Play
I am finally actually playing Persona 4. I've been putting it off for years because I know it's going to be huge, but I got hit with the urge to play it the other day so I dug out my Vita. So far I'm loving it, although it's early days yet. My Vita is struggling a little though; it keeps on popping up the "Battery low" message and then it remembers that the battery isn't actually low. It might settle after I've put a couple power cycles through it, otherwise I guess I might have to replace the battery.
Want
I am saving up my free cash just now to buy old 2000ads. I have a 50% off voucher for the 2000ad shop, so the more I buy, the better value.
Bin
I loaded up a few PSone games to my Retroid. Tenchu, Blood Omen: Legacy of Kain, Colin McRae 2.0, Silent Bomber, Crash Team Racing. All charming, all also annoying. I think I'll be sticking to JRPGs from now on.
Play
Mainly still just Sea of Thieves. There are 3 of us bumbling about on a Brig, occasionally running through Tall Tales if we get online early enough.
I did also give You Suck at Parking a go, after it came up on Game Pass. I've only tried the "campaign" yet - it's sort of a Micro Machines-ish racing puzzle game where the objective is to park in a small box; the trick is that if you stop at any point, you've "parked", meaning that if you're not careful on the brakes (there is no reverse), you fail. Good fun, and restarts are very quick, so it doesn't get frustrating - but like a lot of puzzle games, I can't play it for very long at a time; one or two levels is usually enough.
I'm about 45 minutes into AC Odyssey, but I just don't know if I can be bothered with it. Watching Rings of Power has me leaning more towards a Shadow of Mordor replay instead.
Want
The only thing I'm really waiting to give a try is Pentiment, which I've had preloaded for a while.
Idly interested to see what the deal is with Overwatch 2, though they've tinkered big time with Best Girl (Orisa), so I don't know how I feel about that. I've played a couple of rounds of the original again the last few days, and I'd forgotten how much I actually enjoy it (and how much I don't suck, apparently? It was just QuickPlay, though…).
Danganronpa V3 - after a slow start I'm really enjoying this. It's always tough starting a Danganronpa game because they need to introduce sixteen new characters, set up the plot and get you accustomed to the game environment before it even really starts, but ever since I got to the first class trial it's been great. Only on chapter 3 so far but already one of the twists has been so audacious it might be one of my favourite moments in the series. My only hope with this is that it remains reasonably self-contained and doesn't go too meta - I can barely remember what happened in the first two games and there was a spin-off and an anime series in between 2 and 3 that I've not bothered with at all.
Far Cry 5 - peak open-world Ubi nonsense that's very fun to play on a moment-by-moment basis but feels a little hollow overall. This one has got a great premise - a cult has taken over Montana, and you are sent in to sort things out - but the game is utterly, utterly determined not to engage with that in any meaningful way. There are all sorts of interesting things that could be said here about the rise of the religious right in America, the methods that can be used to coerce people to your own ends, and whether or not the heavily armed good guys are really any different to the heavily armed bad guys - but Far Cry 5 ignores all that in favour of "those are the baddies, go blow shit up". I guess that's what you get when the audience for your big budget AAA game includes the kind of people you are trying to lampoon in the first place.
Want
It's a good month for Game Pass, with the Plague Tale sequel and Persona 5 both coming out within a few days of each other.
Judgment is in the current sale and I'm very tempted but it does feel like a cert for Game Pass given that all the Yakuza titles have been on there. I have this argument with myself every time it goes on sale, so if it does pop up on Game Pass, you'll know I've just bought it.
Danganronpa 2 was very tied into the events of 1, so I'm expecting 3 to be the same. I'm OK with that, I just hope it doesn't require knowledge of an apparently quite bad Vita spin-off, or an anime series I'm definitely not going to watch.
Twist (BIG spoiler for those who haven't played it):
Spoiler - click to showWhen you realise that the culprit for the first case is actually you.
Twist (BIG spoiler for those who haven't played it):
Spoiler - click to showWhen you realise that the culprit for the first case is actually you.
Oh, THAT. Yeah, fun times.
Yeah, I had a feeling that might be the case.
