Kill Your Completion 15

[Static_Rook]

Game 3 Review - Huntdown

 

Hours played -      8

PCG completed -  73%

Trophies earned - 16/20

 

Writing this a day early since I'm at a good stopping point in the game. Beat the final boss and mopped up the misc. trophies earlier. The only trophies left are the ones for completing the game 100% on Normal, Hard, and Badass mode. I may attempt to get 100% on Normal since I have a few of the stages done already, but it would take some serious time and patience to do it on the harder difficulties. Badass is one hit death the whole way through, for example. The game is fun enough that I wouldn't mind giving it a shot sometime. It definitely feels like the type of game you could replay and learn well enough to get really good at it. Maybe when my backlog gets a little more cleared out. To get 100% complete on a stage you need to kill a certain number of enemies, collect 3 secret stashes, and beat the stage without dying. The good thing is, you only have to do each stage goal once (on Normal anyway). So you could get the first two while learning each stage and boss fight, then replay it to go for a deathless run.

 

Huntdown is a side-scrolling run n gun game straight outta the 16-bit era, but with some welcome modern day QoL additions. There are no lives or continues, if you die you start at the last checkpoint and if you die during a boss fight you start right at the boss again. But, some of the bosses have 2 or 3 phases and if you die you start back at the beginning of the fight. Checkpoints during each stage are pretty generous as well.  There are 4 levels and each level has 4 or 5 stages with a boss fight at the end of each stage. The stages are short enough that replaying them multiple times doesn't get boring, and each boss fight is unique and fun to learn. Only a couple of the bosses became slightly tedious to learn and beat, and some of the later levels go a little nuts with armored enemies, but that's a small nitpick. Overall I'd say it's like 98% fun and 2% frustrating, but I'm sure that changes on Hard and Badass.

 

I'm surprised this game isn't bigger. It's fun and well-made, and seems perfect for streamers and speedrunners. It's challenging but learnable and just exudes a fun, grimy aura. There a bunch of different weapons to pick up, and plenty of 80s action movie enemies to blow away. As of now, there are still under 900 owners on this site and it's already been on sale for half-off (which is when I picked it up). I'd love to see it as a PS Plus game at some point just to get more eyes on it.

 

Game 3 Preview - Labyrinth of Refrain

 

I read ladynadiad's review so I have a good idea of what I'm getting into. I think the last DRPG I played was Dungeon Travellers 2 on Vita, which was a little too anime horny for my tastes, so I'm looking forward to giving the genre a try again. 

[Edunstar84]

Game #6 First Impressions

 

Playtime: 1 hour

Trophies: 3/43

 

I wasn't sure if I was ready to jump back into this event. I'm a bit sick at the moment, but I do have some good moments when I feel up to gaming. So I thought I would start with Freedom Wars. The game takes place in a world where resources are very limited, and each faction battles it out to gain the upper hand of not starving. You, however, lost your memory in one of these battles and now have been sentenced to 1 million years in jail. That's right! One million years 'cause you got amnesia. In this world, if you use more resources than you need, whether intentional or not, you get punished, and since you forgot everything the government taught you (military training, for instance), you get thrown in jail losing all the rights you earned at that point. 

 

You don't really know what level you were at before your amnesia, but it doesn't matter because now you're literally at level 1. In order to gain any additional rights and benefits, you have to earn them by fighting, which also lessens your sentence. What I found really cool though was the character creation. There were many options to fiddle with, like height, arm/hand/leg length, eyes, hair, etc, much more than I think God Eater had. 

 

Freedom Wars is one of those monster hunter type games: 1. go on mission 2. kill beasts, 3. hunt for parts, 4. upgrade weapons...repeat. However, the battle system seems much more fast-paced. I've only played 2 tutorial missions, so that might change. I'll probably write more about it in my next review.

 

 

 

The battle system...

[Gretchen27]

Game #3 Initial Review

Muv-Luv  

Ow, I think my heart is beating again. What a strange feeling

Play time: 30 minutes

 

Let me preface my first impressions by saying, my play time may be short, but this will likely be a main review of sorts lengthwise. It's a VN, the further into the story I get, the less spoiler-free information I can share. Okay, now let me gush over this game. 

 

Story: Takeru & Sumika have been childhood friends ever since Sumika accidentally broke an ammonite fossil. Takeru cleverly offered up a sacrificial snail to replace it, before ultimately taking the blame & the punishment. Now these inseparable friends are attending the same University, & I believe they live right next door of each other. Anyway, it's summertime and Takeru's parents have decided on a vacation, leaving their son to his own devices. Takeru spends his short-term freedom as much as one would expect of any young man, with a video game marathon & a plan to sleep in the next day, skipping his responsibilities. See, but Sumika comes over every morning to wake him up. & she won't let a simple chain door stop her. Much to both the friends' surprise, Takeru isn't waking up alone in bed. There's an alluring purple haired woman sharing the covers with him just long enough to be seen by Sumika before vanished the next moment. Sumika takes the strange phenomenon in the wrong context, as if it wasn't obvious she's in love with the boy.

 

That's as far as I've gotten. I know, you're thinking: How can you be enamored with something from that snippet? Easy. It's all in the punchline.

 

The Method of Storytelling: Muv-Luv relies heavily on stop action motion (well, 2D drawings, not photographs of objects). For example: Sumika calls over a dog at the park, you get to watch the dog blink forward. It's more involved than it sounds, showcasing the tiny details. Character expressions & placement change more frequently than a normal VN, keeping it interesting with the accompanying dialogue.

 

When I mentioned punchline, I meant that literally. The charm of this game comes from a stoogie, slapstick humor approach. Smacking each other upside the head, him hitting her, her hitting him – in a playful not abusive sort of way. Though I guess that really depends on the person on the receiving end of that slap. - are near constant reinforcers when one of them does/says something stupid. Takeru has been blasted off like Team Rocket by Sumika on more than one occasion. I wish I could emulate how funny it is, but I couldn't share a screenshot of the text because you'll miss out on the little actions & sound effects that make it what it is. 

 

It certainly has its own cute style I did not expect to take to as well as I did. I was smiling from the first couple lines, & it made me laugh. That's not easy to do. I was expecting a dull rom-com (which it could still develop into), & I can count on one hand the ones I'm willing to put up with. This is the contrast of Danganronpa's dark humor. In a rare twist, I'm taken with the cutesy, & looking forward to more. I can use the upbeat right now. 

 

Random details I didn't know where else to place: From the start menu, it appears there are two separate storylines, Extra and Unlimited. I've started up the first listed, Extra. Also, as I've discovered because I always check the options menu first, the game gives you an unusual amount of control from English text with Japanese voice overs, to being able to mute specific characters. This might be weird to explain, but there's even an option to not cut off voice overs. As in you can choose to let them finish speaking even when tapping to the next text (if it's the protag's thought bubble. If it's the same character to speak, the line will cut off & begin playing the new one on screen).

