What are you playing?

[tiesto]

I beat Snatcher last night... what a fantastic game. It's extremely Kojima, and it was nice to actually see an "ACT III" in a Kojima game after that last one I played

The amount of voice acting in a game of that vintage is crazy, too.

[Positive Touch]

the va in that game is still better than most other contemporary games tbh. if you know any other old games that capture that late 80s sci-fi feel as well as Snatcher I'd  love to hear them bc tbh that's my favorite thing about the game

[tiesto]

the va in that game is still better than most other contemporary games tbh. if you know any other old games that capture that late 80s sci-fi feel as well as Snatcher I'd  love to hear them bc tbh that's my favorite thing about the game

There's SD Snatcher on the MSX, which is more of a turn-based RPG but seems to follow the original quite closely. Don't know how it is but apparently there's a fan translation. Also, there's Rise of the Dragon on PC and Sega CD (I remember someone installed this on the 386's in my middle school Tech Ed class, and we all got busted for playing this in class!)... it's from Dynamix (Willy Beamish) and has that early 90's cyberpunk thing going on, too, but it's been so long since I played I don't remember how good it was.

[archie4208]

Final Fantasy X is as schlocky as I remember (maybe even moreso) but I'm still unironically enjoying it.   

[Rufus]

I've been craving some 2D action lately, so I finally played Popful Mail after putting it on the list ten or more years ago. Whenever it was that I read the Hardcoregaing101 article on it. It's simple, colourful fun. Also, definitely from a different era. You can immediately tell that it's been localized by Working Designs. They snuck in a prostitution joke within the first 10 minutes. There's also a bit of dialogue later on where characters call each other distinguished mentally-challenged, which threw me for a second. Definitely from a different era, this one.
One thing that bothers me a lot are the difficulty adjustments WD have made. Enemies doing more damage is one thing, but they also tweaked the invincibility frames such that they're almost useless. If an enemy doesn't speed through you, you will get stunlocked and killed within a couple of hits. This is especially bad if you accidentally jump on one, since you're going to eat at least two hits for it. Thankfully you can save at any time, otherwise this would be unbearable.

[tiesto]

Yeah, Popful was a bit of a tough one to beat, due to the enemies doing a ton of damage. WD balance changes
If I knew enough about hacking I'd love to go and dump WD's translations into the original Japanese Popful Mail (and Exile: Wicked Phenomenon) without the balance modifications.

I started playing Breath of Fire 4, about 7 or so hours in... apart from its stunning graphics (even the 3D looks good), it's pretty mediocre. Story isn't grabbing me, the combat has this thing where to learn skills you have to guard and wait for enemies to attack. Encounter rate is extremely steep, combat seems to have a lot of lagging, and navigation sucks - control is stiff, you can only rotate the camera at 90 degree angles (and everything is in an isometric perspective), camera rotation is slow, this is made even worse because every environment is super confined with multiple layers, frequently it's hard to tell where to go unless you're CONSTANTLY rotating the camera. Not to mention the game has 'minigames' at every step. I hope it picks up soon, but so far this is my least favorite in the franchise (I have played all the others except 2).

[Rufus]

I have a soft spot for BoF4 because it's the first one in the series I played. It has its moments (and I love the style), but the biggest one is pretty far into the game. When you finally find Nina's sister. I also remember liking the combo system quite a bit. There are certain combinations that let you hit triple digit combos, but only on certain enemies. I don't remember the purpose for that though. I think you get something for high combos... bonus XP, more items? Hm.

