What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

[WelshMegalodon]

Much regards! Killer description, too. And that thumbnail with the American flag... well done.

All things considered, I think SamSho MD is good as well. Not that the Internet at large seems to disagree. Control is good and the character sprites were redrawn quite competently.

[Sumez]

I'm an artist, so I appreciate her designs as well. How could they get rid of her? She's so central to the concept art, that they've been employing her for those 25 years.

Her artwork is beautiful. I'd definitely assume they'd stick to using her as long as possible - the surprise comes from the fact that the characters manage to looks like such garbage despite having her designs to base them on.

According what I remember reading in the Wikipedia article, the director specifically made the call to have the production art follow the concept art exactly.

Well that failed spectacularly.

[Marc]

WTF is going on there? They're doing some weird thing where they're cutting huge parts of the corners, but without even slowing down by going off-road? Can't for the life of me understand how it works, as any attempt by me to replicate the same thing just sees me slow to a crawl.

Yeah, high-level play in Outrun is kind of dumb, in my opinion. There's a good video here explaining the boost start and geargacha techniques.

Ah, cheers Ghegs. Yeah, not something I'm gonna be looking to replicate any time soon I'm afraid, the replays using this method are no fun at all to watch.

Routes A & B down anyway. Didn't realise there were unlockable modifiers on the Switch version, may be fun to have a mess around when I've unlocked the lot. Was it ever explained why the decision was made to swap around the stages for the overseas version? Still got everything crossed for an Outrunners port. Or even Enduro Racer. Or Powerdrift. or AB Cop......

[kitten]

I don't know if DS has any of this stuff and I probably won't find out for a while as I don't plan on playing it anytime soon, but to me this has always been the 'fun' part of the series.

it has almost none of it, tbh. though... you can pee with sam, create a mushroom, and then have other players pee on it to create a huge mushroom patch. i guess that's, uh, something. most of the emergent qualities are basically like a slightly more advanced version of the message sending system from dark souls, except instead of hitting "recommend" you smash the like button as fast as you can to pump them full of likes. structures people make will sometimes show up in your world and make the game more convenient, but it's largely an embarrassingly drab implementation that just reduces the speed of the busywork. inventing chores to help people do their chores faster through extreme labor - this is the true feeling of connection, the brilliance of the first "strand-type game!"

i cannot stress to you how much i bought this game on the notion that it was going to be 99% a combination walking simulator/kojima-nonsense-delivery-system only to discover it's absolutely just a long series of incredibly boring chores with semi-randomized nuisances and retreading scenery. i enjoy walking simulators! firewatch is one of my favorite games of this generation, even. this is... this is a really bad one :[

I don't get what you mean by 'a system saying you're wasting your time with the sandbox elements'—which game has something like this?

the ranking systems and way the game incentivizes and scores behaviors tend to suggest paring your time spent on things down and to lower effort spent on ancillary activities. while the fun things are there as novelty distractions, very little about the game ever suggests you should even bother with them and you're generally penalized for wasting your time or putting yourself at risk of further alerts and combat situations in the setup process for these elements to shine. you're often asked to only use the tranquilizing weapons, too, and to play mostly focused on stealth - PW and V even more strongly suggest this with the fulton system and the constant base micromanagement. each metal gear game progressively added more silly thing to do but further incentivized not doing them.

not to say the silly and emergent bits aren't the meat or the fun part of his games (that's frankly up to the player! i love a lot of the silly stuff in original mgs and feel it runs as close to concurrent with the intended pace of the game), just that the game as it's designed doesn't seem to believe that's the case. i've long believed kojima has no idea what he's designing and people just take to the potpourri of offbeat nonsense, but i feel like death stranding is almost definitive proof that his idea of what the "meat" of his games are is almost obscenely disconnected from what people actually enjoy about them. this game would have been a tremendous flop from anyone with less of a cult of personality around him.

