toxicitizen Posted June 20, 2015 Report Share Posted June 20, 2015 Ys. Lots and lots of Ys. So, like a couple weeks ago I didn't know what to play and on a whim decided to replay Ys II. I'd done the same thing with Ys I a couple months back so I'd been meaning to do II as well at some point. But after I beat it I wanted more. I still needed to replay Ys Origin as the second character, so that's what I did. Then I did it again as the "secret" unlockable character, which as it turns out is how you get to the true final boss and get the true ending, which I didn't even know was a thing in that game. So that was pretty cool. Then, with surprisingly perfect timing, the Ys games went on sale on the same night I finished Ys Origin, so I bought Ark of Napishtim. But figured what the hell, I'll replay Oath in Felghana as well while I'm at it. I skipped Memories of Celceta, though, since it's almost twice as long as the others and I didn't really feel like switching to Vita. Anyway, that brings us to Ys VI: The Ark of Napishtim, which was my first new Ys game since I played Memories of Celceta last summer. It's based on the same engine/formula as Origin and Felghana but it was the first of that "trilogy" so it's not as refined. The combat is a little more clunky and being able to carry healing items and use them during boss fights makes the game significantly less challenging. Plus, there's some seriously annoying enemies that you can't damage until you do a drop attack to stun them. And they're usually found in large groups and can easily catch you in some bullshit stunlock, which can kill you near instantly if you're even a little under-leveled. That was fucking infuriating at times. The story was pretty good, though. Replaying all the games back-to-back really helped me get a better grasp on the few minor overarching plot threads that carry on between the games and Napishtim ties really nicely into that. Overall, I thought it was neither the best nor the worst Ys. I think I'd rank it above I and II but below Origin, Felghana and Celceta. I wasn't really planning to marathon the series like that but these games are just so much fun! The way they have as minimal a story as possible and instead focus on that fast-paced combat and sweet soundtrack just makes them a joy to breeze through. They're so replayable I could actually see myself doing this again every time a new one comes out. Speaking of which, I need Memories of Celceta and Seven on Steam. I don't care what it takes, XSEED, just make it happen! Honestly, I don't think I can go back to playing Ys on a handheld now. I mean, obviously I'll buy the new one for Vita since that's most likely going to be my only option, but I don't think I'll ever touch the PSP versions of the first three games again. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
deanb Posted June 20, 2015 Report Share Posted June 20, 2015 Stanley Parable.... Maybe? edit: Nope, on the previous run I'd not completed it. Now I have, even got the achievement for it. Though it's still a "maybe" I guess. I beat one ending that gets you an achievement. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MetalCaveman Posted June 29, 2015 Report Share Posted June 29, 2015 Shadow of Mordor. The brand ability is awesome. \m/ \m/ Nemesis stuff is cool, just wish it didn't insist on having a cutscene for every encounter, gets really annoying, specially when fighting groups of captains/warchiefs. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
danielpholt Posted June 29, 2015 Report Share Posted June 29, 2015 Her Story Fantastic little 'game' that will probably feature in my top 5 games of the year. I need to discuss this game with someone. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
danielpholt Posted June 29, 2015 Report Share Posted June 29, 2015 (edited) Among the Sleep Fairly simplistic game where you play as a toddler. Didn't love the gameplay, but the final 5 minutes was fantastic, goosebump inducing. Edited June 30, 2015 by danielpholt Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
toxicitizen Posted July 6, 2015 Report Share Posted July 6, 2015 Batman: Arkham Knight. I finished the story a couple days ago but as it turns out you need to do all the Riddler shit or something before you can get the ending. I've been reading stuff that suggests it's only for a little extra bit a the end but the game never indicated that I could trigger any kind of ending sequence until I had done 100% so whatever. Anyway, I finished doing all of it last night. I'm not really sure what to think of this one, to be honest. PC version issues aside (I was lucky enough for the game to be decently playable on my rig), I thought it was fantastic. I actually enjoyed the batmobile stuff a lot, which seems to be the main divisive point for most people. I mean, some of the racing