What are you playing?

[Bebpo]

Romancing Saga 2 Remake is pretty dope.

All SaGa is dope 

[Himu]

Romancing Saga 2 Remake is pretty dope.

Game looks great

[Joe Molotov]

This is basically the first Saga game that I've played (at least since Final Fantasy Legends II on the GB lol). I'm just taking it easy and playing on Normal difficulty (not Classic) and not stressing myself about min-maxing or missing quests, and I'm having a great time. After a story-heavy game like Metaphor, I'm enjoying playing a more gameplay focused JRPG, and the pace of having a lot of dungeons and quests that you can do in just 20-30 minutes, means it's constant dopamine hits of progression. 

[demi]

Back to Saturn gaming, I'm almost done!

These are the games I have left:

- Albert Odyssey
- Dungeon Master Nexus (translation, this game is exclusive to Saturn)
- Valhollian (translation)
- Panzer Dragoon Saga
- Shining Force 3 (all 3 episodes...)
- Dragon Force 2 (translation)

But I finished one last night: Magic Knight Rayearth

This game is about $800 CIB, and as well all know, these games are never worth that much. Magic Knight Rayearth is no exception. It's a simple Zelda-like that's pretty on-rails. You can swap between each girl, with Fuu being the best of course since she has a homing bow - and - a heal spell.

Mixed in with some voice acting and anime clips (I've never seen this anime, anime is for babies of course). It has some nice music, though what is there repeats often. The difficulty is hardly there, again Fuu negates like everything in this game. I finished it in about 9 hours across two streams. There's not really much secrets, but if you find all the collectables, you unlock outtakes.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pqtmIf336RU&list=PL88C2E05CBCA72AB3

[Himu]

Never played it before but super monkey ball is crack. Got Banana Mania and it’s fiyah

Edit: I can’t get over how good this game is

[Samson Manhug]

Someone tell me why playing Super Puzzle Fighter II on my Xbox shows up on my friend's Discord as "Hentai Puzzle." 

[Svejk]

Never played it before but super monkey ball is crack. Got Banana Mania and it’s fiyah

Edit: I can’t get over how good this game is

Are you playing the original GC one? I played the piss outta it myself when it came out.  Couldn't put it down.  Couldn't get into the 2nd one though for some reason.

[Himu]

Never played it before but super monkey ball is crack. Got Banana Mania and it’s fiyah

Edit: I can’t get over how good this game is

Are you playing the original GC one? I played the piss outta it myself when it came out.  Couldn't put it down.  Couldn't get into the 2nd one though for some reason.

On switch. 1, 2, and deluxe are on a collection called Banana mania

[demi]

I played through the Piglet game that's having a viral moment on twitter right now for being "scary for kids"

https://www.twitch.tv/videos/2299500434

Besides Eeyore's entire section (which is where most people are focusing) and an early track in Pooh's area, the game is pretty standard kid's game. It also glitched out on me like 5 times at the end.

[tiesto]

Opoona - it's frutiger aero in a nutshell. A bit simplistic but fun RPG that I think is one "HIDDEN GEMMMMMM" video from becoming a sensation.

[demi]

Quick Saturn Update:

Played some games to see if they clicked for me

Valhollian

This is a simple SRPG with some... fine graphics. When you attack, you are treated to a pretty useless 3D animation. Thankfully you can turn this off.



I made it about a few maps in before I had to tap out. This game is very brutal, lots of reload/resetting. If the main character dies = game over. Enemies scale up terribly, and practically one shot you. Maps are filled with enemies, while you get like... 6 characters. Damage is pitiful on enemies, unless you do a "combo" attack, which uses up multiple characters per turn. When you end your turn you have to wait for - every - single - enemy - to end their turn. Now repeat this for hours on end. If you like Super Robot Wars I guess this is normal? It wasnt fun for me, so I bailed.

Dungeon Master Nexus

An exclusive version of Dungeon Master on Sega Saturn. I'm not really familiar with this series, but I went in with an open mind, I like dungeon crawlers to a degree! Unfortunately I didn't get much into this. I tried to follow whatever information was out there, but it was in broken french, broken japanese, broken english, so going in blind was just me clicking buttons trying to navigate the awkward controls. If you love this shit, you'll probably find more than me here.



Dragon Force 2

https://www.twitch.tv/videos/2300408770

Finally some good food. This game takes place 500 years after the first game, so a lot of the world and characters are different, but plenty of mentions and references to  at. Dragon Force 2 is more Dragon Force but with some changes. Some of these changes include:

- Being able to make split teams (e.g. 50 Cavalry + 50 Dragons) instead of just singular teams (you can still do this)
- Castles being searched automatically at the end of a round
- Being able to see compatibility for units before a battle
- Adding Caverns to allow you to level up or earn "awards" and items
- A fast mode for world travel

The graphics unfortunately got kind of a downgrade - everything is more drab and dark. Overall though the visuals are upgraded as well. Here's a quick shot between the two:



Overall I'm excited to play more and finish the campaign I went with. More Dragon Force!

[Polident Hive]

Opoona - it's frutiger aero in a nutshell. A bit simplistic but fun RPG that I think is one "HIDDEN GEMMMMMM" video from becoming a sensation.

Bought this at release and never played it. At the time it was described as an intro JRPG you could play with one hand.

