What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Anything from run & guns to modern RPGs, what else do you play?
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Sumez
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Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by Sumez »

Just tried the Kirby Star Allies demo, and it's really mixed. On one hand, this is a totally classic Kirby platformer, something that hasn't been seen on a big screen console since, like.. Kirby 64 or something? Unless you count Epic Yarn.

On the other hand, in true Kirby fashion, they just added a bunch of gimmicks to make the game even easier and more chaotic than usual. You're forced to play with 3 additional partners, CPU controlled in lack of better alternative. Needless to say, boss fights are a mindless mash fest. The demo stage marked "hard" is exactly as ridiculously easy as the one marked "easy".

It would be so cool with the option to play the game completely solo. Or even better - without the option to copy enemy skills at all.
That said, I can imagine it's an absolute riot to play with three real life chums.
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Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by null1024 »

Ys VIII: Lacrimosa of Dana [Vita].
Just started it last night, having an absolute blast with it. It's a little bit awkward with jumping and the free camera, but overall, it's cool. Great sense of adventure for a game that points out damn near everywhere you can or should go.
I've been doing a bunch of fishing and roaming around to open up paths to get the rest of the villagers to help me with instead of heading straight to each story beacon.
It's not a bad looking game either. Damn far cry from Celceta, which looked ugly next to Ys Seven on the PSP. Dynamic resolution switching keeps a good balance between smoothness and performance, not to mention that there's a lot more detail in the environments.

Adol's voice is fucking dreadful here, though -- it's a damn good thing he barely speaks.
It would also be nice if the waist-high walls blocking you weren't quite so... well, waist-high. Presentation, you know?
Being able to jump just makes it entirely absurd that you can't jump over a big tree that fell in the way with nothing above it to keep you from climbing over.

I'd have looked into the PC release, but apparently it's completely fucked, and I don't have a PS4.
Come check out my website, I guess. Random stuff I've worked on over the last two decades.
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Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by BrianC »

Sumez wrote:Just tried the Kirby Star Allies demo, and it's really mixed. On one hand, this is a totally classic Kirby platformer, something that hasn't been seen on a big screen console since, like.. Kirby 64 or something? Unless you count Epic Yarn.
There was Return to Dreamland on Wii, which was the classic style platformer.
On the other hand, in true Kirby fashion, they just added a bunch of gimmicks to make the game even easier and more chaotic than usual. You're forced to play with 3 additional partners, CPU controlled in lack of better alternative. Needless to say, boss fights are a mindless mash fest. The demo stage marked "hard" is exactly as ridiculously easy as the one marked "easy".

It would be so cool with the option to play the game completely solo. Or even better - without the option to copy enemy skills at all.
That said, I can imagine it's an absolute riot to play with three real life chums.
I haven't tried the demo, but I wasn't impressed by what I heard of it (what you said about the game is spot on to what I heard elsewhere). For some reason, despite the game being on more powerful hardware and the lack of 3D, the game also runs at 30 FPS.
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Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by Sumez »

null1024 wrote: Adol's voice is fucking dreadful here, though -- it's a damn good thing he barely speaks.
The first thing I did after starting Ys 8 was changing it to Japanese voices. The English ones are unbearable.
BrianC wrote: There was Return to Dreamland on Wii, which was the classic style platformer.
Forgot about this. I even have it.
BrianC wrote:despite the game being on more powerful hardware and the lack of 3D, the game also runs at 30 FPS.
At least the backgrounds are definitely 3D. I imagine it's full 3D?
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Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by iconoclast »

First half of the year's done, here's everything I put more than a couple hours into:

Ninja Gaiden Black
Went through Master Ninja a few times and did all of mission mode. One of the best games ever made.

Ninja Gaiden 3 Razor's Edge
Played through MN a few times in this as well. The AI isn't as annoying as it can be on Ultimate Ninja (where it blocks and evades too frequently); it's pretty nicely balanced overall. This game still has lots of things I dislike about it, but the combat is always fun.

Shantae and the Pirate's Curse
Signed up for an Xbox Game Pass trial because I wanted to try this. I like the art and tone of the game (the writing needs work), and the dungeons were decent, but everything in between was boring. When some character told me I had to go find every collectible in order to unlock the last dungeon, I felt like an idiot for being dumb enough to play another WayForward game. But I wanted to finish it, and the last boss was pretty good, so overall it was okay I guess.

