Games Completed 2023

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Scrustle
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Re: Games Completed 2023

Post by Scrustle »

Spoiler: show

03/01 - The Last Campfire
05/01 - Splatoon 3
17/01 - Wolfenstein (2009)
22/01 - Fragments of Euclid
02/02 - Postmouse
08/02 - Mortal Kombat: Shaolin Monks (Kung Lao)
26/02 - F.I.S.T.: Forged In Shadow Torch
06/03 - Omensight: The Definitive Edition
09/03 - X-Men Origins: Wolverine
21/03 - Forza Horizon 2 (first finale)
25/03 - Majin and the Forsaken Kingdom
31/03 - Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed (World Tour)
01/04 - The Murder of Sonic the Hedgehog
16/04 - Knights Contract

After playing Majin I’ve had the works of Game Republic on my mind again, so I played through this one as well. This was their last game, which was a flop and got a critical mauling, that likely killed the studio. I have to say, the slating it got in reviews was not really undeserved, although it does have some redeeming qualities.

This game is quite a bit different to the studio’s previous work. It comes across like it was an example of a struggling Japanese studio attempting to court Western tastes to try to turn around its fortunes, as many others were doing at the time. It veers away from what the studio was doing before and instead goes for a grimdark aesthetic in a more traditional fantasy setting, with a focus on bloody, violent combat. Many of the games that went down this path around the same time ended up stumbling hard, and lost the character and appeal that their creators had in the first place. That is largely true in this case as well, but not entirely. Despite the huge departure this game made from the developer’s usual wheelhouse, quite a lot of their signature style can still be found peeking through.

The story is nothing spectacular, but it’s one example of this game not being as dull and morose as it first appears. It’s a very simple story about this knight and witch duo teaming up to take down a bunch of other witches who are trying to destroy humanity as revenge for how they were treated by them. At first it seems like it’s going to be gritty and dour, with miserable humourless characters. But it turns out there is a bit of lightheartedness in there. It’s not much, but you do get the sense that the game isn’t trying to be exclusively dark and edgy, and that it wants its characters to come off like they actually care about stuff. There are signs of inspiration similar to what this studio has done in the past too. A lot of the characters take their names from fairytale figures, and they do make a point to empathise with the witches’ desire for revenge by touching on the injustice of witch trials that took place in the real medieval era. In practice it doesn’t amount to much though, it’s a fairly humdrum fantasy adventure. But there was at least an attempt to make it something a bit more than that. Maybe if this game got more time in development, it could have done more with it.

The combat that you spend most of the game doing makes a good first impression. It is pretty stiff and clunky, as you play as this enormous hunk of meat with a massive scythe for a weapon. But it does a good job of making that feel appropriately chunky and like every hit has a huge amount of power behind it. Ripping through enemies feels pretty satisfying, and the sound design is fittingly heavy. Your witch companion who you are protecting also has powerful magic abilities that play in to fights as well. It feels like an evolution of what Majin was doing, but more fleshed out this time. While in Majin all you could really do was hit a co-op finisher move when the prompt appears, here you have a range of spells that have different effects that you can set off on demand, which you can then follow up in to a synchronised finishing move. So there can be some good moments when you’re ripping enemies to shreds and then seamlessly ending a combo with a big spectacular magical spell. That feels like what the game is trying to achieve with its combat, and it’s pretty good when it goes like that. But it definitely doesn’t manage that a lot of the time.

You have access to a bunch of different combo strings in this game, somewhat similar to the lock-on direction relative stuff of DMC, but also in the light and heavy attack string style. Very few of them seem to be worth bothering with though. A lot of them don’t have much practical use, some don’t seem to come out when you try to perform them. There’s a launcher that can also be used to knock enemies over, and that’s the only one I found to be useful outside of just doing the basic light-light-heavy kind of thing. The game just eats inputs a lot of the time as well, making it feel pretty unreliable to attempt anything more technical. The camera is also atrocious. It very frequently gets stuck in a corner during fights and jerks around erratically making it hard to tell what’s going on, and has a habit of pointing up at the sky or down at the ground unprompted. One of the worst I’ve ever seen in an action game. The lock-on isn’t much better, as the target it selects feels random, and it will sometimes just switch target by itself for no reason. The bosses are also just awful. The character you play as in this game is immortal, but your witch companion is not. Bosses can just erase her health near instantly with no warning. A good run at a boss can be stripped away from you in seconds because they did some ridiculous attack that fills the entire room and she gets caught in the middle of it. And although you can’t die yourself, your body can get destroyed, at which point you have to mash a button to reconstruct yourself. It takes way too long to do and is very frustrating to have to do in a boss fight when the witch is also dying and there’s nothing you can do to help. For some reason the game also has a habit of putting instant death pits around the boss fight rooms, which the terrible camera doesn’t help with. And to add the perfect capstone to all of this, boss fights end with an instant death QTE sequence, that if you fail, you are sent back to the start of the previous boss phase. Not the start of the QTE. So that means you’ll have to do half of entire boss fight again, just to have another go at it. Baffling design. These problems with the boss fights are so bad that if just they were fixed, it would honestly make the entire game a much better experience.