That whole era was the expendable income time where I bought more games than necessary. The other day I was reminded of the Crystal Bearers Wii game. I finished it and can’t remember what it’s like. And nobody on YouTube really reviewed it.

[Himu]

DQIII hd is so good

[Let's Cyber]

Demi, did you enjoy Unicorn Overlord?

[demi]

Never played it, but I want to try Ogre Battle again at some point. I havent bought Unicorn but I'm kind of feeling the same way with that

[Himu]

I have a DQIII pre order promo code from Amazon for switch. Anyone that wants it dm me. It's a bunch of seeds (wisdom, strength;etc.) and I don't want to break the game with this.

[Svejk]

Been mostly playing Stellar Blade of late.  About half way through.  Game is pretty rad, although I feel it still hasn't reached the mind-fuckery levels of Nier: Automata... at least not yet.

And speaking of, pretty good timing of playing it since this is releasing this week...



Also still making my way through MGS2.  The recent update finally offers an upscaling option, so my timing of playing this is paying off as well.

And making baby steps through Dead Space remake.  It's starting to get it's claws in me as well.  It hasn't hit any levels of freakiness as the RE games so far, but it's still fun and atmospheric.  Only like 2-3 hours in.

Backlogging on and on...  2024 is GOATED.

[Samson Manhug]

The new Frostline DLC for DayZ is wonderful. It's amazing that this sensation of an Arma 2 mod from over a decade ago released as a standalone title to pretty much dismal reactions and yet has been continued to be developed all this time. I started playing during the pandemic because it was on Xbox Gamepass and since then I bought my first PC since the year 2001 to play it properly.

It's recently reached its peak player count 11 years after release. There's no Battlepasses, no in-game store, no microtransactions. The developers have said they don't even have plans for a DayZ 2 at the moment—they don't see a reason to abandon DayZ yet. What a treasure.

[demi]

Recent gaming:

- Ys IX: Monstrum Nox

Decided to play the latest Ys game (in my library) and played through this on Nightmare mode. Nightmare mode in these latest releases might as well be normal mode. This game is not as good as Dana (which is PEAK imo). The music alone does not compare to Dana. I still overall enjoyed it -- its fuckin Ys, man. I got the platinum.

- Dragon Force 2

I finished this, at least one campaign anyway. I think I prefer the first game, but this one is still a good time.

- Albert Odyssey: Legend of Eldean

The most traditional ass JRPG to ever grace the Sega Saturn. Game looks pretty as a 2D JRPG, but it is very, very basic. Not very difficult either so far. Also FULL of Working Designs-isms, yes including the Ebonics lines I posted somewhere else. I also discovered this game has some... what the fuck files sitting on the disc that are unused.

https://tcrf.net/Albert_Odyssey:_Legend_of_Eldean#Unused_Sounds



- Star Ocean: Integrity and Faithlesness (or SO5)

Time to play the next Star Ocean! I only briefly started it, but I will probably focus more on Albert Odyssey

[Svejk]

Spent an embarrassing amount of time taking selfies in Stellar Blade.    There's apparently 2-3 recently new quests that if you go around the Wastelands and Great Desert, you look for images of some little graffiti pics plastered in random places scattered about you're suppose to take a selfie with.  It's pretty dumb, but finding 12 of each lands you a new outfit.  To get the Nier Gear, you have to find these other random scattered items (Stellar Tears) to purchase the Neir stuff.  The collect-a-thon is driving me nuts, but I'll be content once I get the A2 outfit. 

Tried the Dynasty Warriors Origins demo.  It was much more overwhelming than the likes of Hyrule Warriors, which is probably the last musou game I've played.  Seems pretty cool, but nothing I would want to jump on day 1 or anything.

Dragons Dogma 2 - Jumping back in this makes me second guess whether this or Astrobot is my GOTY.  Sweet jeebus it's fucking tight.. It sucked me right back in.  About to take on the Sphinx riddles again tomorrow.  Also downloaded grabbed the custom music pack for it.  Didn't know it was a stand alone.  It's neat having the title music and sound effects of DD:DA.

[tiesto]

Recent gaming:

- Ys IX: Monstrum Nox

Decided to play the latest Ys game (in my library) and played through this on Nightmare mode. Nightmare mode in these latest releases might as well be normal mode. This game is not as good as Dana (which is PEAK imo). The music alone does not compare to Dana. I still overall enjoyed it -- its fuckin Ys, man. I got the platinum.

- Dragon Force 2

I finished this, at least one campaign anyway. I think I prefer the first game, but this one is still a good time.

- Albert Odyssey: Legend of Eldean

The most traditional ass JRPG to ever grace the Sega Saturn. Game looks pretty as a 2D JRPG, but it is very, very basic. Not very difficult either so far. Also FULL of Working Designs-isms, yes including the Ebonics lines I posted somewhere else. I also discovered this game has some... what the fuck files sitting on the disc that are unused.

https://tcrf.net/Albert_Odyssey:_Legend_of_Eldean#Unused_Sounds



- Star Ocean: Integrity and Faithlesness (or SO5)

Time to play the next Star Ocean! I only briefly started it, but I will probably focus more on Albert Odyssey

Oh god, SO5. I'm a SO series apologist but even I can't defend that trash. Curious about your thoughts once you make a bit more progress. And curious as to what you think of the torturous final dungeon in Albert Odyssey, that game was like a 6/10 for me up to that point, where it suddenly became a 4/10.

