What games did you complete? 2022 Edition

[jamesy]

26/02 - Devil May Cry

 

This is a blast. Completely over the top and ridiculous. Great fun combos and enough variety to keep it from getting boring. Never beat it way back when but was just as fun as I remember it. Only real downside is the camera. Some of the fixed camera angles make the action a bit frustrating at times as you literally cannot see the enemy or where attacks are coming from. Despite that it's absolutely still worth playing and only took around 6 hours to finish.

 

I'll be interested to see what went so wrong with the sequel as I've only ever seen bad reviews of it.

Spoiler

08/01 - Paper Mario

19/02 - Resident Evil 2

21/02 - Ridge Racer

26/02 - Devil May Cry

 

[Unofficial Who]

27/02 Final Fantasy 14:A Realm Reborn:Seventh Astral Era (PC) 

 

 

It has it's own credits and as much content as a full game so I'm not cheating here, it counts. I got through this in half the time as the first half and while it still suffers from too many meetings in Minfilia's office that should have been emails parchments and an overly tricky raid near the end some of the dialogue and story is quite good and the last hour really picks up with a great end sequence. I really think Square need to do a lot more trimming though, there's more fat in Realm Reborn than there was in the starting area of Dragon Age Inquisition. I'm told that this is where the story really starts to get good (70 hours in). I would have given up by now but my wife adores this game so fingers crossed it picks up the pace and I can at least start to understand the memes she shares with me about Thancred and Estinion.

 

Earlier this month

25/02 Vampire Survivors (PC) 

18/02 Hypnospace Outlaw

05/02 Final Fight (PC/Arcade)

 

Earlier this year

Spoiler

8. 31/01 Dynasty Wars (Arcade/PC)

7. 31/01 Mega Twins (Arcade/PC) 

6, 29/01 Superhot:Mind Control Delete (PC) 

5. 16/01 The Forgotten City (PC)

4. 09/01 Mr Driller Drill Land (PC)

3. 07/01 Olija (PC)

2. 07/01 It's a Knockout! (C64) 

1. 02/01 Katamari Damacy REROLL (PC)

 

Abandoned games

04/01 YIIK: A Postmodern RPG

 

[Sprite Machine]

Previously...

Spoiler

1.) Lego City Undercover - PC - 2017 (2013)
2.) What Remains of Edith Finch - PS4 - 2017
3.) Superliminal - PS4 - 2020 (2019)
4.) Untitled Goose Game - Switch - 2019
5.) One Finger Death Punch 2 - PC - 2019
6.) Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood - PC - 2011 (2010)
7.) Vanquish - PC - 2017 (2010)

8.) Mass Effect (Legendary Edition) - PS4 - 2021 (2007)

 

9.) Telling Lies - PC - 2019

 

A follow-up to Her Story, this is another narrative experience in which you piece together a story from fragments of conversations and videos. It's basically the same thing but on a bigger scale. Presented as a 'virtual desktop', through which you access clips from an intelligence database by searching for key words, this story features an entire cast of characters (focusing on four) and a lot more videos to sort through. Much of it is Zoom-style video conversations, which for a game released in 2019, is oddly prophetic!

 

The main problem with this is each clip only shows one half of the conversation, which is both unrealistic (why wouldn't you hear the other side through the speakers?) and also makes for some boring videos with a lot of silence and nodding heads. The interface doesn't let you easily skip to the beginning of each clip (nor does it give you a complete list of what's left to find) but you can scrub back and forth to find bits of interest. I just wish there was a way to watch these conversations together, in sequence, without resorting to a YouTube video! Maybe that's the whole point, to ensure the story resides in your head more than it does the screen, but it seems like an oversight.

 

There won't be a point where you're suddenly satisfied you've seen everything and, unless you find every single clip, you will always feel like there's more to learn. Unlike Her Story, there's no real plot twists, but the characters are strong and performances are excellent. I don't think this is as compelling a project as Her Story - I think it's a little more bloated than it needs to be - but it's a very clever and wonderfully presented game and there aren't many others like it.

 

[jamesy]

01/03 - Devil May Cry(Hard)

 

This is cheating a little bit as I just beat the game on Normal and went straight into hard mode as I was enjoying it so much. Enjoyed going through it again but the irksome camera angles become more troublesome when the hits you're taking do more damage. Even with this it's still it's a top tier game.(except the 3rd nightmare boss which annoyed me to no end.) Now I'm ready to move onto the sequel.

 

Spoiler

08/01 - Paper Mario

19/02 - Resident Evil 2

21/02 - Ridge Racer

26/02 - Devil May Cry

01/03 - Devil May Cry(Hard)

 

 

[James Lyon]

Hypnospace Outlaw - Another one of those I was incentivised to play after learning it was leaving Game Pass. I thought this was fantastic. It's essentially a simulation of late nineties webpages set in an alternative universe. There's some nonsense about it involving the ability to access the web in your sleep for the purposes of the story, but it's essentially just a collection of 90s-tinged websites to peruse. You're a sort of moderator tasked with looking for and reporting illegal or immoral content in this microcosm of the web.

 

My biggest fear was that it would either be way too wacky (given the name and box art), or I'd get bogged down in endless text. It's happily neither of those. It's definitely played for laughs at points, but it's more an exercise in nostalgia. It absolutely nails the feeling of the internet at that time: pages filled with low-res GIFs; old people building webpages they struggle to understand; teens bragging and insulting each other; annoying pop-up ads, 'innocent' viruses, and so on. Plus everything around it: the interface, downloading songs to a Winamp-style music player, virtual pets.

 

One of the major threads, and one of the things I liked the most was the comment on corporations trying to act cool or be down with the kids, building on proto-memes to trick users into marketing their products (which amusingly backfires, of course).

