What Are You Playing?

Skullgrin140 said:
Playing Silent Hill 2 at the moment, finished Silent Hill 1 quite a while ago so I'm just going through the 4 previous games in the series and sort of avoiding the current ones.

I've played all the silent hill games. To tell you the truth. Although 1-3 are excellent. I recommend playing them all. Even SH: Homecoming and SH: Down Pour. They are pretty good despite what you might of heard with reviews. A lot of people were aggravated that the controls and battle system are bad. I call bs on that. If you survived SH1 and SH2 you can live what these later installments have to offer. Silent Hills battle system style hardly changes. Usually the biggest difference is if how much you can keep in your inventory, whether or not your weapons deteriorate with use, and whether or not you have a inventory at all. Homecoming and Down Pour are unique and certainly have great moments. SH2 may of done the best job from start to finish, but that doesn't mean these later games are a disaster. Even SH: Origins is a great game. The only one I think is hardly worth your time is SH4, and there is a lot of people who like it for some reason. My personal favorite SH is the third one.
 
After Diablo 3, I vowed never to buy a game at release date price again. I was so happy with the large backlog of games I collected through steam sales and humble bundles.

Then the Bioshock Infinite hype train came along.

I tried to distract myself by digging into my backlog and playing through Bastion, then Bulletstorm, and then the Walking Dead (telltale version).

Bulletstorm was a fun game to play. Trying to kill enemies in creative ways to rack up points to buy ammunition (like getting drunk and then kicking them into a giant venus fly trap) was a fresh take on gameplay. The story, on the other hand, was laughably terrible. I don't think spoiler tags are necessary for a story of this caliber, but here they are anyway:
The game's story mostly is you chasing Serrano, having him slip from your fingertips, and then having to kill and run away from random things while he gets away. In the end of the game, you don't even get him. He slips from your fingertips again just to leave room for a sequel that would have been the same damn thing another 10 times over. Serrano is supposed to be some ruthless, powerful commander of killers, but his dialogue feels like some kid saying 'nya-nya-nya, you're stupid'. That being said, having the ultimate villain in the game call me a fungal rim job was pretty damn funny, even if I can no longer get that image out of my head.

The Walking Dead by Telltale games was excellent. The story sucked me in so thoroughly I played through the whole 8-10 hour season in one go. It had a much better told story than the AMC TV show (which I didn't think was very good and gave up on) by miles. It's not much of a game so much as a TV show where you step in from time to time. Gameplay mostly consists of dialogue options, quick time events, and simple puzzles. There is a choice system in the game,
but it does not have as an enormous of an impact on the game as others might have you think. It mostly affects the characters' dispositions in the next cutscenes, but who gets to live in the end is predetermined. You are also going to go to the same places no matter what.
But the linearity did allow them to craft an excellent story. I unequivocally recommend this game and can't wait for season 2.

After replaying the original Bioshock, I bought the remastered version of Final Fantasy VII and have played through a small amount of it so far. The biggest disappointment so far has been that the music is not from the original PS1 version of the game; it's instead a remastered version of those shitty MIDI versions of the songs. If you buy the game and want the proper music, don't expect a patch. There are some free mods online to take care of that issue.

Well, none of that got Bioshock Infinite off my mind. The press releases, glowing reviews, trailers, developer interviews, Voice Actor interviews, and let's plays finally broke my will and I bought the game for the full $60. I am so ashamed. Then I played the game in 2 sittings over the course of less than 24 hours. To sum up and repeat what almost everyone else has said, yes it's excellent.
I don't know where they'll go or even if they will continue after this. The game showed the player this meta-universe where all possible Bioshock stories could exist. I'm not sure if any future Bioshock games could feel as exciting and new given that everyone knows about the ultimate mystery of the meta-universe. Where do you go from there?
 
^
Yeah I agree about TWD game, they almost captured the comic atmosphere to perfection. And its one of those games where its really fun to look up some "lets plays" and see how people react and handle the stress and decisions and all... Even the ending was epic, and really hope they keep up the quality for the next season. And yeah, they should´ve hired these guys to make/write the crappy TV show.

