Whatcha Been Playing?

[dezm0nd]

Castlevania: Harmony of Dissidence ...[snip]... Anyone else played this game ??

For a moment I thought that was the 360 game harmony of despair

[KSubzero1000]

Yeah, I end up muting people quite often on Rocket League.

Completely forgot to mention... I always mute people by default and everything I described happened in the chat window. As in, they actually take the time to type out this basura. The mind boggles.

[Mr Ixolite]

I've been playing Castlevania: Harmony of Dissidence on my trusty GBA-SP ...h it.

Anyone else played this game ??

I have; I mostly remember it for the gimmick itself, and having a really lame true final battle. I don't remember it being much worse than other handheld Igavanias, but then a lot of the issues you describe (the eventual navigational tedium, eventual obtuseness) are emblematic of those games to me - HoD probably just excacerbates them with its parrallel castle setup. Even Symphony of the Night has many getting restless at the inverted castle, after all.

But yeah, I think the general consensus is that HoD is lesser/more forgettable.

[Stanshall]

Chat is a crucial part of the RL meta game.

Great pass!
Great pass!
Great pass!
[mute]
...
...
...
Great pass!
Great pass!
Great...

[hazeredmist]

Haha!

Yeah, to be honest with Rocket League I've not experienced the full-on aggro messages, that's probably due to playing on Switch where randoms can't message me outside of the in-game chat. Even then though I don't recall it on PS4 where I used to play it ages ago. Best advice I could give though is ignore and block anyone who annoys you, report them too. But also laugh, because you've probably caught their attention due to being good at the game which is certainly the case with ksub!

The banter with the chat is quite funny sometimes.

Nice shot!
Great pass!
Thanks!
No problem.
No problem.
No problem.
No problem.
[Chat muted for 4 seconds]
No problem.
No problem.
OMG!
Wow!
Whoops!
Whoops!
Defending...
gg
Well played.
No problem.



Really enjoying the game in general lately, I have good days and bad days with it in terms of how I do but it's generally always fun. And a nice treat playing with ksub along with my group who are a good bunch of lads. It's become our lockdown game.

Alex - if you get the itch again you'd be more than welcome to join in any night too, there are always people on and i get on quite often myself but later on. I could invite you to the club and get your ID to share. Same goes for anyone here who might be interested! The more the merrier.

[Suits]

I have one more plan of action tonight, then if I don't get anywhere, or get a better understanding of any direction, I'm done with it.

Well it worked and I ended up playing for a few more hours last night making great progress and things flowing as they should.

I will continue to stick with it.

Not sure if those of you who played it remember but I seem to have stumbled into what feels a like a super OP tactic - which has been super effective now for a while (way before I got stuck but is still now effective) is if you mix the cross sub-weapon, with the wind spell book, you get a sort fo protective circle of 'things' that spin around you and offer an outstanding AOE weapon.

You essentially use your character position as a weapon and just move towards things with this spell. It is fun.


Sadly my complete inability to spell and total reliance on spellcheck has once again been exposed. I've never been able to spell and my professional career would be in jeopardy if spellcheck vanished. It's not my first language mind and Owly's incredible ability to use English isn't a fair comparison .

[Flabyo]

I’m always surprised how different the chat experience is in causal play compared to listening to chat in a pro player match. I’m most familiar with Overwatch where pro player shot calling is *crazy* and *constant*, but I imagine rocket league is just as frenzied.

(It’s one of the things you don’t pick up on watching real football if you’ve only ever watched it on tv and not in person, the players are talking to each other *all the time*)

[Suits]

(It’s one of the things you don’t pick up on watching real football if you’ve only ever watched it on tv and not in person, the players are talking to each other *all the time*)

It's so essential. Often it's not even tactical just encouraging and bullshit most of the time.

There's a huge responsibility to be vocal on the pitch.

The stuff we used to say on the field was maddening .

The other team would be like WTF .

[KSubzero1000]

Sadly my complete inability to spell and total reliance on spellcheck has once again been exposed.

Hey man, it happens. To be fair, the title you came up with genuinely sounds like some cool War of the Roses period thriller. Could have been worse!

I’m always surprised how different the chat experience is in causal play compared to listening to chat in a pro player match. I’m most familiar with Overwatch where pro player shot calling is *crazy* and *constant*, but I imagine rocket league is just as frenzied.

