Recently completed video games

[dartmonkey]

Finished A Link Between Worlds. Really enjoyed it. After disappointment with A Link To The Past last year, this was the game I wanted the original to be. Perhaps it's the result of it being a portable game designed for shorter play sessions, but it feels lean and trimmed where Link to the Past felt bloated after 20 years. Back then the trek across the map on a television probably felt epic whereas now it gets wearisome. That overworld theme got repetitive but here you spend less time in the field and the orchestrations really transform them - there's fantastic music throughout.The shorter dungeons were perfect for handheld sessions and even if I only had 5 minutes on the bus, there was always something useful I could do in that time. Great controls, fluid 60fps, 3D so good that I never turned off - I felt like I was missing out without it.

 

And

Ravio turning out to be Lorule Link was so good. I did wonder why he just moved in to my house! Should've seen it coming with the bunny suit.

I was expecting some more explicit link to Majora's Mask and Termina, but as far as I could see there was only the mask itself in Link's house. Are there any other clues I've overlooked?

 

So basically what everyone else has said. A brilliant game which has made me excited for Zelda again.

[Merus]

Luigi's Mansion 2! A really smart expansion on the original, preserving the fun adventure puzzle feel without wearing out its welcome by over-extending itself. Each mission felt like it had its own identity, and by the time I felt like the game had shown me all it had, it was just about to end.

 

The optimisation around 3-star runs proves to be interesting, because of smart balancing where many of the environmental enemies are only worth 5c but there's lots of 100/200c secrets around. It's a bit of a shame that 3-star is as high as you can get - I reckon there's an interesting optimisation game in working out if the 60c secret is worth the 30 second detour that's mostly irrelevant so long as you hit the 3-star requirement.

[eot]

I saw this on RPS today and decided to buy it (massive epilepsy warning):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lhtcJyo0hgM

It's a collection of short minigame vignettes to accompany the music and I kinda liked it. It's only $3 on Steam at the moment

[Bjorn]

I played through both Space Ace and Dragon's Lair tonight.  Man, DL hits such a nostalgic sweet spot for me.  I get chills watching the trailer for it, I watched it so many times in the arcade as a kid.  Space Ace is fucking hard though.  I had never played all the way through it, and I don't really see myself ever doing it again after tonight.  The significantly longer events really wear you down, having to replay a long section just because you blew one of the last couple of inputs.

 

My daughter had never seen either of them.  Her reaction to Princess Daphne was hilarious.  She was incensed that this was one of the more famous video game damsels.  Her voice is soooo ditzy, and that outfit/design.  We were looking up some stuff about the games after I finished them, and it turns out they couldn't hire a model to come in when they were doing Daphne's design, so they just used some Playboys they had lying around.  That explains a bunch.

 

I saw this on RPS today and decided to buy it (massive epilepsy warning):

It's a collection of short minigame vignettes to accompany the music and I kinda liked it. It's only $3 on Steam at the moment

 

Normally crazy flashing visuals don't bug me, but I literally had to stop watching that about 20 seconds in.  That's just like...wow.

[Dewar]

I finally actually beat Divine Divinity. I made the best choice ever just running through the entire last zone ignoring combat. The final castle would have taken me around 5 hours of constant fighting to get through otherwise, and the end boss only took me 10 seconds to kill.

 

Regardless of the poor balance, I had a lot of fun.

[Griddlelol]

I bested Dragon Age: Inquisition. Yeah, it was alright. I liked it enough to play for over 100 hours, but I don't really know why. It's biggest problem is that the combat can't decide what it wants to be. They should have gone either the transistor root, with a weird, semi-turn based thing, or a dark souls route, with an almost "character action" style combat. Dragon age really suffers for it. To the point that the combat becomes a chore. This isn't helped by the awful AI, and terribly customisation for the AI. Melee DPS warriors spend most of their time dead since they never get behind enemies. Mages will not pay attention to elemental resistances (one Mage had a ton of ice spells, but instead spammed his single fire spell on dragons meaning I had to baby sit him as well as my character) leading to difficult fights being frustrating, or requiring a lot of micromanagement with a system that makes micromanagement incredibly slow and difficult.

The narrative is kinda boring too, it's old fashioned high fantasy style thing, which to be honest, isn't really my thing. Even if it was I probably would find it a little cheesey. Bad guy is bad because he's bad. You've got to stop him because...he's bad? It's never really explained what he'd do to people. I assume he wanted to hurt or kill people, but I don't really know why.

What I did like about it was the mini-narratives. The politics, the interactions between characters and finally the world. Fighting the dragons was surprisingly fun, as you have to make sure each member of your party is behaving correctly, dodging attacks and dispelling debuffs. One of the greatest moments I had was

Seeing a dragon and giant in a scuffle and being scared of getting my ass killed. The dragon then flies away, and my first instinct was "time to fuck up that hurt giant!"