[demi]

I finished Albert Odyssey. Game was pretty mid, and it was weird how they basically jacked up the XP of the last few bosses lol. I took a bunch of screengrabs from the goofy Working Design translation.

https://imgur.com/a/QN0hNR4

[Svejk]

Still chugging away at Stellar Blade.  The amount of filler fetch quests in the Wasteland and Great Desert are only tolerable due to watching Eve move and her combat.  The “story” tidbits and so forth you find in digital pads and notes, are painfully uninspired.  Nothing like Nier Automata, or Horizon even.  Needless to say, I’m starting to b-line the game.  I got most moves and the outfits and accessories I like unlocked, so the fomo is gone.  So far, it’s been a soft 8/10 game.  The old school PS2 design standpoint is great, but the modern open hub/world-ish quests feels a bit forced and unnecessary… especially when the story doesn’t really branch off in any way. 

Slowly making progress in Dragon’s Dogma 2 trophy hunting.  Trying to trigger a cyclopsian bridge when you’re OP, makes it a bit challenging.  Also realized that I never came across a Dulahan in my initial playthrough.  Moving the regular quests along to get to another quest that can supposedly lead to one.  At least these open world side quests are more engaging and feel appropriate for the game.

Lords of the Fallen – I loaded up and tried this game again for like the 4th time.. It still just does not click with me.  It’s not sparking any Souls feels for some reason.  Just feels unusually off, and I can’t pinpoint why.  The wise thing would be for me to pick up Dark Souls 1 Remastered, as I never played it.

Contra: Operation Galuga – Picked this back up to do more Arcade runs; to unlock more characters and upgrades.  Unlocked Sheena from Contra:HC.  She has unique gun fire, similar to what she had in HC, which is pretty cool.  Getting Spread will give her her  “>>>>” shot, but holding it down charges one giant “>” shot.  She even has unique animations; like ducking for example, she’ll lay on her back instead along with different stage complete poses.  Nice little touches.  Working on unlocking Browny next.  It’s not the end all, be all Contra… Far from it, but it’s easily right up there with Contra 4 goodness. 

[Joe Molotov]

Just started Stellar Blade. I'm only a few hours in, still in the first area. It's pretty sweet.

[tiesto]

I just beat Opoona. Super charming game, though there are certainly clunky and dated elements to it. Really like the art direction in the game, everything has that mid 2000s futuristic "Frutiger Aero" look. Warm neon colors, futuristic minimalist signage, sleek metallic environments. Though the last third of the game falls back into some traditional RPG territory. The soundtrack is (mostly) phenomenal, though some of the objectives for the "licenses" you get aren't super clear, area layouts are very confusing too (though you eventually get the "structure" of how things are laid out), and some of the jobs feel kinda like rote busywork. The one-handed control scheme (only using the Wii nunchuck) is also innovative. This game feels like something that would be appreciated much more nowadays.

Also beat Metroid Prime 2 Echoes. Very punishing and oppressive game to play, especially in the dark world. The fact the dark world is constantly draining your health, dissuading you of exploration, I feel misses the whole point of a Metroid. Never at any time did I feel powerful, still relying on charge shots and trying to remember what monsters have which weaknesses. Some of the environments were insanely cool, especially the Torvus Bog and the Sanctuary Fortress.

Currently working on Ys X (very good though the setting and graphics feel kinda drab) and Mega Man Network Transmission (extremely clunky at first - i.e. it takes 10 regular shots just to kill an enemy, but more manageable once you get some powerups). Also, about to leave for the DR for a destination wedding, will bring my Analogue Pocket along with FFL2 and Kirby and the Amazing Mirror. I made it really far into FFL2 as a kid but could never beat it, so now it's time.

[Svejk]

I just beat Opoona. Super charming game, though there are certainly clunky and dated elements to it. Really like the art direction in the game, everything has that mid 2000s futuristic "Frutiger Aero" look. Warm neon colors, futuristic minimalist signage, sleek metallic environments. Though the last third of the game falls back into some traditional RPG territory. The soundtrack is (mostly) phenomenal, though some of the objectives for the "licenses" you get aren't super clear, area layouts are very confusing too (though you eventually get the "structure" of how things are laid out), and some of the jobs feel kinda like rote busywork. The one-handed control scheme (only using the Wii nunchuck) is also innovative. This game feels like something that would be appreciated much more nowadays.

Also beat Metroid Prime 2 Echoes. Very punishing and oppressive game to play, especially in the dark world. The fact the dark world is constantly draining your health, dissuading you of exploration, I feel misses the whole point of a Metroid. Never at any time did I feel powerful, still relying on charge shots and trying to remember what monsters have which weaknesses. Some of the environments were insanely cool, especially the Torvus Bog and the Sanctuary Fortress.

Currently working on Ys X (very good though the setting and graphics feel kinda drab) and Mega Man Network Transmission (extremely clunky at first - i.e. it takes 10 regular shots just to kill an enemy, but more manageable once you get some powerups). Also, about to leave for the DR for a destination wedding, will bring my Analogue Pocket along with FFL2 and Kirby and the Amazing Mirror. I made it really far into FFL2 as a kid but could never beat it, so now it's time.

MP2 was definitely a slog. I remember just wanting to get it over with back then. Great music though.