[Positive Touch]

I've been craving some 2D action lately, so I finally played Popful Mail after putting it on the list ten or more years ago. Whenever it was that I read the Hardcoregaing101 article on it. It's simple, colourful fun. Also, definitely from a different era. You can immediately tell that it's been localized by Working Designs. They snuck in a prostitution joke within the first 10 minutes. There's also a bit of dialogue later on where characters call each other distinguished mentally-challenged, which threw me for a second. Definitely from a different era, this one.
One thing that bothers me a lot are the difficulty adjustments WD have made. Enemies doing more damage is one thing, but they also tweaked the invincibility frames such that they're almost useless. If an enemy doesn't speed through you, you will get stunlocked and killed within a couple of hits. This is especially bad if you accidentally jump on one, since you're going to eat at least two hits for it. Thankfully you can save at any time, otherwise this would be unbearable.

i replayed lunar 2 ps1 last year and it threw me because they used that particular insult plenty of times. was pretty ugly.

also had the same shitty wd rebalancing... :\

[demi]

lunar 2 is weakazz compared to the first anyway.

[Positive Touch]

no demi that is an awful fucking lie. i will allow that if you're speaking solely about the ps1 versions, but only bc lunar 2 has wd's fucked difficulty rebalancing and it refused some assets from the Sega cd versions. otherwise it's a fucking awesome game that's just as fucking awesome as the first one BACK THE FUCK OFF

[demi]

Zophar is lame compared to Ghaleon the goat

spoiler (click to show/hide)

[close]

[Positive Touch]

well no one can argue that

[Rufus]

So, Popful Mail and I might be going seperate ways already...

The boss I'm stuck on now is passive until you hit him. His face is also his only weak point. You hit him, he gets mad, stomps the ground. A from what I can tell completely random pattern of rocks falls. He then chases you and spits three fire balls. He repeats this once or twice, calms down, turns his back, and slowly - one step every coule of seconds - walks to his starting position. You can do nothing but watch until he turns around again.

This would actually be  funny if not for the fact that you do shit damage but get hit like a truck yourself. So you either play extremely cautiously/lamely and draw out the fight for ages (the strategy works for every boss, just doesn't take as long), or try your luck by gobbling health items, praying that you don't get stunlocked. WD actually ruined this fight with their sardonic difficulty adjustments. Shame, as it's been a charming little game so far.

[Bebpo]

Beat SMTIV Final/Apocalypse - Pretty great SMT game.  Fixes almost all the issues of IV and is a lot of fun to play.  It's still no SMT3, but that'd need a whole fresh new experience and not a FFX-2 style re-run through SMTIV's world again with a better cast, gameplay improvements and better boss fights.

Still need to get around to playing SMTxFE and then with P5 in a few months...I'm definitely gonna be good on megaten this year. 

Also still playing the every living fuck out of the new Hitman am totally convinced it's one of the most unexpected gaming masterpieces we're gonna be so lucky ever existed when it's all said and done.  Still exploring and learning new things in Ep2 Sapienza, but Ep3's release date is getting announced next week so that'll last me a while.  I'm getting about a good 15+ hours out of each episode's map in terms of depth and enjoyment.  The brains of the people who made these stages are just wow..., these could easily be the most complex maps ever designed in a videogame with all the NPC routines and mini-stories going on.  It's basically Shenmue Hitman each month.

Hitman's been so good it's why I still haven't even finished Uncharted 4.  I keep going back to Hitman.  I like U4 though, the graphics in that game damn, I don't know how the PS4 is doing it at parts.

[mormapope]

Nearing the end of Parasite Eve (of the normal game mode, will still have to do EX mode).

Weapon crafting seemed weird as fuck until a third or halfway in, what confused me was can be transferred when it came to attributes and weapon abilities. The difficulty spikes can be pretty fucked, buts it nice to see an RPG that throws you off when it comes to cherishing your character build.

Its a really quirky and fun RPG.

Dissidia 012 Final Fantasy, about five hours in. Combat system is excellent, learning curve was steep but its similar to a lot of fighting games. Play to your character's strengths, don't try too much, use basic shit well (in the case of Dissidia, map less abilities, look for more opportunities rather than going in guns blazing). Fan service done perfectly.

Papaton 2. Fucking majestic.

