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OldCharlieStoletheHandle



Joined: 12 Dec 2009
Posts: 1288
Location: Mastic Beach, NY
PostPosted: Sun Jul 15, 2018 12:16 am Reply with quote
I played Octopath Traveler again today for a long time. I have gotten to all 8 characters and done their first chapters. It looks like I will need to do a lot of grinding levels to get to chapter 2 on any character (although I did start the "town" part of Tressa's chapter 2) as my highest level character is at level 18 and when I went into an area with "danger level" 20 my entire foursome got wiped instantly. The game locks you into keeping whatever character you started with as part of the party at all times. Unfortunately, I am too far along to want to go back and start over as I now wish I had started with a different character. Either way I still think there will be a lot of grinding through previously explored areas.
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NotableMesser



Joined: 01 Aug 2018
Posts: 3
PostPosted: Wed Aug 01, 2018 4:16 am Reply with quote
I am playing Fallout 4. The beginning pretty much repelled me, but I want to finish it, plenty of interesting plot twists, according to spoilers.
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OldCharlieStoletheHandle



Joined: 12 Dec 2009
Posts: 1288
Location: Mastic Beach, NY
PostPosted: Sun Aug 12, 2018 7:26 pm Reply with quote
I've still been playing Octopath Traveler a lot (although not every day) and I have completed chapter 3 for all 8 characters. I also have been trying to level up the characters I don't use that much (I have 3 main ones I use constantly). I got one of the "hidden" job classes (sorcerer) and have found the location of another. I'm not sure if I want to get all the hidden jobs then do chapter 4 or do chapter 4 first.
One thing that makes this game different for me is that I started playing it the day it came out. I have never done that before so I was always able to look up info online because I was always playing old games. Although there are a bunch of YouTube videos available I still am going blind into a lot of things. Then again, I watched videos about how to fight the boss to get the sorcerer job and still got wiped on my first attempt.
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zawa113



Joined: 19 Jan 2008
Posts: 7357
PostPosted: Sun Sep 09, 2018 10:13 am Reply with quote
Playing Dragon Quest XI! I feel like the last "proper" DQ game I really played was 8, way back on PS2, damn near a decade ago! 10 was an MMO (and Japan only, I believe) and 9... that was more "make your own party" so there wasn't any character development on that. So far, 11 reminds me a lot more of 8 (except everyone speaks at a more normal pace and not like they're speaking through molasses. I had always noticed how extra slow the voice acting was in 8, still not quite sure why). At least they went for full orchestra right from the get go! On 8, I don't think the Japanese version had orchestra, but the international version did (two soundtracks exist as a result). Also, all the animation and character and enemy designs? They're just so good and move and look so....right! I love it! Of course, I've always really liked Akira Toriyama's character designs, and I definitely remember thinking 8 was impressive way back when, but this is even more impressive!

I'm about 6 hours in and so far, I do like the changes to the DQ formula. The first one, which they've actually been doing for a while, between 7 and 8's remakes and some of the Monsters: Joker games, is no more random encounters! Another change (which I noticed on someone else's stream because I have yet to die) is that, upon death, you can just go back to the last church, classic style, or you can do last save point or the last autosave. So a few different options to lessen your headaches!

The funny thing is, when I went to boot up the game, I hadn't quite realized that my PS4's memory was getting pretty full Embarassed Since the PS4 tends to load a bunch of the game off the disc, it results in even disc games taking up a good 50GB sometimes. However, it keeps the save data off to the side separately (and that usually takes up mere MB per game). Anyway, I took a look through and deleted the system data on like, 4 games (God of War took up the most data, so it got axed first). Guess 500GB wasn't enough.... maybe I'll consider upgrading if they make a 2T+ Pro or something, I dunno, but for right now, that costs way too much money (and I want to buy a Switch, so a PS4 upgrade can definitely wait)
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#spiewak



Joined: 21 Aug 2018
Posts: 2
PostPosted: Mon Sep 17, 2018 2:48 am Reply with quote
Right now I am playing in EVE Online. IDK why. Maybe I am a little bit addicted about this MMORPG but for me - it is worth. The price on the market is changing but they are stable. You can easily verify it here https://mmogoldprice.com/game/eve-online and amount of currency do not really matter in this game because only with skill you can play op.

