Was a slightly dodgy framerate so much to ask for?!

Switch can just about handle PS2 games, it seems. :)

… and now I've bought it. Sixth version. Fuck sake.

Play++: Overcooked 2

It's great. Basically exactly the same game, but with new recipes and the ability to throw ingredients. Some of the levels really rely on the throw, too, separating players so you have to toss stuff back and forth (or miss, and hurl chopped steak into the river).

We've just competed world 1 (of 6?), and the difficulty is really starting to ramp up now.

(after we finish with 13th Age)

I might DM you some questions about this - I'm trying to set up a game and I'm still a little fuzzy about how sone of it works in practice.

Ask away, I've figured out most of it. DM or start a thread.

Play

Okami. Obviously. Still brilliant. Most impressive handheld mode of any game I've played on Switch. Skippable dialogue, skippable intro cutscene. Worth the 16 quid, just accept that you hate yourself for being a sucker and buy it.

On a different note, this gold coin reward thing Nintendo has going on is actually really good. I got about 70p of points from Okami, and it was only 16 quid. It's nothing that'll set the world alight, but it seems more generous than other reward programmes. And being charged 13 quid, instead of 16, is a nice little surprise whenever you get to checkout.

I played a fair bit of Okami on the PS3 and I seem to be immune to its charms. Even discounting the appalling intro, the squeaky voices and the endless walls of text, it’s just so… dull. I kept waiting for it to open up but it never does, just one small area after another small area where you’re told what to do and you dutifully go do it. I can’t even remember the actual story as it made so little impression on me. Graphics aside, I’m perplexed as to why it’s so eternally popular.

I don't think Okami was ever billed as an sandbox game, so complaints about the plot-objective-based nature of progression feel a little hollow. Yes, there have been many comparisons to Zelda thanks to its dungeon structure and unlocking items (in this case, brush techniques) that allow you to open up new routes and secrets in the "overworld" areas, but it's not much more open-world than Ocarina of Time (at least as far as my memory of OoT goes).

The start of the game is undoubtedly atrocious, though - for a game with such an amazing art style to begin in murky purple miasma (and stay there for about the first four hours) is a monumentally stupid decision.

I do like the whole package, though. It looks amazing, the soundtrack is fantastic, combat is quick and satisfying (albeit not especially deep), the brush techniques are varied, and the enemy design - especially some of the bosses - is tremendous.

That said, I don't think I'll be picking it up on Switch just yet. I've still got Octopath to finish, and the PS4 version sitting unloved has me feeling guilty about splashing out on another edition.

I don't hate Okami but I bought the PS4 version and said atrocious opening is why I've not gone too far in it, though it'd be like my 3rd time or whatever so it's not like I don't know it gets better. One day I'll go back to it. Thinking about Orochi actually hurts me as well now, lol.

Just press Start twice. You skip the whole thing. We all know the story anyway – big snake thing bad, white wolf and human hero good. 100 years pass. Repeat.

I've been playing for 40 minutes (including all cut scenes) according to my save file, and I've left the village, done the first dungeon AND restored the big field already. The new speedy opening is a god (no pun intended) send.

Don't worry, I know it all becomes a fraction of the playtime (especially as the game is so long people think it ends at the halfway point, lol), it was just at the time it really irked me.

Getting into Final Fantasy XII more now. It's still quite dated in many respects - PS2 games exist in that weird space at the moment where they feel quite modern in terms of production values but the fact they do feel quite modern makes their limitations (in this case it's small boxy areas and simple facial animations) even more apparent - and the remaster is kind of functional in that regard, it's certainly no Shadow of the Colossus in terms of trying to bring the game up to modern standards.

But it really opens up once the combat system fully unlocks, and it's really quite unlike anything else I've ever played: it's more like Final Fantasy Manager in many respects, as once you've set up a good set of Gambits the game effectively plays itself. You spend more time tweaking the rules for your team than you do actually micro-managing anything, and it's a really interesting way of recognising that in these games you often do do the same things in each battle; here you can simply automate that and let your characters do the grinding while you take care of the tactical side of things. A few QoL improvements in this version make a lot of difference, especially being able to increase the game speed to 2x or 4x and happily Benny Hill your way around the landscape levelling up as you go.