[Positive Touch]

your gonna regret saying the difficulty curve in pe isn't that bad when you get to the last boss. FUCK THAT LAST BOSS

[Rufus]

Made it to the last stage of Popful Mail after all. Gaw, the little blue dragon thing, turned out to be elemental in me not tearing my hair out in the ice level. He gets the strongest weapon, but he also moves the slowest, so you don't screw yourself as easily on the slippery ground. Thankfully only two levels are iced over, or I would have to rely on buying spike boots (which run out after a while, because all items do).

The bosses after Goradus have all been pretty easy outside of a floating head in the mines. That was the only actual boss fight I may have had so far, in the sense that you can't just stay still at the edge of the arena in relative safety. Fun fight, too.

[CatsCatsCats]

Elite: Dangerous is pretty and I like it

[chronovore]

Just found out dropping SR IV to "casual" difficulty adds time to all Activities, so even Dirty Olds can finish them. I could not even get to the final hard Prof. Genki's Mind Over Murder area in Gold time.

Casual Chrono finished SR IV to 1200/1200 today, all Achievements including DLC. The grindy specific weapon kill Achievements left a bad taste in my mouth, but the game is otherwise perfect. Where else can I battle hordes of T-800 Terminators and BDSM gimps, alongside my army of prostitutes and ninjas while wearing a Santa costume?

[Cerveza mas fina]

Sick day was spent playing Heroes of the Storm, Hearthstone, Starcraft 2 (Heart of the Swarm campaign) and Clash of Clans.

Also tried the Titanfall demo but although the obligatatory training was ok there were only 258 players online worldwide and I didnt fee like dling all the map packs just to play them.

[Positive Touch]

sick days when yr not too sick to game >>>>>>>>>>

[Cerveza mas fina]

Sorry murica, paid sick days

[demi]

Some places give paid sick days (often under the umbrella of "PTO") - mine does, anyway

[Cerveza mas fina]

I mean it makea sense not have a sick employee at work who can make more people sick

so you dont have to be dead sick to stay home

you also get a paid day off th first day your kid is sick and you have to stay home to take care

[Positive Touch]

i used to work at a hospital where they'd get pissed when you called in sick. like coming could literally kill people but fuck it you're mad that you're short today.  fuck America 

[Mr. Nobody]

Beat Dark Souls 3 and Uncharted 4 a few days ago and now I'm back to my PS1 backlog.

I checked out Brave Fencer Musashi for a bit a few months back but now I'm actually playing it. There's actually an in game clock/calender and the stores in the town actually work on a schedule 

[Positive Touch]

not just on hours but days of the week too! it's a pretty great action-adventure game

[CatsCatsCats]

Pretty hooked on Elite Dangerous, even though it doesn't really seem like I'm doing much

[larrydavid]

astro boy is so great. treasure is a treasure.

[tiesto]

Warming up a bit to BOF4... the dungeons, even though they are chock full of random encounters and having to navigate with sluggish movement/camera control, go by rather quickly and you're never spending more than a half hour in them. Ditto for the towns. Makes pacing a lot faster than I initially thought.

Graphics and art direction are top-notch... the sprite animations are great, the environments are detailed and full of a soft, pastel color palette... it's a shame BOF5 came out looking so hideous in comparison.

[chronovore]

Pretty hooked on Elite Dangerous, even though it doesn't really seem like I'm doing much

I played the original on my Apple II back in the day. It was transportative, even with those graphics. Somehow that planar radar system felt so groundbreaking.

[Yulwei]

wtf game? I think this is the first stat down on level up I've seen in a FF game.

Bought this on iOS earlier and I'm a little over 2 1/2 hours in. Just beat the Octomammoth. I'm already liking this waaay better than FFIII. Not having abilities gated off by a shitty job system is a huge improvement. Also, this game's combat encounters are already more engaging than 90% of the battles in III.

I see that Romancing Saga 2 remake came out already. Going to buy that after I'm done with FFIV.

