I beat You Have to Win the Game. Well, I got the bad ending. But, I did it on my keyboard, and that's enough winning for me.
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Beating Games
- Thread starter Octopus Prime
- Start date
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- Tags
- the end times
Johnny Unusual
(He/Him)
Finished Inscryption. A great game but it never tops it's first act in both game play and tone. I appreciate what it is doing in the second act but I found it the least fun section and the third act is more fun again but I'm less interested in the meta-mystery by that point. Overall, it's a really cool game and would like to see another game in this vein.
Ghostwire Tokyo is what god invented 7 out of 10s for
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As it turns out, the secret to making Ninja Saviors: Return of the Warriors transition from “Game that I’d like but I can’t get past the first dang level” to “Very Extremely Fun and Surprisingly Nuanced Beat Em Up” was changing what character I play as; turns out the Blue Guy is effectively Easy Mode and also a ninja whose idea of stealth is to deliver body slams capable of leaving craters in the ground.
The guards can't sound the alarm if they're all unconscious.
And my momentum Carrie’s forward; just wrapped up Voice of Xards: The Island Dragon Roars, since I had a save from the penultimate dungeon I hadn’t touched in about six months.
It’s a tasty little nugget of an RPG, encounter rate felt a bit high, especially in the final dungeon, but it went by at a zippy pace. Didn’t really feel like a Yoko Taro game until the very end when it very much became one.
It’s a tasty little nugget of an RPG, encounter rate felt a bit high, especially in the final dungeon, but it went by at a zippy pace. Didn’t really feel like a Yoko Taro game until the very end when it very much became one.
The hits keep on coming;
Finished off Blasphemous. Didn't get the Best Ending, as I have no idea what the requirements are, but otherwise it's been beaten to my satisfaction.
This church... really doesn't make a good case for joining up with it.
Finished off Blasphemous. Didn't get the Best Ending, as I have no idea what the requirements are, but otherwise it's been beaten to my satisfaction.
This church... really doesn't make a good case for joining up with it.
R.R. Bigman
Coolest Guy
I completed the Story Mode and found every sun stone in Kirby: Triple Deluxe. I still have about 30% of game left in bonus modes, which I look forward to seeing.
I continue to be impressed by the consistent quality of Kirby, with this being the fourth Kirb’ I’ve played this year. I have Planet Robobot waiting on my shelf, and I hear it’s even better than Triple D.
I continue to be impressed by the consistent quality of Kirby, with this being the fourth Kirb’ I’ve played this year. I have Planet Robobot waiting on my shelf, and I hear it’s even better than Triple D.
Oh yeah. You are in for a treat.
I often describe Donut County to people as "Katamari, but in reverse".
I enjoyed Donut County, and my kids did too, but man it could use skippable cutscenes when replaying it as my kids wanted to repeatedly.
I just finished Life is Strange, which has been occupying my thoughts for much of the time since I started it. I’m kind of annoyed at the endings, probably just because I feel sad now, which I guess indicates the game worked for me.
I just finished Life is Strange, which has been occupying my thoughts for much of the time since I started it. I’m kind of annoyed at the endings, probably just because I feel sad now, which I guess indicates the game worked for me.
Some further thoughts on Life is Strange, which has had me in a melancholy mood since I realised the bleak ending Max was stumbling towards, and more so since she got there:
I’m not sure if I’ll engage with the rest of the series. Probably the prequel if I do. I thought Life is Strange was really good, but I’m not sure I want to face more of it.
This game made me sad. Like, I was feeling really glum this morning, and will probably stay that way for a while. It reminds me of a description of Chrono Cross I read once but can’t find again (I think it was on Action Button, but who knows), that it was a game about a kid dealing with the safety of the universe depending on his dying. Except I don’t remember Chrono Cross making me sad. Anyways, I wanted things to wrap up neatly and happily, even though that would probably be a much weaker ending than either of the ones the game provides.
