What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

[Immryr]

nope curly was worm food. the final boss was the doctor / core.

I played it without a guide so I probably missed a bunch of stuff, I will probably go back to it at some point.

[Obiwanshinobi]

I suggest you guys use that "Spoiler" button.

[Blinge]

Haha yeah the true endings a wee bit harder,

Spoiler

you're welcomed to an extra stage by a sign saying "welcome to hell."

[Perikles]

Sol Feace/Deace are most definitely on my radar, among several others - lately I like to just follow you around the forum taking notes.

That immeasurably flatters me considering that my Everdrive list of NES/Famicom games almost entirely consists of your essential recommendations (alongside a few old favourites like Gyruss, Jackal and Silver Surfer; I honestly still think that the latter is one of the better shooters on the system, that AVGN review is concededly amusing but it has little foundation in reality). I actually got my RGB modded AV Famicom just today and wanted to immediately start delving into action platformer heaven, but alas, the technology has its own nefarious mind! I can either play with a crystal clear RGB picture whilst not having sound or a drab AV picture with sound. Ordered a new RGB cable, hopefully this'll do the trick, I'd hate to send my beautiful console to an expert this soon.

I'm currently dabbling with a modern game (the horror!): Metal Gear Solid V: Business Administrations Never Dies. I developed a better understandig as to why Liquid killed Miller before the events of MGS1, that guy is a raging asshole alright. "Snake, you gotta capture the only Russian in Afghanistan that speaks English!" "Snake, collect more materials for us to blithely build some platforms in the middle of nowhere!" "Snake, the TV reception is pretty bad around these parts, steal some modern satellite dish, will ya?" "Snake, we need toilet paper, unused if possible!" And after the events that occured when I brought back a particular prisoner I sure as hell would've enlisted Miller to the one-handed breaststroke olympiad.

[BIL]

Oh wow, can't believe it's been a year (almost exactly!) since I wrote that. Have only added two or three titles since, by far the most essential being Gimmick!. Don't be put off by the cutesy as I was, it's sterling stuff. ^__^ Haven't traded/sold off anything either, I'm proud of myself.

edit: oh yeah, Max Warrior is really cool too, though the isometric view takes adjusting. Worth it, imo. Bizarrely recalls The Super Shinobi with its somersault bomb.

I've yet to get into NES stuff, Jackal and Gyruss being two of several FDS exclusives I'd love to pick up sometime. The former's a lifelong favourite, easily among the best topdown shooters for the platform... it's the stage designs, mainly. Tons of personality and detail. I love that sense of motoring through miniature 2D warzones with jeeploads of POWs, fending off enemy land, sea and air units as the evac chopper buzzes past. Some slight and manageable screen edge-riding aside, I enjoy it as much as Guevara, no slouch on the details itself (distinguished by a truly singular precision fury).

Also Section Z, Zanac, Zelda II... then there's KID's NES-only sidescrollers Kick Master and GI Joe 1-2, plus the sadomaso label versions of Ninja Gaiden III and Castlevania III.

Side Arms' PCE soundtrack is exactly why I never write off those ostensibly dated ports... it's a great HuCard to have around regardless, but goddamn, that stage 1 BGM is dynamite. Blows the doors off the arcade OSV! Brings to mind the very talented zabutom's "sense of videogame elation and final confrontation."

[Obiwanshinobi]

I enjoyed Gyruss with digital controls on GBA (Arcade Advanced collection).
Full Auto 2: Battlelines on PS3, folks. It's like UT meets Virtual-On at would-be-30 fps (in 720p, that is - way fewer in 1080p, so I must disable 1080 every time I give it a spin). Just don't use "unwreck" and you'll be fine.

[EmperorIng]

I picked up the latest indie darling Undertale. A lot of people label is as "RPG + bullet hell" and I'm all "heh nothin' but aimed shots what plebes." Though to be fair some of the enemy attack patterns are visually neat and a little tricky (and the game keeps things interesting by forcing your avatar into different dodging environments, whether it be rhythm, platformer, or free movement).