[Positive Touch]

eating car litter >>> ff3 remake

I'm sooooo tempted by romancing saga 2. i always tell myself I'm gonna wait on price drops for se mobile games, but then i end up buying them in the first 24 hours anyways lol. plus i feel like I'm ready to give saga games another shot. it's been aloooong time since saga Frontier

[The Legend of Sunblade]

Finally getting around to Uncharted 4. Really neat so far.

(Image removed from quote.)

wtf game? I think this is the first stat down on level up I've seen in a FF game.

Bought this on iOS earlier and I'm a little over 2 1/2 hours in. Just beat the Octomammoth. I'm already liking this waaay better than FFIII. Not having abilities gated off by a shitty job system is a huge improvement. Also, this game's combat encounters are already more engaging than 90% of the battles in III.

I see that Romancing Saga 2 remake came out already. Going to buy that after I'm done with FFIV.

Tellah is shit. His stats gets /worse/ the more you level him up and his MP will never go above 90, so keeping him dead during battles that don't count is a valid strategy (or at least, it was on the 2D versions).

FF3 remake is shit. The NES version is infinitely superior and surprisingly fun because the Job system isnt gated by a garbage fatigue system and the remakes arbitrarily made later bosses attack x2 "just because" even though they didn't in the original.

[octopushover]

killed pontiff sullyvan in one attempt 

easiest boss for me so far is what people call one of the hardest

[qq more]

I saw the FF3 remake on the NVIDIA Shield's store the other day and thought of buying it because I wanted some nice rpg on the system. Decided not to for some reason, I guess I dodged the bullet there 

[Bebpo]

Finished Severed - Was ok.  I like the dungeon crawler swipe combat cut off limbs and use them for upgrades concept and the art/music/setting, but the battles were kind of frustrating in parts, especially since I'm not a huge touch gamer fan. 

Started up some new stuff for the weekend:

Wolfenstein TNO: The Old Blood - Couple hours in and enjoying this pretty well.  Reminds me what a fun game The New Order was.  The only thing I hate is the mandatory stealth stuff.  I still love playing this by lowering the difficulty and just going run n' gun like oldschool Wolf & Doom.  Running around with dual shotguns, sliding on the ground taking out dozens of guys is super nostalgia great and the story/characters stuff like TNO is nice because I like story in my games as long as it's not intrusive or super lame.

Nier - June is gonna be the month where I finally play through Nier.  I played the first hour like a year ago but didn't get back to it.  Played the 2nd hour or so tonight (met Kaine).  Not sure what I think this early on.  The combat against grunts seems pretty crap, I wish magic was more smoothly integrated into combat thus giving a larger combo moveset.  Like I got the punch arm magic and I thought cool I can integrate punches into my combos but no it still has the some pause startup that the lance magic has, boss fights seem fun though, story is real interesting, music is amazing for the first 5-10 mins in an area and then gets sort of repetitive, seems like a lot of running around on the map between areas.  I'm skipping all the sidequests because I hear their dumb and I'm mostly interested in the story so I'll focus on running through the main plot.

ACIV Freedom Cry - After Uncharted 4 I was kind of in a pirate mood and I never got around to a bunch of DLC stuff (hence The Old Order) and I generally like good DLC because they're short.  Man, old AC is really fucking hard to go back to after Unity even though I don't like Unity!  Just feels all stiff running around and combat and stealth sucks coming from stuff like Hitman and MGSV and even Uncharted 4.  And then everything is like repeat this stuff over and over, fail conditions, eavesedropping, etc... and I think maybe I'm out.  Might give it another session but yeah I think may never get to Freedom Cry or Rogue because of how dated they feel post Unity/Syndicate engine.

[brob]

nier's dumb side quests are good actually, when people complain it's usually just because one particular side quest is wild trolly (it requires u to change system clock and it has RNG, so u might have to do it three or more times), most of them are fine and some of them are real neat. and the combat doesn't get good but it's inoffensive at worst.

