Anarchic Fox on 10/10/2020 at 19:39
Apparently I have Else Heart.Break() in my library already, Qolelis. Your description is intriguing, so I'll give it a look.
qolelis on 11/10/2020 at 02:44
Good luck. I hope you find what you are looking for. I haven't played it again after posting about it, because I got distracted, but it's definitely a game I'm going to return to soon.
So, distractions: Syberia 3 was on a real steal sale and it turned out that getting a bundle of all three was cheaper, so I got the bundle (which also included some DLC and extra material) and then spent a couple of hours making 1 & 2 start and run correctly on modern hardware. The games are almost 20 years old, so not exactly made for today's machines, but I got them working.
I already own physical copies of the first two -- which I played a long time ago -- but am now going to replay them on Steam to refresh my memory before playing the third one -- which I've been putting off getting, because of bad reviews, but with it being on sale, I thought it was worth getting anyway, and it seems like most bad reviews were due to technical issues and awkward controls, while many still appreciated the story. I played it briefly and while it felt a bit off compared to its predecessors, I think it will still be good enough to be enjoyed.
I also played the (free) prologue for the upcoming Syberia 4; quite different in style, but I liked it enough to most likely get it at one time or another once it's been released.
Malf on 11/10/2020 at 07:03
Quote Posted by Tomi
No, I only played Roche's path and ignored the elven guy.
It's a bit of a hard sell, as you've only just finished one playthrough, but a second playthrough siding with Iorveth is
essential to fully appreciating the story Witcher 2's telling.
There's one thing in particular which isn't even
hinted at while playing the Roche path that completely changes how you may perceive the overall story.
Gameplay-wise, it doesn't affect a huge amount, as most areas are shared between the two paths. But the Witcher games have never really excelled at the moment-to-moment combat and exploration loop. They're all about the stories and characters, and Iorveth's path holds many hidden gems.
Starker on 11/10/2020 at 09:16
Yeah, I'd have to agree, you get a much more complete picture on the Iorveth path and I found it to be the more satisfying of the two (though perhaps it might have been in part due to Witcher 2 fatigue, as I played Roche's path last). Also, you get to hang out with Saskia.
Harvester on 11/10/2020 at 14:56
Finished Brothers: A Tale Of Two Sons. Very charming experience. Reminded me of Ico in some ways, especially the castle section. They put the central mechanics of each stick controlling a brother to good use, for some creative puzzles and a type of gameplay I haven't seen before. There are also some varied, nicely atmospheric environments that look good despite not necessarily being very high-poly with ultrasharp textures. But what I liked most is how much they created an engaging emotional experience despite the player not being able to understand the dialogue. In fact I think it added to the experience that the dialogue was not spoken or subtitled in English. I was emotionally on board for the whole ride and had a very good time with this game.
froghawk on 11/10/2020 at 15:01
Quote Posted by Starker
Yeah, I'd have to agree, you get a much more complete picture on the Iorveth path and I found it to be the more satisfying of the two (though perhaps it might have been in part due to Witcher 2 fatigue, as I played Roche's path last). Also, you get to hang out with Saskia.
I played the Roche path first and Iorveth was still much better.
Malleus on 11/10/2020 at 18:22
After finishing AC Origins, I actually got in the mood to play more of the franchise, so of the games I got for free I decided to check out Assassin's Creed 3, mostly because the main character is a native, and that's something I'm interested these days. I also stopped playing with Revelations back then after all, might as well continue there.
As I thought, Connor being a native wasn't the focus of the story, but it was still a nice inclusion. I learned some stuff about them, and I liked that they spoke their native language. As for the story itself, I think it was great idea to start with Haytham and basically show the world from the antagonists' perspective (the twist actually managed to surprise me), I think they were reasonably well written, and the conflict was pleasantly shades of gray. I also liked Connor, I just found him quite relatable. It is a bit comical sometimes how he ends up involved in every main event of the revolution, but this is not really a problem, just funny. All in all I think the story was good.
The locations, colonial Boston and the frontier, first seemed boring, but they slowly grew on me, I ended up liking them. The Frontier was particularly atmospheric, I really enjoyed just exploring it, and hunting there, especially in the winter. Speaking of hunting, there are a bunch of side activities that I enjoyed: the Peg Leg missions (short linear, but well diesgned fun quests), the Boston Brawlers (bare handed combat challenges), and the Homestead Missions (story heavy quests about people living near the Assassin HQ, it basically chronicles them becoming a real community over time). There were also ship missions too, but I wasn't a fan of those. Many of these quests involve combat, which I found to be really well done. It is based around counters, but has enough variety to make it interesting, and the character animations are top notch. I can't stress this enough, the movements are just spectacular, and every weapon type has it's own moveset.