Death May Die said:
I've played all the silent hill games. To tell you the truth. Although 1-3 are excellent. I recommend playing them all. Even SH: Homecoming and SH: Down Pour. They are pretty good despite what you might of heard with reviews. A lot of people were aggravated that the controls and battle system are bad. I call bs on that. If you survived SH1 and SH2 you can live what these later installments have to offer. Silent Hills battle system style hardly changes. Usually the biggest difference is if how much you can keep in your inventory, whether or not your weapons deteriorate with use, and whether or not you have a inventory at all. Homecoming and Down Pour are unique and certainly have great moments. SH2 may of done the best job from start to finish, but that doesn't mean these later games are a disaster. Even SH: Origins is a great game. The only one I think is hardly worth your time is SH4, and there is a lot of people who like it for some reason. My personal favorite SH is the third one.

I´ve probably fan boy'd enough over the SH franchise on this site already but as long as we´re still at it...

I practically agree on everything here. My fave is the second, gawd I was obsessed with it for a whole year or so. The Room is my least favorite too, it really shows how much of an unfinished product it is, honestly it has a lot of cool ideas and concepts, only its all mashed together in such a rushed and clumsy way.

You totally forgot to mention Shattered Memories :carcus: Even though the controls may not be the best I believe a classic SH fan "should" appreciate the story and the refreshing new system despite being somewhat limited. Sure there was some (seemingly) pointless stuff like those collectibles, but it had a core, a truly original and eerie atmosphere which made it a successful "alternate approach" of the first game. Plus it had me in tears cause of Yamaoka´s last run as sound/music director.


On that note, I just got myself Shadows of the Damned, which sound department Yamaoka moved on to after quitting the SH series. I havent started it yet though, still sneaking through Dishonored at snail speed, wanna get good stats but it always ends with a killing or two anyways, lol I suck at this sneaking strategy, but its fun anyway... So, anyone got any thoughts on either of 'em?
 

Dar_Klink

Last Guardian when? - CyberKlink 20XX before dying
Been playing a lot of Age of Empires 2 HD edition on Steam with friends. It's great for both nostalgia and actually being a good game. The sad thing is that Microsoft somehow bungled the framerate in it, causing massive slowdowns in even singleplayer games, which is quite sad for such an old game. They also took out LAN play for some reason.

Fan-made widescreen/HD mods actually run more smoothly, so the only real reason to get this game over your old discs(if you have them) is for steam's online play. There's ways to play the old one online even then though, it's just a bit of a pain to set up. Hopefully they can patch these simple issues soon.
 

Oburi

All praise Grail
Age of Empires 2 was my life for many, many years. I wish I could see just how many hours I poured into that game.
 

Griffith

With the streak of a tear, Like morning dew
Got Crimson Shroud for $4.99 after a heads up on the price drop from Walter. Wow, figurines, you guys weren't kidding! Neither was Matsuno about recreating that D&D vibe, and I can't help but be reminded of FFT. Also, I don't know if the verbose flourishes will wear thin over what sounds like thin plot, but so far the writing and translation are very impressive (intentionally so, no effort was spared =). This game is sort of amazing just for existing though. I love the idea of making them literal role-playing figurines shot at dramatic angles, I just can't believe they were able to stick to it... nor am I sure they should have. :ganishka:
 
I hope my developer hero Shinji Mikami can reinvent the genre he pioneered.

http://www.ign.com/articles/2013/04/22/the-evil-within-first-look

Oburi said:
Age of Empires 2 was my life for many, many years. I wish I could see just how many hours I poured into that game.

I still return to those day long battles. Sadly, today's computers aren't very compatible upon installing it. The color grid is all wrong as if the game glitched. It really takes away a lot of the luster.
 

Walter

Administrator
Staff member
Griffith said:
Got Crimson Shroud for $4.99 after a heads up on the price drop from Walter. Wow, figurines, you guys weren't kidding! Neither was Matsuno about recreating that D&D vibe, and I can't help but be reminded of FFT. Also, I don't know if the verbose flourishes will wear thin over what sounds like thin plot, but so far the writing and translation are very impressive (intentionally so, no effort was spared =). This game is sort of amazing just for existing though. I love the idea of making them literal role-playing figurines shot at dramatic angles, I just can't believe they were able to stick to it... nor am I sure they should have. :ganishka:
I loved the figurine thing, I just wish it was more ambitiously utilized. You see some cool and funny uses of it early on, but they don't vary as much as they could. Of course, its a small-scale game so it doesn't fully exploit the concept. As for the plot, it explodes in scope after a while, but perhaps too late. That's my only real complaint about the game. The story that's there is quite cool, enough for a full-scale game even. And then it's over :sad:

Personally, I'm playing a lot of games at the same time, which is another way of saying I'm not really into anything special at the moment.
 

