Jason Moyer on 1/8/2021 at 02:20
Quote Posted by Jason Moyer
Now I'm finally playing Outer Worlds, what with it being delayed by a year on Steam and all that. I'm enjoying it immensely through what I assume is most of the first planet.
Just found my first flamethrower. Went to a workbench, installed a silencer. Now I have an almost silent...flamethrower? And there are people who don't like this game?
Yakoob on 1/8/2021 at 07:10
Ok, I actually finished Dishonored 2!!! The Stilton Mansion was probably my favorite with the time traveling mechanic really fun to use (and zipping behind enemies to choke them and zip back out was super fun). The Royal Conservatory was also the best designed level, with interesting objectives and a cohesive big space you could scope out and figure out the best angle to approach it from (reminding me of the more fun Deus Ex missions that did that too).
While I finally got into the groove and overall enjoyed the game, I still think my earlier criticism holds true. A lot of spaces feel maze-like and disorienting, particularly when exploring the city - you never know if a window will be just a small room, a shortcut to a whole different street you haven't seen yet, or a 10 minute maze with a dead end and bunch of flies. It doesn't help that the bonecharm/rune markers are all over the place and half the time it's not clear how to get to them (I had a few maddening cases of literally running around whole buildings for 20 minutes because I couldn't find some obscure entrance that wasn't even part of the apartment the marker pointed to). And so many quick reloads because my choke prompt wouldn't show up, or an enemy who was facing away suddenly noticed me, or someone 30 meters away who perfectly blended into the backdrop spotted me.....
I guess, ultimately, I felt less like a sneaky assassin carrying out a well-planned heist, and more like a bumbling idiot breaking into random houses and occasionally stumbling onto their goal.
Yakoob on 9/8/2021 at 06:32
Inline Image:
https://cdn.cloudflare.steamstatic.com/steamcommunity/public/images/clans/423471/1f0cf6714f03aedcf23aaac211c11ed9d98b6406.pngSo (
https://store.steampowered.com/sale/tinyteamsfestival)
Tiny Teams event is happening on Steam, which means a bunch of new deals and new demos! I gave a few that looked interesting a whirl and here are my impressions:
Inline Image:
https://cdn.cloudflare.steamstatic.com/steam/apps/1211240/header.jpg?t=1623344110(https://store.steampowered.com/app/1211240/Trifox/) Trifox - top-down action shooter thingy where you can choose between 3 classes (melee, ranged, and a techy). I only played techy guy and it was somewhat interesting, instead of shooting at enemies you place turrets, walls and mines, trying to create choke zones or defense spots. It looks nice and has potential, but feels a tad bit slow (especially movement contrasted with the fact you're literally a fox). Hard to tell how the full game could turn out.
Inline Image:
https://cdn.cloudflare.steamstatic.com/steam/apps/1325900/header.jpg?t=1627658405(https://store.steampowered.com/app/1325900/Demon_Turf/) Demon Turf - this is a pretty solid platformer that oozes style. You're a little sassy demon girl going on a quest to defeat the evil one. The platforming feels tight and gives you good amount of mobility, and the music + art direction is solid. My only gripe is that, as nice as the game looks, it lacks cohesion. The characters are 2D drawings, but the world is 3D, but some surfaces have realistic shaders on them, but particles are super pixelated... it's all over the place, but I doubt average gamer will be as pedantic as me.
Inline Image:
https://cdn.cloudflare.steamstatic.com/steam/apps/1099640/header.jpg?t=1627202264(https://store.steampowered.com/app/1099640/Jack_Move/) Jack Move - a cyberpunk JRPG. Gorgeous art style and solid combat mechanics reminiscent bit of Nier Automata (i.e. you can install ROM chips into limited memory space to give yourself extra powers). Hard to judge story or writing from just the demo but it does feel a bit generic (dystopian cyberpunk, mention of evil corporations, your dad was some super smart scientist and evil organization wants to steal his secrets, etc. etc.) The combat is also a bit slow and imbalanced, but nothing that can't be fixed by release. Overall, seems like a very solid title to keep eye on.
