What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

[Marc]

Started on F-Zero GP Legends, unfortunately there doesn't seem to be a Master level, and Expert is significantly less challenging than it was on Maximum Velocity. I'm also not a fan of the N64-style 'point' approach to racing, rather than the SNES's 'finish 3rd or do one'. Having said that, it controls a lot more smoothly, its pre-rendered visuals are really, really impressive, and the soundtrack is killer. Liking this quite a bit.

Sadly, Climax appears to be missing from my RetroArch build, and I'm generally incompetent at messing around with things like this. But if I do remember correctly, it was even easier than this.

Started Guacamelee 2. Surprised I don't here this mentioned more often on here - it's got far more brawling than other arcade-adventure types, and seems to be build on pretty decent fundamentals. Starts off at a decent pace and isn't afraid to demand a bit of competence from that player right from the get-go. Plus, full marks for the SoTN-inspired playable intro. Looking forward to getting back to this one.

[BareKnuckleRoo]

Wrapped up a no-weapon run of FF1. After the Lich, it was all fairly smooth sailing, aside from long bouts of grinding at the Peninsula of Power in order to get the levels needed to have a reasonable amount of MDef for Mages in the Ice Cave who like to use Rub. With the airship, it was easy to zip around and grab the first Ribbon from the Waterfall, as well as all the shiny new stuff to be had in Gaia and the Volcano. Kary dropped without issue, Castle of Ordeals nearly caused a wipe due to a Red Gargoyle ambush spamming Fir2.

The hardest, most annoying part ended up being the Sea Shrine, an otherwise easy dungeon for most teams. There's a TON of unrunnable encounters here, and without offensive spells to use, you have to beat them all down the hard way. Ghosts were an outright menace as they hit insanely hard, and nearly caused a wipe.

From there it was all according to plan. Kraken's a joke as usual, no Sorcerers or Warmech got in my way in the Sky Castle, Tiamat was totally doable with three infinite use healing items and hilariously ate a Mute spell, rendering it trivial. I then spent an absurd amount of time grinding on the Eye in the Ice Cave, which is generally the fastest and easiest way to level. It still took a while because instead of one hit killing it as most teams would at this point, it took a good 8 rounds of combat until I slowly got stronger.

With max level of 50, I took on WarMech, landed that lucky 3/256 Mute shot on first try (which somehow stops it from firing nuclear missiles at us), then went to punch Chaos's stupid face in. I had to exit out and recover a few times from Gas Dragons on floor 3 who sap way too many healing resources to kill for my team, but I eventually made it past without any issues. Phantom and Lich both went down without a fuss as I was hitting for considerable damage as opposed to just 1's, Kary as well has low enough defense for a level 50 Knight to punch her severely. Kraken's a joke; has no instant kill spells and nothing noteworthy aside from potentially killing on turn 1 with a physical attack (which immediately stops being a threat after buffs; no matter who he targets it doesn't matter if he kills or not on turn 1).

Tiamat's refight in the boss rush, as expected, was the toughie of the run. He has an instant death spell he uses frequently enough to be a concern, and has an absolute boatload of health. We also can't waste Mute spells, making it a damage race. All 4 members got hit with Fast, and we started punching and healing away, praying Bane didn't break resistance. Fortunately, it decided to cooperate, and we were off to Chaos.

Chaos was a disappointment. All 31 Mute spells tossed at him missed, but then our first Fear spell hit (taken exclusively for Chaos if Mute ran out) followed by a another soon after. A few turns of healing, and Chaos ran away, winning the game on a technicality. We beat the game without a gameover, but we didn't actually get to punch Chaos to death. Well, that's no fun.

Attempt #2 got us killed by Tiamat2. I tried hitting only the Knight and Red Wizard with Fast, and it ended up being a tad too slow. His Bane spells hit all 3 Mages, with Knight just barely killing him and having to do Chaos solo. All 4 Mute spells he had missed, and Chaos landed some seriously huge numbers. Dead.

The third attempt saw Tiamat's Bane spell cooperate with us again, and Chaos ate a Mute spell, spending the remainder of the fight trying to toss spells at us to no avail while we whittled down his 2000 HP.

[Blinge]

Chaos RAN!? hahaha Oh man I didn't know that could happen.