Devil May Cry 4 Special Edition
There aren't many good games on Xbox Game Pass that I haven't already played, so I figured I'd play this again. I finished up all of the achievements (DMD & LDK S-ranks, Bloody Palace, etc) but going back to DMC4 after a few years just lowered my opinion of it tbh. It's still a great game, but I get bored of it faster than any top tier action game because the enemies just aren't that engaging. I'd rather play NG3RE.

Muramasa Rebirth
Played through this again on Fury to get the platinum trophy. I'm halfway through the DLC as well, but it's a mixed bag. I like how the characters play differently, the new art is great (as always), and the stories are enjoyable, but if you want to complete everything, every episode is a grind. You can go through their story in 2 hours max, but to get the final ending (and all of the trophies), you have to complete every single boss/dungeon in the game again, as well as all of the caves of evil. That's just a lazy way to pad the playtime out. It's still my favorite Vanillaware game though.

ReCore: Definitive Edition
Boring. Watching videos will probably make you think this is a TPS, but it's mainly an open world collectathon/platformer/adventure game with subpar combat (mainly because the enemy designs are shit). The most baffling thing about this is how you can only bring two companions with you at once. They have abilities that let you reach new areas (wall climbing etc), so if you find a section that requires an ability you left behind, tough luck. You'll have to quick travel back to your base, sit through an insanely long load screen, swap your companions out, then backtrack to where you need to be. I can't believe anyone thought this would be acceptable design when it's clearly trash. The platforming is kinda fun, but I should've just skipped this.

Gears of War 3
I figured I'd play GoW4 with my game pass sub, but I needed to play 3 first. Honestly this game is way better than I expected it to be, mainly because it has a lot of enemy and weapon variety. I think at some point I started to put Gears in the same 'all style, no substance' category as Uncharted, but that's not right. Mechanically it's pretty basic, but it's a good game.

Gears of War 4
This doesn't have as many enemy types as 3, and some of the new ones feel like dull bullet sponges. But the new rifle is more fun to use than any of the automatic weapons, so combat is still good. Gears 3 is probably a little better, but I'll end up playing this way more because it's on PC with crossplay.

Mega Man Legacy Collection
I played through Mega Man 1-5 last year, and went back to this to clear 6. I was going to stop after that since the challenges didn't interest me (they're all about speedrunning), but after trying a few, I realized it wouldn't take that long to get 50 gold medals and finish up the achievements. It would've been nice if the challenges were more creative than "just play through these sections quickly" but it was still fun.

Mega Man Legacy Collection 2
This was my first time playing Mega Man 8. It probably takes the crown from 7 as the worst in the series. Thankfully 9 and 10 are here to make this collection worth owning.

Classic series rank: 9 = 3 > 2 > 10 >> 1 > 5 > 4 >>> 6 > 7 > 8

Inti/Capcom understood what made Mega Man 2 and 3 better than the rest of the games that followed. The charge shot was a bad idea; not only does it slow down the pace of the game, it makes the boss weapons much less important, and that's one of Mega Man's key characteristics. So that needed to be cut. The slide was probably tougher. It's a fun mechanic, but it can break the balance of the game since it makes evasion much easier, so cutting that was also the right move. Protoman actually has both of those abilities, but with some tradeoffs (lower shot count, and he takes double damage & recoil), so they at least tried to keep it balanced.

The speedrun challenges are much easier to get gold ranks on too, which is good since you don't have to spend much time playing 7 and 8. I enjoyed the more demanding time limits in the previous collection though.

Street Fighter V Arcade Edition
Got up to Super Diamond (20,000 LP) earlier this year; after watching CEO I felt like playing again. Maybe I'll aim for 25k if I get some confidence from casual matches.

I also played The Silver Case, The 25th Ward, Ys VIII, Monster Hunter World, but I think I posted about those before. I need to get back on Yakuza 6 too.
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Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by BrianC »

Sumez wrote:
BrianC wrote:despite the game being on more powerful hardware and the lack of 3D, the game also runs at 30 FPS.
At least the backgrounds are definitely 3D. I imagine it's full 3D?
I meant 3D effects, not 3D graphics. The game is definitely using 3D graphics, but it doesn't have those autostereoscopic or whatever illusion 3D effects like the 3DS. The last couple of 3DS games were designed with the 3D effects in mind and a lower framerate is understandable since they have to draw two sets of images. However, the Switch doesn't have a special 3D screen like the 3DS, but the game is still 30 FPS.

