What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Anything from run & guns to modern RPGs, what else do you play?
User avatar
kitten
Posts: 1102
Joined: Mon Mar 20, 2017 1:26 pm
Location: プププランド

Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by kitten »

Mischief Maker wrote:Because the psych evaluation tapes for all these supervillains make a mockery of the idea that they could be cured.
this happens with volume 4 of batman: tas, too, and i believe both were helmed by paul dini. while the guy is often cited (along with bruce timm, who is also a mess) as the magic man who made the DCAU go 'round, i think he may actually just be a fucking idiot whose one or two good ideas got amplified by everyone else around him. real george lucas situation, but i'd argue arkham asylum and its sequels are dumber than any of the prequel movies.

really fucking pisses me off, too - batman: tas very passionately argued in favor of rehabilitation and forgiveness and took to deeply nuanced depictions of traumatized and broken individuals at the edge of their rope. batman didn't just beat the shit out of Crazy Folks, he tried to set them back on the right path and was often broken and worn down by his inability to help some people. i still cry at some episodes, and the show has obvious, tremendous bones to pick with modern society. bruce becomes an anti-hero or even outright villain in his own show by batman beyond, clearly having been pushed across the edge and having lost what was holding him together as a compassionate individual. most interpretations of batman *across the board* since batman: tas completely lack nuance or taste and just delve into nonsensical hyperviolence and "the mythos." the batman beyond bruce - a broken, decrepit, angry man ready to murder and on the road to dying angry and alone - is all you see today, only rather than being criticized and seen as a cautionary tale he's uncritically heroic. eugh.

frank miller occasionally writes decent bats, too, and is probably the only guy to able to take him to a point of insane hyper-violence successfully. while he occasionally goes off the deep-end and nearly into alex jones crazypants territory on a few stories (the man went insane for a while after 9/11 lol), he's got some damn sharp wit mixed into some of his comics and a lovably violent, satirical bend that is pretty worthwhile. i often wonder what his politics are and he sometimes veers more right-winged than i'm comfortable with, but the guy probably hates republicans more than even alan moore.
~Imagination and memory are but one thing, which for diverse considerations have diverse names~
Image | Image
~*~*~*~*~*~* If there's a place that I could be ~ Then I'd be another memory *~*~*~*~*~*~
User avatar
vol.2
Posts: 2435
Joined: Mon Oct 31, 2016 3:13 pm
Location: bmore

Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by vol.2 »

kitten wrote:politics
far-right libertarian.
User avatar
BrianC
Posts: 8859
Joined: Wed Jan 26, 2005 1:33 am
Location: MD

Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by BrianC »

BIL wrote:Never again will we see the Hobbesian alacrity of Famicom Batman - where Bats not only promptly executes a beaten Joker, but the game refuses to proceed until you manually walk him over to commence extrajudicial Bat-defenestration. edit: It could only be improved if hesitant players were electrocuted by a massive comedy dildo turned 9000V stun-gun upon approaching the recovered Joker.
Not to mention the Tim Burton directed Batman movies themselves had a Batman who was willing to kill. I like TAS quite a bit, as well other versions like Golden Age, Frank Miller, BatB 2012 series, the 60s comics, Batmanga, and the 60s TV series/movie. I liked what I read of early batman too, where one of the thugs just happened to fall off a cliff when Batman threw him and Batman said it was a "fitting end for one of his kind". I liked how Marv Wolfman wrote a couple episodes of Batman TAS and Teen Titans. I liked his 80s New Teen Titans.

