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1

Gaming / Re: 2023 Still Back Loggin'

« on: September 15, 2023, 10:53:15 PM »

F-Zero 99



Games journalists "Yeah the only thing announced at the nintendo direct was paper mario ttyd remake, C- nothing else of note"

Me "ttyd, new SaGa game, new wargroove, tomb raider 1-3 remakes, contra,...F FREAKIN ZERO?!"

This does NOT make up for nintendo all but abandoning the F-Zero series for the past 20 years, and this is NOT the game to "bring it back"

HOWEVER...this game is a lot of fucking fun...ngl...

I already have the premium nintendo service thing so I didn't even buy this as it just comes with that, so I've been cracking this the past few days and it's tough to put down. I don't know what it is, but this game just works. 99 players, chaos, fun, can feel actually good about finishing in 30th place.

Goddamn this came out of nowhere, I ain't going to put a ton of hours into this, but while it's fresh and people are playing it, it's a blast. Would I recommend getting the nintendo premium service only for this, if you aren't a big F-Zero guy? No...but if you have it, or if you're an F-Zero fan, give this bad boy a try. It's a lot more than just the snes game with an online taped to it, it's full HD, looks really nice for what it is, has new mechanics not in the old games kind of tailored to the online nature of this game. You can also unlock a bunch of stuff by doing a variety of things, and a time trial mode thing too.

Probably cut it off there, I figured I'd try it for 10-20 minutes as a novelty...3-4 hours later "one more race, one more race".

Very Impressed.

2

Gaming / Re: 2023 Still Back Loggin'

« on: August 30, 2023, 07:19:46 PM »

13. Armored Core VI: Fires of Rubicon



So uhh, as soon as I seen it for sale within 1-2 before any "rationality" hit my brain I preordered the "big dick" edition of this game. "cough"



To my defense, it's half the price of the "really big dick" edition with the hanger bay the AC can go in...but still...wasn't cheap for a game what haven't had a sequel in over a decade.

The good news though, this is a good videogame, a very good videogame.

Community, myself included was worried upon seeing "estus flasks" being inserted into the game and big over the top bosses that this game was gonna be armored souls coreborn...but thankfully it isn't the case.

The healing kits/estus flasks/potions, well "repair kits" to my understanding are in the game to raise tension. They heal for 4k a pop, if you have 12k life that's like having 24k life only not all at once. Pretty inoffensive, not too bothered. Besides that there's a "stagger" system in this game. Funny how this thing I didn't like in that game I didn't like (final fantasy 13) started popping up in other games, and in this one too. I don't think the game needs it, but the kids like the stagger? It doesn't really affect the game in a positive or negative way for me so I guess it's just there. Why do consistent damage when you could do very low damage except in certain "damage windows". Again I am more indifferent, but I would favor it not being in the game.

Gameplay is mad fun though, very fast, controls well...very...difficult game. First level, VERY FIRST LEVEL OF THE GAME, 6 attempts to beat it. You could go "that's so souls of them" or...remember the first armored core game that the very first thing you do before knowing any of the complicated controls is "hey fight these 2 mechs, if you die game over this is 1996 we don't got time to coddle you" so throwing a boss while not unfair being a bit too challenging for a player with at this point in the game, 5 minutes of understanding of the controls/combat and it's pretty tough. 

Plenty of missions/arena to do. Plenty of reason to replay missions to collect logs that when you get X amount of them you unlock parts. Certain missions have chests you can miss, so you can replay those to snag those. My experience after beating the game in NG+ there's a routine early mission I was replaying only for there to be a decision to make...that wasn't in the first playthrough. This alt path through the mission unlocks NG+ only missions, and I got access to a different tab of the arena after chapter 2 of NG+. Good incentive to play more of this game after seeing credits, besides the big thing that is hard to put into words. This game is just fun to play.

To compare apples and oranges a bit, Final Fantasy 16 exists. Removing my expectation of wanting an rpg and receiving a character action game with an entire tv show season worth of cutscenes jammed into it, the playing of that game to me in the short time playing it was very uninteresting. Mash square, dodge sometimes, there's also stagger in that game too, do more damage in the window, do it again. This game has the stagger bullshit, and the action combat, without the 13 hours of cutscenes...but the part where I do the pew pew and dodge dodge is...again hard to say with words, but it's fun. It's just engaging gameplay that feels damn good, if you like big killey robots and like well crafted fun ass combat, I can only recommend this game. I am probably being unfair to final fantasy, and the real reason is I just arbitrarily like the "vibes" from armored core over final fantasy...but iunno, I want to play more of this post credits than even finish that, so there's something in this game that that game don't have.