- -

to kind of continue popping off about kojima - i also forgot how browbeating his narratives are! explaining and re-explaining basic concepts ad nauseum to you like you're an infant that can't grasp his genius while his takes are frankly naive or even outright stupid. my eyes about rolled out of my skull during the dozenth time the game had brought up oxytocin & likes having a correlation and then suggested the discovery a chemical in the body called "likecin." i could frankly go on for hours about how dumb this game is or pick out dozens more dumb-as-hell takes from the information diaries. never before has his world-building been more transparently myopic or obviously warped to deliver whatever hamfisted point he's locked onto for the last couple of years. his concepts are a lot more attractive when not explained (fetus in jar to spot umbilical cord ghosts is kind of neat!), but he absolutely can't help himself.

remember how in mgs1 you had cigarettes as a basic item, but they radically reduced your health as you used them, you could actually die from using them, and everyone browbeat you over the codex for smoking? then in mgs4 there were the hilarious anti-smoking blurbs that popped up on the screens between loading that depicted snake being a Super Cool Smoker? this basic sentiment of "i know what is cool and smart, but my audience won't know how to receive it" has defined almost all of his works in both presentation and mechanics and finally hit culmination in death stranding. given how much all of his games focus on the ethics of social responsibility, i would not be surprised to discover that he genuinely thinks he is doing the entire world a service with this game. it blows my mind how much his inspirations are frequently works left heavily up to interpretation but how absolutely frightened he is by someone having an interpretation of what he's done that is not his own.

[Stevens]

Bloodborne

Now while I adhere pretty strictly to no help on a first play through I will go look at wiki pages for bosses after I've dealt with them.

The boss design (from what I've seen so far) is really fantastic. In fact whenever I play a From Software game I feel that this is what all AAA games should be like. Though I suppose if all AAA games were like games from FS then they would no longer be as special would they?

Anyways..WARNING - YUUGE WALL OF TEXT INCOMING

For me anyways.

Spoiler

Blood Starved Beast took me less than 10 tries before I successfully pulled its spine out through its mouth. Not to say the fight wasn't a harrowing affair. I went in with 20 blood vials, the same amount of bullets and three antidotes. I left only with my life. Fucker took every resource I had down to me being poisoned, using the pillars to create distance (worked better with Ornstein and Smough), and healing multiple times so I didn't die while poisoned cause I had no antidotes left. Holy shit being slow poisoned in BB is no fucking joke and even less of one during a boss fight. I can't wait to be fast poisoned. Before the fight I read the description of the blood bait stuff and wondered if it would work on the beast. Did I try it? No. I sold it for other shit. Find out later it dies work, although I don't know how well.

I collected my winnings at the bottom of Old Yharnam and headed back to the Cathedral. A new pathway opened to an elevator which took me to the Healing Church Workshop. I took my time and cleared it out like Marines in LV 426, but a large locked door ended my bid.

Going back towards the main stairs I noticed an enemy I had never seen before. Sort of looked like a cross between Manute Bol and a vulture. Fucker killed me and sent me to Yar'Ghul. Luckily there were even more of these guys there so I died three or four more times before finding the lantern and getting the fuck out of there. I will go back there eventually, but other things require my attention first. Also fuck that place right now. I was wondering if any place in BB would make me feel the dread of my first trip to Blight Town. Congratulations From Software - mission accomplished.

After returning to the Cathedral and avoiding Manute Bol I made my way up the stairs to where it splits. To the left was a path sloping down and two guys who really like Nikolai Tesla and making sure I don't come near them. I engaged the first while the other waited, I hit him once for almost no damage and he cleaved half my life with one shot. I hastily retreated and eventually he gave up pursuit. To the other way was a forest but I turned around as I got there.

Making my way up to the top of the stairs I went inside and discovered Vicar Amelia. I knew what was coming (BB does a great job of telegraphing boss locations for the most part - look a big empty area with one other person/thing) and that the likely hood of her staying small and cute was almost zero. She took me several tries to bring down (less than 10 and maybe less than the beast?). I tried different strats with both the stake gun and the axe. I changed my robes, settled on the axe, and decided to be really aggressive. My longest fight with her saw me "kill" her like three times HP wise but I could never get her to zero. The fight I did kill her she healed only once and I am wondering if it was because I was generally up in her shit the whole time. Well at least as much as the fight dictated.

Again after I discover I could have prevented her from healing, but sold the numbing mist prior:D. Some fucker always trying to ice skate up hill - though I won't lie, I do like the idea of going in with just my shit and just using weapons on the bosses. Up to now I have never called for help in a Souls game. Want to see if I can do it again.

