So I'm the only one who has issues with the DS3 trigger buttons, gotcha.
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So I'm the only one who has issues with the DS3 trigger buttons, gotcha.
That you inferred that from my statement makes me question why I even bothered to answer your first query.
Thief, take it down a notch, dude. I would love to one day just "voice chat" this with you to see if you're really this stubborn.
P.S.> I have free Canada minutes.
It's been too fucking long.
Late Shift (PC)
An FMV game that is nothing like the games of old, and more "choose your adventure" whilst watching a movie. Storywise, it's about a student working the night shift in a car park as watchmen, when he gets dragged into doing a heist, which then spirals out of control. Along the way, you get to choose what you do at select points, and the "movie" progresses from there.
The problem with this, is it's length. The game lasts about an hour, and doesn't allow you to skip scenes (or even save, which I'll be honest, I've only heard it doesn't - the game was over well before I needed to save it). Multiple playthroughs allow you to see the story fold out in different ways, but you'd have to be nuts to sit through the same scenes over and over just to get to the choice that allows you to see new content.
It's cheap, but there's way too much padding. Beat it twice, watched the other endings off Youtube, called it a day. It's alright.
Doom '16 (PC)
Had a blast with this. As much as I liked the Shadow Warrior remake from a few years back, this reboot was much, much better. Tough as nails, and just insane fun.
Glad you liked that one. What difficulty did you play it on, though? I think I chose the easiest for the one-hit-kill melees. Just too much fun. :D Reminded me of Halo a bit. 'Gameplay was on point.Quote:
Originally Posted by The Jackal
P.S.> Thanks to you, btw, I'm also excited about playing Shadow Warrior 2. And possibly replaying it on the PS4 b4 that.
I'm a bit of a wuss, I played on "Hurt Me Plenty". Def looking forward to replaying it on a higher setting tho.
EDIT: Yes, SW2. I need to pick that up. If I got the PS4 version, would you be down for co-op?
You betcha! :D
2. Argos no Senshi [Rygar]: Nintendo Famicom: This is one of my favorite NES games, so I got the FC version to see if it was any different. The only significant change is that the music is almost entirely different between the two versions. Also, I think the FC version is slightly harder... but not by much.
37. God of War (God of War Collection) - PS3
http://i.imgur.com/72iHwuy.jpg?1
I've been holding-off on revisiting the first trilogy in higher definition in anticipation of God of War (4) on the PS4 (hopefully this fall). I actually had a mind to play the trilogy closer to the fall (PS3 Collection of 1 & 2 + GoW III on PS4), but with all the E3 hype and me going over too many gameplay spoilers, I decided it's best I play them now so I can still have a somewhat fresh mind on the series, while still not holding-on too much to the OG voice actor and the cinematic, static camera mode. I know that part 4 will have a free camera (hopefully they don't mess this up by impeding axes inversion), as well as Chris Judge taking over. I don't mind either of the changes too much, but I don't want those two things to be in the back of mind all the time while I play the new God of War.
Anyways, that being said, this game was as superbly fun as I remembered it. The gameplay is fantastic for a 2005 PS2 game. But I was taken aback at how outdated the graphics now look. Man, I used to think that Chains of Olympus and Ghost of Sparta were the ones that would age the fastest, but this OG GoW does not fall too far behind. I remember being so amazed when playing God of War II on the PS2, graphics-wise as well as gameplay-wise. I played that one first, then jumped restrospectively to the OG GoW, which did have blocky graphics, but didn't feel as aged back then (circa 2010). I still love the graphics of GoW(1) for what they were. It's a 2005 PS2 title. And it still has some great elements to awe upon. Regardless, where it all shines is in terms of gameplay; very fast-paced still and just all-around highly dynamic. 'Still love the puzzles (which now were a breeze; not only after having played it already back then, but also after having played a lot of other games of its sort). And the music, acting and story were still on-point. I do admit that, even the gameplay can seem outdated now (the balancing acts and crazy platforming portions definitely felt very 5th and 6th gen). I know those were two elements that even took over the earlier part of the 7th gen in action games (i.e.- Uncharted: Drake's Fortune); but soon disappeared; giving way to the core of what made these games fun: combat, puzzles and fast-paced action.
Overall, it still remains a true page-turner in my book. I am glad I revisited this franchise; especially now that I don't even have the time to replay any games. I did finish it in under 8 hours, which is the main reason why I would even attempt a revisit nowadays. 'Love the franchise. Here's to hoping PS4 God of War (4) does not disappoint....