Texting a former co worker who has the game earlier he mentioned how Fromsoft knows this game ain't touching Elden Ring, but they made it anyway. I hope it does financially well to see the franchise come back from the dead with a new release every few years because I'm having a blast. The critical reception seems to be doing pretty good so I know I ain't the only one having a good time. Variety is the spice of life and while I love me my rpg's they would get dull if it weren't for all these other genres keeping me busy. Now if you excuse me, I need to smash my head against the Chapter 2 endboss on NG+...again.

*edit*

What I apparently meant by smash my head against the chapter 2 boss...apparently meant doing it in one try...barely by the skin of my teeth, but one try > the 15 or so tries it originally took me.

*edit*

Finish the game NG+
Finish the game NG++

Do everything in the game sans "S rank all missions" which...I "might" do later...I did S rank the "NG++ specific FINAL BOSS" multiple times to do money grinding to get the rest of the parts...but other missions look like a pain in the ass to go for S so I may just stop there.

Gonna end this with...there's some similarities with Nier Automata here...and to go back to the FF16 comparison. I give this game a pass and not that game, despite doing the exact same thing because...BECAUSE...this game is actually fun. The fuck would I play a game I ain't even find fun 3 times over a game I find really fun 3 times and I'll probably play it more in the future.

This game is fuckin boss, my "non metroid dread GOTY" is gonna be difficult to pick this year. Because it's totally metroid dread...but these other games need props too.

3

Gaming / Re: 2023 Still Back Loggin'

« on: August 24, 2023, 09:37:09 PM »

Baldurs Gate 3



So...been thinking about this all day. I'm gonna...not beat this game.

I preface, this game is VERY VERY GOOD.

VERY



GOOD

But

And a big ole BUTT...I ain't going to finish this game, until Larian finishes the game first.

I am not going to spoil anything, but let's just say, a few of the characters in this game are half cooked. Quests in the game that lead to...a good ending? NOPE just unfinished no matter what you do, cut content not finished.

I was thinking, do I finish the game and leave a bitter taste in my mouth when the first...85-90 hours have been fantastic...or just stop and come back when the game is done? I think this is for the best of my enjoyment of this game.

Also I play knowledge domain cleric, and the key feature of this class in 5th edition dnd..."ahem"

Channel Divinity: Read Thoughts

At 6th level, you can use your Channel Divinity to read a creature's thoughts. You can then use your access to the creature's mind to command it.

As an action, choose one creature that you can see within 60 feet of you. That creature must make a Wisdom saving throw. If the creature succeeds on the saving throw, you can't use this feature on it again until you finish a long rest.

If the creature fails its save, you can read its surface thoughts (those foremost in its mind, reflecting its current emotions and what it is actively thinking about) when it is within 60 feet of you. This effect lasts for 1 minute.

During that time, you can use your action to end this effect and cast the Suggestion spell on the creature without expending a spell slot. The target automatically fails its saving throw against the spell.

In Baldurs Gate 3, a lot of classes get cool stuff at 6th level. What do I get as a knowledge domain cleric? JACK SHIT, NO THING. Which is fine because apparently nobody even plays cleric, let alone knowledge domain, so it may be a while before they get to probably the least played class/subclass combo in the game. Let's ignore the fact that the other big feature of knowledge domain is literally a gith racial ability...that anybody who plays a gith anybody gets for free...Don't go knowledge domain cleric...play a wizard or another domain instead. Not even going to mention I played a mephistophiles tiefling which gets mage hand...but gith not only get the knowledge clerics channel divinity ability without needing to be a cleric, they get a BETTER MAGE HAND that is invisible! That race alone invalidates my race AND class, inbalance much? I am just ASSUMING knowledge cleric is unfinished, at least I hope so.

So that I got my bitching out of the way, I am going to put this on the backburner for a while. I may go back to it with other characters to further understand the mechanics of the game, but I don't want to actually see the credits until this thing is done.

Not a case of dragon age inquisition where that is just a bad game and I'm not going to beat it. I WILL go back to beat this game when I can have a satisfying conclusion, but in the current state, it's just not possible. I can still highly recommend this game, it didn't just "accidentally" become my third most played game on steam. It's very damn good.

*edit*

I will mention that time played was not only not enough time for me to beat the game, but this game has no grinding, no "kill 3 orcs" "gather 6 pieces of lumber" mmo quests, it's a dense, fully voice acted game with very little "filler". It's kind of amazing when you stop to think about it. You couldn't even grind if you wanted to, things that are dead stay dead, there would be no way to grind or "farm" like you can do in many other rpgs.

4

Gaming / Re: 2023 Still Back Loggin'

« on: July 26, 2023, 07:43:43 PM »

12. Pikmin 4



I'm not done with the game...but I have seen the credits and enough "postgame" to talk about it.

Not going to dilly dally or talk around it, this is the best Pikmin game to date. It's also a pretty content rich game as far as Pikmin games go. I think 1 took me ~6 hours, 2 was ~8, 3 was just shy of 10...I think I seen credits in this title at around hour 19.