Dar_Klink

Last Guardian when? - CyberKlink 20XX before dying
Death May Die said:
I still return to those day long battles. Sadly, today's computers aren't very compatible upon installing it. The color grid is all wrong as if the game glitched. It really takes away a lot of the luster.

The HD edition is on steam! You could also get some of the widescreen fixes if you want, I found some a while back when I wanted to play and the HD edition wasn't out.
 
Been playing Luigi's Mansion 2 a fair bit. Its a pretty neat game, but there's a few disappointments. I think it might be a little too easy. Then again, I'm also currently playing Dark Souls, so that might be why it doesn't feel very difficult. There's also this pretty annoying element where you get called by one of the characters to give advice and tell you what to do after missions. Its gotten less and less frequent the further I get in the game, but holy hell I wish they hadn't incorporated that crap. It even freezes your screen so you cant just ignore it. :mozgus: And lastly it doesn't feel as dark as the previous game, but that could be due to me being 10 years older. Otherwise I'm really enjoying it though, no regrets even at a $40 purchase. Ive been humming the theme song all day. Lots of fun little puzzles, really nice aesthetic and atmosphere, and a nice use of the mechanics. And Ghost Busting is just such a satisfying way to pass the time.

I also picked up super metroid with my nintendo club points. Unfortunately I dont have the SNES controller for the wii, and the gamecube controller doesnt work too well for it since sprint is b and shoot is x and the button config makes it so I just cant manage to do both at once. Cant seem to configure the controls either. Its not like its game breaking, but it is pretty frustrating.

Hanma_Baki said:
Yeah I agree about TWD game, they almost captured the comic atmosphere to perfection. And its one of those games where its really fun to look up some "lets plays" and see how people react and handle the stress and decisions and all... Even the ending was epic, and really hope they keep up the quality for the next season. And yeah, they should´ve hired these guys to make/write the crappy TV show.

I agree, it really did give off the same vibe. I even felt like that one female character they introduce towards the end could be introduced into the show or even comic at some point, she was that compelling and tenacious. Id really enjoy a second season, but that seems like itd be a pretty difficult thing to tackle considering the various ways in which the story deviates. Itd be like another mass effect 2 situation where they kinda mute the actual effects of your decisions and take creative license to force you back into some narrow plot path. I dont know, it might be better as a standalone to be honest, or having an entirely new set of characters.
 
After getting to the huge materia part of Final Fantasy VII on the PC, I was finally bored to tears. Battles felt like a complete chore and in some ways felt like punishment for not finding my way around the many maze like environments quickly enough. Attack, cast spell, cure, rinse, and repeat. But comparatively speaking, It had a much better told story than Final Fantasy XIII, even without the aid of pretty graphics, fancy camera angles, or a better variety of sound effects.

So I went back to Dragon Age: Ultimate Edition I had bought on Steam about two years ago and set the difficulty to hard this time around. It has just about everything I want in a game:
- A long main quest. It's nice to have a game that takes upwards of 15 hours to beat; that seems increasingly rare nowadays.
- Side quests that don't make the main story feel any less urgent
- A combat system that relies on both pre-planning and what you do on the battlefield as well
- Characters who you can chat with endlessly and who have intersting things to say
- A beautiful look with low hardware requirements
- Room to permanently fuck yourself over if you didn't plan your characters well. I'm actually having an easier time on hard difficulty than normal because I'm more familiar with the skills
- Not being locked into using only one skill or one weapon to defeat an enemy.

The game definitely isn't perfect. Inventory clogging is a frequent nuisance and the main overall story is as generic as it gets: an evil force has returned to bring suffering to the world and you must unite the different races to defeat it. It's the side quests and subplots where the game is the most exciting. The Circle of magi stands out in particular.

