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Hey, Talking Time, Whatcha Playin?
- Thread starter Octopus Prime
- Start date
Started up Star Wars: Jedi Fallen Order today. It felt really good to chop up stormtroopers during the intro sequence! Then they gave me the choice of two planets to check out next, so of course I went to the one that wasn't marked as the main objective, and it's much harder. Pretty sure I shouldn't be there yet, but whatever. At least I've gained some skill points?
I'm on a foolish quest to play through every Kingdom Hearts game. I don't know if I ""like"" them per se (save one), but I am endlessly fascinated by them. The ranking thus far: Chain of Memories > Re:Coded > II > Kingdom Hearts
On one Dr. @Octopus Prime 's recommendation, I have purchased and begun Operencia, and am pleased to report that it's a good duck. It reminds me of Grimrock without the real-time combat and with less of a focus on puzzles. I love the fine-grain difficulty settings. After much debate, I went with hard mode combat, but normal everything else; I would have also turned on the limited saves difficulty switch, but the game hard crashed during the tutorial, and I didn't want to risk that being a regular occurrence. Anyway, the combat has been nice and challenging, so I'm pretty happy with my chosen settings. This hole, it was made for me.
Picked up Meteorfall Krumit’s Tale on iOS (may be on other things too), and it’s a great mobile game. It’s a sequel to Meteorfall Journey (which I didn’t play, and can offer no contrast to), and it’s a deck building roguelite card game that defies simple comparison. Maybe a cross between Slay the Spire and Card Crawl. Each dungeon is represented by an Increasingly stacked deck full of treasure and monsters, with the goal of eliminating every single card. Cards offer a lot of variety (and different characters have extremely diverse decks) and combat is as tricky as it is simple, with a really Enjoyable risk/reward flow where you can dump helpful cards in exchange for a resource bump, and managing when to equip or unequip gear in order to manage durability and jumble up enemy status.
Really liking it so far, after unlocking the third character
Really liking it so far, after unlocking the third character
first time playing ff9. really really works. the characters are mostly great, but that's really helped with some great economy in the text. It's not exactly poetic writing, but it's heady and meditative enough to make it feel that way anyhow. Idk, there's just very little to complain about for me. I guess i just wish Quina would stop leaving the party for reasons that rarely mean anything for the plot, but that's still endearing.
Despite not being "finished" until this year, Black Mesa feels more retro now than Half-Life 1 did when Black Mesa began development. Playing it is sort of an odd experience, as it seems to keep things mostly the same but changes things just enough that you can sometimes wonder if something is actually different or you just forgot what it was like before. I'm still pretty early in it but it's interesting to revisit a classic in this way.
I have now unlocked every character, and every one of them is Mechanically Weird, and I love them all and can’t pick a favourite, and this game is great.
My slate is starting to overflow, but I'd really like to get to the end of all of these:
Final Fantasy XIV. Taking it pretty slow, in Heavensward on one character and early-to-mid Realm Reborn on another.
Dead Cells. I keep unlocking cool new areas, but they're generally harder than the default route so my runs are getting shorter overall!
Ikenfell. Adorable. Casually queer. Beautiful music. Recommended!
The Legend of Zelda: A Link Between Worlds. Clever of them to cash in on LttP nostalgia with a familiar overworld and NPCs, but keep things fresh with a new story and mechanics.
Final Fantasy XIV. Taking it pretty slow, in Heavensward on one character and early-to-mid Realm Reborn on another.
Dead Cells. I keep unlocking cool new areas, but they're generally harder than the default route so my runs are getting shorter overall!
Ikenfell. Adorable. Casually queer. Beautiful music. Recommended!
The Legend of Zelda: A Link Between Worlds. Clever of them to cash in on LttP nostalgia with a familiar overworld and NPCs, but keep things fresh with a new story and mechanics.