[Polident Hive]

I don’t think I ever finished MP2. Originally released at an unfortunate time. In that same month as Halo 2, Half-Life 2, and MGS3. Bought it, gravitated towards the other games. Tried again years later with the Wii trilogy. Then I might’ve just gotten bored and stopped.

[Joe Molotov]

Finished the second area of Stellar Blade. The open world zone wasn't as good as the linear first zone. They probably could have made a really awesome 15 hour game if they just left out all the extra guff and stuck to tight, linear stages. Oh well, it's still good. I need to farm up some Stellar Tears now so I can be 2B (only reason I bought this game ).

[Svejk]

Finished the second area of Stellar Blade. The open world zone wasn't as good as the linear first zone. They probably could have made a really awesome 15 hour game if they just left out all the extra guff and stuck to tight, linear stages. Oh well, it's still good. I need to farm up some Stellar Tears now so I can be 2B (only reason I bought this game ).

Agreed.  The open hub Wasteland and Great Desert parts really fizzled out the momentum for me... I too had to Stellar Tear it up till I got my fav combo of A2 outfit, with B2's hair and blindfold.     With that, I'm more than content with the look now. Pretty cool they added some music tracks from Neir: A, too.  Fishing; did once and was good to not do that again.   You'll blow by where I'm at though I'm sure, as I'm slow AF.  I just hope it gains some serious momentum in this second half.

[Joe Molotov]

Finished the Great Desert, this area was so anus lol. This is some unfinished/cut content they accidentally left in the game. I have a few side quests left, but it’s just so bad, I’ve gotta get out of there. Most of the side quests are terrible anyway and the rewards are like “here’s 3000 gold and 4 health packs” uhh thanks. It’s mostly just the bulletin board filler quests that I didn’t do, I did all the “story” quests (they’re pretty bad too).

Also, it’s kinda crazy that it takes this long to unlock fishing. If I’d unlocked it earlier, I probably would’ve done more of it, but at this point I don’t even care anymore. It’s actually pretty well designed imo.

[Svejk]

Finished the Great Desert, this area was so anus lol. This is some unfinished/cut content they accidentally left in the game. I have a few side quests left, but it’s just so bad, I’ve gotta get out of there. Most of the side quests are terrible anyway and the rewards are like “here’s 3000 gold and 4 health packs” uhh thanks. It’s mostly just the bulletin board filler quests that I didn’t do, I did all the “story” quests (they’re pretty bad too).

Also, it’s kinda crazy that it takes this long to unlock fishing. If I’d unlocked it earlier, I probably would’ve done more of it, but at this point I don’t even care anymore. It’s actually pretty well designed imo.

Yep. Absolute horrible pacing.  Extreme time wasting filler quests.  Only one that was pseudo interesting was getting the Xion's bar singer's legs/body back.  Also agree on fishing... Once I did it, I was already burnt out from the area, I just wanted to move on.

Here's the last screenshot I took when I had to stop last sesh..

[bork]

Finished the second area of Stellar Blade. The open world zone wasn't as good as the linear first zone. They probably could have made a really awesome 15 hour game if they just left out all the extra guff and stuck to tight, linear stages. Oh well, it's still good. I need to farm up some Stellar Tears now so I can be 2B (only reason I bought this game ).

[Joe Molotov]

Finished the second area of Stellar Blade. The open world zone wasn't as good as the linear first zone. They probably could have made a really awesome 15 hour game if they just left out all the extra guff and stuck to tight, linear stages. Oh well, it's still good. I need to farm up some Stellar Tears now so I can be 2B (only reason I bought this game ).

[tiesto]

Flew out to the Dominican Republic for a wedding last week and played a bunch of SaGa 2/FFL2 on the flight down, and while relaxing at the beach. I played a ton of this as a kid, but never did finish it. Venus always stopped me in my tracks. My first time playing FFL2 was renting it at a Phar-Mor while visiting my snowbird grandparents in Florida, so playing in a tropical setting brought up fond nostalgic memories. I'm a bit further than Venus now, as I have 33 more years of RPGs under my belt since then. Up to Sengoku-era world now. I fucking love the SaGa games, though have only beat 1 (back in the day) and 3 (first time completed was a few years ago) and Frontier. The variety of environments and the interesting, abstract character building mechanics are always cool... this reminds me I gotta play the RS2 remake too, as I haven't really delved very much into the 3 RS games. SaGa2 and Frontier are my series favorites so far, due to their wild settings and fantastic soundtracks.

[Joe Molotov]

Started playing Indy, it’s pretty dope. I made it to Giza.

[MMaRsu]

Indy is very dope and it only gets better

[chronovore]

Last few FPS I tried to play on my TV made me motion sick. Not sure how I'll play Indy. I want to!

[MMaRsu]

Well it is first person for the most part, however there is a crosshair on screen, which can help against motion sickness I believe.

Also it's not a very fast paced game in that matter

[Polident Hive]

Experience with the Meta Quest 3S follows a trajectory of thinking VR is very cool and ten minutes later just wanting to play normally on a monitor. Previous time was the PSVR1, only with the controller for Astrobot. This is the first experience with hand tracking. What I’ve yet to grasp is needing to physically turn around. The free motion games I’ve tried, I’m treating it like Time Crisis 4’s FPS mode. One stick moves, the other turns the camera, and right hand aims the gun. It’s not intuitive.