Last edited by #spiewak on Mon Oct 01, 2018 6:43 am; edited 1 time in total
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ArisaRimi



Joined: 18 Sep 2018
Posts: 2
Location: New York City
PostPosted: Tue Sep 18, 2018 2:13 am Reply with quote
I play League of Legends and Smite on PC. Because I'm a real fun of MOBA genre.
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OldCharlieStoletheHandle



Joined: 12 Dec 2009
Posts: 1288
Location: Mastic Beach, NY
PostPosted: Sun Sep 23, 2018 12:20 pm Reply with quote
After spending some time away playing Torchlight 1 & 2 (mostly 1) on PC I'm back to playing Octopath Traveler. As of my last post I was still in the middle of Chapter 3 but I have since completed that and gone into chapter 4. I completed two more characters' stories (Primrose and Olberic) and got the last "hidden" job (Starseer). Only three more stories to complete and that should unlock the endgame. The three I have left are the three characters I have been using the most and thus are the highest level. Since I did so much grinding the chapter 4 bosses have been quite easy for the most part (especially compared to the bosses in the hidden job shrines). There is a side dungeon I need to go back to and beat the boss since I now should be able to do that and I need to find out about another side boss that is supposed to be almost impossible (in the Forest of Purgation which has the highest danger level in the game).
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OldCharlieStoletheHandle



Joined: 12 Dec 2009
Posts: 1288
Location: Mastic Beach, NY
PostPosted: Sun Sep 23, 2018 9:54 pm Reply with quote
I played Octopath Traveler again today and it was bad news and good news. The bad news was that after completing Ophilia's story I was able to activate the quest for the boss in the Forest of Purgation and got wiped twice trying to beat it. It does seem to be nearly impossible but there are videos on YouTube of people beating it so I will have to check them. The good news was that since I did not want to end on a bad note I completed the last two characters' stories. After the last one I got an unskippable 15 minute credit sequence. The last one I completed was the one I started with so that character is now unlocked so I can replace anyone in my party. I then spent some time trying to do some side quests as it appears that all side quests must be done to unlock the true ending dungeon, though I don't know how much longer I will actually keep playing this now that the main game is complete.
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iGomui



Joined: 27 Oct 2018
Posts: 4
PostPosted: Sat Oct 27, 2018 8:39 am Reply with quote
its pretty much either fortnite save the world or overwatch for me every day i go home from office : )
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nobahn
Subscriber



Joined: 14 Dec 2006
Posts: 5120
PostPosted: Sat Nov 03, 2018 1:21 am Reply with quote
Let me get this out right now: I am not a gamer. I do, however, pay attention whenever issues of bigotry arise. For that reason, when I came across a link to a gamer who is both a woman and a mother I could not help but straighten up and pay attention. Perspectives like hers need to be paid attention to because they are both different and valuable. Below is a link to an article she posted about an experimental game.
A Game About Staying In Bed All Day
Keza MacDonald wrote:
For a couple of months I’ve been dipping in and out of #SelfCare, a game about deciding to not get out of bed. It’s nominally designed for people who don’t really like video games, but as someone who has played them all my life, I’ve found it a fascinating experiment in game design.
[…]
This is the first game from TruLuv Studios, a studio whose mission is to make games with and for people who don’t already play them. #SelfCare was designed by former Ubisoft developer Brie Code, in collaboration with Eve Thomas, a magazine writer and editor from Montreal. It’s an experiment in game design born from extensive experience with more conventional games.
[…]
In her 2016 essay “Video Games are Boring,” Code suggested that game design is failing to reach outside of the seemingly closed group of gamers, impacting the things that games can do. In “Slouching Towards Relevant Video Games,” she outlined a way to do things differently, based on a human response to stress that many games don’t address: the idea of “tend and befriend” as opposed to “fight or flight.”
[…]
For the last few weeks I’ve dipped in and out of #SelfCare, but that’s how it’s meant to be played. Instead of giving you more thing to do to keep you in the experience, it keeps things minimal and gentle. After five or ten minutes I naturally get bored of it, and don’t feel the urge to return until I next have a spare moment and want to relax. It makes me feel very good, perhaps because instead of stimulating adrenaline and dopamine like most games I enjoy, it’s stimulating oxytocin and opioids, a different kind of high. It is a break from the horrible things I usually see on my phone: endless bad news and Twitter invective, Brexit doom and Trump fury, the shocked responses to a world that seems to be spiralling out of our control. I like having it on my phone, like a private safe room. Instead of getting harder and more complex to keep you engaged, #SelfCare remains consistently pleasant until you naturally get bored with it. This is by design, and it’s made me rethink some fundamental emotions I go to games to experience.
[…]
It leaves me with the optimistic feeling that even though I’ve been playing games for a quarter-century, I still have a limited perspective on what they can be. There’s so much more out there to explore.
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SmashingJB



