Whatcha Been Playing?

This is where you can deliberate anything relating to videogames - past, present and future
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Magical_Isopod
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Re: Whatcha Been Playing?

Post by Magical_Isopod »

Somehow I was under the impression that Sonic Lost World for 3DS was a 2D sidescroller like Generations was. I genuinely have no idea how I came to that conclusion. But I spent more than I'd like to admit on a game I evidently did not do even cursory research on. >: Not the first time this has happened, but it still sucks.
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Truk_Kurt
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Re: Whatcha Been Playing?

Post by Truk_Kurt »

I have this long held ambition to play all the Zelda games (hopefully finish them too unless I'm really not enjoying the game) and so I started playing A Link to the Past on Switch Online a few days ago. So far it's good, satisfying dungeons but there are elements that really frustrate me. Primarily it is the lack of guidance of what and where you're supposed to be going. There has been a few times where I've had to resort to a guide and when I have seen where I am supposed to be going and doing, I've no idea how the game was expected me to figure it out. I'm also not a fan of how when you die you're put all the way back to the start of the dungeon or worse, your house or the sanctuary which could be miles away from where you had just got to. These frustrations aren't enough to stop me playing though as I'm enjoying the rest of the experience enough.
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Will Marley
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Re: Whatcha Been Playing?

Post by Will Marley »

I guess it's a design ethos of the era. I think signposting where to go next is a relatively modern...approach. I was going to say 'development' but in many ways, that exploration, lack of hand-holding and uncertainty is something I miss about 90s gaming. We had fewer games, tropes were less established, game design involved much less cut and paste of familiar 'refinements'.

Granted, it's also partly a time issue these days. We want to be railroaded through the good stuff, not spend fruitless hours searching for it but suddenly finding a secret tunnel behind a rock or a hidden walkway to a previously inaccessible area felt a hell of a lot more exciting than pointing the camera towards a minimap marker.

I'm not saying it's perfect, I haven't actually finished the game myself because I don't enjoy the combat in 2D Zeldas, but I do think it's a good example of 'the price of progress'.
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ratsoalbion
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Re: Whatcha Been Playing?

Post by ratsoalbion »

This is the aspect of gameplay 'evolution' that perhaps we talk about most on the podcast.

There are pros and cons to having no signposting, total hand-holding, and everything in between, but different players have different motivations, so as such I think the best solution is to give players the choice of how much they want to be guided through a game.
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Magical_Isopod
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Re: Whatcha Been Playing?

Post by Magical_Isopod »

I know the 2002 remake of Resident Evil like the back of my hand today, but it's easy to forget... I had to use a walkthrough a lot during my first play through. I think the same is true for others as well. I can almost guarantee a lot of the people bemoaning games for "handholding" today also used GameFAQs or Nintendo Power when they got stuck. And there's nothing wrong with that.

And especially when you look at some of the earliest games with any modicum of complexity, some of those games had absolutely ludicrous solutions for puzzles, or totally unclear navigation. As Leon says, signposting has its positives and negatives... I think games have gotten a lot better at masking their signposting, guiding you along with lighting, camera angles, etc.
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Truk_Kurt
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Re: Whatcha Been Playing?

Post by Truk_Kurt »

I do like some flexibility and lack of signposting in games. Like for example I like discovering things myself such as some of the things you can find in Breath of the Wild or older GTA games. To an extent social media and gaming websites have ruined this somewhat by spoiling any of the cool stuff you can discover within 5 minutes of the game coming out which is why I will avoid clicking on any ToTK articles after its release. It's also good when you can achieve a goal via a variety of methods like in BoTW and immersive sim games, but the key being that the goal is clear rather than you having to work out what the goal is before you can even attempt to work out how to achieve it as I have been experiencing with Link to the Past. I felt the same when I played Links Awakening remake a couple of years ago.

I can understand how it is appealing to some people so I don't want to say it's bad design so to speak, just that it is a point of frustration for me.
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markfm007
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Re: Whatcha Been Playing?