But to give you a fair warning, EA is the game's publisher. It could be argued that waiting to buy a complete edition of a game on a Steam sale sends EA a good message and keeps Bioware alive. But it can also be argued that EA will continue its unpleasant business practices so long as at still breathes; that's the impression I've had for the past year anyway. In other words, I don't know whether or not buying this game or not could be considered taking the moral high ground.

Id really enjoy a second season, but that seems like itd be a pretty difficult thing to tackle considering the various ways in which the story deviates. Itd be like another mass effect 2 situation where they kinda mute the actual effects of your decisions and take creative license to force you back into some narrow plot path. I dont know, it might be better as a standalone to be honest, or having an entirely new set of characters.

You don't even have to wait for a sequel for your choices to be muted. Your moral choices definitely effect the short term, but the farther I got into the season, the less my choices my mattered. And there are certain events that will take place no matter what choice you make.

You will leave Herschel's farm in episode 1 no matter what
Duck will die in episode 3 regardless of whether or not you tried to save him in episode 1.
Ben will die be dead by episode 5, rendering your episode 4 choice much less consequential
Lily's father will get his head smashed in episode 2 whether or not you try to help Kenny
Lee Everett will die no matter what
Lily will no longer be in your party in episode 3 regardless of whether or not you chose to keep her

And the list goes on and on. So by the end of the season, even though you were given so many decisions, the conclusion is pretty much the same. If they did manage to make your story truly branch out in different directions, I would be impressed.
 

Griffith

With the streak of a tear, Like morning dew
Been playing a lot of Mario Kart 7 lately, but it reminds me how disappointing it is this game doesn't have DLC retro tracks. BTW, anybody wanna buy a new coin rush level for NSMB2? Anybody? Yeah, didn't think so.
 

Johnstantine

Skibbidy Boo Bop
Griffith said:
Been playing a lot of Mario Kart 7 lately, but it reminds me how disappointing it is this game doesn't have DLC retro tracks. BTW, anybody wanna buy a new coin rush level for NSMB2? Anybody? Yeah, didn't think so.

I've actually been playing that a lot lately, as well.
 

Walter

Administrator
Staff member
I dove into a demo of an indie game called "Memory of a Broken Dimension," after reading this article by Eurogamer: http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2013-04-29-the-art-of-noise-inside-memory-of-a-broken-dimension

The game begins with an emulated DOS prompt on a machine that's old and dying.

Hack your way around the system for a few minutes and exciting things start to happen: strange files are downloaded, and you're invited to explore them. So far you're still outside the screen, peering in. You're role-playing yourself, in essence - a lone figure tapping away at an odd interface, trying to make sense of it all, trying to progress. Then you hit the jackpot. Everything starts to scroll, figures and symbols rushing past. It's a sudden eruption of data. The soundtrack, formerly shifting tones and chattering bursts of static, begins to build to a jet-engine crescendo, the occasional glitches that have rattled across the text increase in frequency. The code becomes a syringe pushing you forwards, the light starts to fragment and then - black out. You're somewhere else.

You're inside.

The world you see is shattered, and distorted. Things don't work the way that they should. There are visual artifacts all over the video feed that is your screen, the architecture and machinery you can see is broken.

The game's creator describes his influences being Neuromancer and BLAME! But taking one look at the screenshots, I already knew what he drew inspiration from. Was nice to get a confirmation, and it was then that I said "Yeah I probably need to play this..."

I wouldn't call it fun, and it's certainly not for everyone, but it's a very unique experience, and utterly atmospheric.
 

Rhombaad

Video Game Time Traveler
I beat Final Fantasy VI: Advance over the weekend. Now it's on to an old favorite of mine: Final Fantasy VII.
 

Walter

Administrator
Staff member
Rhombaad said:
I beat Final Fantasy VI: Advance over the weekend. Now it's on to an old favorite of mine: Final Fantasy VII.
Did you do the new dungeon? I thought it was pretty neat to have a brand-new area in such an old game, even if it felt a little half-hearted.

I'll be interested in hearing if you think FF7 holds up. I think a lot of the hype surrounding the game is tied to its GRAFFFIXXX at the time of its release.
 

Rhombaad

Video Game Time Traveler
Walter said:
Did you do the new dungeon? I thought it was pretty neat to have a brand-new area in such an old game, even if it felt a little half-hearted.