Story/characters are nice, though some of the humor is a little too reliant on internet pop culture (e.g. enemy name is Tsunderplane, another time I heard the "Gutsman's Ass" jingle) - though to the game's credit, it does do a decent job of making sure the humor comes from the game's world (well, and a healthy love of anime cliches) and not just from a quick browsing of KnowYourMeme.

So I've read: the real conceit of the game is you either kill everyone and are a dick, or be nice to everyone and are not a dick, and the game and its subsequent playthroughs will remember just how much of a dick/nice guy you were. The manipulation of ingame data (hidden away in your steam caches or steam cloud sync - existing even if you delete everything!) is a clever way of surprising the players with a seeming awareness of your previous runs.

It's not bad, especially at $10.00.

[lilmanjs]

Rallisport Challenge 2 on the xbox was the last thing I played. Still trying to get first place, or at least enough points for first place in superrally. This is where the already difficult game just jumps up and beats you into submission and a coma. If only I had a place where I could actually use my steering wheel this might be an easier go. I wonder if I might be using the wrong Group B car to try this with as well.

[BrianC]

I enjoyed Gyruss with digital controls on GBA (Arcade Advanced collection).

Despite the perspective of the game, the arcade version has always used a digital joystick.

[Perikles]

Also Section Z, Zanac, Zelda II... then there's KID's NES-only sidescrollers Kick Master and GI Joe 1-2, plus the sadomaso label versions of Ninja Gaiden III and Castlevania III.

How could I forget to try out Section Z? I want to play the arcade version really soon, so that's definitely going on my list. Dito regarding the KID games (I was at least canny enough to add the rest of the enumerated titles to my list, I love(d?) Zelda II and, to a lesser extent, Faxanadu and The Battle of Olympus back in the day ).

Side Arms' PCE soundtrack is exactly why I never write off those ostensibly dated ports... it's a great HuCard to have around regardless, but goddamn, that stage 1 BGM is dynamite. Blows the doors off the arcade OSV! Brings to mind the very talented zabutom's "sense of videogame elation and final confrontation."

Exactly! It cannot be overstated how important the first impression can be. This theme gets me excited every single time and is surely one of the reasons why it's among my favorite HuCard shooters - doesn't harm that it plays sorta like a (relatively speaking) harmless horizontal version of Gun.Smoke, it has a lot of those moments where the player will zip around the screen while using the terrain to his advantage. I actually just uploaded only the stage theme to put the focus on the important part (I kept that quirky materializing noise, I like it )! Also added one track of another system favourite (however short it may be) of mine, Violent Soldier. It suffers from a somniferous first half, but the final two stages are sheer murder. If the entire game were up to this standard it'd be potentially my favorite 16-bit shooter, in its actual state it's "only" in my personal top 10 (I never would objectively try to defend it to that degree, I just love that last third so much).

[Squire Grooktook]

Undertale

Yeah. On another forum I'm visiting, people are totally blown away ("THE FEELS"). I think it's good. Pretty sweet and charming. Humor is generally solid (I like the more slapstick moments). Combat is pretty fun, and the pace is good. I'm not totally fond of some of the fourth wall breaking elements (I think they break the suspension of disbelief for an otherwise charming fairy tale), but it's overall pretty good.

Trails In The Sky is still the best rpg (in both gameplay and story) on Steam though, for me at least.

[Mischief Maker]

Just picked up Supreme Commander: Forged Alliance

I'm not even into RTS games, I wanted a game that showed my computer at its most number-crunchiest, and a game involving up to 2000 units battling it out with their individual shots rendered as moving physical objects is a great place to start.

[Some-Mist]

beat armikrog last weekend. very short, beautiful, and yet buggy game. it's gotten a bunch of mixed reviews too.
probably my most anticipated game of the last 2 years, and while it didn't quite live up to the hype... it was still fun/nostalgic to play through.



I'm a sucker for anything claymation based... and dat music too...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HubUImd77wg

bought undertale and read only memories recently... might give one of those a go.

[mamboFoxtrot]

Mega Man X6 Xtreme Mode, God fuckin help me... at least you effectively have infinite lives in this game.