I went with sacrificing the town, even though it’s a pretty monstrous thing to do. It seemed like what Max would choose. Maybe. Then I used my own powers of rewinding time to reload the last checkpoint and try the other ending (a trick I’d also used to save Kate earlier in the game - maybe I’m just bad at letting the chips fall where they may). Letting Chloe die seems like what the game wants you to do - you get a more involved ending (and the kiss scene), and aside from what happens to Chloe it’s kind of a happy ending, with the villains caught and nobody else hurt. It undoes everything you’ve done to that point, of course, but so does the tornado in the other ending. Still, I think my true ending is driving out of town with Chloe.
I went with sacrificing the town, even though it’s a pretty monstrous thing to do. It seemed like what Max would choose. Maybe. Then I used my own powers of rewinding time to reload the last checkpoint and try the other ending (a trick I’d also used to save Kate earlier in the game - maybe I’m just bad at letting the chips fall where they may). Letting Chloe die seems like what the game wants you to do - you get a more involved ending (and the kiss scene), and aside from what happens to Chloe it’s kind of a happy ending, with the villains caught and nobody else hurt. It undoes everything you’ve done to that point, of course, but so does the tornado in the other ending. Still, I think my true ending is driving out of town with Chloe.
I’m not sure if I’ll engage with the rest of the series. Probably the prequel if I do. I thought Life is Strange was really good, but I’m not sure I want to face more of it.
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FelixSH
(He/Him)
Played through Emily is Away <3 (thanks again, Positronic Brain!). Unlike the first two games, which simulated AIM, this one simulates Facebook, the early one, and it had a really weird effect of making this way more real than it should be. Like, maybe that's me not having English as my native language, but the people I chatted with felt real enough, that I couldn't really differentiate between them as written and a real person. I never used facebook and had no friends during the relevant time in school, so no nostalgia for that, but it felt like it could have been that way, or something? Dunno, it was a pretty effective illusion, making me feel like friends with the virtual people I chatted with.
Worked well enough, that the last chapter really hurt. Dunno how it can go, but Emily broke up with me, and actually made my eyes a bit teary.. Got an ending that only 4 % or so got, which is interesting. That said, sometimes the game felt too manipulative. The simulated chatting works, by giving you three alternatives to choose from, whenever you are saying something. Sometimes, especially at the end, I chose an option that didn't seem as bad at first as it was, and then had a really hard time getting back out of it, or maybe I didn't even get back. And then, the following options were all things I didn't want to say, just because I misinterpreted one before incorrectly. Maybe that's the idea, but I felt like I was supposed to roleplay, and then the DM takes away control of my character (more than is fitting for the setup).
Still, had a lot of fun with it, I like this series. Maybe I should replay the other two sometime.
Worked well enough, that the last chapter really hurt. Dunno how it can go, but Emily broke up with me, and actually made my eyes a bit teary.. Got an ending that only 4 % or so got, which is interesting. That said, sometimes the game felt too manipulative. The simulated chatting works, by giving you three alternatives to choose from, whenever you are saying something. Sometimes, especially at the end, I chose an option that didn't seem as bad at first as it was, and then had a really hard time getting back out of it, or maybe I didn't even get back. And then, the following options were all things I didn't want to say, just because I misinterpreted one before incorrectly. Maybe that's the idea, but I felt like I was supposed to roleplay, and then the DM takes away control of my character (more than is fitting for the setup).
Still, had a lot of fun with it, I like this series. Maybe I should replay the other two sometime.
Violentvixen
(She/Her)
Oh hey, I just finished the first one. Fun (I very much enjoyed the pixelated music albums) and short but a bit sad. I liked that in the final conversation your character doesn't have the courage to talk to her and keeps deleting the stronger prompts selected. Hard to watch but a nice touch.
FelixSH
(He/Him)
Oh, I remember that. I mean, it's been years since I played it (Steam says 2018, and that was when I took a short look after playing the second game, that I had played the first game had been one or two years aback, even then), so my memory is hazy, but reading that spoilered part made me immediately remember it.
The prequel is... meh. It's definitely the weakest game in the series. LiS 2 is good but is kind of missing the spark of the first one, plus it gets even darker at points. True Colors is very good and if you're only going to play one other LiS game I would suggest that one.
Watch Dogs Legion is a fun open world stealth hacking game, but the randomly generated PCs don't add much to the gameplay and their interactions are excruciating.
I'll second this, especially if you're key reason was the *sads*, which the second one has in spades but the third game really only has at the beginning for its set up.