I did both the Dragon's Den and Soul Shrine, the latter of which took me almost 3 hours to complete (I died twice...). I enjoyed the Dragon's Den, but the Soul Shrine can kiss my ass. :iva:

I also obtained a 98% bestiary completion, missing only four enemies (I didn't realize that some of them don't show up in the Soul Shrine, so I thought I'd be able to run through it once to get all of 'em). Even though I'm a completionist, because I didn't obtain all of the enemies in the bestiary, I decided not to complete Gau's Rage list. I got all of Strago's Blue Magic and Mog's Dances, though.

Walter said:
I'll be interested in hearing if you think FF7 holds up. I think a lot of the hype surrounding the game is tied to its GRAFFFIXXX at the time of its release.

It does and it doesn't. I've played it several times since I first beat it in 1997-98. It's a very nostalgic game for me to play, and I really like the Materia system. The graphics look much better when playing the version released on the Playstation Network, since it's designed to be played on the PS3. Unlike many others out there, I don't think it's the greatest RPG every made (now that I'm older, I find that labeling something "the greatest" doesn't matter much anymore, but that's beside the point), but I think it's a very well-made game for the time. It doesn't hold up to more recent outings in the RPG field, but it's not supposed to.
 

Walter

Administrator
Staff member
Rhombaad said:
I also obtained a 98% bestiary completion, missing only four enemies (I didn't realize that some of them don't show up in the Soul Shrine, so I thought I'd be able to run through it once to get all of 'em). Even though I'm a completionist, because I didn't obtain all of the enemies in the bestiary, I decided not to complete Gau's Rage list. I got all of Strago's Blue Magic and Mog's Dances, though.
Geez, I never bothered with bestiary stuff nor with getting ALL of the rages/dances/blue. But I always get the ones that are best in the game. I do enjoy grinding up my favorite characters to max stats though, and I've done it probably every time I've played through the game.

I really like the Materia system
I was never a fan of it because I prefer the characters to have roles in battle,instead of their role being determined by whichever materia they have equipped. It made the characters feel generic in battle. And only a handful of Limit Breaks are truly useful in battles. I don't think the damage cap was scaled well for them in later parts of the game. Unless you're strictly using their ultimates.

Unlike many others out there, I don't think it's the greatest RPG every made (now that I'm older, I find that labeling something "the greatest" doesn't matter much anymore, but that's beside the point), but I think it's a very well-made game for the time. It doesn't hold up to more recent outings in the RPG field, but it's not supposed to.
Yeah, "THE GREATEST" is a ridiculous, subjective term to throw around unless we're talking about Berserk. :guts: But it's totally fair to say it's YOUR favorite.
 
Rhombaad said:
It's a very nostalgic game for me to play, and I really like the Materia system.

It's also a very nostalgia ridden game for me as well. FFVII was the first game I remember seeing advertised for in theaters. Seeing a minute long trailer with those cinematics on the big screen at 10 years old was a total mind fuck.
 

Rhombaad

Video Game Time Traveler
Walter said:
I was never a fan of it because I prefer the characters to have roles in battle, instead of their role being determined by whichever materia they have equipped. It made the characters feel generic in battle. And only a handful of Limit Breaks are truly useful in battles.

That's true. I tend to attach the materia in a way that makes each character a bit more individual. For instance, I don't have Cloud set-up with any Magic materia at the moment, just Sense (I'm only a few hours into the game), since I'm trying to make him more of a Fighter. Aerith, however, is loaded with Magic materia.

I agree with you 100% about the Limit Breaks. I love Cloud's level 4 Limit Break, though. It's very helpful when completing the mini-game to obtain the Final Attack materia towards the end of the game.

Walter said:
Yeah, "THE GREATEST" is a ridiculous, subjective term to throw around unless we're talking about Berserk. :guts: But it's totally fair to say it's YOUR favorite.

Well, yeah. :void: I'm not sure it's my favorite game, either, but it's definitely up there. I have a lot of good memories of playing Final Fantasy VII when it first came out. It's the game that introduced me to RPGs, which is now my favorite genre.
 
I am playing Rome Total War.. Well, I was playing for a month non stop but I'm trying to quit now :ganishka: Man, that game is so addictive...
 
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