Finished Teslagrad. Not sure why Robio hates it. There are some things about it which are annoying. Like having to fight difficult, multi-tiered boss fights with one-hit kills and having to start them over from the very beginning each time. That, and a few platforming sections require pin-point accuracy and nimble controls in order to navigate. Other than those bits, the game is great. And neither aspect is bad enough to make one hate on the game, at least I don't think so.
I adore the look of the game. The graphics and visual style make this one of the most stunning 2D games to look at. The music is also top notch. It sets the mood rather nicely. The magnetic polarity gimmick makes for some excellent room puzzles which are always fun and intuitive and never get frustrating. There are also different abilities which you obtain at different stages in the game which allow you to go higher up the tower and open you rooms and solve new puzzles, in short, to progress Metroidvania style. The boss fights ... I don't know what to make of them. The first two are OK if a little simplistic. The third one is also OK once you realise how you have to play it. The fourth one is very frustrating for the reason I mentioned before. The story is told without any spoken or written words and you are to make of it what you will of the silent FMVs none of which are forced upon you (and which you actually watch as a sort of 2D puppet plays ...an awesome and very clever idea in itself). The game is a bit on the short side. I think that if I didn't have to repeat the fourth boss close to 30 times, I'd have finished the game in less than 3-4 hours though it's hard to tell as my playtime was fragmented. There are collectible scrolls hidden in various corners of the rooms which require solving more difficult puzzles to be obtained. There is a room after the 4th boss which only opens up after you find 15 or more of these scrolls but I think I am a couple short and I'm not sure where to look for them. Can't remember how much I paid for this though it wasn't full price, so for me it was well worth it. In fact I wouldn't mind if I had a boxed copy as it is one of those lovable games. I can't help comparing this to the atrocity and crime against gamers that Braid is. I think Teslagrad is what Braid desperately wants to be ... but falls oh so short.
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bugsonglass said:Finished Teslagrad. Not sure why Robio hates it. There are some things about it which are annoying. Like having to fight difficult, multi-tiered boss fights with one-hit kills and having to start them over from the very beginning each time. That, and a few platforming sections require pin-point accuracy and nimble controls in order to navigate. Other than those bits, the game is great. And neither aspect is bad enough to make one hate on the game, at least I don't think so.
I think my issue with the game started with frustration with boss fights, and some control issues, but ultimately got magnified several times because the game was really buggy when I played it. It crashed on me a couple times, and had a weird problem loading when going from one section to another that always scared me that the game was going to crash again. That took a game that I probably would have been indifferent to and made me hate it. And I still do.
Finished Undertale, antichamber, and until dawn. Reviews all coming.
robio said:I think my issue with the game started with frustration with boss fights, and some control issues, but ultimately got magnified several times because the game was really buggy when I played it. It crashed on me a couple times, and had a weird problem loading when going from one section to another that always scared me that the game was going to crash again. That took a game that I probably would have been indifferent to and made me hate it. And I still do.
This is fair enough. I haven't had a game all-out crash on me for many years and I think it would certainly rub me the wrong way too. I know what you mean about the game hiccuping sometimes when you open one of the doors on the side of the main body of the tower. It would go into a long uncomfortable pause, which worried me, but it never crashed completely. So I'm guessing they fixed it.
Also true about the bosses. I didn't think they were particularly difficult, but one-hit death in encounters like those no doubt results in big frustration. My biggest problem was the hidden scrolls. It's fair enough to require harder puzzles in order to obtain them, but it's very stupid and annoying if you don't know where they are in the first place. They should at least have included a hint on the map that there is something to find in a given room, the way Metroid does for example.
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Man I'm not off to a good start this year. Last year by now I had already finished like 7 games.
Finished Devil May Cry 4 Special Edition on the Xbox One. So much backtracking but still a great game.
Archangel3371 said:Finished Devil May Cry 4 Special Edition on the Xbox One. So much backtracking but still a great game.
I remember I played a good chunk of this on the PS3 back in the day. Was enjoying it and felt somewhat surprised that I could actually play it (after failing miserably with DMC3 even on the easy difficulty). Not sure why I stopped. It wasn't because I got stuck.
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Finished Guacamelee! STCE on the Wii U. This was the second time I played this but this edition includes some new areas, new enemies, an extra boss fight etc. No amount of praise would be too much for this game. It's a true labour of love and it's damn near perfect in every way.
