Well I've been playing some Final Fantasy IX today, while the TV wasn't being used by anyone else.
Just stopped after the end of disc 1.
After about 10-11 hours of playing, I remember how good this game actually is, aaaaaannd, it still is great.
I always liked how the game focused on a character's arc one at a time at the start.
We really get to know who Zidane, Freya, and Vivi (and to some extent Quina! XD), are, what their motives are, and the unique quirks of their personality.
Steiner's development is evident, yet slowly burning. Its interesting to see how he slowly questions his orders and his responsibilites, even at this early point in the game.
The game excellently gives us a tough boss battle with Beatrix, (I had to use a pheonix down, but it was fairly easy for me at least because I levelled up a bit and prepared the abilities of the characters and their epuipment well), and a tease of Kuja right at the end, taking off on his giant freakin' dragon! 0_o
Truly the only game to compare FFIX to is VI, because the template is similar.
Every character gets a good share of the spotlight, and the pace is much slower, (which makes the drama much more impactful).
This is where I think FFXIII falters. It rushes these vital elements. Sure, it crams a lot in, but its just too confusing and not very fun.
To be honest I hated almost every character in XIII when I started it. Lightning is a bitch, Snow is a douche, Hope is an idiot, and Vanille, OH GOD I WANTED TO SKEWER HER ENTRAILS! >:X
And the story just dumps you right in the thick of the action, only giving little snippets of development, and the battle system is straight out frustrating, and you don't feel that you are making much progress with it.
(IX is better because it gives you quite a bit to tinker with from the get go. I definately wanted to try out all the abilities the equipment gave you, and I made sure everyone could learn almost everything by the time I got to the end of the 1st disc)
And IX feels like a living breathing world.
Sure at this point its a bit linear. But you can stretch your legs a little, talk to some NPCs, get some side story, and explore some areas. It FEELS like a world.
Even FFX had that to some extent. (And Lost Odyssey, which Sakaguchi's team made, has quite a bit of that in place as well)
But FFXIII makes itself so much worse. The map, the corridors, the obvious "go here" visual design. Its just lazy.
FFIX looks like someone hand-crafted every scene. The details in the environment almost make me want to just stop once in a while and admire them. Its a game one can get lost in.
I know ragging on XIII is old, but as a designer its important to cross-analyse games, and see what elements of the past need to be kept, and what needs to be filtered out, and to be honest when you compare XIII to IX, a HUGE amount of important stuff which makes an RPG great was taken out of XIII and a lot of crap was shoved in to try to fill that void.
Now there is something I must rant about now about this game, and that is the god-awful autosave system. Now the game doesn't use checkpoints, it just makes you go back to the previous save(manual or autosave), however, the autosave is so terrible, you don't want to ever use it! I started at some station that I needed to get completely repaired, and remove some pest that keeps attacking the area. I repaired the station, met scientist from a lab past the system, fought for a bit, and then had an attack by the same pest, which had glitched itself(Another problem, I've gotten a LOT of bugs on this game) so it could one-hit kill me at max armor and health(the same enemies that do damage sure, but never one-hit kill), so I died and the game NEVER autosaved, this was an HOUR of gameplay magically lost because of the game's crappy autosave.
TO ALL DEVS! If you are going to put in an autosave feature, that doubles as your checkpoint system, for the love of god please make it during every loading screen/after every cut scene. ESPECIALLY if they are unskippable(BTW why is dialog skippable, but not cutscenes?) Yes I get it, Geth attacked this area, I don't know why its cutscene worthy when they've attacked EVERY area I've been to, but I don't need a near minute cutscene showing the same geth attacking this area, I freaking get it!
Ok rant over. The game is still very good beyond these stupid problems.
I take this exact issue with The Walking Dead. I hate quitting after a long cut scene only to have to go though it all over again when I come back. Ugh.
Mass Effect 2, less then 10 minutes and I already have a rant.
So I have the disc right? A physical copy.
And I'm saving everything on my harddrive? Again physical copy.