I JUST WANNA KILL... CHAOS
Y'all mind if I kill Chaos real quick?

[BareKnuckleRoo]

Yeah, all enemies have a "morale" stat. Every single turn in combat a roll is done to check if they run on that turn. Bosses are given the max amount which means they will never run, even if you're at the max level. However, there's nothing preventing bosses from being hit with Fear spells, even if the chances are incredibly low when they resist it (3/256). At max level, hitting with Fear once is just enough to give a slim chance each turn that Chaos will run. Hitting twice raises the chance considerably, and it's just a matter of waiting. Despite not technically being a kill, it's treated as such by the game (hence why I only ever used it for Chaos in case Mute fails to land).

I also had the Bane sword in case I ran out of Mute and Fear spells. Killing Chaos simply isn't doable otherwise. Even if I could keep up with his spell damage, he casts Cur4 now and then, recovering all of his 2000 HP at will, and I simply can't deal enough damage to drop him to even near half that before he uses it. Enemies also have infinite MP, so without weapons or attack spells I need something else to get around Cur4 (Mute, basically).

[Sumez]

Lol what the hell.

Pacifist clear get.

I want to scare Chaos away.

[BIL]

Is there an option to chase after him when he runs away? That's hilarious either way.

The Theme Of FF1 Chaos Scurred Run

[BareKnuckleRoo]

Maybe he trips and breaks his neck as he's running scared. Who knows. But it's hilarious to see it in action!

[BrianC]

Are any of these quirks also in some of the FF1 ports like the MSX, WSC, or PS1 versions?

[BareKnuckleRoo]

As far as I know spells should be able to critically hit through resistance (including damage spells) on any of these versions. It'd be easiest to test on something like a group of 2 Sand Worms. Cast Wall on whoever is missing the Ribbon so everyone has Earth resistance, and wait to see if they manage to kill anyone with Quake. If someone on your team dies from Quake (or gets hit from a status spell/death spell while resistant at any other point in the game such as being hit with Rub while wearing a ProRing) then spells can very rarely bypass resistance.

Note that the Sorcerer enemies have non-elemental physical attacks that can inflict death (they eat your brain) and a non-elemental spell that tries to inflict Stun on your team. The only thing that can stop those is inherent Magic Defense (depends on class + level).

The only versions I think don't have this are the significantly altered Dawn of Souls and Anniversary editions on GBA and PSP. I don't recall ever seeing spells bypass resistance there and I suspect resistance is true immunity to status/death spells of that element, but it's been a while since I've played those and I've never tried to hit Chaos with Mute/Fear/Bane there.

[BulletMagnet]

Phoenotopia Awakening - encountered a boss last night that infuriated me so much I refused to go to sleep until I beat him. Yes, I am a well-adjusted and functional adult, why do you ask?

[guigui]

Phoenotopia Awakening - encountered a boss last night that infuriated me so much I refused to go to sleep until I beat him. Yes, I am a well-adjusted and functional adult, why do you ask?

Looks like I could really like this one : nice sprites and music, not easy, exploration, not too much time consuming.
Can you describe the puzzle aspect ? I remember Monster Boy in Cursed Kingdoms killed me with puzzles everywhere blocking the progression.
Also, any other good games like this on the Switch ?

[BulletMagnet]

I'm not a huge puzzle guy, but I generally like the way they're done here; there's a pretty decent variety of them, from switch-hitting and block-pushing to reading environmental clues and creative tool use. Moreover, while you do sometimes need to solve stuff to progress, a lot of the time it's only for optional rewards, and can be gone back to later (and possibly solved a different way with a new ability); I obviously have my issues with the game, but if there's one thing it absolutely nails it's the "I'll ignore the main story for a bit and just fart around" factor, as pretty much every time I've done that I find myself stumbling upon new stuff or figuring out something that stumped me earlier, which thus makes me eager to keep going and see what else is out there.

One thing I will caution, however, is the "not take too much time" thing you mentioned; save points are fairly frequent, so you can certainly play for a bit and then put the game down, but there is a lot of stuff to sniff out and the game gives you very little overt guidance (just for starters, there's no map or quest list), so the pace, especially at first when you're gradually wrapping your head around how everything works, will be quite slow. I'm two or three dozen hours in and have found less than half the collectibles, so if you want to try to see everything, especially without a guide, you will be spending some time with this one.