Maybe I will/should make a Morrowind thread on the off chance anyone still wants to talk about this game, but after mostly focusing on becoming the head of guilds/factions I finally returned to progressing the main quest and just now met Vivec and read the texts he presents you.
The multiple irreconcilable accounts of the game's central mysteries and the high likelihood that even the most relatively honest and informed sources probably didn't/couldn't understand the actions and motivations of many of the key figures is maybe the best writing in any RPG I've ever played.
The multiple irreconcilable accounts of the game's central mysteries and the high likelihood that even the most relatively honest and informed sources probably didn't/couldn't understand the actions and motivations of many of the key figures is maybe the best writing in any RPG I've ever played.
Started playing the fan retranslation of Breath of Fire 2 and, wow, it is a drastic improvement. Not that the original release had anywhere to go but up, but this is just inestimably better.
Besides a full overhaul of the script, it also adds in a voiced song for an intro movie and added in a run button. Not sure if it included the revamped experience/zenny rates From the GBA port, or if it fixed up buggier parts of the game, but even if it didn’t, it’s enough of a revamp to justify my affection for a game that history has been justifiably cruel towards.
Besides a full overhaul of the script, it also adds in a voiced song for an intro movie and added in a run button. Not sure if it included the revamped experience/zenny rates From the GBA port, or if it fixed up buggier parts of the game, but even if it didn’t, it’s enough of a revamp to justify my affection for a game that history has been justifiably cruel towards.
I don't know how much I like SteamWorld Quest. I mean, I enjoy how it looks and its general tone, but card-based rpgs are just not my thing. I like those kinds of games usually in spite of the cards rather than because them. And SteamWorld seems to want me to go back and grind old chapters to be strong enough to beat new chapters. That or to know what is coming so I can set my decks accordingly.
i got rising storm 2 vietnam a few weeks back on epic for free and it's the first time i've played a fps in idk how long but it shows. also it's a little bit awful playing a game very forwardly about tactics and communication with almost no one talking. sometimes you get lucky and have a commander that's giving orders and that's nice though.
I started Gravity Rush HD back in August, but ended up not touching it for exactly 2 months (8/15-10/15) while I continued to noodle in Bloodborne and then played through Dragon Age: Inquisition. But before diving into anything new, I'm going to finish it off, and I'm glad I am. I have a soft spot in my heart for that game, and I'm still really enjoying this revisit. Traversal is just such a joy - fly-falling all around town, getting crystals, etc. Yes, the combat is a little janky, and the challenge missions are kinda repetitive for how important they are to do (the crystal rewards are huge for keeping your stats and skills upgraded), but the art and just the joy of flying around more than make up for it. Leaping off the side of the floating city, stopping midair next to the underbelly then falling back upwards, skidding off the sides of buildings until you pause above the town's biggest tower, flinging yourself over some houses to find your next area, taking a moment to stand on an airship or flying bus and look out over the city... They really knew what their core appeal was going to be and they nailed it so hard.
I'm Hunting Monsters!
If you're interested in something "new" for your Mega Drive I can't recommend the Columbus Circle release of the Mad Stalker port highly enough. It's a single-plane scrolling beat-'em-up that gives you the toolkit of a Street Fighter shoto (down to the dragon punch and a projectile for zoning!), and it's the most fun I've had on the MD in ages. It's from 1994, so it's a late one, but it has the look of something from quite a bit earlier in the system's life, in a good way - its palette is gritty and subdued and there's an emphasis on animating a few big, detailed sprites at a time as opposed to filling the screen with Treasure-esque effects and several layers of parallax, etc. My favourite thing about the moment-to-moment action is that it really forces you to make full use of your moveset, just as in a fighting game: a lot enemies, especially bosses, are all about the rushdown, and will make no bones about pummelling you straight into a corner and keeping you there until you're dead, so understanding all of your answers to that is crucial.