Joined: 11 Nov 2018
Posts: 2
PostPosted: Sun Nov 11, 2018 9:45 am Reply with quote
I've just started Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty on my PlayStation 2 console. I'm a big fan of the Metal Gear series. As for me, the creators of those games are the example of the coolest Japanese game-makers. Konami Corporation and Hideo Kojima just did their best while working on the Metal Gear. The main thing I like those games is the motion capture technology, it makes the game process so realistic and fascinating! Here is the blog for those who like Japanese video games as I do:
http://puyogemu.com/
I've already found a lot of cool recommendations there.
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zawa113



Joined: 19 Jan 2008
Posts: 7357
PostPosted: Fri Nov 16, 2018 5:04 pm Reply with quote
Started the Spyro Reignited Trilogy! I had played them when I was younger, so I needed this! Also, I am playing them in the order that I originally played them in, which is actually 3-2-1. I got the 3rd game no knowing it was the third game (it's just called "Year of the Dragon", unlike Spyro 2, which did have a number with it). So, going in reverse order here! I was rather pissed that I had to download a good 40 some GB just to start the game up though (clearly this is because it's not all actually on the disc, but damn! That's a lot! And my internet was being a jerk that day so it took AGES!)

I've beaten Year of the Dragon, so I can say my thoughts on that. First off, Agent 9? He's incredible! His gameplay improvement is probably the most drastic, and the most affected, with a good 18+ years of FPS and 3PS games now. His levels went from some of the worst in the game to some of the best, it's such an amazing change, I can hardly believe it! Sgt Byrd, and Bently also have some good gameplay improvements, Sheila and Sparx are about the same. Sparx has some changes that Spyro now needs to be on the ground to pick up gems though, not too big a fan of that. It's not a huge change though.
But the skateboard? Mixed feelings. I guess it overall works well enough, but the tricks are a bit weird, I crashed so many times when I thought I should've been fine....
And the speedways are another issue. When it comes to the speed challenges or the Hunter things, I'm ok with those. But it's the races, Spyro's flight is really drifty during those, even with a generous hit box on the rings, I was still missing rings and having the race auto quit on me all the damn time. So I'm not too big on the skating or the speedways. Bently boxing also still sucks, but it's not like they had much to work with there to begin with.
Voice acting is kind of hit or miss for me. I rather miss some of the delivery of the old lines. I think this is most noticeable on the Sorceress for me, who just doesn't sound mean enough. I also kind of miss some of the more charming accents on some of the single world creatures.
Although on those, I overall approve of any redesigns on them. They're actually all unique now! Not just one seal copy/pasted, they have different skin colors and stuff! The best redesign though? Probably Enchanted Towers, they went with spoiler[hipster] and it's so damn funny!
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#889739



Joined: 26 Nov 2018
Posts: 3
PostPosted: Mon Nov 26, 2018 6:13 pm Reply with quote
Generic #757858 wrote:
Mass Effect 3 (X360)
Just finished my third and final playthrough (Control), this time as an absolute bastard Renegade-Shepard. spoiler[Man, betraying both Mordin and Wrex and then coldly gunning them down really made me feel like shit Sad ]. Still loved this game and the trilogy as a whole, quite possibly my favorites from last gen. And no, I'm not going to argue about it, so you can keep your opinions to yourself.

Castlevania: Harmony of Dissonance (GBA)
Just a few missing items and the final battle left. I like it, but this is still the weakest Castlevania I've played so far. Juste's abilities are pretty boring compared to Symphony of the Night and Circle of the Moon and there's just too much backtracking, which isn't helped by the lack of fast travel and the game giving pretty much no directions or hints where you're supposed to go next.

Super Scribblenauts (DS)
Almost done with this too. Eh, I think I like this more as an idea and a concept. As a game, not so much. Harder puzzles and less freedom in solving them might've helped.

I finished it. It's a Tales game so it's fun to play. Ask someone else about the naunces of the battle system, because they are lost on me. It's fun to play and it works very well. Though, at least on normal I think the additions of the link partners are kind of superfluous. I bet you could get by without them. Either way it's fine
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Aca Vuksa



Joined: 22 Mar 2018
Posts: 643
Location: Nis, Serbia
PostPosted: Thu Dec 13, 2018 10:07 am Reply with quote
I am playing as of 2018/19:

Grand Theft Auto San Andreas
FIFA 19
Naruto Ultimate Ninja Storm 3: Full Burst
Pro Evolution Soccer 2010
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zawa113



Joined: 19 Jan 2008
Posts: 7357
PostPosted: Sun Feb 03, 2019 10:21 pm Reply with quote
*Ahem*, back to actual video games, Kingdom Hearts 3, obviously. I actually beat it way faster than I expected, I was thinking it might take me all weekend or something, but nope! I beat it on friday (late night).

