Support NeoGAF

[InfiniteCombo]

always apex, some prodeus and until you fall, alyx workshop, into the radius

y tu?

Yooooo, are you a Spanish speaker!? (I'm American but originally from a Spanish-speaking country)

I blame my current spree on jshackles -- I signed up for RetroAchievements.org, and right now I'm playing Mario games: both SMB1 and SMB3 (the NES versions). I'm probably 6 Achievements away from the SMB3 "platinum." I usually write my extended thoughts in this thread after I'm fully done playing whatever game(s) it is I'm playing, so I'll be writing up on those. Oh, that also means my actual retro hardware and games will be collecting dust for a bit, LOL, since I'm playing those games on RetroArch now.

As for "modern" games, I'm playing the first game of the Crash Bandicoot remastered trilogy. Having a lot of fun. (My avatar on this site generally reflects what "main" game I'm playing at the time). Again I'll do a write up once I'm done.

 

[Tesseract]

Yooooo, are you a Spanish speaker!? (I'm American but originally from a Spanish-speaking country)

I blame my current spree on jshackles -- I signed up for RetroAchievements.org, and right now I'm playing Mario games: both SMB1 and SMB3 (the NES versions). I'm probably 6 Achievements away from the SMB3 "platinum." I usually write my extended thoughts in this thread after I'm fully done playing whatever game(s) it is I'm playing, so I'll be writing up on those.

As for "modern" games, I'm playing the first game of the Crash Bandicoot remastered trilogy. Having a lot of fun. (My avatar on this site generally reflects what "main" game I'm playing at the time). Again I'll do a write up once I'm done.

some, 2 years in middle school and 4 years in high school

learned the cuban or caribbean variety

crash remastered looks excellent, shoulda nabbed a copy during the steam sale ...

 

[Ascend]

Yooooo, are you a Spanish speaker!? (I'm American but originally from a Spanish-speaking country)

I speak Spanish too. In fact, I speak 4 languages, three of them pretty much perfectly, Spanish being my weakest but still quite good.
Above that, I understand a bit of Portuguese, French, German and Italian too. But only the very basic stuff.

In any case, after finishing NFS Undercover, I think I'm simply going to continue with Pokemon Sword. I will consider it done when I finish the main story, not when I catch them all lol.
I do want to train a team for competitive battling. I always found it fun to form these weird teams that no one expects, but can also be competitive in the meta xD

 

[InfiniteCombo]

I speak Spanish too. In fact, I speak 4 languages, three of them pretty much perfectly, Spanish being my weakest but still quite good.
Above that, I understand a bit of Portuguese, French, German and Italian too. But only the very basic stuff.

In any case, after finishing NFS Undercover, I think I'm simply going to continue with Pokemon Sword. I will consider it done when I finish the main story, not when I catch them all lol.
I do want to train a team for competitive battling. I always found it fun to form these weird teams that no one expects, but can also be competitive in the meta xD

Geez, 4 fluent languages!? Awesome! Well, we got English and Spanish out of the way, what are the other two?

You brought up a great point. The awesome thing about this thread is that each player has their own criteria for when they are "done" with a game. For some people, it's when they're done with the main story/campaign. For others, it's reaching a certain milestone. For others, it's reaching a certain completion percentage (main story + extras). For others, it's getting the Platinum trophy.

Regardless, it's all about experiencing the game under one's own conditions, and having fun (or, at least trying to; some games might suck) in the process.

 

[Ascend]

Geez, 4 fluent languages!? Awesome! Well, we got English and Spanish out of the way, what are the other two?

Dutch and Papiamentu.

You brought up a great point. The awesome thing about this thread is that each player has their own criteria for when they are "done" with a game. For some people, it's when they're done with the main story/campaign. For others, it's reaching a certain milestone. For others, it's reaching a certain completion percentage (main story + extras). For others, it's getting the Platinum trophy.

Regardless, it's all about experiencing the game under one's own conditions, and having fun (or, at least trying to; some games might suck) in the process.

Indeed. I normally don't bother with trophies or achievements. They are more a hassle than anything else. They were cool when they came out, to some extent. But right now, it doesn't matter to me.

 

[InfiniteCombo]

A couple of notes on Retro Achievements:

+ Breathes new life into old games
+ You end up learning things you didn't even know about old games
+ Gives you a sense of accomplishment at achieving difficult feats of skill
+ You get an option to get achievements in "normal" mode, or "Hardcore" mode, which is pretty cool. So "normal" mode allows you to use emulator features like Rewind, Save States, etc. Hardcore mode is more for folks that want to play the game "in the letter of the law" without any emulator features; playing it this way gives you double points for Achievements. Even though I can see both sides of the coin, I prefer to play on Hardcore.

- Just like modern achievements, some retro achievements are less about skill and more about "grind." I generally skip those.
- Some achievements for well-known things are missing. For example, in Super Mario Bros., there's the almost mythical/legendary "minus" level (infinite(?) water level) that's accessed via a glitch in the World 1-2 warp area. There's no Achievement for that. In Super Mario Bros. 3, there's a well known "infinite lives" exploit in World 3-4, involving a Lakitu and a Koopa Troopa shell bouncing between two bounded sections under a pipe. No Achievement for that.
- The integration of the Achievements with RetroArch is hit or miss. You could get into a situation (like I did), where a certain emulator core in RetroArch doesn't register ("pop") certain Achievements. Some emulator cores are better than others. For example, I was playing Super Mario Bros. 3 with Nestopia NES, and a lot of Achievements were not popping. When I switched over to QuickNES, everything started working again. This was fine for SMB3, which I consider to be a quick game; but I'd hate this unreliability to show its face if I'm 25 hours into, say, Final Fantasy VI, and an Achievement doesn't pop because of this. That would suck. (Obviously, none of this is the end of the world).