The quests are pretty weak too, so many go here, collect this. I started off reading the descriptions as to why, but after a while it became like an MMO where I just wanted to get shit done.

I doubt I'll ever play it again, but hey, it was better than skyrim.

[undermind9]

i finally got around to finishing Wind Waker HD

 

It was a slow burn play through trying to figure out all the treasure hints - which included me making my own spread sheet with annotations, hints, etc.  i did look up the "fast sail" addition to the HD version and that made all the difference.  Being that most of the game is water...and traveling said water it baffles me that the first game only had the one sail - and had to change the wind direction each time got going.

 

Overall it is a spectacular update to a great game.  The second screen while sailing is amazing, minor interface improvements are extremely helpful, and the cartoon style looks the same but sharper

 

in the complaint department - the game pad control layout makes aiming difficult (didnt even bother with the gyro aiming), some of the treasure maps (Platform, hearts, etc) dont update when cleared so getting them so late and finding out there are 9x hearts on windfall...after getting 3 - 5? was disheartening.  if it updated i would go back for a full clear 20 containers

 

 

 

I cannot completely articulate my last thoughts, but playing this again after the existence of Bioshock Infinite gave me pause that they could just as easily make a Zelda in any setting (and already have - basic Hyrule, dark world, water world, air world, time travel).  I'm looking forward to 1920's New England Link saving some one from Cthulhudorf

 

 

*edit - oh that was close, i did not want this sludge as a new page post

[Twig]

I finally actually beat Divine Divinity. I made the best choice ever just running through the entire last zone ignoring combat. The final castle would have taken me around 5 hours of constant fighting to get through otherwise, and the end boss only took me 10 seconds to kill.

 

Regardless of the poor balance, I had a lot of fun.

Oh wow I gave up on that game about an hour after getting to whatever the main city was. And then I started up Beyond Divinity or whatever it's called and quit that after ten minutes. As far as I'm concerned, Original Sin is the only game in that series.

 

(I might be willing to go finish it if you tell me I'm close to the end. Am I?)

[Sno]

I feel like i can go ahead and probably give a fairly enthusiastic recommendation for Ziggurat, a game available on Steam that is a very overtly Heretic/Hexen influenced roguelite. It's something that i am definitely having a lot of fun with.

 

The shooting and the movement feels quite good and definitely owing to the games it's drawing from, the light progression system seems reasonably fleshed out, and there's multiple unlockable character and difficulty levels to go through. Also, in addition to unlocking characters, more weapons and upgrades gradually unlock as potential drops. The game also has a really vibrant and colorful aesthetic that just looks great, and they have in their hidden rooms little easter eggs where the developer is amusingly pretty open about shit talking their previous games. (Which appear to have mostly been XBLIG faire.)

It could probably benefit from a little more visual and layout variety in its environments, but there's definitely enough there as it is, and the developer is apparently still active and adding even more.

 

I like this thing a lot though, it feels like an easy recommendation to make.

Edit: I just started a run in a room that was a fairly obvious recreation of the difficulty select stage from Quake. I like this game, this game is pretty alright.

[Dewar]

Oh wow I gave up on that game about an hour after getting to whatever the main city was. And then I started up Beyond Divinity or whatever it's called and quit that after ten minutes. As far as I'm concerned, Original Sin is the only game in that series.

 

(I might be willing to go finish it if you tell me I'm close to the end. Am I?)

 

It's a 60 hour game or so, so I doubt it. What step were you in on the Zandalor quest line? Have you been inside the castle and met Duke Janus yet?

[Twig]

I don't know who those people are. Well i recognize the name Zandalor, but Duke who? So I'm probably not very far in. Steam says I played 28 hours.

[Apelsin]

I just finished NightSky by Nicklas Nygren (also known as Nifflas, creator of the Knytt series and Within a Deep forest).

 

It was a very pleasant little physics based puzzler that just oozes of that aesthetic that Nifflas is known for in his games. Quite minimalist/muted presentation, sedate pace, simple mechanics and some real clever bits that made this a very nice little game to just relax with for a few hours.

[Dewar]

I don't know who those people are. Well i recognize the name Zandalor, but Duke who? So I'm probably not very far in. Steam says I played 28 hours.

 

I would imagine you are less than a quarter of the way through then. 

[Twig]

Haha okay I'll just let it go, then!

