried to jump over things like the traffic cones in the Virtual Zone but still died. And sometimes the final boss' first phase didn't care if I was rolling and his sword still killed me.

But there's one big problem, these special weapons suck (except for the grenade, you're fine).
The whip moves around too slow to be useful, it has short range, and it doesn't seem to do more damage than the machine gun.
The proton gun is probably better uncharged, and when it's charged you have to keep the darn thing pointed at your target for the whole shot, or that time you spent charging will be wasted.

The other problem with these special weapons is that they all seem to be have been built around bosses, yet this game still has lots of areas that are boss-free. So what special weapon do I use on the small fry? Where is the spread shot? Homing? Guess I can try to take out groups with the grenade launcher.

 

[R.R. Bigman]

I thought Blazing Chrome was really cool, but the power-ups were poorly balanced. Having a Contra inspired game without a spread gun equivalent is unthinkable to me.

 

[Violentvixen]

Trying to get through my Apple Arcade stuff before the trial runs out. I beat NeoCab tonight, really liked it.

 

[Mr. Sensible]

I got K.K. Slider to perform on my island, so I guess that means I "finished" Animal Crossing: New Horizons?

 

[Yimothy]

Nanopesos is a short IF about getting by with more expenses than income. I played through in about fifteen minutes and left my PC in a very bad position. It’s pretty stressful dealing with the small decisions that add up over the game. I’m not sure if it’s possible to get a better outcome or keep the game going longer than the one month my playthrough lasted. You’d have to be pretty miserly, and it seemed like that could have consequences in other aspects of the PC’s life. The game reminded me how fortunate I am to live the life I do.

 

[Patrick]

I beat Super Mario 3D Land. Although that only opens up the more difficult second half of the game. Stages now have poison mushrooms and Tanooki leafs, too!

 

[Adrenaline]

Ori and the Will of the Wisps feels like the developers played Hollow Knight and took some good lessons from it. Not too hard but a really fun game.

 

[Octopus Prime]

Finished Pokemon Sword, which was fine, but felt like a step back from Sun & Moon in a lot of ways. Or at least in all the Ways that made Sun and Moon my favourite of the series.

 

[Riot.EXE]

Finished Pokemon Sword, which was fine, but felt like a step back from Sun & Moon in a lot of ways. Or at least in all the Ways that made Sun and Moon my favourite of the series.

Game Freak gon' Game Freak...

 

[JBear]

CrossCode is in the can. What a good game! Not at all what I was expecting, but a great time, nonetheless.

 

[Droewyn]

JESUS GRANDPA WHAT'D I PLAY THIS STUPID GAME FOR

(I just finished Last of Us 2)

 

[Johnny Unusual]

Castlevania. Couldn't beat Dracula without creating a save point until he turns into a gargoyle. Just got sick of having to go through the first rigmarole and I actually think that's the harder part for me but it took me a few tries to get the timing down and I didn't want to do it again for the millionth time. Fun game but damn frustrating in segments, like when eagles keep dropping fleamen in the tower. Now on to Castlevania II.

 

[MetManMas]

Stuff like this is pretty much why I exclusively play the Japanese reissue of the game on Easy difficulty now. I like to play Castlevania more for the experience than the challenge and I'm in no big hurry to defeat the Grim Reaper and his murder hallway the standard "four damage + lose power-ups on death" way ever again. That place is not fun if you lost your holy water fire bombs.