The last third of the game has some serious padding issues too. You reach a point where you’re getting towards the final confrontation, but then an antagonist appears and throws you in to a literal pocket dimension that you have to spend a handful of chapters trying to escape. These levels reuse a lot of the areas from earlier chapters, sometimes even multiple times, except this time they’re all completely grey like they’re made out of ash or something. It also splits up the duo you usually play as, having you switch between playing each of them solo. At first it’s actually pretty fun to play as the witch directly, but this whole section goes on for far too long and feels like such an obvious point of trying to cheaply extend the runtime that it runs out of that good will by the time it’s done. Not having access to the most interesting part of this combat system gets old pretty fast.

The aesthetic is another mixed bag. At first the game does seem kind of ugly. An uninspired medieval fantasy world, filled with drab, dirty colours. When one of the major strengths of this studio has been their visual design, it’s pretty disappointing. And while this game definitely doesn’t have the vibrancy or uniqueness of their previous works, there are actually still elements of it that show imagination and the same kind of sensibilities that defined stuff like Folklore and Majin. It’s most clearly seen in the design of the magic related things in the game. Namely the spell effects of your witch companion, as well as the designs of the bosses, most of whom are the other witches. The magic spells you have access to in combat have a cool thorn motif to them, but with a glassy, purplish material to them. They are animated really intricately, which is definitely a factor in how fun they are to pull off. This purple thorn theme extends to the UI as well. To be honest, it is a bit garish, but I like it. It adds some character to the game, and feels in line with the ornamental design this developer has always done. The boss witches all have really outlandish and colourful designs as well. Some grotesque, others impressive and imposing. It’s a shame they are so miserable to actually fight, because they are the stand-out moments of the game from a visual perspective. Some of the environments do have their moments too, despite the mostly generic dark fantasy settings. They tend to improve as you go through the game, starting out in fairly bland locations, but later on you end up in some places that do actually show some imagination and interesting use of colour and lighting. It’s a shame the game doesn’t put its best foot forward in that area.

So this is a game that I cannot really recommend. While there are some parts to it that can be enjoyable, and there are signs of artistic ambition that occasionally shine through, it is far too flawed an experience to look past.
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Scrustle
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Re: Games Completed 2023

Post by Scrustle »

Spoiler: show

03/01 - The Last Campfire
05/01 - Splatoon 3
17/01 - Wolfenstein (2009)
22/01 - Fragments of Euclid
02/02 - Postmouse
08/02 - Mortal Kombat: Shaolin Monks (Kung Lao)
26/02 - F.I.S.T.: Forged In Shadow Torch
06/03 - Omensight: The Definitive Edition
09/03 - X-Men Origins: Wolverine
21/03 - Forza Horizon 2 (first finale)
25/03 - Majin and the Forsaken Kingdom
31/03 - Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed (World Tour)
01/04 - The Murder of Sonic the Hedgehog
16/04 - Knights Contract
20/04 - Strider (2014)

I've had this game ever since it first came out, but I got stuck on a boss and dropped it originally. Decided to finally revisit it and actually do the whole thing. It's a neat game. It's a fun Metroidvania with really good feeling controls, some fun ideas, and a pretty nice aesthetic too.

It feels really tight and satisfying just doing the basic movement, and your sword slash is so lightning fast that you can attack literally just as fast as you can mash the button. You can also reflect enemy bullets with your sword, which has great sound design to go with it. There are other sword types as well that all have their own unique properties that fun to mix around with in combat. There's a good range of unlockable abilities in general, and it has a good feeling of getting more capable over the game, although the rate at which you unlock stuff feels a bit odd. It takes a while before you start feeling like you're actually getting anything significant, but then you start getting a lot of stuff pretty rapidly. It also likes to play around with gravity in some levels, which is pretty fun. Some sections have these large orbs that have their own localised gravity field, and it's fun to traverse through those areas hopping between orbs.

