Whatcha Been Playing?

[gallo_pinto]

I'm replaying the main campaign of Shovel Knight. I wanted to play it again before moving on to the Plague of Shadows DLC and the upcoming Spectre of Torment DLC (out in April).

I forgot how great this game was! It's really, really good! The mechanics are fun and I love the world they've created. The character designs are so goofy and memorable. Glad to be back in this world.

[Alex79]

I had a similar idea, I downloaded it again to my Vita to play through the Plague Knight in prep for Spectre Knight but just couldn't get on with it. Still love the original Shovel Knight campaign though. Can't wait for Spectre Knight!

[Hicks]

I'm replaying the main campaign of Shovel Knight..

I just went back the other day and finally finished up my New Game + for the trophy. Trying to now go for the 'no death-no relics-no money spent-all checkpoints destroyed' run! I have to platinum this game just for my old school gamer cred lol

And yes, so excited for the next campaign!! Plague of Shadows will be your first run thru it? I'll warn you, it plays verrrry differently from SK. Parts that you struggled with in SK will be a breeze with Plague, while the easy parts of SK will frustrate you as Plague, at least in my experience. But, that's not a bad thing, I honestly enjoyed Plague as much if not more than SK (definitely got into the story more, YCG actually made me care more about the future of a bad guy and an ancillary character than I did the two protagonists of the first one XD)

[stvnorman]

DoTT is much more logical than Grim Fandango, I think. It's easy enough to complete without a walkthrough, but I'm struggling with Grim to do the same! Do you know about this site? http://www.uhs-hints.com/uhsweb/dott.php

Never seen that before Alex. Thanks! You're definitely right. It is more logical. There's a formula to most of it, especially where things need to be switched between characters. All the same, my patience has worn very thin a good few times!

[Flabyo]

Playing the beta of For Honor and it's a bit of a mixed bag.

The combat system is pretty deep. Lot of things in here that a fighting game fan will be familiar with (startup times, block stun, frame advantage, parries, okezemi and so on...), and a varied selection of characters to play as with unique combo chains and move properties.

Then learning curve is quite steep though, which isn't being helped by the matchmaking being off so the games aren't very skill balanced during the beta. The final game has a long single player campaign which I assume will walk you through playing the nine hero types, so that might help too.

It also appears to be using peer to peer instead of servers to host the games, and that's going to sting it hard when it comes to being played as an eSport.

So, promising, but not quite there yet.

[Jobobonobo]

DoTT is much more logical than Grim Fandango, I think. It's easy enough to complete without a walkthrough, but I'm struggling with Grim to do the same! Do you know about this site? http://www.uhs-hints.com/uhsweb/dott.php

It's really good. It'll offer you hints without telling you the solution (unless you keep clicking, then it will!!) I've found it really brilliant in a past for some adventure games, especially ones I've already finished and half forgotten the solution and just need a jog of the memory.

Cheers for this website, I intend to crack into Grim Fandango some time this year, so this will be a useful resource if there are any particularly obtuse puzzles that I come across!

[ADumican83]

Dragon Quest VIII- 3DS.

Never played a Dragon Quest game and haven't played many JRPGs in general. I'm only a couple of hours in, but I'm really enjoying it. Getting a real sense of adventure about it even though I've only just left the first town.

[Jobobonobo]

Starting a new game plus on Bastion. Very satisfying that being that bit more levelled up with stronger weapons means that enemies that were a hassle in the beginning of the game (Scumbags, ugh) are now a walk in the park. I do have a question about what to do at the end of the game so for those who are interested in playing it but do not want anything spoiled I will put behind spoilers.

Spoiler: show

In my first playthrough I carried Zulf when he was injured in order to return him to the bastion. Then I chose to preven tht e calamity fro ever happening. If I ignored Zulf but still chose to prevent the calamity, would that give a different ending or is only the choice at the very end meaningful?

But yeah, fun to play again. It is a very well presented title.