Now I return and it is fucking night everywhere. If I push forward it will be through the forest, but I may take the scenic route and go re explore the places I have already been.

The latter is more likely.

[Steamflogger Boss]

Bloodborne

Now while I adhere pretty strictly to no help on a first play through I will go look at wiki pages for bosses after I've dealt with them.

The boss design (from what I've seen so far) is really fantastic. In fact whenever I play a From Software game I feel that this is what all AAA games should be like. Though I suppose if all AAA games were like games from FS then they would no longer be as special would they?

Anyways..WARNING - YUUGE WALL OF TEXT INCOMING

For me anyways.

Spoiler

Blood Starved Beast took me less than 10 tries before I successfully pulled its spine out through its mouth. Not to say the fight wasn't a harrowing affair. I went in with 20 blood vials, the same amount of bullets and three antidotes. I left only with my life. Fucker took every resource I had down to me being poisoned, using the pillars to create distance (worked better with Ornstein and Smough), and healing multiple times so I didn't die while poisoned cause I had no antidotes left. Holy shit being slow poisoned in BB is no fucking joke and even less of one during a boss fight. I can't wait to be fast poisoned. Before the fight I read the description of the blood bait stuff and wondered if it would work on the beast. Did I try it? No. I sold it for other shit. Find out later it dies work, although I don't know how well.

I collected my winnings at the bottom of Old Yharnam and headed back to the Cathedral. A new pathway opened to an elevator which took me to the Healing Church Workshop. I took my time and cleared it out like Marines in LV 426, but a large locked door ended my bid.

Going back towards the main stairs I noticed an enemy I had never seen before. Sort of looked like a cross between Manute Bol and a vulture. Fucker killed me and sent me to Yar'Ghul. Luckily there were even more of these guys there so I died three or four more times before finding the lantern and getting the fuck out of there. I will go back there eventually, but other things require my attention first. Also fuck that place right now. I was wondering if any place in BB would make me feel the dread of my first trip to Blight Town. Congratulations From Software - mission accomplished.

After returning to the Cathedral and avoiding Manute Bol I made my way up the stairs to where it splits. To the left was a path sloping down and two guys who really like Nikolai Tesla and making sure I don't come near them. I engaged the first while the other waited, I hit him once for almost no damage and he cleaved half my life with one shot. I hastily retreated and eventually he gave up pursuit. To the other way was a forest but I turned around as I got there.

Making my way up to the top of the stairs I went inside and discovered Vicar Amelia. I knew what was coming (BB does a great job of telegraphing boss locations for the most part - look a big empty area with one other person/thing) and that the likely hood of her staying small and cute was almost zero. She took me several tries to bring down (less than 10 and maybe less than the beast?). I tried different strats with both the stake gun and the axe. I changed my robes, settled on the axe, and decided to be really aggressive. My longest fight with her saw me "kill" her like three times HP wise but I could never get her to zero. The fight I did kill her she healed only once and I am wondering if it was because I was generally up in her shit the whole time. Well at least as much as the fight dictated.

Again after I discover I could have prevented her from healing, but sold the numbing mist prior:D. Some fucker always trying to ice skate up hill - though I won't lie, I do like the idea of going in with just my shit and just using weapons on the bosses. Up to now I have never called for help in a Souls game. Want to see if I can do it again.

Now I return and it is fucking night everywhere. If I push forward it will be through the forest, but I may take the scenic route and go re explore the places I have already been.

The latter is more likely.

Spoiler

The blood bait works okay, it's honestly not great from what I remember. Using the pillars was a must for me as well. That effer gets insanely fast.

I'm trying to think of what regular enemy you are referring too lol.

I think I used something serrated with fire paper for BSB and Amelia but it's been awhile. You can really do damage in chunks that way. I didn't stop the healing either. HARD MODE.

[Blinge]

Stevens you fuck get in MUH FROMSOFT thread !!!111oneone.
we can all use spoiler tags about BB till you've finished.

Ah man I've always loved how some people struggle in different areas in From games.
I killed BSB first try but Amelia took me fucking forever, way longer than you!

[Stevens]

I'm trying to think of what regular enemy you are referring too lol.