I don't have a Switch so I unfortunately can't make any additional recommendations, but I do know that Phoenotopia has a demo on Steam if you want to have a quick taste of it; maybe there's one on the eShop as well?

[guigui]

Thanks for quality input BM.

I like what I hear about varied and skippable puzzles, explore out of the main quest. Not too scared by the big amount of content, I like that too. What I dont really like is RPGs with tons of grinding and characters/jobs to choose from. So this one is definitely on my wishlist.

[Sengoku Strider]

I bought the ACA port of Psycho Soldier a while back on a whim. I'd heard about it for years as part of KoF lore and for its audio implementation, but never actually seen it. I was flatly unimpressed, played it a couple of times then moved on & let it sit at the bottom of my Switch software list.

The other night I was looking for something brainless to play before bed that didn't involve rotating my monitor or getting off the arcade stick. Psycho Soldier jumped out as fitting the bill and I hadn't touched it in months, so its moment had arrived.

The game actually really clicked for me this time. I suddenly better understood what the game was trying to make me do - it's not just a generic forced scrolling run n' gun. You need to manage 4 lanes of enemies without getting trapped or sniped, almost like Tapper but with mutants and lightning instead of root beer. Smash as many walls as possible to uncover multiple arcane power ups without getting crushed by the forced scrolling - kinda like Wrecking Crew but with a wall of invisible doom always closing in behind you. Mastering the layout & your routing to accomplish this is crucial, because without accumulating enough power ups in a given level the game will just slap you around past stage 2 or 3.

And those power ups...thank goodness ACA titles include a decent set of instructions. Okay. The thing that looks like an electricity shower stall increases your main shot. The sword seems to increase close damage? But it has a limited number of swings so you can't spam anything in this game. The things that look like Metroid save points increase your psychic power. Your psychic power determines what effect shooting your psycho balls will have. There are a couple of different items which increase your stock of psycho balls, and you want to use them a lot for vertical wall & enemy management. If you max out your psychic power & uncover a green egg, you turn into a giant phoenix that can waste everything for the duration of the stage. Otherwise the egg spawns a bunch of grub enemies.

All that's actually quite a lot to take in and manage for what at first seems like a very simple game. There's so much more too...skulls & skull zappers that sap your psychic power. Bamboo shoots on the ground that'll trip you up as the voice actress tries her best to say "ouch that's tough" but doesn't quite get there. Unless you shoot them, then they spawn score items which genuinely matter as extends are both relatively plentiful and necessary, but they'll fly off screen if you aren't quick. Enemies can transform into more powerful forms at will, and there are items which either evolve or devolve them. Ground tiles can crumble under your feet, or unexpectedly spring you up into the air and likely a waiting enemy. There are items which affect various elements of co-op play.

I ended up playing it a fair bit over the past few days, it got kind of addictive. I could 100% have seen myself putting a decent amount of coins into this back in the day (Arcadia rankings had it at #7th most successful for 1987). I don't know how long I'll stick with it though, I credit fed through to the end and the later stages are just ridiculous. The ending even has the programmers saying they respect your spirit for getting all the way through it.

[Randorama]

Sengoku Strider: the way I remember it, Pyscho Soldier felt like a game that was rushed up for release, so the last 2-3 levels were not tested at all (or maybe the programmers just couldn't bother: Guevara is another potential example of this attitude).

Fun game, but I indeed remember spending quite a bit of money trying to make sense of the last 2 (3?) levels and failing (1990, I was 10). I do remember people 1-CC'ing it in co-op play, but only via the execution of a precise route (...could it be otherwise?).

Difficult to hate it, nevertheless: Taito, Konami and Capcom created "westernised" games, so one needed to turn to the smaller companies for the manga/anime-style games, and I fondly remember this and the Jaleco very weird belt scroller (Ginga something, also quite an impossible game) as the best examples.

Oh well, "it was acceptable in the '80s", as Calvin Harris would sing.

*badum thumpsh!*.

[Kino]

Only real accusations of poor design I can see being thrown Psycho Soldier's way involve those randomly-respawning walls in the final stage. Barring that, it's surprisingly top tier stuff from pre-Neo Geo SNK. I can't name a single arcade actioner from that era with more interesting scoreplay, other than Psychic 5. Not a Herculean task to 1CC either, long as you can maintain level 5 psychic power thru the whole game.