It's a miracle it was discovered at all, let alone finished up and released on a physical cart. The music all sounds so, so much better than the X68000 and FM Towns versions, too. The prototype actually had no music at all, so Keishi Yonao has belted out the best arrangements of his old tunes this year, at the drop of a hat. Legend!
It's a miracle it was discovered at all, let alone finished up and released on a physical cart. The music all sounds so, so much better than the X68000 and FM Towns versions, too. The prototype actually had no music at all, so Keishi Yonao has belted out the best arrangements of his old tunes this year, at the drop of a hat. Legend!
Not monsties?
Been sinkin' my teeth into Zelda II recently. Like every other sane person, I've always found this game quite unforgiving, but I've long loved it's air of mystery and hostility. I've always enjoyed Link's agility and gravity in this game, but his slow sword draw (together with the unrelenting knockback from enemy hits) can be infuriating.
The game also starts throwing very tricky enemies at you in the latter half that often (as far as I know) can't be killed by normal sword attacks... among other things (those projectile firing enemies in the third palace, arrrgh). I don't think I would ever have the patience to complete it without save states.
I feel that the game's emphasis on combat over exploration, particularly against humanoid enemies (with few, if any, Link-dwarfing monsters), and more detailed, less abstract visual style compared to the original LoZ grants it a wonderful dark flavor. In some ways it's a starting point for the 'edgier' stylish swordplay elements from Ocarina, Twilight P and so on.
The game also starts throwing very tricky enemies at you in the latter half that often (as far as I know) can't be killed by normal sword attacks... among other things (those projectile firing enemies in the third palace, arrrgh). I don't think I would ever have the patience to complete it without save states.
I feel that the game's emphasis on combat over exploration, particularly against humanoid enemies (with few, if any, Link-dwarfing monsters), and more detailed, less abstract visual style compared to the original LoZ grants it a wonderful dark flavor. In some ways it's a starting point for the 'edgier' stylish swordplay elements from Ocarina, Twilight P and so on.
Getting used to the controls after playing so many games with unlocked cameras, but man, this game is so atmospheric! I've only played 4, so I had no idea what to expect from this one, other than a couple of plot points that everyone knows by now. Only just got the sapphire, but looking forward to digging deeper into this game.
Breath of the Wild
Kind of a hidden gem from Nintendo that flew under everyone's radar. Would recommend.
Kind of a hidden gem from Nintendo that flew under everyone's radar. Would recommend.
The patch for the Switch port of Outer Worlds came out today
It's still below the other ports overall, but it is a *massive* improvement
It's still below the other ports overall, but it is a *massive* improvement
In one of the dungeons in Etrian Odyssey IV there’s a pool of water with a crayfish in it. If you try to catch it, one of your party reaches into the water and it bites them, costing you 20hp. Try again and the same thing happens. A third time, 20 more hp down the drain. On the fourth attempt you don’t get bitten, nor on the fifth. On the sixth, your character successfully pulls it from the water, the party celebrates, all is jubilation, and then the game asks “Why did you want to catch it?”, and the party release it back into the pool. You get nothing for this, and I love it.
Violentvixen
(She/Her)
That is delightful.
The recent patch has really elevated the Switch port of The Outer Worlds, what was once a technically functional game now plays... if not great, at least *vastly* better.
Like the PC version set to its lowest level.
Like the PC version set to its lowest level.
I was in the mood for a classic JRPG and Black Sigil caught my eye. I was excited for this game before it came out, but it was a little jank and so I dropped it after a couple hours. Coming back to it now more than a decade later and I'm surprised to find that it's pretty darn good and fun. A little jank sure, but it's got its hooks in me with some solid writing and interesting story, and really, pretty darn polished for a project of this type.
Dare I go as far as to say a hidden gem?
Dare I go as far as to say a hidden gem?
Disco Elysium is a literal trip, holy crap. I tried to slip away unnoticed and failed upward harder than I could've believed and couldn't breathe I was laughing so hard because THAT IS NOT WHAT I EXPECTED TO HAPPEN