The game doesn't feel well suited to going for a 100% run though. As I tend to do with games like this, I wasn't necessarily aiming for that, but was still trying to do as much as I could. When it comes to combing through the game for collectables and such, it got kind of tedious and I gave up on it. When you're just following the critical path, the pace of the game is really swift and fun. But if you're trying to sweep up those last few things, it does a pretty bad job of making navigation around the game world seamless. There's no fast travel, and each zone exits out to multiple others, but the game doesn't tell you what connects to what. Each zone can also be split in to multiple sections that require you to enter from a different one too. The map isn't especially helpful in trying to find spots you haven't explored already either. If you're not trying to go for literally everything it's a fun time, and doing some light exploring off the beaten path is still enjoyable, but when trying to do everything it kind of breaks down.

But despite that, it's a solid and fun game. It's somewhat strange this game barely gets acknowledged these days. Or even when it came out. It's a good example of a popular genre that came out when said genre was the hot thing, and not as overcrowded as it is these days. It's also a decent revival of a dormant IP that has its fans. I guess Strider has never been especially popular, but you do see people mention it every now and then. People often lament about how Capcom has so many old dormant series, and here is an example of when they actually tried to bring one back, and did a pretty good job with it too.
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Angry_Kurt
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Re: Games Completed 2023

Post by Angry_Kurt »

Kirby’s Dreamland Deluxe

It was ok, probably one of the weaker Nintendo exclusives I’ve played in recent times but it was fun enough. The lack of challenge didn’t bother me so much, it was more the lack of invention and creativity we’ve had from other Nintendo games. It just felt like a very by the numbers 2D platformer. The exploration side of things in each level was good though as you tried to figure out how to get to certain collectibles and hidden areas. But I just overall got more from the likes of the Yoshi games when it comes to this style of game from Nintendo. 7/10
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markfm007
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Re: Games Completed 2023

Post by markfm007 »

Spoiler: show
January 5th - Final Fantasy VII
January 22nd - Death's Door
January 25th - Citizen Sleeper
January 31st - Dead Space (2008)
February 5th - Dead Space 2
February 18th - Hi-Fi Rush
Feb 24th - Gears of War: Ultimate Edition
Mar 3rd - Gears of War 2
Mar 8th - Gears of War 3
April 1st - Resident Evil 4 (2023)
April 6th - Demon's Souls
April 26th - Resident Evil 4 (2005)

I decided to give the Wii version a go after hearing some recommendations, and wanting to try it after loving the remake. This version really does feel great, and I found it much easier to wrap my head around than using a controller. Using the nunchuck in my left hand to move Leon into place, then pointing and shooting with the right. It’s a nice mix of tactical positioning with an arcadey, light gun feel. It looked a bit rough in glorious, blown up 480p, but sometimes sacrifices must be made.

I was able to employ some of my strategies from the remake, and found myself falling into that similar addictive flow state, moving from one encounter to the next. Didn’t find Ashley particularly irritating or hard to manage like some have said. The game has a slightly unhinged, cobbled together feel about it, compared to the more polished remake. I loved the castle in particular, felt the most different to the remake, with all its crazy rooms and traps. Some parts were less enjoyable though, especially the island, which drags on, and some of the boss fights.

Overall I find the remake more immediately and consistently enjoyable, but I’m glad that I’ve played through this game, and can appreciate what many see in it.
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Alex79
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Re: Games Completed 2023

Post by Alex79 »

Alex79 wrote: January 14th, 2023, 12:34 amJAN - Red Dead Redemption 2: Arthur's Story (Xbox)
JAN - The Witcher 2 (Xbox)
JAN - Ori And The Blind Forest (Switch)
JAN - Shinobi III (Megadrive on Switch)
JAN - Sonic Spinball (Megadrive on Switch)
JAN - Super Fantasy Zone - 1cc (Megadrive on Switch)
JAN - Death's Door (Switch)
JAN - Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (NES on Switch)
JAN - Final Fight (Arcade on Switch)
JAN - The King Of Dragons (Arcade on Switch)
JAN - Yakuza 3 (Xbox)
FEB - Goldeneye 007 (N64 on Switch)
FEB - Starfox (SNES on Switch)
FEB - Mafia 2: Remastered (Xbox)
FEB - As Dusk Falls (Xbox)
MAR - Grand Theft Auto 3: Definitive Edition (Switch)
MAR - The Legend Of Zelda: The Minish Cap (GBA on Switch)
MAR - Pentiment (Xbox)
APR - Resident Evil 4 (Switch)
APR - Forza Horizon 4 (Xbox)