[Positive Touch]

^look at these evil evil lies

Nier's sidequest stories can occasionally be fun or interesting, but they'll always have you doing one of two things: grinding monsters, or running back and forth between one of the other towns. they're boring. as fuck.

as for the rest of the game, it has a lot of neat ideas but fails at damn near all of them. gameplay is clunky and repetitive at best. your first playthrough will have you going thru dungeons twice, and to do all the new game + runs and see all the story you'll have to run thru them at least three more times.

even still the game has lots of charm and weirdness, so it's at least with going thru once.

[Rufus]

The additional playthroughs are really quick though. And the OST made running errands enjoyable enough.

Also, yout gotta respect boar drifting.

[brob]

first of all, fite me pos 

secondly, nier is trashy in many ways, but it's all ways i find tolerable. the combat isn't demanding so it's whatever to fight ten waves or fifteen and going from place to place isn't really an issue since u can boar it. the drakengard games are shitty, nier is janky in a lovable fun euro-jank kinda way.

[Bebpo]

Do you need to do a side quest to unlock boar riding?  I don't get that option just being near them.

[demi]

Yup

Nier is amazing. Play till the very, very end.

(And backup your save)

[demi]

Gotta post the amazing field music too

[Bebpo]

Yup

Shoot, guess I'll do some quests until I at least get this and make field traversal quicker.

[demi]

I've just sent back Star Fox Zero to GameFly.... I couldnt even finish the game. It's absolute fuckin trash. The only other game I've done that to is Ninja Gaiden 3.

[Joe Molotov]

I've just sent back Star Fox Zero to GameFly.... I couldnt even finish the game. It's absolute fuckin trash. The only other game I've done that to is Ninja Gaiden 3.

No cheevos, no cry. 


I started playing Ar Nosurge the other day when my Internet was down, it's p. good. And by that I mean that's it's totally fucking weeb. I have no idea how any of the sub-systems work, shit is all over the place. I just hit buttons until I win enough battles to get to the next cutscene.

[Freyj]

I loved every second of Nier. The sidequests never once bothered me and I'm absolutely not someone who would usually say that. The NPCs and their quests / quest items add good depth to the story. Not that it needs added depth, but it's nice.

Also, it's simple but the way the lyrics to Devola's song meld into the Village's background music as you move closer to her in the town square is so good. 

[Bebpo]

Yeah, I started doing quests and they seem easy, quick and harmless enough.  Only reason I was avoiding them was I remember last time I was going to play Nier a few people highly recommended that I skip the sidequests.

[Bebpo]

One thing I really like about Nier is how the art design is straight out of Ico/SoTC.  The graphics may be PS2 in detail, but the environment design makes it looks super cool.  Also the gritty detail 2.5d stuff makes me want another Valkyrie Profile.

The loading though  ....sometimes I think it should be called Now Loading the game.  Too bad the game never got ported to the PC.  Maybe the loading is better on the X360 version.  Playing PS3 version.  Wait, lemme check if the game is installed.

[Bebpo]

oh shit, it wasn't installed.  No wonder.  Man, could've had a lot better loading experience for the last 3 hours if I realized this blargh.  Felt like early PS2 loading days!  I just got to Seafront the 3rd town.

[chronovore]

One thing I really like about Nier is how the art design is straight out of Ico/SoTC.  The graphics may be PS2 in detail, but the environment design makes it looks super cool.  Also the gritty detail 2.5d stuff makes me want another Valkyrie Profile.

The loading though  ....sometimes I think it should be called Now Loading the game.  Too bad the game never got ported to the PC.  Maybe the loading is better on the X360 version.  Playing PS3 version.  Wait, lemme check if the game is installed.

oh shit, it wasn't installed.  No wonder.  Man, could've had a lot better loading experience for the last 3 hours if I realized this blargh.  Felt like early PS2 loading days!  I just got to Seafront the 3rd town.

I was pretty sure PS3 installs automatically. It was one of the "features" Sony touted, because HDDs were optional on 360 but every PS3 had one by default. Hence, PS3 users get to sit through an install before the game can launch, and then any number of updates downloaded at PSN's 14.4Kb modem-like speeds, before they can ever actually play the game.