SO WHY IN THE WORLD DOES MY INTERNET GOING DOWN FOR 5 MINUTES MAKE THE GAME RESTART ITSELF AND DELETE MY PROGRESS IN THE GAME??????
EDIT:and the cutscenes are unskippable. WHY???
I'm currently playing the Bee Movie Game. Aside from leaving out half the plot of the movie (which you NEED to watch to understand what the hell's going on), the game is surprisingly boring, with the exception of the numerous quick-time sequences which need to die. Overlong, occur far too often, there's not enough reaction time and the button prompts change each time you go through them. A perfect example of how NOT to do QTEs.
I don't see how you could be having that much trouble with ME or ME2. I never had such problems.
Sure, autosave in ME1 doesn't save often enough, but quick save is one button press, and I pressed it a lot. I also figured out quickly that if I couldn't quick save it was usually because enemies were nearby, so if I moved far enough away from them it would work.
And yes, I've been caught covering on the wrong wall in ME2, but it it didn't happen that often. It seemed to me that covering was made the same button as running so that you could enter cover faster.
Oh, and I always reassign the key bindings for ME2 to make them similar to ME1. For example, if ME1 taught me that spacebar pulls up the HUD, then I'm not putting up with ME2 screwing me around by assigning it to shift or control or whatever.
Sure, autosave in ME1 doesn't save often enough, but quick save is one button press, and I pressed it a lot. I also figured out quickly that if I couldn't quick save it was usually because enemies were nearby, so if I moved far enough away from them it would work.
The problem there was that there were no enemies at all. Sometimes I was on the normandy and the game wouldn't save. Plus I play on console so quicksaving isn't an option.
And yes, I've been caught covering on the wrong wall in ME2, but it it didn't happen that often. It seemed to me that covering was made the same button as running so that you could enter cover faster.
Yeah, I noticed that running to cover is less of a pain thanks to this, but I've had more scenarios of Shepard not taking cover at all or jumping over the cover than the system working.
Let's see how you like it if you run out of ammo (which shouldn't happen since there is always enough around actually. At least on normal).
I liked combat & character builds in ME1 a lot more. And if anybody could tell me the stats of the weapons ...
Yeah, so far I'm 50/50 on this build. The combat is actually... fun this time around, but the fact that everyone can use just about all of the weapons does annoy me. Plus I hate the fact that instead of buying weapons, upgrades, and armor to figure out which is the best build, its just flat out upgrading your gear for everyone now. At least it makes use of minerals this time around.
I like I can interrupt conversations and do paragon/renegade actions. Works pretty well with the system already ingame.
EDIT:All of my complaints are now invalid. I can buy a space hamster. 15/10
for me is Diablo3,just tried the open beta and got to Level 5 before the servers went offline. Gotta say it doesn't feel much different from previous entries...Facebook social games and browser-based social games are the same thing if you have ever looked into both genres. while neon's the grinns tale and latest 3d Facebook game linkin park recharge tell another story that you never heard of. Believe or not, check these two games.
Playing saints row 2, and I'm not really liking it..you need respect to get missions..and all you do is kill, and kill? I mean I know...grand theft auto plays the same way but...I think I prefer Grand Theft Auto to this.
Playing saints row 2, and I'm not really liking it..you need respect to get missions..and all you do is kill, and kill? I mean I know...grand theft auto plays the same way but...I think I prefer Grand Theft Auto to this.
Replaying the epic tale of crime and corruption in the land of the dead.
Can't go wrong with that!
Personally, I'm playing a relatively new mainstream game, which is quite unusual for me... Fallout 3 (hey, "relatively new" is a very broad term for me).
I tried playing the first two games in the series, but I just couldn't get into them, really, but I was hoping my love for Oblivion would rub off in this game as well. So far, I think I prefer Oblivion though... Fallout 3's environment is just so incredibly depressing. I know, that's the point, but still... I've only just scratched the surface though, and I'm not going to fast travel if I can help it. Hopefully the game will grow on me, but so far it feels rather empty (I did think the introduction was very clever though).