Inline Image:
https://cdn.cloudflare.steamstatic.com/steam/apps/1158220/header.jpg?t=1628333593(https://store.steampowered.com/app/1158220/Kraken_Academy/) Kraken Academy - this one I had a harder time getting into. It has a nice, simple art style, but the demo basically throws you into 20 minutes of exposition. By the time you learn what the main "plot" of the game is and the main "mechanic" is (time travel?), the demo ends. I think I might just be too old to relate to a kid entering a (high?) school for the first time, and the other characters feel very... Gen Z. Also, surprisingly Russian.
Inline Image:
https://cdn.cloudflare.steamstatic.com/steam/apps/1189220/header.jpg?t=1627150666(https://store.steampowered.com/app/1189220/Exophobia/) Exophobia - Wolfenstine, but with 3 colors, slow moving bullets, and higher difficulty. I'm sure there will be a big nostalgia fanbase for this, but I wasn't one of them. Noped out after 5 minutes.
Harvester on 11/8/2021 at 17:13
I finally finished Serious Sam: The Second Encounter (HD version) after not being able to beat the final boss years and years ago (playing the regular version at the time). This time I watched a Let's Play of how to defeat the boss. The mistake I made back then was trying to defeat him while ignoring all the monsters he spawns in quick succession. After a while there simply are too many monsters to survive. From the LP I learned that I had to keep thinning the herd of monsters while unloading on the boss, in order to stay alive long enough to drain his health bar. With that strategy, I beat him in ten minutes, though it was only on Normal difficulty while the LP guy did it on Serious difficulty.
On the game itself, I had fun with it but it's not necessary to write much else about it. It's Serious Sam, you know it and you already know if it's your type of game or not. Anyway, Serious Sam 2 got middling reviews so I'm skipping that, but I'm putting Serious Sam 3: BFE on my Steam wishlist.
Now I think I'll try Little Nightmares, I got it the day it was free a while ago. If it's any similar to intelligent, atmospheric platformers like Limbo and Inside I'll probably like it.
Thirith on 15/8/2021 at 15:20
Well, I finished Dead Space 2. Or I would've, if my selection of weapons and/or upgrades had been up to the final boss. I tried 10-20 times, but I always ended up getting overwhelmed. Most of the rest of the game had been a cakewalk, so getting there and finding that none of my main weapons were up to the boss kinda put me off, so I watched the ending on YouTube and uninstalled it, which probably reflects my feelings about the game as a whole. Some nice bits, but on the whole? Nah. Not my thing.
Yakoob on 16/8/2021 at 04:56
Inline Image:
https://cdn.cloudflare.steamstatic.com/steam/apps/315860/header.jpg?t=1465923387So I just beat a 2015 game called
(https://store.steampowered.com/app/315860/Celestian_Tales_Old_North/) Celestial Tales: Old North and it's an interesting, albiet conflicting one. It's a JRPG without (most of) JRPG tropes, set in a more realistic and, at times grim, medieval world. You lead a group of squires in training all from different backgrounds and personalities, as war brews in the kingdom.
Inline Image:
https://cdn.cloudflare.steamstatic.com/steam/apps/315860/ss_764ddfeb193772e540d94813d35ffeee154dba04.600x338.jpg?t=1465923387There's hints of greater intrigue ala GoT and everything feels mostly grounded, save for a few cringe trope-y moments (like
winning a war with power of MUSIC). I like how it actually does touch on the social-class issues of the time, instead of brushing it away like most fantasy JRPGs (none of the "and nobles and villages lived happily together!"). The 6 characters you lead are all archetypes, but done well enough to enjoy their banter, with one being an enjoyably hateable protagonist (I swear to god if
Aria was born in 1930s Germany she'd be the first signing up to join the Nazis).
I think the biggest beef I have with the game is that it all feels like a ~6hr long exposition. You complete a major story arch, you finish your squire training and become a knight, then a new twist throws the kingdom into chaos, your new important task is revealed, an- THE END!
Inline Image:
https://cdn.cloudflare.steamstatic.com/steam/apps/315860/ss_2805d5e71edc15644b804d692b3c8381a271afa6.600x338.jpg?t=1465923387What's particularly shitty is that the game leads on to feeling there's a lot more that you missed. You only explore a chunk of the map (with markers for areas you can't go to), part of the main city is blocked off with a guard literally telling you to "check back later," there is a big decision you have to make and the game warns you it will impact things later, there's a hint of magic and "other worlds," a key character gets exiled and suggest you might run into him later... there's just SO many chekov guns planted in the story that never come to fruition. So it feels like you just got blue balled really hard.