 

P.S. I was busy this morning & had to voice to text my review. Just wanted to share the imperfect recognition software understood me saying Takeru as Taco Dew. 

[purgta]

Game #3 Silent Hill 2

 

Silent Hill 2 is a survival horror game that was originally released for PS2. I have heard nothing but good things about Silent Hill 2... and nothing but bad things about the HD remaster. I have been meaning to play this game for years but since I am unable to play the PS2 version, I decided to give the PS3 collection a go. 

 

I am not going to go into the story to avoid spoilers but I enjoyed it a lot.  Well worth a playthrough. I found exploring the various areas really enjoyable. It was a lot of fun exploring and slowly making your way through a building bit by bit. Some puzzles were slightly out there but most were fine. I don't know if this is unique to the HD collection, but whenever you start the game up it just shows new game and options. It takes around five seconds for load game and continue to pop up. It scared the crap out of me the second time I booted it up as I thought my save got deleted or something.

 

The combat is probably the biggest weakpoint of the game. Neither firearms or melee weapons are that fun to use. Actually fighting the enemies takes away from the horror feeling the game has going on. I often found myself more tense when radio static went off, alerting you to an enemy being close by but not yet in sight. Once they were in view, that tension went away and it was just another encounter. It was slightly similar for bosses. They lost the previous buildup once you were actually fighting them. While the boss encounters were not great from a gameplay standpoint, I did really enjoy them storywise.

 

I really enjoyed the game and can tell it was something special when it first released on PS2. Glad I somehow avoided spoilers of a twenty year old game. I kind of regret not getting it back then. I completed the game but it has multiple endings so I have plenty left to do. I might give it a break and do a playthrough every now and again to avoid burn out. I still have to play 3 as well.

 

[AuroraHistoire]

A New Void Has Opened in my Life - void tRLM();// Void Terrarium

 

Void Terrarium is an amazing roguelite dungeon crawler with a very emotional story. The soundtrack is also extremely good. 

 

The story is about a robot, a girl and an AI. The robot has a name but it only comes up a few times. The girl's name is Toriko. The AI has a name too but I always called her Ms. Genocidal AI. Before the game starts, a deadly fungus wipes out most of mankind. The ones that didn't die a horrible fungus death, escaped underground with the help of a bunch of autonomous machine they made. Things were kind of okay until the AI incharge of the remaining humans got a bit upset at the humans for wanting more food and complaining. She ended up killing the remaining humans in a fit of rage. The game starts with an old junky robot rebooting after what one can assume is a very long period of inactivity. After walking right for a minute, the robot comes across a girl barely clinging to life. A quick walk down a hill reveals what is left of Ms. Genocidal AI in a scrap pile. The rest of the story is Robot and Ms. Genocidal AI taking care of Toriko and making sure she doesn't die.

 

The gameplay loop of Void Terrarium is go to dungeon in hopes of getting resources, coming back after a success or failure and upgrading yourself for the next run. The dungeon crawling works well and is fun. It is simple going between procedurally generated hallways and rooms, killing quirky enemies, collecting loot, and moving to the next floor. Killing enemies gives you exp and when you get enough you level up; a level up gives you 5 more HP (some other stat upgrades too I think) and you can pick 1 of 2 ability cards (or none if you want). Abilities are passive or active. You can have up to 4 active abilities and they are mostly attacks. Passives are a lot more common and you can have has many as you want. They range from simple stat increases to stuff that can change your whole playstyle. You need to manage your energy in dungeons too. Energy goes down overtime while you play and active abilities have an energy cost too. When you are out of energy your HP will drain every time you do anything until you die. Energy can restored with certain items that are common. Speaking of items, there are a variety of items with various effects that can be used on yourself or thrown at enemies. You can also find weapons and armor to equip; they usually increase your damage/defense by a % and will counter a specific type of enemy. There is a third equipable called mods. Mods have a powerful buff but usually come with a bad debuff or drain your energy at a faster rate. You also need to collect food for Toriko on your adventures. Everything can have 3 levels of contamination; none/little, medium and high. Items with none are best most of the time, medium items are always worse, while high contamination items can be best or terrible depending on the item.

 

When you die or finish the dungeon, you lose all the abilities you earned, go back to level 1 and all your items (aside from food, blueprints and special crafting materials) are broken down into 4 kinds of materials; organic, inorganic, electric and contamination. Materials can be used to craft decorations for Toriko's room and upgrades Robot. Crafting a decoration for the first time will give Robot a permanent stat increase. The upgrades are mostly Robot's inventory capacity and more food storage. You can also build items that influence the draw rates of certain abilities (basically influence the RNG), let you start with specific active abilities, let you draw more abilities on level up and even remove skills you don't like from the rotation. I didn't play around with the RNG manipulation mechanics that much and mostly focused on inventory and stat upgrades.

 

Another part of the game is taking care of Toriko. It is easy for the most part. You just need to give her food, clean her room, keep her contamination level down and play with her sometimes. Food is somewhat rare but you only need two food items to bring Toriko from starving to full. Cleaning can be done at base for free or while in a dungeon for a lot of energy. I am not really sure how play works. Contamination comes from giving Toriko contaminated food but will go down if you give her uncontaminated food. I had to come back from some really good runs because Toriko got hungry but it is a lot better than having Toriko get sick. Toriko getting sick can happen from failing to take proper care of her. You will have to go out to collect resources special resources to treat the sickness. The game puts a lot of work into the sicknesses and won't go easy on Toriko on how graphic they can be. After I got six unique ones for a trophy, I was too traumatized to ever let Toriko get sick again. The game also alludes in a tutorial that Toriko can die; I am not brave enough to confirm this.

 

I'll comment on the trophy list this time since I did finish it. It is mostly finishing the game and doing a few other things. The RNG doesn't make the list annoying since there is very little RNG in the trophies and the RNG that is in there is very kind. Feeding Toriko every food type is probably the worst one but it isn't too bad with the low amount of food types and a dungeon spawning maybe only have 3 different foods (4 in one case). 

 

Void Terrarium is the best game I have played in this event so far and going to be hard to top. It is definitely up there as one of my favorite games in general. The story is very good and one of the most emotional I have ever played. I was brought to a sobbing mess multiple times. It is actually incredible the story is so good with only 1 character who talks. Toriko can't talk and Robot's main form of communication is headpats. The gameplay is flawless. I picked this game up and didn't put it down for 5+ hours on multiple occasions. The visuals are very pretty and the music is amazing all the time.  