[Randorama]

Just in case...

I am not accusing the game programmers of poor design, but rather I *remember* the game having very tight/strict design, as if the programmers couldn't be bothered to test the game some more and make it less strict/ less punishing on levels 4 and 5 (...or the last two levels, anyway).

In fact, SNK released other games that were also very strict in design: Guevara, the one with the POW guys, the whole Ikari series, early Neo Geo titles would often revolve around flawless executions of very precise strategies (especially last stages), or the "game over" screen would appear very soon.

I always adored Psycho Soldier (and adore it now), but I would need time and patience to 1-CC a title like this, at 41 years of age, since I would need to enter again in the frame of mind of "one mistake and it's over" for, dunno, X amount of time per day. I don't think I touched the title in 5-6 years at least.

It could also be that Eiji Kawasaki (SNK's supremo) told the guys "This game has to be hard, dammit! Are we Capcom, that we make games 1-CC'able after a few attempts (e.g. Black Tiger)? Hell no!".
Incidentally, I imagine him being some badass guy looking like Geese Howard (one early Neo Geo title's credits hinted at this: I can't remember the game, though).

If there is something I remember about SNK titles pre-Neo Geo, is that their last levels always felt extremely unforgiving, whether they didn't test them more, or the players testing the levels were total badasses, or Kawasaki was a badass, or something.

The treble of Rainbow Islands, Psycho Soldier and Psychic 5 is legendary, though. Their respective programmers came up with highly sophisticated scoring systems when shmups were still "whoo! Destroy stuff!".

[BIL]

Regarding oldschool SNK, blackoak has a really insightful interview with Koji Obada, the director of TANK, Ikari and Guevara (and I think Dogosoken... doesn't say in the interview, but it wouldn't surprise me). Highlights include supercharging the PCB's audio-out to own the competition, catching DECO red-handed stealing Ikari code for Heavy Barrel, and someone getting so pissed off at Ikari's last stage, they set the cab on fire.

I've no-missed Ikari and Dogosoken, and while they're both tough, Ikari's final stretch becomes an unfortunately literal memoriser. You can improv your own routes up to that point, the short, trap-infested ruins area aside - but once you hit the asphalt and beacons start appearing, you need a hard route. (it's nothing fancy; "keep right" basically)

Guevara's not technically as unforgiving, but in practice, yeah, you need to know where every last spawn is in the final stretch. Just one weapon or tank would've broken that stage wide open, it's annoying. The only way I even 1CCd it was with the wrap-around glitch I learned from GGA_HAN's 1CC on Youtube, which makes the last boss trivial. Nomiss remains on the back burner.

Dogosoken actually avoids this pattern of straitjacket endgames; provided you (as the flyer commands) BECOME A MASTER WITH YOUR SWORD, you can plot your own course. I have no idea how anyone could even 1CC it without the sword, granted, but it's something!

[Randorama]

Ah, thanks Birru-sensei!

I re-read the interview...I mean, I just finished reading it now, and by the end I realised that I read it before but I forgot all about its content.
My brain has only space for work matters, these days: to hell with the videogame stuff!
So, I can see that the programmers were probably aiming for the players to set the cab on fire! (Kidding: it was more like "It's tough and we wanted that way, but at least it's fair").

I also played Pyscho Soldier again, cheating my way through the game. Superb stuff, though the stage sequence is 1, 2, 3, 4, 5...and 10 or something, as the last stage is really though.
Fair? I guess that if you play it with dedication, it should be fair and unforgiving in equal parts, though I wonder how many parts of the stage require effective rote learning of precise patterns.
The general atmosphere of the game (and the Toaplan-ish music...) is absolutely great, though I doubt that I have the patience and brain memory space to get a 1-CC on it, these days

[Mischief Maker]

Warhammer 40k: Battle Sector

I was really looking forward to dumping Sanctus Reach for this game, but I'm feeling mildly disappointed.

It's certainly much prettier than Sanctus Reach, but feels much smaller and shallower. Smaller unit sizes (predator tank is the biggest you'll get), smaller army sizes, smaller maps. No random maps, no individual unit XP, 20-mission campaign and 8 premade skirmish maps.