Will probably continue mess around. And I see the value to VR but I don’t think it’s there yet for me.

[Svejk]

Guess it’s that time of the year where I have my phone emulator splurge.  Got DamonSX2 (PS2 emu) running pretty well on my phone.  2x upscaling with barely any performance hit.  Realized I never gave Dragon Quest VIII a try, and wow… what a treat of a DQ game!  The presentation value is really impressive for a PS2 game.  With the upscaling and the in-game option for 16:9, it looks practically right up there with DQXI. 

[Polident Hive]

Not bothering with PC VR but some VR mods are available on Android. Interesting insofar as how scale of normal video games is completely out of whack in VR.

Return to Castle Wolfenstein is actually really impressive in how natural it feels. The team putting together the mod allows for dual wielding and physically stabbing instead of a button press. At the same time, at default height, it’s like tiny huge island in Mario 64. You feel like a hobbit. Adjusting the height to make the environment scale correct, all the enemies become the hobbits looking up at you.

Still really cool. The first mission has a moment where enemies on the floor below shoot up through the floorboards. Intention in the original game is toss grenades down those gaps. In VR, you can peak over, aim down, and pop off head shots in pseudo blind fire.

edit:

Ok getting motion sickness. Never experienced this before. Tried to be macho and power through it until it felt like I might actually vomit. People say pointing a fan at your “north” helps ground you.

Guess it’s that time of the year where I have my phone emulator splurge.  Got DamonSX2 (PS2 emu) running pretty well on my phone.  2x upscaling with barely any performance hit.  Realized I never gave Dragon Quest VIII a try, and wow… what a treat of a DQ game!  The presentation value is really impressive for a PS2 game.  With the upscaling and the in-game option for 16:9, it looks practically right up there with DQXI.

I’ve read up on all this for when I eventually get the Retroid 5. But it’s crazy to me how all that is playable on mid range Android phones. The higher end snapdragon chips can do Wii U, Switch, now even PS3.

[Joe Molotov]

Finished Indy this afternoon. Started playing the new metroidvania Prince of Persia next. Seems gud.

[Bebpo]

Been on an end of year indie kick and picked up a bunch of indie stuff during the last steam sale and finished up these ones:



Chasing Static - Horror sci-fi themed walking sim with light gameplay elements. You follow the radio to echoes of what happened in the past to unravel the story. Story was sorta interesting, but nothing special and not really worth the time. Decent VA work.



A Castle Full of Cats - Metroidvania structured hidden object game about finding cats in Dracula's mansion. Was pretty fun for a hidden object game. Worth the couple bucks if you like finding objects and cats. Has some fun secrets.



20 Small Mazes - Free game on steam. Drag around 20 small mazes and solve them. Does a few interesting things with mazes connecting to other mazes. It's free and only takes an hour or so. Worth it for the creative ideas.



Felvidek - A 5-6 hour jrpg made by a Slovakian dev that takes place in 15th century Slovakia. Despite the jank, it plays it mostly straight with an interesting location and some hilarious dialogue. The combat is actually pretty hardcore turn-based since you don't get levels and everything is gear and item based. Can die pretty easily but the game gets easier as you go along and get more gear and items and party members. Combat reminds me the most of some of the DS Mistwalker type games. Pretty good game and the soundtrack is fuck awesome. Also some great art.



The Excavation of Hob's Barrow - Pretty solid point and click adventure game that's folk horror. The story is engaging and the VA is some of the best I've heard all year. Really impressive VA work. The gameplay and puzzles are just kind of eh and I think whether it sticks the landing is divisive, but the atmosphere really nails folk horror of living in a weird and creepy backwater village.



A Date in the Park - One of the first games by the same dev Cloak and Dagger games. 30 minute free point and click game that's creepy and uses digitized sprites and backgrounds. It's not amazing or anything but I thought it was interesting and the ending sticks with you for a bit. Feels like the story would fit well in any horror film anthology series like V/H/S.



How Fish is Made - By the dev who made Mouthwashing. Sorta prequel to it and free. You are a fish and you flop around to the exit. Pretty fucking terrible.



Mouthwashing - Space sci-fi psychological horror adventure. I liked this but have issues with it. The story is good and the way it's told is really well done. The art is cool and the gameplay which is an adventure game mostly is passible. But the story really drags towards the end and when the gameplay does things that aren't point and click basic, it is terrible because man this dev can't do gameplay. So I enjoyed the story but don't think I'll be there day 1 for this dev's next game because they suck at gameplay. Also it's kind of similar to Signalis being a sci-fi space horror with Evangelion inspirations and Signalis is a ton better game because it actually has decent gameplay to back up the story.



Iron Lung - A game where you blindly control a submarine through a blood ocean on a moon after every living planet mysteriously vanishes leaving only humanity that is on space stations and space ships remaining and searching for answers. This is by the dev that did Dusk, which is an amazing FPS. Iron Lung was surprisingly really engaging once I got the hang of driving a submarine blind using only way points and a map and radar. Really intense game with great atmosphere and cool lore. Liked this a lot.



Sludge Life - Sandbox platformer where you explore and platform and interact with NPCs and environmental storytelling to get to 100 tag spots and tag them. It's solid and I had fun, but the platforming controls are kind of slippery and there's a lot of backtracking until you get certain items that cut backtracking down. Liked it enough that I'll play Sludge Life 2.