Wrapped up Anno Mutationem which... I didn't regret playing but, well... saying it put its best foot forward is accurate but misleading; midway through the game it just changes into something completely different, changing from a combination of walky adventure game and side-scrolling action game to being Control, except in 2D. And also the plot goes form "Complicated but enjoyable cyber-punk anime pastcihe" to something genuinely incomprehensible.
Sarge
hardcore retro gamin'
Knocked out Bloodstained: Curse of the Moon 2. More classic Castlevania, although this one is a good deal longer than the first. I went so far as to solo Zangetsu the original (unboosted!), which is definitely right up there with the toughest of the series, but I don't plan on that with this entry since it took so many replays just to get to this point. I've knocked out all three main episodes and also taken down the final boss with just Zangetsu, made easier with his Ultimate form, to get the last secret ending. I think I'll give this one an 8.5/10 - I don't think it quite measures up to the first CotM, but it sure gets close when it's clicking.
FelixSH
(He/Him)
Beneath a Steel Sky is done. If you enjoy classic point'n'click adventures, get it, it's free on Steam. And it's a well written, funny game, with a good story. The setting is actually pretty grim, but the game always stays lighthearted, due to the writing.
Also, it is pretty accessible for a game of this genre. I did use a guide, more as I got closer to the end (the game is probably around five hours long), but especially at the start, the possibility space is small enough for you to work stuff out on your own, and you only need to combine items three times, or so. I probably could have gotten through the game without a guide, if I put in the work, but I don't really enjoy getting stuck on these games, so whatever.
Still, probably a pretty good example of what the genre has to offer.
Also, it is pretty accessible for a game of this genre. I did use a guide, more as I got closer to the end (the game is probably around five hours long), but especially at the start, the possibility space is small enough for you to work stuff out on your own, and you only need to combine items three times, or so. I probably could have gotten through the game without a guide, if I put in the work, but I don't really enjoy getting stuck on these games, so whatever.
Still, probably a pretty good example of what the genre has to offer.
Finished off Tunic; had to look up the actual solution for some late-game puzzles, because the mechanics of actually figuring out the solution was way more frustrating than enjoyable.
All in all, absolutely tremendous example of a Zelda game; easy front runner for Game of the Year.
All in all, absolutely tremendous example of a Zelda game; easy front runner for Game of the Year.
I cannot recommend Touhou Shoujo Tale of Beautiful Memories (or Super Touhou RPG as its subtitle states the intent) for two and only two significant reasons. For the first, it exists in the branch of fan derivative work that makes no attempt to contextualize or bridge the gaps for people who aren't already fully invested in the material; it draws readily from official material across the entirety of the series up to the point when it originally released in 2017, down to the illustrative prose databooks, soundtrack release writings and tie-in comics. It's impenetrable to those who don't already share in its lingua franca, and a comprehensively stunning delight in trainspotting just how much is incorporated into its portrayal of the setting, at a scope rarely seen in fan efforts or pulled off as holistically--even the oft-forgotten PC-98 cast are represented in it.
The second and more immediately discernible reason is that it encompasses probably the most hypersexualized depiction of the series cast this side of legitimate pornography, something which the game's portrait artist must surely pursue as a hobby or professional venture on their own time judging from the stylistic showcase here. The ways in which this treatment particularly chafes is because it is an aspect of the game solely restricted to said portrait art; none of the written narrative, characterization or otherwise humorous bent are reliant or even gesture towards sex humour and titillation, so what you're left with it is a legitimately impressive selection of 100+ illustrated character portraits where every one of them breasts boobily through their screentime, with no bearing on the game's larger ethos or internal voice. It's arbitrary, literally gratuitous and a tremendous detriment as it by necessity casts every compliment the game might otherwise receive and earn as a "yes but" apologia that needs to be prefaced with disclaimers, as here.