 

Regarding the text, pages are mercifully short and to the point, which ensures it's not a chore to read everything. It's more a flavour of the time rather than completely accurate, this being an alternate universe and all. Nevertheless, it all made me whistful for a time before social media and Google changed everything.

 

The game itself is an excuse to delve through those pages, looking for clues that'll link you to the information you're looking for - figuring out passwords, searching for hidden tags, etc. It's rather fun detective work, although my initial disappointment was that there wasn't enough as, just as you're getting into the swing of things, it changes it up in order to tell its story instead. I could have happily done a bit more of that stuff. Then again it's quality over quantity, and thankfully the back half of the game is just as good and lets you utilise the web surfing skills you've acquired in a slightly different manner to conclude the plot.

 

Given I played it right up to being taken off Game Pass, I never got all the achievements or found all the pages, but I got at least over 90% so I'm happy with that.

 

Overall, very impressive. Stick it in my top ten of the year of whenever it came out.

 

 

 

 

[shirubagan]

Spoiler

01. How We Know We're Alive (Mac)
02. Gorogoa (Game Pass)
03. The Procession to Calvary (Game Pass)
04.Shadow Warrior [2013] (Xbox)
05. Pokémon Legends: Arceus (Switch)
06. Crossfire X – Chapter 1: Catalyst (XSX)
07. Battlefield 4 – Campaign, Normal (XSX)

 

 

08. Astro's Playroom (PS5)
Utterly charming game. I enjoyed every second of it.

[Unofficial Who]

Mar

 

17/03 Battle Circuit (PC/Arcade) A quick chaser after We Happy Few to clear another completed badge on Capcom Arcade Stadium. It's Final Fight meets Guardians of the Galaxy! Amazing sprite and colour work, Capcom were really on a role back then.

 

 

17/03 We Happy Few (PC) Theres no getting around it. This game is broken in parts, bugged and unpolished. It really feels like it was pushed out the door too early. I gave this a quick go in January and expected it to end there.

 

 

But after a very overly scripted opening it turned into a sort of Fallout 3 Lite UK Edition. Eventually I worked out a gameplay loop that worked for Arthur, the government censor on the run for being a Downer. It didn't take too long to finish his campaign only for the game to reveal that this was Act 1. There are three acts in all, the second where you play as Sally Boyle, a small (in size) drug dealer. Her goal isn't to run, or at least for reasons she has to run out and back. As Sally you're incredibly fragile, getting into fights is a sure way for the game to end in most instances. This reminded me a lot of my own experience of the 70's and 80's watching my mother negotiate with awful men while smiling and flirting while trying to walk a very fine line. In act 3 you play as Ollie who is an old Scotsman who wants to tell everyone the truth. He's accompanied by the ghost of his dead daughter and in combat he is a powerhouse. Useful given that he's much hated among the populous. The biggest threat that he faces is from his poorly controlled diabetes and you can easily die from high blood sugar. Low blood sugar isn't great either leading to vision blurring and swearing at people at random.

 

This is so close to being great, the story is really interesting, the setting is unique in games at least, part Brazil, part Clockwork Orange. It's the mechanics and the balance that lets the game down. It's hard to stealth when antagonists seem to randomly see through your disguise. The levelling system seems to be set up just to get over the issues with the game systems (the most useful being "Oh You", a perk that allows you to run above a pace without people getting upset. The almost ever present Uncle Jack seems to be less used then originally planned with his dulcet sinister tones playing from radios, TV's and PA systems. He feels a little wasted in this.

 

 

It reminds me of trying to push through games like Liberation:Captive 2 on the Amiga where it felt like not everything was balanced. Would I recommend this? Better to play Dishonoured or Fallout but....but....there's something about this game that led me to pushing through this (on easy). I think it bodes well for future games by Compulsion.

 

07/03 Powered Gear (PC/Arcade) I've played through this before on another Capcom collection but I hadn't on Capcom Arcade Stadium and since it's finally released stamps for those who've paid for it I thought I'd mark this as complete. Weirdly enough this compilation doesn't have the English translation but that just allowed me to power through, ignore the dialogue and concentrate on mixing and matching parts. It's like every other beat-em up scroller but like most of Capcom's work of this period the sprite design is top notch.

 

 

06/03 FAR:Changing Tides (PC) Bit of a nautical theme this weekend. I loved FAR:Lone Sails when I played it a couple of years ago and I decided to buy this day one. Imagine my surprise when it was released day one on Gamepass! It's much like the previous game. You play as a little guy in charge of a large steampunk boat which requires several people to operate. There is one of you. So you end up at times scurrying about to feed the engine, pump the bellows and cool the engine, at other times nothing much happens at all but that nothing is so relaxing. When the find picks up and the seas are calm you can let the engine die down, head topside, raise the mainsail and just trim or let go of the mainsail in order to pick up as much wind as possible. There are some light environmental puzzles and extra parts are added to your boat slowly over the five or so hours and it's really satisfying to work out how the new machinery works or how the boat might interact with other machines. The urban ruins in the background which I would have found atmospheric a few weeks ago now take on a more sombre tone than I suspect the creators intended (like the previous game there's not much to tell you about how civilisation has fallen and it's left open to interpret if it's due to climate change or war.) It's a better game than the original even if the excellent music might not be quite as driven as the train like compositions from the original. You don't need to have played the prequel first (although it's currently 80% off on Steam and a bit of a bargain.) Didn't disappoint after the two year wait and already one of my favourites of the year.