I have zero experience with the high-level RL meta-game so I can't comment on that, but even on Overwatch competitive, shot calling and communication is a huge part of the experience once you get past Platinum, especially when playing as a team. Learning how to recognize the important info (footsteps for example) and to communicate it properly is really important, especially when playing Support. Loved doing that.

And a nice treat playing with ksub along with my group who are a good bunch of lads.

no u

[frogbeastegg]

I've been playing Castlevania: Harmony of Dissidence [...] Anyone else played this game ??

I've finished it twice. Once back when it was new, once early last year.

At release I loved the game. It was Circle of the Moon but iterated upon. Smoother controls, easier to see, more to do, less grinding to get ability drops, and the kinder difficulty level suited me better as my interest was in exploring rather than boss battles. CotM itself was one of my stand-out GBA launch titles, a real discovery as I'd not heard much about this Castlevania thing before and had never played anything with this style of exploration gameplay.

Revisiting it via Wii U virtual console I found it held up in some aspects and not in others. The big failing for me was the environments, and the confusing navigation which they caused. I found too many rooms were visually indistinct and shared the similar layouts of platforms and enemies, so I never developed that mental map which allowed me to say, "I want to go to X, so that means this corridor and that climb" Add to that the dual nature of the castle, and my confusion only grew. Whereas, if I see a screenshot of Symphony of the Night I can say roughly where in the castle that room is despite only having played that game once and several years ago. Obviously screen resolution and production budget impact on the art, but it's the heavy recycling and lack of unique touches which cause the problem for me. In the end I stuck a map on my ipad as the need to constantly pull up my in-game map was disrupting the flow. The music was quite the shock. Turns out the soundtrack which I'd remembered for this game was actually CotM's. This one I liked a whole lot less, and less still once it was playing through TV speakers, where it became harsh, tinny and shrill. I found myself turning it down, and down, and down, then putting a podcast on over the top as muting it would be even more destructive to the atmosphere.

Back then, and today, I found Aria of Sorrow is a much better game in every possible way except one - I miss the greater dash mobility. If Aria were ported to a modern platform I'd buy another copy day 1 and play it through yet again. By contrast, I'd say HoD is worth playing once if you want to see how the GBA side of Castlevania developed. After that once, or if you're not so keen on the history, maybe not. CotN ... that's for the dedicated. I found it was one of the rare classic games where I couldn't find a reason to keep playing versus newer incarnations.

That circle of "things" was one of my favourite tools in the game. There is something delightful about lazily standing next to an enemy and watching it crumble.

[Suits]

That circle of "things" was one of my favourite tools in the game. There is something delightful about lazily standing next to an enemy and watching it crumble.

Wicked man, thanks for your post.

Seems like the weird navigation aspect isn't something I'm alone with then - which is nice.

I'm enjoying it, just left frustrated by some of the choices that were made.

I also play with the music turned down, which is a shame and I'm playing it on a mono GBA-SP so its toned down anyway.

My personal highlight of games is the Sorrow pair, probably Dawn - as I like the functionality that then DSi-XL brings but it's marginal.

Circle of things kicks ass don't it, feels like cheating .

[Alex79]

This is going to sound absolutely wild, but your username came up in a dream I had last night. I think it was the name of a nuclear bomb? But I asked myself in the dream, "Is he Alex, born 1979 in the UK, or model 79uk of the Alex series of drones?" I thought that amusing to share.

How strange, haha. But the boring version is that I wanted to be called Alex79 when I set my Xbox live account up about 15 years ago and it was already taken so I just stuck a UK on the end! (And yes, it's the year I was born).

[Alex79]

Alex - if you get the itch again you'd be more than welcome to join in any night too, there are always people on and i get on quite often myself but later on. I could invite you to the club and get your ID to share. Same goes for anyone here who might be interested! The more the merrier.

Oh definitely, I've neglected it recently but was loving it. I actually tried to play it a few night ago because I saw you were on but was embarrassingly bad due to not playing for a while and turned it off after the first match!

[Magical_Isopod]

This is going to sound absolutely wild, but your username came up in a dream I had last night. I think it was the name of a nuclear bomb? But I asked myself in the dream, "Is he Alex, born 1979 in the UK, or model 79uk of the Alex series of drones?" I thought that amusing to share.