Incredibly minor complaint here, but when I'm told I'm going to play a game of poker in ME2, I'd actually like to... play a game of poker, not have the screen fade to black and tell me I lost. Thank you.
Magic The Gathering - Duels of the Planeswalkers 2013
It definately looks and performs much better than previous years.
And the decks have some interesting strategies in play.
(Fire, my favourite, has a good balance with spell cards that damage the opponent and their monsters, monsters that use energy to boost their attacks (big lategame damage), and cards with recycle abilities)
Because unlike the second and third games, Twin Snakes only came out on the Gamecube, so I suspect there'd be licensing issues and whatnot. Or maybe they just can't be bothered to port the damn thing. I dunno.
There's definitely rights issues involved. It was developed by Silicon Knights when they still had an exclusivity agreement with Nintendo, rather than by Konami. And since Nintendo still owns stock in the company, I doubt Konami will be able to untie the legal strings to get the game out on non-Nintendo platforms.
That said (and because I just realized I responded to a weeks-old post), I'm putting Metal Gear Solid HD on my next-to-buy list. Mostly because I never played Peace Walker
There's definitely rights issues involved. It was developed by Silicon Knights when they didn't suck. And since Nintendo still owns stock in the company, I doubt Konami will be able to untie the legal strings to get the game out on non-Nintendo platforms.
That said (and because I just realized I responded to a weeks-old post), I'm putting Metal Gear Solid HD on my next-to-buy list. Mostly because I never played Peace Walker
I've just finished Peace Walker and it was a mostly enjoyable experience. Some parts annoyed me (like having to play side mission things to get better weapons) but all that stems from the fact that is is a PSP port at the end of the day and I did like the fact that you have many shorter missions as opposed to one giant mission. I loved the overall story and playing it just after MGS 3 felt perfect and really makes me want to play MGS 4 even more so now (and it looks like that will happen sooner than I ever though possible with the news my flat mate had to day, that he's getting a PS3 as part of a new mobile phone contract).
On the whole the Metal Gear Solid HD experience is a positive one, I enjoyed my replay of Sons of Liberty, I had never completed Snake Eater until now and now it's my favourite of the series and I've never even looked into Peace Walker before this and got a good ride out of it. According to Raptr I've put 80 hours across these three games over a two week period. Actually, that doesn't sound good at all...
I really need to find something else to do with my time.
Been going through the Myst series. I've beaten the first two and gotten halfway through the third but stopped. Now I'm continuing my journey with the advent of picking up the first Myst novel (The Book of Atrus) which was fantastic. It spurred me to finish the series. Currently on Myst 4. Love these games. Fantastic world and concept.
It still looks fantastic, even after all this time.
The Wii controls are decent, though I've had some trouble with them (I imagine I am too close to my TV and my TV is wall mounted, and its having some trouble).
Its pretty great and suprisingly tough so far. Definately want to play the trilogy now.
Slightly dodgy voice acting, but since it IS a PS2 game, and it IS the first of a trilogy I'll happily let that slide!
Played Limbo today. Not a bad little platformer. I might play a little Insanely Twisted Shadow Planet tonight. If I don't play it tonight, it's going to be waiting until I beat Kingdom Hearts 3D.
Mass Effect 3. I would attempt to get the "best" ending possible and get the needed level of readiness or whatever, but I apparently need to mess around with the multiplayer or follow a VERY linear path of decisions. I do what I want on decisions and am playing the 360 version with no online pass OR xbox gold membership so... at least the games ending sucks no matter what :P
Mass Effect 3. I would attempt to get the "best" ending possible and get the needed level of readiness or whatever, but I apparently need to mess around with the multiplayer or follow a VERY linear path of decisions.
Yeah, I wasn't particularly happy to hear about that either, and it's exactly why I don't want multiplayer intruding on my single-player experiences. F**king Bioware, you used to be awesome.
I'm on Ratchet & Clank 2 ATM and my god it's so much better than the first one. SO much better.