Post by markfm007 »

The main issue for me is when I've come back to a game or I've just forgotten the last thing I was told, and there's no way to reference it again. For some games a glowing waypoint or whatever would defeat the purpose, but at the same time if you have nothing to go on then you're inevitably going to go to a walkthrough, unless the game's very small.

I remember Majora's Mask 3DS added a hint system, which isn't a bad idea, just some sort of general hint or direction as to what's next. I liked the guidance of grace in Elden Ring, and how major dungeons and the Erdtree helped your orient yourself just by how they were positioned. This was an issue I had recently with Death's Door, a lot of the map looked samey to the point that I would have to just wander around aimlessly until I found what I was looking for.
Truk_Kurt wrote: January 24th, 2023, 2:14 pm To an extent social media and gaming websites have ruined this somewhat by spoiling any of the cool stuff you can discover within 5 minutes of the game coming out which is why I will avoid clicking on any ToTK articles after its release.
Definitely an annoying aspect of being online. Even when I play a game at release I'll end up getting spoiled. Either I ignore the internet and rush through a game, or I just accept I'm going to get spoiled on some things.
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Alex79
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Re: Whatcha Been Playing?

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Truk_Kurt wrote: January 24th, 2023, 9:02 am I have this long held ambition to play all the Zelda games (hopefully finish them too unless I'm really not enjoying the game) and so I started playing A Link to the Past on Switch Online a few days ago. So far it's good, satisfying dungeons but there are elements that really frustrate me. Primarily it is the lack of guidance of what and where you're supposed to be going. There has been a few times where I've had to resort to a guide and when I have seen where I am supposed to be going and doing, I've no idea how the game was expected me to figure it out. I'm also not a fan of how when you die you're put all the way back to the start of the dungeon or worse, your house or the sanctuary which could be miles away from where you had just got to. These frustrations aren't enough to stop me playing though as I'm enjoying the rest of the experience enough.
I remember as a kid you'd just end up exploring every corner of the map. We had more time, more patience, and a lack of other games to play, so for these reasons we'd usually end up finding the way eventually. And there were always guides in magazines and stuff too. I'll admit it frustrates me now, I checked guides for both Zelda ALTTP and Super Metroid when I played them a couple of years ago.

Just wait till you go back to the very first Zelda. It's even less signposted!
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Will Marley
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Re: Whatcha Been Playing?

Post by Will Marley »

Truk_Kurt wrote: January 24th, 2023, 2:14 pm I can understand how it is appealing to some people so I don't want to say it's bad design so to speak, just that it is a point of frustration for me.
I think I'm on the same page to be honest, but just wanted to also recognise the value and excitement of that design approach vs modern day railroading. I also abandoned Link's Awakening, so frustrating and obtuse.
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Truk_Kurt
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Re: Whatcha Been Playing?

Post by Truk_Kurt »

I did end up finishing Links Awakening (well, the remake on Switch) but I would say it was my least favourite Zelda.
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Truk_Kurt
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Re: Whatcha Been Playing?

Post by Truk_Kurt »

Well the opening couple of hours of Dead Space remake are the most impressive I have experienced in a game in a long time. The atmosphere and world building reminds me of Bioshock.

There was a real cool moment where I got into a room I thought was safe just as 3 monsters were chasing after me and I shut the door in their face just in time. But then the 3 of them started to move away from the door and next thing I know they're crawling through the air vent behind me in the room I was in, I soiled my pants!
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Alex79
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Re: Whatcha Been Playing?

Post by Alex79 »

That sounds cool, what you playing it on? I didn't even realise it was out yet!
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dezm0nd
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Re: Whatcha Been Playing?

Post by dezm0nd »

Woke up at 2am to sneak a go on Goldeneye on the Xbox Series S.

It's supremely interesting to me to see the bits of duct tape they've used to patch over certain elements of the original N64 rom. Love it when old games are reborn into a modern era. Scratches a certain part of my brain to see unusual iconography in classic videogames.

Mr Bond feels slightly slower in comparison to the n64 and I'm sure it's down to the controller mapping. It's quite hard to articulate why but if you searched for "Speed strafing" I'm sure it'd be easier to understand.