Seems a lot of people have signed up, but just like Steam, Xbox, and PSN, it seems that the achievement rate is low. Getting most Achievements in only SMB1 and SMB3 has already put me in the top 18th percentile on the site. [Correction: 15th percentile]

 

[jshackles]

Well - I can't say that I'm upset about being blamed for introducing someone to Retro Achievements. Well done, InfiniteCombo it sounds like you're getting the swing of things there.

Now (if you're on PC) you've just gotta do the RetroArch integration with GOG Galaxy with the handful of games you're playing and it'll feel like these old games are fully realized on a modern launcher.

RetroGOG: Use GOG Galaxy 2.0 to Play and Track Your Retro Games

https://github.com/jshackles/RetroGOG The goal of this project is to integrate all retro platforms that are supported by both GOG Galaxy 2.0 and RetroArch so that games can easily be launched from GOG with minimal user configuration. GOG Galaxy will track user's play time as well as...

www.neogaf.com

And seriously - if anyone reading this knows anyone who works at GOG / CDPR and can put me in touch with them further about integrating achievements directly into Galaxy, I would be most grateful.

 

[WakeTheWolf]

2. Dragon Age Inquisition (PC) - 60 hours
3/10
I love the Dragon Age series but I absolutely could not get on with this game. I did manage to complete the main story after around 30 hours of completing maps realising that going 100% is just not going to happen. The maps are tedious and every new zone brought me to close down the game. The only thing bringing me back was knowing DA4 is coming out and I'm hoping it redeems itself. Essentially its a great story destroyed by its gameplay and tedious checklist fetch quests. It is so tedious that I think the people who developed it genuinely must hate gamers. It was so boring I quit around 5 times and in the end decided to only finish the story quests. Doing this certainly helped. After finishing the game which had a very anti climatic ending I said screw it and watched The Trespasser DLC on YouTube. I know people say its the best one but I just couldn't put anymore time into it. I would say its just a literal mess of clutter. The war table and everything so unorganised and scattered but buried deep in the tediousness is some great storytelling. It is a shame. I hope DA4 is better.


Games Completed in 2021:
- Dragon Age 2
- Dragon Age Inquisition

 

[DunDunDunpachi]

I made tamales today, which takes all day. In between steps of the recipe, I played alternating rounds of Dodonpachi (shmup) and DDR Supernova on the PS2. My 4yr old son has been playing Spelunky 2 since it came out, and he's getting pretty good. He is entirely reckless, but as a result he can clear earlier stages in 20 seconds flat. He still dies to easy stuff (like any Spelunky player does) but it's wild to see him mastering the game, bit by bit. His older brother and sister really took to the (first) game too, so it's like a Super Mario-tier or Minecraft-tier game in our family.

I've noticed that when I'm not too worried about beating/completing games and keeping up with new releases, I'm quite satisfied to play a handful of arcade-like games and "accomplish nothing", so to speak.That's how kids play games. Now that I'm watching them grow up, I realize that when I was a kid (around their ages) I didn't care much about beating games, either. It was great when you beat a game, but in most cases you were just happy to play.

After playing games today I'm not any further on any backlog. I didn't unlock anything or really do anything special except play a few stages. I was enjoying the simple thrill of playing games while waiting for chicken to slow-cook and tamales to steam.

i know one big facet of the thread is to get through the backlog, but personally I enjoy playing games and filling up sessions with whatever strikes my fancy. A backlog can feel like an anchor. Taking a break from new games can help give oneself a breather to go back through the backlog and catch up, but the backlog itself shouldn't become burdensome. Otherwise it's not fun.

tl;dr go waste your time on more arcade games pls

 

[Harts316]

I tried playing the first The Evil Within game when it came out, but the performance and load times on the last gen consoles wasn’t that great. Now that I have a Series X, I bought it during a sale for five bucks.

I am three quarters through the game and I like it so far:

Pros

-Graphics hold up for a game this old
-Framerate is a solid 30 fps
-Load times are almost instant in the Series X
-Great use of lighting and the environments are really detailed and fleshed out.
-Some really scary and gross moments. They really went all out in terms of horror.

Cons
-Story is barebones. Not too much is explained and the characters are not developed at all.
-Punishing difficulty. I had to drop the difficulty to casual.
-Gameplay mechanics are introduced and don’t feel fully fleshed out. Seems like there were too many ideas they tried to cram into the game. An example is burning the bodies with the matches. It’s a cool concept, but it really doesn’t seem to matter.

Looking forward to the sequel.

 

[CitizenZ]

I tried playing the first The Evil Within game when it came out, but the performance and load times on the last gen consoles wasn’t that great. Now that I have a Series X, I bought it during a sale for five bucks.

I am three quarters through the game and I like it so far:

Pros

-Graphics hold up for a game this old
-Framerate is a solid 30 fps
-Load times are almost instant in the Series X
-Great use of lighting and the environments are really detailed and fleshed out.
-Some really scary and gross moments. They really went all out in terms of horror.

Cons
-Story is barebones. Not too much is explained and the characters are not developed at all.
-Punishing difficulty. I had to drop the difficulty to casual.
-Gameplay mechanics are introduced and don’t feel fully fleshed out. Seems like there were too many ideas they tried to cram into the game. An example is burning the bodies with the matches. It’s a cool concept, but it really doesn’t seem to matter.

Looking forward to the sequel.

Its an overlooked gem. it was, along with Breakpoint, that forced me to get a new CPU and made Huuuuuge difference. Dont skip out on the DLC one of the few that delivers. Tango one of my new favorite devs.

