Uh you’re welcome ; )
2 Likes
played some lost kingdoms to rinse the feeling of zelda. it’s nice. i’ve ran out of cards once in the past and so i always think about how each random encounter is a resource drain.
it’s tiring. i’m exhausted after barely an hour. and after playing a bunch of games that are never tiring, always pulling attention and always inviting you to keep going forward, i think this is perfect. especially if it’s a short game. like, wouldn’t the ideal be a 5-7 hour game that is unbearable to play for more than an hour at a time?
7 Likes
Been playing Relicta, which I got free off Epic god knows how long ago.
It’s a Portal-like, or a Talos Principle-like. (Or even a Witness-like, I think that’s a related game.) Self-possessed puzzle chambers that are individually solved by manipulating a simple physics device - here, magnetic polarities that you can apply to movable crates, making them attract or repel from each other and other static features, along with a gravity-defying toggle so said boxes can fly indefinitely thru the air.
Like many of these games it roughly tutorializes new ways of interacting with the limited objects, and slowly increases the amount of objects (lifts, buttons that move level design around, drones that fly in prescribed paths that carry nullification fields that turn off all your magnet stuff) that makes for potentially exponential additional complexity. Some of the puzzles have been quite devious, at least for my stunted brain.
Also like Portal-likes, it has a frame story, which is this game’s weak point. It’s very standard indie game, a few personalities bouncing off each other. The way the game constantly orchestrates its plot so you never actually meet any of these other people face to face (because then it would have to render them, no thanks) is very funny. And maybe leading to some kind of hallucinatory twist, which it is clearly setting up for. It’s impossible to tell at this point exactly what form the twist will take but its general shape is obvious and sort of lame.
I’m waiting for it to bust out of its confines, to pull Portal and Talos’ best trick, making use of your powers where they don’t “belong”, turning what were traversal spaces into new puzzle spaces - Breaking Out Of The Chamber. So far no hint of that whatsoever. Seems very possible it never will, which defeats the purpose a little bit imo.
I keep meaning to stream it to discord, group playing these kinds of games is always great fun.
6 Likes
still chipping away at death stranding director’s cut. i haven’t been this hooked on a game since elden ring, and my playtime is starting to creep closer to 200 hours…!
it is still so enjoyable, though. on very hard mode, your structures decay extremely quickly, so it is a constant war. i wish there was an even harder mode
15 Likes
It gives me no pleasure to agree with Popular Opinion, but Alien: Isolation is just too damn long and poorly paced! Especially by the second half. Like, scanning its plot points in the abstract: cool, solid, and gameplay-wise The Hook (Alien’s AI + immaculate production/sound design) is all-timer stuff but it’s strangled to death with A-to-B tangents: “go flip this switch” “oh it’s blocked, you’ll have to find another way around” “you reached it but oh, it’s lacking power, go to this panel over here” “ok now that it’s flipped come back over here”…and it just keeps going for hours. They can call it an Orbital Frame Module X or Ventilation Systems Y all they want but it’s still Point A and Point B and I’m supposed to be scared in between, after 12 hours (maybe 20 total?) I get it! The most damning casualty was the ability of the alien to scare my ass anymore : (
I thought of recently played Metroids. They’re going for something cinematic here, so keep it short like Fusion then. Otherwise I’m gonna need some Prime-like engagement with/autonomy over the environment (unlocking your own routes/altering environments so backtracking is more interesting/less contextual gating of spaces and more emphasis on developing an intimate mental map to more dynamically navigate encounters, not to roll this into more cliche power fantasy but to ground the stakes!) there’s too many voices over radios dropping waypoints, plot points throwing curveballs, it’s got all the locks and keys of a Metroid game (more lock-like, more key-like, all those ion torch upgrades lol) with a map mostly experienced linearly and fragmented so that design meeting whiteboards and spreadsheets start to overlay Matrix code-like onto everything and it feels like padding and pandering to Gamer Hours Required (happy to blame gamers for this, there should be a trend of Director’s Cuts for games but they’re always like half the original length at least, cut the crap! (but also, could see this being gameplay scenarios stretched to fill the story structure? idk guess I’ll read about development next)) and even though I said the plot points are solid, the malaise that sets in kinda undermines them as well with all the optional (though imo nice) info dumps that let you suss things on your own + the density of the “micro plots” jerking you around to different micro objectives (thinking of the reveal of Taylor’s motives here but also I looked away right when she died so that whole thing fell flat (you deal with a lot of people through glass windows with control over your character, I can’t decide if that is good and thematically appropriate or just a naturally reccurring dev trope (reminded now of the relationship of human (you) and tech, the motion tracker is great because it provides you information more broadly at the expense of your bodied immediate spatial awareness, things like the save stations (generously provided, truly grateful for that) and hacking interfaces (…so these are a little silly yes but not BioShock stupid though I did roll my eyes hard when they gave me an entirely new little mini-game at a seriously pivotal plot point that completely derailed any in-the-moment magic I might have experienced) both play with having your being inconvenienced and made vulnerable for a few seconds to do something important, save your progress or make progress, that’s a neat little tension, however I draw the line of “interesting relationship to tech in survival situations” here, not extending this reading to all the console/switch/button hunting that drives your progress, if their point is that mouse-trapped in space station = tedious activities, bite me, elevate your macro game to the level of your micro game)))))
Uh, anyway I’m losing my train of thought. That final QTE sure was bad, huh? But also that first no-alien hour and…well basically up to LV-426 and when the Marshall “betrays” you (after that, you should confront him, reveal the alien is still around, reveal everyone’s motives, have it gradually pick off the remaining members one by one as you all try to escape, “get away from her me you bitch” showdown, THE END) it was pretty fucking cool for a while, so focusing on what works: solid B+
Thinking on those fresh final hours though still like
18 Likes
this reminded me of part in Dead Space (which I also undermined) where the game wants you to be “immersed” and “in the world” experiencing scripted events so instead of a boring old restrictive cutscene they’re gonna put you into a room to basically watch TV (or ruin it lol)
4 Likes
I worked at the PC Engine version of Salamander (check the thread for literally hundreds of PC Engine game impression!) glad I was playing on the anbernic as the second stage has a whole lot of full screen flashes. that was quite a shock on the train.