I'd really not appreciated what a complete rip-off of Star Wars this is though, it borders on plagiarism in places. You've got an evil empire, a resistance led by a plucky princess, a dashing bounty hunter sky pirate and their sidekick, and the whole thing's viewed from the point of view of two minor characters who mostly just observe what's going on. It's helped by good dialogue and generally excellent voice acting, though the overall storytelling is fairly poor - it introduces characters, doesn't mention them for ten or twelve hours of gameplay, then expects you to remember exactly who they are when they reappear. It feels quite disjointed in that respect and it doesn't help that the graphics engine kind of makes a lot of the characters look quite similar.

It's decent though, the world-building is as good as ever and the cities feel remarkably lively and bustling given the technical limitations. It's a bit more open than 10, has better characters than 13 and is more coherent overall than 15. If I can keep a handle on the overall plot, which keeps threatening to leave me behind, then I'm going to quite enjoy this overall I think.

It's a great game, it's great to play (and shame on any real time party RPG without gambits) and I really fucking enjoy the story, it's so unlike most FF games in some ways (no romance, more politics than magic etc) and as you said, the voice acting is top notch. I think it has a better story than 13 but worse gameplay, better fucking everything than 15 (yes even gameplay, fight me).

There's a Valkyria Chronicles 4 demo out now. I just happened upon it when looking through the PS Store at the end of last week. Quite big, 4-6 GB (can't really remember) and also available on Switch. Progress from the demo carries over to the main game.
Haven't played it yet but apparently it's the same one that came out in Japan the other month – quite meaty, 3-4 levels to play through.

I grabbed it, but haven't given it a go yet; I really ought to finish the first one…

…and the second one, which I've had on Vita for ages.

I finished the 1st one years ago, never got on with the 2nd one as much. Trying to get through the remaster and play the DLC (which I also bought and never played on the PS3) by which time I'm hoping 4 will be on sale.

Additional BUY:

Stupid transparent blue limited edition PS4 Pro - If I can secure a pre-order when they go live tomorrow morning. No, you're still in the retail therapy stage of your break-up, shut up. :)

(Will be selling my current PS4 Pro if anyone's interested)

(Will be selling my current PS4 Pro if anyone's interested)

How much..?

Cheap. I mean, not stupid cheap, but not the £350 they are brand new. Happy to discuss, we're all friends here. Kind of. :D

If I had a 4K TV, I'd probably be tempted to enter a bidding war with aniki, but for now I'll leave him unchallenged.

Actually the Pro's not a bad purchase these days even for those with 1080p TVs. Plenty of games come with high frame-rate modes for the Pro, 4K games can use system-level supersampling for a better picture and there's Boost mode for older titles, plus faster loading times across the board.

I’d be tempted, if it wasn’t for the fact I’m trying to actually save money this year.

There's a Valkyria Chronicles 4 demo out now

Grabbed this for Switch earlier - put about an hour into it, and so far it's.. yeah, that's Valkyria Chronicles alright. Which is great in a lot of ways, but boy those tutorials are a powerpoint and a half. Surely in this, the year of our Lord two thousand and eighteen, there is a better way to teach people how to play than to pause the game, dim the lights and give them three pages of homework. And I could do without the anime high-school drama cutscenes. Plus some of the names they've chosen are… familiar.

Additional BUY:

Stupid transparent blue limited edition PS4 Pro - If I can secure a pre-order when they go live tomorrow morning. No, you're still in the retail therapy stage of your break-up, shut up. :)

Dear reader, I got one.

Let the bidding commence! :D

£10!

£11!

£1

Let's haggle. :)

I’m not clicking on a link called Bottom Parade especially when it’s been posted by Mart.

No wonder they call you Harry the Bastard. :)

Downloaded Dead Cells last night. Played a couple of hours and really enjoyed myself. This might be heightened because I've been occasionally bashing through the old NES Castlevania's (mainly III on a recommendation) and their main characters control like wounded elephants in comparison to Dead Cells.
Movement is fun, the world is interesting and there's lots and lots of loot to collect and lots and lots of weapons to play with.
I've never seen the appeal in things like Diablo and Torchlight but this feels like the closest I'll get to understanding those games.

Dead Cells is really good. Well, I think so anyway. It's the first game in ages I feel genuinely excited to play now, finding all the secret stuff, talking to other players online and discovering things they've found which I haven't, all that jazz. Someone told me two things today I never knew, so work now can't end soon enough so I can get back to playing it.