Danganronpa 2 was very tied into the events of 1, so I'm expecting 3 to be the same. I'm OK with that, I just hope it doesn't require knowledge of an apparently quite bad Vita spin-off, or an anime series I'm definitely not going to watch.
It doesn't, don't worry. The biggest twist of V3 is literally right in front of you the whole time… it's quite the mindfuck. But other than general awareness of the previous two main titles, you're fine. I think.
Idly interested to see what the deal is with Overwatch 2, though they've tinkered big time with Best Girl (Orisa), so I don't know how I feel about that.
This is allegedly out now, but I only made it about halfway through a match before getting kicked by server issues; this was after about 2 hours queuing with about 40,000 of my closest friends. Anyway, it seems to be so far, so Overwatch. I didn't notice much of a difference from the new team sizes (not that I'm clued into "the Meta" anyway), and ended up on Support, so didn't get to try the new Orisa; my old standards Brigitte and Mercy seem identical, though.
The Standard OW2 skins are all pretty fugly and overdesigned, but (maybe because I'm coming from Overwatch 1?) the original skins & unlocks are selectable, so I don't have to use the new versions. They also let you merge console and PC account progress now, so I have a bunch of extra skins (Barbarian Zarya*!) that I previously only had on PS4.
*Not that I think anyone's going to be in a hurry too play the Russian war hero right now…
Play Addendum
I bought a new laptop this week. It's nothing special, just a £500 Asus but it is a massive upgrade on the laptop I've been using for the last four years and it has enabled me to play a whole bunch of things I've been wanting to for years.
Celeste - I have no idea if anyone here has played this. Its a 2D platformer adventure game by the team behind Towerfall. So far I'm loving it, each screen/room is a clever platform puzzle/deathtrap and so far the difficulty is just the right side of annoyingly hard.
Gamecube emulation - I have downloaded Thousand Year Door and Skies of Arcadia.
PSP emulation - After not enjoying them on my Retroid I have FF Tactics and Tactics Ogre ready to go. I have also managed to play some of Killzone: Liberation which I remember loving back on the PSP; it actually still holds up.
Celeste is really good. A bit too hard for me but my son loved it and completed all the B-side and C-side levels too. There's quite a lot of hidden content in there so once you've played it through once you might want to find a guide to give you an idea of where to look.
If you're going to be playing Tactics Ogre via emulation then take a look at the One Vision mod - haven't played it myself but apparently it rebalances the whole game for the better. Of course the official remaster will be coming out soon with its own set of changes so it'll be interesting to see how that fares.
Pretty much 10s across the board from me, I can see people not caring for the story but I think in that case you can just skip it anyway. Not played this in a minute because of Xenosaga but I will as soon as I can.
The story is very much almost a visual novel, I feel. Lots of silly dialogue and giving gifts collected in levels to unlock even more dialogue (and bonus missions). It's quite cool.
Did the whole first area with Ace medals across the board bar the very last level… I can see how it's done, but always fall one second short. Gah.
Spoiler - click to showThere are 'Red Medals' for beating times set by the devs but they're a secret I have not got a single one
The cool thing about this game is, each level is like, beat this time, now beat your friends time, now go watch a WR run of the level on Youtube and gasp at the level of skill/precision that still looks kinda' doable with practice? And a 5 milisecond gap can feel like a full on second or two, which is why I hit restart if I even slightly scrape against a wall.
I hope I didn't make the game sound too intimidating to everyone else lol, it's not really, I think it's pretty clever how it's set out tbh. Requiring precision just not TOO much, like all the demons are rather large targets and unless it's some unintended WR trickery I have yet to see anything close to pixel perfect requirements, but you sure do feel like a god damn pro when you do well and that's another reason it's so good imo.
Oh, sure, playing it isn't that hard at all. All the levels are small and self-contained, it's got solid controls and everything seems doable. The hidden stuff, you l33t studs can have it.
I am presumably the only person playing Overwatch 2. It's gone free-to-play, which is a source of much salt on the subreddit, and admittedly the season pass is Very Bad. Progress is slow, and the stuff you unlock is really random. But the core game is good! There's a new colosseum level that I like a lot.