 

[Goro Majima]

Beaten so far in 2021:

Spider-Man Remastered
Spider-Man Miles Morales
Maneater (came with PS Plus)

Got the platinum on all three since it was easy enough. Almost gave up with Miles Morales because they want you to beat it twice but New Game Plus goes by in a couple hours since you don’t need the side quests if you’ve done them all.

Working on Godfall now while occasionally putting time into Sackboy Adventures.

This is going to be a really difficult challenge once PS5 games start coming out later this year. I’m mostly on a “I just want to play PS5 games” kick right now and if that persists then it’s going to be a problem once I’m done with my launch titles.

Fortunately I’ve still got:

Godfall
Sackboy
AC: Valhalla
Watchdogs Legion
Immortals Fenyx
DMC5 Special
Warhammer Chaosbane
Mortal Kombat 11

And anything PS Plus gives me since I’m not buying anything.

 

[Ryuji Goda]

Still playing Bloodborne. I really like it. I can feel myself getting better at the game. It's really rewarding.

 

[Phase]

10. Burnout Paradise (PC) - 10hrs

Got the Burnout License and the credits so that's good enough for me for now. It was nice to come back to a time when arcade racers were still a thing. Loved the ol' hold down boost as long as possible gameplay. There's a nice design to this game that makes you want to do "just one more" event (again and again) before stopping for the day. Very fun.

 

[DelireMan7]

My challenge :
No 2021 games . I can buy older games as my backlog is limited to 1 genre and I might want to change genre during the year according to my mood.

Physical Backlog :

• Lunar Silver Star Harmony (PSP) Done !
• The Legend of Heroes : Trails in the Sky (PSP)
• Rogue Galaxy (PS2)
• Odin Sphere (PS2)
• Baldur's Gate : Siege of Dragonspear (PS4)
• Baldur's Gate 2 : Shadows of Amn (PS4)
• Baldur's Gate 2 : Throne of Bhaal (PS4)
• Assassin's Creed IV : Black Flag (PS3)
• Baten Kaitos : Eternal Wings and the Lost Ocean (Gamecube)
• Zelda Ocarina of time (N64)
• [Replay] Final Fantasy X and X-2 (PS2)
• [Replay] At least one SoulsBorne (PS3/4)

Games completed :

1. Rayman Origins (PS3) (started in Spring 2020, main story finished 5th of January 2021, coop with my 4 years old daughter, her first video game)
2. Lunar : Silver Star Harmony (PSP) (Started 1st of January, finished 17th of January, 25h56m)

Done with this classic. Quite generic and "average" (but on the good side of average, if it makes sense).
No aspect is really standing out but none (expect one for me) is bad.
Story, art direction, characters, progression's system, world are all quite generic but it's probably due to the age of the game. Still I enjoyed playing this classic RPG, actually just the fact it's a classic is enough for me to enjoy a game xD.

Still there is one thing that was bad and frustrating for me : the battle system.
You input your command for all your party then you watch them being display in "random" order. Sometimes the enemies will act in between, sometimes not... I didn't really feel in control of my characters and it removes a lot of strategy normally inherent to turn based system.
Also I ended up trying to avoid the battle, since you can see the enemies on the map. But I said "trying" because most of the maps and dungeons are designed in tight corridors that make really difficult to avoid contact with enemies. And most of the dungeons required back and forth between different screens, which makes all defeated enemies respawn...
One last thing : the really not obvious unbeatable battle that occurred at one point in the story... I made it last 1 hour before dying (due to have used all my reviving item) to discover you're suppose to die to continue the story...

Classic story, classic music, charming cast of characters... Evenso I usually prefer when at least one game's aspect is unique, it's enough for me to appreciate it.

What to play next :
Let's jump into a game that intrigued me quite a bit at the time and have what's look like an unique battle system : Baten Kaitos : Eternal Wings and the Lost Ocean. (Started 19 th of January)

 

[Ryuji Goda]

I ordered my backlog (163 games...) by date. So oldest first and newest last. Next up is...

I am really excited to play this.

 

[Banjo64]

Halo CE

My original plan after competing Halo CE was to start playing Halo 2. As is often the way though, I’ve ended up completing something completely different.

This weekend passed, Yooka-Laylee was included in the Xbox ‘free play weekend’. And it got me thinking about the game. I started looking at some YouTube reviews/retrospectives, and I stumbled across a video from one of the only YouTubers that I rate; KingK.



On the back of this video, I decided to boot up the game on Friday night and resumed from where I left of in 2017.

I will preface this post by saying that I love 3D platform/collectathon games. Banjo-Kazooie, A Hat in Time, Jak and Daxter: The Precursor Legacy, Ratchet and Clank, Sly Cooper, Spyro, 3D Mario. It’s safe to say, it’s my favourite genre.

For those who don’t know, Yooka-Laylee is a game made by some of the veteran Rare developers who made Banjo-Kazooie. I backed this game on Kickstarter. I was really looking forward to this game releasing. Whilst the game was met with mediocre reviews upon release, I gave it a fair shake. However, I found the game to be too bloated at the time. It reminded me of Banjo-Tooie. I got to the second world, Glitterglaze Glacier, and tapped out. Its scale was too daunting for me.

Banjo Tooie is a great game. However like Yooka-Laylee, it forsakes the core tenet that makes 3D platform/collectathons what they are; self-contained worlds. In Banjo-Kazooie you can enter any of the 9 worlds, and you can 100% that world in one go. 100 notes, 10 jiggies, 5 jinjos. There is order. The only exception to this is 1 jiggie in Gobi’s Valley. This jiggie requires the running shoes, which are unlocked in a later world. To me, this is the only act of sacrilege in the otherwise perfect, definitive example of the genre. In Banjo-Kazooie, the notes carefully and subtly guide you around the map and lead to hidden jiggies/key points of interest on the map.