 

 

05/03 In Other Waters (PC) I meant to play this when I bought it about a year ago but I forgot about it as it got buried until this week. Knowing I might forget again I put aside almost everything else. I love this sort of game. It's about a marine biologist exploring an alien world but you don't play as her, you play as the AI operating her deep sea diving suit. This means you don't have eyes but have to work out your surroundings using sonar. It sort of reminds me of Capsule from 2014. Eventually you get some other tools and are able to take samples back to analyse as it weaves a story about why Ellery is on this planet and what might have happened previously. It gives you almost no instructions (it took me five minutes to work out how to move but after that the interface is pretty intuitive.) The writing, functional interface and sound really makes what is essentially a visual novel without a lot of the visuals come to life.

 

 

02/03 Aperture Desk Job (Steam Deck/PC) It's really a free half hour long demo for the Steam Deck but if you have a modern controller on your PC you can play it with no issues. It's slick, funny, inventive and it really makes me miss when Valve used to make full games. (Yeah I know, Half Life Alyx but a lot of us don't have VR rigs.) Any fan of Portal should download and play now.

 

 

Earlier this year

 

Spoiler

12. 27/02 Final Fantasy 14:A Realm Reborn:Seventh Astral Era (PC) 

11. 25/02 Vampire Survivors (PC) 

10. 18/02 Hypnospace Outlaw

9. 05/02 Final Fight (PC/Arcade)

8. 31/01 Dynasty Wars (Arcade/PC)

7. 31/01 Mega Twins (Arcade/PC) 

6, 29/01 Superhot:Mind Control Delete (PC) 

5. 16/01 The Forgotten City (PC)

4. 09/01 Mr Driller Drill Land (PC)

3. 07/01 Olija (PC)

2. 07/01 It's a Knockout! (C64) 

1. 02/01 Katamari Damacy REROLL (PC)

 

Abandoned games

19/03 Narita Boy

04/01 YIIK: A Postmodern RPG

 

[HarryBizzle]

First one in the bag.

 

1. Sekiro (Series X) - 28/2/22

 

 

What a game. I have been a bit frustrated and annoyed with myself, playing lots of games and just being generally a bit down on them - my experiences being more apathetic or negative than many on here with whom my tastes generally align, but this proved I didn't need a break from gaming, just the right game.

 

Starting this 2 weeks before Elden Ring was probably a bad idea, but I fell in love with this game so much that I haven't really felt much pressure to rush it or stop playing to start ER. I finished it two days ago and haven't booted Elden Ring once - I've been playing bits I missed and replaying bits that I didn't. I think it's in part due to how much it makes you feel like you've developed skills, which I now don't want to lose, and am enjoying putting to work.

 

It's just superb. I haven't felt any of the anxiety that I've felt playing any of the other Souls games. No worries that I might not be good enough to get through, that I have to keep playing or I might give in to the despair and not come back to it, and that's all because it makes you genuinely feel like it's a test of skill, rather than a test of your build. Everything about it, from how simple and streamlined it feels, to the relatively low fantasy setting (at least early on) feels like a breath of fresh air in comparison to the other Souls games. It's a bit dark, but nowhere near as grimdark as any of the other Souls games.

And thanks to the Series X, it runs at 60fps and looks superb. I think it's my favourite From Software game. I need a bit of time to decompress before starting ER, but that's fine. 

 

 

 

[Sprite Machine]

 Previously...

Spoiler

1.) Lego City Undercover - PC - 2017 (2013)
2.) What Remains of Edith Finch - PS4 - 2017
3.) Superliminal - PS4 - 2020 (2019)
4.) Untitled Goose Game - Switch - 2019
5.) One Finger Death Punch 2 - PC - 2019
6.) Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood - PC - 2011 (2010)
7.) Vanquish - PC - 2017 (2010)

8.) Mass Effect (Legendary Edition) - PS4 - 2021 (2007)
9.) Telling Lies - PC - 2019

 

10.) Halo 5: Guardians - Xbox One - 2015
Completed the campaign on Heroic difficulty (approx 10 hours). I don't have an Xbox so I played the whole thing on xCloud, which is pretty wild.

 

I thought this was reasonably good, but not one of my favourites. Some new features are great, like the grab/climb move and the dodge/dash. I'm not sure about ironsights in a Halo game, however I do think the hover-aim in mid-air is really cool. Aside from that, it's business as usual, Halo 5 reminded me a lot of Halo 4, but didn't seem to learn any lessons from it. It's more of the same, really. The Prometheans are still no fun to fight, but I guess we're stuck with them now and yet they're back in greater numbers. There are still too many weapon types cluttering up the place. They've still got snipers shooting at you from clifftops and lots of sections where you have to get through turret defences with barely any long-range weapons handy, which is often annoying. And they've made some enemies, particularly the Hunters, insanely hard! No longer can you quickly whip around the back of one and shoot it in the fleshy part. They are fierce, they are fast and their weapons hit you from miles away. The best tactic seems to be holding back and chipping away at them from a distance, which is not all that fun. Again, I think both Halo 4 and Halo 5 have lost sight of that "30 seconds of fun repeated" mantra. I suppose this is to balance the fact that you can now be resurrected by your squad mates at any time, unless you get hit by something particularly nasty or fall off a cliff. On the other hand, some of the checkpoint placements are ludicrously far apart and I got annoyed at having to redo troublesome sections over and over.

 

It grates because Halo can be so much better and, hopefully, the next one will be. All that said, the production values, graphics, scope of the setpieces and everything was top-notch. And even a mediocre Halo is still a boat-load of fun.

[df0]

Horizon Forbidden West

 

The best candidate for Open World and Sequel Needs More Of Everything Bingo. It failed to grab me in any meaningful way, most of the time I was kind of bored. If you need a dime-a-dozen Open World in your life there's nothing better available right now. If you are even remotely tired of the tropes, stay far away.

[Gabe]

My life has pretty much gone to crap since late-January so I haven't really been playing much at all, but I wanted to play something short to, I dunno, just give me a bit of control over something, you know? First though, an update I never got around to making (because: life):

 

5. 31/01/2022 - Fire Emblem: Path of Radiance (Gamecube)

 

My only previous experience with Fire Emblem was buying a GBA Advance and some RPGs to accompany me in the downtime when I did a bit of travelling many years ago.