...And now off to part 2 on the HD collection :D
I love the GoW series, but after getting a little deeper into it, I was surprised at how poorly the original game has aged, even compared to the second one. When I replayed it last, I think I compared it to watching episodes from the first seasons of The Simpsons or Family Guy.
I'll be interested to hear your thoughts on God of War II (my personal favorite from the series).
I can say something negative here, but I won't.
Here, I'll do it for you:Quote:
Originally Posted by Thief
QuickSciFi, you are sending the wrong message to game developers by buying these HD remakes. You are encouraging them to shit out minimal-effort cash grabs instead of devoting these resources to new IPs and you (and I do mean you specifically) are only making the entire video game industry that much worse.
Oh, and Sony sucks, and you should really be playing [X] game instead of God of War, which is just like it only better.
I was just going to say I dislike the way Kratos looks, but... I like your post better.
^I think he's calling you out because you just can't help yourself...
Lol.Quote:
Originally Posted by MrMatthews
I was actually trying to think of the most reasonable criticism Thief could have ... and then I turned the volume up. ;)
38. God of War II (God of War Collection) - PS3
http://i.imgur.com/72iHwuy.jpg?1
Definitely the solid experience I remember. It goes without saying that this game looks miles better than the first. Better textures, rounder edges (not sure if I'd call that anti-aliasing here, this is true higher polygon count, and it shows). Though still representative of a PS2 game, the graphics look much less blocky than part 1; and I might go as far as saying it holds its own very well against most early 7th gen games. Looking back now, you can tell that they had to sacrifice quality in some of the cutscenes. And when the camera pulls back (or draws in), you can tell they had to severely drop the resolution. But it still had some great cinematic scenes; and the graphics still looked great for the most part anyways. You can tell they delved deeper here with particle effects. But where I remember this game shining the best was with reflective surfaces (no pun intended). This effect put me at awe back during the days of the PS2.
What can I say. It's God of War at its finest. Quite possibly the best gameplay of all the God of War games (and that's saying a lot); but I won't sign-off on that just yet. The combat is definitely optimized from part 1. The puzzles were smoother to solve. No more crazy obligatory balancing acts of death. Ladders are jumpable. Spike management was also optimized (still there, but fairer). And the puzzles were much smoother to solve. I actually can't believe I remember over 90% of the puzzles here as well as the ones from part 1; since I only did a single playthrough, each. But what really made me miss the gameplay in part 2 above all else were the Icarus Wings. Double jump is a must in these types of games; but that added glide is just fantastic.
...And now off to Part 3 remastered on the PS4 :D.
39. God of War III: Remastered - PS4
http://i.imgur.com/kaq8NbU.png?1
Ok. Most-definitely the best God of War game out there. No question. Perfect gameplay. Perfect graphics. Perfect ending. :D
I'm still at odds on whether I prefer this one or part II. Let's just say for now they are both equally awesome and I love them both equally ;).
What a great series. This is the 9th GoW game I've finished (including remasters) and I can't wait to see what's in store with God of War (4). Just about the only thing that irks me the wrong way about the upcoming GoW game (4) is that it doesn't follow the numbering cycle; at least thus far with the advertisements. Either way, I know I'm definitely looking forward to it. A minor detail that I'm a bit 50/50% about is that there is going to be no cinematic/fixed camera mode. Not that I don't like "free camera", but the GoW games were the culmination of the cinematic/fixed camera action game genre. They built-upon from the 6th gen's Prince of Persia and Devil May Cry games and made the subgenre even more mainstream. So much so that awesome games thereafter like the Lords of Shadow Castlevania games and Dante's Inferno followed in like manner. Fixed camera is part of what made for the GoW experience so fluid, imo. I still love 3rd person action/adventure games either way. So I know won't have much trouble acclimating to a free camera GoW game anyways; lest they don't allow for axes inversion ;).
One of my favorite series since the 6th gen overall.
40. Shovel Knight - PS4
http://i.imgur.com/h5aUquP.jpg?