Mass Effect 3. I would attempt to get the "best" ending possible and get the needed level of readiness or whatever, but I apparently need to mess around with the multiplayer or follow a VERY linear path of decisions. I do what I want on decisions and am playing the 360 version with no online pass OR xbox gold membership so... at least the games ending sucks no matter what :P
Not to post a spoiler but there is no best ending. Well there is but the difference to the worst is a colour change and a clip that isn't even a second long. Have fun grinding points for that!
Yeah, the endings are much more varied now, each with their own distinct and unique sequences showing the consequences of your decision. It's much more satisfying as a result.
The problem is that the God child still appears from nowhere and you you still have to pick one of those three endings (or not, but that option's basically a great big f**k you to the audience). By this point though, it's pretty much impossible for Bioware to give the indoctrination theory actual credence without invalidating all the work they've done on making the Extended Cut. Shame, but hey ho, at least we got something.
Not to post a spoiler but there is no best ending. Well there is but the difference to the worst is a colour change and a clip that isn't even a second long. Have fun grinding points for that!
Oh I know it isn't anything of value to go after it, that's why I'm not. I would attempt it if I could do the multiplayer though, doesn't look too bad.
EDIT:Also, I'm having the weirdest glitch where multiple people all look like my Shepard. Its getting creepy.
EDIT2:And I just want to say that these are the neediest guys I've ever seen. "Before we can help you stop the reapers, get these guys to help" "Before we help, cure our diseases" yada yada yada. Do they want to live or not?
Back to Lego Pirates. First site I rented it from wouldn't run, so I had to do it from my other rental service, and that one works fine. Phew. Was scared my disc drive was knackered or something.
Currently I'm playing Quantum Conundrum on Windows, which is really addictive. It's somewhat of a Portal 2 ripoff (which is already one of my favorite games), but instead of portals you work with different dimensions in solving puzzles, a dimension where everything is 10 times lighter and a dimension where everything is 10 times heavier, etc.
It's by Square Enix and available on Steam.
And I'm playing Trine 2 on OS X. Damn, that's a beautiful game. The graphics are sublime, controls are perfect and it's a real original story. I never played the first game, but I read everywhere that this one is a better update.
It kinda reminds me of Lost Vikings, working with a team of three characters getting through medieval levels.
Started playing Deponia. The design is solid, the puzzles are tricky but all operate on an in game logic (so far). Also, I am a fan of the game's visual design.
There have been a few bugs here and there but my biggest issue with the game is that the main character is a sociopathic monster motivated entirely by self-interest. He unnecessarily and unprovokedly rude to pretty much every character he encounters, except the one he is attracted to, and from an overall standpoint is a cancer to the community. I get that he is supposed to be like that but I have yet to see a single redeeming quality to his character. In fairness I've only just finished the first act (i.e.
It's a trilogy. You'll have a sliiiight bit of social responsibility at the end of the first Deponia part, but they're obviously saving a lot of character development for "later". In the meantime, you'll experience that ruthless Rufus does a lot of unbelievable shit to ALL characters... EVEN the one he's attracted to.
Comments
Just stopped after the end of disc 1.
After about 10-11 hours of playing, I remember how good this game actually is, aaaaaannd, it still is great.
I always liked how the game focused on a character's arc one at a time at the start.
We really get to know who Zidane, Freya, and Vivi (and to some extent Quina! XD), are, what their motives are, and the unique quirks of their personality.
Steiner's development is evident, yet slowly burning. Its interesting to see how he slowly questions his orders and his responsibilites, even at this early point in the game.
The game excellently gives us a tough boss battle with Beatrix, (I had to use a pheonix down, but it was fairly easy for me at least because I levelled up a bit and prepared the abilities of the characters and their epuipment well), and a tease of Kuja right at the end, taking off on his giant freakin' dragon! 0_o
Truly the only game to compare FFIX to is VI, because the template is similar.
Every character gets a good share of the spotlight, and the pace is much slower, (which makes the drama much more impactful).
This is where I think FFXIII falters. It rushes these vital elements. Sure, it crams a lot in, but its just too confusing and not very fun.
