I can only imagine it’s on purpose! But as far as I’m concerned, it’s borderline dirty pool.
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It’s a kind way to say, “Hey, this is what this game is like, and if you don’t like it, maybe it’s not for you” within the 2-hour Steam refund window (sorry to all the console players).
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i found out that the big overworld bosses in xenoblade x have a global w/l ratio in their info pages and i think that would be so sick in elden ring
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Yeah the tracks are great. Weirdly enough I really like the sound of the sirens and how it blends into the prep theme.
Well let me know when you hit day 100 because I am curious to know what you think.
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I put another 90 or so into Clair Obscur, finishing the first boss, taking my first jaunt through the world map, and progressing a little further beyond that. I’m getting into the rhythms of the game’s combat now, and it feels great. I didn’t expect I’d have much fun with the parry mechanics, since that’s always a struggle, but at least so far I’m finding that attacks are telegraphed well, so I can actually hit them sometimes
And, damn do they feel good! I’m not nailing them often (and missing dodges frequently enough), but the system and animations feel pretty fair so far and quite satisfying
I’m also wholly onboard with the story and characters thus far. The writing is impressive, too: so far it has the maturity that Final Fantasy XVI tried to achieve while not quite getting there. They’re getting a lot of characterization into relatively sparse dialogue, and I can already see things being set up for character growth just a few hours in. I’m enjoying Gustave far more than Clive, too, which in part is probably because there are actual party members here
It’s hard not to think about Final Fantasy more generally while playing this. Even the way character movement works, with just a little bit of jank, becuase they were focused on other parts of the experience, reminds me of FFX through FFXIII or so
Hitting the world map was also strangely emotional. I don’t consider myself someone who really longs for such older trappings of the genre, but I think deep down part of me was waiting all this time for a new game to do it again
All in all, it’s quite striking how much of an impression the game is having just a short ways in. I’m trying to limit my PS5 time, though, so I’ve been doing most of my gaming on my Steam Deck. Hopefully, I can start getting an hour or two in more regularly because I very much want to see more of this one
In the meantime I’ve continued plugging away at Baldur’s Gate 3. I’m near the close of Act 2 and still having an all right time, though I’m also rubbing up against some of the dissonance between this game and its predecessors (namely, in Act 2, the portrayal of Shar, and what it portends for the game’s greatest sin in Act 3 with Viconia). I do think playing it in shorter bursts on the Deck as opposed to hours on my PC is doing the game a lot of favors, though
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Today I played Max Payne 1 out of curiosity. Put it down after the first half.
This game sucks, but it sucks in a student film sort of way where it’s obvious that Remedy will make great art… someday. Not back in 2001 though.
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Max Payne 1 is for me a game that sucks and rules at the same time. I find the comic book presentation and cheesy dialogue charming and the bullet time thing works much better than I expected. The dream sequences were also unexpectedly dark even for a dumb shooter game. That said, there is a certain section of the game that is so frustrating to get through that I basically deleted the game out of spite and have not looked back. Alan Wake imo approaches that same delicate balance of goofy-serious but I have to admit Max Payne 1 walked that line in a more entertaining way… I wish I had the patience to go back to the series.
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I’m glad they made it, because developers need to go through an experimental phase of seeing what works and what doesn’t. You certainly wouldn’t get Alan Wake or Control without this.
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I won’t say anything because I expect a plot twist, but once I finish the route I’m going to tell you.
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i went back to Peppered a lil bit after the update. it fixed a couple of my gripes like more controls to remap. it still has issues here as you cant rebind up, down, or confirm, so although im using arrow keys and zxc i have to use w/s and space for menuing and some interactions which isnt great. and idk, i think ive just been soured by this and some of the other gripes i had which sucks cause it is kinda cool. ill probs need to leave it for a while until ive cooled off a bit
also been playing lilac 0, a fun shmup that came out recently. its my 2nd shmup (the first being angel at dusk (great but it just didnt hit the same way lilac 0 has for whatever reason)) and i really love it. managed each stage on normal and going to hard now. and its got its grips in me enough i kinda wanna try for a 1cc
imma try the new lunacid soon then who knows. ive too many games to get to. 1000x resist probs tho
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I played Peppered on Steam Deck and didn’t feel the need to rebind anything, but the controls kind of suck anyway. It’s a Shane because the game has some very clever level design ideas that would rule if the Star Thief felt better to control.
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Dove into my backlog tonight and ended up bouncing right off two games due to control issues.
The first (name withheld because it’s below my threshold to publicly bitch about) progressed from me noting the Steam screenshot key advanced the text, to noticing that pressing alt-tab to check if this was a known issue also advanced the text, to noticing that every single input I used while scrolling the steam forums also advanced the text…
The second, The Bookwalker, seems very neat. But I’m stuck between breaking my wrist holding Left Trigger constantly while moving or a fixed WASD should be enough for anything scheme on kb+m.
Eventually I settled on Creepy Redneck Dinosaur Mansion 3, which is good fun, with some very clever writing. Though I feel that when the main premise and gimmick is revealed, the game does not adequately communicate which meta-layer it operates on.
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Started Clair Obscur last night while I was very tired and played about an hour. I was incredibly distracted by the really bad aliased background blur and janky animations. I just can’t ignore it. I also thought the opening took itself too seriously and I couldn’t care about the tragedy because I couldn’t even remember the characters’ names yet.
This is still super early though and it quickly got more interesting when the expedition landed and immediately makes you ask questions. I can appreciate some expedience in skipping the traditional long and slow JRPG opening. It’s the Very Serious Film School Project vibes that had me eye rolling.
The 2 hour windows is approaching and I’m thinking of refunding but it could take a couple more hours to give the game a fair first impression.
Also no FSR? WTF?
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i definitely turned off the blur and, idk, some grainy film effect or something.
i was feeling oppressed by the atmosphere untillllll the second little dungeon, its just this side of undah da seaaa and has this really nice little steel drum esque battle music. it all has lightened up significantly from there. in a village of weird little guys at the moment.
idk if that helps! you’d be very close to 2 hours!
Turning off the blur would be great. Is there a menu option for it that I missed?
I think I can learn to live with the bad run and idle animations, but that blur. Oof. I love a good bokeh, but it’s just so distracting.
Played my second session of Clair Obscur today.
I’m still a fan of the diorama view for the overworld and the music continues to be a highlight as well. I’m starting to get better at dodging. Some of my problems during the last session were caused by pretty bad performance and lag. I tweaked some of the graphics settings and now it’s running relatively smoothly and dodging became easier.
I entered the second area and the combat system opened up a bit more. I’m starting to really like it. I felt pretty confident in my improved battle performance after I fought one of these big guys that eat your party members but I quit the session after being repeatedly beaten to death by a chromatic troubadour with its trumpet. There’s definitely room to grow.
The general setup and world are pretty intriguing to me. The game definitely is good at making you wonder about different aspects of how its world works. I love that so far most lore and storytelling has been very show don’t tell. No endless bioshock voice memos explaining to me how the Nevrons are this and the Gestrals are that. I like it.
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You know, i read your post too fast - I turned off motion blur. There’s not a setting for background blur but I did find the whole thing way more palatable with just like all of those filters and effects turned off.
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edit: no you know what that’s too spoilery potentially
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I’ve played the whole game twice and I’m still not entirely sure what the deal is with Gestrals. I love that this game doesn’t have a codex explaining all of the worldbuilding, which has been a trend for a while in games but I greatly prefer figuring things out through context.
And yes, I had to spend five minutes in menus getting the graphics to look decent. The default settings did not vibe.
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