Spoiler

I guess he is a mage of some sort - the ones that hang out in Yhar'Gul/Unseen Village. The tall fuckers who wear cloaks and hit hard.

Spent Turkey Day morning in Yharnam -

Spoiler

At the fork in the Cathedral stairs I headed right. Killed the two hunters (Electro and Gun Happy) and headed into the cave. Came out and made it to that room at the end passed the two big guys with axes (with snipers on the rocks for that extra fuck you). Turned back and headed into the forest. At night. Should have done it in the day but too late now. Was overwhelmed and killed by the gunmen a few times but never twice without getting my echoes back. Forged through to Hemwick Charnel Lane. Lit the lamp, killed some of the locals and then headed back to dreamland with close to 25,000 echoes. The women of what I am presuming is a coven of witches seem really friendly - the hanging bodies of what I can only assume are the men were a nice touch. That's were I'm at.

I've had the axe and pistol since the start. Thinking about maybe replacing the axe, but it has served me so well thus far.

Stevens you fuck get in MUH FROMSOFT thread !!!111oneone.
we can all use spoiler tags about BB till you've finished.

Ah man I've always loved how some people struggle in different areas in From games.
I killed BSB first try but Amelia took me fucking forever, way longer than you!

Biggest boss hurdle for me so far was unsurprisingly

Spoiler

Father G

, almost made me call it quits. Seriously. Didn't even have that much trouble with any Dark Souls boss. Then I remembered I'm not a pussy:)

I'll try and find the thread.

Also in BB -

Spoiler

I found the hunter who is stalking Henryk. I don't know if it is unavoidable, but I respected the hunter's wishes to not go after him for now. If I come back later game and she is still standing there I'll know what I have to do. Curious if this is one of those scenarios.

[it290]

Keeping up the newer-release C=64 goodness with Age of Heroes (Psytronik 2019). This is an awesome Rastan-style game which although relatively easy (there's a challenge mode included if you want something more hardcore) is lots of fun with varied levels, the ability to select your next stage Bionic Commando-style, permanent weapon upgrades and character level ups. You can blow through the whole thing in about half an hour, but it's a great time if you like this style of game.

[Squire Grooktook]

given how much all of his games focus on the ethics of social responsibility, i would not be surprised to discover that he genuinely thinks he is doing the entire world a service with this game.

Although I don't think he meant it quite like this, he did once refer to games as "a service...rather than art."

I was slightly interested in Death Stranding when it looked like a spooky post-apoctalyptic occult horror survival sim. When I saw it was more delivery sim I completely lost interest. Might be okay. Not my thing.

[kitten]

^ you know, i think the first hour or two of the game is really strong (i went in optimistic and had to be worn down) and feel like the material could be re-arranged into a relatively solid experience. your first traversal of any stretch of land is generally the best, it's the way the game wears you down with extreme repetition and nuisances that ultimately drives it unforgivably into the ground. honestly, for all his conceit, the reason i really am most irritated with kojima is that he lacks the confidence to deliver any purity of ideal. he has no real self-respect and is deathly afraid of just letting his ideas out there unguarded, which is why they go so totally out of control in over-complication and ceaseless reiteration.

i do actually think the guy has some neat ideas, he just very badly needs an editor (and maybe an assertive therapist) and to swallow himself for a moment. dude is a mess, and i'm saying that with some sincere empathy. here's hoping movies are more therapeutic medium for him to finally tackle and he doesn't make bizarre 5-hour epics that leave you begging to die.

[Squire Grooktook]

Based on his games and some interviews, my impression of Kojima is that he's just a really hyperactive, surface level kind of guy.

The kind who will skim a wikipedia page of some random esoteric subject, be like "D-DUDE...!", throw it in his narrative, and then forget about it to repeat the process until the drawing board looks like a Jackson Pollock painting.

Very much needs an editor.

[kitten]

my favorite "read a wikipedia page and put this into my work" auteur is araki. he makes it work

opposite example where i'm incredibly glad the guy doesn't have an editor

[Blinge]

the reason i really am most irritated with kojima is that he lacks the confidence to deliver any purity of ideal. he has no real self-respect and is deathly afraid of just letting his ideas out there unguarded, which is why they go so totally out of control in over-complication and ceaseless reiteration.

