Sums up my experience so far pretty nicely
Sums up my experience so far pretty nicely
8 Likes
Need some advice on if I should continue playing Tunic or not! My friend has let me try out Game Pass on the TV (which works much better than I expected, the lag on controller to action is very small, almost unnoticeable) so I thought I’d give it a go as it’s been on my list for a while. I like it, but not sure I like it enough to keep playing it.
Almost everything about it makes it the sort of game I would want to play all the way through, but the Soulslike aspect is something I do not enjoy. One boss took over 50 attempts to beat and by the time I had, it was more out of frustration than enjoyment. Both the route to get back to it and the fight itself was far to repetitive for my liking.
The world, music, how you learn about the world, puzzles, art style, exploration - literally everything else is beautiful. However my above point is a big thing for me and having played it enough to know this is going it be appearing again, I’m stuck.
So do I continue? Should I Insert Credit? I’d appreciate either side of the yes or no camp on this one!
3 Likes
i played this game on the switch, made it about 3/4 the way through - and ironically dropped it for performance issues. but there’s a setting that lets you turn off damage if you just wanna see the game, and there were a few parts where I started using it. The world is still such a vibe! If it runs well I recommend it, and just dont feel bad about the accessibility settings.
3 Likes
If the combat is a big sticking point, there is an option in the settings to effectively turn damage off as freakscene says. I did this fairly early on because the combat is one of the big things that dampened my enjoyment of the game.
I think if you’re fine basically enabling god mode and enjoying what else the game has to offer, carry on. The puzzles are sublime and the highlight of the experience in my opinion–and reason enough to keep playing.
2 Likes
I’m thinking about playing Boku no Natsuyumi 2 during this month one day IRL per one day of game when possible.
Maybe I’ll stream it, I don’t know.
5 Likes
I’m enjoying the Front Mission 2 remake on PC substantially more than when I tried playing it on the nincrapdo shit. A solid framerate, responsive cursor movement, sharp visuals, etc etc. It still looks kind of bad and budgety (in a bad way) but you can appreciate it as a representation of plastic miniatures on a gameboard, although that’s not really what the art direction is intending. The remakers are in a difficult spot bc the real strength of the original was the murky, esoteric atmosphere and mechanics in line with a lot of early PS1 3D games before pacing, camera, UI conventions were codified: there’s a lot of downtime watching animations and camera angles flop around and about 36 different fonts pop off with weird statistics + it’s a heavily twilight game visually with this moody color palette with UI elements and explosions and tracer fire burning through it. So that’s tough to A) appreciate from “normal person you want to sell the game to” perspective and B) carry forward without the original assets. To their credit, you can see they tried to preserve some weirdness and I think they smartly reeled in some of the slack at least. The cool setting + story is still intact though. Can’t think of another game that takes place future Bangladesh + has a Bengali protagonist!
12 Likes
I’m a few hours further into Nine Sols now, and it’s back to being one of my favorite games I’ve ever played. One of the boss fights is maybe my favorite boss ever, definitely in the last 5 years of gaming.
I still have 2 sols to go.
6 Likes
When I did all the levels in Nintendo World Championships: NES Edition, a Legendary mode unlocked that is a sequential run of the hardest/longest run from each game. There is one try for each level and no way to save progress halfway or consult a replay. That’s pretty hard, but yesterday I scraped together time for it. So how did I do?
- Donkey Kong - Do the three level loop. This one is pretty easy. The one thing slowing me down is the fire movement in level 3, which got in the way of ideal pathing.
- Metroid - Escaping Planet Zebes in a long vertical jump. I never played Metroid, but this one is OK. The hardest thing is regular jumping versus spin jumping, since the spin is harder to control. I’ve had better runs of this.
- Super Mario Bros. 2 - Do 1-1. It was my best run yet. I dropped the bomb right the first try for the shortcut and didn’t miss any of the Birdo hits.
- Balloon Fight - Do the first three levels. I never played this but did play Joust back in the day. I’m fine with a B+ (a C in Sega grading scale).
- The Legend of Zelda - Do the first dungeon. I’ve learned the map pretty well. For me, the key is getting to the boss with enough health to just sit there and thwack the dragon. That was a good run for me.
- Ice Climber - It’s so hard to hit just one hole and jump through it, so I usually settle for at least two. Jumping into the condor is also hard; I got it second try here.
- Super Mario Bros. 3 - Do World 1. I had a great 1-1 and 1-2, but I haven’t figured out the fast way to do 1-6 yet. It feels odd to not get either warp whistle.
- Excitebike - Do 2 laps of a track. I’ve only played this in an arcade, so I have no muscle memory at all for when to turbo. There is probably lots to optimize here.
