BadHat

I really cherished this. The characters are all great and shitty and charming and relatable. Even when the dialog feels at times as though it's going to veer a bit too "clever," mostly it really dials it in and gives each character their own voice and room to react authentically. I feel like in other games/things with this style of writing (very off the cuff and anti-punctuation) characters often feel like pieces to be maneuvered into place so that a gag or whatever hits just right, which might be cool in the moment but robs them of some individuality. The only times I felt thrown off by this were when certain scenes waxed on too long, with tons of awkward silences. It's a nice trick but they probably could've used it a bit less often. So yeah. It has FLAWS, some of which have already been mentioned here, but as a whole they really dwindle in comparison to all the things this does so very right.

I think mastery in this game is largely a matter of being able to effectively parse what's happening on screen at any given time. Most of my deaths are because I failed to notice the one deadly thing that mattered because I was focussing on some other deadly thing. Also learning to pace yourself, so that there are less deadly things on screen to worry about at any given moment. But also knowing when to just go balls-out bullet hell when the game decides to spawn you into some ungodly mess and then Lil Hunter is there and a thousand snow dogs are charging at you and aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa Basically fuck this game is what I'm saying.

Mystic Knight is so good. Seems kind of weak for the first couple ranks, but then you get the hang of pulling perfect blocks with an enchantment on, and zooming around Sky Dancing motherfuckers all over the place, and laying energy traps which send enemies flying into the air so you can Sky Dance them more, and buffing your entire party with weapon enchantments and and and So much fun.~~ Edit: Sky Dance, not Lunge. :v

The leaderboards still haven't been fixed? Cripes. I should get back to this some time. I really want to unlock Rebel again but I could never quite nail the loop. Died to the second Throne twice, which never happened to me pre-release.

I thought playing a game with the developers was usually posted under the "Quick Look EX" label. Anyway, I stopped watching shortly into the gameplay because I didn't wanna spoil myself, but Chris and Jake looked pretty fucking dapper.

Wow, what the hell? I had no idea there were actually some interesting quests in this game. I was expecting cool combat and exploration with some daft fetch quests draped over top, but my last few quests have been... Intrigue!

Whoa, super cool cover! I actually forgot what I came here to post...

I've taken down a few Griffins now at level ~30 and they seemed like they were about where I was at. Mind you, I'm playing mage/sorcerer so I probably had an easier time of it than a melee character. Griffins are just a matter of spamming fire at their wings to keep them grounded and then melting the head. I did have some trouble with the Chimera, though, mainly because they attack so swiftly if they decide to target you and mages don't have a dodge/block move. So yeah, it might be more a matter of what you're playing than what level you're at. p.s. I really really like this game. How do I even have 45 hours played?! I feel like I'm just beginning.

Cool! Except now when I sleep at an inn it fails to connect to the server? I could even get online inside a rift stone to favourite your pawn, but it won't let me update my own. Is there a way to force this besides sleeping? Edit: Disregard, fixed it.

Just started playing and loving it, except none of my friends have it! My pawn is a level ~20 burly fighter lady, add me up if you're still early enough to take advantage of that I guess. http://steamcommunity.com/id/badhat/

Spoilered in case people don't want to read vague specifics, but this isn't a solution.

I tried a round of this and I got stomped! I will never play again. But seriously though this seems really cool but I have such a hard time reckoning with the tactical depth of games like this when I first jump in that it turns me away 90% of the time. Willing to give this a fair shake though since I like the concept, and it's pretty.

I thought you had to Or maybe that's a method from an old patch. I'ma have to try this out now, I gave up on doing it that way since I could never get it consistently... Edit: That's still what the wiki says:

I just got Crypt of the Necrodancer in the sale and have only played for a few hours. Even so, that Necrodancer run was freaking amazing.

HAH. I swear I noticed that similarity on some kind of subconscious level. I feel like it was eating at me for years but I never knew until now. Here's some stuff I said elsewhere while listening to the GOTY pods. Preface: I'm enjoying them a lot and generally kind their discussion entertaining if not super enlightened, it just got frustrating on day 2 when they could not get off Fallout 4 for like an hour.

I can't seem to get into the new Tesseract, except for this one track. Was really excited for Dan to be back on vocals since I always thought One had much higher high points than Altered State, which was more consistent but blander on the whole. This new one just seems kind of tame though, too trimmed back. Bonus Acle clip! This cover is awesome/hilarious:

I have 117 hours played and I've looped maybe twice in that whole time. Mind you, I bought it early and played sporadically, so a lot of what I learned each time was either lost or no longer relevant.

Ahhhhhhh, I can't beat the Throne again. I've gotten to it 5 or 6 times in the past couple of days and every single time I forget about my positioning and just wander back into his centre beam. Been playing a lot of Crystal since I got more used to her ability, but I'm having no luck getting to the mansion to get her a golden weapon. Hitting a bit of a brick wall. I feel like this game would really benefit from daily/weekly goals rather than levels. The layout of the levels is far less important than, say, Spelunky, but the tools at your disposal are basically everything. I think if they expanded on the weekly thing and had you trying to accomplish specific goals it would make casual play really interesting. I guess I just need something to shoot for (heh) when I'm not playing for serious and trying to unlock characters or loop or whatever. Daily doesn't really matter to me without anyone to compare with, and the leaderboards still don't work anyway... Edit: Two mansions with Crystal. Two golden wrenches.

I will rep Phantom Hourglass and Spirit Tracks every opportunity I am given. They're so fun! Every time I mention them I think about getting one second hand to replay.

I've watched this at least ten times.

Oh noooooooo that's the worst. Didn't RPGs solve that problem 10+ years ago? Wasn't it solved in the fucking first game?

I wonder if a defensive build using melee weapons and some kind of power weapon would work. Something with power and range like an energy weapon, then use the melee to flick bullets and rushers away. Honestly I haven't really bothered with melee in forever, outside of carrying a screwdriver for the mansion.

I don't min/max it but I play to try and get better. Mostly I just try things and intuitively figure out what works, sometimes I'll hit a wall and look some stuff up. The spoiler dump Ninety-Three posted earlier, for instance, is definitely information I feel comfortable having.

I love explosives against my better judgment. I try to only use them when I'm super focussed on the game and getting good results, not when I'm playing casually and messing up a bunch. I find they work well with something that can keep enemies away if they come in close (like those bastard crystal spiders), like a shotgun or a meaty melee weapon. Edit: Also there are blood explosives which are fantastic and completely safe, even though I never seem to find them. Just watch your ammo counter!

VR Snatcher.