The example par excellence is MGS4 I guess. The player is absolutely clobbered over the head with them concepts.. It's so strange how much I loved that game on first play and every subsequent look leaves me more and more sick.

Interesting you'd put this down to a lack of confidence. I thought he might've been treating his fans like idiots who won't get it without the repetition. I guess it could be a form of both.

I'm gonna parrot (inaccurately) what JDE said to me about Stranding though.. Despite probably not liking it and what it turned out as, part of me just likes that it exists; the fact that Sony would finance such a thing at AAA level. It makes a change from the standard design by committee risk-free, microtransaction, lootbox ridden tripe that makes up modern games.

[Sumez]

If that was what Konami's next Silent Hill was turning out as, however, I almost understand why they fired Kojima :3

[kitten]

It makes a change from the standard design by committee risk-free, microtransaction, lootbox ridden tripe that makes up modern games.

i mean, i guess. i don't know, i don't play much AAA anymore and death stranding to me still feels like some hyper-bloat, ubisoft-adjacent bullshit in comparison to a lot of the other similarly narrative-focused games you can play, these days. maybe it's not as bad as the relatively recent 22nd (yes, 22nd) assassin's creed in how much detritus there is, but it feels about as miserable to me as playing one of those games. there's definitely some imagination, but the play routines and constant leveling, micromanaging, inventory organizing, orders/missions (of which there are nearly six fucking hundred, the vast majority of which most of which can be repeated for higher ranking for more unlocks), collecting, etc. feel more cynical than the last ubisoft game i played.

it's hard to see a substantial difference between this and all the other junk out there. it feels to me more like kojima caving into AAA trends than it does him being one to stand up and show them what you can do without them. a lot of indies fall into the trap of copying design from massively popular trends, too - those who think themselves infallible to influence like that rarely are.

Interesting you'd put this down to a lack of confidence. I thought he might've been treating his fans like idiots who won't get it without the repetition. I guess it could be a form of both.

it's both - they're one in the same, actually. almost any confident artist will put their work out there without the fear of it being misunderstood. it's his insecurity that people won't understand him that makes him compromise his games so much. when you cave to your lowest common denominator to make sure they'll "get" your genius, you make a game for them, not everyone else.

[Sumez]

I'm playing the PS4 God of War, or hell, let's call it God of War 4, because that's what it is.

I was expecting a ton of AAA jank, and some kind of tedious open world crap, but hey this is actually a fairly enjoyable and chill beat'em up.
More to the point, I was expecting a departure and reinvention of the series, a soft reboot if you will. But hell naw, this is straight up by-the-book God of War. Right to the point of smashing in the faces of gods with a rock wall within the first hour of the game, in a barely interactive cinematic. There are a bunch of new mechanics of course, but nothing that changes the fundamentals.

I'm playing on the harder difficulty (but not the supposedly insane-ass highest one), and I'm enjoying it a lot. The game does have a lot of issues though, but I'll wait on commenting any more on the game until I've played it till the end. There's a few things in terms of structure and storytelling that might yet redeem themselves.

[third_strike]

Now, cadillacs and dinosaurs.
I will try 1LC this.

Here is The Punisher CPS2 1LC, I did last year: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QozIm74CzKo

[Ruldra]

Just want to say that I bought Aggelos and I'm loving every minute of it. It's been a while since I enjoyed a game this much.

[Jonny2x4]

it's both - they're one in the same, actually. almost any confident artist will put their work out there without the fear of it being misunderstood. it's his insecurity that people won't understand him that makes him compromise his games so much. when you cave to your lowest common denominator to make sure they'll "get" your genius, you make a game for them, not everyone else.

Kojima's insecurity is no more obvious at his treatment of Raiden post-MGS2, where he made Snake (well Big Boss, but he's basically just Snake in the prequels) the protagonist again in MGS3 and then introduced a character that was basically one big joke at the expense of Raiden, and then in MGS4 he desperately tried to make Raiden cooler than Snake by making him the new Cyborg Ninja.

[Blinge]

While I take all your points, Kitten.

There's part of me that is impressed by a game of that budget being released that isn't about killing or hitting things.
Where's Mx7 at he might love it.