- Kirby’s Adventure - Do the Monochrome Hero map. The first time I did this run, I didn’t know how to run by double-tapping right. Knowing that, it still feels like an improvised blunder to the finish line. I’m OK with my B (D in Sega).
- Kid Icarus - Do the Underground Fortress. So I aborted a prior run of this map when I got lost and realized I had backtracked. 2D grid maps that aren’t top-down confuse me. This run was much smoother. I stopped and healed, which lost a little time, but meant less caution when I got to the boss.
- Super Mario Bros. The Lost Levels - Do 8-2. So I totally goofed up here because I forgot the trick of the level and looped it twice before coming back and doing what I needed to. You have to stomp a turtle mid-air and hit the brick block above it to grow the vine to proceed. Here is how the help guide I couldn’t read while running it explains: (ETA. My best run of this is 26 seconds, not 4 minutes 40.) I was bemused with myself, but I only had two runs to go, so I kept going.
- Zelda II: The Adventure of Link - Do Parapa Palace. This one is fun and not a bad one to remember: go all the way left, go right, go up for a key, go down for a boss. The hardest part for me is hitting enemies with shields, since I needed to do a jump where I attack as I’m descending to hit their head.
- Super Mario Bros. - Run the whole game using the warps in 1-2 and 4-2. I like this one a lot. I have 1-1, 1-2, and 8-4 pretty well down, and 4-1 and 4-2 aren’t bad. I have little muscle memory for 8-1 through 8-3, so I lose most of my time there blundering through hammers and what are still for me blind jumps.
I wasn’t an NES-owning kid, so I’ve mostly just played Zelda, the Mario games, and Donkey Kong out of this collection. Out of the ones I hadn’t played, the one I’d be most likely to pick up and play through is Zelda II, which tickles my Cadash muscle memory. Metroid is OK; I’ve played enough Super Metroid to appreciate what it’s doing. The others are interesting as a slice of gaming history but aren’t something I’d play for long. It’s funny that adding a timer and cutting out slices of these games makes them more palatable, but it does!
8 Likes
I played through the first area in World of Goo 2. So far it’s very similar to the first game but they’ve introduced some fun new mechanics (such as the ability to build pipelines that siphon liquid around).
The original game is one I like to revisit every few years, at least in theory, so it’s nice to have a lot of new levels. I look forward to seeing what other new things come later.
2 Likes
@freakscene @Synchronise Thank you both for the advice on that one. You’ll be pleased to know having found the “No Fail Mode” option and turning it on I am enjoying the game even more than before. You can still take damage but when it is empty you simply carry on playing, it’s an amazing concept! I don’t see it as a God Mode selection, more something that removes the worry of having to repeat sections over and over and leads to becoming frustrated with a game which doesn’t deserve to be felt about that way.
One strange effect no playing in No Fail Mode, I found that for bosses and harder enemy fights I actually play better knowing I cannot lose, makes me want to try harder!! Not sure if anyone else got this from applying this setting but it has really changed how I look at the game and just makes it even more wonderful.
Now if you’ll excuse me, I have a day off from everything and I plan on getting comfy, picking up a controller and enjoying more of this beautiful game =)
6 Likes
Enjoy the ride gamer
3 Likes
So, I’ve recently been playing REAL WEB LEGENDS: Carter’s Quest Act 1, Available here.
This game came on my radar when I saw someone I follow on twitter RT the developer’s art of a hot goblin (who doesn’t appear in game!). I’m normal. It’s in Early Access right now, with only Act 1 being playable right now.
It was just released on Friday, and I’ve gotten to the end credits so I feel fine about talking about it. I like it a lot so far, it’s sort of a Legend of Zelda Ocarina/Devil May Cry/Esoteric action-RPG game. The term N64 or PS1 throwback has been thrown around for it, but to me it feels like a game that started development on PS1 before the development team was forced to hastily move it to the PS2. I mean this in the best possible way.
The combat is very Devil May Cry to the point where the first encounter I had, I hit back on the left analog stick and x instinctively and was happy to see it used as a launcher. The combat isn’t always smooth and some of the moves you can buy in the combo system don’t flow especially well, but it’s all being improved on all the time.
I don’t feel entirely grabbed by the story, but the game world and fine aspects are interesting enough to keep me going and I suspect I’ll warm up to them more in the future. There’s some charming and weird characters along the way and I’m especially looking forward to more Games Goblin as more game acts releases and more content is added to the game.