Gameplay was a mixed bag though. Having separate slow walk and fast walk was really nice, and would've been great in Origins. But Origins had normal sprint and parkour sprint, which would've been really needed here. Many times I just wanted to sprint at street level without Connor trying to climb every random nearby object. This made chasing (or being chased) very annoying. It also has that thing where you press a direction and jump, and the character jumps in another direction. The controls in general were simply not reliable enough. I did like the tree parkour though, jumping from branch to branch. Stealth did have its problems as well. For example, a basic method of hiding is crouching into bushes. The problem is that there is no crouch button, Connor does this automatically, except when he doesn't, and you just get detected without doing anything wrong as a player. I also encountered multiple situations where I got detected when I shouldn't have been, or when I got attacked out of nowhere, even in incognito.
I gotta say, there was one mechanic that was really well done, and it's the assassin recruits. Unlike in brotherhood, ever recruit is a named character with their own story, but more importantly, they all add a unique assassin ability when recruited. For example, apart from the default assassination, you can order a sniper shot on an enemy, or call a friendly assassin to lure away guards, or the coolest one, Covert Escort: two of your buddies dress up as enemies, while you pretend to be a prisoner. You can walk into enemy strongholds like this without arousing suspicion, and cause mayhem at the desired moment.
So, as much as I ended up liking the world and the story, the unreliable controls, stealth and mechanics in general were a big annoyance, but despite these pissing me off many times, I still enjoyed the game. I guess the magic of historical adventure sucked me in, like it did with the other AC titles. It wasn't bad for "edutainment" either, as I pretty much got a crash course of the events of the american revolution while playing. After not playing AC games for nine years, and then this year playing Origins and AC3, I can definitely say I am interested in the franchise again. I still have Black Flag, Unity, and Syndicate from free promotions. I'll probably play Unity next, but we'll see...
Tomi on 12/10/2020 at 09:51
Quote Posted by Harvester
Finished
Brothers: A Tale Of Two Sons. Very charming experience.
Glad to hear that you liked it! :) I played it a couple of years ago, but I remember it fondly. It's a powerful story delivered in a rather simple way, and you're right that the "nonsense language" dialogue somehow really works. The two-stick control method is surprisingly challenging until you get the hang of it - I had some trouble with just moving towards the same target on the screen at first, but that's kind of what you'd expect to see when two kids go on an adventure together.
I just finished something called
Cat Quest. It's a cute little RPG where all the characters are cats. Cat Quest starts off quite nicely; the game looks nice, the combat system feels simple but fun enough, the cat jokes and dialogue make you smile, and the treasure and gear hunting feels exciting... You feel like there's a grand adventure waiting for you! Well, unfortunately things never really take off from there. The gameplay remains the same throughout the game, it really does get very grindy, and you spend most of the time just running back and forth the map doing very simple tasks. The combat gets really easy after a while, and the treasure hunting loses its charm when everything that you find is practically useless. Some of the dialogue is genuinely funny, but sooner or later the endless cat puns start to feel old. Fortunately the game is very short.
Inline Image:
https://steamuserimages-a.akamaihd.net/ugc/1667979838753734570/2C0AC4B6099E17196EEE91174B8C46860930AD73/Cat Quest isn't a bad game at all, but I think you'll have to be a cat person to really appreciate all the cat humour.
Pyrian on 12/10/2020 at 13:27
I got Cat Quest in some bundle or other and played through it a little while ago. It was alright! I found the combat surprisingly decent, it kept me going through even as the questing grinds (luckily you eventually get much faster map movement). I liked the Kitmas questline. Cute. They apparently made a sequel but I can't be arsed, lol.
Jason Moyer on 14/10/2020 at 08:18
Just replayed FEAR. The combat is so good it's hard to believe how much they fucked it up in the sequels. I don't know that the AI is particularly clever, but the funny chatter makes them seem that way. Plus they do actually try to flush you out with grenades and/or flank you since so many areas were designed to allow for that. Whereas in the little bit I've replayed of FEAR 2 so far, they just spawn dudes behind you periodically if you decide to go exploring. It's been 15 years or whatever and there's still nothing that really feels like the first FEAR game. The horror element is there but it's not constantly in your face with slasher/body horror. I'm going through 2 right now and it's actually kind of giving me a headache with all the vaseline-smeared-on-a-camera jump scare shit, and the actual shooting is pretty bland. It's basically any other scripted shooter except you have a slo-mo button. Anyway, I'm not trying to bitch about the other games so much as praise the original which pretty much nailed everything. So good. Early in the game a couple guys came rushing through a doorway and I popped out with a pistol and slo-mo'd a bullet into the first dude's head. Then I peeked back out to see where the other guy went and realized I managed to headshot both of them with one bullet. The game is full of moments like that that make you feel like a badass. And even though there are some short sections with armored enemies (drones, elite guys near the end), I basically spent the entire game with akimbo pistols and a shotgun in my first two weapon slots, sniping guys with the pistols and turning them into red paste with the shotgun. Mmmmm.