Basically the combined movement of angling JB and running in a certain directions allows for increased speeds and I can't quite find the knack for it on the xbox Controller due to the twin stick controls.

Overall its an emulated version of goldeneye which is nice. I'm obviously head over heels for it and I'll continue to batter it until I get 1000G

I've not touched the NSO version yet but I've heard it's a bit of a pickle to control if you don't have the N64 controller for Switch.
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Truk_Kurt
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Re: Whatcha Been Playing?

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Alex79 wrote: January 26th, 2023, 1:05 pm That sounds cool, what you playing it on? I didn't even realise it was out yet!
Xbox Series X
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dezm0nd
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Re: Whatcha Been Playing?

Post by dezm0nd »

Played a teeny bit of Dead Space remake last night on my Series S.

Is it just me or is the S not performing, visually, as I'd hoped. Everything just seems a bit fuzzy.
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Magical_Isopod
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Re: Whatcha Been Playing?

Post by Magical_Isopod »

dezm0nd wrote: January 28th, 2023, 6:24 am Played a teeny bit of Dead Space remake last night on my Series S.

Is it just me or is the S not performing, visually, as I'd hoped. Everything just seems a bit fuzzy.
The Series S has really been struggling to keep up the last year or two. It seemed to be doing great when games were still targeting PS4 Pro and XB1X, but now that games are pretty much exclusively targeting PS5 and Series X, I've definitely been noticing more and more bad reviews for Series S performance on Digital Foundry and the like.
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Jobobonobo
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Re: Whatcha Been Playing?

Post by Jobobonobo »

Finally tackled the Parodius trilogy on Super Famicom. Tough but very silly and enjoyable affairs. Playing Saejima's story in Yakuza 5 and while it is very different from what I have seen of the series so far, I like it. The hunting sidestory is honestly quite a nice diversion and becoming proficient at taking down bears and trapping prey is pretty rewarding. Even though I am far from finished with it, I admire Yakuza 5 for the changes it makes to the formula and I'm into it a fair bit more than 3 or 4. Lastly, tried out something a bit more casual, BoxBoy! for the 3DS. Very basic puzzle platformer but a welcome change of pace from the bullet hell of Parodius and the huge time sink of Yakuza. On World 5 now, should take two playthroughs at most to finish it off I reckon.
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Will Marley
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Re: Whatcha Been Playing?

Post by Will Marley »

Charged up the Switch for the first time in months and ended up playing about six hours of Binding of Isaac and picked up the Repentance DLC. Still annihilates any other rogueish kinda games for me because of the build variety early doors. Where you end up from where you start is always so much fun. I found the Hades love-in quite irritating for many reasons, mostly the smug tone of the game and that it ripped off every single mechanic, but a few hours of Isaac solidified exactly why I find it so dull. It's very very polished and nicely balanced, it feels good - if completely derivative - but the parameters are so narrow. One run is so similar to the next whereas the synergies with Isaac can be unpredictable and novel even after hundreds of hours.
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Magical_Isopod
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Re: Whatcha Been Playing?

Post by Magical_Isopod »

I really like the progression mechanics in R-Type Final 2. On first attempt, the game feels impossibly hard, but as you press on, not only do you learn the levels, but you unlock new stuff - ships, pilot gear, etc. So instead of just being an arcade type game you play through once, you gradually chip away at it and come back better.

Reminds me a lot of Einhander, and I think this is a great way to structure SHMUPs. Like the stuff you unlock is downright better, but you can't unlock it without putting your time in and chipping away. Provides a great balance of risk vs. reward, and doesn't make the game end too quickly.
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RinseWashRepeat
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Re: Whatcha Been Playing?

Post by RinseWashRepeat »

Anyone else still stuck playing Vampire Survivours? I just can't stop playing this thing. I get into bed, planning on having an early night and then 3 runs later, it's well past my bedtime.

I'm also chipping away at Danganronpa. Think I'm near the end - very enjoyable and there's another 3 or 4 games in the series for me to get into.
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