Usually the above would be enough to repel me from a work; there is no shortage of interesting and well-made Touhou derivatives available after all, with more compelling aesthetic key aspects. Super Touhou RPG is additionally a pastiche of 1996's Super Mario RPG, a game that has never "clicked" with me. It's for that aversion that I did eventually try this mutation of it, because my issues with Mario RPG are really external to the game in specific and more influenced by my wider antipathy and disinterest toward the Mario series and setting as a whole; substituting in an analogue that I actually care about allows me the opportunity to enjoy in the shared design concepts that are being paid tribute to through the entirety of this fan work, which it fully and gleefully commits to. Setpieces and scenarios are often sourced directly from SMRPG, and they are accomplished in their efforts to serve both ends of overlapping fandom as all of them are adapted and interpreted in such a way that they naturally integrate into Gensokyo's larger world and speak true to the voices of the inhabitants who indulge in the re-dramatizations. The versatility and diversity of Touhou when used as a springboard for further creative work is at full display here, as what could've read as a forced and referential-for-the-sake-of-it mess of incongruences instead appears as a thoughtful extrapolation of an established classic under an affectionate lens.
That kind of syncretic adaptation of the source material is what ultimately comes to carry the game and elevate it from its suspect first blush. When Touhou is adapted, any derived work must fundamentally decide how the series's niche genre roots as a shooter are treated in the process: will they be integrated into the result, downplayed or swept under the rug? Super Touhou RPG is not a shooter, but it is an RPG that patterns itself after another genre work that similarly had to wrest a convincingly characteristic formula out of a collision of at-odds genres in its day. The immediacy of a platformer and the resulting audience expectations informed Mario RPG's form, and it's something Touhou RPG remains highly observant of--a do-all, superboss defeated leisurely playthrough took no more than a lean 20 hours. Despite its effected vastness in how the world is presented through an overworld map of many tangenting branches, this is a game that has no concept of filling for time or making engage repetitively with the genre mechanics if they don't wish to. Most rewards come in bulk from the game's dozens of boss battles with its expansive cast, and the way standard battles exist in the environments are more as live obstacles to weave, leap and shoot through. It's an use of the symbol encounter format that extrapolates the natural opportunity for avoidance and extends it to a playstyle and mentality that both highlights the strengths of a timing-based RPG system in reserving the attention for the major battles, and complements the game's parallel bent as an isometric platformer.
Though deliberately simplistic and literally gridded as a visual basis, the game's environmental work nonetheless props up the necessary elements in what's needed to make the adventure exploratorily compelling. The very emphasis placed on highly conspicuously delineated tileset grids is indicative that platforming is a significant part of what the game considers its core identity, and thus visual tools for parsing perspective are always accounted for. As the battles grow in challenge and complexity, so does the jumping, and the two are rarely if ever separate. In the wider scale, the game's overall structure encompasses a MacGuffin hunt that allows for a degree of player-directed exploration and charting of the world in self-determined order, though grand non-linearity is not as far as it's taken. Regardless, it's through the poking and prodding of one's boundaries that makes it evident how carefully constructed the world at large is: despite a break into an overworld map, all environments naturally (or supernaturally) connect to one another and sometimes intersect in surprising ways, with some corners of the world remaining hidden and optional if not thoroughly scoped out. The process is further interlayered by the existence of several exploratory tools that facilitate and encourage backtracking of old environments aided by their new abilities, which are just plain fun to utilize to boot, from screen-clearing super jumps to magnetically attracting grapple ofuda; usage of these wrinkles is further channeled into locating the many hidden goodies littered around practically every screen the game has. Many RPGs live and die by what they consider their defining, foremost aspects--typically the responsibility falls on battle mechanics or narrative. Super Touhou RPG does not ignore either, but it's a game in which spatial navigation and applying oneself to its sheer movement feel can often be its most jubilant aspect.
What strangely came to crystallize everything I enjoyed about the game was its utilization of mini-games. The sheer concept of a mini-game in the genre has been a traditionally divisive subject, for a myriad of reasons that I can only conjecture toward. My impression has long been that people are suspect and repelled by being torn from a "what they bought a game to do" baseline of mechanical interaction--the learning of new rulesets with no chance of applying them toward anything except their isolated context is the breakpoint of player engagement as far as I've witnessed the sentiment. Final Fantasy VII, as in so many other ways, became emblematic of the approach in its multimedia fervor to dazzle with its literal theme park design, and defined or tainted the genre for many from then on in what to expect or dread from it. Under that context, Super Touhou RPG might have the "best" mini-game array of all time because they are all derived from the fundamentals of movement, jumping and shooting. All of them twist and remix the exact balance and expression of these core concepts, but they never stray from the baseline, allowing one to utilize the skills and headspace of what they've indeed been doing all game long, only now framed under a particular narrative or supplementary concession. I'm not particularly averse to mini-games in the distinct sideshow mold, but I was taken aback by how much I came to genuinely look forward to how the game would adapt itself for the next round of intermissions, and it knocked it out of the park on every occasion. That it rationalizes and contextualizes these moments as something the related characters would themselves do is the other lasting testament to how considered the game's design is from nearly any direction one can approach it from.