[eot]

I played through 140 the other day, it's a short music based platformer. Everything in the game is executed very well, the music, how is builds, how the platforming mechanics are built around the beat etc. it's fantastic. I do wish there was more of it though, because there's only three stages and I think the concept could've been pushed further. On the other hand it's nice to play something so focused that doesn't suffer from trying too many things. Watch the

, if you like it I think you'll enjoy the game.

[Tanukitsune]

I just beat Disney Universe, which I won in a Steam auction.

 

It's a ridiculously poor LEGO styled game, where you'll eventually give up on pick up because money picks ups are too generous and the other power ups are kinda annoying. The "good" power ups are only good in battle, only you almost never get them in battle and out of battle they are hindrance because they make you drop the item you're carrying. The game has an item to level up your weapon, so once you max it out the battle are even easier.

 

The game is so meager, only 6 worlds with three tiny levels in each world, at least the worlds have minor changes in objectives, but still, this game was pretty mediocre, probably the most mediocre game from Disney I've played this year and I've played the WHOLE Disney Princess and Fairies pack.   

[Sno]

I reluctantly played Shadow Warrior.

Given that 3d Realms' attempted revival had so far consisted of the catastrophe that is Duke Nukem Forever, and the well-meaning and unfortunately messy Rise of the Triad remake, presented with the opportunity to play a reboot of the game that perhaps most clearly signaled what Duke Nukem Forever would eventually become, i could not have been less interested.

I finally gave into a friend insisting i should play it, and... You know... Kinda loved it. It's an incredibly fast moving FPS with an extremely generous dodge mechanic, a very old-school suite of weapons, a big emphasis on an elaborate melee system, several fairly expansive progression mechanics, and special moves that evoke the adrenaline combos of UT2k4. Your performance in large fights is even scored, pushing you to play better and more stylishly. (The game evokes a Bulletstorm-like vibe to me.) You have this combat flow where you're just switching weapons as much as you can, abusing special moves as much as you can, and always being incredibly mobile. Hanging back for a bit with a shield up and spamming bullets, or dodging into a fight with a special sword strike ready. Early on, it can feel like a bit of modern day FPS bloat, but the game becomes quite relentless and you're really forced to abuse your abilities as much as you can, it ends up feeling like a really cohesive and thought-out set of systems that create some really, really frantic combat.

You know though, I also quite liked developer Flying Wild Hog's prior game, Hard Reset, so i think i'm probably on board for whatever they do next.

(There's an important question here i'm kind of avoiding, and it's if this Shadow Warrior is gross in the ways the original game was. My answer to that is that i don't know, i'm not sure i can be an effective judge of that. I don't think it is, but i'm not articulate enough about things like this to offer an explanation for why.)

 

Edit: Oh, i also played Antichamber. Holy shit, what a great game. Does a brilliant job coaxing you into thinking about solutions to remarkably abstract and unprecedented problems, there is some pretty masterful puzzle design in there, i think.

 

If there's anything to nitpick, the matter gun mechanics and the mechanics relating to the game's non-euclidean space feel almost like they're from different games, they don't really ever meet up in any puzzles. The matter gun stuff does end up being incredibly interesting and satisfying in its own ways though, it builds up to some pretty outrageous possibilities.

There's also that a few peripheral corners of the game seem to be a tiny bit unfinished, apparently waiting for an update that doesn't seem like it's ever coming.

Anyways, really should have played this one a long time ago. Blew through it pretty quickly, but it's going to stick with me.

[Jordan A]

(There's an important question here i'm kind of avoiding, and it's if this Shadow Warrior is gross in the ways the original game was. My answer to that is that i don't know, i'm not sure i can be an effective judge of that. I don't think it is, but i'm not articulate enough about things like this to offer an explanation for why.)

 

I've only just started playing Shadow Warrior today and admittedly I've only played a little over an hour of it, so I don't know if it's gross in the same ways the original game was. It's certainly a bit gross in the same way that a game from the 2010's can be.

[Tanukitsune]

I just beat Among the Sleep, only a few hours after buying it on the Steam Sale.

 

It never really gave the sensation of playing as an infant, only as a very small person. It was neat to see writing as a garbled since the baby can't read, but... Why can he read blocks and numbers? He's(was the baby's gender ever mentioned?) just too too young to do half the stuff he does, heck, my five year old nephew wouldn't understand the puzzles we solved in three seconds.

 

It was too obvious who the monster is, before the scary part even starts you can find nothing but liquor bottles in the kitchen and you can easily see the monster is female is the first jump scare.

 

Where did the baby get the forest/swamp area from? From potted plants? I seriously doubt a kid could understand the concept of a forest at this age.

[SuperBiasedMan]

I got Shovel Knight for Christmas! (my family had Christmas at the weekend so no I didn't finish it in just one day... I finished it in 4).