Paul Dini made some good Batman and He-Man episodes, but a lot of his newer stuff is questionable or aimed at a younger audience.
User avatar
Sumez
Posts: 8019
Joined: Fri Feb 18, 2011 10:11 am
Location: Denmarku
Contact:

Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by Sumez »

Taking the Batman vilains to that asylum is a completely accepted suspension of disbelief to me. It's central to the entire setting, and I wouldn't have it otherwise.
User avatar
kitten
Posts: 1102
Joined: Mon Mar 20, 2017 1:26 pm
Location: プププランド

Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by kitten »

^ i mean, it is absolutely not acceptable suspension of disbelief when the characters are insane turbo murderers that kill more people than cancer. it works in the context of TAS very well because it's pro-rehabilitation and compassion and they usually aren't slaughtering people by the dozen, hundred, thousand, etc. any batman world that allows for a little silliness, levity, or even just absurdity (a world of satirical INSANE VIOLENCE also works, so long as it knows it is really over-the-top satire!!) tends to make arkham asylum (the concept, not the game) make enough sense, i guess. it's still silly and i don't think the world needs to address what magical prison they're in that they keep getting out of because it just turns back the curtain.

but most modern conceptions of batman - the arkham series of games, especially - are head-up-their-ass serious about proselytizing their bizarre stance on true heroes never killing people while also having impossibly capable, intelligent, and powerful sociopath villains with body counts literally above quadruple digits. aaaaand despite pretending not-murder is noble, it still eagerly glorifies the completely obscene brutality of its billionaire vigilante protagonist, anyway. it's deeply disingenuous at best, unforgivably stupid at worst, and more than a little bit sociopolitically regressive, either way.
~Imagination and memory are but one thing, which for diverse considerations have diverse names~
Image | Image
~*~*~*~*~*~* If there's a place that I could be ~ Then I'd be another memory *~*~*~*~*~*~
User avatar
Sumez
Posts: 8019
Joined: Fri Feb 18, 2011 10:11 am
Location: Denmarku
Contact:

Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by Sumez »

I disagree. The Arkham series of games is definitely a part of the intentionally absurd comic book world - the fact that they have a generally dark tone to them doesn't mean they are trying to be serious and realistic too.
The absurdity of it is the first thing you need to buy into to enjoy the setting, and it's basically the basis for anything that is Batman. It's just how comic books works.
User avatar
Blinge
Posts: 5369
Joined: Tue Feb 19, 2013 4:05 pm
Location: Villa Straylight

Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by Blinge »

"Superheroes are dumb" - Me, an intellectual.
Image
1cc List - Youtube - You emptylock my heart
User avatar
kitten
Posts: 1102
Joined: Mon Mar 20, 2017 1:26 pm
Location: プププランド

Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by kitten »

i can buy into absurdity. i love absurdity. i don't love dissonant marriage of it with the real, with the serious. not when it doesn't communicate anything useful. 'grimdark' could be valuable if it even truly believed in that element of itself and didn't go also spouting twisted virtues about its insane conception of justice. hell, i love garth ennis' works with the punisher, and they're often about how justice cannot be found through hellish violence by measure of representing the most grimdark situations imaginable and presenting the morally grey and murky with a bold face. i can find useful communication or the presence of values whether agreeable or not in a moore store, a miller story, the cartoon, hell, even the adam west show or the burton flicks - not in those games, not in most the new stuff. they're too confused, too sprawling, too messy, too useless. everything is just a mess - hell, "everything is just a mess" would be saying something, but that's not what it is saying, just what it is. i'd be happy if i could even disagree with the game, but it can't articulate a point without already disagreeing with itself.

if you can tell me what the arkham games are saying that has teeth and isn't contradicted by something else in the game - through mechanics or through narrative, i'll frankly take either - i'm interested in hearing it. it can't even communicate how interesting violence is without trying to marry it with a totally facile ideology it doesn't even believe about when it's justified and how much is acceptable. i mean, i ain't being picky here, i'd have accepted something as rudimentary as "violence" as a value or ideology on its own. i can't accept something that can't even accept itself, that can't even understand itself. mythos and lore for the sake of mythos and lore is offensively useless, you might as well be reading mark millar stories or watching marvel movies.

the batman and the justice systems in that game's universe not killing the villains just doesn't make sense - there's a reason miller's bats goes fucking crazy and starts wasting dudes. :shock: that the punisher is an unstoppable avatar of violence. that judge dredd is judge, jury, and executioner. arkham's bats is a totally irrational character in the world he is in, and rather than saying something about his irrationality the game still pretends he's cool and smart and correct and just and driven by noble purpose. sometimes it challenges him only to say he's right in the end, anyway (why? idk. he just is. he's batman. batman is now an ideology).