To enjoy Yooka-Laylee, I had to let go of my assumptions of what a 3D platform/collectathon game should be. Gone is the order, and as such, I let go of my belief that I had to collect every pagie, quill, ghost writer, pirate treasure, health and energy booster. I became much more liberal with my exploration. I could only collect 4 out of the 25 pagies in Glitterglaze Glacier? Who gives a fuck? Let’s go and buy the latest move from Trowser and go seek another world in the hub area. Oh look, now have this move I can go back to Tribalstack Tropics and get more, previously unattainable pagies. I can extend this world? Why the fuck not.

I definitely think that Yooka-Laylee is bloated in terms of collectibles. 200 quills on each world, 100 would suffice. 25 pagies on each world, 20 would suffice. However, I didn’t give a fuck. Unlike Banjo-Kazooie’s notes, the quills seem haphazardly scattered around each map. So I didn’t go out of my way to collect them. Just through playing the game and exploring each map, I had more than enough quills to buy every move from Trowser, getting all 200 on each world became irrelevant.

I’d seen in advance that you can boundary break to access the final boss without getting 100 pagies. I utilised this exploit last night. I had 70 pagies by the time I defeated the world 5 boss, and I didn’t fancy going back to grind the remaining 30 needed. I’d enjoyed the game, but I was finished with it.

Is this game perfect? Not at all. On a true 1-10 scale I’d give it a 7. It was fun. The actual platforming was tight. The bosses were quite fun. The worlds, despite being large, are ok. They actually improve when expanded. David Wise and Grant Kirkhope deliver a great score as you’d expect. The transformations in the whole felt unnecessary for me, with the exception of the pirate ship in world 5.

If you’re a completionist, avoid this game. But if you can let go, give it a go.

 

[ROMhack]

I finished Halo 2 at the weekend but have absolutely no motivation to write a proper review.

Yes I liked it.

That's my review.

 

[SCB3]

Alright, I plan on keeping to this list, I have so many unfinished games at the moment and picked a few that I know I'll enjoy, I'm not keeping to a strict No NEW games list, as Halo Infinite and Hitman 3 are games I'm looking forward to, I am also counting Super Mario 3D World + Bowsers Fury as although I did finish most of the original, I want to 100% it

- [ ] Zelda (May wait for 35th Anniversary for a Bundle on Switch???)
- [ ] Link to the Past
- [ ] Ocarina of Time
- [ ] Majoras Mask

- [ ] Star Wars
- [ ] KotOR 2
- [ ] Old Republic - 8 Stories and Expansions, Jedi Knight almost done
- [ ] Squadrons

Yakuza
- [x] 0
- [ ] Kiwami
- [ ] Kiwami 2
- [ ] 3
- [ ] 4
- [ ] 5
- [ ] 6: Song of Life

Mario
- [ ] 64 all Stars
- [ ] Sunshine All Shines
- [ ] Galaxy All Stars
- [ ] 3D World All Stars and 100%

- [ ] Bioshock Infinite
- [ ] Dying Light
- [ ] Days Gone
- [ ] Persona 5 Royal (Buy on Next Sale)
- [x] Halo 4
- [ ] Skyrim
- [ ] Vampyr
- [ ] Divinity OS
- [ ] Wasteland 3
- [ ] Warframe Quests up to date
- [ ] THPS 1 & 2
- [ ] Hades
- [ ] Ghostrunner
- [ ] Sekiro (Legit Best Ending)
- [ ] Gears Tactics
- [ ] Control w/ DLC
- [ ] Cyberpunk 2077 (when fixed)
- [ ] Black Mesa
- [ ] Evil Within 2
- [ ] 100% AC Valhalla
- [ ] 100% Hitman Season 1 - 3
- [ ] 100% Cyberpunk


So far, Halo 4 has been done, I really enjoyed it, I never beat it back on release (the only Halo I'd not done that with, in fact) and I really wish 5 was on PC, I own it on Xbox One and I may go back to it before Infinite

 

[DunDunDunpachi]

I am also counting Super Mario 3D World + Bowsers Fury as although I did finish most of the original, I want to 100% it
- [ ] 3D World All Stars and 100%
- [ ] Ghostrunner

I plan to tackle these in 2021, too, so I'll tag you when I post about em if you'll do the same for me.

As an aside, the thread is a lot hotter this year. Already 6 pages and 9K in views and it ain't even the end of January. Last year we got 9 pages in total and about 36K in views.

Probably because there are more participants this year. Big think.

 

[InfiniteCombo]

As an aside, the thread is a lot hotter this year. Already 6 pages and 9K in views and it ain't even the end of January. Last year we got 9 pages in total and about 36K in views.

Probably because there are more participants this year. Big think.

Thanks for setting it up.

I mean, to me this is almost a perfect thread. Encourages me to play games and post about them:
- Not every game deserves its own LTTP/RTTP thread, so it's nice to write the thoughts here.
- This is, for me, more chill than the 52-game challenge thread, for my own reasons. (Although that's a pretty good thread in its own right)
- People's writeups here are pretty awesome, because the thread itself fosters that. I have already learned a lot from reading people's posts, and writing them here instead of its own thread means I can read the legit opinions without the inevitable set of "shit"/low-information posts that are extremely likely in a game's dedicated thread.

Thanks for setting this up, dude. I've been MIA from this thread for a few days but I'm actually working on retro Achievements for SMB1, SMB3 (got the Platinum, hell yea), and SM World. Will write up my thoughts on all 3 games when I'm done.

Cheers, and happy gaming!