Conversely, I hated Death's Gambit. Played an hour of it and it's soooooo derivative. I get it, Dark Souls is popular, making a 2D version seems like a good idea, but come on… at least try to be a bit different. The character creation and inventory screens might as well be exact copies of DS! The controls are clunky, but not in a 'Play carefully, death is everywhere' way, because they just feel unresponsive and sluggish. Lore is EVERYWHERE, but not in an interesting or useful way - it just feels like they needed to come up with extreme lengthy descriptions for stuff, where the useful bit about what something does is hidden away. I didn't even get past the first boss and just gave up - deleted it already, so that's £15 I'm never going to get back. :(

Salt & Sanctuary does this thing a lot better. It's far more oppressive and bleak, but at least it feels like you can play it. Death's Gambit looks nice, but that's about it. I don't get the gushy outpouring that some in the indie scene are having over it… people really do overreact over stuff like this. It's not the best example of the genre in ages, it's really not. It's not even close.

Want
Divinity 2 on PS4. Anyone played the original? What's the difficulty curve like? It looks like an incredible game, but the reviews make it sound pretty intimidating.

Want
Divinity 2 on PS4. Anyone played the original? What's the difficulty curve like? It looks like an incredible game, but the reviews make it sound pretty intimidating.

I have the original on PS4 but haven't got very far with it. A friend gave me that and Wasteland 2 for my birthday after #1 daughter was born.
If there are two other titles less conducive to playing when you're a sleep deprived shell of a person I'll happily listen to your arguments. Two resolutely old school RPGs were not things I was able to process at the time.

Play

Dead Cells is just… so good. Really satisfying game on many levels. The Spelunky lineage becomes clearer and clearer the more you play and the more you discover. The levels are randomly generated but they follow a similar rule set that you see in Spelunky's design. It feels, to me, slightly less frustrating compared to Spelunky and the difficulty isn't quite as punishing.
This game has also resurrected an increasingly dormant friend's Facebook group that was set up to discuss the Dark Souls games.

Got both the demos for Valkyria and Monster hunter on Switch. I nearly got Monster Hunter World on last week but want to see how this is first.

Mentioned this to Mart on twitter but never played Okami, I owned it for the ps2 but was when I'd near completely moved to Xbox and Xbox Live so never started it and ended up selling my ps2.

The Monster Hunter demo is aimed squarely at people who already know the series: if you’re coming in fresh, it’s almost guaranteed to put you off. World is a far better starting point.

It feels, to me, slightly less frustrating compared to Spelunky and the difficulty isn't quite as punishing.

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA.

Oh, you poor misguided soul. Please tell me you still think this way when you've discovered the Ossuary or the Clock Tower and had your flaming head stoved in for the umpteenth time. :D

I'm up for multiplayer on Monster Hunter Generations Demo if anyone wants, as far as demos go, it's pretty simple imo. Just pick Guild Style for whatever weapon you're using.

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA.

Oh, you poor misguided soul. Please tell me you still think this way when you've discovered the Ossuary or the Clock Tower and had your flaming head stoved in for the umpteenth time. :D

I wrote a post about this and then hit F5 thinking I'd highlighted another window. I had not. It's gone.
Basic thought was that Spelunky is overwhelming because of the environmental dangers where this has a more Souls-like combat focus and you're more likely to be overwhelmed by a mob than lose on a 1v1 battle.
I got to the Ossuary last night. Didn't get past it but then I've not beaten the Concierge yet.

The Monster Hunter demo is aimed squarely at people who already know the series: if you’re coming in fresh, it’s almost guaranteed to put you off. World is a far better starting point.

The only game I played was one of the PSP ones, which I loved. Playing a lot of xbox currently as its the summer hols but September I will be back to Switch handheld as 90% of my weekly gaming hence why I am intrigued by this one.

If you've already played one of the earlier games, then you should be fine with this. Just don't put too much store in the demo - it'll show how it looks and how well it runs, but doesn't really give you much of a feel for the actual game, and doesn't teach you anything either. The full game should have a smoother learning curve.

The PSP Monster Hunter games were absolutely brutal, even the later 3DS ones, MH3U and MH4U were way more forgiving and less harsh in comparison, so if you were okay with that shit you should be okay for MHGU.

Also, didn't mean to undermine Gar earlier, he was right, MHW is the best starting point.