I guess there is a second game that came 5 years later that seems to carry forward, but I can imagine how frustrating it must've been playing in 2015 and waiting half a decade for a sequel :x
henke on 16/8/2021 at 06:15
Quote Posted by Harvester
Now I think I'll try
Little Nightmares, I got it the day it was free a while ago. If it's any similar to intelligent, atmospheric platformers like Limbo and Inside I'll probably like it.
It's like an off-brand Playdead game, yeah. It's got some neat moments here and there, well worth playing, but it probably won't stick with you like Limbo or Inside.
I've been replaying
The Last Guardian, which looks and runs great on PS5. It's a shame this wasn't as big a hit as Ico or SOTC, but the gameplay does require a certain fondness/patience for the procedural animation and animal AI of Trico.
Also suddenly felt a nostalig pang for the 1998 Breakout-clone
DX-Ball 2, so I looked it up on Steam and noticed there's a (
https://store.steampowered.com/app/922400/DXBall_2_20th_Anniversary_Edition/) 20th Anniversary Edition. This edition introduces some new gameplay tweaks like letting you impact the ball's trajectory with a magnet in your paddle. Initially I didn't like the idea of any newfangled tweaks like this interfering with my nostalgic experience, but after a few games I gotta say this is a great addition. It gives you something else to do when you've got your ball in the upper part of the screen besides just "wait and hope for the best". It makes the game much more engaging and less passive. I ended up sinking a bunch of hours into this over the weekend. :)
demagogue on 16/8/2021 at 07:24
I've been playing some Death Trash. It's still in early access, but I think it's pretty complete, at least as far as I've gotten for the first several hours. It has a vibe of the original Fallouts.
The world has undergone some kind of "bleeding" event, and there is a mass of flesh and mutants everywhere, and robots have kind of taken over the place... Kind of SS2 like, now that I think about it. It's 3/4 perspective RPG-lite, where most of it you are treking through wastelands and bandit camps with roving mutants and bandits, using stealth tech or circling around bad guys to set up a quick series of take downs before you get overrun (kind of like a light version of Hotline Miami).
It has a pretty cool blend of scifi, western, and fantasy tropes. I don't know if I'd call the style slick; it's like it was made by someone that's not really an artist but tried very hard to nail a specific art style with a lot of passion and commitment. And it definitely has a style. It's got a kind of wry humor to it, but mixed in with serious moments.
Well I've liked it so far. It strikes me as being made by one person or a really small team, but they definitely have a strong vision for it. It appears to have a world bigger than it is, but we'll see how big they can make the whole game. I like it's imagination though. It's making this old genre feel pretty fresh. And to its credit its kept hack and slash gameplay at the center, along with lots of dialog and mini-storytelling with lots of quirky characters.
Thirith on 16/8/2021 at 07:31
I also like the Playdead games (or at least Inside) better than Little Nightmares, but aesthetically I absolutely think that Little Nightmares stands with them. Its world and especially its characters have a tactility that is still rare in games.
What doesn't sit well with me as far as Little Nightmares is concerned is the way it uses imagery that clearly recalls the Holocaust (especially the heaps of shoes) to tell a story that mainly works as a dark fairytale. Sure, you can read all of the game as being about some real-world horrors, but I don't think such a reading holds up to close scrutiny, because the game doesn't have anything much to say about what it alludes to. It works better if it just leans into the Tim Burton thing: mood and aesthetic.
faetal on 16/8/2021 at 17:34
I'm playing Dishonoured and Days Gone.
Not much I need to say about the former as it is well known here, suffice to say that I am getting a mixed Thief / DX / Bioshock vibe from it.
I'm not great at stealth, but am following advice to just roll with the fuck-ups rather than save spam and that is working for me so far.
Lots of people are dying mind...
Days Gone is really doing it for me. Feels a lot like State of Decay, but without the pain in the ass base maintenance stuff. It does suffer from being Yet Another Zombie Game, but there are good mechanics and it is pretty immersive outside of some mantling niggles and questionable UI choices.