 

[DunDunDunpachi]

I played through some Super Mario Bros (All Stars version) yesterday InfiniteCombo

Any jump that requires you to use one of those infernal springs is broken, but otherwise I think it holds up. I try to beat the level as quickly as possible to add some challenge to it, but no warps. Even kids can warp. I play straight. I got to 7-2 before game over. Great way to spend 15-20 minutes and then be done with the game for the day imo.

 

[InfiniteCombo]

See, now that's exactly what I'm talking about, DunDunDunpachi (I'm tagging you instead of replying; as I understand it, that's your preference? ). Gameplay observations like that is what I live for in this forum. Awesome.

I've always found the springs to be a bit wobbly and to this day still don't know exactly whether it's a button press or a hold to launch you higher. But your post has gotten me extremely curious, and I'll test it out tonight on my Super Nintendo. (I'm playing the NES version of SMB1 via an emulator.)

Anyway your observation is interesting. When you say it's "broken" -- what exactly do you mean?

 

[DunDunDunpachi]

I don't have a preference either way. Sometimes a quote is better, sometimes a mention is better. No worries InfiniteCombo

The spring has crazy upward momentum if you time your jump correctly, but when you're trying to do a run-and-spring sometimes I don't do the superjump properly and I lamely fall off the cliff.

There's a fairly early stage (I think it's the first springboard in the game) where you can use the spring to launch in between two rows of bricks. The top row is hiding a Special Stage beanstalk vine. Anyway, it's hard as hell to get in between those in Super Mario Bros, but in later Mario games (like World) they redesigned the spring physics to be a lot... better. such a feat is easy using SMW springs. Hard to describe without putting them side by side and trying to superjump on a SMB spring versus a SMW spring.

It's not "broken", per se, it just has really weird physics that don't feel quite right.

 

[InfiniteCombo]

There's a fairly early stage (I think it's the first springboard in the game) where you can use the spring to launch in between two rows of bricks. The top row is hiding a Special Stage beanstalk vine. Anyway, it's hard as hell to get in between those in Super Mario Bros, but in later Mario games (like World) they redesigned the spring physics to be a lot... better. such a feat is easy using SMW springs. Hard to describe without putting them side by side and trying to superjump on a SMB spring versus a SMW spring.

Yup, don't even have to turn on my Super Nintendo. I know that one. World 3-1, right after the two hammer brothers and right before the end of the level where you get the two Koopa Troopas and you can do the Infinite 1-up trick.

So what I've found is that if you want to get in between the two rows consistently: Do not use the spring. Just sprint and high jump towards that gap (between the two rows) and you should land there comfortably. On your run towards the jump, of course avoid the spring. I found that using the spring can work, but it's tricky: you either bounce too high and land on the top row of blocks (which is not where you want to go), or somehow have to try to move Mario in mid-air in some weird way to try to make him "squeeze" into the two rows.

 

[Harts316]

Started The Evil Within 2 right after finishing the first one. They actually did a good job leveraging the previous game’s events to lead into this one. There are a lot of quality of life improvements over the first game in terms of the stealth which now has a cover mechanic.

It being semi open world is awesome too.

 

[ROMhack]

Harts316 It's an awesome game. Enjoy~

Also agree that tagging is a much underutilized function of the Gaf.

 

[stn]

Started The Evil Within 2 right after finishing the first one. They actually did a good job leveraging the previous game’s events to lead into this one. There are a lot of quality of life improvements over the first game in terms of the stealth which now has a cover mechanic.

It being semi open world is awesome too.

I prefer the story and setup of TEW1, but TEW2 has much better and more refined gameplay. Enjoy!

Backlog update - having been playing nothing but Yakuza: Like A Dragon (PS4). I'm on chapter 12/15 now, and will probably play Pokemon Shield (Switch) next, since I'm at the final mission anyway and only a few hours away from completion.

 

[DelireMan7]

I have started Baten Kaitos. I have played just one hour but I am already in love and I need to share it ! Charming music, interesting setting and this combat system... Also the Magnus (card) system looks quite deep with the special combo and "aging" mechanic.

But most importantly I love the graphics of this era. The PS2 was the console I have most memories and with which my passion for gaming really developed. And now I always find the graphics from this generation (PS2/GC) charming and "superior" to the current one.

My reference for JRPGs is Final Fantasy X. My first Final Fantasy and JRPG. I spent several hundred hours across multiple playthroughs. Thinking to this game always make me nostalgic, melancholic and emotional.
Since then I kind of automatically compare any JRPGs to this one and I always look for the "FFX vibe". Last year I played Xenoblade Chronicles (Wii version) and it has it and I loved it.

I already got the "FFX vibe" in my first hour of Baten Kaitos. I can't wait to see more of it

 

[Sidney Prescott]

I'm not going to buy any games for majority of this year. Honestly there is nothing jumping out at me too much either, perfect time to delve in to my backlog.

Currently playing through and finishing Rockstar's Manhunt. This game certainly wouldn't get made today, I am surprised it is on the PS4 store honestly. Really enjoying it though, has a great atmosphere.

 

[InfiniteCombo]

Currently playing through and finishing Rockstar's Manhunt. This game certainly wouldn't get made today, I am surprised it is on the PS4 store honestly. Really enjoying it though, has a great atmosphere.

Nice! How's the gameplay? People in general complain about Rockstar having subpar gameplay, which may or may not be true.