To be honest I hated almost every character in XIII when I started it. Lightning is a bitch, Snow is a douche, Hope is an idiot, and Vanille, OH GOD I WANTED TO SKEWER HER ENTRAILS! >:X
And the story just dumps you right in the thick of the action, only giving little snippets of development, and the battle system is straight out frustrating, and you don't feel that you are making much progress with it.
(IX is better because it gives you quite a bit to tinker with from the get go. I definately wanted to try out all the abilities the equipment gave you, and I made sure everyone could learn almost everything by the time I got to the end of the 1st disc)
And IX feels like a living breathing world.
Sure at this point its a bit linear. But you can stretch your legs a little, talk to some NPCs, get some side story, and explore some areas. It FEELS like a world.
Even FFX had that to some extent. (And Lost Odyssey, which Sakaguchi's team made, has quite a bit of that in place as well)
But FFXIII makes itself so much worse. The map, the corridors, the obvious "go here" visual design. Its just lazy.
FFIX looks like someone hand-crafted every scene. The details in the environment almost make me want to just stop once in a while and admire them. Its a game one can get lost in.
I know ragging on XIII is old, but as a designer its important to cross-analyse games, and see what elements of the past need to be kept, and what needs to be filtered out, and to be honest when you compare XIII to IX, a HUGE amount of important stuff which makes an RPG great was taken out of XIII and a lot of crap was shoved in to try to fill that void.
I take this exact issue with The Walking Dead. I hate quitting after a long cut scene only to have to go though it all over again when I come back. Ugh.
So I have the disc right? A physical copy.
And I'm saving everything on my harddrive? Again physical copy.
SO WHY IN THE WORLD DOES MY INTERNET GOING DOWN FOR 5 MINUTES MAKE THE GAME RESTART ITSELF AND DELETE MY PROGRESS IN THE GAME??????
EDIT:and the cutscenes are unskippable. WHY???
I'm currently playing the Bee Movie Game. Aside from leaving out half the plot of the movie (which you NEED to watch to understand what the hell's going on), the game is surprisingly boring, with the exception of the numerous quick-time sequences which need to die. Overlong, occur far too often, there's not enough reaction time and the button prompts change each time you go through them. A perfect example of how NOT to do QTEs.
Otherwise, yeah, it's just boring.
How the heck do you make cover based combat worse?
By combining it with run AND jump over the cover and get shot at as the same button! Its a crap-shoot on what Shepard does!
Other than that, the new combat changes are ok. Can't really say if they are for better or for worse at this moment.
Autosave doesn't suck thank god.
Let's see how you like it if you run out of ammo (which shouldn't happen since there is always enough around actually. At least on normal).
I liked combat & character builds in ME1 a lot more. And if anybody could tell me the stats of the weapons ...
Sure, autosave in ME1 doesn't save often enough, but quick save is one button press, and I pressed it a lot. I also figured out quickly that if I couldn't quick save it was usually because enemies were nearby, so if I moved far enough away from them it would work.
And yes, I've been caught covering on the wrong wall in ME2, but it it didn't happen that often. It seemed to me that covering was made the same button as running so that you could enter cover faster.
Oh, and I always reassign the key bindings for ME2 to make them similar to ME1. For example, if ME1 taught me that spacebar pulls up the HUD, then I'm not putting up with ME2 screwing me around by assigning it to shift or control or whatever.
The problem there was that there were no enemies at all. Sometimes I was on the normandy and the game wouldn't save. Plus I play on console so quicksaving isn't an option.
Yeah, I noticed that running to cover is less of a pain thanks to this, but I've had more scenarios of Shepard not taking cover at all or jumping over the cover than the system working.
Yeah, so far I'm 50/50 on this build. The combat is actually... fun this time around, but the fact that everyone can use just about all of the weapons does annoy me. Plus I hate the fact that instead of buying weapons, upgrades, and armor to figure out which is the best build, its just flat out upgrading your gear for everyone now. At least it makes use of minerals this time around.
I like I can interrupt conversations and do paragon/renegade actions. Works pretty well with the system already ingame.
EDIT:All of my complaints are now invalid. I can buy a space hamster. 15/10
Saints Row 3 doesn't have this problem
Really? I don't remember being forced to do the side missions.