I can't imagine Ys 8's voices being anywhere near as bad is Ys 6 PS2's English voices. They made Dogi sound like a stereotypical musclebound idiot.
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Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by Sumez »

iconoclast wrote: Inti/Capcom understood what made Mega Man 2 and 3 better than the rest of the games that followed.
:|
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Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by rapoon »

Bananamatic wrote:almost done with persona 5 on hard mode
funny difficulty curve, the first 2 bosses are insanely hard on hard mode, worse than anything in p3 or p4 that early
then you get to the endgame and it's super easy due to all the social link bonuses in this game and how you can choose what skills to carry over when fusing
literally went from the hardest SMT earlygame to the easiest SMT lategame I ever experienced

I started playing this last week on hard. I had to drop it back to normal a few times out of irritation, notably at the beginning with the Archangel (not boss) mobs. If i didn't kill him first round, he'd cast makouha and wipe the team and out of laziness I wasn't inclined to go find a null light item or fuse a demon.

It's been so long since I played Nocturne on Hard, I really can't compare the two, but I have a vivid recollection of Matador being a real motherfucker without the proper lineup. Then again, SMT difficulty has always pivoted around your lineup and skills.

The Surge - Finished this recently and wasted enough time to get to NG +2. Despite their faults with Lords of the Fallen, Trap13 did an excellent job this round. Ghegs already wrote a review on the game, so there's not much sense parroting whats been said, but some things I particularly appreciated were the perceived impact of the weapons and their respective movesets. On the flip-side, the weapons are the games weakest point, and you'll find yourself rarely using (or never using) half of them. An exceptional game for $20, and I was pleased to read there's a second game coming out next year.
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Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by iconoclast »

Sumez wrote:
iconoclast wrote: Inti/Capcom understood what made Mega Man 2 and 3 better than the rest of the games that followed.
:|
Everything from 4 and on is skippable, until 9 made Mega Man great again.
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Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by BrianC »

iconoclast wrote:
Sumez wrote:
iconoclast wrote: Inti/Capcom understood what made Mega Man 2 and 3 better than the rest of the games that followed.
:|
Everything from 4 and on is skippable, until 9 made Mega Man great again.
The last two GB games are two of the better MM games. 2 and 3 on NES are excellent, but 2 has some rough spots towards the end and 3 is a bit buggy to the point that the beta tools were left in by mistake. I also feel that the original X for SNES is one of the best takes on the Mega Man style gameplay.
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Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by iconoclast »

I agree 2 has some bad parts, but it's so strong in every other area that it makes up for its weak points. 9 and 3 are top class in all aspects though. I've never played any of the Gameboy games or most of the X series (only X1 when I was a kid, which was great). I want the collection that's coming out, but I'll probably put it off for a while.
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Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by Sumez »

4 to 6 on NES are all vastly better than 9. You are entitled to disagree of course, but to me it feels like a pretty hard fact. People tend to discount the later NES titles without ever really giving them the time of the day.

I agree on the charge shot, but it's not game breaking, and Inti had absolutely no clue what made Mega Man good. We already had that discussion here :P
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Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by Blinge »

iconoclast living up to his name haha
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Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by Steamflogger Boss »

I rather like 5 and 6.

Anyway...

Policenauts and RE5.

After getting further along I am fairly sure I never played the main game of RE5 before. Lols. It's alright.

Policenauts is everything I was expecting. It's awesome...
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Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by Immryr »

Is there are point playing nier automata after ending C? I started the game again but it seems to have looped back round to the beginning again with nothing changed from the first time through.
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Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by BrianC »

iconoclast wrote:9 and 3 are top class in all aspects
Funny you say top class when the top spin in MM3 is incredibly glitchy. Don't get me wrong, I like the game quite a bit, but the game is known to be buggy. I also like 1, 4-6, 9 and 10, and even 7 and 8 quite a bit. 7, I have a soft spot for because it's more like the GB games in some ways.

Lately I have been playing Splatoon 2 (just finished the final stage in the Octo Expansion, though I have plenty of regular stages left to complete) and a bit of Money Puzzle Exchanger. I also plan to play more Vs. SMB.
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Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by ryu »