Also, as a nonsensical joke, I'm just gonna tag ROMhack for no good reason whatsoever

 

[Ascend]

2. Dragon Age Inquisition (PC) - 60 hours
3/10
I love the Dragon Age series but I absolutely could not get on with this game. I did manage to complete the main story after around 30 hours of completing maps realising that going 100% is just not going to happen. The maps are tedious and every new zone brought me to close down the game. The only thing bringing me back was knowing DA4 is coming out and I'm hoping it redeems itself. Essentially its a great story destroyed by its gameplay and tedious checklist fetch quests. It is so tedious that I think the people who developed it genuinely must hate gamers. It was so boring I quit around 5 times and in the end decided to only finish the story quests. Doing this certainly helped. After finishing the game which had a very anti climatic ending I said screw it and watched The Trespasser DLC on YouTube. I know people say its the best one but I just couldn't put anymore time into it. I would say its just a literal mess of clutter. The war table and everything so unorganised and scattered but buried deep in the tediousness is some great storytelling. It is a shame. I hope DA4 is better.


Games Completed in 2021:
- Dragon Age 2
- Dragon Age Inquisition

That's exactly how I felt playing it, and, I have not yet finished it either. It feels a LOT like Mass Effect Andromeda (which I did finish after one whole year of grinding through it). The games feel like it's mainly filler and that they don't respect your time. Maybe when I was a teen I wouldn't feel this way, but, my time is way too valuable nowadays to be wasting them on unsatisfactory fetch quests.

I did not really play anything else after NFS Undercover. Have been a bit busy. I will continue with Pokemon Sword soon, and also Pokemon Let's Go Eevee. Liberated is still on the list, and I might add Journey to it. I'm kind of improvising as I go xD

 

[Sidney Prescott]

Nice! How's the gameplay? People in general complain about Rockstar having subpar gameplay, which may or may not be true.

Also, as a nonsensical joke, I'm just gonna tag ROMhack for no good reason whatsoever

It has definitely aged, but I like that it presents a challenge. The AI is better than most stealth games I play today if I'm being honest. You have to be really careful not to make any loud noises. They hunt you out really well. The game is super immersive.

I honestly think how old it looks graphically only adds to the atmosphere. It is meant to be a gritty experience and like it was filmed on tape. This is how the art style looks when you take out an enemy:

As I'm approaching further through the game it gets a lot less stealth orientated. It's kind of a mixture of stealth and action it seems. Every level feels really unique. Rockstar did a great job.

The character designs are creepy as hell. The way some of these guys look as they are hunting you gives me the shivers.

 

[ROMhack]

Nearing the end of Halo 3 now. Good game, probably the best in the series, although I do love some of the early Halo 2 levels.

Annoyingly it didn't save my data for Gravemind so it says I didn't beat the level - I did too MOM!

Probably going to end it here and continue with Reach, ODST, 4 later this year (forgive me if I mentioned that already).

InfiniteCombo right back atcha!

 

[Ascend]

Question. Would you break the rules if you would play an old game that you got for free this year? I don't have such a game right now, but, it's good to know.

I just got Galactic Civilizations III for free on the Epic Games Store, and that game is like 5 years old. FYI I have over 180 games on the Epic Games Store and I didn't buy a single one lol. But Galactic Civilizations III is obviously very low on the list and I don't plan on playing it anytime soon. Just curious.

 

[DunDunDunpachi]

Question. Would you break the rules if you would play an old game that you got for free this year? I don't have such a game right now, but, it's good to know.

I just got Galactic Civilizations III for free on the Epic Games Store, and that game is like 5 years old. FYI I have over 180 games on the Epic Games Store and I didn't buy a single one lol. But Galactic Civilizations III is obviously very low on the list and I don't plan on playing it anytime soon. Just curious.

Go for it.

 

[Mr Hyde]

Been clearing out a couple of games in my backlog. Four games to be exact.

Astro's playroom
Demons Souls
Jedi Fallen Order
Super Mario Galaxy

 

[Ryuji Goda]

Finished the original God of War, part of the HD collection on PS3.

I liked it overall but fuuuuck are those last few battles total trash. Absolute trash. Who the fuck designs such garbage.

7/10.

Next up, Resident Evil: Director's Cut (PS1 version on PS3). Tomb Raider 2 will have to wait.

 

[ROMhack]

Game #3: Halo 3 (How well did that work?!)

Like all kids born between 1988 and 1992, I was a big fan of Halo 3 when it came out. I spent many moons in my teenage bedroom enjoying multiplayer with me mates on xbox live. As far as I remember, I was pretty dang good at it. Turns out though, time is a cruel mistress because now I'm kinda shit. I kept getting pwned by n00bs on the few occasions I tried and soon realised, yeah this isn't fun anymore. So let's concentrate on the story instead...

Halo 3 is to the Halo series what a Taiko drumming parade is to Japanese culture. It's a big bombastic set-piece with each level fighting against the other to be crowned king of the levels. The opening, Sierra 117, takes you into the heart of Covenant country and begins as Master Chef falls to Earth from 20,000 feet. BOOM. After a couple of seconds where the game suggests he may be dead, he awakens, assault rifle in hand ready to kick alien butt. PHEW!

This is a good level btw. Probably one of my favourites. There's lots of foliage with jackals trying to snipe you left, right and center. You're introduced immediately to brutes like the game knows you already beat Halo 2. It's not just those you vs. those useless grunt cnuts anymore. Then WOAH, a big ass dude with a mace. Can you kill him and hold off until the pelican arrives? Of course you can. You're mustard chef and you're the king of the god damn universe!

I gave myself a 5 paragraph limit and I've only mentioned on one level? Shit. The next few aren't so good. Crow's Nest has too many of worst enemy: those flying bug things. Tsavo Highway is an all too typical of a driving level and after three games of those already, it feels less impressive. It only kicks into gear when the scarabs arrive in The Storm. The Ark is nice but I'm over tanks, thanks. The Covenant is amazing, the best level in the series. The last level whimpers.