My Pokemon Moon playthrough has me now on the second island with three new members to my team; Cutiefly, Mudbray and Wishiwashi. Cutiefly is my first ever bug type that I ever put onto any of my teams and he has been really useful so far, he even resisted poisoning in one battle in order to get me to win! Wishiwashi is also a true monster once he gets to lvl 20 and his schooling ability activates. Pokemon that used to give me real trouble as a single Wishiwashi are fish food now! I think it is a great idea for a Pokemon and shows that Gamefreak still have some great ideas when it comes to new monsters in the series.

The game is really opening up now and I am enjoying it so much more. Treating Pokemon after battle is a great way to bond with them and will enable them to perform better in battle if you pet and feed them enough. It was how Cutiefly resisted poisoning and Mudbray resisted fainting for two turns so I could try and win (it was only on 1 Hp). The last time I felt so connected to a Pokemon team was in Soul Silver where they follow you around throughout your entire journey.

Team Skull are really refreshing after so many evil teams were trying to take over the world or some other grandiose goal. Their incompetence and pathetic tough guy act make them oddly endearing. Also their animation with the arms flailing all over the place is just brilliant stuff. The fact that you can ride Pokemon at any time is an incredible godsend and should have been in the series years ago. I always detested HMS as they simply filled up a slot in your Pokemon's move pool that could be filled with any other move. Riding around on Tauros busting rocks with his head is an absolute delight. I am also finding the Trials to be a nice change from the gym structure of previous games as well.

So overall, I am really getting into this game a lot more lately and it has made some very welcome changes to the formula. However, the fact that wild pokemon can now summon allies is a big load of BS quite frankly. If you are not careful these battles can drag on and on and on. You can get a lot of experience but it can be an absolute slog at times. It is my only real complaint with the game so far though.

Also just got onto world 3 of Kirby Mass Attack. I find it surprisingly challenging for a Kirby title and managing your little army of kirbies lends a air of Lemmings to the gameplay that certainly make this title stand out from the rest of the series. The difficulty ramp from world 1 to world 2 is truly noticeable or maybe it is as easy as other Kirby games and I am just rubbish . The level where you have to bring the baby birds back to their mother....yeah, I died a lot more on that than I am willing to admit! Still a really fun little game though, can't go wrong with Kirby.

[Jobobonobo]

Dragon Quest VIII- 3DS.

Never played a Dragon Quest game and haven't played many JRPGs in general. I'm only a couple of hours in, but I'm really enjoying it. Getting a real sense of adventure about it even though I've only just left the first town.

Oh bugger, forgot this came out ! This has been on my must play list for ages! Really enjoyed IX and I heard this is an absolute classic for the PS2 so will definitely pick it up some time this year.

[DomsBeard]

I've clocked 7.5 hours on Resident Evil 7 in two days so yeah I am enjoying it!. Not had a game get its claws into me like this for a long time.

Story is a very slow burn and nothing has been made crystal clear even now but pieces are starting to be put together.

Combat is similar to Resident Evil 1/2 so no run and gun and you need to pick your battles. I won't spoil it by saying anything else but if you're a long term fan of Resi I'd recommend it highly.

[ColinAlonso]

So overall, I am really getting into this game a lot more lately and it has made some very welcome changes to the formula. However, the fact that wild pokemon can now summon allies is a big load of BS quite frankly. If you are not careful these battles can drag on and on and on. You can get a lot of experience but it can be an absolute slog at times. It is my only real complaint with the game so far though.

Bloody hate when a battle against a Zubat/Golbat turns into a battle against 4/5 of them. Wishiwashi was great for that part of the game. Sadly I dropped him as Wingull/Pelipper and Poliwhirl were taking up my preferred water spots. Barring the wild Pokemon backup, it is very streamlined and user friendly in a good way (well they could speed up the battle sequences a bit).

Started The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask for the first time on the 3DS on Saturday after finishing Sun, and promptly wandered around for a good 3/4 3 day cycles, particularly when I knew I needed a bottle but couldn't find one, not even a mention of one. I'm sure there was an easier way to get a bottle but I did finally get it.

Spoiler: show

by going through a fair amount of the Anju/Kafei quest line to get a bottle of milk from the mayor's wife.