100% of the races complete. It was fun going through this without the distraction of weekly events and time limited races etc. I just went and completed every race in the game, with the highlights being the extra long ones at the end of each different discipline. I might go back at some point and do all the businesses and stories, but got what I wanted out of it for now. Can't wait for Forza Motorsport hopefully coming soon.
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seansthomas
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Re: Games Completed 2023

Post by seansthomas »

Jan 13th - Horizon Zero Dawn (PS4)
Feb 7th - Hi-fi Rush (Xbox Series S)
Feb 10th - Goldeneye (Xbox Series S / Switch)
Feb 20th - Halo: Combat Evolved / The Master Chief Collection (Xbox Series S)
Feb 25th - Bayonetta 3 (Switch)
Apr 10th - Metroid Prime Remastered (Switch)

Apr 30th - Dishonored + The Knife of Dunwall / The Brigmore Witches (Xbox Series S)

Really loved my time with Dishonored. Been on the list for ages and it didn't let me down.

Loved the period / setting, art direction and flexibility of the game the most.

Started out trying to play it stealthily but I suck at stealth games. Don't have the patience. It was far more fun when, if I went wrong, I rolled with the punches and leant in to the chaos. Gave me MGSolid vibes at times like that, as opposed to the gameplay of Hitman where if a plan goes wrong, you have to just reload.

Played the base game largely non-lethal. Possessing, blinking around, staying out of sight, taking down people who caught me with sleep darts.

But for the DLC, went full on chaos, using assassin's, blades, traps and rewiring those Tesla devices to zap everyone.

I had a great time on the whole. Some brilliant settings like the whale oil processing plant and a giant industrial lighthouse will stay with me. Not surprised to hear on the C&Rinse podcast that there were people involved here from the Half Life 2 team (though I was a bit surprised at how cool they were on the game in general, I thought they'd love it).

Will have a break for a while but keen to do the sequel down the line...
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seansthomas
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Re: Games Completed 2023

Post by seansthomas »

Jan 13th - Horizon Zero Dawn (PS4)
Feb 7th - Hi-fi Rush (Xbox Series S)
Feb 10th - Goldeneye (Xbox Series S / Switch)
Feb 20th - Halo: Combat Evolved / The Master Chief Collection (Xbox Series S)
Feb 25th - Bayonetta 3 (Switch)
Apr 10th - Metroid Prime Remastered (Switch)
Apr 30th - Dishonored + The Knife of Dunwall / The Brigmore Witches (Xbox Series S)

May 1st - Tron Identity (Switch)

The new detective text adventure from Mike Blithell, creator of the Subsurface / Quarantine Circular games, where your decisions advance and alter the story.

It's clear Mike loves Tron, as the aesthetic builds on Tron Legacy brilliantly and the story expands the lore around Flynn and The Grid. I don't think it's vital to understand Tron to play it, but if you don't I'm not sure it'd be half as rewarding. Dan le sacs score is also noteworthy, escalating subtly as your decisions do.

This time around, there's a new puzzle mini game to crack codes. It's interesting enough but by the end of the game, their pacing and appearance was growing weary. You can just plain skip them though on subsequent playthroughs.

Which you'll probably have a few of. I beat the game in 2-3 hours first time around, completing the codex of locations, characters, lore etc. I've seen credits 3 times now and the following playthroughs were doable in 40 minutes I reckon, so it's a good length to see if you can alter the fates of certain characters, if not necessarily the overarching story.

It's great to be back in the world of Tron. I don't think I liked this as much as Subsurface Circular, which is often available for less than £5 now, as it's largely more of what I expected so lost a bit of that freshness. But it's awesome to see Blithell getting to realise a personal goal and advance the story of Tron, and also promising to see Disney backing it.
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Jobobonobo
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Re: Games Completed 2023

Post by Jobobonobo »

Spoiler: show
Jan 8: Densetsu no Stafy
Jan 10: Parodius 2: Fantastic Journey
Jan 26: Parodius: Non-Sense Fantasy
Jan 28: Jikkyō Oshaberi Parodius
Feb 19: Metroid Zero Mission
Feb 21: Kirby’s Dreamland
Mar 6: Yakuza 5
Mar 25: Luigi’s Mansion 2
Mar 30: Kirby’s Dreamland 2
Apr 13: New Super Mario Bros
May 1: Crash Bandicoot 4: It’s About Time