All in all, Halo 3 is a solid and fun sandbox shooter, albeit one that feels like an extension of Halo CE more so than its own thing. It misses a lot of the excellent characterization of Halo 2, especially because Arbiter (the best character) is left to be an NPC. While the levels are mostly good, it lacks that wow factor. The story comes and go, limping to a conclusion rather than feeling like an amazing ending. I'm still not sure what they were doing with Cortana or Gravemind.

If you're wondering, Halo 2 is my favourite.

 

[Sidney Prescott]

Finished Manhunt. Was a lot shorter than I was anticipating, but had an absolute blast with it. It gave me a real challenge and I didn't find it boring at any point. I also like how the game always keeps it fresh and isn't just purely stealth orientated. The action parts were a nice and welcome surprises. It definitely has some flaws, and you can tell it's an old game in parts. Despite that, it only seemed to add to the overall creepiness and immersed me more in the world. The final level was creepy as hell. This is what I had to deal with:

Rockstar sure know how to creep you the hell out. What the hell is that thing!

I would rate the game a 7/10. Great atmosphere, awesome character designs, and engaging storyline. Definitely one of the best stealth/horror games I've played.

I think I'm going to play through the rest of Sleeping Dogs next. A great game that I shelved for one reason or another, need to get it finished. I might play through the DLC's too, as I have the complete edition on PS4.

 

[Phase]

@Sidney Prescott I remember being scared shitless playing that game when I was younger. It was so tense.

 

[Sidney Prescott]

@Sidney Prescott I remember being scared shitless playing that game when I was younger. It was so tense.

I don't normally get super scared during games, but this one got me. Especially when you get hunted by the AI, some of the designs are super creepy. I don't know who was behind the character designs, but I hope they got paid well.

 

[InfiniteCombo]

+2. Current backlog completed count: 8.

Super Mario Bros. 3 (NES, via emulator)

What is there to say, really? Game is straight up a masterpiece, no questions asked. It holds up so incredibly well. For me, this is the pinnacle of NES gaming. Levels are short enough to be completed in seconds -- yet they contain so much to see (especially vertically) that even veterans can find new things 32 years later. The various suits are great; it's a pity, though, that an amazing one like the Hammer Brothers suit is only available through the middle of World 6 at the earliest, so you don't get too much time with it. I wish the game gave you a New Game+ option of carrying over your suits from the game you just finished, instead of automatically filling up your entire inventory with P-Wings.

No one will probably care about these, but these are lesser-known things I found out while playing the game very thoroughly:

• Fire Flower and bosses: So I reached a couple of bosses with the Fire Flower powerup. Most (all?) bosses have this "hop" move where they hop a short distance to either get on a different plane, or just come towards you. I don't know if this is for all bosses or not -- I only saw this on the World 3 and 6 bosses (the ones that have extra balls/artifacts flying around), and when they do their little hop move, they seem to gain invincibility frames ("i-frames"). When they're normally on the ground, you can damage them with Mario's fireballs. But when they hop, the frames immediately starting the hop and at least through the top of the hop arc --- the enemy is invincible to your fireballs. I thought this was interesting and I'll do more testing.
• White Mushrooms: If it wasn't for the achievements telling me, I wouldn't have known that each World (except World 8) has an unlockable special "white mushroom," and that odd numbered world white mushrooms have a P-wing, and even-numbered world white mushrooms have an anchor (kind of a cool concept, but useless item if you ask me). I always knew that Worlds 1 and 2 had a white mushroom; as a kid I had unlocked them by accident (by getting all coins in Worlds 1-4 and 2-2, respectively), but I didn't know the rest had them. I figured out some on my own, but some others I had to look up on the internet because no way I was going to figure out every single world's special mushroom unlock; this would have required to purposely go for all coins in all worlds, which would've taken a very long time.
• Goal rewards: The end of most regular levels has a "goal" with a quickly spinning card that toggles between a Mushroom, a Fire Flower, and a Star. I haven't done a frame by frame test to see if all 3 cards are given equal amounts of time, but it seems that the goal spinner is "biased" towards the Star. I think most people know the trick of getting a Star consistently: run quickly (achieve the "P" fully) and jump into the goal box at a 45-degree angle. Boom, star. There are achievements to get 3 Fire Flowers in a row, and 3 Mushrooms in a row. Those were hard.
  • Fire Flowers: The way I consistently got them was by not running to the goal box, but standing directly beneath it, and jumping at it straight up in a crouching position. This sounds crazy, but it did work fairly consistently for me (although it's far from a guarantee)
  • Mushroom: Man, this was the hardest one. But I think I got it to come up consistently. What I figured out is that for the Star, you need to be already well into your P (running at max speed) for a few frames before jumping into the goal box at a 45 degree angle. For a Mushroom, you need to run towards the box and jump at the box a very small number of frames (and no more) after achieving the full running "P" velocity. I wish I could make a GIF showing this, but I don't know how to make GIFs (I imagine I need a video in the first place, but emulators have video taking capability I imagine...)

Spoiler: Wait... what? After I went through all that crap, all I get is a lame joke and a "bye bye"? Get the hell out of here, LOL

Street Fighter II Turbo (SNES, via emulator).

I obviously own this game, and was playing it for nostalgia's sake. But, man -- in the age of the Street Fighter 30th anniversary collection, the ability to buy a used copy of Street Fighter Collection 2 for PS1/Saturn, and other ways of playing this (I believe Xbox 360 Arcade has Hyper Fighting as one of the games you can buy on it?), there's no reason why anyone should be playing this particular version in 2021. First of all, the SNES controller with its 4 face buttons -- no. Capcom fighters need the 6 face buttons. And most other versions are better looking; this is just too pixelated and "low fidelity" for what I've gotten used to. Of course, that's not to take away that at the time this game came out, it was a miracle that it ran as well as it did on the SNES.