The Norwood Suite - First Cosmo D made game I've played and this was a really polished and interesting adventure game around 2 hours long. Has a bit of that late 90s adventure game aesthetic. Very cool setting and great music and good weird writing. It felt like a Suda game but polished instead of janky. Will play more of Cosmo D's games after this.



Fatum Betula - A very weird PS1-aesthetic game where you start at a church where the roots of a new world are growing and you're given three test tubes to fill and pour into the root's water to determine what the new world will be like. You go around 3-4 immersive environments interacting with NPCs and solving small questlines to get all kinds of materials to use in your test tubes to get tons of endings that reflect the new worlds you create. It is very much "my first 3d game in Unity" feel, but it's also kind interesting once you get in the hang of it and the endings are well done and make you want to get them all. The dev's next game "Mysteries under Ophelia Lake" is a weird fishing game where you fish for 5-6 hours to get to the mystery trench under the lake, but it sounded like it wasn't worth the time so I just watched a youtube breakdown of it and it was kind of interesting. Otoh Fatum Betula is worth the couple of hours to get the endings though at first it's pretty confusing how the game plays.

[chronovore]

I have Mouthwashing and Sludge Life, but have not played the former, and was not able to get far in the latter. I may try again. The visuals on Mouthwashing looked intriguing. The sliding window for what's considered "retro" is fascinating. Quake was mindblowingly "realistic" at the time, and much more so once the 3DFX card became mainstream.

[Polident Hive]

Batman Arkham Shadow VR

Surprisingly, it’s an actual Batman Arkham game, with concessions and simplifications for VR. The aesthetic and cast from the Origins games returns after 11 years. It’s pretty linear and doesn’t have the Metroid backtracking (yet?), but the pacing and mechanics feel like those old games. Just most actions are replaced with motion controls. The combat goes from bouncing around a room of goons to three or four guys you focus on one at a time. It becomes the Hokuto no Ken arcade game where you’re aiming punches at yellow circles. There’s only so much you can do.

[demi]

Recent gaming:

- Panzer Dragoon Saga

I finally played this game after reading about it for so long. Game is FINE... I think the combat is the highlight. Everything else is very whatever. Music was nice too.

- Star Ocean: Integrity and Faithlessness

Very mid Star Ocean. I didnt care for any of the characters, the music is whatever, just not much to talk about here. Also the horrible "protect" battles I read about online, they arent a meme. They're that bad

- The Scorpion King: Rise of the Akkadian (Gamecube) https://www.twitch.tv/videos/2332662922

Someone brought this up so I decided to stream it for them. Very generic. At least it plays Godsmack in the title screen. I found out the broken move and pretty much spammed it the whole way.

- Indiana Jones and the Great Circle

Visually great, but I think this game is pretty boring. I wish it was more focused, level centric, like Infernal Machine. The whole hubworld thing is meh

- Shining Force 3

The final game in my Saturn journey, this one is gonna be a doozy. Spanning 3 games, I'll probably be here a while. It's fun, it's Shining Force.


With only a week left of 2024, I'll probably finish Indiana Jones to wrap it up and continue working at Shining Force 3.

[Polident Hive]

Arkham Shadow VR cont.

Really surprised me. Initially I thought it’s the Uncharted Golden Abyss Vita to the main console games. But that was all based on the prologue. (If anybody cares about spoilers, sorry) The majority takes place in Blackgate Prison, where it is the Metroid loop of Arkham Asylum. Twist being, during daytime you’re disguised as “Matches Malone” to gather intel. Reminds me a little of Riddick Butchers Bay. At night, you’re Batman and it plays like the old games.

If it were a regular non-VR Arkham game released for consoles, everything else the same, I think people would’ve been really happy with it. Especially after Gotham Knights and Suicide Squad.

Read up on the development. This is all new to me, but Meta/Facebook bought a lot of games studios? It’s mainly credited to Camouflaj. Additional listings are Armature; ex-Rare who made Arkham Blackgate like 11 years ago and RE4 VR. Ready at Dawn; Daxter and the PSP God of Wars. Sanzaru; Sly Cooper 4. All starts to make sense. These guys are great at doing this exact thing. Camouflaq (apparently these guys worked with Kojima way back, to explain the spelling) also made Iron Man VR, which is said to be quite good.

[demi]

2025 is here, and with it come some goals I'd like to aim for with gaming:

- Onimusha replay, now that we're getting Onimusha 5, it's time for another replay of the series. Onimusha Tactics I might do as well for giggles, but it's not a requirement

- Goemon series! Now that majority of the games are in English in one way or another, I would like to explore this series as well.

- Legacy of Kain series, I've actually never really played these. Mostly just dabbled with Blood Omen and Soul Reaver.

Besides these, the market is open after the Saturn stuff. I'm having way more fun playing the classics rather than the newer games, and I guess I'll keep the streak going.

[Samson Manhug]

With full time work, full time school, full time parent, and my wife being pregnant again, my gaming goals for 2025 are:

- Stop buying games on Steam sale to fulfil a fantasy of having few responsibilities and being able to play them.

- Keep my Arma 3 server and unit going - we meet every 2 weeks and the scheduled game time is good for me.

- Embrace single player games that I can pause/save. I love MP games for the dynamism but I also need to get up and do other things frequently.

