[Maark Abbott]

I think that's why I can tolerate a game like Darkest Dungeon being hard in its way over something designed simply to be outright punishing, like Dreadful - The difficulty in DD is half in preparedness/skill with mechanics (i.e. right hero for the right area, right trinkets, right skills and using them in the right way) and half from the fact that sometimes the dice just say 'fuck you'. And that's how D&D is at the table.

[Mentalist]

Gungrave G.O.R.E. ceetainly has some high-quality cutscenes. And a very anime story (which checks out).

The gameplay though... eeeeeeeh

It's not terrible. But it's just waves of mooks rushing you to die.

okay in small doses, but can easily get tedious.

[Mentalist]

3/4 crime bosses down.

We're running out of enemy ideas, so now they've got souped up rocket launchers, snipers who one-shot my shields, and also throw mutants in with the human enemies.

I feel like I may need to replay a bunch of levels on Easy just to get extra currency and unlocks for the later levels.

[Tsundoku]

Mentalist, on 28 March 2023 - 06:12 AM, said:

I feel like I may need to replay a bunch of levels on Easy just to get extra currency and unlocks for the later levels.

The struggle is real.

[Maark Abbott]

Firing up Dyson Sphere Program again later, but this time with knowledge of how to play the game.

Let's see if I can make my interplanetary logistics a bit more efficient this time.

[Mentalist]

Tsundoku, on 28 March 2023 - 09:02 AM, said:

Mentalist, on 28 March 2023 - 06:12 AM, said:

I feel like I may need to replay a bunch of levels on Easy just to get extra currency and unlocks for the later levels.

The struggle is real.

Turns out there was no difficulty spike.

Finished on Normal, 10 hours total run time.
Not terrible, but absolutely not worth the full price.


For a change of pace, I'm going thru a bunch of student projects/ free small games in my Steam backlog.

Jivana was a really pretty 3D platforming puzzle game. Feels like a prologue for a much bigger game that'll probably never happen, but it's nice.

[Mentalist]

Mya of the Desert is an earth-bending 3D puzzle platforming. It's got a bunch of clipping bugs, b/c your main gimmick is summoning pillars or rock out of sand floor/walls/ceiling, and so fairly often you can fall through this "terraformable" part of the wall and end up outside the level. But it's an okay collectathon (each level has a set number of "mosaic shards" and collecting a full set increases your mana bar, so you can do more stuff at once), with a decently fun boss at the end. Needs an ending cutscene. Also most achievements are bugged, which is a shame. The idea is pretty promising.

Mot de Pass (which is "password" in French) is a really weird thing.
It's a linear 3RD person shooter, which is a collection of levels designed by Russian-speaking students in a Ukrainian design workshop (apparently). It has no unifying theme, as it's just a bunch of people making cool shit in Unreal Engine. So they made this story about a futuristic cop chasing some punk criminal through a bunch of portals and different time periods/universes.

It's weird, janky AF, but strangely earnestly compelling. Some of the individual levels are pretty neat. There's terrible shooting (enemies tend not to die unless you headshot them), climbing and swinging on a grapple hook to traverse, some puzzles (there's an area where you get a wizards's hat and magic powers apropos of nothing), there's a level where you stumble through fog at night in a mountain valley that felt very "Alan Wake". It's just a really strange collection of game stuff.

[Mentalist]

After playing a bunch more indie/student project stuff, I decided to play something nice and chill. So now I'm exploring "Submerged: Hidden Depths", which is an elaborate sequel to a really nice open world collectathon. Now with even more stuff to collect.

[Maark Abbott]

I went back with a slightly clearer head and played through as much of Dread as I think I'm capable of. I got stonewalled by the gold spear guy in the rainy area.

Pros:

Looks great
Movement/traversal has never felt so good
Abilities are satisfying to use

Cons:

Level design is not as solid as I'd expect in this series (not in the Jaffe sense, more in the
Difficulty is simply too high - I had to turn it down to the 'easy mode' and it's still way too hard
Boss fights are a stressful slog
Lots of hitbox jank meaning you get some very odd interactions with enemies that can one hit kill you
Presence of enemies that can one hit kill you in a series that's never had that before

I honestly feel so disappointed by this. The devs have very clearly decided that the series' market is the Soulslike kids who want every boss fight to just be unfun and stressful. I don't mind difficulty (see: Prime 2) but I think it's a reasonable expectation that if normal is too hard and I turn the setting down to at least complete the game, that it makes some difference, but there are bosses lategame who still hit you for around 200-250 damage a pop, in a game where you have about 12-1300. The game is still ludicrously punishing. I dunno, maybe I'm old school in this but I think changing a game's design philosophy to the point you push out players who've been in since the 90s is a poor move.