Is this some kind of "partial install"?

[Bebpo]

No, that's PS4.  PS3 you had to optionally go into options and install.  I actually checked in options while playing and didn't see an install option.  I think it only shows up under options on the title screen.

[tiesto]

Now I'm at the point in BOF4 where the story is really taking off and I'm seeing some pretty sad moments in it. World design and graphics continue to impress. A little ways into Act III.

Gameplay is still a bit sluggish and nearly every fight can be beaten by attack/heal, though.

[CatsCatsCats]

Omg I'm loving Elite: Dangerous. Did a bunch of bounties, got a bunch of cool upgrades and a new ship -- gonna keep doing bounties to get a few more upgrades I want then I'm gonna head out to deep space

[Bebpo]

One thing I really like about Nier is how the art design is straight out of Ico/SoTC.  The graphics may be PS2 in detail, but the environment design makes it looks super cool.  Also the gritty detail 2.5d stuff makes me want another Valkyrie Profile.

The loading though  ....sometimes I think it should be called Now Loading the game.  Too bad the game never got ported to the PC.  Maybe the loading is better on the X360 version.  Playing PS3 version.  Wait, lemme check if the game is installed.

oh shit, it wasn't installed.  No wonder.  Man, could've had a lot better loading experience for the last 3 hours if I realized this blargh.  Felt like early PS2 loading days!  I just got to Seafront the 3rd town.

I was pretty sure PS3 installs automatically. It was one of the "features" Sony touted, because HDDs were optional on 360 but every PS3 had one by default. Hence, PS3 users get to sit through an install before the game can launch, and then any number of updates downloaded at PSN's 14.4Kb modem-like speeds, before they can ever actually play the game.

Is this some kind of "partial install"?

Actually never mind, yeah a bunch of PS3 games have mandatory installs on start up, while a bunch have optional installs in the menu, and a handful don't have any install option at all.

The worst is when you want to play an online game these days on consoles and it's like first you have to download the latest 6 gig update at console download speeds.  So basically turn the system off you're not playing until the next day.

[chronovore]

Yup. That's exactly what I meant.

My son plays Star Wars Battlefront, and that game drops 10GB patches like they're handing out cupcakes.

He also keeps asking me what the unlocks are for the weapons in Jabba's Contracts, because the wording is stupidly vague in Japanese. I hate reading bullshit vague Japanese which was probably translated by someone who hasn't played the game.
Back on topic, I'm /not/ playing SW BF, but I am playing Star Wars Rise of the Empire playset in Infinity. My son is playing the hardcore SW game while I play the toy-based one. Something is seriously wrong. Also, as many things as were done correctly by Avalanche, their net-code is pretty horrible. There's an Achievement for playing 10 Flynn's Arcade multiplayer games, but I've only managed to complete one, with three more attempts ending in disconnects.

Also finding myself still hooked on Clash Royale and Age of Empires Castle Siege.

[Bebpo]

I'm at the end of the desert temple in Nier.  The desert stuff is the first stuff I'm not looking forward to replaying on new game+ runs because the following the girl around the desert map + the dungeons with all the "rules" puzzles is all kind of tedious and decent once but I wouldn't want to sit through it again.


Otherwise digging the game.  It's a completely different game than I expected.  I thought it was going to be all dark and serious and fucked up considering the Drakenguard games and the fact western gamers love Nier, but it's actually a really relaxing pleasant game of going around doing little fetch quests and running across green fields and visiting cool cities while listening to nice music.  Also a lot of humor in the exchanges between the main guy and the book.  It's a very charming game so far around 6 hours in.

On the new game+ replays you need to do in order to see all the story, can you skip all the sidequests on those runs?  I'm taking my time enjoying doing all of the quests this time around, but I really don't want to do them again on a new game+ run.

[demi]

NG+ might as well be a brand new game, tbh. So many new scenes.

[Rufus]

No reason to do the side quests again. That's one reason why subsequent playthroughs are faster. Just get a good spear and shit on everything.