How strange, haha. But the boring version is that I wanted to be called Alex79 when I set my Xbox live account up about 15 years ago and it was already taken so I just stuck a UK on the end! (And yes, it's the year I was born).

I'm still not precluding the possibility you're an android.

[hazeredmist]

Alex - if you get the itch again you'd be more than welcome to join in any night too, there are always people on and i get on quite often myself but later on. I could invite you to the club and get your ID to share. Same goes for anyone here who might be interested! The more the merrier.

Oh definitely, I've neglected it recently but was loving it. I actually tried to play it a few night ago because I saw you were on but was embarrassingly bad due to not playing for a while and turned it off after the first match!

Honestly, that is not a problem with us, we aren't aiming for Premier League status

We do have a club but it's nothing serious at all, everyone is just having a laugh and at sporadic times, nothing is really organised. I created the club just so we'd have a name after matches rather than "Blue team wins". I'll drop you an invite to the legendary Red Mist FC

[stvnorman]

Finished Streets of Rage 4’s story mode on normal difficulty with a mix of solo and online co-op, then went back to do some sightseeing on easy to find the four retro levels, and just take in some of the fantastic artwork and attention to detail. Now I’m back on normal, going stage by stage to get the better of the ones I couldn’t do alone before, and rack up enough score to unlock all the retro characters. I adore this and it’s going to take some knocking off my game of the year spot.

Also finished TimeSplitters 2 on PS2. Not much more to add - it’s still great! The last two levels were really tough to get through the first time, but I went back and did a bit of beating my own time on the last level once I’d finished it, which turned out to be pretty simple if you went a bit more gung-ho than I’d been before!

And also finished Moley Christmas on the Spectrum. This is a Monty Mole game that came free with Sinclair User so it’s not very long, but it’s as cruel as you’d expect! That said, I became obsessed with clearing it without losing a life once I’d worked out how it worked. Great value even if it took a while to get to!

[Alex79]

This is going to sound absolutely wild, but your username came up in a dream I had last night. I think it was the name of a nuclear bomb? But I asked myself in the dream, "Is he Alex, born 1979 in the UK, or model 79uk of the Alex series of drones?" I thought that amusing to share.

How strange, haha. But the boring version is that I wanted to be called Alex79 when I set my Xbox live account up about 15 years ago and it was already taken so I just stuck a UK on the end! (And yes, it's the year I was born).

I'm still not precluding the possibility you're an android.

It would explain a lot.

[Alex79]

Stuff...

Steeeeeeeeeve!! How's G-LOC? I want to get it but haven't heard anyone's opinions yet. Seems to have got OK reviews.

[Scrustle]

More Burnout Paradise Remastered. Starting to get in to the groove with it more now. It seems a big part of it is simply unlocking cars that feel better to drive. Except weirdly they only start showing up after the credits roll. So I've technically "finished" the game by one metric, yet the game doesn't feel anywhere close to being over. There's like half the game left. I do remember there being a lot of post-credits content, but I wasn't expecting it to be practically half the game. It's very odd.

Also started playing Mini Ninjas. This is another one that I did play way back when it first came out, and I'm now revisiting it. Although Burnout has got way more attention through the years than this. Anyway, it's a cute chill game that actually commits to its premise quite impressively. Like despite the very cutesy, cartoony presentation, you can tell the developers did their research and actually cared about representing things faithfully. One big problem though is that the levels are too big. There's a whole lot of empty space and not a lot in it. The levels themselves are pretty linear too, yet have some level of collectathon elements. So the idea of having to scour these massive levels where you have to go through them back and forth is kind of tedious and not appealing. But it's an okay thing to just sit back with and relax with.

[stvnorman]

Stuff...

Steeeeeeeeeve!! How's G-LOC? I want to get it but haven't heard anyone's opinions yet. Seems to have got OK reviews.

Stuff!

G-LOC came out on the wrong day unfortunately, and is struggling to get much of a look in. I’ve been playing most nights last thing before bed, which isn’t ideal because it really needs the sound up louder than I’m able at that time, but it still looks spectacular and it plays just how I remember it... which is very shallow, more luck than judgment, mostly mindless shooting stuff at high speed!

As someone who’d always take Rambo over War Horse, that suits me fine! I really need to put some more time into it though. I think I’ve got better but it still feels like my enjoyment is pretty superficial. If you have nostalgia for it, buy it!