[Jonny2x4]

I'm sure most of the budget went into face-scanning Norman Reedus (and all the other celebrity actors) and not into the development of the actual game.

[Blinge]

lol oh shit yeah.

[kitten]

my fav part of the game is being mads mikkelson's baby and having storybooks read to

[guigui]

Just want to say that I bought Aggelos and I'm loving every minute of it. It's been a while since I enjoyed a game this much.

Also had a nice time with it, though I was complaining about the difficulty not being right imo. I wonder if Sumez would finish his hard run ?

[Sumez]

I finished it I'm not sure I'd recommend it to others, but I found it super rewarding!

[Ghegs]

Just finished off Blasphemous.

It was a good, but not great, mix of a few elements from Dark Souls and Metroidvanias with some gorgeous (and at times grotesque) sprite art going for it. I'd say it's comparable to Hollow Knight in the overall feel of everything, only Hollow Knight is more fine-tuned and polished. The Dark Souls DNA shows up in overall gloomy feel of the world, how different sections of the map intersect with each other via shortcuts, and how dying leaves behind a marker for you to fetch. Though the punishment is only sealing off a bit of your MP bar, there's no stats to improve here, and money is only used to buy items or improving your attacks. The Metroidvania DNA is even fainter, there are some items that help you in traversing specific areas, but that's pretty much it.

Speaking of the gloomy feel, the game's theme is a rather one note affair - it's all about religious guilt and suffering in penance. Absolutely everything is about that, from the world building, character motivations, events, item descriptions...there's not much variation there.

I beat the final boss for the first time at around the 12 hour mark, but then I went back and got items I had missed before, explored places I couldn't get to earlier and did the things needed for the good ending, which pushed my counter up to ~17,5 hours. It was fairly easy going from start to end - some bosses I beat on my first attempt, most on second or third, and there were only two bosses that I had to try more times than that. Overall, everything's good - the controls, the combat, the world, audio and visual, everything's solid. I do wish there was an option to mark things on the map yourself, and there are some (non-mandatory) quests where you need to bring certain items to certain NPCs, and I was a bit lost who wanted that. So I ended up just visiting all of them every now and then to see if I had any of the items they wanted.

While I did like game overall, my enjoyment was brought down by some bugs. The game crashed on me twice (playing the GOG version), and the second time it did, it actually caused changes to my save file. Most of the shortcuts I had opened up in the world were closed again, and all the collectibles were available to be grabbed again. There was at least one door that became permanently sealed because it opened after killing a boss, but luckily none of this broke my game and made it unwinnable. I could still get where I needed to be, even if it meant opening up the shortcuts again, and though I could re-collect items, the game didn't give me a second copy of the item if I already had it in my inventory. Except in one case, where I had "evolved" said item, and I was able to pick up the initial version of it again. Naturally this also increased my gametime for no good reason. At least I was still able to get the good ending despite of it.

3/5, with the bugs patched out it'd be a solid 4/5 from me.

[Ruldra]

Also had a nice time with it, though I was complaining about the difficulty not being right imo. I wonder if Sumez would finish his hard run ?

I'm playing Hard mode right off the bat. While I agree that some enemies hit way too hard and you need to be extra careful at some points, it's still manageable imo. Just unlocked the air temple and doing well so far.

[guigui]

Also had a nice time with it, though I was complaining about the difficulty not being right imo. I wonder if Sumez would finish his hard run ?

I'm playing Hard mode right off the bat. While I agree that some enemies hit way too hard and you need to be extra careful at some points, it's still manageable imo. Just unlocked the air temple and doing well so far.

Nice job getting to Air Temple, I gave up hard mode before that. Sumez said he could clear the game on Hard, so you can do it too, enjoy.

[it290]

I started Blasphemous tonight based on Ghegs' review. Really loving the art direction and feel of the game. Someone on YT labeled it 'Christpunk' which I think is appropriate. The overall design obviously heavily borrows from Dark Souls, but the music reminds one of Diablo. So far I'm only at the second boss and the challenge is decent if mildly inconsistent. Agreed that the game emphasizes platforming and combat more heavily than exploration, but that's not a negative in my opinion. Nothing strikingly original here at all but a fun and cool ride regardless.