I might be more willing to put up with a lot of this shit if it weren't for the whole "save the Reploids before the flying scuba ghosts zomibfy them!" shtick. And maybe if I could shoot through walls like most other Mega Man games. Anything to be able to better deal with these asshats that keep hanging out inside of walls - and sometimes in the floor below you! Those guys and the God-forsaken series staple of enemies respawning the moment they get just a little off of the screen account for probably half of this game's difficulty by themselves.

Weapons like Yammark Option and Guard Shell are some of the best in the series (though part of the latter's usefulness is due to a glitch), but other weapons are just useless. Like, you charge up Ground Dasher and fire an enormous boulder that goes through walls and shit. Sounds cool, right? Except... it does about as much damage as a single Buster pellet! WTF?! I guess it's pretty normal in Mega Man games for there to be a lot of useless weapons, but it really hurts in this game where your Mega Buster or Z-Saber by themselves aren't quite enough to comfortably deal with all the shit coming at you.

Most of the bosses are actually really underwhelming, though. Even on XTREME mode, the likes of Yammark, Scaravich, and Metal Shark Player are all a bunch of pansies. Shield Sheldon does some decent damage, but has a really easy pattern and practically no health. I honestly find it more disappointing than relieving to take them out after going through the hellacious stage before them (esp. when accounting for the resets due to zombified Reploids).

Oh, and nothing feels more ridiculous than entering a stage to manipulate the Nightmare system, and then killing yourself to be able to exit it, just so that the stage you want to go to will be a bit more playable.

[BrianC]

it really hurts in this game where your Mega Buster or Z-Saber by themselves aren't quite enough to comfortably deal with all the shit coming at you.

Not to mention that, if I remember correctly, the Z-Saber also has a tendency to get stuck if it hits something that is indestructible.

[mamboFoxtrot]

Getting stuck in hitlag and listening to TINKTINKTINKTINK for two seconds straight is annoying, but it doesn't really contribute to the difficulty, as everything else is slowed down along with you. It is, however, annoying that clanking with invincible parts prevents you from hitting vulnerable parts. The shield enemies floating in the air or occupying raised platforms in Shield Sheldon's stage are a bitch and a half to kill with Zero because of that. (Especially when you're trying to NOT hit the mirrors you need to angle at the same time)

[Squire Grooktook]

Picked up Alien Vs Predator (the Capcom arcade brawler, of course). Finally managed to make it past stage 3! In fact, I got up to the penultimate boss blind. Mad Predator is an amazingly hype boss.

Also this might be a weird comparison, but the games difficulty curve reminds me of Perfect Cherry Blossom, in that it's like 2 games in one with their own difficulty curve. Stage 3 is like a mini-final stage with its own mini final boss that's likely to kill you a few times or outright game over. The following stages are actually fairly lax and start building up the challenge from the beginning again.

[Obiwanshinobi]

As I posted about Super Monkey Ball lately, I believe easier stages immediately following harder ones in some coin-op games are intended to give the gamer a bit of relief in arcade environment, where you can't pause the game and typically stay tense, adrenaline rush, stiff neck, back & shoulders, for as long as you play. It's been like 18 years since the last time I played on a cab, but that's how I remember those times. Must have been economically sound not to wear one down too much for as long as they had money to burn.

[mamboFoxtrot]

Well, I finished X6 XTREME mode. I was going to go for 100%, but when I belatedly found out that two of the rescuable Reploids were zombified off-screen, I decided to just go for the end-game. I didn't even bother getting any energy tanks. Not that those would ever get filled up, considering that there's no health or weapon drops in XTREME mode.