god *damn* i apparently really, really hate shitty batman lol. or just... capes comics stuff, in general, most of the time.

edit - uhhhh, tl;dr: instead imagine i posted some ironic reverse of the "wow cool robot" meme. like, it says "wow cool batman," except that's what's going over the dude's head (via a batarang? grappling hook?) while the dude interprets batman as saying something. the batman in this meme is the arkham asylum batman. i am too lazy to create this image.
~Imagination and memory are but one thing, which for diverse considerations have diverse names~
Image | Image
~*~*~*~*~*~* If there's a place that I could be ~ Then I'd be another memory *~*~*~*~*~*~
User avatar
Sumez
Posts: 8019
Joined: Fri Feb 18, 2011 10:11 am
Location: Denmarku
Contact:

Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by Sumez »

If you really want to be realistic, it's hard to imagine a justice system anywhere in the world straight up just killing criminals, yet there are still places out there struggling with basic human rights. :)

The villains in the Batman comics are straight up abstract and colorful monsters that don't really belong in any kind of realistic depictions of a "justice system", and the Arkham games ham them up to 11. I really don't understand how they don't mesh with a haunted house style caricature of an insane asylum.
User avatar
kitten
Posts: 1102
Joined: Mon Mar 20, 2017 1:26 pm
Location: プププランド

Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by kitten »

sumez idk if you've ever listened to paul dini talk but he tends to take himself pretty seriously. i think you may be just enjoying the games for the silliness but i swear to you that guy thinks that shit is serious, and he's the one writing them :shock: most of the fanbase thinks it's the fucking bee's knees, too.

- also, i'm not sure what you're intimating abt justice systems? what do americans do to ppl we label terrorists who kill people in single digits? the american justice system locks u in jail for a decade for smoking an herb in your house and drone bombs you and your family for having written sedition. even in cartoon abstraction fantasy land i think either the righteous vigilante or the justice system would kill the arkham asylum joker, but BOTH being like "nah dude, he's a human being, gotta let him live" is pt outrageous.
~Imagination and memory are but one thing, which for diverse considerations have diverse names~
Image | Image
~*~*~*~*~*~* If there's a place that I could be ~ Then I'd be another memory *~*~*~*~*~*~
User avatar
FinalBaton
Posts: 4461
Joined: Sun Mar 08, 2015 10:38 pm
Location: Québec City

Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by FinalBaton »

Blinge wrote:"Superheroes are dumb" - Me, an intellectual.
mah boi
-FM Synth & Black Metal-
User avatar
Mischief Maker
Posts: 4802
Joined: Thu May 08, 2008 3:44 am

Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by Mischief Maker »

Woah, what a mega-discussion I've spawned with that little comment!

But my question is genuine, I really can't tell what the game's tone is aiming for. So many times Batman beats up two goons in the room with a helpless civilian then says to them, "stay here, you're safe now." And literally two minutes later you see that same civilian being dragged off to some horrible torture booth by the Joker's thugs.

The only thing I can clearly identify is the game's SUPER anti-reform. With the aforementioned tapes in which every comically inept psychologist gets killed by their patient, the scarab blocks that tells the story of the Arkham dude getting driven insane by his pursuit of criminal reform, and the cheerful voice talking about how the asylum is great for non-violent patients and they accept most HMOs while you're walking through a hallway straight out of a Silent Hill game.

I dunno, maybe politics have melted my brain, I love the "feel" of the game, love the spooky surroundings, the music is fantastic. Yet I can't stop being quizzical every time Joker gives Batman a wide open shot to kill him and end it all now, Batman can't bring himself to do it, then as a direct result dozens of named NPCs with entire character biographies die horribly in poison gas. The one clear message in this game is that Arkham doesn't work, Batman! Take 'em someplace else, at least!

Obligatory.
Two working class dudes, one black one white, just baked a tray of ten cookies together.

