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2015 VIDEO GAME CATCH-ALL THREAD


Gonzo

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Put me on Team '97 for any KOF wars. Don't know what was going on with the soundtrack, but a single player endgame I can actually look forward to is something it can exclusively boast from the KOFs I've played so far.

 

According to my personal review bible I ranked Samshos 2 and 3 as best in the series (again, so far) but yeah the slash/bust stuff wasn't a good direction. I don't want to see configuration in an arcade fighting game. By the time the series reached 6 it seemed to be looking up to TES in the 'before we let you play answer these questions you don't understand the consequences of' stakes and makes it look like the team's final pitch for how the game should play was 'I dunno.'

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I know I am super-late on this. 

 

But I am loving the shit out of Saints Row 4. Simple, funny as all hell. Repetitive side quests, but I am loving the fuck out of this game.

 

Nolan North voice ftw.

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So I finished a couple games this weekend:

The Last of Us (Remastered) - Hmm...what to say about this one? Well, the first third is terrible. Cheap deaths, boring gameplay, annoying characters, and just overall terrible. The last two thirds are good, often very good. There are some genuinely great moments, like Ellie finding a joke book and reading some of them to you. It's a sweet, sad moment in a terrible world and it works really well. There are a couple spots where initial attempts to get past some enemies failed but then a different, stealthier approach worked magnificently. Unfortunately, stuff like that doesn't happen enough. More often what you get are cheap deaths from guys who are somehow invisible to your stealth listening skill even though they're moving. Or deaths because Joel refused to turn around and actually swing his melee weapon at the enemy attacking him. Or deaths because the game takes forever from first hitting the melee attack button to actually...attack. There's also way too much foraging (hey, so-and-so is in time-critical danger but we need to dig around safety pin thingies to upgrade our handgun!) and too many cutscenes. And the game falls into the trap that's a big pet peeve of mine - artificially low limits on ammo and crippled weapons. On what planet does it make sense that Joel can only carry, say, 6 shotgun shells at once? WTF? That's just...stupid.

On a different note, the improvement from the PS3 version to the PS4 is dramatic. The PS3 version looked really great until you started moving. Then it got all jerky with screen tearing, texture pop-in, and all kinds of graphical issues. I remember talking to Bix back when it come out and telling him I was shocked that Naughty Dog released a game with graphics that had that many issues. Well, the PS4 version fixes all that. And improves the graphics themselves on top. A LOT. I ran it in the "try for 60fps" mode the whole time (I found the "locked at 30 fps" to be choppy and slow) and it ran great. This is an incredibly good-looking game with great detail all over the place. The river about 2/3 of the way through the game is just amazing to look at. If we get remasters like this all the time, I'll be less inclined to dismiss them going forward. Well done, Naughty Dog.

I should also mention I wasn't crazy about the ending.

So where do we end up? The last two thirds are good - maybe even an 8/10 - but the first third is bad. So bad I almost quit again in the same place I quit when playing the PS3 version. So, overall? 6/10.

Brothers: A Tale of Two Sons - Brothers tells the tale of two brothers. They are grieving after the death of their mother, who drowned in a boating accident with the younger son after he was unable to rescue her. Their father falls ill and needs water from the Tree of Life to be healed. They set off on an epic quest to gather this water and save his life. What follows is a trek over really, really gorgeous landscapes and environments. The setting is a fantasy medieval-type setting, complete with trolls, giants, and orcas with...tails that look like the tines of a rake? You'll climb castles, swim rivers of blood, escape wolves and fly a hang glider. The entire game you control both brothers at the same time, controlling each one with one of the analog sticks and the L2/R2 buttons (on PS3). This is essentially a puzzle game as you are presented with obstacles that must be overcome with cooperation between the two brothers. It's a great mechanic and works really well. If you're like me, you'll end up moving the wrong guy all the time but it was always my fault, not the game's.

The story is a good one, if not particularly original. You'll meet great characters along the way, some of them helpful, some of them not. There's touching moments here, too. The developers do a tremendous job of mixing all that together.

As mentioned, the graphics are great. The environments are varied and always beautiful. The music is great and very haunting (leave it on the menu to hear a great example).

So, are there gripes? Sure. Some of the action is pretty repetitive. The sequences I found most annoying - Uncharted-style rock climbing are also the most frequent. You'll spend a LOT of your 5 hour playthrough jumping from one handhold to another. Much like one of my complaints about TLOU above, there's stuff in here that doesn't make any sense - you're on this time-critical mission to save your father, why are there tons of places where you can stop and sit on a park bench to look at scenery or play ball with a little girl?

It's worth noting that Brothers is extremely easy. Even the most incompetent gamer will finish this game easily in under 6 hours. There are also super-frequent autosave checkpoints, which is really nice. So this is really a game you experience rather than one to be challenged by. And that's OK.

In the end, this is a terrific game, one I'm glad I went back to after trying the demo (and not really caring for it) eons ago. 7.5/10 - almost 8/10.

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What did you not like about TLOU's ending?

I wanted some resolution to the story. Either tell me how the disease started and give me some of the origin or give me something that implies humanity is going to recover. Instead, we get Joel & Ellie wandering off into the forest.