I love how colorful this game is. Heavy use of dark contrasts and solid colors, especially primary colors. Lots of Blues and Reds, lots of greens and yellows. I love it. I didn't expect it to be this hardcore, though. Nothing too difficult at first glance; but definitely challenging. Although some of these trophies look insane! Didn't even care to go for the challenge. I just wanted one good playthrough. And it was fun. I must say, I was a bit detracted by the pixel art, I won't deny it. Not because I don't like it; but bc it seemed to blatantly bank almost exclusively on the retro craze, and that just irks me the wrong way. I still knew it looked beautiful in its own fashion, the music was neat and the gameplay seemed dynamic-enough to give it a shot. But it took me a while to get there. That being said, I still don't see the need to make more than half of these newly-developed 2D sidescrollers so pixel art heavy. The same effort could be aimed at making something as outstanding-looking as, say, Rayman Origins or Shantae 1/2 Genie Hero; while still holding true to that retro gameplay style and overall feel. That's not what pixel art was all about back then. It was about optimizing the look with what little devs had. And if they had these many pixels back then to show-off on a TV, they would've made something truly astonishing. And they most-definitely did; countless of times. Speaking of which, oh what I wouldn't give for an HD remake of Disney's Aladdin on the Sega Genesis.
Overall, I liked this game a lot. Now, how do I fight Kratos?
[EDIT] Never mind. Just beat him. Cool gift!
What about GoW: Ascension?
I liked it. It was slightly shorter and easier than the other ones (1/2/3). I played it after all the patches, so I didn't experience all the negative stuff others did. Plus, I thought the story was brilliant.
My 2014 thoughts on it:
Quote:
Originally Posted by QuickSciFi
Hm, I didn't care for it as much.
The graphics were pretty amazing though. I didn't realize what an improvement the visuals were until I went back to God of War 3 after playing this one.
^Yeah. I can understand that. I know it wasn't as popular as the rest. I really enjoyed it though; especially the story.
41. Dishonored - PS4
http://i.imgur.com/bTdzxUI.jpg?1
I had been holding-off on this one because I thought it was going to take a steep learning curve of some sort; this being a Bethesda game and all. I was pleasantly surprised to find a straight-forward "stealth shooter". The gameplay reminded me a lot of Shadow Warrior for some reason. And when I found out that it was originally envisioned as a feudal Japan story, the sword fighting started to make more sense. I'd say I had fun with this one; although it's way shorter than what people online like to say. Maybe even just over 5 hours. I know there are many branching paths and ways to play it to make it much longer, but I enjoyed my pace. To each his own, I suppose. I also like that you can remove the "head bobbing" effect when you run. Any FPS that lets me do that gets a plus from me. I can't stand shaky cam effects.
3. Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild (WiiU): 108 hours, according to the system clock.
The game itself? Damn, son.
I won't bore anyone with a wall of text gushing about the minutiae of this game's awesomeness, so for the sake of simplicity, I'll just leave it that I liked it.
4. Batman: The Brave and the Bold (Nintendo DS): A licensed game from WayForward, based on the animated series (which is presumably a send-up of the old Super Friends cartoons from the 80s). Jake Kaufman channels the feel of the old Adam West Batman and the game's climax is a endless-runner style sequence with Batman dodging obstacles while holding a cartoonish bomb over his head. Without being familiar with the actual cartoon, I'm not sure whether these references are layered on by WayForward or are lifted from the show.
It was a fun and reasonably clever game while it lasted. I completed this game in under four hours, including all the extra challenge modes.
Oh, and while I was looking at my 3DS Activity log to see how long this game actually took me to 100%, I noticed that I have some more games to add from earlier this year.
5. Alice in Wonderland (Nintendo DS): This game was far better than I was expecting it to be. I'd recommend it to anyone who is a fan of Metroidvania-style adventures.
6. Kirby Super Star Ultra (Nintendo DS): Fun and breezy like most Kirby games. I wanted to hunner-percentit, but I couldn't be bothered to give my all to the boss rush modes (I had enough of those from the Smash Bros Series).
^Glad you enjoyed Breath of the Wild and Kirby Super Star Ultra. I had the same exact feelings as you. BotW was just a fun journey. And I couldn't give the time to do the boss rush on Kirby Super Star Ultra (one playthrough of the main campaigns felt fun enough). I have a feeling that Super Mario Odyssey is going to be somewhere between BotW and Super Mario 3D World. If not, I'll take a Sonic Adventure (1) Mario any day anyways.
42. Earth's Dawn - PS4
http://i.imgur.com/PUZnWMM.jpg?1
What a pleasant surprise. I bought this from a bargain bin at some retail store brand new. I don't think I even paid more than $10 for it. But it just called-out to me. I know I looked it up on my phone, and there was something about it that appealed to me; but I don't even recall it being a 2D sidescrolling Hack 'N Slash. What a treat! :D. Loved it!