An oligarch walks in and grabs nine cookies for himself.

Then he says to the white dude "Watch out for that black dude, he wants a piece of your cookie!"
User avatar
kitten
Posts: 1102
Joined: Mon Mar 20, 2017 1:26 pm
Location: プププランド

Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by kitten »

Mischief Maker wrote:I really can't tell what the game's tone is aiming for.
it can't, either
The only thing I can clearly identify is the game's SUPER anti-reform.
even this is made debatable - there's a hell of a lot about how the criminals are abused and mistreated by the corrupt arkham staff and that arkham is the problem, itself. it refuses to seriously take any concrete position. is it impossible to reform criminals? is it the system's fault, if so? what's the alternative? no answers, just a billionaire aggressively brutalizing people with a sense of absolute purpose and unflinching courage. modern batman is the exact product of today's reactionary america, might as well be jeff bezos in the costume. shit's dumber than (but exactly as useless as) south park or gta at their worst.

the anti-reform vibe they mostly pick up from miller's dark knight returns (the game is just a potpourri of every batman media contradictorily jammed into one Product). i strongly disagree with some of miller's ideas in his batman comics, but at least the guy takes stances.

Image

tfw even the reviled schumacher movies have more wit & bite than ur game

y'all, i know way too much about mother fucking batman. how much space in my memory is batman?? this could have been memories with loved ones, the smell of a nostalgic meal, an epiphany in my youth, a meaningful dream... it's batman. it's all batman. batman. no greater commentary on the sheer evil of cultural detritus' oppressive ubiquity than the sad, damaged husk that is my fucking tortured mind. god help me.
~Imagination and memory are but one thing, which for diverse considerations have diverse names~
Image | Image
~*~*~*~*~*~* If there's a place that I could be ~ Then I'd be another memory *~*~*~*~*~*~
User avatar
BIL
Posts: 18988
Joined: Thu May 10, 2007 12:39 pm
Location: COLONY

Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by BIL »

Batman is inherently dumb and gay. There's nothing wrong with that, until you try to pretend it isn't, at which point it rapidly becomes fucking insufferable, making me want to haul MovieBob's massive deathfat ass out of a clock tower with the tendon-shearing, muscle-tearing adrenaline of a mother lifting a car off her trapped child.
User avatar
Blinge
Posts: 5369
Joined: Tue Feb 19, 2013 4:05 pm
Location: Villa Straylight

Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by Blinge »

That BIL post was simultaneously the least and most BIL post to have ever BIL'd.
Image
1cc List - Youtube - You emptylock my heart
User avatar
BIL
Posts: 18988
Joined: Thu May 10, 2007 12:39 pm
Location: COLONY

Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by BIL »

Sorry, currently rereading Beowulf in the original Nowell Codex transcript for my fifth PhD in Nerd Shit, and seething that his tight buns aren't the focus of more attention nowadays. :[

Image

Plebes
User avatar
kitten
Posts: 1102
Joined: Mon Mar 20, 2017 1:26 pm
Location: プププランド

Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by kitten »

i'm imagining BIL watching the dark knight rises and enacting the described situation. i sometimes wonder if things like select, early episodes of the animated series or the killing joke are actually the "worst" batman media for popularly positioning the serious, brooding batman and making a character so "dumb and gay" - something i think i have to fundamentally agree with - seem compelling and rich with depth (i believe alan moore has probably wondered the same thing, goddamn does that man hate what has been done with his work lol).

i think my immense hatred for today's batman is that it's a conglomerate of everything popular jammed into a package that could never make sense and an almost perfect representation of how mass media can't ever just let something exist. it becomes a franchise, a property, a brand, an identity, a god.

Image

look, he even says so, himself.