 

I never played any of them. Not because I was always doing stuff (there were some gruelling 7/8 hour van rides within that trip), but because I just really don't like handheld gaming. At all. (This also was true when I had a prolonged hospital stay and a PSP, for which I bought FF:T and, again, never played it.)

 

It's a shame, I remember I had the first Fire Emblem game for the GBA and Golden Sun 2, probably a couple of others that I forget. Anyway, my only memory of the hour or so I probably played it was that it had permadeath and because of my gung-ho and not at all strategic nature back then, I remember losing a character very, very early and that was me done with it.

 

Since those heady days the SRPG has become one of my favourite genres (Shining Force 2 had been my first love of the genre, but these games just didn't exist on PC when was old enough to buy stuff, so I never played any others) and I've decided to try some of these old games via the joys of emulation - and I'm really glad I did.

 

There are some niggles - the interface for buying/equipping/moving items is just overly cumbersome, comparing party members is equally tedious and because of the way the level-ups work it's hard to really get a feel for who might turn into somebody really good unless you invest your limited XP into a character or consult a guide (and even then, because it is % based, you still can't really guarantee anything.) It's only in later years that I realised this was true of Shining Force 2 as well (when I replayed it last year, actually). Also, because you have a large cast that could all die, it means you never really care about any of the characters (some don't even ever get any lines outside of you recruiting them) - your team really is just fodder and when you lose somebody you never really need to be that bothered because you'll likely be recruiting at least 1 new person on the next mission anyway.

 

On the plus side though, there is a satisfaction in building your team's skills up and finding your favourites and the tactical battles - whilst mainly just 'kill everybody' - do present alternative objectives every now and then. Besides, they are just fun to play, so that's okay. I also quite enjoyed the plot, and in Ike we also got a main character who a) wasn't mute and b) actually had opinions and things to say. In awe of all around him, he was not. It made a refreshing change compared to a lot of RPG protagonists, that's for sure.

 

I got really heavily into this post-Christmas, to the extent I played virtually nothing else. I do have the Wii game to go through next that's for something later in the year, I think, because the gameplay on these titles never really changes all that much and I don't want to burn out.

This was good stuff though.

 

6. Gogoroa (PC)

 

An incredibly smart and inventive puzzle game, but a) it was way too smart for me (I used a walkthrough from chapter 3 onwards) and b) I have absolutely no idea what was going on.

 

It looked very pretty though, was short and got me to make this post, so I'll take it as a win.

 

Previously completed:

Spoiler

1. 01/01/2022 - Final Fight: Streetwise (PS2)

2. 02/01/2022 - The Forgotten City (PC)

3. 05/01/2022 - Football, Tactics & Glory (PC)

4. 08/01/2022 - Alt Frequencies (PC)

 

[Darwock]

My first of the year:

 

08/03 : Valkyria Chronicles (PS4)

 

Played to the platinum trophy, but still have the expert hard skirmishes and DLC content to have a go at. Loved it from start to finish.

[RubberJohnny]

Pokemon Legends: Arceus - I had pretty rock-bottom expectations for this, it looked ugly and coming in hot from a series whose recent entries have been so bland and handholdy and just plain unfinished that they've been impossible to recommend if you didn't grow up with them and don't have nostalgia for the series.

 

 

But it's actually pretty good! Graphics aside, what's here is actually surprisingly polished, the game runs smoothly, world traversal is fast and fluid, and in areas like the UI you can tell there was a lot of thought in how to handle things like battle transitions while keeping interaction consistent.

 

The SMT/Pokemon loop of finding, capturing and building up a team remains as claws-in-you as it ever did, and here benefits from a big increase in speed - what would take you a few hours in the older games will take you thirty minutes. There's an overall cleanup of game systems to make things less fiddly, and increasing flexibility for your team due to the alphas and other additions.

 

That said it's not perfect, while changing up the structure refreshed the gameplay, it didn't really fix the series' existing problems - it's still bland, it's still handholdy early on, it's still a bit barebones, and it does manage to look worse than a 2001 Gamecube launch game. But, it's that old cliche, "a good foundation to build on" - the next announced games already look like they improve a bunch with the move to a fully open world with multiple settlements and bringing back the focus on the duelling. Arceus is a solid 8/10 in my book, but since those other ones are coming this year, you might as well wait if you haven't picked this up already.

 

Spoiler

Mass Effect 3

Red Dead Redemption 2

 

[shirubagan]

Spoiler

01. How We Know We're Alive (Mac)
02. Gorogoa (Game Pass)
03. The Procession to Calvary (Game Pass)
04.Shadow Warrior [2013] (Xbox)
05. Pokémon Legends: Arceus (Switch)
06. Crossfire X – Chapter 1: Catalyst (XSX)
07. Battlefield 4 – Campaign, Normal (XSX)
08. Astro's Playroom (PS5)

 

 

 

09. Il Filo Conduttore (Mac)
A short interactive experience about pulling strings I got with the Itch IO Bundle for Ukraine. It was a bit odd, around 10 minutes long and I think I enjoyed it as the string physics were very pleasing.

[ImmaculateClump]

Stainless Night - 1cc

 

Spoiler

Nekotosakana - 1cc

Moon Dancer - Normal 1cc (no miss), Hard 1cc (no miss), Expert 1cc

Grand Cross: Renovation - 1cc

Operation STEEL - Normal 1cc, Hard 1cc

Vampire Survivors - Inlaid Library hyper, Mad Forest hyper, Green Acres hyper

Sophstar - 1cc and TLB, Arcade, Intermediate, original scoring, Reyka

Sol Cresta - 2-all, Normal (3-5)

[Sprite Machine]

Previously...