This game starts off with 3 areas, you get the 4th and FINAL area, then you do that and...credits. Then post credits...you come back and there's a 5th "final" area...and because I like to look things up, that isn't the final area at all, there's ANOTHER area which is the actual last area.

ONTOP OF THAT you have a postgame mode which is almost a game within a game. You play from Olimar's perspective of the things that happened just before this game started which kind of acts like Pikmin 1...but in Pikmin 4...only...kinda harder? Pikmin 1 was 30 parts, 30 days. This mode is 30 parts in...15 days. I completed it in 11 and ~2:20 completion time, but despite that, the old "pressure to do all the things before you perish" was loud and present in this mode, as it is lacking in the main game. Not a full game, but as a side optional thing, very fun and very welcome.

After doing that...you unlock a "trial of the sages" thing which is 10 of the "dandori" challenges. Basically take the DLC missions from 3, and it's kinda like that here. I only just did the first one thus far but from online comments a few of the later ones can be very hard to even complete, let alone get good scores on.

I still got a little ways to go before I chew through all what this game has to offer, and whether I can do it before Baldurs Gate 3 comes out next week...I am not 100% sure. But I seen credits thus game beaten thus I can make a post.

This is actually a great game and I had no hype at all for it until the Pikmin 1+2 thing was released, but compared to the last 3 games, they delivered, and then some. HIGHLY recommended to give this a shot.

*edit*

I realized I didn't even talk about the gameplay/mechanics/levels at all. Or even the night mode stuff, or the dog companion, or the light rpg stuff, or the "hub town", or the many "if you played pikmin 1, or 2, or 3" references...this is a CHONKY game. TL;DR all of it is good. The ONLY single con in this entire game is...the co-op is one of those "girlfriend co-op" modes where the second player just controls a cursor and throws pebbles...pretty lazy especially coming from the last game which had the second player controlling another captain...this game you could pick who plays as the dog who is "mostly" like a captain with some things he can do that the captain can't do, and vice versa. OUTSIDE OF THAT THOUGH...."chefs kiss" very quality vidya.

*edit*

So...this game has quite a bit in common with Pikmin 2, only executed a lot better.

Caves aren't a BAD idea...but with the og pikmin controls, they were pretty frustrating. With a few modern touches like...being able to select the proper pikmin...a pretty mandatory feature 1/2 lacked, caves are fun now.

No day time limit, and a "you beat the game but...we gotta go back!" style ending that makes you wanna play more to "100%" the game. Didn't do it in 2, and I won't do it in 2...but I did it in this game. 35 hours 55 minutes is my final playtime, all treasures, all missions, all rescues, all caves, all of the stats 100%. Now...there's still more I could do like platinum rank all the dandori challenges, there was an optional sidequest that gave you a meme reward I haven't done, but that's licking crumbs off the plate at that point, I finished the entire meal already.

One could look at the treasures in it's own menu each one has descriptions from multiple people and some treasures you found have animations or actions you can mess with.

Each enemy/plant/wildlife has an entry you can look at the model and read, from also multiple character perspectives.

...and a multiplayer mode I have yet to mess with.

This game is actually literally CONSIDERABLY bigger than the last 3 games put together. I know I sound like a broken record but this is a complete ass package of a game and it should be commended. Easily some of the most fun I have had playing games this year, the game has flaws but they are few and far enough to where the good heavily outweighs the bad.

5

Gaming / Re: 2023 Still Back Loggin'

« on: July 04, 2023, 04:51:55 PM »

11. Pikmin 3 Deluxe



For the record I have been playing like all of these games at the same time...all of them...2, 1, 3, and the demo for 4...also none of them very long. 9h23 minute completion for this game, I think like ~6 for the first one and ~8 for the second one.

THIS is the entire reason I have been wanting to finish pikmin 2, not because I wanted to play pikmin 2 but because I wanted to play pikmin 3. It was another Wii U release like captain toad that I wanted to play, but didn't want to get a Wii U...now both are on switch I have both and have completed both.

I do highly recommend playing 1, and getting through 2 just to say you did it, but this game feels actually modern. It still has a "time limit of days before game over" but it's...so lenient to being almost a joke, it's more of a narrative device than a "you gotta be really efficient", because I beat the game in ~22 days, could have gone a few days faster...and I had like 77 days worth of juice remaining. If you get a game over, it's because you wanted to see the cutscene and didn't want to youtube it for whatever reason.

Definitely the easiest of the 3, and also has the most structure. There's a main objective they point to you on the map, that you can choose to ignore, but being as you don't have all of your pikmin from the start, that's the path you wanna go to get those. By time you get the last of your pikmin you're in that "end game" mode where you can just finish the game, or get all the fruits from the levels...then beat the game. So I went back and got all of those, none all that hard, but still fun level design.

The gamecube games looked good for the time, but this game just has a look that nails all of the aesthetics in the right way. Very good looking game, charming music almost akin to animal crossing in at least one area.