Finally finished all levels of this, both the normal and N-verted versions. It was at times very fun and satisfying, at others intensely frustrating. I think overall I do like this game but honestly it suffers from a lot of bloat. Six gems per level as well as six extra in the N-verted version, meaning 12 gems per level does not sound like a lot until you realise that you have to collect 40, 60 and 80% of all Wumpa fruits in the stage, smash every crate, find a hidden gem in each level and die a maximum of three times. Since crates can be sadistically hidden in the stage or placed in very dangerous spots, you WILL die more than three times first time round getting everything. This basically amounts to grinding the same level numerous times to fully complete it and with how hard levels can be just on a regular play through, there was no way in hell I was going to aim for 100%, never mind 106%. Levels like Cortex Castle had me swearing like a whole dock of sailors first time round and going through that numerous times to get all gems? Quite frankly, piss off.

Another element which makes this game bloated is the amount of repetition even if you are not going for everything. N-verted stages are really the same stages again with visual filters and well, inverted. Some of these filters can be quite cool such as spinning creating colour in a monochrome world while others such as the comic book dots filter can be utter torture on the eyes and make navigation a headache. But fancy visual tricks aside, it is the same level at the end of the day. Another element of repetition is from the alternative timepaths with the three new playable characters. While the first section is a new level dealing with their particular movesets and the end of that they do something which affects part of another level which Crash/Coco are on. Cute idea, but then you have to replay that particular section of the level again as Crash/Coco and it just made me think why? They could have made the side character’s levels a bit longer and then just end it where they change the path for the main character. But just ending those levels with sections you have already played is ridiculous padding.

Speaking of the other characters, Dingodile is definitely the best with his vacuum gun and powerful tail spin. Tawna can be fun but her hook-shot requires a bit too much finesse to use at times. Cortex is utter shite, can barely jump and his gun can be extremely fiddly to operate with it hitting stuff you don’t want it to hit and the energy ball fizzing out at a very short distance. Almost a blessing in a way that I did not have to do entire levels with him I suppose. But yeah, would groan out loud whenever any of his levels popped up.

Now I’m aware that I have been quite negative on this game but there is a lot to enjoy about it. Visuals are really a feast for the eyes and the art design overall is top notch, a great modern update on the PS1 icon. It can be pretty amusing at times with loads of references for fans of the series and a fantastic little Easter egg when you collect all the wumpa fruits before you fight N.Tropy. Bosses in general were a lot of fun with the added challenge of no Aku-Aku at all but balanced out by saving every time you do land a hit on them. Level variety was good with alien planets, New Orleans style music festivals, future metropolises and ancient Chinese landscapes. And even though I was red faced dealing with some of the frankly mean spirited shit the game can pull on you, flying through sections that used to give you endless heartache can feel pretty satisfying. Even that dreaded end-section of Cortex Castle went much more smoothly when I redid it in N-verted mode. New masks were also a great gameplay addition and added a lot of variety to as well as enhancing the typical platforming.

In conclusion, Crash 4 is a nice modern update on the little marsupial’s standard gameplay but I think it could have being streamlined a lot by getting rid of having to grind levels numerous times to get everything and replacing repeating levels/sections of levels with just new content or even just leave it be. This game would have been a lot better with a “less is more” mentality. Even though I ranted about the difficulty a lot, I was grateful there was an infinite lives “modern” mode. This game really is WAY harder than the original PS1 trilogy so doing this the retro way would have absolutely made me throw in the towel out of frustration. I just do not have the time to dedicate countless hours to gitting gud, sorry. While I did enjoy it for the most part, I do think the flaws of this game are a bit larger than I would typically tolerate and at times made me rage in a way I haven’t since the 16-bit days. As it stands, Crash 2 and 3 are still the best of the series for me. Not long games but they improved on what came before and were more reasonable on completion requirements.
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Truk_Kurt
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Re: Games Completed 2023

Post by Truk_Kurt »

