PWB July 2019

Okay, I'll go first.

PLAY
Dandy Dungeon - on Switch, still.
Legend of Zelda: Wind Waker HD - determined to do everything, since I never have even though I've finished it. And yes, that includes the figurine quest, though the HD version has a buttload of improvements to make that easier so I'm happy. This'll take me a while.
Bayonetta 2 - borrowed from the work library, since I've been playing/working on [REDACTED] and now I'm super excited for it, so I need something similar to enjoy in the meantime.

WANT
The internet - two and a bit months now without my own internet connection and I hate it. Can't use my laptop, can't use my consoles except the Switch and Wii U, can't reliably talk to my girlfriend without the conversation being broken up by failed WhatsApp calls. It's bullshit. Trying to resolve it, but there's continual roadblocks in a language I don't speak. Bah.

BIN
Wizards Unite - a bunch of things all happened at once and I lost interest in this faster than you can say Hermione correctly. I got fed up having to try and hunt down ingredients, especially since a few of them all look the same AND you need water for seeds. I had a bunch of confoundables all run away on me, even though I had potions and was casting well (the last being an 'emergency' level Harry Potter I hadn't seen before). And then I completed a section, realised you could prestige if you caught everything and then twigged that essentially, it's just an endless barrage of catching random things with very little charm for no real payoff. It doesn't have anywhere near the character of Pokémon Go, despite being rammed with content from the start, and I just couldn't be arsed. Life's too short. Deleted.

Play

Shadowbringers-

Dancing on the wind
Up and down again
Round and round the bend
Falalalalala

This isn't going to mean anything tom ost people here, but people are already regarding the story of 5.0 as the best experience of the game thus far, saying a hell of a lot for a game this big honestly. And I mostly agree, but I really liked 3.0.

There are other games besides Final Fantasy XIV right now?

Play

Slay the Spire: a genuinely incredible game, definitely up there in "all-time classic" territory. It's been balanced within an inch of its life and I can't stop playing it. Beaten it now with the Silent and the Defect but still utterly hopeless with the Ironclad; looking to unlock Act 4 before starting Ascension runs.

Hollow Knight: revisited this on Xbox and I'm enjoying it more than I did before, got further with less trouble so either I've got better at it or it's just clicked more this time round. Got totally lost though a few areas in, I'm still not a fan of the mapping system whereby you really can't tell where you are unless you happen to get lucky and stumble on the mapping guy early on in a new area. I'm still not sure if I'm going to see it through, I find it enjoyable and stressful in roughly equal measure.

Gears of War Ultimate Edition: continuing my tour of greatest hits of Xbox. This is just ridiculous really, all the characters are so bulked out they are practically spherical and a combination of all these dudes waddling around and the hilarious "dum-dum-dum" footsteps they all make means it's like Attack of the Teletubbies. It's also Hiding Behind A Wall: The Game, which isn't really all that much fun, and the remaster is curiously unimpressive. So, not aged brilliantly, then, but still quite cathartic for a quick blast.

Want

Yes I want to go back to Final Fantasy XIV, you can stop telling me how brilliant it is Alastor. New expansion week isn't the time to do it but as soon as the servers settle down I'm back on this with a vengeance. Can you play dungeons with NPCs now or is that just a Shadowbringers thing?

Also want to go back to Hitman 2 but when oh when will that damn expensive Expansion Pass go on sale?

Bin

Nothing really: finished a couple of games lately but haven't rage quit on anything. Game Pass makes it very easy to check stuff out for a couple of hours then just move on if it isn't your sort of thing.

Play

Darkest Dungeon - I've always loved the idea of this - the aesthetic, the Mignola-inspired art, Wayne June's narration - and downloaded it the day it came it out on PS4. I also have it on Steam and iPad, thanks to various sales, but for whatever reason(s) I'd only actually managed to play it sparingly until the last couple of weeks.

I now have an estate on my PS4 with a few hours on invested in it, and one on my iPad with similar, and am having a whale of a time letting it kick my ass.

Slay the Spire - I love to say I told you so.

I played 40 hours on the Steam version, so I haven't played many standard runs on the PS4 yet, but am doing the Dailies here and there to level up the characters. Assuming I don't crack and get a Switch in the meantime, I'm now just waiting for the iPad version to render most of the other games I have on that obsolete and, all being well, probably make it my preferred platform to play on.

Persona 5 - I'm trying to get into it, but three (decent length, admittedly) sessions in three weeks isn't hugely promising. If it doesn't get its hooks in soon I think it'll start to confirm my suspicions that JRPGs - even ones this stylish - might just not really appeal to me that much anymore.