Unfortunately, former Best Girl Orisa doesn't work much for me now; her new energy javelin needs more accuracy than I can reliably manage, and the removal of her shield barrier - basically the core of her character in OW1 - means she doesn't have much survivability or area control. I've seen some other players do really well with her, but I just can't make it work. I tried Reinhardt, too, but I was never very good at him; so D.Va remains my go-to tank.
I've yet to play… whatever the third role's called. Assault? Damage? I've been queuing All Roles, and usually get shunted into Tank or Support.
I put so much time into Reinhardt on the original, literally just holding a button and slowly advancing until everything falls apart and you just wall slam someone, maybe not doing that again this time tbh. Especially when you consider how dumb people can be on this game and will run through your shield to shoot the enemy team, which is why I hope Zenyatta is good so I can pick him and pretend I'm a healer because I throw heal orbs on someone and then just dps the other 95% of the game.
Never played Zen in anger. Mercy was my only Support until Brigitte. I want to like Moira, if only through a vague national solidarity, but I don't.
Had a great moment last night where my un-MEKA'd D.Va was being chased by Cassidy, until I turned around and melee'd him to death. Also splattered a Kiriko with one of my MEKA summons, which is always a treat.
Sounds like the game is fun again, I always liked Overwatch but I think I stopped playing before even Deathfist dropped and it kinda' looked like it just got more wild as it got on. My favourite character in the game was actually Ana though and while I know we will never get the glory days of her OP launch patch status again I hope she's at least still useful because the design philosophy of her gun healing her team and hurting the enemy is still the coolest mechanic.
There was a lot of joy in launch Ana no scope rapidfiring a Roadhog easily because he was such a big target and watching him regenerate like the Incredible Hulk and destroy house.
For better or worse this game hasn't changed one single bit lmao. People will still scatter from Rein's shield, people will still run from the defense area to try spawn camp the enemy, people will still pick Widow and play her on the ground at mid range, people will still expect Mercy to solo heal an entire team from four corners of the map etc etc etc
Despite that, it's still a super fun game, loving it atm.
PSP emulation - After not enjoying them on my Retroid I have FF Tactics and Tactics Ogre ready to go. I have also managed to play some of Killzone: Liberation which I remember loving back on the PSP; it actually still holds up.
I just remembered that I was trying with minimal success to get Burnout: Dominator running on my Retroid. It runs great on PPSSPP my laptop though. Jury's out on whether it's actually any good though. I'll let you know if I stick with it.
I remember enjoying it back in the day on the PS2 (I was playing it while everyone else was playing their shiny new 360s). After playing the first two challenges though it does feel like I might have minimal control and the draw distance might be ridiculously short. It could be that all those speed lines and sparks are actually hiding a very basic game. You know, maybe.
For better or worse this game hasn't changed one single bit lmao. […]
Despite that, it's still a super fun game, loving it atm.
There are a lot of complaints in The Community about the monetisation - in particular about how slow Battle Pass progress is, and the stingy weekly challenge currency rewards; but while the "it would take 5 years to unlock all of Kiriko's cosmetics!!! " arguments certainly sound dramatic, part of me is, like… have you seen those cosmetics?
I mean, it helps that: A. I'm not really a compulsive collector; and B. almost all of the cosmetics in Overwatch are fucking hideous, but I'm perfectly bent to just, y'know… play the thing.
Realising that Battle Pass progress is meaningless to me has also let me cast off the shackles of the Great Tyrant: the All Roles queue.
I do not give one single shit about the battle pass either, I think there are some really cool skins you can get but who cares. I think I don't really like the DPS role as much as the other two so I mostly queue them up, going through a bit of a D.VA arc myself as well even if I pushed a Moira on to a medikit, it's too fun bullying people with her. Healer wise I love and hate playing as Mercy, I feel guilty not playing her because when I swap to anyone else except maybe Moira in some situations (tossing the ping pong damage ball into the little closed space you need to capture on errr one of the Illios maps is hilarious) but at the same time I like Making a Difference as Mercy and getting dem assist kills.
dps wise I think Ashe's gun is 10/10 satisfying to use but I just don't understand the point in her at all when McCree and Soldier and Soujourn exist? So back to Tank it is, and by Tank I mean not Reinhardt who I am sorta dissapointed to see he still seems almost mnandatory in some maps you will never see him on in unranked, and who can blame anyone? At least Mercy's impact on the game involves more than holding up shield and unlike with Rein they can't exactly run out of range of your heals because you can fly after people, and as much as I like Lucio I feel the same way about him seemingly feeling iireplacable too, kinda' think they could have used the jump to 'OW2' to cull the list a bit.