Immryr wrote:Is there are point playing nier automata after ending C? I started the game again but it seems to have looped back round to the beginning again with nothing changed from the first time through.
You're missing endings D and E
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Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by Bananamatic »

rapoon wrote:I started playing this last week on hard. I had to drop it back to normal a few times out of irritation, notably at the beginning with the Archangel (not boss) mobs. If i didn't kill him first round, he'd cast makouha and wipe the team and out of laziness I wasn't inclined to go find a null light item or fuse a demon.
I don't think those even exist at that point
just debuff his attack and defense and pray he dies before you do

honestly that's the issue with those games, earlygame gives you no tools to deal with stuff and then you get shit like bypassing the level requirement for fusions, SP regen, operator throwing full party buffs and healing at you for free, party members getting to survive a free mortal attack, party members covering mortal attacks for you (while surviving on 1 HP instead of dying instead of you), instant escape from ambushes and god knows what else
by the time you get to the endgame the enemies have to get past 4 layers of "quality of life" before you get the game over screen
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Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by gameoverDude »

rapoon wrote: The Surge - Finished this recently and wasted enough time to get to NG +2. Despite their faults with Lords of the Fallen, Trap13 did an excellent job this round. Ghegs already wrote a review on the game, so there's not much sense parroting whats been said, but some things I particularly appreciated were the perceived impact of the weapons and their respective movesets. On the flip-side, the weapons are the games weakest point, and you'll find yourself rarely using (or never using) half of them. An exceptional game for $20, and I was pleased to read there's a second game coming out next year.
The Surge is great. Just got started with it on the PS4 Pro last week (Performance mode does a good job of keeping 60 FPS). So far I've stuck to using the reclaimed piston as a weapon. The sliding & jumping attacks are cool. Most of the time I'll try to dodge rather than block. Bet the sequel will be amazing.

Lords 2 has switched developers. Instead of Deck 13, that one's gone to Defiant Studios in NYC. Glad to see this one's still coming- the first LOTF isn't too bad.
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Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by Durandal »

Is it even doable to defeat the final boss' last form of Sin and Punishment: Star Successor on Hard using Kachi?
Some waves absolutely beg for Isa's Charge Shot, and the delayed targeting behavior of Kachi's main shot is absolutely sub-optimal for this shit.
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Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by gameoverDude »

Trails of Cold Steel II (PC) - About 47 hours in. Maybe about halfway done.

NBA Jam TE (arcade) - 25 teams down. Just Seattle & Chicago left. More than a few retries along the way.

The Surge (PS4 Pro) - Just gave P.A.X. a proper thrashing. (Skip to 45:25 to see that).
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Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by Sumez »

Started out Momodora 4 (forgot the subtitle, but I didn't realise it was the fourth in a series until after I started) yesterday, and got pretty caught up by the game, making it very close to 100% map completion until decide I should probably go to bed.

It's one of those games I've been looking forward to, as it seemed like something right up my alley, and fortunately this one didn't let me down. I started out playing on Hard mode, which I don't regret. Some enemies will absolutely tear you up right at the beginning, and pretty much anything will either one- or two-shot you. It did get quite a bit easier, though, when I realised all healing items would refill at checkpoints, causing me to stop hogging them.

Bloodborne is obviously a big inspiration, both in the overall mood and the dark gothic city with a brooding red moon in the background. But this is also pretty much the best attempt I've seen at applying Bloodborne style combat to a classic 2D sidescrolling action game. Instead of making it sluggish and repetitive like Slain, it retains most of what makes good 2D platformers good, lifting only mild concepts stuff from From's titles, such as the importance of crowd control, the roll/dash, and the stunlocking melee attack combo with its dedicated forward-moving swings. I ended up relying on the ranged arrow attack for most of the game though.

Apparently the game isn't too big, but that also means everything is more tightly packed, and it doesn't overstay its welcome. I appreciate how open ended it gets pretty fast, with several branching paths you are free to take. At the end of the day though, it feels as if there's a definitely "correct" order to tackling areas and bosses, and I had to backtrack a bit to reach another area that opened some stuff in the area I originally went to first.

Oh, did I mention it looks really beautiful?
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Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by Marc »

Ooh, that does look nice.
I've got the PS4 one on the HD to start, might make that next in line after seeing that.
Still on with Bloodstained for now, which I really am enjoying.
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Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by Sumez »

Definitely do it. I really think the short length is one of its strongest assets. Even though hard mode is slightly challenging, it makes taking on the game much less of a daunting undertaking.
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Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by BulletMagnet »

Few additional thoughts on New Mario U as I plod along:

- The more I think it over, another reason I might have clicked better with this one than Wooly World is that the visuals are simpler, but cleaner; there's far less detail here, but everything is far more distinct, and runs at a smoother framerate on top of that (and I'm the sort who will always turn my PC stuff down to "potato" settings to get 60 FPS out of it on my laptop). Of course, even this preference could probably be tied back to Mario World way back when to some extent, so who knows.