Also worth noting that the series has always had an AFF which was to change a beef enemy's colour the closer it got to dying; this game doesn't even have that, so you can't tell if you almost had a boss or if you had no chance that time. Which is a bit shit really.

It's the first Metroid game I have zero inclination to replay at all. Hell, I probably won't bother grinding out the end of the game because I feel like playing games should be fun, and this just ain't fun. I waited twenty years and got this mess.

4/10.

[Mentalist]

Finished "Submerged: Hidden Depths".

Very pretty, but mechanically simpler than the original.

Gonna be away this weekend, so laptop gaming- prolly gonna play Owlboy, and some other 2D stuff.

This post has been edited by Mentalist: 07 April 2023 - 01:12 AM

[Traveller]

Dredge is a fine combination of fishing and eldritch spookyness.

Nearly finished the story, even now its throwing some weird new stuff into the mix at night as well as the weird tentacled horrors. Nearly ran into a dark island with a house on it just now as it loomed through the mist, only to have it fade and disappear just as I reached it. There is no island on the map there..

Such a good creepy vibe. And the day fishing is fun, I'd actually like a game where you just upgrade the boat and equipment and catch stuff without the night-time nasties.

[Mentalist]

So I guess Pronty's worm boss was at least inspired by the one in Owlboy.

Finished all the main game stuff, even got all the coins. The cannon minigame took me most of the night yesterday, but today, back on a regular keyboard, I was able to get the last 2 ring sets relatively quickly.

Need to got to outer space for the endgame stuff.

This post has been edited by Mentalist: 10 April 2023 - 05:10 AM

[Aptorian]

I want to play Dredge when it drops in price a bit. I love fishing games, like Ridiculous Fishing.


I've been playing Atomic Heart the past week since it's available on Gamepass.

There's definitely some weird euro jank holding it back from being truly great, but this is a really good game. It's a strange mix between Bioshock, Half-life and Portal. And it works rather well for what it's trying to do.

The story is cool, the environments are crazy and wonderfully imaginative. The scope of the designers vision is a kin to Bioshock Infinite mixed with Metal Gear.

Unfortunately the writing and dialogue is atrocious. I don't know if it's just a translation and culture thing, but the way the main character talks and behaves is tiresome bordering on insufferable. It makes you long for the days of the silent protagonist. Thank god Gordon Freeman didn't have a potty mouth and an attitude problem.

[Mentalist]

I will be stoked to play Atomic Heart. After the war.

Finished Owlboy. Space bit in the endgame was alright.

Was gonna start the Alice games, but 2 titles that I was really stoked to play after the demnos are dropping this week- "Rusted Moss" and "Hunt the Night".

So until those release I guess I'll just dip into the big pile of demos again.

[Mentalist]

Started "HAAK" on Wed, it's a post-apoc metroidvania. Sorta. There's no interconnected world, because you need to travel between levels on a map that reminds me of Fallout 1&2, mostly.

But then as you gain more abilities, you can go back and cleanup map bits you haven't been able to get to earlier. The story is a big chase from one location to another, as you're trying to track down your lost brother. But the actual gameplay been pretty fun, because movement is fast and combat is mostly just there, and doesn't really get in the way of the exploration.

[Maark Abbott]

I changed my view on Dread. It required a few things that my brain injury makes tricky: a change of perspective philosophically (you can't run and gun hyper aggressively; you have to pick and choose WHEN to do so) and a change in mindset.

Once I accustomed to those it became a lot more enjoyable. Still not as good in my view as Super or Fusion, but definitely a fun game.

[Mentalist]

wrapped up Haak, mostly. I need to go to an areea to trigger credits, but the devs are adding more story content from time to time, so I'll just let it sit there for now.

Waiting for AfterImage to drop on Tuesday. Decided to play something shorter.

So picked up "Yeomna: Legend of Dongbaek", which is an action-platformer (not quite a metroidvania) base don Korean mythos. Game's controls are pretty janky, but it's easy, and I really dig the bosses' visual designs.

[Tiste Simeon]

The Last of Us 2 is currently reduced from £35 to about £8 on the PlayStation store so yup I got that. Dunno when I'll play it but it's there when I do get round to it!

[Tiste Simeon]

Tiste Simeon, on 21 April 2023 - 05:31 PM, said:

The Last of Us 2 is currently reduced from £35 to about £8 on the PlayStation store so yup I got that. Dunno when I'll play it but it's there when I do get round to it!

So I actually did start playing this and I have two initial thoughts: this began like a soap opera ("you kissed her!" And "you got into a fight with that guy!")
Also, I hate Abby, so you can probably work out what specific but I just reached...

[Aptorian]

Abby did nothing wrong.