Image

batman is at a point of such cultural ubiquity that a highly successful television showrunner genuinely thinks the character is where he'd like to unravel theology for the masses. i wouldn't be surprised if more children in america know more about batman than jesus, and like him better, to boot. i don't even want to open the can of worms that 2019's joker was w/r/t its insane critical reception. batman arkham asylum is this weird parasite that is just everything batman has done that is popular up to the point of its creation with no actual voice of its own - a thing of unbaked collected mythos, like if the bible was written with the intent to be sold at gamestop. this strange, oozing mess. the thing frank zappa is singing about, here. if a new one came out, expect it to also absorb all the stuff since the last one into its mass.
~Imagination and memory are but one thing, which for diverse considerations have diverse names~
Image | Image
~*~*~*~*~*~* If there's a place that I could be ~ Then I'd be another memory *~*~*~*~*~*~
User avatar
Blinge
Posts: 5369
Joined: Tue Feb 19, 2013 4:05 pm
Location: Villa Straylight

Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by Blinge »

BIL wrote:Grendel limb tearing..or ballroom dance
whaaat, no shit man, my next tattoo's gonna be a line from Beowulf 8)
Image
1cc List - Youtube - You emptylock my heart
User avatar
vol.2
Posts: 2435
Joined: Mon Oct 31, 2016 3:13 pm
Location: bmore

Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by vol.2 »

BIL wrote:Sorry, currently rereading Beowulf in the original Nowell Codex transcript
I enjoyed the Seamus Heaney version. It came out when I was taking Medieval Lit in undergrad and that's what we studied.

On a related note, I just recently re-read Le Morte d'Arthur. I guess Mallory was a terrible shit-bag, but the weird mysticism of those books is unparalleled.
User avatar
BareKnuckleRoo
Posts: 6162
Joined: Mon Oct 03, 2011 4:01 am
Location: Southern Ontario

Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by BareKnuckleRoo »

Get off your collective asses and watch Batman Beyond already. It's smarter and less much less IDEALISTIC CRIMEFIGHTER <3 vibe than the other series which relied more on campy suspension of disbelief.

It's also the series that's blessed us with one of the most memorable villain lines ever, the "Do you have the slightest idea how little that narrows it down?" meme.
User avatar
BIL
Posts: 18988
Joined: Thu May 10, 2007 12:39 pm
Location: COLONY

Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by BIL »

kitten wrote:i sometimes wonder if things like select, early episodes of the animated series or the killing joke are actually the "worst" batman media for popularly positioning the serious, brooding batman and making a character so "dumb and gay" - something i think i have to fundamentally agree with - seem compelling and rich with depth
No those are the best ones :O I know what you mean, but clueless imitators are always going to happen. The Dark Knight Returns is another adroit take - when the flame of youth burns low, and those buns of steel begin to sag, yet bitter fury persists - that's probably inspired its share of "LOL BATMAN KILLING PPL THATS XTREEM" Snyders and "HEHE LOL HE BACK HURT SO SPUNKY TEEN HALP HIM INTO CAR, TRES QUIRKY" Whedons.

(I have a resigned tolerance of the former's slop, like one might have for a retarded dog, but a visceral disgust for the latter and his ilk. don't wink wink nudge nudge hehe so quirky at me you smarmy cunt! :O what a shocker when that gurning bellend turned out to be porking starlets on the side mirite)

Can't have the rainbow without the rain. 3;<

"Men and women and children, they all live under the dark death-shadow. He is so strong, so huge, so loathsome, that no one is able to do anything about it."

"I will then!" Beowulf leaped up in front of the Geats and heard himself shouting. "I will then!"


Image Image Image There is no "DOOD VIOLENCE" nor "hehe lol quirky" in this stuff. Hero: Do the best you have ever done, and attack the weak points of goat-fucking machine.
Blinge wrote:
BIL wrote:Grendel limb tearing..or ballroom dance
whaaat, no shit man, my next tattoo's gonna be a line from Beowulf 8)
Peep dis Image
vol.2 wrote:
BIL wrote:Sorry, currently rereading Beowulf in the original Nowell Codex transcript
I enjoyed the Seamus Heaney version.
Same same. Image Good chap was Mr. Heaney.
User avatar
Blinge
Posts: 5369
Joined: Tue Feb 19, 2013 4:05 pm
Location: Villa Straylight

Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by Blinge »

BIL wrote:[

Peep dis Image
Holy shit. That really captures the incessant feeling of dread that existing as an Anglo-Saxon must've entailed.