Plus the deluxe edition which is the only version on switch has what I think was DLC in the original game? Basically you're doing missions as olimar and co from what I assume is shenanigans after pikmin 2. Each mission is a single day, and you have a time limit to get all the fruits, at least for the first level. I think there's over 20 of em, ontop of the challenge missions that was in the base game, plenty more to do after finishing the game.

Game came out a decade ago, couldn't play it due to circumstances. Now that I have finished it...it's another one of those "will play again in the future" not too big of a time commitment, chill fun game.  Give these games a shot, not anything else like em.

*short edit*

Playing some of this dlc has me thinking. These games really "are" "technically" RTS games. Especially this one, swapping between characters to do multiple tasks at the same time...it's not starcraft or warcraft "at all" but ONE COULD SEE a comparison...

Again not apples to apples, but maybe apples to pears?

*completed dlc edit*

So I did all the "side mission" dlc whatever its called. ~14 missions or "days" in total overall a good time with a few caveats. I think I got "platinum" rank on all but mission 3, and some missions I won with seconds left on the clock. Almost to me feels like pass = PLATINUM, if you get gold or whatever it's a failure and you have to retry it.

I did like the variety, the missions in which were the most interesting required you to split up and multi task. This is where pikmin is strongest imo, and also gives me RTS vibes. Trying to be efficient juggling multiple tasks, just satisfying to do.

Final mission felt kind of tacked on. "heres 80 pikmin, you can make a few rocks over there, down the slope is 4 guys to beat up, down that slope is a boss, after you beat the boss there's another boss, take 3 parts back with like 7 minutes left on the clock, gg." It wasn't horrible, just felt lazy?

Still, worth playing. Different feel than the main game while still in most missions giving you the essence of what pikmin plays like. Plus being a part of the "deluxe" edition, it's free extra content for me, and more things to do in a game I already like and want to play more of is good. Good job Nintendo.

6

Gaming / Re: 2023 Still Back Loggin'

« on: July 03, 2023, 05:21:23 PM »

Pikmin



METROID DUDE...pikmin dude in a pikmin mood? Well, with the whole 1+2 thing, beating 2 for the first time I wanted to revisit 1.

This is a game. Yep.

I really like this game despite it being kind of...annoying at times. Your 'mins like to trip and get lost and fall off bridges into the water where they die, get eaten, dig for sap when you're trying to do something else, all with this big honkin time limit, and a 30 days to beat the game or game over limit.

Despite that though, this game I wouldn't consider hard...but it does have a bit of a learning curve with some challenge to it. Kid me was using a strategy guide and I BARELY beat it in ~29 days. The final area took me 2 days, one to get to the boss, and the other to beat the boss.

Adult me...15 days, all parts, final area took half a day to get to and defeat the boss. Either kid me was bad at games or I got a lot better because I haven't touched this game since 2004...and I had a good time. Quite short, I only got on today to finish the "forest navel" area, and just one more part...one more part...3.5 or so hours later I am seeing credits. Short, doesn't overstay its welcome, fun, would replay again, better than the second game.

I think that covers it, no number because this is my second time beating the game, but yeah, 10 games already, didn't even break a sweat. I think people are sleeping on these games, myself included. Always wanted to play the third game but it was on the Wii U...then it came to switch but didn't want to touch it because I haven't beaten 2...well...more to come in the next post I suppose.

7

Gaming / Re: 2023 Still Back Loggin'

« on: June 28, 2023, 09:18:21 PM »

10. Pikmin 2



So FINAL FANTASY 16 err...Pikmin 2? With Pikmin 4 coming up and 1 and 2 not being on the switch yet, Nintendo decided to fix that. $40 for both games, not a bad deal imo. Also appreciate this whole Nintendo direct "Here's this game, you can buy it...either right now or within the next 30 minutes, have fun" thing they've done the past few.

So the game. BLAST FROM THE PAST Pikmin 2 comes out on the gamecube and young me gets it! THEN I PROCEED TO...not play it because I wanted to finish the first game. I finish the first game, enjoyed it, play the second one till...a point where I got frustrated or something then stopped for about 10 years. Some time later I tried again quickly dropping it for unknown reasons for another...iunno...7-8 years? Either way it's last October, I wanna beat Pikmin 2, get to one of the games "dungeons" immediately lose like 50 pikmin from some hidden enemy, rage, quit again.

So while the first game has a hard "30 days to beat the game else you game over" time limit. This game does not, it has a day time limit, but you can play as many days as you want. Dungeons do not have time limits, however you need to bring the right 'mins for the job as each dungeon has different hazards, and also you can't get more pikmin for the most part in a dungeon. Near the end and someone ate all your guys? SoL SON!...well...till I recently discovered you can just reboot the game and the game saves at the beginning of each floor...that made dungeons a bit more forgiving. STILL THOUGH, this game feels quite a bit harder than the first game, and that game had a pace you had to be at or you would game over.