There is so much I love about this game I don't know where to begin. I know Leo, IGA and Robio have played this for sure, perhaps others have too ... I hope everyone does at some point.
Guacamelee is a 2D brawler action adventure set in a huge seamless world which one can navigate from area to area in true Metroidvania style by gradually picking up new moves and power-ups etc. The action is frantic and some of the encounters near the end border on hectic but without ever getting too frustrating. Certain areas are like obstacle courses which one has to navigate using a variety of moves and abilities, often having to string several of them together. The player is usually awarder with upgrade items or coins for doing these but a lot of them are not required for progression.
The game just oozes character, and has an irreverent but excellent sense of humour. You can't help smiling much of the time whilst playing this. The dialogue is well-written, witty and funny. The mariachi-house tunes pumping out of the speakers accompany the action and platforming perfectly. If I had to find a negative, even though I understant that this is largely subjective, is that I don't care for the visual style so much, even though it does suit the game.
The new edition includes some new stuff but if truth be told I didn't remember much of the game so it was almost like playing it for the first time. Excellent game. Well worth playing twice.
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I'm just happy to hear about someone playing Guacamelee. Definitely one of my favorites of all time. Not only is it a top-tier Metroidvania, but it does that rare thing that so many games try to do but ultimately fail.... it's funny. It's not just a few funny parts either. It consistantly maintains a level of humor the entire time through the semi-ridiculous story, characters, etc. And yet it never really feels like they're forcing jokes either. They are surprisngly organic. Anyway, yeah count me in as someone who loves it. I'm going to have to make some time later in the year for another play-through.
robio said:I'm just happy to hear about someone playing Guacamelee. Definitely one of my favorites of all time. Not only is it a top-tier Metroidvania, but it does that rare thing that so many games try to do but ultimately fail.... it's funny. It's not just a few funny parts either. It consistantly maintains a level of humor the entire time through the semi-ridiculous story, characters, etc. And yet it never really feels like they're forcing jokes either. They are surprisngly organic. Anyway, yeah count me in as someone who loves it. I'm going to have to make some time later in the year for another play-through.
Exactly! It's not just funny ... for a game. You don't have to lower your standards because it's an interactive medium. It's funny period. And all the references to other games, pop culture and other inside jokes are simply amazing. It's like the few amazingly funny lines from Fawful in the first Mario & Luigi game, but as Robio said, in Guacamelee they keep this up throughout the entire game. You can just imagine how much fun the development team had creating it and how much they love what they do.
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Yeah I really enjoyed Guacamelee as well, very good game.
gamingeek said:I enjoyed it up until the end when it became insanely difficult.
Come on! I'm a Sunday morning gamer and even I didn't think it was so difficult. You just need to be able to pull off the colour coded special moves and link them up at will. Not that hard. Not even the optional bits I thought were that hard. Should be a walk in the park for the Splatoon God
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Played through Xcom: Enemy Within in prep for Xcom 2.
Enjoyed it greatly for the 5th time.
Guacamelee's updated ports did dial back the difficulty in comparison to OG Guacamelee, so you all might have played a different version of the game from him.
Gagan said:Guacamelee's updated ports did dial back the difficulty in comparison to OG Guacamelee, so you all might have played a different version of the game from him.
I played it first on PS3, and never used the "fury meter" mechanic on the U version, which I believe is the one GG tried but I could be wrong.
I actually don't know which of the two is more difficult. The STCE does give you the fury mechanic but it also introduces the tougher "black" types of enemies. Anyway from what GG said he found the navigation difficult which is probably identical.
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Finished DmC Definitive Edition on the Xbox One. Great game with excellent gameplay, very cool boss fights, and an interesting take on the storyline.
Archangel3371 said:Finished DmC Definitive Edition on the Xbox One. Great game with excellent gameplay, very cool boss fights, and an interesting take on the storyline.
So you hated it. 
Dvader said:Archangel3371 said:Finished DmC Definitive Edition on the Xbox One. Great game with excellent gameplay, very cool boss fights, and an interesting take on the storyline.
So you hated it.
Absolutely. 
3. Beat That Dragon, Cancer - oh my fucking it is impossible for a video game to be this sad.
It took me about half the month, but I've finally finished a game. God of War III is done and now I can go back to Fallout 4, then Kingdom Hearts.
By Miu Watanabe.