Again, the section of "shit that only I care about":

• Random damage output(?): There were times when I was sure I had victory in hand, only for my move to do not the expected damage. This was more often the case towards the end of the match, which is where I would more easily notice it. I thought random damage was a well known Super Street Fighter II Turbo thing, but in fact it may have been in place as early as this game.
• AI cheapness at higher difficulty levels: Higher difficulties are not just the AI reacting better and countering your moves more; they do much higher damage (and in return, you get to do a lot less damage to them). And sometimes they resort to cheap tactics. Blanka can go eat shit, seriously. Vertical ball, land, immediately do electrocution. Rinse and repeat. I had a round where mofo literally spammed that crap until he killed me -- and of course he did it against my Dhalsim who's generally terrible with anti-airs. And Dictator -- let's not even talk about him. Level 8 dictator is a cheap mofo.

Spoiler: But I don't care. It was a particularly aggressive day for cheap AI. For me, it was simply a Tuesday

 

[teezzy]

Oh my god... why am I not posting here? I think this is my favorite new thread. Fuck you guys, I'm joining your club until NHL 22 comes out. Blow me

Didn't realize this was just retro GAF



Currently playing?

I'm excited to finally getting around to learning DoA 6 proper. It's been a long while since I plugged away at DoA 3 on Xbox... and even then I wasn't much of a 'pro'. Just a pre-teen doing his best to not suck. Plays a lot different than Tekken or Soul Calibur, but I'm digging the parrying system especially. Just tryna find someone worth utilizing as a main here.

Had both this and Heroes of Might and Magic 3 HD in my Steam library. This one is prettier, so I picked this. Kinda grasping exactly what's going on here, but I think I've got it more or less. Not overly complex, but hardly shallow either. Hopefully not too long. I love how 2006 this is. That was a solid year, fo' sho

 

[Harts316]

Finished Manhunt. Was a lot shorter than I was anticipating, but had an absolute blast with it. It gave me a real challenge and I didn't find it boring at any point. I also like how the game always keeps it fresh and isn't just purely stealth orientated. The action parts were a nice and welcome surprises. It definitely has some flaws, and you can tell it's an old game in parts. Despite that, it only seemed to add to the overall creepiness and immersed me more in the world. The final level was creepy as hell. This is what I had to deal with:

Rockstar sure know how to creep you the hell out. What the hell is that thing!

I would rate the game a 7/10. Great atmosphere, awesome character designs, and engaging storyline. Definitely one of the best stealth/horror games I've played.

I think I'm going to play through the rest of Sleeping Dogs next. A great game that I shelved for one reason or another, need to get it finished. I might play through the DLC's too, as I have the complete edition on PS4.

Manhunt was so good. Such a unique over the top violent game. Can’t imagine it being made today.

The sequel was good too. I think I ended up playing the second one on the psp.

 

[Kazza]

I somehow missed this video from My Life in Gaming at the end of last year:




Note that they call it "The Game We Played in 2020", meaning they discuss a variety of games, from the 8-bit era all the way to the present. It's the perfect video for this thread, as they just do what we are doing. I like how one of them tells how much his young kids enjoyed watching him play Pokeman Snap on the N64 (they couldn't get used to the N64's gamepad, so had their dad play instead )

 

[Ascend]

Played a bit of Pokemon Sword. Just reached Circhester City. If that doesn't tell you anything, it's the next gym challenge city after the 5th badge. Did some catching as well, currently Pokedex is at 199 seen and 137 caught. Not that I plan on completing the pokedex lol.

 

[DunDunDunpachi]

Sinking some casual hours into Old School Musical. If you're a retro fan of the 8/16 bit consoles, this game is one big love-letter/riff on the era.

 

[DelireMan7]

Sinking some casual hours into Old School Musical. If you're a retro fan of the 8/16 bit consoles, this game is one big love-letter/riff on the era.

Wow ! Never heard about it but these sounds are awesome ! I am gonna check this game Thanks for the recommendation


I haven't play a lot last week and I am now 6h in Baten Katos and... damn ! This game is good. Looks like I am gonna be addicted to the battle system and deck building tie to it. .
"Should I build this deck around a few similar number to focus on "pairs" chain bonus ? Or put more diverse numbers to increase my chance of "Suite" chain bonus ?"
Also you have to find the good balance between attack, defense and support card. Then also watch out of for elemental cards since opposite element nullify each other if use in the same chain.

And the "aging" mechanics of the card is really cool. For example you have "Green banana" card which is an attack card. After a certain time in your inventory/deck, it will mature and become "Banana" which is a healing card. Then again, after a certain time it will become "Blackened banana" which is an attack card... And this apply to "quest card" as well meaning you have to wait certain card to transform to get the item you need to solve a quest. (For example, someone ask me for yogourt. So I picked up some milk and after a certain time the card became yogourt)

Then there is some "special combo" you can do in fight by combining specifics card to unlock new cards. The combos are hinted in the cards description and you have to experiment by yourself to find the good combination.

I am having so much fun

 

[Phase]

11. The Division (PC) - 56hrs

I picked this game up last year when Ubisoft gave it away for free and it's just been sitting in my backlog since. Maybe the severe drought of shooters I enjoy playing is the reason I'm liking it so much, but the gameplay loop and gun play is very satisfying. I played through most of the game with a SCAR variant for my primary and an smg or lmg secondary, using the airburst seeker mine to get a jump on groups of enemies. I thoroughly enjoy this game and just picked up Division 2 for 9$ a few days ago on sale. Looking forward to going from snowy NYC to summertime DC after a bit of a break.