I don't have particularly insightful remarks to make about Super Mario RPG. I played it the once about a decade ago, and wasn't taken with it despite seeing the appeal. The ways in which I find Super Touhou RPG exceptional may well be shared by that model work, and certainly I could recognize several of the adapted setpieces. Even if my own thinking around media and tastes thereof have greatly changed in the intervening decade, I don't think I would have gone back to Mario RPG to reassess it; the interest simply isn't there from a critical or otherwise curious standpoint. At the same time, I don't want to frame Touhou RPG as a thoughtless copycat, because it's anything but; I came in with a raised eyebrow and left bedazzled by its ability to syncretize works so formally and stylistically askew from one another in ways that highlighted the strengths of both. That's the optimal result of such self-consciously tributary fan works as these, in that they may bestow additional perspective and appreciation for works thought closed to one's personal preferences. I give it the highest non-recommendation possible.
The second and more immediately discernible reason is that it encompasses probably the most hypersexualized depiction of the series cast this side of legitimate pornography, something which the game's portrait artist must surely pursue as a hobby or professional venture on their own time judging from the stylistic showcase here. The ways in which this treatment particularly chafes is because it is an aspect of the game solely restricted to said portrait art; none of the written narrative, characterization or otherwise humorous bent are reliant or even gesture towards sex humour and titillation, so what you're left with it is a legitimately impressive selection of 100+ illustrated character portraits where every one of them breasts boobily through their screentime, with no bearing on the game's larger ethos or internal voice. It's arbitrary, literally gratuitous and a tremendous detriment as it by necessity casts every compliment the game might otherwise receive and earn as a "yes but" apologia that needs to be prefaced with disclaimers, as here.
Usually the above would be enough to repel me from a work; there is no shortage of interesting and well-made Touhou derivatives available after all, with more compelling aesthetic key aspects. Super Touhou RPG is additionally a pastiche of 1996's Super Mario RPG, a game that has never "clicked" with me. It's for that aversion that I did eventually try this mutation of it, because my issues with Mario RPG are really external to the game in specific and more influenced by my wider antipathy and disinterest toward the Mario series and setting as a whole; substituting in an analogue that I actually care about allows me the opportunity to enjoy in the shared design concepts that are being paid tribute to through the entirety of this fan work, which it fully and gleefully commits to. Setpieces and scenarios are often sourced directly from SMRPG, and they are accomplished in their efforts to serve both ends of overlapping fandom as all of them are adapted and interpreted in such a way that they naturally integrate into Gensokyo's larger world and speak true to the voices of the inhabitants who indulge in the re-dramatizations. The versatility and diversity of Touhou when used as a springboard for further creative work is at full display here, as what could've read as a forced and referential-for-the-sake-of-it mess of incongruences instead appears as a thoughtful extrapolation of an established classic under an affectionate lens.
That kind of syncretic adaptation of the source material is what ultimately comes to carry the game and elevate it from its suspect first blush. When Touhou is adapted, any derived work must fundamentally decide how the series's niche genre roots as a shooter are treated in the process: will they be integrated into the result, downplayed or swept under the rug? Super Touhou RPG is not a shooter, but it is an RPG that patterns itself after another genre work that similarly had to wrest a convincingly characteristic formula out of a collision of at-odds genres in its day. The immediacy of a platformer and the resulting audience expectations informed Mario RPG's form, and it's something Touhou RPG remains highly observant of--a do-all, superboss defeated leisurely playthrough took no more than a lean 20 hours. Despite its effected vastness in how the world is presented through an overworld map of many tangenting branches, this is a game that has no concept of filling for time or making engage repetitively with the genre mechanics if they don't wish to. Most rewards come in bulk from the game's dozens of boss battles with its expansive cast, and the way standard battles exist in the environments are more as live obstacles to weave, leap and shoot through. It's an use of the symbol encounter format that extrapolates the natural opportunity for avoidance and extends it to a playstyle and mentality that both highlights the strengths of a timing-based RPG system in reserving the attention for the major battles, and complements the game's parallel bent as an isometric platformer.