Spoiler

1.) Lego City Undercover - PC - 2017 (2013)
2.) What Remains of Edith Finch - PS4 - 2017
3.) Superliminal - PS4 - 2020 (2019)
4.) Untitled Goose Game - Switch - 2019
5.) One Finger Death Punch 2 - PC - 2019
6.) Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood - PC - 2011 (2010)
7.) Vanquish - PC - 2017 (2010)

8.) Mass Effect (Legendary Edition) - PS4 - 2021 (2007)
9.) Telling Lies - PC - 2019
10.) Halo 5: Guardians - Xbox One - 2015

11.) Halo Infinite - Xbox Series - 2021
Completed the campaign on Normal difficulty (dropped down from Heroic a third of the way through). Did a few of the side quests, mostly en-route stuff. Total playtime: 17 hours. (EDIT: more like 20 hours - the in-game timer is wrong)

This is obviously the biggest shake-up the Halo franchise has had since its inception, almost delivering on some of those lofty claims/assumptions about the original Mac game in the late 90s. You don't, unfortunately, get an entire halo ring to explore, but you do get a fairly sizeable open world full of bases, research facilities and interesting terrain. A bit like Metal Gear Solid V, but with more aliens and less stealth.

 

I think this is 343 Industries best Halo game. (Is that damning with faint praise? I dunno!) They've nailed the fundamentals of combat (just on a larger canvas), they've got rid of Prometheans, got rid of the Flood, and solved a lot of the weapon/ammo management problems with elegant solutions and tweaks. Things they've added are almost all great fun, especially the grapple-rope, which never gets old. However, they did completely fuck up with the bosses, which are absolute anti-fun and way too hard. They also seemingly ran out of time/money by the later stages of the game, which presesnt shiny corridor after shiny corridor, perhaps appropriately borrowing another leaf from Halo 1's book.

 

Nitpicks aside, however, I think this is pretty damned good. Less consistent/traditional than the previous couple of games, but more memorable for it, and it looks excellent, both in graphical quality and artistic design. And with that, I've now finished my epic year-long Halo campaign marathon! A shame I had to drop the difficulty down for the final game but I won't lose any sleep over it.

Edited March 11, 2022 by Sprite Machine

[strawdonkey]

On 25/02/2022 at 23:22, strawdonkey said:

2021/65a. Star Hunter DX (Space Cadet, 1CC, 19.3mil)

01. The Artful Escape

02. Rhythm Doctor

03. Monolith

04. Higurashi When They Cry - Ch.2 Watanagashi

05. Outer Wilds

06. OMORI

02a. Rhythm Doctor (all the bonus stuff and B+'d every stage)

07. Yu-Gi-Oh! Master Duel (all solo content clear)

08. Windjammers 2 (1CC)

09. Vampire Survivors

10. Ghost Blade HD (1CC Easy)

10a. Ghost Blade HD

07a. Yu-Gi-Oh! Master Duel

11. Magic The Gathering: Arena (Mythic Rank, constructed)

 

I've been saying to myself since MTG Arena launched that I'm probably good enough to make it to the top rank, but a mixture of time and laziness meant that I've never devoted the time to it. A new ranked season starts each month so decided to finally give it a crack since there's a new expansion out and there was a deck I liked the look of.

 

More details in the spolier below, but it took about 130 games to get to the top of the ladder, a win rate of about 67% (which is preposterous and you can definitely get there with a much lower win rate, I got very lucky) and making it there has been extremely satisfying and I will definitely not do it again next month because it's a lot of effort, even though it's been an absolute blast.

 

 

Next up: Hearthstone a rest

 

Spoiler

So here's the deck - it's a Green/White enchantment deck that has a few key elements:

 

- A lot of cards are enchantments and a lot of cards care about playing enchantments, or the number of enchantments you have

- Weaver of Harmony lets you get extra value out of your enchantments, like removing two cards with Touch The Spirit Realm, or getting an extra activation out of Michiko's Reign of Truth

- Jukai Naturalist reduces the cost of your enchantments

- There's a small +1/+1 counter theme with Generous Visitor, Luminarch Aspirant, and Kodama of the West Tree as the payoff

- Ranger Class doesn't really fit with the rest of the deck, but is a great piece of insurance when people inevitably kill all your stuff, since it allows you to play creatures off the top of your deck after a bit of investment

 

 

It's very much a proactive deck, and while you sometimes just get to T1 Generous Visitor, T2 Jukai Naturalist and then T3 dump the rest of your hand on the table and attack for a bunch, you'll usually have a slower start and be much more vulnerable to boardwipes, which are very common at the moment, so need to play around them by being careful what you commit to the board. But also, the deck has some resilience in the event of a wipe - Ranger Class lets you play creatures off the top of your deck, and the three Cave of the Frost Dragon and three Lair of the Hydra mean that in the event you've just drawn a lot of lands you can usually still put some power on the board.

[GaryC]

Psychonauts 2 (Series X via Gamepass)

 

I did waver about finishing this about a quarter of the way through. The platforming/combat/bosses were really annoying me. But shortly after there came a point where I got a bit better at it and it didn’t irritate me as much anymore.

 

The imagination in the art, story and general vibe really pull the quality up. Video games really can be anything they want to be and Psychonauts 2 pushes the envelope in that regard. A total original.  
 

I am trying to, within reason, finish what I started and not be so tempted by switching to other games when a game has a dodgy hour or an element isn’t quite right. I’m glad I stuck with it but with all the great games getting released there were definitely moments where I thought “argh I should dump this and buy Elden Ring”. 
 

Previous Games

Inside (Jan)

Deathloop (Feb)

Psychonauts 2 (Mar)

[Sixkiller]

On Wednesday night I finished two games, which is quite something for someon who rarely finishes anything at all.