Basic thought was that Spelunky is overwhelming because of the environmental dangers where this has a more Souls-like combat focus and you're more likely to be overwhelmed by a mob than lose on a 1v1 battle.

Yep, absolutely spot on. In Spelunky, literally everything was out to get you. Here, the environment only hurts if you're not paying attention - most dangers are easy to avoid, if you're vaguely careful. But each battle matters, you have to be cautious later on as wading in thinking you're the greatest usually leads to nasty death.

I got to the Ossuary last night. Didn't get past it but then I've not beaten the Concierge yet.

Initially, he seemed daunting. Now, I'm getting close to taking him down without even getting hit (which is a trophy). Not made it past the Ossuary or the Clock Tower though. There's an Elite with an ability in the Ossuary, so I think I'm going to focus on that for a bit.

Also: Gardener's Keys. Fuck those. How are you meant to use them if they don't carry over, since one is in an area past where the door is? Very odd.

Initially, he seemed daunting. Now, I'm getting close to taking him down without even getting hit (which is a trophy). Not made it past the Ossuary or the Clock Tower though. There's an Elite with an ability in the Ossuary, so I think I'm going to focus on that for a bit.

I got to the Stilt Village at the weekend then found a cursed chest and got cursed and then died trying to lift the curse. The curse mechanic is pretty fun though… and stressful.

I love how the chest taunts you into opening it. Dangerous but fun. :)

Additional PLAY
Shovel Knight - Had this ages back on 3DS and enjoyed it, but wasn't overly taken by it like some folk were. Grabbed the Treasure Trove on PS4 in the sale though and now I'm deep into it… pretty much rinsed all the trophies I'm likely to get bar a couple, then I'll move onto the other modes featuring different knights (Plague and Spectre, the King mode is coming soon). Not bothering with the 'Don't die /fall down a pit' trophies, that way madness lies. :)

I love how the chest taunts you into opening it. Dangerous but fun. :)

The first time I opened one I got a curse that meant I got insta-killed by the next hit I took, until I'd killed ten enemies, which was a bloody nightmare; I was on the section with those Lovecraftian maggot-dudes that spawn little teleport maggots when they die. I hate those little bastards at the best of times, but they were nightmare-inducing at that point. Reward totally wasn't worth it either. :P

I think I'm still missing one skill upgrade, seeing as there are still areas I can't get to, and I'd put a large amount of money on it being a wall jump (or possibly climb). It remains a minor miracle that I got the last one, to be fair; first time through that area, flask charges exhausted, and less than half health with an Elite to take down… That fight and the (extremely cautious) trip to the exit were nerve-wracking, to say the least.

So yeah, I'm playing Dead Cells too, and it is wonderful.

Play: Pokemon Ultra Moon. I can't get near my Switch at the moment due to my boy's ongoing Splatoon fixation so I've dug out the faithful old 3DS and reminded myself how many great games it's got that I still haven't got round to (especially RPGs, which are pretty much my genre of choice anyway). I haven't played a "proper" Pokemon game in years, despite playing Pokemon Go daily, and this is actually really fun: it looks surprisingly nice, there's a good mix of Pokemon I know and ones that make you go "what the fuck is that?", and it's just gentle and charming throughout. No 3D at all which is odd for a flagship title but that's hardly a deal-breaker.

How are you finding returning to the 3ds? I am far from a gfx snob with the amount of retro systems I still play, however the 3ds is a difficulty blurry and tiny hell box to return to now I find.

It’s still the least ergonomic and most uncomfortable-to-hold system ever made, but on a technical level I don’t really have a problem with it. Especially now it’s effecively a retro system, I can appreciate what the games manage to do with its relatively puny capabilities without expecting it to be cutting-edge or comparing it to other consoles. And it genuinely does have a lot of really great games to play.

I dunno if it's my New 3DS nub or what but it's starting to get hard to use it to move the camera in MH4U, it'sl ike I need to strap a tiny nub sized cup around my thumb to go over it or omething so when I press down it will actually register. I have no issue playing games on it though.

One thing about the 3DS that's really noticeable though is that it's really the last true portable and the games are actually designed around that. Text is nice and big, displays are clear and everything's chunky and obvious. With the Switch or the Vita it's often too obvious that games are designed around the big screen and they don't always do enough to make them just right for the portable screen. The 3DS is just a nice fun thing to play on and if only it wasn't so bloody uncomfortable I'd probably use it more.