Jobobonobo wrote: May 2nd, 2023, 5:51 pm
Spoiler: show
Jan 8: Densetsu no Stafy
Jan 10: Parodius 2: Fantastic Journey
Jan 26: Parodius: Non-Sense Fantasy
Jan 28: Jikkyō Oshaberi Parodius
Feb 19: Metroid Zero Mission
Feb 21: Kirby’s Dreamland
Mar 6: Yakuza 5
Mar 25: Luigi’s Mansion 2
Mar 30: Kirby’s Dreamland 2
Apr 13: New Super Mario Bros
May 1: Crash Bandicoot 4: It’s About Time
Fair play for doing all that, I agree with what you said about it, positives and negatives. As I mentioned before, the game got too difficult for me, perhaps I should have stuck on the 'modern' mode which had I known about I probably would have put more time into it. If they were to do another, I would like to see them be a little more forgiving but there is definitely a good base to work from here.
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Jobobonobo
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Re: Games Completed 2023

Post by Jobobonobo »

Oh definitely there is certainly stuff here that can be elaborated on to make a more balanced follow up but the completion requirements need to be overhauled a lot to prevent frustration/burnout. When I had certain levels mastered it is genuinely a good time but there were quite frankly also sections of this playthrough where I was just not having fun. I have played plenty of challenging platformers before and had a great time with them with a big smile on my face the whole time. But the fact that if you fail in Crash 4 you end up having to redo certain very irritating sections over and over even when you are not aiming to get everything just made me feel like I was hitting a brick wall. Despite being much older games I think Crash 2 and 3 hit this balance of challenge and fair far more successfully than 4 and future developers working with the character would do well to study what made those two entries work in particular.
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Tolkientaters
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Re: Games Completed 2023

Post by Tolkientaters »

Finished Dredge and it was fantastic, little horror fishing game. It's got a fantastic presentation with some interesting systems that don't overstay their welcome. Having a "mundane" job that gets complicated by existential horror is arguably more authentic to Lovecraft and just really helps maintain a compelling atmosphere.
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Rhaegyr
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Re: Games Completed 2023

Post by Rhaegyr »

The Ninja Saviours: Return of the Warriors (Switch)

It finally clicked for me other a year or so of playing it on and off and I managed to get past the first boss - everything after that (bar the end boss) seemed much more doable (and fun).

Never played it back in the day but ended up really liking it, especially the sprite-art and animation which is absolutely gorgeous.

Don't think I'm ready for hard mode yet though!
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dezm0nd
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Re: Games Completed 2023

Post by dezm0nd »

I dont really finish many games anymore due to single parent mode but we did recently push through Spongebob: Bikini Bottom Rehydrated. It's pretty average platforming but saved by the aesthetic which my daughter adores at the moment.

I finished RE4 Remake twice. That game is a banger.

And me and Ivy also played through that new (old) Kirby game. It's a delight in co-op.
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DeadpoolNegative
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Re: Games Completed 2023

Post by DeadpoolNegative »

Citizen Sleeper: Purge DLC (Xbox One, 4/6) My favorite game of the past year, great conclusion, no notes.

Rise of the Tomb Raider: 20 Year Celebration (PS4, 4/24) Thanks, PlayStation Plus! While I had played this game long ago thanks to the power of XBox GamePass, This was offered on PS Plus a while ago with all the DLC I missed out on the first time. Like the other games in the series, it plays great. Also like the other games in the series, the story is a complete train wreck
Spoiler: show
For one thing, Ana's duplicity is revealed too soon, and for another, she's doing this because she's been sick, for a very long time. And yet, in the decade plus since she's essentially been taking care of Lara (I think?), our heroine never noticed? In her first scene she discourages Lara from going after the Prophet, shouldn't she be encouraging her? And while Trinity is a bad bad organization, yes, why kill Lara's father? Why not imprison him and force him to work for them? He's a valuable asset!
The lack of the supporting cast from the previous game is felt, only Jonah is back (Apparently Sam was written out in the Dark Horse comics tie-ins). Lara herself barely has an arc; she wants this magical golden thing that can possibly grant immortality, but you know in the end she'll learn that Some Things Must Stay Hidden. And the arc doesn't really work. Lara just... does the right thing
Spoiler: show
And if the divine source could be destroyed as easily as it was, why didn't Jacob and the other guardians think of doing it sooner?
I don't know what it is, but I've been playing some really poorly written games this year, and I keep thinking- do the writers and producers know when they test it, or play it back, how some of this stuff doesn't work?

The optional tombs, while still kinda small are much better designed than they were in the previous game. The combat and movement is top notch- I actually found this to be slightly better than the Uncharted series, which this reboot shamelessly emulated at every turn, but the Uncharted games are the better series overall. Some of the big puzzles to progress are impressive, some less so. Since I had all the DLC guns, combat was a bit of a cakewalk. I had a lot of fun with this, as long as I don't think about it too hard.