Structure is kind of odd, you need to get 10,000 moneys and you win. Never felt like the game escalates or anything, the areas do get harder, and some of the dungeons are outright cruel, but...buisness as usual till you get your 10,000 moneys. Then you get to the part of...Did I beat the game? I got the 10,000, got an ending scene, an endgame stats screen, and credits...but a thing happens, and you can go back to get the rest of the treasure. You get a new area AFTER the credits, so...I'm just going to go the 10,000 is "beating the game" and getting all treasure is "100%ing the game". I think that's the community consensus.

I did enjoy my time with this game, but there are some things that are kind of annoying. I finished a dungeon, but there are enemies that steal your treasure and...permanently steal it. So I had this happen to me and I really don't feel like redoing the entire thing for one treasure. I may go back to it to keep chiseling at it over time, since it is a fun game...I just feel like I didn't beat it in the past for a reason, it's not as good as the original. The original had this focus, you have 30 days to collect the ship parts so you don't die, once you get x amount of parts or a certain part I forget how it worked, a final area is unlocked. You go to the final area and do this gauntlet that leads to the final boss and the game climaxes there and you win. Had a pretty smooth natural way of progressing you through the game. This ones gimmick is dungeons, so you collect like 3 things on the overworld and get the other 15 in these dungeons. More focus on the execution and combat over managing time and being efficient like the first game.

TL;DR the thing keeping me from even trying Pikmin 3, was not having beaten Pikmin 2, and the thing at the time keeping me from beating 2...was 1. Now I have completed 1 AND 2, I can get to 3...whenever I feel like plunking down full price for the sucker...thanks nintendo.

TL;DR mark 2. GOOD GAME, does some things better than the first game, but overall feels like a weaker entry.

8

Gaming / Re: 2023 Still Back Loggin'

« on: June 06, 2023, 09:04:51 PM »

9. Street Fighter 6 (World Tour mode)



So...unexpected. First time I seen this third person adventure mode thing I went from "the hell is that" to "might be cool" to...couldn't stop playing it when I got my hands on it.

24 hours played to see credits.

This is probably the only fighting game with a good single player mode. Mortal Kombat has been the leader in single player content, but for a proper story mode it's "just get the fight over with so I can watch another neat cutscene". This game has a few cutscenes, characters, a story arc, and it VAGUELY (and I am grasping straws here) kinda does what starcraft did. You have this competitive multiplayer game, and then you change some things up for the single player.

You have your create a character, and you can learn from various "masters" which are the main roster of the game for their moveset. Ontop of that you get to pick and choose which special moves you want to use. You want ryus normals but deejays fireball? You want ryus fireball AND deejays fireball with chun-li's normals? Go ahead! There's leveling, gear, and a skill tree that looks like a tournament bracket which I find cute. You got side missions, multiple areas to run around in, minigames, shops, some areas you could vaguely call "dungeons" albeit small. This is a full fledged rpg with the combat of street fighter 6, and it kinda works.

Before I played this game, people saying "this mode is worth the price of the game alone" I was highly skeptical. However...being as I put 24 hours into the game to "complete" it...yeah that holds up. This mode can't compete with your highly polished rpg games, but the fact that it's as good as it is, with how damn good the core online experience of street fighter 6 is with what I have played, it's nothing short of amazing for the fighting game genre.

As for the online, this mode has been taking up all my online time. I only got ~60 matches in so far, and while you can get some poor connections, I may have had 1? Very good early impressions.

Street Fighter 5 killed my interest for the fighting game genre, guilty gear strive started to reel me in a little bit, dnf duel gave me a few weeks of fun, but this game I think will actually bring me back. Less than a year after sf5 released, I have been waiting for them to pull the plug and make 6 already and it's nice to finally be here, and the game is GOOD!

9

Gaming / Re: 2023 Still Back Loggin'

« on: May 28, 2023, 08:47:28 PM »

8. The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom



O boy, this is a big one. Where to start?

This game should be called "breath of the wild 2" for how similar in structure it is to the previous game. It IS a direct sequel and...does the exact same thing the last one did, albeit, better....in most areas.

First and foremost if you didn't like botw, don't play this game. Whatever was broke in that game like how hard it is to get money, or weapon durability, ain't fucking fixed in this game. Arrows do come by easier however, which is notable.

Similarities. The whole tutorial island thing is the exact same 4 shrines to get your powers in each one, a cold area you need to cook for warm for. You do a main quest in the 4 different race areas for their respective dungeon/power. Each dungeon is structured the exact same "you must get 4 things to fight the boss, then we'll tell you the story of the imprisoning war, and then give you a heart piece and a ring" FORUMLA TO THE T. You fight gannon he has 4 little bosses from the dungeons, if you didn't do those you gotta fight em, if you did, you get a cutscene and can get to the boss. You fight the gannon, after beating him, big setpiece "boss" fight you can't die in.