Though deliberately simplistic and literally gridded as a visual basis, the game's environmental work nonetheless props up the necessary elements in what's needed to make the adventure exploratorily compelling. The very emphasis placed on highly conspicuously delineated tileset grids is indicative that platforming is a significant part of what the game considers its core identity, and thus visual tools for parsing perspective are always accounted for. As the battles grow in challenge and complexity, so does the jumping, and the two are rarely if ever separate. In the wider scale, the game's overall structure encompasses a MacGuffin hunt that allows for a degree of player-directed exploration and charting of the world in self-determined order, though grand non-linearity is not as far as it's taken. Regardless, it's through the poking and prodding of one's boundaries that makes it evident how carefully constructed the world at large is: despite a break into an overworld map, all environments naturally (or supernaturally) connect to one another and sometimes intersect in surprising ways, with some corners of the world remaining hidden and optional if not thoroughly scoped out. The process is further interlayered by the existence of several exploratory tools that facilitate and encourage backtracking of old environments aided by their new abilities, which are just plain fun to utilize to boot, from screen-clearing super jumps to magnetically attracting grapple ofuda; usage of these wrinkles is further channeled into locating the many hidden goodies littered around practically every screen the game has. Many RPGs live and die by what they consider their defining, foremost aspects--typically the responsibility falls on battle mechanics or narrative. Super Touhou RPG does not ignore either, but it's a game in which spatial navigation and applying oneself to its sheer movement feel can often be its most jubilant aspect.
What strangely came to crystallize everything I enjoyed about the game was its utilization of mini-games. The sheer concept of a mini-game in the genre has been a traditionally divisive subject, for a myriad of reasons that I can only conjecture toward. My impression has long been that people are suspect and repelled by being torn from a "what they bought a game to do" baseline of mechanical interaction--the learning of new rulesets with no chance of applying them toward anything except their isolated context is the breakpoint of player engagement as far as I've witnessed the sentiment. Final Fantasy VII, as in so many other ways, became emblematic of the approach in its multimedia fervor to dazzle with its literal theme park design, and defined or tainted the genre for many from then on in what to expect or dread from it. Under that context, Super Touhou RPG might have the "best" mini-game array of all time because they are all derived from the fundamentals of movement, jumping and shooting. All of them twist and remix the exact balance and expression of these core concepts, but they never stray from the baseline, allowing one to utilize the skills and headspace of what they've indeed been doing all game long, only now framed under a particular narrative or supplementary concession. I'm not particularly averse to mini-games in the distinct sideshow mold, but I was taken aback by how much I came to genuinely look forward to how the game would adapt itself for the next round of intermissions, and it knocked it out of the park on every occasion. That it rationalizes and contextualizes these moments as something the related characters would themselves do is the other lasting testament to how considered the game's design is from nearly any direction one can approach it from.
I don't have particularly insightful remarks to make about Super Mario RPG. I played it the once about a decade ago, and wasn't taken with it despite seeing the appeal. The ways in which I find Super Touhou RPG exceptional may well be shared by that model work, and certainly I could recognize several of the adapted setpieces. Even if my own thinking around media and tastes thereof have greatly changed in the intervening decade, I don't think I would have gone back to Mario RPG to reassess it; the interest simply isn't there from a critical or otherwise curious standpoint. At the same time, I don't want to frame Touhou RPG as a thoughtless copycat, because it's anything but; I came in with a raised eyebrow and left bedazzled by its ability to syncretize works so formally and stylistically askew from one another in ways that highlighted the strengths of both. That's the optimal result of such self-consciously tributary fan works as these, in that they may bestow additional perspective and appreciation for works thought closed to one's personal preferences. I give it the highest non-recommendation possible.
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yesssssssssElden Ring