 

Lost Words : Beyond the Page - xbox gamepass - stunned by this game.  Found it really emotional and well put together.  Basic as a game, but I felt that was for the best as similarly to "The Artful Escape" it wasn't a game where you wanted mechanics or puzzles to get in the way of narrative progress.

 

Gears of War - Started the original Gears of War on my 360 back when it first came out, but never even got half way through as it just didn't click with me.  Didn't like the characters especially, and found the movement clunky.  When I got the Series S I decided to revisit it via the remastered version.  This time I made it through, although it's still taken me over a year only playing it every now and then, and I still think the characters and dialogue are awful.  Given the game & series' reputation, I'm glad to have played it to the end, but in no hurry to dive into any other Gears games based off this.

[moosegrinder]

Borderlands 3. Took about 79 hours.

This was an odd one. I played and completed Borderlands 2 more than once so this was one of the rare occasions where I stumped up before release and for the 'Ultimate' edition because I wanted the DLC. I did all the DLC on the first 2 games, so why wouldn't I, right? This was the last time I pre-ordered a game digitally, let alone get the all-in version. Because I thoroughly disliked Borderlands 3 at launch.

 

'course, it didin't stop me putting about 20 hours into it when I first got it despite almost everything about it pissing me off; the gunplay, the humour, the writing, the archaic way it keeps gun inventory slots locked (and the artefact class mod slot also), the fact you still have to pay to increase your ammo reserve limits and back pack. It's like everything that's happened since 2012 in FPSs was completely ignored.

The worst of all this is that, for all its faults, Destiny 2 takes a massive steaming dump over almost every other FPS in terms of gunplay and I'd played a metric shit-tonne of that before Borderlands 3 came out, so moving to gunplay that felt as underpowered, inaccurate and generally ineffectual like Borderlands 3s was a huge issue. So I binned it off the hard drive.

 

I forget why I went back to it. My brain has been locked in pointless number grind mode for a couple of years now so playing anything story based has very much taken a back seat. They did a tarted up update for Series X so it might have been that. It helps that I remember it supposedly had significant post game content with Mayhem mode (think the Torments of Diablo III) plus the 4 dlc, new game+, 3 other classes and loads of loot and whatnot to grind out. Whether I stick with all that I don't know, I guess we'll see.

Overall I really enjoyed it. They must have done something to the way the game handles since I stopped playing because it felt much better than before. Maybe it's just me. Anyway, yeah, it were reet good in the end.

[BabelRich]

13/03 Horizon: Forbidden West

 

I do struggle with write-ups for bigger games so apologies.

 

80 hours gone and loved every minute of it. There is so much to do in this game that it could be considered too much. But as there is so much you can skip the shit you’re not keen on and there is still loads for you to do. It’s not all scrapping (pun intended) either; some light puzzling is in order when scouring ruins for ornaments and searching for Vista Points and when you do have your bow in hand, thought is required as to how to take down machines while salvaging the parts you need for that next tripcaster upgrade.

 

Story wise, it’s certainly up there. I loved the story in Zero Dawn and thought it was a very fresh take on the apocalypse, so was a bit worried when, at first, this seemed like it was going to be a straightforward search for the baddie and MacGuffin but had enough twists to make it far more interesting than expected.

 

The acting is simply stunning and made all the better by the best character models I’ve ever laid eyes on (apart from the teeth which were a bit ‘off’). A lot of folk have said they did not care for Aloy but I found her a great protagonist, she knew what needed to be done and didn’t take anyone’s shit unless she needed to.

 

Those sexy graffix were a theme throughout, the world was, if not the most interesting, the most beautiful and made hunting machines and wildlife a joy.

 

It's a bit of a shame this got lost under the weight of a certain other game as I would have liked to see some more discourse around it but it seems that is Horizon’s fate. Hopefully some of the Ring crowd will pick it up down the line like the Breath crowd (which I was one of) did as it deserves to be played.

 

10/10

 

Spoiler

15/02 - Agent A 7/10

14/02 - Saint's Row - Gat Out of Hell 6/10

11/02 - Nobody Saves the World 8/10

04/02 - Final Fantasy 7 Remake Episode INTERMission 6/10

01/02 - Final Fantasy 7 Remake 8/10

26/01 - Gorogoa 9/10

25/01 - The Gunk 7/10

23/01 - Control 7/10

11/01 - Rise of the Tomb Raider 7/10

07/01 - Sam & Max Beyond Time and Space 9/10

 

[SeanR]

brb, venting in a bumped FH1 thread

[Sprite Machine]

Previously...

Spoiler

1.) Lego City Undercover - PC - 2017 (2013)
2.) What Remains of Edith Finch - PS4 - 2017
3.) Superliminal - PS4 - 2020 (2019)
4.) Untitled Goose Game - Switch - 2019
5.) One Finger Death Punch 2 - PC - 2019
6.) Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood - PC - 2011 (2010)
7.) Vanquish - PC - 2017 (2010)

8.) Mass Effect (Legendary Edition) - PS4 - 2021 (2007)
9.) Telling Lies - PC - 2019
10.) Halo 5: Guardians - Xbox One - 2015
11.) Halo Infinite - Xbox Series - 2021

12.) Ori and the Blind Forest: Definitive Edition - PC - 2016 (2015)
Completed on normal difficulty (not 100%), approximately 8 hours.

 

One look at Ori's beautiful art style, its cute protagonist, its eco themes and peaceful woodwind music, and you might think this was going to be an easy-going or relaxing game. Nope! This is a challenging precision platformer that takes no shit! It may be a Metroidvania, but it also borrows a lot from Rayman (the Origins reboot) in how it has a certain flow and intuitiveness to the controls, and it asks you to perform complex strings of moves to escape all manner of deadly hazards. You will almost certainly die a lot, but the game instantly resets you back to your last save point, allowing you to perfect your technique, while the musical score powers on uninterrupted. I am aghast that there is an achievement for completing the game without dying, as that seems utterly incomprehensible, but a hearty "well done" to the 0.09% of players who apparently did just that.