Koroks? 900 of them in the last game, ONE THOUSAND in this game. I got like 43, fuuuuuuuuuk that.

Shrines? 120something in the last game? ONE FIFTY TWO in this game. I did get like 114, they are too many but they're done better in this game. The ones I liked and disliked the most are the ones that took all your gear and made you kill all the enemies with just the stuff around the shrine, took more effort, but ended up being more fun.

Armor sets most of them are the same as the last game, you end up wanting the barbarian armor like the last game...woulda been cool if you used something else.

Powers? Well this is the main appeal of this game imo, they are actually good. Didn't think I'd like the build a vehicle thing, and it is a bit fiddley, but the powers have good synergy. Overall probably the best part of this game, you actually actively use your new powers and the game expects you to do so. Best thing you can build is 2 fans and a control stick to make what is basically a helicoptor, long as you have the battery, you can get ANYWHERE, and it's really convenient.

The game trailers showed off a bunch of sky islands, this game is already huge, and there's an entire sky layer. Not a "ton" of stuff up there, but more than enough to be it's own map layer. Takes good advantage of your new tools to navigate the skies.

...also not so shown in the trailers is the depths. Which I would compare to blackreach in skyrim, if blackreach was...1:1 the size...of..skyrim...yeah...an entire underground map AS BIG AS THE ALREADY TOO BIG HYRULE MAP...no light, enemies permanently sap your hearts until you get sunlight or eat for recovery (in which you still need to eat to heal proper). It's a cool addition and way too much for me to explore fully.

...and i could go on and on and on...and on, I need to stop eventually. Last thing of importance, I totally exploited item duplication a lot. It make my experience so much better I took my switch offline (because I know they're gonna patch it, and they DID patch it several days ago) to keep my exploits until I was finished. Not needing to worry about my high tier lionel parts made me actually engage in combat instead of run away, having money made me actually buy things instead of forget shops existed. Any edge to get me to chew through this game before street fighter 6 launch (June 2) because this game is just way too goddamn big. I have no idea how it's only 16 gigs, and I have no idea how the nintendo switch can run this thing.

This game is not a 10/10, it's not goty, it doesn't improve on big issues I had with botw...but it's still really fun, the new powers are actually great, and I DID have a meaningfully better time with this game over botw.

I also hope to never play it again, I think I had my fill and it is time to move on. Fingers crossed Nintendo can bring back some of the old zelda magic next rodeo. Gonna end this one before I turn it into a novel. Till next time!
 

10

Gaming / Re: 2023 Still Back Loggin'

« on: May 10, 2023, 05:53:07 PM »

7. Armored Core: Master of Arena



So...well, these games aren't horribly long aren't they? So uhh, that's it. Third and final Armored Core ps1 release.

I beat the first AC game with around ~13 hours played. Phantasma I didn't 100% but I did all the arena and all but 3 missions in ~5 hours. This game was about 4 hours...but I left most of the disc 2 content on the table. Might go back to do that stuff in the future? But that may be in the farther future because hot games are bout to drop soon.

Despite the short playtime there's 3-4 more missions, and an entire disc 2 with more arena stuff. The arena stuff in disc 2 has you making specific mech types (normal, reverse joint, tank, quad, blablabla) which is cool to keep you from making one god build like I did and recking most of the game.

This game has a different story covering the final boss of the first game, so I think it's a prequel? While project phantasma had the arena as 100% optional, this game has it as a mandatory part of the game. You do missions, then they make you do a little arena, then force you out of the arena to do mandatory mission, then no missions available, till the final mission. Beat final mission, any missions you didn't do are available to 100% at your own time.

I started off Project Phantasma not liking it so much, but after a little while I did end up enjoying it. This game is basically that game, but starts off non linear for the first half, and is extremely linear in the second half. I think I liked this release the least of the 3 personally, the final boss was also...really dumb. Due to the aforementioned VERY POOR controls the final boss is a 1v1 arena style fight which is fine but he's very fast, and uhh I am very slow because I wanted all the big guns. Took me 3 attempts because once he gets up on me, he kills me before I can even turn to face him the turning is so slow in this game. Thankfully the arena is huge and thus the third time I thought to just...boost backwards and unload on him, that one took about 6-7 seconds for me to finally see the credits. Harder final boss than the first game, but less frustrating level? Last level of AC1 has some very very bad platforming, FOLLOWED by two bosses that are in a hard to aim arena...different levels of pain I suppose.

So that's all 3 AC games on the ps1. I more or less went for the path of least resistance when it came to my build. Low mobility, high firepower and stuck with it. Curious if I will play this way in the other games when I get to it. The important part is that I had more fun than I remember having the last time I attempted this series, mission accomplished.

11

Gaming / Re: 2023 Still Back Loggin'

« on: May 07, 2023, 09:53:45 PM »

6. Armored Core: Project Phantasma



So I decided to play Armored Core 2, err the second armored core game Project Phantasma?