But Jesus Christ some of the bullshit this game throws at you I swear... Infinity Mijinion might be one of the stupidest bosses I've ever faced. Not only does he clog the screen with a random amount of bubbles, bullets, and clones, he also randomly heals himself for half of his HP! I'm pretty sure there's no way to knock him out of it, and there doesn't seem to be a limit on how many times he'll do it in a fight, either. In one fight he did this to me five times! FIVE GOD DAMNED TIMES! Winning the fight seems to be purely luck with not getting too many clones (who, by the way, can't be quickly killed with ANYTHING because they have invincibility frames just like the boss) and him not healing himself. His weakness is the Guard Shield, a weapon that absorbs certain projectiles and counter attacks. Problem is, only one of the five things that could on screen at any given time are actually absorbed. The charged version can hit him if he decides to be in it's way, but ultimately it doesn't seem to be more effective than charged Metal Anchors or Magma Blades. The final nail in the pincushion that is the player at this point: The boss, his clones, and even the fucking bubbles are immune Falcon's Giga Attack. Of all the places in the game where that sorry excuse for a "screen nuke" might actually be useful, and the game just gives you the finger for no fucking reason.

At first final Sigma seemed like a clusterfuck rivaling the above, but then I found out you can just camp under his chin with Guard Shield up and wait for the weak point to appear. Not sure whether to be disappointed or relieved.

There are other bosses, stage elements, and general mechanics I could talk about, but I think I'll just stop here.

[Khan]

Fallout New Vegas on xbox360

After pumping in like 150hrs into fallout 3 a few years back I thought id give new vegas a try finally, I already have the game on steam but much prefer to play on a bigger screen so opted for the 360 version.

50hrs in and level 19 and im still doing side quests. I figure I may try to rap it up now though getting by most quests easy enough only thing giving me problems this time around are deathclaws, in fallout 3 having a combat shotty I could nail one in a matter of seconds but this time around it seems using guns is a little weaker, infact melee is supposed to be quite op since you can learn certain power moves but I havent gone down that road and went guns. Havent met any real memorable chars yet however I did kill a person who raped a lesbian that made me feel good inside also nailed his minions too

So after about 90 hrs I finished it, not much to say except by the end I was level 30 with tons of weapons and ammo that I had no chance to use all of it I decided to recruit cass and rex the dog and had them wander the wasteland with me. The sniper rifle is ridiculously OP especially when you have Commando as a perk in VATS, I decided to side with the NCR over the whole thing and the ending was a little meh since they built up the final boss to be this amazing beast who took down 10 guys on his own or something but he dies with a couple of headshots from my sniper rifle.

[Immryr]

I'm currently up to the ice dragon boss on ys oath in felghana. He is a fairly annoying boss. For the first 1000 hp he doesn't even attack and since I do next to no damage to him it's quite tedious just getting through that stage. Once he starts jumping in the air and raining ice down the fight gets pretty tough. I suck at dodging the falling ice and can only take four hits total. I basically ran past all the enemies in the ice area, so perhaps I'm slightly under levelled but I doubt an extra level would make that much difference anyway.

I really like that you can switch to the pc88 music, it doubled my enjoyment of the game when I found that option.

[Blinge]

So after about 90 hrs I finished it, not much to say except by the end I was level 30 with tons of weapons and ammo that I had no chance to use all of it I decided to recruit cass and rex the dog and had them wander the wasteland with me. The sniper rifle is ridiculously OP especially when you have Commando as a perk in VATS, I decided to side with the NCR over the whole thing and the ending was a little meh since they built up the final boss to be this amazing beast who took down 10 guys on his own or something but he dies with a couple of headshots from my sniper rifle.

Haha, sounds like you played the systems too well. If you fight on Caesar's side the final challenge is way different, quite interesting too.
I was gonna have two final bosses when I went for my initial playthrough ending, not being enough of a smooth talker to get me out of it, yet still pursuing my anarchist fantasy for Vegas. But.... the game glitched out when I used a stealth boy to get away and heal, and the 2nd "boss" de-aggro'd and the game ended.
I just said.. oh fallout.. and accepted it.

[Squire Grooktook]

Don't think I've had a single play session of Trails In The Sky where I haven't laughed at least once.

[Blinge]

Also Khan, fuck the NCR! you're just a suckup to the Man, man!!

[qmish]

Alien Vs Predator (the Capcom arcade brawler, of course)

? Those 3 fps games (1 on Jaguar and 2 on PC) were also awesome. Especially playing as Predator in multiplayer.

[Squire Grooktook]

Yeah, I hear they're solid.