It was good solid platformy fun. Quite challenging, especially if I play through collecting all the stuff. Which I might, I'm not one for doing that normally though. There's nothing really new about it, it is all out a retro celebration and just well put together. Had some nice light touches on the story, which is all I want from a game like this.

Also this was the first 2D platformer game that actually felt like it was bad on keyboard. That was a new experience for me. It was mostly fine, but the relic activation button combo was finnicky, especially in mid air and that made the phasing challenge level more awkward than it ought to be. I thought they were just meant to be super hard until I did the dust fist one and it was barely any trouble. Admittedly I might just be using it wrong or the controls might be dodgy regardless of whether I use keyboard or controller. It's just a minor gripe, the only one I had!

[Bjorn]

I just beat Among the Sleep, only a few hours after buying it on the Steam Sale.

 

It never really gave the sensation of playing as an infant, only as a very small person. It was neat to see writing as a garbled since the baby can't read, but... Why can he read blocks and numbers? He's(was the baby's gender ever mentioned?) just too too young to do half the stuff he does, heck, my five year old nephew wouldn't understand the puzzles we solved in three seconds.

 

It was too obvious who the monster is, before the scary part even starts you can find nothing but liquor bottles in the kitchen and you can easily see the monster is female is the first jump scare.

 

Where did the baby get the forest/swamp area from? From potted plants? I seriously doubt a kid could understand the concept of a forest at this age.

 

Yeah, overall I thought it was an interesting attempt at a different take on the horror genre, but ultimately wasn't terribly successful. I think the best thing it did to convey your age was just the toddler shadow you had.

[Griddlelol]

I finished Metal Gear Solid. This game was ambitious for its time. Incredibly so, however that's probably one of the parts that stops me from loving the game.

The entire game is fantastic until you get to Metal Gear Rex, that boss fight, in idea is brilliant, however it's poorly executed due to the inherent limitations of the controls and camera. It turns what was meant to be an epic fight into something frustrating and unfair. Similarly the fight with Liquid Snake suffers from trying to be a fighting game without the controls. There's that terrible hold over, where you get knocked down to invisible when you are hit, which allows you to be stun locked to death by certain bosses, and equally, bosses turn invisible when you hit them which feels out of place in a game like this.

I think if I had played this in its time, I would have fallen in love. Despite my comments, metal gear solid has aged incredibly well, except for certain parts. I can forgive it for being too ambitious, and I understand why it's considered a classic, and it's clearly influenced hundreds of games but those ending boss fights destroyed it for me to the point I put it down for months.

On to Metal gear solid 2...

[elmuerte]

Completed MURI

It's a classic DOS platform game, think Duke Nukem 1. It plays and feels like a game from that time. Even the music and sound effects are in the classic PC speaker format (PC speaker not needed). The difficulty isn't that high on normal, but you can make it much more difficult if you want. There are 4 episodes, each with 5 levels. You can start from any episode you want. The only thing missing in the game was a CRT emulator to bring back even more of the feel from the early 90s.

Is this game better than DN1? No, but it's still fun to play. Note, the install is quite large, you need 3MiB of free diskspace.

[elmuerte]

Lilly Looking Through

A samorost kind of adventure game. It's not really long (<2hr), and there are not a lot of interaction points. Everything that can be touched is significant. There are a couple of puzzles you have to solve in order to go forward. As with smorost, there's no hints so it can take a little while to figure out what to do. The game is really heavy on the animation, some animations take quite a while to complete. It's a bit like a short interactive animation.

[Tanukitsune]

I can vouch for how good MURI is. 

 

I beat Monster High: Skultimate Roller Race, the only roller derby game I know of and... it was rather fun! Obviously it has Mario Kart power up and it's no Mario Kart 8, but for game created to see monster fashion dolls in derby outfits... it was better than it should have been.

 

Gods Will Be Watching is a "tough decision maker", except it's not like a Telltale one in the sense you can actually make the right choices and have everybody survive with the resource management, which is what most of the game is about. Do I give this guy water of do I let him die? Do I let them rest or make them work to keep us alive?

 

My biggest issue with the game is that it presents one side as slavers, but never show it, while the other side does show it's uglier side.

 

AR-K is adventure game I got in a Steam auction about a girl on a space station trying to become a reporter, except she got blind drunk and sleep with a stranger and didn't make in time for an assignment.

It's the typical "make everybody miserable because I need something you have" adventure, she's almost as bad as Rufus, but she's not delusional, she's just an awful person.

 

Many puzzles don't really make sense and I wonder if they were like this on purpose, because the game is episodic and an episode feels shorter than a Telltale one. It's just a so-so adventure with a loathsome main protagonist.