challenges are fucking terrible but there were only like 2-3 that were truly bad. Once I got a hang of the controls, it was pretty fun blasting through the streets of Gotham. I always found myself driving to places instead of gliding, even when I wasn't going very far. So, my initial reaction was that Arkham Knight is the best game of the series. But the more I think about it the more I wonder if some stuff really was better or not. I'm glad that they picked up pretty much every single plot thread left dangling from Arkham City, even the side-quests, but while it was satisfying to see those things play out, a lot of it felt...I dunno, less thought out? Like, for example, the Hush side-quest was one of the highlights of AC for me and the follow-up to that starts with a really neat twist but then it's basically just a cutscene with a counter QTE and it's over. It lasts all of 5 mins and it's not the only one that feels like very little thought was put into it. I mean, was that really Hush's fucking masterplan all along? Sneak into Wayne tower, try to access the computer and then awkwardly shoot at the secretary? Kinda seems like making himself look like Bruce Wayne was a LOT of unnecessary effort here... Also, what was up with those half-assed Arkham Origins nods? That wasn't even necessary. You could've just ignored that game, it didn't need to be acknowledged. Honestly, those felt so shoe-horned in that I wouldn't be surprised if it wasn't Rocksteady's decision to put them in. Like someone went "Yeah, just put that in there" and they had to roll with it. I mean, seeing Deathstroke again was kinda cool, I guess, but did we really need another face off with Firefly?? Clearly most of their efforts went into crafting the main story, which I can't really blame them for I guess. Arkham City's main story was pretty weak by comparison. But overall, I kinda want to say AO <<<<< AA < AC < AK but I feel like I need to give AK some more time to sink in before I'm sure. Probably do a new game plus run at some point, too. I played both AA and AC to death so I feel like I need to spend more time with AK before I can truly decide how it stands against them. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheMightyEthan Posted July 6, 2015 Author Report Share Posted July 6, 2015 Are there more races beyond what you need to do to rescue Catwoma ? Cause if that's all there is I didn't find them bad at all. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
toxicitizen Posted July 6, 2015 Report Share Posted July 6, 2015 (edited) Well, there's some other racing-like stuff but those Riddler ones are what I was talking about, yeah. They're the worst by far, although that might have been in part due to being early in the game when I still sucked at controlling the batmobile. Edited July 6, 2015 by FLD Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheMightyEthan Posted July 6, 2015 Author Report Share Posted July 6, 2015 Yeah, really my only issue with them was that there wasn't really a riddle or puzzle element to them. Except for one, with the big water reservoir, that one was neat. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
toxicitizen Posted July 6, 2015 Report Share Posted July 6, 2015 Oh, yeah, some of the batmobile Riddler stuff was actually pretty cool. I'm talking about the time trial ones specifically, where you have to do 3 laps around a race track. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Strangelove Posted July 7, 2015 Report Share Posted July 7, 2015 Shadow Warrior. I really liked it. In all honesty, the only real bad part of the game are the berserkers. Fighting 2 of them at once is fucking terrible. A regular enemy shouldnt be tougher than all the bosses, nor should it be able to take so much damage. On a technical level Im guessing their hitboxes or whatever it registers to take damage is all fucked up. Every once in a while I could kill one in about a minute, but often id spent almost 10 minutes fighting 2 at a time, if I didnt die first. Its fucked up to think about it but because of these enemies and these encounters I cant recommend the game to certain people I know. They woulndt be able to deal with it. Anyways, the ending was great. I doubt I was going to say that when I bought the game. This looked like the type of game that wouldnt give a shit about story. Guess not. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
danielpholt Posted July 7, 2015 Report Share Posted July 7, 2015 Witcher 3 You know that feeling you get when you finish a good book and say bye to all of the great characters you've met along the way? I've got that right now. I hope it's not the end of the Garalt story, but if it is then I'm happy with its conclusion, and the final game as a whole. I don't think I enjoyed it as much as its prequel, but I can see why the game won so many fans. I'm still annoyed at how things went down with Triss, but that aside I really enjoyed this game. Witcher 2 > Witcher Wild Hunt > Witcher 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