[Arctic Cress]

Game #2 - London Detective Mysteria

Time played: 4-5 hours

Trophies: 2/16 (3% - E)

 

London Detective Mysteria is an otome game localized by XSEED Games, which is a rarity for them - you don't see many straight visual novel titles from them (mostly hybrids) and certainly not ones for an even smaller niche audience like this one. I did pick it up when it went up on Limited Run Games for the physical copy, and the game's been... decent so far. Nothing too surprising either way, I think.

 

London Detective Mysteria's main character is Emily Whiteley, a young noble in London. The day she was to debut into high society, she eavesdropped on a meeting between the Queen and a number of young detectives, and after assisting the detectives with their work, she received a letter of recommendation to Harrington Academy, an academy for young detectives. At the academy are the possible love interests for Emily, including the son of Sherlock Holmes, the son of John Watson, the son of Arsene Lupin, Kenichirou Akechi (a homage to Edogawa Ranpo's mystery series) and... Jack the Ripper. No, seriously. I really need to go through that route and see how they manage to explain that being added in here.

 

Like any visual novel, the game is mostly reading with some choices that come up every so often. Annoyingly though, choices are timed in this game so it is impossible to save before them which is something I usually do in many visual novels. As some choices that should be made rely on detective work that Emily does it makes some bit of sense to have a few of the choices timed, but not all of them. Many choices that aren't detective-related usually end up raising affection with one of the love interests above provided the right answer is chosen. The button on the Vita pulls up the relationship chart on how you're doing with all of the characters, and my five hours have ended up having Watson Jr. leagues ahead of anyone else. Not even with a guide - I've been playing completely blind the entire way.

 

The game does seem to have chapters for each of the characters to focus on - I still haven't gotten to Akechi's chapter, but the other characters have all had their time in the spotlight so far. My main complaint with a lot of otome titles is the constant problem of the protagonist being a doormat and doing nothing of note throughout the entire game. This problem happens in titles such as Hakuoki, which I read last year. From what I've read so far, however, Emily does not seem to be like that with how she's acted through the first few chapters, which is a good sign for the rest of the game. One last note though - the game is fully voice acted in Japanese... but it seems awkward that it is considering they are in London the entire time! It kind of breaks the immersion and I have skipped a whole bunch of the voice acting by just reading instead due to this.

 

I was not especially wowed by this game so it will probably head to the side for a bit while I play some of the other cartridges on my Vita. I definitely will get back to it eventually, though!

 

Starting completion: 74.01%

Current completion: 73.52%

Difference: -0.49%

Dragon Sinker: 3/32 (4% - E)

 

It's been two weeks since my last writeup in this topic... work has been killing me the past few weeks (though that might end for a bit soon). I'm probably going to have to drop a few games that I meant to play but I'm not sure which ones at this point; I'll decide on that later. I've played a RPG and a visual novel so far, so let's try something different. Next game will be Earth Defense Force 2.

[Edunstar84]

Game #6 Final Impressions

 

Playtime: 2 hours, I guess.

Trophies: 4/43

 

I manually wrote some notes about the game that I have somehow misplaced...Hmm, what to do now? I've already forgotten what's happened.

 

I played 2 more easy missions where I had to save citizens. The citizens in this game are the smart ones keeping society from ruin by relegating resources. The gameplay is action packed. I thought I would be alone in saving citizens, but you actually battle big machinas with a group of other jailers. It made the first 2 missions not so bad, but I don't think it will last when I get more into the game. I was really into playing this game, but now I'm not so sure because I can't remember anything about it. I might be tired. I'm going to sleep now.

 

I thought this event would help me get out of this gaming funk that I have been on, but then I got really sick, and it kind of threw me. I hope the next games can help me break out of it.

[Gretchen27]

Game #3 Final Review Please excuse any funky formatting, I've only got my phone at hand. 

Muv-Luv  

I warned ya I wouldn't have much to add come final review time. The game is still a riot if you're wondering. 

Play time: ~1hr

Trophies: 1/16 (1% complete)

Percent Change: -0.98%

Enjoyment: 9/10* The highest I can give a game. I don't award 10 out of 10 unless I feel the same way after I've 100% completed it.

 

Here's my problem with this game (aka my excuse for not meeting the time requirement): I picked this game to be played this week because I knew I would be busy & thought I could snag 15 minutes here & there. Now, I want to devote bigger blocks of time. Reading snippets ruins the pacing, but damn it, I'm getting in 1hr uninterrupted tonight. It's the weekend, time for gaming.

 

Screenshots:

Spoiler

 

 

 

 

Preview: Final Fantasy XIII

The only game on my KYC list where I've played something in the series before. That's not saying all that much when FF games switch it up just enough to be separate from one another, yet still contained within the same universe (I think, at least the monsters are the same - I hate those floating bomb things).

 

I can tell you I don't know anything about this one, other than the main character is called Lightning. That I ingeniously know because I've heard of the sequel,  Lightning Returns. I will say I'm digging the simple white cover art on the box, with the bluish conglomerate FF logo you can't make out until putting in at least 50 hrs of game time. Bonus: there's a reversible cover & color manual (I miss the crisp  smell of a freshly painted one).

 

Oh, but I'm digressing from the topic. I've played 4 FF games. My first, was I believe FF III on the Nintendo DS. Then I did X & X - 2 HD on the Vita, Type - 0 HD on PS4. No, I have never played the critically-acclaimed VII. Since we got the remake on PS+ this month, I almost considered swapping, but I use this event as a motivator to play games that have been collecting dust on the shelf for too long.

 

Anywho, I look forward to starting this one tomorrow or Sunday at the latest. It'll probably take me years to finish it though.

[AJ_Radio]

On 3/15/2021 at 7:50 PM, DamagingRob said:

Game #3- Unravel 2 Review

 

So, I really liked this game. It kind of got me out of the gaming funk I was in, and I didn't want to stop playing. It also wasn't quite what I expected. There is no A.I. companion. You basically control both yourself, pressing to switch between the two. For speedrunning, this is a nightmare and will probably be why I don't finish it. Which is a shame, 'cause I really like it.. But what can you do? Don't know why this one went so tryhard with its list, and didn't just stick to no death runs. Trophies focused on co-op with no online multiplayer is kinda gross. :/ Maybe I'll try them more at a later date, but I decided to take a break last night after even a no death run wasn't fast enough for the one I was trying to do. But MLB 18 was fun, so there's that.

 

I just remember hearing that doing these speedrun trophies is very frustrating. Main reason why I haven't bothered picking this game up, despite having the same charm and atmosphere the first Unravel had.

 

Oh well.

[voodoo_eyes]

Game #4 - Cuberdimension Neptunia 4 Goddess Online - Final Impressions

 

Time played: 11-12h

Trophies earned: 24/50

 

 

Well, this sure is a Neptunia game. Got most of the popular character, the odd lewdness and the recurring 4th wall tropes.

