Another good hack I’d recommend is « Peach’s memory ». 60 stars, nice environments, and muted colors that somehow fit
Edith: yeah Last Impact is one of those high quality but ridiculously hard ones
3 Likes
more dork souls 2 sotfs
still not really feeling “it’s actually the best one!!!” but it feels so much better when you’ve pumped adp
also refreshing playing one of these i’ve finished only acouple of times at vanilla launch & don’t remember all of the item placements and optimal paths/builds straight off
3 Likes
i think my feelings on ds2 these days are “it’s actually the most depressed one” and i vibe with it mostly for that reason. it’s a hugely flawed game that evokes a certain fucked up, broken vibe for me and it resonates all the more for it
it reminds me a lot of king’s field 3, a similarly depressed game that is hugely flawed that i also love
8 Likes
i just spent a couple of hours playing risk of rain 2 with my best friend. this game is good for just talking over. like a run based EDF.
1 Like
I always felt like it was obligatory to get ADP to like 25, whatever makes rolls normal, like it’s not even an option.
2 Likes
king’s field 3 is a good comparison, it’s no coincidence that dks2 is the only latter day fromsoft game lead designed by naotoshi zin, right? a noble kusoge
7 Likes
there is a specific mapping in my mind for this that probably doesn’t make sense but there it is so now i have to type it out
king’s field '94 - demon’s souls
king’s field 2 - dark souls
king’s field 3 - dark souls 2
shadow tower - bloodborne
king’s field 4 - dark souls 3
3 Likes
started feeling at some point ds2 is even more of a king’s field followup than miyazaki’s games were. something about the monsters and environments feels more at home being a direct sequel to kf4 than to ds1.
it even has the hidden early game skeleton guarding a chest.
ok this explains a lot
5 Likes
shadow tower abyss - sekiro
kf '94 to demon’s souls is the one that doesn’t feel right, that first King’s Field is so sparse and minimal and Demon’s Souls is shocking in how many of the series features it nailed right off the bat
6 Likes
yeah that one doesn’t sit right, it’s the outlier for sure. king’s field '94 is great, but it’s kind of a tech demo compared to everything after.
but the others have a lot of interesting parallels!
the undead crypt from ds2 maps to kf94 because it’s the same area as a concept but reduced to a single level
demon’s souls is way more kf2jp/1us to me, it’s so lustrous and fully realized. imo miyazaki’s reflections on past fromsoft titles are even more interesting in his non-souls games: murakumo - armored core for answer, echo night 2 - déraciné
4 Likes
is it too much to hope for that we wrap around with
demon’s souls - elden ring
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now i’m thinking of a branching timeline
kf2 - demon’s souls
kf3 - ds2
and ds1 is assigned to a game in a different timeline where kf3 successfully built on some of the best elements of kf2 and wasn’t quite so fucked up haha
2 Likes
honestly i think dks1 might be kf4
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damn that’s actually apt as fuck
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Glad to see people playing this one. I don’t think I ever played the Death Wish stuff (later DLC?) but you’ve nailed the biggest problem of that game, the difficulty is really weird.
Finished Beyond Blue - the scuba-diving environmentalism game by the people who did Never Alone. I’ve never been diving but I can see why people like it if it’s as soporific and relaxing as this with the vague thrill of being extremely close to very large/strange animals. As someone with a passing interest in marine biology it scratched an itch that Abzu failed to capitalise on because Abzu is just Journey: Swim edition.
I mentally align this game with Assassin’s Creed Discovery Tour since the goal of the experience is to place you into a virtual environment to vicariously learn about oceanography, the plight of preservation, and sperm whale trivia. Free swim is the highlight but you have to wade (lol) through the main story to get to it. It’s not bad but it’s presentation is quite dry. Like a PSA with too little budget. That said, I dig the vibe and the message and the game goes out of its way to have a feminist undercurrent (lol) to the main thrust of giving a shit about oceans - literally the source and sustainer of all life in the known universe. An excellent chill-out game made for a good cause.
I did not know sperm whales slept like this:
Of course they do!
I also played the Cris Tales Demo and this went from being an anticipated game to stricken from the list. I love the visual style but the game really has very little going on other than the novelty of scrolling through past, present, and future in the environment. The story is weak, combat even more so, and it feels like a case of writers wanting to write but having nothing to say. It’s by the same publisher as Ary and the Secret of the Seasons and a worrying trend is emerging. I’m hoping these are symptoms of an early build but I didn’t really see much that compelled me.
8 Likes
sekiro : demons souls, imo
i can pick out flaws and issues i have with both games but i still think they’re excellent and feel really fully-formed right out the gate. i would like a dark souls to sekiros demons souls. Do i know what that means? No, and that’s why it’s exciting.
i hope elden ring is not that game though
3 Likes
I really liked Abzu but yeah, was feeling this throughout as it played like flowing nothingness and lo and behold thatgamecompany folks were involved. Will check this out just to fill my modern day Aquanaut’s Holiday/Artdink open world exploration itch.
3 Likes