[Ed Oscuro]

OK, this is driving me nuts: Somebody (it probably was Obiwanshinobi) recently mentioned a PS2 game, and I haven't been able to find this mentioned anywhere. Any thoughts?

I'll tell you what, though, PS2's Spawn Armageddon is some shit. Very tiring on the fingers to play, but there's no reason to because it's so simplistic and dumb. I do enjoy that Blade/Matrix-to-polygons aesthetic in the neogothic cathedral courtyard from the game's opening though. I also noticed that they used the same sample source for some of the music as Nosfteratu on PC, as the post-boss music from that game has some sections identical with the ambient music in the newspaper print shop level.

Due to improvements in the PCSX2 OpenGL backend, you can now play your legally-obtained copy of FIDDY CENT: PROOF OF DA BULLETZ in glorious full speed even on c. 2010 hardware. I'll admit, though, that the old software rendering speed level was more appropriate for representing the refined qualities of Mr. Cent and his associates, and of the absurd number of people who apparently enjoyed this game enough to upload videos of it to youtube. Next up: 25 to Life?

[Khan]

So after about 90 hrs I finished it, not much to say except by the end I was level 30 with tons of weapons and ammo that I had no chance to use all of it I decided to recruit cass and rex the dog and had them wander the wasteland with me. The sniper rifle is ridiculously OP especially when you have Commando as a perk in VATS, I decided to side with the NCR over the whole thing and the ending was a little meh since they built up the final boss to be this amazing beast who took down 10 guys on his own or something but he dies with a couple of headshots from my sniper rifle.

Haha, sounds like you played the systems too well. If you fight on Caesar's side the final challenge is way different, quite interesting too.
I was gonna have two final bosses when I went for my initial playthrough ending, not being enough of a smooth talker to get me out of it, yet still pursuing my anarchist fantasy for Vegas. But.... the game glitched out when I used a stealth boy to get away and heal, and the 2nd "boss" de-aggro'd and the game ended.
I just said.. oh fallout.. and accepted it.

I got summoned to his hold and for the unto Caesar quest I wanted to kill him there and then but I held off since I stored some of my equipment in my motel room in Novac I decided to go back for it and come back armed to to the brim. Once i reached the island again and got told to give my weapons up before being allowed access I flipped my shit! it was a goddamn massacre! those praetorian guards of his were a bit of a pain as they storm you with their ballistic fists but nothing a few rockets and grenades couldn't deal with. What really surprised me was just how easy taking the island was, I envisioned Caesar to have lots and lots of troops but he didn't, and what took the piss was when I made my way back to the shore and to the Strip/NCR embassy no one said thanks for killing their arch nemesis the one who got them shitting their pants this whole time! Bah! so much for solving a supposed BIG problem for the ungrateful bastards.

Spoiler

I got told to eliminate the Brotherhood of Steel by the NCR chief at the Dam and there was no way I was about to do it, infact id have wiped out the NCR if it came to that...the BoS are too cool and honorable to do that to and it was as Elder Mcnamara said once your a member of the BoS the BoS comes before anything else.

Also Khan, fuck the NCR! you're just a suckup to the Man, man!!

hehe if I had to choose for the greater good I chose the NCR simply because from what I saw of them they were mostly civilized, the legion on the other hand everywhere they go they were pure evil with raping, murdering and pillaging everywhere they went I couldn't let that continue. I did think about the followers of the apocalypse but I didn't learn enough about them for me to consider helping them as much. Only guy I killed in the game that had no real relevance was the black powder ganger in Nelson Boxcar or something, I decided near end game id go back and pay him a visit to see if his attitude would change and he would stop cursing me out but he still had a stinking attitude so I had to blow his brains out.

[Blinge]

Eep^ I think you could do with putting in spoiler text in a few places.

Haha nah maann, New Vegas' politics are a bit more nuanced than that! the NCR may look like a stable government but they're corrupt to the core too. I felt like if I joined them I may aswell be playing call of duty..