 

Visually this game is ok. The areas are still fairly bland and generic, like pretty much every other title in this franchise. Music and sound in general is also alright. What also returned is the partially voiced segments, which is pretty much a 50/50 split between voiced and non-voiced cutscenes. Still don't like the middleground, and never will. Either ful voice -acting or none at all.

 

Similar to a lot of the other spin-offs, this game is not a turn-based RPG. This is more an action-RPG, similar to Megatagmension or Action Unleashed, alebit slightly more depth with the several skills each character can learn.

Also this one is party-based. 4 members total and can be played online in co-op. I've been playing solo with the party AI, if you cn call it that. My god the AI in this game is terrible. Characters getting stuck constantly in the envronment, with them trying to hit enemies on a higher plateau and same thing the other way around. I guess that's why the devs made your party teleport to you if you're far enough from them. Couldn't be bothered programming proper pathing.

The game is set-up in a way, where you pick up quests in town, unlock new areas and go to said areas to complete the quests. Each area has a boss at the end, which unfortunately keeps being the same one in different colours in other areas. That was kind of quite disappointing to be honest. At least getting through the dungeons if you die is pretty quick, as you can just run past all the mobs.

 

YOu can also buy armor, items and weapons in the shop, as well as upgrade your gear. New equipment is fairly ratre though, and I found mysef having the same armor and weapon for over 6 hours. That's not what I'd consider a good ratio.

 

I've just hit guild rank 5, which is about halfway. My main party is around level 50 and I've now started leveling the second group.

 

Even though I'm kind of bashing this game quite a bit, I fairly enjoyed my time with ti so far. I initially really enjoyed it, until it became noticeable that the game is just going through the motions without much depth. Furhtermore the game bugged out during a oss fight, to the point where I couldn't move with the cahracter I was controlling. So I was stuck for a good minute with the boss almost dead. Of course what happened was the friendly AI (with two healers mind you) didn't heal when getting to low health, and me not being able to move out of range, the boss ended up swiping everyone out of existence.

 

It's a decent game, and seemingly easier than the main series. At least so far I didn't feel like I had to grind. Still a .

[DamagingRob]

Game #4- Dark Rose Valkyrie- Review

 

Take command of your harem, and fight a bunch of monsters! I guess? The main character is Asashi, a young Captain newly assigned to the rest of the party you'll be fighting with. Surprisingly, this includes two other guys, so it's not an all female cast besides him. Though they're fairly forgettable, and I've left them in the reserves. Along with the weird sisters, one who keeps trying to convince you she's the other one's brother, and the other being the shy anime girl who also hates men. Rounding out the rest is a girl next door type, who also gets embarrassed if you insinuate you like her, usually ending with you getting punched/slapped. A rich girl who is a bit too friendly, causing dilemmas of whether to enter her room when she says to come in while she's changing, in the shower, etc. And a girl who is kind of obsessed with guns. Then there's Asashi, who is kind of plain. I dunno..

 

Anyways, yes, you fight Chimera, which are humans who have transformed into monsters. In between missions, you can talk to your party members at the base. Which is as simple as selecting their room from a list of choices, and seeing a visual novel scene. Which is how all of the story is presented, and they did this weird 2D-but-slightly-3D thing that looks weird. And usually, you have a dialogue choice to make, which may strengthen your relationships/affect the ending. But then some say the ending is completely random, so... 

 

The base is also where you pick up quests, trade in medals for items, repair your clothing, and heal up. As mentioned by Gretchen, there are a number of free DLC in the Store, which gives you a lot of stuff. Including like, 500,000 medals. Which can easily be blown on expensive items, but I am trying not to waste them. Running out and not being able to repair your clothes, probably wouldn't be good. 

 

When you leave the base, there's an overworld with dungeon entrances here and there, and Chimera roaming about. One thing that I really find annoying, is while running around exploring, the character's have this... breathing sound effect. I switched to the girl with the least obnoxious sound, after not liking the MC's. But it's still there, and I don't know why they had every VA do this silly thing. 

 

Battle system works well enough, though I don't really know what I'm doing. Lol. Playing on Easy, or I'd probably be dying. I typically just keep attacking, and healing with an ability when needed. You have to set up your choice of combos in the menu, and can have 3 different ones. There's often no getting away if an enemy spots you on the field, either. They move much quicker than you. Attacking them on the field can give you an advantage, but if they run into you from behind or while you're in the process of attacking, it'll be an ambush. 

 

I don't have much more to say. It does seem like people drop this early, though. In about 3 hours of playtime, I had every trophy over 30% rarity. If I get that far, 10,000 kills is gonna be some grind for the finish. :/ This one is probably a . 

 

Time played: 6 hours.

Trophy progress: 14/53 for 20% and a C rank. 

Completion percentage: 92.88% (-0.48%)

 

Game #5- Killzone Shadow Fall- Preview 

 

I don't know when I'll actually start boosting this. Lol. But I guess it worked out, so I didn't have to change my order of games. Killzone felt like a series that got progressively better, with 3 being my favorite. But I don't know.. Just didn't have a huge interest in playing this one, but eventually picked it up cheap. Have also had Mercenary in the backlog since 2013. :/ Time to shoot some more. 

[Gretchen27]

1 hour ago, DamagingRob said:

One thing that I really find annoying, is while running around exploring, the character's have this... breathing sound effect. I switched to the girl with the least obnoxious sound, after not liking the MC's. But it's still there, and I don't know why they had every VA do this silly thing. 

 I forgot to mention that weird gasping thing. There's a way to stop that: Go into the options/config menu, there's one that opens up a toggle to turn off voice overs for individual characters. But that also applies to cutscenes, so you'll either have to remember to switch it back on, or pick one of the two boys as the leader since their roles are pretty small. 

Edited March 21, 2021 by Gretchen27
Typo

[MarkusT1992]

I'm one review behind so I'll post both together in this post.

 

Game #3: Crysis Remastered

 

 

A remaster of the 2007 released game Crysis. Back then it already had amazing graphics that were quite demanding on your computer's resources.

Since I haven't played the original I can't really compare the graphics to the remaster but I can say that it looks very good.

 

The game starts with you and your team being in a plane travelling to the island your mission is on. You are part of a 5 head team of special US forces and your goal is to rescue a team of archaeologists held hostag by the north koreans. Over the island you jump of the plane and land on a beach that was not the planned landing point. Since everyone landed somewhere else you make your way to your meeting point. Soon you find one of your teammembers and shortly after another one dead. It seems that he was killed by some kind of weird creature. Since you have a special nano suite whenever someone dies he has to be desintegrated so the north koreans won't get their hands on that suite.

Later on you find the ship of the archaeologists in the middle of the forest. A weird place for a ship. Also some more traces of that creature from earlier.