I read wulf on the tube for the first time last year, the bit when the lil scrub finally loses his shit at the rest of the cowards, and goes to an aging Beowulf's aid vs the Dragon was hype as fuck. Think I actually got chills.

hæþenra hyht
Image
1cc List - Youtube - You emptylock my heart
User avatar
cave hermit
Posts: 1543
Joined: Sat Sep 07, 2013 2:46 pm
Location: Pennsylvania

Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by cave hermit »

Mostly been playing Tekken 7 and the new Call of Duty.

Looking to spice things up with a nice beefy JRPG, I'm deciding between playing Bravely Default or Lost Odyssey.
User avatar
BIL
Posts: 18988
Joined: Thu May 10, 2007 12:39 pm
Location: COLONY

Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by BIL »

Blinge wrote:Holy shit. That really captures the incessant feeling of dread that existing as an Anglo-Saxon must've entailed.

I read wulf on the tube for the first time last year, the bit when the lil scrub finally loses his shit at the rest of the cowards, and goes to an aging Beowulf's aid vs the Dragon was hype as fuck. Think I actually got chills.

hæþenra hyht
Wiglaf a bro 2 the end 3;<

Mucho manlove hath no men than these, that lay down their lives for their pussy-ass squad hiding in the castle with the womenfolk and children
User avatar
kitten
Posts: 1102
Joined: Mon Mar 20, 2017 1:26 pm
Location: プププランド

Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by kitten »

BIL wrote:I have a resigned tolerance of the former's slop, like one might have for a retarded dog,
did you watch uh. batman versus superman? that was probably its name. there's this bit where batman is in some kryptonite armor pummeling clark's face into dust and then stops when he utters "martha." at this point we were watching with a group of friends, and i started talking over the film to go "WHY U SAY MARTHA!?? U MOMMY MARTHA?? ME MOMMY MARTHA, ALSO!!!" this being the moment he actually turns around on the guy is just. god damn lol. i love how brazenly stupid bruce is in the movie, and how unintelligible his batman voice is
but a visceral disgust for the latter and his ilk. don't wink wink nudge nudge hehe so quirky at me you smarmy cunt! :O what a shocker when that gurning bellend turned out to be porking starlets on the side mirite)
Image
~Imagination and memory are but one thing, which for diverse considerations have diverse names~
Image | Image
~*~*~*~*~*~* If there's a place that I could be ~ Then I'd be another memory *~*~*~*~*~*~
User avatar
BIL
Posts: 18988
Joined: Thu May 10, 2007 12:39 pm
Location: COLONY

Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by BIL »

Nah I never watched any of the Snyder DC films past Man of Steel, which had staggering problems, but at least led to a great Half In The Bag, as did Batman VS Superman and Justice League. :lol: But I don't actively dislike them or anything. As long as people keep that shit outta my face, at least. Image

To be honest I'm probably ok with several Marvel films, I just don't watch them ever since Avengers 2: Iron Man's Powerful Dong Laser Was Reflected Into Bruce Banner's Mouth (the only way the latter could find a peaceful death, a bromo sacrifice for the ages, until it was all undone in the subsequent film, Avengers 3: Captain America Really Knows How To Make A Man Scream).

I think Thor 2 was on the plane one year, bugger if I can remember anything about it. EDIT: oh fucc, I liked Winter Soldier. I can remember more than five minutes of that one. Still not something I'll rewatch, but ala The Dark Knight, I won't dive for the remote if it comes on the tv.