This was cool because there really weren't many games back in the day that had save file transfer between games. I took my 100% completed Armored Core save with my 2 million credits, booted up my save in Phantasma and...they just let you keep your mech, all your parts, and all your money. Alright? No strings attached? Yep!

This game while basically just "Armored Core 1 but...more Armored Core 1" is a little different. First off the missions are very linear with I think 3 parts where you get to choose between two missions. There's a story...and several voiced characters?! However less missions, I think you beat ~14 to beat the game, and the other 3 are the missions you didn't pick when you had to make a choice. The first game had around ~48 or so missions in comparison, so that game wasn't super long, this game ain't that long by half. By half? There's less than half the missions...well this game is the first in the series to introduce ARENA!

So you get the 1v1 ranking arena thing and you start at the bottom and there's like 50 guys to get through. Even using the busted OP laser rifle from the last game...you find out there's a travel time to those blasts and quick mechs can dodge and stuff. Needless to say I had to slightly retune my mech. I like non standard legs, but the "op laser rifle" only works on normal legs probably because it's a large model and wouldn't work with other options, so I went with the big tanky slow normal legs that move like molassas and added a laser canon because if I'm heavy why not add more firepower. Some of these fights are hard, probably the hardest content is in the arena tbh. Anything I couldn't blow up with my laser rifle I had to boost around (mind you I can barely walk with my heavy build) and play this cat and mouse sniping game with my laser canon. Sometimes frustrating, but pretty cool addition. Beating the arena gives you a busted broken "the remainder of the missions you will do in the game will be easy" machinegun, so that's kinda what I did.

I wouldn't recommend this game in a vacuum, if this game was released in the modern era I would consider it a DLC or expansion rather than a standalone game. Play this only if you did everything in the first game and wanted more of that.

Didn't intend to beat this game, but now that I did...the save I took from AC1, to PP, can go to the third and last game in the ps1 series of Armored Core games, Master of Arena. I have again no intention to beat that game, but if the difficulty isn't too much and I got the time before the 12th...might give it a shot.

Last thing I want to air out is there's a lot of Armored Core games, I have known about them and even played the heck out of the demo of the first game as a kid. Pretty cool to finally start seeing the origins of this long running series for myself, and again despite...questionable controls I am vaguely starting to get used to, I'm still enjoying myself quite a bit here.

12

Gaming / Re: 2023 Still Back Loggin'

« on: May 05, 2023, 01:10:44 AM »

5. Armored Core



With Armored Core 6 coming out in...~3.5 months, I am unreasonably hyped.

I have played this game as a kid, the demo, with 3 missions you would play over and over and get money to upgrade your mech. Later in ~2014 I had tried to play this game again and struggled with the really dated bad controls (the controls are THE thing that deterred even kid me from this franchise), and a labyrinthine mission that has you in a maze with 5 bombs to plant...and everything is poison so you constantly take damage.

Decided to try AGAIN and gradually chip away till I did it. That said, this game structure is kind of weird. You get the same few missions to start, but they are kind of random how they serve them to you. I remember getting the moonlight blade last time but not seeing the final mission. This time I did not receive the mission to get the moonlight blade and got the final mission...didn't really need it  because the laser rifle is god tier in this game, but still.

This game suffers from god freaking awful controls(left and right on the d pad is turn left/right, l1/r1 are strafe left and right, l2 is look up...r2 is look down)...and...I still had a good time. This game is pretty fun, decent enough mission variety, the mech customization is fun, the "bleak everything sucks you're just taking missions for the $$$ even if it means going against your previous contractor" it's just a cool game.

I don't think I'm gonna play ALL the games before 6 because...I just ain't, but this was the big one on my bucket list, and it has been beaten. Now...after beating the game any missions you didn't get served you can just do, or farm easy missions for money because you can reselect them. Pretty cool reward for completing the final mission if you wanted to buy more parts and whatnot.

13

Gaming / Re: 2023 Still Back Loggin'

« on: April 26, 2023, 03:59:43 PM »

Advance Wars (1+2 Re-Boot Camp)



So another turn based strategy game that apparently only I give a shit about just came out. I wish these games were more popular but the first con I'm about to mention will probably not help.

Just gonna get it out of the way, the "online play" is trash. I mean it's probably good? You can make custom maps and play online...with some caveats. FRIENDS LIST ONLY, if you don't have anyone on your friends list with the game booted up, may as well be offline. No matchmaking, anyone not on your friends list, no online. Also if you do have a few people to play, it's 1v1 only and only certain map sizes allowed. This game has all of the old 2p, 3p, and 4p maps the originals had, and those 3p/4p maps are for local play only. Figures the one thing you couldn't do on the originals, online multiplayer...you can't do in this game.