In the end you learn about the location of one of the archaeologists and make your way to the school ro rescue her. That's the story so far.

 

The game is a third person shooter with stealth elements that are quite important. You have different weapons to choose from like guns, machine guns or snipers that can be adjusted with a silencer or a visor for example. You have a main objective and from time to time get a side objective you can do. The game is level based but the levels are open so you can attempt your mission how you want.

The combat is a typical shooter but in my opinion you take a lot of damage so a full front assault leads to a quick death. That's were your nano suite comes in play. One of the most important feature is the abillity to turn invisible. Being silent is the better option in my opinion in this game that's why I mostly walk around invisible. While invisible your energy depletes depending on how you move. Walking normall depletes it the fastest, crouching a bit slower and crawling the slowest. Shooting completly depletes your energy so you get visible again. After a short time the energy refills as well as your health should you loose some. In case of being spotted you can reinforce your defense which also need energy but is important to get in cover to survive.

 

You can drive with some vehicles in the game, some with turrets. Shooting trees and some other things will destroy them so the world is kind of destructable.

At first I didn't really enjoy the game because of the easy deaths but after using the stealth more I started to enjoy the game more. It wasn't quite what I expected the game to be though.

 

Time played: Around 3,5 hours

Trophies: 5/41

Rating:

 

 

Game #4: Slay the Spire

 

 

Slay the Spire is a deckbuilding rogue-like game and one of the best rogue-likes I played. For me only The Binding of Isaac is better.

You can play with four different characters from which only one is available at the beginning. After finishin a run (win or loose) you unlock the next one but you need to win a run to unlock the last character. So far I unlocked the original three (the fourth is a new one added by an update). I'm currently in my third run in total with the third character.

Each character uses a unique set of cards that have a different focus on playstyle. The first character called Ironclad uses red cards focused on dealing a lot of damage with each card.

The second one called The Silent uses green cards focused on generating energy to use a lot of card each turn with lower damage than then Ironclad's card.

The third one, The Defect, uses blue cards focused on generating orbs.

 

Each run starts in act 1. You can choose your way on a kind of map. You can see the path you can take and what will await you with symbols.

Once in a battle you use your cards to defeat your enemies. You always see what the enemy will do in their turn so you can plan ahead. Your enemy wants to attack? Play block cards so you can block all the damage. None of the enemies wants to attack next turn? Use all your energy to attack without worrying about geting damaged. Always depending on the cards you have on hand. Each turn you draw five cards. Each card uses between 0-3 energy to use and you start with three each turn. Some cards use x energy which uses all your remaining energy.

Besids attacks and blocks you can play power cards to give you an effect for the rest of the fight like getting 2 block at the start of each turn or letting you keep one card at the end of your turn.

At the end of your turn all your remaining hand cards are put on the used card pile which will be reshuffeled once your redraw pile is empty. Some get exhausted which means they are out for this fight and won't be reshuffeled.

After the fight you get some money and a new card for you deck. You can choose one of three or just skipp if you don't want the cards. Which card you can get is random. Then you have potions you can use during combat and relics that give a passive effect. Relic are very varied like giving one more energy but removing the ability to heal in exchange or doubling the damage of every 10th attack you play.

Besides the fights you have event rooms, shops or tresure rooms. At the end of each act you fight against a boss. After winning you start in the next act fully healed.

 

In my second run with The Silent I reached the boss of the third act where I finally died. Due to a relic I had my max health halved which could be the reason why I lost in the end. According to the wiki there are four acts so I nearly won my second run of the game.

 

Time played: Around 5 hours

Trophies: 5/46

Rating:

 

[voodoo_eyes]

Game #5 - Monster Boy and the Cursed Kingdom - Preview

 

Developer:: Game Atelier

Publisher: FDG Entertainment

Genre: Platformer

Price: 39,99€

 

 

It's one of those games I literally know nothing about. Never heard fo the dev, nor the publisher. It does have very good review though, so here's to hoping, it'll live up to that.

Usually platformers are not my thing, but maybe this one will be a pleasant surprise.

[AuroraHistoire]

Sword Nun Adventures - Minoria

 

From the creators of Momodora, Minoria is a metroidvania game where you play as a nun with a sword. The game itself is flawless (aside from a few tiny nitpicks) while doing nothing to make it that great. 

 

The story is about a group of witches trying to destroy the Sacred Office and religion in general. They were doing a very good job until the game starts and Sister Semilla starts killing almost everything that moves. Sister Anna Fran, Semilla's assistant, is also there but all she really does is talk. The story is more of a way to keep the gameplay going and is not very interesting. The few interesting bits of story that do crop up and never explored that much, if at all. 

 

The gameplay is fast paced and rewards aggressive play. Semilla's sword combo is lightning fast and powerful enough to kill basic enemies in a single combo. There are multiple weapons to collect that mostly change up Semilla's combo. Semilla's defensive options are a dodge roll and parry. The parry is activated by hitting the button when a enemy attack lands and Semilla will do a powerful counter attack that will hit everyone on screen (expect during boss fights). The dodge roll is a way to avoid damage with iframes and to move around the map quickly. You also have incense (spells) for healing and attacks. Each Incense has a set number of charges that get reset to full when you save at a save point. There are also passive incenses that have their own special effects. You can have up to 3 active incenses and 2 passive equipped but you can change your incenses at any time (even mid combat). 

 

The combat balance in Minoria is interesting. Semilla is quite strong but will die in 2-3 hits from pretty much everything. Your healing incense is your only way to heal between save points but I rarely ran out since save points are frequent. Boss fights are over really quickly since they don't have too much health. You parry doesn't counter attack during boss fights but will still negate the damage. Some attacks don't end well if you try to parry them so the roll useful in boss fights. The boss fights are about learning the attacks and how to not get hit but you usually have enough healing to brute force them to a point. You are rewarded for beating a boss flawlessly (without getting hit and taking no damage) with a powerful incense or a new weapon. You need to beat one boss flawlessly for a trophy but it can be done relatively painlessly on new game plus. Also, there is an experience system with levels but it only improves Semilla's stats. I never went out of my way to level up and didn't notice any substantial change in difficulty. 

 

The metroidvania elements of the game exist but are not very rewarding. Most backtracking involves having a certain key to open a door and nothing else. You learn a few new abilities during the game but they are mostly for movement. There is a bit of optional backtracking but all you get are silver coins, archives and the rare incense. Silver coins let you buy new incense from shops and you need to collect 20/40 for a trophy. You need to collect all the archives for another trophy. Incense while nice, most of them I never ended up using. I guess to wrap up trophies while I am kind of on the subject, the list is mostly completing the game twice and defeating an optional boss. A second playthrough isn't that bad since Minoria is a short-ish game (my first playthrough took 7 hours) and the new game plus is nice to you. 