Skyrim Special Edition - PS4
https://i.ytimg.com/vi/Fpj69DjvbAg/maxresdefault.jpg
Been playing this game for over a month, and can finally say this time around I've beat the main quest, Dawnguard DLC, and Dragonborn DLC. Now I can finally put this game behind me for good. ie. It's getting traded in toward my next game purchase, no doubt. I'm done with Skyrim.
A big part of the appeal lost and why I don't see replay value in this game anymore is that it's really best experienced for the first time. As this second time through I remembered way too much since my first playthrough of when this game came out. Namely sense of exploration not being as strong and that the story lines don't hold up as much in replay. Though some of the dialog, namely what guards say, is still ace. Gameplay wise - the sneaking, sniping with a bow and exploring is still pretty fun... there's not enough meat for it to last well past 100 hours.
Surprisingly, considering how much I've played this time around, I didn't hit the level cap of level 81 like my first playthrough. Finished at like level 66 or so. I've managed to buy a house in every major hold, didn't bother with that building houses DLC this time around either, completed Dark Brotherhood and Thieves guild in their entire, and for the Civil War quest line I sided with the Empire this time all the way to completion.
Now the real dilemma begins once again... what do I play next?
7. Might & Magic: Clash of Heroes (Nintendo DS):
A reasonably breezy "rpg" in the vein of Puzzle Quest. The battle system is essentially a match-3 puzzle game, which I found fun and addictive. There's a lot more strategy involved here than the afore-mentioned Puzzle Quest, so I suppose you might call this a tactical RPG, but it ultimately doesn't put up much of a fight compared to other games in that genre.
4. Streets of Rage (Game Gear)
If fun in a videogame can be described as having many options, and the freedom to play in your own style, then this is the antithesis of that.
There are roughly two attacks worth using. The pipe, since it has great range - almost all enemies become trivial to deal with. If you don't have the pipe, by far your best option is the backthrow. Using any other attack is most likely to result in you being hit out of it by one of the other opponents, and then quite commonly, after you are knocked down, being hit again as you are getting up, over and over, until you lose a life.
You can't even grab an opponent and then hit them - if you don't backthrow, pretty much your option is 'let go by accident' (annoyingly easy to do), which will usually get you hit by one of the other opponents, and then hit again as you are getting up, over and over, until you lose a life. It is possible to flip over the opponent and suplex them, however doing this will almost always result in you being hit afterwards by one of the other opponents, and then... you get the picture.
Fortunately the backthrow seems to leave you with a lot of time afterwards to walk up to the other enemies and then grab them for a back throw. You can chain this over and over again, it's even ALMOST satisfying. This technique works against most of the enemies, and even quite a few bosses.
But it's just not really very fun. You're just doing the same throw over and over again, until you mess up or do something different for a change and then you will pay for it. And I'm not joking about the enemies hitting you as you get up, it happens a lot, and you can get bounced along the floor with, as far as I can tell, nothing you can do, if the AI deems it so.
On the plus side, there are more enemies on screen at once than the Master System version (3 as opposed to 2), and the music is about as good as you can get from the Game Gear - little wonder, since it's composed by Yuzo Koshiro.
Recommending this game is difficult. I love Streets of Rage on the Mega Drive, but both the Master System and Game Gear versions are very rough ports which don't capture the gameplay which makes the series such a favourite. The Game Gear port possibly feels less rough than the Master System version, but forces you to play even more robotically to progress. At least the Game Gear allows 2p co-op - just what you want on a handheld, and not on a home console, right? Stick to the Mega Drive version, where there is plenty of fun to be had.
Mass Effect - PC w/controller mod (65 hour run time, Insanity difficulty)
https://static.giantbomb.com/uploads...masseffect.jpg
First play through of the PC version in true 1080p and 60fps. Could have took it a step further and downloaded the hi-res texture pack mods, but wanted to experience the vanilla graphics and there's always next time.
The hardest part on this difficulty were the two guards just outside the strip club very early on in the game due to very weak weapons and crazy enemy regenerating health speeds and dmg. Took me over an hour to beat. The very few first off world missions were pretty hard too. After getting some better weapons and leveling up a bit it became much more manageable, until the final challenge of the Pinnacle Station DLC. Must have been over two hours of constant attempts at this mission and still no success. I was stubborn and trying to complete it early on at level 37, but eventually gave up and returned to it much later when I was level 50 and more importantly, had better armor and weapon mods. Success on 2nd attempt.
And yes, I did every off world side mission and searched everywhere, like always. Contrary to how most feel about the off world missions, I much enjoy them.