Hmaster Boy was a HUGE problem the other night, must investigate further…
So back to Tank it is, and by Tank I mean not Reinhardt who I am sorta dissapointed to see he still seems almost mnandatory in some maps you will never see him on in unranked,
I haven't set foot out of unranked once. I don't recall ever having much fun with Ranked in OW1.
I haven't played either game extensively, but Orisa is a beast this time around. She feels nigh-on indestructible, and her damage is basically at DPS levels. I usually clean up with her, so I imagine a better player would wipe the floor with everyone.
And I have no idea whether he's any good, but my go-to healer is Lucio. It's nice not having to actually target anyone for heals – everyone just sort of gathers together for a warm, healing hug.
And yes the battle pass is a disgrace, even by battle pass standards. Someone on Reddit worked out that you have to grind for 8 months to afford one epic skin.
I'm totally uninterested in Overwatch (especially now that I'm one of the top Fortnite players in the world) but I am fascinated by an advert for it I saw that made it look 100% like a Pixar movie, complete with the kind of generic dialogue that appears in movie trailers. You wouldn't even know it was a game that was being advertised, never mind one with no narrative aspect at all.
Yeah that works now, I am guessing after a certain distance without a wall slam you just broke free of his hit stun? Got what he deserved trying to suicide himself from his team anyway :p
Genshin Impact - Got tired of waiting for the devs to bother putting controller support into the Android version or release the Switch version, so I looked into controller mapping instead. Found a good solution called Mantis that doesn't result in account banning, so I've set this up now and have the game running comfortably with the minimum of touch needs (outside of some menu stuff). It's decent enough, looks pretty, but I've no idea what half the things do - I'm collecting random items all over the place, there are all these weapon enhancement and other options I have no clue about and it's so full of stuff that it's almost overwhelming. But I'll plug away now I've got it working, so it gives me something else to play I guess.
I’ve been playing Xenoblade Chronicles- remastered. When I say playing I’m up to chapter eight and I believe the last of the tutorials has added one more thing to try and manage during a fight!
When I say play, I’ve watched an equivalent number of hours of YouTube videos, which I’m not sure has really helped.
Anyway, I’m enjoying the sci-fi-fantasy nonsense.
I finished Paper Mario N64 - I really enjoyed that, as much as the more recent Switch game. I did need a walkthrough, but it was a fun time sink.
Want. I think I want Mario v Rabbids - I really enjoyed the first one but the ads and trailers haven’t given me any joy!
I think by the time I’ve got through Xenoblade’s 2&3 I might be more grateful.
Want. I think I want Mario v Rabbids - I really enjoyed the first one but the ads and trailers haven’t given me any joy!
Said this to Gar already, but sadly this is a Ubi joint and so won't be on our internal store for cheap codes. Booooooo. Looks like a really good game though.
Bless you, Lord Eneba and your discounted Xbox codes.
Picked up LEGO Brick Tales, the remake of Kingdoms of Amalur and the new Ghostbusters game for a grand total of €20 all in, so that'll do. The first looks awesome and relaxing, the second I loved the original of but never finished, and the latter intrigues me (plus I have friends who are also getting it, so will play with them). Not that I need more to play, but hey.
I'm totally uninterested in Overwatch (especially now that I'm one of the top Fortnite players in the world)
I never thought this would be the thing that brought me back, but holy fuck felt the first few games of Fortnite you play are populated with AI bots to make you think you're good at the game. The suspicion is it also periodically drops you into AI rich lobbies to keep you locked in too.
" arguments certainly sound dramatic, part of me is, like… have you seen those cosmetics?