 

Minoria is a very good game while not being very memorable at the same time. The story fell kind of flat while the gameplay is very good. It tries to make itself look difficult while not being very difficult once you know how to beat that enemy type. Minoria is a pretty game to look at. For better or worse, I never noticed the music. 

[Edunstar84]

Welp, guys, I must regretfully bow out of this event. I thought I could get my gaming mojo back with this event, but I unfortunately got sick and couldn't keep up after that. But I wish everyone good luck!

[Psy-Tychist]

58 minutes ago, Edunstar84 said:

Welp, guys, I must regretfully bow out of this event. I thought I could get my gaming mojo back with this event, but I unfortunately got sick and couldn't keep up after that. But I wish everyone good luck!

 

Well, you've gotten to 6/10 games on your list so that isn't a bad thing. Hopefully when you feel up to it, you can try out the rest of the games. A Kings Tale is quite fun and The Nonary Games is an interesting puzzle and suspense VN with good characters.

 

Feel better soon

[Edward_FOX_86]

Game #4

 

Lego Lord of the Rings - Vita

Final Review

 

I thought I play a Lego game on the Vita to see just how far the downgrade goes comparing to the ps3 or ps4 versions of the game. I have to say I'm very happy with the result.

It feels like a complete game nonetheless, I love the Lord of the Rings saga so I had to give this one a Go.

The graphics are good and its a game that you could still play to this date and have fun with. It has voice acting from the original actors and It follows the story as it should.

 

Besides this I believe its a good Lego game but in my opinion the gameplay is really repetitive , I know its supposed to be like this cause all Lego games are like this , but again its good for a Lego game but overall and comparing to other games I'm not a huge fan of Lego mechanics. 

 

Having said that its still fun and enjoyable to play. 

 

I would rate this one a 7 out of 10.

 

Cheers and Happy hunting!!!!

 

[Fenrirfeather]

  

 

Gravity Rush (on VITA) 
My playtime: 03:02:52 (according to my auto-savedata)
Trophies earned: 14/64 

 

A short, belated review incoming here. Everyday life has been making me woozy and caused me to miss the deadline for this review, but if there ever was a game on my KYC list that would not benefit in particular for a full review, it is this one: Gravity Rush. The game I’d played a demo of when the VITA was yet a fresh, young babe, full of possibilities. All those years ago, the demo never succeeded to rouse my interest, as I found it bland and boring for reasons I do not remember anymore. As a consequence, I’d slept on this game until this day and until this KYC, for which I’d wanted a somewhat long non-traditional turned based RPG game on VITA that also had been tucked away in my backlog for far too long. Gravity Rush seemed to fit these two criteria nicely. 

 

And I gotta say, I’m glad to have given this game a proper chance. This time, I was engaged from the very first scenes and when I was following the middle-aged man with Kat through a tunnel filled with silhouettes of people who made confusing comments about a crow that’s like the glitter cat by my side, I was already wondering where this journey through the strange world of Gravity Rush would take me. 

 

By merely mentioning that I had started playing Gravity Rush, I was immediately hit with a wave of nostalgia by gamers who’d played the game (on VITA or the remaster) at some before, as well as multiple handy tips of what to expect and what to keep note of. Playing a popular game like this one relatively many years after release meant that the resonance was great. Else I wouldn’t have known to start my adventure with a search for crystals to help upgrade several of my abilities early by combing the city from head to toe (and even upside down). 

 

The prospect of having to complete every challenge in the game with a gold medal eventually appears to me as a tall order from where I am in the very beginning of the game, as I’ve no luck scoring high enough for the bronze reward alone in the race and sliding challenges yet. My first and only attempt at sliding was a wonderful crash galore into every available wall left and right head-on. I do prefer the motion controls to the right stick for controlling the camera (and thus my aim when I fling Kat across the map), so I’ve figured that the next time I give those two types of challenges another try, I will get up and dance across the room in hopes that it’ll make me more comfortable with and less conscious about the control scheme. 

 

This is a KYC game that I’ve already decided not to bury in my backlog after the event as, despite this past week making me busy-whoozy and not in the mood for action gameplay in the evenings, I had a fantastic time when I played. The story (so far) is a little barebone but the huge, explorable city and the unique gameplay of denying normal gravity more than makes up for it. As does the presence of Kat’s black glitter cat companion, of course!

 

 

Now, the next stop for me, right after reading up on all your reviews since last week on some games that I happen to have played myself (and loved) and on others that I’m curious to get to know about, is going to be the JRPG Akiba’s Beat (played on PS4)! 
 

[Lodbizarro]

Game #3 Review: Ratchet and Clank Future: A Crack in time

 

Hey everyone I apologize for the delay I got injured IRL in that slowed me down a little but I'm going to still continue. So I decided to do a Ratchet & Clank game for my 3rd choice now for those who might have viewed my profile pic on here or my psn account this will be no surprise that I love these characters and this series. But I have something to admit I only played the original trilogy on PS2, I never played none of the future games from the PS3 I'm not entirely sure why I never even owned them. But thanks to the announcement of Rift Apart for PS5 , and this event I decided to finally play through the entire series(Main games) before the June release of Rift Apart. Now full disclosure I ended my playthrough of ACIT short because I made a mistake since I never played through the future series and I'm using PSnow to play them I thought ACIT was the first game of the future series I played about 7 hours into the game when I realized it's actually the 3rd. On top of that while Psnow has the rest of the future series it's actually missing Tools of destruction which is the first game in that arc. So since I'm planning on playing through the entire series I decided to stop playing ACIT for story purposes.  In the 7 hours I played I was having a great time the platforming is still done very well, the weapons are still crazy, I loved the VA, Humor and Dialogue all the things that made me fall in love with this series when I was a kid is still there I'm honestly mad that I waited this long to get back into the series. My only complaint in its minor is that aiming can be a little wonky It takes awhile to lock on to the target I was intending to hit. Still this was a blast and I can't wait to play through the other games and has me even more excited for Rift Apart which if I'm not mistaken should be out before the next KYC. ?

 

Rating 8/10

Hours played 7

Trophies 9/37

Completion 16%

 

Game #4 Preview: Tales from the Borderlands

This will be a first for me but I like Telltale and Borderlands so I'm excited I wanted to play this for a long time but it was delisted for awhile but now its back and it's finally time.

Edited March 22, 2021 by Lodbizarro

[purgta]

Game #3 Valthirian Arc: Hero School Story

 

Valthirian Arc is a mixture between an action rpg and a simulation game. You develop heroes in a school setting and send them out on quests. I was not the biggest fan of this one. It was not a great game. To be fair, I would not call it bad, it is just leaning painfully on the wrong side of average. The game is incredibly basic. You can build different facilities and choose what classes your heroes develop into but it all feels a bit shallow.