I also appreciate the fact that Goba has made an effort to make all the male characters attractive and put them in slutty outfits. That’s right, they finally made a game just for the fellas. The sluttiest outfit you can get in the game is the naked costume, the main drawback of which is that I constantly keep taking screenshots when Carter is wearing it during any cutscene, especially when the model is off just enough to make him cross-eyed.
It’s not a huge game at the moment, I get the feeling there’s a lot of stuff I haven’t been able to find and the signposting for that stuff could be baked-in better. It’s playable, but still very much in early access. The developer has been great in responding to bug reports though, and one of the bugs I reported has already been fixed. Also, the camera system is constantly being worked on. At launch it was rough, but there have been enough hotfixes to make it much more manageable. I’m planning on giving it a week or two before firing it up again to see what changes there are, but I’m cautiously excited for what’s coming down the pipeline.
6 Likes
I just finished up Dirge of Cerberus last night.
That game sure is a game!
And by that i mean, I really like it.
I don’t think there’s too much that’s really “great” about it but it’s all around a very fun time to me.
There’s one boss fight that i think is absolute garbage but that’s really my only complaint.
The final level’s really cool and it’s very hard to be killed.
I love when a final level just makes you feel like a badass; like nothing can possibly stop you.
Not that it’s really a difficult game in the first place.
But one-shotting stuff while a Gackt song is playing is pretty cool.
Everytime I complete a ps2 game i think “WoW! What a cool console!” and i consider selling all of my other consoles.
7 Likes
Thinkin’ bout playin’ Resident Evil: Code Veronica. Just played the first three REs, might as well hit that one next, right? But maybe I’m on the cusp of getting burnt out on the series and should pause while I’m ahead.
Or maybe I should take the slightly surer bet and try RE Zero first. But I’m thinkin’ bout Code Veronica most of all. That, and finally moving my Parasite Eve save off my handheld’s SD and onto my computer so I can finish it more comfy-like.
3 Likes
I finished FF7 Rebirth but the discourse has moved on so I can’t chat with you all about it!
Had a bit of a weird gaming hangover after that as that was basically the only game I played since it came out and it took me a while to even want to play something.
But I started Animal Well last night. It’s great. If you play online games on the PlayStation you have access to it because it’s included with the “+ Extra Money” tier. Go try it out!
9 Likes
I’ll happily discuss Rebirth with anyone.
3 Likes
Done with Final Fantasy 4, and I ended up liking it quite a lot. The second half is more interesting, although that’s partly because I started turning off random battles after a certain point.
I’ve heard people say this is the first “real” Final Fantasy game in terms of narrative, but one thing holding it back is the complete lack of hangoutitude. The best part of FF is seeing your party members vibe with each other, and these guys only really talk about the main quest. I would have appreciated some campfire scenes.
Also it does the annoying trope of revealing near the end that the bad guy has an even bigger bad guy that nobody has mentioned until now. And then it turns out that Zemus is actually Zeromus as though that means anything to me.
5 Likes
Wanted to say I finished Tunic today - in no small part to the advice from @freakscene and @Synchronise thank you again for that! What a truly beautiful game, which I cannot recommend enough to anyone to play. Yes I put on the “No Fail Mode”, yes I used a guide to find a few of the items but it got me the ending and for that alone it was worth it.
So glad I reached out here for some advice as otherwise I would have given up and missed out on this wonderful game.
IC - helping gamers game =)
10 Likes
played and finished nine sols over the course of my east bay visit. I think this might be my game of the year so far.
the presentation and the flowy combat are obvious sells, but what really got me here was the storytelling. there’s something about watching yi soften and contemplate the course of his life in the process of caring for his surrogate son that had me shedding actual real tears right before getting carved to bits by the final boss for a full three hours. it helps that this game is awash in Chinese mythology and the philosophy of the tao, there’s meaning almost everywhere you look.
it’s not something I could really articulate off the cuff, I think, but I’ll give it a shot. nine sols is not just a story about something but it’s a story about something very, very human, a modern container for a lot of old and profound ideas about accepting meaning in whatever form it may come. as yi the archer struggling to bring down the sky, not only to right my past wrongs but to also accept what I cannot change about them, to find perspective, to find someone new to care about and something worth passing down in light of terrible mistakes made in good faith, i felt a strange sense of peace in reflecting on my own trainwreck of a life and why remembering might be worth more than I could allow myself to believe in the past. maybe even as I struggle to change, it’s actually ok for me to be here, now, as I am, imperfect, with eyes open
cool game cute cat people good son
6 Likes
Yessirr. I definitely am the world’s supreme guide enthusiast and I think that’s fine, even in a game like Tunic. I was even more sacrilegious with Void Stranger and it is still probably the best thing I’ve played this year.
2 Likes