Now, don't go into this game expecting that you only need to play the previous 2 games before it. No, you have to play like, 5 games and watch a bunch of movies to have any hope of understanding the plot. Yes, they put some "story so far" movies on there, but WOW are they useless. So for anyone new, just don't start with 3. And their movies for Union X are kind of not the whole story, but there are some good story explanations on youtube.

Anyway, I guess I'd have to divide the game into two: gameplay and story. Gameplay wise, it's a lot of fun, but I also feel like it's missing some of what I liked in its predecessors. For example, no more form dual wielding. But I do like the addition of the form changes (though I prefer BBS's version of it). Also, magic is EXTREMELY overpowered in this game. I'm no speedrunner, but when I saw how overpowered magic was, I knew they'd be using it. And honestly, that's basically the strategy at all times, spam magic. There's even an ability you can equip that ensures you won't run out of magic (except for using cure, which always uses all remaining HP). And you can buy a TON of ethers easily AND hot key them. While it's fun, I kind of feel like it's missing some of the balance of previous games, because magic is just THAT overpowered that attacking almost feels like a waste. And while the forms are fun in their own way, I don't feel like they're quite as satisfying or stylish as either the combo forms in 2 or the form changes in BBS. On the plus side though, I do like that they're linked to the keyblades themselves, and while in previous games, once you get a better one, you basically toss the old one in the garbage, here, you can upgrade the keyblades to keep the relevant through the whole game. Odds are you'll pick maybe 2 you like. And you can equip up to 3 and cycle through them effortlessly during combat (your form changes will even stay with the other keyblade if you switch out to it and come back later!). It's also what determines your shotlocks, so it's like having multiple ones of those equipped as well. So there's some things I really like, but I also feel like it's a step back in some ways from some of the other games in the series. But really, the magic just makes it all so broken that you're typically better off equipping the keyblade with the highest magic and going from there (and you actually have a LOT of MP in this game on top of it). Another new gameplay thing were "attractions", which I found largely annoying and avoided using whenever I could.

The gummi ship is actually fun though, easily at its best here. Since it now involves exploration and isn't just a straight up auto scroller. Other mini games on the other hand? Meh. Also, this game has the lowest barrier ever for the secret ending, just finding pics of the "lucky emblems" (90 total, but for proud you need 30 and normal is 60, beginner needs all 90). Some more stuff has come out through updates (free, at least), so there's now an extra bonus fight and some battles you can mess around with, but it really feels like the post game is lacking, especially in comparison to 2 Final Mix (which is on the 2.5 collection). Also, the game only took me not even 30 hours. I think BBS took me longer and DDD probably took me about 30 hours too. And KH2 definitely took me way longer, probably closer to 50.

Now as for the story…. well, despite being called “3”, I feel like the amount of plot in here was smaller than a lot of the “side games” had. BBS and DDD definitely had way more. The other problem I had was with the pacing. The previous KH games tended to have a bunch up front, then let the Disney worlds take over for a while, and then a bunch more in the middle, more Disney worlds, and then a fair amount at the end, usually in a world designed specifically for KH. KH3 just backloads the whole thing. Yeah, it gives you a tiny scene after you finish each world, but I feel like half of those didn’t even matter. And then rather than having an entire final world, it’s just a stage for a boss rush and a ton of cut scenes. KH3’s pacing was just awful. And don’t think it’s going to wrap up a lot of loose ends either. Ironically, I think the only loose ends it DOES wrap up are the plots of two of the side games (BBS and 358/2), and on the plus side, I really liked how it wraps those up. Of course, if the secret ending is anything to go on, KH is FAR from done, they only said this game would end the Xehanort as the main bad guy and all that nonsense. And yeah, I guess it did, but… I wouldn’t be surprised if the series changed its mind later on somehow. Oh and remember how Nomura loudly claimed that spoiler[characters would die, never to be seen in KH again]? Game of Thrones this is not. So yeah, don’t go in expecting this to actually be the grand ending of a saga, it feels more like a road side pit stop where you know the hotel choices aren’t gonna be great, but hey, at least some members of your caravan had a good nights sleep at the budget motel. So rather than feeling like another full novel, like you were probably expecting, it feels more like a good few solid chapters. But given that others in the series WERE full novels, it’s hard not to be a tad disappointed in that regard. It’s still just an confusing as before, but it also felt like it tried to retcon a lot less than previous games (actually a plus, not every KH game needs to retcon every KH game that came before it!).

Hopefully now that they’ve got a KH engine up and running, they’ll be able to pump out a few more games more reliably (and on main consoles, though I can’t imagine them going for 3DS or Vita at this point, Switch perhaps though). Because the series clearly isn’t over and this just felt like another step on the way of this lovely and fun confusing mess that KH has kind of always been and that we love it for.
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