- Explore more retro games. I have a Retroid and the ability to pick up/put down and save/pause when necessary is great. Plus, none of these games are too engrossing and the price is right. I am not sure where to get recommendations though.

- Cancel Game Pass Ultimate again. This really isn't as good of a deal as it's made out to be, at least for me. Like the Steam sale thing, it's more aspirational. Wouldn't it be cool if I had time to play all these new games whenever (and wherever?) Wouldn't it be cool to be playing Xbox with my friends? Yeah, it would. But it doesn't happen.

- Maybe play less DayZ. It's literally the most fun game I've ever played, but it's too engrossing. The only time I can really play is late at night and I should be sleeping. I keep starting up private servers for it and that's also too engrossing (and costly—I'm paying for hosting and literally buying private mods). I am going to let my current server die and maybe write about DayZ instead.

[Polident Hive]

2025 is here, and with it come some goals I'd like to aim for with gaming:

- Onimusha replay, now that we're getting Onimusha 5, it's time for another replay of the series. Onimusha Tactics I might do as well for giggles, but it's not a requirement

- Goemon series! Now that majority of the games are in English in one way or another, I would like to explore this series as well.

- Legacy of Kain series, I've actually never really played these. Mostly just dabbled with Blood Omen and Soul Reaver.

Besides these, the market is open after the Saturn stuff. I'm having way more fun playing the classics rather than the newer games, and I guess I'll keep the streak going.

Last I checked, Blood Omen 1 options are PC with fan patches or the substandard PS1 version on emulators to mitigate loading and such. Maybe they’ll do a second remaster collection like Tomb Raider with it, Blood Omen 2, and Defiance.

[demi]

PS1 the only way to play it 

Plan is for Legacy of Kain

Blood Omen - PS1 (via PS5)
Soul Reaver - Maybe remastered, but may use my Dreamcast copy
Soul Reaver 2 - Maybe remastered, but may use my PS2 copy
Blood Omen 2 - Gamecube or Xbox (doesnt really matter). Available on PS5 but don't really care to pay $15 for it
Defiance - Xbox

[MMaRsu]

Bought this game

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1249480/ExZodiac/

Its a lot of fun

If starfox was good

[Samson Manhug]

I got GRIS to play with my two year old daughter. She loves it, but I can't figure out the puzzles 45 minutes into it.

[archnemesis]

I've played through the entire game and I also got my 7 yo to play it. He got stuck at an ice block puzzle and a difficult jump. 95% of the game he could play without help.

Where did you get stuck? Maybe you're in the wrong area? Try backtracking and see if that helps.

Their new game Neva is supposed to be great too. I haven't played that yet.

[MMaRsu]

I've played through the entire game and I also got my 7 yo to play it. He got stuck at an ice block puzzle and a difficult jump. 95% of the game he could play without help.

Where did you get stuck? Maybe you're in the wrong area? Try backtracking and see if that helps.

Their new game Neva is supposed to be great too. I haven't played that yet.

Yeah I'll be playing that



 

[chronovore]

Bought this game

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1249480/ExZodiac/

Its a lot of fun

If starfox was good

Yeah, I bought that too. It's good, and tough. Need to get back to it.

I got GRIS to play with my two year old daughter. She loves it, but I can't figure out the puzzles 45 minutes into it.

Yeah, I played a bit, got stuck, looked up the solution, realized my brain doesn't work that way… it's beautiful, but I'm not interested in unsolvable problems.

[Bebpo]

Beat more games (been in a gaming mood):


Lunastice - Fairly decent indie 3d platformer that is like a halfway between Sonic speed and non-Sonic jumping/attacking 3d platformer. But takes a bit to get good and then is over in <3 hours so isn't all that satisfying. Would love to see a sequel that is double the size.


Arzette: The Jewel of Faramore - Thought this was going to be a gag, but it was actually freaking great 2d stage based metroidvania. Really fun gameplay, good level design, funny cutscenes, great music. Only complaint is too much backtracking at endgame to collect everything. But surprisingly fantastic game.


Crow Country - Was solid. Great visuals and detailed environments, fun and challenging puzzles, actually a good story. Combat is kind of shit and it's basically a bite sized RE you finish in like 5 hours so it's satisfying but feels small and short. It's a good game, could've been better though.


Off-Peak - Was an ok short little free adventure game by Cosmo D (first release on Steam by Cosmo D prior to Norwood Suite).


The Secret of Retropolis - VR adventure game noir style. Was solid with some good writing and VA and nice art style, but easy puzzles and only like 6 rooms total or something in an hour. Too short like a lot of AA VR projects. There is a sequel that's like 3x as long so might play it at some point.


The Frog Detective 1: The Haunted Island - This was funny as hell but also barely a game at like 40 mins. Still recommendable because the writing is hilarious. I'm about midway through game #2 now.


The Moon Sliver - First steam released game by David Szymanski of Dusk and Iron Lung fame. Walking sim. Quite well written and interesting how much he's able to do with so little game (very small area and journals to grab).  Impressive.


The Music Machine - Second steam released bigger game by David Szymanski. Walking sim again. Really well written and good story. Also connects to The Moon Sliver. Between these and Iron Lung and Dusk, Szymanski is one of the best game designers/writers currently in the industry imo.