Want

As I alluded to above, I find myself interested in a Switch again. Seeing as it's mainly just so I can use it as an alternative/better way to play games I already own (Dead Cells, the Binding of Isaac, Enter the Gungeon, Into the Breach, even possibly Darkest Dungeon and Slay the Spire), rather than because I particularly want to play most of the exclusives, I'm not in any great rush.

They Are Billions is out on PS4 this month, I think.

I genuinely couldn't think of anything else off the top of my head, oddly. (Apart from an iPad version of Slay the Spire.) A quick scan of a wishlist suggests I am also interested in Control, Death Stranding and Cyberpunk 2077, which is true to varying levels, so I'll say them.

Bin

JRPGs, apparently.

Yes I want to go back to Final Fantasy XIV, you can stop telling me how brilliant it is Alastor. New expansion week isn't the time to do it but as soon as the servers settle down I'm back on this with a vengeance. Can you play dungeons with NPCs now or is that just a Shadowbringers thing?

As far as I know it's only new content….for now. I can't see them not doing it on older content though as arguably older stuff needs this system more than new content. I personally haven't used it yet and don't really plan to, but if you wanna' level a new class you're not used to or have Tank anxiety it's probably a good idea for you.

What I DO know about the system so far is, they have 'personalities' and AI and they will talk to each other mid dungeon, an example given is that if you take Alisae (the female of the twin Elezen duo) she will use Limit Break as soon as it caps out because she wants to be as helpful as possible whereas Y'shtola probably won't. They have their own EXP so need to be levelled up too.

Play
Shadow of War – I remember this being torn apart when it was released, although apparently over some mechanics that are no longer present. What's left is really good fun, just an incredibly polished version of the already great first game. The plot is bobbins, but the combat is incredibly satisfying.

Mario Maker 2 – Joyous, bouncy fun.

SNES mini – Brilliant, although I wish you could rewind without having to be near the console itself.

Play: From Dust (2011). I had a night to myself last weekend and half thought I'd get through some more Red Dead but then found a copy of Castlevania: Lords of Shadow in a cupboard, put that on for a bit and then had a look through my PS3 library. Ended up playing about half of From Dust again and have been working through it over the last few evenings. I still find it really enjoyable and engaging, the terraforming aspect is really fun and there's real satisfaction in going through the semi disastrous states of the levels out the other side into a lush, green, populated island/islands.

I've never really had the patience for classic God games but if anyone has recommendations for similar things to this I'd be delighted to hear them.

Bin: Getting ever further away from going back to Red Dead. It's weird, I've not found much fun in it.
I was kind of enjoying the story for a bit but then the mechanics that get piled on top of each other became a bit off putting. After that I was enjoying just having a look around the world but then I'd encounter events that I didn't have any context for (a gang would appear and start shooting or a prisoner transport popped up and… What? Am I supposed to free the prisoner?) and it started to feel like it was all a bit much. It'll probably go into the cupboard that Castlevania came out of so I'll look forward to discovering it again in 3 years.

Additional PLAY:

Baba Is You - It's in the Switch sale currently for £7, grabbed it for £5 with a gold coin discount. Brain-breakingly fun, basically code rewiring for game mechanics. My girlfriend bought it too, so we spent all of last night playing it together (it's not online or multiplayer, we just sat on WhatsApp chat doing the same levels together and working out the puzzles as a pair). Loved it. It's already getting tricky though, so hopefully this doesn't kill my new relationship.

(My favourite level so far was called Poem, where the initial rules were Rose Is Red, Violet Is Blue, Flag Is Win, Baba Is You)

The Aquatic Adventure of the Last Human - Tough as nails Metroidvania set underwater. Come for the relaxing music and absolutely no guidance gameplay (which I like a lot), stay to be battered over the head with constant 'THE EARTH IS DYING, WE'RE THE REAL MONSTERS' narrative. The typos in the text also piss me off. Still, I'm enjoying the action especially as it was £3 and change in the Switch sale.

Additional PLAY:

Yono and the Celestial Elephants - Had this for ages virtually untouched, which was weird because when it was coming, I was really looking forward to it. Went back yesterday and I now remember why I left it. It's an isometric adventure, except the puzzles are as rudimentary as you can get (push crate, hit switch, stand on moving platform, maybe headbutt an enemy of two). The town bits are the worst kind of traversal fetch quests, since you're basically taking items from one place to another that just happen to be at opposite ends of the area. There's no map and everything looks the same, so it's really easy to get lost and forget where you're taking things. And worst of all, there's soooooo much talking and text, all trying to deliver a story that's got blatant 'Capitalism is bad, people are awful, down with the bourgeoisie!' themes. I've got no problem with games being political but when it's a cute elephant talking to a funny little robot about how trade tariffs are stifling a kingdom and another character telling me how regal edicts are basically just an extension of physical violence against the masses… well. Dunno if I'll push through, I'm already bored again.