Lacuna (XBox One, 4/29)- This is more of a playable movie or a visual novel than a game- there are choices to be had (eight endings!!) and slight puzzles, but overall very little interaction. In fact, most of the action is walking from place to place. And yet, that walking, once you get into the nuts and bolts of the game's story, is quite touching. Every trudge back to your empty apartment, every hollow call of the subway station for you to board, it feels real.

The game is in some sort of alternate universe where several planets have been colonized. The opening/tutorial actually takes place decades in the past of the game's present, as you play a young student on what turns out to be an eventful day in her life. Then we jump to the present day as divorced, chain smoking Gharan CDI agent Neil Conrad (Buzz Blackburn) is assigned to the security detail of a diplomat from a neighboring planet Drovia. Turns out there's a lot of history between the Ghara and Drovia (and the game's third planet), and a lot of tension. Ghara has been sort of lording it over Drovia for decades, and Drovia wants its independence. Neil himself is a well respected agent, but that's taken a toll on his personal life, as he's ten years past a divorce he still can't shake, and has trouble communicating with his ex and his daughter. The Drovian diplomat gets whacked, and Neil's investigation into who did it spirals out of control, encompassing secrets that have stayed hidden for decades.

And yet strangely, it's more about how it all affects Neil Conrad. Blackburn gives the role a tinge of sadness as the chaos over the assassination forces him at last to confront why his marriage fell apart. The game gives you choices in how you interact with others, and tiny side quests that always help with your investigation. The story moves forward whether you complete the game's investigations correctly or not (But it's advised you do it correctly), but you'll want to explore everything because each NPC you meet will have something interesting to say. and an act of kindness or cruelty can affect the outcome. The game lashes you to one save file, no exceptions, so you'll have to play the game eight times to get all eight endings. On the one hand this is unfair; on the other it adds to the tension, your fear of screwing things up.

I know I've been complaining a lot about game writing, but this is phenomenal stuff. The word of Lacuna is well though out, every character feels like they have depth. I'm really impressed with how well DigiTales interactive established their world. The game is only four hours, but that's a good length for it; it doesn't wear out its welcome. Like Citizen Sleeper, it creates a believable world about regular people in danger of being swallowed whole by entities much bigger than them. So yeah, if you like Citizen Sleeper, you'll definitely like Lacuna.

--Dan
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Truk_Kurt
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Re: Games Completed 2023

Post by Truk_Kurt »

Spider-Man: Miles Morales

I was left a little cold by it. I enjoyed the first game and I still loved the core gameplay with the mix of combat and stealth just as much here, the addition to the mechanics with the venom powers is a good one too. I was left cold mostly by the story and characters though. Miles is great but I had little idea what was going on in the story which I didn’t think was told very well and didn’t really know what the villains motivations were. I thought there was a lot of repetition in the missions too, even within the main story where there was a lot of similar environments too. I’m still looking forward to Spider-Man 2 but I hope they sort out the repetitiveness which has been an issue in both games. 6/10
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Rhaegyr
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Joined: July 29th, 2019, 2:47 pm

Re: Games Completed 2023

Post by Rhaegyr »

RE4 Remake

It's pretty great but I think I still prefer the original.

Combat is fantastic. Many sequences are changed for the better (discovering the Garrador was a highlight). Ashley is much more bearable (although I do miss "Leon! Help!"). Graphically it's a stunner. Flashlight sequences add more of a 'horror' feel at times. Optional stealth sections with knife kills are quite satisfying and add to the tension. Weapon shortcuts on the D-Pad, hurrah! They trimmed some parts from the Island that definitely needed to be trimmed.

On the other hand, a lot of the campy tone has vanished and it ends up feeling a bit po-faced. They also removed a few sequences I really liked (U3 and the truck escape coming to mind). Ashley's AI is somehow worse than the original. Boss fights vary wildly in quality - some are better (Krasuer and Mendez) but the Ramon fight was torture. Sidequests aren't optional if you want some fairly important items (treasure maps, weapon stocks etc) and they really don't help the pacing. Merchant isn't a patch on the original and the Regenerators didn't seem as terrifying this time around.

It's about as good a remake as you could have asked for but had the unenviable task of being a remake of masterpiece that (I think) still holds up well even now. I could be blinded by nostalgia though as the GC original is definitely on my 'epic shelf'. Maybe it should be 9.