Personally, I'm playing a relatively new mainstream game, which is quite unusual for me... Fallout 3 (hey, "relatively new" is a very broad term for me).
I tried playing the first two games in the series, but I just couldn't get into them, really, but I was hoping my love for Oblivion would rub off in this game as well. So far, I think I prefer Oblivion though... Fallout 3's environment is just so incredibly depressing. I know, that's the point, but still... I've only just scratched the surface though, and I'm not going to fast travel if I can help it. Hopefully the game will grow on me, but so far it feels rather empty (I did think the introduction was very clever though).
It definately looks and performs much better than previous years.
And the decks have some interesting strategies in play.
(Fire, my favourite, has a good balance with spell cards that damage the opponent and their monsters, monsters that use energy to boost their attacks (big lategame damage), and cards with recycle abilities)
That said (and because I just realized I responded to a weeks-old post), I'm putting Metal Gear Solid HD on my next-to-buy list. Mostly because I never played Peace Walker
I've just finished Peace Walker and it was a mostly enjoyable experience. Some parts annoyed me (like having to play side mission things to get better weapons) but all that stems from the fact that is is a PSP port at the end of the day and I did like the fact that you have many shorter missions as opposed to one giant mission. I loved the overall story and playing it just after MGS 3 felt perfect and really makes me want to play MGS 4 even more so now (and it looks like that will happen sooner than I ever though possible with the news my flat mate had to day, that he's getting a PS3 as part of a new mobile phone contract).
On the whole the Metal Gear Solid HD experience is a positive one, I enjoyed my replay of Sons of Liberty, I had never completed Snake Eater until now and now it's my favourite of the series and I've never even looked into Peace Walker before this and got a good ride out of it. According to Raptr I've put 80 hours across these three games over a two week period. Actually, that doesn't sound good at all...
I really need to find something else to do with my time.
It still looks fantastic, even after all this time.
The Wii controls are decent, though I've had some trouble with them (I imagine I am too close to my TV and my TV is wall mounted, and its having some trouble).
Its pretty great and suprisingly tough so far. Definately want to play the trilogy now.
Slightly dodgy voice acting, but since it IS a PS2 game, and it IS the first of a trilogy I'll happily let that slide!
I'm on Ratchet & Clank 2 ATM and my god it's so much better than the first one. SO much better.
Not to post a spoiler but there is no best ending. Well there is but the difference to the worst is a colour change and a clip that isn't even a second long. Have fun grinding points for that!
The problem is that the God child still appears from nowhere and you you still have to pick one of those three endings (or not, but that option's basically a great big f**k you to the audience). By this point though, it's pretty much impossible for Bioware to give the indoctrination theory actual credence without invalidating all the work they've done on making the Extended Cut. Shame, but hey ho, at least we got something.
Yeah, I've given up all hope of completing my backlog this summer.
Oh I know it isn't anything of value to go after it, that's why I'm not. I would attempt it if I could do the multiplayer though, doesn't look too bad.
EDIT:Also, I'm having the weirdest glitch where multiple people all look like my Shepard. Its getting creepy.
EDIT2:And I just want to say that these are the neediest guys I've ever seen. "Before we can help you stop the reapers, get these guys to help" "Before we help, cure our diseases" yada yada yada. Do they want to live or not?
It's by Square Enix and available on Steam.
And I'm playing Trine 2 on OS X. Damn, that's a beautiful game. The graphics are sublime, controls are perfect and it's a real original story. I never played the first game, but I read everywhere that this one is a better update.
It kinda reminds me of Lost Vikings, working with a team of three characters getting through medieval levels.
There have been a few bugs here and there but my biggest issue with the game is that the main character is a sociopathic monster motivated entirely by self-interest. He unnecessarily and unprovokedly rude to pretty much every character he encounters, except the one he is attracted to, and from an overall standpoint is a cancer to the community. I get that he is supposed to be like that but I have yet to see a single redeeming quality to his character. In fairness I've only just finished the first act (i.e.
Have fun!