New Play Mad Max.
It was £8 the other week and I've been thinking about getting it for a while so… Here we are.
I quite like it, it reminds me of Shadow of Mordor – which is still the only game I've got a platinum for – because it's borderline mediocre but has just enough to keep me going. Everything's sort of… shit but also it's not very taxing and you don't have to care all that much about what's going on. A perfect 7/10.

New Play Mad Max.
It was £8 the other week and I've been thinking about getting it for a while so… Here we are.
I quite like it, it reminds me of Shadow of Mordor – which is still the only game I've got a platinum for – because it's borderline mediocre but has just enough to keep me going. Everything's sort of… shit but also it's not very taxing and you don't have to care all that much about what's going on. A perfect 7/10.

My kind of game. I have it from PS+, so that's getting played then.

Play

I hopped back into Dragon Quest XI last night for an hour or so – enough to race through a pretty simple dungeon and level up a couple of times – and I'm not entirely sure its more retro elements are working for me.

The environments in the overworld are pretty large, but the dungeon had more loading screens than I expected and the MIDI music detracts from the experience more than it really should. Being able to see enemies on the field helps when you just want to get on with things, rather than random battles interrupting your progress every few steps, but it also leaves me feeling obligated to fight them all. Which is great for steady levelling progress, but the fights are over so quickly that they're still a bit of a pain to stop for.

At least random battles felt like an event happening, but the fights here – which are still instanced into their own little sub-area with a loading screen, intro and outro to sit through– get kind of tedious. (I'm not a fan of action RPGs, but at least they're streamlined.

I got a new PC monitor (with more than one input, so I could hook it up to my work laptop) which is very big and very 4k (though the contrast ratio leaves a little to be desired) so I also fired up Sea of Thieves and Elite Dangerous to see how they look. Most of the time in Elite was spent in menus, reconfiguring my controls (which had been forgotten again), but they both look pretty impressive.

Want

It's going to be another 3 weeks before we get to play 13th Age again, thanks to a party member's other social engagements. I'm honestly kind of glad, since I've got no idea what they're going to do next, but I'm still looking forward to getting back to it.

Bin

This heat. We've had two thunderstorms in the last three days, and it's done nothing to help.

Bin

This heat. We've had two thunderstorms in the last three days, and it's done nothing to help.

(looks at current temperature in Frankfurt, sees 41°)

Bitch, please.

Hey, you're the one who decided to move there.

Play

Shadowbringers - Thinking of making an alt, kinda' want to be an unknown again.

Fire Emblem: Three Houses - I wasn't going to, the new Fire Emblem games are decent enough, but the map design has really fallen off since Awakening and now they've added 'self inserts' as characters the story seems just not as interesting, has anyone ever had a blank slate character represent them? I haven't. But I haven't played a Fire Emblem on console ever and the new stuff in this sounds pretty good.

Also me calling the post Awakening series 'waifu simulators' is a bit hypocritical considering I've already pledged my undying devotion to Edelgard tbh.

Seriously though, I hear this is super long (70 hours I heard, but that's a lot of optional stuff apparently) and has some good gameplay elements.The new 'you are a teacher and can teach students' thing sounds wild for a FE game, so I'm looking forward to running around the Monastery and looking after my class. T_T

Want

Marvel Ultimate Alliance 3 - I love love love the last two games and this looks kinda fun, and I can finally play it onine and synergise abilities. Hopefully it's full of nerdy stuff, like how in MUA2 characterswould have dialogue between them depending on party composition.

Bin - Nothing, can't be bothered making a comment about global warming because I'm too hot???

Yeah, very tempted by Fire Emblem although I’ve bounced off Awakening a couple of times due to the permadeath - it feels like a cheat to play in casual mode but losing a character right at the end of a battle due to one lucky shot is rage-enduring. I hear this has some kind of limited rewind feature though so might be less frustrating? Interested to hear your opinions on it.

On the other hand I could just get my SRPG fix with the three Banner Saga games that have landed on GamePass, as I hear they’re quite good.

I heard that too, but I'm yet to experience the feature so far. And I also think Casual is practically a different game, I won't look down on anyone who plays it in that mode but knowing you can send people on a suicide charge changes everything for me. I'm on Hard/Classic, hope I don't regret it!