Still Wakes the Deep - First really disappointing game I've played in a while. I really liked Dear Esther and Amnesia: A Machine for Pigs (Haven't gotten to Everyone's Gone to the Rapture). So I thought I liked The Chinese Room developers. And a period piece Scottish supernatural lovecraftian tale on an oil rig in 1975 six hour interactive movie? Sounded great! But then everything about this game is bad. The story isn't very strong and with no audio logs or even really a mystery hook the only story is "Isaac go here and fix this. Isaac go here and fix that" on an oil rig that is falling apart. Yeah, it's basically Dead Space (including basically Necromorphs; this is Color out of Space; not Call of Cthluhlu) without Dead Space's combat and story stuff. So what you get is a very boring to play walking sim with bad stealth sections, bad swimming sections, with an uninteresting story that never goes anywhere. The dialogue is solid and the Scottish VA is great. Art is good. But it just felt pointless by the end. Why waste six hours on a game that has no gameplay and not much of a story? Very disappointing and I wonder if it had dev issues. Will still get to Everybody's Gone to the Rapture at some point since I've heard good things. But more hesitant about any future stuff from The Chinese Room after this.


Finally I'm late to the party but started getting into UFO50 last week. So far I've cleared Ninpek (good but made me rage), Magic Garden (good but maybe a bit simple), Barbuta (good but never would've figured this without a guide and with a guide you kind of lose the experience), Bug Hunter (really good strategy game but a lot of rng with your loadouts), Planet Zoldath (really basic/simple game but I kind of dug it?). Would like to clear all 50 games, but may give up on some that I know just aren't going to be for my skillset like I did with Paint Chase. Very impressed by the quality and depth of mechanics in the games so far.


Currently playing: More UFO50 games, LOUD, The Frog Detective 2, Lorelei and the Laser Eyes, Tales from Off-Peak City, MvC Infinite Beyond Mod

[Bebpo]

Also cleared Vergress on UFO50 last night. It was good but intense on the nerves. I had the most issues with stage 3 because I'm not great at bouncing on enemies in it.

[demi]

Recent gaming:

- Nancy Drew: Message in a Haunted Mansion (GBA) https://www.twitch.tv/videos/2343688285

After playing about 33 out of 34 games in the series (waiting for the final one to go on sale like a real pc gamer), I chose to play this. A GBA port of one of the older PC games (released 2000, GBA released a year later) so I was very curious how the experience would be. Overall I'm pretty impressed, it does a good job emulating the PC experience, but there are a lot of cuts and resource crunch to make it fit. Backgrounds looking like 1KB JPEGs, horrendously crunchy music, and misc. scenes and puzzles were cut. But it's the PC game! (this was played on my gamecube w/ game boy interface, which is funny since the stream looks like its being emulated. its not!)

I signed up for a little Twitch series where streamers play "jank" games and I figured this would be a good one to present. It's a short game at least.

- Ganbare Goemon! Karakuri Douchuu (NES) https://www.twitch.tv/videos/2345789476

The start of the Goemon journey. This is a simple NES game where the goal is to find 3 "passes" to be able to exit the level. How you do this is up to you - you can find them in hidden dungeons, or just buy them at the store, which requires money and goes up in price every time. There are neat little "dungeon crawler" segments that don't have any actual combat or anything, but navigate in that fashion. I did a single loop (there are about 8 full loops to actually finish the game, but it just restarts anyway).

- Ganbare Goemon 2 (NES) https://www.twitch.tv/videos/2345790396

The next Goemon title, this is similar to the first but with several improvements in the UI mostly. This has a single path so there is no looping, but it plays functionally the same as the first game with the same mechanics, just improved visuals for the most part.

- Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League (Xbox One)

I bought this for $5 for the super digital version (priced $100 lol) and I played through the campaign and got all achievements. The presentation is really good, captures that goofy ass movie feeling. The gameplay is fine, you basically bounce around metropolis, shoot your guns, and hear lots of one liner quips from the gang. It ends in a way to promote DLC/updates, but that side of things is done horrendously. For example, in the first "episode" you are required to literally just play the same missions you did over and over in the story to level up an "episode rank" to be able to be high enough to fight the same boss as the story to unlock Joker. This repeats for about... 6 more episodes, but the game is officially dead so there will be no more updates so who knows if the story will even be finished. I dont care, I deleted the game after getting all achievements.

- Genma Onimusha (Xbox) https://www.twitch.tv/videos/2351125788

Onimusha is coming back, so time for a series replay. First up is Genma Onimusha, the exclusive Xbox version of Onimusha, which has a series of improvements and additional content not found in the PS2/PC versions. Still a fun game, it's short, about a 5 hour completion if you don't bother with the side content like the Dark Realm or Ogre Tower.


Some stuff I played before 2025 as well:

- StarTropics 1&2 (NES) https://www.twitch.tv/videos/2340474813 | https://www.twitch.tv/videos/2340970777

Just felt like playing them again. One of my all time favorite NES games, will StarTropics come back for Switch 2? Probably not

- Viewtiful Joe 2 (Gamecube) https://www.twitch.tv/videos/2336959872

Played now that Kamiya is back with Capcom, I need to prepare myself for VJ3, since VJ2 ends on a cliffhanger!!!! (no the DS version does not continue this story)

[Polident Hive]

Planning on playing Startropics on some upcoming travels. Always heard the reason given for why it’s ignored is it never released in Japan?

Can’t recall why I have a note saying to play Radia Senki NES. That’s the other game I’m gonna go through.