deanb Posted July 7, 2015 Report Share Posted July 7, 2015 Come on, what ending did you end up with. Mine here: http://forum.pressxordie.com/topic/225-the-witcher/?p=142924 Anyway if you want this is a good post game watch: http://youtu.be/hBoCRYX6Vq0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Saturnine Tenshi Posted July 7, 2015 Report Share Posted July 7, 2015 I think I may feel the same about TW3, daniel. I'm sure I'll have the same sense of, uh, bereavement when I'm finished, but being open world doesn't do it any favors as far as I'm concerned. I really need to get around to finishing it . . . Nice video at any rate. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
danielpholt Posted July 7, 2015 Report Share Posted July 7, 2015 I think I may feel the same about TW3, daniel. I'm sure I'll have the same sense of, uh, bereavement when I'm finished, but being open world doesn't do it any favors as far as I'm concerned. I really need to get around to finishing it . . . Nice video at any rate. I'm not really an open world guy. I'd rather my stories be precise, to the point and more akin to how it went down in Witcher 2, which in itself was no small game. Still, i can see how and why people enjoy just wandering around the world, it's beautifully crafted. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TCP Posted July 8, 2015 Report Share Posted July 8, 2015 Batman: Arkham Knight I just 100% the story mode. I'm still a little sour that I didn't have the option to start the incomplete ending, as finding all the riddler trophies wasn't something I would have done. Regardless! I really like the game. I liked the tank combat. I liked the story. I like the way they handled the multiple characters, though I would have liked free roaming as Catwoman (like in AC), Robin, or Nightwing. In fact I wish I could have had more of that. I really hope they do a better job with the DLC in this game. I still have to complete the Harley Quinn mission, and I hope Red Hood comes to everyone soon, but the Batgirl DLC sounds promising. Just don't take too long and underwhelm like the Robin DLC in City. Here's a little secret: I suck at Arkham combat. This made Asylum and City kind of frustrating for me. So I played on easy, since it didn't affect trophies, and it made the game 100000% more enjoyable. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
deanb Posted July 8, 2015 Report Share Posted July 8, 2015 Adds Batman Arkham Knight to the pile. Ending kinda dragged the game down a fair bit of like "oh yeah, complete like 95% of the sidequests to actually end the game". Extremely anticlimatic. I think I've the Harley Quinn DLC. Not super sure, I guess I can check. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
toxicitizen Posted July 8, 2015 Report Share Posted July 8, 2015 The Harley Quinn DLC is pretty bad. It's like 20mins long and was clearly phoned in. I really hope the others about Batgirl and Red Hood will be better. --- The Legend of Heroes: Trails in the Sky. So, I finished my replay of this last night. I'm usually not crazy about replaying long JRPGs but Second Chapter could be coming out any week now and I felt I needed a refresher on the main plot. It turned out to actually be a fucking blast to replay. Last summer, I enjoyed the game a lot but I went in completely blind and it backfired a little bit. I normally love doing that but this game is so dense with world-building and lore that it moves very slowly for the first 30 hours or so. I was enjoying the characters and everything but I kept waiting for something to happen. This time around, now that I'm more familiar with the Kiseki world and have some knowledge of the other games, I got a lot more out it. References to neighboring countries and historical events felt much less abstract now that I have reference points like "Right, that's where game x takes place!" and such. And the way this game is written, NPC dialogue changes pretty much every time the story moves in some way. So, if you really go out of your way to talk to them, you can get some really interesting little nuggets of info that hint at upcoming plot points and even foreshadow stuff from future games. I'm not exaggerating when I say this game is just fucking dense with lore. Not only that but, while I vaguely remembered most of the main plot events, I had actually forgotten pretty much all the important details and specifics. So, I would've probably been confused as all fucking hell going into SC like this. Replaying it was definitely a good idea. Also, I'm really glad I decided to switch to the Steam version because at one point I fired up the PSP