Anyway, another great time with a game that best encompasses the best of all the great sci-fi movies of the 80s and earlier.
43. Thief - PS4
http://i.imgur.com/OCDoZSe.jpg?1
Mediocre game. Not even on par with any of its counterparts. The lowest low I've played from Square Enix. It's still playable, but I'm talking minimum effort here. What happened?
8. Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney (Nintendo DS): I'm going to have to lump this one in with Elite Beat Agents as a game/series that seems to have an ardent following that I just don't get.
I enjoyed this game's humor, energy, and some of the stories and characters, but ultimately, I grew bored and frustrated with the often tedious gameplay. I love the premise of collecting clues and evidence and then using them to win cases, but the game doesn't strictly follow its own logic, and some of the solutions are simply ludicrous. For every moment that I legitimately felt clever for effectively utilizing evidence and deductive reasoning, there were plenty of other times where I simply felt like a monkey randomly pressing buttons to make the cartoon go.
This series may get better as it goes on, but I have no desire to pursue it, especially when there are far better examples of this genre on the system (999 and Hotel Dusk, to name a couple).
Go play The Witcher III next. You might be on to something there...Quote:
Originally Posted by MrMatthews
9. Parodius Da! (Famicom): This was my kind of shooter: adorably bizarre, charismatic, and challenging without reaching the hair-pulling frustration levels of the other games in the Gradius series. I'd put the difficulty level on-par with Contra, with the added benefit of Castlevania's generous continues. As with the proper Gradius games, the frequent checkpoints are not always particularly useful; I'd rather just start up the level from the beginning after dying, to recoup the lost power-ups.
That said, I'll definitely be returning to this one often.
^ I personally think Konami really botched that game up. Ditto for Gradius 2. Only NES/Famicon Gradius 1 & Life Force I really approve of.
...against my better judgment, I'll bite.Quote:
Originally Posted by Thief
How?
They probably did their best honestly, the problem is the game is just too much for a famicom. But yeah still the worst port of the game out there, you are better off playing the SFC or PS1 onesQuote:
Originally Posted by Thief
As someone who hasn't played either of the "superior" versions, I can truly say that I didn't notice any deficiencies in the FC version that aren't in 99% of the NES library. Why worry too much about sprite flicker and slowdown when things didn't even improve for shooters on the SNES?
The thing is the slowdowns and flicker is too much even for NES standards, like I said I don't think it's a bad port or anything, but probably not the best game to port to the NES since it ran on much superior hardware. Gradius NES for example was a more realistic port since they only allowed 2 options on screen, thus played more smoothly.Quote:
Originally Posted by MrMatthews
Got beat to the punch, but what Vludi said. Konami pushed the NES in the wrong areas. Instead of dedicating more sprites toward more enemies, bullets and less flicker, they waste it on more options and the extra firepower your ship can carry (why I mentioned Gradius 2 too). Not realistic prioritizing of the NES hardware at all. But alas, graphics in still screenshots sell.
This is also very unbalanced with more ship options/firepower and less enemies and bullets. ie. Gradius 2 was the easiest no miss run for me ever, because once you're maxed out in options, you're unstoppable.
Also Gradius 2 only has one boss where there's even a noticeable difference in challenge at all (Covered Core - where he shooter like 4 or so new pea size bullets in front of him now too. Can't find a picture of that, but here's what he looks like anyway).
https://cdn.wikimg.net/strategywiki/..._FC_Boss_5.png
Like literally, there's no other noticeable difficulty increase at all for loop 2 or consequent loops. I'm pretty sure NES Parodius is pretty similar too, because they've been optimized to leave little room for increasing difficulty. Meanwhile games like Life Force I hear become quite the challenge by loop 4, which is nice because otherwise Life Force isn't that hard either, as it too was another easy enough 1 no miss for me (though to be fair I no missed the harder Arcade version first).
7. Fossil Fighters: Champions - DS
Not as charming as the first game but still charming. The gameplay was greatly improved, and this game is more of a game than the first one. Story is still ridiculous and predictable, but the translation is good and very silly. There are some good references to the first game, but it's not over the top. So far, this series has been a bit of a guilty pleasure of mine, although I still won't say the games are actually good. Not sure when I'm going to get around to the third one, but I'm definitely going to play it. I become more surprised with each installment in this series as I think I'm the only person who actually plays them.
^I have this in my queue, actually. ;)
I decided to play what may be its "sister" game instead.