Also me calling the post Awakening series 'waifu simulators' is a bit hypocritical considering I've already pledged my undying devotion to Edelgard tbh.

This disgusts me for reasons. Blue Lions forever!

The feature you're thinking about appears early on and is called Divine Pulse - you can use it to undo moves, whole turns or even the entire battle but you only get limited amount of uses for it. It's definitely helpful though.

The Blue Lions are definitely better than the Golden Deer, don't worry. I would have probably went to Blue Lion for Annette and Mercedes but oh well. I serve my Axe wielding (I think she swings it with one arm too lol) Empress-to-be and her alone.

This one’s not so much a waifu simulator as a child grooming simulator, isn’t it? The whole setup is slightly icky.

It's not like that, honest. You're a teacher, they're students. Plus, that's not everything.

It’s a military college, so really a third level school, I’d say the minimum age is 18 - other than some of the child geniuses- but two hours in and I’m annoyed with one of the students for perving at me!

Additional Play:

Somewhere on the JRPG Venn diagram at the overlap between Persona 4, Valkyria Chronicles and Skies of Arcadia sits The Legend of Heroes: Trails of Cold Steel. It's not really quite as good as any of those games, of course – it lacks the wonder of Arcadia, the heart of P4G or the strategy of Valkyria – but right now, this is the game that's grabbed me in a way that none has in recent memory.

It might not have made quite the same impression without Dragon Quest XI as a contrast, though; their bright colours and turn-based combat aren't a million miles apart, but Cold Steel's cast of characters is bigger and more interesting right from the start, and the main character actually had a personality, which is something I didn't even realise was bothering me about the mute cipher you puppeteer in Dragon Quest.

The thick layer of dumb anime high school tropes will prove too much for some people, but its broad strokes of character and humour make it a pleasant way to spend a few hours. I'm looking forward to things opening up a bit, as I've been shuttled from one tutorial to the next so far with little time to indulge in any of the mini-games it's been throwing at me.

The battle system has a couple of nice touches – spells have a casting time, so while you choose which one to use on that character's turn, they'll be shuffled down the initiative order a little before it actually happens. Monsters have a vulnerability to different weapon types, which allow your other party members to perform follow-up attacks. Certain turns in the battle will grant the active character bonuses (extra HP or magic points, or guarantee a critical hit). The characters' most powerful special moves can be triggered at any time, meaning you can actually steal an enemy's Critical bonus turn from them.

I'm still waiting for the central conflict to kick off – the game opens with a flash-forward to your characters at level 49 in some kind of warzone – so it's a slower burn than Skies of Arcadia or even Persona 4, which threw you into the plot right off the bat. That said, with nine classmates' names to learn from the very beginning, a slower introduction is probably useful.

Additional PLAY:

Sea of Thieves - I like Sea of Thieves.

I haven't played in ages; Sarah's PC still isn't properly online, and I don't have any other regular crew since aniki started sailing with other people.

I doubt the people I play with will always be on when I am, so feel free to ping me if you're on (MajorDysentry on Xbox, unlike on all my other consoles).

Friend invite sent. I'm unlikely to be available pre-9pm, what with the sprog's bedtime being… changeable, but any time after that, send me an invite and I'll try and hop on.

We'll try to coordinate, but don't forget a) I'm an hour ahead of you and b) I'm an old man, so 10.30pm is usually my bedtime on a school night.

Standard Soc operating procedure, then.

Not just an old mans bedtime, Mart asks for the blandest curry too.

FE3H - so I’ve got most of my students to lvl 20 and Byleth to 25. Some of the Paralogue maps that have opened up have been fun, but so far I’d say there has been a revolving door approach to the maps. Forced splitting of the team is no fun!

Seeing that the level cap is 50, I reckon I have a bit of a grind ahead of me.

I’m beginning to think that I should go into the settings and turn off some of the battle animations just to speed things up.

I’d like to be able to save certain states for my students too - at the moment just to have a setup that turned on all the Monster abilities or the Armoured abilities would be nice - and something the FEH app does well.

Are all the students still students? Or, you know. Wink.

Not just an old mans bedtime, Mart asks for the blandest curry too.

I forgot a Biryani was mostly rice, I'd have ordered something else if I had. Plus, you burnt my face off with the lamb starter.

You'd hate it out here. Everything's so generic and uninteresting - curry, Chinese, everything vaguely unique is a watered down equivalent. Damn tasty in places, but still decidedly non-spicy.

I like the way they mix things up, I hate the 'protect these npcs' maps, thankfully I don't think any of them outright fail you for not saving everyone, but I hate being rushed in a Strategy RPG. It's the reason I stopped playing Xcom 2.