 

I liked this, and if I had more time I would probably keep playing beyond the credits and exploring the entire map. However, I'm half-way through my £1 GamePass month and I have more games to squeeze in before it expires. #firstworldproblems

[rockhops]

After struggling to get into games over the last year or so, I've been having a Switch driven renaissance.

 

1. OlliOlli World 

Absolutely loved this one. I played one of the earlier OlliOlli games and while I enjoyed it, I didn't progress far as I lacked the skill to nail all the mechanics. OlliOlli World gets around this by keeping the mechanics, but making some of them optional, for example you don't have to nail a perfect landing, but it can affect your score. I long ago accepted I'm unlikely to git gud at gaming, so I've been able to enjoy the world and get to the credits by completing the bare minimum. 

 

The world itself has been graphically overhauled and oozes charm, and after the credits roll there are still a load of challenges to complete that should be good to work through in short bursts. Recommended.

 

2. Metroid Dread

This was my first Metroid game. I was a little intimidated going in as I'd read the game was quite difficult, and I did frequently get Samus killed, but the difficulty always felt fair. I think it also helped that being killed doesn't send you miles back to repeat large chunks of the game over and over, instead you just respawn at the end of the previous room and try again. 

 

The E.M.M.I.s seem a bit divisive online. They weren't my favourite part of the game (I enjoyed the boss battles far more), but they added some suspense and helped break the game up, especially towards the end when Samus had turned into a bad-ass and I could sprint past most enemies without any fear. They really nailed the feel of controlling Samus, and the game was just the right length clocking in at 9 hours. Really enjoyed this one as well.

 

 

[cassidy]

Spoiler

06/01/22

 

1. Yakuza 3 remastered -(series X)

 

26/01/22

 

2. Yakuza 4 remastered - (series X) 

 

27/01/22

 

3. Nobody saves the world - (Series X)

 

16/02/22

 

4. Infernax - (series X)

 

17/02/22

 

5. Dreamscaper - (series X) 

6. Young Souls - (Series X) 

A solid enjoyable side scrolling beat em up with RPG elements built in. Took me about 5hrs and it throws achievements at you. 

[Zio]

This year I want to make a real effort to stop constantly blowing money on games I won't play, so I'm making real efforts to get some of the backlog done. This is my first post in one of these threads, so here's what I've completed so far this year:

 

1. Night Book (Switch) - My first FMV game since the Mega CD days! Honestly I thought this was mostly cheesy shite, but my missus loved it. It has made me want to try some of the other FMV games out there, and I already have The Shapeshifting Detective in my backlog.

 

2. Deathloop (PS5) - I came so close to rage quitting this fucking game so many times. Ultimately I definitely did enjoy it a lot, but there are aspects of the looping mechanic that can become soul-crushing when you fuck something up late into a loop and then have to trudge through all of it all over again. But, mechanically, it's a fun shooter and, considering the Dishonored games, I'm not sure anyone can do scene-setting like Arkane.

 

3. Spider-Man Remastered (PS5) - I absolutely loved this! This is definitely how you do a superhero game. Something else I liked a lot is that it's a substantial game, there's a lot to it, but it's easy enough to dip in and out of without feeling completely lost. That's usually something that really puts me off bigger games, because life means sometimes I'll end up taking a break, only to come back completely unable to remember what I was doing in the game or even how to play it. Not an issue with this at all. Loved it.

 

4. The Witcher 3: Complete Edition (PC & Switch) - This is another I've always been able to dip in and out of and have been playing it on and off for well over two years. I'd long since finished the main quest and Hearts of Stone, so this is really just to recognise that I've now done Blood & Wine also. There's definitely still a few unfinished, and maybe even undiscovered, side quests for me to do at some point later too. Very possible that this is my GOAT.

 

5. Return of the Obra Dinn (Switch) - I struggled through this in places. I did enjoy it and I can see why it gets so much praise, but it is properly hard. Sometimes I had to make some real leaps to figure things out. To my eternal shame, at one point I even needed to peek at a walkthrough online. Maybe I don't have the right brain for this kind of thing. One day, once everything has sufficiently faded from memory, I'll have another crack at it. But hey, at least I did fully complete it this time.

 

6. FAR: Lone Sails (Switch) - Honestly I put this on because I just fancied something fairly short from my Switch backlog. It's fantastic! An absolutely wonderful little adventure! Can't recommend it enough.

[instasis]

18/03: Horizon Zero Dawn (PS5)

 

Finished the main campaign over lunch. This is something like the fourth or fifth time I've tried to play this game, and it finally stuck. After some initial amusement with the controls - it's dodge and crouch buttons are the opposite of Valhalla's - and some getting to grips via side quests, I quickly became massively overpowered for most of the storyline the necessity to take my time when stumbling across new beasts evaporated.

 

It's a game that confuses a breadth of systems for depth; they're all hopelessly shallow and - ultimately - entirely dull and unnecessary. The hardest thing to achieve in this game is the harvesting of fox skins, which you need for a couple of things, but everything else is easy peasy. One shotting most human enemies with head shots while sprinting through bandit camp is mildly interesting, but the AI just cannot cope. And if everything gets tricky? Find a funnel and pick them off.

 

There are a bunch of combat systems in there to make that all more interesting, of course, but given enemy patterns and behaviour are fundamentally predictable it's difficult to understand why anyone would bother. There's almost nothing 'emergent' here at all, and everything related to combat is solvable either by finding the very simple thing that makes it a cinch, or running in circles, dodging occasionally, and firing a near limitless number of arrows at a thing.