I had to save state to beat the flesh-wall in stage 1 and that still took dozens of tries. I eventually got through it, but what an intense brick wall right at the start. The flesh wall regenerates way faster than expected. I thought maybe it was some kind of Mister error, but Retroarch was the same.
I then restarted and it did it legit just to show I could, but think the eye-searing flashes put me off any further tries.
Check the PC Engine Thread! We’re in 1991, that means Valis IV and Spriggan and Magical Chase!
11 Likes
Silvergun is especially funny because it’s been $200 for 15 years. Technically it has gone down in value but only because of inflation.
11 Likes
the only game whose value has skyrocketed that I don’t quite get is Gigawing 2
like, guys, the US version doesn’t even have the characters yelling every time they reflect, it’s not worth 500 bucks
7 Likes
but the reflect force is the holy weapon that turns despair into hopes!
5 Likes
i have that game also from Epic and it’s something i wanted to look at at some point. something about incredibly mid puzzle games with some degree of production value like this just fascinate me. i similarly played this game The Sojourn a few years back while jurying festivals and never forgot it. i guess because i found the Journey-like generic visuals combined with being a mid puzzle game fascinating. something about the like self-assuredness of the idea that the thing is clever enough to carry all the effort of its production while never really getting to the point of being actually clever is amusing to me. it’s like a container for the idea that there’s some epiphany you’re going to have later on that you never really do. as much as people shit all over the Witness i think that game runs laps around these in terms of actually capturing that feeling at times. i guess i tend to like these kinds of puzzle games more than other people though.
2 Likes
I love Lost Kingdoms. I feel like it’s one of those games that benefits from its exact size. The sequel never clicked with me quite the same way the original did since the first is such a small finite experience
The sequel was kind of cool but felt like it suffered from the need to expand out and overcomplicate existing mechanics. Like they added an elemental affinity system you had to level up to use stone cards or water cards or whatever, but upgrading in one affinity meant dropping down in the others. Bleh
8 Likes
i love lost kingdoms!!! someone busted it out at the most recent sb meetup… still sad that they couldn’t keep the superior japanese title (Rune / ルーン)
7 Likes
The sequel passes over From’s traditional fog-soaked graveyards and mute, shambling animalistic monster for blue skies and cackling villains. It feels like the same path that leads to Enchanted Arms, unusually trend-chasing for the studio.
It also pushes on the internal game system enough that it breaks. There were some huge design issues with the first game, but they barely show up in its short length. The second is at least three times longer and they’ve made some smart changes but it’s just not strong enough to sustain that. I think ideas that are neat but limited might still make for fine games if they stay mindful of those limits and bow out gracefully.
6 Likes
Final Fantasy (NES)
Third time’s the charm for getting a readable FF1 cart from eBay. : )
After playing around with various combinations, here are the ROMhacks I think I’m gonna run with (no pun intended):
Pitch Correction
– Apparently there are some out-of-key notes in the original sound and the theory is that a rounding algorithm or something may have been throwing things off.
Final Fantasy Flash Reduction
– Thanks to @meauxdal for pointing this out: it removes flashing FX from the game, like when triggering a random encounter, or using various spells (your characters still blink when hit, maybe someone will come up with something for that eventually ^ _^), and even removes screen shake, like when any of your characters takes a hit! This is what let me even consider playing FF again. : D
Final Fantasy Randomizer
Improved Vanilla
– FFR can generate completely random worlds (and monsters, I think, if you want) and a ton of other configurable stuff; for now I’m just running with standard quality-of-life improvements: a Walk Fast button, faster UI and scene transitions, bug fixes, etc.
It also cuts out spell flash by default, and encounter initialization time is cut, so that cuts that flash down–but it doesn’t cut screen shake and probably other stuff, so I kept the Flash Reduction patch in there. Would probably be all right without it if compatibility issues come up though.
13 Likes
I almost added something like this in my other post. Maybe they restricted you to certain elemental affinities for the sake of balance, so you can’t dump all the good cards in one mega deck. But the first game is succinct enough that you get all best cards, use them, and then it ends. No need to try to tackle balancing
3 Likes
Bought, installed, beat, and uninstalled Titanfall 2 today.
The infantry and ground based stuff was pretty fun. The best level was by far the time-hopping one while the biggest letdown was basically the entire climax of the game from the start of the ship chase to the ending credit roll.
It would’ve been better without the titular titan, imo, or at least if it wasn’t something you ever piloted.
7 Likes
Last night I played some Text Express which is a word search game with exceptionally lavish visuals and no sound fx for some reason. There’s music though it’s pretty forgettable.
Also there’s a sub game that’s a riff on Wordle, which gets introduced by a bird. So it’s called Birdle.
As a mobile game it of course has 19 different currencies and stuff on cool down timers in order to cajole you into watching ads or spending money.
3 Likes
I checked and I also claimed Relicta when it was free on Epic in case I ever got a PC that could run it well (which I probably do now) but what sticks out to me is that it is apparently between 14-20 hours long, which is really long for this sort of first person puzzle game! They generally wrap up by the ten hour point, often much before then. If the Portal people kinda struggled a bit with Portal 2 filling a full 10-15 hours I am almost terrified to see someone try and go even longer.
3 Likes