It's still early days and I probably won't feel that bad again but it felt like when I'm stuck on a point and click game and have no idea what to do, I just get frustrated so easily when that happens.

[chrysalice]

About nine hours/two worlds into Kingdom Hearts: Dream Drop Distance and it's... a little odd. I really enjoy the series, and for the most part it's just more of the same, but the drop mechanic where you're automatically switched to the other character seems jarring and pointless, particularly as it can happen at any moment, including mid boss fight.

Looking forward to getting to 0.2: A Fragmentary Passage, Aqua's a lot of fun to spend time with.

[Suits]

I'm right at the end of Super Metroid and it's giving me the hump.

So I've started casual run through on Super Mario Bros. 2 just to ease the pain.

As soon as I've finished with Super Metroid, I'm starting my next Nintendo classic play through. I've already got my next SNES title lined up and got myself an import cart to play it on. Literally can't wait too much longer.

[Jobobonobo]

[Bloody hate when a battle against a Zubat/Golbat turns into a battle against 4/5 of them. Wishiwashi was great for that part of the game. Sadly I dropped him as Wingull/Pelipper and Poliwhirl were taking up my preferred water spots. Barring the wild Pokemon backup, it is very streamlined and user friendly in a good way (well they could speed up the battle sequences a bit).

Ugh, Zubat is already a pain in the arse to battle anyways, going into a seemingly endless loop sounds horrific! Thankfully, only being in that situation once, I am packing whenever I am in caves so not intending to go down that rabbit hole.

Latest update with my Pokemon Moon playthrough is that I have finally caught a female Salandit which I am well chuffed about. Going into the Lush Jungle to start the Mallow Trial and level her up a bit as well.

[Joshihatsumitsu]

I managed to recently acquire an official Ninja Baseball Bat Man JAMMA PCB, after an intense eBay bidding war with myself, as no one else wanted it. Score!

For anyone unfamiliar, which I assume is many people, it is a beat 'em up/belt scroller from 1993, developed by Irem. I had never played it in arcades, and was very much drawn to the sprite art work. According to the hopefully correct interwebs, Drew Maniscalco came up with the concept, and Gordon Morison, who did a lot of artwork for Gottlieb pinball machines, did the actual artwork for this game, which very much won me over.

I would say if ya curious, and you have a fondness for 1990's beat 'em ups, then feel free to download a rom and MAME it. I would love to recommend an official, legal way to acquire it outside of spending quite a bit of money on a PCB, but alas, there were no ports, which is a shame.

In terms of actual gameplay, if there's one thing I greatly appreciate is the inclusion of a dash/dash attacks. As much as I love my 1991 Sega Spider-Man game, and I do love that game, you can only move at a walking pace, so the ability to move quicker in NBBBM sticks out.

Like quite a few arcade games at the time, it can take up to four players. I don't know four people, so that feature is a bit lost on me, but it's nice that its there.

So yeah, it won't be to everyones taste, and thats understandable, but if you're MAME-ing it anyway then check it out.

[Joshihatsumitsu]

I just finished Life is Strange today, and loved it, so if you're on the fence jump right off and get into it.

And it's been interesting because I've also been playing Stein's;Gate (Tutturu!), and apart from both sharing the element of time travel, they are very different games. I just can't imagine Max putting up with the mad scientist Hououin Kyouma's antics, though maybe Chloe would get along with Kurisa?

[ADumican83]

Don't know whether to begin playing Read Dead Redemption or The Witcher 3. Both XBOX One.

[ADumican83]

Don't know whether to begin playing Read Dead Redemption or The Witcher 3. Both XBOX One.

[deacon05oc]

Persona 4 Dancing All Night has just taken over all my free time. I never finished Persona 4 so I know absolutely nothing about what the story is referencing. But I love the music. It's been my soundtrack all of this week.

[gallo_pinto]

Persona 4 Dancing All Night has just taken over all my free time. I never finished Persona 4 so I know absolutely nothing about what the story is referencing. But I love the music. It's been my soundtrack all of this week.

It's sooo good!!!