Aja on 30/9/2022 at 00:21
I love that they included some Rally Trophy tracks as well. That game was so good back in the day.
Jason Moyer on 30/9/2022 at 02:50
Rally Trophy is still good, I wish Bugbear would make a proper rally game again.
Thirith on 3/10/2022 at 07:16
Still enjoying Return to Monkey Island a lot, but there are a couple of puzzles that do something I dislike in adventure games: you have to do the same thing more than once in order to get results. I don't mean doing the same thing in different places or in different contexts, or even doing the same thing and you get some sort of joke from the repetition, just that you have to do the same thing several times for it to work. And that's not my favourite kind of puzzle design by far. In an adventure, if I do something once and it doesn't quite work I then go off to look for alternative solutions and additional actions. I don't think of just repeating the exact same "Use X with Y" action, because I've done it once and obviously it wasn't enough.
[spoiler]It's not the worst case of this, but I already ran into this with the monocle that I needed to read the numbers on some locks, and then later I need to use *two* monocles to read a lock with smaller numbers. I don't expect that the solution to the puzzle is to grab a second monocle where I grabbed the first one, because that's boring puzzle design. I expect that I need to find some kind of magnification device somewhere else and combine it with my first monocle, but just "Use monocle 1 with monocle 2"? Snooze.
The bit where it *really* annoyed me was in the hold of LeChuck's ship, where I had to grease the porthole several times for it to work. Again: where's the fun in this? Where's the cleverness? I thought I might have to grease the floor and then use it to work up some speed so I can get out of the greased porthole - but just repeating the original action 3-4 times? What's the point? How is this sort of puzzle design interesting or fun or anything really?[/spoiler]
Also, the digital version of Gloomhaven is probably pretty nifty if you already know the game, but it does a crap job of getting a group of players used to its systems. The first mission already is tough, but it's also boringly designed. I've been playing the board game version of Gloomhaven: Jaws of the Lion, which does a much better job of introducing you to how the game plays and giving you easy missions up front, so you can get used to the systems and figure out what works. The single-player tutorials are okay (if clunky), but there should absolutely be a series of 'learner dungeons' or something along those lines to introduce a group to the game, rather than a first mission that's just a dull meat-grinder.
WingedKagouti on 3/10/2022 at 07:42
Quote Posted by Thirith
Still enjoying
Return to Monkey Island a lot, but there are a couple of puzzles that do something I dislike in adventure games: you have to do the same thing more than once in order to get results.
Could it have something to do with the difficulty setting you're playing on? Because it sounds like something that would be added to make it "harder" or removed to make it "easier". Still, I completely agree with you that it's not good puzzle design to give failure messages for trying an action but then getting a success after repeating the same action with no alterations.
Thirith on 3/10/2022 at 08:47
It's definitely possible that it's a difficulty setting thing. But yeah, it's not the difficulty that bothers me. I'm fine with adventure puzzles asking me to think outside the box, but this strikes me as the game wanting me to think inside a smaller box placed within the box I'm already in.
But, to be fair, such puzzle design is the exception (so far), and overall the puzzles are fine.
Briareos H on 3/10/2022 at 10:18
I'm at Act IV now and I can't say I'm too impressed with the puzzles, a lot of it has felt like an extended tutorial with few interdependencies. Things seem to be shaping up though. I didn't mind the monocle puzzle, grabbing a second one felt like a clever joke to me but for it to work better I think they could have had Wally replace the monocle immediately rather than needing to exit and re-enter the cartographer's shop. The grease puzzle was a bit cheap on the other hand, I still thought it communicated clearly that you could try again but it just didn't bring anything to the experience.
Everyone seems to be fine with the art style in the end, as far as I'm concerned the general style for both the environments and animations is really nice (the use of colors is gorgeous) but I still hate the character design as much as the day it was announced. That's not enough reason not to play, though. Story is great, voice acting is meh, music is fantastic. I'm overall positive about it.
WingedKagouti on 3/10/2022 at 12:34
Quote Posted by Briareos H
but I still hate the character design as much as the day it was announced.
You're not alone.
To me the character design looks like something you'd find in a cheaply produced childrens cartoon with deadlines like "We need 10 episodes animated before the end of the week", even if I know the actual work that went into the RtMI art and design is a lot more dedicated.
Thirith on 3/10/2022 at 13:29
It's not my favourite Monkey Island look, but I'm fine with the character designs. I definitely like them better than, say, Thimbleweed Park, which has a certain weird appeal, but it looked and felt too much like Maniac Mansion-era point & clicks, and I have stronger feelings about the aesthetics of the Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis and Monkey Island 2 era.
Talking of visual design: I very much dig how Sekiro has a much more Japanese flavour than other From Software games, but at the same time the aesthetic has the decaying undertone that From does so well. Visually, the game feels both new and familiar, but familiar in uncanny ways.
glslvrfan on 4/10/2022 at 21:59
Save the World mode in fortnite.
This is the most fun I've had playing a game in 15 years. ive been playing a bit over 3 months and its Its fantastic. This is the original paid version of fortnite, then battle royale exploded for those that didnt know. In simplest terms, I guess its an RPG Tower defense . Its geared heavily towards building which I hated in battle royale but is actually quite fun in this mode. Theres a mini version of the game itself, called ventures. It was made to give the players who had beaten the game a new level up progression system with rewards to power up weapons and items farther than originally intended. Anyone else still play this, or used to play?
Tomi on 5/10/2022 at 21:17
I've been playing Star Wars: Squadrons for the last couple of days.
I don't know what to think of it really. It looks great, the flying is good, it has that Star Wars feeling, but... I don't know. It's not terribly exciting and everything in it feels so scripted. I'm not particularly good at this game, but I've breezed through the first ten missions and haven't died once - oh, except in the very first mission (the flight controls take some time to get used to) and even that only took me to the latest checkpoint save from like a minute ago. The targeting system is terrible and I sometimes spend way too much time just to find the enemies or whatever I'm supposed to be targeting, yet I'm still winning these missions. If I ever get in trouble and my ship is about to blow up, I just hit the left shoulder button and my droid fixes everything in a couple of seconds. Apparently I can somehow also "call for resupply" even during a battle, and magically my ship gets fixed again and I get more missiles as well. I guess I should have chosen a harder difficulty level, but I'm not exactly a "veteran pilot". Perhaps it'll get harder later on.
Wing Commander 2 is still my favourite game in this genre after all these years. I'm a bit of a nostalgic fool for sure, but the space battles in it felt much more intense. Managing to get back home after a tough mission with your fighter full of holes was such an awesome feeling. You couldn't just fuck around if you wanted to win, there were no checkpoints to save your ass if you did, and there was none of this auto-repair nonsense. :p You could even fail missions or lose your wingman in the game and the story would just keep going. And the music was much better too. :o