 

So, the story! That'll save it. (It doesn't). It's all so wonderfully, incredibly derivative there's barely a beat here you haven't seen, experienced or read a million times before. Sylens sums up Aloy perfectly; upon stumbling across the entirety of human knowledge she whines some more about a mother she knows has been dead for hundreds of years. When she discovers she has an absolute, fundamental destiny and reason for existing she questions the nature of her life itself. She's an absolute tool.

 

Gonna clear The Frozen Wilds next and, given the length, count it as another entry in this list, but then I am 100% done with Aloy and her adventures.

 

Spoiler

23/1: Ninja Baseball Bat Man (MAME)

17/02: Assassin's Creed: Valhalla (PS5)

19/02: The Pedestrian (Xbone)

19/02: Gorogoa (Xbone)

20/02: The Gunk (Xbone)

 

[Quest]

20/03 - Flynn: Son of Crimson (Series X)

 

 

Enjoyable little action-platformer that knows well enough to wrap things up before running out of ideas. It's the sort of game that a less restrained developer would overthink and turn into a dreary grind, but here I appreciate the confident simplicity and focus.

 

A few light gimmicks to keep things varied and a well-pitched difficulty curve kept me coming back over a couple of days to finish it off. Recommended for all you Game Pass sorts.

 

Spoiler

20/03 - Flynn: Son of Crimson (Series X)

13/03 - Cyberpunk 2077 (Series X)

10/01 - Taiko no Tatsujin: The Drum Master (Series X)

31/01 - Touhou Luna Nights (Series X)

28/01 - The Forgotten City (Series X)

26/01 - Poochy &  Yoshi's Woolly World (3DS

17/01 - iS: Internal Section (PS1)

16/01 - New Pokemon Snap (Switch)

15/01 - Shinobi III (Mega Drive)

14/01 - Bulk Slash (Saturn)

13/01 - Densetsu no Stafy (GBA)

13/01 - Wolf Fang - Kuuga 2001 (PS1)

11/01 - Clock Tower - The First Fear (PS1)

11/01 - Finger Flashing (PS1)

10/01 - Mon Amour (Switch)

10/01- Psy-O-Blade (Mega Drive)

08/01 - Romeo + Juliet (Mac)

08/01 - BLACK BIRD (Switch)

04/01 - The Pedestrian (Series X)

03/01 - Paper Mario: The Origami King (Switch)

03/01 - Sonic Generations (Series X)

01/01 - How We Know We're Alive (Mac)

 

[Popo]

Super Mario 3D Land (2011)

I recently bough a (New) 3DS (XL) because of the news about the eShop closing, and the dawning realisation that it's a great system that completely passed me by on release. This was the game I wanted to play the most, and it didn't disappoint in the slightest. The buttons can be a little fiddly at times - especially the shoulder buttons - which meant that I wasn't able to be as precise as I always wanted, but this is a proper Mario game through and through. The 8 stages available offer a modest challenge, so I played all S-stages as well. This was nice because not only are the stages themselves fun, challenging remixes of the earlier stages, the way the game locks progress based on star coins means you have to go back and collect those you didn't manage previously, gently encouraging you to develop your skill level and lengthening the game content in a welcome way. By the time I beat the last special stage I had amassed 290 coin, which meant perfecting all the main 8 stages and 4 of the special stages, which is a great feeling of achievement. I believe I can now play through all of the stages again as Luigi to get a perfect ending, but to be honest I've had my fill at this point. Time to move on to Link Between Worlds!

 

Spoiler

06/01/2022 - Halo Infinite

09/01/2022 - Hyper Light Drifter

05/02/2022 - Ori and the Will of the Wisps

13/02/2022 - Guardians of the Galaxy

20/02/2022 - It Takes Two

20/03/2022 - Super Mario 3D Land

 

[Quest]

20/03 - Kaze no Notam/Notam of Wind (PS1)

 

 

Artdink released Triangle Strategy just recently, but I've been playing their 1997 hot air balloon simulator instead. Now, being an air balloon game you don't have much in the way of direct control over where you're headed, but you can fire the burner to control altitude and catch an air current that'll carry you somewhere. Probably not where you actually want to go, mind, but that just gives you a chance to take in some of the low-poly vistas that disappear into the fog about a hundred yards away.

 

There are a few different modes with objectives that are fairly annoying, so I tended to just customise my balloon, float around and enjoy the music. An enjoyable diversion every once in a while.

 

 

 

Spoiler

21/03 - AI: The Somnium Files

20/03 - Kaze no Notam/Notam of Wind (PS1)

20/03 - Flynn: Son of Crimson (Series X)

13/03 - Cyberpunk 2077 (Series X)

10/01 - Taiko no Tatsujin: The Drum Master (Series X)

31/01 - Touhou Luna Nights (Series X)

28/01 - The Forgotten City (Series X)

26/01 - Poochy &  Yoshi's Woolly World (3DS

17/01 - iS: Internal Section (PS1)

16/01 - New Pokemon Snap (Switch)

15/01 - Shinobi III (Mega Drive)

14/01 - Bulk Slash (Saturn)

13/01 - Densetsu no Stafy (GBA)

13/01 - Wolf Fang - Kuuga 2001 (PS1)

11/01 - Clock Tower - The First Fear (PS1)

11/01 - Finger Flashing (PS1)

10/01 - Mon Amour (Switch)

10/01- Psy-O-Blade (Mega Drive)

08/01 - Romeo + Juliet (Mac)

08/01 - BLACK BIRD (Switch)

04/01 - The Pedestrian (Series X)

03/01 - Paper Mario: The Origami King (Switch)

03/01 - Sonic Generations (Series X)

01/01 - How We Know We're Alive (Mac)