That said if you are spoiled and have irl friends who like advance wars (whatever bizarro world this hypothetical person lives in) you got multi system or single system multiplayer for local play like the originals had, except you can play on a big tv now instead of the tiny gba screen. Unfortunately I won't be able to experience this...at least I can play the CPU in those maps.

Cons aside...it's the first two advance wars games, and they're mostly faithful to the originals. I've only completed the first advance wars campaign, which "unlocks" the second campaign. However if you just want to jump into 2, it's not really gated off and they'll warn you about spoilers but let you in if you only wanted to play the second one.

They streamlined unlocking characters, instead of the weird campaign requirements of the originals, you unlock the right to buy them in the shop after certain missions, no strings attached. Once you complete a campaign, you can go back for higher scores without needing to restart a new campaign again which is a really nice change. ALSO certain parts in the campaign you pick between a few missions which you can pick one and ignore 2, you can go back and finish the branches you didn't select after completing a campaign, another very nice change.

If I was rating the single player stuff I'd rate this remaster as an A+...but with the extreme low effort put into the online I would have to lower the overall package to a B. I don't care about competitive play at all, but just messing around playing matches online, or even 2 players vs 2 cpu's would be a lot of fun online...but it's just not something they had in mind.

I intend this game to be a slow burn, one of those games I go back to every now and then due to it's bite sized nature. So I am very happy it exists, but I do hope they add even barebones basic matchmaking and the ability to play those 3p/4p maps online. Not counting on it, but anything's possible right?

14

Gaming / Re: 2023 Still Back Loggin'

« on: March 13, 2023, 06:17:15 PM »

Metroid Dread 1000% Complete



I beat dread mode but didn't 100% dread mode...considering you die from any damage it makes 100% dread mode harder than low%. The first time I beat the final boss it took me like...literally..40+ attempts over 2 days. This time, I made an idiot mistake on the first try, and killed him the second try. I'd like to think I have achieved mastery of this game...ignore those deaths though...any sneeze = game over.



I don't even care anymore, this game is 10/10. No game is perfect, but jesus this game is close.

*edit*

Wasn't even trying to go fast, wasted a good few minutes dicking around because I was just playing for fun...but 3:10 Hard mode.

15

Gaming / Re: 2023 Still Back Loggin'

« on: March 12, 2023, 12:40:32 AM »

4. Metroid Fusion



3:45, 40% item completion.

I'm gonna preface. I cheated. I used the rewind feature, and totally used a save state before the final boss.

This is my least favorite metroid by far, as in, it is the only metroid game I do not like.

I get it, coming from Dread I am spoiled by great bosses and unmatched controls, but I have a caveat. The #3 game I beat was METROID 2, THE ORIGINAL GAMEBOY METROID 2, and I had a good time.

Way too much story for a metroid
OBEY THE COMPUTER GO HERE SAMUS GO THERE SAMUS SAVE YOUR GAME SAMUS
None of the bosses even enter a territory that I would call "fun". Rag on me all you want, but I beat every single boss in dread without taking a single hit, those are fun bosses. Trying to stand at a pixel perfect distance to hit a weakspot with micron accuracy 50 times is not fun...only to have an orb pop out of it and gib you for having low health.
x parasites in dread were annoying...they're only 50x worse in this game

There are good parts to this game, but I don't care to talk about them, the cons severely outweigh the pros.

I ain't going back to do the few parts of the game I used rewind on again, I am not going to revisit this game. I actually regret playing this game, it was better off as a mystery.

I had more fun paying my emergency room bill than playing this game.

*edit*

Feeling generous, and I will talk about a few good points.

For one this is metroid 4, to dread which is metroid 5, so you do see some carry over. Like how missiles are just straight upgrades instead of separate entities like in super. Or how power bombs have a vacuum effect for all x parasites in an area.

In dread where the whole first two areas turn to ice, this game has the ice zone which ends up melting and a few other environmental changes.

ledge grab, not executed that well in this game...but it's a good addition for future games.

Ohh Just thought of it. For as linear as the game is, I was alright with completing an objective and the game throwing a wrench at you "stuff is out of wack, 6 minutes to fix problem gogogo" or "power is out, find an alternate route to restore power, no elevators, save points, recharge stations work", mixed up the experience a bit.

Besides that I really don't understand why they want to keep adding "horror" elements to a metroid game. Fusion started this mess, and it's seeped into dread which would probably be named something else if not for fusion, and probably be an even better game for it. The cold isolation and lack of friendly npc's should be "horror" enough. And I feel super, and prime do this very well.

*edit*

I just can't stop playing dread. Did boss rush to unlock survival boss rush meaning anything unlockable in the game is unlocked. And also found through this that you can "practice" bosses you've gotten to in boss rush. I didn't know each boss had a time attack, or maybe you want to practice the quick kill on the z57 boss or whatever. Not a mode I typically care about, but given that the bosses ARE fun in this game..."cough"...worth checking out.