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What did you not like about TLOU's ending?

I wanted some resolution to the story. Either tell me how the disease started and give me some of the origin or give me something that implies humanity is going to recover. Instead, we get Joel & Ellie wandering off into the forest.

 

 

Ah. Well....

 

I don't think humanity IS going to recover! Because Joel doomed the entire species because of his selfish need to not be alone.

 

I didn't feel we needed much of an original. Cordyceps are a real thing, they just jumped to humanity. That's all I need. I felt it was Joel and & Ellie's story, not the world's story.

 

That's my take anyway. I think the whole game is an origin story of humanity's biggest villain (Joel).

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THE BAD:

- For all the hype about the story, halfway through the game it's razor-thin. Escort a kid kinda like your daughter because she might hold the key to immunity. Big deal.

 

 

I honestly don't know where to start there.

 

 

What did you not like about TLOU's ending?

I wanted some resolution to the story. Either tell me how the disease started and give me some of the origin or give me something that implies humanity is going to recover. Instead, we get Joel & Ellie wandering off into the forest.

 

 

There's these games, I think they're called Resident Evil, you might prefer them for maximum exposition.

 

I mean really, in the context of a narrative so focused on two characters who in the grand scheme of things are nothing more than survivors, why the hell would the game answer universal questions like that?! I don't know how someone can miss the point so much

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I don't know where to put this, since there don't seem to be any Nintendo specific threads.

I was so excited, when I got an e-mail today that Humble Bundle is offering a Nintendo e-shop bundle this week, which I never thought possible.

Of course then I clicked on the link and found out that it's restricted to North and South America. :'(

Maybe someone else will have fun with it:

https://www.humblebundle.com/

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I've been playing the heck out of Super Mario 3D World in my down time. So far, I've collected every stamp and star. I just made it to world 5, and did not realize that collecting golden flagpoles was a thing until today. So now I have to go back and get the ones I didn't get. My ultimate goal is to collect everything I can possibly get from playing as one character. I do realize that collecting all of the last stamps will be impossible unless I play as all 5 characters through every stage...and I'm not about to do that.

 

I do love this game. It feels like a Mario game through and through. The catsuit is pretty awesome...and the visuals are pretty damn great too.

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I mean really, in the context of a narrative so focused on two characters who in the grand scheme of things are nothing more than survivors, why the hell would the game answer universal questions like that?! I don't know how someone can miss the point so much

Missing the point <> Not liking the point

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I've struggled with playing through Last of Us because I have never been good at stealth horror games, and those games obviously limit you supply-wise to force you to fit within that structure. (Same reason I have never finished a Metal Gear game).

However, I would say I last was about 1/3rd through Last of Us when I played the remastered version on my PS4, and I think I kind of agree with Tabe. There are some interesting moments with how they're shot cinematically, but I have yet to see why this is a gaming experience that people rave over.

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The game really DOES improve after the first third. Once you're done with the section with Bill, it gets a lot better.

There's a really great sequence later in the game where you're walking on a highway and have to get through a tunnel. There's a group of clickers up front, then you have to pass through a side hallway past three runners, and then finally another group of clickers with two bloaters. I tried this section multiple times, failing each time as I ended up on top of an overturned bus trying to fend off the last group of clickers and bloaters. Finally, I decided to try a far more stealthy approach. Managed to avoid the first group entirely, then into the hallway where I took out the three runners with chokes, so I went completely unnoticed. Out of the hallway, I threw a brick near the last group of clickers & bloaters. They congregated and I lit them up with multiple molotov cocktails. I then threw bombs at the bloaters. Took everybody out and they never got anywhere near doing damage to me. That was GREAT. Very, very satisfying.

Unfortunately, way more common is dying because of the lag between hitting the melee attack button and Joel actually attacking.

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I do really enjoy combat and how abilities work in the game.

 

Having a blast with The Witcher. Reminds me of my experience with Mass Effect.

 

I'm finding that it's best to spend your ability points on magic. Maxing out the 1st quick strike tier is a given, but after that, magic is the way to go. At least for me. Finally made it to the 3rd town. 

 

Spent 6 straight hours just doing secondary and contract missions yesterday. Can't remember the last time I lost track of time and played something all day. The Baron's quest in particular is a lot of fun. Pretty dark too.

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The hunting side missions are easier, you can find animals for crafting stuff a lot quicker, and there's fewer random attacks. It's a good game overall, though it is like other Ubisoft open world games in that it packs in too many side missions and not enough story ones.

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That was my problem with 3, is that I would be doing something, and an animal would attack.  And I shouldn't have to unload a full M5 clip into a damn dog to till it.

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Finished Dead Rising 3 and enjoyed the hell out of it. Just gonna do a quick run on Nightmare so I can get the buster cannon. I also downloaded Neverwinter but apparently you need to have Live to play it. Guess I'll dust off one of the two 12 months I bought. Was kinda waiting to start it back up when a good free game with gold came along to download, but I've been waiting for months...

 

Or if I picked up a game that others are playing, like Destiny. But I might have missed the boat on that.

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