version to check something and holy fucking shit, my eyes! I don't remember what the resolution of PSP games was but that shit was so blurry and full of aliasing. I mean, the game still doesn't look all that great on PC but at least it's clean and sharp. The only visual "issue" I noticed was that while the game runs at 60fps, there's the occasional animation that's clearly locked at 30, for some reason. It makes them look a little jerky and out of place but that's pretty much it. Anyway, I wanted to get a perfect clear save ready because you can transfer it into SC and get some bonuses but man, this game goes kind of insane with missable shit! And it's not just collectible items for achievements, either. You can miss out on entire side-quests if you're not at the right place during very specific (and short) time windows to talk to whatever NPC triggers them. Then there's also choices you make during some quests where making the correct one will earn you more points and a perfect clear save requires getting the maximum amount of those points. It's pretty much impossible not to miss anything without a guide. Hell, I was following one and there were a couple times where I had to go back to an earlier save because I realized too late I'd missed the window for something or other. But, unlike my recent playthrough of DXHR, I managed to not screw anything up! I also couldn't resist and had to craft the badge. Hadn't done that in a while. Now I just need SC to come out soon. This month would be perfect, actually. If it takes too long, I'm a little worried I'll just start forgetting the plot details all over again... 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TCP Posted July 9, 2015 Report Share Posted July 9, 2015 It's my understanding the Red Hood DLC is similar to the Harley DLC, but I'm under the impression the Batgirl DLC will be a bit more meaty. Especially since it has multiple trophies but the other DLC only has one each. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheMightyEthan Posted July 9, 2015 Author Report Share Posted July 9, 2015 Well the Harley and Red Hood DLCs are just preorder bonuses, it makes sense that there wouldn't be much to them. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mister Jack Posted July 9, 2015 Report Share Posted July 9, 2015 The Red Hood DLC isn't much, but playing as him is surprisingly fun and I want more of him so I hope he gets a proper DLC episode in the season pass. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Strangelove Posted July 9, 2015 Report Share Posted July 9, 2015 Is Catwoman in AK? I havent seen her being mentioned at all this time around. And i havent played the game yet, but youre welcome to spoil anything. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheMightyEthan Posted July 9, 2015 Author Report Share Posted July 9, 2015 Yes, but it's not as major (at least as far as I've seen) as it was in AC. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TCP Posted July 10, 2015 Report Share Posted July 10, 2015 (edited) There's about 10 missions that feature Catwoman to one degree or another, and they all involve... The Riddler. Basically The Riddler kidnaps (CATNAPS?!) her and puts a necklace on her that will blow up if she removes it. You need 9 keys to remove it, which involves some team up fights with Catwoman and some puzzle solving with her too.... and then some race courses Bats has to do by himself.. Edited July 10, 2015 by The Cowboy Poet Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
toxicitizen Posted July 12, 2015 Report Share Posted July 12, 2015 (edited) Ori and the Blind Forest. Really cute, short and simple metroidvania. Think Dust: An Elysian Tail but without the ugly art and with short range projectile attacks instead of sword combat. It's not the most complex metroidvania ever but it is surprisingly challenging. Hell, at times it can even be a little frustrating. It's not Super Meat Boy difficult or anything like that but it does require you to at least be decent at quick precision platforming. Also, every single "dungeon" is followed by a fast-paced escape sequence that you pretty much need to pull off flawlessly because it arbitrarily disables your ability to create checkpoints. That's probably my biggest complaint about the game, that was complete bullshit. It's also fairly short, I went out of my way to backtrack and get all the upgrades (there's only health and energy) and it still only lasted about 10 hours. That's a pretty decent length all things considered but it felt a bit short compared to other similar games. I don't know if I'd recommend it at full price but for 10 bucks or so it's definitely worth a look. Edited July 12, 2015 by FLD 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Join the conversation
You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.