Ho ho hoooly fuck, the quips make me want to die, though. Or more specifically, the tendency of these movies' fans to barf them all over the place. Tarantino's sweary tres mature version can fuck right off, too. Middleschool verbal diarrhoea only a MovieBob could love. (and boy do I love MovieBobs, rainbow/rain etc 3;<)
User avatar
vol.2
Posts: 2435
Joined: Mon Oct 31, 2016 3:13 pm
Location: bmore

Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by vol.2 »

I'm playing DOOM. I have it running in Pbroom at 240p out to my Ikegami. I love what this era FPS does in 240p when you get really close up to a wall. Quake is also great, but it's a lot more purple.
Spoiler
Image
Last edited by vol.2 on Tue Dec 01, 2020 3:57 am, edited 2 times in total.
User avatar
Vanguard
Posts: 967
Joined: Wed Jul 31, 2013 7:32 pm

Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by Vanguard »

Been replaying Demon King Chronicle (wrote a review here after my first run through). It's a lot easier the second time. Disappointingly so, really. I loved how death waited around every corner in my first playthrough. It's good that the game rewards mastery and knowledge, it just loses something when you're not hanging on by a thread the entire time. The exploration also isn't nearly as fun since I can roughly remember where important items are and what's the easiest order to clear the different areas. Last time I spent a lot of effort trying to sneak into places I had no business going. Didn't end up with much to show for the effort, but it was fun. Now that the mystique is gone it makes more sense to clear each area once I'm good and ready for it. Don't know if anyone has ever made an exploration game that doesn't lose much of its luster the second time. Maybe half-remembered Legacy of the Wizard is better than that terribly daunting first try. RNG games' exploration might not lose as much the second time through but randomized games rarely have good exploration in the first place. With all that said, this is still really good and I'll be sure to give it a third playthrough at some point.
User avatar
Squire Grooktook
Posts: 5969
Joined: Sat Jan 12, 2013 2:39 am

Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by Squire Grooktook »

A friend was explaining the latest Crossover Crisis in which the Joker has gas which turns whoever kills him into another Joker and then Batman Joker shanks Dr Manhattan Batman (Batmanhattan) in the skull with an ENERGY KNIFE to lobotomize him (how did he do that to cosmic molecule man ? He was just really fast okay) and transplants his brain into Batmanhattan to become DARKEST KNIGHT and we all lost many brain cells by absorbing this loathsome information. Now you have too.

Batmanhattan is not a fan nickname by the way.
vol.2 wrote:What I like about Asylum/City is that there is a rhythm in the fighting
There is, but it also epitomizes one of my biggest critiques of modern 3d action game design: it's nothing but rhythm. The whole counter system and moveset basically means you never really have to move if you don't feel like it. Spacing is totally irrelevant.

I think at the time when I played it at launch, Asylum might've guided me back to arcade gaming a bit because of how tensionless everything felt. About halfway through I felt like I was just slogging through the motions, to the point that I don't recall caring too much when my game disc fucking froze on the Poison Ivy boss fight. The only thing that really stuck with me was the atmosphere/art-direction on the Scarecrow sequences.
BIL wrote: (I have a resigned tolerance of the former's slop, like one might have for a retarded dog, but a visceral disgust for the latter and his ilk. don't wink wink nudge nudge hehe so quirky at me you smarmy cunt! :O what a shocker when that gurning bellend turned out to be porking starlets on the side mirite)
Same. I talked about something similar in regards to "earnestness" in the Fromsoft thread last week. If something is worth doing, it's worth going all in. I find the wink and nod approach spineless: if you're going to sell me a concept, then fucking sell it. Don't wimp out and laugh at yourself halfway through in an attempt to avoid embarrassment if people don't like it. If you don't believe in your own story, why are you telling it to me?
RegalSin wrote:Japan an almost perfect society always threatened by outsiders....................

Instead I am stuck in the America's where women rule with an iron crotch, and a man could get arrested for sitting behind a computer too long.
Aeon Zenith - My STG.
User avatar
Ajora
Posts: 207
Joined: Mon Apr 17, 2017 5:42 pm

Re: What [not shmup] game are you playing now?

Post by Ajora »

Popful Mail: Magical Fantasy Adventure. It's very charming and fun.
There was a time, in the era of great chaos, when the Earth and the moon were at war with each other. A daredevil from the moon piloted a bizarre aircraft. It was feared, and because of its shape, called... Einhander.
Post Reply