Recently completed video games

[JonCole]

I love this thread.

[Sno]

... Why was this thread locked earlier today?

[Orv]

Toblixian Conspiracies.

[Tanukitsune]

I have no idea, maybe some admin didn't like people talking about games that already have their own thread? I always thought this thread was better for games that probably should not get their own thread. :|

[pabosher]

<Toblix did it.>

[brkl]

Awwwww This goddamn thread. I'm not reading a hundred posts of "I finished X, it was fine" just in case I might miss something interesting, but it bothers me that I'm missing discussions.

[Tanukitsune]

So.... is OK to post here again about beaten games? I recently completed the The Amazing Spider-man, I got if from the Steam sale and thought I'd give a non-Batman super hero game a go.

I haven't played a Spider-man game since the GameBoy and I haven't seen a Spidey movie since the Sam Raimi ones, so I have no idea what happened in the movie, but it seems this game takes place after the movie? Also, it's so Arkham Aslyum/City it should be called Spider-Man: Oscorp Labs. Not only in gameplay, but even in plot!

In this Universe the main thing is cross-species, almost every villain a mutant version of the original, Rhino is a mutant rhino, Scorpion is Doc Oc for some reason and I never even heard of the Iguana and Vermin. Black Cat is still continuing the animal theme, but she's not a cross-species like the others.

The combat is very much Arkham, except web based instead of gadget based and not as fluid, I mostly used my web to ram into them, punch them a little, retreat and do it again. There is also stealth takedowns, which feels appropriate with his web powers.

As for the world? Almost every mission takes place in the Oscorp labs and the city... OH THE CITY! It's terribly amusing, due to a crappy engine, Spidey moves too fast for it's own engine and can reach a building while it's still just a grey block! The side missions are what you expected to due, but ridiculous repetitive, you stop petty crimes, which are the same only they eventually get more thugs to fight. You also have to take sick people to the "Hospital", which is tedious, but only takes a few moments. He also has to take photos, which makes sense and I kinda like the missions where the cops ask for help and the other missions are secret labs and... show-off missions? A blimp ask him to do special trick for him, but they are just checkpoint races and keeping the camera on Spidey.

The one thing this game has that is somewhat better than the Arkham games? The collectibles unlock actual comics you can read! I would have loved if the Bat-Man games gave you digital issues with the villains' first appearance like the Spidey game did.

The game engine is strange if you put the setting too high the game is too fast and blurry and hard to control. It's strange, why is the game faster with higher settings? Shouldn't it slow the game down?

The game is fun and cheesy, the engine is terrible at rending and can't keep up with spidey's speed, but I still had a lot of fun playing it, taking down the bigger bosses was a blast.

On a side note, the comics I unlocked made me like Peter less, he's such a selfish emo whiney baby! XP

[Erkki]

For some reason November and December seem to be the months where I find more time to play games than usual. I finished Dead Island and Deponia. Deponia is a pretty good classic point & click adventure. It's quite well done (even has the '.' key for skipping dialogue!) and not too long or short -- I finished it in one 10 hour sitting. The puzzles are good, but occasionally fall into the same traps as many other adventure games that come before. I consulted a walkthrough about 3 times just because I wanted to get it finished in a single session. The story and dialogue is ok, but there's a bit more dumb jokes and fourth wall breaking than I like (recent adventures seem to love doing that for some reason). Overall, I would recommend it if you like point & click adventures.

Now I'm thinking about what else should I finish... Batman: Arkham City, Skyrim, Trine 2, Black Mesa, Sword & Sworcery? Those are in various states of completion. I tried getting back into Skyrim but now it just seems a bit boring. I also installed Assassin's Creed: Revelations -- maybe AssCreed 3 will be cheap at Christmas and would be nice to get AssRev over with before that. Of course, I also want to play Dishonored and Far Cry 3 so I'm afraid I'll have the same situation as the end of last year that I'll have 3 or 4 unfinished open-world games in progress

[Tanukitsune]

Woohoo! I'm excited to hear people enjoying Deponia! What do you mean by "puzzles falling into the same traps as others"? Too predictable or too obscure to make it difficult?

[elmuerte]

Borderlands 2

After 66 hours I finally completed this game. Well... I didn't finish all rounds for those boring arena quests and I didn't kill that level 50 monster. But other than that I did every mission. Anyway...

Blands2 is much better than Blands1, as it became less boring towards the end due to the fact that there is way more variety in the world and things you do.

Event though blands2 is better than 1, there are still the same annoying features. a) Pickup up look is still a pita as you often have to reposition yourself properly so that the thing you want to pick up is highlighted. This is especially annoying with ammo chests. A lot of missions are still in a very linear level when you simply move forward, and at the end open a shortcut to the exit. c) You cannot quite the game until you completed the mission you are on, otherwise you will be reset to the start of the level.

[Twig]

I played To the Moon.

Man, that is a game. I mean, it's not really a game, but I don't think it would have been half as effective if it wasn't structured as an interactive entity. It's quite good.

[Erkki]

Woohoo! I'm excited to hear people enjoying Deponia! What do you mean by "puzzles falling into the same traps as others"? Too predictable or too obscure to make it difficult?

Well, just the usual: pixel hunting, or having a bunch of items before you know what to do with them so you try combining them all etc. Also found from the walkthrough I had to look at some item in the inventory before it could be used for it's purpose (I forget which puzzle that was), and monkey wrench type things, including an item that only made sense if you noticed something about it's icon because it's text didn't give any hint.