8/10
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Indiana747
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Re: Games Completed 2023

Post by Indiana747 »

(Jan) Death's Door - Series X.
(Jan) Warhammer: Chaosbane SE - Series X.
(Feb) Evil West - Series X.
(Mar) God of War Ragnarok - PS5.
(Mar) Dead Space(2023) - Series X.
(Apr) Ben 10: Power Trip - Series X.
(Apr) Resident Evil 4(2023) - Series X.
(May) Ghostwire Tokyo - Series X.
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seansthomas
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Re: Games Completed 2023

Post by seansthomas »

Jan 13th - Horizon Zero Dawn (PS4)
Feb 7th - Hi-fi Rush (Xbox Series S)
Feb 10th - Goldeneye (Xbox Series S / Switch)
Feb 20th - Halo: Combat Evolved / The Master Chief Collection (Xbox Series S)
Feb 25th - Bayonetta 3 (Switch)
Apr 10th - Metroid Prime Remastered (Switch)
Apr 30th - Dishonored + The Knife of Dunwall / The Brigmore Witches (Xbox Series S)
May 1st - Tron Identity (Switch)

May 10th - Elden Ring: NG+ (Xbox Series S)

Never done a NG+ run of a Souls games before. Despite being probably my least favourite of the 3 I've played (DS, BB, ER in that order) it feels like Elden Ring is the easiest to pop back into, due to the faster loading times I have on Series S and the quality of life tweaks.

Didn't ever really mean to do a new run, I just did bits here and there. Very much mainlined the necessary quest and visited a few favourite optional areas.

Quite surprising how little of the game you really need to see, to get to the end in fact. Second time around, I don't think I've seen 40% of what the game holds.

Taking it all in again, I'm left feeling much the same.

That it's a gorgeous world. The music is incredible. The 'dungeon' areas like Stormveil and Leyendell are truly stunning, design wise.

Boss wise, I think it's my least favourite of those three games. There are a few standouts, Margit springs to mind, but many I'm less into. And I think the final few encounters are oddly underwhelming both combat, design and lore wise compared to DS and BB.

I beat this run barely using my Mimic Tear but I realised at the end, I don't half make my life unnecessarily difficult in these games. Even after 3 of them, I find the menus and systems very overwhelming. And I hoard items, terrified to use them in case I need them.

It means I don't play around with what the game has to offer and beat them very attritionally. After two runs, I've not got enough magic to heal or cast decent spells. After 150 hours, I only just realised you could level up a shield, so had been playing with a base one (no wonder I got knocked over so easily 🤦). And I've barely dared to use any of the Runes, touched higher level Smithing stones, experimented with weapons or tried a different build.

I really ought to. But my brain doesn't seem to think that way. Instead I seem to play all these games the same... Get up close, dodge, hammer away and slog my way through.

Anyhow, glad to put this run to bed before you know what game drops on Friday...
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Seph
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Re: Games Completed 2023

Post by Seph »

I played that Case of the Golden Idol over the weekend and it's possibly the best detective/deduction game I've played; maybe on par with the also excellent Return of the Obra Dinn.

The concept is simple in that each level has a series of images, not too dissimilar to a point and click adventure, but in this case logic and attention to detail is king. Once you find all the clues (presented as individual words), you then have to complete the sentences that explain just what happened in each case. The difficulty level is pitched perfectly and the game does a fantastic job of making you feel smart once you hit the correct solution. At no point did I feel like I was randomly pressing items and buttons until I had the correct one, it gives you everything you need to crack the cases piece by piece.

The game has very little in the way of dialogue and only has a handful of cutscenes, but it's one the best presentations of a story and world I've seen in any game. The power of environmental storytelling is strong in this one. A definite recommend for anyone who enjoyed Obra Dinn and wants to try a puzzle game that neither holds your hand nor wastes your time with nonsense item combinations. I finished the base game in a couple of sittings, so if you want something to get you through an empty weekend or day off, give it a go. I haven't tried the DLC, but I will if it pops up in a sale.
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Indiana747
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Re: Games Completed 2023

Post by Indiana747 »

(Jan) Death's Door - Series X.
(Jan) Warhammer: Chaosbane SE - Series X.
(Feb) Evil West - Series X.
(Mar) God of War Ragnarok - PS5.
(Mar) Dead Space(2023) - Series X.
(Apr) Ben 10: Power Trip - Series X.
(Apr) Resident Evil 4(2023) - Series X.
(May) Ghostwire Tokyo - Series X.
(May) Ravenlok - Series X.
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