Spoiler

They're trying to annex the Mojave against its will just like the Legion is, they also mercilessly crush tribes like the Great Khans and take territory. I think NCR is supposed to be analogous to the USA in a number of ways, like foreign policy. They aren't a real democracy either.

Deciding to help the followers out or team up with Yes Man to have an independent New Vegas doesn't mean the Followers take over, they're not a group pre-occupied with rule.

About you killing Caesar, for story reasons you're not supposed to, but Obsidian obviously wanted you to be able to if you so wished, which is kinda cool. But you're right, there isn't really much repercussion across the wasteland compared to the effects of other quests and sidequests on the world. The legion was a bit of a pushover for me too (I also killed Caesar after finishing the game) but then nothing in the game on default difficulty is that hard if you're just popping stimpaks the entire time. Maybe they should've made the legion's fortress scale better with your character's level, like the legion assassins that now come after me nearly every day; a whole camp full of those assholes would be a different story.

A friend of mine also just wanted to kill Caesar from the get go, which saddens me a little bit because he's the most interesting character in the game. Seriously, you can play along with a couple of requests, secretly doing the opposite of what he wants while keeping him friendly.

In fact you can be a real schemer and make all the leaders dance to your tune quite far into the main quest before they get annoyed. But getting into Caesar's favour opens out a lot of dialogue and you can hear his origin story, motivations and ideals, it's really well written. The fiction written by Obsidian for their Mojave wasteland is very coherent, and key parts of it come from Caesar's dialogue.

[Khan]

Eep^ I think you could do with putting in spoiler text in a few places.

Haha nah maann, New Vegas' politics are a bit more nuanced than that! the NCR may look like a stable government but they're corrupt to the core too. I felt like if I joined them I may aswell be playing call of duty..

Spoiler

They're trying to annex the Mojave against its will just like the Legion is, they also mercilessly crush tribes like the Great Khans and take territory. I think NCR is supposed to be analogous to the USA in a number of ways, like foreign policy. They aren't a real democracy either.

Deciding to help the followers out or team up with Yes Man to have an independent New Vegas doesn't mean the Followers take over, they're not a group pre-occupied with rule.

About you killing Caesar, for story reasons you're not supposed to, but Obsidian obviously wanted you to be able to if you so wished, which is kinda cool. But you're right, there isn't really much repercussion across the wasteland compared to the effects of other quests and sidequests on the world. The legion was a bit of a pushover for me too (I also killed Caesar after finishing the game) but then nothing in the game on default difficulty is that hard if you're just popping stimpaks the entire time. Maybe they should've made the legion's fortress scale better with your character's level, like the legion assassins that now come after me nearly every day; a whole camp full of those assholes would be a different story.

A friend of mine also just wanted to kill Caesar from the get go, which saddens me a little bit because he's the most interesting character in the game. Seriously, you can play along with a couple of requests, secretly doing the opposite of what he wants while keeping him friendly.

In fact you can be a real schemer and make all the leaders dance to your tune quite far into the main quest before they get annoyed. But getting into Caesar's favour opens out a lot of dialogue and you can hear his origin story, motivations and ideals, it's really well written. The fiction written by Obsidian for their Mojave wasteland is very coherent, and key parts of it come from Caesar's dialogue.

Yes sorry think the spoiler thing was needed incase there is others who wanna give the game a shot soon, I did save and reload on a few different save files with Caesars dialogues

Spoiler

He spills the beans on how he was a member of the followers of the Apocalypse/NCR and he was captured by some tribe who would go on to kill his comrades and how he taught the tribe the art of war and how to make weapons and bombs and how to be ruthless and barbaric, but regardless of all that he was still a vile piece of work that if left alive would endorse more barbaric acts, the scene in nelson with heads on spikes kept coming to my mind every time I initiated dialogue with him so I had to deal with him ;p

In anycase looking forward to November 10th and my copy of Fallout 4!

In the meantime now playing Castlevania Lords of Shadow never been a fan of 3D Castlevania even though i thoroughly enjoyed Lament of innocence+Curse of darkness back in the day but this isnt too bad very God of war, but it still doesnt change my opinion Castlevania is always best in 2D and in the Metroidvania format!