[Tanukitsune]

Well, just the usual: pixel hunting, or having a bunch of items before you know what to do with them so you try combining them all etc. Also found from the walkthrough I had to look at some item in the inventory before it could be used for it's purpose (I forget which puzzle that was), and monkey wrench type things, including an item that only made sense if you noticed something about it's icon because it's text didn't give any hint.

What? I'm pretty sure the game had a "show everything" button. And I'd rather have the item I need before I need it than backtracking.

[subbes]

This thread is an unstoppable juggernaut.

[elmuerte]

Deadlight

It starts out ok, but near the end the game is becoming more and more annoying. Sequences that you need to redo often because your timing is not perfect, or the controls don't respond well enough. Overall it's a fun little game, but quite some annoying gameplay segments. If you need to fill some four hours with some platforming, this game is ok for that.

[dibs]

Just completed Walking Dead. Going to go have a cry.

[TychoCelchuuu]

Just finished SiN Episode 1 - Emergence, the first and last and only and best and worst and shortest and longest SiN Episode which I got when it was the daily deal a little while back on Steam. Pretty great Source engine FPS, I'd say. Competently made, with fun weapons, enemies that aren't always as stupid as a sack of bricks, and interesting environments. The plot wasn't even bad enough to be good, it was just blandly inoffensively absent, which is annoying. I'd rather have something awful to chew on than a perfunctory excuse to shoot people.

The game also takes its cues for "how much should we pander to the male gaze?" straight from the "The Duke Nukem 'Give 'Em Big Titties and 50 Other Tips for Spicing Up Your Female Characters' Guide to Game Development" so that's depressing.

The game has a dynamic difficulty scaling thing and I don't know how much it actually works, but you can look at all the pretty numbers and charts in the menu and it certainly stayed challenging but not brutal the entire time. I often found myself at very low health and ammo after each fight in a level, which I suspect means that the difficulty scaling was really working. I don't like how one of the enemies it spawns in greater numbers when you're doing well (I think) is the minigun enemies that don't drop any ammo when they die and that can't be headshotted but on the other hand that certainly kept things difficult for me.

So in the end I recommend it if you're a fan of HL2 single player mods, especially if you're snooty about them and want high production values, because this has pretty great production values. It's a good length, it has secrets to find (including Dopefish!) and you get to see what Ritual would be doing if they hadn't gone broke.

[mikemariano]

I beat Quantum Conundrum tonight. I posted in the main topic about it.

The physics of flinging reverse gravity safes around is very satisfying. I'm wondering if the game will actually be more re-playable than Portal 2. I went back to Portal 2 for the developer commentary, but didn't have much fun re-creating my same puzzle solutions over again. With Quantum Conundrum, it's shaggy enough where a second playthrough might go differently.

[Tanukitsune]

I just 100% LEGO Lord of the Rings and I must say, this is the closest you'll get to a LEGO RPG.

The game's world is the largest's yet, so big it has quick travel between areas and a "bread crumb trail" system that before only led you to the next mission, but now leads you to side quests and bricks. Yes, this game has sidequests, within each level you'll find not only the minikits, but a blueprint and three treasure items, completing the side quests is as "simple" as getting the item the side quest givers asks for. I mentioned blueprints just a second ago, well, you'll use your bricks to forge items needed for quests, but most items also give powers you wouldn't normally have as a character, like giving a bow to a non-elf and such.

As for the silly bits? It's mostly in cutscenes where you'll see some character goofing off while something serious is being said, speaking of which, I'm positive they just took the lines from the movies and didn't hire the people who worked on it. It's hard to describe, but sometimes they sound "echo-y". One of the new "cheat bricks" brings 8-bit music to the game, which was pretty awesome.

The worst part? Keys and cranks, sometimes they are very hard to find and far away from the place you need them. Oh, and the game has an item that's called Skeleton Key, but doesn't open anything...

To sum it up, Traveler's Tales is getting better and better with each game. Can you believe they actually have graphics settings for a LEGO games? Motion Blur, bloom, FSAA... That's a first.

[Yohji]

I played To the Moon.

Man, that is a game. I mean, it's not really a game, but I don't think it would have been half as effective if it wasn't structured as an interactive entity. It's quite good.

I just played through this today, highly recommended. Can't wait for the next one!

[Twig]

I just played through this today, highly recommended. Can't wait for the next one!

Yeah, I'm kinda stoked for whatever they do next.

[Yasawas]

VVVVVV. I got this a while ago in a Humble Bundle I think but never played it, was convinced to buy it again for the 3DS and I'm glad I did. A simple enough concept but with a surprising amount of variations to keep it fresh, some ingenious level design and a superb soundtrack. Argh, so good.

[mikemariano]

VVVVVV. I got this a while ago in a Humble Bundle I think but never played it, was convinced to buy it again for the 3DS and I'm glad I did.

How are the 3DS controls? Do you use the analog stick or the d-pad?

I am considering a 3DS purchase which will be almost entirely for VVVVVV and Luigi's Mansion.

[miffy495]

Do it. Get Pushmo, Crashmo, Kid Icarus, and Mario 3D Land to tide you over. Paper Mario is still awaiting a verdict from me, but hell if you don't have a 3DS yet and are the least bit interested, what are you waiting for? The system has proven itself a pretty good little device by now.

[Sno]

There is loads of great stuff happening on the 3DS right now.