- Still not having much trouble with making progress (currently have 80-something lives stocked up), but I DID have to use the "Super Guide" at one point so far, since the hidden path you need to take in one of the ghost houses was simply too obtuse for me to suss out before finally saying "screw this" and hitting the big green block (and while the visual hints sort of make sense once I saw what they were actually alluding to, I still doubt I would have stuck around long enough to randomly progress, as my intuition was leading me in a completely different direction). When I first heard of the feature back when the game came out I fit squarely into the "no need to freak out, just ignore it" camp, but after this I have to say I kind of appreciate it. Because I'm just friggin' hardcore like that. :P

- Tooling around in the menus I discovered something I'd completely passed over up until now; several dozen "superplay" videos right on the disc, not only showing how to perform certain "practical" feats, but also players simply messing around and exploiting the system just to show off. I'm struggling to think of many other platformers that included such a feature...not sure if it's only on the version of the game that includes Luigi U, but it was a pleasant surprise to stumble upon, especially since the "play with Mii" stuff is pretty well off my radar.

- While it's hardly my biggest gripe with the NSMB sub-series as a whole, "Oh yeah, Mario time" will never stop reeking of boardroom-ripened "kids these days totally talk like that" mothballs. :lol:
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Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by Stevens »

Bomberman and Avatar Golf with the missssus.
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Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by gameoverDude »

NBA Jam TE (arcade) - Finished it with a percentage of .380 (27-44). I played as 76ers all the way, but almost thought of switching to the Detroit Pistons since my last opponent was the Chicago Bulls. At least in the original NBA Jam, Mark Turmell admitted that if the Pistons were playing against the Bulls, Scottie Pippen would be massively nerfed & the Bulls would tend to brick any last second shots.
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Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by Mischief Maker »

Okay, I've got a legit complaint with the new Battletech videogame. No not the gender pronouns (boo-hoo), no, not the Unity engine choking on large overhead maps (Satellite Reign had insane load times, too). It's the fact that you're limited to four mechs.

Why this is a problem is ironically because of the game's greatest strength: its excellent streamlined interface. Playing the Battletech boardgame was a very involved process with complicated character sheets simulating these complex sci fi vehicles, representing armor as individual circles to be blacked out as they take damage, heat levels constantly filled in and erased, and so on. This was fun work for an imaginative middle-schooler, but it was still work nevertheless and so the limit of 4 on 4 made it actually possible to finish a game in a day.

But in Battletech the videogame that's all handled by the computer in the background and the end result is... kinda dull. Don't get me wrong, a complex story map can still be a blast to navigate, but in general mech-on-mech random missions it feels like a heavily stripped down SRPG. You just move and shoot. The only real dilemma is choosing between moving to a hex with the highest amount of evasion and cover verses a hex with optimal firing position. There's no overwatch, no area-denial artillery, and with jump jets not even any choke points. The battletech board game rules were very simple in many aspects to make up for all the busywork but now that the computer's taking care of the busywork the only gameplay left for the player is too damn simple.

It's kinda like how in the Etrian Odyssey games if they took out the manual map-drawing mechanics you'd realize their dungeon layouts are incredibly simple and boring compared to other games in the genre like The Dark Spire.

Now this could still work if they massively increased the numbers of mechs on a map and included vehicle artillery backup or city maps, but I don't know if their engine can handle it.

As much as that game does everything in its power to try to make me hate it based on terrible aesthetic choices, Sanctus Reach in its current patched state is way more fun than Battletech.
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Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by BulletMagnet »

Beat Bowser in Mario U, now looking to grab the stuff I missed and open up the bonus levels, which is quite frankly an unnecessary pain in the neck: mimicking World once again, there are hidden areas which are accessed by finding alternate exits in the "main" levels, but unlike in World the stages that have such hidden exits are not clearly marked as such on the map (and, if "unofficial" visual hints exist, I'm not catching them), so you're left scouring every corner of every level to find them, aaaaand I'm basically playing Wooly World again. I'll stick with it a bit longer to see if something clicks in the post-game, because I've had a good time with the title on the whole, but at least for me the level of obtuseness at times can be really off-putting.
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Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by Sumez »

Just got started on Prey (2017), and already put a good few hours into it.
Really feels good to finally play System Shock again! I'd wish it were mere straight up that though, instead of lifting so much from Bioshock as well. Really loving the (mostly) open ended structure. A ton of games today are afraid of doing that (with Bioshock being a pretty damn obvious example), but it feels like Arkane didn't care if you sequence break the shit out of their thing. Appreciate it.

Combat sucks (feels like the Shadow of Mordor school of making something challenging through chaotic obscurity), but also serves as a good utility for experimenting with your powers, tools and the surroundings, so that almost makes up for it.
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