 

There is not much to the combat and quests. The quests consist of things such as kill a certain amount of enemies or gather a certain amount of materials. Quests have a difficulty level ranging from one to five stars. It is not an actual great indicator with the hardest quest in the game being a three star quest. You have to  graduate a student who is at least level 10 every six months. This basically means you have to permanently sacrifice a character and get resource points in exchange. It is not hard to level up a new recruit to level 10 so you never have to worry about sacrificing a main party member.

 

The central story is not terrible but with the way the quests are given, it is told in a very poor way. The Wicker Princess arc felt like wasted potential. The story ending section actually surprised me and I thought it was actually kind of good. I don't know if this was because my expectations had been lowered so much beforehand. The in game character models don't look great although the portraits look nice enough. Characters feel kind of one note. The illustrations shown during the credits were great though and showed some real personality.

 

I would not really recommend it to people. The gameplay loop, while basic, is kind of satisfying. There are just much better games out there.

Edited March 23, 2021 by purgta

[Psy-Tychist]

Definitely not The Kingpin

 

Trophies Earned: 2/12

Percent Complete: 9%

Completion Percentage: 65.97% + 0.15%
Milkshakes Drunk: 9

 

Bunnylord is a Psychopath. Just throwing it out there. I know that a lot of games have an antagonist who basically has no regard for human life and it's meant to be funny there is nothing new there. I think what made me laugh at the game was the total absurdity and how deadpan the characters all seem to be while being caracaturish. The game itself is a 2D action goal based platformer whch involves killing a lot of people and collecting various unimportant trinkets for Bunnylord. His goal in the game is to become Mayor of whatever city we are in and he does want to do it by using the buzzwords on most electorates lips (reducing crime, helping local organisations and always something to do with children). His way of ensuring that he will become Mayor is to eliminate the gangs and get rid of all the evidence by promoting flashy ads and milkshakes. You play as one of the available 'helpers' who each have different weapons, abilities and speeds to promote different styles. The further into the game you get, the more people will come and offer their help in completing the daily tasks to help Bunnylord reach his goal.

 

Each level has a goal and 3 subgoals. You must complete the main goal before you can finish the level and hopefully you won't die on the way through. You have to complete 21 days and at the end of that, Bunnylord wil have reached his goal of becoming Mayor. The thing that makes the game a lot more difficult is completing all the subgoals as well as the main goal. The subgoals normally fall into the categories of completing the level in a timeframe, collecting some item or items or making sure that you take a minimal amount of damage or minimal amount of shots. Depending on how many of the subgoals you complete gives you a different title at the end of each level and ultimately at the end of the game. To make Bunnylord Mayor you have to complete the main goal and at least one of the subgoals in every level to make sure this happens. The hardest part of that is that you have to complete all the goals in the mission to make them count, you can't just pick and choose subgoals and replay to get the ones you missed.

I completed the first 7 days and reached the first boss (which Bunnylord violently killed) in very few attempts and did quite well completing the subgoals too. After that however, the next day took me 22 attempts just to actually finish and slowly ground to a halt in my progress on completing much more than the next day. The game is punishing after a little while and it all comes down to remembering  level layout, spawn points and the quickest route through the level. 

 

The game itself is quick enough to pick up and play, but with games like this, you need to have dedication and some element of skill to complete the game to the fullest. I have a kind of love/hate relationship with the game. It is quirky and cute enough in a violent kind of way but the threshold to actually complete the game is much higher than the introductory levels. I feel like I am banging my head against a wall, a bit like when I play a Souls game. I know that with enough practice and time you can get good at any game but there are certain games that will test your patience much more than others. This game falls on that list with me, a lot like Bloodborne. I want to enjoy it and feel like I am progressing but it is so slow that I almost feel it is better to play something else because the rewards aren't as great as the effort put in.

 

Trophywise, the game does have a lot of VR and UR trophies because completing the game itself is a challenge and is not for the faint hearted. It is nowhere in the league of Super Meat Boy or Splasher but it does require a lot of time to perfect the challenges and is not something I will be finishing anytime soon. Hopefully one day though.

 

Next Game: Detention

[PerryToxteth]

KYC 15

Game No. 5

 

 

 

Trophies Earned: 3/43 (4% E ranking)

Playing Time: 1 hour

 

Final Review: I knew this game slot was going to be a tight squeeze with being out of town, but I only found an hour of time to devote to this game, so I’m glad @Psy-Tychist was able to give everyone a more proper review.

  I will just say that this does not play like a typical Artifex Mundi title. Almost all their games follow the formula; a mystery invoking some mystical legend that requires solving with a haphazard sleuth, with the gameplay being simple puzzles.  My Brother Rabbit went slightly off course in a Dali painting-like setting that had a simpler story, but was really well done. 
  Irony Curtain is clearly different from these with a comic element to it right from the tutorial. The gameplay is also more classic point-and-click where there’s lots of story, investigating, and using the appropriate pick-up item in the proper spot.  Sometimes this works really well, such as the Telltales Back to the Future game. Other times, it is infuriating like Day of the Tentacle. In that game, there were task paths that followed a logical path such as - use the dog tail as a brush and paint cream cheese all over the bowling ball before putting it in the refrigerator. I’m hoping Irony Curtain doesn’t go down this inane path but I only cleared the tutorial and first scene. Therefore, I can only give it an: Incomplete

 

Next Up: A Tale of Paper

[Together_Comic]

 

This is me.  With that out of the way...

 

Game #3: Valfaris - Review

 

Trophies 4/35

Time Played ~1.5 Hours 

Completion Percentage: 90.58 --> 88.62 (-1.96%)

Impression 6.5/10

 

So with the caveat that I didn't get to play as much of this game as I would have liked, I'd say that this game is in the definitely in the "Sure, why not?" category.  The story is largely irrelevant, but from what I can tell from the first level, you are some edgy destroyer type returning to the titular Valfaris to raise some havoc.  A green Cortana woman is guiding you along and managing your equipment.  That's kind of all there is to it, but it isn't that bad.  Is it campy and trying to be edgy? Yes, but its kind of charming in a way.  ?

 

The Gameplay itself is actually the highlight.  The game plays similar to one of those side scrolling shoot-em-ups (a la Contra) combined with some metroidvania elements.  You have a melee attack and a gun attack.  The gun is good at hitting from range (obviously) and the melee attack compensates by being more powerful.  Along the way, you can find better weapons, like a more rapid firing gun, or a more powerful shotgun, but those consume energy which is the resource you use to block in the game.  Blocking is neat in this game.  You can block mostly whatever (the only thing I haven't been able to block so far is bombs dropped on me) but it uses a meter.  When your meter runs out the shield shatters and you get stunned a few frames and likely hit by whatever attack you were trying to block.  Killing enemies restores your meter so the game tries to do the doom thing by encouraging you to be aggressive rather than just sit behind a shield.  The combat is pretty seamless so far and I'm looking forward to playing around with different weapons in the game.