And there's this really annoying thing campaign missions do where it spawns endless hordes until you accomplish the objective... then it stops spawning but still obligates you to hunt down the last remaining enemies.

The morale system of Sanctus Reach could make for a really dynamic battlefield. A well-placed flamer attack could effectively neutralize a stronger force and turn the tables. Battlesector instead has a "momentum" system that's basically a rage bar for each of your units that rewards aggression with a higher crit chance, then at max power you can either boost a special ability or get an extra attack.

Now if history is any indication, this could be something special in a year after several heroic DLC and balance/QoL patches. Battlestar Galactica Deadlock was actually pretty mediocre at launch. But right now, the extra prettiness of Battle Sector can't compensate for the shallower gameplay compared to Sanctus Reach in my opinion. Wait for a sale.

[Squire Grooktook]

I replayed Legend of Zelda Link To The Past while waiting in lobby for jury duty a few days ago.

It's pretty okay. It definitely doesn't hold up THE MOST AMAZING LEGENDARY AWESOME GAME EVER MADE replaying it as an adult, as legendary as it was at release and as much obsession as I had for it when I was a kid. I'd still say there's not much reason to replay it as an adult (other than nostalgia or historical appreciation) when something like Ys Oath in Felghana exists. Combat is easy and bland, puzzles are barely extant, dungeons are simple and borderline linear at times (might be a plus, but not something other games don't do better), and there's very little to the presentation/story/atmosphere/mood compared to later LoZ games. Not hating on the game but when people say "LTTP is STILL an AMAZING game to play and one of the best ever even TODAY" I just don't see it. It's a pleasant little game but not much more.

One thing I found amusing/notable though is just how short the dungeons actually are. They felt longer when I was younger but you can clear most of them in 10 minutes or less (and I ain't no speedrunner and it was 12 years since I last played it so memories were slightly hazy). Kind of a speedy pace which I appreciate.

[Vanguard]

Yeah LttP was a tremendous achievement in its time, but in a modern day context it is merely an unexceptionally good game.

[Blinge]

Holy shit Squire with the Heel-turn

[Mero]

Still playing Touhou Genso Wanderer, I'm only going to be playing this for a few more days so I'm just going to try and get as far as I can in the 1000 floor dungeon with the equipment I've already got, no time for any more reincarnations.

I'm around floor 220 right now (enemy level = floor number) and I'm doing fine atm, even Creator Kisume is no threat to me, just got to be careful not to antagonise Big Yuka if she shows up.

I've only got Defence Ignore as a 10% pink seal but it makes a hell of a difference.

[Stevens]

Started up Ghostrunner again. Just got back to where it starts to get really good.

[null1024]

Wipeout 3: Special Edition.
Something seems to have clicked with me, so I'm doing a good bit better than I remember.
I'm easily getting first on course+speed combinations that I used to barely manage a top-3 finish on, and getting top-3s on those that I'd usually do miserably on or almost make it and crash out on.
This is with basically no playtime in over a year.

[Marc]

Control has become the latest game to be abandoned. Just didn't progress in any meaningful way. Shooting was enjoyable, but literally eight hours in, all I'm doing is shooting grunts and throwing chunks of rock at anyone with a shield. While the agency building is a fantastic setting to begin with, it soon becomes tedious running around the same grey/red offices, and the map isn't overly helpful. Side-quests never amount to anything more than 'this bit of the map is being invaded - fast-travel there (after an excruciating load), shoot something, travel back to where you were. Fun for a while, but with my backlog, I don't have time for anything I'm not fully invested in.

[Mischief Maker]

Clone Drone in the Danger Zone just left Early Access!

Wonderful voxel-based 3rd person lazer sword gameplay.

I've been enjoying it in EA since 2016 and it still hasn't gotten old.

[Marc]

Seriously, there's some serious Treasure shit going on with Guacamelee 2. Second temple in, and if you haven't started getting some serious control over your moves, it will wreck you. I know that it will irritate folk here with the frequency of its checkpoints, I've no idea if this is different on hard or not, but moment-to-moment it's impressive stuff. Original was good fun, but this builds on it in every way possible.

[Blinge]

My friend re: Guacamelee 1

"there's a difference between a challenge and a game that's just hard to be annoying/for the sake of it "

But he's a total pussy, so to me that's a great recommendation