 

In other news, while the game isn't particularly hard per se, it is pretty easy to die, which leads to one of the more interesting checkpoint systems lately.  As you play you can collect these green crystals that basically act as checkpoint markers.  When ever you come across an altar, you can use these markers to make a checkpoint from yourself, or you can skip it and save the marker.  At the end of the level (at least level 1), there is a machine that you can trade these crystals for blood metals which are used to upgrade your equipment.   This leads to a pretty interesting risk vs reward of do I take the checkpoint, or do I skip it and risk going all the way back if I die.  The problem, in my opinion, is that again at least early on, the checkpoints are so close together that you can easily skip 2 or 3 before taking one and there not be all that much risk.  That's compounded by the fact that you can only trade 2 at the machine at the end of the level for blood metals so after you collect 4, which is the maximum you can hold at a given time,  you may as well use the remaining checkpoints, which kind of defeats the whole system.

 

On the whole, the game should be ok and I'll probably come back and finish it (who am I kidding, I was always going to finish all the games in this KYC at some point.  I don't know why I keep pretending that I may not ?).  

 

Game #4: Pyre - Preview

 

Given that we only have 7 days left in the month, and I have yet to get to Nioh and I want to save some time to actually play through more than just an hour of it since it's the game I most wanted to play during this KYC (though to be fair Trails of Cold Steel caught my attention more than I thought it would), I probably also won't be spending much time on Pyre, which is a shame because having played Hades on the switch, I'm excited to see what else supergiant has in their arsenal.  From what I understand the gameplay focuses on some kind of sports/battle arena type thing and the narrative is really character driven.  Definitely interested to see what it's all about as if it's half as good as Hades, I'm sure I'll enjoy it. 

 

~TC

Edited March 24, 2021 by Together_Comic

[ladynadiad]

 

 

Game #4 Valiant Hearts: The Great War

Trophies earned: 17/20 (80%)

 

Current completion: 97.39% (-0.74%)

Current unearned trophies: 252 (+74)

Current games played: 265 (+4)

Current games completed: 253 (+1)

Current unstarted games in backlog: 51 games

 

So first off, it should be said this game lacks a plat, so that's why it hasn't really affected my completion much and in fact my completion is up since my last review because I got a few more trophies in Trials of Mana before starting this and got enough in this game to be a bit above where I was when I wrote my Trials of Mana review.  So going into this one, I'd heard pretty much it was a point and click adventure sort of game and was overall pretty short and heard plenty of good things about it, yet I kept putting off playing this one for some weird reason.  But in my poll every time there wasn't a tie this one was in third place so you guys got me to finally play it.

 

I would say though, that this doesn't really fall into the realm of a typical point and click adventure game.  It's kind of a hybrid between that and a more action oriented game, especially as you get further in.  The game itself follows the stories of 4 people, Emile, Freddie, Karl and Anna.  It takes place in Europe during World War I.  Emile and Karl were drafted into service, Freddie was a volunteer and Anna volunteered her services as a doctor.  There's also a dog that joins them and is a part of every group at one point.  The game itself has 4 chapters and each chapter has 6-7 missions in it.  The characters you are following the story of change around as you progress.  One thing to also keep in mind with this game is that the only spoken dialog is the narration at the beginning of each mission that explains the current situation for the characters.  For the missions itself, it uses pictures and other visual cues to communicate what is going on and the only sound is the sounds of war.  The art style is also similar to a comic book.

 

I admit, I found the lack of dialog a bit confusing at times because there were times when the objective wasn't fully clear.  I was using a guide, but at times the guide didn't explain stuff well so between that and the game trying to communicate with pictures, I had some moments where I had to go look up videos to figure out what the hell I should be doing.  I definitely am not a fan of games that try to keep dialog to a minimum because I'm terrible at figuring out directions from pictures.  I also found the art style itself made it hard to truly take things seriously.

 

The game also has a large amount of collectables to get as you progress.  The collectables themselves aren't bad because with each one you get, the game explains what those items were used for.  Along with each mission giving you some historical facts, it's clear a part of this was meant to educate players about WWI and what life was like for a typical soldier.  The player also goes through various tasks from having to retrieve items, to throwing grenades to get rid of barriers to having to move without getting killed by gunfire.  There's even a few missions where you drive a taxi and have to dodge various obstacles (and a trophy for doing one of these missions without being hit).  Also like mentioned above you have a dog, so at times you'd have to command the dog to go retrieve items or do something in an area you can't reach because only the dog will fit there, or because there are deadly obstacles like lethal gas and only the dog is small enough to get past that.

 

As the game progresses, it gets much more difficult to accomplish these tasks and not die, and some of the trophies you have to get in the last two chapters are an incredible pain in the butt.  The main reason why I haven't finished the game yet is because I got too frustrated at one of these trophies where you have to save a particular character without making any mistakes.  It's actually a hard QTE because if you screw up, you have to start again from the beginning.  On top of that the whole time the character's child is crying and I hate screaming children.  I'm probably going to have to mute the game to get that trophy because the crying child gets on my nerves so much.  To me this just felt like a cheap ploy to tug at emotions.

 

Overall, I think the game is decent enough, but I do think it's highly overrated.  I was told that it's supposed to be pretty emotional, but I honestly am not finding it as such.  Not too surprised though, I get emotional over sad scenes because of an attachment to the character.  Instead this game relies on more generalized imagery and symbolism of the horrors of war and that just doesn't do anything to engage me.  To me it's hard to feel anything when I'm not attached to the characters.  Games like this that try to tug at heartstrings without dialog tend to fall flat for me because I just miss most of what they are trying to portray and I fail to get any attachment that gets me emotionally invested enough to care.  At this point I just want to finish up the last three trophies and be done with this one.  If anyone here plays on PC and is familiar with games like To the Moon and A Bird Story, this game is similar to those in regards to the emotional engagement but with more interesting and complex gameplay. I can't really think of anything on PSN to compare it to though except maybe Journey.  For people who like the artsy sort of games that don't rely on spoken dialog, this might be up your alley, it's just definitely not my sort of game.

 

So last game is Shiness: The Lightning Kingdom.  Maybe I'll luck out and actually enjoy it.  So far this KYC has been a bunch of games that have ranged from terrible to meh and it's pretty bad that so far the game I like best is a Square/Enix game that also isn't really anything special.

 

Edit: After some hundred or so tries at that damn QTE later, finally got the last trophy for this one.

Edited March 25, 2021 by ladynadiad